Man Hunt (16 page)

The women roared their cheers and Emma, dutifully following years of tradition, retrieved the bag of food and began to untie it. Whenever they played "Short String" with a pair of men, one would eventually best the other and be given the food as payment for such excellent entertainment.

When Emma tossed the bag over the edge a moment later, the victor caught it deftly with one hand and quickly made his way out of the alley. Behind him, the man who had caused Lucy to receive Gertrude's berating lay unconscious.

Lucy's smile faded into a smirk as the others watched the victor leave. Another moment later it was gone entirely.

"What's that look for?" Sherry asked when she saw it.

"Oh, nothing," Lucy said. "I guess there
are
some things I'll miss from this place."

"
You'll
be missed," Emma said.

And coming from the usually wild Emma, Lucy's heart broke just a little. She smiled her thanks in reply.

"Any regrets?" Sherry asked. And at this Lucy actually balked. It wasn't that she didn't have regrets. It was that she hadn't realized how short her time really was until just then. The question framed her time there, and her time there was all but over.

A recurring thought came to her, one that she'd been toying around with for months now. She had kept a diary as a little girl and at the time had thought she would grow up to be a great novelist. But little Lucy had fallen heartbreakingly short of this dream. She hadn't even finished filling out the diary let alone ever written an actual story. For some reason she had never seemed to have the time.

Or the nerve,
she admitted.

What she really wanted to do before leaving the island was to leave behind something memorable. A story or perhaps a letter of some kind that might, in its own way, make her live forever. She imagined hiding it before she left and having it sit, unseen, for years. She wouldn't have to face any of her peers that way. She wouldn't have to face Gertrude.

It was a feeble action, surely, but one that had caught her fancy the last few weeks. It was romantic, in a way, and she was positive she'd never in her life find any other kind of true romance.

I certainly wouldn't be forgotten,
she thought. And suddenly she realized she was still afraid of some things. She was afraid of becoming a nobody once again. The realization quickly overwhelmed her. To be nothing after all she'd experienced and done on the island would not just break her heart, but snuff it out completely. She was, in fact, terrified of it.

At that exact moment Lucy made the decision to go ahead and write her letter. She took another bite of apple and enjoyed its sweet flavoring.

"No," she said. "No regrets whatsoever." She took one more giant bite from the apple and then tossed its unused remains to the ground. "Now come on," she said with a deliberately mischievous smile. "I want to go hunting."

The other girls followed her down the ladder and into the darkness below. Behind and above them, the half-eaten apple began its journey toward spoil and rot.

CHAPTER 8

There were forty-some-men in the Family of Blue, and all of them were on their feet now. Grocery Day had begun, and as Obe looked upward he saw that another fishing pole had appeared beside the first. The woman operating the first pole was already lowering the satchel of food swinging by its hook when three men burst into the area directly beneath it and a clearing formed. These three were ravenous, pushing and clawing each other, trying to grab at the food even though it was still well out of reach. The other men in the alley did not speak or move. They only watched in a strange, respectful silence.

Five feet over their heads, the bag stopped and hovered. All three men jumped and stretched in vain. Obe's nerves started to twitter as this new and cruel act played out. He felt his lips begin forming his healing words again, and he stopped it consciously. Then the bag dropped and lifted, deliberately taunting the starving men.

"C'mon boys! You can get it!" a woman yelled from above. The three men jumped again in such futility that the women on the roof laughed.

Finally the satchel of food was lowered enough for one man to grab it. Immediately one of his starving companions began wrestling with him. The third man ignored them, lost in the glorious sight of the second approaching bag.

During the whole degrading charade, none of the other men in the alley made the slightest move. Obe couldn't decide if this was in respect for these famished men or because nobody wanted to fight them. The two who were wrestling were vicious. Scratching and pulling, they were more like brawling alley cats than human beings. More like scorned women than prideful men.

When all three early-goers escaped with their prizes and their scratched faces, four new men ventured into the clearing. This time, however, the other men took action. As a circle formed around them, these four were bumped, pushed, and chastised as they awaited the descending food. Men would take a step forward, shove one of them, and then step back, all to the laughing delight of the rest.

This is a family?
Obe thought.

He saw Jain, Rein, and even Doov grinning almost wickedly, approving and encouraging the minor abuse. The four men in the middle did not fight back. They took the shoves and shouts without so much as a look at their aggressors. Strangely, however, they didn't fight amongst each other. When one gray-haired man leaped at the descending bag and pulled it off its hook, the others allowed him to keep it, and he escaped the alley completely unscathed. His absence created an opening that was immediately filled.

But the gray-haired man was the first and only who got away without paying a price. The next bag caused a small scuffle. The one after that caused two men to wrestle. And when yet another arrived, three new men ventured in and all had their hands in the little fray.

The women never dropped more than one bag at a time, and as this perverse version of grocery day continued, each satchel caused a disruption when it reached a plausible height. Each bag was a bigger and bigger prize.

Slowly, more and more men advanced into the clearing to take their turn at jumping and grabbing. At least a dozen burlap bags of food had been taken when Obe suddenly realized he had become an observer instead of a participant.

Get your food early,
both Doov and Leb had advised him.

There was no clearing anymore. Several men, Jain among them, were openly aggressive. They shoved and elbowed their way to the center, heedless of any pain they caused. Obe was on the outskirts of the throng of men. It would now take extreme effort to make his way in to the area directly beneath the drop zone.

Just as Obe broke his paralysis and stepped forward, he noticed one other man outside the group. He was calmly seated on an upturned plastic bucket across from the dumpster. His position was at least twenty feet from the descending bags.

The solitary figure was Leb, and Obe wondered what possible reason he could have for this strange behavior.
'Get yours early', huh?
Obe thought.
But you don't take your own advice.

He had liked Leb more than the others, but this disquieted him. He realized he should be very careful about who he should trust, and turned back to the clamor of men to assess how to get his food.

2

A scream came from the center of the crowd and Obe peered into the swarm under the women's fishing rods. A real fight had broken out over a satchel of food. Fists were being thrown as another trio of men wrestled on the ground under the feet of all the others. A small clearing formed but quickly closed in on top of them as another bag dropped. Finally one wrestler was thrown hard against the brick wall, and Obe cringed. As the fallen man slumped into unconsciousness a hearty cheer erupted from the women above. Obe saw the victim had been Rein.

The two leftover men had strangely not fought amongst themselves for the satchel. In fact, Obe was amazed to see one of them casually toss the food bag to the other man. Soon it was safely secured behind a zippered jumpsuit, and both men went back for another bag.

Two bags later Obe's assumption was confirmed. Another fight broke out and again it was these two against just one man. The same result occurred. The outsider was tossed aside and a satchel of food had been won. Then the pair simply strolled out of the alley. Nobody challenged them in any way. They were friends, Obe saw. True friends. The first he'd seen on the island. And despite his growing anxiety, Obe smiled.

He joined the growing frenzy with a renewed hope, but found himself blocked by the extremely tall man he'd seen while seeking out Rein. This emaciated bear, as Obe thought of him, was trying to reach over the others from the back row. Obe found a small space between men and began squeezing through it but he was blocked again and shoved rudely backward.

Adapt or die,
he reminded himself, and tried again.

With a mighty push using leverage against another man, Obe gained access into the meat of the mob and was suddenly wedged in place, still well outside the center. It seemed impossible in the density of men, but his feet kept tripping up and he nearly fell down.

They were all struggling and pushing now. It appeared that most of the satchels were gone and Obe could feel the spreading of group anxiety. At least one man would not eat today. Maybe two or even five. That's how the women worked. Like many of the men not directly under the women's fishing poles, Obe could only wait nervously until a few more men were gone and the group had thinned.

Whenever a man burst from the center of the mob, the hole he left closed in instantly. As he shouldered his way to freedom, arms grabbed and scratched at him from all directions. But each of these hungry veterans held on with both arms crossed over the protected treasure.

A barrel-chested man who had probably been outright fat back home came barging through the crowd. Obe grabbed his wrist and pulled hard. Without even looking at him, the man spun his back to Obe and swung around with the elbow of his other arm. It met squarely on Obe's nose.

White light exploded and blood sprayed. Intense pain shot through him and a torrent of fury came. He screamed in agony and rage as the once-fat man lumbered away unharmed. Nobody seemed to notice or care. As his vision fought to recover, he heard the trailing chorus of approving cheers from above. The women had seen and had loved it.

He was easily pushed backward into the emptiness of the alley where he fell hard onto the ground. And just that quickly he was an outsider again, a misplaced and overmatched Greenhorn. He sat there, dazed. He touched the bridge of his nose and winced.
Broken!
he thought.
I'll
kill
that asshole!

Blood was pouring down his face. He tried plugging his nostrils with his fingertips but the pain was too much and he let the blood flow. He sat instead and fumed, debilitated by his frustration.

"Are we feeling angry, pig?"
the women had liked to ask things like this while pulling toenails or breaking fingers.
"It is unmanly to let a little pain rule your emotions. Ask yourself how a woman deals with childbirth. Imagine, if you would be so kind, squeezing a watermelon through a hole the size of a lemon. And if you
can't
imagine it, we can show you. It's been done before. Now, pig, are you still angry?"

He shook himself aware. He would
not
think about those bitches now. He had food to get, and he was running out of chances. The group under the descending bags was no longer a crowd. In fact, by the time his nose stopped bleeding there were only five men left clambering under the wooden crate.

Just then the emaciated bear came running with a bag clutched in his arms. Obe reached out a hand as he passed, hoping to trip him, have him fall and land on his face. Maybe break his nose. But the tall man wrenched hard with his foot and inadvertently kicked Obe square in the face.

More lightning. More pain. More hatred. But these only lasted a moment. The world suddenly began to spin and swirl, and like the many times it had happened in the fortress, Obe consciously knew he was about to pass out. In the split second before it happened, he realized the bear's bag of food may have very well been the last that the women were willing to give.

He was being taken out of his box and down the corridor of little square doors. Taken left, away from a desk lamp that provided the only source of light.

Correction. An enormous woman named Rhonda was
dragging
him down that corridor. Minutes before, he'd found himself naked and chained inside a box of some kind. The last thing he remembered before that was sharing drinks in Hawaii with a gorgeous girl he'd only met a couple days before. How he'd gotten to Hawaii was an amazing story he had been planning on telling and retelling to all his friends. But how he'd gotten to this place was a complete mystery.

Rhonda had opened the door to his little box after he'd begun screaming for help. Then she'd introduced herself and made him a simple deal: If he kissed her feet before she counted to three, she would be kind when cutting off his testicles. He'd been too shocked and still too pissed to react, so he'd ended up doing nothing while she counted.

Now, however, he was wishing he had. Rhonda's fake smile had been exchanged instantly for fury when she'd gotten to three. Then she had reached into the box, grabbed him by the short chain between his wrists, and hauled him out with one arm. Her strength was amazing. He struggled but was surprisingly weak and went with her helplessly.

I've been drugged!
he realized with fear.

At the end of the corridor she swung him around the corner and into the adjacent hallway like a dead weight. The chain between his ankles clanked loudly on the cement floor. The bracelets dug into his wrists, his very first injury. She took him through one of just three full-sized doors in that hallway.

Rhonda flipped a switch and a blinding light came on. "You should have kissed my feet, pig." She grabbed him by the ankle chain with the other hand and in one deft motion lifted and dropped him onto a cold metal table. He fought some more despite his weakness– tried to grab her wrists– but she overpowered him with ease. In seconds she had him strapped to the table. One wide leather belt was secured across his chest. A second was put across his stomach while his wrists were fit into table shackles. A third belt was put over one knee but underneath the other.

She grabbed the free leg and hoisted his foot high in the air. Hanging from the ceiling was another strap with a loop at the end. Rhonda slipped his foot in the loop, tightened it around his ankle, then sharply pulled the strap short. His hamstring was wrenched and stretched violently, and he screamed.

"Oh, that's nothing," Rhonda said. "Wait until we break you." She crossed the room to a cabinet, pulled out a leather doctor's bag, and placed it on a small cart. He struggled with the straps. He tried to kick his elevated leg free, even to just reposition and drop the strain on it. Rhonda ignored him.

She took a few items out of the bag and positioned them one at a time on the empty space next to his strapped leg. "Do you know why you are here, pig?"

"No!" He was truly frightened now. Then she held up a scalpel and gave him the first real fright of his life. She spoke, of course, with that smooth, porcelain voice they would all eventually use on him.

"It's because you've been bad. You
should
be killed. I
should
cut your jugular and bleed you to death right now. You don't deserve to live. But this," she spread her arms wide, "is Monroe's Island. And what we do here… is educate. And that means you have a chance, pig. If you pay attention and learn quickly, you just might make it home alive… and a far better person." She moved closer to his face, waving the scalpel slowly back and forth like a magic wand. "But you didn't kiss my feet, so it's time for your first lesson. I hate it when men behave badly."

She paused, looked him in the eye, and suddenly screamed at him. "BAAAAD!" He jumped, but she only straightened and went on, perfectly calm once again. "The next time I tell you to do something, I want you to remember that this could have been quick. I can perform this entire operation, incision to suture, in just three minutes. But you didn't listen, so it has become your first lesson."

She reached under his testicles and lifted them. "They call these the family jewels. A quaint little term, isn't it? Well, you've proven that you don't deserve a family. It's a wonder what kind of an influence you'd have on a younger male of our species. Probably just spawn another pig, and then where would we be as a society? One step lower, that's where.

"We cut off the testicles to ensure the betterment of the human race," she finished. And swiftly, she sliced the base of his left testicle. Blood poured out, soaking the back of his thighs and buttocks.

He screamed again, more in fear than in pain. His muscles flexed taut as he pulled against the restraints.

"Don't be bad," she warned, and he stopped. "You must learn to control your anger. It is unmanly to let a little pain rule your emotions." She sliced again at the same spot. Vaguely, he felt something loosen and drop. He was reminded of an overfilled trash bag whose drawstrings had snapped.

He screamed again, struggled again, and she took the loosened testicle between two fingers and squeezed. He screamed more, truly loud this time, flailing against the straps, and she squeezed harder still. A clammy slickness washed over the left half of his body. He managed to only gurgle but didn't move. Rhonda smiled, hummed pleasantly, then finally released her grip.

"So far I'm not impressed," she said. "I heard you yelling for help. I always hear every pathetic word from every pathetic man. I don't sleep. I'm like your shadow, always there. Did you really think someone would come and save you?" She looked at him, apparently expecting an answer. "Seriously, did you?" He didn't say anything. Instead he locked eyes with his captor and wished a thousand horrible deaths on her.

"Fine," she sighed. "I hope you don't turn out to be a weakling like the last few I've had. Though I do love my work, I must say that it's refreshing to find a student now and then who progresses at the proper pace. Not too quickly, not too slowly. Like my own little Goldilocks. It's wonderful research for my book, you see." She cut again, deeper and around the bottom.

"Unghhh."

"Better," she said. "It's the fighting you need to repress first." She flicked the bloody scalpel as she motioned with her hands. Drops of blood flew off it and landed somewhere on the floor. "You know, you may be here in our fortress anywhere from a few weeks to nearly a year. The record is seventeen months. Of course that was a long time ago. We know better ways to help you learn than we did back then. But if they fail completely… we simply give up. It is true that some men cannot be educated."

She cut again, incredibly deep. He screamed again, twisted against the straps. He couldn't help it, and even as he awaited another agonizing squeeze she touched his chest with a hot, bloody fingertip. His raised leg was numbing, sending a message of sharp, poisonous needles to his brain.                  

Then he opened his eyes, looked, and saw it wasn't her fingertip she had placed on his chest but his own testicle. Rhonda ignored the dreadfulness of this action and commented, "But I don't think you'll turn out to be one of those. You'll be broken soon, won't you? A quick start. But then you'll be as stubbornly slow as the rest of them to actually learn, I believe. Eventually, though, you will learn. I can see it in your freaky little eyes. And once you're on your way, it's only a matter of training you for your
real
test. That's when we release you and see how you've learned."

He breathed rhythmically, unaware how closely it resembled Lamaze, while he stared at his own bloody testicle, rising and falling quickly with his breaths. The clammy left side of his body phased out and was replaced by a whole-body wooziness. He felt her two fingers take hold of his right testicle and his rhythmic breathing sped up.

"Now then," Rhonda said. "About that last scream of yours…" and she squeezed again with what felt like all the might hidden in her strong hands, and for the first time in his life, he passed out.