A/N: Right now, as I am writing this, there are more slaves alive today than in any time in human history. There are an estimated 21-46 million people who are being forced into work that they likely receive little or no pay for.
The industry of sex trafficking is worth around $150 billion a year, only rivalled by the drug and weapons industries. Every penny made through the violation and degradation of men, women, and children. Homeless people, for whom every day is a struggle, are particularly vulnerable: a study has found that around one fifth of young people who find themselves on the streets are victims of trafficking.

'There are many slaves in the sex trafficking industry. The pimps who are slaves to greed, the johns who are slaves to lust, and those who are physically enslaved.' - Pastor Eddie Buyn

Chapter One

So show me where my armour ends,

Show me where my skin begins

He could still vaguely remember what it felt like to be a person. He had fond, but ever disintegrating memories of being tucked up in bed by a mother who loved him, the tight embrace of friends who cared for him. He remembered warm, hazy afternoons sitting at his desk in school, eyelids heavy as he fought sleep, and the biting cold of freshly settled snow that crunched under his shoes. He knew these recollections were his own, and yet it felt as though they were someone else's. In a way, he supposed, they were. They belonged to a boy who had been, for the most part, whole, and happy. And loved. Whatever he was now, holding tight to whatever humanity remained to him, he was none of these things. He certainly hadn't been loved for a very long time.
He existed still, in some form of living hell. Sometimes he wondered if, in the chaotic evil he'd experienced in the past few years, he had died along the way. Perhaps this was hell. Perhaps this was purgatory. Or perhaps, when you are living a life where love and kindness are in short supply, life could simply be so agonisingly awful that it would be preferable not to exist at all. Some days, he would give anything, anything, to cease to be. He would imagine himself dissolving into particles of dust, forever destined to drift lazily, catching hesitant beams of sunlight. Other days, he seemed not to think at all, an empty husk. A collection of cells, and that was all. Unaffected by hands that breached his defences, the tickle of a stranger's breath that scorched his skin.

Sitting on the windowsill in his room, Kyle forced his mind away from the past. He couldn't afford to feel anything at all, let alone nostalgic longing for a life he could never lead. He had, after all, forsaken all that he'd had, or would ever have, when he'd packed a bag on that cold night years ago, and had withdrawn into the darkness. He'd been thirteen at the time. Kyle wasn't sure how old he was now. Time seemed to have slowed, leaving him suspended in the oncoming tide, and his body felt old and broken.

Thirteen was no age to be living on the streets, begging for loose change from passers-by who clutched steaming cups of coffee and fresh pastries as they hurried by, trying not to make eye contact with the child that grovelled at their feet. The hurricane of his highly unusual childhood had taught him a lot about human character, but he learned more sleeping rough than he had in all of his previous years. People, for the most part, were assholes. To them, the homeless weren't human. They told themselves that to open their wallets for the vermin would be irresponsible. Homeless people took drugs, they drank themselves to death on street corners and were buried in unmarked graves. Kyle felt this was grossly unfair. After a few days wandering the streets and nights curled in a doorway somewhere, he understood why a person might be so eager to escape their lives that they use drugs and alcohol as a crutch to survive the unforgiving nights. To him, if you gave money to a homeless person, you entrust them to do what they felt was best with it. If what they felt was best was a bag of smack to chase away the demons, then that was their decision.

Within days of leaving home, almost everything he had brought with him -including his coat, hat, gloves and shoes- had been stolen. Years of fighting with Cartman, defending himself from the sixth graders, and smashing baseball bats into the kneecaps of paedophiles had left him with fairly proficient fighting skills, and he defended himself until the bitter end. When two men had come in the night, twice his size and reckless after a solid few hours of drinking, he was defenceless as they picked him clean and dumped all his things in the canal. They only thing Kyle had been able to save, clutched in his fist, was his most treasured possession: two crumpled photographs. His mom, dad, and Ike in one, he and his friends in the other. For the next few nights, he would lie shivering under flattened cardboard boxes. They did a very poor job of protecting him from the cruel wind and rain that made him feel as though his very skin was soaked through. He would clutch his photos, thinking of when they had been taken almost a year ago. The four boys and their parents had all taken a beach vacation; a glorious few days of warm sand and the vast, endless ocean stretching out before them. The boys, still glistening with droplets of salt water soaking their straggled hair, grinned toothy smiles at the camera, arms draped around each other.
On those cold, isolated nights, those photos served as his candle, his tiny flicker of light to ward off thoughts of slitting his wrists with a rusty can, or jumping headlong into the canal.

Looking back, he felt a warped sense of pride for lasting so long with at least the vestiges of his dignity left intact. All things, however, must pass, and when he was so desperate for a warm meal and new gloves to keep his frost-bitten fingers from turning septic, he had eventually given in. From his very first night on the streets, he had been asked if he offered his 'services'; usually by balding, middle aged men with food stains on their ties and body odour. At first, the idea had made him shiver. He'd flat-out refuse- he would never sink so low! But day by day, his resistance had been ground down. The more his stomach twisted painfully with hunger, the more nights he spent lying awake, wondering if this was the night that the cold might kill him, the more he felt he was already at rock bottom. This was just one step further down the path of destruction. Even so, it had taken every bit of his internal strength to agree this time, to give up the youthful virtue he hadn't known he had at the time, for a hand-job. It had taken almost everything from him, and all he received in return was fifteen bucks and a feeling of self-loathing that would lie heavy as a paperweight in the base of his stomach for the rest of his life.
Just teetering on the brink of adolescence, he was clumsy and awkward, and he had kept his eyes tightly shut as the man kept making disgusting little grunting noises. He hated the whole experience with every last fibre of his being.
When it was over, Kyle sat dejectedly in a dingy twenty-four hour cafe, warming his trembling, defiled fingers around a cup of coffee. The brew was stale, and the eggs and toast he had ordered hadn't been any more appealing, but he was so relieved not to be starving for a while that he wolfed it down without complaint. His green eyes swivelled unendingly in their sockets as he looked first at the peeling wallpaper, the scuff marks on the tiled floor, the bored waitress behind the counter chewing gum. He looked for all the things he might not have noticed because not a single part of him wanted to think of what he had just done. He felt utterly ashamed with himself. He could still smell the musty scent of the man he had just pleasured on his fingertips, a radiating symbol of his newfound status as a common street whore. Someone who sells their body to those who have sold their morals. Even if a miracle happened and he was welcomed back to South Park with open arms, he was certain that they would see the imprint of the man on his skin.

It didn't take that long for handjobs to develop into blowjobs. Kyle had always been fairly proud. He had crises of faith -like every other person on the planet- but until that point his self-esteem had been quite high. Although still young, Kyle knew that he was someone of worth. Someone his parents could be proud of, a caring big brother, a good friend. He had spent thirteen years building to this peak, but one fifteen dollar night, an act of survival, had taken a wrecking ball to everything he knew about himself. He had yet to succumb the other thing, however, and he only did what he had to when there was absolutely no other option. He would rather hunt through fifty trash cans for a paltry crust of stale bread than have to become that intimate with a strange man.
Although he hated himself a little more every day, he was, at least, surviving. This state of middle-ground continued for a while, until, as often seemed to happen to him, life got just that little bit worse. He had struck up a friendly rapport with another rough sleeper who often paced the same block as Kyle did. Ralph was the first person who had been kind to him in what seemed like an eternity. He couldn't even remember the last time he had spoken to someone who knew his name. It hurt to think about.
Kyle had been sitting desolately on his cardboard floor, arms wrapped around his aching stomach. By now, he had gotten used to the feeling, and he estimated that he could last at least another night without being too weak with the hunger. Ralph had stumped over to him, his characteristic limp particularly bad that day.

"Here you go son." He sat down next to Kyle with a soft 'oof', and offered him a packet of biscuits. He took one without hesitation, mumbling a quiet thanks as he jammed one into his mouth. Ralph watched him as he quickly chewed and swallowed before he spoke again. "Want a nip?" As always, a hip flask appeared seemingly from nowhere. Kyle took it, and swigged the burning liquor. He didn't often drink, and when he did it was only a couple of gulps, but he quite liked the feeling of warmth spreading from his chest; and the buzz it gave him was the closest he could get to happiness. The drink still made him cough a little, but Ralph never laughed at him.

"Thanks, dude." He rasped, trying to summon a smile for the old guy.

"Don't mention it, kid. Actually, I came here to talk to you 'bout something. Found a place where we can light a fire, get warm for the night. Got us some cider, too. Figured we could heat it up over the flames, fill our bellies and have a good drink." When he was older, there were several moments in Kyle's life that he could pinpoint as 'where it all started'. The real suffering. The very first handjob had been one, and this was another. Kyle had taken Ralph up on his offer, and allowed him to ply him with hot cups of cider until his head was swimming. He loved how uninhibited it made him feel, but every so often he would have a fleeting moment of doubt. A tiny corner in his mind where the Old Kyle now resided told him that something was wrong, that he was being so fucking stupid, but he let those moments be submerged under the toxic cloud of alcohol that was quickly enveloping him.
Whereas the night before had been almost surreal, the morning after certainly was not. Reality smashed his ass back down to earth with pain in a place other than his head, and a nauseous feeling that he wasn't entirely sure was due to alcohol poisoning. He was lying in a sleeping bag, his eyes squinting at the painful sunlight. Ralph was next to him. They were both naked. Kyle made a noise like a frightened animal, lurched to his feet and stared, completely in shock, at the man who lay snoring before him. He hurriedly groped for his clothes, stained by dirt and smelling of cider. Hardly stopping to redress himself, he staggered away, leaving his virginity behind in a small stain of blood on Ralph's sleeping bag.