Intoxication
Chapter 8
The reviews just keep pouring in, I'm amazed. I've never gotten such a reaction to a fic before. I wonder if it's because of fanfiction.net's easy review system. I was thinking of removing all my stuff from the site, especially since they said they'd remove the accounts of people who put the wrong rating on their fics. What a bunch of bloody Nazis! (Please don't tell them I said that!) I still haven't quite forgiven them for making me lose one of my favourite fics when they established the anti-NC17 rule. Okay, enough bitching, on with the show!
P.S: To black demon wolf, there is absolutely no need to check the site twice a day to see if I've updated. Now that's what I call devotion! But as much as I'd like to bask in such adoration, I remember the pain of waiting to see when an author would or wouldn't update. I write the Chapters on Thursday nights while watching Oz with a cup of tea, and usually post that night or Friday morning. I started early tonight, though!
P.P.S: The song Io's singing is Suzanne by Leonard Cohen. As to why she's singing it, I'll let you draw your own conclusions.
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The time Rei spent sequestered in his cell passed by in a haze. Night and day ceased to exist, only the moments of inactivity between eating and sleeping. During these moments, Rei's voices would jabber back and forth incessantly to each other and to themselves. With the trio of opposing voices and his extreme isolation, in was only a matter of time before the voices took on physical manifestations. It was the forms that they took that really surprised him.
Miss Logic, the bitchy opinionated harridan of the three, appeared as Europa form the portrait of Europa and the bull on the wall. She was pretty in a classical sense, with a swarthy complexion and a figure that was on the plump side. Most of the time her thin lips were curled into a sneer, and her eyes were slanted and angry-looking. She was clothed in a robe that she rarely adjusted so that it often fell open and exposed her breasts. She never seemed too concerned by this, sometimes it was hard to tell if her immodest conduct really was accidental. She spent most of her time perched on the bed beside Rei, in a lounging position.
Worry-Wart, the hysterical, timid little girl, appeared as the nymph who had managed to escape the unwanted advances of the winged youth by dropping into Rei's cell and perching on the shelf where his food appeared. The barely-there piece of cloth she had possessed in the painting was still clutched to her nude body, but although it disguised nothing it seemed like just the attempt to cover herself preserved her virtue better than the robes that Europa wore and disregarded. There was nothing sensual about the nymph, her very appearance suggested that she was a girl to be protected, not accosted. She was unbelievably pale, everything from her white-blonde hair to her watery blue eyes made her look bloodless, two-dimensional. She spoke in a high-pitched whisper about how helpless they were and how much better it would be if Rei gave in to his captor. Europa despised her, and she despised Europa.
The third girl, the Enigma, appeared as Io from the painting of the girl being seduced by a wisp of cloud. She was a strange creature, possessed of a child's face with a constant smile on a woman's well-endowed body. She was naked and indifferent to this fact, she liked to sit with her legs crossed on the end of the bed with one hand fondling her honey-blonde curls and the other drawing patterns in the sheets. She spoke in nonsensical riddles and sang constantly, only talking sense on rare occasions when what she said was useless. She ignored the other two, and they ignored her in return.
C hadn't approached Rei since the last ballroom incident, and since then the very thing that he had been trying to bury at the back of his mind became the only thing he could think about, and the only thing the girls could talk about. After Europa and the nymph finally fell silent, Io sat on the edge of the bed singing softly to herself in her birdlike twitter.
"Suzanne takes you down to her place near the river,
You can hear the boats go by, you can spend the night beside her,
And you know that she's half-crazy, but that's why you want to be there,
And she feeds you tea and oranges that come all the way from China,
And just when you mean to tell her that you have no love to give her,
Then she gets you on her wavelength and she lets the river answer that you've always been her lover.
And you want to travel with her, and you want to travel blind
And you know that she will trust you, for you've touched her perfect body
With your mind.
And Jesus was a sailor, when he walked upon the water,
And he spent a long time watching from his lonely wooden tower,
And when he knew for certain only drowning men could see him
He said all men will be sailors then until the sea shall free them,
But he himself was broken, long before the sky would open,
Forsaken, almost human,
He sank beneath your wisdom like a stone.
And you wanted to travel with him, and you want to travel blind,
And you think maybe you'll trust him, for he's touched your perfect body
With his mind.
Now Suzanne takes your hand and she leads you to the river,
She is wearing rags and feathers from Salvation Army counter,
And the sun pours down like honey on our lady of the harbour,
And she shows you where to look among the garbage and the flowers,
There are heroes in the seaweed, there are children in the morning,
They are leaning out for love, they will lean that way forever
While Suzanne holds the mirror.
And you want to travel with her, and you want to travel blind,
And you know that you can trust her, for she's touched your perfect body
With her mind."
Europa, who could never hold her tongue for very long, began to fuss again.
It's finally happening, Rei. You're losing your mind. Not that you were holding together brilliantly to start with, but it's never been this serious before, has it? And you know who's to blame. You never had a chance. Not with her blood running through your veins.
" It wasn't her fault," Rei protested weakly, " she didn't ask to be born any more than I did." The nymph
spoke quietly but sharply to Europa.
Of course it wasn't her fault, any more than it's Rei's fault the situation he's in now! It's just what happens when you're beautiful. It's them, out there, that make it this way. There's only desire or envy, always anger, no room for love or friendship. If they can't get it willingly, they take it by force, and then condemn you for being what you are. To be beautiful is a blessing, but it brings suffering. Your mother suffered for her beauty and so will you!
I hate to admit it, but she's right. Because you are what you are, no one will ever feel sorry for you, sympathise with you, want to help you in any way unless it brings some sort of gratification to themselves. And you know this, even if you tried to escape it. Remember?
" Stop." Rei felt tears burning his eyes. " I don't want to think about that."
Deny it all you want, but you know it's true. I'm amazed you can still talk to Lee after what happened. All those disgusting things he called you, the things he accused you of…"
" Stop it!"
…over a Bit Beast! A lifetime of trust you placed in him, all lost, because he believed the only way you could get Drigger was by seducing his grandfather! And remember what they used to say about your mother…
" No! No more, please!"
It's always going to be this way, Rei. You can choose to ignore it, but you'll only wind up getting hurt, time and time again. It's never really worked, has it? Putting your trust in someone, then finding out what they really want. The villagers hated your mother, their children only liked you because of what their mothers told them about her…
" Please…"
…and Lee seemed so nice, too. But he must have thought of you that way for a long time. He called you a whore, a harlot. And you were only thirteen! Is it any wonder you ran away? How do you think your mother ended up in that village? Something drove her into your father's arms!
Rei was sobbing in earnest now. Things that he had forced himself to ignore were surging forward like vomit, the pain was unbearable. The voices waited until his tears subsided before the nymph spoke gently, soothingly. But her words burned like acid.
It's always going to be that way, Rei. Out there, you're just a pretty face. I bet there's people out there, people you know, who believe you deserve to be here. That looking the way you do, you're asking for it. No-one's going to take this seriously. Stay here, Rei. What you want is to be accepted, and he accepts you. He can protect you from what's out there, and he loves you, in his own way. Give in, do what he wants. It can't be any worse than what's out there.
Europa gave a snort of derision.
That's bullshit! Let him rape you just so you don't have to face anyone else wanting to get into your pants? Newsflash, people are naturally lusty. If you're even mildly attractive to someone the first thing on their minds will be sex. You're a cutie-pie, Rei, but that doesn't mean than everyone who's attracted to you thinks you're a slut. So you grew up in a small town full of people who didn't take a little splash in the gene pool very well. It's a big-ass world out there, if you search long enough and far enough you'll find someone who might care about you.
Io trilled something about birds and roses, then went quiet again. Her big blue eyes bored into Rei's watery amber ones, and her rosebud mouth curled into a smile. The girls vanished from sight but their voices remained when the door opened. C waited in the hall to escort him, but he held Rei back before he could leave.
" Wash you face, Rei. Crying does terrible things to your complexion."
Rei did as he was told sedately, without enthusiasm. And then C brought him to his study, where the subject of his mother had come up before. Rei was pressed into his seat and given a glass of scotch, which he sipped gingerly. C took the other seat and swirled his drink before talking.
" I have something for you, Rei."
He took out a bundle of sheets from behind the chair and pressed them into Rei's hands. And for a few minutes, all Rei could do was stare at them.
" Sheet music…?"
" For the cello. I think you may have some musical talent. Your lessons will begin in two days, and I expect you to have those notes memorized before we begin."
Rei leafed through the pages when the name of a song caught his eye.
"La Forzi Del Destino…"
" Puccini. Italian. I thought it rather fitting. We both have Italian blood running through our veins. My father could trace his lineage right back to the Borgia family, although that's something few people would admit to. And your mother was from an old family too, wasn't she? We could even be cousins."
This was the first unselfish act Rei could remember experiencing in his short life. He couldn't help feeling grateful.
" Thank you," he whispered.
" Thank you, Cesare. My name is Cesare. And that is what you shall call me, bella."
Cesare laid his hand on Rei's head. And Rei leaned into the touch.
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The sites popped up, one after the other, each more filthy than the last. Kai winced with disgust, Tala and Bryan didn't so much as blink. They were researching fetish sites, and Kai didn't quite know why.
" Why are we doing this?"
" The guy we're looking for is a fetishist," said Bryan. " He's a guy that's gotten so carried away with his fantasies that he lost touch with reality and broke the rules. What we're looking for is a regular of these sites who suddenly stopped logging on about four years ago. That was when he experienced the fantasy in real life."
" Well, if he's a fetishist what does he want with Rei?"
Tala and Bryan laughed at that, but stopped abruptly when they saw Kai wasn't.
" You are joking, right?" said Tala incredulously.
" No. What?"
" Fetishists tend to feel sexual attraction for individual body parts that are unusual. This guy doesn't limit himself to just one fetish, but found only single parts to admire in his other victims. Rei, however," Tala sighed before continuing, " he's a fetishist's dream. Small hands and feet, long black hair, unusual eye colour, it's a wonder something like this never happened before."
Bryan tugged at his sleeve. He had something.
" Take a look at this guy. He spent up to a month at a time on some of these sites, suddenly disappeared three years ago. His handle is Renaissance man."
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Ooh. Getting warmer! OZ ROCKS!