Chapter 4 - by Jouley

Beyonce and Slash
-----
We watch.
Fingers tapping, forehead pressing, mouth agape.
Madonna is red.
Her colour no longer consensual.
Forced on her by dirty hands.
Unfeeling hands.
We shudder at the memories, though unsure which are ours.
And which belong to our friends. "Bey', come away from there, please.." Slash pleaded, walkin up to the cell wall to place her hands on the girls shoulders. She knew one of their friends was in the other room, but didn't have the courage to look up and see who.

"It-It hurts.." Beyonce whimpered as her body was pryed from the glass, her hand subconsciously traveling up to her cheek. "They cut us.. It hurts.." Tears began to trickle down her dirt stained face.

Slash sighed and pulled the malnourished girl into her arms. She still couldn't understand the girls switch to plural possessive nouns, 'us' instead of 'me' and so forth. Though even more disconcerting was the girls apparent need to take other peoples wounds and unpleasant situations and imagine them on herself.

"You're not cut sweety.." She tried to reassure as she rocked the girl in her arms, both their backs now to the other cell.

"Yes.." Bey tried to reason, but the words were so jumbled in her mind she couldn't put them together coherently. She ran her fingers over her tear stained cheek and then held it in front of her lover. "Blood.." She really did perceive the tears as what she described them as.

Slash felt her heart break at the other girls confusion. This was more than merely a strange coping mechanism to horrific environments. Something was seriously wrong with Beyonce, something, Slash knew, that would likely never go away.

Suddenly there was a noise from the cell adjacent to the girls, as a body was thrown into the glass. Crying out, Beyonce placed her hands to her ears to try and dampen the sound of cruel laughter also coming from the cell.

"Don't look..." Slash whispered, placing her own hands over her lovers eyes, hoping if she stopped the girl from watching, she wouldn't suffer the effects of it later.

Only, with her hands now occupied, there was nothing stopping Slash from watching into the next cell, where Cheeky Fairy lay, struggling to pull herself up.