Summary: Taken by men who are going to rent me out to strangers that will take advantage of me…Brilliant. This wasn't bad luck. It was my sentence to hell. Rated M for adult themes including rape and slavery.
Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight or its characters.
HUMAN TRAFFICKING PART 3: REALIZATION (part 2)
BPOV
As soon as I entered the next room, my stomach flipped uncomfortably. The room would have looked like boot camp barracks except for the racks of clothing lined up neatly against the wall. Each held colorful fabrics with sparkles and shimmers radiating from them. Victoria stood in front of the room, looking down at the barracks. At that's when I realized who she was looking at.
Down on the floor and on the beds lay about twenty girls, all looking startled at the new arrival. Most of them looked up at me and stared while a couple of the other girls openly glared or shared looks of pity. I stepped back only to fall back into James. He smiled before lightly pushing me forward. I walked toward Victoria, unsure and nervous. She didn't even say anything. She just pointed out a bed with her perfectly manicured, red nails. I silently made my way there only to trip over the air.
"Ostoba lány," Victoria muttered irritably. I quickly pulled myself up to see James standing nearby, looking as if he wanted to come and assist me. From the glare he was getting from Victoria, I could only assume he didn't want to risk it. I got to my bed and sat on its hard surface like the other girls. Victoria nodded curtly. And then the sound of quiet footfalls hitting the floor sounded through the room, Victoria called out, "Feltámad. Aro jön." I didn't understand what she was saying, but all the girls stood, so I followed their lead. They all gathered in front of their beds, standing at attention. Only then did I see what they were wearing.
The scantily clothed women were wearing lingerie that all seemed to be fit for accentuating their figures. All of them were beautiful and young, my age or younger. I didn't quite understand at first, but then I saw them.
Thick bruises covered a few of the girls' wrists and ankles, as well as a few welts on their backs and torso. One girl had a large bruise over her left cheek and her eye barely opened. Another had dark handprints covering her legs, but they were centered in on her inner thighs. I blushed and looked away. These girls were like me (other than the fact that they, by far, surpassed me in the beauty department). They were here against their will. Everything became clear.
They were slaves. Battered like animals being tamed by a cruel master, they were only trying to protect themselves from the slaps of the hands of their handlers. But as a result for their refusals, they were marked, branded by fists and kicks. They looked as if their spirits had been broken down to nothing, leaving them as nearly empty shells with no signs of hope left.
The thought made me want to cry, scream, and thrash around. Because in the end, I would end up just like them, bruised and used and sold. My mind instantly tried to come up with ideas. I thought of the possible ways to escape, but there was no exit besides the one that James was guarding. I was stuck and there was nothing I could do about it.
The door opened behind James and in walked Aro and Caius, both sporting blank expressions. When Aro saw me, he smiled and stood next to Victoria.
"Good morning, ladies." Victoria was translating in a foreign language behind him. "You have a new sister today. This is Isabella." He pointed me out and the other girls looked towards me. The blasted blush came back again and I grimaced. His grin widened and he proceeded. "Now, we'll be doing business in Chicago. Tonight you will load the vans and remain quiet and well-behaved. I do not want a repeat of what happened last night." He looked at one of the girls in the line and then turned away. "Isabella, James will assist you with preparing for Chicago." With that, he left with Caius following behind, his nose high in the air.
The girls relaxed and went back to sitting on the beds, some curling up on the floor. I too sat on the floor, just thinking about what was happening. The situation seemed pretty straight forward. Taken by men who are going to rent me out to strangers that will take advantage of me…Brilliant. This wasn't bad luck. It was my sentence to hell. But for some reason, I couldn't bring myself to show weakness, to show these girls that I was helpless. None of them were crying for everyone to hear. No, they were all silent, talking amongst themselves or sleeping. I jumped when I felt a small tap on my shoulder.
A beautiful woman stood in front of me, her long black waves settling around her face, her hazel eyes showing curiosity.
"Nem beszélsz Magyar?" I sat there, confused and unable to communicate with her. She shook her head and gestured with her hands, trying to come up with the words. "Uh, th-thank y-ou?" My head turned to the side and I looked at her. I shook my head and tried to think of something to say. There were no classes for learning Hungarian in high school and from what I could tell from the little bit I had learned from reading the Harry Potter series, that's what she was speaking. I had only met the minimum requirement for learning Spanish as well.
"She's trying to say "thank you". She thinks you saved her earlier when in reality, you just made everything hell for her." I turned to see another even more beautiful woman with long blonde hair standing at the foot of the bed. She and the other girl were dressed alike; both in robes that were wrapped around them loosely and in black lingerie that made their skin look beautiful though they both had bruises along their torsos. But the black haired girl had a long cut doing down her face and several large bruises along her arms.
The blonde glared at me with hard ocean blue eyes and continued. "If you hadn't tried to "save" her," she made quotations with her fingers, "she wouldn't have been beaten by Caius. Because of you, they will now be guarding us twice as much and that means they'll be irritable. Idiotic girl." Her heavy accent showed her anger. I shrunk away as she took a step forward, but the raven haired girl put her hand in front of her.
"Állítsuk le a Rosalie." The blonde named Rosalie huffed but walked away. The raven haired girl sighed before kneeling down beside me and putting her hand on her chest. "Katea."
Ostoba lány means "stupid girl"
Feltámad. Aro jön means "Get up. Aro is coming."
Nem beszélsz Magyar? means "Do you speak Hungarian?"
"Állítsuk le a Rosalie" means "Stop it Rosalie."
"Katea," I said to show that I understood her. She smiled and put her hand on my shoulder. "Isabella," she assured, looking at me for reassurance. I shook my head and put my hand over my heart. "Bella." She repeated my name as if she was taking in the information and testing it out before nodding and smiling. She pulled me up from my place on the floor and dragged me to a bed on the other side of the room. There, several other girls all watched me conspicuously, clearly not caring if they were caught. Some smiled when they saw how Katea was pulling me along with her while others just watched curiously.
Katea climbed up to her top bunk and gestured for me to follow. Careful so as to not trip over my own foot on the way up, I followed her up the wooden ladder. When I sat atop the bed next to Katea, our feet hanging over the edge, I saw what she had done to her bunk. Displayed next to her pillow were several pictures, some old looking, some new. I leaned forward to take a look and saw a little girl that looked like very similar to her standing alongside a woman and man, all smiling happily at the camera. Katea laughed lightly and I jumped, surprised at how close her voice was.
She took the photo from the bed and pointed at the people. She pointed at the older man and said, "Papa." Pointing to the woman, she said, "Mama." And then pointing to the little girl, she whispered, "Si-sis-ter, Rachelle." Tears leaked from her eyes and she rested her head on my shoulder, sobs racking her chest. Unable to control my own lump of emotions from choking me, I allowed the dam to open, releasing all my sadness and self anger through tears. I held her in a hug as we both futilely attempted to stop crying over the hopelessness of our situation.
It was futile really. Crying would get us nowhere, especially now that I understood the situation. Seeing these girls, all looking so broken and battered on the floor, I realized that we were nothing but things to sell. Drugs in the game of dealer and junkee. Vulnerable, scared, helpless women in the business of human trafficking.
A/N: The translations above are in Hungarian.
Authors are friends, not food! Don't flame them (and eat them). That, children, is known as cannibalism and is frowned upon in most societies.