Spark: Sins of Grievance
Part 1
Part 1
A gruff crackled voice spoke through an armored helm that covered the head of a man fully clad in maroon and black armor. “Two thousand is my best offer Sampson. They are girls and there is no guarantee that they will even last as Enforcers.”
An older man’s voice answered back. “So be it then.”
“Would you like to say goodbye to your daughters?” the armored guard asked.
“What for? I think I’d rather avoid the waterworks.”
The guard sighed, a sound that his helm didn’t modify. “Your call I guess.” He took a pad of paper out of his desk and scribbled something onto it. He looked up at Sampson who waited eagerly for his payment. He returned his glance back to the paper and finished writing his note. “Two thousand clicks. Bring it to the bank in town and they will give you your money.”
Sampson took the piece of paper and stared at it to be sure he was guaranteed the amount they agreed upon. He looked up from the paper and smiled from one side of his mouth to the other. “It was nice doing business with you. Carlton was it?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I won’t be seeing you around,” he cackled as he strolled out of the room.
Carlton looked down in disgust at the carbon copy of his clerical note. He didn’t like being an Enforcer at Grievance. From under his helm of dark eyes and long black mouth slits he thought about the nature of Grievance.
Grievance, he thought, a slave city inside a mountain that produces geothermal energy. The concept itself was good enough minus the slaves. It didn’t always used to be that way. It wasn’t until their leader, an insane woman named Victoria, took control when her father died, that the place changed so much. Grievance made enough money as it was, but she saw the place as more profitable when she turned the workers into slaves. Those with families that tried to resist the decision ended up being enslaved themselves.
Carlton got up from his chair and walked over to his weapon rack. He stared at his long iron rod. He suddenly wondered how many times it had broken skin, how many times bones were broken with it. It was a number that he didn’t want to focus on. He took it off of the rack and tapped it on the cold marble floor.
Sampson would be long gone by now. What a sick bastard he was for traded his own daughters for money.
Both girls were eighteen. Rachel, the oldest, was about to turn nineteen while her sister Melanie had just turned eighteen. At least that was the story Sampson told him. Carlton wondered how accurate his tale was, he seemed overly excited to hand them to Grievance, perhaps the youngest wasn’t yet the age that they took Enforcers in at.
He let out another sigh that his helmet didn’t modify; longer than the first. He thought that he better get next door where they were being guarded and get them into armor before some of the more immoral guards noticed they were female. Several of them had to be disciplined often for raping both female slaves and other Enforcers that were unlucky enough to be female.
Carlton exited his office that was carved out of the mountain itself and solid marble. His iron rod swung at his side. His stride wasn’t natural, but one of someone who had to be important looking.
He entered the room where the two girls were being held until the transaction had been finished.
“I’ll give them the rundown, go back on patrol,” Carlton’s gruff modified voice commanded to a guard that matched the same description of him.
“Can do,” the guard said in the same voice as his.
It was difficult to tell who was who, but after a while you noticed body movements, speech patterns, and other little things that differentiated one guard from the other. The guard he just dismissed was another female guard, though he was sure that not many of the other guards knew that fact.
One of the few rules were that they had to remain geared unless in their private quarters. Not that everyone followed such rules, either by choice or involuntarily. It was one of those things that he made a rule a few years ago when the rapes were getting out of hand and his few female Enforcers were getting overly timid and unstably emotional. That lead to them being unfit as Enforcers and were regrettably converted into slaves.
Carlton stepped into the room further and saw the two girls sitting at a table very close to one another. They turned to look at him and appeared very frightened and had good reason to be. With the increased temperatures inside Grievance as well as how the average person was treated had most of its occupants believing they were in hell.
“My name is Carlton. I’m the big shot around here next to Victoria herself.”
They didn’t say anything; they just looked at him with eyes that were wet from crying. They had to know what went on at Grievance; it wasn’t like the surrounding towns didn’t have a clue how they got their energy. Both of them probably thought they were brought here by their father to be slaves.
He didn’t know if they should feel lucky that they were bought as Enforcers or if it was equally as unlucky. In armor or not, they were all slaves of Victoria’s when it all boiled down to it. He decided to try to give them the news using the word lucky. “You two probably know what goes on here in Grievance. Lucky for you, you were sold as guards and not given as slaves.”
The blond one of the two spoke up, “How is that lucky?” Her sister had jet black hair and seemed to have stopped crying more recently than the other one.
“I’ll let you know when I figure that out for myself,” Carlton said trying to make light of the unfortunate situation they were in. Neither of them smiled at his light hearted comment. “Listen, let’s get you to the armory and have you suit up. I know this is all a lot to handle as is, but trust me when I tell you that it is best for you to be in your own set of armor and sound like I do.”
The other sister wiped her arm across her eyes. “What do you mean by that?”
Carlton didn’t know how to answer that properly without sounding like a pig himself. “Umm,” he leaned on his rod nervously, “being a slave is bad enough in here, but being a girl, Enforcer or not can be very, um…”
The blond finished what he was trying to say, “Rachael, he’s telling us that we are likely to get raped.” As soon as the sentence left her mouth her sister started crying.
Carlton felt uncomfortable but knew that it was best for them to get going. “About those suits... Let’s get going girls.”
The blond stood up and reached for Rachael’s hand. She pulled her up out of the chair and led her over to Carlton.
“The armory is just through these doors. Walk right through those doors over there.” He pointed with his rod to the door to his right. The blond dragged her sister through the doors and Carlton followed behind them with his rod held in a way that would allow him to strike one down if they tried to run. It was a precaution he always took and had to do just that a small number of times over the years. He basically gave someone one chance to show resistance and after that it was strait to slavery. There were no second chances in Grievance.
The room they went into had weapon racks with rods of assorted lengths. Based on a guard’s height they would be given a rod that they were able to wield properly. Over in another corner were several suits of armor displayed over mannequins.
Again with his rod he pointed, “Over there, we’ll get you each into a suit that is the right height. We don’t have a lot of suits, so be happy you both have slender bodies.”
“You really are terrible at this making us feel better thing,” said the blond.
Her sister scolded her. “Shut up Melanie. Thank God that he isn’t rapping us.”
“Humph, I don’t feel happy, lucky, or anything right now,” Melanie said putting her hands on her hips.
Carlton was feeling uncomfortable again. He was happy that he didn’t have to endure these types of situations that often. It was rare enough as is, but two females at once wasn’t something he had dealt with before.
He knew that when they thought about it later that he might seem like a nice guy, but it wasn’t what he really was. The things he did at Grievance hardly constituted him as being nice. He was being kind based more off pity than anything else. He wasn’t able to show any remorse when his male guards did the things they did to the female slaves or he would be shown as weak and lose his rank. With his Enforcers he at least had some control over what happened without it seeming like disguised reasoning behind what he did.
He found the right suits for both girls and explained how to put the gear on. Melanie had made a smart ass comment to him that he didn’t much care for during the explanation, but he let it slide.
Nervously he told them to strip down to their underwear and bras, that the armor had cooling units in it that would blast them with chilled air from time to time, but they could still get warm even with just those on.
“Are you going to stand there and watch us change?” Rachael asked quietly.
“Yes I have to,” he answered back. “To make sure you aren’t planning to escape.”
Melanie shot back, “What makes you so sure that once we have the gear on you give us rods of our own that we’ll still cooperate?”
Carlton had been asked this question before and had an answer for it already. “The fact that you said it lets me know that you’re smart enough to know what would happen if you tried.” He crossed his arms to be his normal tough self.
She glared at him briefly before she began to take off her pants and shirt. Her sister looked embarrassed and unwilling to do what she was asked.
Melanie said something quietly to her and she Rachael said, “I don’t feel comfortable taking my clothes off in front of guys.” She turned to Carlton, “Can you at least turn around?”
He was running dry on niceness now and was reverting to his normal behavior. “Can you at least do as you are asked without bitching and crying about it?”
She looked sad at his words and quietly said, “Fine, I’m sorry.” Slowly at first she took her clothes off and then quickly started putting on the gear.
Carlton tried not to stare at the girls and was glad that his helm hid his eyes. They were both very beautiful and before his life as an Enforcer he had been a sucker for blonds. He couldn’t help but get immoral thoughts in his head as he watched the sisters undress and redress.
Melanie got the gear on first but Rachael was having trouble getting her armor on.
“Let me help you Rachael,” Melanie said.
“No, I got it. I’m just fine.”
“Woh, my voice,” Melanie said touching the helm’s mouth. “All of us sound the same?” she asked Carlton.
“Yes.”
She turned her head to the side. “How do we tell each other apart?”
“You do and you don’t.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that I have gotten to know the different guards under me by speech patterns and certain movements they do. I don’t know them by name, only that they are who they are because of those things.” He thought for a moment. “Some people have distinguishable marks on their armor too from different situations.” Carlton lifted his hand and pointed to his shoulder. “See this dent?”
“No,” Melanie answered.
“Well, I got it from being attacked by a new slave that was brought in. He pushed me off the elevator and I fell about thirty feet or so. It knocked me out and broke my shoulder. And before you ask, no, they didn’t get away. Poor bastard was beaten to near death and died from internal bleeding.”
“Is that true?” Rachael asked as she held her helmet in her hand, it being the last piece of gear she had to put on.
“Why wouldn’t it be? There is plenty of stuff here to scare you already. I’m not going to make up a story to accomplish what is already there.”
“And what is that exactly,” Melanie asked with the same voice as Carlton was speaking in.
“Fear. The place is thickly coated in it. Slave and Enforcer alike. Don’t think for a second that just because you have a rod in your hand and metal between you and someone else that it doesn’t make you vulnerable to it.”
Rachael pushed the helm over her head and the three of them were quiet.
“Ahhh!” Melanie yelled and jumped randomly at the cooling unit pushing cold air through her suit. Carlton couldn’t help but laugh. It was an action that made an eerie cackled noise through the voice modifier in his helm.
Regaining his focus he instructed them further. “Enforcers,” he called them by what they were now, “grab a rod that is a weight and length you can handle.”
They did as they were asked and stood sluggishly holding the heavy rods.
“Alright, I’ll show you around the place. At no point do I want you to show that you are new. If a slave believes that you are new, they will take advantage of that and you could end up dead pretty quick. Got it?”
The girls nodded and Carlton gestured outside of the doorway.
Want to continue? Part 2
Interesting :) I like this side story here.
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