by King, Bella
I’m not even sure where I’m supposed to be going from here. I’m at the front of the partially-unloaded cargo ship, but I don’t see any sign of life. It’s far too early in the morning for people to be out, and even the thieves who hang around the port aren’t out anymore. They’re back home sleeping like I could be doing.
I pull my coat tighter around me as I slowly make my way to the side of the ship. That’s where the entrance is, but I’ll need more than a key to get in. The key, I suspect, is to access the bridge and start the boat. The ramp to the boat is closed to discourage thieves from hopping on board overnight.
I have the urge to turn back, but Olesya said that I should come in two hours. It probably hasn’t even been one yet, so it would be silly to think she’d be here already.
I wait, crossing my arms over my chest and watching the air in front of me turn into fog and join the rest of it in the air. I can barely see more than a few yards ahead of me, but that’s typical for this time of day. Hopefully, it will clear up as the sun rises.
I breathe out again, focusing on the fog just inches from my nose. My focus changes as a dark shape appears further out.
“Olesya?” I call out into the fog, unsure if I should keep quiet or not. The figure is moving straight toward me, so I figure it would be better to know who they are before they arrive.
The figure doesn’t speak, but it keeps coming forward at the same pace, details coming into view. By the height alone, I know that it isn’t Olesya, and that’s when the pang of regret hits me the hardest. I shouldn’t have let the Devil’s Kingdom and come out here without confirming that it was Olesya who wrote me the note.
I turn to run, fear driving my sudden decision, but as my body swivels around, a much closer figure comes into view behind me. On a dock like this, there’s nowhere to go but back and forth, and both of those ways are blocked.
In a split second, I have to decide whether to jump into the freezing ocean and risk drowning or try to run past the strange figures in the fog.
I bolt to the side, aiming for the edge of the dock. I don’t know if I’ll survive, but something tells me that I don’t want to fall into the hands of whoever has come to meet me here. It’s not Olesya, and the prospect of being lured into a trap is more frightening than what lies under the thick sheets of salty foam licking the underside of the dock.
But luck isn’t on my side as I rush to the edge. I slip on the wet wood, sliding forward and falling onto my hands. I try to scramble to my feet, but a hand grabs the back of my jacket, pulling me away from the edge. For better or worse, I’m not going into the ocean this morning.
“Are you sure she’s the one?” a gruff voice asks as I’m yanked across the ground.
“If she has the key, then yes. If not, then we kill her.”
Either they want to shake the key to the bridge out of me, or these are Olesya’s bodyguards making sure that I’m the person who is supposed to show up. I get the feeling that Olesya has nothing to do with this.
The hand on my jacket leaves for a moment, but then lands on my shoulder, forcing me down onto the ground so hard and fast that my head hits the wooden boards. It bounces up with a dull thud, and pain radiates through my brain.
“Where’s the key?” a voice growl into my ear.
I can barely think, much less figure out what the hell he’s talking about. I can feel my pulse in my ears, and the world around me seems to be in a much thicker fog than when I arrived. I breathe hard, trying to figure out what he’s asking.
“The key! The fucking key,” he shouts, shaking my shoulder.
“Jesus fucking Christ, you idiot. You probably scrambled her fucking brains,” the other voice yells. “Let me see her.”
The hand on my shoulder leaves and is quickly replaced by another, much softer hand. “Hey, can you hear me?”
I tilt my head up, nodding slightly as I attempt to bring myself back to full consciousness.
“You hit her fucking head, you idiot,” the voice above me says.
“She did it to herself, scrambling along like that.”
“I saw you push her, idiot.”
“Stop calling me that.”
“Stop acting like an idiot, and I might, idiot.”
I lift my head again, trying to see who is arguing, but it’s difficult when my vision is split in two. I let my head fall back down to the ground, surrendering to whatever happens next. I don’t have the strength to run from these men, and if they’re just looking for the key, maybe they’ll leave me alone. I’m not a threat.
One of the men shakes my shoulder again, waking me back up. “Hey, you have the key or what?”
“Yes,” I mumble.
“Grab the bitch, and let’s go. We don’t have time for this,” the other man says.
I hear the jingle of the key as a hand reaches into my coat pocket to take it. I’m unable to move, unable to cry out for help, but I doubt anyone would hear me if I could. I’m lifted up, tossed over a hunched shoulder, and carried away as I fall into complete unconsciousness.
I’ve failed at everything I wanted to achieve, and now there’s no telling what will happen to me. Fate is no longer in my damaged hands.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Diavolo
This morning, Slate and the others are going to wake up and find that I’m missing. They’ll have no idea where I went, and when I will return, if I ever do. All this because I didn’t want to let Zella escape from me.
I remove my jacket, twisting the rank seawater out of it onto the floor of the shipping container. I drape it over a tall crate and sit down on a short one beside it, letting out a deep sigh as I feel the floor rumbling beneath me.
The boat is already moving away from the shore, and with how many people are crawling around on it, I’m safer hiding in a half-unloaded shipping container than trying to find Zella and take control of the boat. I can’t believe that she managed to get an entire crew out here and steal the fucking ship.
This is, by and large, the biggest mistake I’m made while running the Devil’s Kingdom. I got cocky, wanting to play games with Zella, and now she’s stolen the last of my ships, taking it out to some unknown location to sink it like the rest of them. She and her sister are bringing down my organization.
But I’m hardheaded enough to do just about anything to stop them. I won’t let Zella screw me over that easily, nor will I accept failure before I’m dead. I can still take control of this ship and turn it around, but it’s not going to be easy.
I hunch down, burying my face in my hands, thinking about all the ways that this went wrong. I was so sure that Zella was attracted to me and that despite her sister vanishing with my ship five years ago, she wasn’t going to pull something this wild just to screw me over.
But I was wrong. Zella fucked me. Then she fucked me over.
I groan in my hands, irritated at myself for letting her do that to me. She was so perfect and so aroused for me that I decided to let her sleep in the bed right by my side. She had to have enjoyed what she did with me, but her desire to do me wrong was greater than anything else she may have felt.
I was a fool to let it happen, but I won’t be a fool now. This cargo ship belongs to me, and I’m going to reclaim it, one way or another. It won’t happen tonight because the crew will be on guard, but the next day, when the threat of retaliation is behind them, I will leave the shipping container and break their bones like toothpicks under the darkness of night.
I sit up, fishing into my pockets for everything else that’s left to dry. My guns are soaked, but I was prepared for wetness when I bought them, knowing they’d always be close to the ocean or at sea. They should still function normally even after getting dunked in seawater.
I remove them from their holsters, taking the magazines out and laying them on the crates around me. Ideally, most of what needs to happen next won’t involve shooting since that’s the easiest way to avoid attracting a swarm of attackers.
I’m saving
the guns for when I reach Zella.
My pockets are still filled with soggy reminders of who I was before the walls of my organization began crumbling. I pull out a wet cigar, the coiled leaf holding it together unwinding around the expanded body of tobacco. There’s nothing redeemable enough to smoke, but I shouldn’t be smoking on the ship anyway. Someone would smell it and investigate my new metal home.
I doubt there’s anything that even comes close to food in here, and it’s going to get awfully cold during the night if I don’t find a way to keep warm. The next forty-eight hours are going to be about survival and beating the boredom that comes with being locked up in a shipping container for such a long time without any inkling of an idea of what’s going on outside.
I won’t see much of the sun today, save for the small hole I punched into the metal door with the tip of my knife to keep the airflow constant and prevent me from suffocating. Thankfully, my watch still works, despite the fact that it was dunked in saltwater for several minutes, and it’s not the typical plastic survival watch that everyone else in the Devil’s Kingdom wears. I opted for something classier.
Well, classy doesn’t equate to practicality, as I’m finding out. I’m shivering already, and if I don’t manage to warm myself up in the next few hours, I’m going to have a very tough time getting through the night without developing hypothermia. It shouldn’t get below freezing, but I’m wet and underdressed. That makes a world of difference.
I begin moving crates as best as I can as the ship groans and creaks. I try not to make much noise, but I’m sure it’s not a huge issue with how loud the boat is while leaving the shipyard. It’s better that I move everything now before the boat falls back into relative silence as it drifts through the open ocean.
Crates of chemicals, crucial in the production of Black Sugar, provide structure for my shelter. I’m able to build a wooden igloo out of them, which should help to trap heat in the small space. If I don’t go in and out too much, then I should be able to stay warm enough to hold steady until the time to strike arrives.
Until then, the only thing I can do is lie down, count the grains in the wood above me, and rerun the experience of claiming Zella’s tight body in my head over and over again. She may have betrayed me, but I won’t deny how good it felt to make love to her last night. I’ll never forget it.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Zella
A dull pain, not unlike a migraine headache, throbs in my head as I lift it from the hard floor. My eyes are bleary from having been knocked out, but my internal clock tells me that it hasn’t been very long. The sunlight streaming into the room confirms that it’s still morning.
I lift my head, but I encounter resistance when I try to sit up. I’m chained to the floor, metal clamps around my wrists and ankles like I’m a dangerous beast. I don’t feel especially dangerous when my head is pounding so hard, though.
My eyes have trouble focusing on what’s in front of me, but once they do, the dread inside of me grows like mushrooms after the rain. I’m trapped in a cage no larger than is necessary to contain a small human being. I’m a prisoner, but I don’t know why.
I swallow, sourness from my dry mouth overtaking my throat. I feel like shit, but it’s not just because of my battered physical state. I’m embarrassed that I turned against Diavolo so soon after we had sex, only to fall into the hands of another enemy.
I look around at the room outside of the cage, recognizing it as a bedroom. Judging by the sway of the ocean and the circular window letting sunlight in, I’m on the cargo ship, and we’re no longer docked in the shipyard. We’ve drifted out to sea.
At first, I think there’s nobody else in the room with me, but then I hear a sound from behind the cage – heavy boots thumping down on the floor and walking up to me. My body shrinks in response.
The boots come around to the front of the cage, and then a man squats down, revealing his face.
I gasp.
“Hello there, little Zella,” Javelin says with a wicked grin. “I hope my boys didn’t knock too much of your brains out. You’re going to need them when we get to Pleasure Island.”
“Take me back,” I croak, panic striking me at the sight of Javelin’s evil expression.
“Hmm,” he says, placing a thick finger on his beard. “No, I don’t think I will.”
I scowl at him. “What the fuck are you doing with me? You don’t need me.”
“Actually, Zella, I think I do,” he says with a grin.
“How do you know my name?” I ask, thoroughly freaked out by his calm confidence.
He tilts his head to the side, leaning in so close to the cage that I can smell the old coffee on his tongue and the hardened plaque coating his crowded teeth. “I know your name because Olesya told me all about you.”
“Olesya?” I ask. “Is she here?”
He chuckles. “She’s back on Pleasure Island, but don’t worry. You’ll be joining her in a few days when we arrive.”
“What are you talking about? What is Pleasure Island?” I ask, unsure if I even want to know the answer. It doesn’t sound like anything I would want to be involved with or anything that Olesya would be involved with willingly.
Javelin smacks his lips. “Pleasure Island is where the pleasure is made, my dear. I think you’ll be very useful there.”
I don’t know if he’s being intentionally vague just to freak me out, but I don’t like it. It sounds like some kind of human trafficking operation, but why would he steal an entire cargo ship just to keep people as prisoners?
Javelin chuckles, adjusting his footing in front of my cage. “Drugs are joy, and Black Sugar is the ultimate pleasure,” he explains. “Since Diavolo wants to keep his recipe a secret, we’ve had to take matters into our own hands. Think of it as an offshore competitor to the Devil’s Kingdom.”
Things are starting to make more sense now, but I still don’t see how I would be of any use to him. I doubt Diavolo cares enough about me to pay for my ransom, and if my sister is actually on that Island like Javelin claims her to be, then she’s been there for the past five years. What could she have been doing?
Javelin stands up. “I know this is confusing for you, Zella, but it will all be clear once we arrive. Until then, try not a knock your brains around too much again. I’d really like you to help us.”
“With what?” I ask.
“The recipe.”
“I don’t know anything about Black Sugar,” I reply.
“That’s too bad, then,” he says, “Because then we’ll have to continue testing new formulas on Olesya.”
“What are you doing to her?” I shout, jerking my hands up to grip the bars of my cage, but getting cut short by the chains that hold me down.
Javelin turns away from me, talking over his shoulder. “Experiments, Zella. We don’t use rats. Humans are more accurate.”
My heart sinks, the terrible truth frothing up like poison in my lungs. A sharp pain shoots through my chest, and I collapse on the cold floor, curling up as Javelin leaves the room. My sister, the one who I thought was dead, has had to endure Javelin’s sick experiments for years.
At this point, I can’t even blame Diavolo. I doubt he has anything to do with it, but the entire thing sickens me to the core. I want to puke until I pass out and die. I want to break free from these chains and throw myself into the ocean, but I’m trapped, heading toward the same fate as Olesya.
Tears fill my eyes, stinging them with their heat as they drip down my flushed cheeks. This is a nightmare, the worst possible outcome. When I assumed Olesya to be dead, at least I could know that she was at peace. Now, there is no peace. There’s only endless suffering.
Javelin must have used Olesya to get to me, to lure me into the Devil’s Kingdom only to be tricked and yanked out like a pawn that was finished carrying out their mission. I was used, and my thirst for revenge was taken advantage of. I’m ashamed to have ever trusted the information I got from the person who claimed to be Olesy
a.
All along, it was Javelin.
I let the tears keep flowing because I don’t know what else to do. I can’t get out of this cage, and I certainly can’t stop what Javelin is doing. He has control of the ship, and we’re going to a place he calls Pleasure Island, a twisted rip-off of the Devil’s Kingdom.
Just when I thought things couldn’t get any more fucked up, they took a turn for the worse.
I don’t see any way out of this now.
It’s over.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Diavolo
I’d like a refund for my stay on Javelin’s cargo ship. It’s cold, smells like mold, and there’s absolutely nothing to do. I didn’t pay a dime to be on board, but I’ll still take a refund, and I’ll do it with my gun.
I still find it hard to believe that Zella would join the Devil’s Kingdom just to swipe a cargo ship from under my nose. Even if she is working with her sister, I don’t see how those two could really be all that crooked as to try to take down my organization. As far as I can remember, Olesya was a loyal member until the day she disappeared.
And it’s not like she was the only one to go. Many others vanished with the original cargo ship, and not a single one of them was suspicious.
Of course, the evidence still points to Olesya since the report from the Black Diamond was about a boat named after her. That isn’t a coincidence. Olesya’s name isn’t common enough for it to be by chance.
After a long and boring day, it’s gotten too cold for me to stay in one place any longer. The crew will still be on guard since we’re not far from the port, but I have no choice but to execute my plan tonight. With any luck, I’ll be able to turn this ship around and take the necessary steps to ensure that nothing like this ever happens again.
I slide the dry magazines back into my guns, cocking them and putting bullets in the chambers of each and every one of them. I’m ready to shake things up on the hunk of metal tonight, but I’ll be using hand to hand combat as much as possible. I won’t be able to shoot everyone, and I’m certain the crew will be armed.