None of the girls had actually known each other beforehand, but they did share one language, which was broken English. The fragmented city they found themselves walking into looked as though at one time had been teeming with life and as if it were once a bustling little place. The dirt and stone roads seemed to go on for miles, and each person who had traveled by bus there had interesting backgrounds. Aside from English as a shared and mostly secondary location, they had all visited the same school with plans for beginning the technical college there, where Ariel had planned to go. They had also been confronted by that nice couple and counseled to take a two-week vacation to explore Europe and its eastern countryside. After walking for a while down the road they saw a hotel that was actually somewhat kept up. Outside of it, there was a helicopter pad and some areas for vehicle parking.
The sign on the outside wall of the Hotel noted that there was a complimentary breakfast each morning for hotel occupants, so Ariel and the other twelve girls entered the hotel to look around and see if they could share a room for the night. Everything actually seemed pretty lovely. The rooms were clean, the linens were washed, and just one hotel room seemed spacious enough for all of the girls. There were extra linens provided for turning into some sort of sleeping bag. The girls drew straws and the seven with the short straws would sleep on the ground. They were satisfied with their patrol through the first floor of the hotel and decided to finally check in. After checking in, courtesy of one of the girls who had come in from a more well-to-do part of society, they settled in for the night. They took turns using the shower. Ariel took hers last, washing her medium length blonde hair, her hidden areas, and her healthy and physically attractive frame. After drying up, getting into her PJs, she and the other girls chatted until they fell into a deep sleep, and knew their famished tummies would be satisfied with the complimentary breakfast in the morning. Their grumbling stomachs would insist upon it. But for now, the tiring walk earned them some sleep. They also knew this location must have been a mistake, so they had to rest up, and eat up; they would get back in the morning.
It all seemed a little too quiet in that room, so much so that they could hear music playing in the distance as if there were a party going on. It was the sound of muffled shrieks, followed by what sounded like a gunshot and ominous silence that caused them all to be alert, no matter how tired they were.
“Did you hear what I think I heard?” asked the rich girl, who had paid for the room. She sat up in the bed, looking in the dark toward the other girls, with her pristine blonde hair pulled back and wearing her princess cut sleeping dress.
“I heard it too,” said each of the girls, and one by one they began to huddle as the sounds became eerier. Two king beds held seven girls on one and six girls on the other. With the night light on, Ariel could see that she was sitting between the rich girl to her right on the bed closest to the far wall from the entryway, another very beautiful girl with red hair to her left, with three more girls on their bed huddled up. The next king bed had the other seven girls, huddled closely as well. Interestingly, they were all very darling and somewhat young girls.
“I want to get out of here,” said the youngest, with dark brunette hair and pale skin, in a very innocent voice. “What should we do?”
Ariel then spoke up, “I think we should keep quiet and let the morning ride through. See the bars in the windows? We can’t get out using those. Also note, the bus dropped us off in the boonies and there were no actual bus stops there if you recall. Right after breakfast, let’s check-out, and then we can look for a cell tower. Does anyone have a cell phone?”
“I do, said the rich girl next to her,” she pulled it out of her nightgown pocket and turned it on, but there was no connectivity.
“Yeah, that won’t do. Ugh, right now we are in the safest place we can be, but we’ll need to leave first thing after breakfast.” Ariel was pretty sure she was right. If they were too loud or if they tried to leave now, they would be heard by those responsible for the creepy vibes that emanated from the same building and not too far away. They would also have no place that was warm enough to stay that was away from whatever thugs or wild animals that might find them to be a treat during the night.
Right then, one of the seven girls on the second king bed got up, ran to the door, and screamed. She had begun losing her mind increasingly, since the eerie walk through the forested woods, the stone and dirt roads as every moment went by, and somehow screaming was her only learned safety mechanism. No one else in the room could blame her. She was young, naïve, and fragile. Ariel looked around at everyone else, climbed over the footboard of the bed, and made a dash to comfort the scared little girl.
Sharon was an olive-skinned girl with dark and slightly frizzy piggy tails and couldn’t have been too much older than 13. What in the world would have suggested to her parents that traveling alone was a good idea? But, then again, Ariel was only fourteen, but she’d finished high school early. She finally managed to get her to stop screaming and to return with her to the room.
Unfortunately, it was too late. The screams obviously alerted whoever it was that was responsible for the business going on in the distance. Whoever it was, knew that they were there and quite possibly had heard everything.
After the situation seemed to calm down, the girls could hear the muffled bass-filled chatter of men coming down the hall. Fully alert, Ariel looked to the rich girl, and then the other girls, and said, “We need to get out of here, and now.”
It was too late. They were surrounded by what seemed a sardonic cult of men.
Four years later, they were still there, but had contrary to their will found a different place to lay their heads during the night. This place, in particular, smelt of offal; the pillars of this location where the stones had scattered about the room was evidence that more pillars had once existed but had been broken apart by something grave, so they used the stones left behind as pillows, and the only warmth was the warm body next to them. Each and every girl with Ariel had that night and many nights from then on endured brutality that was unexplainable and unconscionable. All of her sisters, as she called them, the twelve that had arrived with her, along with a few others who wandered into the same trap, some of whom had died, and quite a few more who had lived in much the same way yet still were among the living, were much like they, and they too wound up several floors below the room they had paid for in full, on their first night.
Death was more than a threat, and, in some ways, it became more of the only hope for a sweet release from the torment and anguish existent in the lives they had known. Ariel had witnessed as her tormentors made their points in front of herself and her sisters all too often, with a gun to their head and a trigger pulled, and the life of a once vibrant young girl gone. The savage beatings of a club, the severing of limbs, or new scars carved by the sharp edge of a knife, and then the brutal reality that would unfold, became the deep scars in the minds and hearts of these young girls. Too many times for anyone, these young beautiful women witnessed as those with no mercy, among some with eyes of those who still possessed some humanity until they too did nothing and lost their genteel nature, caused wounds so fierce that the light of life left the eyes of yet another potential friend in less austere circumstances, and only her spirit escaped them. Gone was another young lady, who would finally escape this torturous hell from which there was no reward, yet whose injustice was no part of their own.
A numbness of it all had begun to set in week after a week, and in such a brutal way that she too couldn’t wait until the day they were done with her. Every time no matter who was there, the torture was ruthless, and the merciless laughter of those enjoying the show before them was a mockery of their very existence. The morbid husks of men and sometimes women witnessing and doing nothing about the inhumanity existent before them as these girls screamed in pain was a dismal reality of the lack of honor existent in or even a fiber of respect from one human to another simply based on fate alone. Brutalit
y continued, yet nothing was done to stop this barbarity against the young and innocent human beings. It was as if this were the place that devils’ demons got to play with and torture God’s little angels, and then get away with it.
On occasion, there had been a tender soul who had attempted to show mercy, but if he or she were ever discovered, he or she was killed and so was the girl they were trying to help. Again, brutal points were made by some of the vilest, most malicious and uncaring of individuals—people who had lost all inflection of humanity for the very cause of sacred edict and delusional rituals, personal pleasure and the power that overindulgent wealth alone could bring over the lives of others. It didn’t matter to these sociopaths, these evil psychopaths, these thieves of virtue and these bullies of nature un-swayed, what transpired against their young and innocent victims, because without much wait after the consequences of their actions the dead girl or the tool for their ill-gotten gains would be thrown away or replaced by another victim of the massive human trafficking operations rampant worldwide.
Ariel had learned early on that these vile monsters, as the girls called them, when they were far from earshot, would try to figure out each of the girl’s ages and determine their life expectancy based on what they had managed to extract from the girls in the dark and painful chambers, along with their obedience during their sorrowful existence. There was a repugnant purpose in this because they would get girls who were showing signs of puberty, and when they reached the age of eighteen, they would disappear for good. The party music of the twisted souls who were brought in by helicopter or wheeled in by limousine, the muffled screams, and the “bang! Bang!” would follow by the absence of the girl who’d inherited the title of “longest stayed.”
To protect her twelve friends, right when she figured this out, she claimed she was the oldest of the girls. “I’m fourteen, and the other girls just turned twelve.” For once they seemed to listen. The rich girl, who was her age, almost died from a gut wound two years after they arrived. However, because Ariel had known first aid, had caught it at the right time, and due to a side study by way of her interest in biology and biotechnology, she had saved her life. She had looked at the wound and knew to take a moist cloth, lay her on her back with her knees up to keep the pressure off her abdomen, and continued to keep that area moist and clean until sewn shut and the wound healed. While the monsters were as vile as anything else, objectifying these girls through vicious rancor, Ariel managed often to find their humanity, convincing them that they still had to maintain their cash crop, and as a result had thus provided limited antibiotics, pain-numbing agents, and bandages, so Ariel used those as well as her wit to save the girl’s life.
Just as the girls, older than her, had been killed in front of the other girls on many occasions, mostly to demonstrate the futility of hope, tonight was her night. Tonight was her eighteenth birthday, it was 2022, and it would certainly end with an indulgent party and a bang. The important people and their coming of age sons would be there tonight, to dabble in the debauchery, mutilation, torture, and murder of Ariel. If she died tonight, her sisters had one more year of hell on Earth before she would hopefully see them again, perhaps in a better place.
“It’s my time. I love each of you. We’ve endured so much, but somehow, we’ve all made it this far. Look after our newer and younger sisters, you know first aid well—stop the bleeding, remain calm, small sips of water, and eat in small amounts until healed. They cycle through us each week, but tonight is my birthday, so when you hear my screams, cover your ears. When you hear the gunshot, please cover your ears, and you’ll know this hell is done for me. One last hug?” They all tried to avoid sobbing, took turns hugging Ariel, and then the door opened.
A big and burly bearded man waved his bat and then pointed it toward Ariel, “today is your lucky day, birthday girl! You’re coming with me. It’ll all be over soon. If you try to fight, two of those girls next to you will die.” Ariel slowly walked to the monster, put her hands out, he bound her arms and legs, gagged her mouth, and forcefully drug her away. She bore the pain as though her weight and friction were dragged upon a thick sheet of sandpaper that tore at her flesh and she could feel each of the stones through the burlap sack covering her face as the floor ground into her flesh. She tolerated it all, in part because it would all be over soon, in part because shock had settled in from all of the pain, and in part because she did not want any of the other girls to be punished because of her own actions.
She felt the abrasions in her knees as they lifted her body to the table and she heard the cutlery rattling and clambering with its serrated stainless-steel edges bumping against each other as a cart was rolled in. Her heart was pulsating. She knew it would hurt, but after some unbridled and then muffled screams, a boom would go off and for her, this misery, this suffering, and this hell made from the minds of those, those who could have been kind rather than ruthless, those who could have cared rather than lust after brutality, those evil monsters from hell would see to it soon that all of this, all of it would be over. The death metal music playing for the benefit of her torturers and paying onlookers began to fade to quiet, she felt her clothes being torn from her body, and she heard the eerie death metal music beginning again and climbing to a crescendo, as the cheers of the crowd suggested their approval of the oncoming pain and horror she would soon endure. The clank of the blades followed by the taunting, the unwarranted fondling, grew more unbearable.
Just as the cold metal touched her stomach with the unforgiving serrated edge facing upwards, she began to feel the urge to scream. The blades started their path up to tear through the ample flesh on her chest, when all of a sudden, she heard one of the monsters of men nearby yell, “Oh my God, What the hell!?”
Whatever light was coming through the blindfold on her eyes went out. And then she blacked out completely.
Coming to, shortly after, she felt every nerve, every synapse, and every sensory system in her body almost convulse, and then she felt a nirvana she had never felt before. Slowly, a light began to fade in and finally, it returned, as she realized she was standing in a beautiful garden with a statue of an angel looking over a waterfall feeding a pond of coy fish and frogs. She looked at the terrain around her and began to understand things she had never understood before. “Am I dead?” she asked herself.
She saw a rainbow of light reflecting off a maple tree not too far away and being sure that the light was emanating from behind her, she turned around and saw an iridescent angel, glowing in a white and beautiful arrangement of rainbow colors. Her white, long, and beautifully braided hair with iridescent highlights, her crystalline blue eyes, a tear down her left cheek, and a gentle yet sad and voluptuous smile took all of the pain she knew she would endure only moments before and caused it to melt away. She then looked toward Ariel and spoke. “You and your sisters are all safe now. The pain and unforgivable insanity unleashed upon such a fair maiden with such a beautiful mind should never have happened to you or anyone. Ariel, you’ve protected those girls for a long time, and I am so sorry for every bit of torture each of you has endured. I have been to many places, all of which were places where hope seemed to be gone forever, but a place such as this wrought with little purpose but suffering within should never be. Come with me, you should never have to suffer again, let me show you a better way of life. Gather your sisters. They too are with you here, next to the pond behind you and let’s go on a little journey.”
Filled with questions, Ariel and her sisters put them on pause and followed this exquisitely beautiful angel, and she wondered why she went from terror to bliss so soon.
The angel took her, and then what seemed as sisters to the angel, took her sisters by the hand to the edge of the solar system where right before their eyes lay an array of beautiful tech cities, each with a dazzling view of Pluto, Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, Jupiter, Ceres, Mars, Earth, Venus, Mercury, and the beautiful Sun. Somehow her vision had granted Ariel the ability to see each of them as thou
gh they were close enough for coloration and planetary detail. As she focused more, she saw great big shields situated around each planet to protect them. She then focused more and saw each planetary surface adjust and change until each one had an atmosphere, like that of Earth, teaming with mountains, rivers, streams, lakes, and oceans. She saw the beauty of the shared ecosystem and environment working in concert with magnificent and regal cities—so much art, so much purpose, and an incredible sense of peace.
“One of these places can be your home, but there is work that needs to be done on Earth before you begin your work here. Please go with these girls and see that they return to their homes. Please also pursue your education and I will see you again, soon. You and these beautiful, yet unfortunate, girls have been healed and optimized both physiologically and neurologically in every possible way. I have looked into each of your hearts and minds, and you will have a neural link that will allow each of you to communicate, share ideas, truly understand each other and much more. Please help each other to train, control, and use your new-found abilities.
“I and my daughters must leave, but I will leave you with the history of Pathway and life from the viewpoint of Eliza Amber Williams.
“Even the perpetrators have been healed in both ways, however, there has been a quickening of their minds to understand the pain and suffering they have caused, they will experience everything you each have experienced from your perspective, and they will gain an elevation of compassion and eloquence the likes of which they never knew before, and I will leave with them my mark, a tattoo of an iridescent scorpion on their right buttock cheek which serves as a marker. They will be healed, they will now be honorable, and they will help you. Once they have been duly judged they will go through what is called the Correctional Matrix, wherein they will be thrust into many centuries’ worth of experiences, wisdom, and given a cause to increase their kindness and notion of consent. For now, when you awaken, they will use every resource available to help you help your sisters return home and recover from all that was lost throughout the years.
Further than Before- Pathway to the Stars Page 83