She had often seen dazed pretty women wandering there, and figured that if any of them were willing to spend some of their hard-earned cash for some short-lived relief, it would be them. Failing that, she’d try to get along with them, trade the Bliss for some short-term company, and she’d be able to have some long overdue fun denied her.
In the far-off distance around a corner, she noticed a comigration of women being led into a side entrance. When the door shut, she made her way closer, and rapidly knocked on the door. The doorframe opened, and an intimidating man peered out with narrow scrutiny.
“I’m the escort service you hired.”
“Who sent you?”
“You know... the usual company you guys normally hire.”
The man twisted the Girl’s arm behind her and pushed her to the ground and repeated the question.
“Nobody sent me! I came by myself!”
“We’ve got a live one here.”
“She alone?”
The other man looked around. “Don’t see anyone.”
“Put her with the others.”
She was rudely escorted through a darkened hallway down several stairs, and was shocked to see a holding pen filled with multiple mature and underage girls in various states of undress cooped up together looking extremely uncomfortable. They looked at the Girl with some curiosity before bombarding her with questions.
“Which organization are you with?”
“What?”
“Who are you affiliated with?”
“I’m independent.”
“Nonsense. Not without joining up, you don’t.”
“She must be. No one would think of going out otherwise.”
“Didn’t even bother to pretty herself up.”
“All she did was make herself awful stinky.”
“Unless her Clients are into that kind of thing.”
“I must be getting old”, said a Hostess who looked too young for this kind of business. “I can’t keep up with all these kinks.”
“How old are you, anyways?”
“Old enough for my feet to touch the ground.”
This barrage of questioning was silenced by one of the women who managed to do so with quiet authority. Here, in the lowest of low places, she seemed to have high status even though she had a swollen face.
“Dhis ih no playsh pohr de likhs ohf yew.”
The Swollen Woman spoke with a throaty accent, and the Girl wondered what region she came from until she noticed - she had no teeth.
“Ehnnywaysh, yew soodn’t go ouht wehn yewhr ehpecting.”
The Girl self-consciously covered her lower half. “How did you know?”
“Ah kin tehhl. Ah kin uhhlwhys tehhl.” She leaned in closer. “Ahn yewher shtill ihntahct. Dat muhsh'f takhen sohme dewing.”
The Girl didn’t see what the big deal was all about. “I just wanted to have a good time.”
“That’s how we all come here.”, a jaded-looking woman said. “We all wanted to have a good time, but it turns out that there’s such a thing as too much of a good thing.”
“It used to be just stuffing things up our noses”, the Young Woman said to no one in particular. “Grinding armpits against phallic objects in a lewd manner. Sticking things in our bellybuttons and ears.”
“No one wants to hear your work history.” The Numb Woman continued. “I’ve already lost all sense of sensation. There’s no joy in it. You just do the routines day in, day out. What was once innovative has now become a bore. We have become irrelevant in the best sense of the world. Now there’s all kinds of species out there vying for attention that can’t even be bothered with us.”
“Well, maybe some of those species are worth pursuing!” the Girl countered.
“Personally, I don’t see the appeal in... wait. You didn’t happen to lie down with one of them, did you?”
“What’s it to you?” she cautiously guarded.
“You HAVE!” she remarked in a combination of fascination and disgust. “What was it like?”
“Well, I’m not one to kiss and tell, but it could’ve gone better.”
“From what I hear, it could’ve gone a lot Worse. You’re lucky to be alive.”
“Am I? Am I really?” Ever since she treated herself in that sleazy place, her life had been nothing but a nonstop series of escalating events. Some birthday present! The Girl was about to vent her frustrations, but the Young Woman got there first.
“It used to be you could use the most basic things to excite clients. Fruit. Vegetables. Rocks. Big rocks, small rocks, sand rocks. Now, even zero-gravity doesn’t do it anymore.”
“How old ARE you?”
“Old enough for my feet to touch the ground.”
The Young Woman’s repetitive answers had a sordid history behind them. Back then, women wore lifts to elevate their height. Then, flats came back in, then high heels again. The fashions kept changing with the styles of the time, depending on what constituted for beauty, resulting in flagrant self-mutilation to appear acceptable. Sometimes, this could be taken to absurd lengths. In one such instance, the women would have their ankles operated on, replacing them with arched tendons giving the illusion of tiny feet. Over time, they shrunk, becoming smaller and smaller, tapering down to pointy stubs, ultimately culminating into no feet at all.
Hence, ‘Old enough for my feet to touch the ground’ meant she had seen tastes change on a continuous basis to the point where she no longer held illusions about reality. It also meant that the person in question no longer needed to sit on the baby chair, having ‘grown up’ enough to sit at the adult table.
Despite this, the Girl wasn’t willing to concede. “I’m jealous. You guys have seen more action than I have!”
“It’s not as glamourous as you think. Most of my clients are more interested in talking than anything.”
“They are??”
“Yup. And even then, there are still some kinks to work out first. One such guy wouldn’t start until I took a bite from a jellyfish sandwich, squirting jelly all over my toes. Only then would he start to talk. And talk and talk and talk. And I’d wake up in the morning with a headache! All because of a jellyfish sandwich.”
“Number #860.921s!”
The Numb Woman gawked in amazement at the Young Woman’s categorical outburst. “What surprises me is that I can still be surprised. I thought I was the only one!”
“There are only so many ways we can do the same old actions.”
“Dhash noh hexcush. Hwe haf tuh prufide sherfices dhat khan’t bhe faowhn ehnywehr helf.”
“We’ve got creatures that can gaze right into your very Soul. Compared to the ONEs, how can we possibly compete?”
“Ih ish deh deshire hof hefry liffing tihng tuh be duminashed buh beyingsh shuperiuh tuh dehm.”
The Girl had doubts about that. The Tentacled One she encountered wasn’t that impressive, both in looks and deed. She barely remembered anything that happened that night. Even in her wildest imaginations, it never went further than clumsy foreplay. She wanted something more aggressive!
The Swollen Woman turned her attention back to the Girl. “Hyu shuldh goh beck tuh wehr yew khame frum. Hwe haf ehnuff cuhmpehtition ahn ahr awn whihaut cohmplesh ahmaturs likh yew schrewing tihngs hawp.”
Just then, the gate opened, and one of the men looked at everyone present. On cue, the Swollen Women brought out some false teeth bent at a 45 degree angle down the middle, and shoved them in her mouth, revealing a dazzling smile. After that, she spoke no further.
“Take them in for re-education.”
All the women were lined up and shoved outside. After a short distance, they were ferried into a vehicle, its destination unknown. The Girl was having trouble moving, her body steadfastly refusing to go any further. She didn’t mean to slow everyone down, but her legs wouldn’t budge. To keep the queue moving, her arms were lifted up, and she was sleepily going along the rest of them until another man intervened.
“Not this one. The Living Martyr wants to speak to her.”
The group upon exiting all looked at the Girl with jealousy and loathing, and even the Swollen Woman couldn’t hide her revulsion behind her brilliant smile. What gave this... GIRL the right to see the Martyr that the rest of them didn’t have?
Even the Girl didn’t know herself. Apart from her smell, there wasn’t anything particularly remarkable about her. She looked back at the loaded vehicle with a pained look on her face. She couldn’t even take any satisfaction from being singled out. In any other situation, she’d take pride, but not this time.
Without meaning to, she still wound up finding Religion, whether she wanted it or not.
She was led down a number of winding corridors until she entered a room that looked just as unremarkable as all the rest, with one notable exception. She was now in the presence of the Living Martyr, a dignified hooded figure that radiated force, even without the expanding self-contained explosion around his belly.
The Girl decided to play the charm offensive, cozying up to this Religious icon. Sure, there was the risk of being torn to shreds by the Martyr’s 'condition', but that was a small price to pay for...
But upon seeing the face of the Living Martyr, all preconceptions she had beforehand dissolved away. For underneath the hooded figure was a woman.
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