It was a weekly occurrence: The black town car driving down one of the most improvised of neighborhoods in the inner-city, past the masses of homeless camped out on the street with nowhere else to go. The poverty stricken apartments above were not any better. This was a perfect neighborhood to hide, or if you wanted to conceal someone as a sex slave.
For Second Hand, that was his business: The art of the slavery. For him, it was a one-half psychopath, diagnosed by his court-appointed psychologist when he was just an angry teen in the child services system, the other half was 'out of sight, out of mind'. As he exited out of his town car in the bum infested alley, he kept one hand on his concealed gun and the other reaching for the side door to a vacant looking apartment unit. He was not worried that the city police was after his boss or him at an extent; it was more of the rival groups looking to use the opportunity to take some of Pete's turf. What better way to do that was to take down his top lieutenant. He entered the run down hallway and towards the flickering light. He knew the routine, as he done so many times before.
"'s'cuse me sir, have any cash to spare?" the old man asked, next to the locked elevator.
Second Hand gave the man a large wad of cash, totaling over a thousand dollars. The old man casually took the money and stuffed it into his pocket, while handing Second Hand a key.
"I think you dropped this."
Second grabbed the key and unlocked the cage that was blocking the shabby elevator. Second Hand tossed the key to the old man and pressed the only lit button on the panel, sending him upwards with a jolt. The ride to the top only took a few moments, but he couldn't help but notice the bugs, roaches, and rats that were along the walls of the elevator shaft, one of the roaches falling off next to him, meeting a fitting end under Second Hand's right dress shoe.
The elevator took an abrupt stop to its destination which was in front of another deplorable hallway. He left the elevator and entered the only door at the end of the very short hallway, which was only a few steps long. He walked in and was met with the strong aroma of roses, the inside was painted a rosy white with a white trim. The seats, reception desk, and trim were all imported wood. The middle age woman recognized him the second he walked in.
"Hello, 5846, we have a surprise for you."
"Oh?"
"We have a new domestic girl, uno-cinco, CHEERY, room five."
"You know me too well," He said as he handed her his coat.
His walk down the hall was filled with the muffled sounds of other girls 'servicing' their clients. He knew each service was more money to him and Pete, so it helped drowned the realization he was ruining lives with each new girl that was brought in, either by kidnapping in this country, or buying them cheap off rebel and government alike in war-torn areas of the world.
The room he entered was lavender themed. Lavender bed decor, purple room color. The windows overlooking the city was tinted heavily so one can look on to the city while not being seen from the outside. What wasn't lavender was the girl in the room; She was sitting cross-legged, her back to the door. She had a white and red cheerleader uniform, which complemented her curly crimson and white hair.
It was better to see her like that, walking in with her in tears would not end well, especially for the one little spot in his mind that still had a conscious.
He took off his holster, his straps, and then the shirt, exposing his chest. Usually for him, he would keep the pants on during the act, mostly out of necessity in case the police came knocking.
Still, until then: there was breaking in this new girl.
He crawled behind her and began to massage her shoulders. He could hear the deep breathing of her, the whisper of "more" between breaths
Second Hand was elated, a girl who was into that. Those where the type of girls that stayed alive and did not end up butchered alongside a ditch. He reached in, trying to give a tender kiss to her young, soft neck.
He stopped, his heart was racing over a thousand beats per minute. It wasn't euphoria, but fear
He was staring down the barrel of a revolver.
She turned around, long enough to look deep into her beautiful opal eyes. He had his hands up, staring at the 'panic button' only a few feet away next to the door. She reached into the chest holster, hung on top of his shirt, and pulled out his sleek, silenced pistol.
How cute, I bet she doesn't even know the safety is on-
The girl moved her trigger finger forward, unlocking the safety for the gun.
Fuck.
"Go ahead and press it, I disabled it before you arrived," The young woman commented.
"What do you want? Money? Freedom?"
"Pedo Pete, where is he,"
"I don't-"
She took a shot with his silencer; the bullet going right through his foot.
"FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!" He screamed, collapsing on the floor in pain.
"Next shot is going through your knee."
"Don't shoot, I don't know where he is, but if-"
She took another shot, shattering his knee on the opposite leg.
"FUCK! "
"Next one is going through your dick! Where the fuck is Pedo fucking Pete!"
"I KNOW WHERE YOU CAN FIND SOMEONE WHO WOULD KNOW WHERE HE IS!"
"Talk."
"There's a shipment of merchandise coming in tonight by boat, Warehouse 346. He might even be there since he likes the girls from south of the border. Just please don't shoot my dick."
"I should anyway, you're not gonna use it in a while.."
Second Hand was about to inquire more, but was interrupted by the multitude of sirens getting closer.
"I guess that's for you and everyone in this place. I might have phoned ahead. I was getting bored."
Outside, the screams of the men in the establishment were echoing through the floor level. They knew it was for them. And they only had mere seconds to get out.
Second Hand tried to get up and run, but he collapsed, both legs incapacitated.
"Well, catch you later, fucker."
"There's no way out of here, how the hell you-"
He turned around to see that the girl was gone as if she vanished into thin air.
"Wha?"
Before he had a chance to process what happened, the door exploded outward, and three heavily armed men entered, rifles pointed at the man.
They radioed in that he was shot, and that he had a resemblance to one of Risky Line's top lieutenants.
Second-Hand didn't care at that point, he was concerned about the girl, and where did she go.
***
The girl reappeared in a flash of opal on top of the roof. Below her was the red and blue flashing lights of the police. She wasted no time running between the roofs, in the direction of the port. As soon as she was out of the visual view of the police, her cheerleader uniform melted away, as well as the white streaks. The clothes melted into the black cargo pants and black turtleneck, her processor returned to its brilliant yellow.
Failed mission. We need to return home.
"What? No. We have to free those girls, no matter if Pete is there or not!"
Freeing the girls is not the primary objective.
"I'm making it now!"
Why? They are not important.
Sunset nearly tore the program a new one, but she knew better. "Right, not a program, no sense in humanity. GLADIS, freeing the girls is my secondary objective. The secondary objective is now active."
Understood, coordinates now uploaded on your hub.
A few hours earlier, Sunset received yet another piece of tech: Contact huds. Instead of fighting with a thousand dollar pair of glasses, she had the hud display a bit sturdier. She had it on, and it was telling her where to go, which she obliged. Sunset leaped one last time, disappearing into an orb of fire. When she left the sphere, she returned to her sh-demon state, and with a few flaps of her wings, flew into the night, in the direction of the port.
* * *
The demon disappeared in an orb of fire, and out came a petite, feminine figure in black clothing.
She slipped into the warehouse through one of the open sunroofs, and hid in the metal rafters that supported the roof of the warehouse. Underneath her was the operation: the armored guards standing around. The men with cattle prods were waiting to get the girls moving, with the electrified prod if need be. In the middle of the room was five windowless vans, ready to take the girls wherever they chose to send them. In front of the vans was a man sitting on a rolling desk. His laptop out and ready to begin processing the girls.
They arrived in a big shipping container, straight from the country of "El Trote". One of the cattle prod guys opened up the massive shipping crate, and he waved his hand around as if he was trying to clear his nose of the stench. Out came a parade of dirty, tattered girls of all ages. From eight to sixteen, all of them in tattered clothes, all of them covered in filth.
All sunset could have felt at that moment was rage.
She transformed back to her she demon form and went to work. She waited until one of the guards were not being watched. As soon as everyone had their attention elsewhere, she would quickly drop behind a guard, cover his mouth, wrap her wings around him and teleport up, the guard never to be seen by the rest of the group. She would wrap the armed guard with a rope around his waist, including his hand, tape his mouth, and let him hang from the catwalk. The fear a guard would have just hanging off the deadly drop to the concrete below was enough to keep him silent. She would complete the process until they were all missing. The processor soon began to complain that the guards were slacking off again.
The lead guard left the warehouse, expecting to see his men slacking off or having their way with one of the girls that tried to escape, as they usually did.
Instead, he was greeted by a flying beast snatching him off of the ground like a bird of prey.
By the time she was done. The processing was about to begin, the first girl: a darker, more defiant 15-year-old looking girl, was getting ready to be dragged to the processor
Better now than never.
* * *
The girl was defiant, resisting her captors and the processor. Her resistance was rewarded with a hit from the prod sending her collapsing in the floor in a yelp of pain.
The scene ended when the six foot beast landed between the girl and the processor's table. The guards jumped back, the girls ran back into the container in fear, even if the stench was unbearable. The first girl moved back, her captor more mesmerized by the creature than his job. The She-Demon smashed the table and smacked the tailored suited processor away, landing against the metallic wall.
The other guards rushed the monster, hitting them with the electric prods, which only angered the beast. She smacked them away as well, sending them flying. Some were knocked out, some got up to continue the fight. One of the guys ran up one of the vans and leaped, hoping to hit the creature in the face with the prod, and was rewarded with a backhand from Sunset, sending him flying into another van.
It was over as soon as it started, or so the demon thought. She turned around to see the processor with his pistol raised at the beast. He got a shot off, but the demon invoked her ever-trusty flame shield. The once solid bullet ended up as a molten pile of metal on the floor. The processor was in shock. Shaking in fear from the mere presence of the tall demonic looking woman. She walked over to the laptop and pulled out the hard drive of the laptop, and walked to the container, where the girls were hiding.
They were no longer scared of the entity, but curious.
"Are you okay?" Sunset asked the girls, knowing that it was futile due to the language barrier.
"we are scared. But we fine," the defiant girl answered, in broken English.
"You speak English?"
"My father taught me. He governor of state of Veracruz… cartel kill him and mom and took me here." the girl said in tears.
Sunset felt her heart churn in pain. The girl was almost her age. She had friends, family, maybe even a crush, just like her. That all changed and now she was in filth in a country she never set foot in, almost sentenced to live a life of slavery.
As predicted, the sirens were heard. This time, they were a little faster, and there was no way she can fly off without being seen by then, so there was no point leaving in a hurry.
"The chief of police here is a good guy, he will help you out, I will make sure."
"Gracias. And here…"
The defiant one walked up to the creature and handed her a Catholic rosary. It was a cross, with clear and white beads. Above the cross was a small silver plate that was engraved with the face of a woman
"While you fight, everyone think you 'Guerra de la Magdalena Santo" she said, as the girls smiled.
Sunset began to choke up and wanted to assure all of them that everything was going to be okay.
"HANDS UP!" screamed the men in body armor, pinning down the guards on the ground, and looking up at the rest of the guards hanging off the ropes, all of them relieved to see the police for the first time in their lives.
The policemen didn't get close to the she-demon, only aimed their rifles in amazement. Everyone in the police force thought that the she-demon was a fake urban legend, they now were face to face with it.
Looks like the party is over, coordinates to home are updated.
Sunset did not give the police any time to apprehend her. She flew off into the night, a hard drive in one hand, a rosary in the other.
What's with the hard drive? It's like watching someone carry the brain of your species. It is not a good feeling.
"Dropping this off to my dad. He needs to save all the girls under Pedo Pete."
And the beads? My translation has it down as them calling you "Warrior of Saint Magdalena, the patron saint of the plight of women."
Sunset pondered that question for a while. Why did she carry them? Why was it her duty to protect the girls, when the police could have done it, even if they had no idea it was happening? Why was it on her to save the world? She was no hero, she was just a former magical talking pony that left home! It was a tough question, and GLADIS was waiting for an answer.
"I guess I have to remind myself that I have a purpose in fighting. That is better than doing this without rhyme or reason."