One in Ten Ch. 04

As I entered the channel into the structure, I was bombarded with every ray and particle of the electromagnetic spectrum to confirm the most insidious thing on me were the crowns on two of my teeth. I had swallowed the pills in my mouth right before entering. See, if you took too many anti-nausea pills at one time, it made you vomit.

I was counting on that, but the clock was now ticking before this overdose kicked in. I had to throw up in the narrow window between being fed my aphrodisiacs and the time it took them to dissolve in my stomach and get into my bloodstream. The only weapon I had was my wits and I wasn't going to surrender that without a fight.

"Hold up!" a male voice called out before the doors shut. One of my two minders hit the 'door open' button and a well-tailored man with frosted blonde hair slid in gracefully. I've been told I'm good looking by a fair number of women, but this guy was freaking gorgeous. On second glance, I realized he wasn't handsome, he was pretty - sculpted so.

"Hi, I'm Gil," he offered his manicured and pampered hand. I looked and gave a weary smile, but did not shake his hand.

"I'm Israel," I replied.

"I know," he smiled with his perfect teeth. "I've seen you on TV. You are weird."

"Thanks," I shrugged.

"It wasn't really a compliment, Israel," he smirked.

"I'll get over it," I shook my head. "You come to these often?"

"All the time," he gleamed knowingly. "I often get special requests."

"Nice," I said non-committedly. "Where do you work?"

"Parks and Recreations," he grinned.

"Live near here?" I persisted. Hell, the legitimate head of P&R couldn't live in this neighborhood.

"Yep; five blocks down. Drove my car here too," Gil bragged. He drove his car - five blocks.

"Nice ear rings," I pointed out. Diamond studs.

"Yes. They were a gift," he touched them fondly. I wondered how many facials that cost him.

"Nose stud?" I looked him over. He nodded.

"I see you have a piercing for a nose ring," I continued. "Going to put it in later?"

"Yes," he responded with far less enthusiasm.

"Prince Albert? Cock stud?" I inquired. "Does the cock ring go on later too?"

"What are you getting at?" Gil was becoming decidedly less friendly.

"You have more cock-jewelry than a pole dancer, you have your face cut to look like a much younger boy yet you're in - what - your late twenties/early thirties?" I continued. "You wear the crumbs off their tables like freaking prize possessions and you dare call yourself a man. I'm sure Washington, Hathcock, Gordon and Shugart would be proud."

I was pretty sure Gil barely had a clue who the first man was. He was at a total loss as to who the other three were. They hadn't even been famous in their time. Those three did share two things though; they were all very dead and all had adopted peculiar vocation for dealing with their enemies.

"It is your first time," Gil countered vindictively. "You'll learn."

"No, I won't. Ask anyone who knows me knows - I refuse to learn anything," I snarled. "I do know this; in a few weeks, maybe a year or two, you are going to tumble down. Women farther down the hierarchy who settle for cast-offs and hand-me-downs will take you in for a short while."

"Then you will tumble again, farther and farther down until you find a middle class women who doesn't mind that you are a washed up whore. Because, you will always be a whore," I glared at him. Gil pushed me and I stumbled back. My minders did nothing. Gill assumed something that might have been a fighting stance.

"I've been trained to defend myself, Jerk," he smirked. He had instruction alright, but I doubted it was really effective. His female trainer would be far more interested in pumping up his testosterone levels than any actual training.

"You are a dancer, not a fighter, Numb-nuts," I snapped back.

I whipped out my belt, folded it in two and got ready to wail into the bastard, but when I hauled back for the first swing, one of my female minders reached out and grabbed my forearm.

"Oh, now you show some initiative," I bitterly remarked.

"Not the face," she instructed. I nodded then kicked Gil in the nuts.

Whomever had taught Gil how to fight had failed to drill in any combative reflexes. I was on the mark. Gil's eyes bugged out, he whimpered then toppled over like a rotten tree in the forest. I was slammed into the elevator wall by my first minder.

"You said nothing about the balls!" I screamed, trying to stave off the beating I felt coming my way.

"Kick his ass," Gil rasped through the pain from the carpeted floor of the lift.

"We don't work for you," my second minder mocked Gil as she yanked him back to a standing position.

"If I let you go, are you going to stop acting stupid?" minder one asked.

There were no words I would dare let out of my mouth considering the multiple poor choices I'd been making so I nodded instead. She let me up. She pointed to the belt I'd dropped when she slammed me. I knelt down, picked it up and offered it to her. She shook her head so I stood and put it back on.

Gil looked at me with hate-filled eyes. There was something else there too. He'd convinced himself that selling his body made him part of the powerful women's little club. He had just learned he was little more than a hood ornament on last year's model. He wasn't even a person in their servant's eyes. My return stare told Gil I was laughing at him on the inside.

My options were either derision or pity, and I was all out of pity for parasites like Gil. He was the stereotype that women accessed whenever they wanted to reduce male humanity to trophies in their minds. Men would give up our sexual beings for trinkets. Once the sperm left our bodies, we ceased caring what happened. We were all off to the next bauble.

To that way of thinking, male whores were the 'honest' ones. The rest of the male population simply hid it better, or refused to admit what we were really all about. Men like Gil made it that much harder for the majority of males who were nothing like him. Worse, Gil's lifestyle rarely worked out well in the end. He wasn't even helping himself.

Gil wobbled out of the elevator first. My minders had to push me, I was so scared. I would have administered cunnilingus on both of them if I thought that would let me take the elevator back down. A woman in a tuxedo waiting close by. She let Gil pass but approached me.

"Mr. Jensen," she smiled pleasantly. "Please come this way and welcome to the party."

"I'm Tia and I'll help you through all the things you need to know before the party starts," she rambled on. "The patrons will know you are a little nervous - and a little tired," she winked, "so try to relax and enjoy yourself." Wondering what drugs she might be on took a back seat to the wink and the 'little tired' remark.

The four of us went around one of the turns in the corridor then through a door into a dressing room. Several guys were in various stages of undress and by the suspicious looks I received, Gil had already blathered about me. She handed me a wrapped tuxedo.

"Here," she kept with that warm, friendly smile, "put this on. I don't need to ask you if you've showered, but do you have any cologne or perfume?"

"No," I muttered. This was getting bad. "Where do I change?"

"Just do it here," she instructed.

"Can't I have some privacy?" I all but begged. With friends around me, I'd still barricaded myself in my bedroom to change a few hours ago.

"It's not like it is anything we haven't seen before," she giggled.

"I don't know you and I doubt you've seen me naked before so could I please have a secluded spot?" I repeated. Tia laughed at me.

"Oh, I'm sorry," she stifled that laugh with her hand. "No private rooms though. I apologize."

"No cologne or perfume," I repeated. I put the suit bag on a hook, zipped it open and began sorting through the costume I was supposed to wear. It was a nice tuxedo - most likely silk or some sort of silk blend. Their choice of underwear was...economic on materials used...I was beginning to hyperventilate and the room was starting to spin.

"Problems?" Tai asked nicely. I shook my head. She pulled out a small pill box from inside her vest and popped out a pill. "Take this, it will help," she proffered up something to me.

"What is it?" I asked.

"It helps with anxiety," she informed me.

"No thank you," I mumbled.

"It really will help," Tai insisted in her pleasant tone. "It won't affect your ability to perform; don't worry about that."

"Please," I begged.

"Listen Israel," Tai became harsher, "you can take this or they can make you take it. I don't want that and neither do you." She was smiling again. No choices.

"You haven't identified yourself as an EMT or physician," I stared at her. "So, I decline your attempt to peddle your crap on me. Beat me up if that makes you feel better. You are nothing but animals anyway and we should all stop pretending you are not."

Tai shrugged.

"Hold him," she told my minders. My resistance was feeble and I obediently opened my mouth when they twisted my head in position. A cop would have known better but neither the two women restraining me, or Tai, were cops.

When Tai presented the pill, I extended my tongue. She was still giving me that pleasant, kind smile as I took the pill in.

"Let me see inside your mouth," Tai commanded. I showed her, she looked around to see that I had indeed swallowed the poison. The clock was ticking.

"Your continued resistance makes no sense, Israel," Tai scolded me patiently. Something inside me cracked.

"When you are reduced to a skin-bag of meat impaled on a metal rod for days, you'll understand what it is to not give in to putrid wastes of humanity like yourself, Tai," I grinned angrily.

"Until then, you don't get to question what makes me keep fighting. You are simply too ignorant to understand and I don't have the time to torture you enough so that you get it," I added.

"They are going to love your passion," she snickered. She motioned the guards to let me go.

The rest of the dressing process was quick and quiet. I could feel my stomach twisting and lurching, seeking release. Most of the men had evacuated the room by the time I was done. My first stop upon leaving was meeting Isobel.

"You've already been a pain in the ass and you've barely been here ten minutes," she regarded me thoughtfully.

I had no reply. I need to speed things along.

"You look nice," Isobel looked me over. "It is nice to see your eyes so alert after your marathon sex session with Detective Kristi. After seeing that many of the ladies have expressed an interest in you." I couldn't keep the humiliation and sense of violation from my face.

"You had no right," I whispered.

"Israel, I promised to destroy you and I am, one piece at a time," Isobel glowed vindictively. "Consider this your first installment." They had hacked my security system illegally and showed it around Isobel's clientele to up my value at the upcoming flesh auction.

How could I have possibly believed that my private, sensual moments with Angel would remain so? Isobel knew about the sorority sex tape and this was a clear imitation of that degrading experience. I refused to become submerged to this latest assault against my identity.

"Here you go, Israel," Isobel offered me a pill and a glass of champagne.

I took the pill and a long pull on the glass.

"Will this make me forget?" I whispered vacantly.

"Oh no," Isobel. "This lets you remember everything. This wouldn't be any fun if it didn't."

"At the end of this, I really think I'm going to be dead, Isobel," I muttered, "but you will still be the monstrous, twisted evil sow you are right now."

Isobel's left hand lashed out, her hand gripping my throat and started to strangle me.

"I like it when they fight back," she snarled in a darkly passionate outburst. She must have held me there for thirty seconds before Tai cleared her throat. Isobel let me go. "Get him out of here."

As Tai, my two minders and I approached the last door to the 'reception' room, one of my minders held me back.

"Where did you hear about those names?" she asked. I had to assume she was referring to my little talk with Gil in the elevator.

"Civics 304, my junior year at Bowden: Studies in Character," I responded. "The study of the last two led me to history of other Congressional Medal of Honor winners as well as men of that profession. It isn't like I could ever be in the armed services, but it is still my history."

"Did you ever learn any other names?" she asked. Her partner and Tai looked irritated.

"Do you mean like Walker?" I questioned. She nodded. "Where did you learn the names?"

"It was in the graduation hall where I went to school," she regarded me. At least not all male history was being swept away, I thought. It also told me the woman was trained as a Special Forces sniper.

Tai took me through the final door and introduced me to the room. At first glance, there appeared to be twenty men and twelve women as 'participants' and around fifty party guests. This way the guests had to 'compete' for the party favors. Not that we would appreciate that largesse - Isobel would.

"Ladies, this is Israel Jensen," Tai announced. "Don't be too rough on him. It is his first time, though not his first time today." She turned to me and quietly added, "Israel, I hope you have a good time tonight."

"Tai," I whispered back, "I hope your car battery explodes and burns you to death."

She giggled, patted my ass and began to circulate the room. Me? I spotted what I needed and made a bee-line for it. I was almost at the balcony when a woman came out of one of the many padded chairs in the room and grabbed my arm.

"Hello there, I'm Magdalena but everyone calls me Maggy," she smiled.

She was somewhat short, heavy but curvaceous - voluptuous, I supposed. She was maybe in her mid-thirties with short, wavy black hair, expensive jewelry and wearing a backless, silver gown with deep cleavage and breasts that clearly needed support.

"Nice to meet you," I mumbled. "I gotta go." If I didn't I was going to spew all over her.

I broke free and ran for what I was praying was a balcony. I stepped into the city's cool night air, found what I was looking for - a planter - and vomited into it. Whatever male had spread this recipe for avoiding being drugged failed to mention the sheer pain of having your stomach attempting to exit your esophagus. I was back in my dorm room in the aftermath of Bethany's sorority function all over again.

I was still bent over with both hands resting on the sides of the planter when a voice spoke up from right behind me.

"If you are finished, you can have my drink," she offered. I nearly vaulted the planter. Only the height of the shrub kept me from trying.

I spun around to face a woman of indeterminate age with blonde hair and blue eyes. She had an odd, lopsided quirk to her lips, a daring, floor-length red dress and a gold and diamond chocker. Her features were hauntingly familiar but I was too scared and physically discombobulated to figure out how. She was extending a long stem glass of something my way.

I gingerly took it and walked over to the railing. It was as high as my ribcage so jumping over wasn't going to be easy. I wasn't so disillusioned with my life or my chances here to embrace the seventy story fall anyway. After taking a deep swig of the alcohol, I swirled it around my mouth, spit it back into the glass and throw the whole deal off into the night.

"Wine not up to your standards?" the lady in red mused.

"It is probably pointless, but thank you. I'm Israel Jensen," I responded. "I don't take anything I'm going to put into my body from a woman I don't know. Your kind has the annoying habit of dropping the dope of your convenience into things coming my way."

"Delilah," she tipped her head in greeting. "Delilah Fremont."

"Any relation to Bethany Fremont?" I requested.

"She's one of my daughters," she replied. "I understand you two aren't getting along right now."

"Kind of in the way that Boadicea didn't get along with the Romans," I stated. Considering that the Celtic British Queen had started her rebellion after being raped, this was somewhat apt.

"Ah - rumor has it you were irreverent," Delilah mulled over. "Have I done anything to earn your ire?" That was a bit of an odd thing to say and definitely far cleverer than anything Bethany would have come up with.

"Beyond living long enough to breed - nothing I can think of," I shrugged.

"Oh, very well, I can understand that impulsive reaction," Delilah allowed. "Don't you believe that men should still try to replenish the Human Race, despite personal tragedy?"

"No." That word pretty much summoned everything else I might have said.

"That is an awfully bleak epitaph for our species," Delilah didn't sound angry or offended.

"Quite frankly, I haven't seen a damn thing this entire week that would make me lift a finger to save any of you," I started back at her. "The few women I have found worthwhile can't be saved by me and won't be saved by you. My only regret is that the worst of you won't die in the bone-wracking agony you so richly deserve."

"This doesn't qualify as participating in the party, Israel," Isobel murmured threateningly. She'd snuck up on me as well. "Monday is starting to look very complicated." She had Tia and my two minders with her.

"Wait," I gulped. "She's a guest - Delilah, I mean."

"Mr. Jensen and I were discussion funerary rights as well as future mortality projections," Delilah intervened urbanely.

"Dr. Fremont, I wasn't referring to Israel's dubious ability at conversation but at the fact that he seems to have purged his medication," Isobel clarified. The ever-present surveillance system had boned me again.

"I concur with that," Fremont nodded. "He's not sweating, his pupils aren't dilated and his breathing is steady. It was probably some sort of IG medication - probably an anti-nausea drug."

Isobel glared over her shoulder at my minders.

"We didn't see him take anything," minder one stated.

"Isobel, those kind of drugs take ten to fifteen minutes to work. He may have done it before he entered the building," Delilah suggested.

"Israel, all your little ploy earned you was a stomach crap. Tai, dose him," Isobel commanded. What the fuck was I going to do? I edged down the railing but there was no visible egress from this place.

"Why?" the woman who I had shrugged off earlier asked. I was too fearful to try and figure out where she'd come from.

"Standard policy," Isobel answered icily. "He needs the 'pick me up' and his mood is a bit unstable." Isobel was explaining herself?

"Previously submitted evidence suggest Israel has no problem performing," Maggy grinned. "Standing up to you is hardly a reason to dope him. Besides, a spirited man really screws you up inside - or it used to Isobel."

That was far more than I ever wanted to know. Usually you fight back to scare off your attacker. What the hell was a man supposed to do when it excited the aggressor instead?

"That's enough," Isobel seethed after she turned on Maggy. "We need to talk."

"Until you come back, I'll keep an eye on Mr. Jensen," Delilah spoke up.

"There is no need to drug him," Delilah stated.

"I concur," Maggy added.

"Fine," Isobel conceded poorly. In a few seconds I was left alone with Delilah again.

"Some men would make a gesture of gratitude," Delilah studied me, "or be curious about what happened."

"I wouldn't be here if you didn't feel entitled to hold functions like this, so thanking you would be disingenuous," I answered. "As for the rest. I don't want to know any of you. I don't want to know anything about you. That you are stewards of our dying culture is wish fulfillment, or karmic justice."