I have lost count of how many days I’m traveling. After the first night, everything become a blur. We travel during the day and at night we stop in some beach to rest. Rest for the pirates, for us is a living hell because the pirates use Natali and Rita for rest and recreation.
The only thing that changed is that we stopped vomiting on the boat and Natali and Rita no longer scream during the night. I'm pretty sure there’re no longer sane, there is no light in their eyes anymore.
And I stooped crying myself to sleep in the third night, now I just stay quiet while hearing the sound of these bastards having their fun until I fall sleep.
For some reason the Brute only came in the first night and I didn’t see he anymore, not that I pay attention to who visits the women. But for some reason in my nightmares, I can hear his laugh before the scream starts and I wake up.
We are barely giving anything to eat or drink, just enough to keep us alive. We are not long living, just existing. If there wasn’t a guard 24 hours, I would have tried to committed suicide.
Not that I have a way to die. Since I pass all the time with my hands and feet tied. I wonder what waits me, nothing good I suppose. My body shakes when I remember how they touched my whole body when we were captured and how happy they looked.
I just hope they send me to work on some farm, better be worked to death then be a sex tool for some rich pedophile. I look to my right side and see Natali and Rita.
I’m a selfish person, here I’m think how awful would be become a sex tool and I have two people that have been used by hundreds of people in the last few days.
Even in this situation the only person that I can think is me. What about they? I can’t imagine that the future will get much better for them, and that’s without thinking about Rita’s husband, the poor bastard is complete out of his mind since we were captured.
He just stares at nowhere all day; he even refuses to eat and our jailers have to force him to eat and drink. They hate doing that and always beat him a little, not that hitting him has any effect.
I wonder if loosing one mind it’s not a defense mechanism. A lot easy to deal with all this when you lost the capacity for coherent thinking. Natali and Rita after a few days become just like him, looking to nowhere and needing to be fed. At least they are not beat for not being capable of eating without help. They are just rape every night.
I look in the horizon and I see a sail. That’s new, whenever a looked outside the ship the only thing that I saw was more water. Perhaps we are in a more commercial part? Thanks to the position that I’m it’s impossible to get up and have a better view but I keep looking outside and more sails are showing up.
Maybe we are near a port? I don’t know if that’s a good or bad. The time continue to pass when the boat stops and a group of four men board caring some wood tablets and starts to talk with the two guys I think are the leaders.
I think they all know each other by their body language. The skinny man is doing all the talk and points to us. The new group looks in our direction but dosen’t pay much attention and continues to talk to the skinny man.
By their looks, a bunch of overheight middle age men wearing good tunics, I will eat my imaginary hat if they are not bureaucrats. I think I’m correct about who they are, when the skinny man hands a bag of coins to the leader who counts the coins and leave the boat after shaking hands. Dosen’t matter the time or even world, bureaucrats will always have a share of any criminal activities.
To tell the truth I don’t know if what they did to us, was a criminal activity. They could be doing something legal and are good citizens respect by all their neighbors. I don’t know the laws of the place. I would like to think that what they did is wrong in any time or place. But I know enough about human personality to understand that's wishful think.
After they leave, I can feel the boat moving and I think they are maneuvering the boat to stop. I’m prove correct when the boat finally stops and we are guide outside. The pier is way larger that I was thinking and there are dozens of boats, some larger then the Dancing Fool but they are clearly for commercial use.
The pier is made of stone and there is a lot of people loading and unloading goods, the first impression that I have is that the place is in complete chaos. But after a few moments I can see that there is a logic and everybody knows where to go and what to do, organized chaos, I supposed.
In front of the pier there are a lot warehouses made of wood, clay bricks and stone, on top of each one there is a board with some letters that look like Greek, Latin and Mandarin had a three way and resulted in a abomination.
The shackles on my hands are pulled and I finally enter the pier and I’m hit by the worst smell of my life. I can’t even describe how horrible it’s and my clothes still smell like vomit and the sea water that they used to clean us once and a while.
By the Corgi Gods, how can people live in this filth? This makes the Pinheiro River[1] smell like roses! By the looks of ever one surrounding me they are used to the smell, I start breathing through my mouth. Since I’m in the front I can’t tell how the others are doing, considering their mental state I would be surprise if they realized the new smell.
Our guards continue to guide us inside the city. After the warehouse district, there are a bunch of stores selling people and goods. All stores put some merchandise in the front to attract customers and there are a lot of humans with iron shackles in front of the stores.
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There are people of all genres and ages, all with a dead look in their faces and no life in their eyes. Some of the employers are yelling or even dragging some customers to see the products, the fight is fierce between the vendors but like in the dock, it’s a organized chaos.
Since we are slaves and our guards are clearly not buyers, nobody bothers to try talk to us.
When I’m lost in my mind think about the city, we are guided to a very large house. After we enter the guards push us to a small courtyard that has a water well and some middle age women that look like house slaves.
They use some scissors to cut our clothes and throw them in a small oven to burn. Then they start washing us using buckets of water take from the well and a very hard sponge.
The sponge hurts a lot, but the guards are looking at us with angry faces so I just bear the pain in silence. I can see crust after crust of dirty leaving my body, the water on my feet is black.
When the slaves are finally happy that I’m clean enough they use a razor and scissor to cut my hair until I’m bald. The same thing happens with the other three.
Finally, I’m given a tunic made of very cheap fabric that I put on. Since every men on the island wore a shirt and trousers, I thought that was the normal in this world, but everybody in the ship and the city wear tunics.
The fabric hurts because my skin is still sensitive from the sponge and it’s very uncomfortable, but there is nothing that I can do about it. They bring us to what I think is the slave dinning hall, which is basically a big room with a few tables and chairs and they give me some hard bread and soap.
Even after dipping the bread in the soup, it’s still hard, but I’m starving so I eat with gust. The soup is water with some vegetables, not very different from what Natali used to make, lacks fish to be a perfect copy . Speaking of her, I look to see if she is eating but the trio are just siting looking to the wall.
One of the woman who cleaned us go close to Rita and Natali and speak with a soothing voice to them, I don’t understand the language, but the point must be the tone of the voice, because in a very little time both start eating. They must have a huge experience dealing with cases like that, maybe one day the old lady was in the same position.
I finish my share but I’m still hungry, Rita’s husband is on my left side and nobody come to help him eat, he is just staring the wall. I consider steeling his food, it’s not like he is going to eat and I could use all the nutrients.
There is very short fight in my head about what to do, one voice says that he is good as dead and I need to think about me and it’s not like we are close or anything, the second voice says that I can’t loose my humanity because that will make me just as bad as the people who capture me.
The first voice laughs of the arguments used by the second voice and counter argues by saying that I’m no longer in a civilized place and I need to think about the number 1, me. The second just says: this is what you become after a small setback?
The second voice win, even if I think my situation is a lot worst then a small setback. Becoming a slave is THE setback in both of my lives. But I always liked to think that I’m a good person and I don’t know if I have much longer to live, better try to be a good person until the end.
I dip the bread in the soup and try to feed him, but the idiot dosen’t even open his mouth. It takes me some effort and I had to beat him a little but I managed to make him eat half of the food when the guards yelled and shoved us in room with a lot of straw mattress on the floor and closed the door.
The place is big, I think that 20 people can sleep here with they don’t mind being close to each other. The straw mattresses in the floor looks like they were never cleaned, but I'm not in a position to call room service so I laid down in one that is a far away as possible from the door.
I still have the shackles, so it’s not very comfortable but it’s a lot better then the boat or sleeping on the beach. When I’m about to try to sleep I remember about my compatriot who just sat down by the door.
The place is too big for just two people, so I imagine that in the end of the day more people will be coming. If they find him there could mean problem. Sighting and complaining in my heart that being a good person sucks I take him by the hand and bring him to a mattress close to me.
He just lays down, for some reason his eyes are still open. I laid down too, my arms and legs hurt from caring the iron shackles, why didn’t they take the bloody thing since they put us here?
There is only on door and very small windows close to the roof, there is no way for us to escape. At least they give me a smaller one since I’m child or would be impossible for me to move.
After some time trying to sleep and falling, I start to think about my day and my situation.
Hope is a complicated thing, I knew since we were capture that I would become a slave, but there was this voice in my head that would tell me that there was still a chance that I could be save. And the reason that I could be save?
Because I’m special, I was brought from either the future or another world, surely the Corgi Gods would come to the rescue, they would never let their chosen one die or became some sex tool.
They most have used a lot of power to bring me here, so they must have a very special project to me and it’s impossible that a slave could do something important. Any time someone was going to rescue me.
I talk about the others losing their sanity and leaving reality as a defense mechanism, but I also created a defense mechanism by pretend that my situation wasn’t that bad and I would be rescue.
I created a wall in my heart with false hope to protect myself from reality. But when I saw so many people being sold my wall was destroyed. There is no way out for me, my life is no longer mine, someone else will decided what I need to do and when. If I refused, I will be beat and starve to be set as a example.
I can accept my situation and try to do my best with the cards that I have on my hand or became like the others and become disconnected from the realty or kill myself.
I have admitted that losing my mind or committing suicide sounds very interest, why try to fight when there is no point? Better to take the easy way out. But I want to live, dosen't matter that this is my second life, I'm scary of dying again and I don't know if death is really a better option, the Corgi Gods could pass the eternity punishing me for destroying their plans and losing my mind doesn't seem interesting at all.
Besides, how can a person go insane on purpose? Is that even possible? Maybe I've already lost my mind and I didn't realize.
For the moment I will try to live and see what is going to happen. But I will keep my options open, you never know, maybe there's a way to go crazy for a few months and get back to normal when the situation improves.I've seen crazier things happen.
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[1] River that pass in the city of Sao Paulo, used to be incredible polluted and smell horrible, it’s was considered dead because didn’t have any life inside. After years and billions it’s better now and smell if not good at least tolerable, there are even some fishes and birds in the place today, not many, but it’s something for a river that was considered dead a few years ago.