Whimsy

Evernight
Publishing

www.evernightpublishing.com

Copyright© 2012 Thayer King

 
ISBN:
978-1-927368-39-8

Cover
Artist: LF Designs

Editor:
JC Chute

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

WARNING:
The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is
illegal.
 
No part of this book may be
used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission,
except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.

This
is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any
resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or
dead, is entirely coincidental.
 

WHIMSY

Thayer King

Copyright © 2012

Chapter One

 
Whimsy Featherstone
stood in line with the rest of the women, trembling and trying to hold back
tears. She did not want to fall into hysterics as the woman with blonde
hair had done.  The guards had hauled the woman away so roughly, there was
no doubt she was to be punished.

 
Whimsy
had been kidnapped by the
Gogath
while at the Colony
9 mall along with a group of other women. The
Gogath
were an ugly group of Colony 13 dwellers who occasionally enjoyed making life
miserable for those around them. They were all big; it was nothing for a
Gogath
to be seven feet tall. And they were all ugly.
Perhaps they wouldn’t be so ugly if they gave a care for hygiene, but to a one,
they did not. They all had long filthy black hair, rotted teeth, and
grime-streaked faces and hands. Their clothing was always made of things they
had stolen, but never washed. To the
Gogath
, the
clothing they wore was a trophy. One of them wore a vest to which he’d sewn a
billowy white sleeve cut open at the wrist to fit over his thick forearm. It
looked to be a woman’s sleeve. The front of the vest held hoops of gold and
silver earrings. Another of the
Gogath
had tacked
loops of hair down the entire front of his shirt. The back of his shirt had
been a patchwork of different bits of cloth.

 
Sure, the
Gogath
were a grumpy, thieving and unpleasant lot,
but they’d done nothing of this caliber in a long time. They’d raided the mall,
taking everyone unawares, and kidnapped women of every age, shape, and race in
a short period of time. Those who had tried to stop them were brutally
beaten and tossed aside. Sheer pandemonium ensued for several minutes, with
everyone running and screaming as the
Gogath
had come
pouring in from every entrance, waving crude weapons.  At first it was not
obvious they were taking captives, but in the midst of the commotion the
Gogath
steadily pulled women from the fray.

 
Whimsy
had run just like everyone else, but was caught while
stopping
to help a man who’d been beaten trying to protect his daughter. Strong arms had
lifted her body from the floor and tucked her under one malodorous arm like she
was a sack of flour. Momentarily stunned, she’d done nothing.

 
Before
she could gather her wits or get a headache, she was passed off to another
member of the troop. This one bound her hands with cuffs made of a soft cloth,
but which proved to be surprisingly restrictive. The material did not give at
all. After that, she was herded off with a group of likewise bound captives
into the belly of a large waiting craft. The hovering ship was already more
than half full with women. 

 
"Oh,
blessed Myrna," Whimsy had whispered, speaking to the soft pink moon of
her own Colony 7, "Will I ever see you again?"

 
The craft
had been swift. They were only on the ship for a few hours before they were
docking and the women were herded off the ship into a building of arena-sized
proportions. Other ships docked and spilled their contents. 
More women.
All women.
 It was
then that Whimsy realized they were to be sold. She vaguely recalled a news
story
 
about
these auctions,
but in the safe world of Colony 7, she had dismissed the stories as
sensationalism.

 
The place
they were in now was probably a temporary facility, to be used only once or
twice, but not so much that they would get caught in the illegal trade of women. 
She couldn’t believe this was happening. Her mind recoiled from the ugly
truth.

Despite her mental withdrawal, everything else
seemed to be speeding up at an alarming rate.  As the
Gogath
sorted their bounty, the older women were separated from the young. Those
deemed too old would be ransomed or just dropped off on a nearby
colony. Once the sorting was done the women were shuffled about again and
separated into classes. Of the young, some would become servants and some would
become pleasure slaves.

 
Whimsy
stiffened her spine when it was her turn to be sorted. She didn’t know
what a
Gogath’s
tastes leaned to, but she hoped he
found her extremely unappealing. Her sorter was perhaps eight feet tall,
but he had all his teeth. His smell was fetid, his hands and face caked with
filth. When he raised his hand to touch her cheek, she flinched but didn’t pull
away. She couldn’t. Another of the
Gogath
stood
at her back, prodding her forward, ready to pull her aside once the decision
about her class had been made. 
 

 
Her
sorter smiled. Whimsy bit her lip, praying frantically. He caressed her cheek
with the back of his hand. "Pretty," he said at last. His
eyes, a light shade of brown, dropped to her chest and then narrowed. 

 
Whimsy
wore a pink zip-up sweater, zipped to the neck, over a simple tank
top. When he reached for the zipper, she backed up. She was immediately
shoved forward. "I’ll do it," she said. She grasped the small
metal catch with the heels of her bound hands and quickly unzipped her
sweater. 

 
The
sorter took the edges of the sweater and spread them apart so he could look at
her. His smile widened to a grin, and Whimsy felt a sinking feeling in the
pit of her stomach. He said some words in his native language to the
Gogath
behind her and she was pulled away. 

 
Whimsy
shivered as she sat in the belly of the ship. She had only to look around
to know into which class she’d been sorted. All the women around her were
beautiful. She wasn’t sure how she’d made the cut.

 
There was
nothing extraordinary about her features, in her opinion. Her long hair
was black, her eyes were brown, and her skin was the color of
cinnamon. She’d struggled for years to be as skinny as some of the other
women here, but always consoled herself with the knowledge that she carried her
hourglass figure well and had always had the same figure. No matter how
much weight she put on, that didn’t seem to change. Her hips were well
rounded, her waist was unbelievably small, and her breasts were more than a
handful. Whimsy supposed it was the latter that had swung the sorting
choice in her favor. 
Or rather, against her.

 
This
second journey was proving to be longer than their first. Some of the
women were still crying
,
others like herself she
supposed were in a state of shock and denial. 

Whimsy thought of her family and wondered if
they knew she was missing. Were they already worrying about her? Did anyone
know what had happened on Colony 9?

 
Exhausted
from the day’s events, she fell into a troubled sleep on the floor. The
Gogath
had given them not so much as a blanket for
comfort. 

 
She was
awakened by more screaming. The
Gogath
had finally
landed and were roughly hauling the women to their feet. Whimsy gained her
feet with no time to spare as she saw one of them heading her way. Her hands
were still bound, throwing off her stability and making her quickly scramble to
stand in a less than graceful position. The
Gogath
propelled her towards the exit with a hard shove. She whipped her head
around to glare at her assailant for the unnecessary roughness. She received a
nearly toothless grin in return.

 
The light
outside was blinding after the long trip in the windowless belly of the
Gogath
ship. The building they were led into was a dome
made of glass. It was very similar to the first one—large and open, but this
one was teeming with men from other cultures. Once again, she was placed in a
line with the other women. 

 
Whimsy
shivered and kept her arms close to her body. Her sweater was taken before she
was allowed to disembark. This room was cold. The men openly examined the
women, which led to much screaming and crying on the women’s part and much
laughter on the men’s. The entire spectacle was degrading, to both sexes.

 
Anger
simmered hotly inside of her, but Whimsy wasn’t stupid enough to raise a
protest.
 
After all, what could she do?

 
Whimsy
was not overly harassed. She thought it was because there was nothing special
about her looks. Perhaps the sorter had been wrong––quite a few men did look at
her, but their glances were quick and furtive. They didn’t linger.