Locked in Wonderland

Chapter Six

I awoke thinking what a strange fucking dream it had been.

I had to stop eating whatever it was I’d eaten.

Had I had cheese? That was supposed to give people fucked-up dreams, right?

I couldn’t say it had ever had that effect on me before, but it was the only thing I could think of.

Percy and Lola were nothing but figments of my imagination. Thank fuck for that.

“He’s awake,” a familiar, shrill voice trumpeted.

Lola. Fuck. Not a dream.

I opened my eyes and sat up. They both stood there, smiling at me.

They’d changed clothes, deep purple replacing the orange.

How long had passed that they needed a change of outfit?

I shifted, the squeak of leather telling me they weren’t the only ones dressed differently.

I slid unsteadily off the surgical table, my legs taking a second to remember what they were for.

I did not want to think about having woken up there and what it might imply. Instead, I headed to the mirror.

A stranger stared back at me. Well, not quite a stranger.

But the differences were stark enough that it may as well have been.

My black hair was shorter. I couldn’t deny that the more severe cut accentuated my cheekbones and jawline.

I stepped closer to the mirror, blue eyes narrowing instead of the brown I was used to.

They’d given me contacts. My eyebrows were plucked too.

Thankfully, not to the extent theirs were.

More shaped. It wasn’t something I’d ever have chosen to get done.

The biggest difference, though, was the clothes. I’d arrived here in baggy blue jeans and a T-shirt that had seen better days. Head-to-toe leather had replaced them. I started at my feet because they were the least alarming part of the transformation. Boots. Surprisingly soft and comfortable.

The boots led to leather trousers that fitted like a second skin.

The trousers had a low cut, which revealed the sharp jut of my hipbones, and I could tell just from looking that my underwear had gone the same way as the rest of my clothes.

My top was leather too—or at least what little there was of it.

To call it a vest would be generous. A better description was two short pieces of leather attached with threaded laces at the side, leaving my midriff completely bare.

There were buttons at the front, but they only started once a deep V had finished.

The word that sprang to mind was fuckboy.

I looked as if I should have been on a street corner.

Or failing that, in a club looking to get railed by half of its clientele.

“Well?” Percy prompted, painted-on eyebrows raised quizzically.

What did he expect me to say? Did he want praise for turning me into this?

“I can’t wear this.”

“Yes, you can,” Lola said.

“I look like a prostitute.”

“You look hot.”

I took a step back, two additional sources of confusion making themselves known. My chest was sore. I would have been more alarmed about that if it wasn’t for the fact that my arse was sore too. Icy dread settled at the base of my very naked spine.

“What did you do to me?” I directed the question at Percy. While I wouldn’t trust Lola as far as I could throw her, I assumed she lacked the equipment that my paranoid brain was currently concerned about.

“Well, let’s see.” Percy ticked things off on his fingers. “Haircut, shave, contacts, douche, shower, clothes.”

My brain skipped the rest of the words to seize on the most alarming one. “Douche?”

He frowned. “Well, yes. We had to get you clean everywhere.”

“Everywhere,” Lola echoed.

“You drugged me and then shoved something up my arse!”

Lola tutted. “Don’t be like that. If you hadn’t been so resistant, we wouldn’t have needed to drug you. You only have yourself to blame. Percy and I are busy people. We don’t have time for arguments.”

Percy still had his fingers raised. “Tattoo,” he added.

The soreness on my chest. I strode back to the mirror and pulled the leather aside. Before I arrived here, the space below my left clavicle had been bare, like the rest of my skin. Just how I liked it.

Now it bore the image of a black bird on a branch, its wings extended. When I licked my fingers and scrubbed at it, the ink didn’t shift. Anger sparked hot and immediate. “You can’t tattoo a person without their consent.”

“It’s part of processing,” Lola said. “No one can leave here without a tattoo.”

“What the fuck is it?” I asked. “Is it a crow?”

Lola’s expression turned disapproving. “No need to swear.”

“Really? I think there’s every fucking need.”

“It’s a—” Percy started.

Lola elbowed him sharply in the ribs and gave a warning shake of her head when he looked accusingly at her.

“Right,” he muttered.

I looked between them. “It’s a what?”

“It’s a bird,” Lola said with a phony smile. She reached into a pocket and held something out to me. “Don’t forget your watch.”

My initial instinct was to tell her where to stick it.

Warren had given it to me, though. The first and the last thing, so it meant something to me.

There was no point in cutting off my nose to spite my face.

I snatched it from her, hoping the severity of the gesture adequately conveyed my feelings for the strange pair and what they’d done to me.

For a moment, I imagined paying another visit to the police station with tales of being drugged, douched, and tattooed against my will. And then I imagined Police Constable Thornton reacting to that story the same way he had the last one, with nothing but a sceptical hmm.

I forced myself to breathe, to think more rationally.

While the thought of Percy doing anything to my unconscious body made my skin crawl, it was only douching.

And the days when tattoos were permanent were long gone.

Once I got off this island, I could get laser treatment.

Warren could hold my hand while I had it done.

All of this was for him, and it would be worth it once I tracked him down.

“What about my phone?” I asked, my words clipped.

“No phones in Wonderland,” Percy said cheerfully. “That’s rule number thirteen.”

“No, it’s fifteen,” Lola corrected. “Thirteen is that you can look at the artwork in the gallery, but you can’t touch it. Even if it asks nicely.”

“So… what?” I asked. “I come back to you when I’m leaving to get it?”

They exchanged a look. “Yes,” Percy said, nodding emphatically. “That’s exactly what you do.”

“Of course,” Lola said brightly. Too brightly. “We’re always here. Always processing.”

“Processing,” Percy echoed.

“And that’s when I get my clothes back as well?”

“Oh no, we burned them,” Lola said.

“Did you burn my phone as well?”

Lola affectionately swatted my arm. “Phones don’t burn, silly.”

“Don’t burn,” Percy echoed.

I was suddenly done with these people. In hindsight, it was nothing short of miraculous that it had taken this long.

Nothing in my life had taught me how to deal with people who could drug someone and not show even an iota of remorse about it.

I could stand here all day and argue with them, and it wouldn’t get me anywhere.

“Where do I go?” I asked.

I spent the next few minutes navigating a warren of corridors. When an anguished scream rang out, I froze in place. “What the fuck!”

“See,” Lola said, gesturing for me to hurry and catch up with her. “Sometimes it’s better not to be awake.”

“What are you doing to him?”

“Nothing. We’re with you.”

“What is your team doing to him?” Percy opened his mouth to respond. “And don’t tell me you’re making him prettier.”

His mouth snapped shut, his frown suggesting he genuinely didn’t know what else he was supposed to say.

Something suddenly occurred to me. “Warren White?” I demanded. “Is he here?”

They both shook their heads.

“Are you sure?”

“Never heard of him,” Lola said.

“Never—” Percy started.

“Heard of him, yes,” I snapped. “You don’t need to say everything twice.”

“Rude,” they both muttered in unison.

“And after all that we’ve done for you,” Percy added.

I counted to ten. It didn’t feel anywhere near high enough. “Just… get me out of here.”

Lola pointed at a door I could have sworn hadn’t been there a moment ago. “Through there,” she said, pulling it open. “That takes you into the gallery. Go through the gallery and you’ll be in Wonderland proper.”

I stepped through it. “The gallery?”

The door had already shut behind me with Percy and Lola on the other side, which was mostly a relief.

The lighting in the room was dim, presumably to highlight the extreme chalkiness of the statues inside it.

Seven of them, all spread out. Four males.

Three females. All naked. All completely anatomically correct.

And not in the way most statues were with the men, like the sculptor had run out of clay by the time they reached the genitals.

In fact, the one closest to me looked like its creator had found himself with extra material to use up.

I stepped closer, admiring how realistic it was. The artist must have been incredibly talented. It felt as if I reached out, the skin would be warm to the touch.

And then I saw it. The slight rise and fall of the chest.

I stumbled backward, putting space between me and the breathing statue and narrowly avoiding crashing into another.

Not a statue. Alive!

How? Why?

I could see it with all of them now. They were still, but not still enough.

Little signs gave them away if you knew to look for them: slight tremors, color variations where veins lay beneath the skin, fine hairs catching the light.

Statues definitely weren’t supposed to have hair.

The eyes of all the statues were closed, presumably to hide the color.

Was this Percy and Lola’s handiwork? Or someone else’s? Did I even want to know?

“Hey,” I said loudly, my voice echoing in the room.

Nothing. No reaction. None of them so much as opened their eyes. Their dedication to maintaining the facade somehow made it even creepier. Although I had to question whether I really wanted them to move. If they did, I couldn’t guarantee I wouldn’t lose control of my bowels.

I edged my way past a large-breasted woman toward the door, battling with whether I was supposed to say, excuse me. In the end, I decided there was a time for politeness, and this wasn’t it.

A fleeting thought struck me as I reached for the door handle with my back to the ‘statues’. What if it was locked, and this was when they attacked me?

It wasn’t. And they didn’t.

Another gallery awaited me when I opened the door.

This one was brighter, and there was no pretense that the subjects weren’t living.

They were, however, still displayed in various tableaux.

A painting that wasn’t. One lounged on a chaise-lounge surrounded by fruit.

Another swung gently on a wooden swing suspended from the ceiling.

Their eyes were open, but they stared straight ahead, completely expressionless.

There were people in this room, guests presumably, laughing and making comments while they circulated. At least it brought a little normality to the situation. Far better than the dark, empty room with the creepy statues.

I caught a woman gently by the arm. “The way out?” I asked when she turned to face me.

Her gaze trailed over me. The heat in her eyes when it finally returned to my face reminded me of how I was dressed. I could hardly blame her for treating me like a sexual object, given how much skin I had on display.

She pointed toward a door at the far end of the room. “Through the next gallery.”

I thanked her and headed that way, studying the faces of the ‘artwork’ I passed in case any of them were Warren. None were. I paused for a moment before opening the door, bracing myself for more weirdness. I was right to.

More tableaux. Only these were distinctly X-rated. Bodies arranged in positions that simulated various sex acts between a multitude of pairings and groups. All completely naked. Some twisted into positions that must have been excruciating to hold for more than a few minutes.

There were two particularly alarming things about this room. It wasn’t silent like the other two, moans and groans slipping free at regular intervals to add to the sexual frisson. And all the men were hard.

I stopped in front of one, this man slightly detached from the pair he posed with. He was handsome and muscular, dark hair slicked back from his forehead. Nature had been generous, his cock jutting out in front of him.

His gaze suddenly locked onto mine. “Touch me,” he said. “Make me come. Please.”

The desperation in his eyes suggested I’d be doing him a favor. Lola’s words came back to me. “You can look at the artwork in the gallery, but you can’t touch it. Even if it asks nicely.”

It had sounded like just another bizarre statement that made no sense.

Now it felt more like a warning. I didn’t know what happened if you broke the rules, but I couldn’t risk it being banishment from Wonderland.

Not until I’d found Warren, and not for someone I didn’t even know.

Besides, if this man were suffering, he could just get up and walk out.

They all could.

“Please,” he said again.

I backed away. “I’m sorry. I can’t.”

I turned on my heel and carried on through the gallery.

Past a couple arm in arm, pointing and laughing at two women locked in an embrace.

Past a tall man with his cock out, openly jerking himself off and seemingly unconcerned by who saw him.

But then, I supposed what was one more cock in a sea of cocks?

Another door. I yanked it open, relief flooding through me when I saw the street beyond it.

Wonderland.

Finally.