Part 123
Posted by Barbanne on November 14, 2003 at 21:29:25:
PART ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY THREE
IN THE ARENA SHE SHALL DIE
"Strip yourself."
Karla stood only centimetres from my face shouting.
"I won't fight."
"Strip her," she screamed at her guards and turning she strode out. The two men grabbed at my clothes and started tearing them off.
"OK, OK I'll do it myself."
"Stop this insanity," pleaded Alex.
"Shut up," one of the two guards swung an automatic pistol until it was covering all four of my friends.
"I'll do it darling, I'll be alright," I said, not believing a word of it.
What I did believe was that I was about to die.
I tossed my clothes aside and one of the guards picked up my tee shirt and sniggering showed the inscription to the other.
"Well, we'll find out if this is true in about fifteen minutes."
I felt sick.
They hustled me out and led me into the sand arena where Karla stood stripped, naked and oiled up. Lights around the edges lit up the gloom. I realised she was older than I had thought, late forties, maybe even fifties and her body, although trim and tightly muscled, showed the folds and wrinkles of age. Her long black hair swung free and she stood every bit of a full head taller than me. I didn't have to look down to know that my own body, although tanned where it had been exposed to the sun, was mostly pale white and, unlike Karla's, was soft and feminine and better suited to thinking and loving than fighting. I looked over to where Alex, Dave, Jade and Loreen were standing and tried smiling bravely.
Someone threw a knife into the arena. It looked like the same one that had killed the blonde girl.
Karla feinted and then lunged for it. I threw myself across the sand intent on beating her to it.
We both missed and ended up grappling each other and I had to struggle to hold fast to Karla's slippery nakedness. We went down onto the sand and then started wrestling. I found myself looking at Karla's hair from only a few millimetres and could see the silver grey amongst the dyed blackness. At least I'm younger I thought, the old bitch might tire. Karla pushed me down and I could feel the burn of the sand on my back and buttocks as she skidded me over the ground. Shit, for an old bitch she's strong I thought. She half raised herself and started pummelling my tummy. I gasped and wheezed. She slapped my face back and forth and then bashed me on my cut cheek.
I squealed and, triumphantly, she bashed me again and then dived sideways for the knife.
She had it and raising it high she lunged at me with a downward slash.
Fuck you you drugged out old bitch I thought and anger washed through me. Anger I had never experienced. I'm a lover and a submitter and an all round peaceful gal and this adrenalin pumping rage was new to me and it was all directed at Karla.
I grabbed her knife hand and swept it aside and then I bit the wrist that held it. Bit it hard enough to taste blood and she yelped and I shook her until the knife spun away and then I went for her eyes determined to claw them out. She was shrieking in anger and pain and I gouged at her eye sockets and then fisted my hand and started belting her anywhere my blows landed. Karla was shrieking and squealing but she was also sobbing and I just kept belting her. I was caught up in my fury and blind to anything but hurting this woman. I smashed my fists into her face and her breasts and her tummy and I couldn't and wouldn't stop and then I found myself straddling her and just bashing and bashing her head and slowly, ever so slowly I realised she wasn't moving although her tummy rippled and her breasts rose and fell and I knew that I had knocked her out. I grabbed her thick dyed hair and hauled her head up. Her mouth gaped, drooling saliva and her eyes were almost shut and out of it and, unconscious as she was, I could suddenly see her age. Her tummy bulged and her neck had the start of wattles and her belly wrinkled above her sex and under her arms and anywhere she had joins she was wrinkled and old.
She groaned.
I looked around at the mob. They had all assembled to watch me die.
"Doesn't look much now does she?" I said, "your queen, your goddess, your Isis, whatever you dumb fucks all thought she was. Doesn't look much now does she?"
Karla groaned again and I shoved her face down into the sand.
I stood up shakily and saw the knife and looking at it I said, almost to myself, "I'm no killer, I'm not going to be responsible for anyone's death."
I started to walk away and the slim dark girl who had killed the blonde earlier, jumped into the arena and raced over to where the knife lay and picked it up.
"Shit," I thought.
She rushed towards me and I sidestepped, but she had no thoughts for me and ran on to where Karla was pushing herself off the sand and with a wild feral cry she plunged the knife into Karla's back. Karla screamed and girls came running from everywhere and the first girl passed the knife to another and then another and another endlessly and every one of them plunged it's bloody blade into Karla's body. She twitched and spasmed as they hacked and slashed but she was long since dead and it was only the relentless knife thrusts that animated her corpse.
Alex took my shoulders and handed me my clothes.
"Let's get out of here Barb."
Running along and skipping some as I pulled on panties and shorts and sobbing quietly from the reaction to my violence I went with them as we ran back out of this underworld of madness and into the cold night air.
By the time we arrived back to where we had parked the Sprinter it was just coming on dawn.
Alex drove and Dave sat beside him. Jade, Loreen and I sat in the rear seats. I was totally knackered and had only made the last half hour of the trip back thanks to being half carried by the guys. I sagged in my seat and Loreen wrapped her arms around me and pulled my head onto her breast and within minutes I had fallen into a deep sleep of utter exhaustion.
I woke up hours later and the other girl's were dozing and Dave and Alex were talking softly and we were scooting along a fair dirt road headed east.
"Where are we?" I mumbled.
"Hi Barb, back again? On our way to the Alice."
"That's nice," I said and went out again.
Back in Alice Springs we went into the police station and told our story, leaving out the bits about girls being killed and my part in Karla's demise. They sort of didn't believe us (who would?) but they took down all the particulars and said they'd get the West Australian police to check it out. They asked us to stay around but we were all keen to get going away from here.
Back in the motel where we were saying I watched Alex as he spoke on the phone. As soon as he hung up I set on him.
"Alex, I want to go home."
"But Barb what about my documentary?"
"I thought it was finished, well part one anyway."
"I guess it is pretty well done up to where they wanted it, but Barb where's home?"
"Oh back to the city. I want to go back to Playdead the way it was."
"It burnt down Barb."
"A building burnt down that's all."
"Don't you like it out here Barb?"
"No. And I totally hate being tied up in old mines and threatened by maniacs and forced to fight insane shielas and I really hate real violence and I want my fantasy life back."
"Funny about that."
He had a strange grin on his face like a kid at Christmas time and the others had come in and were watching.
"Why is it funny?"
"Well I've just been onto a guy back home and I've rented another building and as soon as we get back I have to finish editing the doco but after that I've told them to get another film maker to do part two because I'm going back to what we all do best."
"I couldn't believe it.
"Really...........Playdead again?"
"That's right Miss model."
"Yippee!!!"
The new place wasn't nearly as big as the old one but it had a good big studio, a front desk for me to sit at and a hideout for Alex and enough space for the rest of us to doss down and exist. The kitchen was minute and if we wanted to do any dead girl in the bathroom sets it wasn't going to be here, but it was fantastic.
Alex sold the van and bought the lights and backdrops and props we'd need and Playdead dot com was back in business.
I was one happy girl.