Chapter Text
Dani felt the freezing cold sensation of sheet metal underneath her making her jolt awake, upon her stirring two things assaulted her, first, a truly rancid smell, like a mountain of human waste. Second, a foggy memory, one of helping her girlfriend Rose start her car and then nothingness.
Wherever she was it was in near pitch black, she could barely make out her wrists having rope marks on them, but she wasn’t bound. So, she stood, and the metal made a clanging sound beneath her feet. “HELLO?” Dani called out not sure if she wanted someone to be there or not. Rapidly she saw sets of eyes move in the darkness. ‘ Five, no seven, two more, oh god.’ sets of eyes she could barely make out in the darkness descended towards her. It made this situation feel very real, and the panic she wasn’t feeling before set in.
“NO, STAY AWAY! PLEASE DON’T HURT ME. I HAVE MONEY, PLEASE JUST LET ME GO!” This made some of the eyes stop, and disappear, making Dani hope this was all some hallucination, but two sets of eyes remained walking closer, she heard the metal banging beneath their feet, they were having a conversation just barely audible to Dani.
“Clara, she’s scared out of her mind! You can’t just go charging into asking her questions.” Dani rapidly backed away, until she hit the back wall of whatever she was in, the rancid smell was even stronger here, making Dani gag and cover her nose with her sleeve. “Ruby, we don’t have time to babysit anyone here, she could know something that can help us get out of here or at least find out where they’re taking us.”
“PLEASE DON’T HURT ME!” their conversation didn’t make sense to Dani, ‘Clara, Ruby?’ she didn’t know anyone by those names. This wasn’t her apartment, and Rose was nowhere nearby to comfort her. “Can you please stop screaming? We’re in the same situation as you.” The voice called out to her inching ever closer. Dani curled to the floor completely untrusting of these two, in her panic-stricken mind they could’ve very well been the people that put her there. Playing some elaborate game. “Let me do this, okay, Clara?” Dani didn’t hear a response to this, instead, she felt a single hand touch her shoulder.
“I’m Ruby, this is Clara.” she motioned to the darkness next to her, Dani could only just about make out the woman’s pale hands. “You probably can’t see her right now, but your eyes will adjust. Can you please tell us your name?” She sounded sweet and maybe a little older than Dani herself. She couldn’t see her face to verify this of course, but her voice was calming, a sea of normal in this hell hole.
“I-I’m D-D-Dani.” She was still scared who wouldn’t be, but she would try her best to answer her questions. “That’s a very pretty name ‘D-D-Dani'” Her mocking of Dani’s scared stutter elicited a laugh from both Dani and the darkness that was Clara. “Please, please do us a favor, and tell us the last thing you remember.” Dani racked her brain, trying to cast off the foggy feeling from within. She felt a pit form in her stomach as she tried to recall.
“I-I was on a home date with my girlfriend, when she left, she was having car trouble. She asked me to turn the key while she fiddled with the engine.” Dani squeezed her eyes shut desperate to try and recall the rest, there was nothing, but a sensation, a noise, a feeling of touch. She gasped. “And, and I felt someone grab me from the back seat.” She sobbed; no, she was full-on wailing at this point. She hoped this didn’t mean what she thought it meant.
“She set you up kid.” the cold voice emanated from the darkness, it wasn’t soft or caring like Ruby’s. The hand squeezed at her shoulder in an attempt to comfort her. “NO! No that’s not possible, they must’ve been there for her, but they got me instead. Yeah, that’s what happened. She’s probably getting us help as we speak!” A cruel cackle followed “I thought you were panicked, not fucking stup- OW” Dani saw the faint shadow of Ruby’s other hand connect with something. Ruby took hold back over the conversation. “Were things going ‘too well’ or did you meet on a dating app?”
Dani didn’t see what meeting Rose on a dating app had to do with anything. As for the going too well part... yeah, in retrospect maybe, Dani didn’t do hookups she was on the app to find her true love, it’s hard being a Hispanic lesbian in Texas of all places, and when she met Rose, everything just felt right. She didn’t want to rush into intimacy, she didn’t demand Dani come out to her parents, and they shared interests, like photography and scrapbooking. She loved hearing Dani be mediocre at guitar. She thought Rose was perfect for her, a little too perfect, but she rapidly dismissed those thoughts as self-sabotage.
“ OH GOD.” It all clicked into place for Dani, she had been set up, and Rose was nothing but an elaborate lie, to trick some sad sack of a lesbian like her. Ruby put her arms around Dani, pulling her into an embrace. Dani desperately clutched at the woman's back as she sobbed into her bare shoulder. “We don’t have time for your proclivities Ruby, ask her the other questions.”
“Jesus Christ give her a minute!” it was the first time she heard Ruby raise her voice or sound in any way her unpleasant self. Her eyes were adjusting slowly, but it was just enough to see the blue eyes of Ruby staring at her, full of sadness, pity, and something else Dani couldn’t quite place. When Dani calmed down slightly, Ruby asked something else. “Where were you when you were grabbed? Geographically, like city and state.”
“El Paso, Texas.” the two women were silent for a while seemingly contemplating what this meant for them. “We’re going even further south. I wouldn’t be surprised if we were in South America by now.” the darkness said to Ruby. “I’m sorry can someone fill me in on what the fuck is going on?”
“You make 10 Dani... there’s 7 other women on the other side of the container, from what we’ve gathered by asking the others, we were all on a date or out drinking somewhere when we were abducted, and the container has steadily made its way south... we’re being human trafficked it seems.” She said it so matter of factly like it was as natural as the sun coming up, but honestly, Ruby’s calmness was giving Dani strength.
“But, but where to? And why?” Dani asked a question the darkness next to Ruby made sure she knew was stupid. “We’re ten women locked in a shipping container headed south... A labor camp would be a mercy.” The very real possibility she was being sex trafficked made Dani feel sick. She was. IS a lesbian, but she doubted her captors would care, she’d be made a man's sex toy, nonetheless. “NO, please I'd rather die than that. Please, don’t let them do that to me!” Ruby’s hands moved to capture Dani’s, holding them tightly before entwining their fingers. “Dani, I won’t let anything happen to you. We have a plan.” Ruby stood pulling Dani to her feet with her. “But for now let's get away from here.” she led Dani by the hand back to the other end of the container, where the multiple sets of eyes reappeared.
“OH, before I forget, Dani check your pockets. When we arrived here, we all woke up with a small bottle of water on our person.” Dani quickly patted down all her pockets, her phone and wallet were gone of course, and she didn’t feel any water in the pockets of her jeans, but she heard rustling when she tapped on her left pocket. Emptying her pocket revealed a note. “It’s a note, but it’s too dark I can’t read it.”
“LINDSAY, LINDSAY GET OVER HERE WE NEED YOUR LIGHTER!” Clara was screaming pretty much in Dani’s ear. A pitter of small footsteps was quickly heard before another set of eyes was before Dani, “They let her keep a lighter?” Why didn’t Dani have water? Were these guys so amateur that they forgot Dani’s water and didn’t take Lindsay’s lighter?
“I’m wearing cargo pants, I have about 70 pockets, dumb fuckers probably got too lazy to check them all. Let there be light bitches!” She sounded like a party girl, and that’s exactly what she saw when the lighter sparked. Light brown hair pulled back in a ponytail, emerald, green eyes, wearing the smallest tube top Dani had ever seen, “Quickly! I don’t have much lighter fluid left.” Dani shakily unfolded the note. It was from Rose!
Dear Dani
I’m really, really sorry. I did really like you, but you were already marked before I fell for you. You don’t deserve this. Please try to stay safe. Word of advice, get on the Mistress's good side. You're pretty enough.
Goodbye, Daniella.
Love- ‘Your Rose’
P.S. Check the back.
Clara snatched the note from Dani, turning it over to reveal just a single word. ‘ Evergr33n’ before angrily handing the note back. “What’s so special about this bitch that she’s getting hints from the other side.” Clara was seething, “I woke up bound and gagged with a man’s...a man’s filth dripping out of me and, this bitch gets a fucking love letter! It's not fair, IT’S NOT FAIR!” before Dani could even get a good look at her or say anything in her defense Carla’s jet-black hair disappeared into the abyss of the container.
“You are so special, you know that? To make your human trafficker fall in love with you... You’re amazing. She just gave us so much info. So, where we’re going is run by a woman, and it’s possible to appease her. And that code, ‘Evergr33n’ maybe it’ll help. Habibti you might have just saved us!”
Dani felt so many mixed emotions, If Rose truly loved her why not warn her... why give her a note with clues? Why apologize? It wouldn’t help Dani now. And why was Ruby’s hand curled around her waist? Dani looked to Ruby who was reading the note over her left shoulder. The lighter still illuminated about 2-3 feet around them. Ruby was truly stunning. Brown Carmel skin, deep blue ocean eyes, and dark brown hair, she had the cheekbones of a goddess and towered over Dani who wasn’t exactly short herself, standing at 5’6 above the average height for an American woman as she always reminded her brother. If Dani had to say, she’d probably guess she was Arab American. Her beauty truly made Dani hate the Hand around her waist...
‘Straight women with their no fucking boundaries. I bet if I made a move she’d call me a creep, or a freak. Or I'm mistaking ‘womanly affection’ for love.’ The only thing Dani hated more than a man flirting with her, was a handsy woman because it was always ‘her fault’ she was always blamed for ‘misreading the situation.’ How is Dani to read a situation where a woman gropes her breasts or rear, holds her hand, kisses her cheek, and smiles so sweetly for her, as ‘not flirting’ sometimes Dani saw being a lesbian as nothing but a curse, a curse where a woman could hold her hand or kiss her, and Dani was the ‘weird one’, for thinking affection was affection.
“Hm? Is something wrong habibti?” Ruby had noticed Dani’s glare being stuck on her. “What are you calling me? What does that mean?” Ruby smiled sweetly at her.
“Habibti means Sweetheart in Arabic.” Dani felt her face heat up; she thanked God that the container even with the lighter was shadowy at best. “You-You shouldn’t call me that... if you don’t...”
“If I don’t what?” She raised an extremely well-trimmed and maintained eyebrow. The ocean eyes were fixated on Dani’s lips. “If you... don’t like... me.” Dani heard a loud chuckle come from Lindsay “Sorry, sorry.” Ruby tilted Dani’s face back towards her. her fingers cold, the silver rings on her hands sending a jolt down Dani’s back.
“I thought I was being too forward, if anything. Lindsay turn out the lighter.” The room in a flash quickly became enveloped in complete darkness again. The brief amount of light had reset Dani’s adjusting to the dark. Leaving her in near pitch blackness. “You got it, boss.” She heard Lindsay reply.
Dani quickly found her face cupped, the hand with several rings adorned on it cool against her face, Dani quickly had her lips seized, captured, completely by a woman she could no longer see. Her face tilted upwards to accommodate the woman’s height. Her lips were dry but petal soft and tasted oddly of cherry, they were plush and her movements with them were slow and deliberate. Dani felt a tongue lick her bottom lip, seeking permission to parse her lips, and she obliged, the tongue wetter than it had any right to explored Dani’s mouth. Dani only broke off the kiss when she felt the hand at her waist wandering downwards... A thin trail of saliva between them being the only evidence of their embrace. And even that quickly disappeared.
“Be my Habibti Dani, Be my Habibti at the end of the world.”