"A play cannot have just one actress. I said there were others." Justine's hanging twin continued with hypnotic calm.
The door Justine had just hoped would open suddenly unlocked with the subtle clicking of tumblers. Worry for what was on the other side had her quickly backing away, only to bump into the suspended woman behind her and she stumbled to the floor, looking back at the glazed facade matching her own face hanging from above. Taps of heavy platform heels, two sets of feet, turned her back to the now wide open door.
Two women, each similarly tattooed with chains along their skin and metal shackles around their limbs and necks, stood waiting. To the left in slightly taller heels to compensate for her shorter natural height, an Asian woman with a slim body but bolted on clearly fake honeydew sized breasts. Obvious scars revealed the low skill of her surgeon. On the right, a much rounder Hispanic woman, surprisingly muscular but nearly as zaftig as Justine or her further exaggerated clone. Each had a steel cable attached to a kind of track in the ceiling pulling the neck ring taut against her throat and lifting each woman's limply standing body a little more upright. Between the two, they held a heavy cast iron tray swaying on cords of twisted black leather. The tray held a crucible glowing with the heat of liquid metal, a clear crystal jug of blue liquid, and a clamp shaped metal ring approximately the size of Justine's neck.
Just as she was about to run, Justine felt her own hands grip her wrists behind her back. The sound of padlocks closing told her that she was now trapped, attached to the ceiling on her own wire by the shackles around her wrists. Pulling away in any direction just twisted her arms helplessly and left her crumpled on the floor. Her copy stood uncaring just out of reach, dangling against her lowered restraints like a puppet.
"Accept the master." All three marionettes said at once in perfect unison in the same lifeless voice.
Their leashes went slack and the two newest creatures lowered the tray to the floor. Lifting Justine by her arms with mechanical precision, the muscular one held her while the other poured the blue liquid over Justine's neck, massaging it with her cold hands. The mold was clamped in place with uncomfortable tightness, making it hard for her to scream. Then the smaller woman lifted the crucible by the long ornate wire grips and tilted the super-heated liquid into the mold inches from Justine's face.
Justine cried out as the molten gold alloy surrounded her neck. It felt like her neck was coming off, the knife like heat causing her excruciating agony for the next several minutes. Finally the metal cooled and Justine realized she was still alive, but drenched in sweat and barely conscious. Her torturers stood in a triangle around her, no longer needing to restrain her broken spirit. She dimly felt the smaller woman's hands popping the mold apart and brushing away the glittering scraps from Justine's red but undamaged neck, before she passed out once more.
Fri Dec 19 22:53:41 2014