Free Psycho Save Us by Chad Huskins

turns up by the time the dicks get on it, let’s hit the Waffle House. 
What do you say?”
    Officer Beatrice
Fanney pursed her lips and nodded in a way that suggested it sounded like a
plan to her.

 
    3
     
     
     
     
     
     
    When
she woke, Kaley discovered that her pants were gone.  They were on the floor
next to her.  She tried to sit up, and found that she had to use her elbows
because she was handcuffed at the wrists and ankles.  She kicked out against a
phantom attacker.  There was no one else in the room.  Except…she heard a
whimper, and turned to see a truly terrifying thing.
    Shan was bound
and gagged on the floor with her, and looking up at her big sister with huge,
tear-dripping eyes.  Kaley tried to say something, tried to yell, but found
that she was gagged, too.  Something soft and large had been shoved into her
mouth, and something else held it there.  Upon her first scream, she almost
swallowed it, and would surely have choked on it.
    Panicking, Kaley
tried to wrench her hands apart.  That didn’t work.  The handcuffs were closed
tight, cutting off circulation it felt like.  It was dark inside the room. 
Bars of moonlight came through the shades of a window above her, casting her
and her sister in zebra stripes.  On the floor of whatever room she was in,
toys lay strewn like so much detritus.  There was a space heater, but it wasn’t
currently running.  A ceiling fan overhead blew on its lowest setting, giving
off a light gust that in her latest dream had manifested itself as the wind
blowing in her face as she stuck her head out the bus window on the way to
school.
    There were
voices.  Perhaps the echoes from before?  No, new ones.  These came from
someplace.  They came from somewhere inside the house.  Sounded not too far
away.  An adjacent room.  There were three or four different men, all jockeying
for position in the conversation.  She caught snippets of English words, but
there was also plenty of some other language to conflate the topic being
discussed.  At times the voices raised, then lowered, and even whispered before
rising again.
    An argument?
    Kaley kicked out
with her feet again, trying to break free of the cuffs by sheer power.  She had
heard of people becoming uncommonly strong when they were under pressure, but
she was issued no such magical powers now.  She screamed through her gag and
writhed in emotional anguish, and in frustration at herself for not listening
to the charm.
    Beside her, Shannon
sniffled.  Fresh snot was moving from her nose and collecting around her gag. 
Her eyes were like saucers.  She was missing her pants, too, but still had on
her Powerpuff Girls underwear.  Kaley crawled over to her and threw her cuffed
hands around her neck, hugging her closely, briefly, hoping that this would
assuage her long enough so that Big Sister could do what had to be done.  “I
have to leave you,” she tried to say.  But what came out was, “Ah hah tuh luh
yuh.”
    Shannon—poor,
poor Shan—she got the gist of this and shook her head violently.  She clung to
her sister, who was trying to separate from her.  Then, Kaley touched her
forehead to her sister’s.  She closed her eyes.  She couldn’t speak, but had to
make her sister see.  She had to make Shan feel what Big Sister had to do. 
What happened next was closely akin to prayer, only not directed towards the
heavens.  For a moment, Kaley felt something.  It was Little Sister Terror. 
Then, Shan’s body jerked, and she peed herself.  But peeing herself was good,
because after it was over it calmed her.  When Kaley opened her eyes, Shannon
was looking at her.  Her little sister nodded reluctantly.  She didn’t like it,
but she understood.  Big Sister must leave to go get help for Little Sister .
    Kaley then
pushed herself away from Shan and found the nearest wall.  She couldn’t stand
right up, of course, because her feet were bound.  She inch-wormed until she
got her back