A dim gloom hung over the desolate wasteland of the outer edges of Chicago. The tendrils of the ruined city expanded far beyond where the reclaimed portions of it now stood. The ground was littered with the remnants of towering buildings and battered bunkers. There seemed to be an eternal cloud of dust settled over the city, keeping any of it from ever looking clean. Indeed, the whole city seemed grimy and dusty. Any sort of government in place had little concern for the cleanliness of its denizens. After all, happiness and the public welfare were barely even secondary concerns in this new world.
New Chicago, as most people referred to the reclaimed portion of the city, had seen its fair share of fights over the year. Its proximity to the Great Lakes was enough to maintain it as a bustling trading port, at least in the context of a post-fallout world. As a consequence of this, it had been a constant target of larger bands of raiders, a large prize to be fought for by the few starving wolves that remained in this world. The design of the city reflected this aptly. Rows of mismatched trenches were strewn haphazardly around the perimeter of the city, each likely added as a result of a current threat rather than placed due to any semblance of planning. Smatterings of barbed wire and sharpened sticks were also in place, the occasional crude bunker only adding to the war-torn feel to the entrance of the city. Chicago may have been a trading center, but it was not a welcoming place. It was a a city as hardened as its people.
Kelsey, who had started to accept her new name through a combination of fatigue from the grueling journey and the constant degradation thrown from Jake, had never been a wolf, but rather one of the many scavengers. She had scurried across the ruins of civilization, fending off other scavengers and picking the scraps that were either left behind by the wolves or too small for them to bother with. Her downfall was nothing more than a vulture outwitted by another of her own kind.
Of course, that did little to ease her conscious. As she walked in front of Jake, bare as day, into the city, she couldn't feel anything but helpless. Perhaps the worst part of her journey was how long she was left to her own thoughts, however. She had spent much of her new life as a slave contemplating the events that had unfolded after her downfall. A nagging question constantly circled through her mind, never ceasing, allowing not a single moment's respite. When she had been down on her knees, helpless to Jake's whims, she had felt an odd sort of arousal She had never been quite turned on as much as she had been when unable to fight back.
Kelsey had always thought of herself as more of a dominant. Her southern drawl and tough line of work lent itself well to a more dominant attitude in bed. However, her assumptions were based on very little experience over the years, nothing more than an occasional night of passion to pass away the dreariness of her reality, and her experience with Jake was now tearing away at her whole reality.
The other emotions still appeared whenever she attempted to confront her fate: anger, fear, and a deep sense of helplessness. Yet, arousal always seemed to follow suit, an unwelcome guest that she was ever-aware of in the back of her mind.
As they walked into town, Jake broke the long silence that had settled between the two, broken only by occasional commands to pick up the pace, followed by typical insults. "You know what's occurred to me, slave?" he intoned, his voice an odd mix of contemplative thought and cheerfulness. Kelsey didn't even bother to turn her head, to face him, afraid her anger would provoke him to place a bullet between her temples. "I can't keep you," he said, a forlorn note of sadness creeping into his voice.
Panic shot into her eyes. Jake was a sloppy, cut rate criminal. She had assumed that it would only be a few nights before he made a mistake and she found a way to slit his throat, or enact even worse retribution on her captor. "I managed to break free from you, and that was your job. You know, before I made you into a whore," he added, a satisfied smile plastered across his face. "Anyways, if you couldn't keep me in check, I doubt I could keep you in check."
Jake tugged on the rope leash he had fashioned and pulled Kelsey to a halt, tugging on the rope to spin her around to face him. "You wouldn't hesitate to slit my throat at the first chance you got," he commented offhandedly, studying her face with interest. "Even a blind man could see the hate on your face." Jake slackened the leash and spun her back around, sending a hard smack on her naked bottom to continue into town, as if she were a mule. "As much as I'd love to humiliate you for the rest of your pathetic life, I value my skin more. No, I'll sell you to the slavers. They'll whip that defiant glare out of you," he added with a laugh, nodding to one of the watchmen as he entered Chicago.
Kelsey had little time to panic, and even less to be angry at Jake. The busy entrance of Chicago, the large square of merchants and townspeople totaling somewhere around a hundred, now filled Kelsey with a deep sense of shame. Jake's voice never gave her a moment of respite however, his harsh tone allowing her not even a moment to recover. Even if her chances to escape were higher with Jake, she would at least be grateful to never hear his smug tone again. She could've dealt with it when she was in charge, but not when she was paraded in bondage throughout the streets.
Jake yanked his property left, guiding her towards then entrance of the slave market that she was oh so familiar with. "Never thought you'd be brought here, did ya slut?" he added idly, enjoying every last moment with his pet. Kelsey walked on in silence, eyes only flitting up now and then to see her way before returning to her eternal shameful downwards gaze.
The entrance to the slave market was perhaps the most decorated of the city, though it was likely the least tasteful. Large wooden stakes were erected upwards, forming a solitary wall that was only broken in the middle by a grand entry. On either side of the entrance, hanging from the stakes themselves, were large metal cages suspended at least 10 feet in the air. Each a housed a completely naked slave girl, who was recognized as such by the brand that stood out oh so strikingly on their butts, an advertisement of sorts for the wares that would be sold weekly at the vile place.
Once a week there was always a sale of the slaves that had been brought in by slavers or merchants, and it was perhaps the most popular public event in Chicago. Kelsey had hoped she would arrive in town on the day of the auction as she wouldn't have to endure much from the guards of the auction, but her luck continued to be faint as Jake had taken her into town a couple of days before the auction would take place.
Kelsey had little time to ponder her fate more, however, as she felt another harsh yank that pulled her short and sent her staggering to her knees in the muddy street. A combination of mud and dust now lightly coated her tanned, nubile form. She looked up tentatively to have her worst fears confirmed; they had arrived at where she would be sold to the auctioneers.
The man in charge of procuring wares for the weekly sales was recognizable to Kelsey. Jared was his name, and he was a sleazy, eerily thin man with slicked back brown hair and an ever-present smirk tattooed across his gaunt face. He happened to be her least favorite auctioneer to deal with when she was a slaver as he always took copious amounts of time to expect her female slaves and charged the hardest bargain for her wares. "At least he'll be getting a shit price for me" she thought idly, though somehow she was rather interested in how much she'd fetch, a weird sort of vanity kicking in for her.
"What have you brought me, stranger?" Jared asked, barely bothering to look up from his wooden desk, idly thumbing at the mess of loose papers strew across its surface as he spoke.
