JC: Harry and the Lee Girls Chapter 1 By Lazlo Zalezac Copyright (C) Lazlo Zalezac, 2004 Shao Lee stared at the needle of the sewing machine through the blur of tear filled eyes. As the needled performed the up and down movement required to bind the two pieces of fabric together, her mind kept returning to her rape earlier that day. The bastard Wong had picked her as his victim today. She rocked so that her left buttock was supporting her weight. It kept the weight off her ass and her bottom from sitting in the pool of her own blood. It wouldn't be until the dinner break that she would have a chance to wash away the blood. Wong liked it when a girl bled after his violation of her since it made him feel big. It was his way of boasting that his cock was huge, after all it was big enough to tear up their asshole. Getting raped wasn't the end of his victim's ordeal, he enjoyed making them clean his cock afterwards. He always came a second time, the flavor of his come mixing with the blood and shit. The rape never ended until he was satisfied that his cock was clean. Shao Lee sobbed, but tried to keep quiet. If she made too big a deal out of her abuse, Wong would whip her as an example to the other women in the room. It was okay to shed tears, but to whimper, speak, or scream was not forgiven. If she had actually fought the treatment she received, he would have killed her in front of everyone else as an example. She knew that. A few weeks after she had arrived there, one girl had slapped him. It only took her six hours to die, but they were a horrible six hours. Wong smiled at her as if she was supposed to be happy that he had chosen to relieve his desires in her asshole. She didn't know if he really believed that the girls in the room enjoyed his attentions. From the way he acted, it seemed highly likely. She knew that every girl in that room would kill him if given the opportunity. She finished the sewing the shirt that she was working on. She earned a quarter for each shirt that she sewed. She had to do forty of them to cover what they charged for the two meals a day and the cot she slept on. Everything after that went to pay down her debt of ten thousand dollars. It was hard to imagine that she had wanted to come to America. If she had known what she would find here, she would have remained in Hong Kong to work as a prostitute. As she put the shirt in her basket, she looked around the room where she spent fourteen hours a day seven days a week. She was locked in a cage fifty feet by a hundred feet in size. The chain-link fencing that defined the boundaries of the cage ran from floor to ceiling. A locked door at the front led to the main office from which Wong watched them. A door at the rear led to the dorm where they slept at night. Chain-link fencing surrounded the dorm as well. The ceiling was twenty-five feet high with florescent lights that hung down in four rows from the ceiling. Half of the lights didn't work, lending a dull flickering of brown light to the depressing atmosphere. The floor was concrete and cold on her bare feet. Crammed in the work area was row after row of sewing machines. Behind each machine was a girl. They ranged in age from fourteen to seventeen. It was well known that Wong didn't like adult women working for him. It seemed that raping them didn't produce enough blood to satisfy his sadistic need. The older girls usually disappeared in the middle of the night. No one believed that the missing girls lived. It was impossible for any of them to pay off the debt before they became too old for him and he didn't like the idea that they would talk about him to others. As she prepared to work on the next shirt, she glanced at her older sister, Da Lee. Her sister was wearing panties and nothing else. It was too expensive to buy clothes, so most of the girls wore nothing except panties. Da Lee and Shao Lee did the same, but now her panties were ruined and she'd have to work extra to get another pair. Wong acted like they dressed that way to attract his attention despite the fact that he knew they couldn't afford more clothes. It took eight shirts to pay for a pair of panties. It took twenty shirts to pay for a bra. It took thirty shirts to pay for a T-shirt. Getting a skirt was outrageously expensive. The clothes would be ripped to shreds the next time he raped her so wearing clothes wasn't really worth the cost. She cringed at the expression of anger and pure hate on her sister's face. Da Lee always reacted with anger when her little sister was raped. Last time, she had almost lost control of her temper. One day, she would go too far and Shao Lee would have to watch her die. She turned her attention back to her sewing not wanting to think about that. Just a couple of more shirts and she would be able to start working for the money to get new panties. She remembered back to the day when her parents had died. She and her sister had been in the boarding house in which they lived. They had huddled in the one room shared by the entire family, waiting for their parents to return from work. Her mother and father were drug couriers for the Triad in the Tsim Sha Tsui area of Hong Kong. It was a high-risk job that didn't pay much money, but it paid enough to get them a room and food. When their parents didn't return by nightfall, they knew something was wrong. Their parents never left them alone at night. It was too dangerous for teenage girls to be left alone with all of the creeps and drug addicts in the boarding house. They got word at midnight that both of their parents had been murdered. It was only seven hours later when they kicked out of the boarding house. If life was hard in the back alleys of Tsim Sha Tsui for anyone without a home, it was impossible for two young orphans. Desperate, they had searched for some way to survive. One of the important men in the neighborhood had told them they could come to America. It sounded so simple. The man had told them that they could borrow the money to travel to America. Once there, they could get a good paying job were they would be able to pay off the debt in three months. The two sisters had discussed it for a day and then told the man they would do it. The idea of living in America, the land of opportunity, was just too attractive to the romantic young girls. It wasn't so simple. They had come here, not even knowing where here was, and discovered that their debt had been sold to Wong. After one look at them, he said that they were too ugly to be whores. He snarled as he told them that no man would pay money to fuck such scrawny women with flat faces. He took their passports and locked them up in this hellhole. They were his slaves and, as such, he controlled everything about their life. When they worked, when they ate, and when they slept were decided by him. They existed for his profit and his pleasure. She finished the shirt and put it in the box. Just a couple more and she'd be working towards new panties. Her ass hurt, her back was stiff, her fingers were numb, and she was hungry. All she wanted to do was cry, but slaves weren't allowed to cry. A quick glance at her sister showed that the older girl was about to explode in anger. It upset her that her elder sister wasn't calming down. That was bad news. She glanced out the windows and saw that it was starting to get dark. That meant they would be eating soon. After dinner, she would have three hours to make some money towards her debt. She wondered why she bothered to work so hard. She would have to sew forty thousand shirts and dresses to pay off her debt. It was an insane prospect, since there was no way anyone could do that. She stopped working and stared at the sewing machine blankly. Was it better to keep on working to die later or to stop with the consequence of dying today? Keeping her head down, she looked up at Wong. The man might have passed for handsome if he wasn't such a sadist. Tall for a Chinese man, he was fit with well-defined muscles. The rumor was that he was a killer for a Chinese Triad and that this business was just one way of paying him. The girl next to her had filled her box and raised her hand. Wong's assistant, Chin, would come in the room and count the number of shirts in the box before carrying it away. Every girl in the room knew exactly how many items they had to sew before they could leave. The counting would be watched carefully by the girl, despite the fact that it was meaningless. Not one woman had ever paid off the debt that had landed her in this situation. Da Lee had watched her sister get raped by Wong, furious that she could do nothing to help her. This was her fault and she felt shamed by it. She was the older sister and was supposed to protect her little sister. What had she done? She had brought her little sister to this place and then watched as she was raped repeatedly. Even worse, she had done nothing to stop the rape. She had to do something, but what? There was nothing that she could do to help her sister. Tonight, she would try to comfort her and give her a little extra food. It was hard to comfort her since she knew that when her sister's wounds healed, he would rape her again. Then would come the day when she wouldn't bleed after he raped her. The body adapted to protect itself from injury and, in this case, it would be fatal. Her little sister would be killed soon afterwards. Da Lee knew that she wouldn't have to watch her sister die. She'd probably be dead before then. She had been raped just as many times as her little sister. She bore it, thinking that as long as he was raping her that he was leaving her sister alone. The last time, she hadn't bled much. It meant that her time was near. Chin unlocked the door and stepped into the room. Turning his back to the girls, he fumbled with the key to lock the door behind him. It was just a momentary lack of attention, but Da Lee took advantage of it. Shao Lee sucked in her breath when she saw her sister fly to the front of the room and through the unlocked door. She had pushed Chin, who was taken entirely by surprise, to the floor in her rush. Running without regard to anything else going on around her, Da Lee ran through the door that led outside the building. A furious Wong followed her. She had gotten three steps from the building when she realized that she had no idea where to run. She stopped before running into the wall. She looked around before turning to the left and had taken one step when Wong caught her by the arm. She screamed when he spun her around and slapped her. Her scream echoed through the trash filled alley. She fell to the ground, her legs swept out from under her. Without saying a word, Wong looked around for something to use to as a whip. On the ground was a twisted coat hanger that would make a perfect whip. After picking it up, he started hitting her across the back at a fast and furious pace. He wanted her bloody before taking her back in the shop. Each time the hanger hit her, it ripped a thin strip of skin creating streaks to blood that started to blend together. Unable to hold it in, she screamed as the beating continued. The pain wasn't nearly as intense as the realization that she was going to die and her sister would have to watch it happen. Her plan to escape and then rescue her sister had failed. She screamed her frustration and anger to the alley. A loud rap of metal hitting against dumpster sounded like a pistol shot. The sound echoed through the alley cutting off her scream. She looked up as Wong stopped what he was doing. Through tear filled eyes, she saw an elderly man in a green robe standing in the alley holding a shepherd's staff in his hand. In Cantonese, he shouted, "Leave her alone!" Incredulous at her luck, she knew that she would have to do her part to get away. Grabbing the opportunity to escape, she started to scramble forward. Her attempt was cut short when Wong pulled her hair and pushed her to back onto her knees. Laughing at the old man, he reached in his coat and pulled out a pistol. "Fuck off," Wong replied in Cantonese. With a casualness that surprised Da Lee, he fired the pistol without bothering to wait for the old man to respond. The man in the green robe spun as the bullet ripped into him. Wong watched as the man fell into the trash in the alley. Due to the dark shadows of the alley it was impossible to see if he had killed him, but Wong knew he was a good enough shot that the man was hurt enough to be unable to get away. Wong would send Chin out to take care of the matter and that would be that. Even if the old man tried to crawl away, Chin would find him and kill him. The first thing he had to do was take care of the girl. He hit her again just to let her know that he was the one in control of the situation. She cringed, but froze when grabbed her hair. Lifting her by her hair, he pulled Da Lee towards the door. He froze at the sound of a bottle breaking behind him. As he turned to see what had created the noise, his hand moved into his coat to pull the pistol. A dozen homeless men were approaching him, moving in a slow steady shuffle. They were armed with boards and broken bottles. One of the men had a metal bar. A chill went through Wong as he stared at the men. He knew the look in their eyes, having seen it twice in his life. It was the look of men who accepted that they were going to die, but that they were going to die trying to kill him. He wondered, 'What would cause them to be that willing to die?' Another noise attracted his attention and he turned to where he had shot the man in the robe. Another dozen homeless men had shown up, armed with anything that could be used as a weapon. All of them had that same empty look in their eyes. For the first time in his life, Wong felt real fear. Rather than going for his gun, he pulled Da Lee by the hair towards the door. There was nothing gentle about the way he dragged her back into the building. Hearing the noises in the alley, he locked the door behind him. Inside, he threw Da Lee to the floor and kicked her in the side. She collapsed on the concrete as pain exploded inside her. For a full minute, he stood over her trying to decide what to do as a fitting punishment. That she was going to die wasn't at question; it was more a question of how she should die. She was going to have to serve as an example for the others. He shouted, "Chin, get a couple of boys and hang her on the fence." Chin disappeared into the front office and returned after a few minutes with two other men. Da Lee stared at them in horror. There were only two times anyone saw the front room thugs. One was when they came back to rape one of the girls. The other time was when someone was going to die. There were no doubts in her mind concerning why they were there and who their victim would be. Shao Lee started to cry into her hands, feeling guilty that her rape had led her sister to losing control. It just wasn't fair. The two men picked up Da Lee as if she weighed nothing and carried her into the cage. While they held her up against the fence, Chin tied her in place using ties made from clothes hangers. Her legs were spread with her feet three feet off the ground. She was quickly bound to the fence at her feet, knees, hands, shoulders, elbows, and neck. The wire cut off the circulation to her extremities without cutting the skin. Once she was tied, Chin ripped off her panties. Shao Lee knew that the ordeal was only beginning and that it was going to get even worse. While Da Lee was being hung, Wong went into the office to wait for Chin to return. He wanted to plan how he was going to make this little problem work for him. Her death would put him a little behind schedule unless he managed to get another girl in a day or two. A girl cost him about four thousand dollars to purchase from the traders and an additional dollar a day to keep her fed. He was making good money on the designer knock-off clothes the girls were producing. Who needed to go to China, when China could come here? It was just a few minutes later when Chin returned to the office. The young man looked nervous, knowing that it was his fault that the girl almost got away. Wong was one of the bosses within the Triad and was third from the top in this country. If Wong was really angry, Chin knew that his boss could make him disappear at any time. He knew that if the girl had escaped, the chances were good that his boss would have hung him in front of the room. Bowing his head, he said, "Sir, she has been hung in the normal manner." "Good," replied Wong. It was time to punish Chin for his role in the events of the evening. In a quiet voice, he said, "I need you to go out back and dispose of someone. I had to shoot some asshole in a green dress. If the old man isn't dead, make sure that he gets that way." "Yes, sir," replied Chin relieved at the assignment. He gave a half bow and then left the room. He was smart enough to know better than to argue with having to do morgue detail. Taking care of bodies was beneath him, but he was being punished for letting the girl get loose. As he left, he wondered if Wong had really shot an old man wearing a green dress. Maybe it was an old woman. Even in this part of the city, old men didn't walk around wearing dresses. Now that Chin was taking care of the body, Wong could have a little fun. He left the office and entered the fenced area. Stepping in front of Da Lee, he looked over at her with a smile on his face. Wriggling, she tried to get free but was unsuccessful. Knowing she was going to die, she hoped to anger him enough to kill her quickly. She spat in his face and said, "You have the smallest cock I've ever seen." He didn't react immediately, but turned to face the women in the room. His face was tight with controlled rage. The vein in his forehead throbbed signaling his anger in time with his heartbeat. He shouted, "She tried to cheat me by running away without paying her debt. No one cheats me!" He walked around the front of the room furious at Da Lee. Her comment about his cock had angered him, but he could not say that. Instead, he had to use the excuse of her breaking her contract. The girls stared at him in horror. A few knew what to expect him to do while the rest guessed what would happen next. Confident that he had their attention, he reached into a pocket and pulled out a very small knife. Making a production out of it, he opened one of the blades and held it up for all to see. The blade was barely an inch long, useful only for clean dirt out from underneath fingernails. A few of the girls, on the verge of laughing, relaxed thinking the knife was nothing. That impression was dispelled less than five seconds later when he cut a four-inch slice across the girl's stomach. It was a shallow cut, intended to create more pain than shed blood. She screamed in pain provoking a smile from Wong. The smile chilled the girls to their soul. He said, "We'll be seeing lots of that for the next few days." Da Lee wondered if she had understood him correctly. He would be doing that to her for the next few days? The word days echoed in her mind. The true horror of what awaited her was only now becoming clear. She had watched that bastard Wong torture other women in her position, but none of them had lasted days. She had tried to imagine what they had gone through. Now that she was hanging there with a gash across her stomach, she was beginning to get an idea of what she faced. Shao Lee was frozen at her sewing machine staring at her sister as she realized what would happen to her. Cut by cut, he would drain the life from her sister. She wanted to help, but what could she do? If she tried anything, she would end up there with her sister. She lowered her head, sobbing in anguish. Her cries were too loud. Another scream emerged from her sister as another four-inch cut appeared along her side. Moving to stand in front of Shao Lee, Wong said, "I'm going to cut her every time you cry!" The horror of the situation descended upon Shao Lee. Reacting to her sister's pain would only create more pain for her sister. Her sister shouted, "Don't cry for me Shao. Don't give the bastard the satisfaction." Stepping back, his hand whipped out and a streak of blood appeared across her breast passing right through her nipple. The girl screamed in pain as the nerves, sensitive to all forms of stimulation, protested the passage of the knife. Every girl in the room gasped in shock, feeling sympathetic pains in their breasts. Shao Lee couldn't help herself as her hands flew up to cover her breasts. A bloody Chin stumbled back into the room in shock. Turning to Wong, he said, "There's hundreds of them!" Seeing the blood covering his assistant, Wong asked, "Hundreds of what?" "Men, ugly men." Hundreds of homeless men had shown up in the alley. As soon as he had stepped out of the building, he had been pelted with bottles and small rocks. It was almost as if they didn't want to hit him since most of the debris landed around the spot he stood. Only a few poorly thrown rocks had hit him. A shiver ran through his body at the memory of their faces. Sure, the men were ugly, but the true horror was the empty eyes set in hard faces. Recalling the homeless men he had experienced in the ally, Wong walked over to the window and looked out over the alley. He fully expected them to have left. Instead, the alley was filled with homeless men, at least a two hundred of them were waiting for something. The men were standing stock-still, staring at the building with that look in their eyes. He knew what they were waiting for. They were waiting for him and once they had him, they would kill him. He knew that he could step outside with a machine gun and they would just keep coming. He walked over to the other side of the building. With so many men in the back, he was sure that the front of the building would be empty. These homeless men might look scary, but Wong believed they were so stupid that they would only guard the back door. A frown crept over his face when he looked out the front window. There were five hundred homeless people out there, blocking the road. Bag women, beggars, and winos stood together staring at the front of the building. Wong opened the window and shouted, "Get away from here!" Heads lifted to look at him, but no one answered or moved away. He looked at the one of the men in the front. A grizzled beard covered the man's face, a mole grew from his cheek below his left eye, his chipped teeth were green, and his hair was greasy. The man wore a tattered coat. Underneath the coat, was a green sweater stained with past meals. A shirt and undershirt were just visible. In his hand, he held a two-by-four that was about three feet long. Other men in the crowd looked just as bad. Scattered through the crowd, men coughed. Their diseased lungs expelled phlegm that ultimately ended on the sidewalk beside them. No one seemed to notice or care. In some areas, men shared a bottle of some kind of booze, hidden within a brown bag such that only the short neck of the bottle was visible. A commotion at the end of the street caught his attention. Hundreds of women had shown up and were entering the crowd. For a minute he was puzzled by what he was seeing. Whereas the homeless men were wearing many layers of clothes, the women wore almost nothing. He realized that they were streetwalkers. Aloud, despite the fact that no one was there to answer his question, he asked, "What the fuck are whores doing here?" Chin came up to stand beside Wong after checking the alley again. He said, "There are even more homeless showing up in the back. What's going on?" "I don't know," answered Wong. The situation was beginning to make him angry. He slammed the window shut. With a frown, he said, "Make sure the doors are locked and put a man on guard at each of them." As Chin went to do as directed, Wong returned to his office. Inside, he sat down at his desk and tried to figure out what was going on. What was every homeless person in the city doing surrounding his building? It didn't make sense. All he had done was shoot a crazy old man in a dress. The idiot had stuck his head into business where it didn't belong. The telephone rang demanding his attention. Answering it, he listened in shock as one of the men who worked for him explained that he was unable to get to the shop to deliver the food for the girls. The homeless had the entire area surrounded three blocks out from the shop. Wong slammed down the phone angry at the news. Other people were concerned about the situation. The police had surrounded the homeless, but weren't doing anything to break up the gathering. The police didn't consider it a riot. None of the homeless were moving, making threats, or even talking. They weren't damaging any property. A few of the more together individuals had actually requested that porto-potties be set up. Da Lee hung from the chain-link fence in misery. Her arms and legs hurt from supporting her body, but that was nothing compared to the cut across her breast. That wound burned like a never-ending fire, pulses of heat released in time with each heartbeat. Her mind kept imagining him cutting her breasts several more times. The horror of it paled when she realized that he would cut her clit at some point in the future. She'd want to die, but it wouldn't kill her. For at least thirty minutes, her mind retreated from reality trying to protect her sanity. Her body convulsed, but the wire holding her to the fence hid it. After coming around, she stared at her little sister feeling sorry for her. No one should have to watch someone they love get tortured to death. "Da Lee, are you okay?" The look on her little sister's face conveyed that Shao Lee was feeling every pain applied to her sister. How to answer the question? She hurt something fierce, but to tell her sister that would be cruel. "We both know he's going to kill me. Don't blame yourself. I provoked him. Eat, drink your water, and work. Maybe you will get out of here. Don't think about me." Shao Lee held a finger to her mouth to let her know not to talk anymore. Someone was coming and there was no sense in creating more trouble. Hanging there, Da Lee wanted to laugh at the irony of her behavior and the fact that she didn't want to get in trouble. She would be good to avoid getting hurt more frequently, but being good would only make her ordeal longer and, ultimately, more painful. The human spirit is amazing in how tenaciously it will fight for life. Wong came out of the office and stared at the women in the sewing pen. Keeping them under control was a full-time job. The news that their dinner would not be arriving until after the homeless people left was going to make keeping control even more difficult. Taking out his knife, he opened the short blade. He poked a couple holes in Da Lee's stomach with the same offhand casualness that he had shown when he shot the man in the alley. The short blade prevented any major internal injuries, but it did injure nerves she never knew existed and now they throbbed in pain. Her anguished scream was the result that he had wanted. Smiling at the girls in the room, he said, "No dinner tonight." The reaction among the girls was immediate, but was quickly subdued when he poked another hole in Da Lee. Her scream reminded them what they could expect if they created problems. Confident that there wouldn't be any arguments, Wong turned and walked back to his office. Chin was waiting for him in the office with a worried expression on his face. He had heard the announcement and knew that it meant they had a real problem. He asked, "If I may be so bold, but why aren't we feeding them?" Irritated by the entire situation, Wong answered, "The boys can't get the food to us through the crowd outside." He was about to explain how they would have to pay for their lack of nerve when the telephone rang. Wong picked it up and stated, "Wong here." The clipped voice on the other end of the line was that of his boss and he sounded angry. "Wong, I am not a happy man. I am on my way to the airport. All of the other bosses are on their way to the airport. You are on your own. It would be best for all of us if you would die." Shocked at what his boss was saying, Wong asked, "What in the hell is going on?" "You were on television. We have been forced to drop all of our investments on this continent, once again," answered his boss. "What are you talking about?" asked Wong. Why would the Triad pull out of North American overnight? Nothing about this day was making sense to him. Wong asked, "What is going on?" "You really don't know?" asked his boss incredulous that Wong had created such a mess and didn't even know what he had done. "I really don't know," admitted Wong. The admission would kill his career, but as far as he could tell it was over anyway. A dead career was better than being dead. "You shot someone tonight!" The anger in the voice was real. "Yeah. I shot an old crazy man in a dress that had seen our operation," answered Wong with just as much anger in his voice. It was wrong of his boss to question how he handled his businesses. If someone poked around Triad business, that person disappeared. Everyone knew that. "You fool. That wasn't a crazy old man in a dress. That was a fucking Druid," replied his boss just before the phone went dead. Wong paled at the news that he had shot a Druid. After recovering his wits sufficiently to act, he hung up the phone with a shaking hand. The last time someone killed a Druid, the Triad had lost 800 members and over a billion dollars in assets. The killers had been the Russian Mob. Today there wasn't a Russian Mob, either here or in Russia. No wonder the entire contingent of the Triad on this continent was running scared. Even if he came through this alive, he was a dead man. Watching the very uncharacteristic reaction of his boss, Chin wondered what Wong had heard over the phone. This was not a good sign. He had watched Wong accept the news that a rival had killed his brother. Wong had not reacted in any visible manner except to get a little harder. That was the expected reaction of a boss to bad news. To stand in the middle of the room, pale and with hands shaking, was not how a boss acted. Wong moved over to his desk, his legs barely supporting him as his mind raced through his options. He sat down in his chair and tried to figure out what to do. The first thing was to get out of there with as much money as possible. Looking up, he focused on Chin and said, "Get in the waiting room and prepare the men for war." The announcement seemed a little extreme, but Chin nodded and left the office. Once he was gone, Wong picked up the remote control for his television and tuned into the local channel. On the screen was a shot of a hospital with a reporter standing in front of it with a microphone. Wong listened as the news reporter described the situation at the hospital. The only information that they had was that a Druid had been shot earlier in the day and had been admitted to the hospital in critical condition. Druids were flying in from all parts of the country. The scene changed to the newsroom. The announcer babbled on for several minutes about how they were still waiting to learn the identity of the Druid that had been shot. He then announced that another breaking news story was being tracked that evening. Wong frowned when the scene on the television changed to the area outside his shop. A news reporter was pointing down the street to where police cars were parked. The reporter explained that hundreds of homeless people had gathered there, but wouldn't let anyone near them. In fact, they had escorted the press away and would not allow them to approach any closer. No one could say why so many homeless people had gathered in that area. Speculation was that some sort of homeless gathering had been called. A bystander had suggested that they were electing some sort of new king of the homeless. Wong knew the truth and understood how his boss had figured it out. The Triad didn't trust co-incidence. Believing in co-incidence was the quickest way to get killed. A Druid getting shot and the homeless marching on his shop had to be connected. He didn't know why the homeless cared about a Druid, but it was clear they were here to avenge the fact that he had been shot. The channel returned to the show. He flipped to the cable news station and saw that they were covering both stories as well. He watched their coverage and saw that they didn't have any new information. It did show a helicopter landing at the hospital and Druids emerging from it. Stomach tightening, he sat back in his chair considering his situation. He figured that Chin had discovered that the old man in the dress was a Druid from the television in the waiting room. If he were in Chin's place, he would get a couple of the men and return here to take control over the operation. Chin would decide that by killing him, he could turn the body over to the homeless and make good his escape. Closing his eyes, he pictured how Chin would do it. He'd come in the room with two of the other men. The two men he had picked would turn to the desk and open fire without saying a word. Chin would be standing behind them ready to move in for the final kill while he was busy with the first two men. Opening the desk drawer, he took out his automatic and made sure that it was loaded. Getting up, he moved to a chair on the other side of the room. While he waited for the inevitable, he listened to the television for an explanation of the homeless people outside. No explanation was forthcoming. Da Lee had stopped crying and was waiting for the next round of torture, but Wong hadn't shown. Shao Lee glanced over at the man guarding the door. He was pretty far away and she realized that she could talk to her sister without him hearing her. Putting a hand in front of her mouth to hide the fact that she was talking, she said, "Da Lee. Are you okay?" Trying to keep her voice low, Da Lee answered, "What's going on?" "I don't know. There's a guard at the door now," answered the younger sister. One of the girls seated next to Shao Lee whimpered, "How come we aren't having dinner? I'm hungry." Without thinking of the consequences of her actions, Shao Lee glared at her as she shouted, "You're hungry? My sister is getting tortured!" Expecting to get beaten, she was shocked when all that happened was that the guard shouted, "Shut up!" Shao Lee looked down at the sewing machine. It took her a minute to realize that something else was odd. For the first time since she had arrived, no one was sewing. She looked around the room. The girls were sitting around looking over at the guard, at Da Lee, at the front office, and then back at the guard. Keeping her voice low, she asked, "What happened outside?" Recalling that half second of freedom hurt, but Da Lee answered, "Wong caught me. Some old guy tried to stop him, but Wong shot him. Then he pulled me back in here." "Why is there a guard at the door?" asked one of the other girls. It was clear that the guard wasn't watching them, but the door. Shao Lee said, "There's something out there." This was the ultimate in cruelty as far as Da Lee was concerned. Here she was hanging from a fence, in pain, tied up, and covered with wounds. Something was outside but it had shown up too late for her. She knew what it was. Its was hope.