“Damn,” said Winky. “Serious girls’ club. I know it sounds a little twisted, but I gotta respect it in theory.”

I frowned at her before asking Rob, “So what are you saying? That Bodo’s going to be used for sex and then killed?”

“Well, you said something about Eden. That’s Adam and Eve stuff,” continued Rob. “Maybe they’re planning to repopulate the earth.”

“Using Bodo,” I said. The idea was ludicrous. “No, huh-uh. That’s just … weird. Or sick.”

“I don’t know. It’s not really an original idea, is it?” asked Rob.

“Adam and Eve? No.”

“No, I mean, find the perfect male specimen and the perfect female specimen, and having them make the perfect baby specimens.”

My blood chilled. “Crazy girl said that only pretty girls are allowed to be with the Amazons.”

“Oh, shit,” said Winky. Then she giggled. “Your boyfriend is about to become a sex slave to a group of hot chicks. Sucks to be you.”

I punched her in the arm. “Shut up, this is serious. She also said that if he refused to comply, they’d cut off his dong.”

“Ooh, ouch,” said Rob, covering his nuts. He looked towards the mansion where Bodo supposedly was, yelling, “Dude! Just do it! She’ll forgive you!”

“Rob, if you were closer, I’d punch you in the face,” I said.

“Good thing I’m not, then,” he said smiling, moving his bike farther away. Then he got serious again. “All kidding aside, what’s the plan? If Bodo is supposed to be their boy-toy, they’re not going to be all that happy about letting him go.”

“Maybe we can offer them a trade,” said Winky.

“Like what?” I asked. “We have nothing to trade, except maybe a bike or something.

“No, we have something much more valuable than a bike,” said Winky. “We can trade Rob.”

“Hey!” he said. “How’s that supposed to work? Why me?”

Winky shrugged. “I don’t know. You said you liked the idea of being a sex slave. And you don’t have a girlfriend or anything.”

“Screw you, Winky. I don’t have one because I choose not to have one.”

“She’s just kidding, Rob. I think.” I took a few steps, moving the pedal so I could use it to launch the bike by pushing down on it. “Come on. Let’s just go over there and see if we can get a peek at what’s going on.” I looked at Winky. “Do you think the baby will be quiet?”

“I think it’s sleeping,” said Winky, peeking in the blanket. “But how do I know? I’m no baby expert.”

“All right. If it starts to cry, take it away. You can wait for us down by the beach.”

We took off, heading towards the gates with the lions. The closer we got, the clearer it became that there was some sort of party or celebration going on.

Lights from fires made the space above the front yard glow orange. Noises of girls cheering and laughing floated over the wall as we arrived, and the smell of cooking meat made me salivate. I felt sick, worried it might be a cannibal’s meal which would be just downright wrong to drool over. I swallowed hard, trying to move my mind away from anything that would cause me to announce my arrival with the loud spatter of vomit.

“They’re partying it up in there,” said Rob quietly. He got off his bike and dropped it in the weeds carelessly, silently moving up to the gate. I watched him climb easily to the top of it and peek over, joining him at the bottom after leaving my bike near his.

“What’s going on?” I asked in a stage-whisper.

“Party. Big one.”

“How many people?”

After a few seconds of silent counting, he said, “Fifteen girls. Two guys.”

My heart seized. “Is it Bodo?”

“I’m not sure…” said Rob, a strange tone in his voice.

I grabbed the posts on the front of the gate next to Rob and climbed as fast as I could, using the lion paws and head as footholds. I reached the top and slowly lifted my head above the edge.

There was a huge bonfire in the middle of what used to be a big fountain in the front of a ginormous house. It lit up the entire area so well, I could even see the faces of the people standing nearby.

A driveway led from the gate where we stood to circle the fire-fountain. Girls were standing around it in small groups, and two male figures were tied to columns at the front of the house.

The one on the left was big and dark-skinned, possibly Hispanic. He was bald and cleanly shaved. It was the first time I’d seen a guy with no facial hair in almost a year. Even the Native American guys had a sprinkling of it on their faces.

Bodo had always had a scruff that he kept short with a knife given to him by Yokci, but this person tied to the column on the right had none of that. He was also bald, and covered in paint. Oh, please let it be paint, I begged no one in particular. It was brownish red and reminded me of old blood.

“What’s going on?” asked Winky. “Come on, guys. I can’t climb up here with this poo factory on me. God, he stinks now,” she whined crankily.

“I’m not sure,” I said, looking down at her before turning back to the scene in front of us. “It might be Bodo, tied to a pole thingy. But he’s bald and covered in paint.”

“That ain’t paint,” said Rob, shaking his head.

“Shut up,” I said, hitting him with the back of my hand on the shoulder. “It’s paint until I say it’s not paint.” I hated the idea of Bodo being covered in something evil.

“Get off me, you ho-bag!” yelled Winky from below, the sounds of a scuffle quickly reaching my ears along with her demand. She can’t possibly be talking to the baby, can she?

My head whipped around and down, my eyes taking in the nightmare scene below. Three girls had Winky in hand, two of them with one arm each and the other pointing a machete in her face.

“There’s a baby here, idiots, be careful with it!” she yelled, trying to twist away from her captors.

“Shut up, bitch!” growled one of them. “Stop trying to get away and neither of you will be hurt.”

Another girl came walking out of the darkness, pointing a machete at Rob and me. “Come down and do it slowly. My machete likes blood.”

Rob and I exchanged looks before slowly climbing down. We’re screwed, was all I could think. We were out-numbered, and I had serious misgivings about fighting chicks with knives this big and this lethal, especially when Bodo’s life hung in the balance along with ours.

***

The warrior women led us around the front wall and into a door on the side of the property. There was one girl in front and two behind, with the others staying on either side of us. Winky held her arms around the baby protectively, and I could tell from her expression as she searched left and right for a way out of this mess that her mother-like behavior was totally instinctive. It crossed my mind that someday, she’d be one badass momma.

We reached the bonfire and one of the girls escorting us peeled off to talk to a heavily-painted girl standing on the steps in between the two columns with guys tied to them. Her markings were all over the place, blue and purple and even bright yellow and orange. It looked like a rainbow had vomited on her.

As I got closer to the fire and the front of the mansion, I realized it was indeed Bodo tied there on the right side. He saw me looking at him and smiled lazily, his head bobbing around a little. He looked so pitiful, especially with his bald, white head.

“Hey!” he yelled, obviously so happy to see me, he was laughing. “Ha, ha! Dat’s my girlfriend over dare! Hey, Bryn! Ha, ha! You’re comingk to da party!” His head bobbed to the side, before he brought it up again and shook it a few times. “Party, party,” he said, chanting in a monotone. “Time to make da party.”

“Daaaammmn …” said Rob, sounding impressed. “He is seriously messed up.”

I was pissed, glaring at the nearest girl. “You drugged him? What the hell is wrong with you guys?”

“Shut up, bitch!” she said, stepping over swiftly and backhanding me.

My head whipped back from the force of it. It took every ounce of willpower I had not to drop her with a solid boob punch followed by a right hook. I could totally picture myself doing it, but the visualization was very unsatisfying, only giving me a very small measure of pleasure and no outlet for my rage.

Someone was going to get her ass kicked tonight. Maybe a few of them. But I had to wait for my moment. I stood up straight again, shooting her death lasers with my eyes for a couple seconds before looking back at Rainbow Vom Girl.

She finished talking to her informer and slowly descended the stairs like a queen, moving in our direction and finally stopping in front of me. She was weaponless, and her eyes never left mine.

“Who are you?” she asked simply.

The fire was to my left and her right, making it possible for me to see one side of her face very clearly. She was blond, and if the light wasn’t fooling me, blue-eyed. She could have graced the cover of a Vogue magazine she was so beautiful, with her high cheekbones, aquiline nose, full lips, and aristocratic air. I could totally see her in shiny, brown leather riding boots and tweed.

“I’m Bryn.” I motioned with my head towards the column. “And that’s my boyfriend up there. I’ve come to get him.”

Our conversation was interrupted by the sound of the baby’s crying. I turned around to see Winky gently bouncing it, and shushing it in a quiet voice while talking nonsense.

“Boongy, boongy, baby headsies, no more crying, no more pooping, nozies, nozies, noziiieeees …”

The painted girl spoke again. “That her baby?”

“Uhhhh, kind of.”

“She crazy?”

I was confused for a second before I realized she was still talking about Winky. “No. She’s perfectly sane.” Her goofy baby-talk made it a hard sell, but the girl just frowned at me, switching topics.

“What were you doing outside our gates?” Her eyes were scanning me from top to bottom, as if making some crude assessment. It made me nervous.

I looked around me, at all the faces staring at us. The talking and laughing had stopped. Every girl there stood still, wary, looking every inch the Amazon warriors I had pictured in my mind. They weren’t all necessarily tall, but they were beautiful, tough-looking, and totally confident. Their body language spoke volumes.

Should I tell her the truth or make something up? My mind was drawing a blank about what to say, so I went with the truth. It was easier.

“We were spying on you to try and figure out how to get Bodo back.”

Bodo’s head popped up. “She luffs me, you know! I triedt to tell you dat, but you don’t listen to Bodo. Dat’s a problem, you know, dat you don’t listen!” His head flopped down and he roared, lifting it up again with effort. “Aaarrraaahhh!! Get me off of dis thingk, now! I need to go take care of my girlfriend. You know she iss helpless without me. She thinks she is soooo bigk and tough, but I know bedder. Insite she’s chust a … ahh … fluffy white thing … dat thing … argh! Honigsuker! I don’t know what you call dat thing. But it’s very soft and like sweetness of da sugar.”

“A marshmallow!” yelled the guy next to him, sounding way more sober than Bodo did.

Bodo’s head snapped to the side, acknowledging his tied-up partner. “Yes! Dat’s what it is! Thank you, Alejandro!” He looked back to us. “Bryn is chust a marshmallow so she needts me a lot.”

I shook my head. That boy is so far gone. He honestly believes that about me. Idiot.

“So you’re the one we’ve been hearing about non-stop for days,” Rainbow Vom said, no expression on her face.