WARNING: Contains graphic violence, horrific descriptions detailing human trafficking, and a semi-brief non-con scene. May be triggery. Read at your own discretion or PM if you want to skip the chapter and ask for a summary of events.

Ash almost whimpered, but the tiniest movement of her throat made the knife dig in just a little bit deeper. She did her best to refrain from any sudden movements, or to struggle so much when she was in the thick of danger.

She thought since it was public and out in the open, as well as an official and rather well-known show, that she would be okay. That she'd be safe…She was with people! There were a lot of them together. She thought what would happen a long time ago wouldn't happen again, not when she was surrounded by so many people and was in a group, and with it being such a public event.

How did it happen like this?

"Alright, ladies and gentlemen," the man behind her said loudly to address the group. "We're going to do this nice and quietly. Don't struggle or else we'll have to get a little rough on all of you, and things might get a little messy."

"The hell I'll go quietly!" one of the men in the group she was with yelled angrily, consumed with fear and panic.

One of the circus people rolled their eyes and strolled over to him, stopping behind the guy as he took something from out of his belt and cocked back the hammer of a gun and then point blank shot the man in the head, blood splattering from the exit hole through the man's forehead. The deceased man had a final look of surprise before he fell forward and hit the ground face down.

Ash let out a little scream that mostly got stuck in her throat, while all around her everyone else in the group let out louder screams.

"Good girl," the man holding her whispered into her ear. "One little move, and that pretty little white neck of yours will be stained red. Do you understand?"

She gave a small nod, careful of the knife against her. She blinked back tears, but really she just wanted to cry and curl into a ball on the floor, and pretend this wasn't happening to her right now.

"Okay, everyone down on their hands and knees," the pretty lady from before told all of them coldly, her pretty features twisted into an unemotional look. "Don't struggle," she warned them again.

There was plenty of crying and pleas as they all followed directions, and Ash tried to do the same. However, the man behind her kept a tight hold on her, keeping her standing there.

"Not yet, little bird," he murmured. "I have a little question for you. You're a little young to be a trainer, so why do you have two pokémon with you?" he asked as his hand went near her belt and took Maximus' pokéball away from her.

She whimpered, mind whirring quickly. "T-that was a gift from someone. It was a gift for me to have until I start my pokémon journey in a few years. The-the Pikachu I just met not too long before the show started. I-it left soon after this."

She was vague enough to be truthful for Maximus, while she outright lied about Pikachu. She could only hope, and it seemed like it, that Pikachu had gotten away and was hopefully safer wherever he was. She didn't want to think of what could happen to him, if he'd been caught by these people.

"…A few more questions then," he said, and she nodded slowly as she watched the others being tied up with plastic cuffs and being taken away, loaded up into the trailer of a truck that had just parked nearby. "What's your name?"

She tried not to move too much. She wondered if she should say her real name or make something up. And then she realized she'd taken too long as he pressed the knife harder against her throat in warning.

"Well? It shouldn't take too long for you to give me your name."

She winced. "Giovanna. My name is Giovanna."

It reminded her of Giovanni, who she wished would show up like he did so long ago –saving her from this man and whisking her away. But he wasn't here and he wasn't coming, and she had to realize that quickly and think about what to do herself. There was no one else there that was going to help her but herself.

"Giovanna, huh…You don't look like an Outsider, even though you have an Italian name. You live in the Regions?"

Ash was quicker to reply. "Yes. I live i-in Celadon," she lied, remembering the place as the one other city she'd been to.

"Giovanna what?" he asked then, surprising her. She had to come up with something quick, though she knew she couldn't use Giovanni's surname or anything close to it. She remembered one of his business rivals, who she remembered because the interview she'd been watching with Gary the day she left, had been announcing a partnership with a man named Cyrus Akagi. So she blurted it out.

"Giovanna Akagi, huh. Any relation to Cyrus Akagi?" he pressed her for answers that she was having trouble coming up with.

"N-no. I don't know him at all. Please, what's happening? What are you going to do with me?" Ash couldn't help bursting out with the questions.

"How old are you?" he asked instead, and she had a feeling he was vetting her for something.

"I'm 14," she replied quietly, starting to become subdued. Her panic was receding in the face of numb terror. "I want to go home," she couldn't help pleading.

But he pushed her towards the opened trailer, where she could see many of the people in the group she'd been with, all passed out or dazed. She wondered what was wrong with them, when the man with her took out a rag from his pocket and held it against her face. She breathed in the chemical that was doused in the cloth, and it wasn't long until she passed out as well.

~*~*~

She felt like she was burning. Everywhere was hot and she couldn't think straight. She couldn't even open her eyes and see what was going on. She knew they were closed because all she saw was darkness, and her hearing was muffled, like she was underwater and everyone's voices became muted.

When she awoke, she was in a moving car and was face down. She was no longer in the trailer, but a separate vehicle where she was lying in the back of the car and the driver was the man from before. She was bound now too, just like the others. Both her wrists and ankles were ensnared by the plastic contraptions, tightened to the point of being too tight, but not enough to cut off her circulation. Being unnoticed, she took the time to watch the man closely.

He was clearly handsome. He had sharp features that went well with his green eyes and dirty blond hair, and his slim frame seemed deceptively weak. But she knew that he was probably more than capable of subduing her, or anyone else, even those thrice his size. Besides, appearances can be deceiving and she could see enough toned muscles on him that said that he wasn't to be trifled with and wasn't as weak as he could seem otherwise.

"Awake finally?" he spoke up, barely glancing at her with his cold green eyes.

"What happened?" she dared ask, though she noted her tongue had trouble moving and her voice was slurred.

"You had a bad reaction to the chloroform/alcohol mixture. I was afraid that you might have gone into cardiac arrhythmia," he told her frankly, and she didn't believe he really cared. Any ounce of concern for her was probably more due to a loss of money.

"You broke out into a high fever," he continued. "You probably still have a bit of one, looking at your flushed state."

"What's your name?" she blurted out, still slurring and a bit dazed.

He was silent, causing her to fear that she might have crossed the line with her unintentional question. But after he started tapping his fingers on the wheel of the car for a few seconds, he actually answered her.

"Tobias. My name is Tobias."

"Is that your real name?" she asked, feeling her eyes droop as she began to feel sleepy again.

"Maybe, maybe not. Would you really want to know?"

'No, no I don't,' she thought.

She just had a feeling she wouldn't have a choice.

~*~*~

Ash woke up again, to find she was in a dingy room with several others, who looked as miserable as she felt. They were all stiff tied up, so there was no chance of moving too much in the area or getting around easily. The difficulty of just standing up with their locked legs would keep them from going far, if they attempted any sort of escape with the way they were.

Suddenly the door to the room opened, and the pretty lady from before entered, watching them all in detached amusement. Her brown eyes landed on Ash and their focus intensified, catching Ash off guard.

"You there," she pointed at Ash. "Get up and come with me."

Ash hurried to get up, using the wall to prop herself up and then trudge over to the woman, watching her step so she didn't fall because of her cuffed ankles.

"You're taking too long," the woman said in boredom, and walked over to Ash, despite her being almost close to reaching her destination. Without warning, she yanked at Ash's shirt collar, pulling at her and causing Ash to stumble in surprise, tumbling towards the door and slamming her left temple against the frame. Ash let out a loud yelp, and was further roughened up as the woman kicked her legs and she buckled, falling head first out the door.

She felt the blood seep from the wound at her temple, dripping down the side of her face. The back of her legs were pulsing with pain, and she wasn't sure if she could move them. The woman looked her over and sighed, reaching for her head. Slender fingers slid through Ash's hair and gripped it tightly, and then her scalp was in pain as the woman pulled and started to drag her across the floor by her hair. She felt like her hair was going to be yanked off, and she couldn't help sobbing and trying to pull her hair away, which just made it worse as the woman held on tighter and yanked her back.

She didn't know how long it was as she was dragged across the floor of the hallway, the rough cement harsh on her back. She just knew it felt like forever until they stopped in front of a door, and she was left lying on the ground on her side as the woman entered into the room. Her back was aching and the back of her legs jolted with pain every few seconds, along with the pounding in her head. Even left alone as she was, she didn't think she could attempt to run off. Her ankles were still tied up as well, and she wouldn't have gotten far before she was found and probably met with a severe punishment for the escape attempt.

But she wanted so badly to get out of there and go back home, be in Sammy's Corral, play with Pikachu and secretly hang around Maximus, and train to one day be an awesome pokémon trainer. Remembering them, she felt herself become upset and beside herself with worry. What had they done with Maximus' pokéball? Had they released him out of it? Were they hurting him or were they keeping him in there? And what about Pikachu? Had her loyal friend managed to run away?

The door opened and Tobias stood there, shaking his head as he saw her.

"Really, Miranda? You couldn't have gotten her here in better shape?"

"She shouldn't have taken so long to get to me."

Tobias quietly snorted, glaring at the woman who passed him by and left the room. 'Miranda' gave one last disinterested look at Ash, and then departed from them both. He took that moment to kneel by her and scoop her into his arms, carrying her into what she realized was an office, once she'd gotten a good look around.

"Miranda is a complete sadist. I would suggest you would take care to try to go beneath her notice," she was advised as she was set down on a couch that was parallel to the desk. "Now stay here while I make some calls and finish my business, before I come back to you."

Ash stayed quiet, watching dully as she tried to take her mind off of the pain she was in. When he made his call, she listened as he talked dispassionately to the other person.

"A new batch has arrived. A good amount of them are women, so we'll have them trained and sent off to the buyers or auction them off. Some of them are better off for labor, which is where the men will be heading off to, except for the younger ones who will go with the women. Break them in, so they won't fight off the customers.

"Some of them are pretty useless, so we'll just harvest their organs. There's also a pregnant woman in the group, so have her sectioned off with the other pregnant women in our hold. Once they've given birth, those women should be broken in as well, while the babies are sold off. There's a few that we can market in a snuff film, and if they're still intact, we could sell off their organs too."

Ash shivered and watched the man terrified. Were they going to take her organs? Was she going to be alive and aware when they did it? Or was she going to be sold off to someone or someplace, and forced to work all day and night? She was glad she was too young to have babies…Right? 14 year olds can't…can't have babies, right?

She whimpered, which caught Tobias' attention as he hung up.

"Are you crying?" he asked her in detached curiosity.

Ash couldn't help her sniffling, so she tried to distract herself by asking him questions.

"W-what's a snuff film?" She'd never heard of the term, and though in context it sounded bad, alone the name didn't ring any bells or sound really threatening.

Tobias tilted his head and watched her for a minute, causing her to grow uneasy and wonder even more about the term.

"A snuff film is when a person is purposely murdered on film, for the express reason to make a profit off of the filmed murder."

Ash sucked in a huge breath. She wished she had never asked, and now she wished she could take it back because she was going to have nightmares about it. She should have let herself stay ignorant.

"Am-am I going to be in a snuff film?" she asked, hating the fact she sounded so scared.

But she was scared. Terrified really. And she was still in so much pain. Everything seemed so hopeless, and she couldn't see how she could get away or find a way out of her situation.

He slowly stood up from his desk and headed towards her, causing her to shrink back into the couch as he towered over her prone form.

"Hm…You said you were 14, yes? No, you won't be in a snuff," his hand trailed up her bare leg, and then firmly planted itself on her thigh, on top of her skirt. "No, you're much too pretty for that. The sex-trade market is in high demand for younger kids these days, and you'd be perfect."

Ash, desperate, threw herself off of the couch and tried to head towards the door, only to land on the floor as her legs once again jolted in pain. Before she could start to at least try to crawl, he patiently picked her up and sat on the couch, holding her to him.

"Now, little bird, you mustn't struggle. This is what happens to difficult merchandise –to break them in, as you must have overheard me order my associate, there are many methods we employ. We starve them. We beat them. We rape them, even to the point of gang rape. We can confine you, abuse you whenever we feel like, force drugs into you –so long as you're intact enough to make us a profit. Do you want to be subject to and broken in like that?"

"No," Ash sobbed, shaking her head in terror.

"Good girl," he stroked her head idly, the other hand making brushes against her chest that had her wanting to tear out of his hold and attempt to run away again. "If you behave, everything will be much more pleasant for you."

"Why are you doing this?" Ash blinked back tears, even though they came anyway. "Why would you take all these people and do these things to them?"

His mouth was too close to her. She could feel his breath against her ear, and his hand escalated from brushing against her chest, to more firmer and longer-lasting touches, though he wasn't quite yet groping.

"This is all relatively low-risk, did you know? But it's high-profit. It's why the human trafficking business is growing so fast. And well, unlike drugs, humans can be sold repeatedly," his tongue darted out and licked the outline of her ear and she stiffened up. She held still though, remembering his warning. "Truth is, you can generate a profit of anywhere between $9 billion to $31.6 billion in this trade."

His other hand stopped stroking her hair and went down to clasp hard on her thigh.

"A man, another trafficker, once said, 'You can buy a woman for $10,000 and make your money back in a week if she is pretty and young. Then everything else is profit.'" His hand slipped underneath her skirt and easily moved aside her underwear, a single finger poking at her. Her breath hitched. "You are going to make me a huge profit. And I didn't even have to pay a single penny for you."

His finger wiggled its way into her, and she yelped and tried to move away. But he held her firmly against him, and let his finger make its way in and out of her, again and again. She sobbed unrestrainedly, not liking the intrusion, when he removed his finger. She felt relieved for a second, only to feel dread again at his next words.

"I'm going to personally train you, Giovanna," he revealed, emphasizing her 'name' like he didn't believe her.

And then his hand was back against her entrance, his fore and middle fingers forcing their way into her while his thumb rubbed circles against her clit. She could feel his two fingers curling inside of her and then unfurling, while his thumb pressed and rubbed her and she began to feel strange. She almost…almost felt good, which made her begin to hate herself for the reaction.

"You can feel it, can't you?" he murmured into her ear. "It's building up inside of you. It's okay. Spread your legs and enjoy it."

She shook her head violently, refusing him and wanting to run away. But it was this or what he said would happen to her if she made it too difficult on them, and she didn't want to be beaten or-or do this with a lot of guys.

She felt the waves of pleasure go through her, building up rapidly, and she couldn't help her lower half quivering and her back arching upwards as she came violently against his hand. She started to cry even louder, but he just shoved his fingers into her mouth and forced her to suck on them.

"Good girl," he approved. "You're learning. You'll be trained in no time."

She sobbed around his fingers, inwardly hoping for anyone to come save her because she didn't know how she could stay and do this.

~*~*~

Giovanni massaged the bridge of his nose as he closed his eyes. This was a disastrous case. The parallels weren't lost on him either, though at least he and his Team didn't go anywhere near the brutality and viciousness these people reveled in. The pokémon they stole got some rough treatment, especially at the hands of his more aggressive agents, but the Team was better off with pokémon that were whole and not broken. A broken pokémon would be weak and therefore useless to Team Rocket.

That didn't seem to be the case with these traffickers.

They needed to break in their victims, shame them and break their spirit. They become more compliant and malleable to their group. Shaming them made them undermine their self-worth and less likely to run away.

A human trafficker can earn 20 times what he or she paid for a girl. Provided the girl was not physically brutalized to the point of ruining her beauty, the pimp could sell her again for a greater price because he had trained her and broken her spirit, which saves future buyers the hassle.

He'd read the reports Oak had handed him. He'd always been a man of money and looked for profit, but even this disgusted him. And the thought that Ash, his Ash, might be in such a situation made him balk and yet also feel furious. And when he considered that the most business conducted in human trafficking was the sex-trade, it made him feel all the more dread.

Sex traffickers often train girls themselves, raping them and teaching them sex acts.

His hands clenched and he swore if he found out any of them had touched Ash like that, he would put a bullet into their head.

The sound of flesh being pounded on stopped, and Giovanni looked to see Attila looking at him questioningly.

"Sir, he says he has nothing else to tell us," Attila informed him, using a clean rag to wipe his hands. "Do you want me to dump him back onto the streets?"

Giovanni calmly observed the man they'd managed to find, a lower-ranked individual in the human trafficking business. There may be six different main Teams around, but it seemed there was only one group (a very large group) that maintained this human trafficking faction.

"You really have nothing else to tell me?" Giovanni asked coldly, and the man shook his head tiredly, face beaten to a pulp. "A name? Someone important. You can't do that?"

"A…a man," his captive thought slowly. "He's high in the group. I-I don't know his name. He goes by a lot of names. Howard….Frederick…Anthony…He's got dirty blond hair and green eyes. That's all I know."

Giovanni hummed an acknowledgement, taking off his jacket and then his tie. Then he folded his sleeves up his arms and smiled coldly at the man.

"It's much too dangerous to just let you go."

"W-wait, please!"

Attila silently went behind the man and tightened up the restraints, before moving away and letting his boss have at it. Giovanni cocked his fist back and then landed a hard punch to the man's face, breaking his nose and blood splattering from the impact.

"Giovanni, are you sure you don't want me to deal with this?" Attila spoke up, watching his boss in concern. Giovanni usually didn't do the dirty stuff himself, or handled the interrogations personally unless he needed to.

A flash of Ash's face, the little girl from so long ago and yet still fresh in his head, went through his mind. His mouth tightened into a frown.

"No, I will handle this, Attila. This group has…wronged me, you can say. I want to personally make sure they go 'out of business.'" Giovanni landed another punch into the man's gut, ignoring the scream he let out. "Besides, I have a lot of stress because of all this, that I need to take care of."

He'd take it out on each and every one of them, if he had to.

~*~*~

Pikachu sniffed around the area, eyes darting around nervously as he tried to make sure he wasn't seen. But he was determined to stay with the group, while being unseen. They'd taken his mistress after all, and he wouldn't allow it.

However, she'd gotten separated from the group, and now he had to find her.

He'd follow along, while being hidden, but first chance he had, he would get Ash out of there. He just didn't know what had happened or where and why they had separated her from the others. He didn't even understand why they'd taken those people captive in the first place. All he knew was that he had to find Maximus and Ash, and get the hell out of there.

Pikachu let out a light growl as he saw the people that were to blame for all this, though he didn't see the knife lady that had lured them into the group to go backstage, or the man that had taken Ash and had enticed them into coming to see the show in the first place. However, he did smell a familiar smell and his nose twitched as he followed the scent.

Wondering if he was getting closer, he cheered inwardly as he found a familiar pokéball. He hopped onto the table and grabbed it, before carefully finding his way back down and moving away from that tent. He hid somewhere and held the pokéball, continuing to hide and not be seen by the group of people that had taken his precious person.

Maximus had to wait a little. He would surely be spotted and they couldn't sneak around, as was Pikachu's current goal in order to find Ash and rescue her from this place.

He chittered quietly to the pokéball in his paws, which stopped shaking as it had started to as soon as Pikachu had grabbed hold of it. He made his reassurances to the Charizard, who would wait patiently for now.

They just needed to find Ash and then they could make their move.

~*~*~

When Ash woke up, she was still in the office. Her mind was blank for a moment, not remembering anything, until it all slammed back to her all at once and she had to bite back a whimper. She curled up in a ball on her side, her mind racing with thoughts of what was going to happen to her. And then the door slammed opened and Ash shot up, staring in fear at the door. But it wasn't Tobias. It was Miranda, and Ash didn't know if that was any better.

Miranda smiled slowly. "Well, well, Princess. You look lonesome."

She came towards Ash, who cringed back, but had nowhere to go. The woman's slender fingers reached up and took a piece of Ash's hair.

"Such pretty hair," she murmured, before letting go. Ash was thankful that she hadn't gone back to yanking on it. "Follow me."

Subdued, Ash did as she was told, fearful of the consequences. She made her tired, aching body follow after the woman, who walked a brisk pace towards another room somewhat near. When they entered the room, Ash noticed it was mostly bare, large, and the only things in there were a multitude of cameras at around different angles. Miranda walked to the middle of the room, where a huge mat lay, and Ash followed, wondering what she wanted. Ash's attention became distracted, as she gazed closer at the cameras.

When she turned back to Miranda to hesitantly question her, all she got was a quick glimpse of a manic smile and then a smack to her face that had her fall to the ground. She crashed onto the floor, but didn't have time to recover as Miranda was on her and yanked her up, while pinning her legs to the floor by sitting on them.

"Be pretty for the cameras," she cooed, and forcefully turned her head to face one.

And she realized what Miranda was going to put her through, and realized that this was one of those snuff films.

Instinctively, she lashed out and managed to hit Miranda in the face. But before Ash could take advantage of it, Miranda had a hold on her and began wrapping a rope quickly around Ash's neck, and then she was suffocating Ash.

"Cat got your tongue, Princess? Ah well. Try to scream loudly for the cameras, won't you?" she drawled, tightening the rope.

And then Miranda took out a knife, and playfully tapped it against Ash's cheek.

"Maybe I need to make you scream," she said, letting the knife trail from Ash's elbow and to her wrist, avoiding anything major.

Ash choked against her, trying to desperately escape from Miranda, whose vice grip on her seemed inescapable. The knife came up to the level of Ash's eyes, and Miranda flipped it into a reverse grip, pointing it at Ash's eyes as she slowly moved towards one of them.

"Why don't I dig out one of those honey eyes of yours?"

Without warning, someone yanked the knife away from Miranda and tossed it to the side. And the very same person grabbed Miranda and tossed her violently away, like a rag doll.

"Idiot woman," Tobias spat out. "Don't damage merchandise. I already told you she wasn't in the snuff group. And this is also why I don't let you in on those –you kill them too quickly, and don't draw it out like you're supposed to."

Ash listened, all the while holding onto her neck and coughing harshly. They were insane. Both of them were. And they were wrong –something was just wrong with them. How could they do things like this, and not care? Or enjoy it? She didn't know which was worse.

Tobias picked her up and then headed out, and Ash wondered if maybe she would've been better off with Miranda after all. At least she'd kill her and she wouldn't be here, and go through all this.