Edgar always hated coming to this part of town. Maybe it was the crowds, the noises, the smells, all too much for a man who preferred the quiet and solitude. He thought it was something else though, something far worse, emanating from the nightclubs, the bars and…worse, that crowded this district of the city to bursting. Some intangible force was at work here, which it seemed only he could feel, but he was certain was real. A feeling of lurking evil, saturating everything, from the dirty pavement beneath his feet to the sparkling neon lights overhead. It sickened Edgar to surround himself in such wickedness time and again, yet he knew he must. He had a mission he needed to perform. 

No one took notice of Edgar as he walked the streets of the district. He was the sort of small, unremarkable man people ignored, which suited him fine. If they had, he would have had a harder time achieving his mission. He noticed the people around him, though, especially the women. The Lost Girls, Edgar thought of them, coming to a place like this, in their immodest dress, seeking wicked pleasures of drink and…other vices he didn’t want to think about, little knowing the deadly dangers that would, sooner or later, fall upon them. 

It was Edgar’s mission, willingly accepted, to brave this wicked place and try and save as many of these poor Lost Girls as he could. He was their Guardian Angel, the last thing standing between these girls and the perils of this terrible world. Though they may not realize it, may try to resist or run, he would save them all the same. The rest of the world would not understand, the agents of darkness and their deluded dupes hunted him, trying to stop his merciful mission, but that hardly mattered. Edgar knew, in his heart, he was doing what had to be done, to save these Lost Girls from themselves. 

There! Edgar looked past the crowd and spotted a figure, coming out of one of the clubs. By some instinct, he knew she would be his next rescue. The Lost Girl looked to be in her early twenties, with a short, youthful body, well shown off by the short blue dress she wore. Her pale blonde hair was cut in a short bob. She had clearly given in to the temptations of this place: Edgar could see her stumble a little under the effects of drink, exasperated by the extra high heels she was wearing, but the Guardian Angel thought she was not so far gone she couldn’t be saved…with his help. 

The same instinct that had made Edgar pick the Lost Girl out of the crowd also told him the route she was likely to take. He knew, from previous forays, there was an excellent spot where he could intercept her. A dark, narrow alley, with a particular raucous club opposite. It’s showy facade would distract all eyes, allowing him to pull his Lost Girl out of the jaws of darkness. He waited, until he saw her walk past the opening of the alleyway, then, without a word, sprang forward, and grabbed her. 

This part of the mission was much easier, now he had the bottle. A small splash of the clear liquid in the bottle onto a rag, then all he needed to do was hold it to the Lost Girl’s face and soon she would sleep, long enough for him to get her away from this wicked place. They might kick and struggle at first, as the blonde girl did when Edgar dragged her into the alley and pressed the rag over her mouth, but he didn’t mind, even when sometimes he got kicked or scratched. The girls didn’t know any better. Didn’t know he was here to help them, that he was their Guardian Angel. Sure enough, once the blonde girl had gotten a strong whiff of the stuff, her struggles slowed, her terrified yelps grew quieter and soon she swooned back into Edgar’s arms. 

Edgar had gotten the bottle from another Angel he’d met two or three months back. The other Angel had been quite surprised when Edgar stumbled into him in a deep, dark corner of the district. Fortunately, Edgar had already rescued a Lost Girl that night, so the other Angel recognized him for what he was. Edgar had her over his shoulder, with her hands and feet taped and more over her eyes and mouth. Back then, he’d had to threaten the girls with a knife to get them to cooperate, so he could rescue them. This one was proving extra uncooperative though, so Edgar had sought a hidden place where he could add more tape. 

This other Angel must have been doing this for a lot longer than Edgar, because he’d rescued three Lost Girls that evening. They were lying in the back of a battered old van, sleeping peacefully as he tied their hands and feet with some rope. At first, Edgar was worried they might have been hurt, or dead, but the other Angel allayed his fears by showing him the Bottle and demonstrating it on Edgar’s rescue, making her sleep like the other Lost Girls. Edgar put her in the van with the other three and climbed in the front with his fellow Angel, then his new friend took him to see the Man…

The Blonde girl was now fast asleep. Edgar wasted little time, putting the rag away and taking out a roll of tape. You could never tell how long a particular girl would be out and Edgar didn’t want to risk her causing a scene before he’d gotten the Lost Girl back home, where he could explain things to her. A couple quick turns around the girl’s wrists, then her ankles and finally a few strips over her mouth and eyes. Edgar hoisted the limp figure over his shoulder like she weighed nothing and hurried down the alley. Not far away, as he knew from previous rescues, there was a manhole which led down into the sewers. From there, Edgar could reach the small home he’d fashioned, from which he carried out his mission and where he kept the Lost Girls he’d rescued. 

The rescued girls were kept in their own chamber, which he’d tried to make as comfortable as possible for them, despite the limited circumstances. There were also certain precautions he’d had to make, for security. So few of the poor Lost Girls really understood he meant no harm to them. Others were so far gone into evil, if given the chance they would run back to its embrace. Worse, they might tell the darkness’ agents and dupes about Edgar. While he cared little for his own life, if he were killed or locked up it would mean countless other Lost Girls having no Guardian Angel to rescue them. Thus the lock on the outside of the Girl’s Chamber door, and the shackles, the collars and chains and the gags… 

There were, at the time, three other Lost Girls in the chamber when Edgar arrived with their new sister. Susan had been there the longest, nearly three weeks now. The tall, pale brunette sat on her cot quietly as Edgar unlocked the door and came in. She’d convinced him she’d been reformed enough not to need the shackles or gag, though she still had to wear the steel collar around her neck, with a long chain attached to a bolt in the wall, just in case. Polly, a tall, curly dark skinned girl on the cot beside her, still had her hands chained, as well as a cloth band, knotted in the middle, tied between her teeth. She too kept quiet as Edgar carried the blonde to an empty cot, so Edgar considered she might be ready for a small increase in personal freedom. 

That was not the case with the third and, until now, newest rescue, Lucy. The short redhead wore, besides her collar and chains, one of his ‘punishment’ gags: a jaw-strainingly thick ballgag with multiple head-wrapping straps, to teach her not to use such unlady-like language in the future. Alas, the muffled grunts coming from behind her muzzle as Edgar cut the tape binding the blonde girl and began shackling her hands and feet told him poor Lucy would be wearing her gag for some time yet. 

The blonde came to, right as Edgar was locking a collar around her neck. She was obviously terrified, begging him not to hurt her, not to do…other things to her, and to let her go. Edgar did his best to explain to the blonde, who with some prompting gave her name as Meredith, that he was her Guardian Angel and that he wasn’t going to harm her, but neither could he let her go, until he was sure she wouldn’t fall back into wickedness. 

He was disappointed, though not surprised, considering she’d just been rescued, that Meredith didn’t understand him just yet. In expressing this, she used some of the same unladylike language Lucy used, and so had to be fitted with a punishment gag like Lucy. Edgar told Susan to try her best to explain things to her new sister, hoping that Meredith would accept things better, coming from another former Lost Girl. Letting the girls have some privacy, Edgar locked the chamber and went to his own rooms. He had a small laptop in his room. He booted it up and checked the email. He was surprised to find a message sitting in his inbox. It was from the address the Man used for all his communications. 

The night Edgar had met the other Guardian Angel, he’d been taken to meet an individual he thought of as The Man. The Man was not an Angel himself, but apparently he worked with a whole network of Angels, all over the country, going into dens of wickedness to rescue more Lost Girls. They then brought the girls to the Man and his facility. 

At first, Edgar was uncertain, seeing the girls looking so miserable in the tiny, cramped cages, all tightly bound and wearing punishment gags and all of them without a single stitch of clothes on, save a collar around the neck. But the Man had soon set Edgar straight. The girls had to be divested of any connection to their old lives, so they wouldn’t fall back into wickedness. And the cages, though unpleasant, were only a temporary thing, because the Man’s mission was to find long term homes for all the Lost Girls his angels rescued and brought to him. They were held here only until he found good families who could keep the Lost Girls safe and make sure they wouldn’t fall back to wickedness. 

Edgar was, of course, overjoyed hearing this. He had, by that time, collected eight Lost Girls in his home, not counting the girl he’d rescued that night who was placed in a cage with the three girls his fellow Angel had brought. None of them were rehabilitated enough yet he was confident in releasing them. Looking after so many girls at one time was taking up much of the time he could have used to rescue more Lost Girls. He had eagerly accepted the Man’s offer to find homes for his girls. He’d considered declining the offer of a reward for each girl; he wasn’t in this for personal gain of course, but had agreed to a small subsidy which would help him maintain and upgrade his setup, including buying the Bottle and other useful tools from his fellow Angel. A few days later, Edgar had made a secret rendezvous with some of the Man’s agents, delivering several of his rescues who had new homes awaiting them. The girls hadn’t seemed all that pleased when he’d told them the good news, but he was sure they would eventually come to love their new homes and new families. 

The Man’s email was like many of the others. He told Edgar he had eager families willing to take in a Lost Girl or two, followed by a list of types they were looking for: 20’s blonde with blue eyes, tall, thin brunette, short active redhead. Edgar was somewhat dismayed that so many were only interested in girls of certain types, but as the Man explained, many of these families had lost their own girls in the past and wanted a girl that would remind them of wayward daughters. Given the need, it was good enough they were willing to take in girls at all, Edgar eventually concluded. Reading through the list, Edgar was delighted to see potential homes for all four of his current guests. Hurriedly, he typed a reply, looking forward to telling the girls the good news. Then he could get out again and look for more Lost Girls to rescue…