The Dull Color of Green

Izuku 1:

I wake up slowly, sleep and drugs still keeping me docile, unable to move as quickly as I usually do. The place I'm in is oddly familiar, as though I've been here before, this would have had to be quite a long time ago. A time that the world forgot, forgot about me. Now the only people that probably even remember me are the black market goers that call themselves my 'owners'. I'm their pet apparently. I had no choice in the matter or course, but from past experiences it seems there is nothing I can quite do.

I look around myself, trying to gather my placement, perhaps even figure out why this place is familiar, but I doubt it. Golden bars, surrounding me on all sides, a circular cage most likely. I look upwards, not just a circular cage apparently, a large bird cage about 10 feet high.

Ironic. It wasn't as if I had never been in a cage before, or a bird cage even at that. Just never one this nice. Usually there in the basements of old warehouses, the stink of the boiler rooms that sat usually just a few feet apart from me, the only separating us being a thick wall of wet moldy cement.

A green reflection dances across the gleaming bars, feathers. Nothing new of course. Yet another green reflection, from a different part of my body, the green fluff atop my head. It used to be curly but I can barely tell anymore.

I look down at my bare left arm seeing that the usual i.v. has been removed for once. Likely for show. Nobody wants to go to a zoo and see an animal with an i.v. stuck in its arm do they. Course I am not an animal, nor do I belong in a zoo or an exhibit, but here I am regardless. Looking at the place my i.v. used to be, I notice all of my scars almost as if for the first time.

A long, dark scar spreading from underneath my left upper arm, twisting around all the way to my wrist. It's from the last time I tried to escape. Another on my right hand, two scars curving around my hand and palm, almost connecting but missing each other, a similar set of scars in between my hand and wrist. I think I shattered my arm in my early years of having an 'owner', but that was quite a while ago.

It's times like these, in the early morning of the day, before the 'customers,' come in, that I remember my mother. She was beautiful, she had long hair, green like mine, it curled up at the bottom like a shiny fish hook, and most of all I remember her eyes. They were beautiful too, they looked at me like I was the only boy in the world. She didn't ever need to tell me out loud that she would always protect me, she just had to look at me with her eyes and I could see it. It's too bad she wasn't able to in the end, I don't blame her though, I doubt there was anything she could have done, the black market is full of very determined people.

The drugs that were previously in my system had started to pass enough that my vision became clear.

I was in an old drama theatre, my cage set on the stage in front of the curtains but close enough to the edge that I wondered what would happen if it tipped over off of the side. In front of the stage there were rows upon rows of seats, all folded up and dusty. The classic crimson fabric fading into the shape of the last person who sat on them.

There are rays of sun, something I don't usually get to experience, shining into my face, directly onto the golden bird cage holding me in place like a spotlight. It's coming from a large glass dome on top of the theatre, patterns of twisted metal framing the frosted glass. It's beautiful really, but I don't get to enjoy it very long as I start to hear voices.

"Here he is!" A voice booms, Carl.

The very man keeping me here, in the flesh. The one who forces me to wear a stupid gray tank top that barely covers my back, that keeps me freezing in the cold months, along with matching gray pants that feel like they were made out of old non-disposable grocery bags. They're old and raggedy and covered in my own blood, blood that Carl has caused me to bleed. Blood from the bones of mine he has broken, blood from the whip marks that usually trace my chest, none on my back of course, can't damage the merchandise, he would say. All because he claims the clothing will be found attractive in contrast to my scars.