Heart of Gold

Chapter One - Waking Up

Consciousness slowly returned to Sunny, the world fading in and out around her. Her head was pounding, and her tongue lay thick in her strange-tasting mouth. She was cold, goosebumps pimpling on her skin, and it occurred to Sunny that was because she was wearing no clothes.

As soon as that thought registered, she bolted upright to be rewarded with a surge of pain through her skull.

Where am I? she thought. The world swirled around her, out of focus and dreamy like a Van Gogh painting. She closed her eyes again, and that action momentarily soothed the throbbing in her head. Straining her mind, she stretched her thoughts back to how she had begun her day, running through the events trying to figure how exactly she had ended up here. Wherever here was.

She had vague notions that maybe she was being held in the basement of a perverted old man awaiting unspeakable horrors, but even before that thought was fully formed she brushed it off. That just didn't happen to people outside of soap operas. The last thing she could remember was getting on the bus to visit her parents for the upcoming long weekend, and then it all went black - no memories of the bus trip, or leaving the vehicle.

A faint shuffle caused her heart to leap in her chest and her eyes to snap open. There was something in here with her. Heartbeat loud in her ears, Sunny could almost feel the adrenaline beginning to course through her veins. It took a few moments for her eyes to adjust to the dimmer light and make it possible for her to catch a glimpse of her company, and when she did, Sunny stifled a shriek.

Eyes stared back at her through the gloom - the slitted orbs of a cat glowing gold. Like herself, the bearer of the strange eyes was naked, but unlike Sunny, he seemed completely unabashed by his blatant nudity, sitting crosslegged in the opposite corner, thickly muscled torso leaning against the wall. Sunny felt a flash of heat, and a hot blush rose up in her cheeks, before she averted her gaze. He wasn't human - not with that faintly shimmering metallic skin, and certainly not with those patches of glossy scales - but he wasn't bad looking, and despite the utter absurdity of her current situation, Sunny wasn't immune.

He scowled, the expression terrifying, and Sunny cringed back into her corner, fighting the urge to hyperventilate. This just couldn't be happening. Any moment, she was going to wake up on the bus, her head slumped against the window, a red marke forming ignominiously on her forehead. His scowl deepened. He clearly was not following her example and appreciating the assets of his cellmate. Keeping half of her attention on him, Sunny allowed her eyes to scan the rest of her surroundings, whilst also attempting to calm her breathing. Sheets of grey steel made up three of the walls, with thick floor-to-ceiling bars completing the rest. She was sitting on a grate of some sort, and when she looked up, the ceiling was much of the same, except for a hatch in the middle.

Flicking her gaze back to her cellmate, Sunny noted his scowl had lightened somewhat, to be taken over by what could be a contemplative expression. His eyes were narrowed and his head angled slightly to the side. His lips were pursed, which, Sunny noted with some shame, only accentuated his sharp cheekbones.

He noted her preoccupation with the hatch, and his scowl returned. He shook his head sharply, the universal expression for no. Well, thought Sunny, at least something is familiar. Thinking about the hatch was stupid anyway. If the beings that had took her had managed to subdue the beast she was sharing a cage with, they would not have an issue with her.

Seeing she'd obviously decided against exploring the hatch, he gave an easily defined roll of the eyes, and turned his body away, lying down on the floor. He'd evidently come to the conclusion she wasn't a threat. Sunny didn't have that same sense of security, and hugged her knees up against her chest, hoping against all hope that she'd close her eyes and wake up at home again. The beings, she'd thought earlier, as if species previously undiscovered were commonplace. This just couldn't be happening. Despite all efforts to the contrary, tears began to blur her vision, before overflowing and trickling down her face.