A Chance to Live

Chapter 12: Hopeless (Partial)

My eyes finally opened up to seeing those same silver bars taunting me. I snarled in annoyance when I recognized that I was in the same cage. I couldn't remember much from earlier, and my head throbbed with an undeniable force that made it quite difficult to see.

I tried to remember, but my mind came up blank when I got to the point when I was dumped into that other room. I could tell something happened, but it wasn't until I tried to move that it hit me.

So she was here as well. I scoffed at this. Why they had decided it was a good idea to pit her against me wasn't exactly clear, but based on the injuries on my body, it looked like I didn't fight very well. I never liked being forced to fight, as I had seen what it looked like in the past. It always made me so sloppy, so undignified. I didn't calculate my moves, instead just being sent into some blind rage hoping to hit whatever my target happened to be.

The wounds seemed to not be too deep so I would recover from most of them just fine. Though the one that probably was going to leave a scar was the one on the underside of my neck. The needle precision of the teeth marks amazed me, and I knew I couldn't replicate that accuracy with my jagged fangs. Anyway, it looked like she had latched on there, and had been dragged off, causing the ones in the middle to leave a trail where they had been scraped.

The rest seemed fine. The odd scratch or puncture wound on my arms and tail weren't too bad, though the oddly high number on my torso was alarming. I knew I'd recover though; I always seemed to.

I perked up to see some guards looking at me with interest, seemingly hesitant to even lay eyes on me, as if angry. Or frightened.

No, this wasn't fright. They were used to me, so there was no way they could be scared of me to this degree. They appeared to wear a different face from fear, and I was intrigued to see them begin to walk off when I had glared at them long enough.

I was so confused. Obviously something was wrong. I couldn't remember anything after that laser was sounded. I blinked my eyes rapidly as they felt quite dry. It was strange, and everything just seemed to be warpy. I felt soft on the inside, like my organs were cremated into a fine mixture.

My claws twitched a bit, I blinked a couple times, and hissed in annoyance. It was cold in there, and it was off that there was no one here. Not just the patrols missing, but also it was strange without anyone in general here. I was used to seeing that family of humans. All of them, and the wolves. Oh, I really hoped that they were ok. The image replayed in my mind over and over again, refusing to back down until I knew just how responsible I was for all of this.

As if I didn't already know enough.

"Feeding time." I must've been so deep into my pity party that I didn't notice a handler approach me carrying a bucket. It drew my attention to the sounds, more specifically the lack thereof. Usually whatever food they brought made a noise, whether it was a chirp, squeal, or an annoying baaah sound. I had associated what noise was made by which kind of food, and began sorting favorites.

This was a bit different. The only distinguishable features were the splating sounds along with a very refined and detailed scent. He held up the bucket and dumped the contents with a mighty heave, and amazingly it all went in.

Speaking of which, 'it' seemed to be food, but I hadn't seen it before. It had a vaguely familiar aroma, but I couldn't quite place it. A lot of little pieces of what appeared to be red meat made up the contents, along with spices and other random things that were probably there for flavor.

Which was very strange and unusual indeed. So much so that I didn't trust it.

When I refused to even come near it, I looked to see the handler already gone without a trace. With him unable to come in contact with me in any way now, I decided to try a bit of the food he left.