thank you NibetKawaii for the fan art :)

MICHAEL

I wake up to the feeling of hot breath against my skin, metal scraping against my arms and legs. The bright light is blinding, shining down from the fluorescent bulbs hanging from the walls. My pupils dilate, focusing in on the figure bending down in front of my cage. A man-- light hair and pale skin, dark brown eyes void of emotion as he stares at me. His fingers fiddle with the lock on my crate, pulling open the heavy door as I watch with tired, scared eyes.

I push myself to the back of the cage, away from the hands reaching inside. The man is wearing a white coat, draping across his wide shoulders. He frowns at my body stuffed in the corner and wraps his fingers around my bare arm, yanking me forward and to the mouth of the cage. I whimper, not wanting to oblige to whatever these people want to do to me. I turn my head to glance at the girl with the black ears beside me in the cage, but she is still unconscious. She has shifted though, her head pressed against the door of the cage. I want to yell at her to get her attention, so that maybe she can help me as the rough hands pull me out of the crate.

It proves to be a useless effort attempting to fight back when his strength overpowers mine, holding me in a startlingly tight grip as he drags me down the rest of the hallway towards the door at the end. My ears press flat to my head, my tail curling around my left leg, quivering. My heart hammers in my chest, beating against my ribcage almost painfully.

The air is freezing cold, raising goose bumps over my arms and legs, and I long to be wrapped up in somebody's arms, anybody's. I'm not used to being alone at night, shivering in a cold cage with nobody pressed up next to me. I don't like it. I don't think people are meant to be alone at night, since it feels like loneliness has settled into my bloodstream.

My body is stiff and tired from sleeping in such a cramped position, but the man pays no mind to my limp form as he drags me through the door, revealing another hallway sectioned off into separate small rooms, closed off by doors annulled of windows. Men dressed in identical white coats pass by us, holding clipboards and blinking at me as they pass. My breathing quickens when the man stops by an open door, and pulls me inside. The room is medium sized, empty of any furniture apart from a table about 6 ft long, thin and made of shiny steel. At the end of the room is a glass window, separating the room from a smaller one on the other side, where three men sit, computers in front of them as they stare at the screens.

They look up when we walk in, and their glasses slide to the bridge of their noses as their gazes fall on me. The one in the middle clears his throat, and I recognize the dark hair has Draven's. He stands up, walking away from the two other men and open a door built into the glass, a smile spreading on his face as he walks idly over to us.

"Michael, how wonderful to see you." Draven greets, stopping in front of me. "How was your first night?"

I don't answer.

Draven's smile grows and he turns, thanking the man for retrieving me from my cage. His hand falls from my arm, but I don't run anywhere. I have nowhere to go, and I know that they could easily catch me if I tried to escape. Instead, I stand silently like a ghost, squirming under the stares of the men around me.

Then, Draven pulls me over towards the table in the middle of the room, and I notice a smaller table attached to wheels has been rolled up beside it, grey and metal like the table. Draven pats the table, standing at the side of it. I am confused, before the words of the detective from yesterday come back to me. Testing. Experimenting. The screams and cries from this hallway that traveled all the way back to my crate last night, this is it.

My bones freeze, and my eyes widen in terror. I want to scream, I want to run or hide somewhere where nowhere can see me, but I am left in this hopelessly empty room, the stares of the detectives around me boring into my skin like bullet holes.

Draven looks pointedly at me, and then the table, so I swallow the lump in my throat and slowly climb onto the hard table, lying down on my back and staring up at the blank ceiling. A few tears well up in my eyes from the intense fear that has started to bubble in my stomach, but I blink them away quickly, remembering what happened the last time I started crying.

I lay there for a few seconds before something suddenly wraps itself around my wrists and ankles, pinning me to the table. I lift my head and look down to see chains pressed against my skin, restraining me onto the tabletop. My breath catches in panic, and I pull my arms and legs harshly against the cuffs, struggling to get loose from the fetters. My throat starts to burns and I cry out in fright, thrashing helplessly.

Draven lays a hand on my head calmly, and I flinch at the touch.

"Calm down, Michael." Draven says in a cheery voice, seeming quite pleased with my discomfort. I still immediately, terrified of what he might do if I don't. I turn my head, my cheek flat against the steel table as I watch Draven turn and walk towards a few men who are standing against the plain walls. The men look excited, interest clear in their faces. They replace Draven's spot by the table, hurrying over and staring down at me with hungry eyes.

One of them touches my ear, and I shut my eyes, resisting pulling away. Their calloused fingers rub the texture of the cream colored fur, and another set of hands grabs my tail, analyzing it carefully, as though it might break. The one who had touched my ears forces open one of my eyes, shining a light down onto it. I try not to let my eyes water at the intensity of it, and after a moment of speculation, it flickers off.

"He's a hybrid type number 7," says a man with glasses. I notice a group of scientists writing down the information. "Fairly rare."

"Sam, how strong is he?" Draven asks from his spot by the wall.

"Very strong. Very healthy. He should be able to keep up with a lot of tests." The man, who apparently is named Sam, reports. I take in a shuddering breath. My hands ache for the comfort of being intertwined with Luke's. I can almost feel his hands touching mine, his fingertips hardened from playing the guitar and his palms smooth and soft, a liniment for the bruises on my skin.

"Should we experiment on him? He's one of the only hybrids here that has a strong body that we can really experiment with." Sam says. "But we don't want his system to fail completely, do we?"

Draven considers this, shifting his jaw as he stares at the wall on the opposite side of the room. My heart throbs in my chest. I'm not even quite sure of what I want him to say, my mind a tornado of black welts pierced with knives.

"I say we experiment on him." Draven decides, and my hands shake. "If he dies, at least he deserved it."

Sam nods and then turns to the small table beside me, opening up the top to reveal a series of different syringes, all different sizes with different liquids filling them. I choke when I see them, desperately trying to squirm away from the needles with no relief, due to the restraints holding me in place.

Sam carefully picks out a syringe with a clear fluid inside, and he plucks a needle from the table, carefully prepping the syringe as I watch. Dread grows inside me as he turns toward me, his brown eyes meeting my green ones as a soft smile curls on his lips.

"If you scream," Sam warns, "I'll hit you."

I keep the information tattooed onto my brain, but when Sam presses the needle against my arm and pushes it through the thick layers of my skin, a strangled cry releases from my throat at the intense pain that shoots up my veins.

The pain is excruciating, like flames have engulfed by bloodstream and is burning me to ashes from the inside out. Tremors of electrifying agony travel up my nerves, making my entire body start to shake uncontrollably. I can't help but scream, it is impossible not to, and I am made sure to receive the punishment as a hand flies down to my cheek, hitting it with staggering force, my head banging the side of the steel table.

"What did I tell you?" Sam spits. I bite my tongue, scrunching up my eyes as Sam turns around, his pen scrawling against the papers on his clipboard.

"How long will it take for the injection to start the chemical reaction?" Sam asks.

"Overnight." Draven answers, and I feel a bit relieved. At least it won't happen right away. That's a plus, right?

I'm also petrified, though, of what might happen to me. I have no idea what liquid is churning in my veins right now, and I have no idea of what it might be doing to me. The scientists clearly have no sympathy for what might be going on with my health, so it's not as though I can trust any of them that I will be safe.

I swallow roughly when I feel hands prodding at my skin again, pressing my skin to analyze how fast it takes for my skin to bruise and running their tough fingertips over my sensitive ears. I want it to stop. I want it to stop so bad. The only person I want touching me is Luke, and he isn't here. Not anymore.

"Alright, test number one is effectively injected." Draven sighs, and the men surrounding me scurry back to their places by the wall as the dark haired man smiles down at me, at my face encrypted with discomfort from the aching pain coursing in my blood. "We'll just leave him here, so that it will be easier to record the results in the morning."

Draven leans down close to me, his breath fanning the side of my face as I shut my eyes. "He's not as willing as the other hybrids. Possibly because of his former life of living like a human." Draven keeps his eyes trained on me as he leans back, sliding the metal tabletop closed, covering up the syringes inside.

"Is that a problem, sir?" a man asks.

"No." Draven answers. "He'll break down soon enough." Draven wheels the small table to the back of the room, and then the men slowly file out of the area, leaving me completely and utterly alone, trapped in restraints and writhing in my own silent pain.

I can't help but think about how my parents were here. I know my mother was here, so I assume this is the same facility that my father was at. They killed them both. I don't want to think about how, since I doubt it was the overload of experiments, like they are planning to do with me. I don't want to think about my mother dead on the floor, or what they did with her body, or if anybody was there trying to save her at all.

I can distinctly remember my mother and father from when everything was perfect, when we were living happily in the woods. We were sitting in the clearing, the sun shining down on us and warming our ears, playing with the grass and listening to the singing of the birds. I was only about five or six, my body small and soft. My ears were tiny, flickering at every single sound, and my tail was half the size it is now.

My mother had pulled me over, into her arms, fluffing up my blonde hair I hadn't yet dyed, and kissing the top of my head.

"You do understand why we stay in the woods, don't you baby?" My mother had asked me, leaning over to look at my big green eyes. I had smiled, playing with her fingers and nodding.

"There are mean people out there." I had said, and my mother smiled sadly, stroking my hair gently.

"They just don't understand us, Michael." She sighed, and my father had patted my back softly in encouragement.

"We'll keep you safe though, Michael." My father had told me, staring at me intently. "We won't let anything hurt you, I promise."

That was the same day my father got captured.

I sigh, closing my eyes as I lay on the table. I want desperately to curl up and hide my face from anybody who may be watching me, but I am physically unable to. I want so badly to escape, to run out of this facility and to sprint into the woods, following the trees until it leads me back to Luke. Luke and his soft blonde hair and his baby blue eyes and his black lip piercing that I would hate except that it is on the body of Luke Hemmings. And I really, really love Luke Hemmings.

I love him so much, and now there is nobody left to listen to the whimpers leaving my lips.

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A/N holla for the worst and shortest chapter I have ever written (((: !!!

but thanks for 42k like wtf omg. i might do a character ask in celebration. maybe.

pls comment and vote! I love you guys so much! bye x