Steven wasn't the only one who felt more comfortable sleeping at night with me cuddling with them while they do, and I wasn't the only one who wanted to cuddle with. Occasionally, I would find myself in Warren's room, sleeping on the other side of his bed, because he just liked having me there, within arms reach. Other times, I would fall asleep snuggling with Jess after she came and knocked on my door, unable to sleep alone in her bed. 

Really, everyone kind of snuggled with everyone. It was just about who someone was worried about that night, or who they decided they would feel the safest around at that time. Sometimes, when all of us just wanted to be together, and around everyone all at one, we would move all of the blankets, pillows, stuffed animals, soft items, and cushions that we could find into the library of the house, and fall asleep after someone would read a chapter from a book out loud to the rest of us. We switched around who read from the book every night, but no matter what, we all always cuddled, snuggled, and protected one another. 

Things were going pretty good for a long time. I was happy, safe, going back to school and seeing my friends, Steven and Jess were starting to get back into their experiments, and Warren was back to doing whatever it was that he would do with his time. Not only that, but we were all starting to become more ok with sleeping alone at night, or just being alone for short amounts of time in general. I thought that we were all gonna be completely, and utterly ok, as long as we had some more time. However, nothing good could last when you were a mutant superhero. 

That's something that I learned pretty quickly. 

I was walking down the street one day, on my way to a park to hang out with Mike, when someone was suddenly behind me, wrapping an arm around me, and pressing a wet rag firmly against my mouth and nose. I struggled, but whatever was on the rag, I assumed chloroform, knocked me out quickly, and I felt myself go limp in the arms of whoever had me, then everything went black. 

***

I groaned as I sat up, feeling sore all over. I couldn't remember much of what happened, and I didn't know where I was. My vision took a moment to come into focus, but I soon noticed a bunch of people standing around me, looking down at me. One of them, a man in a suit who looked like he was friendly, though I knew he probably wasn't, was standing closer to me than the others, and something told me he was the one in charge.

"Where am I?" I croaked out, only to be met with a slap to the face that was hard enough to knock me back down.

"Don't. Speak." The man in the suit hissed directly in my ear. I began to sit up again, when I was grabbed by the back of my neck, and slammed back down. "Stay down."

The man pulled away from me, and I stayed down like I was told, not wanting to cause more trouble for myself. I had no idea what was going on, or what the man in the suit wanted, but I had a feeling I was going to find out soon enough, and that it would be a lot easier for me if I just cooperated.

"Are you ready?" The man in the suit asked, turning to a man in casual clothes standing near him. The man nodded, and lifted up a camera, which he flipped open and turned on, pointing it directly at me while someone else turned on a large flashlight and trained it on me.

"Go." The man with the camera said, and I heard a beep as he turned the camera on.

"Hello there Steven." The man in the suit said, making me wonder if he was talking about the Steven that I knew. "Remember me? I'm your old friend Peter. I hear you've been rather busy lately. So here's the deal. When you contact me, and meet up with me so you can give me all of the research you have on freaks like the one we have here, we'll give him back."

The man in the suit, Peter apparently, walked over to me, and kicked me in the ribs, making me jerk on the floor and groan in pain.

"Here's the thing. We think you've been far too nice to this thing that you call Gill. We're going to treat him how he should be treated until you give us what we want. We know that you're very fond of your pet, but it needs to learn it's place. You'll thank us when and if you get it back." Peter finished. He snapped his fingers, and suddenly, a bunch of guys stepped forward and manhandled me off of the ground.

I struggled against them like anyone would expect me too, but I was still tired, and sore, so I couldn't break free. I began to struggle even more as one of the men who wasn't holding onto me pulled out a pair of scissors, and began to cut my shirt off of me. I kicked, and struggled, freaking out, and having an idea about what was about to happen, and willing to do anything to prevent it.

"No! No, please! Pl-please! Stop! Don't!" I cried out, continuing to blubber, plead, and beg as the man undid the buttons and zipper on my jeans, and pulled them roughly off of me.

I was stripped completely of everything except my boxers, then dropped back on the ground. I tried to scramble away, but I found myself close to tears when I felt the man who had stripped me sitting on my back. He grabbed my hands and kept them pinned behind my back. I continued to beg the man to stop, but he wouldn't. Another man kneeled down in front of my face, and I had an idea of what he wanted that made me feel sick. Pleading wasn't working for me, so I decided to try another method of getting the men to get their hands off of me.

"If you stick anything in my mouth, I swear to god I will bite down on it as hard as I can. And I don't think I need to remind you that I have super strength." I growled, trying to scare the man into thinking twice about what I was pretty sure he was about to do.

However, the man sitting on me didn't do anything but hold me down while the man in front of me showed me a thick, black dog collar with a tag on it that read 'Bitch'. I was very confused at first, but I realised what was happening when the man clipped the collar around my neck, and I was let go. I let myself slump to the ground in relief, glad that I wasn't raped.

"What are you guys doing?" I asked eventually, getting hit across the face once again.

"I told you not to talk!" Peter screamed at me. "You don't get to talk Bitch. Only people get to talk, and you're just a freak. You're not even human."

I heard the beep of the camera shutting off, and I looked up at Peter, knowing that I was in for some real pain.

***

"Rise and shine Bitch!" I heard Peter call, and I lifted my head tiredly. I hadn't been able to sleep very well, because the bed I was given was a dog bed, I was cold, I was sleeping in a cage and I was scared.

It wasn't that I had a bad set up. The bed was new, good for a large dog, and so was the cage, and around me there were a few new toys, with a water and food dish. Even the collar I was wearing was a nice one, and it was put on me properly so that it wasn't loose enough for me to get off, but not tight enough to choke me. The problem was that it was an awful set up for a human. And, despite what Peter had tried to tell me the day before, I was still human.

I heard the beep of the camera being turned on, and a flashlight was pointed at me once again. At first, everyone just looked at me curled up in the cage, staring back at them, but then Peter opened the cage, and everyone stepped back to make room for me to crawl out. I tried to stand up, desperately needing to stretch my tired legs, but I was knocked back down almost immediately. I grunted in pain as I hit the ground roughly, then glared back up at Peter.

"Only people get to stand." Peter snapped. Then he grabbed me by the collar, and pulled me back. Peter snapped his fingers, and someone who had been standing to the side poured a bag of dog food into one of the dishes, and someone else poured a cup of water into the other dish. The food wasn't even remotely interesting to me. I was hungry, but not hungry enough to eat dog food. The water however, was something that I wanted so much that I would have started drooling if my mouth wasn't so dry.

"What do you say?" Peter asked.

"Tha-" I started to thank Peter, but he yanked on the collar, causing me to gag, as he pulled me up so that I was sitting upright, but still kneeling on the ground. Peter snapped his fingers, and one of the men standing near by dropped a knife on the ground in front of me. I inhaled deeply, scared to find out what was going to happen next.

"Hand me that knife." Peter told me. I shook my head. Peter growled angrily, and snatched the knife off of the floor himself.

"This," Peter said as he sliced a short line across one of my shoulders, causing me to tense up and groan in pain. "Is for trying to talk. And these," Peter left two more slices in my back, one after the other in quick succession. "Are for not doing what I told you. Let's work on that ok?"

Peter handed the knife back to the person who had dropped it in the first place, and pushed be back down so that I was on my hands and knees. I breathed deeply, doing whatever I could to prevent myself from crying, not wanting to cause even more pain for myself.

"Here's the thing, you're not a human, Bitch. Human's don't glow. So you don't get the same privileges that other human's do. You're an animal. A dog. A worthless mutt. A bitch. And bitches don't talk, because they bark instead. Now what do you say?" Peter asked me. At first, I was tempted to remain absolutely silent. However, I was very thirsty, and I knew that with the fresh cuts on my back, I would need nourishment in order to heal. So I didn't have a choice.

Shamefully, I looked down at the ground, trying to ignore the camera that was trained on me, and let out a pitiful bark. When Peter didn't do anything, but tug on my collar a little harder, I barked louder. That seemed to satisfy Peter, and he let go of my collar. I slowly crawled over to the dishes, and began lapping up the water with my tongue, and I even ate a bit of the food.

I was aloud to just lay on my bed in the cage, with the door open, for a few hours. Then someone came over, and hooked a leash onto my collar, then pulled me out of the cage. I went along, though a bit reluctantly, and let the man lead my up a flight of stairs, and into a new room. It was only then that I saw that I was in someone's house. It was enormous, and fancy, and laid out almost just like Steven's. There was even a brief moment of a mixture of hope and panic where I mistakenly thought that I still was in Steven's house.

I was pulled out the front door into a fenced off yard, and that's when I realised what was happening. I sighed, feeling so very, very ashamed, and I didn't even have to be told what to do as I pulled my boxers down around my ankles, still staying on the ground, and went to the bathroom. When I was done, I pulled my shorts back up, once again feeling close to crying, and the man with the leash lead me back inside.