He wakes to the sound of thick soled shoes. They clop their way towards him and he can picture the man's face twisted into a cruel smirk. The cloudy fog wrapped around his head starts to dissipate and so does the numbness that keeps the wrath of his injuries at bay. Already his arms throb, purple and swollen, the broken bones still not mended and has taken to cutting off the blood flow in an attempt to prevent blood loss. He knows these things, yet he cannot remember how or why he can. He's still strung up by his arms, dangling, not touching the floor.
His back screams and tears even when he hasn't moved. If he ever survives by some miracle, the muscles and torn flesh might never heal. He might never fly again. he doesn't remember flying, the sensation of wind breezing by, taking away the heat and stress gathered during the day. But he somehow knows it. His head lolls forwards of its own accord and his neck cracks. The sound convinces him that that wasn't the gentle clack of a tired neck or the crack of a normal roll-your-neck kind, it was the pop of my-neck's-dislocated kind. Offhandedly he wonders if humans could survive the injuries he had. Probably not.
The nails on his feet are gone. He can feel the coldness settling on the beds of his toenails . Does that mean his talons are gone as well? Oh, wait. They regrow back every week, don't they? Yeah, his captors love to pull them off every eh, Monday? Or is it Friday? He can't remember. The silence cut in through his thoughts. The man had stopped. Straining his ears, he still couldn't catch even a rustle of fabric to pinpoint the man's location. His senses expanded, becoming hypersensitive, taking in everything. The air stilled, heavy, humid, and suffocating. He could feel every drop of sweat that slid down his body, the vulnerability, the twist of his muscles. The anticipation almost killing him.
The man moves again. Soft and deep, he chuckles,"What do you think we should do today, Serinal-kun?"
The question throws him off guard. This is the first time they asked him. A trick? He chooses to remain silent.
The man continues after a few seconds of silence. "Fine, since you won't choose, I will." He runs his fingers down Serinal's back. Serinal recoils from the gruesome touch and stiffens when his back reprimands him for his careless movement. "After so long, we still haven't managed to find out what kind of avian you are, though some say the fearsome hawk, others say the more docile sparrow. So which one are you? I heard of a method to make an avian reveal its wings. Brutal, but effective. Let's try that out today eh?" Serinal's eyes widen in alarm. A cold metal blade gently rests on his back. It vanishes, and for a moment he thinks his wings are going to be cut out. The rattle followed by smaller vibrations say otherwise. For a foolish moment, he thinks the danger is over and breathes out. The whip slashes through the air and tears a large gash from his right shoulder to his left hip. The pain that flows through his veins like liquid lava nearly causes him to lose consciousness. He wishes he had. He doesn't realise that he's screamed until he's hacking, out of breath with his throat burning. Stop it. Stop it. Stop it. Stop it. STOP IT.
The rumble of a thousand horses stampeding in the sky tends to be normal after a storm as bad as the one that had just passed. The following tremor of the earth wasn't. Loud brays, yelps, chirps, shrieks erupted from the throats of startled animals. Wide eyes looked up and ears flicked, searching for any sliver of sound. The ground beneath shook again. Nervous now, animals moved in synchrony all headed to the same destination. New orange coloured clouds loomed above the land, blanketed with an air of uncertainty and caution, and the one thing that everyone was certain about was that it wouldn't be safe for a long time.
Hunter stares horrified at the crowd under her. Hundreds of shifters were gathered at the center of the land, probably looking for answers. Groups of all kinds waiting patiently for the core to reassure them. The core is a large marble sphere hover a few inches above the ground in a hole half it's height. When there is a major problem, sometimes the core splits apart and the being inside it comes out. Right then though, the core still shows no sign of splitting.
She's perching in a large old canro tree, and she can't help but curse every living being and their creator, human's and the mad sadistic fool that created them, and problems in general. Just barely a few hours back, she had received a letter of plea from a human acquaintance, someone who she has only ever met once and would rather have not met again. Unfortunately, that letter asking for help meant that something had to be incredibly wrong and worrying for her to use her helping card. No matter, after this, she would never have to answer to their call until the next Hokage.
First though, she must change her name to sound somewhat Japanese. Hanta would do.