Chapter one Ginger

Darkness, darkness all around.

She couldn't see anything, just blackness in what felt like an enclosed space.

" What-what am I doing?, and where am I?" She felt groggy, probably from a needle she remember recieving just in the past few hours.

She looked around the place, blackness as always. She fanned out her webbed hand and felt around her.

The space was a wooden square, as it felt as her roughened webbed hand felt the substance. She felt around for an opening, but none was present. She put her webbed hand on her face and sighed.

" Wait, I think I remember what happened?" She whispered as she glared at the darkness.

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It was in Tasmania, near a crystal clear lake in the late afternoon.

Many platypi were in the water bathing, eating and some relaxing with family.

Except for her,

Her name was Ginger, a different type of platypus she had white fur and a yellow beak, she looked more like a duck than a platypus so she had less to none friends.

Ginger would stay in her burrow under the lake and watch as the platypi would dive, making detailed figure 8's in the water, watching them dive their huge bills into the rocks reveiling shrimp and eating them with ease. Even though none liked her, Ginger would always try to eat herself but none would let her.

Rolling herself into a ball, feeling the air bubbles tickle her nose she solmenly wished that she wasn't opharened. Her mother had died a year ago from a water rat insent, as for her father, he died when she was just a baby. Ginger had never woar a smile in her life.

Whilest in her own world, she never noticed all the platypus were swimming faster towards their burrows. Ginger looked up after she heared huge amounts of air bubbles making their way to the surface.

" What's going on?" Ginger yelled, none of them answered.

A rush of adrenline hit her system hard. If none of them are going to tell me, I'll find out myself she thought. Ginger held her breath as she slowly came out of her burrow.

She looked around, nothing was there just emptyness, she even wondered why everyone was in such a panic.

Just then behind her she heard a loud thump, like when a rock hits the water and shadders. Ginger quickly turned around and saw two huge olive green boots staring at her.

" What is that?" Ginger asked, starting to sweat with panic.

The boots started to come closer to her, panicstrickened. Ginger swam as fast as she could to get to her burrow. She had her nose in her burrow when she felt something grab her.

" NO NO NO!" Ginger screamed as she was slowly taken from the water.

As soon as she embraced the air,she gasped and she saw a lot of platypi staring at her, wondering what was going to happen to her. Ginger stared at them with eyes that were crying and overflowing with tears.

She slowly turned to see she was in the hands of a human. The human was walking towards a jeep filled to the brim with metal cages. The human opened a cage with one hand and put Ginger in with the other. Ginger looked though the bars as the human sat down and started to drive down a long dirt road.

Ginger had her webbed hands grasped around the bars and stared at the outback, many kangaroos were about but she wasn't worried about that, she was thinking about where she was going.

What if they're going to kill me because I'm different from the others? She thought, tears started flowing as she thought about how they would bring her untimely death about. Her heart ached as she could have sworn that it was getting ready for her breath to be clogged, her eyes slowly closing reveiling blackness all around her and her, peacefully reunited with her parents. Maybe, just maybe it wouldn't be that bad. To see her parents again would make her life complete, to talk to her father that she never saw or seen would make her weep with joy, and to see her mother in one peace would make her dance about with happiness.

Ginger suddenly felt the car stop. She glanced out of her cage and saw herself stationed in front of grey cemenate building. The human jumped out of the car and grabbed Ginger's cage and walked though the glass doors into a gloomy grey room filled with blue chairs. The human plopped Ginger down in front of one the chairs as she sat down.

" Platypus transfer?" A young woman's voice rang out, devoiring the silences of the fans spining around.

Ginger once again felt her cage being picked up and being placed upon a desk, showing the young woman who rang out just moments earlier. She peered inside of the cage and smiled.

" Cute little mate ain't she?"

The girl picked up the cage and walked though big swinging doors to enter a huge room with a operation table and huge lights hanging from the ceiling. Ginger saw the girl opening her cage and was put on the operation table. The girl walked towards the orange cabinets and started to rummage though them.

The girl then walked back to the table with a syrunge and walked towards Ginger, Ginger not worried knowing her life was almost over embraced the pain as the needle jabbed through the back of her neck. Ginger saw that everything was blurry and fuzzy, Ginger let herself start to close her eyes and fall into a deep sleep. The last thing she heared was the girl saying.

" Enjoy your new home"

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So I guess it made sence about everything that led up to this series of events. Ginger wasn't dead, but being shipped to a different place, a new home. Ginger then felt herself fully snap awake and start to knock harder on the walls of the crate.

" HEY! HEY! IS ANYBODY AROUND?" Ginger screamed as she was knocking.

Ginger stopped, her hand was starting to hurt and she felt a drip of blood start to trickle down her fur. Ginger felt herself start to cry once again, what did she do to deserve to move? Even though she was different doesn't mean that she has to leave her home. Ginger rolled herself into a ball and fall into a corner of the crate, she slowly closed her eyes and hoped that this was all a dream.

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A great burst of light had awakened her.

Ginger slowly opened her eyes and stared at the light that had embraced her. She sat up and prepared herself for anything.

As her eyes slowly adjusted to the light, she saw a lot of buildings and huge walls all around, the place looked like a tropical topia of many places. Ginger then walked out of the crate and found herself beside a lake that looked similar to her lake back in Tasmania, even though she didn't know where she was, she knew she wasn't in Tasmania anymore. Ginger walked towards the lake and dipped her foot in it, it was was warm. Much nicer than the crisp, cool lake back at home. Ginger jumped right into the lake and swam around, she dove towards the pebbles and used her bill to move them out of the way, however there was no shrimp or yabbies or nothing. Upset, Ginger made her way back up to the surface.

Ginger swam back to the land and sat down and looked around. At the left side of her she saw cage that had monkeys in it and on her right side she saw a cage that had an otter in it. Ginger was shy but decided to go visit one of them, She jumped into the lake and started to swim towards the otter exbit when something else caught her eye. She swam to the front of her and saw a couple of birds doing karate lessons. Ginger just sat there and watched them, when one of them looked at her she'd duck her head. She didn't want to leave a bad impreson that she was a stalker or something.

" Hey!" Ginger heared a voice call out to her from the right side of the wall. Ginger turned around and saw the otter hanging over the wall and smiling at her.

" You must be new, hi! I'm Marlene" Marlene stuck out her paw to shake hands.

" Hello, I'm Ginger" Ginger shook hands with Marlene.

Marlene invited Ginger over into her home. Together they talked about where they came from, their families and other stuff. Ginger the whole time kept looking at the birds doing karate, she wasn't paying attention to Marlene. Marlene didn't know untill she saw she was staring at the penguins for a while.

" Who are they, I never seen those type of birds before?" Ginger asked Marlene, while not taking her eyes off of them.

" Oh there Penguins, and of coarse you never seen them before they are cold climate animals so they wouldn't be found in Tasmania, I can introduce them to you if you'd like" Marlene suggested.

" That'd be great! " Ginger started smiling, She had a feeling that those birds- penguins whatever, would become great friends with each other.