Disclaimer: I own nothing except Bel

Author's note: Another chapter. Hope you like it. Thanks to vampirelover15 and thefishandpollytheparrot for their reviews. Enjoy!

The Forgotten One

Chapter 2- Unexpected friend

Close the door, shut the world away All the fights gone from this wounded heart

- Call the man, Celine Dion

The first thing I noticed as I entered the room was the new experiments. The first one was like a fish. It had scales, but only on parts of its body. The other had extra fingers and toes, a non-existent neck and hardly any hair. Neither was harmed, but both were crouched in a corner away from the next cage. As I was shoved into my own cage I looked at the other. There was a girl in... A girl with wings. She turned her eyes to me. It was Angel.

"How do you know my name?" She questioned. I remembered she could read minds, but this made her even more startled.

"How do you know I can read minds?" She asked.

"I was here before." Was my reply. I didn't really want to go into details. I was so tired. But I forced myself to stay awake.

"Before?" She didn't understand, but then I didn't expect her to. She hadn't known me before so why should she remember me.

"Before you escaped I was here. I've always been here." I kept my voice calm and steady despite the pain I was in. I put my mind off my back, I didn't want to know the extent of it.

"How long have you been here?"

"Fourteen years today." Her eyes grew wide. She couldn't comprehend what it was like to be here for so long. She opened her mouth to speak, but stopped as if scared at what answer she would get to the question.

"Is it any better?" She finally asked.

"It's okay for you. They're more high tech. It's all electric sticks and sterilized needles for you now." Of course I didn't say everything. It was better for the others, but that was only when I compared it to myself. If I got the same treatment as all of them, then perhaps I would have thought it was awful, but I didn't.

"For me? What about you?" Angel asked. It was sweet she sounded concerned. I didn't need to give her an answer I just simply turned round and showed her the state of my back. She gasped. I knew it must look a state. My clothes cut to ribbons covered in blood and my wings... well who knew what they looked like.

"How could they?" She said as I turned back round.

"They don't care anymore. I'm useless." Useless. It echoed in my head. It wasn't fair, was it when someone else decided what you were worth.

"Useless?"

"They don't need me. I have no purpose. I'm due to be terminated in the next couple of days." Yes but not without taking a few with me. They could kill me, but not without me proving what I could do first.

"What you're name?" Angel asked.

"Bel." I replied before closing my eyes and sleeping.

As I slept my dreams were filled with what my last minutes would be like. I often wondered what it would be like to have normal dreams... well dreams with some happiness in. It seemed like I had only been asleep a few minutes when I was woken. But then it could have been only a few minutes, I couldn't tell the time and there was nothing to show the difference in times anyway. I was woken as arms reached into my cage and pulled me out. As I was dragged away I looked at Angel's cage. She was gone. I hoped she was okay. I knew the route the whitecoats were taking me; I knew where every corridor in this place went. They were taking me to the flying room. They built it especially for me, not that, that makes me special. I was the first Human-Avian hybrid to ever have been allowed to fly in this place. But it was never good, the made me fly for hours, sometimes days on end without food or water and to keep me going the floor was heated to red-hot and the side electrified. And then it was filled with windows so other whitecoats could come and ogle at me. And of course today was no different. I was shoved into the room and the door slammed shut. I untucked my wings and my winched at the pain in my back. The floor started to burn my feet and I jumped. The pain was excruciating as my wing beats opened up the open just healed wounds on my back. But I didn't stop, I knew the consequences if I did.

I looked out of the windows staring at the whitecoats. I wondered for a second what it would be like to stare out onto the outdoors. I'd never been outside. In my 14 years of existence not once had I felt the sun. When I went against the Erasers that would be the first and last time I would go outside. As I looked up to one of the higher windows I saw Angel, but she wasn't alone. She was with Jeb. I wonder how she felt about Jeb, had he abandoned them? Did she hate him, or love him? I couldn't tell. I concentrated on what he was saying to you, after watching people speak for so long I can now lip read.
"She's the best. Better than the flock. She survives on less than a third of the food that you do. And she can keep this up for a whole week. I've watched. But she's not lucky as you. Tomorrow she will die." I masked the shock from my face as I carried on flying. I thought I was the same as them. I thought the way I acted and what I could do were the same as the flock. But I guess I was wrong. One day… that was all I had left. And that was because I was unlucky. If I were lucky I'd never have been here in the first place. But then again I guess I wasn't as lucky as the flock. They were outside, free. And in many ways I was unluckier than them, but I didn't mind. It was just one of those things.

After five hours they let me come down. The whole time I had been thinking about the others and trying to ignore the burning pain of my back. They dragged me back to my cage and when I hit the floor of it I didn't move. I just lay there my face ground into the floor, my legs curled under me, my arms sprawled to the side of me. I didn't move I just focused on breathing wishing the pain would go.
In
Out
In
Out
"Bel?" I heard Angel's voice.
In
Out
In
Out
"Are you okay?"
"I will be." I managed to whisper back, already the pain was subsiding. I managed to pull myself off the floor and look at Angel.

"Jeb's here." She said. I nodded.

"He came back two years ago. He tried to help me, but didn't really."

"How?" She asked.

"Got them to think what they could use me for, they decided on assassin. Let's just say I didn't agree and they shoved me back here." She sat for minute thinking.

"He told me... he told me... that... it's going to happen tomorrow." I nodded. I already knew.

"Don't worry about it. It's my way out and anyway I'm not going down without a fight."

"A fight?"

"I'm taking out as many whitecoats as I can." She smiled.

"I wish you'd escaped with us."

"Me too, Angel. Me too." I said with almost a sigh. How many times had I wished that? How many nights had I spent wondering what it would have been like if I had gone with them? How many times had I wished I were free instead of facing death? Looking at Angel properly I noticed a small cut on her forehead. I closed my eyes and when I opened them it was on my head. Angel looked at me wide eyed.

"How?" Was her only question.

"I don't know, I just can. It's the only thing that keeps me going in this place knowing that I can help the poor things in here." She nodded.

"Don't worry, I'm sure things will end up being fine." When I finished we both knew I didn't mean it, how could things be fine in this place?