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Chapter 11; Breakfast
The cold was instantaneous and excruciating against his thin skin, but he didn't have the strength to shout at it, or to try and draw his wings around himself to ward off the chill.
He didn't even have the strength to open his eyes and see where this Person was taking him.
All he felt was pain and cold...
The pain of a shoulder in his aching stomach, the pain of having his wings flopping around above his head, and the pain of actually having his wings OPEN for the first time.
He welcomed the pain, at least it meant he was still alive...
And he cursed it, because it meant he was still alive and hadn't been blessed with death just yet.
Hands grabbed him, sharp fingers digging into his body, pulling him, and dropping him onto an icy platform that felt to be covered in steel wool.
What he wouldn't give for a piece of steel wool... He'd gladly swallow it so his insides would be cut to ribbons and he'd finally die.
Death had to be better than this pain...
He heard a muted sound, like a bell and he flinched, remembering that THEY had trained the OTHERS to attack at the sound of a bell, and he anticipated, no, knew more pain was on its way.
And then there were footfalls. Quick ones, someone running. And he pulled his arms over his head to protect his face and tried to curl his wings around himself, but they wouldn't move... The cold had reached too deeply into his aching, sick chest with its icy fingers and he just didn't have the strength to fight anymore.
And then the wall he'd been leaning against shifted away and he gave a short, startled cry as he fell sideways through nothingness and onto a smooth, but hard warm surface. Then he heard a man shouting strange words.
"Sweet JESUS!"
And suddenly hands were on him, soft, but urgent warm hands, on his arms, his shoulders, down his sides over his ribs, and on his wings.
He drew them closed and jerked away from the People, jerked away from their searching, grubby, pain bearing hands.
There was a sharp sound, like a book dropping to the floor, or a door slamming shut, and the hands were back, more insistent this time, and he started fighting. Knowing even as he did that it was a loosing fight. He'd never win...
And even if he did, he didn't think he'd want what he'd won... It might be worse than just giving up and letting the People do whatever they wanted to him...
He hissed in agitation, his eyes squeezed closed because he thought it was worse to see what torture they were planning... If you didn't see it you didn't anticipate it... It just happened without warning and you didn't have to worry about looking at the result...
Looking at what they'd done to you...
Feeling it was enough.
He scrambled, and began beating his wings, slapping the Person with the broadest part, knocking them around, hoping to give as much as he got.
He liked hearing them shout 'OW' or 'OUCH' a couple of times before they got to hurt him... It seemed like he was somehow paying them back for hurting him if he got them first.
This Person made a strangled horrified sound and shrank back from him, scurrying out of his reach. So he went still, wings raised, ready to come down like a fist if the Person got too close for comfort...
And everything was still for about thirty seconds...
Within these thirty seconds he was able to hear everything around him...
He heard the distant wail of sirens, a few distant screams, and closer sounds... A liquidy bubbling sound, the sound not that unlike the sound his stomach made when he wasn't given food for a few days... The sound of his own heart hammering away, the sound of his breath... And the sound of another's breathing... Of the Person's breathing...
Strange syllables whispered from this strange Person... From the strange calm, slow, quiet voice...
"Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name... They Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven..."
And then the smell hit him...
A deep... Bright smell...
The smell of bread... But bread unlike any he'd ever tasted...
Warm, soft bread...
He imagined it all, white with brown crusts... Soft and fluffy in the middle like the down of his wings, and a taste that was just enough salty and just enough heaven...
And another smell... a softer smell... Meaty... Almost like blood, but with a little tang...
And OH... It smelled so good...
Slowly, his eyes came open, one at a time, barely to slits...
Brightness assaulted his vision and at first he shrank back from it, covering his face with his hands, blinking and trying not to scream...
Then he began focusing...
The floor under him was odd... a wood floor, like the wood desk that sat a few yards from his cage...
There was a counter with cabinets, and an odd metal counter with a large metal THING on top, from which a frothy whiteness was wafting upward into the air then disappearing.
The meaty smell was coming from that thing... And the bready smell was coming from within the cabinet in its front.
Everything was bright... The colors woody and green... Colors he barely recognized.
Then there was the man...
On his knees hands tangled together under his chin...
An old man with white hair and a clean shaven face...
He wore all black, save a white square on his collar, and his eyes that seemed to take up all his face were wide and over flowing with tears...
For the longest time there they sat, staring at one another, each afraid to move and invoke the wrath of the other...
But slowly his wings began to tremble and he could no longer keep them open.
He did not ease them closed, but simply let them flop to his sides, half open and limp... Unable to do anything else.
The warmth of the room seeped into his body and he was wracked with chills. Sitting there shivering and quaking, out of fear and his body's need to warm itself...
"Are you alright?"
He flinched at the man's voice. Simply because he wasn't ready to hear it. But he wasn't sure how to answer so he remained still.
"Please, do not move... I'll be right back... I promise."
And as quickly as the man was on his feet, running from the room. The boy was forcing himself deep into the open cupboard kicking out the broom and mop, terrified by the clacking sounds they made upon impact with the floorboards.
Here, he huddled in the darkness behind the garbage can, trembling his eyes too wide, his mouth closed too tightly.
When the man returned and peered into the cupboard at him he hissed threateningly his wings twitching, the sick feathers raising to make himself appear larger.
Slowly the man eased to his knees and held out what he'd collected in the other room.
And when the boy saw it he panicked, thrashing around, trying to force himself farther into the cupboard, or through the back wall and into the other room.
"Calm down... It's alright, I assure you," The man with the funny collar said, "It's just a blanket to keep you warm..."
He collapsed back into the floor and was trying to right himself again when the man suddenly gave the blanket a toss and it came over him covering him completely, pinning him to the floor.
So, he fought it... Twisting himself tightly into it in his urgent attempt to escape.
He cried out, enraged and horrified, his mind nothing but anger and fear... And then he heard the man again, above his own cries...
"Shhhhhh, you're fine... Just relax... It's only to keep you warm..."
The man crab walked away, sitting with his back against the counter his hands resting lightly on his knees... And there he sat, silent, and still. Gently watching, his eyes holding not an ounce of malice...
The boy kept fighting for a while, until he realized the blanket was soft, not scratchy like the little one in his cage... This one was soft, and smelled gentle... Not harsh like chemicals...
It smelled good, and felt pleasant against his arms and legs.
He relaxed almost instantly when he came to the conclusion that there were no arms, no hands trying to grab him, or hold him still. There was no one there to hurt him...
So he sat wedged into the corner, only his face and hands protruding from the tangle of a blanket and stared at the man sitting against the counter...
But the man didn't move... Good... He didn't want the man to come anywhere near him.
His nose was clogged, and every breath he took sounded horrible and left him hungry for air. So he scrubbed at it with the edge of the blanket by his hand, clearing away as much of the clogging gunk as he could.
Slowly, the man rose to his feet and began fiddling with things on the odd metal counter. Moving the THING around, and pulling that wonderful bready smell from the cabinet in its belly.
The boy watched this in complete silence, his stomach rumbling like an engine.
The man glanced over his shoulder a few times, and the boy didn't like the look in his eyes... That, 'I'm watching you' look... He wished the man would go away so he could take that bready smell and devour it...
The shivering started again, worse than ever and he wrapped his arms around himself, holding that wonderful feeling blanket close to him... Trying to make himself small and quiet so not to be noticed.
He coughed a couple of times... That nasty near honking sound of what Dierdre had called 'New-moan-eeeeya'. And he must have dozed, because when he opened his eyes again, the sound of sirens in the distance had gone, and sitting before him on a little tray was a bowl of steaming something, and three slices of the oddest bread he'd ever seen.
The light brown fluffiness in the middle was fluffier than any he'd ever seen before. And the steamy stuff had cubes of whiteish, orange, and greenish stuff along with the meaty cubes...
"It's beef stew... Go on..." The man whispered from where he sat by the door...
The boy looked up and shrank back from it, on the verge of tears because the smell was so good, and yet, if it had come from one of THEM, it most likely had some kind of 'medicine' in it that would make him sleep or make him throw up...
If it had to be one of the two... He hoped it was sleep... He was absolutely exhausted... And yet, too frightened to actually allow himself to sleep.
"Go on... It's perfectly fine..." The man said in a calm voice and turned his eyes to a book in his hands.
The boy was able to pull one hand free of the blanket and he grabbed the bread, stuffing a whole warm slice into his mouth at a time.
The man chuckled to himself as he watched from the corner of his eye.
The bread tasted better than any he'd ever had before... Warm, and slightly salty... It tasted like...
He didn't have words to describe it, and didn't want to take the time to think of one when he could use that time to eat.
He bent over the bowl of 'beef stew' and sniffed at it, then using the spoon shoveled a few of the colorful cubes into his mouth. Barely chewing them before he swallowed.
Before he knew what had happened, the man was sitting in the small cupboard with him, casually reading over his book.
He watched the man warily, knowing that if he got too close there was now no where he could run.
His eyes flicked to the left and he saw a small window high up on the wall... And outside of it was something big... Something HUGE and tall and light gray against an eternal blackness...
And there was something on this huge light grayness... Something the same color, but with different shape...
His mouth dropped open and he felt every muscle and feather rise in shock.
There was a light gray, immobile person standing on a platform... A person with wings...
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