Book I: Chapter II

Her eyes flickered open. Fuzzy brown and gray shapes filled her narrow vision. She raised her arms and elegantly stretched them behind her back, yawning as she did so. The girl nimbly jumped to her feet and ran her fingers through her hair. A clump of dirt caught her fingers, and she roughly pulled it out. The girl frowned; she was still dirty. Jinx surveyed her room, half-hoping to see pretty pink wallpaper and a large closet. Nope. It was definitely hell. The room was no brighter than she last remembered. If anything, the cavern seemed darker—more smothering. In fact, it was hard to see even the backs of her own hands. The electric light shining from above seemed to be weaker than before.

"Reaahh, this place is annoying!" She whined, letting her voice fill the cavern. It echoed once, before dissipating into the darkness. She took in a deep breath. The faint smell of mold still lingered in the air. She choked on the scent, quickly bringing her hands to her face to drown out the seemingly toxic fumes. The girl stood there for several seconds, breathing through her hands, before she began to feel a slight grumble coming from her stomach. Jinx was now well-rested, but ravenously hungry. The girl shook her head and tried to ignore the pain. She would need to fight past her discomforts; now was the time to establish an escape before she psyched herself out. "Food is only a luxury," she weakly told herself. "So is clean air..."

Sound. Was it useful? She had only a rudimentary knowledge of how sound worked. She knew that an echo required a solid surface far enough way to reflect the sound back. Did echoes only result when there's an opening in one of the walls, or can a completely sealed room have an echo? It was something she didn't know. She could only think back to her last echo, deep in a valley with two large walls that sprawled up as far as the eye could see. When she yelled, the sound of her voice seemed to bounce and ricochet off the light brown walls. Little specks of grass littered the landscape, and patches of white flower grew in clusters all the way up. The sun had poured down on her so heavily, that the constant stream of wind felt pleasant against her nauseatingly dry skin…

The daydream dissolved, and the chilly air made Jinx shiver. Her bare feet felt bitter and numb, resting against icy stone. She raised her left foot, and weakly massaged life back into her toes. The vixen looked up at the dark sky above. Although she could see no ceiling, she knew there must be one up high. The place had to be sealed off, else rain could fill the cavern, and drowning would be an immediate threat. She cast her gaze haphazardly around the room, half-hoping to spot something she might have overlooked. There must be something she could use to escape. There must be something that told her the way out. Jinx looked at the walls, and the ceiling. The bucket and her bedding. The tray of food and the polished floor. The jagged rocks and the dull browns. The flickering light that seemed to lose its power the longer it continued to hum.

Her eyes opened wide at the sight of the food near her bed.

"How…" She muttered in disbelief. Someone must have entered her domain while she slept. Jinx tightly wrapped her hands around her body and hugged her stomach. Yet again, she felt violated. "Someone was in here, and you didn't hear them. Come on Jinx, focus! You're losing your edge…drugged..." She paused, before adding, "I must still be drugged."

The girl bitterly sat down near the food and crossed her legs. She looked at the huge, plastic bowl of water. A metal spoon peaked out of the foul liquid. The girl gripped the utensil and loosely stirred her food. There were chunks of stuff in it. She bit her bottom lip. "You've got to be kidding me…what is this crap? This isn't food. This is awful. I deserve so much better than this..." There wasn't even a glass of water to supplement her meal. Unfortunately, she was starving. Dying of hunger. She could barely think straight, and she would need to eat someday. If not this meal, then the next. She also knew she couldn't think on an empty stomach. As much as her first instinct was to reject the meal for fear of poison, she knew time was not on her side. She would eat something eventually. If poison was their intention, it was inevitable. She glanced back at the foul food. If her captors were cruel enough to throw her in a hole, it's possible her little visitor would return and take the uneaten food away… the next time she would get a chance to eat was a distant, yet unknown, future.

She hesitantly looked at the liquid's bubbling surface. It was steaming hot, and the bowl was deep. She raised her eyebrow, wondering how they kept her meal so warm. If there was a kitchen nearby, perhaps that was the direction to start digging. Her eyes leisurely scanned the rim of the bowl, idly calculating the size of her meal. She was a bit surprised; there was a lot more of a meal than she was initially expecting. Ordinarily, a captor might provide only the bare essentials to maintain a life. In this case, she might eat her fill and have extra to spare.

Jinx scooped a bit of light brown liquid onto her spoon and lightly spun it on her utensil. She played with the consistency, letting the liquid slosh from her spoon, and fall back into the bowl. She poked at the little chunks of meat, and the white squares. She wondered if the green sliver was a celery, or a green bean. Jinx scooped a shallow amount onto her spoon, and raised it to her lips. She closed her eyes and imagined Gizmo's hearty stew as she let the substance slide down her throat. She imagined all the flavor and zest her companion's cooking always had. She pretended he had made the meal just for her to experiment a newly concocted dish.

She swallowed.

Her eyes lit up.

It was tasty. It lacked a bit of spice, where a bit more salt might have made it an enjoyable meal, but it was actually pleasant to her tongue. The broth itself had a smooth texture, and the vegetables were cooked just well enough to give her teeth some exercise, but not crunchy enough to flake into stringy bits. Eating veggies and beef in broth was better than the putrid meat-smoothie that Jump City prisons typically offered. She would take soup-stew over loaf of meat any day. The beginnings of a smile grew on her face. She would never admit it aloud, but Jinx was slightly thankful she wouldn't vomit her first night here. It was always a hassle…The thought stalled in her mind for a second, before her eyes grew wide in distress. "ONLY night here!" she quickly corrected aloud.

Jinx finished her meal. To her surprise, she ate it all. It was perhaps the best prison food she had ever eaten—healthy, even. It certainly filled her up, and gave her the strength to sit back sassily with a full stomach. She let her body rest for a few moments longer, before she stood up and gave a little twirl. She danced in the dark, and did a handstand, in the privacy of her own cell. She rotated wrists, and swirled her hips under the dizzyingly dim light. She was full and ready to go.

Escape.

Right.

Jinx looked down at the paved floor. There was a reason for it to be paved, right? People don't just pave things for no reason. There was intention behind the act. Did it hide a way out? It was an interesting thought, but she worried that the paved ground might be her own symbolic crack in the wall. Peculiar doesn't mean escape. Strange doesn't mean important. Besides, the ground was down. She was underground. It only seemed logical that the way out was up. The girl shook her head. She had to think through all of the possibilities. A paved floor could be hiding an escape. Maybe they placed a hidden door, imbedded in her floor, and Raven had nothing to do with her imprisonment. It seemed silly, but it was plausible. Perhaps even cunning—how often does one expect the escape to be downward? It was counterintuitive, and just strange enough to fill Jinx with hope. Quickly scanning the room with her eyes, she tried to look for an out-of-place gap on the floor—anything that might symbolize a trap door, hinge or movable brick. Unfortunately, it was too dark to make out anything significant. The light was scarce and it made it hard to see even a few feet ahead.

Jinx got on her hands and knees. She started at one curve of the room and systematically crawled over every square inch of the floor. When she came to the middle of the room, she pushed away her blankets and her pillow, again inspecting every nook and cranny. Her knees began to ache as the hard surface smacked against her soft skin, and her arms felt sore as they supported her crawling, and sprawling body. As she reached the final stretch of curve, she concluded there were no gaps to signify a door. There was no way the floor could be an exit in disguise. Everything seemed perfectly solid, and the mortar between the bricks was very stiff to the touch.

Plan B.

She stood up and once again toyed with her powers against the stone. The pink rings sliced into rock; bolts scattered everywhere. Slight pings filled the air as her energy ricocheted off one wall and hit the next. In all, her efforts were in vain. A few, subtle dents in rock, but nothing that indicated an escape. The acrobat shrugged. "Well, that's one possibility firmly crossed off the list..." She mentally recalculated her options. Down was no go. The walls were within the realm of possibility, but impractical to test. Her powers were less than useful. If she was looking for a quick escape, above seemed to be the answer.

She analyzed the spiraling, mysterious black that clung to the above. It was inconvenient to test, but it was logically the first place to look. The girl wanted to stay away from exploring the seemingly obvious, but her options were running more narrow. Furthermore, Jinx knew it would be exhausting to explore the upward direction. She couldn't see anything up there, and without sight, she would be at a severe disadvantage. The idea seemed to tumble through her thoughts, before she replied at once. The lack of light must be intentional.

She made a fist, and slammed it against her other palm. "Okay Jinx, the basics. HIVE rule number forty-six: nothing is impossible. There's a way out; I just have to find it." She paused as she once more eyed the room around her. "Rule number sixteen, use all tools to your advantage. Think through the evidence…"

A wooden bucket. Some bedding sheets. A pillow. A plastic tray. A plastic bowl. A metal spoon. A prison shirt and a matching set of sweatpants. Her powers. Her hair. Pieces of rock she might be able to break off. Stone bricks dug out of the polished mortar. The dripping sound echoing in the distance. A light bulb, the metal dish surrounding the bulb, and the electric cord holding it up. The metal rungs holding the bucket together. Planks of wood taken from the bucket. The small strip of rope functioning as the bucket's handle…

She frowned. She had some tools in her procession, but nothing particularly useful. Her mind ran through the tools a second time, before she faltered. "A metal spoon?" She hurried to the tray and picked up the utensil. "Really? They gave me a weapon?" The vixen asked with a slight chuckle. Although she didn't know how to use it to her advantage, she knew it was a very useful tool. If nothing else, it served as a form of defense beyond her powers. She might be able to heat it up, and form it into a different shape entirely. For now, she placed the metal spoon back on the ground, leaving a mental note in her head.

Jinx's fingers tightened into a taunt fist as she grit her teeth. She hated being restrained. She abhorred being made a fool. She detested the fact that the Titans were laughing at her misery. They were mocking her! She was the best of her kind, and they were taking her as an idiot! She was a song bird who was meant to fly. She was never meant to be blind. Jinx would love to sharpen the spoon into a point, and slam it into the frail frame of the girl who had trapped her and provided her such misery. Raven was more than deserving of such a fate. That gothic clown would never smile again... The thought seemed to trail off, as her anger moved elsewhere. Jinx eyed the source of her nearest aggravation. It would serve that stupid electric light well if she shattered it. It had no purpose being so useless.

She frowned, and held in her breath to a count of ten, before hesitantly letting it go. "Keep your cool..." she muttered, knowing that her sanity was a necessity. It was perhaps irony itself that frustrated her the most. Beyond the shadowed walls, she knew the light itself, the very tool that seemed to bring her own ambitions to fruition, was hiding a dirty little secret. Somewhere up above, that cord must connect to an energy source. The cord couldn't be too ridiculously long. They must have dug a small hole in the rock for the cord to fit. It went to an outlet of some kind, which meant there was a room up above and a potential to escape. It had to lead some place better off than 'here'.

This was one of her most likely escapes. However...she paused, letting her eyes absorb the weak light it gave off. The light was definitely a way out, but...it also meant complete and permanent darkness if she failed. One wrong move, and her sense of direction could entirely disappear. She lived by light, and although she was good at traveling in the dark, she graciously relied on her eyes to live. Her teeth chewed on her bottom lip, as words formed in her mind. There would be nothing worse than being blind in this hellhole. That fucking drip of water would only get louder...the smell more awful.

"I don't suppose they'll buy me a new light if I break this one...?" She asked the bitter air. Jinx sighed when she received no response. It was a last resort if she could come up with no alternative option. However, it was a resort she hoped she would not fall prey. The consequences of failure might be worse than death itself.

Drip.

—

/If you have the time, please leave me a review. I appreciate your thoughts!