Author's note: Thanks everyone for the great reviews!

Warnings: This chapter is VERY DARK (or it implies it :ahem: rape :ahem:). There, I warned you all.

Freedom in a Cage

"I just don't understand why he would ask something so…" Shigure mumbled under his breath as he sighed heavily, trailing off and glancing at the down hearted Hatori.

"…Unlike him." Hatori finished off, eyes sad as he nodded in response to the statement that Shigure made about the out of character Kyou.

"I hope he's all right!" Tohru commented with teary eyes as she bit her lower lip to try and stop it from trembling. Her throat began to close up again as she tried to stop herself from sobbing over the missing Kyou.

Yuki, silent over the news that had shocked him, stared at the grass mutely. They were trying to track down the emotionally distressed Kyou, and as of yet…it wasn't coming along quite well. "Don't worry, Miss Honda," he said, trying to cheer up Tohru. She always did have a habit of taking the world's many problems onto her shoulder's around.

"He couldn't have gotten far." Haru commented with solemn eyes as he looked around for a flash of orange in the bleak-looking world.

"It's going to start raining soon," Tohru lowered her shoulders, almost ready to give up. "This isn't good, Kyou get's weak during the rain…"

Hatori blinked slowly, sighing inwardly with emotions leaking through his emotionless mask. He turned to Shigure, making sure his voice didn't carry over to the other teens. "He wasn't in the best of condition when I found him…"

Shigure turned to look at him with raised eyebrows, "You don't mean that…" He bit out with wider eyes, body now tense as he stiffly nodded. 'We can't leave him out there all alone with such injuries. He's been though so much as of recent and we can't allow him to break.' His mind flahsed back to the whole event with Kazuma and Kyou's true transformation.

"Kyou!" Tohru called loudly into the forest, trudging on through the dampened and bleak woodlands near the main house. She fell to the ground in a crying heap as she tried in vain to wipe the tears spilling uncontrollably from her eyes.

"Please," She prayed, hoping her mother would hear her and give her strength, "Please someone find Kyou, please…!" If someone were to find him, everything would be fine and wonderful again.

If only she wished that she was wrong…

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The city was dark, the rain that long before started pouring from the crying sky had helped wash away the dirt and blood staining his shivering body. He closed his eyes momentarily, not looking which way he turned as he walked down into a dark alley.

Thunder rumbled deeply in the clouds, making Kyou look up with half-lidded eyes as he sighed heavily and looked back down. His back throbbed, the welted lines that the whip made on his back pulsing with anger and pain. He grit his teeth, body's strength already beginning to fail him as the cat's spirit embodied in him reacted to the down-pour.

He trudged on, a cat jumping out of a garbage can every once in a while. Kyou wondered with a lathargic mind when the city seemed to dark and ominious, no longer the nice little town where the sun shone brightly. It seemed as if he waked right into one of the street alleys of the large cities, littered with trash, boxes, and arabid animals.

Which is why a dog grolwed at him, jumping out from it's spot near a trash can and a blakc bag that had been ripped to shreds with the razors for teeth the dog had. Fur standing on end, the dog lowered it's body, snarling and barring his fangs at the intruder to it's territory.

Kyou took a step back, adrenaline pumping through his veins as his body entered the 'fight or flight' state of mind. He knew that he couldn't fight the dog in his current condition and took another step back. He didn't expect the dog to leap at him with amazing speed, snarling as it clamped it's fangs down onto his flesh, intantly breaking his skin and muscle, blood flowing freely.

Kyou cried out in pain, instantly shoving the dog off, gripping his bitten forearm and hissed angrily. He should have expected the dog to try and attack him even more than a normal human since he carried the scent of a cat with him, many traits also. He barred his canine teeth at the dog which whimpered and scampered away.

He sighed, body sagging against the grime-covered wall as his eye lids fluttered, exhaustion reaching as far deep into his body as his bones. His head lolled momentarily and he snapped to attention once more, closing his eyes only for a moment which turned into a few minutes.

Something wrapped around him, pressing him to the wall and his eyes shot open, crimson irises narrowing with disgust and hate to the thug holding his hands above his head against the wall rather roughly. Kyou snarled, trying hard not to show his exhaustion.

"Well, well…" He struggled vainly to get free from the grip, fear tinged in his eyes now as he panted from excertion. The thug grinned evilly, head lowering to whisper in his ear, "Look at what the cat dragged in."

"People shouldn't wander alone…" Another said, stepping out of the shadows that he seemed to materialize from. "…Bad things can happen to them." His hand tightened around the chains that he had wrapped around his knuckles.

"Kikaru's right…" The thug pressing Kyou against the wlal gruffly said, grinning as a streak of lightning crahsed against the sky, "Very bad things can happen..."

TBC

Author's note:

(O.O) (my reaction to this chapter)

…wow…..that was a creepy chapter….(I can't believe I wrote it)

ACK! Man, this was an unexpected change of the story for me. This is why the story is rated R. I'm not going into any dark detail though I don't write scenes like that, only imply them. I guess I'm either sadistic or deranged, but hey—I warned y'all that it was going to be dark and angsty.

Yeah, I've already got the next chapter all plotted out in my mind…hopefully I won't forget it and I'm terribly sorry for the long wait for the chapterlot's of stories to work on and the :cough cough: damned idea's won't stop coming. Plus, I might get therapy yea!

Comments and suggestions are always wanted or loved by me and my teddy bear! .

Liebe, Red Tail