They had taken yellow eyes- 189.

They had just waltzed in and shot him full of tranquilizer until he was passed out in the corner he'd been forced into.

And they just dragged his still body away.

Madeline had raged at them. 734 had kept trying to shush her but she could not keep silent. She'd never witnessed something so... she didn't have the words.

The guards had been calm and unexcited. The men in the cages had growled but had watched the on-goings without being exceptionally outraged and shocked. It was the routine of it that enraged her.

That and she'd never been so helpless to before. All she could do was rage at the guards and that was unacceptable. Pathetic even. They'd taken him, ignored her for the most part, and disappeared behind the double doors on the left side of the room.

Then, much like the useless pathetic being she was, Madeline had assumed the fetal position on her mat and silently sobbed. It was all under the pretense of lying down to sleep so her badass-that-does-not-under-any-circumstance-cry image was still intact. When she was out of tears or just so emotionally spent that she couldn't emote anymore—she couldn't tell which—she actually tried to sleep. It was difficult what with the headache still hammering away in her skull and her busted ribs making every position unbearably painful. Christ in a handbasket did she need to sleep. Even just an hour would help.

It felt like days that she was laying there attempting to out stubborn the jackhammer in her brain and the burning ache in her chest. The concrete was ice beneath and the pancake thin mat did nothing to cushion her busted ribs. She attempted to generate some body heat by curling into herself while trying to keep her weight off her busted ribs but it was not working. As it was she had to endure the burning in her ribs if she wanted to be any semblance of warm or lye stiff as a board while freezing her ass off. Ultimately all her efforts were useless. The body heat thing wasn't working and the cold cement under her was only making her colder.

It was frustrating as all fuck.

Madeline Thorne employed the anger management techniques she'd been taught and took a deep breath. Or at least tried—she inhaled one deep breath and her rib cage protested with white-hot bolts of pain shooting all over her. Fuck calming herself!

She needed a blanket.

She had a headache that was quickly becoming a migraine.

She was hungry.

She was beyond emotionally drained.

And she was fucking terrified.

For 189 but mostly just herself. Because what did it say about her situation if they treated the people they'd spent, what she was assuming was millions on creating, like animals—just what in the hell were they going to do to her? To them, she was basically an incubator with an expiration date.

So Madeline did what she always did when she was scared out of her mind. She got angry.

She bolted off the cement ignoring the hot flashes of pain and scanned the ceiling for the camera 734 had told her about. There was at least one per cage and three more placed throughout the room. The sight of them only enraged her more. Christ, she wanted to break their psycho faces. She wanted to throw something but there was nothing to throw. So she settled for shoving her finger at the camera.

"Listen to me you motherfuckers! You will bring me an actual bed with a blanket, ibuprofen for my injuries, and some fucking food!"

"Mad, what are you doing?" 734 hissed at her, his knuckles white against the bars. "Quiet! They will come for you."

"You're fucking right they will." Madeline turned back to her cages camera and shoved her finger at it again. "If you expect me to survive your twisted fucking experiments Dick you need to expend just a smidgen of effort in keeping me alive! I need fucking food, ibuprofen, a fucking bed, and a goddamned blanket!"

There was a moment of silent tension around her as if they were waiting for the ground to crack open and swallow her whole.

"And I want my shoes back!" Madeline wasn't sure how negotiations usually worked but it seemed like the best practice to demand more then what she'd thought they'd give her. "It had better be good fuckin' food too!" There, demands made.

Now she just had to wait and see if they would comply or if she'd get beat on for it. Eh. She could take a hit—as long as she got a blanket out of it it'd be worth it.

"They will come to hurt you now, stupid human." 633 sighed from his cage.

Madeline flinched automatically at the word—usually, the word was accompanied by a fist or a foot. She didn't think the big male would hit but it was reflex that'd been engraved in her bones. Hurt unfurled within her like it always did when she was called stupid. But, fuck that, she wasn't thirteen anymore—she didn't get hurt, she got angry.

"I am not stupid!" Madeline turned her anger on Green Eyes who looked startled by the sudden redirection of her rage.

Madeline had to remind herself that he wasn't the reason she was a guinea pig and it wasn't like he knew she a had thing about people calling her stupid. Mads talked herself down and employed all those anger management techniques she'd been court-ordered to take. Which had just been one load of bullshit after another. She'd never had an anger management problem in her life. It had been self-defense—but that was not something she was going to think about.

Point was, 633 did not deserve her ire. So, instead of cutting him to pieces with her tongue she took a deep breath and counted to ten. And then twenty.

"They might hurt me, but at least I'll get a blanket… and don't call me stupid." Mad took another deep almost calming breath. "I am not stupid."

She wasn't.

She'd graduated high school valedictorian. She put herself through college with two part-time jobs and still graduated with honors and a 4.0 GPA. She wasn't stupid. She'd proven that to everyone who'd claimed she was. If he kept name calling she'd kick him in the head. Multiple times.

"I apologize, Mad." He cocked his head to the side and Mads was suddenly struck with how adorable he was. "It was not my intention to pain you."

"Uh," Madeline drew a blank. Unsure how to go about accepting an apology. No one had ever sincerely apologized to her after calling her stupid before. "It's okay."

A heavy silence settled and gave Madeline time to be embarrassed about her lack of emotional control. She could feel her cheeks flush. Why did she have so many goddamn issues? And why the hell couldn't she keep them under wraps? Other people had no trouble hiding their crazy—why was it so hard for her? But it wasn't like she could take it back now—she just had to own it. She was emotionally unstable and had a metric shit ton of issues—who didn't?

"Where did they take 189? Is he… is he coming back?" She didn't want to ask but she had to know. Would another male take his place?

"They test the healing drugs on him." 743 curled his lip and displayed a fang.

That didn't sound so bad.

"What does that mean? Healing drugs?"

"It means they hurt and break him in different ways and then test their healing drugs on him. They observe if it heals and how fast."

Embarrassment now completely forgotten Mads was on the verge of another emotional outburst. All the blood drained from her face and she swayed where she stood. Those fuckers. How could any sane person hurt another being like that—but she knew—Christ, did she know, how horrible humans were.

"Will… will they kill him?"

743 gave a nonchalant shrug that was offset by the rage in his dark eyes and the disgusted curl of his lip.

"It depends on how vicious the guards feel and what they are trying to heal. But you must always assume that he will die—otherwise…" He trailed off and Madeline's stomach wrenched.

Otherwise, you'd get your hopes up. Otherwise, they would not come back. Otherwise, they would die.

Madeline was overwhelmed with all the implications of what he just said. There were no attachments. Every moment could be their last. It was cold, lonely, and terrifying. Even her childhood was rainbows and daises compared to their existence. Fuck, the people in hell had it better than them.

"Do they do that to all of you?" Tears ran down her face again but Mads didn't bother trying to control them this time.

"I am here for breeding." 743 shook his head. "My sperm count is the highest in the facility they took us from. If my seed does not take I will return to the healing drug trials. They have 633 on experimental drugs. They do no break him on the outside like they do 189 but he is very sick—I can smell the nausea on him. His senses are broken."

"It is not so bad. Not compared to what they do to our females." Voice low, 633 spoke up. His back was to her and propped against his cage. He could hear them speaking? Well, it stood to reason. They were mixed with some kind of animal DNA and animals had better senses all around. "Although I would prefer to vomit less."

More tears streaked down her face, emotion was trembling her hands and making her knees shake. Finally, her legs gave out and she slumped to the ground where she stood.

She was a ferocious one. There were not many human females he had contact with and those that he did were cold and merciless. This human female was different in every way. 743 could smell terror on her and had since the moment she was dragged in by her hair. The terror she felt did not immobilize her however, it seemed to enrage her. Like fear itself was something she was too stubborn to feel so she became angry instead.

Strange human.

743 liked her.

It was disconcerting. She was a human and he was the being humans had created to be tortured. She was not responsible for his or the others torture. It was difficult to separate the humans in his mind but somehow there was now a clear line between the other humans and The Mads.

He had been intrigued when he had heard her muffled cursing in the elevator. The other women had been terrified to the point where they had been docile and subservient. The Mads had been screaming out curses he had never heard before and had been fighting the bastards with all she had. Which had served to only intrigue him more.

Not a good feeling under the circumstances.

She was there only to be used. He would have to force breed her and then when she produced no infant she would be killed. It would be stupid for him to get attached. 743 never got attached. He could remain detached and distant as he had all his life.

At the sight of her slumped form and the tears tracking through the blood and dirt on her face made it difficult to remain impassive.

Impossible actually.

"Do not cry for us Mads." He made sure his tone was as nonthreatening as possible before he reached through the bars separating them and touched her hand.

743 held his breath in anticipation of her reaction but, again, she performed unexpectedly. She did not jump at the contact or shy away from him, she only turned her scraped and bloodied hand over to hold his own. 743 had to school his own reaction at the soft touch of her hand. The action surprised him so much that he had almost wrenched away from the bars and across his cell.

He hardly had time to revel in her soft touch before the footfalls of the bastard guards were ringing in his ears.

"Mads, they come. You must not show them your tears." 743 was reluctant to stop touching her. She was soft, too soft for the way the guards had been hurting her, and warm. He still had a good fifteen seconds before the guards entered the room. "Most importantly you must not make them aware that you cry for us. They will use your caring to get you to do things you do not want to do."

Terror rolled off her in waves but then rage quickly overtook everything else. Her softness was gone and she was kicking at the cell door again just as the guards walked into the room.

"Do you know how many laws you are breaking right now?" She all but hollered at the two guards quickly coming level with her cage. "You are all going to be in jail for the rest of your lives!"

743 did not know what jail was but the way she said it was very threatening. He watched the guards for a reaction. The tallest one only rolled his eyes but the other one suddenly smelled anxious and sweaty.

"Yeah, yeah." The tall one kept his distance from the cage and eyed The Mads. "Move to the back of your cage and I will give you these." His head jerked to the pile in his arms.

The Mads complied after a moment of hesitation and moved to stand at the back. Instead of opening her cell door the guard bent and shoved the pile through the bars.

"I've got money. Lots of money. If you let us go I will give you both ten thousand each." She moved closer to the males and 743 had to keep a growl from ripping out of his throat. They were not the cruel guards but they were still human and that made them untrustworthy by default. He did not want The Mads to get closer to them.

He was useless in his cell. 189 was right, he could not protect The Mads. That did not keep him from watching the humans carefully. The most he could do was howl at the guards and maybe that would be enough. Most likely not but 743 hoped it would not come to that. The tall one was not vicious like the other guards and the shorter one usually did as the taller one ordered.

"There's no point in lying, Madeline Rae Thorn, Monieth briefed us on you. You have exactly six hundred and thirty-two dollars in the bank- and that ain't enough for me to turn on Mercile. You have no friends and the family you do have is doing time up in Maine. "

"Fine, I've got shit for bribing and no one is going to sprain an ankle tracking me down but come on—you're fucking humans—you've both got that high brain function called a conscious! This isn't right. This is so far from humane that it's actually right up there with the shit Hitler did. How can you do this to human beings?"

"They aren't human- they're animals." The sweaty one finally spoke up eyeing the cages as he did so. "Talking animals."

"Like parrots." The tall one shrugged and glanced surreptitiously towards the camera above her cell.

"I know you don't believe that—there is no way you could. They are just as human as you and me."

She was not doing a good job of pretending indifference. This would not be good for her.

"They are just animals!" The sweaty one was angry now and advancing on the cell. "Just cause they learned to talk don't mean they're like me and you! They are fucking animals." The tall one halted the others advance and pushed him back.

"Regardless, there's two ibuprofen in the bag. There's also some socks, a mat you can put under you, a blanket, and a thing of potato soup." The tall one was motioning to the pile again. "I'd eat up and then get some sleep. The testing starts tomorrow."