A Painful Routine

Cassandra's POV

Another day in this Goddess forsaken place. I roll my eyes as if there's something better to look at way back, at the back of my head. 

I let out a sigh. 

Besides the bars and some of the company in this place, the only thing that gets to me are these fucking lights. They're working on my nerves.

We really don't need to see the abominations and botched surgeries going on, on our caged neighbours. It's like these lights were put in so that we missed nothing and could see that these doctors were probably not doctors at all but butchers. Doctor wannabes. They sure were proud of their handy work. 

I grunt. 

And they think vampires drinking blood is cruel. I can't help but roll my eyes again at my own thoughts. Like really!

My eyes scan the cages looking at all the sorry excuses huddled in their cages. Then my eyes land on the mute. She was the only one I really felt sorry for. She's been in here for Goddess knows how long and these butchers seem to dish her the worst of the worst. The only time I've heard her voice was last week, when they took her out and did..... I actually don't want to know what they did to her. It had to have been damn bad to make a mute scream. Yet, looking at her she seems like she couldn't care less. Like this was just another day for her. Just part of a routine. A painful routine if you ask me.

Our pathetic daily routine consisted of being "woken up" by a rather annoying, half dying siren, followed by my favorite light show coming on. A rather heavy set woman bringing food, if you can call that shit food, which gets thrown through the bars like that woman was a participant of a mud flinging competition. A few minutes later, the butcher in the white lab coat, who looks more like a fat hermit than a doctor, who I might add has never heard of personal hygiene, smelling like rat piss, comes in with his fat sausage of a finger attached to his chin. Contemplating? I don't think he can contemplate much of anything with his nose so close to his own armpit smell, but yeah. He then picks a random cage, only he seems to randomly pick Mute's cage more often than anyone else's. Drags the chosen poor sod off to the back, which we've all nicknamed the Slab and does his thing. Brings them back a few hours later and the whole routine starts again the next morning.

Agatha, the ever so lovely witch, excuse my sarcastic affection for her, in the cage next to mine does her best to help heal the ones that make it back to the cages. 

Sick really... 

Currently we're waiting for that fat fuck to come in and choose today's slab victim. 

My thoughts, not even cold before the big door swings open with an unoiled squeak and in walks Fat-fuck.

"Hmmm.... Let's see who we have that's still breathing, shall we." He states with his finger attached to his chin, as he strolls past one cage after the next.

All I want to do is ring his thick neck, break those fat fingers of his and make him choke on his own tongue. I could never drink from a man like that, even I have standards. 

He stops in front of Mute, but then slowly takes a few steps back until he is standing between my cage and the new girl's. Andrea, if I heard correctly. Shame, she still has that determined look of hope in her eyes. Poor girl.

He leans in and takes a better look at her through the bars. He doesn't even get to finish his sentence of "this one"  and Mute lunges at him, grabbing the collar of his white lab coat. He tears himself out of her grip and stumbles backwards into the bars of my cage. I step back, hands raised. I ain't gonna get involved. If he wants to take the new mutt then by all means, at least that means it ain't me today.

I watch him steady himself and glare at Mute. "Oh, so you also want to come out and play, huh?" He says in a menacing tone. "Looks like we have a 2 for 1 today boys!" He chuckles at the now two girls, of which only one is staring at him in horror.

Fuck. Why can't Mute just keep outta it. It's not like anyone ever stands up for her when they come for her. A pang of guilt hits me and sits me onto the bed. 

All I can do is hold my face in my hands as they drag the two girls from their cages and exit out the big doors.

"Fuck Mute" Is all I sigh out before the temporary silence is broken.... By screams.

Agatha's POV

Every time that man walks in here and picks a girl, I pray it's not the girl we've nicknamed Mute. That poor girl has been through enough. You can tell by all the scars riddling her tiny frame like she was made up of tiny puzzle pieces that someone glued together. Yes, sure, she heals quicker than anyone I know. She's never needed me to heal her. She heals even quicker than the new girl who said she was a werewolf , heck she even heals quicker than Cassandra and that is saying something. She certainly ain't no human girl that's for sure. But just what she is seems to be a mystery to everyone. None of us has seen her shift or do any kind of magic. 

Besides the slab, these hunters find it amusing to cage a shifter and a witch together and make them fight each other. Whether it's just for their entertainment or to study who is stronger than who, I don't know. Whoever refuses to fight gets killed there and then, except for Mute and she always refuses to fight. 

These doctors have been trying their best to find out what she is, for years by the seems of things. They've even tried forcing me to get a reading on her. Not that I could.  They tried spell work too, fake spell work. Like I'd actually give them working spells to use on her. They can go to hell. The only thing I will do is heal anyone and everyone when they get dragged back in to their cages.

There's something special about that Mute though. Her aura is different from everyone elses in here, stronger, purer even. But it's her eyes that throw me. She has the most gorgeous turquoise eyes, deep yet completely empty. That can only mean one thing. She's been here for far too long. I guess we all end up measuring our own hopes for escape, to the lack of life we see in Mute's eyes. I also think they've been messing with her head lately because she seems to be having more and more nightmares and they seem to be getting worse. No matter how bad her dreams, she never utters a word, not even while dreaming. 

Only time I heard her was a week ago. She screamed. It was the most terrifying and heartbreaking thing I've ever heard in my life. I don't think the poor girl can take much more. She needs to get out of here. We all do. By some lucky chance, if we do, Ima be damned if I let anything happen to Mute again. She might not be a witch, but she's taken a few for me and then some in this place, as she has for all of us. The weird thing is and I've seen the same thing in Cassandra's eyes, I or should I say we have an unexplained need to protect Mute. Why, not too sure but I would be glad to do it, even without any real reason to it. That is how much she's done for me in this awful place. She might think she's dead inside but we have all seen her heart, for all us poor souls that come down into these cages.