I woke up on the floor of my cell to a pounding headache.
Ah, I must have passed out again.
I tried to sit up, but I'm immediately, painfully, and agonizingly reminded of why I passed out in the first place. I bit back a painful groan as I mentally took note of what hurt. Two broken ribs, a fractured spine, a dislocated shoulder, a twisted ankle.
Wonderful.
I must have not been out for long since none of them are healed yet. I stared up at the painfully white ceiling and sighed in exhaustion, which caused my chest to contract and send another wave of pain through my body. Fucking hell.
The door to my padded cell opened, and a woman in nurse scrubs came pushing a cart in with her. She stopped at my feet and looked down at me with disdain.
"Well, don't you look horrible."
"You look amazingly terrible too, Stella." I croaked out, giving her a pain-tinged smile.
That wasn't her name, of course. I didn't know any of the staff's names. They are careful not to use their names around us—Me, and the other girl in this godforsaken place. And so, I call them whatever name comes to mind first. Stella had been what stuck for this one.
She wrinkles her nose in annoyance at the name. She always does, but she never offers her real name either, so whatever.
"At least you don't have a Tyrnn's spike through your gut this time. I don't have the energy to do such tedious work today. Then again, patching you up is always tedious." She sniffs haughtily as she gathers medical supplies from the cart and begins the very 'tedious' work of patching me up.
Stupid bitch.
I honestly don't know why they bother. It's not like I wouldn't heal either way.
"Ah, fun times. Nasty creatures, those ones. Whatever you do, Stella, please try to get hunted by Tyrnns. Or run towards one. Both suit me just fine." I said, and then had to bite back a scream when the bitch tugged carelessly on the tattered scrub they always have me wear after cutting it off me, making it snag very forcefully on my dislocated shoulder on purpose.
"Being snarky is not attractive, wench," she replies as she pops my shoulder back into place. Bitch! She didn't need to do that. It would have popped back in by itself as it healed.
"Why? Why would I want to be attractive? To you no less, Stella?" I taunted back through clenched teeth.
One might say it isn't very smart to keep annoying the person currently patching you up, especially if said person is perfectly capable of causing you agonizing amounts of pain while doing so. But hey, me and Stella here go way back, and it's become routine for us. Plus, I've grown an astounding tolerance for pain over the years.
"I don't fancy girls, and even if I did, I wouldn't go for a rat like you."
"Oh, my bad. I totally forgot your preference is for your rats to be of the gutter variety like Little Mike. Believe me, girl, you absolutely CANNOT do better." I replied, earning me another wave of pain as she tightened the bandage she was wrapping around my chest to the point where I could no longer feed my lungs the small stream of air I could manage moments ago.
"Be quiet, bitch. At least I have a man. No one would ever want you, you fucking reject."
"Do I look like I want to be wanted right now, Stella?" I gasped out.
"You know what?" She angrily packs up her supplies back into the cart and starts pushing it out of my padded cell without a glance at my still dislocated ankle. "I'm fucking done with this. I hope they pit you against a rabid Wyvern next time, you ugly bitch."
"Likewise, Stella, likewise. Do extend my greetings to Little Mike and tell him I would appreciate it if he could grow a few more inches. His height hurts my neck." I called out after her, and I chuckled gladly as she angrily tugged at the cart when the tires got caught on the threshold of the cell, all the while muttering and cursing me. The bitch was always so easy to rile up.
---
I woke up to the sound of the door to my cell opening. I noted distantly that I must have fallen asleep after Stella left, as I sat up from the floor. A few hours must have passed since I no longer felt any pain, which meant I had healed.
"How does it feel to sleep a whole day, rat?"
Okay. More than a few hours then.
"Little Mike! Yapper! How very unfortunate to see your ugly faces!" I greeted as I got up from the floor.
Little Mike and Yapper were the guards tasked with taking me to and from my second most hated place in the world–the Pits– where I and Mirabel, the other girl with me in this hellhole, are thrown into to fight terrifying and brutal creatures until we die or they die. Fun, right? The only other place worse than the Pits is the Labs. There, we get experimented on and cut open while awake or passed out. It depends on what the doctors want, really.
"What the fuck did you say to your nurse, you bitch?" Little Mike snarled, looking like the squat gargoyle that he literally is.
As a little kid, Little Mike used to be just Mike, but as I grew older and taller, he grew shorter, or, well, I guess he didn't change, and I just grew. Either way, he only comes up to my chest now, and I'm 5'5. So, it naturally became Little Mike.
"Whatever do you mean, gargoyle?" I asked innocently with a smile, folding my hands behind my back like one of the doctors I hate the most usually does. "Do you mean the part where I said she absolutely cannot do better than you?"
"You fucking bitch!" He slapped me across the face so hard that I was thrown right back onto the ground, and my mouth filled with blood.
Well, that hurt.
The fool is short, but he always packs a punch. I spat blood on the ground and stood back up. I'm not cowering to the fucking bastard.
"That was a very weak hit, Little Mike. You doing okay? Why don't you take my collar off and let me teach you how not to hit like a girl, hmm?"
I watched in satisfaction as he clenched his jaw in anger, with a taunting smile on my face. The bastard knew he stood no chance against me without my collar. The damn thing around my neck makes me as weak as a human.
His expression suddenly turned into a weird-looking smile as he licked his lips. "I should teach you a lesson, you little bitch."
I looked down at my chest in confusion. I had only a sports bra and the scrub pants on, as useless Stella bitch had so nicely cut the shirt off in the name of patching me up.
What is he looking at? I know gargoyles don't eat hearts. They leave that to the goblins.
I looked up just in time to see him reach out and drag me back to the floor by my hair. He lifts his hand up to hit me again, but he was stopped by Yapper, who was taller and bigger than him.
He pulled him off me and screamed in his face, spittle flying everywhere. "Are you crazy?! You know that Sire demanded she be brought to him, and you think we have time for this? I don't know about you, but I very much like being alive. Let's just grab her and go. You'll have time for this shit later."
I swear my ears rang in fear as I stared up at them in shock. "D-did you just say Sire?"
"That's right bitch. Maybe today is the day you die." Little Mike answered as he smiles cruelly down at me but I had stopped listening to him after the first sentence.
There is only one person in this terrible place that they call Sire. I don't know what his real name is, but I doubt the staff do either. I've only met the man once– the first time being when I was brought here as a kid. The second time? I don't even want to talk about it. Let's just say it wasn't pleasant in the slightest.
Shit. If he's here, I am in for a world of pain today.
I became so numb with fear that I didn't even react as the guards each grabbed my arms and dragged me out of the cell.
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