She had been captured in the streets. They didn't even try to hide their intentions, their eyes hungry and eager when they cornered her. The humans had seen something different in her—an elf, though she didn't know how they had learned her kind still existed.
They dragged her into a facility, one that smelled of antiseptic and stale air. The humans didn't speak much, except when they barked orders or threw commands at each other. She wasn't a person to them.
She was an object, an experiment. She tried to resist, but they bound her, shackled her, and left her in a cage. Their stares, full of malice and confusion, followed her wherever she moved. She was nothing but an animal to them.
They put her through tests, ones that she couldn't fully understand, ones that made her body ache with each new attempt. They prodded her with needles, shoved metal tubes into her, injected her with substances that burned from the inside out.
Each time she screamed, each time she cried out in pain, they laughed. There was nothing left of her pride, nothing left of who she had been. Her hands trembled, no longer steady, as she gripped the bars of the cage. Her nails scraped the metal, leaving faint marks, desperate marks.
Her body deteriorated in the cold cell, drained and exhausted from the constant abuse. Days bled into nights, but she lost track of time. Each moment blurred together until there was nothing but the cold, the pain, and the humans who stood behind the glass, watching.
She was an exhibit, a specimen to be tested, dissected, analyzed. It was as if they believed they could break her, strip away every shred of her identity, and somehow make her human.
Her skin bruised under their hands. They treated her like an animal, but she was not one. She was something different, something they could never understand. And she hated them for it. She hated them for every bruise, for every scream that went unanswered, for every inch of dignity they stole from her.
There was nothing left of the elf who had once roamed freely, who had danced in moonlit forests and listened to the songs of the wind.
They had stripped that away, and now there was only hate.
The anger inside her twisted, sharpened, until it became all she could feel. Every time she saw their faces, every time their laughter echoed off the sterile walls, it fed the fire. They didn't even know what they had done. They didn't know what they had created.
But she would show them.
A change came one night, when she felt the cage move. They had been talking to each other in hushed tones. The humans thought they had her under control, but they were wrong. They had underestimated her.
She stood, every muscle tight, her eyes narrowing. It was almost too easy. The humans, overconfident in their machines and their restraints, hadn't expected her to break free. She had been patient, watching, waiting for the right moment. And now the time had come. She tore through the bars of the cage like paper, her strength unfathomable, her rage unimaginable.
The humans ran. They scattered like insects when the lights flickered, when the screams started. She didn't care. They were nothing. Nothing but the ones who had wronged her.
She didn't stop. She hunted them down. One by one, she found them, dragged them into the darkness, and let her anger consume her. She was no longer the thing in the cage. She was the predator, and they were the prey. Her mind had already broken. There was nothing left of the elf who once dreamed of peace. Now, there was only fire.
But she didn't get far.
The facility, too large to escape, was locked tight. Her vision blurred with fury as the alarms blared, but they came for her. The humans came, their weapons drawn, their voices trembling with fear. They had feared her for so long, but now they understood.
She was a monster.
But in the end, they were ready. They had learned from her. They had prepared.
She fought until her muscles burned, until she couldn't stand, until her skin had been shredded by bullets. There was no escape. They trapped her, cornered her, until she had nothing left to give but defiance.
And then, they took her again.
This time, it wasn't for testing. They didn't need to experiment anymore. They didn't need to study her. They had broken her. They had stripped her of everything she had been, everything she had wanted. The rage inside her turned cold. She wasn't an elf anymore. She was nothing.
Her body, weak and battered, was dragged back into the cage. Her vision blurred again, but it wasn't the fury that clouded her mind this time. It was the weight of despair.
They had broken her. They had made her a monster.
But they had not won.
As her breath slowed, as her body gave way to exhaustion, she whispered one final vow to the walls, to the humans who had done this to her.
The war would come. And she would burn them all.