I could hear machinery working in the background making rumbling noises and stirring me from my sleep. I opened my eyes and noticed I was on a conveyer belt with my arms and legs strapped to the sides so I couldn’t move. How the heck did I get strapped to a conveyer belt, and where was it taking me? I looked around and saw nothing but darkness. The only thing that was clear was the path I was moving down and a light shining down upon me. I followed the light with my eyes to see where it was coming from. The light was emitting from a window, and standing in the window was a griffin. A griffin I swear I had seen before… Agathon was his name I think, but something was off about him. His eyes were looking at me hungrily and almost impatiently. And his beak had something resembling to a maniacal grin plastered to it. His eyes moved from me and down the direction I was heading. I followed his gaze and saw something I really wanted be a teddy bear. But It was unfortunately not a fluffy stuffed animal, It was a huge saw spinning at an insane speed and it was closing in in a uncomfortable steady pace.
I ripped and thrashed hoping to break the straps holding me down on the conveyer belt, but to no use. I looked for help on my sides, but what had previously been complete darkness was now filled with cut up body parts, fresh blood still trickling down their fresh open wounds. I looked at the blood covered saw and heard it`s uncomfortable humming sound closing in in a rapid pace. I screamed at and thrashed not wanting to die. Seeing arms and legs not connected to torsos just showed what fate I was doomed to suffer. I looked back up at Agathon hoping he would show mercy, but Agathon was no longer standing there. What was instead was a giant dark shadow with the form of a griffin, only twisted and it`s shadowy limbs floating oily in the air. It`s glowing red eyes standing out and covering me in cold, dark, fear. I looked up at the demon, and resisted the straps holding me down even further. The shadow spoke directly into my head, making shutting it out impossible. It spoke of how it had plans for me, and how it was going to make my life as miserable as possible. Luckily for me, the straps broke everything around me tore apart, the saw, the bloody body parts, the demon and I felt the sensation of falling.
Suddenly a bright light intruded the darkness and scared the darkness away. Gasped and I jerked back slamming my head into a tree. My breath was shaky and I could feel cold sweat trickle down my face. I closed my eyes trying to calm down, from whatever had happened. I reached my hand to the back of my head to see if the tree slam had caused any damage. Lucky for me no damage had been made. Just a nightmare I convinced myself.
After a few seconds of taking deep breaths and relaxing my body I looked up to see where I was. Sure enough I was in the garden area, where I had slept last night, only now it was filled with other humans and an unknown woman was standing next to me, eyeing me curiously. I moved my mouth to say hello, but a grunt came out. I sighed, mentally face palming myself for not remembering that I couldn`t talk. I looked up at her again, but only this time not her face, but her naked body. Hey I am a boy, and instincts rockets sky high when naked people are around, especially when that certain individual is of the opposite sex. I am honestly proud of how much I have managed to hold myself back considering I am still filled with hormones. I however for this occation had trouble holding the little guy down. But I tried my best not wanting any unwanted attention, because for all I knew these humans were only driven by instinct like most animals who want to breed during heat or something. So if little mister junior saluted they might take that as approval for any sexual intercourse.
I causally stood up and walked away from her not wanting to deal with her, or anyone for that matter, my grumpy mood caused from my nightmare probably wouldn`t be much good company anyway not to mention my growing erection which I did not want!
I passed many people, just wandering around doing nothing in particular. I noticed some females were holding around this one bulky guy who juts relaxed, and did nothing in particular other than stroke some of his females.“So humans can show some level of affection” I noted. There were no other males who sat down like that guy so I figured this guy was the Alpha of this garden area. I wandered around aimlessly already missing my clothes and my cellphone. Come to think of it, what did the griffins do to those anyway? I mean, surely they would figure out something was wrong when they saw me with all the books with human culture and history. Oh wait, that`s right, they burned up in some mysterious way according to Agathon. But couldn`t they at least have let me keep my clothes. I wandered around for what must have been hours just complaining about why I didn`t get to keep any of my things and wondering what they were doing with it. The only thing I owned now was this collar around my neck with a small tag that I could not read since I couldn`t see it.
“Time to get the humans back into their rooms.” I looked over to the metal door and now saw Agathon standing there with another older griffin and some others. I actually felt a tinge of fear shoot trough me when I saw Agathon, I can`t explain why but I did recall the Nightmare I had a while ago. “Alright griffins! Round `em up.” The old one ordered, and quickly the griffins surrounded us and herded us over to the metal door where each human got into the hallway then later into their respectful rooms. I stood outside my room still refusing to go into the poop filled hole. That was until I was the only one standing in the hallway with the griffins.
“Why isn`t this one going into his room?” I heard the old griffin demand. I gave him a quick once over and saw he had a mix of grey and brown coat. He had wrinkles under his eyes. The wrinkles didn`t suggest tired tough. Just experienced and his eyes suggested the same thing making me not wanting to get in this griffin`s bad side.
“Well… He refused yesterday as well so I let him sleep outside in the garden.” Agathon answered while scratching his neck sheepishly. “Well he ain`t sleeping out there tonight again. Gotta make em learn to respect ya, like you can with any other dumb animal.” The old guy approached me and took his claw on my neck and pulled me down to his eye level and began hissing at me “You will go into that room, and you will sleep there tonight, and don`t you try anything funny or I will personally hurt you so much you would wish you were never born, is that understood?!”
“Uuuhhh… Boss. I don`t think he can understand yo…”
“Shut up Agathon! I have been doing this for years, and I know when a human understands me or not. Isn`t that right…” He looked at my collar “…202”
I was about to nod at the question but I got thrown into the room and tied to one of the remaining posts. “Sleep well humans.” The bossy old griffin said in a rather creepy tone and then closed the door leaving me and three other humans stuck in a dimly lit up room that smelled of shit and piss. There were two females on the other side and one male next to me. We were all tied up so we were out of reach, but that didn`t stop the females from trying to reach to me. Were they attracted to me? Had I known they weren`t dumb animals, I would have been flattered but such was not the case. I tugged at the rope binding me to the post. It was locked with a padlock, making escape impossible and I wasn`t strong enough to cut the rope. So I sat down on my rump leaning my crossed arms on my knees and hid my face from view, ignoring the whining and tugging sounds the ladies were making in an attempt to reach over to me. I began to think, like I have been doing much lately. Even though I was surrounded by my own species, I don`t think I have ever felt more alone. I felt tears welling up in my eyes, and small sobs began escaping from me. I was so tired. I wanted this to end. I wanted to go home.
===============
I have somewhat lost track of time. I knew I have been in this world for around five to six days, maybe seven but it had felt like years. Sleeping in a sewer doesn’t really help, not to mention I haven`t talked to anyone in a while, which I think is taking a small toll on my psyche because I am usually very talkative. I have been wondering if I should reveal my intelligence to some of the griffins, but I am still afraid of how they will react. The only one I trust somewhat is the Doc. It is just something about her that made her tick. She felt more trustworthy than the other griffins, so if I am going to reveal my intelligence to some griffin it is going to be her, definitely although I haven`t had much chances to speak to her. So now I at least had a plan, which is better than what I can say for the last couple of days where I have been getting lost of unwanted attention from females who actually dared to leave mister alpha behind to get a better look at me. Of course Alpha had noticed this and was actually keeping an eye on me, probably to make sure I wasn`t going to challenge him for the Alpha rank.
“Round them humans up so we can begin feeding them.” I heard the boss’s voice coming from the door. I had picked up on these feeding sessions. While the first three days or so when I first got here we humans got a small amount of food, but enough to keep us alive. However for the last couple of days we were getting increasingly bigger meals, and some humans were gaining fat, I however got suspicious and only ate as much as I needed to. I had never been any Sherlock Holmes but I knew something was fishy when the meals turned from small and barely a meal to a meal for a family of four, or maybe I am just paranoid and the company that owns this place finally got some founds to feed humans properly.
This went on for maybe two days, before I knew the griffins were intentionally fattening humans up. The Alpha seemed to keep in shape, even though he never trained or did anything aside from cuddling with his females. Like I mentioned earlier, some females were keeping an eye on me and the Alpha was showing more and more aggression signs towards me every time we were close up to each other. I knew he was going to be trouble that I would have to fix soon, because I couldn`t tell the females to just go away since they can`t speak or read, and Mr. Alpha won`t talk either, so something bad was bound to happen soon should more females leave his side just so they can stalk me all day. Fuck my luck.
I was sleeping at my usual tree which was the one I first slept at when I arrived, but every time I woke up I had a tendency to have at least four or five females laying around me like Mr. Alpha had when he first arrived. His number was shortening and mine was growing, even though I hadn`t proved myself worthy for jack shit. “I guess looks can beat strength sometimes.” I chuckled to myself. However my fun was cut short as a shadow blocked the sun.
I looked up from my position and saw an angry Alpha standing above me. I stood up much to the female’s dismay, and walked up to him. I stood a bit taller than him, but what he lacked in height he made up in width, made of pure strength by the looks of it. I swear I could read a stamp on his forehead saying
“You don`t fuck with me cause I’m tha BOSS!” And I didn`t have any quarrel with Alpha, even though I knew he had one with me. But that was business I didn`t care much for so I just grunted and tried to step around him so I could find another sleeping spot. Grunting probably was a bad mistake cause he grabbed my arm and planted his fist directly onto my right cheek. I staggered back and tried to catch up with what just happened, but before I even think “what the fuck” he jumped at me making me fall on the grass and he began slamming his fists at my sides furiously, tough not focusing on my head for some reason. This gave me a small timeframe to think of what to do.
I kicked his leg making him trip and it gave me a window to stand up. Humans had surrounded us making a small fighting ring with no possible exit, so running wasn`t an option. Alpha stood up and ran at me with a war cry. However his move was predictable since he had his left hook raised under the entire run, making dodging easy. I dodged and was going for a counterattack. I grabbed his arm while he passed me and I managed to get a hold of his head. I kneed his face and let him go letting him fall on his back. Blood was trickling from his nose and mouth. He had little stamina since he was already pretty tired, but he began standing up again not giving up the fight.
I knew I had been lucky with my first counterattack, so I was awaiting his move. He was tired, and I was not so he would be slow while I would be quick. We circled each other until I decided that I needed to make a move, so I closed in slowly, and when I was close enough I charged him with the intention to tackle him. However he got a lucky kick in my face, making me fall on my back, and before I could do anything he was on top of me hitting me furiously again, while I was down. This seemed to be his tactic to win. However as I lied there taking hit after hit I noticed he didn`t lock me to the ground. He stood over me with his legs spread above me which gave me the perfect plan, and probably the cruelest. “I am so sorry bud” I thought, not wanting to imagine the pain I was going to put this guy through. I slammed my leg up between his legs shaking hitting his exposed groin and it got the reaction I wanted. He collapsed and actually began puking from pure pain while clenching his groin area. Right as I was about to stand up, the beating my sides had taken caught up with me and. IT. WAS. PAINFUL! I examined the damages and my sides were turning blue and purple already, and I could see an uneven lump stick out from my chest, suggesting a rib is broken. Blood trickled down my chest as well. Whether it was mine or his I didn`t quite know since both of us had gotten a leg in the face at some point during the fight. I looked over at the Alpha whom I had defeated just a few seconds ago with a nicely placed kick up at his ring-a-ding-ding. He was still in immense pain since he wasn`t moving much so I tried to drag my ass away from him, not wanting to think of what that guy would want to do with me now that I had probably sterilized him for life. It was painful putting strain on my wounds, but I really didn`t want to do fight the Alpha more than I already had. I had no desires to become an Alpha myself so… screw that noise.
I used the support of a tree to put less strain on my already aching body. “Why hadn`t any griffin guards intervened anyway? Was fighting allowed today or what? Cause it sure as hell wasn`t allowed yesterday... I think?” I looked around in the arena hoping to find some griffin watching so he could end this stupide fight for dominance. The pain in my chest grew with each breath, growing to almost an unbearable point. “Fucking hell, I didn`t sign up for this shit, besides isn`t the fight over? Isn`t the poor bastards already defeated, I mean he is puking his last lunch out from pain.” I asked myself worried. If this was a fight to the death then I was royally fucked. I had no intention to kill anybody. I don`t want to kill anybody. I face palmed, at the mess I had gotten myself into hoping an easy way out would just present itself, or I would just wake up from a bad dream and be walking to school any minute from now on, but the pain I was feeling felt pretty real, and the amount of time in this griffin land suggested otherwise.
The Alpha slowly stood up looking at me with a rage I had never seen before. If looks could kill, this look would have gutted, and skinned me and put my head up on a spike. He now stood up tall and flexed his muscles while moving towards me. His blood running down his face and his swollen eye made him look pretty scary, especially combined with the hateful glare he had fixated on me. He seemed to get taller with each step he took closing in on me. I honestly, truly wanted to shed a tear for myself and my luck. You know those moments when you life flashes before your eyes right before you die? I was having one of those and it let me escape to a happy place, where all was fine and dandy, where my mind would protect me from all outside harm. Where I could live happy in my last moments of life.
“Victor!” I turned, and Katinka rammed into me, embracing me in her usual bear hugs while almost knocking me over. Unlike me, she was actually quite strong, and was in much physical activity making her superior in strength. She was also taller than me, which I was embarrassed about before, but grew accustomed to it, and the teasing that came along. “So how was class?”
She let go of the bear hug and looked at me with her dark brown eyes. She grinned at me making her white teeth stand out to her dark brown skin. “It was cool; we finally got to work with animations which I have been longing for, for so long.” I answered. She smiled with the “I am happy for you.” She smiled. She the closed her eyes and closed in on me, making a small O shape with her lips. As she came closer I could feel her breath hit my skin and I could smell her perfume. I wetted my lips and returned her gesture and our lips met each other, making my body grow all warm and fuzzy inside. I knew I could be stuck like this forever and still be happy, since I was with her.
When we broke the kiss I noticed we had an audience staring with mild disgust. What she and I had aren`t not very common around here where I live practically stamping me for blasphemy. But I didn`t care, she meant everything to me. And I meant everything to her. We learned our foreheads on each other and just enjoyed the moment.
I broke out of my trance and returned to seeing the raging man before me running at me at full sprint. But before he could reach me he suddenly collapsed and jerked back and forth on the ground clawing at his collar. “Oh shit” Was all I managed to think before a surge of electricity spread over my body, rendering me unconscious within seconds.
============
I could hear some weird distant voices talking. One sounded like a man, quiet gruff and spoke with authority, while the other was a female voice. The voice had a soft and kind feeling to it. The mumbling slowly became more and more understandable.
“… and he has a broken rib.” I heard the soft voice say.
“I have been knocked out more times within the last 24 hours than what is considered healthy” I groand to myself. I opened my eyes to see what all the fuzz was about related to that broken rib.
“He actually woke up!” I heard the gruff voice say surprised. I looked over at him and recognized him as Agathon. I really did not like any of the griffins, including him. All they had done so far was being rude, insulting, and power abusing, not to mention the stupid shock collars.
“That`s surprising. He was supposed to be in a coma considering the beating he took.” I heard Elpis say surprised as well.
“Does this change our decision?” Agathon asked Elpis.
“What decision?”
Elpis sighed, clearly not comfortable with answering that question. She looked like she was in deep thought and it looked like Agathon wasn`t about to interrupt. I sat there patiently just curious of what decision they were talking about, since it clearly involved me in some way by how they interacted. Elpis let out another sigh and broke from her though. She walked up to me and began looking at my up beaten stomach. It did look pretty bad. I was all purple, and was probarly suffering from lots of internal bleedings. Not to mention the lump sticking up making it clearly visible a rib was broken.
“N… no, It doesn’t. He will just be a drain of money if we keep him alive. We should put him down so he doesn`t have to suffer no more from the wounds, because they are going to hurt a lot more within about an hour or so.”
“Wait… put me down… You mean... OH HELL NO!”
Just as she finished Agathon shrugged and said “Sure. No one is going miss him aside from his owner anyway.” I growled in response to that. I didn`t think about it, it just happened, but he had insulted me that poor excuse of a living soul. This earned me a confused looks from Elpis and Agathon. Agathon shrugged again and left the room, Elpis on the other hand was still looking at me.
I looked back into her yellow eyes wondering if I could trust her like I wanted to, although I knew I couldn`t. I could trust no one but myself. But I would just have to take a leap of faith here or she was going to put me down, which was not an option for me. I sat up from my lying position and pain shot out from my rib, but I ignored it as best I could, even if the bones grinding against each other was the worst pain I had felt in a while. Elpis was not fond of me moving around and was trying to push me gently back down, but I refused. I needed to show her what I was. When I finally was in a proper sitting position I made sure Elpis and I still had eye contact so she wasn`t busy doing anything else. She was still looking at me, although it was with saddened expression it was still focused on me, good. Why was she sad? Never mind.
I stretched my hands out and did the same motion I did tthe first time we met, motioning I was writing with my right hand onto my left hand. She looked down on the motion and her eyes widened. She backpedaled a few steps while still looking at the motion like what I did was completely alien, which it probably was to her. She took a deep breath and calmed herself down and muttered to herself “It`s probably nothing, just a human doing his weird human things.”
I can respond to that. I could still make something resembling a no in a humming style, which included the yes humming as well making yes and no questions a possibility without writing. So I hummed a "No" to her comment. This actually made her yelp and jump in surprise. She was breathing faster and looking at me with curious and fear filled eyes. “C…Can you understand me?”
I nodded slowly while still keeping eye contact, making sure no mistakes were made.
“I need you to understand me. Please just give me a piece of paper Elpis” I prayed inside myself, hoping she wouldn`t do anything rash.
“Wa… What`s that motion you are doing? Are you a…asking for paper and quill?” She asked me still shaky from our interaction. I nodded feeling a small smile tugging in my face.
She quickly went to one of the drawers and pulled out paper and quill, and she pulled a feather from her wing and sent it over to me by shoving it over the floor. It reached my legs, tough I needed to pick it up, and a broken rib would make that difficult and, it would hurt. “Let`s play with her trust a little” I tough to myself. This had to be done at some point anyway. I gave a small frown to her and pointed at my broken rib, and shook my head. When she saw what I was indicating she had almost an apologetic look, but it turned to a freighted look again. “You…you want me to pick that up for you?”
I gave a small nod. She seemed reluctant, but came closer to me nonetheless. She picked up the paper and quill and handed it to me pretty quickly, and then stepped back two steps to create some distance between us. I tough about what I should write, if there is one thing I know, it is that first impressions are one of the most crucial moments when socializing.
+ Elpis. My name is Victor, and I beg of you to not reveal my intelligence to any of the other griffins. I fear what they might do if they knew. I also need you help to get back home. Please. +
Elpis seemed fascinated when I began to write and when I showed her the message she seemed to sway a bit back and forth struggling to keep conscious. I had intentionally written my message to sound like a plead, to make it look like I relied on her to help me, which I kind of did. When she got a hold of herself she seemed a bit more trusting in her glance, but still wary. “We… I… How do you…” Her mouth was opening and closing, imitating a fish very nicely if I must say so myself. She shook her head and tried to form a coherent sentence again “Ho… How are you talking?”
+ Well technically I am not talking, I am writing but. But I need you to stay calm. Like I said, I don`t want the other griffins to find out. +
“But how are you so intelligent? Are humans not… erhm… For lack of better term animals back from where you come from? Also I promise to stay quiet if you answer my questions.”
“Well she is definitely the one in control of this conversation”
+ Yes, Humans are animals back in my world. But you are also an animal. Any living thing is an animal. I think what you meant was if Humans are sapiens where I come from. To answer your question, yes we are sapiens. And I agreed with you terms, but if we are going to talk, I am going to need more paper and maybe some painkillers because my chest hurts really badly right now. +
*Gasp* “I am so sorry. I will get you painkillers right away. Ugh I can believe I forgot about his damages in the span of a few minutes.” I heard her say frustrated at herself. Elpis always reacted negatively when I was hurt of it was on the topic of putting me down. Maybe she has some love for humans that the other griffins don`t have? Well as long as she keeps her promise I will answer any questions she asks. So I prepare myself for a long Q&A session with Doc Elpis.