The journey was long and dull. I was going to make a path or mark where I had gone to lead Zoe and the others. I had nothing on me that I could throw or accidentally drop, plus the hawk would just scoop down and grab the thing like when I kick my shoe off on ‘accident’. I was buried so deep in my thoughts that only when we had landed did I realize that I had wet myself. I pinched my nose and breathed through my mouth, trying to get rid of the horrid smell. The big hawk didn’t seem to mind and let go of me, letting me walk into the dark alley myself. At the end of the alley we reached a small plain metal door, and the hawk beat his wings on it in a specific pattern. Bang, bang bang bangg, bang bang bang, bang bangg. He ended his song with a drum roll and stood back. After a second, the door swung open and the hawk pushed me in gently. He followed closely behind and the metal door swung shut behind us, I could hear dead bolts being put in. I walk forward some and I gasped at the sight,

It was a huge room, with the ceiling being no taller than 10 feet high but the room stretched as far as I could see. Cages, some big and some small, were lined up next to each other. The first one I saw was a bigger cage with 3 hawks in it, presumably the hawks family. The hawk grabbed me from behind and put me in a big cage with Dave. He then took a key from his belt and locked me in, then using the same key, he freed his family and they flew out of sight.

“Dave! How did you get here?”

“Well I had just woken up and a dark skinned man who I saw for a split second put a sack or something over my head and dragged me out. I tried to scream for help but my voice echoed back to me, my ears were ringing for like half an hour after. I also tried to use my fire power to get the guy to let go but it seemed like nothing happened. Also, the sack was basically glued to my neck.”

“Wow that’s weird, maybe they had some sort of magic prevention spell cast on the bag or something?” Looking back, I realized that my magic had always failed me when I was in the most dangerous situations. I decided to trust Dave and told him about when I couldn’t do magic, we also discussed the things in the huge room. I scanned the room for interesting things and I caught my eye on a lonely looking boy who was crouched on the floor of his cage with tears streaking down his face.

“Hey boy!” The boy ignored me.

“HEY BOY!” The boy looked up and saw me. He quickly wiped his tears from his face and stood up.

“What do you want?”

“Look, I just want to talk, how are you and how did you get in here?”

“Tell me your story first.”

“Fine. I’m Joe, I was brought here by the big eagle.”

“And I’m Dave, brought here by a dark skinned man who put a sack over his head.”

“Okay, I’m Hooper, I don’t know how I got here. I just woke up and I was here.”

“Nice to meet you, Hooper, do you want to escape with us?” Dave shot me a look.

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“Well yes, how would we escape though?”

“That’s what we need to figure out, is it not?”

“Well when the hawk guy brought you in he had the keys to your door but I think he flew off with them. Each door has a key though, maybe my key is your lock?” It seemed ridiculous but it was worth a try.

“Uh sure, toss it over.” Hooper took the key on his cell and tossed it to my outstretched hand. I put it in the lock but nothing happened. Dave had a try and still nothing. I sighed.

“Here.” I tossed the key back to Hooper, maybe it will open yours? Hooper looked at me like I was crazy but tried it nonetheless. And to our surprise, the lock opened with a click.

“No way! How did that happen? I have tried it many times before and it has never worked.”

“Well what did you do this time that you didn’t do last time?”

“I don’t know! I just put the lock in and turned!” I took my lock off and tried my own lock. Nothing. I handed it to Dave and he tried it. Still nothing. Hopper came over and with a touch, the lock opened.

“HOW!”

“I DON'T KNOW!”

“Oh no. Get back in your cell and lock the door.”

Hooper looked at Dave questioningly but followed his order. Not a minute too soon had he locked the door when a dark skinned man walked down the aisle and handed out styrofoam trays of cold lunch. He looked at me suspiciously with clear blue eyes as hard as steel. For some reason, he turned around and shook Hooper’s cage door with all of his might. Nothing happened and the lock held strong. The man looked it over one last time and stalked away. When the man was out of earshot, Dave whispered to me,

“That was the man that captured me.” After that, we ate our lunches (cold rice, celery and pistachios) in silence, and I glanced at Dave, wondering how he had known that the man was going to come. I also wondered why the man shook Hopper’s door and acted like he knew that something was up.

After we had finished, we shoved our styrofoam trays into a bucket that reeked of human feces. After a few minutes, the man came back, grabbed the bucket and threw me a pair of jeans. They were ripped and tattered but looked clean.

“Change.” The man ordered me in a cold steely tone.

“But-”

“No but. Change NOW.” I sighed and changed pants in front of everyone. Dave and Hooper both self consciously turned away and looked at something else while the man just stared. I awkwardly changed clothes and handed my pee soaked pants back to the man. He took it and walked to Hooper, took his bucket and left. Looking around I realized that not all the creatures in the cages were human. In fact, only me, Dave and Hooper were human as far as I could see. Everybody else was either a modified version of an animal, like the big hawks or a very different creature. Some of them were just normal-ish that had extra arms or legs while some were completely wrong, there was something that looked like a spider but it had a human head dangling upside down, another looked like it was made from wood. It was like a cabinet that had windows for eyes and 2 doors for mouths. It shuffled around on wheels and occasionally gargled out wood scraps.

“How did he think to try the door?” I asked no one in particular.

“They might have cameras or bugs?” Hooper offered.

“But if so then how did they not kill us or do something yet? Also, Dave, how did you know that the man was coming?”

“Oh, he comes at the same time every day. It is when that piece of wall gets hit with a sliver of light.” Dave pointed at a little piece of light near the ceiling. It had a little number 3 on it which the light had just passed through.

“Wait! But that means that it is open to the outside!”

“Duh, what did you think? Like where would the light come from and where would the big hawk have gone if it didn’t go to the outside. The problem is how do we get out?”