Azurio

Chapter 1

When I awoke from a dreamless sleep, all I could see was pitch-black darkness. The ground I was lying on was as cold as ice and as solid as a rock, with jagged edges cutting into my left side. I tried to roll around, but all of my muscles ached horribly, as if they had not been used in years. My body felt foreign to me, and the comforting warmth of my fur was gone. As I attempted to get up, a terrible pain struck my head and my world began to spin, so I could no longer tell which direction was up and which was down. I fell back down to the ground. Not being able to control and move my own body made me feel utterly helpless. I let out a whimper, but the noise I heard coming from myself terrified me. It took me a few more seconds to regain proper consciousness. Then I noticed them. Breathing sounds, as if from hundreds of mouths. And so many different smells that my nose could not distinguish between them. An unsettling feeling began to emerge within me. Where was I? What had happened to me? Why couldn't I control my own body? Panic started to overtake me.
But then a bright light flashed from above and took my sight. Was it the sun? Was I saved? My kin had to have come to find me. I wanted to howl and let them know I was here, but the silhouettes started to clear up, and what I saw were not wolves. Even with my restricted vision, I was able to see them. Everywhere, sitting and lying all around me, were humans. One of them was standing right at the source of the light, I could make out that it was holding a miniature sun in a cage. Then more came from above, they put down a strangely formed piece of wood and started climbing down, going directly in my direction. I made an attempt to growl at them and tried to move away and escape their grabbing hands, but I was hit on the head and my vision turned black again.

The next time I regained consciousness, I felt like my bare body was being dragged across a rocky mountain path. I shivered from the cold without my warming fur, and the loud, echoing footsteps of humans right next to me were almost too loud to bear. But the worst part was the scorching pain of my back rubbing against the uneven ground. It was unbearable. I cried out in pain. But then a strong thump against my back stole my breath, silencing my scream. I made sure to be as quiet as possible after that, so as not to anger my kidnappers any more. Through my half-closed eyes, I could blearily make out walls of stone and light sources on the sides. The metallic taste of my own blood filled my mouth. Where was I being taken? What were they doing to me? My silent questions remained unanswered. Even though I'd just slept, I didn't have the energy to move my limbs, and I could only feel them sliding across the ground. I needed to get away quickly, but I couldn't do anything. Instead, I silently suffered and hoped for my pain to come to an end soon. After what felt like hours but was probably barely a few minutes, they stopped. I heard a metallic rattling sound, and someone pushed me to the side. A strong kick in my back stole my breath once again as I rolled over inside a small cavity. Before I could grasp the situation, they had shut off my cage with a metal plate and walked away. I could only listen to their steps moving further and further away, then I breathed out a relieved sigh. Finally, some peace.
It was not exactly quiet, though. There was some rattling here and there and various animal sounds that I already knew from living in the forest. They had to have been caught here, just like me. But I did not pay much attention to them, as I knew they weren't dangerous, but scared. Instead, I decided it was best to examine my own body first. Despite feeling pain with every movement, I looked down on myself in the dim lights of the caged miniature suns outside my prison. I had indeed been robbed of my precious fur. My legs were much longer than I remembered them to be, and my paws had a strange and long shape. Even though I knew what kind of body I was looking at, I didn't want it to be true. All of this had to be a nightmare. I blinked. Once, twice. I closed my eyes and waited for a moment, but when I opened them again, nothing had changed. I hit my head against the ground and regretted it immediately. A strong pain that could not be imaginary went through my body. I told myself it would be fine. I just had to escape from this place, and then I would find a solution to my body problem too. A single tear left my eye and slowly made its way towards the stone ground below me. I'd just have to find out how to wake up from this illusion that had been cast upon me.

~ + ~

Time was flowing slowly. I couldn't tell if it had been hours, days or weeks. There was no sun to tell me, other than the always lit up miniature suns on the stone wall. Every once in an eternity, a human came to throw food in for me. At first, I'd been unable to get even close enough to eat it with my malformed body. I had not even known it was edible. But with my unbearable hunger as motivation, I was now already able to somehow wriggle and crawl my way toward the tasteless piece of something I could eat. It only managed to reduce my stomach pain, but it did not satiate me in any way. Another reason to get out of this place as quickly as possible. I already had my first step in mind. To escape, I needed to understand how to utilize my deformed body and make it move. It was much harder than anticipated, especially with my intense muscle ache. Even the smallest movement was horribly difficult, but I was making progress. I was able to sit up now, although a bit wobbly, using the side of my cage to lean on.

I was just practicing to walk on all fours, when the food human came again. But as it came closer, I noticed it was not alone. Two more humans were following it, and they seemed to be communicating with each other using their strange sounds. I didn't mind the food human much since he was who kept me alive ever since I’d been thrown in the cage, but I could do without meeting any new humans unless they were planning to get me out of here. I hoped they would ignore me and keep going down the stone tunnel, but of course they had to stop right in front of me. I prepared for the worst. I had been training, so I had some hopes of defending myself in case they were going to attack me again. One of the new humans, who was covered in bright pink fur with decorations, directed its gaze at me and seemed to inspect every part of my body thoroughly. The other new human, who had black and very short fur, stepped closer too, making melodic sounds in the pink humans’ direction. With a cue from the pink human, suddenly the food human opened my cage and even signaled me to come out. I was confused. Was this really happening? I couldn't believe my eyes, but I didn't want to waste even a second now that I had the opportunity to get out. I mobilized every part of my body that I could and hobbled outside. Then I heard a click behind my head. Shocked, I turned around to see nothing. But I felt something had been put on my neck. I tried grasping it with my new paws, but I was clumsy and the thing was immovable. Meanwhile, the pink human seemed to be leaving. Since it went the same way that it came from, I decided to follow it to find the exit. I could remove the neck thing later, when I was free again. Although I was worried at first, the other humans didn't stop me. They just followed the pink human and me after closing my cage again.

That meant it was true. I was really going to be free now, thanks to the pink human. I wanted to be faster to catch up to it, but the way I was crawling on my four paws I couldn't reach its speed. I knew I needed to learn to walk on two legs, just like the humans. But when I tried getting up on my two hind feet, I lost balance and landed on my rear. Maybe it was something I'd need to spend another day on, for now I could move forward sufficiently in my own way. And maybe I'd be back in my own body and freed from this illusion before I even needed to learn human walking. As I was lost in thoughts, I didn't notice that I'd lost the pink human. Then a sudden jolt of pain struck me and disabled my muscles. I fell to the ground and howled in pain. I was struck not once, but multiple times, no, endlessly. What was this sudden pain? Couldn't anyone make it stop? Was it the humans again?

Then it really did stop. I looked up to meet the eyes of the pink human. What a wonderful human it was. It had freed me, and now it had come back to make my pain stop. I could already feel the strength coming back to my muscles that had felt so weak just a moment ago. So I pulled myself together and got back up to keep going. As we continued on, the pink human walked slower, always waiting for me to catch up when there was a distance between us.

The corridor felt endless and my bare paws hurt from the hard ground, but I used all the strength I had to keep going, until we finally reached the end of it. The black haired human pulled away the piece of wood that was dividing the inside and outside, and I heard them exchange noises again, but I didn't care about any of that. I crouched forward to get outside, back to the home I had missed this whole time. For the first time in what felt like forever, I could feel the raindrops dripping onto my body and soothing my pain. It felt like freedom.