A Caged Start (Bitty Reaper)

||~ 1 Rescue ~||

The shop, if you could even call it that, was musty in a way that the air felt thick. It was like you could taste dust, the normal kind one hoped, on the back of your tongue. It stuck to you, making you feel grimy, no matter how clean you were when you stepped into the shop.

The ‘shop’ was more of a hole in the wall between two buildings, and it stunk of fear sweat and waste. The hint of ammonia from piss that had been poorly cleaned was still in the air. It was like you knew something lived here, but didn’t live well, and the feeling made Geno’s bones crawl. His magic is unstable and unsettled, and he hates everything about what he sees.

He should call someone, he thinks, and has no idea why his friends encouraged him to come down to the exotic pet shop, and Geno is ninety percent sure that this is a front for something bad.

He doesn’t want to be here, he shouldn’t be here, and he should be calling some kind of authority to come take a look at this place. All around him little bitty faces of monsters look up at him, each one more miserable then the last, and the little Edge’s look pretty roughed up, and the little Horror’s look under weight, and yep.

Geno is ninety eight percent sure this is a front for something.

He looks around in distaste as his easily triggered anger grows at the neglect and out right abuse, and the next time he sees his so-called friends, he’s going to lay into them for their idea of fun, when he sees it.

A lone cage near the back of the shop, hung from a thick cable and away from the rest. Its bars are covered with a thick layer of dust, as if it had been forgotten that it was there, painted a depressing flat black, that only showed off the thickness of the dust all the more. A small lump lay huddled to the edge furthest from the door, and for a half second, Geno isn’t sure its even alive, until he sees a fine, full body tremble.

His feet are moving before he’s aware of it, something drawing him to the dusty, old bird cage suspended up in the air, so that his eye lights come perfectly level with the bottom of the cage.

Crumpled at the bottom, along the harsh, wired bars, another bitty lay quivering, his arms banded around his ribs, as if trying to hush the gentle rattle of his bones with little success. There’s something fluffy laying over his tiny back, something long and matted, and it takes Geno a horrifying moment to realize they are the bitties wings.

They’re half molted, rough and dirty looking, and Geno can see tiny fist fulls of feathers have been torn out of them. Like tiny hands had over groomed them in a stressed-out anxiety attack, leaving the once glossy black wings, tattered and broken looking. It’s a sad, heart-breaking sight, and something in Geno’s hardened heart, bends a little for the sad, broken bitty before him.

Licking his teeth, Geno takes a step forward, reaching up gently to the cage, his fingers curling around the lip of the metal carefully, his voice soft when he speaks, “Hey?”

The little bitties head snaps up so fast that Geno worries he might pull something, and terrified sockets stare up at him. They’re wide and empty, the bones of his face ashy grey, and Geno doesn’t think he’s ever remembered a time he’s seen such terror in anyone’s face before.

He chokes it back, barely, before he hunches back down in on himself, trying to make himself as small as possible. It makes Geno frown, “Are you…are you okay?” he asked softly, pushing himself up to his toes a little higher, glancing around the sad, empty cage with a frown.

There was nothing in there for enrichment, nothing to keep that clever mind busy, just a perch and a broken mirror, and a sad little bowl of seed.

Did bitty birds even eat seed? Geno didn’t fucking know, but something about this set up just seemed so wrong. Lacking in creature comforts, even a fucking bed, since the poor little thing had to sleep on the wires.