Hands tore at his clothing, nceremoniously pulling his beanie from the crown of his head as well as his favourite tracksuit from his skin. For a split second, carl wondered how he’d got into this situation.
On second thought, maybe he did know, maybe staying at an advertised ‘free inn’ wasn’t the greatest of ideas. After another moment of consideration, carl determined, it was a fucking terrible idea. There were at least five or six people crowding around him to ‘prepare him’, what were they preparing him for? carl didn’t have a clue.
ne man tugged at the hem of Carl's shirt, and the small avian just stared at him. The fucking audacity this man had. Carl didn’t know these people, he didn’t understand why they’d woken him up from his peaceful sleep, and quite frankly, he didn’t give a fuck, he just wanted to get the hell out of this place. He was just dragged to some dimly lit basement, that, oddly enough, resembled some sort of dungeon hallway— grimey stone walls and questionably stained floors. It wasn’t exactly a poster picture of ‘safety’.
The man tugging at carl’s shirt pulled again, this time harsher to get carl to pay attention. He raised his eyebrows expectantly, as though he wanted the duck hybrid to lift his arms like a kid getting dressed. Instead, carl kicked him back, hard, with the heel of his foot firmly planted to the man’s stomach.
“Fuck off man! Ever heard of fucking social boundaries? All of you, just- let me go, I’ll get out of your shitty little town right now. Just…” He struggled against one of the innumerable sets of hands on him, flailing his left arm to try and shake them off, “Let me go! No one has to know I was even here. Keep your little cult shit to yourselves!” He finished off, unsuccessful in getting anyone to leave him alone.
He violently thrashed, jerking his limbs about, hoping to shake at least one person off of him. He flared his wings out like a trapped pigeon, trying to startle them away, even if for just a brief moment. If they were going to harvest his organs or whatever, he had to at least put up a fight. No one was stealing his kidney today. The man whom he had kicked seemed to have recovered now, a resentful look in his eyes that was worryingly concealed by a monotone expression.
“We’re going to give you away soon enough, don’t worry,” he hissed through gritted teeth, barred like an animal about to strike. The rest of his facial features were emotionless, something that made carl uncharacteristically uneasy. Hell, the whole situation made him feel ill. The mere implications of what they were doing suggested that carl was either going to be sold off in some weird human-trafficking ring, or that they were going to do some weird-ass cult stuff and eat him alive. His mind couldn’t string together any other options, adrenaline clouding his thoughts.
The rest of the people holding him down looked almost pitifully, as if they regretted what they were doing - or what they were about to do. Two of the women had sorry expressions on their faces, like a mother who knew they were about to watch their child fall and scrape their knees.
They were all dressed in casual clothes too, the men dressed formally enough that one could’ve guessed they were going out to a nice morning brunch, wearing normal shirts and trousers, typical attire for a village person. The women were in uniforms, black and white dresses that were nothing special.
The lot of them didn’t let up in their ministrations, pulling him into a room that looked surprisingly like a bathhouse. The men of their odd little group left, leaving carl with three women to tend to him. They all shared a look of sorrow, much more gentle with him than the men had been. The bathhouse door locked with a slam as the women went about with their business, carefully asking him to remove his remaining clothes (a stained white undershirt and his track pants), collecting oils from hidden shelves and odd-sized bottles of whatever-the-fuck from rickety cabinets.
One of the girls, a blonde lady, asked him to take off his shirt. Carl reluctantly complied, peeling the shirt off himself cautiously so as to not hurt his wings. She watched him attentively, whispering unintelligible apologies as she took the ball of clothing from his hands, turning around to fill up the in-ground tub with hot water.
For a moment, carl was left shirtless, in a dirty bathhouse with several women who seemed to be oblivious to his confused presence. Steam began to flood the room, and in a blur, varl suddenly found himself in the tub soaking up the hot water, naked.
As much as a hot bath would have normally calmed his senses, it seemed to have the opposite effect. He felt his nerves electrifying, his pulse quickening. It felt like the bath was marinating him for some huge feast, he hated it. They rubbed sponges across his skin, getting rid of any dirt build-up, they washed as much as they could respectfully and then moved to preening his wings with surprising skill. Nevertheless, he hated it. He felt exposed and vulnerable, with strange women pouring lavish oils into the tub and working carefully at his intimate wings.
He wanted to shake and fight it, to splash water all around and escape, but it seemed pointless. If he moved too quickly they would pull harshly at his wings, and even if he did make it out of the tub, he would have to figure out how to get through the huge locked doors while still dripping water, bare-ass naked .
He wanted to be soothed, he wanted to be calmed down, but in the strange situation, he felt like he was going to explode. The dread pooled further inside of him the longer he let himself relax underneath their trained fingertips, he felt defeated, as though relaxing was the ultimate loss.
It was obvious that the women needed to clean him, but what for? he didn’t have a clue.
Soon enough, the peace was over and he was being yanked out of the tub, one lady at each side to help him stand. The third grabbed a towel and held it out for him, at least saving him some decency and letting him dry himself off.
He grabbed the towel with more force than necessary, hastily covering himself up to preserve whatever was left of his dignity. The women didn’t seem to care about his reaction, bustling around to continue on with their jobs.
The blonde came back with a pile of red silk clothing, handing it to carl and nodding to him as though he was supposed to fill in the blanks himself. To his credit, what she was asking for was fairly obvious and carl did end up getting dressed rather quickly, slightly disappointed that he was made to wear a dress instead of some proper clothing like a t-shirt and pair of pants. His wings were confined by the red silk, bunching up awkwardly behind him, and all in all the clothing choice only added to his discomfort.
The lady came back and shook her head, seemingly just as disappointed with Carl's clothes as he was. She walked around him in a circle and lightly prodded against his back, poking his wings through the fabric.
Once she looked to be satisfied with her adjustments she ran back to grab something else from one of the nearby cabinets. She handed the clothes over to carl before going back to whatever it was she was supposed to be doing instead, and carl once again changed awkwardly in the middle of the room.
The new clothing felt more comfortable, some loose red silk pants with a drawstring waist, feeling significantly better against his skin, he felt less exposed, even if he was going commando— seeing as the lady neglected to bring him any fucking underwear. The shirt was better too— less constricting— still rather tight on account of his wings being strapped to his back, but otherwise it was more comfortable, a vest-like matching silk top, buttons down the middle.
Had carl not been in a hostage situation , he might’ve even considered the clothing to be luxurious, smooth silks against his bath-softened skin. They felt good. His shirt was still slightly too tight, but that seemed to be a recurring theme in half of carl’s normal clothes anyway.
The blonde lady came back with a large pair of shears in hand and the panic took its rightful place in carl’s stomach once again. He took a couple of steps backwards, hands up in defence, “Hey, hey, easy hot-stuff. I’m not really into this whole kidnapping slash selling-my-organs-on-the-black-market role play. I think it’d be good for you to put those fancy scissors down, no one needs to get hurt.”
The lady rolled her eyes, obviously annoyed with carl at this point. Honestly, he couldn’t even blame her. If he were trying to kidnap someone for nefarious purposes and they kept running away whenever he got near, he’d get frustrated too. She grabbed him by his shirt, pulling him forward as she opened the shears to cut, carl couldn’t help but shut his eyes in a tight scrunch, terrified as the world seemed to still for a moment.
The snipping of rusty scissors sounded through the room and carl felt his breath catch at the back of his throat. If the weird-cult-lady had decided to sever one of his body parts, surely he would’ve felt it by now… Right? After a tense moment of silence, there was a gentle tug on his back. He opened an eye hesitantly and noticed that his shirt felt looser. Turning, he found that the odd lady had cut slits in his shirt for his wings to sprout through, as though the shirt was meant to show them off on display, a most beautiful red-gold contrast.
The blonde seemed proud of her work, hands on her hips and a gentle smile across her face. She nodded to him and went to put away the scissors. For one, carl was delighted to have clothes again, but secondly, the women were opening the door on the opposite side of the bathhouse— a new door— which could only mean there was more to come. The new door opened with a loud metal screech, seeming to open into infinite darkness. The blonde lady came back for him and grabbed his hand, leading him forward into whatever came next. The fading light from the bathhouse served to make new anxieties pool in his stomach because at least in the bathhouse, he could see what was going to happen to him.
The lady dragged him to the centre of the new space and let go, leaving him to stand idle in the darkness as he watched the rest of the women scurry away. A short ‘sorry’ seemed to come from one of them, but before carl could pin a face to a sound, they had all disappeared.
The door to the bathhouse was slammed shut, a loud clanging noise echoing out into the silence of the darkroom. The room was now void of all light, leaving carl to blindly turn around in a circle, hoping for even a glimpse of a shimmer. Just something to guide his way.
Suddenly, as if to answer his prayers, a ring of candles seemed to flicker on around him, lighting up one by one. It was like an odd clock, each candle methodically turning itself on. The candles spun around in a perfect circle around where carl was, trapping him in place. The weird cult people emerged from the darkness of the room, stepping forward to let the candlelight illuminate themselves, surrounding him on all sides. They were chanting words, but whatever language they were speaking fell on deaf ears as the avian kept turning frantically to stare at each one of them.
The feeling of dread that pooled in carl's stomach was incomparable to all else. This was the part of the nightmare that he was supposed to wake up at. Crazed with fear, his eyes flickered from face to face, looking for any sign of humanity.
He found none, only happening upon the wicked grin of the man he had kicked. His stomach curdled and he was sure he was going to throw up, all over his pretty little sacrificial outfit.
The stone floor beneath him seemed to shine, a pentacle on the ground— made of what carl could only hope was red paint— lit up, connecting random points from the circle of candles. The people around the circle smiled wickedly, their chanting starting to slow as they each began to stare at the ground. The red symbols continued to grow brighter, lighting up most of the floor that carl was standing on. He couldn’t look away.
And then as quickly as it came, it was all gone. The red lines flashed and the candles disappeared into the darkness, leaving carl scared and alone, back in the void.
At least with the candles, he could see where his kidnappers had been standing, but now the darkness only seemed more frightening. He closed his eyes as tightly as he could, trying to force himself to wake up from this hellish place.
Abruptly, a random hand pulled his head upwards, carl barely stifled a yelp of pain. The grip was much too tight on his jaw. It was surely bruising. It took all of the avian’s remaining courage to hesitantly open his eyes, only hoping that he would be able to see the person who was going to kill him so indefinitely.
However, when he opened his eyes he saw something new. The candles that had previously surrounded him were gone. A ring of bright red flames had replaced them, casting shadows on the being in front of carl. The hand that was holding his face was… not human. It was much too large to be from a non-hybrid at least. Claws pressed into his cheeks, the prickle of pain enough to make his eyes water.
His tear-blurred eyes couldn’t see far in the dimly lit room, barely letting him look far enough to notice that the strong hand was connected to a surprisingly muscular arm. Even though it was only illuminated by the shadows of the fires, it was clear that the beast was strong.
Carl’s eyes trailed further upwards, a tear falling down his cheek and his vision slowly clearing. The arm connected up to a set of broad shoulders, shoulders decorated in plush red velvet. The material looked so fine that perhaps if carl wasn’t completely frozen, shocked in place, he would’ve reached out to feel it. It looked so refined, pooling around the beast’s shoulders as though it was a liquid, as though it were blood.
“Be still.” A deep voice growled, and another large hand gripped tightly around carl’s waist, narrowly avoiding crushing his wings. It was then that carl realized that he had been shivering, being that his muscles were forced to relax as the hands gripped him in place. Carl had no choice but to look up at his captor’s face, flinching to see the source of the sound.
By no means was the man friendly-looking. His eyes were piercing red, unsettling to look at. His face was well-defined, long pink hair framing it perfectly, his bones sculpted nicely as though he used to be the focus of a tragic painting— had it not been for his large size and the large fangs poking out of his lips like tusks. Still, carl found himself enraptured by the sight, completely forgetting that he was in a room full of people who likely wanted to murder him.
The man didn’t give carl the dignity of looking him in the eye, instead, skimming his body over like a pretty doll. His eyes scanned the audience behind carl. looking over the ring of fire as though it was nothing. “Very well. Today’s offering looks… delicious. You have my blessing for another month.”
This casual, indifferent tone only made carl worry more. How could someone take cannibalism so… unceremoniously? The demon’s tongue poked out from his mouth and rolled over his lips.
Murmurs and quiet ‘ooh’s and ‘ah’s rumbled through the room like a haunting chorus that only made carl more aware of how many people there were.
Something about the beast that scared carl more than anything was the fact that if the demon wanted to keep him as a little pet, carl would likely be willing. The man’s face was addicting to look at. Carl couldn’t tell if it was his own feelings welling in his stomach or some special spell, but either way, he hated how powerless he felt under the monster’s uncaring gaze. He felt disgusted with himself. Weak in the hands of a giant who had just plainly said that he looked ‘delicious’. He knew that he should’ve been resisting, fighting back like he’d tried to earlier, but it seemed helpless, he felt stupid. It wasn’t as if he’d win a fight against the beast anyway, the demon’s strong hands were already pinning him in place without even sparing him a second glance.
Carl didn’t have any more time to dissect his feelings before the demon smirked coldly and snapped his fingers, “Well if that’s all, I’ll be on my way to my feast.” Echoes of acceptive remarks trickled through the room, the unseen crowd appraising whatever the demon said. The beast seemed satisfied with that, smirking downwards. Carl made an audible gulp, his wings cowering behind him in an effort to appear less threatening.
The flames around the two of them rose, roaring to life as the grip on his waist tightened and the demon bellowed a hearty laugh, seemingly amused as the flames doubled in size to engulf them, curling inwards to the point that surely carl’s wings would be seared off if he had so much as moved an inch. “Stay still mortal, you don’t want to risk becoming duck confit, now do you?” The demon mocked with a grin.
The avian froze, letting his eyes squeeze shut as he felt his body temperature rise unbearably, the heat starting to make his skin prickle. The demon’s howling laughter only grew, muffled by the sounds of the flames and Carl's blood rushing to his ears. He felt like he was going to explode. He shut his eyes harder, to the point where white fireworks were starting to paint the inside of his eyelids. The claws on his face tightened ever so slightly and carl was damn sure his life was ending. He took a ragged intake of breath and held it, the hot air scorching at his lungs.
It was all so overwhelming. He felt his head become dizzy with the heat and carl gave up. There was no point in trying to avoid his death, if the demon wanted him dead then so be it, he was going to die. A tear slipped from his eye and boiled on his skin as he tried to breathe again, the dry air scratching at his throat.
And then suddenly, there was nothing. The heat had abruptly vanished, the air left in its wake only mildly warmer than room temperature. The tight hold on his face was released, and for the first time in what felt like hours, carl could breathe clearly
