A Tale of Fur and Fangs: The Facility (working title)

Chapter 4: Escape

 A thousand drums played a steady beat inside Sidney's head. As she awoke, she let eyes wander and soon realized that she was back in her cell. She groaned as she slowly sat up on the edge of her bed, her body still feeling heavy from Rosewater's sedative. She cradled her head in both of her fur-covered hands and gently rubbed at her temples for a few minutes before standing up. Her head was still throbbing as she stumbled to the small pitcher of water that was in her cell. Bracing her hips on the edge of a counter, she poured a litt water into her cupped hand and splashed it onto her face before letting out a ragged breath.

She looked into the mirror above the counter and gently touched at the bruise that had swelled under her left eye. 'Great...' she thought, adopting a disgruntled look and rolling her eyes.

She took a long sip of water form the pitcher before swishing it around in her mouth and spitting into a small basin on the counter. It had a streaks of red in it, but Sidney didn't care about that. She was just glad to get rid of the copper taste that had filled her mouth ever since Dr. Sullivan had slapped her.

Carefully, she took a few more sips of the of the precious water, and drank until she felt slightly refreshed. She had to be careful, however, because she was only allowed the one pitcher for the entire day. She then took her hospital gown —she was happy to see that they had at least dressed her again before taking her back to her cell— and wet one corner of it. With the wet cloth she lightly dabbed at her bruised face before walking back to her bed and sitting down on it.

As she sat she made sure to sweep her bushy tail out of her way. It had taken some time to get used to the new appendage, but she had finally done so. She grabbed her tail and pulled it onto her lap before running her hands through the fluff. Despite her situation she had to admit that it was a bit impressive that this "Facility" was able to do these kinds of things to her and the other people they experimented on. She thought about how ironic it was that all of the boys and girls used to call her a fox when they hit on her back in the day. "If only they could see me now..." she said a forlorn but amused voice.

As she was stroking her tail Sidney noticed something out of the corner of her eye. She turned her head and saw the mouse-girl from the cell across the hall staring at her. Sidney had never gotten a good feeling from the other woman. She would just stand there and stare at her for hours sometimes until the other mouse that shared her cell seemed to say something to her. Then she would always start working out, doing push-ups or sit-up or squats.

Sidney figured the other woman just didn't have anything better to do. Well, it's not like she, herself, had anything better to do either, but she liked her body the way it was, and she never really liked that muscled look anyway, at least not on herself. If she had her choice, she thought, she'd rather go for a run or a swim. Being cooped up in this cell was affecting her a lot more than she wanted to admit. She had always been somewhat hyperactive and it was eating away at her that she couldn't spread her legs and run around like a cracked-out squirrel the way she used to.

Suddenly —while she was getting lost in her thoughts— Sidney's stomach growled at her. She couldn't be sure of how long it had been since she had last eaten, but she was sure it had been too long. Her stomach started to twist itself into a knot as she looked at her clear wall and noticed the tray of food that had been left for her. Standing up, she walked over to the tray and picked it up. It was the usual fare: an assortment of roasted meat in a brown sauce, a mash of some indiscernible vegetables, and a roll that was so hard the only way to eat it was to dredge it in the sauce.

She didn't want to think about where the meat came from, but she knew that it was too gamey to be beef, pork, or chicken. At first she had refused to eat it (only eating the vegetable mash and roll), but after a couple of weeks she was feeling so weak that she could barely move and finally gave in.