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Post by Dorjan and Errol on May 27, 2008 13:00:30 GMT -5
<The stocks stretched out in a long, grotesque line down the narrow room, creating a sort of corridor of soft white heads peeking out from hard metal restraints. The room was eerily silent but for the occasional scrape of claws on steel as one of the captives struggled to bring his paws to his painful eyes. That aside, there was little activity; the scientists had left for now, off to jot down notes and compile data. The previous day's damage to the eyes had been recorded, more product was introduced, and now it was a waiting game. After the alloted time had passed, the rabbits would be returned to thier small, metal-bottomed cages to eat their dull pellets... if they hadn't lost thier appetite from pain. Is this what cruelty looked like? A clean, sterile room, shining steel barracks, and soft white fur? It would have all looked rather peaceful were it not for the red, swollen, dripping eyes. There were no agonized screams or signs of struggle, just the wet, rubicund smears of bloody tears and discharge welling up in wounded, ulcerated eyes. The rabbits were, otherwise, healthy, well fed, and clean. The stark contrast of clean bright fur and comically large ears was almost obscene when you looked into the sore-riddled sockets where eyes should have been. The next room had the slightest scent of urine wafting amidst the chemical reek of cleansers. Racks holding some 60 tiny cages each, most having at minimum four rats or 10 mice, lined every wall. Some were designated as breeding colony, holding one male and a harem of females. Others were test colonies, whose transient and ever-changing populations often distinguishable from the other by the sores on thier bodies or simply by thier sluggish activity. Some had suffered profound brain and organ damage in LD-50 tests and no longer had the physical or mental capacity to scurry rapidly through the cramped quarters like the healthier breeding populations. The tests were allready done today, the ugly evidence of the dead rodents packaged neatly into plastic bags and carted away as though it hadn't happened at all. The convulsing, squealing forms of the rats and mice, force fed perfumes and other noxious chemicals, were a long forgotten memory, hidden from the public eye. Never mind that medicine allready had a good knowledge of what was toxic; companies needed testing to fall back on lest thier be a lawsuit. A few dozen mice to save a few thousand dollars was a small price to pay. Dorjan was lucky, or at least as lucky as mice got in these parts. She was part of a breeding colony, which meant she would at least not be subjected to torture. She would be constantly bred until her body gave out to her, she might be barbered and brutalized by her cage mates, and when she couldn't breed any longer, she would probably be gassed. But she would never feel the pain of poisoning, would never go into convulsions, would never be injected. That was a blessing in and of itself. Presently, the small black mouse had her small muzzle poked through the ventillation hole in the side of the aquarium. She could smell the mice in the other cages, and was interested. Her cagemates were boring; older than her, they'd fallen into the boredom and nueroticism that she was yet to encounter. She wondered if the mice in the other cages were more active, more adventurous, more playful, or more fun. She wanted to meet the strange white, pink-eyed mice in the cages across the room. Above all, she wanted out of her cage, so she could roam and explore as she'd always imagined she would some day. In another room entirely, hunched in a metal floored cage, was Errol. The massive New Zealand White rabbit hadn't been used for testing today, though his time was coming. One of his eyes was allready ruined, a slow-healing, painful, bleeding hole. He was utterly blind in the damaged eye, which was now more or less a raw socket constantly seeping drainage from a mild infection. It itched, burned, and above all hurt, but the pain was not nearly matched to the emotional pain and trauma inflicted by the loss of the eye. It had caused Errol to lose all hope, slumping in the back of his cage with seemingly no will to live. He was not alone in his despairation.>
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Post by Lab Animals on May 27, 2008 13:01:17 GMT -5
She felt like her skin was burning, boiling, and falling off, all at once. It was a steady pain, but not in a way that it was light and constant. It was agonizing, never leaving, and slowly but surely getting steadily worse and worse. Any attempts at licking the wounds would send her into a sort of horrific shock, the pain from trying to clean the wounds making her pass out for a few seconds, before she finally woke up to return to her hell. She didn't dare move because it hurt so badly, and thus she hadn't eaten in quite some time. Her only activity came when the humans came, and she did her best to try and avoid them. It never worked.
Meridel laid on the floor of her temporary steel home, eyes clenched shut, her body shuddering once in a while. The patches of skin where her fur had been shaved were various shades of red, some oozing and some slowly burning away... Some looked like both. Most of the wounds looked old, even though they still oozed and burnt like they were fresh, but two patches of skin looked recently shaved, and the test had yet to take full affect. On the other hand, it was only a sharp stinging pain; eventually the oozing and burning would begin.
The albino rabbit dared to open one eye and take a peak around, but there was nothing fascinating to see. Just other rabbits being exposed to skin tests, with a group of eye-test rabbits further down. They were all just as quiet yet just as miserable as her. The rabbit blinked once, made a feeble yet painful attempt to try and clean her wounds, then slowly closed her eyes again.
In the room with the hordes of mice, however, things were much different. And things were far louder in one particular cage. Huddled in a corner were two mice, one terribly thin, his black fur dull and unhealthy, and his body trembling madly from a recent seizure. The other was a younger yet much healthier mouse, grey-brown fur sleek and clean, body speaking of good health and no tests... Not that one could exactly tell from his attitude.
"If you weren't so sick, then maybe I wouldn't have to be here bothering with this! You make all mice look bad, so now i'm going to have to deal with tests too! It's all your fault!"
It was Aditya's latest attempt at explaining his situation: Naitik's health. Forget the fact that Naitik was always force-fed poisons and observed to see if he survived his latest seizure. Never mind that no mouse, even the healthiest in the world, would be able to take such treatment. And ignore the fact that Naitik must be a pretty strong mouse to survive LD-50 test after test. It was still all his fault, and if he would only be stronger and now always have seizures and illusions, Aditya was sure he'd be free. Or so he told himself.
Naitik took in a wheezing breath, the sound a distinct, unhealthy whistle. His body shuddered madly just from breathing, reducing him to having to lay pathetically on the cage. However, his eyes were still okay, and he was sending a glare straight at the younger mouse before him.
"You're just... Unlucky, pal... I have nothing... To do with... It."
His speech came out in painful, quiet gasps, causing Aditya to snort with some disgust and turn his back on the older mouse. Naitik's breath came out in a whistling hiss, before he decided to just concentrate on breathing and living.
In another cage, only a few steps down, Yvette was sleeping peacefully in a corner... Or, sort of peacefully. The rat kept sneezing and twitching, sometimes muttering softly under her breath. Most in the cage were avoiding her like the plague, but not one rat, who only came closer the worse her nightmare seemed to get. Theirn, trembling slightly as he recovered from his latest test, was trying to approach the rat to encourage her in her sleep. The other rats had basically told him to shut up and stop being overly optimistic, so she was the only one he had left to try and reassure.
Finally getting close enough that he felt she would hear him, even when sleeping, the male began to talk quietly, telling Yvette that everyone would be fine, and they would eventually get out of this place and not have to worry about tests or humans or anything. Yvette just kept on sleeping, sneezing, and twitching.
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Post by Dilap on May 27, 2008 13:01:56 GMT -5
<Her stomach felt like it was on fire, as though someone had forced hot coals down her throat and was now sadistically waiting for them to burn thier way out. The agony started low in her gut and rose up into her throat, making her feel like she was choking on a ball of razors. Every day it was the same thing; she'd try to get a few pellets of food, try to eat in peace and solitude, and the other rats would take everything from her, leaving her with tiny morsels that she had to rapidly gulp down only once or twice a day. It was always a frantic struggle, getting enough to eat, and one which pained her greatly. Ever since she'd been forced to swallow the chemicals, every since those horrible seizures and the seemingly endless days of bloody stool and burning agony in her belly, she'd been like this. Unless she ate her food in tiny bits, slowly spread out across the day, the pain came roaring back, tearing at her insides and leaving her squealing and shaking in the corner of the cage. More often than not, she had to endure the horror just to stay alive, just to get enough sustinence to survive. And to survive for what? Who knew. More tests, being gassed, being thrown in one of those cavernous black bags she'd seen so many other rats cast into after thier pitiful lives were extinguished. It was not particularly a life worth living, yet still, the small albino rat always persisted. Dilap had a sort of natural energy that constantly radiated from her, rising above the pain and desolation to offer her an inner peace in this tragic hell. She had always been very optimistic by nature, thinking that what was happening to her must have had some greater meaning, and that surely one day she would be granted reprieve. Many people, had they known of her personality, might have called her almost religious for her faith in the belief that better things would some day come her way. Cynical people would have called her hopeless and naive. But here in the laboratory, no one called her anything; she was just another nameless, faceless number, part of constant drive to avoid lawsuits by proving that x chemical caused x reaction in x quantity...>
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Post by Theirn on May 27, 2008 13:02:32 GMT -5
Yvette was not responding. His words were not helping her; she was still a twitching, sneezing, snorting mess. Theirn's voice became softer and softer, before he finally stopped talking altogether. Staring at the trembling white mass in front of him, he frowned softly, trying to think of something -- anything! -- he could do to help her. However, in reality, he knew there was nothing.
He was just a sickly rat stuck in a cage with hordes of other helpless, hopeless animals. There was nothing he could get to help her. He was not some superrat who could suddenly save everyone. He was just a stupid optimist, someone who refused to acknowledge that they were all doomed to die perfectly miserable in this dismal place.
The male lifted his head, gazing at the other animals around him. Then he shook his head at himself. No. He would not fall into depression or bitterness like the rest of the animals. There was enough sadness in the place; he didn't need to add to it. Perhaps, if he kept his head up, others would follow suit and stop making everything so miserable. It wasn't likely, but he could only try...
Trembling as he rose to his feet, Theirn scented the air quietly. All he could smell was misery and illness; that's all he could ever detect. Still, the male tried to locate a bit of misery very close to him, close enough so that he could walk toward it without risking collapsing and having a seizure. In the end, there was no point. Oh, he could narrow it down, but that only proved to him that there was too much sadness. He could try to help some, only to leave others to get into more despair...
The male sighed and lied down near Yvette, who let out a pathetic wheeze. There was just too much that day; it overcame even him.
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Post by Errol on May 27, 2008 13:03:08 GMT -5
<The bright flourescent lights flashed on overhead, momentarily blinding Errol's one useful eye momentarily as it struggled to adjust. Foot steps resounded off of the sterile linoleum floor, and machines buzzed as automatic feeders and waterers were initiated. A gust a cool air ruffled the rabbit's fur as the vent system roared to life, keeping the temperature consistent and preparing to carry away the fumes that would soon fill the air. Then, there was the loud clang! of the stocks swinging open, ready to recieve their next victims in their tight, guillotine openings. The rabbit backed against the cold steel walls of his prison as the footsteps drew nearer and nearer. He could hear cage doors all around him swinging open, the scuffling and grunting of the rabbits as they were dragged out and carried away. One by one - click - click - click - like clockwork, the rabbits' heads were snapped into place, unable to move, in the stocks. A few still kicked and scrabbled against their confines, but most had given up hope of escape long, long ago. A torso appeared before him, cloaked in white, whiter than his own coat, which had gone yellow and red in places from urine and discharge. He could see the swell of the man's belly, his gloved hands reaching for the latch, but not his face. You almost never saw a face; even when the head of a human was visible, it was always guarded by goggles and masks and hairnets, until they were all the same nameless, faceless vessel for torture. Hands grabbed his scruff, and Errol didn't resist. He slumped listlessly against a second hand that cupped his rump, dangling like a dead thing as they carried him over to his stock. Body positioned in the narrow slat, neck resting on the cool steel curve, a noose of metal clamped down on the back of his neck, holding him in place. Next to him, a younger rabbit, both eyes intact, kicked and flailed until his claws were breaking on the steel. Foolish resistance; it never got anyone anywhere. There was one woman Errol knew by scent, mostly because she was the only woman there, but also because she was the one who came with the eyedroppers. She walked from rabbit to rabbit, prying open mouths, looking in ears, feeling over bodies. Once content that... well, who knows what she was checking for?... she returned to a table, where she drew substances into syringes, squirted them into bottles, then drew them up again. She'd shake something here, tilt something there, then finally fill syringe after syringe with the final product. Down the row, Errol knew the testing had begun. A chorus of grunts and squeals, the hellish voices of tortured rabbits, started filling the air. Rabbits were, in general, nearly silent animals; they only made sounds when wounded or fearful. Here at the laboratory, rabbits were almost never silent. Though the woman approached from his bad side, Errol could smell her, feel her vibrations in his wiskers, and hear the rustling of her stiff white jacket. Her shadow soon fell over him as he listened to the young rabbit next to him screech and wail piteously. She reached down and grabbed his ears, and he could now see her white gloves, soon followed by the sight of the syrine edging closer and closer to his eye. He wiggled feebly, shutting his good eye so that she had to pry it open, but was very much resigned to his fate. The yellowed drops - only three - fell in one agonoizing drip at a time, and suddenly his world was nothing but blind agony...>
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Post by Meridel and Aditya on May 27, 2008 13:03:46 GMT -5
Lights on. It was Torture Time.
Granted, for Meridel, Torture Time had already started a while ago. Her fur had already been shaved, the chemicals applied, the agony begun... She was suffering through the wait, to see what the chemicals did, how her skin was destroyed, what ultimately happened. They had already done this many times, too many times to count -- But that was the way of an experiment. Repitition, to prove that this happened consistently over many trials. It made no difference that living beings suffered in the process.
The stocks whipped open, humans flooding the room in a stampede. Soon she would be back in her miserable cage with her equally miserable companions. But the pain wasn't over. Oh, it was far from over. Meridel had done this enough to know exactly what came next: Observation. And if it weren't for the fact that the slightest movement made her pass out at the moment, she would be trying to find a way out of the room and away from the inevitable.
As it was, she was helpless, and deep inside she was screaming as a human plucked her from the steel, keeping his gloves away from the oozing wounds more not to contiminate anything than out of any kindness. As she was carried away, Meridel felt that this was not the way she should be. She shouldn't be letting this fiend carry her around and do whatever he wanted. She should be kicking, scrambling, fighting with all she had. But she just couldn't. It hurt too much; it wasn't worth it. Admitting such was almost as painful as the testing.
The next few moments were a blur for her, mainly because the handling while being observed kept making her blank out, unconscious one second and in screaming pain the next. The only thing she was really grateful for was that she passed out more often this time around; the last test, she had stayed awake through most of it. Perhaps her brain was protecting her in the only way it had? Was her only escape from all of this losing consciousness altogether?
She was startled out of hazy thinking by a clang, and suddenly she realized it was "over". The man walked away, most likely to review his latest notes. As Meridel watched him, she felt hot, angry envy pass through.
At least he could walk away.
Meanwhile, at one particular mice cage, there was a nightmare come true (again). A hand of death was reaching into the cage. Aditya watched it with horror, squished against the corner of the cage. He watched it approach Naitik, and he was certain that the older mouse would, as usual, be the victim. But, to his horror, that was not the case. Instead, it passed straight over the weak creature, and plucked him up instead. Aditya let out a terrified squeak as he struggled senselessly against the tight grip. He didn't understand; why him? Why not Naitik, who was already sick anyway?
He didn't realize that was exactly why Naitik couldn't go. Such a sick mouse would contaminate the experiment, skew the results and make the chemicals seem deadlier than they were. Statisticians would see it and complain about it, demanding better tests with better, consistent "subjects". It didn't make much of a difference in the real world if the chemicals seemed more dangerous than they were, but a bad test was a bad test. Companies couldn't let it happen. And so, since Aditya was so healthy, he was next to show why one shouldn't breathe in certain sprays.
The chemical mix was prepared, the animals for the long test gathered and brought to the testing room. Aditya, trembling with terror in a human's hand, could hear rabbits squealing in another room. His room contained no stocks -- Just a few cages, to hold the animals inbetween doses and for observation purposes. Aditya looked around wildly, not really paying attention to the human who was carrying him... And then it happened. The smell of something foul was accompanied by frantic sneezing and a horrific burning in his nose that travelled up to his sinuses. The spraying continued, enough until all his sneezing made no difference.
Then he was plopped in the cage, with other mice who were sneezing and rubbing at their faces just as badly as him, their noses already reddened and badly irritated. If they were lucky, however, that was all that would happen. For some, as the chemicals took affect, it would be far worse.
And, as Aditya rubbed frantically at his burning nose, feeling burning all through his head, all he could think about was Naitik laying in the cage, shuddering madly from a seizure...
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