Another day was about to start on the black market. The cats had been awoken with the shrill clang of shovels and broomsticks rattling the cage frames. Once awake, they'd all been offered something only slightly above the level of mud for breakfast. Having eaten (and mostly by force), the cages were then left for the day. If a hound were to come, it would be the same old, same old. Snapping orders at each cage individually, seeing which cat responded the most quickly, scooping up the alert and eager to be shipped off into the world of mundane tasks.

A soft sigh of pure exasperation escaped the young female. She'd thought life was just wonderful for so long, but now what? She was trapped in a metal death box, bars on one side and cold steely walls surrounding her. She was beginning to formulate her doubts about the hounds and their intentions. She had always liked her home and was content with her place below hounds. She'd believed that hounds were good creatures who took good care of their cats. When she ended up shipped off to boarding school, she still sat back and ignored the lessons taught, holding firm to her belief that most, if not all, hounds were kind souls. Now that she was here, her faith was tested to what she expected was the brink as she watched canine after canine come in with that same, cruel expression. The ugly mug who ran this establishment certainly wasn't any better, keeping them in such cramped, dank quarters.

Curled in the back of her cage, her mismatched eyes peered out with a sort of weary gaze. Somewhere, deep inside, the small hope flickered within her that maybe she would be taken home. Every day she felt it might be 'the day'. Every day it wasn't. She sat back quietly, waiting for the first hound to make his presence known. Perhaps her bitterness toward her current predicament was beginning to cast the wrong impression on the hounds who came in. A small smirk appeared for a small moment as she began to hatch a plan. She wasn't exactly unintelligent when it came to playing games, and maybe she'd been looking at this all wrong. Perhaps today she would play the game... perhaps today she would win.