For All the Abandoned Hues:Part Three

     Part III: All the Chromas We Dread

     I remember the worst owner I ever had. This is a part of my life I will go into extreme detail while writing--though painful to remember, I think a lot of pets suffer through the things I did, under him. I need to make sure that owners are aware of their forlorn pets' plight. I hope that after understanding our struggles you will be careful not to make the same mistakes that my owner did.

      This may be hard to hear. It was very hard to write, and there is a lot of crumpled paper in my wastebasket. It may turn you away from my long, winding story forever. It may adhere you to it ever more. You may want to skip this section: I beg you, do not. Not only does it add layering to my character, and explains some of my worst flaws, but it is an abomination that many Neopets are forced into. It needs to be revealed; it has sat in my heart and the hearts of others far too long.

      And so I will begin.

      At around eight years old I was traded by a user named Dragonslayer (who wouldn't tell me his real name) to another similar user named Dacrusader. All of his pets were painted obscenely rare colors-there was a Maraquan Ixi who was miffed that Dacrusader had bought a Pirate Draik Egg. Now, at the time, I was still Cloud, pretty low down on the paintbrush chain. Obviously, I knew that I would be painted shortly, to fit in with his other pets.

      His real name is, or was, Tybalt. There are those users that think galleries, and expensive pets, are the best things in Neopia. He was one of them-pages and pages of expensive stuff lining his gallery, and all of his pets were painted.

      I was on his 'main' for a while. He sold a very expensive piece from his gallery and decided to paint me something rare. The problem was, he already had most of the expensive pets: Island, Darigan, and Fire were his other main account pets. He chose to paint me invisible.

      Invisible was terrible. I felt like I didn't exist. It made coordination extremely hard-I would try to lick my fur but find that I had no idea where my head or body was. It was miserable trying to talk to people-they would keep trying to find somewhere to set their eyes, and soon just walk away like I didn't matter.

      After about two weeks he grew bored. No customization was available for me, only backgrounds, and he wanted to get a Robot pet, which means he needed a lab pet. So, he transferred me over to his side, Draggerron, and ignored me.

      I was shocked at the state of his side account. There was nothing of interest or personalization, no User Lookup specialty coding or well-taken-care-of Neohome. There was not even any furniture in the Neohome-it was a run-down, tattered old barn in Neopia Central.

      When he led me into it, I was, I admit, afraid. It was dusky with no lights, so I could barely see, and there were mysterious shadows in the corners. Adorning the thirty-foot-high ceiling were scattered rafters. He left me alone, shivering, in the middle of the room, after bloating me with Omelette.

      Then one of the mysterious shadows moved. I screamed and skittered away toward the only window, where a bit of moonlight crept in.

     "H-hello?" I asked nervously. I hoped Tybalt hadn't left me in the house with something nasty like a Tencals.

      There was a dry rasp. It was very close to me--I could probably have reached out and touched the sound if I had wanted. Of course, I didn't. Instead, I yelped, and ran towards the door, ready to dash away into the night. I yanked open the handle, and a quiet night breeze floated in. Something grabbed me from behind. I screamed and jumped through the door-or tried to. Instead, I slammed into a wall--and slid, everything going black.

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           When I woke I was in the center of the room, with the door closed, and the window shut. The room was alight with the afternoon's rays, and I noticed that I was alone. Until I heard another dry rasp-and looked up, toward the extremely high ceiling.

      Above me was one of the most hideous creatures I had ever seen. It was a blackish gray, with spikes, and leathery wings. Shadows clung to the rafters, menacing the character still further. Huge ears adorned the head. Vicious claws scraped the wood the creature was perching on. And the eyes...

      The eyes were mournful. Deep in their straw-colored irises was misery. She, for I knew it was a she, made direct eye contact with me--even though I was invisible. I hadn't felt that for weeks-it was electrifying. But through my elation, I could still see the sadness surrounding her like an aura.

     In a scratchy, dry, cautious voice she said, "You cannot leave...through the door or window. The coding...the pixels..." She trailed off. It seemed like it had been a while since she had last spoke to someone. "I'm sorry to...to scare you." She stepped further backward, into the shadows.

     I looked up at her, and slowly, drew out my wings. If she was going to stay up there, then I would follow. I wanted to know her-after that one second of seeing her eyes, and hearing her speak, I wanted to connect. How strange, I think, when I look back upon myself.

           As soon as she noticed what I was doing, she retreated even further from the edge of the rafter. At first, I thought she was trying to hide. I prepared to leap into the air.

     Suddenly she came flying over the edge-or falling, rather. Her wings weren't open-this was careening down towards the hard floor at light speed with no safety net. I think I almost had a heart attack--and I wasn't the one tumbling towards the ground.

     She, at the last moment possible, flicked her wings out to the side. A great snap filled the air as they held taught, gently lowering her to the ground. I breathed again. And raised my head.

     "Why didn't you just glide down the normal way..." My voice trailed off as I looked at her. She was the thinnest, frailest-looking Kougra that I had ever seen. Though Tybalt had stuffed her with Omelette as well as I, every bone, every vein, stood out. She was a walking skeleton. My heart felt as it hadn't in years-someone needed me. Even now, just remembering her, my heart aches.

     She lowered her wings slowly. That's when I realized what the rasping sound was--her wings. "I didn't know if my wings would hold up that long if I let them out at the ceiling..." they were dry and leathery, brittle and shaking. Whenever she moved they made noise. She spoke so softly I could hardly hear her.

     "I am Melise." Her voice was softer, more delicate this time. I was surprised that she could make decent sounds when a moment ago her voice had been tough and brittle.

     "My name is Saphira_15. Call me Saphira."

     We stared at each other for a couple of seconds, me trying to figure her out, and her trying to remember how to start a conversation. Obviously, she had been alone here for a long, long time. I sensed that she would lapse completely into silence if I let her.

     "Tybalt adopted me and painted me invisible. Then he moved me here. How long have you lived here?"

     She slowly crumbled until she was resting on the floor-she had so little body mass, she must be exhausted after her little impromptu flight.

     "About two years. I was traded as a different color, and then traded again, to Tybalt." Again, she was silent. She closed her eyes.

     "You weren't always Halloween, were you?" I really, really didn't want her to fall asleep or something.

     She opened her eyes. "I used to be so pretty...I was royal." She looked miserable. Something nagged at my mind. I let it be-I would have a long time to figure it out. "And...then Tybalt said my coat wasn't expensive enough and painted me Halloween. It's just not me...this color, I mean. I look...I scare children." Her face fell, and her eyes teared up. She turned her head.

     Recovering, she asked, "Were you...created by Tybalt?"

     "No. He traded for me, and painted me Invisible."

     "Were you ever painted Royal?"

     "No...First blue, then a lot of different colors, and now..."

     "And now invisible," She finished. "But not to me."

     I almost asked her why she could see me, but it seemed like she was done talking. Which was sad to me, because I wanted to know all about her, but I had seen plenty of tired, sick animals, and she was one of them. She needed her rest more than I needed my curiosity satisfied.

     She spoke one last time. "I have to rest...I was hard last night, all of that moving around. And today...I need to rebuild up the little energy that I can...you'll understand soon." That sounded somewhat ominous but I knew she didn't mean it to be. She nodded at me and then her head dropped into her paws, eyes once again closed.

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          We spent weeks and weeks together, and at first, I was bouncy and playful, wanting to explore, get out of the house, do something. Melise just shook her head when I asked to play, and gradually I realized that she probably couldn't play even if she wanted to. She returned to the rafters gradually, moving a couple of feet up at a time, and hung over the edge of one, watching me with those beautiful amber eyes. Slowly, I began to grow hungrier and hungrier, moving less, while my stomach felt like it was on fire.

     It was terrible--sometimes, when I was moved to a side, owners would forget to feed us for a week or so, and then come back apologetically. The longest I'd ever gone without food was two weeks, and that was a stretch for me at the time. But hearing from Melise she hadn't had anything to eat in half a year was shocking. My stomach ached for what seemed like forever-an empty gnawing hunger that screamed at me to eat something. Late one night, in a bout of despair, I tried to chew the wall. Obviously, that ended badly for me--the ever-present coding laws, the pixels, danced across my vision for what seemed like hours. My teeth hurt for days. I don't know if Melise saw me try-she never said anything.

     I grew almost as thin and ragged as Melise-my skin hung off of my bones, with barely any flesh; my eyes sunk into my head and lost their sparkle; my fur lost that special gleam that speaks of health. I grew incredibly cold at nights; with winter coming on and no furnishings save a cement floor, I was bound to. One day, as Melise gazed limply at the frost piling up on the outside of the window, and I stared at the wooden wall for the thousandth time, I just lost it. I couldn't take this anymore-this infuriatingly helpless feeling of ravaging hunger and freezing cold.

     "I hate this place!!!" I screamed, then shuddered at the noise. The sound echoed across the empty space.

     Melise was startled so badly that she slipped off of her perch on the end of the rafter. "Arrgh!" She yelled as she tumbled down. She tried to get her wings open but the air was pushing them the wrong way. I watched in horror as she fell. She tumbled end over end with no control.

     Amazingly, she righted herself and landed with a gasp on her paws, after her tumble through the thirty-foot drop. She crumbled onto the floor and let out a moan. I rushed over to her as best I could. Her eyes were closed.

     "Melise!" I nudged her gently with my nose. She moaned again and her eyes fluttered open. "I'm so, so sorry!" I started sobbing.

     "It's...I'm okay," She said quickly, "Just a bit shell-shocked...and my paws..." I started to cry even more. "I'll be fine!"

     She tried to stand, then winced as her paws took her weight. "I'll be fine soon," She said, and sat back down. I sat with her.

     "Stop crying...you're making me want to cry...and I haven't in so long..."

     I tried to stifle my sobs, and after a while, they subsided. I was left sniffling. "I really didn't mean to make you fall."

     "I know. It's okay-sometimes we have to let it out."

     "But hopefully not while our friend is dozing on a wooden beam thirty feet in the air."

     "I'll be okay. Kougras always land on our paws. Except for the times we land on our faces." She smiled half-heartedly.

     I smiled as well. "Okay...thanks."

     She smiled again and gazed at her paw. "I just won't climb for a couple of days. Not that it matters," she said quickly, noticing my frown.

     We sat together and watched the frost firm up on the windows. Night came, and the little heat given by the sun cooled.

     "I-I d-didn't r-realize it w-was s-so c-cold down h-here," Melise said into the darkness. I had curled up into a corner, but she had stayed where she was. "It's w-warmer up t-there in the r-rafters. L-less c-concrete and m-more warm wood. H-heat r-rises."

     I had gotten used to the cold cement, more or less, but I could see how it would bug her. I moved closer to her voice. "Where are you?" I asked when I got to where I thought she should be, and she wasn't there.

     "Over h-here." Her voice sounded to the left of me. I walked carefully, feeling ahead of me with each step, and bumped into her.

     "Hi," I said. "We could share body heat."

     "W-works for me," she said. "T-thanks."

     We curled up back to back. It somewhat helped-neither of us had much mass or heat but what did try to escape, the other person took in. I realized later in the night why she was a lot colder than I was-she lost heat a lot faster, because she had no fur-just a leathery skin. At least my fur somewhat insulated me. We froze all night.

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          "I am definitely climbing those rafters today," Melise said one morning. "After three nights of freezing my paws off, I think I have enough incentive."

     It hadn't gotten any warmer lately, only colder. We had huddled together each night, but Melise still couldn't stand the immense cold. I decided, since we both had wings, that we could at least try to fly up into the rafters like she wanted to. Today was as good a day as any.

     "Okay, here's our plan of action," I said. "I can't climb, but I can probably fly. Probably. So, first we should try to fly, and if that fails, we can try to climb."

     She raised an eyebrow.

     "Okay, here's a tip," I said. "Fix your eyes on where you want to go, and don't look down."

     "Okay." She looked nervous.

     "It'll be okay. Worst case scenario, we have to stay on the ground." She nodded and extended her wings slowly.

     I did the same. Listening to her wings sing out that dry rasp was horrible, even though I was used to it by now.

     "Alright, let's go!" I shouted, and we both lifted our wings high.

     It took three tries, but I finally got my tired, twig-thin self up on the rafter beam. Melise was another story-it seemed a lot harder for her than for me.

     "I'm so weak-I've been without food for longer than you," Melise said apologetically.

     I frowned. "Don't apologize, Melise." I shook my head. "It's not your fault." It's that rotten-hearted Tybalt's. I didn't say it aloud, but Melise knew what I was thinking.

          "He's just so busy...he has no time for us. Don't blame him," she said. This just made me angrier; Tybalt was so horrible, he didn't deserve a pet like Melise. She was practically an angel to forgive him.

     "You can do this, Melise!" I called down. "Don't let it beat you!"

     She shook her head and lay down. "I'll try again...just give me a minute."

     Eventually, she lifted herself into the air and made it about halfway before she started to fall. Quickly, she whipped out her paw and drove her claws into a nearby beam. The impact was pretty intense, and she hung limply for a moment before scrambling into a more comfortable position. "I'm okay," She yelled up. "I'll rest a moment, and then keep going."

     A few minutes later she again launched herself into the air. In a few flaps, she was within reaching distance of the beam. "Come on, Melise! You can make it!" Her wings gave one last thrust. I reached down as far as I dared and grabbed the scruff of her neck in my teeth. With an unbelievable amount of effort, I managed to haul her up far enough for her to grab onto the beam. We both sat catching our breaths.

     It was a while before it sank in that we finally did it-by then the night was almost upon us. Melise had been right-it was much warmer up in the rafters than down below. My only fear was that I would fall, but Melise said that the beams were wide enough.

     We slept single-file on the same beam. I woke up in the morning not sure where I was, but other than that, the day was uneventful. Actually, the next week or so was as well, because we just lazed around-until Tybalt showed up, anyway.

      To be continued...