• When Logan slowly opened his eyes, he couldn’t see much, only wood. He narrowed his eyes at the pain in his head, and the drowsiness that threatened to overtake him. It took him a moment to realize that he was lying down. He tried to move, to lift his head to see where he was, but he couldn’t.
    Frowning, his mind registered the tightness, and coldness, of metal around his neck. He could hear the clanging of chains. He was chained in place, or at least his neck was. He turned his head to the side, not being able to see much but darkness, one so dim that even with his heightened senses, his vision was limited. He tried listening. He could hear breathing, so at least he wasn’t alone.
    Who were the others? Where was he? …Was that the sound of a wave? He tried thinking about it, wishing, not for the first time, that he had his brother’s intelligence. He could only come to the conclusion that he was on a ship, a prisoner on a ship. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been out, nor how long it would be before he was released from the chain and allowed to move, but he sure hoped it was soon.

    As it turned out, it wasn’t soon at all. He was had lost count of how long he’d been laying there. His muscles were cramping, he was thirsty and he was terrified. He could hear the quiet murmuring of other people talking. They’d been talking for some time, though he couldn’t make out the words. Perhaps it wasn’t even in English.
    Time seemed to stretch on and on, and it seemed like forever before he finally heard something. It was faint but he thought he could hear people talking. Was it even in this room? He didn’t think so. It sounded like it was coming from above deck.
    A minute later, moonlight poured into the room. He clamped his eyes shut, the bright light hurting them after so long in darkness. He could hear people talking, more clearly than before, but it was no voices he had heard before.
    “Alright,” it said. “Get up you lot.”
    It was a commanding voice, no doubt. There was something in it that made Logan feel like he’d been stabbed with an icicle. Whoever it was, he knew not to mess with him.
    He opened his eyes again when he heard the sound of chains rustling and people moving. He watched as person after person had their chains unlocked from the wall before following the individual ahead of them out onto the deck. Soon enough, it was his turn.
    He watched as a man with a key made his way over to him. The man unlocked the chains from the wall, but didn’t proceed to take them off Logan himself. Instead, the man yanked him up onto his feet roughly. After so long from not moving, it hurt, a lot.
    Logan was shoved in the direction of the door, falling to his knees. He got back up to his feet before the man had a chance to do anything. He followed the woman ahead of him, glancing back at the room. It was a lot bigger than he had thought, but, as he made his way out onto the deck, he realized there had been even more people in there, more than he had thought possible.
    They were all lead off the ship, down onto the pier, in a single file line. He didn’t know where he was being taken, but he could tell by the looks the people, the humans, around him were giving him, he wasn’t safe. His hands started trembling, causing the chains to hit against each other. He looked down at the ground, not meeting anyone’s gaze.
    He would glance up occasionally, but mostly he just looked at the ground until the group was brought to a halt. He looked up, over the shoulder of the woman. He couldn’t see what was ahead of them, and he didn’t dare lean out of line to try and see. He could hear someone talking up ahead before the sound of a whip cracking silenced him.
    He tried to get his hands to stop shaking, but it seemed to only make them worse. He saw a man dressed in a neat, dark blue uniform walking down the line. Logan looked back down at the ground, staring at it as if it was the most interesting thing in the world. He heard the footsteps come to a halt beside him and only glanced at the man, not daring to look at him fully.
    But the man was looking at him, watching him. He could tell. He could feel the man’s piercing gaze on him. What was he looking for? He cautiously glanced up at the man, shocked by the look of disgust he saw there. What had he done? Then, without any warning, the man lashed out and punched Logan right in the face. He stumbled back and landed on the ground, the wind knocked out of him.
    He grimaced in pain, but got back to his feet. His fear was pushed aside, taken over by anger. He hadn’t even done anything to deserve that! He glared at the man and probably would have punched him back had not two other men joined him. He glared at all three of them before the first muttered something to his companions. They stepped forward and grabbed Logan’s chains. Despite how much he fought back, the two men were too strong. They dragged him over to a group of others selected from the line.
    The others put up no resistance as they were all forced into, what appeared to be, a truck that was used to transport cattle. But Logan but up a fight the whole way until he was finally picked up and thrown into the back of the vehicle with the others. The gates were closed just as he had gotten to his feet. He watched as the two men walked away, back over to the first man.
    Before Logan could so much as glare at them, he heard the engine of the truck start. When it started moving, he tried to keep his balance, but ended up falling back onto his butt. Most of the others had already been sitting down since there was a lot more room in the truck than there had been on the ship. He watched through the bars as the three men and the rest of the people vanished into the distance. He didn’t know where they were going, but he knew that, somehow, he had to find a way to escape and get back to his brother.