A kennel, briefly

The first thing Lucy noticed when she came to was the cold. She was naked again, and her skin was touching metal.

Opening her eyes, she realized she was lying in a cage. Through the bars of its walls she could see more cages, rows and rows of them, all filled with dogs.

No, not all of them. A couple cages down, almost hidden behind the bodies of several large dogs, Lucy spotted Kim. She was in a cage too, lying on her side with her back to Lucy. She was naked, even more so than Lucy. Not that Lucy was happy about the one thing she was still wearing, the pink collar Max had locked around her neck two days ago.

Quickly getting onto her hands and knees, Lucy hissed Kim's name to get her attention. When she didn't respond Lucy repeated her name louder, but Kim didn't stir. She was either asleep or ****. Lucy was afraid to raise her voice any more because she didn't know who else might hear it, and there was nothing in her bare cage that she could throw to wake her roommate. Nor could she move around much in these tight quarters, she had already knocked her head against the ceiling once while getting up. All she could do was shiver on her hands and knees and wait for something to happen.

She didn't have to wait long. After an estimated half an hour the double doors at one end of the room swung open and a woman walked in. She was smartly dressed in dark business attire, and looked strangely familiar even though Lucy didn't recognize her face.

The woman clicked her way down the hall in her heels, and clucked disapprovingly when she passed the **** Kim. She stopped in front of Lucy and crouched down to peer into the cage. "Hello sweetie. Do you remember me?"

Lucy cocked her head, trying to figure out how she knew this woman. Something was itching in the back of her mind, but she just couldn't place it.

The woman frowned. "I shouldn't have entrusted you to Kimberly. You were making such good progress with me and now this. You've really already forgotten how I took care of you in the park?"

Suddenly, almost painfully, it clicked. Lucy remembered Kim walking her down the street on a leash, petting her like an animal, then hurting her, violating her body. But this woman had been there too. Had been there before Kim took her away, in the park where Lucy had waited for Max. The woman had been... had she been nice to her? Lucy remembered feeling distressed, afraid, but was that just from being out there naked or because of something the woman had done to her? It was so hard to remember! Alarm bells were ringing in her head, and yet part of her wanted nothing more than to follow her out of here, wherever that might take her. The nameless woman would help her like she had in the park -but how did she help me?-, would know what to do.

Lucy looked up at the woman with anxious, hopeful eyes. "M... Mistress?"