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From all sides, the thundering cacophony rang forth. Cardboard, thick and flexing, rocked and slammed from below, sliding left and right beneath, creaking and moaning as it bounced and heaved. And from above, the voices sounded, deafening and unintelligible, blasting the high-walled prison with booming thunder.

One by one, the faces peered in from above, blotting out the harsh, burning rays with their sheer scale. A woman wept, a flood of tears coating weathered cheeks, turning away as soon as her gaze fell into the box. A man loomed at her side, his visage frozen, his stare stunned and unmoving. And opposite the couple, lips producing ear-shattering speech, a furry, vulpine muzzle leaned low.

The fox's golden, widened eyes bore none of the sorrow, nor shock, nor unbridled terror of the humans in the room. Those thick lips were tugged back, the very hint of a grin showing itself as they parted, the faint gleam of gargantuan fangs shining from within. Nostrils flared wide, and higher still triangular ears lurched ahead, eagerly drinking in the faint noise far below. Over the cardboard wall, mighty, thick digits, coated in reeking latex, crawled forth like a hideous beast. Each finger twitched and writhed all its own, and the hydra slid towards its prize, encircling the huddling, shrieking mass in the corner.

There was no chance of escape, no hope of reprieve for its prey. The great hand snatched the tiny creature from its pitiful hideaway, those fingers clasping firmly about its catch, latex seizing flesh as it was hauled high into the air. The fox held his naked, screaming subject before his face, close enough to buffet him with waves of hot, humid breath, watching in awe as the little being's arms slammed at his ears with each of his booming words, its begging, frightened wails just barely audible over the din...

"Mark? Are you there?"

The woman's voice rushed back into my ears, crescendoing in a tidal wave of sound. I flinched hard enough to send my heart slamming back against my chest, thumping wildly as it shoved my senses back to the forefront. "Woah! Uh, y-yeah....sorry..." I managed to bite off, sweaty palms lifting off the cool oak below as I hauled myself back into an upright position on the desk.

Avery just shook her head, clicking her beak in an echoing approximation of a human tsk. Her round, bronze eyes held their stare longer than mine ever could, and when I broke my glance a moment later she spoke again, her brow cocked high above as she regarded me, "I'll never understand how you manage to lose focus like that."

"Yeah, it's definitely an acquired skill." I sighed, exhaling the last of my racing heartbeat. Trying my best to get more comfortable upon the hard, unyielding wood wasn't exactly helping my concentration, and it didn't miss Avery's hawkish sight for one second, her softened, low voice still sending deep thunder into my ears.

"Either that, or you're going deaf. You're sure you haven't noticed any problems...and would you prefer to sit somewhere else?" The golden eagle added, her feathered fingers momentarily lifting from the screen of the tablet in her lap, flexing briefly with anticipation. I blushed and shook my head. Questions like that always made me feel like a bother, whether I wanted what was offered or not.

"Nah, I'm fine..." I sat still, wincing and rubbing my neck as I craned it to meet her gaze. The looming eagle seemed to think of protesting, but her beak stayed shut, at least until she glanced back to the screen upon her knees.

"Well, I suppose I'd better go over the usual, then...you haven't been mishandled in any way since our last meeting?"

"No."

"Undernourished?"

"Nope."

"Emotionally neglected?"

"That's a negative."

"Subjected to any sort of traumatic experience?"

I rolled my eyes, raising a hand to rub at my temples. "They've been asking me the same damn thing since I was ten. You'd think they'd realize I'd be inclined to bring these things up myself." I groaned, though I couldn't help but smile up at the suit-clad avian. As tedious as the monthly appointments had become, she was the most amiable custody officer I'd had in years. Certainly better than the ones who could barely grunt out the same old song and dance past their dumbfounded stares. That was my job, after all.

The ends of her beak curled into a small grin, and as her immense form leaned back into her chair she chuckled, voice dropping low into a casual, smooth rhythm as she boomed, "I suppose that means I can just mark "No" on the rest, then?" Her slender finger thumped down the tablet, and after another second or two it was lifted to my level, coming to rest with a heavy thud nearly a foot to my right, sending a decent-sized quake through the furniture.

I smiled and leaned back once more, half for comfort and half to take in the monstrous woman across from me. Even if I'd been normal, she still would've been taller than most, and she wasn't shy about sitting up at her full height. "Well, we still have a few minutes...how've you been?"

"Oh, the usual. Karen's been out of town all week, so I've had the house to myself. Not that it's bad to have a little me-time, of course. I swear, she never stops working, even when she's home." She paused from her musing, and her smile fell into a soft smirk, "Oh, and the administration sent _another_request for examination down the line. I told them your usual...you're welcome, by the way."

A weak laugh left my throat, and I glanced downward, taking in the plain of gray carpet far below, "Heh, thanks...they're not making another big deal out of it, are they?"

The feathered giantess shrugged, her suit creaking audibly as she fiddled with an ebony button, "It wasn't anyone that big, this time. Just another professor from one of the east coast universities." She leaned forwards, her arms resting back upon her chair as she brought her face closer to my level, "You really _should_let some of these people have another look sometime, Mark. They could help you."

I snorted, almost involuntarily, my eyes rolling straight up to the ceiling. "Yeah, that's exactly_what I need. Another doctor and his gaggle of medical students prodding the living hell out of me, telling me they just need _one_more week of observations on the biological effects of my "condition". Or maybe another Nobel physicist telling me they're_this close to understanding how I could have lost ninety-nine percent of my mass and volume and still interact with the universe as if I was made of normal matter."

My gaze turned back down to Avery's looming, disapproving frown. Letting go of the agitation in my chest with another short sigh, I managed to throw on another smile, albeit a sheepish one.

"Look, I get it. I know that maybe one day someone could actually figure out how to change me back from this, or at least figure out how it happened in the first place. And maybe it'd be different if I wasn't the only one who's ever had to live like this. But I am, and it's become clear that this," I waved around the gargantuan, open office, "isn't going away anytime soon. I let them have me for the first year, and you can bet that was the absolute _last_thing I wanted to do after turning eleven."

I watched Avery's avian features soften by the time I'd finished, her frown upturning into a resigned little smirk. It was a breath of fresh air to have someone in charge of me who actually listened to what I wanted. It wasn't that I didn't recognize that there was probably a wealth of scientific knowledge to be gained from doctors observing me, and she knew it. For once, someone with authority understood exactly why I didn't want to go back to a life of intrusive analysis and checkups, why prolonged, gross invasions of privacy and treatment that was rarely beyond that given to actual lab rats probably didn't agree with me.

She sat forwards, letting the tablet fall into her lap with a soft thump. Her face descended from above, slow and premeditated with each massive motion. Her arms rested on her thighs, and her beak hung low enough that I could relax my neck a bit as she boomed with another chuckle.

"All right, all right. I'll tell them to shove off for the time being." She added, reaching up with a feathered finger, "I suppose I'd be just as tired of it all in your shoes." The soft, warm digit settled on my shoulder, touching down with only a mere fraction of its weight. That got a hell of a smile out of me.

"Heh, it's not really that bad." At that moment, it was the truth. I reached up, clasping my fingers around part of the thick, warm fingertip, turning up to meet her gaze. "It's really a miracle I'm alive, right? Not to mention how I managed to get any sort of a life together at all. Besides, I've got people to work with on this, right?"

Avery loosed another short laugh, about to open her beak to reply when her gaze was caught by something outside the window into the hallway. "That's true...and speaking of which, here's another one now." She set her hand down on the counter, feathered fingers flat as she leveled her palm, "C'mon, I'll take you out to him."

I nodded once as her immense finger lifted from my shoulder, grunting and giving a brief little stretch from my perch on her desk before clambering into her palm. Avians always were odd to ride with, and I'd never quite gotten used to the sensation of down feathers beneath me. With a practiced, steady hand, Avery lifted her palm from her desk, lurching into forward motion once she'd raised me to her upper chest. The office filled with the dampened impact of soles upon carpet, before fading away as she opened her door, a gust of wind from the hallway beyond blasting my hair back as a familiar voice thundered.

"Hey! You ready to go, bud?"

I nodded up to the green, scaly bulk that towered in the doorway, craning my neck up to meet his grin. He'd slapped on a simple T-shirt this time, abandoning any sort of formal wear after the dozenth trip or so. Avery handed me over, gently docking her palm against Syrl's, and allowing me to clamber from her bronze feathers back into the familiar emerald padding.

"He's good to go, Syrl." She glanced from the dragon to me, chuckling lightly, "As usual, of course. Seems you two can't help but be the easiest case I've got."

Syrl flashed a toothy smile down to the eagle, and my stomach lurched as he pulled me back up to his broad chest, "Well, I can't exactly say it's much of a chore now, is it?" He tossed a smirk back down my way, reaching out his other hand to shake politely with Avery, "I'll catch you next week, then?"

"Sure thing!" She nodded, raising her fingers once more in a wave as Syrl turned about on his heel, thudding heavily away as I sat in his palm. I waved back before he rounded the corner, leaning back against the thick, warm flesh as it rocked away, the deep bass of the drake's quiet hum ringing in my ears.

It really wasn't that bad, when you got down to it. I'd survived this long under conditions that scientifically speaking should have been impossible. I had a set people who cared about me, a life most would consider comfortable, and all it had cost me was most of my height. Whatever hell this might have been in the past, it was looking all right about then.

After all, what else could one possibly want from life?