Empty Cages

I entered this story into the 2012 Henrietta Branford Writing Competition and was one of the six winners! Entrants had to write a 1,500 word continuation of the opening paragraph shown here in. 


Empty Cages 

‘Of course we won’t get caught,’ I insisted, hoping my voice wouldn’t give away the secret hope that we would.


‘Are you sure?’ Even Astrid looked worried. She was usually the bravest of us all.


Behind her, back on the dusty road, Hannah played with the ends of her hair and Max was studying his shoes like he hadn’t even heard.


‘Sure I’m sure. And even if we do, so what? What will they do? What will anyone do? That’s the problem with the people in this town – no guts.’


My heart thumped. I could practically feel my blue eyes glow, and I had to sweep a hand across my forehead to hide the sweat. My fringe glinted gold in the afternoon sun – a look of purity and angels, my mother had always said, just perfect for the devil to play with. She was probably right.


I crouched back down and parted the thick grass, taking the shadows off what we’d found.


‘So – are you in?’


Astrid hesitated, looking at the ground. Then, she looked up again.

“I’m in,” she said, looking straight at me.


I picked up the creature in the grass. Just as I’d thought, it was a bat. Dead. Another one killed by Dr Richard.

“Doctor,” I muttered. “He actually calls himself a doctor.”


Max took the dead bat from my hands. He looked at it for a second, his eyes full of pity. The poor animal had obviously managed to escape from Dr Richard, but had then been far too weak to survive. Max gently placed the bat under the bushes in Hannah’s front garden. I could see him trying to hold back tears. He liked animals a lot, and cared for them like they were human beings. Astrid and I had known him since we were little children. He’d always been like this, the gentle one of the three of us. He was calm too. Unlike Astrid and I. I could be panicky. Astrid could be bossy sometimes. And a know-it-all. But the kind, generous part of her usually made up for that. Astrid’s neighbour, Hannah, thought that too.


“Stay there, I’ll get the keys,” said Hannah. She disappeared into her house.

“I know our plan will work,” said Astrid. She had been the first to agree to come.

We heard the keys jingling in Hannah’s pocket as she reappeared. We headed for her dad’s blue car. We’d packed it with the things we needed for this evening.


The car journey lasted about five minutes. As we whizzed past the houses by the road I couldn’t help fiddling with my silver necklace, the lucky charm I’d always had. Ours– Hannah’s dad’s car, to be precise– was the only car on the road. If he found out that she was using it, she would be in the biggest trouble she’d ever been in. And it would be my fault.


For a learner, Hannah was a good driver. So the only problem with her driving was that it wasn’t legal. But what we were about to do was even more illegal.


Hannah stopped the car by the woods.

Astrid was the first to get out. She didn’t seem anxious. Max got out next. He looked around nervously. I took a deep breath, reluctant to step out of the car. My heart was thumping.


“We’re waiting for you guys,” said Max.

I thought about what would happen to the rest of the bats if we didn’t rescue them. They would be injected with drugs that were being tested, and then killed by Dr Richard and his colleagues.


“It’s now or never,” said Astrid.

I stepped out of the car and turned to Hannah.

“Are you coming?”

“I still have to stay in the car in case my dad texts me to say he’ll be back early,” she reminded me. “If he does, I’ll have to go.”

I nodded. We’d agreed on this beforehand. There was a chance that we might have to make our way back on foot.


Astrid took out the cages and gloves from the boot. We left the car and walked on in silence, till we arrived at the river.

“OK,” said Astrid, “Me first.”

There was a splash. Max and I peered in. The river was moving fast. We could see Astrid struggling against the pull of the water, while holding one of the cages above her head.

“Do you need help?” I asked.

The only reply was a splash of water in my face, which I wiped away with the sleeve of my old lilac jumper.

“Hang on! I’m coming,” I shouted.

I looked and saw that she had managed to get to her feet again. She then pulled herself up to the bank on the far side.

“I’m ok!” she yelled.

“Now me,” I said. The water looked as uninviting as anything could get.

“Go on,” said Max.


I jumped. For a moment, I was a bluebird sailing through the air. I reached the water with a splash. It was cold, icy cold. I took a step. The water went up to my waist. The current was tugging at me. I tried to keep the cage I was holding above the water, and barely heard the voices of my friends rallying me on. I took another step, and reached the water’s edge. Pulling myself up onto the bank, I breathed a sigh of relief. Then Max stepped into the water, and waded towards us without any difficulty. Astrid and I pulled him up, and we all stood together, shivering and catching our breaths.


The walk through the woods was long. We hardly talked.

We reached the back of the lab. It was surrounded by a wall. We climbed over with the cages.


We all knew what we needed to do next. Maybe we were too young to be involved with things like these. I’d thought about that many times. The risk of being caught was way too high. But if we didn’t try then we would face the guilt of knowing that the bats would be forced to ingest drugs that would kill them, and that we’d done nothing to stop that.

“Which is more important, the life of one small bat, or the life of a living, thinking human being?” the scientists and doctors would say to interviewers. My mother was one of the interviewers they’d said that to.


We walked round the building to a window on the side which I knew would be open.

“For ventilation,” my mother had told me after coming back from interviewing Dr Richard.


I stood on tiptoes, pulled the window further open, and pushed the cages through. They clattered loudly as they fell to the floor.

We ducked instinctively, then slowly stood up.

I clung onto the window frame, but couldn’t pull myself up.


“Stand on my shoulders,” whispered Astrid.

Max helped me up onto Astrid’s shoulders, and she stood up. This time I managed to sit inside the window frame. I held on and let my feet drop. Now I needed to let go, and once I did that, there would be no turning back. The moment I touched the ground on the other side, they would be my responsibility completely.


“Are you okay?” asked Astrid.

I let go. I reached the ground and picked up the cages. The others climbed in behind me.


We were in a small room with white walls. There were a few cages, but they were empty.

“The bats in them have already died,” said Astrid.

“And been thrown away,” I continued.


We stepped out onto a long corridor.

As we began walking down the corridor looking at the rows of doors on either side, something occurred to me.

“The doors—they’ll be locked!” I said.

Astrid looked at me and nodded.

“We haven’t yet tried them,” said Max, walking to the nearest door. It swung open as he pushed it.


This room wasn’t empty. There were cages. Rows of them. The bats were hanging down from the bars.

“Why are they awake? I thought bats were nocturnal?” said Max.

“The stress of the drugs messes up their body clocks,” said Astrid authoritatively.


“Don’t worry,” I said. “We’re trying to save you”.

“We’re not just trying to save you, we’re going to succeed,’ said Astrid.


We slipped on our gloves, and opened up the cages they were in, one by one. We went from cage to cage, and lifted the bats into the cages we’d brought. Most of them were dead. When we finished, we counted them up: there were 36.


“We need to check the other rooms now,” said Astrid.

“When my mum came to interview Dr Richard,” I said, “she told me that they only kept the bats in one room. This is it.”

“Phew,” said Max. “Let’s go then.”

We turned to leave.


We still had to climb through a high window, wade across a cold river and possibly make our way home on foot, but I knew we’d got the hardest part over with, and I smiled inside.