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"Xerah, it's going to be fine --I'm not going to let them take you back_." She heard him say to her, but she didn't take the words seriously as she remembered the horrors of the lab. Every day since her birth, she woke up with uncertainty and the unbearable fear of being exposed to regulated sessions of torture. She tried not to remember, trying and failing as she held her warm mate in her arms.

She remembered the cold hard bindings that the men at the lab used to hold down her every limb as the humans did things to her, sticking tubes in her or cutting at her tender skin, pulling her teeth and so many other horrible things. Mother's voice had been her only link to reality as she tried to tune out her surrounding world. Mother had been born in the lab just like her, but she knew a lot about many things. She had never told Xerah how she knew the things she did, but Xerah never asked why as she gladly listened to what Mother told her.

Mother had told Xerah about some of their kind's past, and how they had had their own home planet where their kind had prospered. Xerah hadn't easily been able to grasp the concept of 'planets', but Mother had explained that they were like very large and connected areas, separated by a vast emptiness. Mother said that when her ancestors were on their planet, the individuals of their kind used to be able to mate with one another and that with each generation they had grown smarter. Mother had said that it was only out of a need to survive that their kind had adapted to being in need of taking hosts.

The idea of a home world for her kind never ceased to fascinate Xerah as she imagined the possibilities of such a place -- yet it only saddened Xerah when Mother told her that their kind had left their world, though Mother believed that their kind was not responsible; she believed it was creatures, not from their world, that had taken their kind's ancestors away from their home planet.

Xerah's thoughts strayed back to Eric as he gently tried to move out of their embrace, causing her to let go of him and move back to allow room between them. He did, though, reach for her hands, and she felt safer as he struggled to judge where her head was in the darkness in which his eyes could no longer pierce.

She carefully brought her face to his and even though he probably hadn't been expecting it, when she kissed him, he returned her kiss without hesitation. She began to pull her head back from the brief encounter, but his head followed, and so she kept hers close as he brought his head forward slowly until it touched her own bowed head; together they stayed like that, their imaginary horns stuck together, keeping their heads from separating.

She felt his soft hands caressing her own and her gut felt hollow as she imagined losing her mate, of being taken from him. Yet what if... What if they didn't just take her from him, what if they hurt him, or even kill...

"Let's leave, Eric." she said to him, not realizing her tone had been laced with worry. "Leave? But we... Shouldn't we at least wait?" he asked. She could tell of his uncertainty and it made her curious.

"Wait for what?" she asked him anxiously. She thought about the possibility of her and her Mate leaving without the people outside noticing.

Eric hadn't known about her imprisonment or about her kind at all. What that meant could be really bad. She imagined that perhaps only a small amount of humans knew about her kind. -- Perhaps 'they' didn't want other humans to know about them. If they didn't want anyone to know, what would they do to her mate if he found out? If they are hunting her and her kind, what would they do if they found out a human knew about her.

"What if it isn't...'Them.' "He asked her as he pulled his head back, breaking their foreheads' embrace. To his question she was uncertain. "Do you know how many are outside?" he continued. She concentrated hard to be completely sure. She could feel the beating of multiple hearts, all of them beating together making an almost symphonic thumping noise. But she found that she knew right away how many of them there were -- her instincts alone knew the number of hearts behind the symphony.

"There are four humans outside, Mate." she said to him, certain in the number of hearts she could hear, yet she tried not to think about the possibility of hearts outside her perceptible range.

"Okay." he said, stalling for a moment as he tried to figure out how she knew. "_ They are in the front of the house, right? You saw them from one of the windows?_"

She didn't answer right away as she wrestled with what "house" meant... Could it mean... ah! He must mean his hive. "House..?" she thought to herself, though without intention she had said it to him as well. "The... um, the..." he started but she cut him off as she figured out what he had meant.

"Yes, they are in the front of your hive -- I mean, house." she said to him, but too late as she realized with awkwardness that she had said it rather excitedly. She had simply been a little too happy and perhaps proud that she had figured out the new word so immediately. She didn't, though, feel like asking him what windows were. Her instincts were telling her to leave immediately, but she feared the wilderness outside.

He didn't say anything for a few moments as he appeared to be thinking, though she didn't have an idea as to what he was thinking about. His silence was finally broken as he brought his head back away, causing her to do the same. Looking directly at her, he began with "Okay," sounding fairly certain of something. "I don't think they know that you're here."

"But-" she began, being cut off by Eric. "It might not even be them, Xerah." he said to her, trying to be reassuring but only making her more fretful as he sparingly doled out what he thought.

"Who is it then?" she said, raising her voice a little in her fear. "Why would they just be waiting outside, Eric? I thought you said that humans can't see in the dark. I don't understand." she said to him, her voicing breaking at parts as her emotions seemingly tickled the part of her mind she used to speak.

"Xerah, if it was 'them' then I don't think they would be giving you any chance to escape. They would already be in here trying to either kill you or take you." he said to her grimly, trying to be the voice of reason, she realized. "It's probably just new colonists, Xerah." he continued. "It's never happened to me before but they might have just stopped to avoid driving through the wilderness-stricken highway at night. Maybe they are just looking for a place to stay for the night."

She was dumbstruck for a moment as she tried to grasp the possibility of the stranger's appearance not leading to something bad. Yet in an effort to keep the conversation going, she asked him of the word that played on her mind._

"What is a colonist?"

"It's a person who has come to a new world and is looking to live on it." he said to her informatively, although she still didn't quite grasp the concept. Releasing her hands he began to move around on the bed, his hands pushing into its soft fabric as he maneuvered himself.

_ "They will probably just leave. Can you tell what they are doing?" he continued as he neared the edge of the bed, apparently trying to get off and to her horror he ended up falling before she could catch him. He made a quick "Ah!" before landing head first on the soft floor below, making a loud thud as he did. She had jumped to her feet before he could even groan at the pain, walking across the bed she got to the ground next to her mate in a partially leaping step.

"Eric!" She called to him as she crouched down to her mate. He groaned in pain but nonetheless answered her plea of uncertainty with reassurance. "I'm okay." he said as he started getting to his feet. She helped him up, offering her hand which he gladly took and let him use as leverage.

Now standing next to her, he took back his hands and applied pressure to the side of his head. "Are you sure you're okay, Mate?" she asked him _

"Yeah, I'm alright. It doesn't even hurt anymore._" He said, a light smile on his lips as he reassured her.

"Eric, this isn't your species home planet?" asked Xerah. "No, Earth is my species home planet; and it is a long way from here."

Xerah wasn't sure what to say, but in an attempt to keep the conversation going she asked. "Do you miss your home world?" "Never been there." he said, "I was born on a colony planet like the one we're on right now, but a lot more populated and with no forests."

"Oh." was all she said. "Yeah, the planet was called Athens 117, a real metropolis crowded with buildings and streets packed shoulder to shoulder. This planet, though, is the second attempt by our species to make a livable biosphere using genetically altered plants and animals. It wasn't a successful colony though and now it's mostly just a rock for mining with a small settlement of people looking to get away from it all. It takes quite a while to get here, even with FTL making it..." He halted his confusing talk, as he must have realized that she didn't properly understand what he was saying. "Sorry," He said apologetically. "I guess most of that didn't make much sense."

"It's okay." she said, as she officially gave up trying to understand. There were more pressing matters that needed attention anyway. "Eric, what are we going to do about the people outside?"

"We might not have to do anything," he said , though she was still uncertain as she looked into his strange eyes -- the pupils -- and even worse, as she looked pitifully at her mate, she saw the blood that was all over his face from his fit on the kitchen floor and even more blood from after he turned the lights on -- that time blood had come from his eyes.

He noticed that she was staring at his face and realized now as he started to feel around his face that it was covered in something -- more than likely it was itchy on his skin. He touched it and as if in sudden realization of how itchy it actually was he started rubbing his finger on his upper lip, trying to clear it away. "Is... is there something on my face?" he asked, seeming a bit more than mildly concerned.

"Blood." she said to him. "From when you... In the kitchen, when you..." she tried saying, but the words brought back memories of the terror she had felt and she purred sadly as she took him into her arms again. Holding him against her and feeling the pounding of his heart against her chest, making her feel better as she let him go after a few moments. "I'm just, uh, going to turn on the lights now." he said, somewhat mumbling. He turned from her and before he did anything else she realized that he would very likely not make the journey to turn on the lights. She prepared to tell him but he took barely three steps before he tripped on something on the floor. Xerah was able catch him from behind; one hand on his hip and the other going around his waist, suspending him from falling.

The tension in her stomach faded away as she realized that she had caught him in time and that he would not fall, and perhaps lose consciousness, again. She carefully pulled him straight up as he sighed out in relief at being caught before he could land on his face again. "Thank you." he said to her as he stood up properly now, though her hands still remained wrapped around him from behind. He brought his hands to hers but did not try to release them and instead just covered them with his own. She was nervous to let him go, nervous that something might happen to her mate.

"Stay here, do not move. I will turn on the light for you, my Mate." she informed him kindly. She let go and moved around him, headed to the entrance way into the room. Seeing clearly in the darkness she stepped over the blanket and approached the strange piece of glass embedded in the wall._

_ She looked back and saw that her mate hadn't moved an inch. She focused back on the screen; it was devoid of light until she touched it, and then the glass suddenly gave off a very faint luminescence, revealing different symbols. She touched the one Eric had touched when he had turned on the lights earlier. As soon as she touched it light suddenly filled the room and as it did she heard Eric breath in sharply through his teeth. She acted fast, rushing up to him to make sure he didn't fall.

"Eric!?" she asked worriedly, aware that he might pass out again. He had his hands over his eyes just as he had before when he had passed out the last time the lights had been turned on. He let out his breath in a painful groan and she saw him lightly sway on his feet. It had only been a few seconds but she worried as he hadn't immediately answered her concern. He appeared to be in pain and as she turned to look at the flat piece of glass against the wall she realized that she should press the button again to turn the lights off as she had done before.

She turned to go press the light switch but was halted by his voice as he replied to her after what felt like minutes and yet had been barely a few seconds.

"_

I'm fine_." he said, taking his hands down from his eyes slowly. He squinted as his hands left his eyes and she saw that they were bleeding fresh blood again.

"No you are not, Eric!" she said suddenly angrily, though not at her mate._

"It doesn't hurt as much anymore and it was way less intense than it was last time_." he said to her hastily, trying to cease her own worry and anger at his denial.

"No... no you're not okay, Eric, and you know it. Yet you don't admit it!" she said to him starting stern, yet her voice carried on into sadness.

"This morning your heart stopped, then after being passed out for the entire day you wake up in agony, then you turn on the lights and yell in pain before passing out again. Now you are in pain once more..." She said ending her short rant with a whimper, her voice breaking up in wake of the emotions she felt, fear for her mate being the leading emotion. "I don't-" He started, but she cut him off as she realized right away what he was going to say and was angry at him for it.

"Don't!" she said angrily. "Don't say you don't know why this is happening. I knew right away when you told me about your remembrance about falling to the floor in the kitchen. You are not telling me what happened... what happened in your head."

"Xerah, I..."

"Were you ever going to tell me? Tell me about that something you call 'Shadow'? Is this 'Shadow' what is doing this to you?" she asked him, her anger peaking as she revealed her knowledge to him -- her lashing tail behind her evidence to her annoyance at her mate's withholding. "You were talking in your sleep after you turned the light on and passed out. You said 'Shadow' a lot as well as muttering something about 'not again.' You were muttering those things over and over again, Eric. But, the worst of it, what I didn't expect to hear from your ramblings was 'wont' ..." She struggled with the words. " 'Won't kill me again.' Eric what happened? Your skin turned pink and your whole body got so hot..."

"I don't know what it is, but..."

He opened his mouth to say something but closed it and looked away for a moment. He looked back to her and before he could say anything, she said something first.

"Go wash the blood off your face." she ordered him, going over to the bed and sitting down on it, her arms crossed as she saw him nod his head and walk towards the entrance. As he walked past her, sitting on the bed, she reached out and tenderly took his arm, halting him in his tracks. "Please," she said. "I have been trying to ignore it, but I can't stand the look of your blood... It means... It means that you're hurting." she told him sadly, her tone quiet as she calmed down.

"_

It's pretty itchy. I'm glad I have a chance to wash it off before... well, before I tell you about 'it'_." he said, to her kindly, smiling as he did and in so making some of the dry blood crack on his face. She felt better knowing that her mate wasn't angry at her, at least not noticeably, from her small outburst and sudden sternness.

Taking back his arm, he looked at it with interest and she saw that the arm she had grabbed had been the arm that was burnt. The burn had come from her blood, and though he had never told her, she still knew that it had to have come from her blood because when she first woke up to find him next to her; there had been a fresh bandage on his arm. "My blood is prettier than yours though, don't you think?" he strangely suggested.

"I suppose..." she said awkwardly, not understanding what he meant by the question and yet partially hoping it wasn't some sort of jab at her, though she knew he would never insult her. "Though, it's not nearly as interesting as yours." he said in a half mutter. He seemed unattached to the world for a moment before, after shaking his head little bit, he continued on to the door and left the room. She was estranged by his act; what had he meant by her blood being more interesting? She could only imagine him meaning that her blood burnt all that it touched. All except her kind, anyway.

She could hear him in the bathing room, the water running and splashing as he cleaned his face in the sink. She was still in the room and presently (presently is not a good word to use here, I think) alone again, left only to her thoughts as she prepared herself for the conversation they were going to have about that 'Shadow.'

Eric walked back into the room, his face clean once more and still a little wet. The forward section of his hair lay quietly on top of his forehead. He didn't come over to her and instead stayed by the entrance way, touching the small square of glass surface on the wall.

"What are you doing?" She asked him curiously,

"Getting a look of my own at our 'new neighbors'." he said to her, looking back at the screen. She realized then to her own horror that she had actually forgotten to keep track of the people outside. She had been so ready to talk about what weighed in her mind concerning her mate's sleep-ranting that she had forgotten about the immediate threat. She realized that Eric really had been the voice of reason and had calmed her down from her worry about the strangers. She was glad of that, but as she focused once more on locating the beating hearts of the people outside, she realized that her fear might have been well placed.

"Eric!" She said, getting up from the bed in an instant. He immediately turned his head from the screen and though he tried to mask it she could tell he was afraid of what he had seen. She couldn't imagine how the piece of glass worked but he could clearly see outside with it. His face said to her that he had not seen what he had expected, nor wanted to see.

"One of the strangers is alone, on the opposite side of the house." she said to him fearfully. "I can't tell what he is doing, but-" She stopped talking as suddenly there was a loud hum and then the lights flickered off. Eric didn't wait a second longer and began to move over to his dresser. He couldn't see and she could tell as he took very cautious yet quick steps.

She knew what was happening -- it really had been them. They were going to take her back to the lab! She whimpered and looked to the window which had been covered up by a thin sheet that kept light from outside getting in and light from inside getting out. She didn't know what Eric was doing but she hoped he hurried as she went over to the window. She turned to Eric who was throwing his clothes out of the drawer and over his head.

"Eric, what are you doing? Let's go this way through the window." she said to him, anxious to escape. "The person from the back has gone around to the others in the front."

He pulled out a metal box and placed it on the top of his dresser -- the lights came back on with a quiet hum. This time though they were smaller and less bright near the top of the walls. She almost yelled at him for foolishly wasting their time to take a metal box until logic clicked in and she realized that there must be something inside of it. She found out right away what that 'something' was, recognizing it from her escape at the lab. He touched the top of the box a few times, causing it to slide open; he reached in and pulled out what she knew was a human's weapon. It was black and small, yet looked heavy for its size. It had a handle, which he held, and above the handle there was a longer horizontal piece of metal. The entire weapon pointed the opposite direction of the person holding it. He turned to look at her and tried to not show the uncertainty he was feeling. As long as he lived, Xerah would be safe. He could take care of the people outside, but he knew that she was going to disprove of what he was about to do.

"Xerah," he started as he gulped in his throat, expecting for her to disagree to his plan. "You need to stay here, in the house. I will go outside and... talk to them." he nervously said.

"Talk to them!" she yelled into his head, taking steps over to him. "You can't just talk to them! If they are here then they are here to take me away... Maybe, maybe you can escape, leave out the back and I'll-"

"Don't you dare!" he said to her sternly as she stood now in front of him, waving the weapon in his hand. "Don't even consider that as a possibility, I will never let anyone hurt you. You, Xerah, are the only thing I have ever had worth living for." he told her. "Now sit down on the bed and twiddle your thumbs for a bit; this might take a while." He reached back into the box with his other hand and grabbed one of the magazines inside.

"But... I..." she crooned very quietly in sadness.

"It's okay, you will be safe here. " he told her reassuringly. "The men from the labs don't know that you are here."

"But, the people outside... You saw them, you grabbed your weapon. It has to be them..."

"No, it's not them. "He explained, cutting her off mid-sentence. He promptly shoved the magazine into the bottom of the gun -- hearing a click, -- and then cocked back the slide-rail with his hand. The gun was now ready to fire.

"The men outside aren't here for you, Xerah." he explained. "They are here for me."_