I thought it was strange that Jeb would give Wanderer water (water is precious to desert people) before checking to see if she was alien or human. He was clearly cautious of her as after giving her water he just watched and didn't try to speak to his niece. If he thought was a Soul like the others he would have either given her a canteen or a bullet after checking her eyes. I thought perhaps it was because she was his niece that he had saved her, but Jeb seems too practical to put his remaining family at risk over sentimentality. It couldn't be pity for Wanderer either as he said himself if he had pity for her he would have killed her. So I think Jeb must have suspected something from the beginning' something like the following must have happened.
"Got any threes?"
"Go fish." Ian replied and Walt grumbled and slotted a new card into his hand.
"Have you got any...sevens?" He grumbled more and forked over three cards which quickly joined Ian's small pile of winnings. Ian quickly replaced the rock keeping the wind from blowing them away.
Trying to restrain a grin so as not to crack his already chapped lips, Ian dutifully scanned the horizon. The small ledge they were perched on made a perfect lookout point to watch the desert that surrounded their subterranean home. To the left of their ledge was a large shard of rock that they could hide behind if they needed to, to their right the crevasse that led to the hospital and caves beyond if they needed to alert the others of approaching Seekers.
The fact that this ledge was helpfully perfect for its job didn't mean anyone liked it. This may, in fact be the most irrationally hated rock formation in all Arizona. All who had trodden its unremarkable surface loathed every divot and bump, and agreed that to even speak of it was to invite its curse down upon you. This was the guard duty ledge. Here, if you had falsely accused of some foul misdeed four hours of guard duty awaited you. Four hours of the same heat hazed horizon. Four hours of being roasted alive like an egg on a skillet. Four hours of-
"Got any jacks?" Walt asked.
"Uh...yeah" Ian gave up the required card.
Four hours of the same stupid card games (they couldn't fit a checker board on the ledge), reading the same crappy paperback again*, four hours of unwilling bonding with your ledge mate. It was Hell.
"Got any...fou...ives?" Ian changed his choice at the last minute to see if his feint would get a reaction. Walt simply scanned the horizon. "Go fish. For the fives I mean." Walt smirked "You gotta learn to enunciate Ian, I almost didn't catch that." he chuckled while Ian muttered uncalled for insults at his new card.
Walt seemed to be the only one who didn't mind guard duty. Ian thought it was probably because, with his illness, he didn't have the energy for much else these days. He thought one of the others may be better, Ian was a large guy and didn't fit easily through the squat tunnel. Wes or Jamie would be faster at squeezing through to raise the alarm if needed, but he wasn't going to deny the guy feeling useful.
"Got any..." He dramatically hesitated over his last card, was milking his winning question in a decidedly unsportsmanlike like manner. Ian set his face in his best deadpan expression and raised an eyebrow in silent protest of Walt's douchbaggery.
"...fours?" He finished with an overly innocent expression. Ian dropped his cards in defeat. Ian sighed, it didn't seem to matter what game they played, Walt almost always beat him. Even at Snap.
"Alright, you got me. That makes it like, three to one now?" Ian started gathering up the cards and reshuffling them. "How about some old maid next, hm?" He looked up with a hopeful expression only to realise Walt wasn't listening, he was squinting behind Ian at the horizon.
Ian dropped the cards, grabbed the binoculars and started scanning the horizon in the direction of Walt's gaze. "Where is it? What do you see?"
"I'm not sure...but it looked like someone walking. Way out past that patch of Prickly Pear at your...two o'clock."
"Hm...I don't see anything. It was probably just the haze again." It was true, the shimmering heat haze could make you see just about anything out there. Kyle once swore blind he saw an army of seeker SUVs before someone pointed out it was just a rock formation and some cacti. That's why they did guard duty in pairs now, to rein each other in. He didn't lower the binoculars though. That was another thing about this job, four hours of mostly boredom interspersed with tense minutes scanning of the landscape, trying to figure out if that was an alien about to kill us all or a coyote.
He sighed and was about to lower them to finish gathering the cards when he saw it. A lone figure walking in the distance. He watched it for a few seconds, even through the haze he could tell this was real but he handed off the binoculars to Walt for confirmation.
Walt took a minute to find it again, then nodded. "I'll go get Jeb." Ian wordlessly took back the binoculars and returned to watching the figure as Walt squeezed back into the caves. In the ten minutes he was gone Ian watched as the figure slowly became clearer. Although it wasn't close enough to even tell their gender it was clear they didn't know exactly where the human refuge was. The directions Jeb had given those he thought were still human led people back and forth in front of the guard post. It meant that visitors following Jeb's clues were all but ringing our doorbell. That didn't mean it was human though, although it is hard to believe that a seeker would come out here all on its lonesome. That's one thing that sure is handy about the worms, if you see one you know for sure there's a bunch nearby. Real social butterflies they are.
Hope rose in his chest as he thought of the possibility of adding one more survivor to their collection of misfits, one more scrap of humanity to save from the rising tide. He quickly squashed that hope and reminded himself that until they knew for sure, that wasn't a person. He would refer to it as a person/parasite until he knew which it was.
When Jeb finally arrived and took the binoculars it was clear the person/parasite flagging, just barely avoiding the cacti as it staggered through the brush. Jeb watched intently for a minute, not moving except to adjust the focus.
"Yep, that's a person alright." He said finally, lowering the binoculars.
"A person/parasite." Ian corrected distractedly. Jeb blinked at him.
"Until we know which it is." Ian clarified, nodding at the figure walking in the fading light. Jeb nodded thoughtfully and scratched at his beard.
"Good job kid. Why don't you and Walt take off early? I'll take the night shift for ya." Ian brightened. Although this was definitely more interesting than card games, he had been getting tired of watching the stranger trip up on its own feet. Giving one last searching glance at their visitor he slipped back through to the caves to get something to eat while Jeb settled down to watch.
The next morning
Jeb had all his attention fixed on the distant figure. He was sure of it now, that was his niece alright, or possibly just her body. Although he doubted the identity of the occupant of the body, he was positive on what was going through their mind right now. He knew how distant the last of his landmarks was from her and, judging by her ditching of the bag she was fresh out of supplies to get there. The look on her face was priceless, like she could drag that Mesa closer by gaping at it. She must know she wouldn't make it, it'd be suicide to attempt even half of that journey considering she's three quarters dead as it is. She was looking at failure, pure and simple. He doubted a centipede would put itself at risk like this but if it was, this is the point he was expecting it to give up. Whip out an alien sat phone and call its buddies to rescue it from this crazy expedition. They would come and get it and, curiosity satisfied, no other aliens would bother checking out this area again.
If she was an alien.
So he watched and waited.
He frowned as he saw her start talking - no, ranting - at thin air. As if she was pleading with some invisible person that this wasn't true. She suddenly collapsed to her knees as if she had gotten her answer. She stayed there for a long time, seeming to falling apart with sorrow. The guilt of putting her through this made Jeb squirm uncomfortably on the ledge. He hated making her battle this merciless desert, he'd nearly lost a few battles with this place himself so he could sympathise. He wanted to stop her suffering, and whether he would end that suffering with a canteen or a bullet was yet to be decided, but he had to see what she would do next. His curiosity was a curse sometimes, but right now he had to know what this creature truly wanted, centipede or not. Eventually she swayed to her feet, stared dejectedly at the far away landmark for a long hot minute and started walking. Walking was probably generous, it was more like she was continuously falling but kept failing to complete the motion to the ground.
She started laughing, another generous term, it looked more like she was trying to cough her lungs up, and speaking as if to her invisible companion. Jeb adjusted the focus to make he was seeing this right and pressed them closer to his eyes. Something seemed to occur to her, and she looked fearfully about the desert floor. She paused to frown, nod slightly and seemed to calm somewhat. It looked like she was holding a conversation with someone only she could hear. Jeb lowered the binoculars and rubbed his eyes as he considered the possibility that her niece was human and had gone nuts or she had a crazy alien in her. Do these critters even go crazy? He'd watched them a lot, probably a lot more than was safe, he'd never seen them act anything more than polite and pleasant. He'd never even seen one get irritated, it was hard to picture one actually losing their marbles.
Raising the binoculars back up he watched as she started conversing again. It was definitely a conversation, he could see she was surprised by her companions response. She asked a question that seemed to make her sad and plodded forward as she waited for a response, whatever it was it seemed to make her feel better and he even saw the ghost of a smile cross her lips. Her improved mood didn't seem to help her gait however, she looked set to complete her long delayed fall.
Jeb's eyes widened as she caught herself and pulled herself back up. It seemed as if someone else stepped into her body, her stride lengthened and straightened out, her expression suddenly confident as she marched towards her impossible goal. He was familiar with that expression of calm bliss, he'd seen it many times on his nieces face when she came to 'visit the crazies' as Jeb's brother had called it. Here was that same expression from the Mel he knew. As if she had popped up and was taking a turn at the wheel...as if...
...it can't be possible.
Could it? To stick around after someone else moves in? Maybe even, come back?
He shook himself and reminded himself not to get ahead of himself. It could be just plain old Mel being plain old crazy. Dehydration could do that to you.
He got up and made his way inside. He needed to get down there, see if she's still crazy when he got some water in her...and see if there's more than one someone in there.
+ That night +
The crunching of his footsteps and his panting breath was the only thing Jeb heard as he searched the desert. He stopped and listened intently for any other sounds, but he heard nothing. Was he too late? Was she worse off than he thought? Had she died because of his thirst for knowledge? He thought he could find her easily but her path had meandered and made it hard to track. He had only starlight and his torch to see by, and it was slowing him. He was watching his breath condense in the cold air while he considered returning for help finding her when he heard something. He stood stock still and listened. For a long time he heard nothing but the cold wind rustling the branches of a nearby tree, silhouetted against the starry sky. Eventually he could pick it out, a slight wheezing as someone struggled to breath.
Abruptly he felt relief and guilt wash through him; relief that she was still alive and guilt that he had let her get this bad. He followed the sound and found her lying face down in the dirt under a small tree. He pulled her gently as he could out from under the tree and rolled her over. When she showed no signs of responding to him he opened his canteen lid and splashed her face with it. Immediately her eyes fluttered open and her mouth opened trying to catch the falling water only to quickly choke on it. Her hands grasped blindly for the canteen even as he thumped her on the back to help her breath again. Propping her upright he let her drain two canteens before laying her back down.
Thirst sated, she finally made an attempt to focus on him. She blinked wearily up at him as he unzipped his jacket pocket and took out a torch. She moaned in pain at the light and tried to protect her eyes with a hand, but he had seen it. The distinctive flash of a silver ring around her iris. The silver that meant that his niece was indeed, no longer completely human. His shoulders slumped in sorrow and he couldn't restrain another sigh from escaping his lips. He looked with sad eyes down at the face that used to belong to family.
Jeb leaned back and closed his eyes, sat down trying to pull himself together. There was still a chance that Mel was still in there, if his theories on her strange behaviour were right. He settled down to wait and see what her reaction was to him. Determined not to influence her actions he waited silently, watching her watching him.
Eventually she recognised him. "Uncle Jeb," she rasped in surprise. "You found us."
"...Well now," This surprised him, was it Mel or the parasite speaking? Or both? "Well now, this is a pickle." This seemed to support his theory of the survival of Mel's consciousness at least. He just wasn't expecting their thoughts to be merged like this. What could he ask to find who was in control of two people smushed together?
"Are they here?" She interrupted his musings as she struggled to sit up on her elbows. "Did they make it?"
Curious, he asked "Who?"
"Jamie! Jared! Jared was with Jamie. Our brother!" She gasped.
Our brother? Jeb thought. So the parasite thought of the kid as family? That explained why it came out here, people do stupid things for family.
"Are they here? Did they make it? Did you find them too?"
He still wasn't sure of the parasite's motivations, despite everything he had seen. Coming out here on its own, not bringing the rest of its kind with it, nearly dying trying to find Jared and the kid. Perhaps...one more test. To be sure.
"No." He answered, maintaining his poker face and watching hers carefully.
"No." She whimpered. Her shoulders slumped and she let herself fall back to the ground, like the fire of hope keeping her going had gone out. She closed her eyes but her anguished expression said she was still awake.
Guilt rose in him afresh for clearly causing her pain in his quest for knowledge. At least this seemed to support his theory.
"Look," he said, getting up. "I,uh, have something to take care of. You rest for a bit, and I'll be back for you." She didn't respond. He left another canteen beside her and started to walk back the way he came, marking the trail as he went to follow back to her.
The parasite seemed to care about Jared and Jamie. It didn't ask after the other humans when he'd told her they weren't here. A parasite who was here to take us for hosts would be looking for any humans, not just Jared and Jamie. Which means that she wasn't here to capture them, but to...what, love them? He knew the centipedes were capable of love, he'd seen them show just as much affection to their partners and families as the original occupants of their bodies did. But a centipede loving a human? Well now, that was new. There was still a lingering suspicion that this parasite was some kind of super sneaky Seeker, trying to trick him but it seemed unlikely. This would be a tough act to pull off for a human actor, but for a centipede? Lying doesn't come easily to them and a act this intricate seemed beyond them. Besides if it was some kind of amazing actor alien, the rest of its plan doesn't make any sense. To come out here pretending that it liked us just to die on our front doorstep? Or be killed by us when we found her? Or, if it did manage to convince someone it was friendly, it had to know we wouldn't trust it enough to leave. It can't run off and bring its buddies like it should have done in the first place. No, the first, peaceful explanation made more sense. If it was peaceful and there was a chance Mel was still in there, he couldn't let her die.
It was gonna be a tough one to sell to the group though. Especially Jared, he thought as he tramped home. He'd think of something though, he had to.
* Like stealing the last Twinkie that Jeb had been hiding inside his pillow for example.
* The cave library consisted of 3 books; a dictionary, a Mills and Boon pulp romance novel (no one knows who thought this was worth saving from the aliens and no one is owning up to it.) and a 1974 farmers almanac. All were well thumbed.