Chapter thirty six:

Near groans as he begins to awaken and his eyes blink a few times seeing as how his vision is blurry. "Wha?" He manages to get out but it takes a little effort as his body begins to awaken.

A lady leans over his or so Near believes seeing as that the other has longer hair. "Hey. Can you hear me?"

Near groans and blinks again as his vision seems to be improving.

"It's a start." The lady almost sounds like she wants to sigh in relief.

Near blinks a little slowly a few more times before his vision truly becomes clear and he can see that the one leaning over him is Luna. "You." He slightly roughly gasps in recognition.

"Good to know your mind is awake." Luna sounds rather relieved to hear that. "A good awakening ability from sleep. Not bad." She closes her eyes as she gives what Near is sure is meant to be a compliment that he isn't too sure if he should truly take it that way as he isn't fully he can trust Luna. "Anyways getting some food into you is what we need to do. You're still healing so you'll need to have some more rest before anything happens."

Near groans with displeasure upon hearing that even closing his eyes along with it. "I don't want to sleep again." He informs Luna.

"It is the best way for you to regain your strength. You took quite a lot of energy out of yourself after all." Luna informs him and as Near manages to sit on his own she offers him a bowl of tomato soup. "Fresh and warm." She lets him know as he glances to it. "Not poisoned. Promise." She grabs an extra spoon from her pocket and uses it to take a spoonful from the soup to eat to show Near that it is safe. "There you go. See? Safe." She already has one spoon in the soup bowl. "Go ahead. Eat it all."

Near reaches over taking the bowl feeling it's warmth in his hands though it's not hot enough to burn him. He is quite hungry if he must admit so. He leaves the spoon on the side of the bowl and tips the bowl back drinking the soup from within from the edge where he has his lips against it. He finishes pretty fast and hands the bowl back to Luna who nods pleased that he had taken it all in. "Now a little more sleep will do you some good." She adds and Near shakes his head.

"I want to be awake." Near tells her a little firmly though he manages to keep himself almost completely emotionless.

"That can be arranged." A voice comes from behind Luna in which she turns just right so Near can also see the other. It's a male with raven black hair and strong dark brown eyes. His hair is swept at the top of his head over towards the right looking well brushed with the rest of his head showing hair just too short to really do anything with it. He is wearing a white button up undershirt with a black buttoned up blazer on top and black pants with black boots. His tie appears to be missing and the top two buttons are undone only slightly taking away the professional look he seems to have going on. His smile holds the look of a rather politician vibe coming from it. He also has this way that he holds himself tall and proud makes Near begin to believe that he might be one of the boss's to wherever he currently is right now. He also has a rather confident stride as he heads over to the two of them.

Luna moves back a few steps making room for the man as her head also bows slightly.

Near feels that this confirms that this man is some sort of boss man. His attention has changed to him as he watches this mans every move reading his body language. "A boss hum? Seems you have something you wish to discuss with me."

"Observant I see. I kind of thought that you'd pick up on it." The man smiles a touch more almost as if impressed.

"First things first though." Near stares right into the man's eyes keeping his mental walls up to do everything in his power to keep this man from reading him. "Where am I and what's going on?"

"We'll get to that." The man responds not losing his smile at all then he turns to Luna with a gentle but commanding gaze. "Luna please feel free to go do whatever else you wanted to do today. I wish to speak with our guest."

"Oh, okay." Luna nods and heads off with that taking the dishes with her.

The man turns back to Near who meets his gaze almost immediately. "You see we are a group that call ourselves Thorax. We are people who wish to stop the treatment of freaks by the government. We prefer to work with those that are with us just in case the government gets their hands on someone. If it's someone outside of our group we cannot confirm their loyalty. They could tell our secrets and we'd be shut down rather quickly. Then we'd be of no help to freaks here that are forced to be on the run or in hiding." He moves a little closer by a step or two and turns his gaze down to the clocks on the bed. "We can try moving some of these clocks to see if you can stand yet or not. I believe you may have drained the energy you can get from them anyways but that is a theory. Am I correct in that?"

"I don't know about a limit to be honest." Near slightly glances down to the clocks and moves one hand to brush against the clear plastic surface of one that is by his hand. He almost seems to be searching for energy that might be coming from the clock that he can possibly take. "I'm not really feeling anything so it is a possibility that there might be a limit. It seems far away like it's just out of reach but very slowly getting closer like it's recharging."

"Handy." The man nods with an impressed look in that nod. "Well then why don't I walk around with you a little to what we can show you before you are officially a part of us. That'll give them time to recharge."

"Getting up and not sleeping sounds nice." Near agrees so some of the clocks are moved on the one side until he can get up. He turns putting his legs over the edge then stands up from there. He however stumbles finding that he isn't too stable on his feet yet. He is caught in strong sturdy arms before he hits the floor then helped back onto his feet. He turns to the man who smiles gently at him keeping his arms around the younger.

"I'll help you walk. You can lean on me and we'll see how that goes." The man offers with a smile like he is trying to keep Near assured that everything is alright.

"That sounds okay." Near agrees as it definitely sounds better than lying in bed and just sleeping while not knowing what might be happening. He might have a chance to find out what in the world is going on around here if he goes with the man. He just won't be able to teleport as he'd take the man with him and well in his condition it'd be suicide. He lets the other have his left arm around his shoulders while he leans against him; He can feel just how big the mans hand is though seeing as how he is taller than he is, with Near only coming up to the top of his chest, it is to be expected that his hands will be bigger… Big enough to cover his entire shoulder even. He admits that it is indeed easier to stand with the support of this strange man that has a hint of cologne on him but it is indeed faint. He isn't too familiar with the smell though so he can't say much other than its cologne.

"Let's go then." The man begins walking with Near showing patience as he's ready to move as slow as Near needs him to move in. "The names Shawn. It is nice to meet you."