Coughing made him quickly return to the girl. Her hand clawed at her throat as she coughed and gagged. He retrieved a glass of water immediately, hoping it would help. Nevertheless, all she ended up doing was coming more and supporting it the water. His heart began to race as the girl began to wheeze. She could not breathe; she must have been choking. He tried to help, to no avail. Something just was not right-and the swelling of her neck and face was an imminent clue.

He hastily put back in his bio mask, diagnostic technology scanning her. She was in anaphylactic shock-having some sort of allergic reaction to what he fed her. He had poisoned her.

He did not know of any yautja that reacted so strongly to any assistance but he did have anti-inflammatory drugs to open back up her windpipe so she could breathe. Still, she would need help it she would die.

He could drop her off on earth, leave oomans to heal an ooman. However, he did not know how advanced their medications were. Would they have the right thing to heal her? He worried that with such a foreign type of meat that they would not.

Therefore, because the yautja home planet was closer, he went there instead.

She was dying, needed help.

However, landing there would seal his own death.

Nevertheless, he had never been happy without her...Why continue to live if what you are living for its dead?

He made his decision and did not deviate from it, did not look back. He attempted to land on the planet, sensors tripping immediately. However, he bargained her life and safe return to earth for his surrender-and they allowed it.

As the ramp dropped and three heavily armed yautja stood before him, he was not even sure if the

girl was still alive. Her body had started to convulse and he had not wanted to watch her. It would not matter anyway-his life was over if hers was.

Two of them led him from the ship; the other went to go collect the girl. He was taken to the king of the district he had done the crime in, the clan he had betrayed and been declared a badblood in. He dropped to his knees, the fight from him gone.

The king spoke again of their terms, promising that the ooman would not be harmed, and then went into how he was too be realistically euthanized in front of the clan. He was too be made an example of. Car'ka bowed his head in submission.

He started at the dreary walls of his confinement. A coffin of sorts, until time came for him to be drained of all blood-a symbolic gesture of ridding the mind and body of the substance, the bad blood in him that fueled such a breaking of laws. Then the god of death, the black warrior, Cetanu would come to take him.

When they came for him, he was ready for death.

When they led him down the dark terminal, he kept his head up, and his stride confident.

He knew the place he would be taken to. It was a staircase of stone up to a circular plaque with a worn dent in the center where so many had been executed over the lifetimes. Chained down on their back, and bleed slowly, the green would ooze and dip down the sides of the stone alter like wax, painting it. That would be his death.

However, before he knew it, he was standing in an empty room in front of the king.

He would jump to no conclusions about his postponed death-instead, his mind waiting to hear that the girl did not make it.

"The ooman female was quite fond of you." The king noted.

The word "was" did not escape him. He found his head bowing, his eyes staring numbly at the floor.

The king was not finished, "She was successfully treated with an antihistamine. Yet, she refused to cooperate until she knew where you were."

The girl lived. His heart began to race at just that fact.

"We put her in an emergency translator collar and told her you were to be exterminated."

He did not know why the king was telling him all this, as it was just making the whole ordeal more painful. His memories flashed with her sad face and crying that he had come to hate and knew she would be doing the same thing.

"She begged for your life."

He met the king's eyes.

"Tell me, would you stay far from this planet if you were let to live-banished instead?"

"I would promise it to the gods." He said thickly.

"And would you also promise not to go to Earth, not to go looking for the ooman girl?"

He hesitated, but knew there was only one truth, "No. If I was left alive, nothing would stop me from searching for her."

"Very well." The king uttered, striding past him.

He was led behind the king through the house, metal boots thumping on the hard floor, creating the music to his death march. As the door opened up, he expected the light to hit his eyes and be made to walk to the site. Instead, they were in the ship holding dock. And to that, he was not much surprised-except that it was his personal ship.

"I don't ever want to hear of you again."

The other yautja backed away, and the king stood waiting.

He did not budge, astonished at the kings behavior.

"You are free to go." The king urged.

"Why?"

"Your crime, though still marking you a badblood, was not an outstanding crime. And your little ooman was very persuasive-as an apology for her mistreatment and kidnap," the king paused to give a disappointed glair at him, "she requested your life." And even though he did not know it, he had given himself in, had given up his life, for an ooman who needed a simple allergy shot—Most badbloods would not have done that.

Relief spun him lightheaded, but he climbed aboard the ship and got off the planet as fast as he could manage. Earth, was his next destination. He had to find the girl.

However, he worried he would never be able to find her. Where had they dropped her off? The planet was maybe a quarter of the size of his, but finding one ooman among around three billion oomans that inhabited the planet...He knew the king would not make it easy and give him directions.

Why had he let both of them go anyhow? With that thought, he worried that they had actually just killed her. It would not be like yautja to toy with him, punish him in that way, yet it would be like them to kill an ooman who knew of their kind. Unlike some other planets, Earth was kept pure as to conduct better hunting.

The ship descended on the blue planet, his eyes soaking up the details. He steered the ship back to the tropical line of islands where he had found the girl.

Could a simple ooman tear compassion from a yautja king?

In the jungle, he tried to track down the girl, even though he was not sure she was there. He strode threw the thick vegetation of leaves, boots trudging through soft brown debri. He passed a glorious waterfall.

...He supposed one could...

He found the girl casually sitting on a fallen tree, as though she was just waiting for him, and her fingers brushed through her golden hair. And finally, she began to sing again, that heavenly voice replacing the dead air with song and life.

He walked up to her, his cloaking device still engaged, and asked, "Kizz?"

The smile that erupted on her face made his heart skip a beat.

~To télos~ (Greek for "The end")