Warning- possible triggers.

The moment that Sin returned to the house carrying the girl, Ali- Rick could see why everyone had been so upset upon noticing her physical state. The poor girl was not only unconscious but her milky white skin had lost what little bit of the golden sun kissed hue that it once possessed hours ago. And in it's wake, made being able to see the mass of discolorations and bruises on her easier to take note of.

Her hair was no longer tied back, and there was dirt and leaves in it as well as a little bit of moss and some blades of wilted grass. Her clothing was rumbled and wrinkled, unlike it had been before when they had first met her. And there were some tears in the hip and leggings of her jeans.

But those bruises and discolorations...those were unmistakable and could only be caused by so many things. Especially the discoloration and bruising around her lips.

The rough condition that she was in was a clear indication of either rough handling/sex or sexual assault.

Watching the man walk by him with the girl, Rick wanted to move forward and open the door to the house for him, but upon hearing a sharp yell from Sin- calling out to the woman that had given him his physical and the really, really unpleasant shot in the arm- to prepare one of the rooms used for the infirmary as another one of the men opened the door for him.

Allowing him to disappear inside while someone went to calm a still raging Alex's temper while Jareth walked over and said, "We're going to hold a meeting about Hina's actions. As new member's of our group- it is within your right to attend. But I suggest leaving those with weak stomachs, and the women and children out of it. And before you ask why the women should stay out of the meeting, it's more for Ali's benefit. Especially since we need to talk as a group and maybe figure out how to handle the situation that we may soon find ourselves in."

Rick nodded his head in agreement and looked to the others.

Glen gulped and looked more than a tad bit nervous due to the somewhat ominous nature of Jareth's words. Shane looked as if he were ready to take on the world bare handed or something.

Making Rick begin to wonder if someone may have messed up his inoculation and switched it out for adrenaline. The man was fucking wired right now. Weirdly so.

Dale and Daryl both had slightly curious/solemn looks on the both of their faces as the younger man stared them all down as Rick agreed, that they did need to sit down and talk about what had just happened. He wanted to know if he should be worried about shit happening to the women in their group or not.

Or worse, to one or both of the kids.

"We'll be there." Rick said as he glanced around at the others.

"Alright, then you can meet us in the living room in ten minutes or so. We'll start talking then." Jareth said as Rick and the others nodded their heads before the man walked up the porch steps and then opened the front door and meandered inside and closed the door softly, but firmly behind him.

They were quiet enough in the few moments between his announcement and his departure that they could hear several people shouting inside of the house. Likely from the make shift infirmary.

And while catching the occasional glimmer of conversation in the hopes of knowing or at least figuring out what was going on- they could hear the others all arguing back and forth. Their voices carrying faintly.

"I can't believe that Hina-"

"I can."

"Both of you settle down now!"

"How is Ali?"

"Injured? How bad?"

"Not sure- Some tearing- will hurt a while. Need's rest..."

Rick blinked as the voices finally trailed off a little bit and internally sighed as he scrubbed his face with his hands and wondered briefly if this place and it's people were actually safe. But he quickly dismissed the idea that they weren't- at least for the time being since he wasn't totally appraised of the situation and what completely caused it.

Ten minutes passed fairly quickly, and after asking Lori and the others to go ahead and explore a little bit- and asking T-dog if he minded watching everyone just in case; something that the man readily agreed to with a hastily explained, "This ain't none of my business. If I need to know, one of you can fill me in later."

Lori, Carl, T-dog, Carol, Sophia and Andrea disappeared to go check out their new potential home while Rick, Glen, Dale, Shane and Daryl all quietly migrated into the house.

Into the living room where several of the foreigners were already sitting, waiting patiently for the others to show up and to start the talk. Rick and the others made themselves comfortable in the spare seats that had been carried into the room for them by someone.

Once everyone was finally there and either seated or standing in their respective places, Sin sighed and looked around for a moment before asking, "Is this everyone?"

"Yes I believe so. Rick? Everyone with you?" Jareth asked.

Rick nodded his head and muttered a soft sounding, "Yeah". And sat forward in his seat a little bit and rested his elbows on his knees and folded his fingers together as Sin then turned to the young woman that had checked everyone over earlier, Riha, was it?

He didn't exactly recall at that moment, but made a note to learn later on as Sin asked how Ali was doing. The woman replied automatically, almost robotically. As if the thought of what had happened to the girl weighed far too heavily on her mind and she wanted nothing more than to escape the thought of the girl's possible assault.

"She's going to be out for a while. I had to give her something for pain and to keep her asleep for a bit when she started to rouse a little bit. I-I didn't want her to freak out if- if..."

"You did well Riha, all things considered. I think Ali would appreciate the rest. What about her injuries? Are they bad?"

"No. There was some vaginal tearing detected, but that's not really consistent with- At least in my limited experience it isn't. Did Hina say anything Sin? Why he would do this to Ali of all people?"

"All he said was that he didn't force her. Alex attacking him as he did, made him clam up pretty damned fast. So I do not know or understand all of the many, many reasons that this has occurred. But I think that I do have an idea of the reason why. I'll have to verify them with Ali once she awakens though."

Sin said before then turning to Rick and the others and saying, "Many of us know that you're a little lost as far as this conversation goes. I and some of the others were hoping to give Ali a little bit more time to get to know you before we had to have this conversation. But unfortunately Hina has backed us into a corner here. So please, listen to what I have to say. And above all else- don't judge Ali for what happened to her. None of it was truly her fault."

"Okay. We're listening." Rick said almost anxiously after a few heartbeats of silence. Sin nodded and then started speaking again.

"We've been here pretty much since the beginning. Even then Ali was the one who united and lead us. Though she often tends to downplay her role in things. On one such occasion, not long after she became our official group leader and asked myself and Ren to co-lead and advise. She got fed up with us for arguing so often and wandered off or the property alone. Without telling anyone."

"We know now that she only meant to walk around for a bit and calm her nerves. Leading a group like ours isn't easy, you know. Even for a kid as intelligent as she. Anyways, she wandered off, and at some point ran across other survivors similar to yourself and decided to go and see if they needed help. She went in blind- probably because of her age at the time. You know how kids can be. Especially the young ones. They are so hopefully optimistic, and long to be of help. But even she will admit, now, that it was a dumb move. But she had only the best of intentions-"

Rick started to get a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach upon hearing this. He could only imagine what had happened. And none of it was a bit of good.

"When she approached them, and they realized that she was a girl, and possibly part of a group with a safe place- they took her... We didn't even know that she was missing for almost an entire day, and by that time, they had taken her miles from here and began...interrogating her about us."

"But Ali is strong, she always has been. So even after they beat her and broke a few of her bones and threatened to do worse, she merely thinned her lips and refused to speak."

That sinking feeling in the pit of Rick's stomach started to turn into a knot of anxiety, anger and rage the likes of which was threatening to send him off of the deep end.

"So it got worse. Much, much worse. They shaved her bald, cut her clothing from her body and mutilated parts of her chest in the process. But that wasn't enough for them. They wanted to break her. So they- they-" Sin stopped speaking for a moment when his voice started to shake and he felt as if he were going to break down and cry like he had so many times before.

"They raped her didn't they?" Rick asked in an almost growling tone. He couldn't help his anger at what Sin was trying to tell them, as someone who was a father of a young kid- the stuff, the truly bad and horrifying stuff- should never get anywhere close to a child.

Not Ali. Not Carl. Not even Sophia.

But Rick knew from years of experience as a cop that there were some truly sick people in the world. Sin looked at him for a moment before slowly nodding his head before Alex spoke up.

"There were fifteen of them that had branched off from a group of forty that was hanging around the area at the time looking for stuff and a safe place, and girls to make sport of. We went after her, but you must understand- it took us days to find her."

"When we finally found her, it was still day. And we had to wait... Myself, Alex, Ren and Masrur waited just beyond the camp, hid ourselves in the trees and were waiting for dark to fall so that we could take her back and deal with them... But after so many days of- She didn't even have much of a voice in which to scream anymore. And no strength left to fight. She was a mass of bruises, and dried, caked blood and still they were taking one after the other. The last one that had her, just as night started to fall- used a broken glass bottle on her- down there." Sin said, awkwardly indicating that the girl had been mutilated internally as well as externally.

Causing Rick's eyes with widen in horror before he turned his head to give the others a quick glance and check their reactions. Each of them were reacting about as expected. Save for Shane, apparently he was listening while in his mind's happy place.

It was probably the only thing keeping his normally hair trigger temper under control.

"We managed to get her away from them, to kill them for what they had done and bring her back here before she bled out. But it was a close thing. We had to keep her unconscious for about a week in a half with sleeping meds. And when she woke up- she was bed ridden for months just so that she could heal. She didn't want anyone near her. With the exception of several people in particular. Alex, Hina, and Jareth were among the only males that she trusted even a little bit."

"She didn't eat. Didn't really speak- She's always been quiet but now her silence is often deafening. There were even a few times after she was mobile again where if a man touched her- she'd attack them for fear that they were going to hurt her."

"She's been getting better in recent months. She's a bit more open, somewhat like she used to be. Her optimism about the way of things now has been damaged by what happened, but I don't think it was destroyed. I've had my suspicions about what she was doing since we've already taught her how to fight, but there was nothing to confirm things as of yet. At least not until earlier with Hina-" Sin said soberly as Rick asked,

"Did you take care of the people that took Ali? That hurt her?"

"We hunted down every one of the fuckers and skinned them alive." Alex said angrily.

"All of them? All forty?"

"Yes," Ren said quietly before then tacking on, "We could not take the risk that any of them might come upon us and take Ali again or one of the other girls for that matter. None of them would have survived a second encounter with those people."

"That's understandable." Rick said before then asking, "What do you think happened between your man, Hina and Ali? Do you think that he-" Rick was cut off by Jareth's quick,

"No. He claims that he didn't force her. And I for one believe him. I've known him since I was barely a few years younger than Ali herself, Hina is a lot of things. But he has a very kind and compassionate heart. If anything, Hina has probably been working with Ali on getting over her initial fear of men and touch. To do that, he probably had to train her body and mind to associate specific stimuli with pleasure. If that is so, then specific rules had to be agreed upon before the two even began their arrangement."

"How can you be sure that that is what happened? And wouldn't the state that she was in when she was brought back, be a bit much for such an arrangement?"

"Not necessarily. In our country, such arrangements are common for women or girls that have suffered through specific traumatic experiences. I myself, had been called on a time or two to help assault victims," Jareth said before going on to explain a little bit more, "It isn't entirely uncommon for the one helping the victim to inevitably get attached and seek to move things forward to prove that there is nothing to fear with the right partner. But there has to be a specific amount of trust between the two, and the rules laid out between them must be obeyed at all times."

"In other words, what Jareth is saying is- if Ali hadn't wanted to take things further- then Hina would have backed off." Ren said as Sin snorted before muttering.

"He wouldn't have just backed off, he would have put space between them so quickly that her head would have spun from how fast he moved."

"So...he isn't a danger to any of us?"

"No. We are just...concerned about the situation that may arise from this...event."

"What situation are you-" Rick started to ask when Glen chimed in,

"For god's sake Rick, how dense are you? They mean there is a strong possibility that Ali may get pregnant."