At Olivia's house, Nikita set her down on her bed, and she fell asleep within moments. He was surprised. It was like she'd repressed all the fear, or any temptation to scream and run, only to exhaust her mind. He stared at her for a while, content with knowing she knew everything about him now, and she always would. She was the one person he could be truly honest with.

He then went to her kitchen. There had to be some sort of comfort food in here… He searched every cupboard, dug through every drawer, but found nothing he could even consider as human comfort food. In the end all he had was a couple packets of tea leaves and a few graham crackers. That would have to do. He pulled out the kettle and put the crackers on a plate. As he boiled the water, Nick hopped up onto the counter and waited.

He must have fazed out, because Olivia's voice startled him.

She was standing in the doorway, her beautiful green eyes wide with shock.
"Nikita?!" she said, surprised. "Why… why are you in my house?"

Nick furrowed his brow. Great, now she was delirious. Maybe he shouldn't have told her…
"I walked you home, but you fell asleep. So I put you in bed…" he slid off the counter and approached her slowly.

Olivia relaxed her posture a bit. "I thought that was all a dream…" she mumbled.

Nikita laughed. "Nope." He grinned.

"And in the gym…?"

"That was real, too." He nodded, taking in her expression. It didn't seem to change; she just seemed a bit out of it, thinking it was a dream. Not at all afraid…

"So you're….?" She didn't finish her sentence, a bit afraid of saying the word.

Nikita nodded, knowing exactly what she wanted to ask. "Yes, I am."

"Hm." was all she said, sitting down.

Nikita watched her for a moment, then heard the kettle whistling. Quickly, so fast Olivia barely had time to recognize what it was he was doing, he poured the hot water into a mug and stuck a tea bag inside. He stirred it a bit then let it soak. Once the flavor of the leaves was all throughout the water, he handed her the mug and then the plate of graham crackers.

"Oh, thank you." Olivia smiled. She nibbled on the end of one cracker.

Nick sat down next to her.
"You said you had questions…" he reminded her.

The girl's head snapped up and she nodded enthusiastically. "Right." She remembered, and then they bubbled in her throat all over again. But she controlled her questionings this time.

Nikita chuckled under his breath. "Slowly, Olivia. Don't rush. We've got all the time you need."

She looked at him, grateful he was so patient, and nodded with a smile. "Okay…. The sunlight thing… you said you went to London to avoid the sun… what happens to you in the sun?"

Nikita chose his words carefully. He wouldn't shield her from the truth by lying or sugar coating it, but he wouldn't say it flat out again like he had in the gym. If he wasn't careful, he might say the wrong thing and she could get hurt…

"In the sun, we don't get hurt. But we become much more…obvious."

"How so?" she was excruciatingly curious.

"Well, it's hard to explain…" he glanced out the window. The sun was already setting. "I could show you tomorrow morning. Only for a small while, I can't risk anyone else seeing."

"Tomorrow." Olivia agreed. "Now… I know all my questions are probably going to sound juvenile and silly."

"Probably." Nikita agreed with a laugh.

"But I guess I should ask them anyhow." She took a deep breath, followed by a long sip of tea. "Sleeping in coffins?"

"Nah. We don't sleep at all, actually."

"Not at all?"

"No."

"Hm… well, then, continuing on, can you turn into a bat?"

Nikita roared with laughter. "No, definitely not." He said when he'd regained himself.

Olivia blushed at his reply to her question, feeling stupid, but continued. "Fangs?"

Nick smiled widely. "Can you see any?"

"No."

"There's your answer."

Olivia finished off a graham cracker, and sipped her tea again. She didn't ask any other questions, so Nikita filled in the silence. He rested his chin on the table and looked up at her.

"Olivia?"

"Yes?" she answered quietly into her mug.

"Did you mean it when you said you wanted me to stay?"

"Of course." She looked up, worried.

"And you don't mind that I'm dragging you into this secret, damned world of mine, only to damn you myself?"

"You said it was my choice. I don't really care, to be honest…." She trailed off.

Nikita scoffed. "Don't care…" he muttered.

"Yes, I don't care." She stared at him blankly.

He smiled. This was just a plus, the way she could still look at him as if he were indeed human. However, he changed the subject.
"Do you live on your own?"

"No… well, yes, but no. My mother kind of lives here, too."

"Kind of?"

"I don't really know anymore. She says she works downtown, and has to stay late a lot of the time. So, instead of wasting money and gas to drive all the way back here just to sleep, she claims she stays at a nearby motel or something. That's all she's ever told me. The last time she was home was… September, I think. She comes by to pay all the bills then leaves again. So I'm pretty much on my own." She shrugged, and then sighed.

Nick's eyes narrowed. September? It was already the first week of November! She hadn't been home fore two months? Leaving her daughter alone, to fend for herself? That's horrible! It was inexcusable! Nick, internally, was fuming. What a selfish person… Oh, if Nick could have a few words with her…

He kept these questions and remarks to himself, not wanting to be rude. He figured if she wanted to talk about it, she would.

"What about your father?" he asked carefully.

Olivia looked up, and answered by simply shaking her head, then went back to staring at her tea. Nikita nodded, understanding completely.

Olivia's father had never been around. Ever. Not for her birth, not for her birthdays… nothing. She'd never heard from him, and didn't even know his name. After doing some digging in her mother's room, around the time when Olivia was nine or ten, she'd found a letter from someone.
It had read:

'Dearest Sharon,

I apologize, once more, for leaving you while you had been pregnant. During our last meeting in June, I felt horrible. You told me all about Olivia, our daughter, and how much she'd grown. You begged for me back… I declined. I'm sorry, but I can't come into your life. I already have my own wife and kids… It would only mess everything up. You do know I love you, and I love Olivia, although I've never even met her.
But now, you said that because of the stress of your job, you were getting into substances. Certain substances that frighten me to no end. You have to stop, for me and for the sake of your child! I won't ask you again, and I promise this is the last letter I will write.

Sincerely,'

And then there had been a signature too complicated to decipher the name written. From the date written on the letter, Liv guessed the letter had been written around when she was five or six,
At the time, she had no idea what the 'substances' were, but now she understood completely. She was just in denial.

Olivia bit her lower lip, feeling it tremble. Admitting these things to anyone had always been difficult, even if she hadn't fully admitted it. She closed her eyes, feeling the moisture building up. Nikita frowned and opened his arms to comfort her.
Olivia shook her head. She preferred being alone when she cried, but this time, she was surprised she wasn't running off to her room the way she usually did.

Nick sighed, and suddenly Liv found herself in his arms, cradled against his chest. She sobbed into his shirt while he rubbed her back and tried to soothe her. Although this might have seemed like an intimate situation to any other, to Nikita it felt like he was soothing his baby sister, or his best friend. And to Olivia it felt the same, like her overprotective big brother was trying to make her feel better or her best friend was begging her to stop crying.

Olivia looked up at him finally, her eyes red and sore and puffy, her cheeks wet and stained. "I don't think she's coming back…" she mumbled, and the tears continued. She muffled them by burying her face into his stone shoulder.

Nikita understood what she meant. He glanced at the stack of envelopes on one of the chairs. The bills that Olivia's mother still needed to pay. If she didn't come home to take care of them, Olivia would end up rid of her home, or in a shelter or forced to live with a new family, a foster family… Seems he'd found her just in time. He hated for anything horrible to happen to her, and so he would protect her from everything. Including her mother's…. absence.

"Shh…" was all he could say at the moment as she cried, her tears soaking into his shirt.