Authors Note: Please excuse any grammer errors in this chapter, I wrote these up late at night so there miight be a few. But please enjoy.

And I do not own the concept of Erasers, theyt are the work of James patterson, everything else is my own original work. Letting the legal disclaimers know.

Chapter 41

We walked back to the camp at a slow leisurely pace, you know the one where you walk, but you want to take as much time to get where you're going while still walking properly. I would have put my arm around her shoulders, but that would have been awkward, what with the wings and all. It would have been the same with the waist, so I had to settle with just placing her hand in mine. She laid her head on my shoulder as we wandered through the trees back towards our camp.

"When was the first time you had feelings for me?" Laura asked.

"The first time I met you," I replied, "I felt physically attracted to you, you took my breath away. But the more I got to know you, the more I realized that my feelings for you went beyond just mere physical attraction. I had fallen for you, fallen in love with you."

"First time I saw you," Laura replied, "My heart skipped a beat, I was taken back by your blue eyes, and when you showed me the true color, I was fascinated by it. But it's what has happened recently that has made my feelings for you grow stronger. Through this entire ordeal, you have never gone into a rage or a depression, never lost your cool, but you did cry. Crying is normal, it's human and I could relate to that, but you always put others head of yourself, always put our safety ahead of yours. You were willing to be recaptured or killed to let us have a chance?"

"Well," I replied, "I decided if I got re-captured, I could just hatch another plan to escape. They can't keep me holed up for long. I was smart before I changed; now I'm smarter. If they killed me… well at least I wouldn't be around to endure any more, but the only thing that stopped me from letting myself be killed to give you guys a major advantage was because I didn't want to leave you behind."

"Courageous and honest," Laura replied, "an interesting combination. Can't say you see that much in guys now days. Most are liars and cheats. I suppose you were a real charmer with the girls in your old life?"

"Yeah," I said, "I sometimes wished they would leave me alone. Well I got my wish, just a bit done over the top. But hey, I can't complain, I'm here with you aren't I?"

"Alright you can quit the flattering comments now," Laura replied, "How are we going to break this to Dean?"

"You knew Dean liked you all along?" I asked, "Man that's cruel. You liked me, yet you lead him along? Remind me never to get on your dark side. I'm afraid of what I might find."

"Very funny," Laura replied sarcastically, "Well I was unsure of how you felt and I didn't know how to let Dean down. He's a nice guy but…"

"He's a bit forward?" I asked, finishing her sentence.

"Got it in one," Laura replied, "But I have a suspicion it was you who let him sleep on the bed at the motel. Did you do that deliberately?"

"Maybe," I replied, "That and I didn't trust my self on the same bed with you. I might have muttered something embarrassing in my sleep."

"I watched you sleep that night," Laura replied, "It was when I realized the true extent of my feelings for you. I just couldn't help but watch you. What?"

I shook my head as a smile crossed my face. To think all this time I was hiding the fact I kept watching her out of the corner of my eye, and she had been watching me in my sleep? Ok, maybe once, but why didn't I think of that. Too stalker like? Maybe.

"I was just remembering all the times I used to watch you out of the corner of my eyes," I replied, "You never noticed me watching you. Dean knew I liked you. Cass figured it out last night while I was gazing at you across the fire. In fact you were the last to know."

"Are you teasing me?" Laura asked, "Because if you are, that's just cruel. How was I supposed to know you watched me? Every time I looked at you, you were always looking the other way."

"Ding dong," I replied smartly, "Anyone home? Usually if a guy does that around someone, either they are busy, or they are deliberately not looking at you because they are afraid what might show in their eyes or on their faces."

Laura went to hit me at the comment I made, but I sucked her hand and stole a kiss before running off through the forest heading back to camp, Laura chasing after me, promising to get me back for that comment. I stopped so suddenly Laura collided with me.

"What is it?" Laura whispered softly.

"People," I replied, "At our camp. I'll see if I can get a look."

I spread my consciousness into the darkness around me and focused it towards our camp. It reached the edges and I could see into the clearing. Three guys with guns were standing around the fire. One was cradling a burnt arm, another was cradling his head as if he had just had it stuck in a vice and it threatened to crack. I saw Dean and Cass tied up over by the opposite side of the clearing, they were unconscious…

Chapter 42

"That darn witch," I heard one of the poachers say, "She burnt my arm real bad. I want to kill her for that. She'll pay for it, one way or another."

"You think your arms bad?" The poacher holding his head said, "My head felt like it was going to crack right in half. That strange guy, the little prick, was messing around in my head. I'll beat him to within an inch of his life for that."

"You won't lay a single finger on them," The third poacher said, "Do you know how much people will pay for freaks like them? It would be in the millions or perhaps another couple of zeros onto the end of that. So we leave them unharmed and see how much we can get for them."

There were grumbles and a few complaints by the other two, but in the end they agreed after the leader threatened to not give them any of the money. I wasn't going to let that happen. I may not trust Cass that much, but she's still one of us, and these guys weren't whitecoats, they were humans, normal unsuspecting humans. They can't know we exist, no-one can know we exist. I returned to myself, the darkness blending back to where it was summoned from and I turned to Laura.

"Three humans," I replied, "Poachers by the looks. They're sitting around the campfire. Laura and Dean are tied up on the far side of the clearing. We can slip around and cut their bindings, free them. Then we take out the poachers; make sure they can't track us down again."

"Are you suggesting that once we free Dean and Cass, we kill the poachers?" Laura asked, "You're colder hearted than I thought."

"What? And you though I was a bleeding heart?" I retorted, "I'm not that soft. I do what I have to, to keep you all alive. Even if that means making sure a few poachers don't follow our butts half way across the world because we might be worth a few million dollars to them, understand?"

Laura went silent and I felt like apologizing to her, but I didn't. We could kiss and make up later but right now I was worrying about making sure all of us survived this. I was not going to let some poachers sell us off to some circus as freaks and I certainly was not going to let them hunt us all around the place because we might be worth a small king's ransom in money. If Laura wanted to complain about it, that was fine, but I was not going to let anyone, especially her wind up in a cage again.

"If you can't handle it," I said after a while, "then free Dean and Cass, I'll take care of them. I am not letting anyone go back into cages. I know people like them. Poachers they are known as. They find something that gets them money, and a lot of it, they won't stop until they get it. They only want money, they don't care who or what they are hunting."

"Let's just do it," Laura replied, "We'll discuss this later."

"One last thing," I replied, "Everyone has flaws, even you. But that's what I like about you, you're not perfect. I hate people who pretend to be perfect. If you don't like the fact I can kill someone, think again. I don't like killing people, I have never killed anyone before, but I care for those around me, that's my flaw. I'd do anything to protect them, unless I have reason not to; just know that before you judge me. I'll ask you at the end of the day if you still want to be with me."

I didn't wait for Laura to respond to that and walked of through the bushes, the shadow panther walking out of the shadows along side me. I approached the clearing where we had made camp and listened to the poachers talk amongst themselves until I had managed to pinpoint their locations in the clearing. Laura moved past me and further around the clearing until she was near Dean and Cass. I waited a few minutes, then heard the poachers start yelling and cursing. I moved into the clearing as I saw them try to grab Laura.

It was as if something snapped in us both at the same time. I let the panther loose of my control and it attacked the first Poacher that headed my way. Laura went into defensive mode and broke the arm of the guy that tried to grab her. The third went for me, swinging his gun butt around at my head. I ducked under it and came up ramming my fist hard into his chest, hearing a few ribs crack and sending him sprawling on his back.

The panther was mauling the first poacher, claws slashing away at clothing. The guy let out a scream as the panther bit down hard on the burnt arm, for a split second I had the sensation of deep fried chicken in my mouth, then it was gone. The second poacher had tried to attack Laura again, this time he had grabbed her from behind as she was trying to free Dean and Cass. I watched thunderstruck as she reached up behind his neck and threw him over her shoulder, twisting his neck as she did so until I heard the crack as the bone broke.

I turned back to the third poacher as he lunged at me, aiming for the gun in my hands that I had taken from him. I reacted instantly, lifting the gun up and pointing it at his head, a moment later there was a loud crack as the gun went of and the guy fell back on the ground, blood seeping through his shirt where the bullet had pierced his heart. I dropped the gun and began to back away from the body, not believing what had happened. Killing people in video games is a lot different to real life killing. The shock at seeing the life leave someone's eyes, knowing you did it, that will haunt you for the rest of your lives.

I looked over at the panther to find it had disappeared back into the shadows, leaving the first poacher dead in the middle of the clearing. I took one look at the mutilated body and ended up vomiting in the bushes at the edge of the clearing. I couldn't, no wouldn't describe what was left of it. After I had finished upchucking my dinner from last night I went back to the clearing, feeling numb and disconnected from everything. Cass had taken care of the bodies, burning them so that no traces remained. I sat down on the ground near my bag, Laura came a joined me.

"I can handle the fact you want to protect us," Laura said, "but I didn't want this happening to you. I knew what it was like, I can handle it. They made me like that, no emotion so I killed and killed without feeling the effects for what I did. I remember all that happened back then, but disconnected. Today when I killed him, I went back to being emotionless. I can kill and not feeling anything. Once you've killed for the first time, Nathan, it only gets easier. I didn't want this to happen to you, I wanted to do that, because I knew I could have saved you the pain, but I can see it's already to late for that."

I broke down in Laura arms, emotion filling me again and I cried. I felt disgust at myself, for being able to do such a thing, sorrow for the life I had ended. But most of all I felt pain at the loss of my old self. I had finally succeeded in killing that person off in this one deed. It was many hours before I was ready to do anything and by then it was dark. We all didn't feel like eating and I was too tired to eat. I fell asleep to Laura stroking my hair, taking comfort in her being there for me…