She had fallen asleep; or rather she had fallen into a dreamlike trance where nothing that was happening right now never happened at all. She was like that for a while, until she heard Cathigans shouting commands and the sound of guns being fired. Thumps of bodies, or what she expected to be bodies but she didn't know whose, echoed through the walls, until a sudden strange silence ceased all form of sound. The girl pulled her legs in closer to her chest and rested her chin on her knees. What went on out there? Was someone trying to save her? That seemed unlikely, but it was a good enough hope to be clinging to. Whatever happened, it seemed to be over now…
The thought immediately disappeared from existence in her mind as the entrance across the room abruptly opened and she heard one last gunshot before she saw anything at all. One solitary being, dressed in what she thought was some sort of a familiar uniform, rushed in. The face was hidden from her sight by a helmet with a dark window, hiding the identity and race of the stranger. It scared her even more than she was before, feeling as though she was going to be captured once again, so when the stranger wrapped an arm around her small waist she let out a little yelp of protest and probably would have kicked him or her, if it even had a gender, if she wasn't lifted and raced out the door.
Once in the hallway, the girl observed the scene as soon as she could, counting five Cathigan bodies lying dead on the floor or against the wall, and saw a life form belonging to what she guessed was the same species as the Carrier, waving a hand furiously as if to say "hurry". She guessed this one was a female, since the body shape seemed similar to the females she had seen in the city. The girl's body jerked as the Carrier ran towards the door, practically diving through it with the Female only moments before it shut, hiding the corpses until they were later discovered. The two unknowns stared at each other, just stared but didn't speak. If they did, then the girl very well couldn't hear them. And since she had been taught to take opportunities when presented to her, she simply took this promising one. A bony elbow to the ribs and a sharp cry of pain as a reaction of a face pressing uncomfortably against the cold floor and it was over in an instant. It hurt, a lot.
She rose to her knees and rubbed her delicate nose, where unfortunately most of the shock was absorbed. Twisting her neck to look behind her shoulder, she watched the female whack the Carrier's helmet harshly while the Carrier held the injured part, courtesy of the girl. The female took a step towards her and held out a hand, and the girl suddenly remembered that she should be running for her life instead of just sitting here. She jumped to her feet and stumbled a few inches before the female put a hand on her shoulder and held her firmly in place.
"Hold your horses, miss." The girl paused. The female spoke in the human tongue. Somewhat startled, she glanced at the stranger out of the corner of her eye warily. "Sorry we startled you," the female laughed. "To put it bluntly, we're here to rescue you." The girl just looked intently at the other for a moment, then shook her head slowly at first but quickening the pace drastically.
"No, no, I do not believe you. You are probably some alien in disguise, a Cathigan pretending to be human and using a translator to speak to me!" The female sighed softly. Releasing her shoulder, the female motioned for the girl to stay put, and the girl willingly obeyed, eyeing the gun strapped around the waist. The female laid her hands on the helmet and pulled sharply up, releasing the head from its hold. The female pushed back her hair and smiled at the girl, kneeling on the ground at the girl's eye level and laid her helmet on the ground.
"See, I'm human. My name happens to be Naomi León." The girl blinked and took in the female's features. She was relatively pale, almost as if she was never in the sun for long periods of time. Her eyes were the dark polished wood of her father's favorite library chair, a deep brown. Her hair was cropped short in layers, the bangs grown out and positioned on both sides of her face hanging down to the end of her chin, held in place with silver, gleaming pins. The rest of her hair rose higher, kind of like stairs, circling to the back of her head, shining black like a raven's feather. The size of her face was neither large nor small, as was her mouth fitting nicely under her round nose. She was thin, but not as thin as those women she had seen on some pictures in her uncle's personal belongings, who looked as though they starved themselves to near death. This Naomi person clearly seemed fit and quite healthy.
Naomi pointed at the other, the Carrier, behind her, massaging the injured side. "So, if I'm human, that means that the idiot over there is one too, I'm sorry to say. We should just hand him over to the Cats and have them get rid of him for us." Naomi laughed as the girl gazed at her with a horrified stare. "I'm only kidding, miss." The Carrier turned in their direction and just looked, making the girl wonder if "he" was trying to speak again. Naomi rolled her eyes. "You don't have the audio speaker on, stupid. Just take off the helmet like I did and make our lives easier, Trinity." As commanded, the Carrier, or "Trinity" as Naomi had mentioned, removed the helmet and tucked it under his arm versus lying on the floor like Naomi did.
"Thank you for actually using my name for once. I do like to keep just one." Trinity glared at Naomi while she shrugged and looked away. He blew a strand of hair from his face and smiled crookedly at the girl, an apologetic gleam in his leafy-green eyes. "As this rude and rather irritating hippo mentioned, my name's Trinity, miss. Sorry for dropping you." He bowed slightly, the unruly hair's color reminding her of the oak stairs back home, though the tiniest darker than the wood. She thought it fit his emerald gaze. His skin tone was tanner than Naomi's, suggesting he spent more time under the sun than his partner did, even though it still wasn't as tan as some of the workers she had seen in the industrial section of the city. She could tell he was strong and his muscles were firm but he was still lean unlike the pictures and actual people she had seen with obviously large muscles and very stocky build that her father had called "body-builders". He was a little over half of the girl's height and about 3-4 inches taller than Naomi. He smiled a nice crooked smile, and at the moment seemed a bit embarrassed. Perhaps it was for dropping her.
"Who's the hippo?!!" Naomi protested loudly, leaping to her feet and advancing towards Trinity. He backed up a few steps and plugged his ears with his fingers, trying his best to ignore her. "And just when you got on my case for calling you more than one name, you clumsy idiot. Besides, YOU'RE the one with a funky name! Not to mention you dropped the Miss, and you trip over your own feet at the most ridiculous times!" The girl raised a hand timidly.
"Excuse me…" She whispered.
"My name was not under my control, it was my mother's doing. I at least said sorry to her...and I'm not that…Ah." Trinity had turned sharply to argue but lost his footing and fell flat on his back on the hard floor. "Ow."
Naomi laughed. "See what I mean?"
"You just said pick her up, run, and make it fast. That's what I did. How was I supposed to know she'd act hostile?"
"Excuse me." The girl tried again, but the words were lost.
"The way you handled it, anyone would! Be gentler! Don't place the blame on the kid…I mean the miss." Trinity opened his mouth to reply, but was interrupted when the girl cleared her throat noisily. They both turned their attention towards her, making the girl shuffle her feet a bit. She tugged her blue, knitted hat and ran her fingers through her blonde hair shyly.
"Um…you two…you don't have to call me 'miss' all the time." Trinity stood and pulled on his ruffled sleeves, glancing at Naomi while she did the same, and then shifted their amused gaze back to the girl.
"Well," Trinity started.
"We don't have anything else to call you." Naomi finished for him. The girl's own eyes pierced theirs before she hesitantly replied.
"Vivi. My name is Vivi Kelchane."
"Alright, Miss Vivi…"
"Just Vivi, please. I get uncomfortable with the 'miss' added on." They both nodded and were about to reply when footsteps resounded off the walls. Naomi cursed and bent down in front of Vivi, indicating for her to climb on her back. Vivi did so, and when they both rose, Trinity had drawn his gun and shot.
Cathigan soldiers filled the corridor Trinity and Naomi had used to get to this spot, and chances of fighting and winning where probably fifty to one with the odds stacked against them. The leading Cat was the most threatening, most intimidating of the bunch. The Cat stopped and raised his hand, palm facing outwards in the path of the bullet, and stopped it in mid-air. The bullet just floated there under the startled glares of the two human soldiers. Then for a short moment a small amount of air pressure was added and the bullet reversed its direction and headed towards the one that fired it in the first place. Trinity gritted his teeth and jumped to one side, luckily unharmed. But a glance at the helmet under his arm told him that it was an uncomfortably close miss. The bulletproof visor was completely shattered and a hole in the back was unbelievably larger than it's normally supposed to be.
Trinity dropped the helmet on the ground, slowly creeping closer to Naomi's side. "I'm lucky that helmet wasn't my head."
"Perhaps you won't think that way when we tell headquarters we got another instrument damaged and left behind." Naomi replied, reaching into her chest pocket and taking out a small box looking thing with a pin attached to a side. "You know what to do." Trinity nodded and Naomi grabbed the pin with her teeth and pulled it out, throwing the box on the floor in front of them and spitting the pin in between the two helmets on the ground. Black smoke rapidly emitted from the opening where the pin used to be, the bodies of the three disappearing before the Cathigans' eyes. Trinity and Naomi ran, and when they were a certain distance away, Trinity fired a bullet at the pin and hit the mark, the pin exploding as a result and demolishing the helmets.
(A.N. We shall refer Anger of the Feared Hungar as the Cathigan officers would refer to him: Hungar. I have decided to take pity on my fingers.)
Hungar had waited long enough for his subordinate's report and had left his room, gathering ten or fifteen soldiers, planning to execute his subordinate right when we found him. As the god Hungar's will had it, the Cathigan's corpse was found lying in front of the main building's main doors. If the smell of Alterians wasn't completely surrounding the body, Hungar would have just been satisfied that he had been struck down by the god himself, but the fury that this worthless garbage allowed Alterians to overpower him and infest hiscommand overpowered him. His building was now contaminated with dirty Alterians because of this creature's worthlessness. It disgusted him completely. This would not go unpunished. The Alterians would pay for soiling his ground.
Hungar went directly to the room where the captive was being held only to find that the Alterians had already freed the young one, which meant that the weaklings behind the closed door were dead as well. Alterians were vicious beings even if they were frail. One immediately fired at him, and Hungar effortlessly stopped the pathetic, small weapon with one hand and sent it back. He growled disappointedly when it missed the jumpy Alterian. That one communicated with the one carrying the captive on its back, and the next thing that happened was the black smoke that blocked them from his sight and a small explosion sounding from somewhere within.
The Alterians were gone by the time the smoke dispersed, and the ridiculous head shields they had were completely annihilated. If Alterians were anything but vicious, they were resourceful when the time came. They would become valuable slaves. Raising a hand, he signaled a soldier to come forward. "Inform the troops to block any escape from this building. Lead them to the throne room." The soldier bowed and rushed to follow the order. Hungar motioned the rest of them to follow him as he walked in a different direction. "Accompany me to the throne room. He shall kill the Alterians there."