I must have looked shocked because Jared looks at me confusedly. My heart is pounding and my hands clench into fists. They were probably looking for a way to do this to us all along. I have no idea how I didn't see it! Angel and I are going to die now. I let out a hiss without thinking about it.

"Are you okay?" Jared asks me.

"Were you planning to do this the entire time? Is this why we were brought here." I snap at him, and listen to Angel hiss.

"No!" Wanda answers before Jared can, looking shocked. "I wouldn't let them do that to you."

I feel a strange pang of pleasure when she said them. She doesn't lump herself in with the rest of them. I don't see why that makes me feel so good, she's been with them for I don't even know how long.

"Are you positive of that?" I hear Angel ask venomously.

"Of course. I'd never let them hurt one of my own." Wanda answers defensively, tensed up now.

I can relax. "Sorry."

Jared snorts. "I figured we'd get this kind of reaction. Don't worry about it."

I'm feeling awkward again so I take a giant gulp of my energy drink, shame suddenly bursting through my system. I did what Angel always does, and I have assumed that the humans are cold blooded killers. I shake the feeling off, annoyed with myself.

Jared looks at Melanie. "Do you want to be there when they attempt the procedure?"

Wanda gets flustered. "They're going to attempt it on the new soul?"

Jared looks at Wanda and blinks. "Is that bad?"

Wanda glares at him. "Of course it is! Why can't you just get the information and try it on someone else! Not on the one who may have the information." Wanda stomps out of the room.

I look at Jared, then hurry after Wanda. She glances over her shoulder at me, but doesn't stop walking. There is a stiff, angry set to her shoulders as she walks and when we come to the main dining hall thing, I stop in the corridor entrance. Wanda just gently grabs my arm.

"You'd have to come out eventually." She says and pulls me out.

There is a crowd of people, but when they see us, they fall silent and shuffle off to the sides, their faces flushed with embarrassment. Wanda suddenly hisses under her breath and hurries forward, releasing my arm. I stay with her to see what's going on.

There's a young male sitting on the ground, looking dazed. His eyes have the silver in them, although I am already expecting to see that, but the joy shoots through me anyways. I feel my face begin to heat up and I stare at the ground, away from the disoriented soul sitting on the ground at Kyle's feet. Wanda hisses angrily and I turn back around to see why.

The poor frightened soul is covered in bruises and trembling. He has his arms wrapped around his knees and he keeps looking around, as if something is going to jump out and attack him. I notice Wanda is glaring at Kyle.

"Did you hurt him?" She snaps, pointing at the soul.

"He wouldn't come willingly when he said what he said. So I had to get a little rough." Kyle snaps back.

"That isn't a reason to hurt him." She growls. "You use the pills to knock him out. Not beat him up. Look, he's terrified because of you Kyle!"

Kyle recoils and holds up his hands defensively. "Hey, he attacked me too. You can't put the blame on me."

"That's because he was defending himself!"

Kyle rolls his eyes. "Whatever. You can take care of him. Doc wants to do the procedure that this thing told him about, but it's up to you and Jeb and Jared..and Ian, wherever he is." With that Kyle stalked off, his hands curled into angry fists.

Wanda kneels down in front of the frightened soul. "What's your name?"

"I go by Lance. That's my host's name. My actually name is really long and doesn't shorten well." He says in a whisper.

From what I can see of Lance, he's tall, a good build, but he doesn't have much compared to Kyle, and he's got tan skin like he's been in the sun a lot. His hair is jet black and short, with dark brown eyes, square jaw and a nose that's similar to most I see on humans. He's shaking badly, probably because he's always been terrified of humans, exactly how Angel is.

"Here, come with me. I know this is scary, but you have some explaining to do about the non-resistant humans thing." Wanda says.

"I don't know anything. I heard it from a guy and then I was telling my friends about it. Then I got jumped." Lance says fearfully.

"You didn't hear much?" Wanda asks as she helps him stand and we begin to leave the room.

"No, just enough that I told my friends and I was going to let the Seekers know but then…" He trails off with a shudder.

Wanda flinches at the word Seeker. "You can't leave here now. You'll get everyone here killed and Moonbeam and I will both be shipped to another world."

Lance looks at me but I look away from him. I don't want to be involved in this conversation. I drift a little behind, so Lance can't really look at me, and I keep my eyes fixed on Wanda's back.

"So I'm stuck here? What if I didn't plan to settle on earth?" He asks, sounding upset.

"There's nothing that can be done now. Kyle brought you here-that dumb brute- and you can't leave without endangering the rest of us." She says.

"But they're all humans." He hisses.

"Don't tell me you want to tell the Seekers?" Wanda snaps. "If you do I'll have no choice but to hand you over to Doc."

I shudder at the sound of that. She makes it sound extremely unpleasant. But, judging by the tone of her voice, that's probably how she's trying to convince him it's better to stay in the caves.

"I can't stay in a hive of humans."

"You don't have a choice. Anyways I doubt you could find your way out if Kyle blindfolded you."

"He did."

"Oh, good. He did one thing right." The tension in the air dissipates.

Lance lapses into silence, but I can tell he's unhappy by the stiff set of his shoulders, his hands clenched into fists. I wonder why he fought back. If Kyle had attacked Angel and I, we wouldn't have defended ourselves. It's not in our nature to turn to violence. So why did Lance? That's a little troubling.

I shake that off and keep walking, wondering how Angel will react seeing another soul here. I don't know. We make it to the other room, where Melanie and Angel are still monitoring the bread and Jared's leaning on the counter chatting away at them. I continue trailing behind silently, not sure what to say. Then I see another person is with Jared. Clearly that is Ian.

Jared looks over at us and raises an eyebrow. "Why did you bring him here?"

Wanda looks tired. "Can you grab Jeb Ian?"

Ian nods. "Of course." He disappears down a hallway opposite from the one we came from.

"Apparently the information he has is very little, and it's probably just a stupid rumor some idiot decided to spread in the community." Wanda says to Jared.

His shoulders sag. "I figured that was the case."

"I don't want to put him through anything with Doc, but he doesn't want to stay here."

"I wanna go home." Lance suddenly grumbles.

Jared gets in Lance's face. "I'm sorry that idiot brought you here for something that you don't know could be real. But now you can't leave. You'll expose us all if you do. I wish I could change that, and I can't. That's just how things are around here. Deal with it." He returns to the counter, and leans on it again. He looks annoyed and starts talking to Melanie again.

Lance turns on Wanda. "How long have you been here?"

"A long time now, and I have no desire to leave. Trust me, you will adjust to living here." Wanda tells him, trying to remain calm.

"But it's an underground hidey hole! How am I supposed to get used to this? Especially living with them!" Lance jabs his finger in Jared's direction.

"You need to calm down. We'll have to lock you up if you don't." Wanda's voice is flat.

I notice that Angel is completely ignoring the situation, staying in a conversation with Melanie and Jared. That's probably best at this point. I'm beginning to wonder if I need to be in this one that appears to be turning into some kind of argument. I quickly move away from the argument, and move to stand by Jared.

He looks at me. "Couldn't handle anymore?"

I shake my head. "All this arguing is weird. I've never seen this happen between two of my kind."

Jared snorts. "Wanda has been here long enough that she's human in that sense. And I don't know the deal with that…annoying twit."

I shrug. "Probably scared."

I realize my awkwardness around humans is already beginning to go away. I'm glad; feeling that way only makes things worse when we've already got that nasty, angry, frightened soul here.

"Maybe. But he seems eager to escape. Like he'd turn us all in." Jared sighs, crossing his arms.

"I'm pretty sure you'd be the same way too, if you were the one who got jumped by Kyle." Melanie states.

Jared laughs. "Yeah, you've got a point. But what about the turning us in thing?"

"It's probably the only thing he knows to do." I say. "But he doesn't understand the settling thing. This may be his first life, so being forced to settle won't sit well with him. That may explain his…aggression."

"Which life is this for you?" Jared asks, changing the subject.

"My fourth. I nearly settled on Song World. But I hated being blind." I sigh. "I just miss the wonderful…melody of it all."

"So you're even younger than Wanda is." Jared says and then looks at Angel. "What about you?"

She is quiet when she answers. "This is my first."

I look at her surprised. "This is your first? And you chose earth first?"

She nods. "I've been here for about ten years now. I was going to go to Song World next but…" She shrugs.

Jared looks stunned and struck speechless. We make eye contact and his expression of surprise reflects mine. This is news to me. I never thought someone would want to be on earth for their first life, at all. I had been offered that but I'd shuddered away from the thought and went elsewhere instead. Angel is a brave soul for willing to endure these unbearable emotions for the first life.

I notice Wanda and Lance have suddenly gone quiet. Then I realize Ian has come back with Jeb, and Jeb looks frustrated, so he must know what's going on…ish. Who knows. Jeb continues over to the others, but Ian joins us, and it's clear on his face that he doesn't want to be involved in the other conversation.

"So you came from Song World?" Jared says, breaking the tense silence.

I nod. "Yeah, and like I said, I was very close to settling. When I was preparing to, I was informed of earth, and it changed my decision." I catch the regret in my tone.

"Do you wish you could go back?" He says slowly.

"Maybe. I would miss the sight though." I laugh.

"Makes sense. I wouldn't want to go blind after having sight." Ian says.

I nod, then sigh and look over at Wanda and Lance. Lance looks absolutely terrified by the sight of Jeb, and his entire body is tensed like he's going to run. Wanda has a hand on his elbow, he's too tall for her to reach his shoulder, and is watching his face. I can tell from where we are he's quaking like a leaf.

Then he suddenly makes eye contact with me and mouths Help me.