Trying to get Temperance back into the hospital a week after she'd left for the first time in eleven years was like dragging a cat to water. She grabbed for the doorframe when Cyclonus finally tucked her beneath his arms, paying the people who stared no mind whatsoever. Finally, after the third doorway, Temperance gave up and allowed the much stronger man to drag her down to Rung's office. She folded her arms as she watched the halls turn left and right in reverse, huffing indignantly.

Finally, arriving to the quaint side door through the garden now clear of snow and steaming with humidity, Temperance was allowed to stand on her own two feet. The pilot could see just how unnerved she was by being in the confines of the medical facility, but it was a necessary psychological check up to make sure that she was adjusting well.

"It will only be an hour. Do not leave his office until I'm outside."

"What will you do if I leave before you get here?" She asked, cock in her nerves. However, the sharp stare down Cyclonus' sharp nose whisked away that confidence in a second.

"I'll have to find your body floating in the Hudson." Somehow that didn't seem like a humorous threat, she thought to herself. He simply motioned to the door with his eyes, narrowing them to threatening slits. The young woman puffed frustrated, but defeated air as she turned around and walked through the heavy glass door. Before leaving the older man said a quiet prayer for the girl, shaking his head. Why me, he wondered.

Inside the office was a dim, overcast light that shone through the large window that joined at a corner with a wall of books in all sorts of languages. Temperance couldn't even begin to understand what they were about, only nervously sitting in a plush arm chair and pressing her hands into her lap. Her crystal blue eyes wandered, looking at diplomas and certificates hung neatly on the wall above more bookshelves and chairs. By all accounts it was your typical high end doctor's office.

Waiting for Rung to finish with his other patient in the droning silence of an obnoxiously loud grandfather clock Temperance closed her eyes. She listened to that heavy swing of the pendulum, each beat lulling her into a meditative state. Thoughts and memories flowed freely as if she were falling through them, body relaxing. It was a strange sensation, drifting in sound. The young woman felt the weight of her chest being pulled downward while her legs tensed to keep her upright. It was almost as if that once agitating beat had become peaceful.

In this trance state flickers of flashbulb memories faded in and out of focus beneath her eyelids. Two blurred faces, probably her parent's, smiled and vaguely scrambled voices called things out to her in tones rather than words. She felt her heart pump fast as memories of running came into focus. She was scared and her legs ached like they had when she first woke up. She was going to be late, but something else was wrong. The corners of her vision were blurring into black when her foot missed a jump, her voice shrieking as she fell down and the earth and her collided, the darkness thickening.

Consciousness felt like ephemeral gradients from color and light to heavy, opaque shadows. Rain, cold against her hot skin, soaked her and light washed over her, deep, concerned voices shouting and whispering overhead. A siren and concerned touches brushed over her as if she were lying beneath the surface of an iced over lake, just barely able to absorb sensory input. She heard a name being called and questions being asked, but none of it ever breached that icy layer of numbness.

"Temperance?"

The girl's lungs hitched as she sucked in air as if she hadn't breathed in hours. Her eyes frantically shot around as Rung took several steps back, hand pressing protectively on the chest of the departing patient. Temperance was trembling as she rubbed her stinging eyes, looking up and seeing Rung and a massively built man with steely blue hair. "Temperance, are you alright?" She nodded, her throat dry and tight and her heart pounding as if it had stopped entirely. It was as if she had broken through that ice and gasped violently for air and feeling, no longer submerged in that weighted darkness. However, Rung was still not convinced she was as fine as she agreed to being. He got down on a knee and placed a hand on her shoulder, mouthing a good bye to the large man nodding and ducking out of the office. "Do you know where you are right now?"

"Your office," she gasped, hand gripping her chest. "I'm in your office."

"Do you know what the date is?"

"June 29th, 2014," she nodded, grounding herself with facts.

"And what's your name?"

"Temperance Anabelle Gate."

Both of them sighed with relief as Rung stood to his full height—average, thank God. Deciding it would be best not to move her, Rung grabbed a chair and sat it a few feet from where the young woman sat and went to grab some session provisions from his actual office. He returned with some water, a pack of crackers to make sure her blood sugar was stable, and her file. She took them gratefully, munching on the crackers as she settled into the chair. Rung allowed the air to mellow out before he even touched the file. After seeing that Temperance was once again relaxed he commenced with the meeting.

Standard procedure Rung read the time, date, and session number aloud for both records and patient awareness. He explained that they would stop exactly at one hour and not a second before or after. She nodded in understanding, a lot less uneasy than she was when Cyclonus dragged her down the fire escape and across the street over his shoulder. At least now she wasn't being gawked at.

"How was your first week?" He asked, hands folded in his lap.

"Ah… well…" Telling him that she'd somehow bunked with a one hundred and twenty-six year old vampire who lived in a an apartment that was a glorious, premier-level forty-by-forty garden shed atop a ritzy building. There was no easy way to say that she'd so far been pampered, snapped at, hovered over, dressed like a doll, dragged from here to there, threatened, warned, and shaken all over the mere space of seven days. She could not tell him how she laid in bed at night with wide eyes scared of falling back into a coma and that each dream she had felt more like waking up in another life and never really sleeping at all. At no point could she explain the moments when the world seemed to stop and for just a moment Cyclonus was all that mattered. There was just too much to say. "It's been… eventful."

"Oh? I take it you've met the slew of Cyclonus' acquaintances," Rung smiled, a knowing twinkle flickering in his bright blue-green eyes behind those small, perfectly round glasses.

"Oh, haha. Rewonda took me shopping and I met some of her friends at a movie night back at her place. Then there was the mute bookshop owner and his oddly human-like pets, the word-vomiting barista, and finally the one-eyed stalker," she counted off with her fingers, nodding firmly with pursed lips.

"Ah, Whirl, yes," he said.

"I figured his name was bloody nosed punching bag, but sure, Whirl's nice, too. Why is it Whirl?"

"He's from the Middle East and his name is very long. After about the third racist joke he decided a more English moniker would invite fewer comments about his heritage."

"Well then… and the eye?"

"Let's work on you today, how about that?"

"You're a cheap asshole, you know that?" Rewonda puffed smoke from her slim cigarette. "Fifty… this is robbery."

"You stole the information. Do not tell me which the moral high ground is," Cyclonus said flatly, but he knew that his words would not bring the woman shame. She was good at what she did and proud of it. "Is this everything?"

"All ten files plus one bonus," she winked behind those blinking blue visor sun glasses. Without so much as a warning Cyclonus grabbed them off her face and chucked them into the water. Smoothly, accustomed to the action, she put yet another replacement pair onto her face. She wasn't stupid. All the footage was live uploaded to the cloud of information back on her mainframe.

"Bonus?" He cocked a sharp brow, looking down and flipping open the thick manila folder. Looking back at him with dull, unfamiliar eyes was Temperance, her usual light and life dulled in the photo. Her eyes were rimmed with shadows and her hair, usually neat and bright, was dingy and a mess. "What is this?"

"Her hand off records," Rewonda said as she lit a second cigarette. "She drowned in a sea of systematic foster homes. You can literally swim in the paper trail. There's no way the kid actually knows who or where her real parents are. Details of each hand off are inside, but warning, it's not a fun thing to stomach. Sweet kid… kind of optimism that makes you question what had to happen to make her that way. You'll know," Rewonda said, tapping that file.

Cyclonus let out a sigh of frustration. He didn't want to read it, but he couldn't toss the folder in the trash because one of Galvatron's men was surely lingering close behind. He slid the woman an extra twenty across the table, her full lips parting in a wide grin of appreciation. She grabbed the money and slid it into her vest pocket. "Much obliged," she tipped her baseball cap as she stood. But before she could leave Cyclonus stopped her.

"Why do you have white hair?" He asked, Galvatron's words itching at the back of his mind. Rewonda searched the man's eyes for intent, giving a knowing smile and turning around toward her ride.

"Domey asks that question all the time. You boys are sure hung up on genetics," she chuckled, flicking her cigarette butt into the dirt and stamping it out. "Hell if I know. Maybe it's like a highlighted word in a sea of black and wide textbook lingo. We're meant to be found because we all have these damn eyes and this inalterable hair. Even if you don't want to be found, light can always be seen in a sea of dark."

Thick, salt-heavy air swept across the pier as the girl hiked back up the beach and hopped into the cab and left. Checking the time, the pilot saw that it had been an hour: time to go pick up the far more complicated young woman than once thought.

"I do know, by the way," Rung said after wrapping up their first session. "And it's incredibly unlikely you don't know what I'm talking about having stayed with him for a week. After all, you've met Rewonda."

"She looks…" Temperance began, Rung nodding. "The hair and the eyes and…"

"That's not yet been explained, but you must keep any and all wits about you. There are things that go bump in the night besides intrigued, one-eyed immigrants. And do remember to lock the windows."

"Wait…"

Knuckles rapped against the glass door, Cyclonus standing outside. He looked pissed at the sun, shielding his eyes with a scowl cut deep into his face. Before she could even turn to confirm what she was seeing Rung just explained that hard light was hard on Cyclonus' eyes, not, unlike media stereotypes, that he was sizzling beneath that jacket. Although he did seem a bit overdressed.

"Same time in two weeks?"

The girl nodded as she stood, sincerely thanking the man for all his help before turning to leave. Outside the garden had baked in humidity and heat that could only be described using words that weren't very polite sounding. She instead made a loud, heavy groan mixed with a growl of disapproval.

"What is this?"

"New York summers," he said simply, ushering her forward.

"But wait, doesn't… heat rise?"

"Yes."

"Your house is on top of a building…"

"Yes it is."

"And heat rises."

"Why are you repeating this?"

"It's going to be hotter than the eighth level of hell up there," she said, dreading climbing the baked hot steps of the fire escape.

"You'll manage."

"I get the feeling sometimes you don't care," she said, trying to elicit some response of empathy or defense. However, Cyclonus simply remained silent. She let her mouth hang in shock as her brows furrowed. Not even a denial. How cruel. Head turned off to the side, pretending to check down a hall for someone, he indulged in a smirk. Just every once and a while it was good to let some humor in. Unfortunately a girl named Temperance was trying to force him to become spoiled on that warmth.

Sure enough the rooftop apartment was channeling some serious hot spring's sauna energy. Temperance had, with permission, stripped down to a borrowed bra from Rewonda and matching panties. She angled a fan she found that had been kicked under the bed straight towards her, sprawled out on the bed. Cyclonus, however, seemed entirely unaffected by the heat. In fact he'd shed a layer of clothes for once and was wearing a black t-shirt.

Temperance, sitting up on the bed and glaring at her comfortable counterpart, barked, "How are you so cozy looking?"

"Naturally cold blooded people prefer hotter climates," he simply said, grabbing the files he'd paid for.

"What are those."

"Profiles."

"Of?"

"People."

"Oh, please. Slow down there, soldier. Too much talking at once might make my brain bleed. Be gentle with the coma patient," she said flatly, rolling her eyes.

Cyclonus sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose as he turned to the young woman. She was sitting on his bed, legs parted as she bent over and rested her elbows on her knees, head tilted up to face him. Nothing about her posture or countenance said that even a drop of shame filled her. He couldn't decide if that was good because she was comfortable or because she'd not taken part in the part of society that would have told her that sitting in her underwear in a man's house is considered sleazy. Considering that neither of them had any sexual interest in the other it wasn't a particular issue. Besides, that shade of blue suited her.

"Temperance, take this in any way you like, but don't you have family to go back to?"

Not missing a beat, the girl smirked and leaned back on her palms, legs crossing. She sighed and smiled to herself. What a complicated question surely to have a loaded answer.

"If they wanted me wouldn't they have been at the hospital to claim me?" She retorted, that momentary spark of confidence making her cocky.

"You never let Rung call them."

This dropped cold water on the young woman, her gleam of cunning attitude fading as her smile left with it. She sucked in her bottom lip as she looked up at him. So he wasn't as in the dark as she'd liked him to be. "You didn't let him call them because you didn't want to go back. For whatever reason, I will know soon enough," he waved her file in the air. He watched as her eyes went dark and wide, her gaze falling into space. "Would you like to tell me anything before I read it from the perspective of a coded system?"

He watched the process of thought run over the woman's face. Regret, shame, anxiety, and then finally resolve faded across her face. She swallowed and bit back the choking sensation in her throat. "I didn't lie. Page one to thirty will say that I… made false claims against the, uh… pff, good people, right? Yeah… I can't even fake bravery without my shoulders shaking so lying it definitely out. Just… I never lied."

As he reached for the door handle to go sit up on the rooftop Cyclonus gave the young woman's trembling shoulder a gentle, reassuring squeeze. No words, no comedic banter, just a silent gesture of belief. She nodded, and waved a hand as she rubbed it against her nose, shaking off the feeling of tears in her eyes.

She finally felt an itching on her skin like eyes were watching her, sliding a sweater on her thin frame. She felt that throbbing breathlessness rush over her as she paced the apartment. Where in the hell had he gotten that folder?

Cyclonus stared at the face that was both distinctly Temperance's and not. The girl in the photograph had been captured by a traffic cam running from what looked like nightmares personified. Her eyes were wide, but still half-lidded from sleeplessness. Several pictures of that nature followed, the sheet-white girl racing down the street as a greyish blur chased after her. The pilot raised the photo close to his face. It wasn't a faulty camera, it didn't capture whatever was after her. But as far as the records were concerned they only cared about the girl running from it.

The file's first page was a standard custody sheet with all her information and some footnotes about her mental state. Those following were page after page of foster family transfer requests and stops at orphanages. She'd lived with more families in nine years than any child should have to endure. It looked like when she was nine, right before she fell into a coma, she was staying with a social worker. It seemed to be a nice fit for the time being. It looked even like Temperance was going to be adopted.

And yet, something happened that night in July. The social worker went missing and no body was ever found, although she was presumed to be dead. Temperance had been found three miles from her house in a sink hole underground with her legs broken. Hence why she was wobbly on her first few days out of the bed.

Nevertheless, a factor could not be overlooked: it was always the foster family that applied for Temperance's transfer. Every time the reason was the same: hysterics and hallucinations, family unfit to care for child. Cyclonus may have been a distant person with a level of distrust to anyone and anything, but he wouldn't be so oblivious as to not notice hallucinations and sudden outbursts of violence. The most Temperance had ever done in the ways of violence was fighting the entire way to the hospital even though she would only be there an hour or so. But it was the details and interviews that caught the man's eye.

Temperance shows signs of paranoia and is convinced that she's being followed by what she calls 'the grey man with red eyes'. She believes that this man can permeate all aspects of her life, saying that she's seen him in dreams and during the day. To be diagnoses, most likely candidates…

"Grey… man?"

"I wasn't a very literate child," Temperance murmured. Cyclonus whipped around to see the girl standing in the oversized sweater and a long tunic on the edge of the apartment opposite to him. "I should have said something like a man shrouded in grey smoke that smelled like iron and rot. His eyes were deep set in his head and glowed like a monster's and he had a mouth full of razor sharp teeth and nails like blades. He followed me everywhere… right up to the point that I nearly died."

Cyclonus saw the distant look in her usually lively eyes and knew that she wasn't lying. Hallucinations… what dolt in the advocacy department fudged the facts on that one?

"I don't even remember this woman's name. She was perfect. I never wanted to leave. She gave me this book about the stars and constellations and their history. I'd spent hours looking up at the sky thinking of how great it would be to fly out there and explore. I planned on it too, but now the world seems so confined. I know she's dead. Whatever that thing wanted it wasn't going to wait for it."

"You said it smelled like…"

"Blood… and decomposing flesh," she said quietly, just above the city's white noise buzzing beneath them. "It would be somewhere whenever I tried eating so I got sick to my stomach and when I tried sleeping to keep me awake. The hallucinations and outbursts were side effects of sleep deprivation and being starved. I can't really decide what's more amazing: the fact that I lived through that or that they could never see or smell how noxious it was."

After a long moment of quiet Temperance walked across the tarred roof and kicked the pebbles from underneath her shoes, sitting down beside Cyclonus. The man watched nervously as she sat on the edge and leaned her head against his shoulder. He wanted to object, but she looked so tired that shoving her away would just add to the tension. "You're strong… I could see that in the garden when I first woke up… I don't know if I gravitated to you or if I was still running from it, but I knew you'd keep me safe."

"I can't keep you safe," Cyclonus said softly, watching as the girl leaned back up and sighed. She stood and walked over to the ladder, heading back down to the apartment.

"Take the compliment once in a while. You think so lowly of yourself and others… it really shows. Try stepping out into the light for some warmth for your soul sometime, okay?" She smiled over her exhausted expression. It was radiation that infected anything around her. Cyclonus refused to return the gesture, turning back to the files as the petite girl shuffled inside. She'd had enough of unloading intensely emotional baggage for one night.

"Temperance," the rough voice called.

"Ye—es?" She replied, walking backwards so that she could see him.

"Come back up."

Not questioning the purpose the girl sluggishly climbed the ladder and stood back on the roof once more, watching as the pink and gold sunset gleamed on the horizon between towering skyscrapers and old buildings. She looked at him, still rather nervous about what he was going to say. "Sit down." This made the young woman smile softly, nodding and siting so that she leaned against his back. She closed her eyes and smiled.

Just when he knew she was about to drift off Cyclonus parted his lips in a song. Temperance knew better than to fall asleep so fast, beaming as the resonance of his voice vibrated through her back like a gently rocking, the song erasing the jitters that had filled her. She mouthed the words along with him, voice finally picking up and catching on.

"Louder," Cyclonus said. "You don't sing hymns like you hum tunes. Sing them with your soul."

This made her smile wide as she raised her voice, sighing sweetly as her voice carried along with his much more experienced tune. She dropped the hymn here and there, but it was together enough. She felt relief and peace rush through her as sleep crept back over her, Cyclonus still singing, his voice softer now. It was bliss. You could almost forget the cold and stillness of his body in such a comfortable state. Almost as if passion revived him even just for a moment.