Story, Story board

[Ghost_Saint]

This game is rated R, write accordingly.

[Ghost_Saint]

Gair looked over at Dinya across the table. She always picked at her food. Gair was already done. He wished that he could set the volume low enough to listen to music on his headphones, but that was sort of impossible. He sighed. Dinya looked at him. "You know those headphones are an eye sore." Gair looked right back at her not saying anything, just giving her a look that definetly told her that she was being a jerk. After a while he ventured saying something. It wasn't like Dinya was going to eat faster.

"It doesn't feel all that good when you remind me of things I can't change." Dinya paused, and then went back to her food.

"Hey, you know I'm just joking around." Dinya said to Gair.

"Yeah, I know. It still kind of hurts though. We don't even know what we are, even if we could be normal."

"You think about it too much Gair. Just got to go with it and have fun."

Gair sighed. "I'm not even going to argue about it this time. You already know that if we don't find out to for ourselves that sooner or later it's going to catch up with us."

"Whatever," Dinya carefully used her napkin so she wouldn't smudge her makeup, "I'm done."

Gair grabbed the waiter for the check and paid in cash. Dinya opened her cell phone once she got outside the door. Gair just went towards his car and drove off. She'd be getting some date tonight, eventually screw him later the night. Gair really felt like no one else cared that they all had brands on them. That they were created, not born, and no one knew why. Gair was depressed for a minute or two, then he refound his purpose. If no one else cared, then he had to find out, for all of them.

[Vision_Afar]

Mwen was at the mall. She loved being among people, it made her feel more normal. It was crowded as usual. Some where shopping, others were chilling in a café. She saw a group of young girls coming her way, and as usual, her eyes were fixed on their hands. Before she knew it she was staring and it was rather noticeable.

“Isn’t it a bit hot to be wearing glows?” said one of the girls.

“What a freak” said another as they walked away giggling.

With a sigh, Mwen pulled up her glows even higher. Her cell phone rang which almost made her jump. She could never get used to that thing.

“Hey it’s Dinya. How about we hit the clubs tonight? It’s about time we find you a man.”

[Oak]

"I already have a man!" Mwen laughed back into the phone.
"The stalker at work doesn't count! Silly goose!" Dinya played back innocently. She had been the reason Mwen had gained the stalker to begin with. "You NEED to go out. If I get you a man, he can beat up that guy FOR you!"
Mwen considered this. It was a plus. But getting past the first date without shocking (either mentally of physically) the date in question, that would be the problem. Din's solution was to always get them smashing drunk (and she mentioned a few ways to do so as Mwen hemed and hawed over the options.)

"Well, there's work tomorrow. --"
"Call in sick!" Dinya offered.
"-- Friday would be better. --"
"That's TWO whole days away. Can you live THAT LONG without action?!"
Mwen blushed marroon and made very odd face before realising that the only ones who could see this were normal people. She immediately blanched and looked down. She played with the collar of her turtleneck.
"-- uh... Well... on the upside... Well..."
"You could get drunk?"
"Yeah."
"Sweet! Hooneybun, we are getting you man-meat tonight!" CLICK
Mwen turned pale blue in fear. Her first thought was: What the hell did I get myself into? Her second thought was even more scary: What will I WEAR?

[Ghost_Saint]

Gair walked into the front door and immediately heard him. It could have only been him because he made sounds like that. What the hell was he doing around here. Gair wished the man would have never been created. So far all of the homoculi that Gair had found had been...well kind was a streach. Dinya could be a total bitch sometimes, and Ally always ended up offending someone somehow.

Cypress was sitting on the couch and watching TV. A book was laying with it's pages spread out underneath it instead of a book mark. Cypress didn't even look up at Gair. Then it came. "What the hell are you doing here!" Ally had found him in the kitchen. "All you ever get us is trouble Kailan." Ally pointed her eyes at the bottle in his hand, and told him how the only thing he ever did was use their money on booze and get into fights. "Not all of us can simply regenerate it back. Why haven't you gone to join the marines or something useful for a change?" Kailan burped. He obviously wasn't listening to a word Ally was saying. Of all the things that Gair hated about Kailan he almost envied the way he could just tune things out.

"You already know the reason..." Gair was cut off by a blood thirsty look at him from Ally. Gair retreated quickly and sat on the sofa with Cypress. "So when'd he get here?"

Cypress looked over at Gair with huge innocent and stupid doe eyes, and said, "Which one?"

Gair sighed heavily, "Which one? Come on, Kailan. When'd he get here?"

"Oh, him. He's been here for....uhhh. Hmmmm, maybe about 2 hours." Cypress replied.

"Well how'd he get in?" Gair asked.

"The door was unlocked."

"The door was unlocked?"Gair repeated the statement as a question.

"I was outside. The weather was nice." Cypress said matter-of-factly.

Gair sighed again. "Well he probably would have broken in anyway. At least this way we don't have to pay for any broken windows."

Cypress went back to watching the TV. It was some talk show, which made Gair think that he was really reading the book. He might have even simply let Kailan in when he slammed on the door. "Can he be any more stupid." Gair thought.

In Cypresses mind he was thinking about what kind of show he was now watching, when he could get back to his book, and hoping that Gair wouldn't bring up that stupid 'get-a-job' thing again.

An eruption happened in the kitchen, or at least that's what it sounded like to Gair. He got up and cautiously look into the kitchen. The alcohol bottle was on the counter behind Ally, and underneath Ally was Kailan. Ally was lording over him like a dog lords over sheep. He made a couple attempts to get up, but Ally was always a step ahead of him. "Now tell me why you came back here, and I'll let you stand up." Kailan said nothing. Ally bounced up and down a little on the balls of her feet. Apparently some previous injury in Kailan's chest was made worse by Ally's movement. "Just wanted to see how ya'all are do'n."

"Bullshit." Ally replied. "You wouldn't come back here unless you wanted something, now what the hell is it, or I'll call the cops on you."

"Cops can't do nothing. I ain't broken anything." Kailan said.

"Yeah, but according to the restraining order you're not ever supposed to be this close to me." Ally lied.

"There ain't no restraining order on me."Kailan said.

"Oh are you sure? You want to test it out? The cops can be here in no time." Ally replied.

"Hey, no need to get the cops 'ere. I just came to ask Gair a question." Gair hid when he heard this. Besides he could hear everything just fine if he wanted to, he didn't need to see it.

"How...?" Ally sounded astonished

"I don't know it just happened last week. How would I know what was going on." Kailan sounded sad and afraid under a masculine overtone.

There was a pause for a second or two. "Gair." Ally said quitely, because she knew she never needed to shout for Gair to hear her. "Come in here and look at this."

Gair came out from around the corner. He saw something that gave him just as much astonishment as Ally. Then he started laughing. "Hey, hey, what you laughing at you little fu..." Ally gave a quick kick to Kailan's head. "You wanted him to look at it didn't you?" Kailan gave up and layed his head back down.

"He's sheading his skin." Gair said simply, with some laughter still in his voice. "I don't think it's any problem at all. His regeneration comes from retile DNA. I think. It might be kind of embaressing, especially when he face starts to peal, but he'll be perfectly fine." Gair said. Ally got off Kailan and Kailan got up slowly. Ally still watched him like a hawk to see if he was going to try to pull something, but all he did was scoop up his bottle and stumble towards the door. It slamed hard as it came back shut.

Ally sat down on the table and put her head down. "We need to get a real restaining order on him." She murmered to herself. Gair went back into the family room. Cypress was gone, but he had left the TV on. Fantasies of kicking Cypress out of the house danced in Gair head as he fliped the channels. Then his mind camed to Kailan and he was almost glad that Cypress was in the house instead of him. Then on to the other members, the other people like him. Dinya hopefully wouldn't be getting back at the ass crack of dawn, and there was a good chance that she wouldn't be coming home untill sometime in the morning if at all. Gair was sort of surprised when she specificly made time for them to have dinner together after he mentioned how she was never around. Of course it wasn't too entertaining, but somehow it felt nice to know she was still around. Gair flipped to the next channel.

[Vision_Afar]

Pushing the door open Mwen rushed in.

“Hey I just saw Kailan. He looked a bit funny.”

“He’s shedding skin….” Gair said trying hard not to pay much attention. But Mwen wasn’t listening anymore. She was already in her room trying to figure out what to wear. The door stayed open so Gair could see clothes flying across the room. Couple of moments later she marched out of the room with a frown on her face.

“I have NOTHING to wear!!!” she screamed which gave Gair a biggest headache ever. He grabbed his headphones and pushed them harder to his ears, but nothing could mute her screams. Ally came out of the kitchen already knowing what was going on. It wasn’t the fist time Mwen was making such a scene over clothes. “Calm down” she said.

And for a second Mwen did calm down. Not because she was told to, but because an idea came to her. She turned around to face Dinya’s room.

“Maybe I could….”

“No, you don’t want to do that” Ally quickly replied.

But nothing anyone said could change Mwen’s mind at the moment. She opened the door to Dinya’s room and headed towards her wardrobe. With an awe on her face she slowly opened it. So many clothes and shoes….

“You know Dinya is going to be pissed” Ally, who was now sitting on the arm rest of a couch, said when Mwen came out of the room.

“Nah, she’ll understand!” Mwen replied, and she really did believe it. “You wanna go to the club with us?” Ally said no, the last thing she wanted was to be surrounded by drunk, filthy pigs. Gair said nothing but made a gesture with his hand which could only mean no. There was no way he’d go to a club with loud music. Not even realizing Cypress was around as well she just said “Oh well, see ya later” and headed through the door. Gair changed a channel again, and he and Ally just said there in silence.

Mwen had no problems getting in a club, her name was on the list and anyone else would have probably been surprised Dinya did that but not Mwen. It was crowded, hot, and loud. Mwen pushed her way through the crowd until she saw Dinya who was, as usual, surrounded by more than 3 guys. She flirted with all three of them, a smile never left her face. Until she saw Mwen.

“Is… that… mine…?” Dinya restrained herself from going ballistic in front of all those people.

“Well... ummmm… yes….?” Mwen just blinked and gave her the ‘what’s-the-big-deal’ look.

“Never, ever take my clothes!”

“But why, you can take mine whenever you want too” Mwen replied.

Dinya felt like throwing her hands up in the air. Instead, she just sighed and said “You better not ruin it or even spill some water on it!” She grabbed some guy who obviously had too much to drink and pushed him toward Mwen. Turning around she noticed Jason who seemed like a much better company at the moment. She sneaked up to him and placed her hand on his butt.

“Heyyyy!” he said with a big smile on his face.

“Did you miss me?” Dinya asked biting the corner of her lip a bit.

[Oak]

Dinya smilled, not really listeing to what the big lug was saying in return. She was having quite abit more fun guessing where this one might have beauty marks. "You know, hansome, girls much prefer it when you let THEM do all the talking--" She purred. Unfortunately, she didn't have the time to add anything more to bring the conversation back her way. The weak lights high above her head flickered without anyone noticing.

It was only a second later that all the lights went out.
People (mostly girls) screamed. People started yelling for the music to turn back on, not noticing that the power had obviously gone out.

"Loosers! Get the damn music back!!!"
"Yeah! Dont stop it! Music! Need it!!!"
"You loosers, obviously the power's off!" Mwen's voice was lost in the louder drunken voices. Dinya rolled her eyes. Seeing in the dark much better than all the others present, she pushed people aside and shoved people out of her way.
"Hey, who did that?"
"Quit pushing me, you hoser!"
"Push you?! YOU PUSHED ME!"

When Dinya finally got to Mwen, a nice little fight had broken out. Yells and shouts from the bounsers were lost in the yells and shouts of the ever-growing fight on the dance floor.
"Mwen, you're glowing." Dinya tapped her on the shoulder. Why couldn't the battery-woman keep her silly power out of her evenings? This power outage of hers was really putting a dampener on the fun.
Mwen jumped, she looked like a nervous wreck. She hugged her arms tighter to herself.
"Wenny, just BE a dear and put the power back so at least I can enjoy this evening."
"I didn't! I didn't take it! I don't take it, I make it!" Damn it, Mwen thought, now she was sweating! This evening couldnt get worse.
"What Ever. Give this party a jolt would you?"
"Help me find a plug or a fuse box, I can't turn on the lights from here!" Mwen hissed.
Dinya growled playfully at one poor night-blind fool that happened to brush her arm. "Fine, follow me."

To her delight, both the fool and Mwen followed her instruction. She grabed one hand of each and led them off the dance floor.

[Ghost_Saint]

"I wish I could just be normal." Was one of the myrad of thoughts that flew through Ally's head. She felt like going to sleep right there on the kitchen table. Sleep was just about the only way she could get it to stop. But her thoughts were to restless, she'd never be able to get to sleep no matter where she was untill she resolved the static in her head.

Gair was still in the family room watching TV. It seemed like he was bored more than anything else because he changed the channels so frequently. Come to think of it Ally couldn't recall what kind of shows Gair liked. Or even what kind of books he liked. She sat down on the couch next to him. "You know I've been thinking about Kalian today, and..."

"I don't want to talk about it." Gair cut her off, never even looking straight at her, his eyes still fixed on the TV.

"But don't you think it's odd that he only now comes to us all freaked out by his skin pealing, and never before?" Ally asked.

"I said I don't feel like talking about it." Gair said coldly still not looking at her.

"Fine then." She said angerly, and stormed up stairs. Guys were such assholes. She found Cypress on the stairs reading some book. He looked sort of embaressed almost and he moved to get out of the way. Ally wished in her head that he would have just been like he normally was, just staring out into space, not bothering to acknowledge reality, so that she could move him out of the way herself, and tell him to get a fucking job and stop free loading off them. It was hard enough to stay a float as it was. It was like he was stealing from them. Ally slamed the door to her room shut. Off to one side of the room there was a punching bag. She started to wail on it. her arms flying in total disregard for any technique. It seemed all that mattered was how fast and hard she could hit the punching bag. After awhile she started to do sit ups and other excerises untill her body strained against her with it's pain.

She went in to get a shower before she went to bed. In the shower she forgot about her anger for the moment and remembered what she was asking Gair about. It troubled her seriously. What if their bodies weren't stable? She got out of the shower and dried off.

Ally would lay awake in bed for another hour before her body finally overtook her mind and lapsed into sleep.

[Vision_Afar]

Dinya was slowly getting irritating though she kept a perfect smile on her face. Maybe she shouldn’t have invited Mwen to join her. The chick gets excited just a bit, and something like this happens.

“There” said Dinya pointing in front of her. “There’s a fuse box. Jump start this party, while I have better things to do.” There’s no way she’ll let Mwen ruin her fun. She started making her way back through the crowd when someone embraced her from behind.

“I’ve been looking for you!” It was Jason.

Turning around Dinya whispered to his ear “This party is over, how about we go and have a party of our own?”

“You read my mind” he grinned and grabbed her hand. They were gone before the power was back on. After a short, quick ride in his BMW, they found themselves in Jason’s apartment. It was nice and spacious, and furnitured well. Jason had a good expensive taste, just like Dinya’s taste in men.

“Why don’t you make yourself comfortable while I get us champagne” Dinya said winking. When she came to the bedroom with a bottle in her hand Jason was sitting on a bed. He took the bottle from her hand when she got close and just placed it on the floor. His hands ran over her back as he got up to take her top off when he suddenly stopped.

“Don’t stop” Dinya commanded.

“There’s something on your back” Jason replied in a tone that showed he was worried but also freaked out a bit.

“What…” she said as she moved her hand over her back and felt hair. She nearly ran to the bathroom where she gave such a horrible cry. There was a stripe of something that looked like fur along the part of her spine. In that same moment she felt dizzy, nauseous and pissed off as never before in her life. She stormed out of the bathroom and apartment without even saying bye to Jason who was just left wondering about what the hell was going on. Catching a cab on the street she went back home.

“Gair wake up!” she nearly screamed when she entered home. Gair, who fell asleep on the couch in front of the tv heard when the front door was opened but he didn’t pay much attention thinking it was Mwen since Dinya is known to sometimes not even come home after a night out.

“I said wake up!!” she shook him by his shoulders.

“All right…” Gair replied as he sat up. “What is it? And what time is it?” He looked around and noticed it was still dark outside. Why was she back home this early…

“Something’s happening… To me!” She turned around and pulled her top up so he could see her back. “Do you see that… fur?!”

Gair now stood up to take a closer look. He touched it and it really was fur. This is getting weirder and weirder. First Kailan and now Dinya… What if they’re all to go through some change? Even worst, what if not just their bodies start to change, but their personalities too?

Dinya pulled her top back down and turned around noticeably upset. “What is going on with me? Who did this to me? US? We have to find out!”

Gair was glad she finally showed some interest in finding out the truth about them, even though something like this had to happen. But an interest nonetheless. “We will don’t worry” he tried to calm her down.

“Ok. Let’s go” Dinya said quite serious.

“What, right now?” Gair blinked. It seems he underestimated her seriousness regarding this matter, or just her love for herself. “We can’t go now. We need sleep cause we won’t get far tired. Go rest and we’ll think of something in the morning.”

“Ok, first thing in the morning” she said pointing a finger at him then paused for a second. “Right after I get waxed that is.”

Gair felt like rolling his eyes but he knew that would make things worst and he wanted her to stay in this eager mood. They said good nights and went to their rooms.

[Oak]

Mwen, left alone at the party, powered the music for almost an hour, just sitting at the fuse box. She was sitting on the ground in Dinya's dress, no longer caring if it got dirty. Not caring even if Dinya had left without her…
She wasn't feeling like herself.
She felt as if she didn't exist. As if nothing she looked like, acted like, or did mattered at all. One of her gloves was off so she could better power the party, but only part of her mind recognized that there would be trouble if someone came in through the closet door in front of her.
It was a very odd feeling.
And, Mwen realized that she... liked it, in a way.
It felt like a release, a release of responsibility, of worry, of... care.
She slowly stood up, smiling, willing to finally really join the party. She stepped forward shakily on her high heels, but as her hand left the fuses she felt her stomach turn.
"Oh-great." She muttered in horror and disgust. She felt nauseous, she felt terrible all over; she felt like she was just hit by the Worry Train.
She scrambled on the floor for her glove, pulled herself to her feet and burst out of the broom closet and pushed through the dark, loud, club, to find a washroom.

Once there, she fumbled in the dark for the nearest porcelain and coughed up everything she had eaten and drank in the last 24 hours... a couple of times.
She only noticed that someone else was there with her, when someone touched her shoulder...

[Aetis]

Kailan’s drunken, slightly worried expression quickly changed when Mwen grabbed his hand, instantly sending a painful jolt through him. Recoiling and cursing, he tripped and fell, over turning a trash can and dropping his bottle, which fell to the ground and shattered.

“Bitch!” He shouted, getting back to his feet. “Last time I try`n be fuckin` nice to any of you bastards.”

The bathroom door slammed hard as he exited, and Mwen suddenly felt much worse. Pushing her physical agony aside, she got up and chased him back into the club.

Kailan’s height made him pretty easy to spot, but his tactics of travel made it difficult for him to follow, as anyone who didn’t immediately move out of his way was knocked to the ground. Still, she managed to tail him to an exit, and then to an alley outside. She was running to keep up with him, but his longer strides gave him an advantage.

“Kailan, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

He stopped, turning back to her. “Coulda fucking fooled me! Fuckers, always complaining `bout me bein` an asshole, and du one time I try `n be nice, you fuckin` shock me!”

“You scared me, I . . . I didn’t know it was you. If I had, I wouldn’t have–“

“Bullshit! All you fuckers hate me, `n fine then. I fuckin` hate you too. Bunch o` fuckin` `ypocrites.”

“Well, Kailan, you’re not exactly friendly . . . or presentable most of the time. Maybe if you didn’t drink so much . . .”

“The fuck dah yah care `bout wha` I do? I `appen to `ike my `ife.”

She stopped for a minute. “Kailan, I’m sorry. I really didn’t mean to shock you. Maybe we should go somewhere . . . you look like you’ve got a lot to sleep off.”

“`m not fuckin` goin` back ta see fuckin` Gair ever. Not dat bitch Ally either . . .”

She approached him slowly. “It’ll be okay, Kailan. I’ll explain to them, that you were trying to be nice . . . they’ll let you stay, for the night at least. Tell you what, I’ll buy you another bottle, to make up for the one you broke because of me.”

Kailan looked hesitant for a minute, but the offer of free booze finally won him over. Shrugging, he started walking. “Whatever.”

“Wait, Kailan, it’s in the other direction.”

[Oak]

Ally's eyes shot open. The dream had gone too far, too wild, too fast, too much. It was the sudden point where you realize "THIS must be a dream, not even life can be THIS stupid." Well, at least she had forgoten what she was angry about last night... though now she had something else to be angry about.

Ally snarled at the flashing numbers. Stupid power companies, why couldn't they understand that An. OUTAGE. At. Night. Means. No. Morning alarms! She tossed the blankets aside, grabbed her housecoat off the floor and took one step to the window.

It still LOOKED like night, at least. She examined the empty streetscene before turning back inside. Facing inside her room, she paused. Out of her memory she recognized a shape she missed in the first glance.

Pulling back the curtain again she checked to see if it was real. Yes, there it was. Two people, wait... is that one of Dinya's dresses? Ally raised one of her eyebrows before looking closer, and leaning he head against the glass.

Mwen and KAILAN? That would be an odd--, the thought was caught off by styfled chuckles. I can't believe I even thought of that. Why is Kailan showing up so much? I thought he had decided he hated our guts!

As she watched, curious, she started to notice something odd. They were walking slowly... not "drunk" slowly, not "injured" slowly, not "dying 120-year-old" slowly... "slower than possible" slowly.

Ally looked horrified, then rubbed her eyes with her hands. They seemed to have stopped walking, but she couldn't tell what they were doing. Maybe talking? Whatever.
She walked heavily downstairs. It would be best if Kailan tried anything funny that Mwen had backup. Paranoia wasn't always a bad thing, she rationalized, it just meant that she could think about all the worst options first, just to be on the safe side.

First she waited on the sofa, then at the door, then sat down in the kitchen and looked up on the clock. At least this one was battery powered... and it seemed to be ticking normally...
Wait.
Thought too soon, Ally growlled, nothing in this place ever wor--

The water drip from the tap was slowing down. She walked over to the sink and looked at it. It quickly sped up to normal again, and stayed that way.
And it was this way, consentrated on the constant drip of the tap, that Mwen and Kailan found her in as they entered, both of them looking worse for wear.

[Ghost_Saint]

Meanwhile Gair was already at his job. He worked for the defense department. More than that he couldn't say, and if he did say, it would be considered treason, and punishable as such. It was surprisingly easy to get jobs in the government. As long as you were qualified and don't have a questionable history, you were pretty much set to get the job. They even decided to send Gair off to get a graduate degree and payed for it all.

"He was sheding?"

"Yes, like a snake sheds it's skin." Gair replied.

"And this never happened before?"

"Yes, sir. Like I said in my report, it seemed very apparent from his fear that this was a first time occurance."

"Do you think we should bring him in for investigation?"

"He has been causing trouble for the others, and he's the least secretive of all of the ones we know about. We just have to do it in a way that doesn't disturb the others."

"Yes, that won't be much of a problem though."

"Just in case, I want you to bring in fresh DNA samples tomorrow in addition to the weekly samples."

"Yes, sir." Gair didn't even want to think about what it would mean if any of the other DNA samples showed mutation.

[Oak]

Press shook his head. This sucked. He had a new place he needed to escape from, now. The roof was getting to be far too much like inside. Sanctuaries were so... Temporary!
"Cypress, ah, Cypress, you are running out of places to escape to!"

He patted the closed book on his stomach with a rhythmic pattern as he watched a seagull drifting along way over head. It was only now starting to get louder in the city, but it was already light enough to see quite high into the sky, the stars and clouds had really faded fast this morning. He had stayed out here most of the night reading with his handy-dandy flashlight... but the cold had got to him and he was sure even with his two blankets that he caught something nasty. At least he wasn't sneezing yet.

Job. Job. Job. Job... Bleah, bad thoughts.
"Bleah." He made a face, stretched his arms and stuck out his tongue. With an extension of the action, he lazily tossed his book over the edge of the roof.

THAT made him feel better, at least. It hadn't been as good as the first one, he hated when authors seemed to forget what was fun and enjoyable (to him) in the first place!

The lazy bastard got up, scratched himself and yawned.
"If this itch is fleas, I'm going-tahhhh--" He yawned again. "--haafta remember not to borrow Dinya's blankets." He smirked to himself lazily as he weaved towards the roof's service door, dragging the blankets behind him.

When he got downstairs he was caught right in the forehead with a shoe, and trampled by a fleeing Kailan.

As he watched Kailan run down the hall shouting obscenities, he decided three things: he didn't like that guy, Kailan, much; he needed to listen first before entering the apartment; and that he was right all along that getting the chicks angry was not wise at all.

[Ghost_Saint]

"Why do you always have to wear those things?"

She already knew why Gair had to wear them, or at least she knew that his hearing was extremely sensitive, not why it was extremely sensitive.

"'Cause they're stylish." Gair smiled cutely to add to the effect. Humor was good at defusing situations.

Cara smiled. That smile managed to wash all of Gair's stress away. He was always amazed at that. He only wished that he could tell her all the things that were really going on in his life.

"Are you okay?" Gairs had let his feelings show. "Yeah, I'm fine." He lied. He always felt weird that he lied about the things that other people could not know, the government would kill him. They'd do it quite litterally, but he would not be missed. Everyone else would get moved, probably to some lab where they would be treated like rats in a cage.

It was all Gair's idea that the only way they could see the full extent of what the homoculi were capible of would be to have them in an open enviroment. Observing them in a very closed and controled enviroment would severly limit any psychological growth to the point that suicidal tendencies would become prohibitive to testing. The people against him argued that it he was doing it for his own best personal interests. In the end the higher-ups decided that Gair's personal condition was a moot point, but that a full psycological evaluation of the Homoculi's capiblities was a neccessary as part of the study.

All the ones that were found became citizens immediately, and were found quite places in soceity where they wouldn't be exposed. Unknown to them, they were always kept a close watch over every second of their day. The others that Gair lived with didn't even know what he did for his job. When they asked he told them the truth, he was working for the government, and if he said anymore they would kill him, or at least lock him up and throw away the key. He felt more like he was a slave than an employee though.

"I can tell. What's bugging you?" Cara said. Gair had zoned out again.

Gair looked into her eyes. He didn't know what he would do without her there to comfort him. "You know I'd tell you if I could."

"Why do you have to stay in that job. It makes me worried about you. It seems to always be getting to you. Why can't you do something that makes you happy?" Cara said lovingly.

"Maybe, someday." Gair said into the distance.

The silence grew thick, but it didn't matter. Any words said would have ruined that moment. Cara and Gair just embraced for a long while. Then they kissed.