The harsh morning light broke through Sam Thompson’s window, casting light upon the sleeping boy of sixteen, who was snoring loudly. His room was surprisingly neat for a teenage boy, though living with three women will do that to you.

Suddenly, the door burst open, and a young girl that looked to be about seven or eight years old came running in, took a leaping bound, and landed right on the end of the bed, whose occupant woke up with a start.

“Huh, what, who?” the boy said, looking about wildly, “Sarah! What the heck are you doing in my room?” “Mom says that its time for you to get up!” she giggled, and she ran out of the room. Sam stretched and yawned. He could smell bacon. He smiled and tumbled out of bed, pulled on some jeans, a t-shirt and stumbled sleepily down the stairs, to the kitchen, where he saw that his mom was indeed at the stove, cooking breakfast.

He plunked himself down at the tiny breakfast nook, flipping his hair out of his eyes as he did so. “Quite a storm we had last night,” his mom said, sliding a plate of bacon, eggs, and toast in front of him. “Really?” Sam asked, “I must of slept right through it” “well it kept me up all night.” she said, and Sam noted the dark circles under her eyes, but he doubted it was the storm that had kept his mother up.

Ever since his father had left, she had been sleeping less and less. “Mom, are you sure that your okay? I mean, ever since Dad…” he quickly trailed off when his younger sister came bounding in, sat down at the table, and said “Good morning!” in a bright chipper voice.

Sam’s mother was quickly at the stove again, effectively cutting off any more conversation about Sam’s father. “Sam, it’s your turn to walk Daisy” Sarah said, as Mrs. Thompson slid a full plate of food in front of her. “Yes Sam, I believe that it is your turn.” His mother said.

Sam knew that this was not the case, and that his mother was most likely just trying to avoid discussing painful subjects, but rather than start an argument, Sam sighed, pushed up from the table, dumped his dishes in the sink, and whistled for Daisy, their dog. Daisy came galloping into the kitchen, a mass of happy black fur, slobber, and big paws.

Sam grabbed the leash from the hook next to the counter and clipped it onto Daisy’s collar, trying to avoid the morning shower she was trying to give him when she was leapt up to kiss him.

He stood up leash in hand, and asked his mom, “Where’s Leslie? She should be up by now.” his mother shrugged, and said “she’s probably still asleep, you know how she is.” and Sam agreed. It seemed that his fifteen year old sister could sleep through anything. “Cook her some pancakes. That should wake her up” he joked, because food was the only thing that could seem to wake Leslie up right away.

“You better get out of here, before Daisy lets loose inside.” His mom suggested, gesturing down at the dog, who was indeed jumping around and whimpering. “Kay’ see you later mom.” he said, kissing his mom on the cheek. “You too squirt.” he said, ruffling her hair as he passed.

Sarah grinned and looked down at her plate. Her smile slowly faded… “HEY!” she yelled as Sam made his way down the front hall. “You stinker! You stole my bacon!”

Sam chuckled as he made his way down the hall. He opened the door and Daisy started to bound out, but stopped suddenly, still in the door way. She began to whimper. “What is it girl?” Sam asked, then looked down to see what was making Daisy so nervous.

He gasped and stumbled back a bit. It was girl. She was covered in blood and dirt, her clothing was badly torn, and both of her eyes were nearly swollen shut. He could see leaves and mud matted in her long, auburn hair, and something else too, was it blood?

He glanced down at her legs, and drew in a sharp breath. One of her legs was just fine, still clad in a mud encrusted boot. But the other leg… the other leg was bent at an unnatural angle, and her foot was bare, missing its boot, and there was a ring of red marks around her calf, which looked like teeth marks.

Her ankle was swollen to twice its size, green and discolored. And there was blood. Everywhere. She was so pale, her lips blue. Was she, he didn’t even want to think the word. Then, he heard a croak. He looked at her face and saw that one of her eyes was open.

It was a startling color, green as the sea, darkening to as deep emerald around the pupil, and shot through with pale lavender streaks. “Help me” she managed to croak out past her dry, bloody, and cracked lips. And then she fainted.

Sam stumbled back into the foyer, bellowing “Mom!”

Lena woke up to find the face of a little girl, covered in freckles, no more than ten inches away from her hers. She gasped, and the little girl scrambled away, running out of the room. Lena looked around to find herself in an odd room, one filled with two armchairs, a short squat table with books on it, and a strange flat black and silver box mounted on the wall.

Where was she? She looked down and discovered that she was covered in a blanket. What in the world? And then it all came rushing back to her. The chase, her leg, dragging herself up to the front porch, and then being discovered by that dog, and she vaguely recalled a boy…

How long had she been here? It had obviously been at least a day, because she was feeling much better. Her system took only a short time to heal, but seeing how she had been so close to death, the healing should have taken a bit longer than usual. Good God, but she was tired.

The sound of the door opening made her glance up. The little girl from before came in, followed by an older woman, and a girl that looked to be about Lena’s age. “See! I told you that she was awake!” the little girl said proudly.

The woman nodded, and said, “Thank you Sarah, you can go play now.” “But I want to stay!” “No, let us check our patient over, and then you can come back later.” “But,” “No buts. Go.” ordered the woman, pointing towards the door.

Lena realized that this woman was probably Sarah’s mother. The whole interaction seemed like something that would have gone on between Lena and her own mother. “Mother…..” thought Lena briefly, then she shook her head. There were more pressing matters at the moment. She could mourn later.

“How long have I been here?” she asked in clear voice. The woman smiled kindly and said “Oh, I’d say about three days, though you’ve been asleep for most of it. Poor thing, my son found you on our front steps, completely covered in blood, and your leg was broken. Lucky for you, I happen to be a doctor, so I set your bone and fixed you up.” “Speaking of which, let’s check you over, just to make sure that your healing up good. Leslie, would you hand me my stethoscope?”

The woman began to poke and prod Lena, and as I became evident that there was nothing wrong with her, a puzzled frown appeared on her face. Crap. “That’s odd,” the woman said “her wounds seem to be healing awfully fast…” think fast Lena. “oh, um yes, that’s because, I… have… great metabolism?” Lena winced inwardly. Even she could hear the flimsiness of her excuse. The woman made a “hmmmmm” noise, but she didn’t push it.

Lena gave a inward sigh of relief. Her secret was safe. For now, at least. She wondered how long she could keep this up. She needed a safe place to stay, and seeing as how they couldn’t get to her, there was probably some sort of barrier set up around the house… but why wouldn’t she have known about it? Her mother and father surely would have known, seeing as how they were the king and queen… Mama. Papa. If only, no, she wouldn’t think about that now. She could greive later, when there was time. This brought Lena’s mind back to the matter at hand.

How could she convince these people to let her stay? At least until she healed and could take them on herself.