Vareva knelt in the snow just before the hanger she had called her home for the past four years. She was washing her hands and desperately trying to get the small blood stains of the human off her hands with some snow.

“Damn.” Grunted the tall female warrior silent, as she took another handful of snow and rubbed it over her hands and fingers to get rid of the last red blood stains on her skin.

Still not satisfied rubbed she one handful of snow after another over her hands while flashes of her past rushed through her head and flooded her mind with the high pitched screams and the terrified yells and pleadings of those she killed in the name of a brutal and cold species she hated deep down to her core.

A few tears hit the snow below her and when she noticed it, stopped Vareva and looked up while the voices in her head began to disappear again.

She looked up into the cloudy, dark, sky and wondered, like so many times, if she and the others, who were like her, would find any redemption for all the things they had done.

“Are you…” Began Cathy behind her when she saw how her foster mother cleaned her hands and fingers again and again.

“I’m done. Sorry. I should have helped you inside but…”

“It’s okay. He is stable for now. Thanks to you.”

Cathy went closer stopping first when she reached the tall Urley’s knees. She took a sip from her still hot tea and looked up into the sky before her eyes fell on the sad face of the one, who had saved her many years ago.

Vareva was sad. She knew the look and she knew what lied behind it. The countless battles she had been forced to fight. The bitterness to have no home or any memory of it because of the long sleep they had been put in.

Still, as both hands of that big woman came towards her, who had easily the power to smash her into pulp in an instant, could she feel the gentleness and carefulness that lay behind every move she did when handling a human.

Cathy was taken upwards until she reached Vareva’s chest and soon found herself sitting onto her mothers left shoulder before both enjoyed the silent humming of the wind for a while.

Inside the hangar, near a small fireplace at the backside, laid Sam with bandaged legs and arms and with a bandage around his head.

In his dream, was he running through the darkness always followed by loud and hard steps until he was finding himself inside a snow covered alley. The buildings and stores where destroyed and covered with layers of snow and ice. He, not older then ten stood in that alley his jacket dirty and his pants sewed together on many parts. His face was dirty and tears ran over his cheeks as he heard the ever so mechanical steps and the silent sound of crushed snow behind him.

He knew what was coming as he saw his younger self before him. But it felt as if it would be the first time again when the snow white hand grabbed the boys shoulder and violently turned him around only to grab his throat with its other.

“Damn you!!” Yelled Sam and charged the machine and his younger self but he simply ran through both as if they weren’t there. He turned and tried to grab its arms while it held the boy further up turning its head from one side to the other as if to inspect him.

“Stop it!!” Yelled he again when his younger self began to cry and desperately tried to get the hand off as well.

“Stop it you monster! Let him go! Let him go!” Yelled Sam out in frustration and anger when the Deva suddenly let go of his younger self and made a few steps backward until it fell backwards.

There in its forehead loomed a big hole and little sparks of the failing energy system jumped out of its inner part before also those died off.

Sam’s younger self turned around when a tall figure seemed to walk out of the fog that was his memory. The mechanical sound of servo engines and the metallic clank sounds it made whenever its steel plated boots hit the concrete where intimidating even after all those years.

The large figure stopped in front of the boy and knelt down before the boy offering a free hand for him to grab which was also covered up and steel and polymer armour pieces.

“Butch…” Said Sam’s older self as he saw the slightly wrinkled face behind the mask of the power suit.

It was the man who had found him. The man who had saved him after his sister had been taken as well. The man who had trained him for years and who had made him to what he was today.

His memories began to vanish behind the clouds of his mind when the tall man picked his younger self up with one arm. He saw the faint smile on the older mans face. Gentle, friendly, determined to protect those under his care.

Slowly awoke Sam from his forced sleep and it took him a few moments until his eyes had adjusted themselves to the dim lights that seemed to come from a barrel somewhere in the distance.

With a grunting sound tried he to get up but his body turned those tries down by sending him one stitch and pain wave after another.

Sam waited until his eyes could see more clearly and then tried it again. This time ignored he the warning signals that his body made and got up forcing his bandaged and stitching legs off the bed he was on. The cold of the floor greeted him immediately and he noticed that he wore none of his old clothes except his underwear for what he was kind of thankful while it only added more and more questions to him.

He checked for his clothes but couldn’t find them anywhere but instead found a pair of black boots under the bed and a pair of white pants and a black sweater nearby.

It took him some time to get it on but he did and when he felt strong enough, he tried to get onto his feet.

Sam felt like walking one a wobbly ground but he knew it came from his nerves and from whatever he had been given as he walked along the riffled metal walls to the large opening where he could see a large grey concrete wall.

“Where am I?” Asked he, himself as he noticed the large tarp which was spanned over the metal walls who he found out, where large freight containers. 

He had a bit of trouble to remember on the last moments before he passed out after the Urley had let him fall to the ground when he thought that he had seen Cathy looking down at him.

He wasn’t sure if he had dreamed it…but surely someone had helped him and he was pretty sure that he was not in the Cadiea bunker.

The bandages around his legs began to hurt as well as his lung and head as he walked around the container he had leaned on when he saw the true size of the place he was in.

His eyes grew wide when he noticed the huge space before him which had to be at least twice the height of Cadiea’s own underground hangars.

There was only one place he knew of that could be probably have the size of that but it was impossible to reach for anyone since it was at least dozens of miles outside the city.

“Fort Hannibal…” Came it over his lips when he heard the silent humming sounds followed by a louder yawn then any human could have done.

The seconds that followed then seemed to stretch into hours when one arm and then a second arm slowly began to reach toward the ceiling. But those limbs…they were far bigger then that of a human. They had the size of small tree trunks…and they had the colour scheme of the aliens as they stretched before Sam’s now shocked, wide open eyes.

“Oooh! That was a good nap.” Managed he to hear when the rest of the giant alien rose behind the containers.

He saw the long light grey hair even in the dim light and heard the muffled noises of cracking joints as she stretched herself some more.

Sam’s jaw stood wide open. Never had he thought to be that close to one of them or even be alive to find them just waking up.

His mind literally screamed to him to run, make a dash or hide but none of his muscles wanted to move as the giant being began to rise and slowly, began to turn its body towards his direction.

As much as Sam wanted it, and as much as his brain told him to move couldn’t he when the giant yellow eyes finally fell on his frozen form on the ground.

He gulped feeling the first sweat drops running down his back as the giant face just looked at him without saying a word.

His mind went blank. No feelings. No plans or ideas that came up in him. He and the giant thing just stared at each other for what seemed like eternity when he heard some noises coming from behind him.

It was the sound of an unlocking door and before he could bring the first thought to an end, was he already running as fast as he could towards the sound and the door.

He didn’t look back to the urley when the door was only a couple of feet away of him when the same began to open and the first icy winds made contact with his skin.

He even began to run faster and slammed with his entire weight against the half open door feeling, and hearing the faint grunting noise that he had hit someone pretty hard and even had knocked him onto the ground.

Had it been a deva, thought Sam as the ice cold wind hit his face but didn’t stopped to take a look back.

- - -

It hadn’t been long after Cathy had gotten back on her feet again. She had tried to call out his name and even thought of running after him but with no clue of where he was, had it been futile an much to dangerous for her. Vareva on the other hand, was already preparing herself and grabbed a visor from her stock.

“I can’t believe that he just ran away.” Stated Cathy sitting on one of the containers and holding her left elbow where the door had hit her pretty hard.

“It was my fault.” Said Vareva when she checked the visor a last time before she closed her violet full body suit, and grabbed her combat belt.

“I should have tried to calm him down or at least catch him before he could reach the door.” She said and sighted before she reached for the tall hangar doors and opened them.

“But don’t worry. I will find him.”

- - - - 

Sam tried to run but his legs were hurting along with his lungs while his eyes still tried to adjust to the darkness. The ice cold wind lashed through his face and forced him more then a few times to adjust his balance while the snow began to get higher and higher.

His breath was still visible in the cold but was already dragged away as soon as it left his mouth while he held his arms, tight around his chest. His lungs began to hurt and after another step, his legs just stopped moving.
Here he was somewhere in the darkness far away from his home his city and the people he loved and cared for. His head was spinning as the freezing cold began to take its toll as well as the wounds in his body which weren’t completely healed up yet.
Sam sunk on his knees and the snow and sharp wind already began to cover his legs and parts of his upper body.
His shivering body refused to do as his will wanted when he felt that his body fell to a side and his face landing into the snow.



Vareva activated the visor as soon as she had left the hangar and had closed the large doors behind her. The greenish HUD in the visor gave her the relevant outlines and information’s of her surroundings and thanks to the system, could she see in the storm and at night, as clearly as if it had been broad daylight on a cloudless day.
She walked around the building seeing the smaller door through which he had left just a couple of minutes ago and zoomed closer to the spot.
The system showed her barley visible footprints, on what it began to calculate a possible course within the blink of an eye.

“Feisty little human.” Mumbled Vareva under her breath and smirked slightly before she began to follow the trail that the system gave her.
It didn’t take her long, thanks to her much lager and wider steps, until the system recognized a faint heat signature a bit ahead of her.
She began to pursuit and reached the little form which had been covered by a thin layer of snow already.
Vareva took her gauntlets off and as carefully as she could, picked she Sam up from the ground. She held him up and close to her body trying to protect his small form, from the freezing weather as she turned and headed back to her home.