Jaxon

Um...

     "Stay!" Hace said very firmly. Hace seemed mad as he placed a light blanket completely over Jaxon and the seat. Jaxon had never seen Hace mad like this. The door slammed shut and the car gave off a beep. Jaxon decided to obey. He didn't want to make Hace madder then he already was.

     After what seemed like an eternity, Jaxon heard the door open, and he felt the seat next to him go down with some weight. Jaxon could hear Hace talking to someone. He was talking soft and cooing them like he cooed Jaxon to calm him down. Jaxon pulled the blanket down just enough to see Hace pull out his phone and put it to his ear.

     "Jap... I ~~~" Jaxon could only understand one more word in the part of the conversation he heard, "vet".

     "Hace?" Jaxon was confused as to what was going on. Did something happen that Hace thought he had to go back to the vet? Hace finished his phone call and looked at him. He pulled off the blanket the rest of the way and smiled. He slightly rubbed Jaxon's head and scratched his chin.

     "Good boy." Hace whispered as he closed the door and then got into the front seat.

     Jaxon looked over at the thing next to him as they drove away. It was a large square shaped item with a dirty looking blanket covering it. He tilted his head and wondered what it was. Then he hear it... the crying. It was the same crying as back at that pet shop. Jaxon gulped as he slowly reached out and pulled on the blanket a bit. He could see that it was a cage. Inside was that same man he saw back at the shop, still shaking and holding his knees up to his chest.

     "Hello?" Jaxon said to him. "Are you ok?"

     The man jumped a little. He looked up for a moment and his green eyes met Jaxon's blue ones. He looked away again.

     "You were the one we saw on the counter." Jaxon continued in a soft voice.

     Jaxon could see the man was terrified. One of the things they had started to teach them was how to handle people in bad situations. They said there might be people on Earth Beta that wouldn't know what it was like to be people anymore or they might be afraid of new humans just showing up. He wasn't sure what they had meant by that... but before the teachers really had time to explain or teach them anything else, the launch date had been moved up.

     The man wiped his eyes and sniffed. He took a few deep breaths and controlled his breathing. He looked up at Jaxon and slightly tilted his head in confusion. He was actually looking more at the seat Jaxon was in then Jaxon himself.

     "What's your name?" Jaxon was trying to get the man to talk. Maybe he could help calm him down. "I'm Jaxon."

     "Ryan." The man said. Jaxon could hear that the man's voice was harsh. He must be thirsty.

     Jaxon looked around, but his cup wasn't in the holder. Hace must have put it away when they got out the car the first time and didn't give it back. He sighed that he couldn't offer Ryan a drink.

     "How long have you been in that store?" Jaxon didn't want to stop talking for too long.

     The man sniffed a few more times before answering. "I... I remember I was home one moment..." Ryan closed his eyes and had slightly choked on the word home. He recomposed himself and continued "Then I was waking up inside a cage inside that place. I was there... maybe two days? I... I don't even know..." He looked back up at Jaxon's face, and Jaxon could see that Ryan had a huge bruise on his left cheek. It was starting to turn purple and green. It looked like someone had struck him.

     Ryan covered his face with his hair and looked away. He didn't like the way Jaxon was staring at him. "How old are you?" Ryan asked suddenly. Anything to get the attention off himself. "You look really young."

     "I'm fifteen. How old are you?"

     "I'm twenty." There was an awkward silence for a moment while each of them was trying to think of what to say. "What..." Ryan looked like he was about to ask something he didn't want the answer to. "What... what are they going to... to do to us?" He almost whispered the last part.

     "Um..." Jaxon didn't know how to explain it to the poor guy without upsetting him more. "Well... they're gonna take care of you. They will probably take you to a v... doctor first to make sure you're healthy..."

     "A doctor..." Ryan's eyes got wide again as he got a little louder. "I'm fine. I don't need to see a doctor." He started pushing himself against the side of the cage.

     "You don't really have a choice." Jaxon gulped. "After that... they take you to a store to get supplies..."

     "What kind of supplies?" Ryan was trembling again. The worst things were going through his mind.

     'This isn't working.' Jaxon thought to himself. He saw that Ryan was holding his knees tighter and was crying again. With a sigh, he figured telling him the truth now was probably a better idea then letting the poor guy freak out about everything.

     "We're pets." Jaxon blurted out before his mind even really came up with how to break it to Ryan. "He's taking you to a vet."

     "WHAT?!" Ryan's head flung up. Jaxon jumped a bit from how loud he was. His ears were still hurting him. He covered them and rubbed them a bit.

     "Ardent ~~~ ~~~ Ok?" Hace asked from the front.

     "Ardent Ok." Jaxon answered him. Hace quickly looked up at the mirror in front of him and gave Jaxon the same funny look that he gave back at the store. Maybe Jaxon was using too many words. He was learning them quickly. Would Hace do something to him if he kept learning words?

     Jaxon looked back at Ryan and saw that he was now laying down in a ball. "Ryan?"

     Ryan was done talking. He didn't have anything else to say to Jaxon.

     "Jaxon!" Ryan was yelling. "Jaxon! What's going on? We stopped moving!" Jaxon forced himself awake and looked at Hace. He was taking off his safety restraint and getting out of the vehicle.

     "I don't know yet. I can't see anything either." Jaxon yawned and rubbed his eyes.

     "Can you pull this blanket off so I can see more?"

     "I can try." Jaxon reached over and pulled at the blanket. "If you pulled from the inside on the same side it should work."

     With the two of them working together, they were able to get the blanket to fall off with its own weight. Jaxon could now really see how bad Ryan looked in full sunlight. He his feet were slightly tucked under him and had no shoes or socks on them. His clothes didn't fit him, he looked skinny... far too skinny. He could also see that his arms and any other skin that wasn't covered had random bruises and cuts. He's hair was dirty and long. It looked like he hadn't had a shower in years. His eyes were sunken into his skull and had large dark rings around them, Jaxon thought Ryan looked a bit like a skeleton.

     As soon as the blanket came off, the door opened, and Ryan scooted as close to Jaxon as he could. He grabbed his knees again and started to shake. On the other side of the door was Hace and Jap. Jap had his mouth hanging open and his eyes were wide.

     "Now there's two of them?" Ryan whispered.

     "It's ok Ryan." Jaxon tried to sound calm. "That's just Hace and Jap... I think they might be brothers. He probably just called Jap to help because you don't have a harness yet." Jaxon quickly covered his mouth. But the damage was done. Ryan started to cry.

     Jaxon mentally facepalmed himself. He really wished they had been able to teach them more about social interactions. He was never any good at talking to people. He had never talked to any civilians back on earth, it was always his crew and teachers before this. He really didn't count the two weird guys and the woman who already knew they were pets. This was different from anything else so far.