He awoke before they came to escort him to the bathroom. He opens the paper carefully and reads the whole story. They said missing, presumed dead. Speculation was that a militant faction of the new Dominant species had taken her. The report was that the apartment was discovered open with nothing missing. A photograph showed it as he remembered it with one exception, on the bed it looked as if there was a bag that was half packed. He didn’t know what that meant, but he knew she was safe.

He carefully folds the newspaper until Sloans’ face is displayed on the front. He clutches it to his chest and moans.

They come to take him for his ‘bathroom break’. He huddles at the side of his cage clutching the newspaper and refuses to move. He feels their anger at him as he refuses to move. He hears a movement. Someone says, "Here, take this."

He hears someone come closer. He opens his eyes a fraction to see. He sees a young soldier, light brown hair, thin, perhaps an inch or two shorter than himself, crouching down looking at him just inside the circle of light.

"Tom, SHE called you Tom. Is that your name?"

He knows the soldier is afraid. He nods.

"Tom, why won’t you come out?"

He clutches the newspaper tighter. "You’ll take it away."

The soldier appears thoughtful. "Tom, we’re not allowed to come close to the cage. You can either leave it on the top or hand it to me. I promise I’ll give it back afterwards. I know that you have no reason to believe me, but I promise."

Tom knows that he speaks the truth. The soldier will give it back to him if he could. He reaches the paper out through the bars as far as he could. The soldier takes it, unbuttons his shirt and slips the paper inside. "I’ll keep it here until you are done. I’ll give it back."

He gets out of the cage and allows himself to be escorted over to the bathroom area. He listens to the conversation between the commander and the soldier.

"Give it to me"

"No sir, I promised I’d give it back, sir"

"You’ll be up on charges."

"As you wish, sir. I will NOT break my word."

He returns to the cage and the young soldier is pushed forward. Tom stays close to the entrance. The soldier crouches down and locks the cage. He reaches inside his shirt and reaches through the bars to give him the newspaper. His fear was so thick it was palpable. Tom takes it and touches his arm. "Thank you."

The soldier just nods.

He goes with the rest of the troops to the door. He pauses as he sees the food brought to Tom. Tom huddles at the side of his cage in a fetal position. He passes his rifle to the man next to him and starts over to Tom’s cage. His commander grabs his arm and growls, "Adamsen." He shrugs it off and walks over to the cage.

"Tom, Tom. You must eat. You didn’t eat anything yesterday."

"Not hungry."

"Tom, Sloan would want you to eat."

"She’s dead. SHE said she’s dead."

Adamsen swallows, he hopes he knows what he is doing. "Tom, the reports say she is missing. She may be alive. If you stop eating you can’t help yourself or her." Adamsen moistens his lips, "Tom, eat and I’ll try to find out what else happened. There have to be more reports. I promise I’ll try to find out more."

Tom uncurls and looks at him. Adamsen is struck by how feline the motion is. He pushes the tray closer and notices that there is more food on it than had been before.

He hopes Tom is getting enough to eat.

Tom looks at him and wonders if this is another ploy to break him. He senses no deceit in the young man. He appears to be struggling with something within himself. He decides to cooperate and see what happens next.

Tom puts the paper down next to the tray and tentatively takes a bite. Adamsen moves back to leave. Toms’ arm snakes out and grabs his wrist. "Stay."

He sits down and waits for Tom to finish. When Tom stops eating he encourages him. ‘Two more bites, Tom, just two more bites." He says in a soft voice, as if talking to a child. Tom complies and eventually finishes it all.

Tom doesn’t know what to make of this. He apparently is truly concerned about him and his health. He reaches to wipe his fingers on his pants, when Adamsen says, "Stop." Tom stops and looks at him, now what? Adamsen sprints away and returns with a damp cloth. "Here use this. It’s not the cleanest in the world but it’s better than using your clothes."

Tom wipes his hands on the cloth and hands it back. He picks up the paper and retreats to the far edge of the cage. This is an unusual turn of events. He turns it over in his mind and wonders what this truly means. Adamsen sighs and picks up the tray. There’s going to be hell to pay. He might as well go and get the shit kicked out of him, even if it was only metaphorically. He puts the tray away and leaves the room.

Tom watches him leave and resumes his act. Curled into a fetal position at the edge of the cage away from the door he holds the paper to his chest and cradles himself. Anyone watching would only see what he wanted them to see.

"Adamsen, what the HELL did you think you were doing!? You’re restricted to quarters. I’ll deal with you later."

He shoulders his rifle and heads back to his quarters. When he gets there he closes his door and leans against it. If Grandpa knew what he was involved in he’d be dead. Grandpa would kill him. These things just didn’t happen in America. He sits down, unloads and cleans his rifle, automatically. The familiar actions calming him. He stows the weapon away properly and looks around to see what he should do. He spies the computer on his desk. He promised he would find out more. He might as well get to it now.

All the reports for over a week after she came up missing point a finger at the Dominants’ having taken her. Then the tone of the reports changes. They have Tom listed as missing and question if he was involved, not specifically accusatory just by implication. Shortly there after she is listed as dead. He prints out the relevant information, not sure what he should tell Tom. He couldn’t find any report of her body ever found. He was pretty sure that Tom had nothing to do with her disappearance, after all, he had been here. Locked in a cage, he thinks with disgust. His stomach roils with the thought of what he had allowed.

He was only following orders. Orders that he knew were wrong. Orders that he knew were illegal. He could hear his Grandpa now, "You have to do what is right. You have the choice. Following orders is NEVER an excuse." He had let himself use that as an excuse. What was he going to do now? "If you make a mess, you clean it up." It wasn’t his mess but he had participated in it. How was he going to clean it up?

There was a knock at his door. He opens it to two armed guards. He puts out his wrists, figuring that there will be handcuffs. One of them shakes his head. He shuts his door and walks between them, he only wishes he knew where.

When they come to a corner they turn away from the commanders office. They were taking him to the brain bank, where all the chiefs in lab coats were. He knew he was in deep trouble, he’d never been there before.

They take him into a room with an older man in a lab coat sitting behind a desk. The man waves the guards out of the room. "Please sit."

He sits.

"What were you doing with Specimen 24?

"What?" Adamsen says, not knowing what he is talking about.

"Specimen 24," he looks at a file folder, "Tom Daniels."

"Oh," he shrugged, "I knew you wanted his cooperation. I figured it wouldn’t hurt to try to get him to cooperate."

"He’s very dangerous. He could have killed you."

"He didn’t. I’m younger than any other of his guards. I think I’m younger than he is. Maybe he doesn’t see me as a threat."

The man nodded. "How did you get him to eat?"

"I promised him I would tell him anything about Sloans’ disappearance that I could find." He cleared his throat, "Sir, I don’t know what you want from him, but I used to work at an animal shelter in high school. I’ve seen animals that were confined go feral. Go wild. I think he is very close to the breaking point. If his mind shatters you won’t be able to get information from him or anything else."

The man’s eyes narrowed. "Do you think you could get him to cooperate."

"I don’t know. He doesn’t trust anyone. He hasn’t been well treated. If he’s that close to breaking, I may help him to cooperate, or he may kill me on a whim. I don’t know."

"Are you willing to try?"

"I know the boss lady wants something from him and doesn’t want him hurt. I guess it won’t hurt to try. If I’m wrong, I’m dead. I won’t know the difference."

"Very well, you will be his prime caretaker from now on. You will take him his meals and escort him. We will be putting him under stress. Your job will be to keep him calm."

"Sir, I usually get a 12-hour pass every 3 days, if I’m his caretaker do I lose all pass privileges?"

He thinks for a while. "No, but it will change to 8-hours every other day. That way you will be available for your services."

"Am I dismissed?"

"Yes, I will give your commander your new orders. You start this evening. He will be eating in about an hour."

"Sir, is there anything I can’t talk to him about?"

"Only this base and what we want from him. I don’t see any reason not to talk to him."

As he left the office he thinks maybe I can clean up this mess after all.

An hour later he enters the room with Tom’s meal tray. He had been issued a key to the cage. He goes over to the cage. Tom is in the same position he left him in.

Adamsen crouches down, "Tom, are you OK?"

Tom is startled. He knew someone had entered but he had not felt the guards enter. He warily looks at the soldier.

"They made me your nanny. I think they figure I’m as crazy as you are. Tom, I have the key to your cage. I’m the only one here. Are you going to kill me?"

Tom sat up and looked at him. He knew Adamsen was afraid but determined. "Why?"

"Why, what?" Adamsen asks.

Tom cocks his head, "Why anything?"

"Somebody had to do something." He shrugged, "I guess I reacted first and thought about it later. Would you rather it go back to the way it was?"

Tom slowly shakes his head. Adamsen unlocks the cage and replaces the key in his pocket. He opens the door and motions for him to come out. Tom puts the paper on the top of the cage. He escorts Tom over to the bathroom area and Tom notices that the shower area has towels and a change of clothes. Still only sweat pants but that was something.

He looks at Adamsen. "Hey, they made me your caretaker. I figured RHIP so I pushed a little. You get a daily shower, complete with shampoo." He shakes his head. "I couldn’t get you any privacy. By the way, do you want a shave? I noticed when you came in here you were clean shaven."

As he goes to the shower he asks, "RHIP?"

Adamsen laughs, "Rank has its privileges. Not much rank, and not many privileges. If you would rather be clean-shaven I’ll see what I can do. They probably won’t let you near a razor, but they may let me shave you, if you want to."

Tom thinks about it as he showers. A shave would be nice. Sloan would not recognize him now. He looks at the young man, who is slightly embarrassed at watching Tom bathe. After drying off and dressing he looks at Adamsen. "Leave it on the floor, I’ll clean up later."

He escorts Tom back to the cage and locks him in. He leaves and brings back a tray of food and a water bottle. He is less ill at ease.

"Tom, I need the water bottle."

Tom hands it to him. His tray has more food on it and a damp cloth, but still no utensils. Tom starts to eat.

"Tom, do you want me to stay while you eat?" Asks Adamsen.

Tom nods. He doesn’t know what to think of this turn of events. He senses determination in the young soldier before him but about what he doesn’t know. As Adamsen sits down he hears a crinkle. Tom looks sharply at him.

"I forgot," Adamsen says as he reaches into his shirt. "Here is what I could find out about Sloan Parker on the net. Many newspapers have web pages so I researched it as much as I could. Not a lot of information but I printed out everything I could find"

He hands Tom a bundle of printouts. Tom takes them, but continues to eat. He sees that the young man is pleased that he is eating.

"Tom, do you want to talk about anything? I was told I could talk to you about anything but this place or what they want from you. The last parts easy, I don’t have a clue what they want."

Tom finishes his meal and wipes his hands.

"What do I call you? You know who I am. Who are you?"

Adamsen looks startled, "I’m sorry. I didn’t realize…my name is Adamsen, just Adamsen. First names don’t mean much here anyway." He stuck his hand out to Tom.

Tom hesitated. "I know jailers don’t usually introduce themselves, but I have the feeling we’re both in almost the same boat. My jail is just a little bigger than yours."

Tom reached out and shook his hand. "By the way, I would like a shave."

"I’ll see what I can do. They’ll probably have some restrictions. I wouldn’t be surprised if it means you have to be chained up or something like that. I’ll do the best I can."

He takes the tray away and cleans up the shower area. Tom watches as he prepares it for the following day. Something has changed, for better or worse he didn’t know. The young soldier, Adamsen, is trying to tell him something. He isn’t sure what. He would keep up the pretense. Maybe there is hope after all. He picks up the newspaper and holds it close, automatically checking the link with Sloan. He then picks up the printouts and begins to read.

When he’s finished cleaning up, Adamsen comes over and sits down on the floor, apparently waiting. Tom looks at him and asks, "Why?"

"Why sit? I’m your nanny. I have nothing better to do. They don’t need to interrogate me about what happened in here; they just look at the videotape. I’ve seen enough of my quarters today. I reckon I’ll keep you company here for a little while, unless you want me to leave."

"Why are they doing this to me? I was working with Sloan." He let his voice choke up and tears start to flow.

"I don’t now why you’re here. I was a guard. They don’t tell us anything. Here if you want to cry, take this." He says handing him a handkerchief. "After yesterday I thought you might need one."

"Do you think Sloan’s still alive?"

"Tom, I honestly don’t know. I couldn’t find any reports of a body being found. I think that would be reported. If she is alive, I don’t know what can be done. You’re stuck in here. Maybe she’s with friends or family and keeping a low profile. After all, you’re missing and presumed dead. She may be looking for you right now."

Tom knows he is telling the truth. He knows nothing about Sloan. Tom feels a flash of anger from Adamsen when he said, "You’re stuck in here." He dries his eyes and asks, "What’s a nanny?"

Adamsen laughed, "That’s someone who cares for children. A glorified babysitter only on call all the time."

"And you’re on call."

Adamsen nods, "My passes are now only 8-hours but at least I get them every other day. Other than that I’ll be on call. I don’t know how you call me, but I guess if you call, someone will get me."

Tom nods. Adamsen is giving him a lot of information in a seemingly innocent manner.

"Tom, what would you like? I’d like to get you better quarters but I don’t think they will go for it. Maybe I can get you better food or something?" Adamsen looks at him. Tom can hear the concern in his voice, he doesn’t need his empathy for that.

"Do you want to rest?"

Tom nods and lies down. He curls into a ball and wishes he could stretch.

Adamsen watches Tom rest. He doesn’t want to screw this up, but he doesn’t know if he can pull it off. Only time will tell. He sits and waits until Toms breathing becomes calm and regular, he doesn’t know if Tom’s asleep but he hopes he is. He hopes he can keep him sane. That may be their only hope.

On his way back to his quarters, Adamsen picks up a meal at the mess hall. He doesn’t need to face the commander now. He has high hopes that Tom will see what he is doing. He is in such deep water now it was sink or swim, and he was swimming as hard as he could.

When Tom awoke he was alone. He finishes reading the printouts. Even though the reports said Sloan was dead, Adamsen was right, no reports of a body. Not even a report of an unidentifiable body, presumed to be Sloan Parker. Someone had slipped up somewhere. Either that or they wanted someone to make the leap that Adamsen had made. Tom knew she was alive, but he had to keep the pretense up that she was dead. They will probably try to use that against him. He has a very narrow line of sanity to follow. Apparently Adamsen’s job was to keep him on the sane side while they pushed him further to the edge. He thinks they want him crazy but not too crazy.

Soon enough he hears the door open and Adamsen rolls in a cart. He rolls it close to the cage. He crouches down and asks, "What do you want first, shower or food?"

"Shower."

He waits for the cage to be unlocked and then crawls over to get out. He is a little stiff and Adamsen automatically helps him up. He’s still holding the printouts and newspaper. "Tom, do you want me to hold these or do you want to leave them here?"

Tom notices that Adamsen is asking questions not giving orders. He swallows and says, "Leave them here."

He escorts Tom over to the bathroom area and waits. When they get back to the cage, before Tom got back inside he stops him and asks, "Do you want to stretch before you eat or after?"

Tom starts, "How do you know?"

"I looked at some of the old videos. Before SHE came you stretched during the day. Why not now?"

"Didn’t seem to be any point."

"Well, if you stretch at least you won’t be stiff. You might as well stretch out here, where there is more room."

Tom started his basic stretches and then went to more complicated ones. Out of the cage he could stretch his body completely out and get out all the sore spots that had bothered him over his captivity. He was soaking wet when he was done but he felt much better.

"How do you that?" asked Adamsen as he pulls a towel off of the lower shelf of the cart and hands it to him.

"Do what?" asks Tom as he wipes the sweat off his face and body.

"Roll up off your back and stand up without using your hands."

Tom gave a half smile. "Many years of practice. You may have to rise with something in your hands that you can’t drop. It helps to know exactly what to do. If you do it often enough the body remembers even if you don’t have time to think about it."

"I read about that once. ‘Body memory’ it was called. Ready to eat?"

"Yes. Tomorrow though, let’s stretch, shower and than eat. I think things will go better that way." Tom reenters the cage. Adamsen brings his tray and uncovers it.

"I thought you could use a real breakfast. Lets see bacon, eggs, hash browns, toast, fresh fruit, orange juice and coffee. Here’s your water bottle. I need the one from yesterday." Tom handed it to him. There was even a plastic spoon for him to eat with.

"How did you do this?"

"I got it from the mess hall. Your breakfast I sent to the lab coat guys. I figure if it was good enough for you it should be good enough for them. And now they have it on tape and can explain to their boss why it wasn’t good enough."

Tom could feel that under the bright smile that Adamsen flashed at him he was deadly serious. Somehow Adamsen had changed the game. Instead of being a lab rat in a maze doing tricks for the scientists, they were putting the unknown watchers through their paces. This was a dangerous game. He wondered if Adamsen knew how dangerous.

"Tom, do you want me to stay here while you eat?"

"Please, stay. Next time you don’t need to bring coffee, I don’t really like it much."

"Good, I’ll drink it. I was running late and only got one cup."

"Are you one of those people who need their coffee in the morning?"

"Noooo, not me. I don’t need coffee to get up in the morning. I need coffee to rise from the dead. You can’t get good coffee here. That’s one reason I like to go to town. There’s a coffee shop that I can get coffee with chicory. Reminds me of home."

He looked at Tom and started. "I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have mentioned it. You can’t go anywhere."

"Not your fault. I don’t have anywhere to go any way." He said with a sigh.

"Tom, what do you want to eat? I mean, I got you what I like for breakfast but you may like something different and what do you want for supper. They only let me feed you twice a day. Maybe I can get them to let you eat lunch, too.

"Well, I actually like fresh fruit and vegetables, but I like some vegetables cooked. I prefer whole grain breads and cereals. But I would like my meat to look like something identifiable, not ‘guess what?’"

"You sound just like my momma. How about tomorrow eggs, oatmeal, fresh fruit, and juice. Toast if you want it."

"That’s fine."

"How about I substitute whatever the mess hall has for a meat in your regular dinner with some whole grain rolls. I’ll check and see what they give you and make sure you have some cooked vegetables."

"Sounds good to me." By this time Tom has finished eating. Adamsen hands him a hand towel to clean his hands on. He puts the tray and towels back on the cart.

"Tom do you want me to stay? I can keep you company if you want." Tom feels carefully around what Adamsen is trying to do. He knew he doesn’t want to stay but is saying it for the cameras.

"No," Tom said, carefully, "I just want to sit and think about what you have said today. I need some time to think." He felt a flash of gratitude from Adamsen. He didn’t think that the young man knew he could sense others emotions. He would have to let him know without either scaring him or let the watchers know that it is important.

He sits and watches Adamsen clean up the shower and bathroom area. He is in darkness again except for the never ending light over his cage. He knows Adamsen is up to something but he has no idea what. Could the young soldier want him out of here? He remembers what he said about a different type of jail. Maybe the young man was looking for a way out for himself, or maybe for both of them.

Adamsen decides that if he is going to have some relatively free time he better put it to good use. First, a stop at the ranges, he could make sure he qualified in both rifle and pistol. The next stop was his commander to see what he was in for.

He did well in both pistol and rifle, but he wasn’t happy with his scores. He would have to find more time to practice. Now to see his commander.

He presented himself at the door and knocked.

"Enter"

He entered and stood at attention, "You wanted to see me, sir?"

"Yes, I see you have been assigned to be a personal caretaker of the prisoner. Your file shows you only have the basics in hand-to-hand. If you are going to be a personal guard I want you to have more training. You are assigned 2 hours of hand-to-hand training daily. If there are no classes, find an instructor. Be careful son, he’s a killer."

"Sir, if I’m assigned to be personal guard, what is my chain of command?"

"As far as I can see your commander is the man who assigned you. You will have no other responsibilities. Since you are solely responsible for the prisoner, I guess you have carte blanche. There will still be guards at the door, but you are to have complete admission. What have you gotten yourself into?"

"I don’t know, sir, but they want him alive. I guess I’m the one who has to keep him both alive and sane. I don’t know if it can be done."

"Good luck. Dismissed."

"Yes, sir."

Well, that went better than expected. All he got out of it was more work. He better sign up for some classes. It wasn’t too hard, since everything here was on a rotating schedule. He only had to sign up for 2 classes.

He looked at his watch. Almost dinner, than time for class, first make sure Tom had some thing good to eat.

Good, tonight there was turkey. He got a double serving for Tom and some sweet potatoes. He knew that he could not give Tom the plastic knife and fork so he cut the meat up for him.

The guards are not happy to see him but let him in without comment.

"Tom, it’s time to eat. Bathroom or food?"

"Bathroom"

Adamsen escorts him as usual.

"Where have you been? You smell of gunpowder."

Adamsen sniffs his hands as he locks Tom in the cage.

"Yeah, I guess I do. I was qualifying. Making sure my skills are up to par. I wish I was better. Now I get to learn personal combat. Hand-to-hand, if I’m guarding you, I have to have more experience. I don’t know what they want. Have me die quicker?

"Here’s your dinner, I got you some turkey with gravy and some sweet potatoes besides your regular fruits and vegetables. Sorry, no whole grain breads tonight. You’ll have to do with white."

"If that’s the worst of my problems I’m in good shape." Tom senses anxiety in the young man. "What are you upset about?"

Adamsen shrugs, "I donno, just everything I guess." He shakes himself. "Let’s talk about something else. Why don’t you tell me how you met Sloan?"

Tom stops eating and looks at him, not knowing what his reaction will be. He puts his spoon down and tells him, "I was assigned to kill her. I couldn’t do it. She was too alive. She was too, I don’t know, there are no words."

"I thought so. I’ve been told more than once that you’re a killer. If that were really true, you would have killed her too. You said you were assigned. You were following orders. You finally realized that the orders were wrong."

Tom nods. He finally realizes what the soldier is trying to say. He realized that the orders were wrong.

"Hey, you aren’t eating. Eat up, I still have to go to class. By the way, tomorrow I get to go into town. So it’ll be early breakfast and late dinner."

"That’s fine by me as long as I get to eat."

Tom finishes and cleans himself up.

"I’m sorry, but I figure I better do the best I can. Be better for both of us.

Tom nods and hopes this young soldier knows what he is doing.