The Long Way Home

Chapter One Hundred & Two: The Incubator

Cass's woke up to a pounding headache, worse than anything that she had ever experienced before. Over the course of her time at the refugee camp she had been getting headaches like this with more frequency. It didn't take genius to work out that it was some how connected to whatever was going on here. Cass wanted to put a hand to her head, but her wrist jingled still restrained by her side to the metal operating table.

Her body was cold, she could feel the goosebumps raising all over her flesh at the coolness that settled over her semi naked form. Nothing had changed in the time since she had passed out. She was still clad in her underwear, the bandage was still covering her abdomen and she was still in excruciating agony from whatever wound was underneath it. Her limbs were stiff from her lack of movement, her shoulders ached and her wrists and ankles were bleeding and raw from struggling against the restraints. She wondered if this was part of the torture, lying here for hours on end with nothing but her own thoughts. The panic had long since subsided, acceptance had filtered through.

It took her more than a few minutes to shake off the disorientation and realize that there was another presence in the room. One that she recognized from the dreams that had been plaguing her consciousness as of late. It wasn't possible, she thought as heavy set footsteps drew closer to the table she was attached to. Yet it was the only real solution to what was happening.

The Wraith weren't acting in accordance of what they knew, for her to be strapped to this table for so long was out of character. The culling itself had seemed strange, from her experience with the Athosians the Wraith usually fed, destroyed and left. Instead they had captured all that they could preserving human life. For what purpose? Cass pondered as she tilted her head towards her captor. Even as she caught a glimpse of his humanoid features she thought she knew.

Experimentation.

Long, white fingers stroked the dark hair away from her features and it took the tensing of every single muscle in her body to prevent herself from flinching. It was clear that she was here for a reason, once they had been on the bridge to becoming friends and now...

Well Cassandra wasn't sure where they stood.

"We are friends Cassandra." Michael's voice echoed through the recesses of her mind. "More than that in fact."

It felt like a needle stabbing into the space behind her eyes, she ground her teeth together at the sensation until it passed before releasing a long deep breath of relief.

"Get out of my head." she croaked.

Cass felt the moment that he disconnected from her brain. It was like someone was pulling the plug and suddenly the surge of power that was erupting through her mind stopped. The headache was fading now, it ebbed out of her like a small river until the pain in her temples had drained away completely.

"It's an automatic reaction after being apart forso long." Michael told her, tugging the stool beside the operating table and seating himself upon it so that they were almost face to face. "I did not mean to cause you discomfort."

"You were doing it in the camp weren't you?" Cass asked as everything began to make a crazy sort of sense. "God that's what Drew was doing wasn't it? He was trading with you."

"In return for the enzyme and my guarantee that the camp would be protected." Michael added helpfully, his fingertip trailed along her bare arm as he surveyed her half naked form stretched out before him.

"You culled the camp." Cass reminded him, as bile raised up in her throat at the intimateness of the gesture.

"It was the only way to get what I wanted." Michael told her, his hungry gaze shifting to analyse her assets. "I needed more subjects for my latest batch of experiments."