A Second Chance

Stars Above Earth Below

Harrigan had been true to his words, somehow working his magic to get her in. He had even scheduled that an entire field be left cleared for Tomak to land, and a car scheduled to come pick her up. It had been a good thing that the ship could cloak, or she wasn't sure it would have gone as smoothly as it did.

But not everything had clicked together.

She still had yet to tell Tomak her true intentions for coming here, to this state. He didn't know the purpose of this visit and the fact that he still brought her all the way down here, hundreds of miles from her home without knowing a thing, filled her heart with a warm glow.

After a successful landing, Tomak's claws clinking against the dash full of electric blues and reds momentarily distracted her from her worries.

But when he was seemingly finished with whatever sequence he had put in, he slowly turned to her, his glowing eyes penetrating the very marrow of her thoughts. "You have been quiet," he noted gently, curious and yet non-pressuring.

To this she nodded, biting her lip. How to go about this? She twirled around that question, before deciding on something Tomak would prefer; directness.

"Do you know why we're here, Tomak?" she asked gently, scared to meet his eyes, but incapable of eluding the action.

His mandibles fluttered tensely over his mouth, before stilling completely. "Tell me."

Taking a short breath, she began hesitantly, "Remember that woman I had spoken about? Amanda?"

Recognition lit within his eyes, "The human female that kept you from me."

She smiled. Tomak always took things so personally, but he wasn't entirely wrong. "Yes, well, she has a son that is dying from..." she tried to put cancer into the simplest terms for him, "a disease that can either kill you slowly, or it's aggressive and spreads rapidly in the body. But it isn't contagious!" she quickly added the last part, hoping to hit all the bases that his concern could stem from. Very quickly though, he caught on to what she was saying.

Suddenly his hands were on her forearms pinning them to the armrests and completely halting her from continuing.

"Gorgeous," he growled, his eyes admonishing and cautious. "Tell me you are not thinking about healing that pup."

She blinked, then swallowed, her teeth clamping down nervously on her bottom lip.

He read her facial expression and sighed, rattling softly in disaccord. "Why do you want this?" he demanded. "Why show mercy to the offspring of your enemy when they deserve none?" He tried to understand her reasoning, but it confused him.

Rae took a breath. "Because at one point in time, that was me, Tomak. I was the kid waiting to die. My father found a way to save me, and that was what Amanda was trying to do, but I had an escape, her son doesn't. His only shot is me, and there's a chance I can save him."

"A chance." He looked at her then. "You do not know."

She lowered her eyes, "No, I don't, but I have to try."

He growled, shaking his head, which caused his dreads to shift and sway. "He does not deserve your help."

Laying a moment of silence between them, she looked him directly in his amber eyes, beseeching him. "The actions of one person don't define who we are. It would be unfair of me to blame him for the mistakes his mother made. He had no say in it."

This quieted his thoughts, stamping out his anger quicker than a dying campfire.

Seeing him soften, Rae took her opening, "Please, let me do this, Tomak. I have to, for my own sanity."