Dreams curled and twisted behind his eyelids.
Hands on his shoulders?
His neck ached, and his eyes rolled open with the force of being shaken, vision blurred around the edges. An unfamiliar face swam into view, but he couldn't focus on it. In the back of his mind lay a sense of unease.
His eardrums vibrated; hummed in confusion; realised what they were hearing was a voice, but still his mind could not pick apart the words. They held an urgency - a desperate, nagging fear, like the clawed remnants of a dream.
He realised, with a flash of clarity, that the language wasn't English. The rolling burr of her words, the colour of her skin - she was a V'rillian soldier. He jolted upright in a moment of pure panic, fingers scrabbling desperately in the dirt for his gun or a knife.
The enemy's hand dropped onto his and pressed it to the ground. Be still. She placed a finger to her lips. Be silent.
His mind disagreed, screamed at him to fight back, but his head spun and his body rebelled; he sank back against the ground, stones digging into his back, and something beneath his head that smelled of sweat.
His forehead sported a bandage. Where from?
The enemy soldier watched him for a time, crouched and ready; body wound tight as a spring. Dark eyes caught the dying light of the sun through the window.
Where had this hut come from? Half of it had sunk deep into the muck of the swampy battlefield, and a machine-gun took up most of the remaining space. Where were her companions? His hands weren't bound, but he felt confident in considering himself a prisoner of the V'rillians. Where were his own friends? His army? The V'rillian army?
His head ached, but he couldn't control the whirling thoughts.
The sun disappeared, and a long, low growl shuddered through the air like the voice of a rockslide. The V'rillian's face grew whiter than snow. Once more, she put a finger to her lips - and gripped his arm.
Ryan - his name was Ryan! - snatched his hand back, but the enemy's eyes flashed with warning, and he did want to know what the sound had been - and maybe, just maybe, up close he would have a chance to overpower her. He let her sling his arm around her neck. She hauled him to his feet, and stood swaying for a moment in a sure-footed dance.
Ryan's head whirled like a loose wheel, and he had no choice but to cling to his enemy. He had no chance of escape. He couldn't have kept his feet without her.
The V'rillian dragged him over to the window and Ryan's legs folded, but the soldier forced him up again, fingers digging hard and cold into his cheeks as she forced him to stare through the glass.
The outside world was dark. Unnaturally dark. The emptiness of it swallowed his senses, not unlike staring into an empty grave. Red spots swam in his vision.
Then something moved.
Ryan only caught a hint of it - the gleam of something sharp; a glint of something wet - but it was frighteningly large, larger than anything he had ever seen before besides Mt. Himali, and it was right outside the window.
He sank to the ground with the breath beaten out of him, heartbeat rattling in his ears.
The V'rillian crouched nearby, elbows on her knees, fingers dangling and dancing in the dirt. Watching him quietly. Ryan lay his head back and tried to swallow the tears.
He wasn't ready for this. He was the rookie, and - A finger tapped his boot. He forced himself to look at her.
The V'rillian pointed to the machine-gun, and jabbed a thumb at herself - then pointed to a crate of ammunition, and stabbed a finger at Ryan. Ryan shook his head. He would not be a slave to this - this alien.
