• When he left, everything came as a rush. So, Kaden Luka had saved me from certain doom, my grandma, the only family that I knew of, was dead, and I was in a rehab center that was run by my savior’s father and brother. Okay, I could handle this.

    I walked over to the closet and opened it. There was a pair of jeans and a t-shirt on one of the shelves. I put them on, sat back down on the bed, and looked around. I felt uneasy sitting in this room alone, so I got up and opened the door.

    The hallway was the same wooden color as the room that I was staying in. It was lined with doors. At the end, there were lighter colored walls. Kaden was walking down the hallway, and saw that I was peeking out of the door.

    “Anion,” he hissed, “get back in there! Quickly before anyone sees you!”

    He ran to the room and pushed me back as he closed and locked the door. He was looking at me incredulously.

    “I’m gone for fifteen minutes, and you feel the need to try and leave the room,” he panted. “Do you know how much trouble you could have gotten yourself into?”

    “I-I’m sorry, Kaden,” I stuttered.

    “It’s fine,” he said, hugging me again. “Just, please, don’t leave the room
    without me. Your family isn’t liked much in this facility. If you get bored, I’ll take you to see the whole place later today when everyone’s sleeping, okay?”

    He pulled back from me and smiled slightly. There were a million questions I had for him, but I couldn’t bring myself to ask him.

    “So, what do you want to do?” I asked him.

    “Well, maybe I could take you to see my father,” Kaden contemplated. “I don’t think the residents will notice you. They’re all supposed to be in the cafeteria right now anyway.”

    “Okay.”

    Kaden put his arm around my shoulders, stepped out, looked around, and led me down the hall. We stayed quiet for the whole trip. When we turned left in the lighter hallway, a boy was standing by the water fountain getting a drink.

    “Cory, what are you doing out?” Kaden asked the boy.

    “I ran out of water in my bottle,” the boy said looking at me. “What is that doing here?”

    Kaden tensed up immediately. “First, if you call her “that” again, I’ll see to it that you are taken of free time for a month. Second, get back in the cafeteria before I tell my father that you were out of place.”

    Cory huffed and stomped back in the door beside the fountain. Kaden took a deep breath and continued walking down the hallway.

    “This isn’t a rehab center, is it, Kaden?” I asked.

    “Um, no,” Kaden said nervously. “It’s kind of… a school for people like us. We just pose as a rehab center to keep humans from finding us out.”

    “Humans?” I said curiously.

    I thought that we were all human here. Kaden certainly looked it. Then I remembered he had said “wolfinian”. Kaden saw the realization in my face.

    We continued walking. After a few minutes, we stopped at a door.