Morrison nodded to Harriet's words. Being a human with no powers himself, he relied on technology to aid him. He silently mounted a night-vision device on his gun and peered through as he scouted the immediate surrounding. He placed his feet carefully on the underground as he moved step by slow step. This is what he lived for. He noticed Harriet was looking in a certain direction, and he turned his attention to that area as well.

Ethan went the other direction with Barrow, both with a company night-vision device on their guns. When a branch snapped, Ethan turned and aimed his gun at where the sound had come from. Barrow had done the same thing, but with Ethan having his focus on the source of the sound, he scouted the area around them to make sure there would be no attacks from another direction.
"How many?" Barrow whispered.
"One, so far," Ethan whispered back.

Harriet kept her attention on the trees, she could keep tabs on Morrison easily; He was a human, she already knew his energy mark- just like she knew Ethan and Barrows.
"Vampires." She projected into all three men's heads, "Keep torches at the ready, eyes glow red." She informed them before she listened carefully.

The two vampires had spit up by now, both stalking their own prey; the first knowing that they would only get one of the two as a meal if they could manage to take both of them down, but they had given the younger vampire more food- They needed it, they needed to grow stronger than what they already were, but hopefully this mission wouldn't be too hard for the two of them. They're hunting 3 humans and... Whatever the other person was.

The first vampire slunk along as they kept their eyes on Harriet, everything that they were about do to was risky, but they were starving, running on fumes of the last meal... They needed to make it, they couldn't find any others they could hunt.
They slunk across their branch, awake of Harriet's stare on them at all times.
"Careful." Harriet whispered out loud, mainly to Morrison. "Train the gun up to the tree, turn the torch on." She spoke softly, making sure to softly order him as she readied herself with her powers.

The second Vampire crouched when the two men turned to them. They pressed their hands on the ground, ready to lunge when they were ready, readying up their legs to string towards Barrow as he left Ethans' side, leaping directly over Ethan in doing so; Although the beats was just a bit off, slamming into the ground face first with a hiss and a hunt. They pulled themselves up slowly, some of the gravel had scratched into their pale, almost paper thin skin.
They rumbled something in an unknown language and moved to simply swipe towards barrow since they were just in reach of him.

Morrison narrowed his eyes when he heard Harriet in his head. He didn't particularly like this but he had to admit it was an effective way of communicating. He sneaked forward, carefully placing every step, when he heard Harriet's whisper. While he preferred to be the one in charge, he followed her instructions.
He aimed at the top of tree and turned the torch on.
There, one of the monsters. He fired a shot.

When the vampire jumped over Ethan, he instinctively ducked. When he was upright again he noticed the vampire had fallen down, pulled itself up and then sniped at his fellow agent.
He aimed, but Barrow moved in his line of sight as he tried to get out of reach of the vampire.

Barrow stumbled back as he aimed at the vampire and fired a shot, but the bullet hit the gravel instead. He cursed and grabbed an iron stake for close combat instead.

Meanwhile, Ethan aimed his gun, waiting for a clear shot.

The First vampire moved quickly, narrowly getting hit by the bullet before it was slammed out of the tree by a large inky tendril. The Vampire tumbled down the tree and slammed into the ground with a hiss and a yowl; they scrambled quickly back to their feet before they narrowly dodged another tendril.
Harriet's eyes had gone completely black, but she faced away from Morrison so he couldn't see; a flash of shadow echoed from her and a pair of horns flashed up on her head briefly before disappearing from view. The Vampire moved to dart around the trees and leapt towards Harriet and Morrison.

The second Vampire was spooked at the bullet nearly hitting it, giving out a hiss as it dove towards Barrow to knock him down and to bite at him; hoping possibly to cut into his skin to get the smell of his blood in their system so their adrenaline would build up.

Morrison narrowed his eyes at the flash of something on her head - that had looked like horns, but it had faded as quickly as it had appeared. The black tendrils were likewise not what he had expected, and they were very effective against the vampire. He followed the darting vampire with his eyes, trying to determine from where he would come at a straight line again.
When the vampire leapt towards them, he fired his gun.

Barrow got knocked down and while he could avoid the bite, he couldn't avoid getting cut. A bit of blood welled up, but he used his feet to push the vampire away from him.
Meanwhile, Ethan had approached during their struggle and aimed the gun at the head of the vampire before pulling the trigger.

Harriet watched the Vampire leap and acted quickly as she watched Morrison fire his gun, instinctively she warped the time around the Vampire to slow them down; making sure the bullet impacted with the beasts chest before dropping the warp as the beast slammed into the ground.
"Stay down." Harriet hissed towards the Vampire as they rolled over, clutching their chest near their heart with their own hiss.
"Fuuck." The vampire let out, their chest heaving as if they still breathed; was it just acting or was it out of instinct? "I was suppose to dodge that bullet, what the fuck did you do?" They asked as they moved to sit up, a shadowy tendril wrapping around their neck and pulled them back down onto the ground. "Urk!" They gasped as they struggled a bit, "Hghey!" The tries to speak, their throat being constricted by the shadows.
"Early stage." Harriet said as she looked the figure over, "Possibly bitten... a month, month and a half ago? Haven't lost themself too much." She stepped closer to the figure and lifted their arm, "Faint Pulse still, possibly able to be cured if gotten to quickly." She said, more to herself before she looked to Morrison, "Unless of course you want to kill them. It's up to you." She raised an eyebrow, "It might be good to try and cure them so you can possibly save others in the future."

The other vampire got a whiff of the blood, ignoring the sound of gunshot at their partner and tried to bite towards Barrow more, before being kicked off and stumbled back. They took a step forward to strike towards Barrow again before Ethan shot his gun. The Vampire froze up, staring towards Barrow for a second before they collapsed down onto the ground, the bullet hidden somewhere in their skull as they laid on the grass plain below them, 'bleeding' a darker shade of red than normal blood.

Agent Morrison examined the vampire. He wanted to kill it, but maybe Harriet had a point. They had a whole facility dedicated to examining humanlike creatures, demons and monsters after all. Maybe he could send it there, so they could find a cure against vampirism. Like that boy that had been a vampire for only a couple of days. He sighed, lifted his gun and fired at its head.
"It's more humane to end it now," he stated, with a hint of regret in his voice. "Maybe the next one, when the change happened more recent."
Did he really want to subject this person to painful tests, or observation to see when the change was irreversible? To save others, maybe he should have, but as long as their scientists didn't even have a theoretical idea to reverse this, he didn't feel comfortable sending them test subjects.
"Let's go."

Ethan looked at the dead vampire for a moment, before turning his back on it and examining the surroundings again. Was it only this one here?
Agent Barrow joined him and scouted the area with thermal imaging, but couldn't see more of them.
"Let's continue in this direction," he said. "We'll meet the others at the back of the base.

The Vampire let out a choke of air before Morrison shot them in the head, Harriet let the powers holding him down vanish before she looked over the vampires corpse before closing her eyes. "May your soul rest." She said out loud before she turned towards Morrison and followed after without a word about Vampires.
Her ears pricked up as she heard the other two start walking again and looked around as they walked along. "Hopefully we don't come along someone who has been recently bitten; adrenaline makes it hard for them to think and they're surprisingly a lot faster than older vampires." She explained quietly.

---

Gaia was roused from her sleep by the sound of gunshots in her mind, her wings fanned out and her scales slowly shifted to make her look bigger before she looked around from her perch.
She let out a rumble of anger and felt her muscles tense before she moved to grab a bundle of pillows and blankets and tied it to look kind of like a human body before she curled up her wings again, cuddling into the bundle she made, wishing it was Ethan. Ethan would be able to feel a soft felling of warm and hugging pressure over his body.

An intern slowly approached Lily with a sheepish look on his face, "M...Ma'am, we have uh... New... New paperwork and a letter for you." They started with a small stutter, "The paperwork is about the little Siren child. They want some tests done on him, it's apparently pretty unusual to have a male Siren." They continued before they moved to hand over a folder with a little letter set on top. "I'm not sure who the letter is from, but it feels pretty hefty."

Agent Morrison acknowledged her warning with a nod of his head. That was his experience as well. But, they were also more reckless which worked in their advantage again. He sneaked further around their previous base, the lights all out. A pity, he had liked this location. But, the boss had ordered it and that was that.
It was silent, except for some nocturnal animals that had come out of hiding and taken over the territory from the daytime critters. So far it didn't sound like there were more vampires, but Morrison knew better than to let down his guard.

Ethan and Barrow were walking on the other side of the mansion, likewise on alert as they scouted the area. Suddenly Ethan fell his body warm up, and a bit of pressure. As if someone was hugging him. He looked around, there was nothing here. Ghost? No, that couldn't be it. Ben had always said ghosts were intangible; a creature that could flow through walls would flow through a human body as well, and that would feel cold instead of warm.
It was a pleasant feeling though, he smiled a bit as he continued to walk.

---

Lily let out an exasperated sigh when the intern mention the siren boy. "Fine," she said as she flipped through the paperwork. "I'll start doing some tests tomorrow. Do some bloodwork, see how long he can stay on dry land before needing water." She'd enjoy working with a siren much more if it'd be female, but this was all she had.
She put the paperwork to the side to take over the folder. "Leave now, we'll begin tests after all the creatures are fed." She waited a moment before the intern left and then put down the folder and opened the letter.

Harriets ears twitched at every move that the little animals created; "I do not know too much about Vampires." She continued quietly, "My brother has a small book of symptoms of transformation of many species." She finished as she paused and looked up to the base.
She closed her eyes slightly as she felt the shadows from the base whipped around in the wind. She felt everything from these shadows, pulling away with a bit of a startle and glanced towards Morrison.
She shook off the anger and worry she felt before she quickly moved to follow Morrison. "My room should be around here somewhere." She said quietly, "Am I okay to just... Break the wall?" She asked with a glance towards the other agent.

---

The intern nodded and scrambled away quickly after handing everything over.
The paperwork held a little list of tests to check on the male siren; mostly what Lily had already written down but also mentions testing the singing prowess of a male siren.
The letter's envelope was made out of good, strong cardboard-like paper. It opened easily from where the wax stamp of a large splotch of red wax and a stamp of a large bat.

I have come into knowledge you are holding one of my creations, one of my greatest creations.
And this is a formal letter to hand her back over to her rightful owners; as we have more need to continue the tests within our guidelines in order to ensure she is working as intended and will listen to commands given to her by my generals.

Failure to return her will cause aggression between our two agencies and I do not recommend starting a negative repour with our business.
A return address has been given on a separate paper, as well as contact information if you cannot transport the Beast to us; contact us and we'll come and take her off your hands.
The letter was signed by someone illegibly. It was obvious the note is about Gaia, and they seemed angry that this place held her in their business.

Steph laid on her bed with her eyes closed, her mind drifted to the outside world.
She worried about Mike, Ethan and more importantly Benjamin. Was he safe? Was Harriet with him?
Please be in her protection. Steph thought to herself and shivered, rolling onto her side and curling up and stared at the wall quietly. Why was she experiencing this just because she looked like a Demon?
So what that she was of demon blood? Why was that such a bad thing? She felt anger bubble through her body as she thought about it, feeling her body heat up and her skin seemed to bubble and crackle into scales in small places.

Morrison stopped when Harriet asked her question and shrugged. "Go for it," he said. "The building will be demolished soon anyway, one more broken wall won't matter." He glanced around for a moment, everything seemed clear at the moment. "I can stay on the lookout here as long as you're inside, or go inside with you if you expect trouble there."
At this moment he didn't care Harriet wasn't a human; as far as he was aware the relations with her kind were good, and she was currently a team member of his.

---

Lily pursed her lips as she read through the letter. Of course she'd report this to headquarters to see how they felt about a potential war with this agency, but she'd fight to have Gaia with her. She didn't have that many magnificent creatures in her care right now, and didn't want to lose one like Gaia.

After thinking about it for a moment she went to her office, pushed a button and looked at the black screen. Before contacting her boss, she decided to ask Gaia about this organisation first.
Inside Gaia's room, a panel at the wall lit up to let her know she was being called.

Harriet listened to Morrisons words, partially surprised that he was so happy to help but ignored the weirdness and just thought he was being kind.
"Wait here until the other two get here and then join me inside?" Harriet offered to him with a small smile, "That way everyone is together if anything, stars forbid, happens." Her attention was drawn to the building again.
Something was in there, was it hers or something else? She thought to herself before she moved towards the wall, black lightning crackling around her hands as she gently moved to trace an area over the wall as the energy sparked and crackled around.

---

Gaia winced at the sound of the call coming through, and the light shone through her wings as she slowly dropped her head from her cacoon and looked over towards the screen with a rumbled snarl.
"What?" She sneered, moving to blink her eyes at the sudden light from the screen, giving a rumble from her chest as she was rudely awoken.
Gaia didn't dream often but she had started to have what she believed was a dream, but she was seeing what Ethan was doing frm a presence in the trees. It felt nice to see him, even if she thought it was a dream, it made her happy he was relatively safe. She had felt Harriet around him as well, he was safer than she expected him to be.

---

The little Siren wandered around his new room, staring with large eyes and a massive smile at the sight of everything.
"All for me!" He said before he moved to climb up the ladder to the little pool and dove in, feeling his gills split and take in the water easily.
He swam around below the surface, feeling his body morph into that more of a siren. A tail slowly appeared on the base of his tailbone; fin-like ears took the place of his human ears and a small collapsable frill fin appeared on his head, fanning itself up as little spines grew down his spine as well as a large rudder fin. "Ahah, I'm a fish!" He said under the water before he popped his head up and breathed in a large gulp of air instinctively, even though he didn't need it.
"Mm. This is nice~" He said before he leaned against the edge of the pool and closed his eyes, humming softly as he rested there comfortably.

Morrison nodded at the idea and brought a radio to his mouth. "Barrow, meet me at this side of the building. We're going in."
As he waited for the other two agents to join him, he watched what Harriet was doing. It wasn't long before he heard two pair of footsteps hurrying in his direction and he glanced to the side to see Barrow and Ethan joining him.
"She wants to go inside her room," he said, gesturing with his head to Harriet. "We might as well check if anything entered the old base. We'll back her up, she'll get the lead for now."

---

"Gaia, I'm sorry I disturbed you," Lily said. "Do forgive me, darling. But I got some unsettling news and I wanted to share it with you. Some people claim you as their own and they wrote a rather threatening letter. I just want to know if you want to go back to them. I will show you the letter on the screen so you can see it for yourself. If you can read. I don't recall seeing anything about schooling in your file. Can you read, dear? Otherwise, I'll read the letter to you."

As she waited for an answer from Gaia, she glanced at the other screens. The creatures in her department were behaving well. Chiyoko was done feeding - such a precious child - and the siren boy was swimming. It still annoyed her she was tasked with testing him, but that was okay. Would she test water acidity and how his tolerance for high and low ph values were? That could be an interesting test.

Harriet seemed to wait until the other two were there before taking a step back from the base, the area she was 'cutting out' simply disappearing into darkness. "Here we are." She said as she looked back to Morrison and smiled before she looked to Ethan with a gleam of protection in her eyes. "Come." She said as she headed inside, looking down the halls in the darkness.

Harriet paused before she pulled her arms up, closing her eyes to focus on her power before the shadows seemed to crackle and suddenly lit into light.
"There." She said as she brushed her hands together, her horns warping into view briefly once more but it didn't last a second. "Now we'll be able to see, and save our torchlights." Harriet glanced back towards the boys with a soft smile, "My room isn't too far away. Did you guys need to get anything here?" She asked, while she knew she was in charge, she didn't want to order the boys around.

---

Gaia fanned her wings out and moved to climb down from her caccoon, still holding the bundled blankets in her arms; using her wings to balance herself before standing up straight.
As soon as Lily spoke, Gaia's anger seemed to disappear and her sneer softened, her ears pricked back up and her spines relaxed back down to their hidden positions.
"Letter?" She asked, surprisingly unbothered by asking if she could read. "I can read, yes." She said with a nod, waiting for the letter to be put up onto the screen.

When the letter was put up Gaia's wings fanned to their full length before arching around in a defensive manner, she bared her teeth as her eyes immediately when to the signature.
"No." She rumbled, holding back the urge to roar and escape, "Do not allow them to take me." She almost pleaded, "I do not wish to go back there. I don't need to be sliced open while conscious again!"

"Nah," Ethan said as he followed Harriet. "I didn't bring any personal things. When we joined we were told that we'd move frequently and sometimes unexpectedly. I've got nothing of personal value here."
Harriet had changed, or was only just showing who she really was. Those horns that were only visible for a brief moment were either new or had been better hidden previously.

Standing in the hallway with their bedrooms made him think of Gaia, when she had gone wild due to that device. He hoped she was okay, wherever she was.

---

"Don't worry, darling," Lily said. "I didn't really want to give you to them anyway, but I figured I should ask you what you wanted. Now that I know, I will fight for you. Cutting you open while conscious. How brutal. They will not lay another hand on you if I can help it. Do try to get some sleep, you are perfectly safe here."
Well, mostly. At least from that agency. She cut the connection and grabbed the phone to inform headquarters about this development and to ensure this facility would be protected against this other agency.

Harriet gave Ethan a gentle smile as he spoke to her, giving a small nod. "Of course." She said as she headed towards where her room was and hesitated slightly, "Oh, if you'd like something to do, I know that Gaia has left a little necklace in her room. Black bound leather with a little Emerald gem in cased in gold." She looked to Ethan with a small head tilt.

She knew exactly where it was in the room, but it would save a bit of time having Ethan look for it while she checked her own room. Of course, if he'd like to look for it of course.
Once he answered, she walked back into her old room and breathed in. It smelt wrong, Ashy and broken. Harriet moved to where she knew her stuff would be in the room; moving to pull a rug away from the ground and pulled up a bit of the wood. She pulled up a small chest before tucking it under her arm and moving to grab the now-broken mirror from her dresser.

---

Gaia rumbled angrily and climbed down from the roof, dropping her bundled duvet as she did so. The feeling of warmth would disappear from Ethan after the duvet was dropped.
She rumbled again, pacing her room with her fans and spikes up, wings arched with a sway of her tail.

Gaia paused and turned towards the screen, blinded by fear and anger she lowered herself to the ground and slammed her head and horns into the monitor; intending to shatter it.
Gaia pulled back as she felt some of the screens glass splinter into her head, her pupils flexing as blood dripped past her eyes before she fanned her wings out more and let out a loud roar.

---

Steph jolted awake at the sound of Gaia's roar; she wasn't thinking as she grabbed a robe and ran out of her room towards Gaia's.
She forced her way in, quickly running to her friend and moved to cup her head in her arms as she started to mutter something in Angellic, healing the wounds on her head.
Gaia tried to strike at Steph when she came in, narrowly missing before the halfbreed grabbed her head, which caused Gaia to calm down; with the soft chime of Heavenly magic helped her anger to bubble away.

"Yeah, sure," Ethan replied and went to what used to be Gaia's room. He looked around when he entered it, there wasn't much there. The girl probably didn't own many things. It took him a bit, but he found the necklace Harriet had described. He examined the emerald for a moment before putting it in his pocket and leaving the room again.

As he joined the other two he stopped when he heard a faint scraping sound. Morrison gestured with a finger at his lips to be silent. The three didn't move but lifted their weapons. Something clawed at the doorpost of one of the rooms and a greenish insect-like head came out.
"Light," Morrison whispered.
"Got it," Barrow whispered back and he flashed a light. During the time the creature averted his eyes, Morrison had screwed on a silencer and shot a bullet through it's head.

As the body of the creature fell, Morrison went to the room Harriet had entered and he knocked on the open door. "Better hurry," he whispered. "Lesser demons are here, LD-5. If there's one, there's lots more."

---

From the monitor Lily could see what was happening in the room, but she let it play out. The girls could comfort each other if they wanted, there was no need for her to intervene. And Steph did a fine job in calming Gaia down.

She stretched her arms. Time to go to bed, she'd deal with everything else in the morning.

Harriet glanced back to Morrison as she moved towards the doorway, her ears flicked and she moved to hold out the trunk and mirror to the male agent. "For a moment?" She asked, she waited for him to take it before she stepped towards where the demon was found and knelt, rubbing her finger in the blood before moving to put it in her mouth.

She gave a wince at the bitter taste and motioned for the boys to stand back. She closed her eyes and felt her body shudder as the inky power flooded her body; the illusion around her horns completely dropping at this point, the black horns now in full sight of the boys, as well as a pair of wings that resembled inky demon wings that shimmered like broken glass.
She stood up properly before she sprung herself into the air as the shadows around her seemed to snake around before dissipating. Pulling on her newfound energy she made sure to keep the boys out of her grips parameter; she felt the shadows dig into every nook and cranny it could find before spiraling up until it hit a demon and moved to move around them like a black fuzzy mold, incapacitating them before moving to drain them of their essence.

Harriet strained to keep this power going, she felt the blood in her veins rush cold before she dropped quickly to her knees coughing up a black inky substance. She winced and curled forward slightly before she opened a portal and vomitted a large amount of green inky substance into the portal, hesitating before she purged her body again before closing the portal with a shaky hand.
Whatever she did made he suddenly weak and shakey.

---

"Gaia." Steph spoke softly in Angellic, not realizing she was doing so. "Gaia, it's Stephan. It's okay, you're okay. I'm here, please tell me what's happening." She tried to tell her, feeling the warmth of her magic trickle over the beastwoman.
Lily would be able to see it if she was still looking through the cameras, but a faint halo had appeared between Steph's horns, and her wings became more feathery.

Gaia gave a weak grumble and shook her head, pulling away softly from the woman and covered her eyes at the glow. "Turn light off." She grumbled, moving to cover her face with her wings.
"Light?" Steph asked before she looked at her hands, noticing the shimmering runes on her mocha skin of her hands. "Holy SHIT." She said before the powers suddenly cut off and caused her to jump back, staring at her hands with widened eyes. "What the fuck was that?" She asked Gaia, "I didn't hurt you did I?"
"I'm fine." Gaia grumbled as she pulled her wing away, "Why are you here?"
"You... Snapped, I heard your roaring and I came to help you... It was instinctive I-" Steph started before she paused and pulled a bit of her hair over her shoulder, watching the white ends steam through her original colour. "Whaaaat the fuck?" She asked, "I wish Ben was here. I wish Harry was here, Would Harry know what's happening?"

"She's have a better explanation on why a Demon blooded beast would be able to use and survive using Angellic magic, yeah." Gaia said as she moved onto one to the spikes on the wall and curled herself up, flicking a wing towards Steph; summoning a small just of air to push her out of the room. "We'll talk about it in the morning."

Steph stumbled before the door closed in front of her. She stared down at her hands and hesitated on what to do; would the books in her room have anything on this? Was there a library anywhere she had access too? She wasn't going to get any sleep with this on her mind.
She briskly walked to a guard, "Please, there's got to be some sort of library around here I can look through?"
"You'll be able to request books tomorrow. Go to your room." The guard said with narrowed eyes. Steph sighed and turned, heading back to her room quickly and searched through the books she was given.

Nothing had any sort of information in it, and someone thought it was a sick joke to put a bible in the stack of books too. Steph grew irritated for a moment before she pulled herself onto the bed and sat with her legs crossed.
"No, you're going to be calm." She spoke to herself, "A thief never loses their head." She reminded what her mentor told her before she focused on the air around her.
Ben would know. She thought to herself, pushing that thought further off into the universe, as if hoping she would connect her mind with Benjamin, "He'd have something smart to say, he'd know where to look to find out why a demon can wield holy magic.."

Ethan stared at the horns and wings that emerged and the first thing that went to his head was that Ben probably would have noticed this about her way before he had. After she dropped to her knees he went to Harriet to help her get back on her feet. "Hey, we're a team, okay?" he said to her as he reached out to grab her arm. "No need to do stuff that will make you weak and an easy prey for those demons. We can handle them."

Morrison had watched it with narrowed eyes. Was this the normal power for this alien race? He had been briefed on her joining the agency, but no one had mentioned anything about this. He made a gesture to Barrow, who nodded back and started making his way to the exit. Once he reached the door, he gestured back it was safe to proceed.

---

Lily had been ready to turn everything off for the day when she noticed the glimpse of a halo and had stayed to watch with growing curiosity.
"Well, well," she whispered to herself. "Interesting..."
It looked like the show was over now, so she turned off everything, left the room and went to her bed.

Harriet winced as she breathed in and looked to Ethan as he took her arm. "Sorry," She started as Ethan helped her up back to her feet, "We're a team." She agreed before she straightened up as she felt her bones click before moving towards whoever took her trunk and mirror and took it from them before Barrow moved away to door.
Harriet glanced to Ethan as the other two where out of whispering difference, "Somethings happening to me." She said to him quietly, "Nothing... Dangerous to my health. Possibly a version of 'puberty' but for the Memopath species?"

She followed the other men carefully, "You... Mentioned the others were taken away." Harriet started again after a moment, "Do we know why?"

---

Steph slowly fell asleep on her bed, the halo flickering softly in the darkness as she stayed splayed across the bed above the covers, still in her clothes.