Pierce sat despondently in the palm of Aezhay’s hand as she carried him back into the house, the other three titanesses trailing behind her.

“So you got yourself a human huh, Tylum?” The taller girl asked jovially. “I never would have figured you for the type to want one.”

“I’m not.” Tylum sighed, rolling her eyes. “It’s just… really complicated.”

“Oh well. Okay.” Aezhay shrugged and gently rubbed the tiny boy’s back with her finger.

Tylum bit her lip and held her hand out. Aezhay got the message and carefully deposited Pierce into the other woman’s palm; the human gave no resistance to this act.

“Excuse me a moment.” Tylum muttered, before heading up the stairs, with Pierce in her hand.

After she reached her bedroom, Tylum shut the door and carefully lowered Pierce onto the desk before sitting in the chair in front of him.

“Hey warden.” Pierce greeted sullenly, sitting on the desk.

“Please don’t.” Tylum replied sadly. “I’m not trying to keep you here as a prisoner.”

“Really?!” The young human snapped. “Because it sure seems that way if the manhunt that just went on downstairs is any indication.”

Tylum sighed and rubbed her face in frustration. “Okay, look, maybe that wasn’t the best way to handle things… but you disappeared and I got worried, okay? It isn’t safe out there for humans.”

“And what gives you the right to decide that for me?” Pierce spat, rising to his feet.

There was a long stretch of silence where the two of them locked eyes. Finally, Tylum sighed and looked away.

“Nothing.” She admitted quietly. “Nothing gives me that right. If you really want to leave, Pierce, then I won’t stop you… but I won’t be able to live with myself if I let you leave without first understanding what you’ll be up against. Just give me a few hours, okay? That’s all I ask and, afterwards, if you still want to leave the other girls and I won’t try to stop you. Fair?”

Pierce eyed the giantess skeptically, as if searching for some sort of trick. Finally, his posture relaxed and he nodded.

“Okay Tylum.”

“Great, be back in a bit.” Tylum rose from her chair and left the room, dashing down the stairs to the first floor where she found Myona and Aezhay had resumed their game.

“Myona… I need your help.”

*.*.*.*.*.*

A few hours later; Pierce, Tylum and Myona were sitting in Tylum’s bedroom. Myona was camped out on the bed, Tylum was seated at the desk and Pierce was on the floor in front of them.

He gazed up at the two towering women nervously. He had no idea why he was on the floor or why Myona had a large electronic device (that looked to be roughly the size of a garage) with her.

“Okay Pierce.” Tylum said, dimming the lights in her room. “Time for a little zoology lesson. Go ahead Myona.”

“What-?” Pierce started to ask, but his question was cut off when the machine next to Myona suddenly flared to life and a large muskrat like animal, roughly the size of a crocodile, with sleek silver fur and large pointed ears suddenly appeared in front of him. Pierce jumped back in alarm, but relaxed when he realized it wasn’t moving.

“Whoa.” He muttered in amazement.

“This is called a Tupp.” Tylum spoke above him. “It’s a small rodent species native to Archavia. It eats seeds and nuts, and occasionally small insects and is generally at the bottom of the food chain.”

Pierce wasn’t listening. He stepped up to the image and ran his hand through it experimentally. The image wavered for a second and then reformed.

“It’s a hologram.” He whispered in awe.

“Yes Pierce, it is. Now you should probably listen since I’m giving you information that might save your life when you decide to leave here.”

“Oh okay.” The human nodded. “Wait… did you say this thing is at the bottom of the foodchain?”

“Yes.” Tylum replied mildly. “I did.”

Pierce glanced at the size of the animal, noting with concern that it was bigger than he was.

“Okay next please.”

“You got it!”

There was a loud click and the Tupp vanished. In its place, another animal appeared. This one was Quadra-pedal, roughly thirty feet long and twenty feet at the shoulder. It had what looked to be a tough carapace, a short stubby tail and a squared face filled with sharp fangs.

“This is called a klipkaer.” Tylum’s voice spoke above him, even as Pierce craned his neck up to look nervously at the sharp tooth-filled muzzle of the beast. “Generally a exhibits a playful demeanor. We titans keep them as pets, however they are carnivorous so you’ll probably want to watch out for any stray ones roaming around. Myona?”

Another loud click.

“The shaar is another animal Titans have domesticated.” Tylum spoke as the image of what looked like an elongated cat with sapphire eyes, rounded ears and a wicked looking tail shimmered into being. “These animals are very sweet to Titans, but they’re wicked to the animals they see as prey. They have sharp claws, sharp teeth and they can whip their tails faster than the speed of sound, using them to stun prey before capture.

Pierce gulped, and his heart pounded in his chest. Suddenly, without warning, the image moved. The animal hissed and opened its jaws, revealing a pair of needle sharp fangs.

Pierce yelled and fell back on his rear, crab-walking away from the image.

Then suddenly, the creature vanished in a blink of colored light. Giant hands engulfed Pierce’s trembling body and raised him into the air.

“Um, Myona? Can you give us a moment?”

“Sure thing Tylum.” The redheaded Titaness jumped to her feet and picked up her projector. Humming happily to herself she strode out of the room.

“I…I’m sorry Pierce.” Tylum sighed as she sat down in the chair by her desk. “I wasn’t trying to scare you… well okay I was trying to scare you a little bit, but… not like that.” She carefully lowered her hand to the desk and held it steady as Pierce jumped down on to the surface.

“I just…” Tylum shook her head. “Pierce, I wasn’t lying when I said you’re free to go if you want but… You need to understand what’s out there waiting for you.”

“No…” Pierce sighed, taking a deep breath to calm himself down. “I get it. It’s just… I used to wonder what my life would be like if I ever ended up in a wheel chair, or if I lost a leg or something… but this? This isn’t anything like that. This is like waking up as someone’s pet mouse.”

“Pierce you’re not-” Tylum began reflexively, but fell silent when she saw the look on his face.

Pierce held up his hand. Clenched in his palm was a tiny black object that Tylum had to squint to see.

“You see this?” Pierce asked. “It’s my cell phone. On it I have the last pictures of my family I will ever see, Tylum. And when the battery on this thing runs dry, which will probably happen in a few days at most… that’ll be it. I will never see them again.”

Tylum chewed her lip thoughtfully. “I think I might have a solution for that…” She replied. “But you’re going to have to trust me with your ‘cell phone’ for a little while.”

Pierce eyed the giantess skeptically. His first impulse was to clutch the phone protectively, hide it away. A bolt of white hot anger flared in his chest. How could he possibly trust her?

But then that anger was doused. If she, or any of the others, truly wanted to harm him, they would have done so already. Sometimes resistance wasn’t the answer, sometimes one just had to trust.

With a resigned sigh, he lifted the phone and deposited it gingerly on the tip of her finger.

“Okay.”

Tylum smiled and gently moved the tiny device to the center of her palm. “Great. I’ll be right back.”

Tylum carefully stood and left the bedroom. She traversed the hallway and then down the stairs that led into the living room. Aezhay and Myona were sitting at the table, playing a game of slates, while Daz was in her usual spot on the couch, her eyes focused intently on her data pad.

“Hey Daz…” Tylum sidled up to the couch. “I was wondering if you’d do me a favor…”

“No.” The other woman responded, never taking her eyes off the screen.

“See, Pierce had a piece of technology on him when he was taken, and I was thinking-”

“No.” Daz repeated.

“-That maybe you could see if you can copy the data on here onto a normal computer.”

“No.”

“Please?” Tylum begged. “It’s really important to him!”

“No.”

Across the room, Aezhay and Myona had paused their game and were watching the exchange with interest.

Aezhay smirked and winked at Myona. “Yeah, you’re right Myona. Tylum shouldn’t bother asking Daz about it, there’s no way she’d be able to decode something like that. She’s not good enough.”

“What?!” Daz snapped, sitting up.

“Aezhay I didn’t say any…” Myona blinked, before a smile split her face. “Oh! Uh, yup. There’s no chance Daz would ever be able to do anything like that, no way. Why don’t I take a look at it for you Tylum?”

“Wait just a minute-!”

“Oh, that would be great, Myona.” Tylum gushed. “I should have just gone to you in the first place.”

“Oh no you don’t!” Daz snapped rising to her feet. “I’m not falling for this.”

“Guess that means you really can’t do it then?” Aezhay responded with a grin.

“Can too!”

“Prove it then.” The taller woman challenged, rising to her feet.

Daz gaped for a moment, and then growled in frustration as she realized she’d been caught. “Fine!” She snapped and held out her hand. “Give me the stupid thing, Tylum.”

“Thanks so much!” Tylum replied sweetly as she carefully deposited the miniscule object into Daz’s palm.

Daz glared at the other occupants of the room before stomping up the stairs, muttering darkly the whole way.

“Thanks for the help.” Tylum sat down next to Aezhay and peeked at the slates in her hand.

“Don’t mention it.” The blonde Titaness sniggered. “I always enjoy any opportunity I can get to wind her up.”

“How’s Pierce doing?” Myona asked her voice taking on an uncharacteristically hushed tone. “I hope we didn’t scare him too much…”

“I don’t know.” Tylum replied thoughtfully. “I think he’s going to be okay. He was a little frightened, but he calmed down pretty quickly. I think at the very least he understands that we don’t want to hurt him. He misses his home, no surprise there, but I think he’s adjusting well enough.”

“Well that’s good.” Aezhay replied, stretching her arms above her head. “I don’t think I could stand to see a sad human moping around here all day.”

Suddenly, Fara appeared in the doorway. “Girls, you’ll never guess what just happened!”

“Oh! Oh! A meteor just crash landed in our backyard and its solid gold!” Myona yelled excitedly.

Fara blinked. “Uhm, no not that. I just-”

“Oh! The Iron Maiden just revealed her identity and she’s really an Avartle standing on the shoulders of a second one??”

“No… I was just-”

“Oh is it-?”

“Myona will you shut up and let her talk already?” Aezhay cried out in exasperation.

“Oh. Sure. Sorry.”

Fara remained silent for a moment, making sure she wasn’t about to be interrupted again.

“As I was saying, I just got done speaking with the head of Student Housing. Seems we’ll be getting a couple more roommates.”

“Really?” Tylum’s attention was piqued. “Did they say who?”

*.*.*.*.*.*.*

“I still think this is a bad idea.”

Rhionne Skohgal ColVanos, Princess of the Archavian Empire, neatly set the folded shirt in her hand into her suitcase before calmly turning to the sullen looking woman seated on her bed.

“Your objections to my growing up are duly noted, Reevah.” The Princess replied mildly.

“This is not about you ‘growing up.’” The dark haired young woman snapped. “This is about you taking an unnecessary risk.”

“Unnecessary risk?” Rhionne scoffed. “Since when is going off to school an unnecessary risk?”

“It isn’t. For most people.” Reevah shot back. “You are not most people, you are a royal princess.”

“And as such it’s my duty to become a well-educated adult so I may better serve the people!” Rhionne snapped the lid on her suitcase and set it by the door.

“Yes. I agree.” Reevah rubbed her face in frustration. “But you can have tutors and personal instructors for that sort of thing, Rhi.”

“I’m not going to stay locked up in a tower like some old legend.” The princess rolled her eyes. “Besides, I’ve anticipated your concerns and already made arrangements for you to accompany me, Reevah.”

“I… wait, what?” The young woman blinked her large brown eyes in confusion. “You did?”

“Of course.” The Princess giggled at the dumbfounded look on her companion’s face. “First of all, it was one of Father’s conditions for approving this in the first place. But more than that… You’re my best friend, and you’ve always had my back. Who else would I trust to look out for me?”

“Oh.” Reevah’s voice was quiet. She brushed her long brown hair out of her eyes. “Um, thanks.”

“Of course.” Rhionne smiled. “Now come on, we have to get you all packed up too. Wouldn’t want to be late to the shuttle.”

“Right.” Reevah snorted in amusement as she pushed herself to her feet. “Wouldn’t want the shuttle to leave without you, now would we?”