Suddenly, Rae was alerted, to his great embarrassment, that this guy was feeling his ears, teasing them between his thumb and index finger. "Fuck!!! My hoodie!" Rae yelled, realizing it had slipped off revealing his ears, which were now being caressed by this weird groggy pod-boy.

Rae blushed with embarrassment, having gotten a proper look at this stranger's face for the first time; this guy was actually very cute. Not only that, but this cute guy he just met was caressing his ears, and staring at him through dreamy drooping eyelids in a kind of strange sleepy way. Rae had never had anyone, let alone a guy who would be considered attractive by any metric, touch his ears before. He was usually too busy hiding them with a hat or his hoodie. So naturally, he reached up to brush the guy's hand off his fluffy twitching ears.

"C-can you stop that please... it's really embarra—"

Before Rae could finish his request, he had a knife pressed to his throat, and the space boy had flipped him over onto his back like Rae weighed nothing. The bigger boy pressed the palm of his hand down into Rae's chest hard, pinning him into the dirt. The long side of his jet-black hair was almost touching Rae's nose. He had an aggressive almost animal-like snarl on his face.

"WHERE AM I!? WHO ARE YOU!?"

"I'm Rae," the smaller shivering boy croaked out, "you're hurting me... please let go." Rae suddenly panicked, he had intense flashbacks to the evening before. That same feeling... when Roland had him in his clutches, helpless.

The aggressive pod-boy clasped the side of his head, and stumbled off of Rae looking rather dizzy. Though it seemed like this was not an intentional fulfillment of Rae's request.

"WHO DO YOU WORK FOR? WHY IS AN ISHTARI HERE?! DID YOU DO THIS TO MY SHIP?!"

Rae felt awash in anxiety as the stranger's confused misplaced anger bore down on him, and he began to crawl up to get away from him. But, he was quickly pushed back down by the hostile stranger's boot, though he was not fully restrained as before. It seemed as if he didn't see Rae as an immediate threat, or at least not a challenge.

Rae froze in fear, ears laying down along his hair, as he looked into the boy's eyes. Those silver circles had seemed so beautiful just a moment before, but now they were accompanied by beady constricted pupils and a furled brow. There was nothing in the space boy's eyes but anger and aggression. This gaze commanded an unreal sense of intimidation. It was like a weapon, boring a hole straight through Rae's skull.

"F-Fuck man!" Rae stammered, as he began his all too familiar pleading ritual. "I was just trying to help you. You looked hurt and I didn't want you to die. I don't even know what an Ish... ish... whatever you said is!"

"Do you think this is a joke Ishtari?" The muscular aggressor asked rhetorically, pulling Rae up by the collar. His voice was more stern and less violent, but still extremely intimidating. Rae turned his head so as to avoid looking directly at him.

"I asked you a question, you imbecile. Do you know who I am?"

"A handsome stranger? —Heheh..." Rae joked, and gave a tiny nervous laugh, trying to diffuse the situation.

"Your master must really hate you, or you must really want to die. Now stop messing with me..." The black haired boy's voice trailed off, as he clutched his head, and collapsed falling onto Rae's shoulder.

"Holy shit!! What the hell is going on?! This guy is a total fucking psycho! He looked like he was going to slit my throat!" Rae panicked, as he slid the now hobbled psycho off of him and onto the ground.

Rae scrambled up to the top of the crater as fast as he possibly could, and then stopped. He looked back and saw the boy laying there. He got a nagging feeling in his head and frowned.

"No... no... no..." Rae thought, as he began debating with himself what he should do, "Rae, don't you go back. Don't even think about it. This entire thing is unbelievably weird..."

"Damnit, what if he's just confused from hitting his head?" Rae thought. He hesitated and scratched behind his ears. "Can I really just leave him there like that? I've been here at least an hour, and no one seems to be coming. If I leave him he could die..."

"But, he's obviously really dangerous... If my ship got exploded and I'd woken up in a strange place..."

Rae's sense of sympathy for the stranger's plight returned again, "...I'd probably be pretty pissed off too right?"

After a short time, Rae made up his mind. If he did not risk this good deed, no one else would take his place, and do it for him. And so his choice became clear. He decided to be brave and selfless.

"Oh come on man... How do I talk myself into this bullshit!?" Rae complained in exasperation, and started walking back down the crater. He struggled at first, but managed to lift the bigger limp boy over his shoulder.

The black haired boy opened his silver eyes half way again and groaned.

"What'r you doin?" He protested, "Coward, you wou— kill a warrior tha— can't stand? Ishtari scum..." His voice was much slower, like he was having trouble collecting his thoughts.

"Please don't kill me, I'm just trying to help you." Rae said softly. It was an odd situation, but somehow Rae felt pity for him. "You're obviously confused man. I don't know what an Ishtari is. But hang in there, I'll take you to the hospital. Just don't attack me ok?"

Rae began forcibly walking the limp boy up the crater and through the woods, as he attempted to reassure him that he was not in danger.

"No... no hospital... I remember... this is Terra?" The hobbled boy said, looking up at Rae.

"What do you mean? You need a hospital, my dude, you clearly have a concussion!" Rae said, looking at him very concerned.

"No... I'm not... supposed to be here. No one can find—" the dizzy boy said slowly, as he tried to make Rae understand. Compared to earlier, there was no sign of aggression in his face or voice, he had an almost pleading expression.

"Is this even the same guy?" Rae thought, confused by the very sudden shift in demeanor from the boy hanging off of him. "Or is this just because of the concussion? He's so calm now."

Rae sighed considering the unthinkable, how to fulfill this guy's request, "Maybe I can take him home, and put him in the shed out back? We do have a bed out there cause of Jamie's tree fort syndrome..."

"Ok but," Rae said, as he struck a simple bargain, "you have to promise me you won't be violent. I can't believe I'm doing this. You just about slit my throat a few minutes ago..." Rae said.

The black haired boy took a second, and then nodded his head in agreement.

"Aren't you Ishtari?" The boy said, his voice steadying just a bit, "I don't understand, why you're helping me..."

At this point, Rae had managed to walk them both back through the woods to the edge of his neighborhood, and was becoming very exhausted again. His body was losing the adrenaline he had been pumped full of earlier as he became more and more relaxed.

"I don't know what you mean," Rae said, trying his best to make sense of the dizzy boy's ramblings, "I'm a human, dude. Same as you."

"But you have a tail, and those fluffy ears... all Ishtari have those." the black haired boy said.

Neither of them seemed to understand each other. But there was, at least for the moment, a small sense of trust between them.

As they were approaching Rae's house, the space boy tried to stand up straight on his own two feet again, only to immediately fall over, and be caught by an exhausted Rae.

"Stop insulting me! Asgeeri Warriors don't need help walking!" he snapped at Rae, saying more weird things.

"You at least need to lean on my shoulder," Rae instructed. "Look I won't tell anyone you did, if that's what you want, but I can't get you back if you're falling down every few seconds."

The black haired boy pressed on Rae's shoulder to help steady himself, without acknowledging what Rae said. He simply grunted, and motioned to keep going.

"Wow man, you're just a regular ball of sunshine aren't you? —Heh" Rae chuckled.