By midday, I started to feel my hunger again, gnawing away at my empty stomach. Aaron took me inside one of the rooms and gave me a few things out of the fridge, telling me to take some to Leo and Braken. I went quietly, thinking about what I'd learned from Aaron. Leo was bright - so was he evil to me, too, or just to Aaron? Why? What was he thinking about, what was he going to do?

I found him sitting by himself up on the roof, his legs dangling over the edge, swinging childishly. He had his elbows on his knees, resting his chin in his palms and staring at the camp below.

"Hey, Leo," I said, trying to keep the concern out of my voice. "I brought you something to eat."

"I'm not hungry," he said, not surprisingly.

"You need to eat anyway." I handed him an apple and a slice of deli meat. "Here. If you don't eat, you'll get sick."

"I'm not hungry," he repeated. "Go away, Joel."

"Please, Leo," I said, gently pushing the apple into his hand. He took it from me, rolling it across his palm.

"Fine," he sighed. "I'll eat the apple. That's it." He glanced at me and his face flushed red. I couldn't tell if it was from anger or embarrassment. "Thanks. Now please, will you leave me alone?"

"I'm afraid you'll do something if you're left alone," I said softly.

"What?" His head instantly snapped up, the fire in his eyes burning a hole into my soul.

"I don't mean that offensively or anything," I said quickly, trying to redeem myself before he pushed me off of the building or something. "Just - I'm worried about you. You're not healthy, Leo."

"How do you know? I'm fine." He dropped his eyes back down to the street below us.

"I don't want you to be alone anymore." I sat next to him, still keeping my distance, but trying to seem as friendly as possible. I really was concerned, but I was also afraid, especially after hearing what both he and Aaron had told me. Scared people did irrational things in their panic. "Why don't I go get Braken? Would you like that?"

"Quit talking to me like I'm a kid," he grumbled.

"You are a kid, Leo."

"I'm nineteen years old. I'm an adult. Leave me alone." His voice cracked on the last word.

"You're acting like a kid. That's okay," I said softly, trying to keep him as calm as possible. "You've been imprisoned in a hell since you were twelve. I don't blame you for anything that happens."

"Why do you keep acting like you know what I'm going though? Quit it. You're just making it worse." His voice was shaking, and I thought I saw his eyes fill up with tears, but he just stared ahead with a determined expression on his face. The scabs on his face had started to scar, especially where he'd picked at them.

"I'm sorry. I'm just trying to help." I stood up and sighed. "If you want me to get Braken, I will."

He hesitated. "Okay. Bring him up in ... an hour or something. I don't want him to worry about me."

"He already worries about you," I said.

"Just ... go away," he muttered, his voice cracking again. He rubbed his face to hide from me and I just nodded, making my way back down to the ground.

I wandered for a long time, looking for Braken. I didn't think we'd split up, but apparently, the small Unnatural - or Gifted; I liked that term better - had immediately become comfortable around everyone else. They all had the same problem.

I found him sitting cross-legged in front of a young mother and her baby, which looked small enough to be only about three or four months old. "Hey, Braken. What are you doing?" I asked.

He looked up at me with wide eyes and pointed to the baby, a huge smile on his face.

"Do you want to hold him?" the mother asked softly. Her voice was sweet and gentle, perfect for a mother with a tiny baby in a world of hate. Braken nodded eagerly and scooted to sit next to her with his back against the wall. I sat down on his other side, watching as she showed him how to hold the baby, and then held my breath as she passed her child over to him. I had a sudden thought - what if he accidentally disintegrated him?

But he was too careful in the way he rested the baby's head on his arm and gently rocked his body back and forth to slip up like that. Watching someone others called a murderer look at the miracle of human life with such awe and amazement gave me a warm feeling in my whole body, starting in my chest and flooding the rest of me. I barely felt the cold.

The baby looked up at Braken with deep, dark eyes - kind of like Leo's, I noticed - and gave him that smile only babies can give. It grew on the tiny face until he was laughing, too, baby giggles that brought me back to memories from years ago. I missed my simple life, but honestly, this wasn't so bad, not once I got used to it. I figured I could stay at Refuge for a long time.

Braken smiled back with nearly as much enthusiasm as the baby did, holding him up close to his chest. A moment passed between them, an understanding moment that seemed to connect them, somehow. Both were young, lost, and confused, abandoned by all but a choice few, and neither could say what they wanted. Neither could express their thoughts. I had no idea babies could be so intelligent.

I leaned back against the wall and closed my eyes, resting a bit. Braken stayed holding the baby, making soft cooing noises and funny faces to make him laugh, but as I began to drift to sleep, the child started to cry. Immediately, I snapped to attention, fully awake, to see Braken attempting to quiet the baby, hushing him gently. The baby had one of Braken's fingers squeezed tightly in his fist as he wailed, and only screamed louder when Braken tried to pull it away.

He looked up at me helplessly, as the mother had fallen asleep against the wall. I shrugged, and he sighed, nudging the mother with his elbow until she woke up. "Oh," she said. "He's hungry." She gently took her child from the small Gifted, and pulled a blanket over her so she could feed him. Braken watched with wide eyes, and she gently explained what she was doing.

Hungry. That reminded me of Leo, and I looked up, but he wasn't on top of the building anymore. I knew almost immediately where he was.

"Where's the bathroom?" I asked. She pointed, and I quickly left for it, finding the door open just a crack and the light on. It was in a small apartment, but the lights were off in the other rooms, and no one was around to bother him. "Leo?" I called, knocking on the door.

"G-go away," he said.

"Leo, can I come in? I know you're not actually going to the bathroom."

"No."

"I want to help you."

"No."

I pushed open the door a little bit, and he whirled around in panic from where he was kneeling by the toilet. He wiped the side of his mouth with his hand, standing up quickly and nearly falling over again. I ran to catch him, and as I did, I noticed the apple core in the garbage can and what was actually in the toilet.

"Leo, why are you doing this?" I whispered.

"Doing what?" he demanded, shoving away from me.

"Why are you starving yourself? Throwing up what food we make you eat? That's why you collapsed. That's why you're so weak all of the time." I didn't understand. I wanted to help him, but I was confused and afraid.

"I told you," he grumbled. "I don't like food. It makes me groggy and sluggish and sick."

I came over to him again, flushing the toilet and closing the lid, trying to make it clear that he couldn't do that. He was going to make himself seriously sick. He backed away from me, cornering himself against the wall, and I stepped forward and pulled him into a hug.

"Wh-what are you doing?" he said, his voice shaking.

"I'm giving you a hug. You look like you need one."

Finally, he started to relax, returning the embrace almost hesitantly. "This is so different from Howell's hugs," he whispered. "I didn't know a hug could feel like this."

My heart ached at his words, and I squeezed him tighter. "I've got you now. You're safe."

"I don't feel safe, Joel," he said, starting to pull away.

I noticed a bathroom scale on the floor a few feet away, and lifted him up and carried him over - I knew he'd never stand on it otherwise. He shrieked and landed a good kick to my shin, but I dropped him on the scale and told him to stay. He didn't want to stand there, and I had to keep pushing him back on, until finally, he realized I wasn't going to give up and held still.

96.2 lbs, the scale said. I had to find the conversion button, as I wasn't really good at the weird measurements Americans used - once I found that, I blinked in surprise. 43.6 kg, it said.

"Leo, you're tiny," I muttered.

"I'm fine," he said.

"No, you're supposed to be around seventy kilograms or something, not forty three." I moved out of the way, and he stepped off of the scale and hugged himself.

"Sorry," he muttered.

"You just need to eat," I said. "Come on. Let's go get you something."

"But I'm not -"

"Leo." I turned to look at him. He flinched at my stern voice and wouldn't meet my eyes. "You have to eat something."

He just nodded a little and kept his head down, following obediently as I left the building - No, obedient wasn't the right word. He was submissive. I'd scared him, and now he was only doing what I told him to avoid getting hurt. I wasn't going to hurt him. I didn't understand. I guess being in the games for that long did things to you. It made you do whatever it took to stay alive. I glanced over my shoulder at him. Except eat, apparently.

Almost as soon as we reached the outside world, Braken slammed into him, hugging his friend tightly. Leo's eyes widened and he nearly fell over, barely managing to stay upright. "What -" he started.

Braken pulled away and grabbed his wrist, writing something quickly. Once he was finished, he stepped back and looked up at him expectantly.

Leo was in some sort of stunned silence. "You ... you knew what I was doing?"

Braken nodded, giving him a few signs. His expression was full of concern, and his rough hands were so gentle as he signed. His friend blinked, unable to speak, and then gave him a tiny, sad smile. 

"I'm sorry," he whispered. 

Braken shrugged, his way of saying he forgave him. Then he grinned and grabbed his wrist, writing a different message. 

Leo frowned. "And - something about your what?"

The silent Gifted sighed through his nose and rewrote the last part of his message. 

"Your mother?" 

"What?" I said, instantly curious.

"He says he remembers something about his mother." Leo took Braken's hand, squeezing it eagerly. "What is it? What was she like?" As his friend wrote, Leo's face fell. "Oh. Um ... okay. Glad to hear you remember."

"What? What's wrong?" I asked.

Leo didn't answer. Instead, he pulled away from Braken's loving touch and shuffled away, ducking his head and hugging himself.

"Where are you going?" I called after him.

He didn't even look back.

I turned to Braken, hoping I could get an answer. "What did you say?"

He paused, and then grabbed my hand and wrote a few words on my wrist, a few too fast for me to catch. Something about being sick. I asked him to slow down, and instead, he looked over at Leo. WHY DOES LEO NOT EAT?

"I don't know, Braken," I said, following Leo with my eyes as he climbed back up to the roof by himself. "Do you think you can get him to eat something? He ate an apple a few minutes ago, but I found him in the bathroom and he threw it up. He didn't want it to stay in his stomach."

Braken looked down at his stomach and poked it, jerking away from himself. He glanced over at Leo and then back up at me, shrugging. Maybe.

Then an idea hit me, and I determined I was the king of random important thoughts. I couldn't protect Leo, but I could protect others. If Gus was a Gifted, like Braken and Leo and Aaron, he needed to come here. He'd be safe here. Was he okay, after we'd escaped? It had only been two days, yet it felt like a year. I had to go back and get them.

"I have to go," I said quickly. "Gus is a Gifted. He has to come here. I have to make sure he's safe."

Braken gave me a strange look, but didn't move to say anything. I waited a moment, and then thought of another thing. If Gus was a Gifted, was Eoin?

"Hey, Aaron?" I called, searching the mass of blankets and people.

His head seemed to pop up out of nowhere as he shouted an answer back. "Yeah?"

"I need your help."