Author Note: I liked chapter 2 so I didn't rewrite any of it

Noah's dirty knuckles tapped softly against Abby's pristine, white front door.  His forehead dripping with sweat as he stood in the empty hallway.  It was strange to stand there, and not see nurses coming in and out of the apartments.

Whether the hallway was abuzz with activity or empty the smell of bleach and old food assaulted his nostrils every time he visited.  All the doors were the same bright shade of white without a speck of dirt on them. The doors stood out against the filthy floor and grubby walls covered with graffiti. These support buildings were all the same, full of far too many people and no one caring enough to keep them looking nice.

Noah could feel Abby's keys in his pocket digging into his leg through the thin fabric. He only ever used her keys when she was in the hospital to water her plants; they were her little bit of beauty in an otherwise grey world.

Noah checked his watch, it had just gone three o'clock in the afternoon. It was possible for Abby to have gone out after all, she wouldn't have expected him to visit her at this time.

Any other day at this time he would be knee deep in dirt with a shovel in his hand along with a hundred other men.

All of them reeking of sweat as they spent hours digging in the hot sun.  

And for what?

So the Signum could have some fancy building there that they would live like kings and queens while most of humanity lived no better than the rats that crawled in the sewers.

Noah felt about as clean as a rat in the sewers. His hair was messy, his clothes were dirty with holes in. He smelt of stale sweat.

All he wanted to do was stand under a hot shower for hours on end and when he went home, he would do just that, but first he needed to apologize to Abby face to face for his attitude over the last couple of days.

Her becoming a host was her only chance to live they both knew. He couldn't help the burning rage he felt whenever he thought about a Signum growing inside her. The thing he hated most saving the woman he loved was almost laughable, if it wasn't so twisted.

A door across the hallway opened making a creaky sound.

"Are you Noah?" A hoarse voice asked to make Noah turn around slowly on the off chance it was a Signum drone. If, it was he wanted them to know he was defenceless. It would be just his luck to get shot on the one day the Signum had declared a half working day.

"Yes," Noah answered. A single word answer was best until he knew who he was talking too, that's what his father had taught him.

A pale, wrinkled hand covered in red oozing sores shoved a piece paper through the crack of the door.  

"Abby, wanted you to have that!" the voice told him in between coughs before slamming the door shut with more force than necessary.

Noah bent down and picked up the paper. He had the same feeling in his stomach, he had the day his father died. It felt like someone had poured lava into his stomach. It was a terrible feeling unlike any other he had ever known.

Noah, Doctor Lyle is taking me to the Sapphire Facility. She got the okay from the Signums but I have to go now or wait months for my next chance to become a host.

Love Abby.

~~~

The water was warm; It smelt like jasmine and roses. A fragrance that Abby found soothing, it comforted her for reasons she couldn't explain.

Abby normally would find soaking in a warm bath relaxing, but it was difficult to let herself become at ease with Mia's watchful gaze studying her twitch or movement her body made.

Mia was a Signum nurse. It was easy to tell she was Signum and not human while the difference between the way the two looked weren't many they were easy to spot. The five small bumps on the hands, the unnatural shade of pale skin, and those flecks of blue in the brown eyes that were visible if you really looked.

Doctor Lyle had left Abby with Mia while she went to prepare the implantation room. Abby hadn't heard the nurse speak a word and it was unnerving.

It wasn't medically necessary to bathe in the water before the offspring was placed inside the host, but the Signum believed that if it wasn't done then their offspring would be born with two souls. It was something they feared and Abby found it strange, then a lot things about the Signum were peculiar.

"Superstitious rubbish" that's what Doctor Lyle had told her about the tradition of bathing in the water. Yet, the Signum belief in this myth was solid and Doctor Lyle had not so much forced Abby to go through it, but had strongly implied she would be going home if she didn't.

Abby lifted her hand out the water, her fingertips were going all wrinkly from being in the water too long. She couldn't wait to get out and dry off.

She heard the sound Doctor Lyle's heels in the corridor long before the sound of the door creaking open.

"Mia, get her towel, it's time!" Doctor Lyle ordered, Mia obeyed the way a dog did when its owner commanded it to sit. It was a peculiar and almost amusing thing to see a human order around a Signum.

Abby hoisted herself up out of the water; her hands gripping onto the cold porcelain sides of the bath as she did so.

She shivered from the cold as Mia wrapped a towel around him. The whole thing felt awkward for her, but for Doctor Lyle and Mia this was something they had done hundreds of times before.

Doctor Lyle held out her hand as a gesture for Abby to go with her.

The corridor was well-lit.but empty and silent. The only sound was Doctor Lyle heels against the cold, tiled floor.

The towel clung to her damp body almost like it was another layer of skin.

"If you are having second thoughts now is the time to back out. After this is done there is no going back," Doctor Lyle warned, her voice was soft with a slight edge to it.

"I can't afford to have doubts," Abby answered in what she hoped was a confident tone.

Doctor Lyle stopped at a grey door. She reached out, turned the handle, then pushed the door open gently. She stepped inside, and Abby counted to ten in her head before following. 

Her stomach was in knots.

"You've come this far. Don't back out now" the voice in the back of her head hissed.

There were people with blue surgical masks on. A bed with two drips by the side of it, one was filled with blood and the other with a blue substance.

There was a table with surgical instruments laid out neatly. Some Abby recognized and some looked more like they should be used for torture, and not in surgery.

"Lay down on the bed, Abby," Doctor Lyle ordered, sending a shiver down Abby's spine.  

"Will this hurt?" Abby asked, she could feel her heart pounding in her chest as if it wanted to leap out of her chest.

"You will sleep through the entire procedure," Doctor Lyle promised, brushing a strand of hair of Abby's cheek. Her voice was warm, but her face was emotionless. "Give me your arm!".

Abby stretched out her arm, she counted the seconds until the needle pierced her skin. It hurt more than she thought it would.

There was nothing at first, but then suddenly Abby was hit with a rush of drowsiness. The urge to close her was stronger than anything else she'd ever felt before. Her whole body was limp and relaxed.

"Get the drips in and make sure nothing goes wrong, she's compatible with Magus offspring and if anything goes wrong, we will all pay for it!"

The voice sounds were distorted, but Abby could just about figure out the voice was Doctor Lyle's.

Just before passing out completely she heard a loud, inhuman screech ring out through the room and the barely audible words: "Everything is okay, it will all be over soon".