ChapterTwentyThree: No Comfort Zone

November 2155

As Hannah arrived at her school, James walked up to her, and walked her back to his car. She asked him, "James, what's going on?"

He sat her inside the car, and he got in himself. He told her, "It's Kylie...and that asshole who tried to make you his..."

He told her everything that had happened in the meeting, from the plan to breed with the Gen-Mods to James calling out Mason and Kylie and their people's history. Hannah was shocked by this. She, too, had heard that Liam was mated to Kylie, the girl he always to be with. Now he was going to be used to create a Gen-Hunter child.

Then James mentioned how there were holes in the Natives' history, and soon brought up the phone call she made to him. Hannah smiled painfully with her mouth closed, and took out the books from her backpack. She said, "I got them last night from Mason's house. Luckily, he was gone the entire time."

Hannah noticed James was staring at her jaw. Her face looked too healthy, as if she piled on more makeup than usual on her translucent skin. He tried to wipe some of the makeup off, but it stuck onto her face like glue. Feeling uneasy, she asked, "What are you doing?"
James told her, "Open your mouth."

"What? Why?"

"Now!"

"No!"

He sat back as he folded his arms. He looked at her, glaring at her even though his eyes were hidden behind his sun-goggles. She demanded, "Why do you want to look into my mouth?"

He said to her sternly, "A Native bit you."

That shocked Hannah. How could he know? she thought to herself. Natives aren't seers like the Gen-mods...or are they?

James repeated himself. Hannah sighed in defeat, and slid down her slightly loose blazer. She unbuttoned her shirt, slid down part of it to reveal a bandaged shoulder. She muttered, "Mason found me...and bit me." Then she said louder with some confidence, "But I got the history books! We could look into them, and find out more about the Natives."

The only expression on his face was anger as he clenched his jaw. Hannah sighed, and touched his hand gently. She told him softly, "It's going to be okay. As long as I acknowledge that I am a human, it'll be fine. I refuse to believe that I'm now some alien humanoid. I promise everything will be okay."

He softened his expression reluctantly. He was still angry that Mason had turned his mate into a Hunter, yet he impressed at how she was doing her best to remain as human as possible. He held her hand, and smiled at her lovingly.

Then he said to her, "We're going to meet up with Damon, Cassie, and Liam. We have to tell Liam what's going on before he ever begins mating with Kylie."

Hannah nodded, and added, "We need to show them the books."

James agreed.

It was now early evening. There was no practice, so James, Hannah, Cassie, and Damon met in Liam's house. Liam was on his couch when he saw them walk into this living room. They were let in by his father. Cassie walked to Liam, and told him, "We need to go into your room. There's something important we have to tell you."

Liam looked at them with a mixture of emotions. Then he got up, and led them to his shared room with Lance. They saw Lance on his bed while using his own tablet. Liam told him, "You gotta leave."

"Why?" Lance asked.

"Got business to attend to."

Lance looked at Liam's friends, then at Liam. He told his twin, "I'm staying."

"No."

"Nope. I'm staying. This is too interesting."

Cassie sighed, "He might as well stay. We got information anyway."

Lance smirked at Liam, whereas Liam just pouted at his older twin brother. The group all sat around. Cassie and Hannah stared at Damon and James to begin speaking. The two guys were awkwardly silent. Cassie rolled her eyes, and asked, "Liam, how long have you've known Kylie?"

Liam was stunned by this question, but he replied anyway, "Since Year 6. She moved here from another city. She never said where, exactly. I assumed she was from Berlina."

Cassie sighed as she said, "Kylie...Kylie, and Mason Jameson from Charlie Academy, are planning to breed with the Gen-Mods to create Gen-Hunters. They've recruited most of the Natives, but the Earth Hunters, and the Bitten Ones, are refusing to go along with this plan. Liam, Kylie doesn't love you. She just wants your sperm and your radioactive Nano-biotic blood to create a very powerful child."

This shocked both Lance and Liam. Lance's mouth was opened, but Liam sat there, too stunned to make any facial movement. Liam could feel his heart was breaking into a million pieces. The girl he always had a crush on, and was glad to be mates with her, was just using him. She didn't truly love him. She just wanted a Gen-Hunter child from him, and that was it.

The group looked at Liam for any type of response. All he gave were sad eyes as he was heartbroken by the news. Hannah told them, "We should probably leave..."

"No," James said. "He needs to know more about the Natives here."

Liam sighed, "What is there to know? They just want to use the Gen-Mods as baby-making-machines."

Hannah said, "No, it's not that."

She took out the two history books from her backpack, and showed them to the group. She added, "These are the history books of Rossa, which is the name of this planet that the Natives named themselves. There are two translations of the history books: One is in English, and the other looks like some mixture of German and Russian combined."

Damon's eyes widen at that. He looked at the book with the strange language. He picked it up, and tried to read it. Cassie noticed this, so she asked, "Do you know how to speak their language?"

He shook his head, and said, "No. The writing looks like Cyrillic. I know how to speak Russian and read Russian Cyrillic, but I don't know what it's saying. It kind of reads like German, but I still don't know."

James asked Hannah, "So these are the history books?"

She replied, "Yeah, they are. If you look on the first page, you can tell there was something missing in their history. It all dates back to 2022, and that's it."

"And they claim they were around as long as we humans have?"

"Yeah."

Lance scoffed, "I bet they nuked themselves up."

Liam said, "But if they did that, then why are the radiation levels here at a minimal level? Where are the ruined cities? Why are the Normals and the Hunters here able to breathe and live here?"

"I don't know! We just know something happened!"

Damon added, "Then how did they end up on Earth?"

Lance groaned, "You think I have all the answers?"

"Well, you are a Gen-Mod..."

Liam said, "I honestly can't deduce anything concerning this. It's like I'm hitting a wall again."

Cassie added, "Same here."

Soon there was a silence that fell upon them. As they were about to leave the house, Hannah asked Cassie, "Have you seen Lilly since the party?"

Her eyes widened as she realized that she completely forgot her best friend. She remembered that Lilly was going to get a mate at the party, but she never saw her during the Hunter invasion. Besides, she was busy dealing with Damon. Her friends looked at her for answers. Cassie sighed, "I don't know. There was so much going on."

Damon said, "Why don't you mindlink her?"
She nodded, and mindlinked Lilly, Lilly, where are you? How are you?

There was a silence for a minute or two when Lilly finally responded through the mindlink, I'm busy mating with my mate!

Cassie looked at her friends, and repeated the answer to them. Lance said sourly, "Make sure your bestie's mate is not a Native."

Liam sighed, "Lance, can you please stop acting like a sour bitch?

Lance only glared at him. The only thing that was on Cassie's mind was that she need to find out if Lilly's mate was a Native or not. The last thing she wanted for her bestie was to become a breeding machine to create a much more powerful human species.