Haven

Dedicated to my friends, my fellow fanfiction writers, and to those who call me a great writer, even if they were just telling me that to be nice. This crazy one's for you guys!

Prologue

It was in the silence of the night that they tried to escape. Their home town had already been Taken and there was no longer anyone they could trust. The pair, a small boy and a grown man, quietly worked their way down alleys and streets until they saw their escape route. The man held the boy back and bended over to whisper to him, "On the count of three, I want you to run. Don't look back. Just keep running. I'll be right behind you."

The boy nodded, his dark eyes wide with fear. At this, the man pulled the boy into a fierce embrace, not bothering to tell him that it would be all right, that everything would be fine because, quite honestly, he didn't know what would happen next.

"Okay," said the man, pulling away, "on the count of three. One--"

Suddenly a new sound came from afar. An alert. They'd been spotted.

"Three!" The man pushed the boy down the alley and as he took off, braced himself to face whatever would come his way.

He ran with tears falling down his cheeks, not daring to look back as his father had warned him not to. Even so, he could hear what was happening behind him. The Wipers had come for his dad. His dad couldn't escape.

They would take him.

If his short legs could go any faster, he would have made them just to escape the sounds of it all happened. He was too frightened to stop and help. He was too small and weak. So he ran down the street as alarms went off and lights flooded the area.

"Hey, kid!" shouted several of the ones who had already been Taken but he ducked under their legs or quickly out-maneuvered them.

By this time, however, their numbers were increasing in the streets and there was only a small possibility of escape. Closing his eyes as he ran, he began to pray to whoever would listen that he wouldn't be caught, that he wouldn't be Taken, and he began to apologize to whoever could read his thoughts that he was sorry for leaving his dad behind, that he couldn't help.

Just as he finished his last thought, he ran into something big and fell backward, not daring to open his eyes and refusing to let a whimper find its way past his lips.

"Whco iz therrr?" asked the thing that he had ran into. A sniffing sound then followed. "Hcuman? Ah boy?"

Slowly, he opened his eyes only to scuttle backwards in surprise. A tall creature stood before him, something almost human but not quiet. A thin reddish hand reached out to the boy only to have him back away from the strange limb.

"Hcere now," said the creature calmly, "I will not hcarm you..."

Before the boy could move or say anything, the creature swiftly had him by the back of his shirt and was quickly moving away from the sound of approaching men and the lights. It was only then that he looked to the creatures face, recoiling slightly as he saw that it had no eyes, despite how human it looked.

Somehow the creature must have known what he was thinking for it smiled slightly and said, "You muzt be verrry zurprized. Do not worrry, hcowever, I ahm az cloze to ah frrriend az you will hcave in theze timez..."