He feels the muscles in his shoulders protest. He's been sitting here hunched over the Cryotank for much longer than he'd like to think. He can't get himself to leave. Leave her. He doesn't trust anyone to be with her.

A hand clasps his shoulder from behind and he tenses even more, ready to defend this, her, with his life. But it was only Doc:

"Ian, please you have got to eat something. You need to move. It has been three days."

Could it be? Has he been sitting here for days? He's replayed her words over and over. She told him she loved him, with her whole soul. He looks at his hand that has not left the side of the tank and it trembles slightly. There's this ache inside him that screams for him to open the tank, take her out, hold her in the palm of his hand, touch her, stroke her tiny silver body, talk to her. She's inside alone. And although he knows she will be in unbearable agony if he does, he still wants it. Right now she feels nothing inside that tank. She is in some sort of hibernation, frozen in time.

"You have my word Ian. I won't let anything happen to her. She is safe here. She's not going anywhere."

He looks the older man in the eye and knows he can trust him. There are others that care about her too. She has friends here. He gets up slowly and his muscles protest after the long stillness.

Doc continues: "The others want to talk with you about her."

Ian flinches. If they think he's going to let anyone send her off to some planet some unknown place where he can't follow, then they have another thing coming.

His voice is hoarse from being unused. "Where are they?"

"They'll meet you in the big hall. Go get cleaned up, eat something, clear your head."

He glances back down at the tank. He can't bear leaving her, not for a single minute longer than necessary.

His voice is firmer this time: "I will go and get cleaned up but I'm coming right back here. They can meet me here if they want to talk."

He can see Doc suppressing a sigh as he gives him a curt nod. "It involves you too doc. And if you're in the big room and I'm in the big room, who's gonna be here with her?"

He walks through the caves to his room, her room, their room. It's the first time he enters it since 

she's... The bedding is still bundled at the end of the bed from where he threw it off when Jared pulled him frantically from sleep. He falls down on the cold cave floor and the pain shooting though his knees hardly registers through the pain stabbing at his heart. He finds himself clutching the blanket to his chest, trying to inhale her scent. But there is nothing but the musty cave smell. There is nothing of her left here, nothing, and he feels his body finally letting go. All these days that he's been sitting there next to her, he's been numb. But now it all comes out and he anger that flashes through him is powerful but the anguish is even worse. He rips the frail blanket in two and tosses it against the wall.

His chest is heaving and he says her name out loud: "Wanderer. Oh Wander why did you want to leave me?"

She told him that she loved him, with her whole soul. She clung to him when she said it. And then she waited until he was asleep and snuck off into the night to give up her live for Melanie. He can't even begin to think about how alone she must have felt how scared and another sob rakes through him. He lies down on the mattress. "Just for a minute," he mumbles to himself, but falls into an exhausted dreamless trance.

It is dark and the stars shine through the opening at the top of the cave room when he wakes up. He stumbles through the dark caves to the hospital room and finds them waiting, all seven of them staring at him sadly. Melanie and Jared. He knows they all think it is awkward for him to look at her and not see his Wanderer but he never saw her body. His eyes shift to his brother Kyle with Sunny by his side. Kyle who got Jodi's body back, but not her mind. But Sunny is a gentle soul and she'll never leaves his brother's side. Jeb, Jamie and Doc finish the group.

"I am NOT sending her away. She belongs here. With us. This is her home now."

To his surprise everyone in the room nods. It is Mel who speaks and even though her voice is the same voice that Wanderer used, it is different. It has no hold on him. Because Mel uses a different tone, her words are different, somehow more aggressive. His Wanderer spoke softly gently.

"Ian we may have found her a host."

"What?"

Jared speaks: "It will be safe. Ian I swear I won't do anything that could cause her harm."

Ian can see that his words made Melanie stiffen a little. And he wonders how much of this man's heart now belongs to Wanderer rather than Melanie.

"We found a potential host but we wanted to make sure you approve..." Jared's voice trailed off.

Ian shakes his head. "No. No. Don't you see? I don't care what she looks like. It doesn't matter to me."

He reaches for the cyrotank and holds it close. When he looks up again they have all left. He sits down with a sigh and cradles her on his lap.

"Please be okay."