Laney Monette hadn't always known she was different. When she was small, she thought perhaps everyone could do the things she seemed able to do. See the things she saw in her head; feel emotions that couldn't possibly be hers. It wasn't until she was eleven or so that she realized something may be wrong with her.

She'd been at a sleep over with her best friends, Becky and Megan. Megan was her usual silly old self, but Becky had been acting strange all night. Laney could feel waves of sadness radiate from her mate from all the way across the living room.

Sitting down beside her, her tiny green night gown wrinkling at the edges of her legs, she asked Becky what was wrong.

The girl shook her head so furiously her hair came loose of it's tie, and fell to frame her small face. "It's nothing." She'd said. But Laney knew she was lying, and not just by her obviously uncomfortable body language. Before Becky could stop her, Laney held her own hand out and placed it on top of hers, while Megan sat across the room from them, puzzled at the exchange.

Laney gasped as images and feelings rushed into her head. Terror, anxiety, and pain; it was such a painful experience, the scene making way to its end in her mind. When she opened her eyes again, a single tear rolled down her soft, supple cheek. When she had a mind to speak again, she looked into her friend's little blue eyes and said "I am so, so sorry."

Becky's eyes widened and with a hiss she yanked her hand out from under Laney's. "I hate you! Don't ever speak to me again, you freak!"

Laney was taken aback. She had no idea what she'd done wrong, and even Megan's mouth hung agape, still perched on an armchair across the room.

Becky had called her parents and asked them to take her home. She never spoke to Laney or Megan again.

Laney had watched her friend climb into her father's grey Range Rover as rain beat against the window of Megan's house. Beside her, Megan asked "What happened? What happened when you touched her hand?"

The vehicle moved further and further away from the cul de sac the house sat in the center of, its headlights cutting through the darkness like a blade, marred only by the rain that shone through them.

Laney shrugged her shoulders, replying "She wouldn't tell me what was wrong with her, so I saw it."

Megan's little brown eyes grew wider that ever, her dark eyelashes outstanding against her pale, freckled skin. "You did what? What do you mean you saw what was wrong with her? You can only know stuff like that if people say it out loud."

Laney looked into her friend's eyes, and suddenly she knew; this thing, whatever it was, that she could do, it wasn't something she was supposed to be able to.

"Nevermind." Laney said, sliding down against the wall and hugging her knees to her chest. Her little friend, stubborn as ever, wouldn't let it go. "Well, what happened to her? Why was she so sad?"

Shaking her head again, Laney replied "It's not my secret to tell."

Truthfully, at that age, she didn't even know how to put into words the horrible things that had been happening to Becky in her own home. She could still feel the lingering melancholy from her now ex-best friend still swimming around in her psyche. It had been her first major encounter with her abilities, and neither her, nor the other two girls present would ever forget that night. Not even Becky, no matter how much she wanted to make herself do so.

In her dream, she was in an elevator. She only needed to go one floor down, but when she hit the button, all of the others lit up with it. The door only closed halfway before the lift began to descend. Laney pressed herself up against the back of the small room, getting as far away from the gaping door as she could. She could see each floor that went by, and the space between them. Then the lift shook, and began to fall.

Laney woke up with a migraine that seemingly threatened to split her skull in two from the inside. Awful as it sounds, this was a regular occurrence for her; she'd had headaches almost constantly since she was very small. It was a rare day she didn't either wake up with one, or have it sneak up on her during the day.

She rolled over and slapped at her alarm clock until it stopped making offensive noises. When she peeped from under her lashes, she saw "9:30" glaring at her in bright red text. She groaned, smashing her head back into her pillow. She'd forgotten she had class today. One of only two classes she was able to take; she didn't have money to put herself through any more school right now.

While she was getting dressed and ready, Megan called her on her cell. Laney answered and put her on speaker while she brushed her teeth.

"Hey, Jacob and I are stopping by the donut shop before class, do you want anything?"

"Yeashmoofh, I shidnnolosh nord moshier" Laney mumbled through all the frothy toothpaste in her mouth.

"Uh…what?"

Laney rolled her eyes, spitting the mess out of her mouth into the sink.

"I said Yes. Could you grab me a kolache and a monster?"

"Oh! Sure. The blue kind, right?"

Laney smiled. Her bestie knew her all too well. "Yep. See you in an hour."

"See ya."

Laney sat in her history 1302 class, bored out of her skull, staring at her 9 billion year old professor who always wore the stupidest bowties and talked about as fast as it took to connect to the internet using dial-up.

She and Megan both hated this class, but it was a required core for a degree from the community college they attended.

They were learning about the Civil War. The professor droned on about Robert E. Lee and the Battle of Bull run. Laney doodled in her spiral where she was supposed to be scribing notes. Class almost over when Laney felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. That familiar fuzzy feeling that tugged at the perimeters of her consciousness arose, and she felt something…different; something alien. It began to push harder on her mind; she felt a twinge of emotions she didn't even know were possible.

Megan saw the troubled look of concentration on her best friend's face, and tried to get her attention without alerting the teacher. When all else failed, she touched Laney's hand, causing the girl to gasp. Laney looked at Megan, wide eyed. She'd zoned out so completely that she hadn't even remembered her friend had been right next to her. Stealing another glance at the professor, Megan soundlessly mouthed the words "what's wrong?" to her dear friend.

Laney didn't even know, to be honest. The feelings had come from nowhere; usually she didn't get any kind of reading that strong unless she was touching someone. She may have been confused, but she knew one thing had to be certain. Meeting her best friend's familiar soft brown eyes, she whispered "I think something's coming."

Megan had little more than seconds to look befuddled before there were a few knocks behind them, followed by the heavy classroom door being pushed open. Everyone turned around in their seats, or at least craned their necks to get a look at who had interrupted the history lecture they were all dying to be done with.

"'Scuse me, sorry to barge in. I'm filling in for Vinny today. He told me you'd been havin' some problems with pests in this wing?"

He had a very thick, unrefined English accent, and a few kid in the room snickered, making snide comments about it under their breath. Laney glared at one of them and said "That's rude." She didn't even know the guy, but it still got on her nerves when idiots picked on people who were different without provocation.

The student told her to kiss his ass in response.

Laney looked back to the replacement maintenance guy, only to find his eyes were fixed on her. His gaze was a bit unnerving, but she met his stare in kind. Something pulled at the edge of her mind; something in those eyes, drawing her down. His eyes were far too old for his body to possibly possess them.

The old professor cleared his throat, causing the stranger in the door to break eye contact with Laney.

"Yes, we've been hearing a lot of strange scratching noises coming from the walls and ceiling of late."

The man moved further into the room and said "I see. Mind if I take a look?" He was about to shut the door behind him before the professor interjected. "That's quite impossible right now, sir, I'm in the middle of a lecture. You'll have to come back when there isn't a class going on."

The stranger nodded. "Alright then. I'll try back later."

He exited back into the hallway where he'd come from, pausing only for a moment to glance back at Laney, winking at her before closing the door behind him.

She hadn't realized how fast her heart had been beating until silence filled the room and she could hear it in her ears. Was that man the reason she'd had the strange feeling a few moments ago? It had come and gone with his proximity; she couldn't think of anything else that would have been cause for it. The lecture continued for another 45 minutes, but Laney couldn't pay attention. She was lost in her head. Lost in the feelings she'd felt before that man walked through the door, lost in the complete timeless void that was just behind his eyes. What could have possibly made them look so old, so lost?

He'd said he was filling in for Vinny, one of the maintenance men, but Laney knew Vinny, talked to him quite often, and Fridays were his day off. He was never here on Friday. So what was that guy doing, why did he lie? He wasn't dressed like any maintenance guy she'd ever seen, he'd had a leather jacket on.

Laney was still collecting her thoughts when the professor dismissed the classroom. Megan had already gotten up to leave before Laney realized it was time to go. "Well, I've gotta go. I've got my other class." She said, as Laney gathered her things and stood up to follow her out of the room. "Alright, Megs, see ya later."

The girls parted ways, Megan headed to her next class, and Laney headed toward the parking lot. There was a huge crowd of people waiting in line for the elevator, so she decided to use the stairwell instead. Not that she'd want to use the lift anyways, after that insane dream she'd woken up from this morning.

The stairwells at this college were so creepy. They were poorly lit and maintained, and always smelled of mildew. Kids left their trash all over the place. Laney always felt like she was in a horror movie in the stairwell, running for her life from some manic serial murderer. All she could hear was the echo of her sneakers slapping the cold concrete as she descended.

Then she heard something else. A shuffling; of feet, perhaps? Then a high pitched screeching noise that sounded kind of like a shrill alarm, but not quite so loud. Laney rushed to the bottom of the stairwell and turned the corner that lead to the supply closet that was under the stairs.

She could sense someone there, but the bulb above the supply closet door must have burned out, because it was shrouded in darkness.

"Hey, who's over there?" Laney hoped her voice betrayed nothing of how scared she was. More shuffling noises, and then "Daft old thing" in a familiar odd cadence.

"Who are you, what are you doing?"

Still no answer. She thought about running away, but her curiosity was getting the best of her.

"I'll get campus security-"

Her sentence was cut of by the weird screech again, this time accompanied by a bright blue light. Suddenly, the bulb above the closet door sparked to life, and there, bathed in it's glow, was the strange man in the leather jacket from earlier.

"There. That's better."

He grinned widely at her. He was holding some sort of metal device that looked like a pen of some sort, but a bit bigger.

"It's you!" She wasn't as surprised to see him as she must have sounded. She'd had a feeling it could only be the odd intruder from earlier.

"Seems that way, yeah." He was still grinning at her, not at all annoyed that she had interrupted him from…whatever he was doing.

"What are you doing down here? You nearly scared me to death."

He sighed, putting the pen like object up inside of his jacket.

"I told you. I'm filling in for Vinny. Trying to figure out what's been goin' on in the walls. Can't seem to get this door open, though."

She shook her head. "You're not filling in for Vinny. What are you really doing, and how'd you make that light come back on?"

"How would you know who I'm filling in for? You the substitute police?"

Laney continued answering his questions, even though she knew she should be reporting him to campus security for breaking and entering, and impersonating a maintenance man. She kept her distance from him, still a little wary of his intentions.

"I know Vinny. He never works on Fridays. What are you doing here, why did you lie?"

He shrugged his shoulders with a defeated sigh.

"I swear. Some of you humans are so nosy. Can't keep yourselves out of trouble to save your own lives."

Before Laney could question why he'd referred to her to her as a human as if he was not, when he very clearly was, she heard a scratching that sounded a lot like metal on metal above her. Snapping her head upward, she hissed, "What was that?"

"I don't know. Maybe if you'd leave me alone instead of hasslin' me, I could figure it out."

She rolled her eyes at him. "Oh, shut up."

His eyes widened. "You American girls sure are cheeky!"

The corner of her mouth moved upward in a lopsided grin. "What, never seen a girl who will tell you off?"

Before he could answer, they heard the noise again, but this time it was louder. Closer, maybe. Both of their gazes averted back to the ceiling, where the scratching noise continued.

"I think it's coming from that air vent over there." Laney whispered, pointing up to where the vent was located in the corner of the ceiling.

The stranger began to walk over to where the vent was, when there was a huge crash that shook the whole building, tossing Laney to the floor. The lights in the stairwell flickered and went out. Frantic voices could be heard on the other side of the door that led out into the hallway. Laney could feel something awful in her head and chest. Absolute terror and pain flooded her thoughts.

She cried out when she felt an arm wrap around her waist and help her up off of the ground. Would be Vinny substitute held her steady against him for a moment. "Thank you." She whispered. He told her to shush. He was listening for something. All she could hear was the faint thudding of his heart in his chest that was pressed against her ear. Wait a minute…there was something funny about his heart beat; it was very irregular. Before she could wonder any more about it, he had let her go and began towards the doorway out of the stairwell.

When he opened it, light flooded the area, and Laney raised an arm to her face. She still heard voices and cried from outside. When she lowered her arm he was gone, out into the melee.

After steadying her mind and trying to shake off the need to vomit from the flood of emotions she was picking up, Laney threw open the door and followed behind him.

Laney had to cover her mouth when she witnessed the scene in front of her. The need to vomit was definitely not adverted. One of the college's elevator's had crashed. There were fireman trying to pry the doors open and get the kids out of there.

Students that were lucky enough to have taken the stairs were running around frantically, on their cell phones, crying, hugging each other, hoping that their friends inside were okay.

Laney backed up against the nearest wall and sank down onto the floor. Her head was swimming with feelings that were not her own; it was making her incredibly dizzy. She was seeing doubles as she watched the strange man try and help the fireman get the lift's doors pried open.

Laney heard a great roaring crunch and her eyes snapped open. She hadn't even realized they'd been shut.

The men had finally gotten the doors open, but she wasn't at an angle where she could see inside the lift, and she wasn't sure she wanted to. In the corner of her eye she saw something scurry out of the elevator that no one else seemed to notice; no one, except the strange man, who proceeded to point his pen light thingy at it.

The pen made a funny noise, and the creature, whatever it was, stopped moving. He picked it up and put it in his jacket pocket, then began towards the exit of the building.

"H-h-hey!" She yelled in his direction, but he failed to turn around.

""Hey!" Laney reached her arm towards him, in the hopes that it would do any good to make him hear her. "Please don't leave me here!"

She didn't want to be here. All of these people, their emotions; it was all too much. She had to get out, but she couldn't do it on her own.

He must have finally heard her, because he spun on his heel and looked around. When their eyes finally met, and he realized who was calling for him, he got the most piteous look on his face.

She could tell he wanted to help her, but thought for some reason that he shouldn't; that he should leave her be. Disappear from her life like he never was.

For a moment she thought he would turn around and leave her here, alone, but she saw something flash behind his eyes. Felt something radiate from his mind to hers, and whatever it was propelled him forward. Back towards the fray, to where she was sitting on the ground while people milled about around her.

"Come on, love." He said, before picking her up bridal style and continuing back in his original direction. Laney glanced back over his shoulder and wished she hadn't. They were dragging students out of the lift, some conscious, some not. All of them were covered in blood. One or two were cradling very clearly broken appendages. She squinted her eyes back shut, trying to erase all of the images from her mind. Trying to forget how scared she was feeling, how sad. The phantom pain she could feel all throughout her body even though she herself was not hurt.

As she rested her head up against the stranger's chest, his frantic and irregular heartbeat thudding against her ear once again, she felt a monstrous headache coming on.

As they walked, out and away from the building now, destination unknown; at least to her, she willed herself to sleep in the odd man's grasp.

That very odd man who'd intruded on her history class, who'd made a light bulb magically spark back to life. That very odd man who'd carried her away when she'd asked him for help.