When she felt the crisp chill of the pine smelling Colorado night, Hobbes felt a deep gratitude unlike anything she'd ever experienced before. She closed her eyes and gave sincere thanks to God or fate or whatever force in the universe it was that had allowed her to get back to Earth alive

"When all the rest of your team are dead." Said a little inner voice. She squashed it, no point in giving in to thoughts like that.

"There are humans… further down this valley. The scanners tell me." Said the alien, as if to remind her who had actually brought her back here "Several units… on foot. Not far for a …warrior."

She turned to see if he had intended mockery by this last remark, with his mask on it was hard to tell. She found him difficult to read at the best of times. Three weeks in his company had not much lessened her fear of him or increased his warmth towards her, but she sometimes suspected a cruel sense of humour at work – usually at her expense. It was impossible to be sure.

She squinted. It was a bright, moonlit night but she couldn't make out the lights of any town nearby. "It figures," She reflected "We could've landed anywhere and he drops me in the middle of nowhere!" She looked back at him again dubiously. He stood behind her, holding the sleeping baby against one shoulder. Selim was tightly wrapped in furs, his father's sole concession to the biting cold.

"Down, medic." He said "Just keep walking... down."

She nodded, unable to think what else to say for a moment. Then she held out her hands "Can I hold him for a moment?" She said timidly "I just want to say goodbye."

He snorted derisively, but handed her the snoring bundle. A few weeks ago, she hadn't held out much hope for Selim's chances of survival without his mother to look after him but he seemed more resilient than she'd expected.

Perhaps it was genetic. The alien's injuries looked almost healed, even after so short a space of time "And someone really went to town on him!" She thought, not for the first time wondering what had been the cause of all this bloodshed and violence.

She imagined he would always carry the huge slashing mark across the right side of his face but amazingly, once he had cleaned it off and the swelling had subsided, it revealed he had not lost the eye. It was emerging gradually from behind a welter of scar tissue. He had been hideous before and now he was slightly more so, she doubted he was the type to care.

His shoulder underneath the mess of gore had also been cut up pretty badly. He didn't discuss his injuries with her and she wouldn't have dared try to examine them without his express invitation, but even from a distance she could see for herself that some of the skin had been peeled away. That too had mostly healed now but it had still left places where the fibrous texture of muscle tissue showed through.

Hobbes looked down at the strange, small face; the pouting lips, the flickering eyelids, the tiny ridges on his brow, the almost translucent white of the tusks that framed his sulky little mouth. His breath whistled in the asthmatic, snuffling way of all little babies.

"He can't help what he is." She thought, as she stroked his cheek very gently "Poor little innocent."

"If you disturb him," The alien growled pointedly "You… must make him be asleep again."

Hurriedly she handed him back to his father. If it was going to take hours to get back to civilisation she wanted to get on the move whilst she had this moonlight, not be blundering along in the dark. There looked to be a fairly obvious track down the valley and Hobbes had done plenty of night marches in her life.

She sighed and wished she could have said her goodbyes to Lex too, thanked her for saving her life. Now Hobbes had time and distance from Myers's death, she knew that Lex had not been to blame "If she hadn't waded in to rescue us, all knocked up, then I wouldn't be on my way home to my girls!" She thought "And now her baby's left without a mother? Life's a fucking bitch sometimes!"

But there was no time for that now. She supposed she could thank the alien, he had kept his word after all "Thank you." She said "For bringing me back here I mean."

He tossed his head, shaking off her gratitude like a cat shakes off water, faintly disgusted "Consider my … obligation to you fulfilled." He said shortly and started back up the gangway, towards the belly of the shuttle.

"For what it's worth Scar," Hobbes called after him "I hope she wakes up soon!"

He half turned "Scar?" He said, sounding displeased "That is not… my name! Only Lexsss calls me that."

She swallowed hard "So what does everyone else call you?"

"Everyone elsssse?" He made a strange noise and suddenly she realised he was laughing; a short barking laugh which echoed off the mountainside in the cold, clear air "Human, there is… no one else. Everyone else is dead!"

The End

Author's note: I hope you have enjoyed this story. Whether you liked it or not please review it and tell me what you think as it's always interesting to have feedback. I am in the process of doing some more writing so it'd be useful to know what people think.