A/N- Hey, this was just begging to be written in my head, so here it is! I'm not thinking Ilanca as a relationship, but definitely as close close friends and maybe it'll be romance at some point, but I'm not sure. For right now I might just develop their relationship as the show does.

In The Name of Science

Chapter 1: Taken

If there was one thing about Lance that Ilana couldn't stand, it was his stubbornness. He just couldn't ever act…normal. She hated herself for thinking it, because they were both so far from normal, but it was true all the same. Keeping up this charade of normalcy was causing them to always have the same arguments.

"But Lance-,"

"No, Ilana."

"But it won't even be-,"

"Okay, fine, whatever. You can go. But I'm not going."

"Lance, you have to!" Ilana protested. Lance scowled.

"I don't have to do anything. If you want to go to that party, you go. But I'm tired from the fight yesterday and I haven't slept and I am not going." He crossed his arms across his chest, pressing his back against the wall behind him.

"You aren't sleeping again? Lance, you should get that checked out-,"

His voice was more firm now. "No, Ilana. I told you, I'm fine. Just go to the party. I'll see you later." His eyes were on the ground, and she hated it. Just look at me, Lance, look at me!

"But-,"

"Later." He trudged upstairs, leaving Ilana wide-eyed and mid-protest behind him. Octus laid a large hand on Ilana's shoulder.

"Come on Ilana, we should go." He looked meaningfully at the stairs, and then turned Ilana towards the door. "Here, we will pick up Kimmy on the way."

"And why do we still let you go out with Kimmy?"

Octus shrugged, a small smile on his face, and opened the front door for her. Lance watched from his window as they got into the car and drove off. As soon as they were out of sight, he dropped down onto his bed with a groan. Lance rubbed his forehead, irritated.

Why did Ilana have to bring that up?

He had never been very good at sleeping; his mind just wouldn't quiet down long enough to allow it. But lately it was becoming much more frequent that he couldn't sleep, and when he did sleep, the nightmares were horrible. Ilana had already been suspicious of the bags under his eyes, but one night she walked in on him having a nightmare, and after that he could hardly hear the end of it.

Normally he would have been worried that his sleeping patterns were progressively getting worse, but he didn't want Ilana to be any more concerned about him. She was getting way too motherly, and he didn't need a mother. He was fine anyway. He had always gotten by on his own, and that wasn't about to change.

He lied down in bed on top of the blankets, clothes still on, and closed his eyes. He stayed like that in complete stillness for five minutes, and then his eyes shot open again.

"This is impossible," he mumbled. Lance was about to close his eyes to try again, but stopped when he heard a sound. He shot up into a sitting position. All of his training kept him from calling out to see if Ilana and Octus had returned home early. It was much too soon for them to be back, unless they had forgotten something. And he would have seen the car pull in anyway.

Lance silently got to his feet, creeping out of his room and down the hallway. He pressed his back against the wall and peered over his shoulder to the foot of the stairs. A black shape suddenly filled the doorframe and Lance gasped, pulling his head back. A few seconds later, he ventured to look again. This time he didn't pull his head away quickly enough; he could see two bright eyes through the slits of the black bodysuit. Lance did the only thing he found sensible in this situation; he attacked.

The black shape- just a normal man, it seemed- collapsed as Lance's foot hit him in the face. But before Lance could celebrate this victory, strong arms grabbed him from behind. Trying hard to tear his arms away, Lance lifted his foot and pushed it hard against the crotch of the man holding him, and the grip fell away.

However, Lance saw that it was far from over. The men he had knocked over were already getting to their feet, and several others were swarming towards him, congesting the narrow hallway and filtering into the living room. He swung out his right arm and knocked one down, only for another man to grab his left arm and twist it behind his back. Lance grunted, unable to pull his arm from the grip, but continued to lash out at the others surrounding him.

Then another hand grabbed his wrist and Lance felt hands on his arms and back and at the base of his neck, and then with a sharp pain in the back of his head, his eyes closed and his body slumped forward in the arms of his captors, unconscious.

Ilana could feel that something was different, wrong. She pushed the feeling away, because maybe it was just the absence of Lance at her side. Ilana had grown very accustomed to him shadowing her.

She missed him, she had to admit it.

Across the room she could see Octus and Kimmy dancing together, and it brought a smile to her lips. It was nice to see two people so happy with each other. She hadn't imagined it possible, especially not with Octus and Kimmy of all people. She was definitely happy for them.

Patting down her skirt, Ilana looked at the couples scattered across the room. They felt distant. She didn't understand why, but she was missing Lance more than ever.

But then a boy came up to her, said his name was Jason, and asked her to dance. He was cute and sweet and new and she took his hand, started to dance, and forgot that she had been thinking of Lance at all.

The first thing that registered to him was the strain in his muscles. Lance's eyes opened slowly and he tried to move his hands, brush the hair out of his face and feel the raised skin where he knew there were bruises. He was surprised when his hands wouldn't move; they were pulled securely behind his back, cuffed with metal. He jerked his arms apart roughly, but the cuffs remained secure.

He slowly became aware of a throbbing pain in the back of his head, and he took a deep breath to try and clear it. If he could just figure out where he was, he would be able to escape in no time at all. But the room looked so empty.

Blinking hard, he took another look. The walls and floor were a similar dingy cement gray, stained dark with things that he didn't care to look at. He could see the door, but the edges around it were reinforced, letting in no light at all. Or air. He wasn't sure if that was why he suddenly had trouble breathing. Lance could feel something wet dripping from his forehead, and his ankle was stinging, but otherwise he felt fine. It was just this trouble with breathing. He tried to focus on evening out his breaths, hopefully to clear his head.

But all of those ideas were lost when the door whooshed open, letting in a terribly bright yellow light and silhouetting the broad shouldered man in the doorway. The man smiled with ghastly yellow teeth.

"Now son, let's see what you know."

A/N- This idea just wouldn't rest in my mind, so I had to write it. I don't think anyone is ooc but let me know if they are. Thanks for reading and please review! I'll try to update often.