The girl is small. Her giggles fill the air as she plays with the shield and talks to the fish. I decide to ignore them until I notice the scales on their arms. Usually, I’d think nothing of it. Ayhirians are known as the 'fish people.' They have various colors of scales on parts of their bodies, and their hands and feet have twice the amount of webbing as an average human. The girl and her mother look different, though. They don’t have the pastel or neon coloring that the Ayhirians do. The scales on their arms begin as a bright yellow, just like a banana. Then they fade into a dark yellow that approaches the color of mud.

They don’t have any webbing on their hands at all. Instead, they have black claw-like nails at the ends of their fingers. They only have four digits per hand. Vuskai. This isn't right. They shouldn't be allowed in this country. Something to me seems very wrong. Sailor taps my shoulder, and I turn to him. I can see it in his eyes that he senses my unease.

“What’s wrong?” I hesitate to tell him. I know he won’t leave me be until I tell him, though. But I can’t find my voice. “Yve?” I glance back and see the mother staring at us. Reptilian eyes. I quickly look back at him.

“There’s something wrong with those two,” I say softly. I hear the mother start speaking in a Vuskai language and I know for sure they are not friendly. Sailor stares over my shoulder at them, unable to understand what they’re saying. “Sailor, they’re Vuskai. We have to get out of here.”

“No,” He whispers. “Tell me what they’re saying.” I bite my lip and nod. I start to interpret what they’re saying once they start speaking.

“Mama are they humans?”

“Yes. Just ignore them. They’re dangerous. If you leave them alone, they’ll leave you alone. Try to pretend they aren’t here.”

“Do they know what we’re saying?”

“They couldn’t possibly. They would only know the language they speak on Urbem, and the one they speak in this country.”

"Oh, okay," There's a pause. "What's going to happen to them?"

“He will save us. He’ll get rid of those monsters. This country used to allow them here, but the president decided that he liked us more than those gross things.”

“But what are they gonna do?” The mother pauses for a moment.

“He will execute them.” She stops her daughter before she asks why. “They have to get rid of them so they don’t ruin their plans. We have to take that planet away from humans. They are selfish and don’t want to share. We’ll make them share.”

I’ve heard enough. I walk away from Sailor and start making my way back to the car. He doesn’t stop me; instead, he forces me to speed up. I’m scared. I don’t know what they meant, but something terrible is coming for us. The main group of humans is at the facility. If it's run by the government, there must be someone on the inside that is going to hurt all of us.

When we are both buckled up, and in the car, he looks at me.

“What do you think that means?”

“We're going to die. Let's just... talk about it tomorrow."

“I don’t think we have that time. They’ll be monitoring us all tomorrow. That doesn’t sound like something we should discuss when we get back.”

“It isn’t, but we have to get out of here. I don't trust any Vuskai.”

“Do you even think we have a chance to talk tomorrow after getting yelled at? Tris and Milo won’t listen to us.”

“I know, Sailor!” I snap. “This isn’t the time to talk about it though. We’re not going to be able to figure everything out right this second. We won’t find out anything here. We have to go. Patrols will probably be out by this time." I glare at him. "Let’s. Leave.” I say the last two words slowly. His hands shake as he starts the car and begins driving.

The more we talk about it, the more I think he believes that we're going to be okay. Sailor thinks I'm blowing it out of proportion. If he doesn't, who will? The words of those things have always shaken me to my core. They don't lie to scare people. Even our history classes say that. There are never empty threats. I have to be the cautious one.

We find our way back to the place where the woman left us the car and get out. The walk back to the gate is long. Once we get back to the edge near the front gates, we work our way around and through the woods. The trees are eerily quiet. Not a single animal makes a noise.

I tap his shoulder and gesture for us to put our hoods and masks back on. My arm is still soaked, but I don’t care. We walk around the tree line trying to figure out how we're going to get back in. It’s difficult to climb, but we find the highest tree and are careful to not fall off of the thick branch that hangs over the fence. I try to ignore the buzzing wires directly below us, but it’s difficult. We’re higher up than we’d like to be, but it’s the only way back in.

I let Sailor jump down first. He may be scared of heights, but he’s much better at tucking and rolling when he takes off from large heights. He looks around and gestures for me to drop down to him. I take a deep breath and let go of the branch I hang off of. My heart skips a beat when I fall, but I calm down when he catches me.

“We have to split here, don’t we?” I nod.

“Be careful,” I tell him. “All the cameras are probably back on. I wouldn’t count on Ty for safe passage right now.” He nods, and we depart. I’m left to my thoughts.

I hope I'm crazy. I hope that our problem is just imaginary.