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He switches positions again, his feet tangling up in the sheets. He’s tried every position he possibly can five times over in the effort to get to sleep. And now he’s returned to lying on his back, staring at the ceiling, for the seventh.
Clean sheets, proper bed. Comfortable surroundings. Safety in numbers. He just isn’t used to this, isn’t used to the fact that it is actually safe to be amongst people, that they won’t be killed for showing him charity. For the longest time his presence has bought the wrath of the Wraith down on anyone kind enough to give him a meal and shelter – part of him expects them to turn up now. The other wonders if this is nothing but a cruel dream he’ll awaken from, finding himself in a cave like he has so often before.
His mind wanders to the memory of the images they had shown him of his home world, decimated, nothing but ruins remaining. He wants to destroy the Wraith for what they have done and fate has been kind enough to show him the way to people who not only share that hatred, and want to fight back, but ones that have the resources and that he actually believes might be able to rid this galaxy of the life-sucking scourge.
He had almost begun to believe the stories of the ancestors were myth, a fabrication to give the desperate something to believe in. Now he finds himself in their great city, surrounded by nothing but ocean as far as the eye can see.
The only sound he has here to draw comfort from in the darkness of the night is the sound of the waves crashing against the base of the spires. He’s used to the noise of the forest – the howling of wild animals, the hooting of birds, the rusting of leaves in the wind. Branches creaking as they sway. Water bubbling over rock, ceaselessly running on its way. Rather like him.
He’s forgotten how to be still and that’s the problem.
Years on the run can do that to you…