A/N: Yay, I got a constructive review! I love those. They're the best. Yeah, I'll try to mention how she's able to understand them in this chapter. I realise it's important but there hasn't seemed to be a right place to put it in. Okay, that's a lie. I could've done it last chapter, but I was lazy and wanted to hurry up and update before I died of old age. R&R!

"She's a humanoid."

"Is she trustworthy?"

"I think she is. Well, everyone she used to know is dead, so how could she be a problem?"

"You're cruel. Besides that, other people may want to interfere."

"They won't."

I opened my eyes. I was still lying on my stomach with my head on my hands, but I wasn't in the fin anymore. It looked like someone had tried to drag me out and given up partway, as I could see the fins a few metres away. The ground was soft and brown, and the surface was flat and continued on to the horizon. I raised my head to see two blurred figures standing above me, and shook my head when I realised that there was something wrong with them.

"Are you fine?" one of them asked. I recognised Kyen's voice but the thing standing in front of me certainly wasn't what I expected.

"You're a flying jellyfish," I murmured sleepily.

"Not quite," He said in reply, a little more kindly than I expected. But he did look like it. He was a beach ball-sized floating transparent sac with slightly see-through blue insides (eww), and almost invisible tentacles hanging down to hover three inches above the ground. That's kind of what I thought a jellyfish was. Except that they're usually underwater.

"You haven't met any others before?" the other jellyfish asked.

"No," I answered, still waking up. "How many are there? And what are you exactly?"

"We're the Tahram," Kyen explained. "There are probably many more of us than there were of humans. Now, definitely more." There was a bit of humour in his voice that made me want to cry. It didn't feel funny to me.

I stood up slowly and stretched my arms up, yawning. The Tahram sped away, keeping out of my reach. Part of their heads flashed purple and I quickly snatched my hands back down to my sides.

"Are you… afraid?" I asked cautiously.

"Come with us, and we'll show you where you can settle in," the other Tahram said stiffly. I wondered briefly how they spoke without mouths, then realized that I didn't care. I followed as they floated away from the fins and towards a building of some sort. It was about as big as a public toilet block (before it all got destroyed, of course) but cleaner, with double doors at the front that slid open at our approach to show a long, wide ramp heading down, underneath the earth.

"You live underground?" I said in surprise.

"No. We live elsewhere. But this is where those who have lost their homes come," the other Tahram explained, bobbing through the doorway.

I followed Kyen, watching curiously as the descending hallway lit up. Then I looked at his insides and realised what was bugging me even more than the see-through part. "How do you talk to me?"

Kyen stopped moving and turned towards me (at least I think he did—he hasn't got a face). "What do you mean?"

"You're talking English. And I don't even know how you talk!" I made a frustrated motion with my hands.

The other Tahram floated further away. "Get the security in here, now!"

"What's wrong?" Kyen asked, sounding confused.

"She's not speaking one of the Human dialects. She's speaking ours, without even realising it. Someone's tampered with her mind."