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A towhead peeked through the door leading to the courtyard, a tentative head grasping the jamb briefly before pulling himself outside. He blinked as his pale yellow-green eyes adjusted to the twilight. Even compared to this and the darkness-bleached world of early evening, the Asylum in broad daylight was a cave. Photinus took a deep breath of the cool, fresh air and a faint smile came to his face. I wonder if we're allowed out here indefinitely. I would stay in a tent instead of a room, if I could...

In addition to this wonderful respite, the outdoors provided something else that Photinus craved. He pulled his other hand from its pocket and looked at his palms. Each hand glowed faintly and against his will. Their brightness seemed to be connected to his moods and other unconscious triggers; he had yet to discover whether he could control them.

Around him several tiny insects spread out and explored the yard. The fireflies that seemed attracted to him were stretching their wings. Sometimes he wished he could fly too. Get out of this place... but where would he go? His whole life seemed to be a nightmare. What if he had been let go, with no strange hybrid traits, to lead a normal life? Could he honestly function in normal society? A derisively jaded inner voice thought the idea preposterous on every front. With a sigh, the firefly boy stretched and spun in a lazy circle, feeling air currents ribbon around his fingers in the rapidly waning daylight. It's okay... If I can have moments like this, I'll be all right...

Firefly-green eyes slipped from their skyward stare only after the first of the stars had burned their way through the heavy gauze of the evening sky. His hands likewise fell to his sides as he stopped spinning. The sensation of movement, that he was drifting lethargically, continued. His sight remained fuzzy and unfocused as they re-adjusted to looking earthward, thus at first, the faint reddish glow went unnoticed.

But the darkness was almost complete; staying outside was dangerous for one who acts as a beacon in the night. As he approached the door, his firefly companions whizzing from their meanderings to return to his side with a swirl if fuzzy green light, he noticed that the bushes seemed to glow faintly red. Closer still, he realized the truth, that someone who glowed, like him, was causing the phenomenon. His eyes widened and with a start, he came to a stop. "Who's there?" He tried to sound more sure of himself than he was; he failed.

Photinus' eyes widened immensely as he beheld the shape that formed before him. Her shapely curves did more to give him an illusion of thick, oozing liquid, together with her deep red color and softly fluid movements, than it did reveal a sensuous feminine form. He shuddered deeply, frozen in terror as he recalled memories that he had with every fiber of his being attempted to suppress. Blood... everywhere... "Nng..." Valiantly he wrestled with images that superimposed themselves over what he really saw. Her glow was like a spotlight that shone on a tableau similar to one he once actually witnessed, and her flowing movements shifted and oozed with a crimson liquid that was not really there.

Shaky hands reached up and grabbed fistfuls of blond hair and he squeezed his eyes shut, taking deep, steadying breaths. He tried to think rationally, that this was a girl who could glow and happened to be red. Maybe she is some kind of star hybrid. Stars are nice. This is a nice girl... Well, he could hope she was nice. The twinge of doubt made his eyes squeeze together more tightly. Just relax. 'That' isn't going to happen again, not even here. This place is better than there. Needles aren't as scary as that. Okay. Open your eyes.

Fireflies swooped in front of his vision. A breeze made him realize how hot he was and how chilled the pit of his stomach had become. This was really very mortifying, to lose himself like this. It didn't matter even if she was made of blood, it wasn't her fault that he had certain issues that he had to deal with... He took one last deep breath and let go of his now-tingling hair, attempted to straighten it and approached her slowly, much more calmly. She seemed just as tentative as he did, after all.

"I'm sorry, I... I'm Photinus," he said softly and sheepishly while holding out his hand. "Ah..." He dropped it again, for it must be rather strange to have a glowing hand held out to shake. "I'm part firefly. The glow won't harm you."

Photinus was startled when she took hold of his hand and watched in wonder the care she took when she touched him. Why were people always so curious and interested in their glow? They were such a source of pain for him. But perhaps in her there was a sense of kinship between them. He remembered - in his fear he had nearly forgotten and overlooked the fact that she was the source of the shrub's glow. He now peered into her face curiously and looked her up and down, more childlike at the moment than anything. He reached up to touch her arm where many rune-like designs glowed -under?- the surface. Her skin here, like her hand, surprisingly, were all dry just like normal skin.

"You're..." You're dry. "Your skin..." He smiled and sighed, "It's very pretty. I'm sorry; at first, I thought I saw blood. But now, it looks very different up close." He turned her hand over and under with his, their glowing skin alternating. "Yes, it's very pretty. How is it you glow like me?"

In a way, in Dimas it was as if his nightmares had come to life. Pretty, gentle girls covered in blood. But her appearance seemed to bother her the same way his transformation bothered him. He smiled sadly. "The government wanted people to glow in the dark. They thought it would make inmates easier to find if they tried to escape. But they used the wrong DNA, because some fireflies are predators, it made things worse. The people with the right DNA were victims of the people with the wrong DNA. But they wanted to see if it would work differently on people who aren't criminals. They found that the results were pretty much the same. So you can imagine why blood bothers me..." And men... He recoiled a little without letting go of her hand. It isn't her fault... He looked up at her smiling shyly. "I guess there are some good things about it though."

He chuckled with her; she had a nice smile and her laughter was contagious. "I'm not familiar with the vampire jellyfish. I don't suppose the experiment helped...?"

"No, no, I don't think you should hide yourself from me. I think the best way anyone can overcome their fear is to face it. Isn't that how the saying goes?"

He ran fingers through his hair and tried to hide the blush that had come to his cheeks. A girl does not kiss the hand of a boy, but she had and somehow it felt just as intimate. They had just met, she could be using him somehow; this thought came to the back of his mind and tickled his brain. But he shrugged it off. He was sick of trusting no one. He tried to think of why she might be so afraid though her family were such accomplished swimmers. The only thing that came to mind are trauma that happen in infancy: sometimes a person won't remember why they are afraid, just that they are.

"Maybe we can help each other face our fears," he said softly. "There's no ocean here, but maybe still we can safely help you through it."

"No, I think I would rather see someone like you all the time and remember that those are just memories now." He nodded solemnly to her. It wasn't a boyscout kind of seriousness, it was the seriousness of a real survivor. "I really do think we can help each other. I've heard there are patients with small pools in their room, or perhaps there is another way, a bath tub to start, or perhaps a swimming pool. It would be just a small depth of water so you'd never be in any danger. And I wouldn't leave you while you're in the water, because it is so much more terrifying to face when you're alone..."

Though he was more or less finished with his earnest rambling, trailing off, his movement ceased entirely in shock as she leaned against him and kissed him. Suddenly it was difficult to think of being afraid when distracted by the question of whether he had ever considered how very female her shape was. He felt safe in her embrace but also in a different kind of danger altogether.

To say he was relieved by her own distraction would be an understatement. "Ah... y-yeah... But that was why I was going inside. It's more difficult to hide outside when you glow in the dark." Though he was nervous she seemed at ease and was enjoying herself with the little glowing insects. "I don't know why they are attracted to me. They could stay outside and free but they always follow me back in."

Photinus smiled gently, "Then a pool is too much right now. It's something you'd work up to, and it's something you would take a while to get used to."

He frowned faintly at what she said about his fireflies. It seemed a little deep for a bug. But he too was a 'bug,' so perhaps it wasn't all that far-fetched. Even so, her short moments of distraction left him wondering whether she was thinking of something else. What it might be he could only guess, but he did not care to. It would be like gossiping.

His hand automatically grasped hers when he reached for it. But her suggestion seemed a little too... Well, what other safe place could we go to, my room? "Er, what about your room mate? Do you have one? That wouldn't be an imposition, would it?" He was not about to resist her, but he was just the type to worry about such things, partly out of concern and partly out of a sense of self-preservation.