Chapter One – Visiting Relatives pt 1
A distressed shriek echoed through the desolate countryside as a giant Golurk raced through the air, with a large burst of bright orange fire released from its lower body where its legs once were. The blonde princess continued to scream loudly as she sat in one of Golurk's large palms, struggling violently against her bonds. Atop Golurk's head was a sinister looking man, dressed entirely in black clothing; he twiddled his thin black moustache with a finger proudly as he seemed to enjoy the princess's agonised cries. Racing across the grass underneath Golurk was a stunningly beautiful Arcanine, with the rider on its back looking up at the villain angrily.
"Faster, Arcanine, intercept that brutish miscreant and his Pokémon!" the hero demanded furiously.
"Arf!" With a compliant nod, Arcanine increased his pace and sped past Golurk at a blinding speed, which even left a trail of white light behind him. Arcanine soon turned around and faced the traversing golem head on.
"Now, stop it! Flamethrower should do it!"
"ARRRRRR!" Arcanine's breath of fire zoomed towards the giant Pokémon and collided with its chest. The villain very nearly lost his balancing, flailing around on one foot in a supposedly very comical fashion on Golurk's head, but the hero's plan worked; Golurk indeed stopped and merely hovered in mid-air. The princess looked euphoric upon noticing the hero that intercepted her captor's Pokémon.
"Waylon!" she cried merrily. The villain snarled furiously and stomped his foot in anger.
"You again?! But I thought I destroyed you!"
"You were wrong, Slade! My Arcanine protected me with his Flash Fire ability; your little trap meant absolutely nothing to him!" Waylon announced as he glared at his adversary. "Let Princess Melody go, you vile cur!"
"Never! You know something, Waylon, you're really beginning to annoy me. What, with your stupid leotard and everything...what are you trying to pull off, the male ballet dancer look?"
"Hah! You cannot hurt MY feelings with an insult as pitiful as you yourself!" Waylon declared boldly. "You, sir, are a fool! Release the princess right now, you're fighting a losing battle!"
"Yes, I am; and it is YOU who is losing this fight!" Slade smirked. "Golurk, lay the smack down on this goody-two-shoes FOR GOOD!"
"Golurk.." Golurk mumbled as its flames died out and were replaced with its legs. Golurk landed on its feet and lifted the hostage in its palm up to its master.
"Now, Hammer Arm!" Slade instructed as he held onto his captive. "Brace yourself, my dear, this is going to be a bumpy ride," he teased.
"Walyon, watch out!" Princess Melody screamed. Golurk's fist shone in a blinding white light and slammed it hard onto the ground, creating a large ditch in the earth as a result. However, Arcanine instinctively leapt away from Golurk's fist and ran up its arm, Waylon still sitting on Arcanine's back.
"Golurk, you nincompoop, squash him!" Slade yelled furiously. Golurk raised its other hand, aiming to slam it down on top of Waylon and Arcanine. Arcanine, however, leapt away from Golurk's heavy palm and towards Slade and Princess Melody. Slade's grip on the princess loosened as he came face to face with Arcanine's snarling face, but Waylon grabbed her and pulled her onto Arcanine's back before she fell. Arcanine leapt down from Golurk's shoulder, twirled in mid-air and exhaled a larger stream of fire, which burned more fiercely than his previous attack, and even grew into a large five-pointed star-like shape that struck Golurk's back. Golurk fell to the ground in defeat as Arcanine landed on his feet. Slade recovered from the fall as Waylon proceeded to untie Princess Melody. Slade glared at his enemy as he saw Princess Melody flinging herself into Waylon's arms. Being gentlemanly, Waylon returned the princess's embrace.
"You may have defeated me yet again, Waylon," Slade began, returning the defeated titan into a grey Poké Ball with blue lumps on top, replacing it with a Honckrow he released from a black and green Poké Ball. "But I will see to it that this kingdom falls..INTO MY HANDS!" he cackled maniacally as he grabbed the ankles of his flying Honchkrow, lifting him up into the air and eventually out of sight.
"Oh, thank you, brave Waylon," Princess Melody thanked gracefully. "You're my hero!"
"And I shall be your hero forever and always," Waylon smiled. "My dear sweet Melody, my rose in the garden...will you marry me?"
"Yes! Yes, I will!" Princess Melody replied, eyes streaming with tears of joy. Arcanine ran off into the sunset gently as Waylon and his royal fiancé shared a tender kiss. Everything faded to black, and the words "A Hero's Rising" appeared from the darkness, in fancy pink and red medieval font.
Many people exited the movie theatre, most of them grumbling and muttering with disappointment and disgust. They passed many posters advertising different movies, one of which was advertising "A Hero's Rising", and depicted the characters Waylon, Princess Melody and Slade on the poster. Even the little children within the exiting crowd were disappointed, some of whom were even in tears. Among the last to leave the theatre was Alexa, who seemed to be too depressed to care about the horrifically clichéd and poorly written film she had viewed with her family; her parents, Hayden and Lily, and her little brother, Keenan. In addition to her parents and brother were two other people; the woman was a lavender eyed pale blonde woman – with her hair initially tied into a ponytail, which was then divided into two smaller ponytails – wearing an oddly casual attire of a plain and simple white T-shirt and black leggings and black heeled shoes. The little girl holding her hand was a small child – a few years younger than Keenan – with medium auburn hair – tied in a pigtail, lavender eyes and dressed in a cute pink dress with a daisy print on the chest, white knee high socks and black shoes. Around her neck was a round pearl amulet and flying near her shoulder was a red eyed Swablu.
"Huh; I could've sworn the movie was going to be better than it actually was," the woman began. "Especially considering that was Troy's Golurk in that movie... Sorry about that, bro."
"Don't worry about it, Hailey," Hayden smiled. "I, personally enjoyed the company."
"Me, too," Lily agreed. "But, no offence, the film was pretty terrible..."
"I didn't like it," the little girl sighed. "I could tell what was going to happen before it happened..."
"It's all right, Peggy," Hailey grinned, ruffling her daughter's hair a little. "If it makes you feel better, we can watch one of your DVDs at home." Peggy smiled a little.
"I quite enjoyed it, actually," Keenan commented. Alexa raised an eyebrow at her younger brother and was about to question his enjoyment. "It was so utterly bad it was hilarious!" Hayden chuckled.
"Don't let the director hear you say that, kiddo!" With a slight hint of worry about him, Hayden looked towards Alexa, who kept both hands in her pocket, which wasn't normal for her to do. "What did you think, sweetie?"
"Eh," Alexa just shrugged. "I didn't pay much attention, if any," she said plainly. Hayden and Lily looked at one another worriedly; they were concerned about whether or not the final scene of the movie reminded her of...
"Hey, come on, chin up!" Hailey said optimistically as she placed an arm around Alexa's shoulder and pulled her close. "So it was a bad movie; big deal! There are better ones out there, you just need to keep digging and avoid picking up the fool's gold!"
"Uh, thanks, Aunt Hailey," Alexa smiled nervously.
"No problem, honey," Hailey winked. "Anyway, Hayden, would you like to come back to my home for a couple of hours? I don't know when the hotel restaurant's opening..."
"From six o'clock in the evening," Lily answered.
"What do you kids think?" Hayden asked politely. Keenan smiled and nodded, but Alexa shrugged with a declining smile. "I think that's a yes on that. Thank you, Hailey."
"No problem! Besides, you're my big brother-okay, one of my big brothers, how could I not invite you over? You know how much I love you guys..." Hayden laughed.
"You know the feeling's mutual. At any rate, I think we should leave before we end up spending the night in front of the theatre," Hayden chuckled. Hailey laughed.
"Yeah, you're right. Let's go." Hailey led Hayden, Lily, Peggy and Keenan away from the theatre. Alexa sighed and followed everyone slowly, lagging behind them slightly.
Hailey led her brother and his family into her home, Peggy being the first one to enter the house with her Swablu in close pursuit. The family home looked pleasantly quaint and tidy, and everyone was only in a corridor of the house.
"Hey, why don't Keenan and Alexa go play with Peggy for a while?" Hailey suggested. "Colin's still at the opticians with the twins; they're having an eye test. The twins, I mean, not Colin; he had his eye test last week."
"Sure, why not?" Alexa smiled.
"Good! This way, this way!" Peggy said enthusiastically as she led her cousins up the stairs to her bedroom. Hailey laughed.
"You know, Peggy still doesn't say Alexa's name correctly," she said spontaneously as she led her brother and sister-in-law to the kitchen. The kitchen looked rather modernised in comparison to Lily's; the appliances were needlessly large, with the dishwasher disguised as another kitchen cupboard with its medium oak door. The oven and stove combo was midnight black, the pans and pots were neatly stacked above the overhead kitchen cupboards, the the tall silver fridge-freezer stood near the back door. The floor beneath the adults was a smooth blue tiled floor, in the middle of which was a rounded table with a bowl of faux flowers as the centrepiece. Hailey took the black kettle off of its base and moved it to the kitchen tap, where she filled it with fresh water.
"I think it's intentional at this stage," Hayden began. "She couldn't say Alexa's name very well when she was younger, but I think she's grown used to calling her Lexa that it became her own little 'nickname' for her."
"Yeah, I think so, too," Hailey agreed as she returned the filled kettle to its base and pressed the silver coloured button on the handle to turn it on, causing the interior to shine in a blue light as the water began to boil. Hailey then searched through some of the cupboards for three mugs, a jar of teabags, a tub of sweetener and a box of cappuccino sachets. "Lily, yours is tea, right?"
"Yes, please, thank you," Lily replied. She suddenly sighed and sat down at the table. Hayden sat next to her. "Actually, Hailey, I'll just have what you're having..."
"A cappuccino? Okay, if you say so," Hailey said with slight concern. She put the jar of teabags and sweetener tub back where she found them, ripped open three cappuccino sachets and poured the contents into the mugs, one sachet per mug. "Is Alexa okay? She's not usually so...distant," Hailey asked as she prematurely deactivated the kettle; the blue glow had since turned magenta in hue, indicating the water's closeness to boiling. She poured an approximate equal amount of hot water in each mug and stirred the frothy coffee for all three.
"That's what Lily and I ought to tell you about," Hayden sighed as Hailey placed a mug of cappuccino on the coasters near him and Lily. Hailey took hold of her mug, which was a rather amusing mug; it was a red mug with the words 'Caution; contents may be hot' in large white text around it. "You know who Keith is, right?"
"Yeah, what about him?" Hailey asked as she sat down in front of her brother.
"Keith and Alexa...have pretty much broken up," Hayden said reluctantly.
"Oh, gosh...! No wonder the girl's not quite all there! I'm sorry!" Hailey said sympathetically. "But why 'pretty much'?"
"Because there was no declaration that they had officially broken up," Lily replied as she held her green and white polka dot mug to her lips and consumed some of the cappuccino. Hailey looked at Lily worriedly; she knew Lily preferred tea over coffee, and only drinks coffee to calm her nerves, though the prospect didn't make much sense to Hailey.
"I see...I think."
"Basically, neither Keith nor Alexa said anything along the lines of "we're through" or "we're finished" or anything like that," Lily explained.
"Oh."
"I'm just glad Alexa agreed to come with us for this holiday," Lily admitted. "I think she could benefit from being away from Keith for a while, but I didn't think she'd agree to it because she doesn't like the idea of her 'time off' outweighing her 'on duty' time, if that makes sense..."
"Right; I remember you telling me she was adamant about not having any time off over something," Hailey said quietly.
"It's not that," Hayden replied. "She didn't want to be taken off duty for 'mental health' reasons."
"Say what?"
"During the whole Jordan situation, things have happened which put quite a strain on her, which, in turn, affected her relationship with Keith," Hayden explained. "They fought more than once."
"Oh, gosh..."
"And that's only the beginning; her Staraptor almost died, Keenan had his accident, Alexa was ambushed and there was the Mt Silver avalanche to boot," Hayden elaborated. "I think the stress from the mission was still around her mind when she left the hospital, and I don't think her relationship with Keith really escaped unharmed after Jordan's crimes drove a wedge between them on several occasions."
"So what happened that made them 'pretty much' break up?" Hailey asked as she finally took a drink from her mug.
"Alexa was incredibly sketchy on the details," Lily explained as Hayden drank his coffee. "Then again, neither Hayden nor myself asked for any further information than what she gave us; she came home in tears."
"Aw, the poor thing! Um, by 'home', do you mean the Chicole Village one?"
"Yes," Lily confirmed.
"I'm thinking of selling the house there," Hayden stated. "I mean, why do we need a home in Almia when Alexa can come home to Johto via Teleport whenever she feels like it and/or needs to?"
"Good point," Lily smiled nervously. "Especially she's now rekindled her friendship with Lupin."
"Aww, that's good to hear!" Hailey smiled.
"It is. Except Lupin is now one of the few Pokémon who bear a grudge against Keith," Hayden sighed.
"He and Alexa had another argument, you see. From what we could gather, it was rather heated," Lily continued. "I don't know what Keith said to her before she ran away from him, but it really crushed her feelings and – as we discovered a couple days later – her self-esteem."
"That explains why she couldn't appreciate how bad the film was anyway," Hailey said quietly.
"We contacted Erma, being Alexa's boss – not Professor Hastings as some people would speculate – and she told us it would be better if Alexa was off duty until she feels like her proper self again," Lily added.
"Alexa was in a bad mood with us for days once we told her what Erma said to us; she hardly left her room during that time, trying to ask Rhythmi to convince Erma to reconsider her decision. But, eventually, Alexa accepted Erma's recommendation and, well...you know the rest."
"Well I just hope this holiday will do her some good," Hailey smiled kindly.
"We do as well," Lily smiled. "Like I said, she needs the space away from Keith, and I think he'll benefit from the time apart from Alexa as well."
"He doesn't know where you're all having your holiday, does he?" Hailey asked.
"I don't know if Alexa said anything to him," Lily replied with uncertainty. "It's something we'll need to ask her at some point."
"It's just that he might try to find her and intrude on your fun," Hailey replied.
"If he's here because he knows Alexa's here, he's got to go through me first if he wants to see her," Hayden said grumpily.
"Whoa, Defensive Dad mode right there," Hailey said with slight shock.
"To be honest, my trust in Keith has been affected since the arguments began," Hayden confessed. "I know she still cares about him deep down, but he hurt her feelings; I can't forgive anyone who hurts my family, intentionally or otherwise."
"Hayden..." Lily placed her hand on top of his, providing some sort of comfort for her husband.
"But my family is my priority; at this moment in time, Keith doesn't matter to me," Hayden added, rather coldly. "Between him and Alexa, my daughter comes first without fail."
"That's not surprising; she is your daughter," Hailey agreed. "I'd be in the same mindset if Daphne or Peggy were in Alexa's predicament."
"As parents, our responsibility is to our children," Lily said. "Hayden and I will definitely do whatever we can do to help Alexa through this, regardless of what the outcome will be."
"I hope Alexa's going to be okay."
"So do we, Hailey," Hayden nodded.
Alexa, Keenan and Peggy lay in the middle of Peggy's bedroom, each with a white piece of paper in front of them and a large assortment of colouring pencils, some erasers and pencil sharpeners in front of them; all three of them were happily drawing something on their paper. Keenan was in the process of drawing the Dragonair he saw during the boat ride back to Puel Harbour after Keith, Alexa and Hayden brought the bloodthirsty Cain to justice; his drawing, in terms of quality, appeared to be average at best, but the colouring of the picture was the best part of Keenan's drawing, as the colours he used for the sunset blended beautifully well with one another, and the shading on the Dragonair looked incredibly soft. Peggy was in the middle of drawing what was on her mind; a princess and what appeared to be a Beautifly was battling against the villain and what looked like a Garchomp, with a stick figure that was supposed to represent the main hero standing behind the princess in complete confusion. Peggy added a round orange and black figure to the drawing that was supposedly depicting an Arcanine taking a nap. Peggy's drawing was rather crudely drawn, with not much detail being given to anything she drew; the humans were stick figures with slight, albeit significant, features that differentiated them from one another, such as the crown on the princess's head, and the Pokémon were drawn very roughly, with their body shapes being approximate, but their colours being either one or two colours, rather than their proper colour schemes. The castle in the background of the picture looked rather squared and was oddly coloured pink. Alexa's drawing was nothing more than a Manaphy swimming in the ocean. Her drawing wasn't coloured, contrary to Keenan or Peggy's drawings; her colouring and additional shading was all done with the pencil she used to sketch Manaphy out in the first place. The quality of the drawing was pretty decent; Alexa captured the light source perfectly and her single stroke shading reflected the light source wonderfully, yet the Manaphy's expression of loneliness was painfully obvious to anyone who looked at the sketch, especially considering that Alexa hadn't drawn anything else in the ocean with the Manaphy. And considering that Peggy's bedroom was absolutely pink in almost every aspect, Alexa's drawing could even be considered a complete mood killer. Peggy caught a glimpse of Alexa's sketch of the lonely Manaphy and looked up at Alexa worriedly.
"Lexa? Are you okay?" she asked. Keenan momentarily stopped what he was doing and looked at his sister with concern.
"I'm fine," Alexa replied, giving her youngest cousin a weak – and unconvincing – smile. She resumed her shading, occasionally using the eraser on the other end of her pencil to smudge the lead.
"You don't look it," Peggy said. "Was someone being mean to you?" Alexa laughed a little.
"It's nothing, don't worry about it." Keenan wondered how Alexa could lie there smiling and claim that she was all right when her sketch was an indication that she was anything but all right. All he could do was trust that Alexa would seek solace from their parents if she truly needed it and carried on with his colouring, occasionally using his finger to help his colours blend.
An hour later, three people entered the house through the front door. Two of them were young teenagers who looked remarkably similar: they both had dark copper hair – the girl's being long and wavy, and the boy's being short and tidy, but both with the same style fringe – and they both wore near-identical glasses over their eyes. Her left eye was lavender and her left eye was brown, but his left eye was brown and his right was lavender. Around the girl's head was a pair of Poké Ball themed headphones attached to a black MP3 player with a blue silicone skin around it, with the very faint sound of a rock song coming from the headphones. Meanwhile, the boy carried a book entitled "Night of the Clefairy Dance" in his hand. She looked joyfully tuned into her music, but he showed no real concern for anything. Their father, on the other hand, was a slightly pale brunette individual who also wore glasses around his brown eyes and, oddly enough, carried a small pen in one of his blue shirt pockets and a small mechanical pencil in the other.
"Honey, we're home!" the man announced. Hailey approached the man happily.
"Hi, Colin, how was everything at the opticians?"
"They're fine, there's nothing wrong," Colin replied. "Though, between you and me," he began, lowering his voice to a whisper. "Daniel's been rather moody since I told him about Hayden's visit."
"I can hear you, Dad," Daniel sighed. Hayden and Lily approached Hailey from the kitchen.
"Oh, hi, Colin," Lily smiled. Colin smiled back at Lily and Hayden.
"Hello there! How was the movie?" he asked.
"How should I put this..? Bad," Hayden replied.
"I'm not surprised; I read the review in the newspaper while I was waiting for Daphne to come back from her examination," Colin chuckled. Daphne pulled her headphones down to her neck; the music could be heard very slightly from them.
"Told you they should have gone to see Brycenman," she laughed.
"Oh, please; Brycenman's nothing more than a stupidly cliché superhero movie with corny dialogue in every scene," Daniel complained.
"Compared to A Hero's Rising, though, it's a masterpiece," Daphne grinned.
"Have you even seen those two back to back?" Daniel asked.
"Why, have YOU?" Daphne teased. Daniel groaned as Alexa, Keenan and Peggy walked down the stairs. "Peggy!"
"Daphne, Danny!" Peggy smiled as she ran over to her brother and sister.
"You all right, Pegs?" Daphne asked. Peggy nodded.
"We've been drawing in my room! Cousin Keenan did a pretty Dratini!"
"Dragonair," Keenan corrected with a sheepish smile.
"Oh, yeah? I'll have to look at that soon," Daphne winked. Daniel looked up at his cousins.
"Keenan, Alexa."
"Daniel," Alexa and Keenan responded in unison. Hayden looked towards his children.
"Just so you know, we're going back to the hotel now," he stated.
"Okay, dad," Keenan smiled as he walked down the stairs. Alexa followed him, and Daniel noticed her lacking enthusiasm.
"Who poured vinegar in your cereal this morning?" he asked. Alexa sighed silently as she faced Daniel.
"With all due respect, it's none of your business," she said plainly. "So please, don't ask again." Daniel huffed.
"Whatever your dilemma may be, you really shouldn't take your aggression out on other people," he said coldly. Alexa winced a little; she was guilty of doing just that more than once. Hailey glared a little at her son.
"On that note, I think we'll be leaving for our hotel," Hayden said nervously.
"Are we still on for tomorrow?" Colin asked. Hayden smiled.
"Of course we are," he replied. "We'll see you tomorrow."
"Thanks for the coffee, Hailey, it was very nice," Lily said gratefully.
"The pack said it tastes like the coffee shop's cappuccino, but I couldn't tell the difference," Hailey said randomly. "But you're welcome! Drop by any time you like!"
"Thank you. See you tomorrow," Hayden said as he escorted his family out of the house. He closed the front door behind him, and Hailey waited for the big flash of white light to come and go before addressing Daniel.
"Daniel, I really don't understand why you don't like Hayden-"
"It's not Uncle Hayden and Aunt Lily I have a problem with," Daniel began. "I just prefer to avoid speaking to Alexa and Keenan."
"Why? They're really nice!" Daphne said in disbelief. "I can understand you don't like Troy, but-"
"Troy's too relaxed and casual for my liking," Daniel grumbled. "And I can't explain my distaste for Alexa and Keenan, they just...they just don't agree with me, you know? Much like Magikarp doesn't agree with dry land."
"Well, we'll be going to Undella Bay with them tomorrow, so you should be at your best behaviour around them," Colin cautioned.
"That goes double around Alexa; she's got her own problems to deal with, the last thing she needs is to feel someone in the family is-"
"Mum, she already knows how I feel about her," Daniel stated.
"Oh. Then I'd leave her be; like I said, she has her own problems," Hailey added.
"Will she be okay?" Daphne asked.
"I'm sure she will. But, for now, I'll get dinner started; macaroni night!" Hailey said excitedly. Daniel smiled.
"Aw, yum! I can't wait!" Daphne said joyfully.
The hotel room Alexa's family was staying in was apparently a very luxurious suite; there were two bedrooms, one with a double bed, the other with two single beds, and the main living room was extremely spacious, with two matching three-seater sofas in front of a glass rectangular coffee table, with a plasma screen television on the wall near the entrance to one of the bedrooms. There was also a reasonably sized desk in front of one of the windows, where there was a beautiful view of the Skyarrow bridge could be seen from the hotel room. Keenan was reading a TV guide on the sofa directly opposite the television while he waited for Hayden and Lily to return, and Alexa sat next to him, looking incredibly glum once again.
"It doesn't look like the Unova League's going to start until next month," Keenan said spontaneously. "Hey, there's a Charity Pokémon Tournament in a couple days!"
"Right," Alexa sighed. Keenan closed and dropped the TV guide onto the coffee table and looked at Alexa with greater concern.
"Alex, come on, you can't spend the entire holiday being so gloomy," he said worriedly.
"I'll pack my stuff then," Alexa said quietly.
"Easy on the sarcasm, Alexa," Hayden said as he entered the room. "Keenan, can you give your sister and me a few minutes, please?"
"Okay," Keenan complied as he left for the bedroom he was sharing with Alexa. Hayden sat down in Keenan's place and looked at Alexa.
"Thinking about Keith again?" he asked.
"Mainly what he said," Alexa replied. "The more I think about it...the more I realise he was right..." Alexa turned around to face her father, her eyes overwhelmed with sorrow. "I haven't completed a single mission on my own since Operation Brighton. And even then I wasn't on my own!"
"Honey, think about it for a minute; you've been on missions without another colleague, but you were still not on your own. Why?"
"Ryder?"
"Exactly!" Hayden smiled. "It might be the Pokémon Trainer instinct, but you never went on your missions prior to Operation Brighton without him, have you?"
"No," Alexa replied.
"From Keith's perspective, being alone means 'without another Ranger'; he must have forgotten about the partner Pokémon you have with you at all times, whoever that may be," Hayden smiled. "You're never alone, sweetheart; you have your Pokémon and, especially, your family backing your corner. Don't lose sight of that." Alexa smiled warmly.
"Thanks, Dad."
"Are you all right now?"
"Yeah. Thanks."
"You're welcome. Your mother and I are here for you if you ever need to talk about anything, okay?"
"Yeah. Thank you."
"Any time," Hayden smiled as he returned the hug Alexa was giving him. "You ready? The restaurant's about to open."
"Yeah, I'm getting rather hungry," Alexa chuckled.
"Snap," Hayden laughed. "After we come back," he began as Keenan and Lily returned to the room. "DVD and popcorn?"
"No arguments here," Lily said happily.
"What DVD will we be watching?" Keenan asked as he followed his parents and sister out of the room.
"Anything that's a better film than A Hero's Rising," Hayden joked as he locked the hotel door behind him. Keenan and Lily laughed as they made their way down the corridor towards the elevator. Hayden walked close to Alexa, as she held onto his arm for comfort, in spite of her gentle smile.
To be continued...