Hello hello hello! This is Jay speaking and I just want to wish everyone reading this a fond greeting and a grateful thank you for choosing to read this story! I was debating whether putting this up early since the rest of these are not finished, but I thought "Since I'm rewriting this specific drabble anyway, what's the harm?" So, think of this as a teaser for the rest of my series, simply known as 'Learning'.

But, before we begin, I would just like to say thank you to the many genius authors I have had the pleasuring of stumbling across and indulging in their fantastic works. These writers have inadvertently influenced me to greater heights, and I wish to give tehm their due. These authors are not limited to the Generator Rex fandom, but I have met one from this fandom who makes me want to cry do to inadequacy. Her name is Sirenitie, and I have fallen in love with her depiction of Noah and Rex's relationship. To those who are taking the time to read my story(which is exceedingly boring in comparsion), please go and look her up! She has four stories and all are absolutely spectacular!

Now, we continue on, da?

Meeting the Family

April 27th, 5 N.E.

Words: 3327 not including A/N

"Rex, what are you doing here?" Noah hissed, bright gray eyes glaring around a chained apartment door at the Hispanic E.V.O. "You told me you were going to be on a mission today!"

"And, according to Six, you should be at school right now," Rex retorted, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. "Our mission ended early because the underlings were actually useful for once and I didn't have to get my ass beat by an E.V.O. before curing it. And, seeing as you shouldn't have been home for at least two hours, I thought I'd surprise you!"

The cheerful response earned Rex a baleful look. "Rex. You know as well as I do that I don't live here." Noah's face was screwed into a nasty look. "The only way you'd even be here is if you tracked me or something." The door slammed shut in the black-haired teen's face.

"Ah, wait!" Rex shouted, sticking his foot in the doorway, cringing as the thick wooden door dug mercilessly into tender flesh. "Noah, I just need a place to stay for a couple hours! Holiday wants to stick a bunch of needles in me! Help, please?" The boy begged, making sure to put on his biggest, most tearful—not that the tears were all fake, Rex was sure that he would have bruises before Noah relented—puppy pout.

Before Noah could make some scathing comment—a response Rex knew was coming his way, he could tell by the way the corners of the blonde's eyes crinkled just so—a loud voice one could only associate with a child cried out, "Noah! Grace stole my graham crackers!"

"Nuh uh! These are my graham crackers, Ian!"

"No, you ate your graham crackers already! These are mine!"

The two children started to scream at each other, voices growing louder and higher pitched as the argument continued. Then, the girl began to cry—both Noah and Rex winced at the racket they were making. A door further down the hall slammed open and an older man with a buzz cut stuck his head out. "Rylander, I swear to God, if you don't shut those damn brats up I'm gonna shut them up for you!" He shouted. "This is the third time today!"

Noah's eyes narrowed and he unlatched the chain before jerking his own door open. "Move," he growled, nodding Rex in. The tan boy didn't hesitate. He wanted to avoid any conflicts with normal civilians—the injured civilian from the mob caused by Hunter Cain was still a touchy subject. As Rex backed out of the way, Noah stepped out and faced the irritated man, arms crossed over his chest. "How many times are you gonna threaten my siblings before I have to call the police, Kurovsky? Maybe if you pulled your head outta your ass you'd realize that they're just kids and will be quiet in a couple minutes!"

"What did you just say, punk?" Kurovsky demanded, stalking out of his own apartment and towards Noah, whom he towered over by nearly a foot and outweighed by well over a hundred pounds—most of that weight came from the almost grossly large muscles twitching under the man's skin. Rex immediately moved to stand behind Noah, putting a restricting hand on the blonde's shoulder. The fuzz-headed man's glaring eyes moved between the two before a sick grin twisted his face into an ugly mask. "Oh, are you going to sic your pet E.V.O. on me? Or are you his pet and he has to fight your fights for you, you bitch?"

A feeling of rage rushed through Rex with the burn of boiling water and he almost stepped forward. Only years of living with Six helped Rex read the subtle shifting of Noah's posture—the slight tensing of his shoulders that meant he could handle the big buffoon by himself. Rex stayed back to watch.

The change was almost infinitesimal, practically impossible to notice physically, but the result was shocking. Noah suddenly looked as though he were the one towering over the other, looking down his nose at Kurovsky as though he were nothing more than a piece of dirt that needed to be scraped from the bottom of expensive shoes. "That's the best you could come up with? Claiming that I'm some pet of a person who could kill you in under a second?" Noah scoffed, rolling his eyes. A cold smirk pulled at the corners of the smaller male's lips. "What does that make you, then? The way you were screaming under me last week certainly doesn't say 'man in charge'."

Rex's eyebrows rose as quickly as Kurovsky's fist lashed out, only they didn't punch Noah in the face and send him falling back into the humanoid E.V.O. "What the hell!" Rex shouted, wrapping a steadying arm around Noah's shoulders. He activated his BFS and held it between Noah and Kurovsky, making sure to position himself so that most of him was between the two as well. "Dude, back off," He growled, an angry scowl gracing his face.

Kurovsky made a rude sound in the back of his throat before turning around and storming back to his apartment, slamming the door behind him.

As Rex retracted his large blade and straightened up, Noah stood upright and shook off the taller teenager's arm. A large bruise was already forming on his temple and around his eye. They both knew that it would make a fantastic shiner by the time it fully formed. "What was that all about?" Rex asked, adamantly placing his right hand on Noah's shoulder and escorting him into his apartment, softly closing the door behind them. "Wait, do I want to know?"

Noah snorted in amusement. "It's really not what you think," he replied, turning the lock into place, ignoring Rex's silent insistence to do something about his injury. "He was drunk and trying to break into the apartment. I went at him with a bat and ended up breaking his bottle of vodka. He bawled over the loss for hours."

"Seriously? That's just sad," Rex said, laughing.

"NOAH!" The girl, Grace, shrieked, reminding the two teenagers of the kids that had been arguing this entire time. "Make Ian give back my graham crackers!"

Rex just laughed harder, leaning against the wall to support himself. The blonde shot him a dirty look before he walked from the doorway and towards what was supposedly the living room area. The raven-haired teenager followed him and hung in the doorway, watching.

A boy—about eight years old shot—an irritated look at Noah as he tried keeping a small girl from crawling onto his lap to snag the crumbled remains of a graham cracker from his hand. His shaggy light brown hair dangled in his eyes and wrapped around the frame of his thin-rimmed but large-lensed glasses. "Get her off me before I do something you'll punish me for," he growled, rolling his bulky wheelchair over towards the green-jacketed boy.

Noah sighed before easily scooping the little blonde haired girl into his arms, casually setting her on his hip. "Grace, you know that you already had your graham crackers today," He gently scolded as he used his sleeve to wipe the tears and snot from her round cheeks. "Why are you trying to take your brother's?"

"Be-hic-because I'm h-hungrwy and he-he-he wasn't-hic-eating them!" Grace hiccupped, fresh tears welling in her eyes.

"You can have my graham crackers, but just for today, okay?" Noah looked back at Rex, nodding him in, before walking through an archway into what the E.V.O. assumed was a kitchen.

Silence pervaded the living space for several moments. Rex awkwardly stood in the doorway, looking everywhere but at the small boy shooting glares at him.

"You need to stop hanging out with Noah."

Rex's head swung around and he locked gazes with Ian. "What? Why?" He asked, trying very hard not to sound accusing. He didn't want to upset who he assumed to be Noah's younger brother—the blonde wasn't old enough to have either of the kids, unless he hit puberty by age eight, something Rex doubted. "If Noah didn't want to hang out with me, I'm pretty sure he'd tell me. And, since he hasn't, he obviously wants to."

"Yeah right," the boy sneered with all the pompousness of a kid raised getting anything he wanted. "That moron wouldn't know what was good for him—or for me and the brat—if it shoved itself up his ass!"

"Don't call him a moron!" Rex snapped just as Noah and Grace walked back into the living room, hand in hand. The little girl had three graham crackers clutched to her chest like a teddy bear, littering crumbs all over her yellow jumper. Noah had an ice-pack placed precariously against the swollen left side of his face.

"Ian said a bad word, Noah!" Grace cried out, releasing Noah's hand to point accusingly at the sour-faced eight-year-old. "He said the a-word! He should be put in time-out!"

"Grace, don't be a tattle-tale," Noah replied distractedly, a resigned look on his face. "Ian, what have I said about cursing in front of your sister?"

The brunette replied by giving the blonde a look at his middle finger. "She isn't my sister any more than you're my brother!" He sniffed. "You don't get to tell me what to do, you bastard!"

Rex didn't think it was possible for Grace's eyes to get any wider. Noah ran a tired hand through his hair. He looked wearier than Rex had ever seen him, but his voice was firm. "Ian, go sit in the corner." Ian stared at him disbelievingly. Noah's gaze hardened. "You heard me, Ian. Go!"

"No!" The newly dubbed stupid brat—in Rex's mind anyway, we assume to Noah he's still just Ian—whined. "I'm not a little kid, Noah!"

Noah's new glare was now Six-worthy and even Rex cowered from it. "So you don't want to sit in the corner?" The blonde asked, slowly stepping towards the younger boy. "You want a big-boy punishment?"

Ian was silent.

"I asked you a question, Ian. It's rude not to answer" Noah stated, standing directly in front of the boy, "and I know that I didn't help raise you so you could be a rude brat. So, what does that mean?"

"…I answer the question?" Ian squeaked, looking all the ready to join the realm of ghosts, his face was so pale.

"Exactly." Noah leaned down until his nose was brushing against his brother's. "Do you still want your big-boy punishment, Ian?"

"Y-yes?" The brunette asked more than said, slouching down in his seat.

"Then, instead of sitting in the corner for twenty minutes and owing all of us an apology, you will go and clean the kitchen as well as the guest bedroom before taking the trash out. After that, you will write formal apologies to Rex, Grace, and myself for your bad behavior. And if I don't think they sound sincere, you'll do it again, and again, until it's good enough." Noah's tone killed any argument before it could sprout. Ian quickly wheeled around him and Grace and into the kitchen before the older teenager could dish out any more punishment.

Rex's eyes were nearly bugging out of his skull while Grace squealed, grin threatening to rip her face in half. "That'll show him!" She cried out, jumping up and down in place. "I told you I was the favorite, Ian!"

"Grace, for trying to take Ian's snacks, making a mess, and being a smug tattletale, you get to sit in the corner for fifteen minutes." He continued, even as the girl gasped disbelievingly and her eyes started to water. "Don't give me that, Grace," He said, voice going from threatening to simply scolding as he remained unaffected by the girl's pout. "There are bits of all graham crackers all over the floor and the couch. You wasted food, and you know how bad it is to do that. And do not get me started on ratting on your brother."

"Fine…" She sighed, slumping over to the corner and sitting in it, looking every bit as forlorn as a dog that had just been yelled at by her master.

"Grace."

"Fine!" She shouted, standing up and scooting closer to the wall, pressing her nose against the corner.

The house finally descended back to the furthest reaches of quiet one gets while living in an apartment building with paper-thin walls. Noah groaned and scratched the side of his head. "Sorry about that," he said, turning his head towards Rex. "Their normal baby-sitter called in, begging for a rain check, so their dad asked if I could watch them. I said I would if he called me in sick for school."

"…That was scary," Rex replied, finally pulling away from the archway he was cowering behind. "Are you sure you're not actually Six in disguise? Not even Holiday is that mean ofr something so trivial."

"If I didn't get away with it when I was their age, they certainly aren't going to," Noah snorted humorlessly before flopping bonelessly onto the couch. "They're usually better behaved. I think they were supposed to go to the zoo with Nicole today and I can't afford to take them."

Questions were burning Rex's brain in their attempt to be asked, but Rex tried to ignore them. "Am I going to get a formal introduction, or am I that unimportant?" He teased, throwing the blonde's legs off the couch so he could flop there as well. His eyes travelled around the room, taking in the threadbare carpet that did nothing to keep the floor warm, the plain white walls, and the lack of a TV and furniture. He started as Noah draped his left leg over Rex's lap and his right leg, from knee to ankle, was pressed flush against the E.V.O.'s calf.

A pale hand rose from its place dangling over the side of the couch to wave dismissively in the Hispanic teen's general direction, its owner content with staring at the cracked ceiling. "They know who you are. They've watched the news for hours just to get a glimpse of you beating up some E.V.O. Plus, the first two weeks we were hanging out, I don't think I stopped talking about all the awesome shit I got to do with you." He continued speaking, completely ignoring—or not even noticing—the dark flush that stained Rex's face at being so obviously appreciated. "But if you want introductions, that's fine. Brat numero uno is Ian Warwick, he's eight, and generally a spoiled pain in the ass. The clingy one is Grace Aleistor, she's five, and just a touch hyperactive."

Rex—still tense from the sensation of his friend's limbs shifting ever-so slightly against him—looked over at Grace and could see her practically vibrate in place, even from the other side of the room. His eyebrows tried knitting together in his confusion. "Wait, you have different last nam—"

"We all have the same mom," Noah interrupted, having already guessed Rex's question. "My older brother, Nathan Rylander, he and I had the same dad, but he—"

Rex shot from his reclining position on the couch like a jack-in-the-box. "Rylander?" He asked—more like demanded, face hardened. "As in, Gabriel Rylander?"

"…Yes?" The blonde replied, quirking an eyebrow as he removed the ice-pack and sat up himself, supporting his weight on his right hand. "How do you know him?"

"Know him? Noah, your dad worked on the Nanite Project!"

"I know that, Rex." Both Noah's expression and his voice were carefully blank, as though he were trying to hide something. "He died during the explosion, so I don't see the importance of talking about him."

"Noah…" Rex faltered, scratching the back of his head nervously. He didn't know how to tell his friend that his dad had actually been alive until a little over a month before.

"Why are you so interested, anyway?"

Rex opened his mouth to reply, paused, then self-consciously shut it. Noah's eyes narrowed at the heavy feeling of hesitation he could feel rolling off of the E.V.O. "Rex, what aren't you telling me?"

No escaping when I start, once I'm in I own your heart~ There's no way to ring the alarm, so hold on until it's over~~

Next thing Rex knew, he had a lap full of squirming Noah and the remains of an unmanly squeak ringing in his ears. "…Noah?" He nearly squeaked himself once he saw the blonde feeling around the front of his own pants to try and find his phone.

The awkward action lasted barely 10 seconds as Noah's hands trailed from his upper thighs to his knees, but it was long enough for Rex's mouth to completely dry up and make him look away before the near-provocative action could fully register in his mind. A couple more seconds of fidgeting and Noah finally found his phone caught somewhere in his jeans, floating near his right knee. "Sorry about this," he said absently as he straightened his leg and tried to shake the vibrating piece of circuits and plastic out of his pants. "There's a hole in my pocket and the patches never seem to stay."

"Do you—" Rex swallowed, eyes locked on his friend's suddenly long and supple and surprisingly hairless leg. "Do you need help?"

"Nah, I got it."

Oh! I bet you thought I was soft and sweet. You thought an angel swept you off your feet! But I'm about to turn up the heat. I'm here for your entertainment~

Noah 'aha-ed' in triumph as he caught his phone as it slid out of his pant-leg and almost tumbled to the floor. "Hello?" He practically chirped, sounding much too cheerful for it to be authentic. Rex wondered if Noah even realized that he was still in the E.V.O.'s lap. Rex certainly knew.

The conversation was mostly one-sided, Rex noticed, as Noah responded with 'Really?s' and 'Yes's and 'No's. A little over thirty seconds later the blonde hung up and turned to Rex. "Well, Nicole can now take over babysitting the little terrors. She'll be back in about ten minutes. You wanna go play basketball after she gets here?"

"…Sure."

"Oh!" There we go, Rex thought as he saw recognition dawn on Noah's face. "Dude, sorry about that!" The blonde immediately crawled to his side of the couch. Surprisingly, there wasn't a drop of embarrassment darkening Noah's ears or cheeks. "I forgot I turned the ringer on and the song scared the shit outta me."

"I'm not blind, or deaf, Noah," Rex replied, forcing his trademark confident smirk back onto his face. "Your girly shriek kinda gave ya away."

That's what brought the blush scurrying to the blonde's face and he scowled, chucking a pillow at the Providence agent. "I did not, you liar!"

"You sounded even girlier than your sister! Speaking of the brat, hasn't it been, like, nearly twenty minutes? She's gonna to kill you."

"Nah," Noah replied confidently, nodding his head in the direction of the suddenly empty corner. "She literally counts the seconds out for herself. Near perfect too. She's just a little bit slower than the clock."

"…Wow," the raven-haired teen replied, shock evident on his face. "You're a family of freaks."

Noah childishly stuck his tongue out at his taller friend, laughing as Rex finally flung the pillow back at him.

They goofed off and spoke of safer topics after the inopportune phone call. Rex didn't answer Noah's question, and Noah didn't press for answers. The raven-haired teen wasn't sure whether it was a sign of trust where the blonde knew that his friend would bring it up later, or if Noah had simply forgotten in the excitement of not having to babysit. Both situations were likely. But Rex would take the reprieve when he could.

:) Well, this is the end for now, but I shall update as soon as the next one is complete. I will try to add these in a orderly fashion, going from date to date, but if I make a mistake, please feel free to tell me. And don't forget to review, I don't care if it's to complain about how much I suck or if there is something that needs to be changed or rewritten. If there are any errors, yet again please let me know! I want this to be as enjoyable as possible!

This is where I bid you adieu, da?