"You know, it been forever since I last saw my sister," A.J. said as he and the rest of the Battle Force 5 sat around their usual table at Zeke's.
"I here you there," Agura said. "I feel bad for not really talking to my younger brother." Sure Agura had sent letters home to her family, but that was it. She hadn't gone home in over two years.
"I'm kind of scared to go home," Zoom started. "After what happened with Zen, I have no idea how my parents will react once they see me. I mean, I flaked on my responsibilities back home."
"I bet our brother doesn't even miss us," Spinner said, thinking of his younger brother that was more addicted to gaming than himself.
"Why not?" Zoom asked as he took a drink.
"He's more addicted to games than Spinner. His exact words the day we left were, 'I don't need human contact, I need games,'" Sherman said.
"Well my little sister is an angel," Stanford exclaimed. "She is absolutely perfect."
"Perfect? Really?" Agura scoffed. "You want to see a perfect sibling, take a look at my younger brother."
"Tezz, you have any younger siblings?" A.J. asked before Agura and Stanford could start fighting.
"I have a younger brother," the Russian said. "I have not talked to him in some time. I believe, he believes that I am dead."
"Yea well I kind of abandoned mine," Vert said, as he refused to meet anyone's gaze.
"It wasn't your fault," A.J. persisted. He had heard the story time and time again, and always said the same thing. "Your mom wanted to leave and you wanted to wait for your dad to come home."
"No, I was the oldest and so I should have gone," Vert said as he got up from where he was sitting and left.
"What did we do?" Zoom asked.
"It's not you," A.J. said as his eyes lingered on the path that his best friend just walked. "After his dad left, Vert's mom wanted to leave Handler Corners. Vert, hoping that someday his dad would come back, had a fight with his mom. His mom left and took Vert's younger siblings with her. Vert hasn't seen or heard from his family in over 4 years. He also said some things to his younger sister that he really regrets."
Vert didn't even slow down until he came to a stop in his usual parking place in the Hub. Even then, he walked directly from them Saber to his room. He ignored Sage as she came walking up to him. What was he thinking? Bringing up old wounds that he thought had disappeared. As Vert entered his home he listened to his door slide shut as he walked to a wall and slid down it. He did nothing but just sit there, sit there and think about the day his family left.
Flashback
"No! I'm not going!" Vert shouted at his mother.
"Vert, we've already had this discussion. We're leaving," she said as she continued to pack up the rest of the odds and ends that hadn't been packed yet.
"No, you've just told me what we're doing, and I'm not going," Vert said.
"We're leaving," his mother said as the final word.
"And what if dad comes back?" Vert demanded. "What if he comes back and wants to see us?"
"He's not coming back!" she yelled before she could stop herself.
"You don't know that!" he shouted back.
"If he loved us, he wouldn't have left," Mrs. Wheeler said as she slowly folded the towel in her hands.
"Maybe he left because of you!" Vert shouted as he ran out of the kitchen and out the front door.
"Mom?" Jason asked as he walked into the kitchen to see his mother with tears running down her cheek.
"Hey sweetheart," Mrs. Wheeler said as she put on a fake smile and used her free hand to dry her tears.
"Are you okay?" he asked as he walked up to his mother.
"Yeah, I'm okay," she said, straining to keep the fake smile.
Knowing his mother was lying, Jason went up and wrapped his arms around her in a protective hug. "It's going to be okay," he whispered.
At that moment she could no longer hold the tears back.
"Vert!" Jenna shouted as she chased after her older brother. "Vert!"
"Go back to mom Jenna," Vert ordered without looking at his sister.
"Vert I want to stay with you," she said as she finally caught up to him. "I want to stay and wait for dad."
Taking a deep breath, Vert refused to turn and meet his sister's eye. "Well I don't want you," he said. He knew that the best place for Jenna would to be with their mom. He barely had a way to take care of himself, there would be no way he could take care himself and Jenna.
"What?" she asked as she stopped short.
"I said, I don't want you," he said again.
"But," she said heartbroken.
"What do you not understand about the fact that I don't love you?" Vert shouted as he turned to face her. Vert watched as she battled with different emotions. He watched her go from happy, to heartbroken, to confusion, and then to hatred.
"I hate you!" she yelled as she ran off, her eye full of tears.
Vert was disgusted with himself. He had just hurt the one person that always looked up to him. The person that he would do anything to protect. The one person that meant the world to him.
"Attention Battle Force 5, there is a storm shock opening," came Sage's voice, breaking through Vert's memory.
Shaking his head, Vert cleared his thoughts before he raced to the Saber. "Choper, Tangler, Reverb, and Gearslammer, you're with me," Vert ordered as soon as he had his ear piece on and racing through the Hub.
"Vert are you sure you should go?" A.J. asked over the coms.
"I'm fine," Vert said as raced out of the Hub to meet up with the rest of the team.
It wasn't long until he and the rest of the team were speeding towards the storm shock at top speed. They hit the storm shock in no time and were then racing across what looked to be a desert. Their tires kicking up dust as they went.
"Okay, you know the drill. Let's find us a battle key," Vert said as he raced across the hard packed sand.
"Does anyone else see those clouds?" Agura asked as she turned her head to look at Vert.
"Scared of getting wet?" Stanford teased.
"No, but the only reason why we can drive this easily is because the sand is like a road. We add water to the mix and we won't be able to drive," she said.
"Agura's right, we need to find the battle key before the rain comes," Vert said. "Stanford, I need an echo map of this zone."
"One echo map coming right up," Stanford said.
"Guys there's something coming this way," Zoom said as he circled back to the group.
"I have nothing one my map," Stanford said.
"Well whatever it is, it's kicking up a lot of dust," Zoom said.
"You got the battle keys location yet?" Vert asked.
"Yes!" Stanford shouted as he took a sharp turn to his left.
After about a minute of following Stanford, they came upon a rather large jungle. At the edge, Stanford came to a stop.
"How much father?" Vert asked.
"Should be close," Stanford said as he got out of the Reverb with a map of where the battle key should be. A few mission's before, Sage had given him a new device that allowed him to take an echo map and let him walk with it.
"How close is close?" Zoom asked as he watched both the cloud and the dust get closer.
"About 500 yards straight in from this location," Stanford said.
"Okay, Agura you're with us. A.J. and Zoom, keep an eye on both threats for now," Vert said as he got out of the Saber and started following Stanford into the jungle.
"Well this is where it should be," Stanford said as he approach the spot on the map of where the battle key should've been.
"It's not here," Agura stated as she looked around.
"Well this is where it's supposed to be," Stanford said back.
"Guys, hurry up," Zoom said over the com in Vert's ear.
Looking around, Vert finally spotted it about 30 feet up into one of the tallest trees. "Agura, you think that you could climb that?" Vert asked he pointed up into the tree towards the battle key.
"No problem," she said as she easily started to scale the tree towards the battle key. "Got," she said as she grabbed the battle key and then easily made her way back down.
"We're on our way out," Vert said.
As Zoom sat there on the Chopper looking at the dust, he noticed that all though the dust was getting closer and there seemed to be less and less.
"A.J., what would kick up dust, but then also get less and less?" Zoom asked. He was already dreading the answer.
"Come on, you know I hate riddles," A.J. said as he stared at the now fast approaching storm clouds.
"Whatever is coming at us is under ground and going deeper," Zoom said to A.J. "Guys, hurry up," he said over the com to Vert.
About a few minutes later Vert announced that they were on their way out. At the time the dust had completely vanished.
"You think that whatever that thing was, was running from the rain?" A.J. asked as he eye clouds that were almost directly over their heads.
"Yes," Zoom said as he looked around anxiously.
"We got the battle key," Vert said as they emerged from the jungle.
"Let's go," Zoom said.
"Oh come on," Stanford said.
"No, whatever that thing was that was coming at us is gone. We need to go," Zoom said.
"He's right," A.J. said as he slipped back into the Gearslammer.
"Okay, let's go home," Vert said as he took the battle key from Agura and jumped into the Saber.
"Owe!" Zoom hissed in pain as a drop of water hit his head before he had his helmet back on.
"Zoom what's wrong?" Vert asked from the Saber.
"A drop of rain hit me and it stung," Zoom said confused. He let out another hiss of pain as another drop hit him.
"Let's get out of here!" Vert ordered. If the rain was burning skin, he did not want so see what it was going to happen if it soaked through a shock suit.
They had never raced so quickly across a battle zone as they did at that moment. Every drop that hit them, either slowly started to sizzle on their vehicles or was one drop closer to soaking through Zoom's shock suit. They quickly approached their portal, and the battle key was fired at the portal.
As they raced through the portal, the only thoughts were to get through before it started to pour down rain. They made it through just before the clouds could no longer hold back all of the rain.
"Lock it down Zoom," Vert ordered as he came to a sudden stop. He was to relieved that they made it before it had started to pour.
"Oh yea, another successful mis-" Zoom started as he turned to face Vert, but his eyes were caught up on something thing behind his leader.
"Zoom what's-" Vert asked as he followed the scout's line of sight to behind him. He stopped mid-sentence in shock as to what he was seeing.
Jenna, being the first to recover, yelled out in frustration, "What the hell was that!"
