Gary was half-way across the vast meadow that was the center of the Venture Compound when he heard his name called. Turning, he saw Triana Orpheus running after him. She was wearing striped black and white knee socks, a short, black shirt and a cropped T-shirt, black, naturally, with a large skull printed across the front. Her shirt was moving crazily up and down as she ran, reminding Gary of why female athletes all wore sports bras.

He stopped and waited for her. In the short while he'd known her he had never seen Triana run. He figured it must be something important.

"What's up?" he asked when she caught up with him. But she was suddenly out of breath. She braced her arms on her knees while panting in between fits of coughing.

"You have really got to cut down on your smoking," Gary said.

"I thought - we had - an - agree - ment - not to - talk - about - my smoking." She panted.

"I thought I was just making an observation," Gary said. "I wasn't trying to... Well, I guess it came out like a criticism. But geeze, Triana, if you're that out of breath after a short run like that..."

Triana straightened up and with a long sigh tried to slow her panting into more normal breathing. "You got any water?" she asked.

Gary pulled a bottle he had stuck in a pocket and handed it to her. She took a long pull on the water, then dump about half of the bottle over her head. Her purple-dyed hair had been damp and stringy from sweat. Now it glistened in a tight cap around her head. "Thanks," she said, handing what was left back to the burly henchman.

"I guess I deserve that crack about my smoking," she confessed. "It seems like I'm smoking all the time. I've been thinking a lot, lately.

"What's stressing you out? I thought you left your mother because it was so stressful there?"

Triana shrugged. "Yeah, she drawled. "Look, I need to talk to Dean. Do you know where he's at?"

Gary wondered what she had to say to Dean that would cause her to run half across the meadow from her father's residence. "He's in the X-1's hanger. Hank and him are playing with their remote controlled airplanes.

"Oh." Triana made a face. "I was really hoping to catch him alone."

"Sorry. Is it that important?" He couldn't actually imagine anything so important that Triana needed to talk to Dean in private.

"Well, kinda." For the first time she noticed the strange device Gary was holding in his one hand. "What's that?"

"I'm going Wabbitt hunting"

"Wabbitt?" Triana wondered. "with a 'w'?"

"Well, it could be a Snark or a Boojum but it's probably a Wascally Wabbitt?"

"No, seriously, what are you doing?"

"I'm looking for that walking tree of yours. Finally caught some picture of it at the mudhole we dug last week. So now I'm going to politely last it to leave."

"With that?"

"It's a wireless TASER. Some Dr. Venture cooked up a while ago. Basically it projects a small lightning bolt. I figure I'll need some like this in case the tree doesn't want to go. See ya." He said and started walking towards the woods behind the various building on the Venture Compound.

A moment later he was surprised to see Triana catching up with him. "I really wanted to talk to Dean in private," she said, but I guess I kinda wanted to talk to you about it, too."

"What's that?"

"I decided to go back to my mother's place."

"Even with the Outrider there?" Triana had returned to her father earlier in part because she couldn't get along with her mother's new husband.

"I'm setting some new ground rules, it's going to be home schooling with mom, and at least once a month I come back to spend some time with Dad. And the Outrider has nothing to do with how I live or with my education."

"Dean will be crushed. What brought on this change of plans?"

"I had a long talk with The Master."

"Who?"

"My father's mentor. His spirit guide from the netherworld."

"And he said you should go back to your mother to continue your magical education?"

"Not in so many words, but then he rarely says what he means directly." Triana was quiet for a moment then continued, "actually now that I think about it, he's a chronic liar."

"Your father's mentor?"

"Yeah, well. It's not like everything he says is a lie but he's always trying to manipulate me into doing whatever it is he wants. The first time I wandered into the nether realm he disguised himself as a middle-aged Dean Venture and said that if I stayed here I'd end up married to Dean." There was kind of twist to her lips as she said that.

Gary wondered, "would that be so bad?" even though the idea of Dean being married to any one seemed pretty unlikely. The boy was just incredibly naive about everything in the world.

"His middle-aged Dean was pretty disgusting: bald, pot-bellied, neurotically fussy and he talked about how our baby was some kind of genetic disaster. I wanted to run screaming from the place right then and there, but I knew I'd get lose in the underworld unless the Master showed my the way out. Later I got to thinking, most middle-aged men are bald. His father certainly is. And they have little pot-bellies, but then by the time I'm in my thirties or forties I bet I'm not going to be any beauty queen. I'll probably be fat and wrinkly with boobs down to my knees and everything. It's kind of a shock to think about but I realized later while study magic with my mother that The master is The Prince of Liars."

"You mean he's Sa-"

"Shh! Don't say that!" Triana exclaimed.

"What, like Lord Vortemort, we're not supposed to say his name?"

"Ah..." Triana blushed. "Those books are full of crap but some thing, they're kind of true. Just don't say that name. It'll lead to trouble..."

"Knowing all this, you still went in to have a talk with him?"

I figure knowing that he's going to lie going in I could separate his lies from the truth, and all that notwithstanding, he knows more about magic than anyone else I know."

"Was he still disguising him like a middled-aged Dean Venture, like last time?"

Triana flinched. "No. It was worse. He looked like...Have you ever seen a man turned inside-out?"

It was Gary's turn to flinch. "Yeah," he whispered.

"Oh? It was disgusting! Of course he was doing it to keep me off balance and too sick to think straight."

"He was a good guy," Gary was speaking without listening to Triana. "Friendly, cheerful. Smart as hell. Worked on the anti-gravity engines on the Cocoon. He was inside the housing working when someone removed the lock-outs and tried to start the engines. turned him into a human Klein bottle. We had to shoot him because there was no way we could every put him back together again. I dream about him sometimes..."

"Holy Shit," Triana said. "At least the Master was only playing a joke on me.

"And still he got you to resume studying magic?"

"Yeah. He was still going on about how if I stay here I'll end up marrying Dean. But I'm not interested in getting married. I can see how it was the biggest mistake my mother ever made. She was unhappy with Dad, thought things would get better if she ran off with the Outsider but it's the same-old same-old. I want to see the world. Go places, do things. I want to be my own person and not someone's ..."wife"! She made air-quote around wife. "But The Master did say one thing that made a lot of sense. Oddly, it was something you had said as well."

"Me?"

"Yeah, remember you once said Hank and Dean are like magnets for bad luck and that if I stayed here I'd all the luck in the world to survive?"

"Ok." Gary didn't recall saying exactly those words, but didn't disagree with the conclusion.

"Anyway, the Master was saying how magic calls to magic and that people who can do magic have to learn how to use magic just to protect themselves from all the other magic users. And I remembered what you'd said and realized that this much of what he was saying was true. Just like Hank and Dean have targets on the backs of their heads just because their father is a Venture, I've got one on my head because my father's a necromancer. So I'd better learn - to see out of the back of my head, or something."

"You gotta do what ya gotta do. I'll miss not seeing you around here."

There was a wistful note to Gary's comment. Triana turned to look him closely in his face. "Are you flirting with me?" she asked unexpected.

Gary felt like he had been pole-axed, and started blushing. "I am?" he protested. "I don't thing I've flirted with anyone in my life. I wouldn't know how to flirt," he stammered.

Triana smiled good-naturedly. "You're doing a pretty good job for someone who doesn't know what he's doing."

I just," Gary tried to explain lamely, "It's nice to have someone around to talk to that near my own age. Who's not Dr. Venture or - the boys - or..." Gary let his words dribble away. It seemed like the more he said that worse he was making it.

"I'll give you my mom's number before I go so you can tell if you hear anything about Kim."

"Sure. Great." Gary wished she hadn't mentioned his ex-girlfriend. It was still a painful subject to him, since Kim, Triana's best friend, had decided that her life's mission was to kill Hank Venture. As long as that remained her goal in life and he remained the Venture's bodyguard they couldn't be together ever again. He shook his head. "I've put notices out in every placed I could think of that she might see, even in Villainous Times, but I haven't heard back anything."

"There's a magazine for super-villains?" Triana was surprised.

"Mostly it's for super-villains groupies, but everyone kind has to keep an eye on it to see who's up or down that week." Gary didn't add that he's seen some of the magazines she father got in the mail. "Modern Necromancy and Voodooism Topics" was every bit as out there as Villainous Times.

"She probably hasn't had time to send a reply," Triana muttered. "You said she was on the run from The Blackhearts?"

"Yeah. After I made my report to OSI HQ that there as a Blackhearts cell in town they sent out a swat team to scour the area. Found an old Convert that looks like they had converted it to their purposes, but the building was empty and had been for a few days. Doesn't mean that Kim escaped but I kind of think the only reason they had to abandon the convert was because Kim was loose again and would rat out the convent as their base."

Triana was nodding her head. "You will let me know if you ever hear from Kim?" she asked.

"Of course. And you'll let me know is she contacts you. 'Cause you..."

"Yeah." Gary stopped walking. They were at the edge to the woods. Phrases like finding a needle in a haystack or missing the tree for the forest flashed through his head. "Say, you don't happen to have a crystal ball with you? One that can could find a walking tree? Now that we're here I have no idea how I'm going to track something that doesn't leave footprints?"

"No, I don't read crystal balls. I'm a sorceress in training, not some flim-flam artist. I can't believe you came out here without a plan!"

"I'm sort of used to ad libbing things."

"Then ad lib something. Didn't you go to Boy Scouts or something?"

"Junior Henchmen - but it was only one summer."

"They have a Junior Henchman Camp?" Triana wondered.

"Well, that's what the Monarch called it after he kidnaped me then discovered that I was underage. That was during my eighth grade class trip to Washington, DC?"

"I thought the Guild of Calamitous Intent had strict rules about recruiting minors."

"They do. Not so much back then but even so after the Monarch discovered he'd captured a bunch of minors he turned our captivity into an impromptu summer camp. Then when he released us he had to paid off all the parents so they wouldn't sue."

"That's just insane," Triana protested. "I guess I should be glad that there are rules for how to deal with underage kids, but... Never mind. Was there anything in your Junior Henchman Camp about how to track your foe?"

"I was fifteen. I was more interested in reading the latest issue of Spiderman then in tracking someone. That took a lot of work. Then again..."

Gary looked back across the open meadow, spotted something, turned to face it then began waving his arms forwards, sideways, up, down. After a moment he turned exactly 180 degrees and looked at the grass under his feet closely. "Ok!" he exclaimed after a time.

"If you're putting on a show to impress me, consider me not impressed." Triana growled sarcastically.

"No, I was trying to figure out where the tree-thing had to have been standing. The security camera's over there. The pond there. It came it in an angle to the pond and if I calculated correctly. It came out of the woods over there and returned here. And see, the grass is disturbed!"

Triana looked where Gary had pointed. "You sure about this?" she asked.

"Of course!. See how the rest of the grass leans downhill? Where it's been dragged by the rains? But here the blades are leaning away from us, as if something had been dragged along there."

Triana looked again. She was beginning to think the only thing disturbed was Gary but decided to keep that observation to herself. She could afford to go on a wild goose chase for a an hour or so before trying to find Dean again.

Gary lead the way across the small glade and into the woods. He slowed up there and looked about constantly for signs of something having moved among the trees and brush. The ground here became rolling with many rocks laying about. Some washed into gullies, others perched on the tops of ridges where the next heavy rain might relocated them downhill somewhere. Finally Gary came to a small hollow where a large sheet of limestone had come to rest on a couple granite boulders forming an overhang maybe five feet high and eight feet back but curving to the left behind the boulders to form a small cave. Even Triana could see that the ground cover was stirred up.

"Hey, Kemosabe, what do the tracks say?" she asked.

"Sshhh. It may be inside."

"Isn't it kind of small for a eight foot tall head of broccoli?" she asked.

Gary turned and silently shook his hands at her as if to say "Shut! Up!"

After listening patently for a couple minutes and hearing nothing, Gary walked closer to the cave. He unslung the wireless TASER, armed it and got it comfortable in one arm, then unclipped a flashlight and held that in his other hand. He bent down to crawl under the overhang and was surprised to find Triana creeping along right behind him. He would have told her to go back if that wouldn't have lead to an argument when he was trying to keep as quiet as a graveyard.

The light was flickering against the back wall of the cave when the heard a rustle.

"Something's in there," Triana breathed on Gary's neck.

"It could just be the raccoon that shows up at the mudhole every night. It's been stealing food out of the trash." Gary whispered back.

"Is that why you send that note to dad?"

"What part of 'shh' don't you understand?" he snapped back.

They crept in a little further. There was only a little area around the dogleg formed by the boulder upholding the shelf of rock above them. From the darkness came faint whimper "ah-ah-ah's"

"That's no raccoon," Triana whispered.

"No shit, sherlock," Gary whispered back, wishing she wasn't crowding him so much. It made it hard for him to maneuver.

"Hey!" she said in a normal voice. "There's no call for that!" Then in a whisper she added, "oh, sorry."

The unseen voice shifted to panicky "oh-oh-oh-oh!"

Gary sighed exasperatingly. "Just step back and give me some room. In case these's trouble." He waited until Triana finally moved, then took a step ahead and flashed the light into the deepest corner of the cave.

"What the heck," he muttered but Triana screamed loud and long into his ear. "Kill it! Kill it! Kill it! It's an abomination. The souls! The souls crying out for peace! Oh, God," and she bolted, hands over her eyes.

Gary didn't watch her running away. His eyes were transfixed on a face that he knew. A face he never expected to see again. A face that was alive when it should very much have been dead.

"Texas?"

Cowering the back of the little cave was a mostly naked, scarred and emaciated man. Someone from out of Gary's past. Someone he never expected to see again.

"Texas?" he repeated. "It's me, 21. Remember? From the Cocoon?"

"Cocoon?" the creature repeated.

There was something wrong with Gary's old fellow henchman. His scalp was Black with kinky hair. A great "Y" ran down from his collar bone to just above his crouch. Coarse and sloppy stitching circled one arm and both legs. One eye was blue, the other brown. The creature - Texas" - wore the tatter remnants of army camo pants and not much else. He looked scratched and scarred and starved half to death. But his (its?) face was unmistakable that of Henchman 127, A.K.A. 'Texas".

"What the hell happened to ya, buddy? Why didn't you make it back to the Cocoon during the recall?"

"Cocoon!" The creature said again, more confidently this time.

"Well, let's get you up to the house and cleaned up and feed. It doesn't look like you've eaten in days." Gary held out his hand friendly-like.

The creature took it and stood up unsteadily. "Food" it crooned. "Food Good."

"You bet it's good," Gary said, and lead the creature into the day. The tree thing was forgotten in Gary's amazement in finding his former colleague still alive after thinking him dead all this time. A hot meal, a hot bath and a night in a real bed and maybe by thing Texas would be able to tell his story. And maybe by them Triana could explain why she ran away screaming.