Wow, I feel like I haven't updated in forever…it's just been a crazy week. But anyways…here you go!
Disclaimer: how many times do we have to go over this? I don't own Flashpoint or any of it's characters.
Wordy sighed as he walked up the steps and knocked quietly on the door. "Boys? Can I come in?"
He didn't have to wait long before Justin opened the door, a sad little smile on his face. "Hi, Mr. Wordy."
"Hey buddy. Where are your brothers?" Wordy followed Justin into the room to see Ben on the bed, math book open before him as he wrote equations in his notebook. Nick and John were nowhere to be seen. "Where are your brothers, guys?" he asked. He hadn't seen them downstairs, and thought all were up here.
But Ben was pointing to the window. "They finished their homework about ten minutes ago," the fifteen-year-old responded. "They're practicing baseball. Playing catch, don't worry. They're not trying to bat in your yard, I promise."
Wordy walked over to the window and sure enough could see the two identical boys throwing around a baseball, running all around as each throw got harder. "You guys have much homework left?"
Justin was shaking his head. "I don't have any. I finished it all!" he said proudly.
"Good job!" Wordy praised. "What about you, Ben?"
Ben lifted his pencil up. "Practice test for math. We've got a huge one next Friday. Justin is keeping me company while I study. But that's all."
"Do you guys want anything to eat?"
"Nah. I'm good. J?"
But the eight-year-old shook his head. "I'm not hungry. I'm going to read. Look, Mr. Wordy!" He held up his book. "I'm almost done with it. Kyle says that when I'm done he'll give me a new book."
"Then I'll get out of your way," Wordy chuckled. "Come downstairs when you get hungry, but dinner will be at six."
With that he closed the door and walked downstairs to the back door. He had already greeted his daughters, who were all still caught up in homework, except for Ally, who was at a friend's house. He slipped outside and watched quietly for a moment. It was lucky he did.
Wordy might be off-duty, but he was still a police officer and father and so noticed anything unusual. Like the man walking alongside the water. He raised his voice. "Nick! John! Come here for a minute!"
Wordy knew that it had only been because they had lived with Snips and Ninja that both boys obeyed immediately, without hesitation. Wordy ushered them inside. "Stay there and lock the door. Don't let anyone but me in."
With that, he took off, sprinting after the already running figure. So that guy was trouble. He ran all the faster.
It took five minutes, but Wordy was finally able to tackle the mystery man down. He parried the knife blow, knocking the weapon away. He twisted the attacker's arm so it was cinched behind him, at the point where if he moved, his arm would break.
"Who are you?" Wordy demanded. "Why were you watching those boys?"
"Why're you attacking me, man? I didn't do anything!"
"You were on my property, and you had a knife," Wordy retorted, wishing he had cuffs or rope or something on him. He wanted to call for back up, but he also didn't want to take his eyes off the man next to him. "I'll ask you one more time: why were you watching those boys?"
It was luck that saved Wordy. His prisoner was twitching underneath him, and Wordy had shifted. That, in turn, caused the other man to lose balance as his kick never made contact. Wordy acted immediately: he wasn't the hand-to-hand combat expert on Team One for nothing. He moved without relinquishing his hold, using one leg to sweep under his already off-balance opponent while jetting his left hand up, open palm, into his falling foe's unprotected chest. The man was left gasping for air.
Unfortunately, that meant there was only one hand to hold the other mystery man, who finally managed to slip out from Wordy's grasp, striking out with one fist. Wordy countered and spun, using his weight to help throw his attacker onto the ground while turning at the same time to counter the punch coming towards the back of his head.
They fought like that for a few minutes, 2-1 until one mystery man got in a lucky kick that sent Wordy flying back a few feet to land on his back. It hurt to get up, and he was fighting for breath, but he was on his feet and in a defensive position while his vision cleared, listening for the next attack.
Only there was none.
When Wordy was finally able to see clearly, he could only see two shadows running away. He debated with himself for only a moment before turning and sprinting back to his house.
FPFPFPFPFPFPFP
"Kev, what's going on?" Shelley asked.
He turned to the boys, checking to make sure they were all there. Sure enough, Justin was clinging to Ben's leg as the three older boys were staring at him, fear written on their faces. "Did anyone else come here?" he demanded as he reached for his phone.
"No," Shelley replied. "Kevin, what's going? What happened?"
"Daddy? Is something wrong?"
"No, sweetie," he assured Lily. "I just want to see if Uncle Greg can come over for a bit."
Greg answered immediately, thankfully. "What's up, Wordy?"
"Hey, Boss. Listen, do you think you could come over here for a bit? And see if anyone else on the team wants to come if they're able? There are just some things we need to discuss."
Amazingly, Greg caught on right away. "I'll gather up as many as I can. Is anyone hurt?"
"No. And don't bother calling Ed. He has some issues he has to deal with."
Greg was quiet for a while, obviously trying to piece together whatever he had missed. "All right," he agreed. "I'll tell Dean and Clark to hang here."
"Thanks Boss," Wordy said gratefully. "I'll see you soon."
FPFPFPFPFPFPFP
"So someone's targeting the boys," Parker said, scratching the back of his head.
"Do you think it has to do with Snips?" Spike questioned.
Greg, Spike, and Lou were sitting across Wordy's couch, while Wordy himself was seated on the floor, thinking.
"Well, we know that Snips has been throwing fights," Lou commented. "What if the people who took knew she was throwing them as well? I mean, they had to have been following her, learning her schedule. They would know she has something to do with the SRU. What if they want to take her brothers as a way to get her to start putting up a fight?"
"Where's Kyle?"
The four men looked up in surprise. Wordy was on his feet instantly. "Ben, what are you doing? I asked you to go upstairs."
The three crossed their arms. "You can't keep this from us," Ben said, jutting out his chin. "We have a right to know. But if these guys are targeting us, then that means they might be trying to get Kyle, too. So where is he?"
"Safe," Wordy replied. "He's at the Lane's."
"Why's he there?" Greg asked. "Clark is over at my house with Dean."
But instead of Wordy answering, it was Nick. "He finally broke, didn't he?"
The four men looked at him curiously. "What do you mean, Nick?" Wordy asked. He didn't know exactly what had happened, just that today was Snips' birthday. He hadn't brought it up to the other boys because he had thought that they might've forgotten or didn't want to talk about it.
Nick just shrugged, as if it was obvious. "Well, you know what today is, right?"
When the men just shrugged, trying to piece it together, John answered. "It's Lucia's birthday." He turned to Wordy. "You knew, right?"
Wordy was nodding slowly. "I didn't want to bring it up if you weren't," he admitted.
But the triplets were shrugging again. Nick looked a little uncomfortable as he finally answered the police officers' silent question. "Look…Lucia never really celebrated her birthday when she was younger. It just didn't happen, and I hope you all know the reason why. Usually, the only thing we do to celebrate is do all of our homework really fast so we can clean the house, and then we cook dinner for her. All of us boys help, and usually Lucia either watches or does her own homework. For the rest of the night we usually just watch movies or go biking or blast music and dance around. We don't get her gifts, we don't sing happy birthday. It's pretty much a normal day for us, just a little different. But Lu's birthday is always special for her and Kyle."
"Why?" Greg prompted. "Is it because they're related?"
"No, well, partly," Ben answered. "None of us really care about who our parents are. It doesn't matter that Lucia and Kyle are related, or that we're all brothers. We're all a family, and we have been for awhile."
"So why is it more special to Lucia and Kyle?" Wordy asked softly.
John sighed. "It was on Lucia's birthday that they found out they're actually brother and sister," he said. "Today was the day they officially became siblings, and so today was always special." He held up a hand. "Don't ask us how they found out, because we don't exactly know. All we know is that they somehow found out. I know that Lucia was able to leave Jake and Lola's house, and Kyle went to live with her and whoever had come out and started fostering them together. I'm not exactly sure what happened, but that much I do know. So today was always a big deal for them."
"Kind of like an anniversary," Spike realized.
"Yeah," Ben said, a sad little smile on his lips. "And they always celebrate it. Sometimes they go running together in the morning before the rest of us are even awake, sometimes they go get ice cream or something after we go to bed. One time they made us these huge banana split sundaes, with all the toppings. They both were drenched in whipped cream, but they were grinning so wide, so we knew they had fun. It's always little stuff like that."
"So when we ordered Team Five to take the day off," Greg began.
"Kyle had nothing to keep him from thinking of this," Nick finished. "And with her missing, and social services hanging over our heads, we were assuming he was going to break down. We just thought he would come over here to do it."
"I think Ed said he was at the SRU," Wordy told them.
They shrugged in response. "All the better," John replied.
"Look, I don't mean to sound like I'm pressing here—"
"Kyle was never going to break down and let it all out in front of us," Nick interrupted Wordy. "We thought he might come over here to talk to you. But I can count on one hand the times I've seen Lucia or Kyle cry in front of us. Especially Justin. Look at it this way," he said, turning to Wordy. "When was the last time you yelled or cried in front of your kids?"
Wordy shrugged. "I don't know, I try not—hang on. They're not your parents, guys. They're your siblings."
"Our older siblings who have held this family together through the foster system, who take care of us, and who pay for our food and clothes. Well, our food. We've started paying for most of our clothes now."
"Wait a minute. How do they pay for these things?" Greg asked. "That's a lot of money to feed six people."
"Lu has a couple of jobs, and I have one as well," a new voice told them.
They turned to see the Lanes, Kyle, and Dean there. It was Kyle who had spoken, and he held out his hand to fist bump the triplets, silently asking how they were doing as he kept talking. "Plus, our house is paid for. It was an old CIA safe house, so… yeah they're pretty much paying bills. They're nice like that."
"How many jobs is a couple?" asked Dean.
"Three," Kyle responded immediately. "And they're all giving her a paid vacation right now because they're the best bosses ever and Lucia's never asked for a day off. They all like her."
"So that's where she was going when she was leaving Laser Quest," Clark realized.
Kyle nodded. "Yeah, Tony had called and asked if she could go to work that day, and she never says no unless there's a team gathering." He turned to the triplets. "What's going on? I just got a text from Justin saying someone tried to attack you guys. Are you okay?"
"Yeah," Ben answered. "Wordy saw them and chased him down before he could attack or whatever. Right now we're just trying to figure out what's going on."
"Or trying to pry into your private life," John muttered under his breath. Kyle ignored him.
"Do you think it has to do with Lucia's kidnapping?"
Greg shrugged. "We don't know. Maybe. Probably, unless you have other enemies we're aware about."
Team One couldn't tell if the boys were joking as they thought about it. "Nah," Kyle finally answered. "There shouldn't be anyone else."
"Shouldn't be?" Ed asked, raising an eyebrow.
Kyle couldn't help but shrug. "Well, we were only interns, mostly running errands or learning how to catch a criminal, never actually meeting them face-to-face. You guys," he looked at the triplets, "didn't make any enemies, right? So we should be good."
It was silent as the adults tried to take in the seriousness they teens were displaying before John bent over, laughing. Ben and Nick were fighting to keep the smiles off their faces as Kyle just smirked. "Relax," Kyle told them. "Witnessing that murder was a once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing. We don't usually make enemies. Everyone usually likes us too much because we're just awesome like that. So it has nothing to do with New York and probably everything to do with the fights. They want leverage."
"Well, they're not getting any," Greg said firmly. "Listen up, guys. Here's what we're going to do."
FPFPFPFPFPFPFP
Lucia smirked as she finally got the cuffs off of her. She knew that she only had a few minutes before Jason realized that his keys were missing, so she had to make this quick. She rolled off the bed and threw her sneakers on, going quietly to the door.
Opening it, she glanced around and saw that there was no one there, at least no one that she could see. She threw on her hooded sweatshirt that she had also stolen from Jason and began to move.
This time, she would make sure she wouldn't get caught.
FPFPFPFPFPFPFP
"Do you think someone will really try to take the boys?" Shelley asked her husband as they lay in bed that night.
He waited a minute before answering. "I think they might. With the way the fights are going for Snips right now, they either need to get leverage or send her back before one kills her."
Shelley turned to her side, propping herself up with one arm. "Are they really that bad, Kev?" She had not seen any of the fights, and neither had the kids living with them. The boys had trusted Kyle when he said they wouldn't want to see it, and it had never been mentioned to Lily, Claire, or Ally.
He looked up and then over at her. "They're bad," he admitted. "But from what I hear, the crowds aren't liking it either. But we need to find her soon, Shell. Snips is strong, and I think she's able to make sure she doesn't get hurt too badly, but everyone has limits. I think she's close to reaching hers." He kissed her softly then added, "But either way, they won't get the boys. We SRU officers know a thing or two about protection details."
Shelley gave a small smile. "You'll find her," she insisted. "I know you will."
So, I have been asked to have more Snips…well, I promise there will be more next chapter, but this chapter I had to do something with the Wordsworth household. REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW! Tell me what you want, and I'll try to make it work!
