A/N: Right, so, where did we leave off? Oh, yeah. Here it is.

"It's about time those two got together," he said. "Y'know, your brother's been making eyes at 'er since we got here. I kept tellin' 'im to make a move but he wouldn't do it. Boy has no self confidence."

"I know, right?" Mel answered back, and then she sighed. "I just can't believe it was her. Lani was totally prejudiced against mutants when I got here; I never would've thought she'd fall for him, even if she thought he was human. You've lived with him, Porkchop; you know what a goof he can be."

"Ya got that right."

Mel and Porkchop laughed, strolling casually down to the garage to check out how the race went, but when they got there, the two of them abruptly stopped laughing. Wylde was beating the ever loving piss out of Nolo, and no one was even trying to stop him. Vert shook his head in shame, Taro grinned, snarled, really, watching over them, and Kurt seemed quite torn as to whether or not he should break it up. Mel gasped, rushing in so fast that to the others it seemed as if she had just appeared out of thin air, and lifted Wylde by the scruff of his neck. She backed away, holding him two feet off the ground, and huffed.

"Markie, what the hell are you doing?" she said. "I thought this whole war with the Teku was over!"

"Put me down, Mel," he said simply.

"Don't talk to me like that!" she snapped at him. Suddenly, she noticed that the ones who weren't staring at her were glowering at Nolo, and she placed Wylde gently on his feet. "What's going on? What did he do?"

He sighed. "Mel, this is bad. This is really bad."

"What? What's going on?" she repeated. She didn't like at all where the situation was headed.

"Tork didn't make it out of the realm. He's gone."

She covered her mouth and gasped. "Oh, man…"

On the floor, Nolo was getting up, wiping blood from his mouth. Damn, Wylde got in a good work out. He smirked outwardly, and he kept telling himself that it was over, that Tone had been avenged, but it felt wrong. All wrong. He'd made a terrible mistake.

Over the next couple of days, the Maniacs kept vigil, unsure of how to cope, and Taro took up position as leader. Nolo was cool and calm, but on the inside he felt like dirt. He'd done something horrible and it ate away at him; he wasn't sure if he could live with himself. Eventually, another portal opened, and they raced, and it really hit home then that Tork might not be coming back.

Mel had grown pretty attached to all the Maniacs since she came to the Acceledrome, and she was disappointed that bad things kept happening to good people, but her boys were worse off. Monkey blamed himself for what happened; he believed he could have done something to stop it, or at least tried harder to help him. Porkchop thought it must have been Old Smokey's last hurrah that blew their leader off the track. Wylde said they should have just killed Nolo as soon as he started up, and showed great guilt over the fact that they didn't, and Taro didn't say anything much at all for a time, though he expressed some regret over not protecting Tork more actively.

Kurt and Vert, too, were very apologetic about not keeping Nolo under better control; they could've stopped him and saved Tork, but they didn't. On top of this, Lani cried that if she hadn't left her post in the control room for just that second, it all could have been prevented.

So, really, the only one not taking the blame was the one who deserved it. All the while, Nolo watched the Maniacs in the garage and at meals, and no one really spoke to him, but that was okay; he didn't want to talk to them. He knew if he did, he'd lose it, maybe say something incriminating. He knew what he had done was wrong, but appearance was everything. He had to stand by what he did; they couldn't know he was guilty.

Nolo was roused from his thoughts as Vert grabbed him by the wrist like a child and pulled him down an empty hallway, ignoring his protests. Before Nolo could even try to get away, Vert twisted his arm. The leader of the Teku hissed in pain.

"Vert, what the hell?" he said as the blonde pulled him into the Nitrox storage area.

"I could say the same thing, Nolo," he said, shaking his head. "I knew you hated him, but I never thought you were capable of something like this. Damn, man…"

"Shut up!! He—he killed my brother!"

"Nolo, you know that's not what—"

"Shut up!!" he screamed. "SHUT UP, SHUT UP, SHUT UP!!"

Vert called after him as he ran, but he didn't listen.

"Nolo, please!" he said, then his voice shrank to a whisper. "Let me help you…"

That was it; they probably thought he was completely insane, but, then again, maybe he was. Really, Nolo didn't know anymore. He was being ripped to shreds on the inside, and he couldn't find relief no matter how he tried. Nolo kept running, thanking whatever powers there were that no one was around, locked himself in an unused room off Dr. Tezla's lab, and for a moment he though maybe he deserved to feel like this. He slid down the wall, sobbing, and crouched in a heap, hugging his knees to his chest.

"I'm a monster," he whispered.

There was that damn twinkle again.

"No, you're not, Nolo," he said sympathetically. Tone stooped down next to his little brother, putting a hand on his shoulder, but Nolo recoiled. He still believed he was seeing things. "You had a moment of weakness, and made a mistake, but everyone deserves a second chance."

Nolo looked up at him, his tears slowing. Maybe he was hallucinating all of this, but it wasn't like he had anything better to do, so he listened to what Tone had to say.

"Tork's not dead," he told him. "He's lost, but he can still be saved."

Nolo was shocked by this statement. "What?! But how do you—"

Tone put up a hand to signal Nolo not to pry. "I just know. Look, you have to hurry. I know it's all pretty sudden, but that's how it is."

Tone smiled at him, then got up to leave.

"Wait! Don't leave!!"

"I'm sorry, little bro, but I have to. Just remember," he said, smiling gently, but his manner was totally serious. "This is on you. You have to make the wrong things right, Nolo."

That same light twinkled again, and he faded away.

Nolo barged into Dr.Tezla's lab, eyes still red from crying. "We gotta go back for him," he said. "We can't just leave him, man; we gotta go back for Tork."

Gig floated gently past him. "The portal has never reopened once a realm has been successfully completed."

"We can't just leave him there! Figure something out!"

"What do you care?!" Lani snapped at him. "You're the one who got him left behind in the first place! What, you feel guilty, Nolo?! You wanna clear your conscience!?"

Nolo only stared at her for a moment, and then he looked away. "Something like that," he said, awkwardly.

Lani sighed, obviously upset. "Anyway, we already tried."

"Lani!" Dr. Tezla warned her.

"No. It's time they knew the whole truth. Tork and Kadeem weren't the only drivers lost in the realms. There were three others; Dan Dresden, Alec Wood, and Banjee Castille went into the realms," she said, pausing, "and they never made it out."

"Dios mio," he muttered. "Why didn't you tell us?!"

Gig answered again. "We thought you would be…discouraged."

"Even if we could go back, there would be no point," Dr.Tezla told him. "Tork has been captured by the drones."

"NO!" Nolo shrieked, breathing heavily. "I don't believe you!"

The good doctor smirked back at him and the monitors on the wall flickered to life. "Believe this. These are the final recordings from Tork's onboard camera."

There was a topsy-turvy view of a race track, and cold steel feet clunked towards the car.

"The drones have Tork, and there's no getting him back."

Lani put a hand on Nolo's shoulder to comfort him, but he grunted and shrugged it off, stomping out.

He admitted to himself that things looked bad, but they were still better than he originally thought. Tork had only been captured, not killed; the drones were ruthless, but they were smart. They'd probably keep Tork alive to try and extract information from him.

There was still hope.

A/N: Yay! See, he's not so bad!