Luck stared at the amber liquid swirling in the glass. He was idly tilting the glass from side to side, consumed in his thoughts. Berga glanced at Keith, who was shuffling a deck of poker cards, but said nothing. Ever since Luck had shown up that morning he had not seemed like himself.

'I'm from the future' Star's words echoed in Luck's head, mixing with images of the one-sided fight last evening. All of the images of Star stored in Luck's memory seemed to flash before his eyes all at once. The girl was a complete mystery to Luck. He could not figure her out. One moment she seemed coy, normal, almost sweet, and then she was tough, strong, and powerful. Luck could not help but feel that if she had wanted too, Star could have killed those men that evening as easily as she had knocked them out.

Lucks mind then drifted from the past to fantasies of the future. Luck imagined what it would be like if Star actually joined the family, instead of just working at the bar. In his mind's eye he could see Star there with everyone else, talking with Tick and Maria, watching card games… smiling. What did she look like when she smiled? Luck didn't think he had ever seen the expression on her face. Not a true smile anyway.

"I'm going out," Luck said, setting the glass on the table and standing up. He grabbed his coat, and without any further explanation, left his brothers in silence.

"What's with him?" Berga asked, a few moments after Luck had departed.

Surprisingly Keith responded.

"A girl."

Luck hesitated once he was outside. He had said he was going for a walk, but he wasn't sure where he was going to. He wanted to find Star, but would she be at the park? Last night she mentioned she was going to be sleeping for a while. Where did she live? Luck didn't remember ever finding out this information.

After a moment of indecision, Luck decided to try the park first.

As he set off he began to turn his thoughts over again. Luck wanted Star to join the family. The power that she could bring… no one would want to mess with the Gandor family if they found out the family had a girl who could literally kill with words. That was right, Luck wanted Star to join the family because having someone as powerful as her would be a great asset. That was the reason he was so eager to find her that morning… that was the only reason…

Luck reached the park and found it deserted, save for a small flock of geese. They were migrating back north for the spring.

Luck sighed. He had truly hoped that Star would be in her usual haunt. As Luck turned to leave he caught sight of a shadow across the road. Someone was standing in the shadows of one of the buildings.

Luck decided to investigate. He had a feeling that after the attack last night there might be more trouble. Nonchalantly he walked in the direction of the alley, looking like a man just out for a morning stroll. As Luck approached the figure he glanced carelessly in that direction.

"Star?" Luck said as he stopped short.

"Oh, good morning," Star responded, glancing at Luck before turning her attention back to the park.

"What are you doing?" Luck asked, glancing at the park, in case there had been some change in the few minutes that he had looked over the space. Nothing… just geese.

"Watching…" Star said in a voice laced with suspicion.

Luck stared at Star. Could she be trying to fool him? No, that couldn't be it, not after she had just volunteered so much information last night. Luck was beginning to find it difficult to raise his guard around Star. The only other though that came to Luck's mind was that someone suspicious had come by earlier, and Star was keeping a watch on the park incase that person returned.

"Are you expecting someone?" Luck asked.

"What? Of course not!" Star responded shooting Luck an incredulous look. "It's them!"

She pointed to the flock of geese.

"Geese?" Luck responded, not entirely sure where Star was taking the conversation.

"Evil little hell spawn…" Star murmured under her breath.

Luck laughed. She was acting so serious over geese.

"This is not a laughing matter!" Star responded, insulted. "Have you ever been attacked by a goose? They're evil with feathers!"

Luck was still smiling even as Star pouted and turned to leave in a huff.

"Wait," Luck said, mastering his emotions.

Star continued walking and Luck took two or three hurried steps to catch up with her.

"You have magic, and you're afraid of geese?" Luck asked, still smiling a little on the inside. The situation was rather ridiculous in his mind.

"Using magic on them wouldn't be fair. It's not like they can cast spells themselves," Star responded.

Luck felt a twinge. As if there was a voice somewhere in the back of his mind trying to tell him something, but Luck decided did not want to hear what the voice had to say and ignored it.

"I thought you said they were 'evil'," Luck pointed out.

"Exactly, I don't want to stoop to their level," Star responded matter-of-factly.

Luck smiled slightly, before his expression changed to that of a frown. The voice in his mind was louder now, and he could not ignore it anymore. 'They're evil', 'It wouldn't be fair', 'I don't want to stoop to their level', these words made Luck hesitate. This morning he had been consumed with thoughts of having Star join the family, but would that be right? Should Luck get Star, a girl with obviously 'good intentions' involved in the underworld?

You're too soft, Luck thought to himself. Just do it.

But even with this mental argument in place, an argument that usually could goad Luck into doing what needed to be done, Luck found himself seriously hesitating. He felt as though he would severely regret involving Star in the 'family business'.

"So, were you looking for me?" Star asked, breaking into Luck's mental debate.

"I still have some questions," Luck responded, shoving the debate from his mind for right now. He would deal with his emotions later, right now he still had business he wanted to clear up with Star. But even as Luck thought this he felt a painful twinge in his chest. If his business was finished with Star, would he have a reason to go looking for her again?

Luck shook his head to clear the thought from his mind. Star worked at the bar, he could just go and see her any time he wanted. He could go see her…

Luck felt himself growing annoyed with the tangled mess of emotions inside of him. He needed to sort all of this out. But not now, he reminded himself. Not now.

"You said something about being from the future…" Luck began and then trailed off. He had absolutely no idea how to phrase the question, or if he was even asking a question. How the hell did someone verify if a person was from the future or not?

The corners of Star's mouth twitched in a smile.

"Yeah, I did say that. Sound's crazy, doesn't it?" Star replied.

"All of it sounds crazy," Luck commented.

Star laughed.

"That's a good point," She replied.

Luck wasn't sure what it was about today, but Star seemed much more relaxed, which was really odd, considering someone had sent people to kill her last night.

"I've thought really hard about this… and the past is the only answer I can come up with right now," Star explained, the smile vanishing to be replaced by a pensive look. "I've been to parallel universes before, and there's always something that doesn't match. Like a world where Abraham Lincoln didn't get assassinated, or a world where everyone knows that vampires exist. Things like that. But here, there's nothing. Absolutely nothing that makes it different from my 'past'."

"But what about us?" Luck asked.

"What about you?" Star responded, not following Luck's train of thought.

"You didn't know that us immortals were here," Luck elaborated.

"That's true," Star conceded. "But you aren't exactly advertising are you? I know a lot of things, but I by no means know everything."

That was true, after gaining immortality Luck, Berga and Keith had pretty much gone on as they always had. Of course they had displayed their immortality on occasion in order to surprise and demoralize their enemies, like in that incident with Gustavo. But no one, not even their most trusted men, knew about the immortality of the Gandor brothers. And Luck did not think there was anything that could happen that would change that. So Luck could not use the immortality of his brothers and himself to disprove Star's 'from the future' theory.

The two walked aimlessly in silence for nearly two blocks.

"Where are you headed?" Luck asked after a while, thinking that he should be getting back soon.

"Nowhere," Star replied. "I don't have any place I need to be until this evening and I don't have anything in particular to do."

"What about those people who attacked you? Or your compass?" Luck asked. It seemed odd to him that Star had so much free time when she had already admitted to needing to retrieve a piece of stolen property, and just the other night those guys had tried to carry out a hit on her. If it was Luck he would be planning right now how to take down those people and make them regret the day they decided to cross him.

Star's face clouded over and she appeared lost in thought. It was a long time before she answered Luck.

"Yes… I do have things I need to do… eventually. But I'm not in any position to do anything about it right now," Star responded.

This answer shocked Luck. He had thought with the power she had displayed last night Star would have been able to take care of everything in the span of an afternoon. Suddenly his thoughts shifted back to two nights ago at the bar. Star had said that she had tried to get her compass back, but she had gotten beaten off. The thought gave Luck pause. He had been impressed by Star's display of power the other night, but if these people who had gotten a hold of her compass had managed to beat Star, then how powerful were they? Luck felt himself begin to worry slightly. He would need to find out who these people are if for no other reason than to keep tabs on them. If people that powerful were on Gandor turf he needed to know about it.

Star glanced at Luck, and in her usual, slightly cryptic manner said:

"This isn't anything you need to worry yourself over."

"You're mistaken," Luck responded. After two days of insanity Luck finally felt as if he were in familiar territory again. "If these people are on Gandor turf then it is something I need to worry about."

Star sighed, feeling exasperated.

"If they were normal humans I wouldn't be arguing with you, but they aren't! Just keep out of it!"

Luck turned on Star and grasped her arm, preparing to force her to face him in order to give Star a lecture on just what being part of a Mafia family meant. But as Luck tightened his grip on Star's arm she let out a small cry of pain and jerked herself free, glaring back at Luck. It was the same arm that Luck had grasped the other night at the bar, when he was preparing himself to force answers from Star. The memory flooded back into Luck, causing him to notice that something was definitely amiss. Star's arm was still injured but, unlike that night, she was able to walk unassisted, yet that night Luck had thought that Star's leg injury had definitely been the worst of the two, but now her leg as perfectly healed while her arm still retained its wound.

"What…?" Luck began, glancing down at Star's leg.

"I healed it," Star said, refusing to meet Luck's eyes for some reason. "I figured my leg was the worse of the two so…"

Star trailed off. Luck stared hard into her face, which she kept turned away.

Star was definitely hiding something. If she could just heal herself, why hadn't she done so sooner? And while Luck was thinking about it, a lot of things she had said were not adding up. She had said that she was a mage, and from the way she talked, and her display of power, mages were a pretty big deal, so why couldn't she get her compass back from a bunch of 'dabblers' as she had called them. From the way Star talked they were just a bunch of hacks playing at magician, so how was it that Star got beat up by them? Star gave the impression of being powerful, yet the last few days had made Luck doubt that impression. Star was definitely hiding something, but what was it? Perhaps if he could get her somewhere more private he could ask her a few more questions…

Just as Luck was about to speak, a shout from down the street caught the attention of both him and Star. Star and Luck turned towards the origin of the sound and saw Maiza making his way up the street.

"Hello there," Maiza said, greeting Star and Luck. "I'm not interrupting anything, am I?"

"No," Star answered without even glancing at Luck.

Luck tugged the brim of his hat down over his eyes. It looked like he wasn't going to get an answer to his mystery anytime soon.

"I'll be seeing you later," Luck said to Star, and with a nod of acknowledgement to Maiza he walked away.

I'm getting tired of questions with no answers Luck thought to himself as he walked away. He was just about fed up with waiting.