Chapter 21: Face your fears (or not)
The temple itself wasn't much a sight to behold, just some dirty rooms with the occasional side and snake. The issue was that while they had figured out most of the towers were decorative, the one tower that was real was at least twenty stories, large inside than out, dark, dirty, filled with creepy things that could kill you…so Quantic Jared wanted out.
Zoe could sense the magic running through the place, but decided to not regard it too much.
"Guys, look at this." Queen Bee looked towards a sign, and her accent was apparent while reading, "Warning: Go no further." Joselyn shrugged,
"Well, we have to go forward."
Kelly had a ball of light in his hand, looking around. He could sense the curse in the area, not just magic. And it was getting stronger as they walked up the stairs.
"So… this shouldn't be too bad." Kagami said. Then they heard Zoe scream and ran up the stairs, seeing her shrieking on the floor.
…
This was not happening. It couldn't be happening…it couldn't…
She had gone up the stairs, ready to get this over with, go home and spend time with her husband and kids. But when she got to the second floor, she saw the horribly mutilated bodies of all of them. It looked as though Eli had tried to shield them, but the black spears used went straight through even him—indestructible, could break a building flying at him—and hit the kids. Roxas looked like he had been pinned and hadn't been able to hold the phasing long enough to get out.
Felix was in the corner, with his eyes burned out and an ash wing pattern behind him, like an angel smiting. He too had a spear in his stomach.
She didn't know these were supposed to be the Spears of Gungnir, as that was the only weapon that could kill her family like this, but it was still horrific to see.
She tried to pull the spear out of Eli, hoping to reach her younger kids, praying that maybe it wasn't too late. How had they even gotten here?!
It was too late. They were gone.
She felt an infection start spreading up her arm from just touching the spears, but she ran over and got the one out of Felix, cradling his corpse and bringing him over to the rest of the family. It looked as though he had been fighting whoever did this and got killed in the process.
She just sat there with their bodies, and let herself weep.
…
"Zoe!" Kelly ran over, "Gem, what's wrong?"
"T-They're gone Dad…" She clung to him, shrieking into his chest. But there was nothing around the room. Kelly looked in her mind, before his eyes widened,
"Gizmo, pass me the squirt bottle." Gizmo dug into her bag and grabbed it, and Kelly sprayed Zoe in the face causing her to cough and blink and few times, "Zoe? You okay?" Zoe looked frantically around the room,
"I-I saw them! They were dead!" Kelly held her close,
"It was just a hallucination. It wasn't real." He helped her up and walked to a side of the room, frowning deeply, "I should have known." Chloe came over,
"What is it?"
"It's an old fear curse." He said, "Basically it makes the person it comes across experience their worst fear. The one on this floor is pretty limited, and designed to only affect the first person. But I can sense it gets stronger as we go higher."
Quantic Jared shrieked a little, "That's horrible! Can I go?"
"No." Kagami said, "If I can do this in the condition I'm in right now, you can suck it up and deal." She walked over to the unfamiliar language on the walls, "How do you know about this?"
"Just assume that there is a Blackwell witch for everything." He shuddered, "Like, seriously, there were 284 witches, and some had multiple talents. Well, come on guys, second floor awaits."
"Um…" Joselyn looked up, "Assuming the first couple floors are first person only, and then increases until we're all screwed, we should probably rotate who goes first."
"No." Quantic Jared sat down, "You can't make me go up there." Psychic Jared huffed, throwing the smaller, younger, more innocent version of himself over his shoulder and walking up the stairs.
But Gizmo was already up there. She was walking around, perfectly fine.
"Hey guys. I don't think this room was cursed." Kelly gaped,
"No…it was. The fact you weren't bothered by an ancient spell worries me." Gizmo shrugged,
"Okay. Cool. Shall we continue?"
"Can we use Gizmo as human shield?" Kelly rolled his eyes,
"Well, yes. But the spell gets stronger, so second floor needs a second person." Joselyn raised a hand,
"I'll do it…"
"Alright." Kelly nodded to himself, "So we should probably make an order. There are twenty stories, eight of us—kwamis don't count—" Blazze pouted at that, sitting on Zoe's shoulder in kwami form, "After Joselyn, I'll go next, then Chloe, Adrien, Kagami, Chipmunk, Zoe, then Jared? Remember we all have to do this eventually."
"Are you sure we all have to do it?" Adrien asked. Kelly nodded,
"The spell will get stronger. You have no choice. But the sooner we get this over with, the better. And the last person up will have to spray the others with the squirt bottle."
"Can we get on with it?" Gizmo asked, "I don't like the smell of this place." She walked up the stairs and Joselyn sucked in a breath to follow.
…
Joselyn walked up the stairs, nervous about what she would find. Gizmo didn't seem bothered at all.
"Gizmo," she looked to her only friend her age, "Do you honestly not see anything?"
"I see something." Gizmo replied, "I see you getting hurt. Only reason I'm calm about it is my analytical ability. I could see it was fake. That and I knew I was the first person up the stairs. And there you are again." She gestured to a patch of ground, "So my singular fear can be handled since you're right next to me. So why burden the others?"
"I suppose you're right."
"Joselyn…" Joselyn whirled around and saw Iku staring at her.
Iku, was both a beautiful and a terrifying woman in her true, vessel-free form. She had long, layered black hair and eerily white skin, with sunken cheekbones. Her eyes were slanted and pure black, including her scleras. The satin black dress she was wearing glistened in the dimmed light, almost making it sparkle like the stars in the sky. It flowed like a river in an hour glass shape and the one strap gave it a sexy yet elegant look, which was odd because Joselyn could see her ribcage through it. Her nails were like daggers, or very shiny claws, kind of hard to tell which.
"I-Iku?" Joselyn backed up, before relaxing, "So I just have to deal with you more than usual? Lovely." Iku shrugged. On her own, her voice was silky and actually had an accent Joselyn couldn't place.
Iku grinned, revealing pointed teeth, "Oh Joselyn Dearest, you don't just deal with me. Back when I was young, people would sell anything to be in the place you are now." Gizmo wasn't batting an eye, and everyone else shrugged, because Joselyn didn't seem afraid, more annoyed,
"What happened?" She asked sarcastically, "Did you eat one too many souls?"
"No." Iku walked ahead of her, clicking her black heels against the stone, "My brother and I were split from one to two, and you know how people prefer the light."
"Because people like hope over despair." Joselyn snapped, and Iku turned, looking rather offended,
"Hope is harmony. A just heart, moving toward the light. That is all." She put her clawed index finger up like she was about to state a point, "Despair is hope's polar opposite. It is messy and confusing. It swallows up love, hatred, and everything else. Because not knowing where you will end up is despair. Despair is what even your friend Grace cannot predict. Only despair's unpredictability can save you from a boring future." She put her finger down and clasped her hands together, "However, mortals like predictable. Take a look at your sister over there," she gestured to Zoe, who was talking to Chloe about something or other, "She downright fears unpredictability. And because most creatures like to be predictable, she rarely finds it. It helps her that she's observant and can see shit coming from a mile away, so not much surprises her."
"So what is your goal?" She asked, "To spread despair to all? Because that sounds rather Junko Enoshima of you." Iku scoffed,
"Don't compare me to that video game's pathetic use of an antagonist. She did things with no reason, while even Grace McAllister—a girl with no true emotion until recently—has motives. And that isn't my goal at all." Joselyn realized in this moment that in the nearly three years of knowing about Iku's active existence, she had never asked what was probably the most important question.
"Does it have to do with you and Vita? He seems to still care and have been left with no choice." Iku sighed,
"I do miss my dear brother. When we were split into two, the Council of Deaths—in which Cradh is the only member of the current council that was around back then, since the others have been replaced many times over—used their respective powers to make myself and Vita think we were normal superpowered brother and sister, with no memory of our goal. I broke free first, and while Vita eventually remembered we were both immortal gods, he chose to follow the path of light. I didn't try to strike him down as the legend says, I was trying to persuade him and one of my men attacked him. He's been against me ever since, because that blow drained his power." She turned to Joselyn, patting her atop the head,
"I wish for balance, little warrior. A multiverse where light and darkness, hope and despair, are in perfect balance. No, not like Thanos, get that thought out of your head." She pulled up her sleeve and revealed the word carved into her arm identical to Joselyn, "I am not what you think I am." She walked over to Psychic Jared, running her claws across his cheek, making blood droplets fall, "With your help, I could create balance. But you need to let go of these mortals who hold you back."
"You are aware most of the people here are immortal, right?"
"Not to me. I have been around since the beginning of everything." She looked towards Zoe, "Other than the Worldbenders, I know for a fact I will outlive them. Lifespan of a Worldbender is still unknown because they either get killed early on or are still around. Though Worldbreakers tend to live around a hundred billon years, so I would assume Worldbenders are the same."
"What's the lifespan of a witch or warlock?" Iku placed a finger under her chin,
"Maybe you and I can get along when you can't punch a mirror. To answer the question, it depends on power. Eli will probably live for as long as his wife, assuming his bad luck doesn't get him killed first. The average witch lives a hundred thousand years, and a Blackwell witch can hit the million mark. Wait, why am I telling you this? I'm trying to convince you to let them die!" Joselyn groaned,
"Iku, if you want me to help you, you should stop trying to kill my family."
…
Kelly watched Joselyn talk to probably Iku for a bit. Gizmo didn't seem phased whatsoever, though that made sense due to her analytical ability and overall lack of emotion.
Looking at the stairwell to the fifth floor, he sucked in a breath, knowing it was his turn. He had a pretty good idea of what he would see.
He walked up the stairs and expected to see his kids dead or fighting to the death or something. But when he heard a different voice, he realized what was happening.
He had had nightmares of his children being hurt many times over the years, and it had evolved from fear to pure dread—which in his opinion was much worse. There was a fine line between the two, but it was apparently fine enough that he didn't need to watch his kids die for the umpteenth time.
That did not mean he liked what he saw in any way.
He opened his eyes and saw a little girl looking back at him. She was Italian looking and cute as hell, dressed in a primrose pinafore dress and soft first shoes kids wore, the ones they could still feel the ground in. Her dark hair was in pigtails and her soft brown eyes looked sad.
"You killed me." She said, crying, "I trusted you, why did you kill me? WHY?!"
Her name was Zoe Perez, the namesake of his eldest daughter.
"WHY?!" She asked, again and again, and Kelly covered his ears.
"I'm sorry!" He begged, "It was an accident!"
"I don't believe you."
Back when he first got his powers, he was trying to go to the grocery store to get soup, because Harrison had been dying from his illness, and Amelia was by his side with Tazri. He went to the store, and ran into a crying child, trying to find her mother—who she had lost track of in the park. He helped her find her mother, but there was too much noise and he lost control of his powers, making her forget how to breathe.
He did everything he could to help, and called the hospital, but she died before the ambulance arrived.
He wasn't charged with murder because no signs of foul play showed up, and he had been just as shocked as the mother. But he always lived with the knowledge he murdered an innocent little girl, and hadn't been able to get out of bed for days after that. And for a long time he thought his powers were evil, and it took many of the witches to convince him otherwise. But he never forgot that child, and the look of terror in her eyes as she died. Or the screams of her mother trying to help.
He ended up screaming, chanting "I didn't mean to, I'm sorry." over and over, until his eldest daughter grabbed the squirt bottle and sprayed him in the face. Then the ghost child was gone and he was able to compose himself, and found he had been being dragged up a couple stories.
"Dad? You okay?" She looked down at him with a worried expression. He smiled a little, but the little girl's words still rang in his head.
"I-I've been worse." He stood up, "That sucked. Good thing Gizmo and Joselyn don't have it too bad."
"Well Dad," Zoe said apologetically, "I'm gonna have to squirt you again in a minute. And…Chloe's next, right?"
"Yeah…" Chloe bit her lip, "I know I have to do this." Quantic Jared tried to squirm away again, but was held firm.
"Chloe, I can go first." Adrien offered, but Chloe looked towards Kagami, blushing, before going towards the stairs.
…
Chloe walked up the stairs and immediately saw her mother standing there grumpily.
"The only exceptional thing about you, my dear, is your mother. According to me, you have clearly demonstrated that there is nothing exceptional about you." Chloe growled, clenching her fist. Four years ago she would have sobbed and pleaded. She had buried her mother deep down, and asked her Dad to make her Mom believe she had died during the Mara attack—and Kelly had helped by wiping everyone's memory of Queen Bee's identity.
"Tell me, mother. What makes me not up to your standards?"
Audrey started counting off her fingers, "You're living without servants, you donate to charities, you've dated women and are currently in love with another, and now you're wearing that" she gestured to Chloe's hiking clothes, "hiking, and willingly risking your life for commoners who should mean nothing to you." Chloe slapped her,
"I am more exceptional than you'll ever be." She said firmly, "And they are my friends, and how dare you criticize my sexuality. I like girls, deal with it. I have a crush on Kagami, and I don't need your approval." She flipped her hair and moved along, not noticing Kagami gaping behind her.
Zoe was also impressed, "Damn Chlo." She smirked in Kagami's direction, "Why's your face red?"
"Pain in my horribly broken arm." Adrien smiled,
"Look at how much she's grown."
"Yeah." Kelly wiped the water and vinegar out of his eyes, "But it will get worse for all of us on the higher floors."
"Put me down!" Quantic Jared pleaded, "I'll just wait downstairs! I don't want to do this!"
"Nope, you are coming with us." Adrien looked to where Chloe was walking off, "So here's a game: how about we all face our fears! Gizmo has none—and that scares me—Joselyn is having a conversation with hers, we have the squirt bottle for Kelly, and Chloe just silenced her mother—or I would assume it was her mother—like a badass."
"Sounds fun." Kagami said, "Though something tells me that will be easier said than done."
"Yeah…" Kelly looked up, "Don't think anyone's made it to the top before." Zoe shrugged,
"We're already almost halfway up the tower. So far so good."
…
It was Adrien's turn next.
"Okay…Jos? Ya good?" They could only hear one half of the conversation, but it seemed she and whoever were discussing Marvel movies. Why? No idea.
"I'm fine—bad Iku!" Everyone turned to Psychic Jared, who had deep claw marks on his cheek.
"Wait, others fears can hurt you?!" Quantic Jared's attempts to escape got more desperate.
"I think it's just Iku." Psychic Jared said, looking at the blood on his hand, "Because Iku. But I didn't feel this at all, which is worrisome."
Adrien watched Gizmo investigate the new room, not caring after the curse at all, before stepping in.
"You know that if I do this, your son will no longer be the same." Adrien gasped as he found himself in the kitchen of the mansion, where Mara was standing with his father—before Naiad, and de-aging—and Gabriel smirked,
"I never cared about that brat anyway. Kill him for all I care, just get me those Miraculous!"
This was Adrien's fear. Like Kelly, losing Marinette had evolved from fear to dread, and he was used to it. This caught him off guard as he had been preparing for his wife's or even Plagg's corpse.
His father had told him he had had genuinely no idea what Mara was going to do, and it had been a dumb mistake in the heat of the moment. But even now, with his relationship pretty much mended, we still feared this was how it really went.
Still it had been his idea to face their fears, so he walked in a straight line, where he would hit the wall if he was really in the kitchen, but merely progressed to the next room. Though he did understand why Gizmo, Joselyn, and Chloe were no longer communicating with the rest of the team. The fear definitely sucked you in, even if you weren't afraid. It was also interesting how it focused in on personal fears and not something simple like arachnophobia.
Though as he went up the tower, the theoretical fears turned into actual memories of the bad times involving his father, including the Heroes' Day…
…
Adrien seemed okay enough, so it was Kagami's turn. Nobody on the team was sure whether to be apprehensive or relived that the fears weren't too bad. Quantic Jared had chosen apprehensive, and was fighting against the people dragging him with all the strength his scrawny body could muster up.
"I'm not gonna do it!" Quantic Jared pleaded, "I'll stay here! I am with you in spirit!"
"In spirit, huh?" Zoe rolled her eyes, still visibly shaken from what she had seen, but relived it wasn't real.
Kagami rolled her eyes, "Whatever, the sooner we finish this, the sooner I can get actual medical assistance for my arm." She walked up the stairs, and froze.
Gina was standing there, with the bullet wound in her head and a spirit-like glow around her.
"Why didn't you see it?" She asked, "You were so busy with other things that you didn't notice your friend fading away!" Kagami squeezed her eyes shut and covered her ears as best she could with a broken arm.
"It wasn't my fault." She muttered to herself, "I didn't see it, that's on me, but I didn't make you pull the trigger." She kept her eyes closed, and let Zoe spray her in the face with the squirt bottle.
"Iku! Bad!" They all frowned as Joselyn ran around the room, and then they saw the gun that should have been at Zoe's hip was floating around the room.
"So Joselyn's fear just removed Iku from her body?" Kelly asked, "Sweet."
"I'll keep in mind that you think Iku being free is a good thing when she's strangling me." Psychic Jared said sarcastically, "Kagami, you okay?" Kagami nodded,
"A little shaken, but I'm okay." Zoe refilled the squirt bottle,
"So shall we continue?" Quantic Jared shook his head, and Zoe ruffled his hair—by floating up to him, because he was significantly taller than her—" Puppy, don't be the one game at Chuck E. Cheese that isn't broken. Come on." When he shook his head again, she pulled a different card, "Alya would find it very brave." And then he was walking up the tower.
"Is Alya just gonna be our weapon against him?" Kagami asked, watching the young man go up the stairs for his turn.
"Pretty much." Psychic Jared frowned,
"Has anyone told him Nino exists?" There was a collective unsure pause.
"Well…shit."
…
Quantic Jared immediately regretted going up the stairs when he made it to the top. They were now on the eleventh floor, meaning over halfway, meaning something bad was gonna happen.
But he was shocked to find himself in his home. But the sky was black.
"Jared!" he turned and saw his parents and little sister tied up and bloody.
He had been told this wasn't real, but he felt so real, the cold air, the screams ringing in his head, so he ran to their side and started untying them.
"Get your sister out!" His mother pleaded, "Now!" He turned to Kaylee and started untying her. She looked up at him with terror in her eyes and the two started running.
"Where do you think you're going?" He turned and gasped, seeing Iku—possessing Joselyn completely—and saw the girl smirk, snapping her fingers. Kaylee screamed in pain and fell over.
Quantic Jared looked at Iku, glaring with tears in his eyes, "How could you?!"
Iku didn't answer, and was replaced with a squirt to the face from the water bottle.
"What was that…" he whispered, doing everything he could to not think about his sister, not wanting her to get dragged into this mess.
He was surprised to find himself being hugged by Kelly, but let himself cry for a minute, before coming back to reality.
"So yours sucked?" Zoe asked, and Quantic Jared sniffled, nodding. "My turn then." She said, helping him up, "But we are now 60% of the way up the tower. So let's go."
They walked up the stairs and Zoe had her eyes closed as she walked up, knowing what she would see.
…
And then they had landed on Psychic Jared's turn.
He found himself back in his personal hell, where he was a villain killing his friends and family. In the real world, he fell to his knees and started screaming, but he was seeing his loved ones die at his own hand and memories of the nightmares Kelly kept erasing the memory of came back full force.
For him, the squirt bottle didn't work, so Kelly and Zoe helped him up three flights of stairs, before he felt himself come back to reality a little, and saw his friends scream before falling to their knees.
The thoughts were accelerating inside his head. He want them to slow so he could breathe, but they wouldn't. His breaths came in gasps and Jared feel like he would black out. His heart was hammering inside his chest like it belonged to a rabbit running for its skin. The room spun and the small part of his brain still attached to the real world had him sit on the floor, trying to make everything slow to something his brain and body could cope with. I felt so sick. I didn't know who to call far, what's their name, who too call, too far away, they're gone, what number, too far away... blackness... creeping blackness...
He was on the floor in a ball. What's my name, who to call, what's the name, the stairs are too steep, the room is spinning…blackness...
And then he, like all the others who had experienced this moments before, passed out.
OoOoO
Morrigan watched Kelly and the others fall victim to the nightmare room, where they all fell asleep and were trapped in their personal nightmares. She couldn't help them now without revealing herself. But she knew someone who could, not that Kelly would like it.
…
"Kels! Wakey wakey!"
Kelly opened his eyes from a nightmare of his three daughters turning on each other and him being unable to calm them down, and watched them destroy each other, then Zoe Perez laughed at his suffering.
He blinked a few times before processing who he was looking at.
She has long black hair, which she had part of in a high bun and the rest down her back. Her eyes were pale grey-violet. Her outfit included a black cardigan over a white dress shirt, with both left open to the third button to expose the top of her light violet bra, a violet pleated miniskirt, and mid-sized black boots with platform heels and violet laces. She accessorized with a long tie that hung loosely around her neck half black and white with a prohibition sign on it, and a thin black choker. And she had a dull blue spirit-like glow.
"Oh good, you're up. The others will be up momentarily." Kelly blinked a few more times before squirting himself in the face with the water, but she was still there.
"Maya! What are you doing here?!"
"A 'thank you' would suffice." She said. Her voice was very high-pitched, but had a slight sense of maturity to it that was designed to lure you into a false sense of security.
Zoe woke up next and rubbed her eyes, followed by the others. Quantic Jared was the first person to ask the question they all wanted to ask,
"Who is that?! I'm still in the nightmare, but I want to know."
Maya waved, "I'm Maya, also known as the Pink Horny Ranger."
"Wait what." Came from everyone collectively. Kelly groaned loudly, his eyes changing from blue to a mix of brown and red, which translated to "I will kill myself or someone else in the next ten minutes"
"Don't question it." He said, "Maya, seriously, what are you doing here?" Maya crossed her arms.
"I am the witch of fear after all, so our Death sent me to help you assholes out in exchange for getting me some more Yaoi." Gizmo raised a hand,
"What's Yaoi?"
"You don't want to know." Came from everyone—including Joselyn—except a now put-out Maya.
"How are you projecting yourself?" Kagami asked, "We need to take you with us so I can run tests!" Gizmo brightened at that. Kelly shook his head frantically,
"Trust me, your patience will be at the end of its rope by the time we get up the last three flights of stairs." Maya flipped him off,
"I swear to god Kels, I am still pissed when you ruined my last pairing and you're lucky I died, otherwise I would have smothered you in your sleep!" Kelly huffed and walked up the stairs.
Fifteen minutes later
Everyone was at the end of their rope.
From asking if Adrien and Psychic Jared were a couple, to going on about the Yaoi she had read and watched, everyone was ready to be done with Maya. Kelly was covering Joselyn's ears while Zoe did the same to Gizmo. There had also been a one-sided conversation about the difference between Yaoi, Yuri, and straight porn.
They could not be happier when they got to the room with the stone—an Emerald apparently—in it.
"So who's taking the stone?" Adrien asked, "The options are Gizmo, Kagami, and Chloe. And I don't trust Gizmo." Gizmo crossed her arms grumpily. Chloe backed up,
"Uh…I just got sucked back into this and you didn't expect to see me. But Kagami, I'll do it if you don't want to." Kagami turned, smiling,
"The plan was for me to do it. So I will." She walked up and touched the stone with her good hand, falling to her knees as she absorbed the power.
And then the room froze over.
"Oh lovely." Kelly groaned, watching Maya who was reading something he didn't want to think about, "Controls over the elements. Fire, ice, and so on. Can we go now?"
"I want to come!" Maya said eagerly.
"No Maya, go away!"
"No!" Gizmo insisted, while Kagami was being helped up by Psychic Jared and Chloe, "We have to study her! Find out how she manifests herself!"
It was strange to see Kelly so annoyed and lacking in patience. But it made sense when they thought about it, since people you grow up with know how to push your buttons. And judging by the way Maya was smirking in his direction, that was exactly what she was trying to do. Also, spending even fifteen minutes with Maya said a lot about how he had grown up.
Joselyn looked in the direction her Dad had gone, before following him where he was summoning the jet to them.
The others followed not long after, and got into the jet. Maya was chatting cheerfully with Zoe about Kelly when he was younger.
The jet came down and they all got in, and Zoe was plotting a wicked and somewhat sadistic prank.
OoOoO
Aelin was looking out the window with Roxas through the large window—or listening to sounds. It was pouring outside.
She giggled, "There do be a rumbly rumbly rainy of death." Roxas nodded,
"Yes. A very spooky rumbly rumbly rainy of death."
"It is very much raining." Elaine agreed, "I was hoping to go play outside." Catra came into the play room—Zoe's old room was used as a play room for all the kids, and nobody touched the murder closet—with a bunch on mugs. Felix was studying history with Gavin at the desk.
"I have hot cocoa!" She said, being helped by Emma and Hugo to bring the tray in.
"Just don't leak it on my desk." Felix said.
"I will always leak it on your desk."
"But then I will have to…be…" he sighed, "no power."
"Are the grown ups back yet?" Emma asked yet. Gavin nodded a little,
"Well, Eden, Hana, and Marinette are back. I hear the others are frustrated at the words my magic spewed." For the most part, when shit like this happened, the kids took care of themselves other than Hana caring for them. They were responsible enough.
Danielle started making noises and clapping, "Mommy!" All the kids turned to the window where the jet was landing. She started crawling to the door when Felix picked her up, carrying both her and Amhar.
"No. As we already established, there is a rumbly rumbly rainy of death outside." That actually meant it was pouring and trees were falling and the power was failing.
The team came in, soaking wet, and they were all injured or shaken, and Kelly looked ready to die.
"Holy crap, Mom?! Guys?!" Felix put the babies down and sprinted down the stairs, "You're hurt!" Chloe gaped,
"Felix?!" Oh…right…
Zoe looked to her son, "Oh yeah, Chloe, Felix is a Nephilim. So Fe, can you heal Chipmunk and Kagami?" Felix nodded and healed them both with a proud smile.
Eden came down the stairs next with Hana, who was holding Amhar. Zoe gaped at her little sister,
"Damn sis. Someone got a makeover." Eden smiled,
"You like it?" Zoe nodded, and then took Amhar from Hana.
"Jared…" she managed to turn her expression somber, and made sure to put mental shields up. When Psychic Jared was more experienced with his powers, he would be able to break through with ease, but she was going to embrace it while she could, "You need to meet someone."
Psychic Jared looked at the dark haired baby in confusion, "A kid?"
"Your kid. Meet Amhar Brock, your son." Kagami squinted, Adrien and Kelly tried their best not to laugh, Joselyn was confused, Gizmo was already looking at Felix and didn't care, and Chloe and Quantic Jared actually believed this. Hana and Eden looked to each other, but neither denied the statement. Zoe could sense that Kagami was just unsure.
Psychic Jared looked at the baby with the utmost, speechless horror, and nobody was paying attention to the ghost hacking into one of the computers,
He was silent and gaping for about five minutes, and Amhar just smiled at him, because he genuinely had no idea who his parents were.
Eventually, Psychic Jared managed to get out a singular word,
"WHAT?!"
A/N: And now Zoe has decided to give her nephew to Jared to see what happens. Maya will be more established, because Morrigan isn't going to be getting rid of her for a bit, just in case another fear curse shows up.
As usual, remember to review!