Woooo, another one down. Really short compared to all the others but it's late and I just want these damn things updated with something. So here we are.

Just finished, so it's not perfect by any means so please excuse the mess. Either way, enjoy!

"I'm a daddy..."

Never before had he ever thought he would have actually enjoyed the taste of those words on his tongue, ever feel this way about holding a child of his own making in his arms the way he was now as he cradled his newborn son in his arms fondly.

He was so small, so perfect in every way possible. How could he ever show his gratitude for something so precious that had been given to him, against all odds?

He was a daddy, his reservations about it seemingly gone with the wind as those tiny crimson eyes blinked and stared into his own. What he wouldn't do, or give, to protect him with all his being now.

Daddy. The word, the concept, always seemed so foreign to him until now. Granted he still had no clue how to be one, not yet, but he was always a fast learner and he had mother hen himself there to help him along with Tala beside him.

He hadn't ever really had the desire to expand their family, now that it had, he wouldn't have traded it for the world.

Until Ray breathed out, "I'm sorry."

Kai couldn't blame him, not after the thousands of times he had been so against this very situation. But it wasn't Ray's fault, it was his own. Yet he wouldn't dare call what he held and guarded in his arms a mistake by any means.

"Don't be." He shook his head at Ray on the bed, "It's going to be okay."

His own words echoed in his head, like a bad nightmare as everything he had ever held dear and loved came crashing down in a blazing inferno on those screens he was forced to watch.

Ray, Tala… Kain, his entire world. They were on that helicopter as it was blown and ripped apart. While inside his chest he felt something snap, unable to hold it in nor did he want to right now.

The collar around his neck shocked him though the pain was barely a dull roar, his heat surging along his skin to the point it made the thick and moldy air around them quiver.

Whatever restraint he had to hold Black back he let go of willingly, what more did he have to lose when his everything was now gone? It wouldn't bring them back, he knew that, but the release he needed would be satisfaction enough if he could wipe that smug grin on Anette's painted lips clean off.

His shoulder blades began to itch, the familiar swell of immense heat collecting within the center of his chest as the collar around his neck short circuited out and began to melt against heated his skin. When the black wings finally erupted through flesh and fabric he let out a pained cry, the color of his eyes flicking rapidly from red to black until the coal color overtook to the point his pupils disappeared inside it.

What happened after that he couldn't recall when he finally woke up, the collar being replaced with a new one that dug into his skin tighter than the first. A heavy weight pulling on his back that he soon came to realize were his wings that he had no clue how to retract, though the crimson in his eyes had come back as he looked about the room he had been stashed away inside of.

He knew this room, knew it all too well once his memories had returned to him years ago. It had been his, when he lived in the Abbey, the stone walls still stained with his blood when he was a child, along with the tally marks he had etched into the wall with rocks where his bed had been pushed against that was still there; though it was now broken and worn down from the years gone by. The addition were the chains on the ceiling, keeping his arms suspended over his head as his feet were left touching the ground along with the tips of his wings dragging behind him.

With the collar back on his neck in working order, the chill of the air bit into his exposed skin, they having tied a sheet just under the collar around his neck that only covered his chest and stomach since his shirt had ripped apart from his wings. The cold air seeping between the thin fabric against his front, while also blowing through the front of it where it felt as though he was being pinned in every direction by blocks of ice.

It didn't matter how times he tried to call his heat to him, actually losing count in trying so hard and for so long, since it didn't come to him at all that he was left in a more weakened state than when he had first woken up after the collar sent shocks through his neck each time and the teeth embedded into him deeper. How they had managed to suppress Dranzer on top of Black's powers he didn't know, though it was clear Anette had covered all her bases. She was still one step ahead of them all.

As he was left to hang there from the ceiling and the chains that cut into his wrists which weren't healing like they should due to the collar voiding out his powers, his mind took him back to the images of the helicopter coming down after being hit with a missile. The fire and the wreckage that it had turned into was more than anything the others would have been able to survive, everything he had tried to protect his entire life was gone just like that and he had no idea on how to even stop Anette now on his own. Or even if he could.

Tears ran down his face as his head hung limply, his chin resting on his chest as the tiny needles sticking into his skin around his neck bit into him tighter with the movement though he ignored the pain best he could. There was a throbbing in his head, from when he had fallen and hit the stone floors after collapsing, yet couldn't remember having even done so.

However long he had been left to suspend in the air in his cell and the events that had led up to him being placed in there was nothing but a dark haze, while the last things he could remember was something he'd rather forget.

At the sound of heels clacking along the stone floors coming towards the cell doors, his head shot up as his eyes narrowed when Anette stepped up on the other side of the door.

"Good morning, I trust you slept well?" She cooed, though there was something in her eyes that Kai caught onto despite the smug tone she displayed.

"Oh, don't look at me like that. What, was I just supposed to let them get away?" She continued after not having gotten a response from her first question.

Trying to call his heat to him again Kai bit his lip as the collar around his neck sent a shock into his system, and once more he couldn't call anything to him while being reduced to look into those eyes that mirrored his own.

"Though…" Anette continued as that look in her eyes Kai had caught onto earlier grew in strength, until she turned away from him and leaned her back against the cell bars that made up his door.

"I guess I should inform you that the mission failed, of course we're looking into what happened but they're alive." She explained in an angry tone, Kai able to feel her heat starting to seep into the cold air around them.

Kai's eyes widened at the revelation, his once shattered heart mending instantly at her words. They were alive…

"For now…" Anette spoke over his thoughts, her voice grating against his eardrums. "We can only assume they're run off to that village of Kon's, I'd ask you where it is but even you don't know where it's at. So… What do we do now, little brother?" She asked as she spun around against the cell bars, taking hold of them as she stared into the darkened room at him.

"Black is awake, but of course you don't know how to control him which is another hurdle we have to step over. Feathers is on the mend, but even he seems reluctant to help me now." She seemed to pout at him, all the while Kai just continued to glare at her as he grit his teeth tightly.

"Though of course he would let something as silly and fickle as love to get in his way, he wasn't raised with the same principles we were raised on. Then again, look at where that pesky little feeling got you. And look at where it's gotten them."

"Do you have a point, to any of this?" Kai cut over her, his voice rumbling out of his cold chest.

"Yes, actually if you cared to listen." Anette seemed to mock back, "See, it seems like you're overdue for a lesson again. I don't need you to control Black as I can do that well on my own, but first we have to get rid of those pesky little feelings inside you." She smirked.

Hours had gone by that they were reduced to sitting and staring at one another, Tala's arms full of Kain curled up on his lap and sleeping against his chest. Ray was beside him though they hadn't said a word to one another since boarding the helicopter that had taken them to safety, all the while the others muttered and whispered to one another over the sound of the propellers whirring outside and keeping them in flight.

The longer Ray sat there, his arms pressed into his chest and his nails digging into his skin, the more of his anger continued to boil and bubble. A small, very small, part of him was only relieved they had been able to get away by the skin of their teeth. Of course, if it wasn't for the rat currently sitting on the other wall of the helicopter across from him, then they wouldn't have needed to call in a second helicopter to start with and use up energy they barely had to make it seem like they had boarded it and sent it flying off. Thankfully they could control it by remote, nobody had to die in the fiery inferno, but Helicopters weren't cheap and the fact there had been a rat sitting there around them all along continued to fuel his anger.

He couldn't even say he was surprised it had been him, apparently all along it seemed too. Tala had said a word, barely spared him a second glance once they had settled and they had already been up in the air on their way for the past four hours; far enough away from Anette and her Savages. It was tempting to throw him off, be done with him, but Ray wanted to know why.

Why, after everything he had already done to help them, help Kai, would Bryan turn around and work for her? Betray his closest friends, people he claimed to love. None of the answers seemed good enough, not to Ray and he was sure Tala felt the same and why he chose to hold Kain in order to keep from lashing out.

If they thought just because he was pregnant that meant he wasn't going to snap at some point, they were dead wrong, and after another had gone by with seven more to go, he snapped.

The sound of thunder outside shook them all inside the metal helicopter, jarring some of them awake and startling the others as they were preparing to wave out a thunderstorm they thought they were currently flying into, until they noticed the slit golden eyes and the fangs being bared.

"Ray…" Tala sighed, shifting an arm from under Kain's small body and touching his shoulder where Ray jerked out from under his touch.

Bryan didn't look away from him the moment his eyes locked with Ray's, having prepared for this moment though if he was honest, he was surprised it had only taken this long before someone demanded an explanation and he had them. He was prepared, as he also had saved their lives in the end as well.

"Listen, I did it to help." He started in a calm tone, his eyes flicking to Tala who turned and looked away from him. Unable to ignore the sting that settled in his chest from such a simple movement.

"If it wasn't for me then we'd all be dead, I know that doesn't fix anything but at least we're alive."

"Don't give me that bullshit! 'Oh I save you, so be grateful'." Ray snapped back sarcastically with a roll of his eyes, "If you were any help, then we wouldn't need to be running hundreds of miles away. We wouldn't be needing to leave KAI!" He roared out with another clash of thunder outside.

"So WHY?! Why would you work alongside her?!" He demanded in a growl.

"Ray…" Tala tried again as Kain flinched in his hold and started to stir.

"It was to help you!" Bryan yelled back, "She promised to fuse me so I took it, I took it so I could actually be useful against her. She sent me those emails, I gave them to Tala and Kai to help, everything I've done has not been for her but for them!"

Ray scoffed back at him, "Why would she approach you? She got something out of it too, so what did you give her?"

"I approached her." Bryan corrected; his eyes once more moving from Ray to Tala who had started to chew on the inside of his cheek while still not looking his way.

"I approached her after the Orlando incident, because we almost lost Tala. When Kai had asked me to start digging up any information that I could I was able to hack into the BBA's files a long time ago, saw she was on your database as well as theirs. I put two and two together and approached her. Telling her I wanted to be fused and she could use me how she saw fit. But I swear, it was to help you when you needed it."

"We needed your 'help' months ago!" Ray countered, "Where was this 'help' you're spouting off about? Where were you when people were dying, when Tyson was being held captive for five months!?"

Bryan shook his head, a sigh passing his lips as he rubbed at his face. "The Fusion process wasn't done yet; I was still useless to you all. If I came out, as a double agent against her, then it would have ended badly for all of you. None of you would be sitting right here right now if it wasn't for me keeping my mouth shut until it was time."

Ray clenched his teeth, shifting angrily where he sat. Bryan's explanations, his excuses, just weren't enough to calm his anger. Right now, they were missing Kai and no amount of excuses were ever going to be enough to forgive Bryan for keeping this from them.

"You don't understand…" Bryan started against the silence that slowly began to creep in around them, "She has an army, as she says, of Savages that can span and overtake in a matter of hours. None of you were ready for that, if I slipped and she caught on then she was going to release them into the world all at once. It would have been a blood bath."

Shivers ran down all their spines at his chilling words, their mouths hanging open as their eyes grew wide.

"Are these ones like the others, where they just get back up?" Mariah asked in a petrified voice.

Bryan nodded, "It's because she's been infusing her blood into them, now that she has Kai… It's possible she can make the Savages immortal."

"You're joking…" Max breathed in pure shock, "And if she has an army of them…"

"I know what I did was wrong, but I have information we can use against her. I know where she is, I know how we can get Kai back before the eight years of Brooklyn's vision are up." Bryan explained as he once more locked eyes with Ray.

Ray considered the offer, angrier than what he had been before though kept his mouth closed and gripped his arms tighter. He wanted nothing from him, even after learning everything because nothing was going to fix the mess they all had created.

At the silence Bryan looked back to Tala who still refused to look at him, "Please."

Tala grit his teeth, holding Kain to his chest tighter as his shoulders began to shake. He hadn't said anything because he wasn't sure if there was anything to say to him. Bryan had been his closest friend all his life, had kept one another surviving when they lived on the streets before Boris picked them up and then in a way adopted the others under their care. At one point in his life he was sure he loved Bryan, like how he loved Kai and Ray, but had never dared pursued it.

Everything that was slowly coming to light cut in deep, a lot deeper than he was currently letting it show while all the times they could have done something sooner to stop this from happening played out in his mind even with the threat of Anette's army.

Maybe there really was nothing they could do before, but if that was the truth then what could they possibly do now? So Bryan was Fused but that was just one body replacing the one they lost, there were the others Ray had spoken of and contacting but it wasn't as impressive as an army of immortal Savages; or Kai and Black Dranzer.

No matter which way Tala currently looked, they were outnumbered and there wasn't a damn thing they could do about it.

"Just shut up…" Tala sighed as his eyes finally met Bryan's in the silence of the helicopter, locking on where the two of them could see the hurt within the other's souls.

Bryan nodded, sitting back and keeping his mouth closed like Tala had commanded. The others around them doing the same, Ray's tense shoulders barely relaxing as his pupils slowly dilated back. It was a long flight home.

"Watch his head." He heard a familiar voice remind him, the picture he saw coming in and out of focus with a white haze to it. His arms were heavy with something in his hold, and there was a feeling in his chest that he couldn't ignore; happiness.

The haze around the vision began to clear, everything coming back into focus as he was hit with the scenery of Ray's hospital room and the bundle in his arms that stared up at him with bright crimson eyes and a pale squishy face.

His heart melted all over again, pulling the newborn to his chest and kissed the top of his head as he cradled his neck to support his head.

"See, you're catching on." Ray's voice was still slightly distorted, but he knew it was him. The memory coming back to him slowly.

"When can we take him home?" Kai asked, that was all he wanted to do now. Just go home with his son and the two loves of his life, enjoy the time they could have together before he was thrown back into the fray.

"Should be able to leave by tonight, they said they wanted to run some more tests." Ray smiled at him, though he didn't know why he suddenly felt like he missed that smile when he had just seen it a few minutes ago.

"Okay…" Kai nodded back, kissing his son's forehead again as he felt tears in his eyes without reason.

Why was he so sad now when he was happy just a second ago? It didn't make sense, he was ready to have them both back home with him and Tala, so what was with the water works?

Holding Kain closer to his chest the weight in his arms began to fade, as if Kain was slowly vanishing as Ray's voice became distorted again to the point it just sounded like broken radio static. His face that had been buried in the babes thin dark hair shot up, no longer standing in the hospital room as the scene began to dissolve around him like wet paint running down a wall.

"Ray? Ray?!" He called though the moment the name passed his lips he put on a confused face at himself, did he know a Ray?

The name was familiar but there was no face that came with it.

As the hospital room's colors and walls continued to run and fade, a terrible pain hit him in the side of his head as a sudden heat began to stretch out from the center of his chest and down his back, arms, and legs.

Fisting the slate in his hair with his hands as his teeth clenched, Kai's knees buckled slightly, the pain and heat reaching everywhere as he struggled against it, struggled to control it.

"No, it's your turn to get up. I've been up with him all night, he's your son." That familiar, almost distant voice came back through his head, the pain beginning to ebb away slightly with it.

He… He had a son?

"Alright, Alright I'm up." He responded as if it were an automatic response.

Pushing himself off a bed he'd suddenly found himself laying on, the air feeling lighter around him as he was fitted with a small crying baby in his hold once more.

"I can't get him to calm down, maybe you can."

"What makes you think I can?" He questioned, rocking the babe in his arms in an attempt to soothe.

Was this his son? …When did he have a son? He never wanted children…

Wet streaming crimson eyes looked into his confused and dry ones, the haze that had settled around him again leaving as they stared at one another as the pieces clicked back into place with a name coming in and out of his hearing; as if someone was whispering it too quietly in his ears until it echoed away and came back.

Kain.

Everything snapped back into place instantly, the earlier distortions coming back and fighting against the haze until it vanished completely and everything that had started to fade away smacked into him. With it a blinding white light hit him in the face, the heat fading again until he was left with the cold air biting into his skin.

Anette frowned as Kai's eyes snapped open, having been putting him under for the past hour with little progress until they had began to pump him with more memory suppressors. At first it seemed to be working, his body had stopped fighting it and she was sure she had him until something went wrong. Now, all that progress they had made was for nothing as she could clearly see the hate in his eyes as he glared at her hard from where he was laid out and strapped on a metal table.

A clunky headpiece was fitted over Kai's head, wires sticking out and running into three computers along the walls of the new room they were in. An IV was shoved into the crease of his arm, feeding him the sedative that had knocked him out hours earlier but had been cut off for some time.

"He… He pulled out of it…"

Anette narrowed her eyes at the scientist that had the gall to inform her of what she could clearly see before her, a ball of fire formed in the palm of her hand. With the air quivering around her, the ball of fire shot out as she threw it at the computer the man was sitting in front of. It quickly bursting into flames and black smoke as the screen cracked and shorted out on itself, the flames staying on the monitor as the desk and wires were left untouched.

With a startled yelp the man jumped off his wooden stool, backing away as the flames grew in strength with sweat beading down his face.

"Then fix it!" Anette scorned.

"Y-yes ma'am." The three scientists all nodded quickly at her, the flames on the computer fading out to nothing but a small wisp of smoke rising into the air.

"It's a flawed system." Kai voice as Anette began to turn away from the room.

"Excuse me?" She asked, peering over her shoulder at him.

Kai scoffed at her, "What you're trying to do, suppress my memories of them. It won't work, it's flawed. Always has been since Boris came up with it."

"Oh?" Anette smirked as she turned back to face him, stepping up to where he was laid out on the metal bed.

"How so? They were able to suppress your memories of this place before."

"And it didn't last, it's a flawed system." Kai repeated with a dull look, "I got out of it before, this one won't be any different."

"Ah, but you see. It may not have lasted, but it lasted long enough." Anette cooed, "And that's all we really need, isn't it?"

"Can keep trying, but I doubt you'll get far." Kai taunted back.

"We'll see." Anette smirked as she turned away from him, "Until then, enjoy the show." She waved over her shoulder at him as she left, the door closing behind her.

Kai swallowed the bile he felt rising in his throat as he watched the door swing close, his eyes darting towards the men who worked for Anette as they scrambled around one another to start the system back up and put him under again. For the first time in his life, he felt a complete wash of dread sweep over him. He had no way out of this.

Big shout out to Roy who gave me the idea of suppressing Kai's memories of the others in order for Anette's plans to work out in controlling Kai and Black. Wouldn't know what I'd do without you love, so thank you for that.
See ya'll in 2020!