DREA

Drea had never been so glad to see her dad in her life. He was holding her a little too tight though. Still, the fear of not knowing when or how the fighting would stop was fading as he rubbed her back. She was safe now. That was certain.

Her head was pounding on one side, her ribs aching, and the hand the bear had slashed was entirely numb. She thought about squirming so her dad would loosen his grip on her, but at the same time the mere idea of doing so took a lot of effort. Something warm and wet trickled down the side of her head.

Summoning her reserves, she moaned. "Myyyy facccce is wet. Daaaaad- yourrrr squishinggg mmmeee. It'ss wettt. Myyy faceee." Each word seemed to stick to her tongue. Her stomach rolled and her blood flashed hot. Her dad looked down at her, but he was blurring into doubles, the wet stuff dripping into her eye.

Then she was being moved, a blast of night air easing her nausea, only to be snuffed out as a door opened and bright lights had her burying her face in her dad's shirt.

PHOENIX

Phoenix put the kettle on, seeking to spend the evening in what would hopefully be insightful reflection.

Jive

She found the joy of Scout's recovery somewhat soured by their lack of progress finding the missing children.

Sensuality

They kept hitting one dead end after another.

Frenzy

And anyone who might know anything wouldn't speak to them.

Smooth

Sappho had come up dry on all technology-based leads. In the event that any of the kids had traceable tech it was always dumped and destroyed before it could get them anywhere and they never disappeared from places with working security cameras or streetlights.

Flow

Medusa had fared no better. Any fresh trails always vanished into crowds or vehicles and the kids, if they deviated from their usual patterns, went to a variety of places that weren't unusual for kids their age to go.

Essence

And the unbidden voice only offered random jumbles of words until she wanted to scream at it to shut up if it wasn't going to make sense. Not that she planned to. All doing so had ever accomplished in the past was to make her look like a crazy lady arguing with the voices in her head.

The kettle began to whistle and she pulled it from the burner. Before she could pour it, the door flew open and Aries charged in.

"Mama, are you home?"

"Kitchen." She called out.

Raph barreled in after him with Andrea in his arms. He swept the plastic tablecloth off the battered dining room table and laid her down.

All other concerns faded into the background as she stepped in to examine her granddaughter.

Bruises, some severe, but no broken bones.

Cuts, mostly superficial, although a few were concerningly deep.

No serious internal damage.

A sedative flowing through her veins.

It was already fading from her system though.

The concussion...now that was a problem, but Andrea had come to her soon enough that she could fix it before any real harm resulted. Not like Anton.

Reaching out her hands, she felt the familiar crawling tingle of her power transferring from her body to Andrea's, healing her.

ZOE

Zoe sprinted to the warehouse with cheetah speed, feeling a minor sting of guilt at leaving her sister's three-fourths of the way through cleaning up a mess that she made. But they'd shooed her on, insisting it was okay.

She burst through the door, following the tether pulling her in. She spied Andrea, her head on Raph's shoulder as she rested. She appeared fine, her senses didn't throw up any flares. Phoenix was sitting in the arm chair.

Aries was standing as if he were ready to leave. "I was just going upstairs to do some parenting myself." He hugged her in greeting. "Drea's going to be fine." When he squeezed her again, Zoe knew she shouldn't, but Aries only reached for her like this when something weighed on his mind; she was about to search his emotions when he suddenly released her, chiding. "Uh-uh, Sister. You know better. Worry about Drea. And let's do lunch, we can talk instead."

His wooly eyebrows lifted and dropped as he turned for the stairs, pausing to exchange a knowing look with Raph. "Later."

Raph nodded.

Zoe set her eyes on Drea. "What happened?" She knelt beside her daughter and her husband, running her hand over Drea's brow.

Drea sighed, opening her eyes. "I'm fine, Mom."

"I can see that." Zoe rested on her haunches beside the couch. "But what happened?"

Her daughter frowned. "One of my friends was attacked in the mall parking garage, last night. I went there- "

Raph, as if suddenly finding his voice, twisted to look at her. "You did what? That's real smart, Andrea!"

Drea sat up, scooting away from him. "You know what, if you're just going to yell at me then let's just go home."

"No!" Raph barked. "You don't tell me what to do, that's my job. Especially if yer makin' shit decisions like goin to the place someone you know was attacked! That's askin' for trouble!"

Zoe sighed as her husband and daughter glared at each other. "Okay! Okay! Raph- "

"No, Z! I found her in a damn cage fight! And I know she didn't sign up for it. So-" His head pivoted towards their daughter. "Somebody better start talkin."

One of Andrea's eyebrows popped up as she crossed her arms. "Well, I would, but you keep yelling every time I say something."

"Fine!" Raph yelled.

"Fine!" Andrea yelled back.

"Not fine." Zoe corrected. "We haven't learned anything yet. So-" She pointed to Raph, "you wait until she's finished."

Raph's lip curled but he was quiet.

Zoe shifted her focus to Drea. "You, talk."

"My friend said she'd broken out a tail light on the van that tried to take her. It had Marcos on the side. So, I went there lookin for the van."

Raph began to tremble and Zoe, without looking away from Drea, shook her head. He exhaled in a huff.

"The club bodyguards attacked me then someone drugged me. I woke up in the cage with a mutant bear. Then I fought a panther and Dad saved me." Drea shrugged. "That's it."

Raph snorted. "That's it." His teeth ground together so hard Zoe could hear it. "That's it. No big. Just an abduction that led to an underground cage fight." His beak wrinkled as he sneered. "That's it."

Then he moved so fast even Zoe hadn't seen it coming; into Andrea's face. "Don't you ever, ever scare me like that again. Got it? You come ta me. No matter who, no matter what. Understand?" His voice wavered. His hands trembled as he yanked her to him. "Never again, Andrea."

Drea meeped as he squeezed her.

"Raph, you're squishing her." Zoe put a hand on his bicep, releasing calming energy into him.

"Stop it, Z." He groused, letting Drea go, but he wasn't done with her. "You can still teach the class, but- "

"You're a hypocrite, Dad." Andrea cut him off, shaking her head. "I'm fifteen. What were you doing at fifteen, hm? What I was trying to do tonight wasn't any different."

"Listen ta me, Andrea," Raph reached out, guided her around to face him. "It's different in a lot of ways. We were fighting just to live."

"You still fight." Drea grumbled under her breath.

Raph nodded, his eyes stern. "So, you don't have to. Now you let me finish. You get to teach. We meet with Leo in the morning. But, other than that you check in at every location change and you're grounded from everything else, until you can show us better judgment."

He reached out to rumple her hair, but she ducked her head away and his fingers closed as he masked his hurt. "I'm not losin' you. So mad or not, that's how it is." He stood and looked at Phoenix. "Thanks, Mom."

CHANE/ARIES

Chane lay on her bed, methodically working her way through a page of math problems. The repetitiveness of the process made the exercise kind of Zen-like.

A knock at her door caused her to look up and find her dad leaning against the frame. "So, Leo says you're quite busy with some legal activism?"

Her eyes widened. "Uncle Leo? That took a winding route."

He crossed his arms. "Planning on clueing me in at some point?"

She flopped on her back and let out a breath. "I sued for legal emancipation."

He frowned. "We talked about this. It makes more sense to be patient. There's no winning and you'll just antagonize her."

"I know. That's why I did it." Chane explained to the ceiling.

Aries arched an eyebrow. "You did it to antagonize your mom?"

She turned her head to face him. "No. Because I couldn't win, no matter how much I deserved to."

He moved to seat himself next to her. "I think you're going to have to explain that one."

She sat up. "The lawsuit I'm going for is to challenge those biased and unfair judgements for everyone. Not every child has the luxury of patience that I do. Someone has to stand up for them."

Mixed with pride and worry, he managed a halfhearted smile.

"I would've told you eventually." She offered. "I just wanted you to have some plausible deniability when mom came for you."

He chuckled. "I think you're giving her credit for more sensibility than she deserves."

Chane nodded seriously. "That's probably true."

He shook his head. "Don't worry about it. You've got enough on your plate. Leave your mom to me."

She smiled. "Thanks, dad."

He nodded and got up. "No problem. Just keep me in the loop from now on, ok?"

She smiled. "Got it."

Aries looked down into the common living area. Now it was time to take Mama up on her longstanding offer to do something about Ana.