Chapter 43
War bound
At the institute
Dean was in his room, pacing back and forth, alone thoroughly thinking how he was going to deal with his current situation.
The half-bloods had scheduled to meet at the hideout today to discuss what they would do concerning the murder of Jon's mother.
They promised they would help Jon with his search, Dean in particular. When he makes a promise he always keeps it.
It had been a couple of days since the incident with Jon's mother and Jon seemed to grow a bit angrier every day.
Dean heard a knock on his door, "Come in"
Rogue walked in, "Hey"
"Hey" Dean said not giving her his full attention.
Rogue noticed that something was troubling him, "Something on your mind?"
"You can say that again" Dean said pacing back and forth.
Rogue sat down on his bed, "Well what is it?"
Dean felt compelled to explain his situation to Rogue since he hasn't told anyone yet. He was considering telling Jean but he's afraid she might freak out or something. Rogue on the other hand, he feels comfortable with, plus it would help to have an outside opinion.
"It's a weird situation" Dean said. He told her everything that happened to him that day.
"Wow...that's awful" Rogue said sincerely.
"And I'm worried that Jon might do something he'll regret if we find the killer" Dean said.
"Well if and when you find the killer, you're gonna have to make sure he doesn't" Rogue said.
Dean pinched the bridge of his nose, "That's what I'm afraid of. I don't wanna be responsible for that because I might not want to stop Jon" he said speaking the truth.
Dean is not one for showing mercy to killers, his experience with Mystique kidnapping his mother should prove that.
Rogue got up, "Well if you're trying to help him be good then you have to"
Dean looked at the time, "I'll keep that in mind, I gotta run" he ran out the door full speed without saying another word.
Rogue sighed, 'I hope everything works out'
At the hideout
Jon, Tim and Billy were sitting outside the hideout waiting for Dean.
Jon was pacing back and forth stomping the ground as he did, "Where is he?"
"He said he'll be here" Tim said.
"Well what's taking him so long?" Jon asked sounding aggravated.
"Dean does have a life beyond that of a half-blood Jon, just sit down and wait" Tim said.
Jon took a seat and started tapping his foot. Eventually the ground started shaking from his hard foot tapping.
"Jeez man can you cut that out?" Billy complained.
John gave him a look that said, Make me
"Or you can just keep doing it, either way is fine by me" Billy was intimidated by that look.
"Who's making quakes?" Dean asked popping in.
"Finally" Jon said getting up, "What took you so long?"
"I got caught up thinking about this whole thing, sorry" Dean said, "So where do we begin?"
Jon came forward, "I need to know who is responsible for my mother's death, I won't rest until I do. If you guys really want to prove that you're my friends, then you'll help me"
"I think we all agree to help you, right?" Dean looked at Tim and Billy and they both nodded in agreement.
"Then we have to analyze any clues we have at the moment and continue from there" Tim said.
"So what do we got?" Billy asked.
"Well for starters your mother was the wife of a very rich man" Dean said to Jon, "It's possible that he could have enemies that wanted to either kill or hurt him in some way. You should go talk to your stepdad about that"
Jon's face grew angrier with only the mention of his step father, and it only got worse when he realized that Dean was right and he would have to have a serious conversation with him.
"Billy, you should search the streets for anyone that knows anything about this" Dean told him.
"Got it, I'll even send out a few of my boys too" Billy said.
"Good thinking" Dean said.
"I could go to the police and find out whatever they've figured out already" Tim said.
"How are you going to do that?" Dean asked.
"Don't worry, I have my ways" Tim said with a smirk.
"Alright then, I think I'll go back to where the first incident happened and see if there's any clues we've missed" Dean said, "We've all got our objectives, so keep in touch and we'll meet back here in a few hours"
They split up and all went their separate ways.
At the AIM building
Dean was outside the AIM building where the first assassination attempt happened. He looked at where the bullet hit and he tried to remember the exact position where Jon and his mother were standing.
'Hmm that's weird. Unless I'm wrong, from where they were standing the shooter would have missed Jon's mother. But that can't be right, it was a clear shot, how could he possibly miss?' Dean thought.
He went up to the roof where the shooter was standing and it was obvious that this was a good vantage point for a kill. Not easily noticed, perfect view of the AIM building, so what went wrong?
Dean couldn't have been that big of a distraction. He ended up with more questions than answers since he got here. Maybe Jon had better luck finding something out from his stepfather.
Dean was walking towards Mr. Forson's office when Jon kicked the door down and came stomping out.
"YOU BETTER NOT COME BACK IN HERE!" Mr. Forson yelled out.
"OR WHAT!" Jon yelled as he left.
Dean just stood there not knowing what to say, "Ummm, Jon? Did he tell—"
"He doesn't know anything!" Jon said leaving the area.
'I better not get in the middle of this right now' Dean made his way to Jon's room, or what used to be Jon's room before he moved out. Jon refused to ever sleep in there again.
Even though the room had been cleaned of all the blood the room still stunk of death. Of all places for her to die, it had to be the one place Jon slept and had all his things in.
'Come to think of it, that is a bit strange, why was she in here at that time of night?' Dean thought, 'Wouldn't she be in bed or doing something else in the dozens of other rooms they have here? And after the first attempt wouldn't Mr. Forson increase security so something like this never happens again?'
Dean went to leave when his nose picked up something peculiar. He followed it to the vent in the upper right corner of the room, he took off the vent cap and smelled something…poisonous maybe? Not exactly poison but something that would affect a normal human weirdly or his nostrils would be flaring right now.
"What are you doing?" he heard behind him.
Dean looked back and saw Mr. Forson standing there, "The vent cap was loose so I was putting it back on" he put it back on.
Mr. Forson eyed him carefully, "What was your name again? Dean was it not?"
"Yes, sir" Dean answered.
"If you're searching for Jon, you won't find him here" He said assuming Dean was looking for him.
"Mr. Forson, can I ask you a personal question?" Dean asked.
Mr. Forson seemed sort of surprised at that, "Go right ahead"
"Why do you and Jon hate each other?" Dean asked him.
"Hate is a strong word" He tried to talk his way out of this, "Me and Jon don't hate each other we just—"
"With all due respect sir, I'm young but not stupid, there's something going on between you two" Dean said.
Mr. Forson was surprised at how fast Dean picked things up, "Walk with me"
Dean obliged.
"When I first met Jon's mother I thought she was perfect for me. Beautiful, Strong, independent, loyal, just what I needed out of a woman to support me" Mr. Forson seemed very fond of her, "But unfortunately she came with baggage, her little son Jon" He said with distaste. "That little runt ruined everything for me! My happiness, my inventions, my offspring, MY WIFE!" He was getting enraged but he forced himself to calm down.
That last part didn't quite make sense, how did Jon ruin his wife? He's probably still emotionally compromised from her death, so Dean dismissed it, "What do you mean by offspring?"
"Jon's mother refused to have any other children since he was so troubled. He doomed any chance I had to have children with my wife" Mr. Forson said.
"Everything seems a little clearer now" Dean said, "It must have been difficult to deal with"
"Yes well, everything will be right again very soon" Mr. Forson said in a peculiar tone.
They finally reached a metal door with a keypad on it, probably restricted area.
"Well I'm afraid this is as far as you go, you have a nice day now" Mr. Forson went up to the door punched in a few numbers and entered the room.
'Everything will be right again?' Dean pondered on Mr. Forson's words.
At the Hideout
Jon was sitting alone outside waiting for the others, traveling back in time through his memories to the times Andrew had messed with him.
Flashbacks
Jon was happily playing with his action figures when suddenly a foot stepped on one of them and crushed it. He looked up and saw that the foot belonged to his stepfather Andrew, "Ooops" he said with a smirk.
"Why did you do that?! That was my favorite one!" Jon shouted.
"Maybe you shouldn't leave your toys laying around, brat" Andrew said.
"I hate you!" Jon kicked Andrew in the leg fracturing the bone.
"Aaahhhh!" Andrew cried out and fell to the floor.
Jon's mother came running in, "What's going on in here?"
"I think Jon fractured my leg bone when he kicked me!" Andrew shouted holding his leg.
Jon's mother looked furious, "Jon why would you do that!"
"He stepped on my favorite toy and broke it!" Jon said.
"I accidentally stepped on it" Andrew said cringing from the pain.
"You did it on purpose!" Jon yelled at him.
"JON!" his mother screamed at him, "IF HE SAID IT WAS AN ACCIDENT THEN THAT'S WHAT IT WAS! NOW GO TO YOUR ROOM!"
"But mom—"
"NOW!"
Jon slowly walked away and looked back once, he noticed a sly grin on Andrew's face.
Jon, his mother, and Andrew were invited over for dinner to a potential business partner of his.
They were currently in the living room where there were quite a few priceless objects.
"This one seems interesting" Andrew said looking at a stone with carvings on them.
"Ah yes that one, I picked that up in Egypt a few years ago" The man poured a drink in a glass, "That thing is over 5000 years old, it's priceless"
"Do you know what the writing says?" Andrew asked.
"It supposedly tells the tale of an old Pharaoh" the man sat down and drank his drink.
Jon went up close to get a better look at it, "Do you know his name?" he asked reaching to touch the relic.
The man immediately got off his seat and stopped Jon from touching it, "Did I mention it's priceless? And yes, it says his name on the inscription, his name was En Sabah Nur"
Andrew seemed intrigued by that name, "Hmmmm interesting…"
"Yes it's an old legend but I think it's nonsense, come now let's discuss things" the man sat back down and Andrew took a seat by next to Jon's mother.
Jon was fascinated with the stone, he wanted to touch it but he knew the risk of breaking it was too great.
Andrew pulled out a small remote from his pocket and hid it under his arm. He pointed it at the rune stone and it immediately shattered into tiny pieces.
The man got up from his seat and grabbed the fragments with his hands, "What have you done?" He was dumbstruck, "YOU BROKE IT YOU IDIOT!" The man shouted.
"No I swear I didn't touch it" Jon pleaded.
"GET OUT OF HERE YOU IMBECILE!"
Jon's mother got up and dragged Jon outside. As Jon was being dragged out of the room he could see a sly grin on Andrew's face.
"Why did you touch it Jon?!" His mother asked sounding aggravated.
"I didn't!" Jon pleaded.
"Then how did it break?!" She asked.
"I don't know!" Jon said.
His mother sighed, "Why do you always lie about these things?"
"I don't! I'm telling the truth!" He said.
"Look just—just stay outside, I don't want you breaking anything else" she walked back in the room.
Jon and his mother were never allowed in Andrew's workplace, this would be the first time he gave them a glimpse of what he did.
Andrew punched in a few numbers and a metal door opened revealing a large room full of machines and different sort of contraptions.
The room was filled with workers wearing yellow jumpsuits that covered their whole bodies from head to toe not showing even an inch of skin, this was protocol uniform for them.
"So this is where I work on my ideas" Andrew said, "Happy?"
"How come you never showed me this before?" Jon's mother asked.
"Because I didn't want you nagging me with annoying questions like this all the time" Andrew said.
Jon walked up to a metal box of canisters full of green liquid, "What do these have in them?" he went to touch one of them.
Right when he does, Andrew pressed a few buttons on some sort of a wrist contraption and the metal box tipped over and all the canisters fell out and broke.
"Jon what did you do?!" his mother ran over to him.
"I—I don't know, I just touched it once and it tipped over" Jon was confused.
"Do you have any idea how long it took to make those?!" Andrew yelled at him, "Months!"
"Come on Jon let's get out of here before you break anything else" his mother said dragging him out.
After they left the room the door slowly closed, but before it did Jon saw Andrew push a few buttons on his wrist thing and the whole thing that just happened reversed, literally. The canisters reformed with the liquid inside of them and they went right back in the box, and as the door closed Jon could see Andrew's famous sly grin.
End Flashbacks
Everyone suddenly showed up at the same time.
"So did you find anything?" Jon asked.
"Nobody on the streets knew anything, not a thing" Billy said.
"Well I didn't get anything either, it seems my stepfather doesn't know anything" Jon admitted.
"I wouldn't be so sure about that" Dean said.
"That's right, I went to the police station, hacked computers, listened in on conversations, and stole important evidence, and it seems that there's only one suspect, your stepfather" Tim said.
"What?" Jon felt confused, "That doesn't make any sense, why would he murder his own wife?"
"We don't know, but look at all the facts. How did somebody get through security when there was an assassination attempt the day before?" Dean said, "And how did they know where your mother would be? They certainly wouldn't have guessed in your room"
"Also none of the cameras even caught a glimpse of the killer, only someone with knowledge of the camera layout could pull that off" Tim said.
"Seems kinda fishy to me" Billy said.
"Then let's pay my stepfather a visit" Jon said.
At the AIM building
Andrew was silently handling paperwork in his office when suddenly his newly attached door opened and his stepson walked in with his new friends..
"Ah boys, what brings you here?" Andrew asked.
Billy and Tim drew their celestial bronze weapons and destroyed the cameras in the room.
"What's going on?" Andrew seemed confused.
Jon went to step forward and speak but Dean put his hand in front of him.
Dean took a seat across from him, "Mr. Forson, I'm going to have to ask you to be completely honest with us, or else…"
"Well what exactly do you want me to tell you?" Andrew seemed surprisingly calm.
Dean took a pen from his desk and examined it, "Did you have Jon's mother killed?"
"What an odd question to ask. So you think I did it, is that it?" Andrew asked.
"Just answer the question" Dean said.
"Before I do may I ask how you came up with this idea?" Andrew asked.
"All the evidence that we gathered point to you and only you. Who else could have let someone slip past security and avoid any sort of detection? Who else could have known that she was in Jon's room? The only thing we don't know is why, and that's why we're here" Tim said.
Andrew bursted out into laughter, "You really are blind aren't you? None of you see clearly"
"Just answer the question! Did you?!" Jon shouted.
Andrew didn't say anything, he didn't have to. He just gave him his famous sly grin that gave away everything.
Jon's eyes widened when he realized what that meant, "YOU BASTARD!" he smashed the desk into a million pieces and grabbed him by the throat with one hand, "WHY! WHY DID YOU HAVE TO KILL HER!" his eyes were full of hate for the man that had made his life miserable.
"You still don't get it do you" his words weren't very loud due to Jon's hand wrapped around his neck, "I was never trying to kill her, I was trying to kill you"
Jon dropped him out of shock, "What?"
Andrew straightened himself up, "Why in the world would I want to murder my own wife? She's been nothing but kind and caring, you are the one that I wish was dead!"
'I knew the first attempt seemed out of place' Dean thought.
"You little brat you ruined everything for me, I wanted to kill you so I could be rid of you, but it so happened that for once your mother allowed you to leave with your new friends and she took your place" Andrew said.
"You sent a sedative through the ventilation system to keep him unconscious because you knew that he would be hard to kill" Tim figured it out.
"Correct, imagine my surprise when I saw your mother's body in your bed. But I guess some things cannot be avoided…" Andrew seemed less depressed about it.
Jon was enraged, "YOU SICK MANIAC! YOU DON'T EVEN CARE!"
"She served her purpose, now I'm going to move on" Andrew simply said.
Jon lifted him up by his shirt and pulled back his fist, "I'm going to punch a hole through your head"
Dean could see in his eyes that he meant every word of it, and maybe Dean agreed with his method, but when you're looking from the outside in you understand that you should make the right choice.
"Jon stop" Dean grabbed his fist.
"Why should I?! You know as well as I do that he deserves it!" Jon shouted.
"Yes he does, he deserves to die like the psychotic maniac that he is. If our situations were reversed I wouldn't hesitate to end his life either" Dean admitted.
"Then why should I stop!" Jon asked.
"Because that's not what your mother would have wanted…believe me I was tempted with the same thing and now that I look back on it my mother would have hated me for doing that" Dean said putting his hand on Jon's shoulder, "You know the right choice to make"
Jon looked back into Andrew's eyes and wished he could crush his head into nothing but he realized that Dean was right, she wouldn't have wanted him to be a killer.
Jon put Andrew down and turned his back on him, "Let's go guys"
They all went to leave.
"Not so fast" Andrew said.
They turned around and saw Andrew holding some sort of gun in his hand, one that they've never seen before, "I'm not about to let you all just leave, now do me a favor and stand still"
"What makes you think you can even hit us?" Billy boasted.
"Well I am a good shot, plus I have an army waiting for you outside my doors" Andrew said.
Dean heard dozens of footsteps outside the doors, "He's not bluffing, so here's what we're going to do, when I give the signal we run like hell" he drew his sword from its scabbard on his back.
"Too late" Andrew went to pull the trigger but before he could Dean threw the pen he was holding from before and it went right into the bullet hole of the weapon resulting it to explode in Andrew's hands.
"Now!" Dean yelled.
They all scrammed out of the room and they encountered the Aim operatives. They were all dressed in the same yellow jumpsuits with machinery on them. Some were holding stun batons and other were holding the same kind of plasma pistols Andrew was using.
"Take 'em down!" Dean yelled and they all sprung their attack.
Dean and Billy took on all the operatives with the ranged weapons since they could dodge so easily and Tim and Jon took the operatives with the batons.
They easily took apart the operatives but there were more coming.
Dean could hear more footsteps down the hallways, "There are more coming, Jon we need a way out"
"My pleasure" he ran full speed into a nearby wall and ran right through it, "Follow me!" he shouted creating a path for them to follow.
"You know I could see how he could be useful" Billy said running with them.
"See if he needs any help" Dean said.
"Right" Billy zipped forward all the way to where Jon was standing in front of an elevator that they needed to take all the way down.
Jon shoved his hands in between the elevator doors and forced them open bending them slightly in the process revealing an empty elevator shaft.
Dean and Tim finally caught up, "Good idea, this is our best bet at getting down" Tim said grabbing something from his belt.
"I don't see why we couldn't just take the elevator down, or even the stairs" Billy said.
"And risk them trapping us? I don't think so" Dean said.
Tim pulled a long line out of his belt and threw it down the shaft as he tied an end by where they were standing, "Ok everyone grab on"
John stepped forward, "I don't need a rope" he jumped into the elevator shaft and bent the metal walls as he landed on them to create handles as he jumped down.
"Me neither but let's hurry it up we have 50 floors down to go" Dean jumped inside the elevator shaft and used his superior agility to leap down wall to wall.
Tim let Billy go first, "After you my speedy friend"
Billy grabbed onto the rope and leaped down using his speed to go down faster while Tim followed.
A couple of minutes later they were still in the elevator shaft.
"Anybody keeping track of what floor we're on?" Billy asked making his way lower.
"I believe we just passed the 15th floor" Tim said.
"You think Dean and Jon reached the bottom yet?" Billy asked
"If not then they're—"he paused as he felt his rope moving from above, "Uh oh"
"Wait what do you mean uh oh?" Billy asked when suddenly the rope was cut and they began to free fall.
A few floors below Dean and Jon could hear Billy and Tim falling.
Jon took immediate action and jumped all the way to the bottom from where he was.
Dean managed to catch Tim as he was falling down and Jon caught Billy at the bottom.
"My hero!" Billy said.
Jon dropped him on purpose
"Ow!" Billy said.
Dean and Tim reached the bottom as well.
Jon forced open the elevator doors and they ran out.
"Let's get to the hideout" Dean said, they all left the building and make a run for it.
At the institute
Dean had returned home to inform the Professor of what happened, and that he was going to be out late tonight.
Rogue walked in Dean's room, "Hey how'd it go?"
"I think it went well" Dean said, "We figured out who the killer was, I successfully prevented Jon from killing anyone, and I got my team out of harm's way"
"Hold on, your team?" Rogue asked with a smile.
"I was pretty much leading them the whole time so yeah, my team" Dean replied with his own smile.
"So who did it?" Rogue asked ending their smiling moment.
"His stepfather" Dean said with a sad expression.
"What?" Rogue was surprised, "But why?"
"Turns out that he was trying to get rid of Jon, and his mother was caught in the crossfire. And after I stopped Jon from punching a hole in his head he had the nerve to send a bunch of guys to try and kill us, and you know the rest"
Rogue understood, "So how is he taking it?"
"He's better than a few days ago for sure but still not the same, this is going to take time. At this age, someone like Jon needs a parent to go to for guidance"
At the hideout
Jon was sitting outside alone trying to think things through. What options did he have besides living here with Tim and Billy? None as far he knew. He could go to that institute that Dean talked about but Jon would rather stay with the only people that he knew right know.
This whole thing just made Jon exhausted, his eyelids felt heavy and his stomach growled from hunger. He'd spent a lot of time trying to figure things out on his own but he just wasted precious time.
First he never knew a thing about his father, then he lost the only other parent he had. Life just didn't seem fair to Jon at the moment.
Suddenly a rumble shook the ground.
A motorcycle the size of a baby elephant pulled up right in front of Jon. The motorcycle's headlight glared red, its gas tank had flames painted on it, and a shotgun holster riveted to either side, complete with shotguns. The seat was leather—but leather that looked like Caucasian human skin.
The guy on the bike would've made pro wrestlers run for their mommies. He was dressed in a red muscle shirt and black jeans and a black leather duster, with a hunting knife strapped to his thigh. He wore red wraparound shades, and he had the cruelest, most brutal face Jon had ever seen—handsome, Jon guesses, but wicked—with an oily black crew cut and cheeks that were scarred from many, many fights. The weird thing was, Jon felt like he'd seen his face somewhere before.
As he got up from his motorcycle and walked towards Jon, a hot, dry wind blew through the air.
The biker looked at him, Jon couldn't see his eyes behind the red shades, but bad feelings started boiling in his stomach. Anger, resentment, bitterness, Jon wanted to hit a wall. He wanted to pick a fight with somebody, who did this guy think he was?
The biker gave Jon a wicked grin, "So you're Rebecca's kid huh?"
How did he know his mother's name? Jon should've been surprised, or scared, but instead he felt like he was looking at his stepdad Andrew, he just wanted to rip this guy's head off, "What's it to you?"
"You know who I am, son" the biker said.
"Son?" Jon said the word as if it was a joke, "Yeah right, as if you're a god"
The biker stepped closer, "Then allow me to introduce myself" he grinned and took off his glasses. Where his eyes should've been, there was only fire, empty sockets glowing with miniature nuclear explosions, "I am Ares, god of war"
Jon was frozen still from the fear that was traveling through his body. Jon realized why his face was familiar, because it looked like his own.
"You…you're my father? The god of war? But why come now?" Jon asked.
"I thought it would be a good time to check up on you, since your mother passing away and me not seeing you since you were a baby. And boy did you grow strong!" Ares put his arm around Jon's shoulder, "I hope you know that you get that from me"
"And I suppose I get my good nature from my mother?" Jon asked.
"Yes that is correct, but you're not all good you know. You remember that feeling when you were mad, that anger that burned deep inside you, that itch for battle" The fire in his eye sockets glowed a little hotter, "Your mother may have made you kind but deep down to the core you're just like me"
Jon wanted to punch Ares, but somehow, he knew he was waiting for that. Ares's power was causing his anger. He'd love it if Jon attacked, but Jon wasn't going to give him the satisfaction.
"Well it's been fun seeing you again kid" Ares walked away from Jon and got on his bike, "Oh and one more thing, don't you carry a weapon?"
"I never needed to" Jon said.
"You should, it's a dangerous world out there" Ares held out his hand and a ball of flames appeared. The ball formed into a giant weapon and then he tossed it to Jon, "Here, you're going to need this"
Jon caught the weapon and examined it. It was a giant celestial bronze axe, a perfect weapon to suit his needs. He looked back only to find his father gone.
Jon came back inside where Dean and the others were waiting.
Tim cleared his throat, "So, have you decided what you're going to do?"
Jon shook his head, "I don't know"
"Well you can stay here or you can come to the institute with me. But you have to decide, this is your life we're talking about here" Dean said.
Jon felt frustrated, "Just leave me alone!"
Billy shook his head, "He's just so angry"
"I know" Dean said feeling bad for him.
"If only there was something we could do to get his mind off of things" Tim said scratching his head.
The three of them looked at each other at the same time with a funny look.
5 minutes later
The four of them sat around a round table and the air was smoky.
"I feel weird guys" Jon said with a wide grin.
"Oh yeah he's feeling it" Tim said grinning as well.
"This was a good idea" Billy said grinning.
"I agree, this was necessary" Dean said grinning.
"I can feel my heart...cool" Jon said sounding fascinated.
"Isn't it cool? Aren't we all cool?" Tim said.
"I think I feel my brain" Billy said.
"Maybe not all" Tim said.
"I feel like something's missing" Dean said.
"Like what?" Jon asked.
"Beer?" Tim said.
"Bitches?" Billy said.
"Pizza" Dean said with a smile.
"Yes!" Jon said.
"That's an awesome idea!" Tim said.
"Hell yeah!" Billy said.
"Let's get 5 pies" Dean said.
"Absolutely" Tim said.
"WITH EVERYTHING ON THEM!" Jon said excitingly.
"But no anchovies" Billy said.
Author's note: Looks like the group has another member, let's see how he'll contribute to the dynamic of the group. Hope everyone enjoyed!