Lukas stopped smothering his own laughter, his face going serious. "As crazy as Aiden's being lately, if he gets that thing? ... that would be bad."

Jesse stood up, her own giggles disappearing. "You're right. And that's putting it lightly."

"If we beat him to it, he won't be able to get his slimy little hands on the thing!" Petra responded, glaring at a pebble as if that pebble was Aiden and she wanted to drop-kick him off the edge of the island.

"We just need to find that nervous guy mentioned," Jesse reasoned, "How hard could it be?"

"No idea," Lukas responded, almost cutting Jesse off, "but it's definitely our best bet so far."

Ivor gave a terse nod. "Agreed." And then they all split up.

Jesse leaned against a wall. Once again, in less than two months, Jesse was already in another crazy adventure that involved tracking down that flint and steel that she'd gotten from the temple.

They'd only read about temples back in the lab. Especially when Jesse was young. Her brother would-

Jesse let out a gasp, clutching at her head with her topmost set of arms, as pain shot through her head.


"Jess, look at this!" called out a soft little voice.

Jesse turned over in her bedcovers to look at the excited brown-haired boy on the floor, his tail wagging as his ears perked up. "It's so pretty!" he cooed.

Tossing the bedcovers off with her lower arms, Jesse crawled over to look at what her brother was looking at so happily. She nodded when a picture of a pretty building came into view. "Cool!" she agreed, kneeling down next to him.

"Yeah! When we get outta here," and her brother looked at her, beaming, "I wanna build something like that!"

"We can do it together," Jesse reasoned, smiling right back, "just like we always do!"

"Yeah!" and he grinned at her happily, green eyes crinkling up, and Jesse just couldn't help but smile right back at the boy. "Jesse promise?"

"Jesse promise," and the two kids bumped fists, high-fived, and then entwined their pinkies, before the boy giggled and pulled his sister into a warm hug. "I love you, Jesse."

And Jesse smiled softly, green and red eyes closing as she wrapped all six of her arms around her best and only friend in the world. "I love you too, Jesse."


Jesse let out a little gasp and shook her head again. What was that?! Her brother was a hybrid too... something with a tail?

She kept her head in her hands, trying to steady her uneven breathing. They were both named Jesse... they'd even made up their own handshake... the two of them couldn't have been more than three or four in that memory, how old were they? ... Jesse hadn't known her friends then...

"Can't believe they just built their way right into town..."

Jesse looked up, feeling the last bit of the headache fade as she saw a woman talking to the nervous guy they'd met earlier. Putting away the thought for later scrutiny, Jesse trotted over to the two, even as the nervous guy said, almost excitedly, "I know, I've never seen anything like it!"

"Um.. hello?" Jesse asked, a little shyly.

Both whirled to face her, nervous looks on their faces. "Oh! Hello. Can we, uh, do anything for you?" the girl asked, with a nervous grin.

Jesse blinked, before giving them a small smile. "Ah, yeah, could you two point me in the direction of the inn?" she asked, before giving them a polite smile.

"They must be looking for Milo-"

The girl furiously shushed him, and the guy whirled back to Jesse. "I mean, no! We don't know any Milo."

He glanced at a nearby alleyway nervously, before looking back at Jesse with that equally nervous look.

"Really," Jesse said, arching her eyebrow. "Because... it sure SOUNDS like you know him..."

"Uh... okay, okay, we know OF him," the guy said, looking around, before leaning in and dropping his voice to a whisper, "If you really, really want to find him..."

"He's the kind of... messy looking guy," the girl whispered.

"Suspenders always falling down," the guy added with a nod.

"So messy!"

Jesse blinked a little at that. "Uh... thanks. I guess? I'll leave ya to it, then." She nodded to them before walking away, going over to where the guy had glanced earlier.

Looking in, she spotted a blonde guy, and was about to turn away when she spotted one of his suspenders hanging down a bit.

She paused, then went back, curiosity gleaming in her eyes, before she glanced up. "... yep, all signs point to this guy being the innkeeper. Especially that sign," and she chuckled a bit before going over to him, as he took some sticks and hissed to the person he was talking to, "Go, go!" Turning back to Jesse, he arched his eyebrow. "Uh, why, hello there. What can I do for you?"

"Uh, hi, sorry to bother you," Jesse said, feeling slightly embarrassed, "Are you.. um, Milo?"

Milo was quiet for a moment, before rubbing his head. "Yes... yes that's me. A pleasure to meet you. As I've... never seen you before... I assume you must be a new arrival in Sky City. Don't see many of those. Incidentally, why do you have four extra arms?"

Jesse looked down at herself, realizing she'd actually forgotten that they'd existed. Typical. "Ah. Um... it's just how I am. I have four extra arms," she said, a bit sheepishly, not wanting to go into the whole laboratory-scientists-hybrid thing.

"Ah. Now... I'm rather sorry I can't help you, but, as I told those other outsiders-"

"Hey. This our guy?"

And Jesse felt a small smile come over her face as she turned around to see her friends coming up to them, some with smiles on their faces, some not. In this case, Lukas was smiling, Petra was smirking, and Ivor had a curious look on his face.

This oughtta be interesting.

A/N: Stopping point!

Yay, we're finally in Sky City! So pumped up! (pumps fist)

rebekahtpe: Hmmmmmmm 'or' xD Sorry, bad joke. If I had to, enemies with Cassie Rose. I can't stand pork.

RapidSammi: I update VERY fast xD And aw, sorry to hear that :(

x.X. A.L. X.x.