Man, what took me so long?! Sorry, people, I've never been blocked so bad in my life. And then I got backed up on schoolwork and my other stories-nightmare for anything I wasn't working ahead in. I even discontinued one of my stories when I realized I was wasting time on something my heart wasn't in. But I wasn't about to give up on this! And I sincerely hope no one else has. Wish me luck and enjoy.

Chapter 12

Rip's shuttle and Brenda's drove up a street that approached the prison.

They all loaded out.

"Are you sure I can't help?" Rip asked.

"It would be nice to have someone around who's of age and not physically limited," Lucy pointed out.

"Let's remember, he's limited power-wise," Brenda countered, "Let me scope out the place before we get too close."

"Why are you doing this alone again?" Kelly inquired.

"I am the Slayer."

"Slayer's eight months pregnant!"

"Halfling's five months pregnant, so I don't see that big a difference!"

"What are we talking about?" Rip started.

"Stay out of it!" both girls snapped.

Lucy started to say something as the two continued to argue. She stopped herself just in time, since there was obviously not an end to the dispute any time soon. She looked at Rip. "Watch the kids." She started off. Then came back. "And the cars." She started off again. Then came back again. "And don't get between those two until their steam's blown off, but do get between them if they start a kung fu fight."

Rip nodded and got back in the shuttle with the kids.

Lucy then started off while Brenda and Kelly continued fighting. She snuck through the shadows to the end of the street and peeked out at the building. She couldn't see a problem from here.

Well, that's what she was thinking for the first five seconds.

Suddenly, lightning struck in front of her.

There stood Weathervane and Massive.

"Figured you'd come this way," Weathervane smirked.

Lucy thought fast. She couldn't fight them with anything but her plants in her current condition, and either one of them would easily take that out of the equation and corner her. She couldn't go back to the others, that would only lead them to more practically-defenseless targets. There was only one thing to do. She quickly gathered all her strength into her speed (and balance, which we all know would be needed) and ran towards the prison.

Fortunately for her, this also caught Weathervane and Massive off-guard.

Weathervane blinked as she processed this new development. "Why is she running that way?"

Massive shrugged. "Don't know. But, hey, as long as she's running…" He then sent out a blast at a bunch of rocks, sending them flying at her.

Lucy quickly formed the toughest shield she could. By the time it fell, she was halfway to her destination.

Weathervane sighed and started her own attack. She sent lightning blasts at Lucy.

Lucy simply shielded against every one. Finally, she held a shield over herself and kept reforming it as she ran. At last, she made it to the building. She collapsed against the wall and branched out the shield. She'd never made a moving shield before—she'd never been able to—and now, after finally discovering just how much it drained her, she decided not to do it again anytime soon. She held her new shield as best she could as she attempted to open the prison doors. When that didn't work…she moved the shield to between the doors and expanded it until it pried them apart. She then rushed through, taking the shield with her and collapsing on the other side.

Weathervane watched the whole thing in shock. "What just happened?"

Massive sighed, shaking his head. "No idea. But I do know…she's trapped now." He stormed over to the doors and began to pull them down— "OW!" He looked to see what had hit him and cut off his gravitational pull.

He'd been hit with a rock as big as his head, which suddenly disappeared in his hands.

There at the end of the street where the fight had started stood little Buddy Bunny, taunting them and preparing for another attack. "HA, HA!" He then imagined up more rocks and threw them all at once at Weathervane and Massive before running back in the direction of his friends.

Weathervane growled angrily and started to launch an attack.

Buddy blocked every attack with some other imagined shield (a tree here, a brick wall there) before he finally came back to the others. "Kelly! Brenda! I'm fighting bad guys!"

Kelly sighed, finally cutting off the fight with her Slayer friend. "Buddy! 1: We told you not to leave the car! 2: Just because the lizard was eating crickets doesn't make it evil!"

"No, it—"

Suddenly, a blast of lightning struck. There stood Weathervane, Massive approaching fast behind.

"Told you."

Kelly panicked. "Buddy, get back in the shuttle."

Buddy quickly rushed back into the shuttle.

Kelly and Brenda got into a combat stance. They couldn't actually fight off the baddies in their current condition, but at least they could draw fire away from Rip and the kids until Lucy came back (and preferably came back with backup of some kind).

Weathervane smirked at the sight. "Too easy." She started the lightning back up.

Kelly and Brenda dodged the attacks as best they could. Weathervane focused her attacks on Kelly and Massive on Brenda. They ducked and bob-and-weaved and hid behind the occasional lamppost or mailbox or street sign. Nothing was working.

Well, until, suddenly, lightning struck Weathervane.

There stood Robert, clinging tight to still-half-drained Lucy as Ace, Tech, Rev, Daniella, Sophie, Wendy, Benny, Ryan, and Michael took his side. "Hey, lightning rod! Why don't you attack someone with your own powers?!" He then started an elemental fight, Ryan, Rev, and Ace joining in.

While that kept on and the pregnant heroes hid with Rip and the kids, the six remaining free heroes set to fighting Massive.

Weathervane struck at Robert, Rev rushed her as Ryan and Ace launched a surprise attack.

Massive sent things flying full-weight on the triplets, Tech and Benny and Michael rushed him.

Needless to say, the two baddies, being so outmatched, quickly fell.

"Lucky for you," Benny smirked, "you don't have a long walk back to the prison." He then realized he was standing on Weathervane's leg. "Oops." He got off. "Did I say 'walk'? I meant 'crawl.'"

The others then came out.

Lucy looked around and noticed someone missing: her sister. "Where's Nadine?"

Ryan looked at her gravely…and then smirked. "I think there's something you wanna see."

A few hours later…

Lexi, Duck, Slam, Jack, Austin, and Sarah finally returned to the tower and rushed into the living room, where the others were waiting.

"Well, the tower is intact and nobody's injured, so I assume we're all OK," Sarah sighed. She then saw that everyone's attention was on the couch. She looked.

Nadine lay there, Ryan knelt at her side, a baby bunny in her arms.

Sarah smiled and leaned over to look as well.

Nadine smiled. "Go on, everyone else had a turn."

Sarah graciously took the baby in her arms. "What—"

"Ethan. Ethan Bade Coyote."

Sarah smiled again. "Has he met cousin Hannah?"

"Met?" Ryan smirked, "They practically baby-bonded."

Lexi looked at her new grandson. She found herself giggling inwardly at the thought. Grandson. I guess all the crime-fighting does a person good; I don't feel 30 yet, let alone grandma age. She then remembered her earlier thoughts. "Weathervane—"

"—and Massive are both back in prison, where they belong," Ace answered his wife, drawing her close, "As to the other three 'escapees,' no one's been able to find them yet, so there's no telling if they ever even got out or if they're just hiding."

"Or vanished. What about our mystery villain?"

"Still working on it," Tech explained, "But based on the info we've gotten in the past ten hours, I'd say it's safe to guess that there's more to them than we thought. The voice we heard over the prison intercom was male, but he might have an accomplice or a voice modifier for all we know."

"Well, if there's one thing we know," Daniella sighed, "they obviously have a hand in the supernatural realm." She looked at Austin. "You've got some insight into supernatural villain minds. What would you say?"

Austin sighed. "Wolfe is not a good example. He plays by different rules, most especially when he's actually toying with people. If Wolfe were doing all this, dead bodies would be piling up in such a way that it would be absolutely obvious who it was. Since that's not the case now, I can't exactly give us a reasonable clue as to the next logical hit."

"Look at it this way: the bad guy(s) might not have a soul. Would a pattern be implied then?"

"Not in the victims—they'd kill for fun. But since these attacks are fairly specific and they seem to know everything that goes on…I have no idea."

Sarah looked up from her gaze on her new nephew. "So what do we do then?"

"The best thing I can think is to pull some research on the Titan Stone and the people involved in that heist. Hopefully, something will turn up that will help us see the pattern."

Wendy suddenly remembered. "Wait! There was a slight pattern…one of the prisoners was a Blood Demon. The second Blood Moon in the Cycle is tomorrow night. Maybe they're planning to use her somehow."

"What?! You can't use a Blood Demon, they're too erratic once they hit the Cycle! Whoever's doing this is either extremely strong or extremely stupid!"

"Well, given their current track record, I highly doubt our chances of getting lucky with that second option," Sophie sighed with regret.

Sarah sighed. "And so I repeat my question within the new context: so what do we do then?"

"I suggest starting with Austin's suggestion," Daniella sighed, getting up to go hit the books, "If we can find something on the target, we'll have something to go on with the targeter. It's not exactly our biggest shot, but it's all we have right now." So she started off.

Problem? She was right. They were doomed until they found something.

Bigger problem? Bad guys knew this.

In his lair, Hunter smirked at his sister. "The Loonies know nothing. And they have three other old enemies to deal with before they can get anywhere near close to specifics about us."

Jesse smiled. She then looked in the direction of Jasmine, who still huddled up in a corner. "They're so boring in between the first and second."

"Just watch. She'll be perfect for our plans in between the second and third."

"The third is next week, we'll have a very short window."

"We need to wait, Jesse. When the time comes, everything will be ready. We'll have our revenge and take the realm. Everyone wins…well, at least we do."