Chapter 5

There were plenty of things that Angelo could have been thinking about. He had a father that wanted him dead. Brothers and Sisters that he'd probably never see again. And a mother that he'd never known. He'd had a girl, Lucy, that he was desperately in love with, and had no idea what happened to him, because he had fled Mexico so fast.

None of that was on his mind. All he could think about was Art. He had been standing just behind Art. He had seen Sabertooth creep up from the foyer, and fear had not only paralyzed his muscles, but also his speech. He could do nothing as Sabertooth slashed the back of his friend. He couldn't get over it. After all he'd been through, he thought nothing could scare him. He had been wrong, and it may have cause Art to lose his life. He couldn't help but feel responsible. He couldn't help but feel that the others held him to blame. Deep down inside, he knew Art was going to be alright. Or at least he wanted to know it.

There was a knock at his door. He ignored it at first, then got up and walked over to the door and cracked it open. Black was standing there with a solemn look on his face. Angelo's heart sank to the floor. Had some of the other's told Black that he had watched Sabertooth attack Art?

"Mind if I come in?" Black asked after starting at Angelo through the crack for a minute.

"Yeah, I guess. It's your house." Angelo let the door fall open and walked back over to his bed. He plopped down on the bed and stared at the ceiling.

Black walked in, and for the frist time since the kids had gotten there, Black saw how one of the kids had decorated their room. Insense wafted in his nose as he noticed the oriental style that the bedroom had been done in. Tapestries hung on the wall with oriental lettering on it. Chinese, Japanese, he didn't know which. He had bamboo vertical blinds covering the windows, and on each side of his bed stood and end-table. On one was a zen-garden and the other had a perfectly pruned Banzai Tree.

"I like the décor, though I may not understand it." Black said casually.

"Thanks, senor, most of these were gifts from a friend before I fled to the states. This is all I could fit in the truck when I left." Angelo said. "Something tells me you didn't come here to see my casa, though."

"You're right. I wanted to talk to you about Art. Whatever you are feeling, whatever you are going through, you have to know it's not your fault. I talked with all the kids and they all said there was no possible way to have seen Sabertooth coming up behind Art, not even you."

But he did see it. And now he had to live with that guilt forever if Art died. Better that none of them realized he could have seen, he guessed.

"Anyway," Black continued once Angelo didn't say anything, "Just to let you know, if you need to talk, Jeska and myself are always available."

With that, he got up and left, leaving Angelo to think about his words.

******

Ashlyn felt comfortable. She had wrapped herself up in Honeysuckle vines. Soft and warm, they made the perfect blanket. She herself wasn't worried about Art. She knew he was going to be ok.

Jane sat in the corner, playing fetch with Achorn, her pet squirrel. She'd toss an acorn across the room and Achorn would chase it, retrieve it, and bring it back to her.

After throwing the acorn and watching Achorn take off in search for it, she looked up toward the bed and at the cocooned Ashlyn that was lying there.

"You think he's going to be alright?" Jane asked.

"Of course he is," Ashlyn said, not even bothering to sit up. "You heard Jeska, all he's got to do is wake up, morph into something, and morph back."

"She said that was a theory." Jane pointed out. "She never said that it would work."

An awkward silence followed, as Jane looked around the room. The walls were covered with vines so that you couldn't even see them. The only decorations on the walls besides the vines were the flowers that grew on them. The floor was bare and the only furniture in the room was her bed, a dresser, and the seat upon which Jane now sat.

Achorn returned with the acorn and dropped it in front of her, then sat up on his haunches and twitched his tail.

"Here, go get it." She said and threw the acorn out the window. She felt annoyance coming from him as he hopped up on the window seal and jumped out onto the roof to try and find the acorn.

The Frisbee sliced through the air and slapped into Ryan's hand as he caught it. His hand stung and he quickly changed hands and shook his right hand to get feeling back into it. It was about 45 degrees out today and catching much of anything was beginning to be a chore. Xi, for the most part hadn't shown any symptoms of the cold getting to her.

He flung the Frisbee back her direction. He knew they shouldn't be having fun, with Art being in the condition that he was in. This was actually the only thing they could think of to get their mindws off of the situation. He caught the Frisbee again, and once again his hands sang to him. He tossed the Frisbee toward the front porch and guided it into the storage box there with a telekinetic push. Xi came walking up to him.

"All done for the day?" she asked.

"My hands are stinging. Are you not cold?"

"No, not really. You're just a wuss." She elbowed him teasingly.

Ryan climbed up onto the front porch and had a seat in the porch swing. Xi sat down beside him. She sat cross-legged and plopped her head down on his shoulder.

"Have you thought about it?" Ryan asked.

"Of course." She said. "I think he'll be alright." Xi answered.

"Huh?" Ryan said and looked at her quizzically. "Oh, you mean Art. Yeah, he'll be fine."

"What were you talking about?" Xi asked.

"I was talking about that training facility in the basement. Where we got our uniforms. Have you thought about it?"

"Oh, no, I guess I haven't thought much about it."

"Let's go find Black and see what's going on. It looks like someone just left in the middle of the project. Maybe he'll let us finish it up. That'll give us something to do."

Ryan and Xi ran into Black in the living room as he was coming down the stairs that led up to the boys dorm. Ryan talked to Black about the idea nad he explained that the mutant inventor Forge had been there and already set up all the difficult equipment. All that was left was putting the workout equipment that was in the main part together and putting it in the work-out room. Black did ask one favor. If they were going to help out down there, he wanted them to take Angelo with them. He explained that Angelo had been taking Art's condition pretty hard, and he thought that this might get his mind off it.

Ryan and Xi agreed that they'd take Angelo with them and left to go to his room to get him.

They met Angelo as he was coming out of his room. He had his jacket on. "Oh, hey guys." He said almost passively. "I'm going to go shoot some hoops. Help get my mind off of this loco situation."

"Hey, that's actually what we came up here for. We're gonna help put the workout equipment together for the training room. We wanted to know if you wanted to come give us a hand." Xi said.

"Um, yeah, sure. Let me put up my jacket." Angelo turned and cracked his door and threw his jacket on his bed. He turned around and gestured toward the stairs.

Ryan led the way down the stairs to where the basement stairs were, then he continued on down to the basement. The large hangar-sized door was already open. Ryan noticed Angelo's eyes never left the Infirmary's door as they walked by. Apparently he was taking it really hard. Ryan also noticed that Black's office door was closed. Ryan thought that they were going to lose Angelo to the Infirmary, but he continued on into the traingin room with them.

"So how do you do it?" Ashlyn asked Jane from on her bed. She had retracted the Honeysuckle covers and was sitting on her bed. "Talk to animals, that is. Do they use words, pictures?"

"Well, yes and no. I feel emotions, and they are just as strongly expressed as any words could ever be. And they feel my emotions as well." Jane explained. "Or at least that's as best as I can describe it."

"Must be nice to know what they are feeling. In a way my power is the same. I can feel what plants feel, but not as strongly. I feel mostly happiness and pain. There are really no other emotions from plants."

"So how do you make them get bigger and stuff?" Jane asked.

"I can manipulate them on a cellular level, I guess. Maybe I make their cells multiply and then disappear, I'm not exactly sure."

Another awkward silence.

"So, do you want to go get something to eat?" Jane asked, breaking the silence.

"Yeah, that sounds great. What sounds good to you?"

"Any kind of meat." She said and smiled.

"That's the best thing I've heard all day." Ashlyn said and hopped off the bed and headed for the door.

They walked downstairs and went into the kitchen. Jane pulled out a package of hamburger meat from the fridge.

"I've got an idea." She said. "Cookout."

"I'll set up the grill." Ashlyn said sliding open the door to the back patio. She walked out onto the massive back porch. She walked over to the grill and dumped the charcoal into it. She sparayed the charcoal with lighter fluid and started the coals blazing. She came back into the kitchen, where Jane was smashing the hamburgers into patties.

Jane pointed over to the lettuce she had gotten out of the fridge. "Could you chop that up for me?" She asked.

"You're joking right?" Ashlyn said staring at the lettuce.

"Oh, yeah, sorry. Here, you make the patties, and I'll make the vegetables."

"No, it's fine, I'll do it." Ashlyn said, bringing a wide-eyed stare to Jane's face. "I've got to get used to this. I don't get and feelings from it, because it's dead. But it's kinda like playing with a cadaver to me."

"Ok, Ash, I'm trying to make FOOD over here!" Jane said.

"Sorry."

They both laughed and set to preparing the cook-out.

Ryan and Angelo were moving a weight bench into the fitness room, as Xi was tightening some bolts on the exercise bike.

"I think this is where I'm going to be spending most of my time." Ryan said.

"Yeah, I think this is a great idea." Angelo said and smiled. It was the first time Ryan had seen him smile since they started fixing the equipment. "I wonder how that outside area works." Angelo said.

"I haven't got a clue, just seems like an open, useless area to me."

"Let's ask Black about it after we get that last bike put together. Then the floor will be clear."

"Hey, GUYS!!" Xi called to them from inside the training area. Angelo and Ryan ran to the door to the fitness room and were shocked to see that the door no longer led out into the training area, but into a forest. What confused them even more was the fact that Xi and the exercise bike were still right outside of the door.

"What happened, chica?" Angelo asked walking out into the forest. The sound of crunching leaves came from his feet. He could feel the branches and leaves crumpling beneath his feet.

"The room just suddenly changed all around me." She said looking in every direction. "It was so gradual, I almost didn't even notice."

Ryan turned toward the entrance to the fitness room and saw that the door was just an opening in the middle of the forest. He shut the door and it disappeared, blending perfectly with the surroundings. He turned back to Angelo and Xi.

"Well, I guess we know what this room is now." He said smiling.

From their left, something bounded through the woods. Something large from the sound of it.

"What is that?" Angelo asked.

"I don't know, but it's coming this way." Xi said.

The sound continued to get closer until a large cat, a little smaller than Samson, came bounding around a rocky out-cropping. It looked at the trio and snarled showing it's teeth.

"Oh, this is a REALLY bad time to not have the 'pup around." Angelo said.