Hello! I think this is the last chapter under; then we go to SGC!

See you around! Enjoy!

M.

Chapter XVIII

March 21st, 2004

Sam sat on the table with one quick movement, frowning at the abnormals who happened to be her biological parents.

"You are telling me, you don't think I can sit still for 10 minutes?" she asked, eyebrow raised. The answer, another laugh, was not quite what she was expecting.

"No, we don't believe so. We know," was the answer Sam got; after what seemed minutes of laughter. Ashley appeared somewhere in the middle of their laugh.

"You don't even know me. How could you be so sure?" The Major asked frowning.

"What's going on?" Ashley asked at Sam, seeing that both Helen and Nikola were useless at that point.

"For some reason, the idea of me sitting still send them into a laughing fit," Sam answered, mussing her hair.

"Dude! That's hilarious!" Ashley snorted.

"Oh! For God's sake! Can someone explain it?" Sam huffed.

"Well, from those two, "Ashley pointed Helen and Nikola over her shoulder, "the one who can stay still the longest is my mom. She manages a whole two minutes before she starts again, and that's now, it took her over hundred years to master the second minute. Dude! She takes long weekends 'vacations' once every seven years because she can't stay still! Nikola, on the other hand, can barely hold himself half a minute, and that's if he is tasting wine."

"And because they can't, I can't? That's so not true," Sam crossed her arms at chest level, making Ashley raise her eyebrow. Helen and Nikola bit their lips to try to stop laughing. Sam huffed in annoyance.

"Okay, how long are you supposed to be here?" Ashley asked.

"Another seven minutes," Helen chimed in, smiling.

"Then, I tell you what, stay still and let's see," Ashley offered.

"I'll do it, no issues," Sam announced with finality.

"Very well, we will go out there," Ashley smiled, pointing the lab from over her shoulder, "just lay down again, and we'll see," Ashley finished, ushering the others out of the room.

"Lay down?"

"Yup."

"Why?"

"We just lost a minute there! Lay down because there are plenty of stuff around, those will be distracting you and will allow you to 'stay still' if you can check them," Ashley explained.

"Okay," Sam rolled her eyes.

"She's so not going to make it past a minute," Ashley commented as soon as she was out of the room. The knowing looks from the others were confirmations of her thoughts.

Inside the room, Sam's started to tap her finger on her hand. Then, hey saw Sam's head moving around, looking around. She chewed her lips, and then her inner cheeks. Finally, she pressed her foot to the bed and started to tap it.

"How much longer?" she asked a breath later, and Ashley entered the room.

"Well, discounting the time in which you started to look around to distract your mind, and bite yourself, or tapped your feet or finger, then you lasted about..." Ashley said, checking her watch, "22 seconds! You are supposed to stay around here for another 4 minutes."

"What?" Sam asked, sitting.

"It's genetics," Ashley added with a smirk.

"She's right," Helen nodded behind Ashley.

"But how? I mean, I've been still for long periods. I need to do it to work and develop stuff," they all looked at her with a knowing smile.

"If we have mental distractions, we can go for days without much concern for many other things regular humans would find distracting," Nikola explained waving his hands.

"He always forgets to take baths," Ashley nose wrinkled.

"Bath, food, sleep," Helen started. "All those are second to the idea or situation at play; we can go for extended periods without having to take much of them. Depending on the situation, we could go weeks with little to no sleep or food. However, once we finish the case, we will collapse."

"And even the collapsing part, can be scheduled," Nikola grinned. "Well, sort of. We can go back to our four to six hours of sleep, and with the right nurturing, we recover quickly. Well, under the right treatment, I recover faster than Helen. But that's related to my particular physiology."

"Treatment?"

"Ah, yeah. I guess we never told you both Nikola and me are under a fake blood-drinking treatment, " Ashley said, scratching her head.

"What?"

"It's due to the unique behavior of their bodies; blood lust is the only thing that's correct from what the masses knew about vampires," Helen explained with a sigh.

"Scared yet?" Nikola wriggled his eyebrows and licked his lips.

"Of you? Who could possibly fear you, Nikki?" Helen asked, with a smirk.

"Oh, come on! You were totally jealous of her!"

"Right, because I was so concerned with Ph.D. long-legs and not with the interdimensional thing your rift field generator created," Helen pointed with a raised eyebrow.

"And here you see how two of the most incredible minds of the world turn back to kiddies," Ashley joked.

"Oh, say that again," Tesla grinned mischievously

"What?" Helen scowled at him.

"Rift field generator," his eyes sparkled, making Helen roll her eyes.

"You are impossible!"

"And yet you keep coming for more," Nikola grinned.

"I walked myself straight into that one," the giggles from both Ashley and Sam, stopped their banter. "Well, at least we are funny," Helen rolled her eyes. "Let me check your responses, and you are free to go, Samantha."

"Sure."

"Well, the sedatives are out of your system. You probably will be feverish for a while longer; I will examine you again at night, to corroborate this was indeed the proper solution for you," Helen commented once she finished checking Sam.

"Can I go now? I'm starving," Sam almost pleaded.

"Food! I knew I would like you," Ashley grinned. "I can transport you to the kitchen."

"Check the area before you go on a jumping strike, will you?"

"I know you want me to take you back, mom," Ashley grinned knowingly.

"Have you seen," Will asked, entering the room. "Never mind. Helen, there are some issues with the cargo," he finished ignoring the other people in the room.

"Did no one teach you how to knock?" Tesla commented, and Will rolled his eyes.

"Not now, Vlad. We need to go, Helen. The Petro…petrozombie…"

"Petromyzontiforme," Helen provided with ease.

"Yeah, that. It found a host on the male Kithapholus."

"We need to find easier names," Ashley huffed. Helen smiled.

"They are keeping the Kithapholus on a freezing chamber, however," Will trailed.

"The petromyzontiforme isn't affected by the cold. Dear Lord, Ashley, I need you to transport us to the border."

"Just to the border?"

"The shield is still active on both sites," Helen grimaced. Sam frowned since everyone else seemed to be worried.

"Yup! No, thanks," Ashley grinned. "Exploding against it is only cool when it's to save you," she finished. "Let's go then."

"I need medical supplies from," before Helen could finish her sentence, they disappeared.

"Do I even want to know?" Sam asked, looking from Will to Tesla, both answering her with a sheepish smile. "Do you know what the petromyzontiforme is?'

"How can you pronounce that so easily?" Will asked in amazement.

"Theoretical Astrophysics, I'm supposed to be able to pronounce weird, complicated words," she grinned. "Also, I have a minor in Latin, which helps a lot," Sam blushed.

"Your fault or her fault?" Will asked, turning towards Tesla.

"Helen's," He grinned.

"So, she's the one into languages and you the one blowing things up," Sam affirmed.

"I do not blow stuff up!" Nikola commented outraged.

"Yeah, he does. This lab was designed mainly for his abilities to find new things who casually explode in his hands." Will winked at her, Nikola huffed. "Now, as for the petrothing, it is a mutation of a regular fish. We found it around Chernobyl, the regular one attaches to fish, and they feed on their blood."

"Like a vampire."

"Hey! That's a tad offensive!" Nikola complained.

"And yet, it's true," Will pointed.

"Touche!"

"Well, the mutated one acts more like a tapeworm. The Petro will bite its way into the host. They will develop there, and it can control the host making it extremely violent until they finish their cycle and burst out of the host once they finish it, effectively killing the host while doing so."

"Nice, like Alien then," Sam grimaced. "And there's one inside an abnormal that you froze?"

"Yes, the Kithapholus metabolism slows down in low temperatures, which is going to give Magnus just enough time to get there, take the Petro out and fix the mess."

"Get where?" she felt a hand on her arm, and then she looked around. "Where are we?"

"This is the border, the limit of my Sanctuary," they were standing in front of a gate of sorts. Beside it, there was an open space and a canyon. She could see the other side of the canyon was greenish with what she thought was pasture. She walked sideways, thinking about a bridge or something that would connect the places, but she saw nothing. She also didn't see a reason why the door was there in the first place when there were no walls or fences to justify it.

"There's a shield, extending from the limits, which prevents us and our contents from going out directly, and others to enter," Helen explained, pressing her hand on a biodevice. A retinal scan followed.

At her side, Will found a rock and aimed it at the canyon, Sam grinned, expecting the stone to fall to the rift. But it came bouncing back, and she saw the ripple effect of the shield Helen had just mentioned.

"Motive and destination?" A mechanical voice asked

"Medical team, site 4."

"Granted."

The noise was low, almost like a humming. When the doors opened, Sam rubbed her eyes because she thought she saw the scenery flickering, then she the canyon becoming a seating area. Helen stepped through the doors and dumped a few bags inside and nodded for them to join her.

"Hologram?" Sam asked as they stepped on what looked like a sphere from the inside.

"Cloaking device," Will provided.

"I couldn't afford the railway system to be known to the city, because it could affect the timeline, therefore," The Doctor explained while opening a bag.

"You made them invisible," The major added in awe, and grabbed the sandwich and water bottle Helen was giving her. "Thanks."

"Ashley's doing," she grinned, biting her sandwich, "your father does come quite handy when you can distract him from his global domination plans," Helen smiled with a bit of nostalgia. "We took the properties we found in one close friend, abnormality. Biologically, he was able to make his cells photosensitive at will."

"An invisible man?"

"Try THE invisible man," Will smiled.

"We didn't manage to recreate the cells for biological use. However, we did manage to create the same results with technology."

"For how long this has been running cloaked?" Sam asked, curiously.

"This particular line is one of the newest; it connects my Sanctuary, based on under the US with Pili's Sanctuary, located under Mumbai. It has 20 years of existence; it has been a cloaked line since the beginning. Cloaking is working since somewhere in-between WWI and WWII. However, the oldest sphere lines date from around two or three thousand B.C, give it or take some centuries."

"What? How can it be possible? The level of technology is not feasible."

"Yes, that was the way the city was planned. The tunnels and the firsts lines were all here before I took over. I had to learn how to duplicate them and improve them when I needed to use them."

"Why are you showing all this to me?"

"It wasn't my idea, Ashley did present a compelling proposal on why you should see this and I happened to agree with her. I don't know you; I wish I did. I know me, and I know Ashley and Nikola. We all see eye to eye on some things, and we differ significantly on others. On our daily activities, we mostly focus on the small picture, it's what we must do. And it's easier since we know the bigger picture."

"The bigger picture?"

"Will told you all about the Network. That's only part of the big picture, and we are going to another small part of it. So you'll see, each node of the Sanctuary isn't small. And they don't exist merely as a whim, the bigger picture, in our limited vision of only Earth. Includes both top and underworlds."

"That's why you were outside when we found you."

"Yes, sometimes, abnormals want to recover what once was theirs, they want to roam the topside with the same liberty humans do. Others are just not conscious of the breach." Helen sipped her water, "we once were able to coexist; however, not all of us were able to do it freely. Now, we don't depend on anyone up there. However, many of the Governments are receiving our help, although veiled by other names and companies. Even when they still are tracking us to shut us down for good'"

"Trafficking abnormals was a thing before; we tried to stop them or to gain access to them, as much as we could," Will explained. "Now, every Government wants useful abnormal. Can you imagine getting someone with Nikola's skills or with Ashley's skills to work for you?"

"I get it, but still," Sam frowned. "It doesn't explain why you would bring me over."

"Ashley thought you would like this one." She smiled, and they stopped. "Or at least, would find the travel interesting enough for your physicist mind."

"I'm an Astrophysics," Sam pointed.

"Yes, I know. And we are all microcosmos of a macro universe," she winked and walked out.

"Should I ask?" Sam said, and Will just grinned at her.

"I blame it to the Tibetans," he added as they walked out.

Outside the sphere, another gate greeted them. However, now the other side was no more the deserted kind of environment where Ashley had puffed them, not the pasture like green Sam had seen on the other side. The place was colorful, covered with all sorts of ferns and bushes. There were two men and what looked like a golf cart waiting for them.

"Doctor Magnus," they greeted eyeing her. Sam noticed quickly, at least one of them was abnormal, by looking at him in his shiny and almost fluorescent green eyes. They looked at her but didn't comment on anything, nor Magnus gave them time to do so.

"Take us to the medical bay, as soon as possible, please."

Soon they were sitting on the cart, and moving at a higher speed than she thought possible. Then she saw why Ashley figured she might like the place. The whole building could be part of the Indian architecture tour if it weren't for the little fact that the entire thing was underground.

A sun replacement was shining bright, and by comparison, it was hotter than the one Sam knew. In front of the construction, a lake took part of most of the view, the rays of the fake sun reflected the building on a mirage which made it seem like it was both upright and sided.

"Wow," she left out, making Helen smile. Soon, they stopped on one side of the lake, and she got to see larger water species, before being walked inside.

"Pili."

"Helen, William," the other chief of the house greeted them, looking at Sam with a frown.

"Ah, I thought you wouldn't mind. This is Samantha Carter."

"I don't mind," Pili grinned. "But you know I must report this, right?" She asked with a thick accent.

"Yes, don't worry. Do what you must as always. Please take us to my patient." They walked fast and got a couple of levels down, where the lake was kept from entering the building by thick transparent walls. "What do we know?"

"You have a little over twenty minutes to get it out before it reaches maturity. We lowered the temperature as far as we could in the isolation chamber, but you know as well as I, that our coldest one isn't enough, not for this kind of containment."

"Then let's gear up as fast as we can," Helen affirmed.

"See you in three," Will said.

Helen nodded before pointing Sam towards a door. Inside, she threw the bag she was carrying to the floor and proceed to take a couple of wetsuits out of it, she threw one to Sam, and then started to get naked and redressed. Sam frowned turning around and following Helen's lead.

"The Kithapholus is a water lizard. To contain it, they fill one room with water from the lake, and then they lower the temperature to just above freezing point. If we take the water out, then he will become extremely agitated and will attack us. Therefore," Helen trailed.

"We need to go inside the ice cube?"

"Yes."

"I was afraid you would say that."

"It will be a great experience, one you can't tell anyone, but a great experience nonetheless," Helen commented, opening the door and walking briskly toward the chamber. Will had joined them, and she followed them both. And she couldn't avoid the way her eyes widened because when Magnus told her it was a lizard, she never imagined it could be that big.

The thing was gigantic! The Doctor was already standing inside in the containment pool, and the creature was almost as tall as her. And it was incredibly long, the tail rolled a couple of times, and Sam wondered if it was its tail, a snake abnormal or the Petro thing.

"You may come in if you want to," Helen announced her. She touched the lizard carefully, and then she stopped. "Hmm, scalpel," Magnus said, and Will placed it in her hands. "I'm sorry, this is going to be quite the mess," And then, she put safety glasses on and made an incision of thirty centimeters long, and blueish liquid came out of the lizard. "I see it; we need to take it out now!"

Will moved as fast as he could and then someone else jumped in. Helen grabbed a syringe and stabbed inside the incision, and they all heard a loud squeal. It took Sam some time to figure it didn't come from the lizard. Sam couldn't see much from her position on the side of the room, she saw Helen's movements, but no specifics of what the Doctor was doing.

"Quickly, pull now!" Helen announced, and Will and the newcomer started to pull, "Head is coming! Watch your hands!" Sam saw something white coming out from the lizard, and they kept pulling until what looked about the size of a Burmese python came out squealing loudly. They pushed the boa-like creature out of the container and into a smaller one.

"Add flurazepam to its containment!" Helen directed, before continuing to close the mess it had made inside the lizard. Once they had managed to contain the Petro, Will moved to help Helen with the stitches. "Well done William," she smiled brightly at him.

"Same back at you," he winked. "Thank God this one won't complain about my awful sewing skills."

"It's not like I'm doing a suture worth of a plastic surgeon either. Closing is more important than the looks right now; he has lost enough blood to be out cold for a week."

"So, this thing is blood?" Sam asked now joining them to check the lizard from near.

"Yes, believe it or not, the pigment of his blood was used to dye clothes. The natives used to bring it to a closed pool, similar in structure to a Roman bath. And then, they would make an incision big enough to make them bleed, but not enough to kill them. When the water was of the blue they wanted, they dragged the Kithapholus out of it, and deposited the clothes on the pool," Helen explained.

"That's," Sam scrunched her nose.

"Quite disgusting, yeah! There are many other weird things around," Will shrugged. "I don't know all the historical facts from the top of my head, but I've read the most bizarre histories by hanging around the library back home."

"Go on; you can touch it if you like." Helen provided not raising her eyes from her work, "the water is cold enough to make it enter its hibernation cycle. It will be asleep for the next two months."

"From where does this creature come? How is it possible we don't know about it?" Sam asked, grimacing at the feel of the cold, sticky skin of the abnormal.

"Ah, the last one emerged on the coast of Japan. Way before the uprising, it was in our hands until the attack on Japan. The cabal raided our Sanctuaries, and they seemed like a valuable species. The reality is that the only attribute they have is the dying abilities of their blood. Other than that, they don't even have another way to protect themselves; we theorize it is due to its size."

"Uh, well, for sure I wouldn't come near it by myself."

"This one is from its time at the Cabal's hands," Helen pointed to a scar that ran along the spine of the lizard. "Thankfully, its mate was pregnant around that time and had to be transported to India. That trip kept her and their litter from falling into the Cabal's hands. He wasn't so lucky. Now, they all live here, well, in their private accommodations," Helen finished the last stitch and moved around. "Shall we? No matter how thermic Henry managed to make these things, I'm freezing."

They moved out of the water tank, and back to the room where they got changed. Helen took a quick shower to warm up, and so did Sam. And as soon as they were both out, Helen walked out of the room and nodded at Sam to follow. She showed her the tank in which the female Kithapholus and their litter were waiting.

"They are going to cool down the environment, to help the mother and their litter to go into hibernation. Then their cycle won't be ruined because of this event. Once the weather settles, they will bring the one we just worked on"

"What else is here?"

"Due to the limits of our current situation, reorganizations were made to improve the care and skills. Pili and her team were assembled to take care of most of the sweet water and warm weather life forms. Pili is human, and she and her family have been working with us for a long time."

"Not quite as long as you, Helen."

"Well, that would be a difficult mark for anyone." She nodded. "As you can imagine, Doctor Carter came with the team we encountered while tracking and capturing our latest guests."

"Similarity between the two of you is remarkable," she exchanged a quick look with Helen, "but that's not of importance, how is Kyoto? How is the Petro?"

"The intervention was done in time and manner, a few minutes longer, and the outcome would be different. We are taking the Petro back with us, will you be a dear and ask Mohammed and Jason, to help us out with the transport? We need to upload it to the sphere, and we are ready to go. I'll get Ashley for the rest of the way."

"How is she faring?"

"She's …. Improving." Helen completed after considering her words.

"I'm glad; I will wait for your confirmation on the departures to send you my recommendation of whom can fulfill the opened positions pro tempore."

"Will do. Have you seen Will?"

"He is probably by the ptero holding; you know how he likes that bird."

"Well, we are going to look out for him, and we will be out of your hair in no time."

"Mom, how did it go?" her radio interrupted the conversation, Pili waved and disappeared along with a corridor. Helen started to walk oppositely.

"We got in time, a minute later and we wouldn't make it."

"Cool, radio in when you are at the gate so we can pick it. Henry is prepping the container as we speak. Tesla mentioned something about rewiring the vibration of the cage."

"See you in a bit then."

"Wait, you said we are under Mumbai, right?" Helen nodded, "And we were before under the US?" Helen nodded again, "I don't want to think how is possible to complete that travel in such a short time, but, how is possible for the radios to still work considering the distance?"

"Well, travel was done differently than we would if we were topside. Planes can only speed so far unless you are using one of ours. Did I ever mentioned how useful can Nikola be?" Helen smiled; Sam nodded with a grin. "Years ago, he developed a way to improve the traveling speed without the passenger noticing it. Both Doctor Frasier and Doctor Jackson were on board of a plane which could reduce the time spent in 60%. Now, add the technology that it was here, and the structure of the hollow Earth, and the railway system."

"A.k.a the spheres. I love this bird," he added, and Sam's eyes widened when she saw the pterodactyl.

"Radio system works differently also; we shouldn't even call it radio. However, it was easier to implement these since most of the staff was already used to them. In these devices, the voice transforms into something similar to e.m pulses. Then, they refract and bounce around the rocks. "

"The whole thing is a giant router," Will said. "Or that's what Henry said."

"Wait? You meant to tell me you managed to create the FTL comm? Like in star trek?"

"What is Star Trek?" Helen asked in confusion. Sam opened her mouth to answer, but she didn't know how to explain that one. Helen grinned mischievously, "I'm joking. Yes and no, this uses a kind of subspace communication; but we don't need to pursue full development of it due to the rock structure. You will want to ask details to Nikola, I know how to make it work, and I can understand how it works or rather, how it should work, but he's the one who knows the names behind it."

"Just for your good, avoid mention of death rays or death beams."

"Beams and rays aren't similar," Sam added in shock, "not at all." Helen giggled.

"I'm sorry, William, but you walked yourself into that one."

"Ah, mom?" Her radio broke again.

"Yes, Ashley?" She answered it with a frown

"You might want to hurry up, crank the sphere up to go a little faster. They are looking for Sam."

"Will do."

When they arrived at the doors, the Petro was already waiting for them in the sphere. They jumped in, and once they started the travel, Helen lowered a panel to grant her access to the sphere controls. Sam frowned, whatever text that was, it looked a lot like Ancient writing. Helen stopped her modifications for a little while.

"Samantha, will you move to the other side?" Sam frowned at the request but nodded and moved. "You both might want to hold onto something," she grinned and held herself tightly to a hold she found. When she did, Helen pressed the palm on the screen, and they were all pushed back against the walls. Then it was as if that never happened. "The decelerating process will be slower. Therefore we won't be flying to the other side when it happens."

"What exactly happened?" Sam asked

"We are traveling half the speed of light; the acceleration process was too brusque and produced what we've just experienced. It's not dissimilar to what occurs when a plane takes off."

"Half the? And you have stabilizers inside," Sam added in awe, looking around. "That's! Wow! This technology, this…"

"I will advise keeping your mouth closed, for now; you don't want to give away something you are not supposed to." Helen smiled

"But we need this! Things like this!" Sam added.

"We plan to give them away," Helen smiled," but your Colonel won't like it."

"You plan to exchange this for me?"

"No, I plan to trade this for the absolute security, your base won't rattle too loud our whereabouts. I plan to stay dead as long as I need to for things to calm down up there."

"Gotcha."

"As I told you before, I will not mind at all, if you decide you are interested in knowing more, about whatever you want to know more. And I will find a way to cope if you don't. And we are arriving."

"How do you know?" After all, there were no windows on the sphere.

"The comm is back up, Nikola is yet to find a way to communicate when at full speed."

"He theorizes it as possible?" She asked in awe while they walked out of the sphere.

"At the Sanctuary, we don't believe in impossible feats, only in very difficult to obtain," Helen smiled and grabbed her radio, "Ashley, we are here."

"Cool!," Ashley's voice came from the other side of the gate, "I still need you to unlock the door," Helen walked down and repeated the process she had when they were going out, and the doors opened. "Are you going to walk back to have a way to justify your whereabouts?"

"That's probably a great idea; they will know if I'm lying," Sam agreed.

"We can pair you up with Henry; I'm pretty sure they won't be bothered if you explain to them you were holed up with him learning our tech," Will offered.

"Henry's lab is locked from their maps. It should be hard, if not impossible, for them to locate you there," Helen added.

"Hum, if I say tech enthralled me, they won't doubt it, and they won't ask too many questions."

By then, Ashley had disappeared with the container and reappeared next to them, watching them closely. Then she huffed, patience was never her best trait. Grabbed both Helen and Sam from their arms and linked her leg with Will's transporting them all to Henry's lab. While they adjusted to the change of scenery and weather, she disappeared and appeared with the wolf in tow.

"Huh? What are we all doing in here?" he asked a bit confused. "I was supposed to check the container for the Petro with Vlad."

"How much time do you need?"

"Five-ten min," Henry managed to say before disappearing.

"Well, this is Henry's lab. Just know the technology you saw today is not his forte. He develops our system and some of our weapons. He has trouble with the language."

"Yeah, about that? Where's that from?" She was going to say she had never seen that before, but she couldn't outright lie to them.

"It's an ancient dialect."

"And you understand it?"

"Understand it? She speaks it natively like the many others, she picked during her lifetime," Will commented, then he checked his watch, "I gotta go, I have an appointment with Magiuch."

"Take Kate with you."

"What about Doctor/patient confidentiality?" Helen raised her eyebrow.

"Last time you were alone with him, we found you stuck to the ceiling. Before that, he attached you to the entrance wall, and. "

"Yeah, yeah, I got the picture. Kate and a stunner, I presume?"

"Atta boy!" Helen winked at him. He raised his eyebrow unamused.

"You are spending too much time with Nikola!" He threw over his shoulders, leaving the room.

"Don't say his name thrice or he might appear," she shouted at him, making him laugh. Ashley appeared behind them with Henry in tow.

"You do have the weirdest relationships," Sam shook her head, amused.

"Yeah, and you haven't heard half of them. Come to think about, Mom, you had way too many relationships," Ashley added squinting at her mom.

"Dude! That's not something I wanted to remember!" Henry added.

"Suck it up, Henry."

"I'll leave you be, kids! Before Ashley can come up with more scarring thoughts, she can't possibly filter out," Helen grinned.

"So? What I'm supposed to do?" Henry asked, looking from Ashley to Sam.

"How should I know?" Ashley shrugged. "I'm simply 'the transport.'"

"Can you talk tech to me?"

"Ah, a woman after my own heart… Just don't tell that to Erika, she might kill me and swear she just lost control."

"Oh, Henry's girl can be feisty. She was under treatment at a facility that was meant to keep their kind controlled; she's the first HAP pregnant in a long while." Ashley explained, "But, she can't control her shifting when she is out of treatment. Mom found a way to stop her from changing until she delivers."

"It protects the baby. But she's been pregnant for almost 20 months. She's more than ready to pop, but we cannot do it yet," he sighed. "It's been terrible for deciding furniture for the room. Anyhow, tech. Weapons? Software? What are you after?"

"Whatever you can give me," Sam grinned. "What's a HAP?"

"Ah, it stands for a hyper-accelerated protean life form. I'm a class nine." He grinned proudly; Sam raised her eyebrow, "Can you not do that? It's kinda too Magnus."

"Will you explain what's a class nine HAP?"

"If you keep doing that, I might even pee in my pants." Ashley chuckled. "I'm a werewolf."

"A werewolf?" Sam giggled, "like moon howling, silver bullet dodger, big furry wolf?"

"They did a freakily awesome job to hide our realities back then," Henry rolled his eyes. "No full moon howling or silver bullet thing, just big furry wolf whenever I want to change to it."

"What do you mean with hiding our realities?"

"They didn't tell you? They provided false information to authors way back when, and when they published their books, they also created the myth. Nothing is more efficient to stop people from believing something than adding it to a sci-fi book or show." Ashley shrugged.

"Hey, I love sci-fi!" Henry complained.

"Yeah, and it gave you ideas for a couple of weapons. Anyhow, Uncle James was the real Sherlock Holmes; with the serum, he developed the same abnormality Will has naturally. Nikola is Count Dracula. Nigel was the invisible man."

"And your father?"

"He didn't need a book; he made himself known enough with his nickname of "Jack the Ripper"… Mom, though, she's the one who didn't get a book. People wrote her tons of music's; she's more like hiding in plain sight. Or was, you know with the whole blowing up my home issue, she can't go up using her name."

"The weird thing is, she's allowing all of you to know it. I know that even your boss knows she will be up there," Henry added worriedly "I do hope she does have a good plan, I don't want to see her blowing herself up again."

"I hope we have something you need. Otherwise, we are screwed." Ashley added.

"How's that?"

"You know, basic hostage negotiation, you have something I want, I have something you want, we make a ridiculous plan to exchange it," Ashley explained, "Mom, is great at negotiating in a conflictive situation. So, are Tesla and Will. I guess I can be the plan X in case something goes tremendously wrong."

"Huh, she mentioned something we might need. Hopefully, it will be in my hands to recommend it. Or better yet, hopefully, my team will realize you are not a threat and yes a help."

"Oh, well. Here's to hope."