Disclaimer: I don't own anything.

"How was she?" Mercedes and Omari were taking a walk through the quieter district of Tucson after her training, occasionally, Omari's fingers brushed hers. She kind of liked it.

"You mean Soraya?"

"Yup."

Omari was thinking a bit. "She was such a strong woman. Not only because of her powers, though. She would never put up with injustice and fight for the good things in the world. She was incredible and I terribly miss her."

Mercedes looked at him warmly. Even though they had only met two days ago, she felt as if she knew him all her life. Probably because of her weird bond with Soraya. "I'm sure she didn't mean to just leave you without a word. You were her best friend; she would never betray you like that."

He smiled at her gratefully. Gathering all the courage she had, she softly put her hand on his left cheek. He leaned down on her and kissed her cheek softly. Butterflies erupted in her stomach at the contact with his lips and her skin. Who knew that such a peck could make her feel like that?

Omari interlocked his hand with hers and she smiled at him shyly.

At that moment, Mercedes saw it. Two people making out in a sidestreet. Normally, she wouldn't mind, but she would recognize that blond mop of hair anywhere. As if on cue, the guy looked up from the woman that was busy sucking his neck with all she had. His green eyes widened in surprise when he looked back and forth between Mercedes and their intertwined hands.

And Mercedes' blood was curdling when the woman looked up to Sam. Those grey eyes…that dirty blonde hair…There was no way in hell that…right…?

…

Just because destiny was a bitch, Sam and Mercedes happened to come home at the same time. Mercedes immediately dragged him to the next empty room when they heard voices from the kitchen.

"So…you and Kaz?", she asked him reproachfully and put her hands on her hips.

Sam unimpressedly cocked his eyebrows. "You and Omari?"

"How do you even know who he is?"

"You whispered his name a couple of times when you thought nobody was listening. I just put two and two together", he explained. "Are you aware how crazy that is, Mercedes? That dude is, like, two thousand years older than you! He could be your great great great great great -"

"I think I get it, Sam", Mercedes cut him off annoyedly. "If I were you, I would keep my mouth shut. You have a fling with one of our enemies, for crying out loud! The ones that want to kill us, mind you. Now what's worse?"

"Kaz is different", Sam said quietly.

"And what if she's just bluffing?"

"At least, I don't have a great grandpa complex like you", he retorted "That's disturbing now that I think about it. You basically made out with a mummy."

"At least, I didn't screw him", she bitched back. "He just kissed me on the cheek, okay? Omari is a good guy; he would never take advantage of me. And he is no evil alien that wants to take over the world. No malicious alien like-"

"I'm half an alien!", Sam blurted out with hot cheeks.

Mercedes froze and stared at him, at a loss of words.

…

Rachel was still seething when she got undressed to prepare for her shower in her own bathroom. How dared Jesse treat her like that? She was one hundred percent certain that he enjoyed watching her suffer. Sadly, he was the only one in that city that offered martial arts courses and she desperately needed to learn some techniques to be prepared in case they encountered those aliens again. They couldn't stay hidden in Tucson forever, after all.

She pulled off her shirt and looked at her naked torso in the mirror. Her palms were already calloused because of the weights Jesse let her lift all the time. Next time, she was going to give him a piece of her mind, she was… She glanced down on the side of her hip and all the bad thoughts were gone. Slowly, she traced the words of her tattoo and sighed deeply. Just at that moment, she heard how something fell down behind her. Startled, she turned on her heel. Kurt had just ducked down to pick up all the books he had accidently knocked over.

"What in the world are you doing here?!", she snapped and quickly grabbed a bathrobe. Thank god she was still wearing her bra. "That's creepy, even for you."

"I was just searching for my phone and wanted to ask you whether you have seen it", Kurt quickly explained.

"Can't you detect it with your super fancy cyborg powers?", she spat with her arms crossed.

"That was inconsiderate." Kurt looked at her weirdly. "Are you going to keep insulting me or do you want to tell me what the matter with that tattoo is, instead?"

Rachel threw him an icecold glance. "That's none of your business."

"He was my stepbrother, so I guess it is", he countered.

She just glared at him, eyes narrowed. Kurt went over to her bed and took a seat on the armchair right next to the nightstand. "I have all time in the world."

With a sigh, she slumped down on the bed and put her hands on her lap. "Finn was the love of my life", she muttered quietly "Losing him tore my heart to pieces. I was never the same again. I wanted him to stay part of my life even though he was gone forever."

"Why didn't you tell me?", Kurt asked sadly. Yes, he knew that Finn and Rachel had been dating in highschool, but he thought their relationship wasn't more than a highschool flirt, especially after they had broken up one month into Rachel's freshman year at NYADA.

"Why should I? May I remind you that you wanted him for yourself too at some point? You even told me to dress like a prostitute to get him."

Kurt grimaced. "Yes, that's not a moment I'm proud of in hindsight. But hey, I'm sure you would have done the exact same if the roles were reversed."

"Touché." They laughed a little.

When something came to her mind, Rachel asked tentatively: "Did he know?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Whether he knew that you were…?"

He nodded. "I told him shortly after the incident with Karofsky happened. My powers have been instable for a while and hiding it from him got harder. Carole already knew, so we decided to tell him. I remember how excited he was about that, he wanted me to fight crime like those heroes in the comics." Rachel chuckled. That so sounded like Finn. "He was sworn to secrecy, and he kept the secret till the day he…" Kurt cleared his throat awkwardly.

Rachel's eyes were glittering with unshed tears. "He was indeed the best."

They both went silent; Rachel quickly patted her eyes dry with a handkerchief while Kurt stared at the wall forlornly.

"We've been doing that for way too long", he muttered after a while.

"What?"

Kurt sighed. "I'm talking about that ridiculous feud that's going on for nearly a decade. In highschool, we have been fighting over Finn and the soli at the glee club. During college, we fought over Diego. I'm so tired of being mad at you all the time for no reason."

"I feel the same", Rachel agreed with a nod "We are grown up now. Time to act our age and bury the hatchel."

"Finn wouldn't want us to hate on each other like that. We are better than that."

"Yes we are." Rachel stuck out her hand. "Friends?"

For a while, Kurt looked back and forth between the hand and her face before he took it with a smile. "Friends." He got up and wanted to leave her room - when something came to his mind. "You are so nice lately. Is it possible you met someone? A guy?" He wiggled his eyebrows teasingly.

Rachel blushed slightly. "Nonsense..."

"Don't lie to me!", Kurt laughed. "I know that face expression well enough. So who is it? What does he look like?"

"Fine!" She threw her hands up in surrender. "He has dark curly hair, dark mysterious eyes, and he can be a pain in the neck sometimes..."

Kurt smirked at her. "The last part sounds familiar to me", he teased her.

At that, Rachel threw a pillow at him with a laugh.

…

Later that day, Santana led the group to an Italian restaurant not far from them for dinner. "We need to get out of the house, fellas", she had chirped on their way "It's getting boring, even you need to agree."

According to her, Antonio's had the best pasta in Tucson, and they needed to try it.

"Why couldn't we just order food, like we always did?", Mercedes complained while she threw Sam a wary glance. "Those Brainwarp people could catch us now that we are out there on the silver platter. As a group. We should have stayed at your place that is protected."

Santana snorted. "I doubt that Brainwarp will find us here that fast. We are literally on the other end of the continent, besides, Tucson is a big city."

"Who knows, maybe a certain blonde is closer to us than you might think", Mercedes muttered ambiguously. Sam threw her a killing glance.

The Latina had paled a little. "I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about", she said with a high voice.

Luckily for her, the others were all so preoccupied with their own problems they barely took notice. Much to their horror, however, a certain quintet got into their way at that very moment.

"Dear friends", Rex greeted them with a grin and an odd device in his hands. "It's been a while."

…

The way Sam looked at Kaz let Mercedes shudder a little. Kaz in return looked at him guiltily. It was more than obvious that the two had some connection to each other. For some weird reason, her stomach twisted violently when she thought about it.

"How in the world could you find us here that fast?", Rachel hissed with her arms crossed.

The boys of the band laughed shortly, Kaz didn't join them though. "Let's say, we have our ways", Taj explained perfidiously.

"Why don't you just leave us alone? What if we promise not to snitch on you?", Mercedes offered. Sam elbowed her in protest, but she ignored him. "You know, I just want to go home, back to my job and my guitar and write new songs. If I take a flight this evening, I might even make it back home by tomorrow…"

"That's actually a good idea", Kurt agreed "My boss keeps texting me and asking when I plan on coming back. We got a VIP as a client; she didn't tell me yet who it is."

"Maybe Beyoncé?", Mercedes guessed.

"Barbra Streisand?", Rachel chimed.

"Cardi B?", Santana said with a cocked eyebrow.

Kurt shook his head "I don't know yet. Ms Wright only told me it was a celeb, but not the name."

Bodhi cleared his throat loudly. "Sorry to interrupt your little chat, but we were kind of in the middle of something."

"Yeah", Deacon agreed "It's not polite to cut people off."

"Look man", Sam tried to negotiate "We really don't want any problems. We just want to go home, okay? It was totally not necessary to chase us all across the country."

Rex let out a scoff. "And that's where you are wrong, freak. Of course, it was necessary to chase you across the country. You are a risk factor that needs to be eliminated, whether you want it or not."

Santana started yawning. "Want me to kick your asses again? Remember last time I did that?" She was about to lift her hand, the ring on her finger started glowing a little.

"Now, Taj!", Deacon suddenly shouted.

Before they could register what was about to happen, Taj held the device to their direction and a shockwave hit all of them, except for the aliens, of course.

"I can't move!", Rachel shouted, horror stricken. The others seemed to feel the same, according to their alarmed face expressions. "What have you done to us?!"

"That's a new technology we have been working on all the time", Deacon said proudly "Our technology to manipulate the brains of you humans. And since y'all are at least partly human…tough luck, it works on you too."

"Why are you doing this?", Sam wanted to know, he sounded so disappointed.

Kaz gulped visibly and avoided his glance.

"We told you from the beginning on: We want to take over your world. We … what the hell?!"

Rex stared at Kurt who started walking over to them with his eyebrows cocked. "What?", Kurt said innocently.

"Why are you able to move?"

"Because your little toy does not impact me in any way", Kurt pointed out.

"But…but you're human…", Deacon stuttered perplexedly. "We studied your brain physiology for days; we know how it works."

Kurt shrugged. "Maybe, but you forgot that I have a microchip implant in my brain. I guess that makes me immune." He squinted at the machine that suddenly blew up in Taj's hand.

Taj yelped and dropped the burning remains of the device.

Meanwhile, Sam, Santana, Mercedes, and Rachel were able to move again.

Kurt smiled at the aliens blissfully. "Sorry", he said "I just needed to destroy that thing. I hope you understand that?"

"What in the world are you?", Bodhi spat hostilely.

"Bionic. Electromagnetic. Technopathic. Pick one, they are all accurate."

"Just say you're a robot, that makes it easier for us all", Santana interjected.

Kurt glared at her. "I'm no robot!"

Taj was still seething. "You son of a…"

Santana groaned and lifted her hand. "I've been waiting way too long to do that." When the ring on her finger was glowing this time, thick tendrils broke out of the ground immediately and trapped the aliens. "It was nice having chatted with you, but we have that reservation at that Italian restaurant now. So if you excuse us…"

"You are aware that we won't go, right?", Mercedes whispered to her.

"Oh, right. Dammit..."

The group of five turned on their heels and started heading back to Santana's mansion, the only place that was save for them.

…

"Fuck!" Rex slammed his fist on the table. "Why did they escape again?"

Kaz glared at him. "I told you not to attack them immediately."

Their leader just snorted at her. "Just shut up, okay? You had the opportunity to end them, once and for all, but what did you do? Exactly: nothing!"

"It would be dumb to take them alone. Remember, they would have outnumbered me, genius!"

Rex waved it off. "Whatever. At least we could find them faster thanks to you. We just needed to follow your signature."

That was another special power of Caldrans. They could sense each other with the help of their auras, also called signatures. Kaz grimaced. Sam surely thought she had told her buddies purposely where they were, but the truth was that she couldn't really hide from them. She had done her best to keep the boys away from Sam and his friends, but in vain. If she had tried harder, Deek and Rex would have grown suspicious. They were not dumb; they could do the math.

"And what now?", Bodhi asked. "Our prototype to control human brainwaves is a wreck thanks to the freaks."

"Thanks to one freak", Deacon corrected him and jumped up from his chair in the tourbus. "You know what I've been thinking, guys?"

"What, dude?", Taj asked.

"If we want that plan to work, we need to improve our prototype. We need Bionic Boy's microchip."

Rex groaned. "Easier said than done, man. We are running out of time, and you know exactly how the confrontations between us ended. I'm tired of fighting them."

"Who said we needed to fight?" Bodhi lifted his eyebrows perfidiously. "We just need to make sure the bionic dude comes with us voluntarily, is all."

"And how the hell do we achieve that? We cannot enter that witch's property. Besides, they hate our guts", Rex pointed out.

But Bodhi just smirked at him. "I think I might know what to do."