The call for help continued a couple of times. Each time, six-two-six could hear it louder and louder. Clearly he was running in the right direction, but it was weird that none of the civilians in sight did anything about it. Not a single one seemed to even care for the cries. They all just continued on their way. He thought for a moment that maybe they could not hear her, or perhaps they communicated in a different way. But if that were the case, then the call for help wouldn't have existed in the first place.

The hot sun beat down on his body, still wary from the earlier crash. The buildings supplied plenty of shade. Some reaching near towering height despite being built from what appeared to be basic materials. If he didn't clearly stand out so much from the population, he would take to the main dirt road. His blue fur was just too different from their fairer blue skin. There was also the problem with the fact that he had fur and was plenty shorter.

"Help!"

The call came again and six-two-six could tell it wasn't too far away. He had finally reached the sound of distress within a few short moments, climbing to the top of a nearby building to get a vantage point. From a quick scan of the situation, it would seem that nothing was out of the ordinary aside from the call for help. All the civilians continued to walk through the streets as if nothing was happening. The largest issue he had with the situation though, was that Tarnet was no where to be found. There wasn't even a sign of scorched earth or building. All was intact and normal.

Having done plenty of research on his target before coming to the planet, if Tarnet had been involved in this situation, there would be a monumental amount of damage. With a complacent sigh, six-two-six let his guard down. It was then that he realized just how much the coastal town looked like Hawai'i. From the abundant plant life, to the carefree breeze, and even the relaxing nature to the busywork below. This mission continued to haunt him in ways he wish he could forget.

Just before he was going to back down and start his search again, he was stopped.

"Please. Someone. Anyone. Help!"

It sounded like a young child. The voice kept him held in place. It was his job to capture Tarnet. Not help the general populace. He wasn't even supposed to be seen or heard from on this planet. Risking that could cause a war this planet had no chance of winning. His heart wished that just one person would stop and answer the call. But alas, no one did. It seemed to only reach six-two-six.

"I shouldn't," six-two-six said, gripping the edge of the building tight. "I have a mission." Again he heard the plea. "Why do I always do these things?"

He couldn't hold himself back. Keeping to the rooftops, he jumped from building to building. Taking extra care not to be spotted, he paused to gauge the distance before leaping across the road. If anyone had spotted the small alien take the leap they made no tell of it. Not a scream, cry, or movement. It started to put a chill down his spine.

He could easily name planet after planet that had such uptight people that they would only stick to themselves, but this was ridiculous. What should have felt like an extremely lively street felt void of feeling. There was no time to be thinking of this however. With another mighty leap, he was back in safety behind the buildings near the ocean. An unbeaten path followed a small hill leading back down towards a steam. There wasn't a doubt in his mind that this was where he was hearing the cry from.

"This is your last chance," he told himself. "If you go through with this the mission is compromised."

Who was he kidding? He had already come this far.

Making sure the path was clear, he ran on all fours until he came across a well. Quiet sobs echoed out from the mossy stone bricks. Hopelessness and sadness oozed from the well as dark clouds began to swirl overhead.

"Hello?" he called down into the near pitch black well.

The crying instantly stopped, bringing out a pause of contemplation.

"Hello?" he said again, making sure they knew that he was in fact there. "Do you need help?"

"Y-yes," a sore voice croaked. "Please. Help me. I-I'm stuck."

"You can't climb out?"

"No. I tried." Six-two-six could here splashing against water. "It's too slippery."

At this point, his cover wasn't yet blown. He could still walk away.

Instead he switched to his night vision, finally getting a good look at the one trapped at the bottom. A small girl sat curled into herself against the side of the well. She was extremely lucky that the water was drained so much. If it had been a couple of feet deeper, she would probably had drowned. The way she shivered let him know that it had been a long time since she had fallen in.

"I'm coming to get you."

The clouds finally parted, allowing light down into the dark hole. He could see she was trying to look up at her saviour, but the light was blinding her too much. Testing that his palms would stick to the sides still, six-two-six crawled down into the well. The closer he got to the bottom, the more he began to slip.

"Okay," he said to the girl. He kept facing the wall, trying to hide his face. "You'll have to hold on tight."

If the girl had any qualms about who he was, why he looked different, or how he was able to scale down the wall, she kept them to herself. Six-two-six didn't even know if her eyes had adjusted to light to let her see him. All he felt was a pair of arms wrapped around him in a tight hug.

"You ready?" he asked.

The girl nodded against his back and he began to climb.

Once the two were out of the well, Six-two-six quickly dashed into the bushes. He could already hear Angel yelling at him for blowing his cover. Reuben would certainly tease him for such a mistake as well. Or he would just complain about being so far from any decent sandwich ingredients. One of the two.

"Wait-" the small girl dove into the bushes behind her saviour- "where are you going?"

He could feel her arms wrapped around him, holding on as tight as they could. Persistent little girl. It would be no problem at all for him to break from his grasp, but something kept him from tearing through. Quickly contemplating his options, he decided the best course of action would be the civil approach.

"I'm looking for someone," he said without turning around. "If I don't hurry I'll lose them."

"Who is it?"

"No one you need to worry about." I hope. He tried to delicately pry himself from her grasp without injuring her. "I just need to hurry." Finally he managed to break free. He quickly started to make his leave. "Go home and forget you ever saw me."

"I can't," she whispered. "I don't have a home."

There was only one thing she could say to make him stop dead in his tracks and he silently cursed that she managed to find it. Reluctantly, he turned around to a gasp.

"You're not from around here. Are you?"

The young girl looked six-two-six from top to bottom. They were around the same height with only his ears to overtake her. She couldn't place the red jumpsuit he wore as any sort of clothing she had seen on her island, and while he was blue like her, it was much deeper and covered in fur rather than skin. To her, he looked much more like an animal than one of her people, but she knew she couldn't be rude to her saviour. It wasn't like she had been all over the planet, perhaps he was from another island.

"You could say that," he said with caution.

"I'm Lilac," she replied with a curtsy, "what's your name?"

He was astounded by how well she was taking his appearance. But even more so over how she just completely ignored his earlier claim of being in a hurry. At least the communicator in his suit was still working. That would make this at least a tiny bit easier.

"I don't have a name." He lied. An old name danced on the tip of his tongue. "You said you don't have a home?"

Lilac shook her head. "Not anymore."

Six-two-six sighed, "Of course." He pulled out his tracking device and saw a faint beep slowly moving farther away from him. "Like I said. I'm in a hurry. It'd be best if I dropped you off with someone then-"

"No one will take me." She took a step towards him, not wanting him to go. "People here don't really get messed up in each others business."

"No kidding. You were down there for a while."

She nodded. "I tried calling for help. But no one came. Until you did." She took another step and took hold of the fabric on his arm. "Please don't leave me."

Despite knowing it would be the end of any chance of getting out of this, six-two-six looked into Lilac's eyes. Sorrow, fear, and loneliness filled them; on the brink of tears. She was lost and alone and he could feel something from her that was so familiar. He couldn't leave her. To her joy, he gave in.

"Okay. I'll stay with you."

\\\

Reuben walked into the command bridge with hesitation and a heavy heart. After his last blow up with Angel he had kept to himself. Their ship was by no means large, but it was big enough to avoid someone if you wanted. And he was very good at keeping to himself, sometimes even more so than six-two-six. There were times when he missed the giant armada ship he worked on with Gantu, but the smaller and more personable vessel fit him and his cousins a lot better.

Once the metal doors slid open his face was blasted with warning flashes and various alarms.

"What's going on?" he asked as he rushed to his seat.

"I don't know-" Angel frantically typed at her command station- "what's happening. Everything was fine a minute ago."

"Shields are up," Reuben said as he went through the ship's systems. "So is life support. Artificial gravity. Outside Communications. Inside Communications. Radar. Everything is fine."

Angel stayed silent as he kept on his list. Something had to be wrong, there was no way a warning like this would sound for no reason at all. Especially not one they had never seen before.

"I found it."

Her ears perked at his words. Just as she rushed over to his station all the alarms and notifications shut down.

"What was it?" she asked him.

"The ship was trying to reestablish communication with Stitch's scouting ship and couldn't find it. I guess he must have put a protocol over it to alert us if his ship goes offline or-"

"Is destroyed."

Angel didn't like this one bit. It had already been long past time for a report. She had expected the mission to go on longer than either of the others had though, but that would only mean regular updates would come in instead.

"I'm sure he's fine." Reuben turned his seat around and got up to stretch. "Stitch can handle himself. It's probably just something with the planet's atmosphere blocking communications that we don't know about."

"Can we really risk that?" she shot at him.

"We have to." Angel was about to retort again when Reuben cut her off. "If we just barge in there and everything is fine them Stitch will have our heads. I don't know about you, but I remember the last time I went in early." He felt a shudder go down his back at the memory. For a moment, it seemed like six-two-six was going to turn his blaster on him. "He said that if we lose contact with him on a solo mission we can go in after two days."

"What if it's too late by then!?"

"It doesn't matter."

"It does so!" she screamed.

Reuben turned from Angel and started making his way towards the door back out. He hated all the fighting. In the early days of their missions everything was going so smoothly. It seemed like he would be able to convince his cousin to go home quite quickly and then life would return to normal. If he had known how long this would last he may not have come in the first place. His mind flashed to Angel's face the day she approached him. Her eyes tore through him with such sadness. There was no way he could turn her down. That Angel was still the same as this Angel. Even if they were near constantly fighting.

"I didn't come here to fight," he said as he turned back.

"It sure seems like it."

Reuben took a deep breath, remembering why he came to the bridge in the first place. "I didn't come here to fight." He turned around to say, "I came here to apologize."

The wall Angel had built up begun to crack. "To apologize?"

"Yeah. For earlier. For yesterday. For the past weeks. Years even. I've been so angry, and I didn't even realize I was taking it out on you."

"It wasn't always me."

"And the walls. And the computers. When you said that I wasn't the only one to lose something... it got me thinking."

Angel stood up and and placed a thankful hand on his shoulder. She didn't want him to beat himself up over this.

"I'm the one who brought you here," she said. "I'm sorry."

"Me too." He placed his hand on hers and gave it an apologetic squeeze. "You've been through a lot. I'm sure the things Stitch says and does hurts you more. And I imagine it feels like you've lost your boojiboo sometimes."

Angel nodded in agreement, letting the weight of the years of pain show in her face and shoulders.

"But I want you to know-" he lifter her chin so she was making eye contact with him again- "that Stitch is still in there."