Snowcrystal of Thunderclan- Yup, you gotta love Bree! :D :D Jay and his sarcasm XD :D

Featherflight123- I'm glad you liked them :D I had fun writing them and Bree is amazing! :D Do I describe her more than I do the others? I don't know if I do! XD

Ah, I get it! :D the "has discussed deeper themes :)" thing is because I'm not as awkward as I used to be :D I've always had the skills I've just been super awkward about it XD XD

:) :) :) :)

Flight and Fight Prequel

(The song is Mine by Taylor Swift)

Uh, oh, oh

Uh, oh, oh

"Run! He's going to catch us!" Cleo exclaimed, catching sight of her father's golden blonde hair, "Hurry!" She grasped Leroy's wrist and bolted out of the room.

Leroy ran after her, laughing as his friend's father spun around at the sound of his youngest daughter's voice.

"Cleo!"

You were in college working part time waiting tables

Left a small town, never looked back

I was a flight risk with a fear of fallin'

"Hey, Leroy!" Flynx greeted the golden blonde teenager as he walked into the hanger, he had just tuned up the other teen's jet, "How's it going?"

"Good," Leroy replied with a smile, he was wearing his new flight suit, since he had outgrown the old one. "I can get up in the sky again."

Flynx grinned, briefly looking him over, "I see why Cleo couldn't keep her eyes off you when you got the suit yesterday, it's more tight fitting like mine is."

"Hey!" Cleo interrupted indignantly, her cheeks flaming, "I was not staring at him yesterday!" She crossed her arms over her chest, she was in her flight suit as well, not that she had ever touched her fighter, too scared of heights to actually fly.

Flynx leaned against the outside of the cockpit of Leroy's plane, "sure you weren't," he grinned cheekily, "if you weren't then you were drooling over him, sis."

"I was not!" Cleo snapped, raising her voice in the process, "I wasn't drooling over him!" She exclaimed, her face warm enough to fry something on.

Leroy looked amused and decided to save his friend from the embarrassment, "I know you weren't Cleo, Flynx's just being a pain."

Cleo huffed and ignored her brother, standing at Leroy's side and not going near any of the planes.

"Well, come on then Leroy, let's get this fighter back into the sky!" Flynx grinned before the grin turned into a smirk, "go ahead and take a passenger as well." his multi-colored eyes flickered over to his sister and he raised his eyebrows.

"Okay, who's the passenger Flynx?" Leroy asked with an identical smirk.

"Cleo's your passenger today!" Flynx grinned, "Let's go!"

"What? No!" Cleo exclaimed, catching on a little too late. Leroy flashed her a cheeky grin and Cleo barely had a second to say, "Leroy, don't!" Before the fifteen-year-old pilot scooped her up bridal style and ran towards his jet where her brother was standing inside the cockpit. "Leroy! Put me down!" Cleo shrieked, "I'm not getting inside that plane!"

"Not your choice sis!" Flynx grinned as Leroy tossed Cleo upward towards him, he caught her and waited while Leroy took a moment to jump into the jet himself, before dropping her onto the blonde pilot's lap and leaping out of the jet, shutting the cockpit as he did so.

"No! Leroy, please don't!" Cleo begged and twisted to look at him, green eyes wide with fear.

"It'll be okay," Leroy encouraged, kissing her on the forehead before settling her in his lap while he reached around her for the controls, "I promise," he said warmly before suddenly taking off.

Cleo threw her arms around his neck and hid her face in his neck while shrieking in fear.

Leroy busted out laughing, his body shaking at the strength of his laughter.

Wondering why we bother with love if it never lasts

"Cleo, you can open your eyes now," Leroy gently encouraged his friend, "we're going slow now."

Cleo tentatively opened her eyes, lifting her head from his neck to slowly open her and look out of the plane in front of them.

"See? It's not too bad," Leroy smiled they were right under the lowest cloud layer, the clouds brushing the fighter's top fin. "It's nice isn't it?" He was surprised she actually opened her eyes, he and Flynx had been forcing her to fly with him for the past week, trying to get her to get over her fear of heights. He knew she would be a really good pilot, she had been training to be one with him since they were ten, but the fifteen-year-old had never stepped foot into a fighter and gotten off the ground. In the simulator, however, she had the highest score that beat her mother's, a feat since her mother had held the record for twenty years.

"It's okay," Cleo replied, looking around at the clouds and the ground below them, her arms still looped around Leroy's neck, "I… I could get used to it." she eventually decided, looking at Leroy.

"I'm glad," Leroy smiled letting go of the controls with autopilot engaged and resting them around his friend's waist, "It'd be cool having you in the squad Cleo, you're a natural pilot."

Cleo smiled and with the excuse of distracting herself from how high up they were, she leaned forward and kissed him for the first time.

I say, "Can you believe it?"

As we're lying on the couch

"Can you believe that Cleo used to be afraid of heights?" Flynx asked Lixa over their radio frequency as they watched Cleo crouch on Leroy's plane wing, the former had been training for this for the past four months, and she loved it.

"If we go by what we're seeing here? Not at all." Lixa replied, watching as her sister jumped off of the plane, shooting downwards at an insane speed before flinging her arms out and jerking upward as she glided to slow her descent. "I mean, she's an air to land fighter," Lixa pointed out as she continued watching her sister shoot downward faster than any of their planes could, "She jumps out of her plane onto Leroy's and literally skydives down on top of the enemy before Leroy swoops down and gives her an air current to back up on, it's amazing really."

Cleo landed, and briefly stumbled before she swung at the person she was supposed to fight, a moment later the dummy was on the ground and she was back in the air, gliding on an air current up to Leroy's plane who opened the cockpit and she crashed down on top of him.

"Although the recovery needs some work," Lixa spoke with amusement, "I can't tell if that's an accident or on purpose."

"Totally on purpose," Flynx laughed, "if it was an accident Cleo would've smacked right into his cockpit."

"Good point."

"Sorry!" Cleo came over the radio, "I missed the plane wing!"

"And I didn't want her to break my windshield," Leroy defended himself.

"Hey! I'm not that heavy!"

"I didn't say you were, you were going about fifty miles an hour, you'd totally smash my windshield."

"I guess."

"Just find Cleo's plane and get back to the hangar," Lixa sighed with a roll of her eyes, "it should be circling above you guys, Flynx and I are going back to the hangar, over and out."

Cleo flashed Leroy a grin and kissed him while Leroy put the plane on autopilot and returned the affection.

"What're they doing Flynx?" Lixa asked a moment later as they turned and started flying back towards the hangar.

Flynx laughed, "kissing! That was totally on purpose Lixa!"

'Of course, it was, they're in love with each other, it's obvious.'

The moment I can see it.

Yes, yes, I can see it now.

Do you remember, we were sitting there by the water?

Cleo swung her legs off of the dock, creating small waves as she swung her legs, her ankles, and feet in the cool crystal water. "Hey Leroy," she greeted her friend in a murmur as she heard his footsteps, "I want to be alone right now."

"I know you do," Leroy replied, sitting on the dock and pulling off his socks and shoes before rolling up his pant legs and sitting next to her, dipping his feet into the water as well, "but I also know I'm excluded in the 'I want to be alone' statement."

Cleo gave a weak smile and kept looking at the medium sized house near the dock and the shore, her childhood home and the home of her now captured parents. "I guess you're the exception," she said in a murmur, looking sadly at the house.

Leroy was silent for a while, letting her mourn over her captured parents, before he spoke up again, pulling the other sixteen-year-old into his lap and resting his chin on the top of her head, "what're you thinking right now Cleo?"

"I'm thinking that I miss my parents." Cleo sighed, leaning back against him, "I'm thinking about how my mother seemed to know that they were going to be captured, how their planes returned with no pilots, my father's cockpit was covered in blood, wondering what I'm supposed to do without them, and I'm wondering what's going on between us." She gestured to their clasped hands in her lap, "I know this isn't friend like behavior and it's more like how my parents act with each other."

Leroy sighed and looked at her, looping his arms around her waist, "I know what's going on here, but I don't want to change anything while you're upset about your parents, Lo."

Cleo shrugged, her heart warming at the nickname he had given her a while back, "I'm not upset, I'm determined, I'm going to find my parents one day, even if it's the last thing I ever do." She looked up at him, "what's going on with us?"

"I don't know about you, but I'm in love with you," Leroy spoke quietly, "this behavior is like your parents because your parents love each other Cleo, and I don't know if you love me, but I love you with all my heart."

Cleo was silent for a moment, thinking, 'Do I? I know I love him in some way, but romantically like he does? I don't know…'

"Just think about it okay?" Leroy asked, "before you say anything anyway, just think about it first."

'I don't know… this reminds me of the conversation I had with my mom a few years ago…'

*"Mom, what does it feel like to be in love?" Cleo asked her mother curiously, the question had been bothering her all day and she really wanted an answer.

"Hmm… that's a good question, Cleo." Cynthia said, drying her hands and turning around to look at her daughter, leaning back against the kitchen counter, "It's a feeling that is different from everything else and unusual for sure. Being in love with someone makes you feel happier around them, they are your central focus, the thing you worry and care the most about." She said, trying to explain it to her daughter, "You'll know if you're in love with someone Cleo, you want to make them happy, not matter what the circumstance."

"But how can you tell?"

"The easiest way is to think of it as this way," Cynthia explained, "imagine that the person you think you're in love with loves someone else, would you let them go because they'll be happy? Or keep them to yourself and make them miserable. If you answered with the first answer then you're probably in love with them." She said simply.

Cleo frowned, "are there any giveaways?"

"Well… there's a lot of affection and trust between two people who're in love, Cleo..." Cynthia replied and trailed off as Leon came in the front door, looking tired and a little worn out. "Hey Leon," Cynthia greeted her husband who went over to her before going anywhere else.

"Hey, yourself," he grinned, the smile widening as Cynthia herself smiled. "What's going on in the crazy house?"

"Lixa and Flynx are still at the base, Miles is upstairs playing a game on the computer, and Cleo's helping me around the house," Cynthia replied, her voice held a tone that Cleo noticed she only used when she was talking to her father.

"What about you?" Leon asked and gave his wife a chaste kiss before letting her answer.

"Perfect," Cynthia replied with a warm smile, blue eyes gleaming with love.

Cleo understood what her mother had been trying to tell her, being in love meant you'd give up everything for the person and that they meant the world to you.

Cleo shook her head to clear it before thinking hard, 'Would I give up everything for Leroy? Yes, Can I imagine being here without him? No. Thanks, mom, your the best.' She looked up at Leroy, green eyes gentle and soft, "I'm in love with you too Leroy," she said softly, "I love you to the ends of the world and back."

You put your arm around me for the first time.

You made a rebel of a careful man's careless daughter.

You are the best thing that's ever been mine.

Flash forward and we're taking on the world together,

"Leroy on you left! Nine 'oclock!" Cleo exclaimed into the radio, sharply turning her fighter and opening fire on the enemy fighter that got too close to her boyfriend for her tastes.

"Thanks, Cleo," Leroy's voice was rushed and tense but it held an underlying touch of a tone he only used with her.

"Lixa," Cleo contacted her sister, "this quadrant is empty, the enemy has been taken down and neutralized."

"Good job Cleo, Leroy, head over to Flynx, Miles, and I, I'm sending you coordinates right now."

"No problem Leroy, just be a little more careful alright?" Cleo said through their private radio frequency, her voice softening, "I don't want to lose you."

"I don't want to lose you either," Leroy spoke, his jet flying over to hers so they were next to each other, "so heed your own advice will you?"

"Of course, I love you, Leroy."

"I love you too Cleo."

And there's a drawer of my things at your place.

"Lixa, Cleo's severely injured, I'm returning to the base," Leroy spoke, his voice tense and strained, Cleo was lying sideways on his lap, having just returned from an air to ground attack with a really bad gash on her lower back. "She'll be with me until she recovers."

"Understood Leroy, Flynx, take Leroy's place and neutralize the threat there."

"Roger Lixa, send me your coordinates Leroy, I'm on my way."

"Sending them now," Leroy replied and did so before turning and flying back towards the base, the seventeen-year-old lying unconscious in his lap, her blood staining his flight suit and the cockpit of his plane.

:( :( :( :(

"She'll be fine," Kia smiled encouragingly at her cousin's boyfriend, "Cleo's a tough cookie."

"All cookies break Kia," Leroy replied worriedly, staring at the red light signaling he couldn't go in.

"Yes, but it's a flesh wound, easily treatable and easy to heal with Bree's device, you know that."

"Yeah, but you never know how long it'll take to heal it and for her to recover."

"She'll recover overnight, just keep her with you for the night so you can monitor her to satisfy your fear, and she'll be fine in the morning."

"Leroy Sheridan?" A doctor asked, stepping out of the room as the light on the door turned green, "she'll be fine, just do as Kia says and keep her with you for the night, she'll probably sleep through the entire thing, she's asleep right now, but you can take her to your flat if you are that worried."

"Thank you!" Leroy smiled at the doctor and slipped into the room. Cleo was lying on her back, the seventeen-year-old was wearing the usual white t-shirt and sweatpants the medics put the injured pilots into, her eyes were closed and she was softly snoring, a usual occurrence. Leroy went over to her and carefully picked her up, her head resting against his chest. He nodded to the doctor before walking out of the room and down the hallway, Cleo still asleep and tucked in his arms.

:) :) :)

Cleo opened her eyes to Leroy's chest and she jumped, falling off of his bed with a yell of surprise. "Ah!"

Leroy jolted awake and peered down at her through sleepy sunset eyes, "what's wrong?"

"Nothing," Cleo replied and pushed herself to her feet before dropping back onto the bed, lying on her side facing him, "I was just startled, usually I wake up in my flat room with you and Lixa pacing holes in my floor, not curled up next to you."

Leroy dropped back on his back and shrugged, stretching his stiff muscles, "it's one of the perks of being in a relationship," he replied as he finishing stretching before rolling onto his side facing her, "it's not a bad thing I hope?"

"No, just surprising," Cleo replied, studying him curiously.

"Having fun checking me out?" Leroy asked her in amusement a few moments later.

Cleo blushed, "I wasn't doing anything of the sort, don't fool yourself," she replied indignantly, "I'm just curious, I haven't seen you shirtless before so I'm naturally curious, have a problem with it?"

Leroy grinned a lopsided smile at her, "Nope, curiosity is great."

I learn your secrets and I figure out why your guarded,

I say we'll never make your parents' mistakes.

"You have parents Leroy," Cleo smiled at him, "my parents love you to death."

"Yeah, I guess…" Leroy replied, taking a page out of her book for the reply, "it still hurts to know that my parents were idiots who didn't love each other at all and just dumped me on my grandparents."

Cleo's green eyes softened and she rested one of her hands on his chest in a comforting fashion, "we won't make that mistake, I'm confident we have a relationship with my parents. They may be captured right now, but I have no doubt that they are together and worrying about us all right now." She leaned up on her toes and kissed his cheek, "we won't make the mistake that your parents did Leroy, I promise."

Leroy smiled at her, "I love you," he said simply, his voice soft and loving.

"I love you too," Cleo smiled and wrapped her arms around him, nestling her face into the other eighteen year old's shirt.

But we got bills to pay,

We got nothing figured out,

Leroy looked at Cleo, sunset colored eyes warm and gentle as he watched her green eyes droop shut from her position curled up next to him. The air fight the two-twenty-year-olds had gone through today had been extremely stressful, and Leroy himself was still shaken up by it. It all started by a troop from the enemy had dropped onto his fighter and had started cutting through the glass…

Thunk!

Leroy jumped and stared at the enemy crouching on his windshield, using some device to cut into the glass. "Someone's on my windshield! He's trying to break the glass!"

"I'm coming!" Cleo exclaimed, "just don't do any barrel rolls!"

A moment later Leroy heard another thunk and he saw Cleo land on the man's back, knocking him off balance and smashing his face against the glass. "Cleo, hurry I can't see what's ahead of me!"

"I'm working on it!" Cleo said as she stumbled when Leroy shifted his plane's position a bit. "I can't fight if I can barely stand!"

"Sorry!"

"Get over here you… I don't know, what's a mean name that isn't swearing?"

"Idiot?" Leroy suggested, watching as Cleo tackled the man.

"Good enough, Come here you idiot!" Cleo then tackled the man off of Leroy's plane, sending them both into the air. A moment after she tackled the man off she opened her arms and started gliding, that's when disaster struck.

The man panicked and grabbed onto Cleo's foot, weighing her down. "If I'm going down, you're going down with me!" the man cackled and slashed at the flaps of cloth that made her glide, causing the lightweight fabric to tear violently and causing Cleo to start free falling.

"Leory!" Cleo shrieked as she fell, flailing her arms like it was going to help, "He cut the wings of my glider! I can't control anything!"

"What?!" Leroy quickly jerked his plane into a dive, pushing it to the limits to catch Cleo before she hit the ground, "I'm coming!"

"Cleo!"

"Leroy hurry!"

"No!"

All three of Cleo's siblings exclaimed, pausing their fighting to stare at their falling sister and her significant other's race against time to catch her.

"Leroy!" Cleo shrieked, the ground was getting closer and her fear was rising, "Leroy!"

Leroy got near her and opened the cockpit, the air rushing past him and making his golden blonde hair messy as the wind blew through it. "Grab my hand, Cleo!" They were getting closer the ground at an alarming rate, "Grab on! Hurry!"

Cleo finally kicked off the man holding onto her leg and she reached for Leroy's hand, her gloved fingers less than an inch from his own, "I can't reach!"

"Try harder Cleo!" Lixa shouted through the radio, "you can't hit the ground!"

Leroy lunged, strapped into his plane, he lunged forward and grabbed her wrist, yanking her into his plane and pulling out of the dive, stirring up the loose dirt and other objects on the ground in the form a huge cloud as he shot up into the air, Cleo safely aboard his plane.

Leroy wrapped his arms around Cleo and pulled her closer before he buried his nose into her auburn hair, squeezing his sunset eyes shut as he returned to present time. "That scared me," he breathed, knowing she was still awake, even if just barely.

"It scared me too," Cleo mumbled, her eyes still closed, "I really didn't want to leave you."

When it was hard to take,

Yes, yes, this is what I thought about.

Do you remember, we were sitting there by the water?

You put your arm around me for the first time

You made a rebel of a careful man's careless daughter

You are the best thing that's ever been mine.

Do you remember all the city lights on the water?

You saw me start to believe for the first time

You made a rebel of a careful man's careless daughter

You are the best thing that's ever been mine.

Oh, oh, oh, oh

And I remember that fight

Two-thirty AM

As everything was slipping right out of our hands

"I don't care what you have to say Leroy!" Cleo shouted at him, green eyes glistening with tears, "I am going to find my parents no matter what you have to say!" She snapped at him, hands tightening into fists, she hated fighting with him, it always reduced her to tears, tears that made the twenty-one-year-old feel weak and useless. "Don't argue with me!" She glowered before she turned on her heel and ran as she tried to escape him.

I ran out crying and you followed me out into the street

Braced myself for the "Goodbye."

'Cause that's all I've ever known

Then you took me by surprise

You said, "I'll never leave you alone."

"Cleo wait!" Leroy ran after her, chasing her down the hallways of the base to the front door of her squadron's flat, he stopped her from entering the flat by loosely grabbing the twenty-one year old's wrist, "I didn't mean that I was going to leave you for wanting to find your parents…"

You said, "I remember how we felt sitting by the water.

And every time I look at you, it's like the first time.

I fell in love with a careful man's careless daughter.

She is the best thing that's ever been mine."

"Remember back at the dock where you said you miss your parents and you were wondering if they were okay? Well this is how you can find out, I know you miss them and I want to help you find them," Leroy's sunset eyes softened at the tears gleaming in Cleo's eyes, "I fell in love with a very brave and beautiful girl those six years ago, and I intend to helping that girl fulfill her goal of finding her parents, after all," he locked eyes with her, "you're the best thing that has ever happened to me, Cleo."

Cleo's green eyes watered and she hugged him, crying into his shirt out of relief.

Leroy wrapped his arms around her waist and tugged her closer, "it's okay, Cleo," he soothed, "there's no need to cry Lo, there's no need to cry over this…"

"I love you," Cleo interrupted him, looking up at him, green eyes glistening with tears, "I love you so much."

Leroy seemed to realize that she was crying out of sadness and the twenty-one year old's sunset colored eyes gleamed with love, "I love you too Princess."

Hold on, make it last

Hold on, never turn back

You made a rebel of a careful man's careless daughter

You are the best thing that's ever been mine.

(Hold on) do you believe it?

(Hold on) we're gonna make it now.

(Hold on) and I can see it,

(Yes, yes) I can see it now (see it now, see it now...)