"Oww." Sonny whined from the backseat.
Natasha glanced back at the raven haired man through the rear view mirror. "What now?"
"Abby kept kicking me and now my shins hurt! I'm gonna get bruises." the goblin complained.
"Boo hoo." Bucky sympathized sarcastically with a roll of her eyes. Currently, she was trying to get a hold of Phishie but the dork didn't seem to be picking up.
"Why did I have to distract her?"
"Because it couldn't have been Owsla or I," stopping the car at the crosswalk she let a few pedestrians pass to the park before continuing. "and you lost rock paper scissors with Bucky, remember?"
Sonny let out a huff remembering the unfortunate event. After the close call with Annie, they had decided to go to Phishie's. There really was no other place to harbor a blue alien child. So they had patiently waited till both of Bucky's parents had gone to work before leaving the safety of the bedroom. The only problem with leaving was that Abby was still there. Knowing Abby, she wouldn't be able to keep quiet about Natasha, much less a blue alien. So, the obvious conclusion was someone had to distract her while the rest of them slipped out. After losing a round of rock paper scissors, Sonny was chosen to distract her. Distract was a light word for it though. In actuality, Sonny had picked up the kid and dragged her downstairs out of sight from the escape path; holding her hostage intill he heard the front door shut. Abby, being the violent child she was, had kicked and screamed the entire time. Safe to say he had some bruises.
'Damn,' he thought. 'I knew I should've picked paper.'
"You didn't have to hog tie her like that. If you hadn't, you probably would have made it out unscathed. We only said distract her." Natasha pointed out to the pouting goblin in the backseat.
The 7 yr. old man child merely grumbled in response. "Yeah, but how else could I guarantee she would stay put while the rest of you were escaping? It's not my fault you guys took forever."
At that point, Nat replied back with an irked tone. "We weren't ready to go yet! Did I tell you to go immediately? I had to gather my stuff, Bucky had to pack and your daughter needed a change of clothes!"
Bucky let out a sigh of frustration, interrupting their bickering as she ended her call again. "Damn! Phish isn't picking up, I keep getting her voicemail."
Natasha glanced at her girlfriend next to her in the front seat. "She's not out of town again, is she?"
Bucky just shook her head "Not that I know of."
"Well, I wouldn't freak out too much, it's common for her to leave her phone lying around."
"Yeah I guess... Oh!" Bucky glanced up, suddenly remembering something. "About earlier, did Tim really tell you to get some work done?"
"Ah, no." Sonny admitted.
Realizing he had lied for her sake, Natasha grumbled. "Thanks Captain Underpants." The nickname was a bit of a long story, so just don't ask.
"You're welcome!" he chirped happily. "But you owe me one."
Nat gritted her teeth. She didn't mind owing favors... Except when it came to Captain Underpants. Owing him a favor meant that he had done something for her and that didn't sit well for her. And secondly, being in Sonny's debt, she could never guess just what exactly she would have to do in return. The man was just too crazy and spontaneous to know. That uncertainty caused the semi-red head a lot of worry.
"That does remind me though, I should probably tell Roadhog where I'm going." Grabbing his phone, the goblin went to contact him when... "Shit!"
Bucky turned in her seat. "What happened?"
Ignoring her, Sonny pressed the phone to his ear. "Hello? Joel, are you still there?"
Bucky just starred at her idiot brother. Had he seriously forgotten to hang up his phone call with Joel? Surely the Mau5 had hung up by now.
"Yeah, I'm still here Skrillz." Joel's annoyed tone rang back in the goblin's ear.
"Why didn't you hang up?"
Bucky's jaw dropped, glancing at Natasha to align their gazes. Both girls were thinking the same thing; 'The skrillmau5 feels strike again'
"Forget aboot that, what the hell is going on, eh?"
"It's nothing..."
"Like hell it's nothing!" Joel argued. "I've heard everything since Annie burst in, man. Why the fuck are people hiding in closets and hatching escape plans? And just who the fuck is Owsla? Is she your new girlfriend?"
"No way!"
"I don't believe you man."
"Mommy? Who are you talking to?" Owsla looked at her mother curiously, the man in question becoming more distressed as the conversation continued.
"Mommy? Shit Skrillz, did you kidnap a kid?"
"No of course not!"
"Tell me the truth dude."
Sonny glanced up at the two girls in the front seats pleadingly.
"No." Natasha shook her head. "We can't risk the government finding out."
"But-"
"She said no." Bucky glared at him seriously.
Sonny hesitated but finally sighed, resigned. "I can't Joel, I'm sorry."
"Can't? What the hell is that supposed to mean!"
"I just can't, ok? I gotta go... I'm sorry man... Talk later?" Sonny bit his lip worriedly.
"Oh we sure as hell will be. This discussion is not over." With that, the phone line died as Joel hung up on the other end.
Catching a glance at his crestfallen face, Natasha immediately felt guilty.
"Sorry Sonny. I know he's your best friend and all but you know the government records phone calls... especially international calls. And, if they find out about Owsla..."
"Yeah I know, don't worry about it. Besides, explaining we have an alien in the car would be way too complicated over the phone. Its not like he would've believed me anyways." the raven haired man shrugged but looked out the window, laughing it off. The fake smile he put on only increased the guilt Natasha was feeling.
An awkward silence befell upon the car. On instinct, Natasha reached out to turn on the radio before the light they were stopped at turned green. Although she had good intentions, the whole car grimaced instead.
"What the hell sort of crap is that?"
Nat scowled. "Probably some Justin Bieber puke." Regretting her decision, she turned the radio off. "Why don't they have a real EDM radio station! I've long thought there is a desperate need for one."
Bucky glanced at her girlfriend. "You could start one."
"Ha ha, very funny." Natasha rolled her eyes.
"No I'm serious." the blonde protested. "Didn't you take radio broadcasting in high school?"
Nat paused. "Well... Yeah but-"
"But nothing!" Sonny pipped up from the backseat. "You'd be perfect for it! You know three artists on the scene personally and you're dating the youngest 'button pusher' already." he laughed at the reference to Joel's constant insistence he wasn't a DJ.
"Yeah, I'll call it 99.3, The Baseline"
"See?" the goblin pounded on the back of her chair excitedly. "You've already got a name for it!"
"I was being sarcastic!"
"I wasn't." Bucky commented.
"I can tell." Parking the car, Natasha quickly unbuckled herself, hurrying to get out of the car. "Look, we can talk about this later, let's just get inside." she didn't have a chance to hear either of their replies, choosing to escape rather than wait. So she ran up to the one story red brick house before they could hound her further on the subject. Without even bothering to ring the door bell, she opened the door; unlocked as usual.
"Hi Oscar... Rex." the semi-red head greeted the dogs as they came scrambling to jump on her.
The household here had long ago become a second home to her. Mr. And Mrs. Laurie weren't Mr. and Mrs., they were mom and dad. To Natasha it was a place of peace and laughter she had never had before, a treasured part of her life. She even had her own key. However, the Lauries never locked the door during the day if they were home, so she rarely needed it.
"Phish?" Natasha called out. Not seeing her in the kitchen grabbing a snack, the next logical place was her bedroom. Walking down the hall to the door, warm memories flooded her mind. Smiling to herself, she pushed open the door to Phishie's cramped, messy, but comforting bedroom. By that time, Bucky had caught up with her. Pushing the door wider to accommodate moving past Nat, she burst into the room first.
They immediately spotted Phish laying on her top bunk, playing on her computer. 'Phishie' of course was only a nickname. Her real name was Aurora, but she had been the only freshman when their group of friends had been formed. Because of that, she had soon become Phishie. And even though Phish would become a senior this upcoming school year, the name was forever stuck. As for the spelling... Natasha liked being fancy sometimes.
"Phish!" Bucky exclaimed. "Why didn't you pick up? I've been calling you."
Phishie looked up from her computer to notice the two of them for the first time since they had bust in. She didn't even bother asking why or how. Those weren't the sort of questions she bothered with. Instead, "What's up guys?" was her reply. "I've been watching Markiplier so I guess I didn't my phone ringing."
Spotting her phone on the bottom bunk, Natasha added "Or because your phone was no where near you... again."
"Or that."
"Listen Phish, are your parents home?"
"Nope. They're out of town for the week to help my grandparents with something. Chris is staying here while they're gone."
"Perfect." Natasha let out a sigh of relief. Chris had work and when he wasn't working, he was out with friends or in the guest room constantly. The place would be practically empty. That would give them a week to figure out what to do. It wasn't all the time in the world but Nat would take whatever she could get.
"Look! I can fly!"
Natasha turned around just in time to see a blur of blue and purple whiz past the hallway into the living room.
"What was-?"
"Owsla, no!" Natasha shouted, hurrying after her. "No flying in the house!"
The semi-red head was relieved to see the child running around with her arms spread out; only pretending to fly. You know, because with an alien in the house, finding out it could actually fly was a real concern.
"Owsla, stop jumping on the couch. You could damage it or hurt yourself." she scolded.
"rrrrRRRROMMMMM!" Suddenly Captain Underpants burst in, also pretending to be an airplane. Well, now they knew where she had gotten the idea. The long haired man began chasing the little alien around the room and through the kitchen.
Natasha folded her arm. "Stop running in the house, Owsla will get hurt."
"What about me?" Sonny asked. "Aren't you worried about my well being too?"
"Not really." Natasha admitted.
Sonny made a pouty face but scooped up Owsla in his arms to prevent her from running into something.
"Anyone want to explain who that is?"
Natasha turned to see Phish peering curiously at the alien child Sonny was holding.
"An alien." Bucky stated simply, as if that was all the explanation needed.
There was a pause as the honey blonde blinked. "Ok," she shrugged and went into the kitchen "Food anyone?"
"Do you have Doritos by any chance?"
"I do actually."
Smiling, Bucky followed her into the kitchen to grab a snack.
"...but moooooom!" Owsla was whining. "I wanna play!"
"I know, but Nattie said we have to stop running in the house."
"Aww..." Owsla sulked but quickly brightened up as she turned towards the semi-red head. "Nattie! Pick me up!"
"Wha-? O...okay?" Walking over she grabbed onto the small child whose arms were already outstretched to her. Once on her hip, the alien whispered in her ear. "Nattie? Who's the girl with the big boobs?"
"Can't you identify her by some OTHER feature!" she exclaimed exasperatedly. It took a moment as the child blinked up at her to realize 'boobs' were the only body part she had learned to identify. "Here look, her skin is very pale."
"Pale?"
"Pale means close to the color white, see?" Natasha pointed at a white stripe on her shirt to demonstrate. "Now look at her skin."
"Oh!" Owsla nodded in understanding. "So who's the pale girl?"
"You can call her Phishie. She's a dear friend of ours so be nice to her, ok?"
Owsla nodded. "Ok!"
"Come on Owsla, let's play airplanes outside." Sonny urged.
Bucky, who, while eating her Doritos, had contemplated Sonny's current play-pretend airplane state, commented. "Shouldn't you be a train? Considering you actually own one of those?"
Sonny stopped momentarily to think about her statement. "I see," he then resumed and began shuffling around. "Chugga chugga, chugga chugga..." he yanked his arm up and down. "Choo! Choo!" in that way he continued through the room and down the hallway.
"I wanna play too! Wait for me Mommy!" After Nattie put her down, Owsla ran off after him. "Choo-choo!" she squealed, following him through the house.
"Oh, me too!" a certain blonde called out.
Soon Bucky had joined them and the three were chugging along as a human train.
Phishie stopped to consider the situation for a moment. "Did she just call him Mommy?"
"Yep." the semi-red head confirmed.
"Well ok then."
