Loveroffanfic- I'm glad you like the direction of the story. And yes Jake did need to knock some sense into Mike.
LJP- I promise you there will be more sibling rivalry to come. After all Benny still needs to have a showdown with his brother Kaine. And Mike was defiantly luckily he didn't say those things to Morgan, had he did I doubt there would have been anything left for him to have picked himself up off of the floor.
Pretender Fanatic- Jake might have gone a bit too far, but Mike did kinda have it coming after what he said to his parents. He is pretty lucky to have both of his parents unlike his cousins Terra and Tobias, along with the majority of the Black Files.
CHAPTER 41
AURORAS
November 27, 2010
12:58pm
Charlottesville, Virginia
Russell Family Home
After talking to his parents a while longer Mike made his way to the room he shared with the rest of the Black Files. The room was large, so large that it took up the whole east wing of the second floor of the mansion. There were fourteen beds in the room. On the right side were the boy's eight beds and on the left side of the room was the girls' side with their six beds. With a different comforter on each bed, the room was quite colorful. Morgan often muttered how the children's room resembled a box of melted crayons.
At the end of each bed was a footlocker, and in between the beds were night stands equipped with a lamp. At the far end of the room was a large window seat, and for such occasions as watching movies a projector screen came out of the ceiling covering the window seat. Connected to the room were two large closets that were the size of a normal bedroom. The closet next to the window seat housed the boys' clothing, and the other closet that was located next to Alex's bed contained the girls' clothing. There was also a laundry chute next to the door to the room.
Mike stood leaning against the door frame watching as the rest of his group were putting away their belongings. He could see their Centre training in the way that the other children methodically unpacked their clothing and the other various items that they had either brought to Blue Cove or purchased during their stay.
The Black Files were a finely tuned group not needing to speak to one another to know what the other need to be done. Mike had never noticed how militaristic his group was when it came to such common task.
"Hey Mikey you just gonna stand there or are you gonna unpack your stuff. 'Cause little bro we aren't doing it for you," Marc called distracting Mike from his thoughts.
"Uh yeah," Mike said and walked over to his bed that was stationed in between Jeremiah's and Aaron's.
"Mike what happened to your face?" Maddie gasped, she had not had the chance to look her brother in the face and was shocked that the right side of his face was red almost purple.
"It's nothing. I deserved it," Mike said as Maddie tilted his face so that she could get a better look at her twin.
"I'm going to go get an ice pack for your face. I don't like the color it's turning," Maddie scowled as she shot Jake a dirty look.
"Maddox, I'm fine. Stop mothering me," Mike groaned. Maddie ignored her brother and left to go get Mike some ice.
Mike turned to the duffel bag on top of his bed. He proceeded to placed his clean clothes in a pile to his right and his dirty clothes to his left. A dirty clothes basket went down each side of the room, Mike tossed his clothes in and handed the basket off to Aaron.
"Mike was that you earlier, tapping into our bond?" Alex asked as she dumped the girls pile of clothes down the laundry chute.
"Yeah sorry I didn't warn you," Mike admitted a bit sheepishly.
"Oh it's okay. It's just been a long time since you did that. I kinda miss our bond being that strong," Alex said.
"It was pretty strong. I don't even think our bond was that strong when we were younger. But it was hard to hold on to, my Dad just touched my shoulder and the connection broke," Mike commented.
"You sort out everything with your Mom and Dad?" Jake asked carefully.
"Yup, we got a few things out in the air," Mike replied as he went to hang he clothes in his closet.
"Here Mikey,"Maddie said returning to the room with an ice pack. Mike sighed but pacified his sister by placing ice pack on the side of his face.
"Are the kids awake yet?" Mike asked sitting down on his bed.
"No," Alex answered.
"By the by tomorrow we all need to go for our fittings for the wedding. Jay and Deb decided to push it back two weeks. Good thing they didn't hire a caterer or rent a place for the wedding," Tobias commented.
"Um here's a question, since Adam..."
"Let's not get in to that right now," Rachael sighed interrupting Andros.
"So no one's heard from him then?" Aaron asked.
"I spoke to him," Jake admitted softly, Rachael looked at her brother. It was obvious to the rest of the Black Files that Rachael had been unaware that Jake had been in communication with Adam.
"How did you get in contact with Ad?" Rachael asked.
"Will gave me his number. I was the one who told Adam about Keegan. I tried to call Adam back later but he disconnected the number," Jake replied.
"For a kid that everyone said wouldn't be able to last a week on his own, Adam is putting the best of us to shame," Greg muttered.
"Hey none of us ever said that," Rachael spoke.
"No, our parents all did. We just thought it," Greg retorted.
"I have complete faith in my brother," Rachael argued.
"Let's be real Rach, Ad is a twelve year old boy with no powers and no true experience in hiding from the Centre or his own family for that matter. Not unless you count all those hours he played hide-and-go–seek," Greg said cynically.
"And whose fault is it that Adam and the others have never been trained?" Rachael snapped.
"All of ours now stop fighting, Keegan and the twins will be able to sense it," Jake ordered. Rachael and Greg backed off from each other realizing that they were being childish.
"On a different note Toby and Terra need to come clean with Will. He knows that they got a new power," Greg said changing the topic.
"How does he know?" Jeremiah asked his brother.
"I accidently let it slip. But Will doesn't know who got a new power or what power they've obtained," Greg admitted sheepishly.
"We'll talk to him later," Terra sighed.
"You got to admit though you guys got a kick ass power," Aaron grinned. "I so wish I could use it."
"Yeah what's it like?" Cassie asked laying down on her bed.
"It's kinda distracting. You see these people, animals, plants even, and there is a halo of color surrounding them," Tobias spoke.
"You two can see auroras. You must get it from your mother, according to your files she was an empath. The ability to see auroras is like empathy to the next level," Will spoke from the door way, next to him was Alley, Jamie and Jeff.
"Damn I knew I should have closed that door," Mike mumbled.
"What does mine look like?" Will asked Terra and Tobias. The twins looked at each other a smile briefly crossing their faces.
"Hot pink," They answered. Will scowled as the room filled with laughter.
"We're just joking Will," Terra said smiling.
"You aurora starts out a bright red that gradually becomes a yellow," Tobias said truthfully.
"So what is it about auroras that let you two see that Keegan was Markus's clone and not Mike's?" Jamie questioned.
"Why don't you four come in and sit down," Alex invited. "It's not really a long story but you'll be more comfortable sitting." Will, Alley, Jamie and Jeff entered the room curious of Tobias and Terra's new ability.
"We figured it out by comparing Greg and Jer's auroras, and Air's and Andy's. Though genetically each pair of boys are identical their auroras aren't," Terra began.
"Greg's aurora is vibrant, a bright blend of greens and yellow. Jeremiah's is more of a dark bluish green, like the ocean." Tobias continued. "Air and Andy's are a bit more alike. Probably because they have the same abilities and their attitudes are more similar, compared to Jerry and Greg's."
"In case you four were wondering my aurora is a lovely shade of rose red. Andy's is darker in color with flecks of gold," Aaron spoke.
"What about Lissa's Alex's and mine while we're at it?" Alley asked.
"Mine favors Greg's colors. Electric green with a shock of pink," Lissa spoke.
"Your's is somewhat similar to Will's. Bright red but there is some blue in there," Tobias said squinting as he tried to make out the color of Alley's aurora.
"As for Alex..." Terra trailed off looking at the youngest Black File.
"I'm the weird one of the family," Alex sighed.
"As if we didn't already know that," Jeff snickered.
"You know I can't wait for you to become my brother-in-law, then you'll really be part of the family and I can set you on fire," Alex retorted.
"Gee my initiation into the family, I can't wait," Jeff grinned and Alex found herself smiling back at Jeff. She genuinely liked Jeff, and was happy that Alley found someone to love.
"Back to Alex's aurora?" Will spoke.
"Oh mine is the color of blue flames with white tips," Alex spoke.
"Now how does this all go back to Keegan?" Alley asked.
"Well his aurora isn't the same color as Mikey's. But it is similar, where Mike's purple and gold, Key's is gold and silver but pale, almost tarnished I guess," Terra spoke.
"Oh and keep the whole pale thing in mind." Jake piped up. "This is were it get's interesting.
"As if it wasn't before," Marc mumbled.
"We got a look at Chris's aurora, it is exactly like Uncle Jarod's -which is a deep red by the way- except Chris's aurora is paler. Like it's been bleached." Tobias said.
"Best we can figure is that when a person is cloned their aurora gets a bit of a bleach looked. Kinda like a reverse xerox, instead of their aurora becoming darker it gets lighter. Thus that is how we learned Keegan was Markus's clone," Jake explained.
"I'm a what?" Came the voice of a six year old with an English accent. Eighteen pairs of eyes turned to the doorway where Keegan stood in nothing but a pair of jeans, his hair tousled from sleep. His blue eyes were wide with confusion, and another emotion that broke Mike and Maddie's hearts. Betrayal.
"Keegan," Mike and Maddie spoke getting up from their beds. Keegan backed away shaking his head as he did so.
"Keegan sweetie it's okay," Maddie said softly.
"The absence of the truth is a lie," Keegan managed to whisper. "You lied to me." The little boy's blue eyes filled with tears and his bottom lip trembled. Mike and Maddie walked closer to Keegan wanting to comfort their baby brother and explain everything to him.
"Key..."
"No!" Keegan bellowed and inadvertently sent Mike and Maddie sailing through the air. Alley had just enough time to react to use her telekinesis to send Mike and Maddie landing on Mike's bed.
"I knew I should have closed that door," Mike groaned.
Shocked at not only what he had done but at the truth of who he really was Keegan did the first thing that came to mind and ran. The little boy had no idea where he was going, having never set foot inside the mansion before. But he managed to make his way down stairs, where he ran past Jarod, Morgan, Lex, Julia, Sydney, Chris and Debbie who were conversing in the livingroom. Keegan then ran out of the room leaving the adults stunned, and out back kitchen door.
Seconds later Mike and Maddie with the rest of the children close behind came running down the steps.
"Mom, Dad he knows. Keegan knows. He over heard us talking. I swear we didn't mean for him to find out. He was just there and he over heard," Mike babbled.
"We have to find him," Lex said getting up.
"Will can you sense Keegan?" Chris asked.
"No he's blocked me," Will said shaking his head.
"Jace and Jack can sense him," Aaron spoke.
"Get them now," Chris ordered. Aaron, Andros and Alex ran up the stairs to get their baby brothers. The triplets returned moments later with Jason, Jack and Amy.
"Hi you three," Chris said crouching down in front of the three children.
"Hi Uncle Chris," Amy yawned.
"Jace, Jack I need a favor," Chris began, Jason and Jack raised a questioning eyebrow. "Can you find Keegan for me?" Chris asked. Confusion appeared on the three children's faces realizing that one of their number was missing.
Jason and Jack closed their eyes in concentration, then with out words they each grabbed one of Chris's hands and led him out the back door. Mike, Maddie and their parents began to follow.
"Stay here," Chris commanded the four of them.
"He is my son Christopher," Lex spoke.
"Yes but as the only other clone in this house I'm the only one who understands his pain," Chris snapped and allowed Jason and Jack to take him to Keegan.
"Uncle Chris and Keegan are clones," Amy said confused. The family turned to look at the five year old realizing that the had a few things to explain to Amy before Chris returned with Keegan and the twins.
Up Next: Chris helps Keegan deal with his origins. And we learn just what is up with Pete.
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