Alright guys, I know it's been awhile since my last update, sorry about that :-)

and not to disappoint you agian but this chapter is really just a filler chapter.

Hopefully i'll have the next chapter up soon, and then the fun will really begin.

Disclaimer: Repeat after me. Ms Collin owns it all. Ms Collins owns it all. Ms Collins owns it all...

The night air was cool on Gregor's tearstained face as he stood on the broken down porch outside the small Virginia home. He couldn't believe all that had happened to him in the past 5 years since leaving the Underland. 5 years was such a long time, the events of his youth felt like a dream, but then the past few months felt like a nightmare. A hideous nightmare that he kept praying to wake up from. He missed his parents, 6 months 5 days 3 hours since his dad and 3 months 14 days 10 hours since his mom. Both of them had relapsed from their Underland illnesses and Gregor had tried to take care of them. He did a good job for a 17 year old kid, but they were all shaken. No one had expected the illnesses to come back, it had been so long. Only Underland doctors can treat Underland illnesses and Gregor wasn't an Underland doctor. So they had passed, leaving Gregor the sole guardian of his two sisters.

Granted, 12 year-old Lizzie wasn't all that hard to care for; she was mature for her age, too mature in Gregor's opinion. He felt terrible that everything that had happened had robbed her of her childhood. Boots on the other hand was a different story, she was a handful, and while Gregor loved her, it was a pain trying to make her understand that she couldn't talk to bugs. He and Lizzie had caught her many times with all sorts of beetles, mice, and cockroaches all over her bedspread and her talking to them like they were people. Whenever the family caught her talking to bugs, Grace got visibly nervous and yelled at Boots, Gregor's dad just sighed and wrung his hands, Lizzie would go to her room and cry, and Gregor would smile sadly, pick Boots up and quietly tell her that "we don't talk to bugs, they can't talk back here." Gregor and Lizzie missed the Underland terribly, and although Grace had banned all talk of "that place" when she was alive, Lizzie would sometimes sneak into Gregor's room after everyone had gone to sleep, and they would talk for hours of the people and the places they had left behind. They made sure that Boots never forgot either, they told her stories whenever their parents would go to the store or leave the house for some other reason.

But everything was different now that his parents were dead. One of their elderly relatives was staying with them until the end of the school year when Gregor, Boots and Lizzie would be put into the foster care system. But Gregor wasn't stupid; he knew the chances of all three of them staying together, especially since he was 17, who wanted to adopt a 17 year old? So they were leaving tonight, they were getting on a plane and going to New York, going home. Gregor wiped the tears off his face, his sisters couldn't know he had been crying, he needed to be strong for them, and he turned around and went back inside to get his sisters. It was time to go.

"Gregor, you grabbed the tickets right? On the counter? And Boot's bag? And-" Lizzie was sitting in the back of the broken-down pickup truck that had been their fathers, with Boots asleep on her shoulder. Gregor glanced quickly in the rearview mirror at Lizzie, then back at the road. She was headed for a panic attack, he could tell.

"Liz breathes." He commanded swiftly. "I have the tickets right here," he held up the tickets with one hand so she could see them, "Boot's bag is on the seat right next to me," he patted the bag, "and the note is right here." He said cutting off her next question. "I took care of everything. Go to sleep. I'll wake you before we get to the airport." Gregor heard her breathing slow and it was quiet for a long time then,

"I'm scared." The whisper was so quiet that Gregor wasn't sure if he'd imagined it. But then he heard her soft sobs and knew it was real.

"Lizzie." He said soothingly, but Lizzie was not to be soothed with a word.

"What is they aren't there Gregor? What if we get to the Underland and everyone's gone? What if they've forgotten us? What if Regalia's been overrun by cutters? What if rats and humans are at war again? What if we can't get on the airplane? What if the plane crashes? What if the apartment building had been knocked down and the rock in central park paved over?" Lizzie continued asking what if, her scenarios getting more and more farfetched and Gregor let her. Not only was it better for her to let it all out, but she was voicing his own fears. He had no idea if the Regalians were still there, or even if they would allow him to stay. But he had to be strong for his siblings, just like he had to be strong when his dad was missing, and when his dad was sick, and on the quests, and when his mom was sick and stuck in Regalia and again when his parents were sick in Virginia. Taking care of sick parents, taking care of his sisters, being the warrior, defeating the Bane, finding the cure, saving his dad, were all his responsibilities. And it was his responsibility now to tell Lizzie that everything thing was going to be fine, so that's what he did.

The trio made it onto the airplane with the note that Gregor had tricked his great-aunt into signing, which said that they had permission to fly without and legal adult. The plane ride was mostly uneventful other than a small panic attack from Lizzie during a particularly strong period of turbulence. Lizzie disliked flying, it made her nervous. But Boots loved it. The last time she had been on a plane was on their way to Virginia 5 years ago and she had been too young to remember it. She didn't remember New York either; she didn't remember the small dinners, small apartment, never having enough in their old life. But she knew what she had been told about her past, and she knew that every time she thought of the Underland, she got a warm feeling inside, like she was supposed to be there. Before they knew it they were touching down at JFK and Gregor was whisking them through the crowds, holding Boots in one arm, and Lizzie's hand in the other. They all packed into a taxi and drove though the streets, headed towards their old apartment building. Gregor had figured that the vent was the best way to get to the Underland, the entrance at Central Park was too public and too far from Regalia. And he wanted to see Mrs. C before they left the surface, for what he hoped would be the last time. They were there faster than Gregor had realized and as they stumbled out of the taxi in front of the building Gregor remembered so well, he got nervous butterflies in his stomach, this was it. He was finally going home.