Back again after ages, or so it seems! Well, here's chapter five, hope you enjoy it and please remember to review guys, 'cause it seriously makes my day and I am now thinking that everyone hates this story!

We left off with Dark Ace and Aerrow in a rather sticky mess, but sadly this chapter doesn't continue with them instead, lets see how everyone else is holding up!

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

Piper looked up from the entry she was currently writing into her journal and glared at the figure of Finn sitting opposite her. He continued, annoyingly tapping his fingers of the table regardless of the silence.

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

Piper held her breath and counted slowly in her head to ten. If he did that one more time-

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

Spoke too soon.

"That's it! Finn, would you please stop it, even for a bit? I have to write this and you're driving me crazy!" she said to the boy facing her. Who now had a cheesy grin plastered over his face.

"Ah, come on Pipes! I'm bored!" He grinned in his own defence. Sadly that didn't help.

"And what did I tell you about calling me Pipes?!" the enraged crystal-specialist glared at him again. Deep down though she knew she was overreacting at this, but she couldn't help it. She was worried…

"Piper, come off it dude! I was only kidding!" the blonde boy muttered, looking forlorn. "I'm sorry..." He looked down at the table, with a sigh.

Piper suddenly felt guilty. Here she was, blowing up at Finn, who though could be an annoying jerk sometimes, he always meant well. A thought struck her. Maybe he was worried too?

She too sighed, looking at the boy in front of her.

"I'm sorry too, Finn. I really am. I didn't mean to blow up at you. Its just…" she stopped, unsure whether to continue or not.

He looked up, staring at her. "What? What's up?"

She looked down. If she said what she was thinking…if she voiced her fears out loud…

"Piper? What's wrong? Is it… Aerrow?" Finn said. He didn't want to admit it out loud either, that he was worried about where their leader was.

Piper nodded slowly. "Its been over an hour, Finn. With no radio contact or anything. This isn't like him. At all."

He got up and walked around to her side of the table. He pulled up a chair from beside her and sat down.

"I'm worried too, but I dunno if there even is anything to be worried about. Man, we all know what he's like when he fights the Dark Ace; he would happily fight the guy for hours if he could." he said to the girl with a smile. She tried to smile back but failed. It just didn't make any sense…

"I know, I know. I want to believe that so badly Finn, but I don't know if I can. We've lost sight of him, and he isn't responding to radio contact, and for once, I don't know what to do!" she finished, feeling herself break down when she said those words. She rubbed at her eyes fiercely.

Finn looked uneasily. He didn't know how to cope with nearly-crying and upset girls, but he could try. And he understood what she was going through.

He leant over and gave Piper a hug. She looked startled, but then leant into him and hugged him back.

"I bet he's fine, Piper. But you know what we could do to check?" Finn said to the girl, who looked up at him.

She sniffed. "What?"

He grinned. "Go out and look for him!"

Piper looked at the boy as if he had lost what little brains he had once had. "Are you crazy? Aerrow told us to stay here in case more Cyclonians showed up! He gave us an order!" She started to say but was interrupted.

Finn laughed at the look on the girl's face. "Piper, Aerrow isn't here, so we can just ignore that order! Plus, no big bad Cyclonians have shown up, and its been an hour now, so I'm willing to bet that it was only Dark Ace out there. Its safe for us to go and look for Aerrow."

Piper looked as if she was going to say something but stopped herself. She nodded instead. "Okay. Lets go and look for a missing Hawk!"

Finn nodded. "Yeah. The sooner the better!"

Junko, who had been with Stork during this whole exchange suddenly walked in.

"Guys? Stork says that he still can't see anything around or near us, so its pretty much safe outside!" He told them with a small smile.

Finn smiled back. "Great. Now we can go and look."

Piper got up and walked out of the room, on her way to her Sky Ride.

Junko however looked at Finn, confused. "What? Where are we going? Aerrow said-"

Finn pulled his buddy over to the door by his shoulders. "Aerrow isn't back yet, and since we're worried about him, we thought we could go a-looking for him. Wanna come?" He said, looking at Junko hopefully.

The wallop smiled again. "Sure. Lets go and find Aerrow then. But can I go and make a sandwich quickly? I'm hungry…"

"Sure. And make me one too, please, while you're at it dude!" Finn called over to his friend as they went their separate ways.

They didn't notice a small and furry creature with its left arm in a sling sneak out of the closest bedroom.

Radarr was sad. His best friend was missing and he couldn't go and help him… but he could go with Piper, Finn and Junko and help look for him.

Radarr smiled happily to himself. Now he could actually do something useful and help his friend.

He carefully walked through the doors and followed Finn. It wasn't hard, seeing as he was humming a rock song's guitar solo very loudly the whole way.

Radarr laughed to himself. Anyone could follow Finn. Anyone. Even Snipe could.

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Speaking of Snipe, he was currently following his sister over to Master Cyclonis' Throne Room. They had been summoned to see her, but neither of them actually knew why. All they knew was that she wanted to see them and it was important.

Snipe growled to himself angrily. If it was to simply yell at them for messing up again, he was going to kill the nearest Talon.

His sister looked behind her.

"Hurry up, you big lummox! You know that she said it was important!" Ravess said to her brother, who was glaring at her. She stuck out her tongue at him and turned around again, quickening her pace.

Yes, that was so mature of her, but frankly she couldn't be bothered. Snipe was really getting on her nerves today. Add to that the fact that their mission had royally messed up again thanks once more to her brainless brother, and she was ready to kill.

"If the Master only wants to yell at us again, I will seriously kill my brother and anyone else in my way!" she muttered crossly to herself.

Finally, they were there… or rather, she was there and her brother was at least a metre behind. As usual.

"Snipe, will you hurry up!" she shouted into the empty corridor.

A minute later she was rewarded by hearing heavy footsteps.

"Why must you always lag behind?" she asked him, before opening the door.

"Snipe's tired!" he muttered back, before following her into the room.

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The siblings walked into the room, and bowed before the cloaked figure ahead of them.

"Master Cyclonis, you were expecting us…?" Ravess asked the figure, who turned around to face the two. The cloak's hood dematerialised to show the pale face of a young girl with large violet eyes. Which right now, were currently flashing with anger.

Brilliant… this is just to yell at us… Ravess thought to herself.

She was about to speak when the Master herself spoke.

"I'm guessing you two do not know why you are here?" she said in her customary cool voice. She walked over to them, holding her crystal staff in her small hands.

"I think its to do with that mission we were on!" Came the deep voice of the brother.

Ravess resisted the urge to turn around and hit him. She looked at Master Cyclonis.

"Master, we believed you wanted to talk to us about that mission, and I wish to say on behalf of both my brother and I that we are sorry about what happened and it will not occur again." She said quickly, while her brother rolled his eyes.

His sister was such a suck up, but if it got them of a punishment, he wouldn't say anything to her about it.

The Master merely smiled the two, and toyed with a crystal on her staff.

"Both of you are wrong. I will speak to the two of you in due course about that, but not today. There are more pressing matters at hand."

The siblings sighed in relief. They were going to get a bit of a breather before that expected meeting.

"A while ago, I sent the Dark Ace out on a mission-"

"Lemme guess; he's mucked it up and now you need us to help him!" Snipe interrupted with a grin.

Ravess sighed at her brother. Seriosuly, why did he always have to say the most stupid things at the worse possible times. She looked at the Master, who oddly enough didn't seem mad that Snipe had interrupted. It was like she wasn't even concentrating on what was around her; on what was being said.

Ravess shivered. This wasn't like her at all. So what on earth was the matter?

"Master?" she asked, looking at the young girl ahead of her. "Do we have to help the Dark Ace like my ever-so-wonderful brother seems to guess?"

Snipe looked at his sister, and was about to say something back when Master Cyclonis spoke.

"Snipe, please do not interrupt me when I am talking." The master said with a dangerous edge to her voice. "And Ravess, you are nearly right. Now, may I continue without the two of you interrupting again this time?"

Okay… Ravess thought. Scratch that last thought. She is mad.

The siblings nodded.

"Good." Master Cyclonis stated. "Now, where was I… Oh yes. A few hours ago I sent the Dark Ace on a mission. He had to investigate the area around Terra Grimius, as we have picked up some strange and unusual frequency readings from there and I wished to find out more. However, as I have said I sent him out there a few hours ago and so far I have heard nothing from him." She said, this time toying with the crystals on the opposite end of her staff.

"Master, maybe there is no reason for worrying. Maybe he is on his way as we speak!" Ravess said to Cyclonis. "After all, there are a lot of reasons why he may be late!"

"Ravess, he has not radioed in." Was all that the Master had to say to her.

Ravess knew that that was all that was needed to be said. All Cyclonians, Talons and Commanders alike, knew the importance of radioing in to let Master Cyclonis know of their progress… or sometimes the lack of. However, if the Dark Ace had not radioed in, it meant that something was up.

"Maybe his radio isn't working?" Was all that her brother had to put forward. Master Cyclonis didn't even bother to respond to that.

"It has been too long. So I am sending both you and your brother to find out what has happened, and while you are there to look around to see if you can find the source of this reading." The Master said to Ravess.

Ravess nodded, and bowed. "I understand. We will go at once."

Snipe copied her, and together they began to walk out of the Throne Room.

"Oh, and Ravess?" Came the cool voice of the teen ruler.

Ravess turned, and waited.

"Make sure that Snipe obeys you this time round. I do not wish to hear of anymore failures."

"Yes Master. I understand." She replied. They were both nearly out of the room when a final sentence was hurled at them while the door was closing.

"Make sure you find him."

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Poor old Snipe, its not his fault that he can be rather slow at times!

Sorry that this is so short, and that it is also late, but I have been rather busy at the mo, but hopefully since I'm off school for a bit I can get more chapters up.

Please review people! Even a simple, "I liked it!" or "I hated it!" Will do. I just want your views on this!

Toodles xoxo