Max sat back in the chair, spreading his arms out on the armrests, and his forehead creased as he thought. Introspection wasn't something Max indulged in often, and he gave himself a few seconds before he answered.

"I was mad. Mad at Justin, mad at our Dad for not acting mad about it, mad at myself, for not seeing it earlier. It's..." He shook his head, said, "I've always been the fifth wheel. Everything's always been about Justin and Alex. He's the smart one, the good one. She's the bad one, the cute one. I'm just... the one who's left." Max shrugged as he said that, but Rose could see the pain in the off-hand expression.

"And it's not just our parents." He stopped, then bent forward. "It's not even just our family. It was like that in school too. All the teachers hoped I'd be like Justin, or were dreading that I'd be like Alex. The other kids…." Max shook his head again, looking down at the floor. "Everybody knew about Justin and Alex. They thought I'd be like them, or wanted to talk to me about them…."

Max trailed off, sighed, then spoke again. "Justin and Alex. They've always been focused on each other. To Justin, I'm just - I'm just another responsibility. Somebody to look after. I could go looking for trouble, like Alex does, but... Alex can be mean. This Alex, h- the Alex here can be. If she thought someone else was getting more of Justin's attention than she was, and she wasn't distracted by something else right then, like some new boyfriend, she'd find some way to get that person out of the way. Even if it was me."

"And in that other timeline... was it like that there as well?"

Max shifted uncomfortably, said, "Sometimes, yeah. But not always. That Alex... look, I know she was horribly screwed up, but she was nicer, in a lot of ways. She wasn't so competitive all the time. She pushed people away, but because she was afraid Justin might hurt them if she let them close, not to keep them away from her Justin."

He stopped, and Rose could tell that wasn't all of it, that he was hiding something, but she felt it was too early to press there. Instead, she said, "I see. And what did you do to Justin, after you learned they were together?"

"I hit him. I chased him around a bit. I... I was taking it out on him, really. He was there, and I could hit him, and yell at him, and after what I'd just been through... Then Alex got in the way, and told me Justin hadn't cast any kind of spell on her, that she really loved him. I yelled at them both then, about how they'd always kept me out, and then I told them I never wanted to see them again, and teleported out."

Max raked his teeth across his lower lip, then his upper, was a bit surprised to feel the hair there grit against his teeth. Need to shave. "Tutor came after me. Not that that was hard - I didn't want to go back home, not right then. I knew they'd be there. So I went to her place. Tutor's. She talked to me, calmed me down."

"What did she say to you?"

"Oh, you know…." Max looked up, gave Rose his usual 'I'm completely out of this' look. "She showed me her new puppy. It was really cute. Did you know dogs will eat their own barf?"

Heaven and Earth are ruthless;

They see the ten thousand things as straw dummies.

The wise are ruthless;

They see the people as straw dummies.

- Tao te Ching, traditionally attributed to Lao Tzu

"The younger brother is extremely good at dissembling. He's obviously had a lot of practice at concealing what he's really thinking." Rose sighed a little, then shook her head. "He's going to be a tough nut to crack. There's obviously something that happened that involved his sister, as his reference to 'my Alex' shows, but he's not going to want to talk about it. He's going to take a lot more work than the older one before he'll let me help him."

Rose paused, and the pen which was taking down her words stopped, hovered in the air over the paper. She gestured toward it, and the pen laid itself down on the paper, even as she said, "But helping them's not anything you really care about, is it, Chancellor?"

Sitting across the room, where Justin and Max had sat before, Tootietootie threw Rose a smile. "How long have you known I was here?"

"About as long as you've been there," Rose replied. She swiveled her chair around, then tilted her head. "I'm not comfortable with this, Chancellor."

"Yes, you've made that clear already." Tootietootie steepled his fingers, made a grimace of annoyance over them. "And I think it should be clear by now that I do not care. Now, if we're done with your protests for the day, tell me what I want to know."

Answering Tootietootie's annoyed look with her own, Rose shook her head. "Honestly, I think the Council is worrying over nothing. Justin is so invested in being an upright, moral person that it's almost scary at times. He really sees himself as a basically bad person, and rakes himself over the coals for every decision that he finds even remotely questionable. He's doing it even worse now that he's seen the alternate version of himself."

Rose rocked back, continued. "He's also completely devoted to his sister. I've worked with incestuous couples before, but... he's especially devoted, even for that. She's his whole world. Don't think you can use her as leverage on him, though," Rose said with a warning shake of her head. "If he really thinks you might hurt her, he won't stop at anything to end your threat. To be quite honest... he wouldn't hurt anyone on his own, but he still scares me."

Tootietootie waved a hand to the side. "Yes, we've watched Justin for quite some time. But now that he's bound himself to the Elemental Powers... he's a potential threat, but much less of a threat. Bonding to the four elements won't let him manipulate time. It's their potential to do that which is the true danger. I'm much more worried about Max now." He sat up straighter then, said, "You've talked about the boys. What about the sister?"

"Alex?" Rose gave him a puzzled look. "She hasn't come in so far, although I suggested to Justin that he should bring her with him. But why be concerned with her? She doesn't have powers now."

"She's still a strong influence on the brothers. And there's still the chance that the powers could wind up with her." He didn't mention Lexie's empowerment - Rose was outside the circle that knew of that, and Tootietootie preferred to keep it that way, for the moment. "And, of course, should it prove to be the next generation that we should be concerned with... 'as the twig is bent, so grows the tree.'"

"I'll raise the possibility to him again, but if I become insistent, he may begin to suspect that there's something else going on."

"He should trust you, since Crumbs recommended you to him," Tootietootie said with a smile. He stood up, straightened his robe a bit, then gave Rose a direct look. "I'll be back once you've had a chance to have a couple more sessions with them. I expect that by then, you'll have a clearer handle on Max. Understood?"

"Chancellor, I can't guarantee -"

Tootietootie cut her off with a wave of his hand, then shook his head slowly. "You can, and you will, or someone else who will work with me on this will be found to replace you. Do you understand?"

Rose's eyes narrowed, but she nodded. "Yes. I understand perfectly, Chancellor."