Author's Note:

So I wrote most of this during Relay for Life, during which I was running on no sleep for twelve hours. As such, the quality may not be…quality. But I wanted to get it up before I started really working on my creative writing assignment which is due tomorrow.

I don't know why the heck I'm still writing this thing, but apparently it entertains people, so why not?

His suspension was only two days, which was definitely better than he'd gotten before. Sergio wasn't sure if Sutton took pity on him because he was the new kid, but it was unlikely given what little he could gather of the woman. Their meeting after the fight had only lasted about fifteen minutes, but within those fifteen minutes he could definitely gather why all of the students were so wary of her. It was an odd sort of intimidating, but intimidating nonetheless, and he wasn't too eager to have to sit in a room alone with her again anytime soon.

As expected, the lectures came in full force. Mr. Redford had been first on the drive back to the house, and his wife had joined when they got in. The couple couldn't really be called foster parents, given that the home was specifically for 'troubled' kids and they more ran the place than anything else, but they always tried to act like parental figures of some sort. His probation officer was a little while after that, and Sergio could honestly say he preferred that conversation. Though he wasn't overly fond of any of the people that were in charge of him, Otis was better than his previous officers. He seemed to get a good deal of amusement out of popping in for his random checks at the strangest times, but at least he actually had a sense of humor and didn't constantly look like there was something smelly under his nose.

"On one hand, I'm impressed it took this long before I had to have this conversation," Otis noted, half his attention on the paperwork he had propped up on one knee. Sergio had been in the middle of lunch when the man had shown up so they had ended up parked in the kitchen and he could hear at least one of the younger kids trying to be sneaky and listen at the door. "On the other…well, you know I'd definitely prefer not to have it at all."

"We agree on that much, at least," the boy muttered, keeping his eyes on his food. "I know the speech by heart. Don't suppose you can just skip over it, slap my wrist, and move on, huh?"

"Not entirely. You know the consequences of this sort of thing, so I can leave that much out." He flipped a page and glanced up. "You're probably lucky that kid was bigger. It'd be worse off if you'd done more damage."

Sergio snorted, one hand going to rub at his eye a little unconsciously. "Not for lack of trying."

"I'd ask you didn't try at all next time, hm? Starting fights like that, given your record…"

"I know my record, thanks."

"Then you know how this looks." Otis sat back, closing his folder and folding his arms. "Suspension is a good break, all things considered." The kitchen fell silent and there was a quiet scuffling and shushing behind the door. "I'm hoping you'll bring this up at therapy."

Sergio swore under his breath, looking up from his plate with a frown. "I still gotta go to that?"

"Part of your program," Otis reminded him. "Doesn't really matter what you talk about, as long as you do some talking. How's it going?"

"She keeps trying to get me to call her Jane." He let out a huff of breath, eyes rolling. "Guess that's not out of the ordinary, but it gets old after the first week."

The therapy sessions had gotten old after his first one, really. He was good with people and very good at telling them what they wanted to hear. It was a little harder with trained therapists, but he figured he might be able to manage it. Still, it just didn't seem worth the effort. He'd have to go anyway, knowing this damn program, and it was more satisfying to let them know just how useless it was.

Otis considered him a moment before shrugging. "I can't tell you how to handle those - not my training. But I can make sure you keep going. The schedule still works out?"

"Well if you'd rather put it during Spanish, I wouldn't complain."

"Good schedule, then." The man glanced down at the file quickly. "Don't think there's any need for a test today..."

"Never any need for those."

"I think that's all I needed to cover." He gathered his papers and pushed himself to his feet. "I'll save you the rest of the speech, but you know what it involves. No more fist fights, alright?"

The boy grunted, picking apart the crust of his sandwich idly. "I won't if he doesn't."

"I guess that's an improvement, at least. Not everybody's out to get you, Serge. Remember that." Sergio frowned a little at the nickname – he still wasn't sure how he felt about that, but there wasn't much he could do about it without sounding whiney. Otis waved one hand as he went to the door. "I'll see you around."

It was silent again for a few moments when the door swung shut, and he let himself sit there for a few moments. With a frustrated breath he finally stood, grabbing his plate and glass and taking them to the sink.

"I dunno what you were hoping to hear, Mark," he called over his shoulder toward the door, and the not-so-quiet intake of breath that followed proved his assumption right, "but I hope it was boring as hell."

There were just four of them in the house right now, and though there was one older boy he spent most of his time doing community service and online school work locked in his room. The other two were nine and eleven, and Mark as the youngest was notoriously the one more likely to try and listen in on conversations. The only good thing about being stuck in the house during school days was that the younger boys were always gone and it was actually relatively quiet.

And hell, two days suspension was lenient. Not like Otis had too much to complain about, and since Daniel had been suspended too, Sergio figured he hadn't ended up too worse for wear. He had a decent number of extra chores simply because he was available to do them, but the house wasn't as bad when the younger boys were at school. It was actually a little disappointing when he had to go back himself.

The first thing he noticed was that apparently two days missing had managed to generate at least twenty new rumors. There were even more curious stares and mutters than before, and he pointedly made eye contact with anyone that stared too long until they looked away.

Apart from that, he was lucky enough to have relative peace for the first half of the day. It figured that it would be lunch that got weird for the second time in a row. Sergio noticed right away that something was off, and he paused on the other side of the room to stare at his usual table and the two people sitting there that he had not anticipated.

For a moment he considered just finding some other distant corner to eat, but then the stubborn part of him arose and decided that he was not giving up his place just because it might be a little odd. He squared his shoulders, one hand went to straighten the leg of his jeans, and he strode over, taking his usual seat across from Sarah who was currently engrossed in what looked like Chemistry notes.

He didn't let himself stare at the bulk of the boy sitting a few spots down from Sarah - and she looked even more tiny in comparison - but he did do a quick glance over. Sergio had considered the various possibilities that might explain his confusion in the office before. Maybe it had just been his eyes being weird after taking those hits or just too fast of a look or bad lighting...but now those were disproven.

This kid didn't look a little like Daniel Aerov. He looked exactly like him. If it weren't for the fact that there was no way Daniel would change up his routine to sit in the corner, Sergio would've been positive it was him. Now...hell, now all of this was just getting weirder.

The other girl - Anana, her name had been, right? - looked up at him almost skeptically, putting her fork down. "Great, you actually go here?"

"For a whole month now," he muttered. When he did let himself glance up to meet her eyes he was a little surprised by how dark they were. She had an extremely intense stare; he didn't feel the need to challenge it and looked back down at his tray. The other boy was watching him too, and after a few moments Sergio sighed, rubbing his face quickly. "Can I help you with something?"

"Thought you had some kind of problem with us," Anana said. "Seemed to have one with Toluk, at least."

"I thought he was someone else," he said immediately. "That's it. I'd sorta of had a bad day."

"Seemed pretty damn convinced at the time."

This was way more complicated than it should be. Sarah hadn't looked up, but he could tell she was listening. She hadn't turned the page since he'd sat down, and there was none of the usual underlining or mouthing words. He realized suddenly that it made sense for these two to be sitting here, if they had been given the same tour guide he had. Just followed the same instincts and sat with the one person that had a familiar face.

"Everyone else seems just as convinced." It was Toluk that spoke then, and there was a slight accent to his words, the same as Anana's, and entirely strange to hear coming from him because dammit he looked just like Daniel. "Had at least three people ask why I wasn't at practice yesterday. A few of the teachers kept expecting me to have the work for class already."

Not exactly my problem, is it? It was tempting to say, but if Toluk hit as hard as his doppelgänger, he wasn't about to risk it. Sergio just shrugged, poking at the food and vaguely wondering how much of it could be classified as edible. After a moment Anana snorted.

"This place is weird. Dunno what everyone's seeing." She was actually eating the lunch, which was a brave feat. It wasn't exactly poisonous, from what he could tell, but even so, it was cafeteria food. "Your Spanish is terrible, by the way."

That was completely off topic. Sergio looked over, brow furrowing. "What?"

"I don't know a ton, but I know enough to tell when it's bad. Your's is bad."

It took him a few moments to put together what she was talking about. The confrontation in the office came back suddenly and the boy snorted, eyes rolling.

"That's because it was Portuguese."

He could hear Toluk stifle a laugh and Anana raised an eyebrow before shrugging.

"See? Terrible Spanish."

Sergio shook his head, returning to his food. He could see Sarah smirking a little and her pen began moving again. It was quiet for a while and after a minute or two he heard Anana start to say something he didn't catch to her brother. She trailed off, though, and when he glanced up at her, he noticed her eyes locked on something across the room. Curiosity got the better of him and Sergio glanced over his shoulder and blinked.

Daniel had walked in. This was definitely Daniel, hockey team hoodie and everything, and a look of utter bafflement on his face as he stared at their table. The entire lunch room seemed to go silent for a few seconds as a good majority of the people apparently sensed the sudden tension and tried to find the source. There were a few glancing back and forth between the two boys and then, just as suddenly as he had come in, Daniel turned on his heel and strode back into the hallway.

The silence continued for a bit longer and then the chatter erupted again. Sergio turned back just in time to see Anana exchange a baffled look with her brother

"Now those are twins if I ever saw them." All three of them looked at Sarah quickly, who was packing away her bag. She looked a little satisfied and nodded at Toluk quickly. "Can't tell you what to make of that, but it's worth investigating, I'd say."

She walked away and the others sat in silence for a few moments. Anana stared at her brother, then at the door Daniel had gone through, then back. When she did actually speak it was quiet, just one word, and seemed to carry all hell of a lot more weight than most words of that length did.

"Miksa...?"