And here it is; the Season 4 finale. I know that some of the recent ones have been lacking, but I really wanted to make up for that with this entry. I feel I did. I tried to get everyone pertinent involved (character omissions will be dealt with next season, as to why they weren't here, unless otherwise mentioned in story). I even threw in some old stuff from the original run of the show (I remember fondly a preview from the episode where Kyle and Declan break into Foss's apartment, and the trailer that went with that episode; see if you can find that scene. If you can and name it right, you get the first two chapter names of Season 5 as a reward).

I really hope this makes up for the previous few chapters, and I really hope you all like this finale. This was one of my favorite, if not my favorite to write. Enjoy.

10: Unfinished Business

There comes a time when one must act, rather than wait and prepare to perform a counter to another's action. Acting isn't always the best plan, but sometimes, it is the only plan.

For me, right now, all I can do is act. With the Latnok college students missing – and some of them having closer connections to me than anyone else would among the group – it has become personal. I don't know what Latnok is planning on doing with this, but right now, it is a time to act.

"Jessi!"

Jessi was going up the stairs when she heard Kyle call her name. She turned around. They hadn't really spoken much since after he woke up in the hospital. They had mostly avoided each other because of the morning of his hospitalization, as they were still trying to figure out what to do with the other.

Kyle had basically denied her, however, hurting her. She had tried to keep as much space as possible, but he was always puzzled by that fact. She was hurt, yes, but it was like she was going out of her way to avoid him.

Why? He didn't know, but that didn't matter right now. Right now, he needed her help.

"Kyle," she said, "What is it?"

He started up the stairs towards her, "I need your help. You're the only person right now who can help me."

"What sort of help do you need?" she asked, showing no real interest. He found that strange, but pressed on with his plea for help.

"Latnok has gone too far," he told her.

"They always have," she answered him, "What did they do this time?"

"They seem to have abducted everyone involved with Latnok at the college," he told her, "We need to save them; rescue them. And I need your help to find them."

"What do you need from e?" she questioned him.

"I need your help to find the Latnok facility; any facility. We need to hack their systems and find some sort of record of this, and then find them," Kyle told her, "You're the only person who can help me to find a facility and get into their systems."

She looked at him. What was that look in her eyes when he had asked her for help? Saying that she was the only person who could help him?

"I'm sorry," he told him, "I can't help."

"I need your help!" he asserted, "You are the only one!" he was affirming that fact for her.

"I'm sorry," she said, going upstairs, leaving him standing on the stairs, questioning her in his mind.

"Nicole," Jessi closed her door as soon as she had said that.

Nicole looked to her, "Yes Jessi?"

"I need advice," she said.

"You always come to me," Nicole said, "I know that you do."

"It's different this time," Jessi said, crossing the bedroom to Nicole, who was going through something in her dresser, "I…I need more important advice. It's about Kyle."

"Did you tell him?" she questioned Jessi in a low tone of voice, "Did you give him any reason to think-"

Jessi cut her off, "No! I didn't. He wants me to help him."

"Help with what?" Nicole asked.

"It seems that Latnok abducted college students, the students who worked for them. Including Mark, as you should figure," Jessi told her.

"Mark…?" Nicole shook her head, "I wonder if Lori knows…"

"I don't know," Jessi said, being rather callous, "Look, Kyle plans on finding a Latnok base, or something, and getting into their computer systems to find a database so he can search for them. He wants me to help him."

"And are you going to?" Nicole asked her.

"I think I have to," she replied, "I'm the only one, but…I wouldn't feel right in helping him, not after what we had to do to save him. We had to betray him. I had to betray him."

"I betrayed him as well," Nicole assured Jessi, trying to make her feel at least a bit better.

"No. Not like I did. I stole the information from him; not you."

"Jessi, I know that it's hard on you. It haunts me as well. But we can't let that control us," Nicole said, "I've seen you trying to avoid Kyle as much as you could. You can't let that dictate how you live your life! It hurts, having to have done that, but you don't see it controlling my life, my interactions with Kyle."

"You're his mother, I'm no one to him," Jessi said.

Nicole laid a motherly hand on Jessi's shoulder, "Jessi...you could very well be the only person in this world for Kyle. As much as we love him as his family, you're the only one who can truly be called anything close."

"But he loves you," Jessi said.

"I know he loves us as family, but you and he are almost the same. You have a bond that runs deeper than love. Trust me," Nicole said.

"What do you think of Amanda then?" Jessi asked sourly.

"Kyle has that same love for her that he does for us, but like I said, the bond and love are much different. I believe that the bond is stronger," Nicole said, "You should pursue Kyle. I know, I know, you can't because of how you feel, but after everything, I really do think you are the one for him.

"I've seen you in this pain over having to help him like you have. I trust that you're the woman for him. I know that it would be hard for anyone, but you really are different than you would have been were it anyone else, Jessi. You really care about him differently than you care about anyone else."

"Do you think that?" Jessi asked her softly.

"I do," Nicole assured her, "You should help Kyle. Maybe by doing that you'll come farther out of this depression, as it were, and find a way to be closer to him."

"Thank you," Jessi said, "I'll try to not let it control me."

"I hope you succeed," Nicole told her, letting her leave the room.

"I'm glad you're willing to help me," Kyle told Jessi as she met him in his room.

"Yeah, so, let's get to it. What do we need to do?" she asked him.

"I've been thinking, trying to figure out how to get the information on where we can find a Latnok facility, and I finally figured it out. I think."

"How?" she asked him.

"We do something we had to do one before. When they had Amanda," he replied, "We need to get Cassidy's cell. If we can, we can probably find a log of calls, and find one to or from Grace Kingsly. If we can find the data on a call, we can find where it was done from with data from the company, and go there.

"Likewise, we could try to find a recorded or saved call and listen to the background. This is what I meant by we pull the same trick. We could listen to anything in the background and try to narrow it done. However, doing that is a lot harder, as we would have to listen for things that might not be there, or might be too common."

"Then our best bet is to get his phone logs and find his mother's number. Then we find where she's been making calls from," Jessi commented.

"But to be safe, we need to work from both ends," he replied, "Then we have everything covered, and we should have their location in no time."

"Ok, how do we do this, then?" she asked him.

"I need your help to break into his office," he told her, "We've done it before; we can probably do it again."

"But what if he carries his phone instead of leaving it?" she put in as a very good point.

"We might have to rob him, then," Kyle said, "I figured you wouldn't have any problems with that."

"None," she smiled, "Now, the other end?"

Kyle opened his bedroom door; "We need you!" he called out.

In a few moments Lori and Josh were coming into the room, "We're here to help," Lori said.

"What do you need us to do? Something moderately dangerous, I hope," Josh said.

"No," Kyle said, "We just need you to get the phone company to give us some information."

"Which one?" Jessi asked Kyle, as he hadn't told her. She was suspecting he didn't know.

"That's it?" Josh complained, "Come on! Give us something important!"

"It is important," Kyle said, looking specifically to Lori, "If we get the information, we're one step closer to finding Mark and everyone else."

Lori hit Josh in the back, "Come on, like he said, this is important to the mission," Lori told him.

"Did you just call it a mission?" Josh almost laughed at that, but he smiled, "You make it sound cooler than it really is. Whatever; let's do it."

"My question still stands," Jessi told Kyle.

"I do have the information," Kyle said, showing his computer, "I have the website up for the specific company as well as his number already input. You need a password, but there's also a number listed. You can call it in and try to talk your way past giving the password. That's your best bet."

"Can't one of you just hack that website?" Josh questioned, "What do you need us for? I mean, I imagine you guys have something important to do, but still, won't it take all of five minutes?"

"He raises a good point," Jessi told Kyle.

"No," Kyle said, "Granted, it is breaking the law to lie and get that information, but I'd rather do that than hack the database. If we somehow get caught, it would be very bad, I imagine, in this day and age with calls being monitored and stuff. And I wouldn't want to do that illegal action."

"I'd do it, and wouldn't be found," Jessi said, confident enough in herself for good reason.

"No," Kyle said, "I'm sorry, Jessi."

"Fine," she said, putting up no verbal fight, because she felt bad for what she had done in the hospital.

Kyle looked curiously at her for not putting up a fight, as he had expected of her. He ignored it for now, "Ok, you two should start. Jessi and I are going after Cassidy to get his phone itself."

"Just the two of you?" Lori asked, "What about Declan?"

"I'm leaving him out of this," Kyle said, "I know he wants to help. I know he would do anything to help us, but…I left him out. He should be with Foss, training some more. And this…I just feel like this is too big for him."

"Wait, what about him and Foss?" Josh questioned.

"He trained with Foss," Lori gave him the abbreviated version, "But come on! You let us do work, but not him?"

"This work is safe," Kyle said, "He wouldn't be happy doing it."

"You're right about that," Lori smiled, "Fine. Leave him out. I won't call him."

"Thanks," Kyle said, turning to Jessi, "Well, let's go and get Cassidy's phone."

"How do you want to do this?" Jessi asked him as they stood behind two trees, watching Cassidy going for a walk, or walking somewhere. They had gotten to the college by taxi, but he had been leaving at the time, so they had decided to follow and wait for their moment.

"I don't know," Kyle answered. He saw some people he recognized from the college, from their questioning of everyone, "I have an idea," he said, making sure that he wasn't being watched by Cassidy, or would be noticed, he ran to those people and started to talk to them.

When they started to walk away, Jessi realized that whatever Kyle had done wasn't working. She approached them, "Hey! I'll pay you ten dollars to go and run into that guy!" she pointed to Cassidy, making sure to keep her voice down enough so that nobody else nearby would hear, let alone Cassidy.

"Money first," one of them said.

She handed him the ten dollar bill, "Go do it," she said.

He ran off, going off another street so he could get in front of Cassidy without running at him from behind to get in front. She headed back to Kyle, who produced a similar phone.

"I remember what his phone looked like," Kyle said.

"You sure he hasn't changed it?" she asked him.

"Sure enough," he replied, waiting and watching. They were soon forced to move in pursuit, but slowly at first, until they saw the student running. Then Kyle ran towards a building on the right, getting ready to get inside, it looked like. Cassidy looked back at the sound of running, but Kyle was already inside, so Cassidy only saw the door closing.

His focus was taken away from the man in front. When the student crashed into him, they both went down. Kyle ran out while the student tried to help him up. Kyle immediately noticed that the phone hadn't fallen out of Cassidy's pocket, unfortunately, and they knew it wasn't at his office, as they checked before pursuing.

As he was coming back up, Kyle started to quickly look at Cassidy, focusing his senses on that man alone. He began to listen, listening for the possible low sound of the insides of the phone. Then he closed his eyes and opened them again, trying to get a reading on Cassidy's heat; performing a sort of heat sensing vision this time. He found the phone, only because it was a different temperature than the rest of Cassidy's body, and the shape stood out.

Kyle moved closer as the student and Cassidy argued as Cassidy was getting up. Going as fast as he could, as carefully as he could, Kyle darted his fingers into the pocket, procuring the phone, and slipped the other one in, before backing up a quick step and heading back towards the building he had just come from by the time Cassidy turned, having heard something like a footstep next to him.

But Kyle had the phone, and Cassidy didn't know anything.

"This isn't working," Lori hung up again.

"Ok, tell the person on the other end that you're his girlfriend," Josh said.

"What?" she shouted at him.

"Look, it's not like they know who you are," Josh commented.

"I feel sick just thinking about a lie like that," she told him.

"Look, I want to help, so I'm helping."

"I know, I need to help too. But how does that get us any closer?" she questioned him.

"Tell the person on the other end that you think he's cheating and want to prove it so you can take everything from the apartment before he gets back," Josh stated.

She looked at him or a few moments, "Where did you come up with a lie like that?" she questioned him.

"When Andy and I can actually talk, and we don't have anything else to talk about…we go off on different topics," he said.

"What was this one, then?" she asked, "Assuming you move in together and she finds out you cheated?"

"Yes, actually," he told her, "But whatever, just call."

Once more she called. Fortunately she had gotten different people each time she had called, making this a bit easier. She put her hand over the mouthpiece, "A man."

"Hang up and redial," he told her, "You need a woman."

She did just that, redialing the phone, then nodded, "Hello, I need to get the private information off of this number," she read Cassidy's number off the screen, though could probably have memorized it by now, she felt better reading it off just to be certain.

"A woman?" Josh whispered, she nodded.

"No, I don't have the password," Lori said, "I know, I know I need that to get at any personal data, but look, bear with me. I want to know if he's a cheating bastard so I know to take everything from the apartment before he comes home. I swear I've seen him with my former best friend, the slut. I need to make sure before I make a big mistake and accept the ring I found in his sock drawer."

She waited for a few moments, "Thank you so much. Yes; here's my email," she gave an email address to the woman on the other end, "Thank you so much. And yes, I will be sure to take the ring and throw it away if it turns out he is cheating."

She hung up, "Got it."

"You know, it's a good thing she didn't just have you ask if a specific number was on there, good thing she sent them instead," Josh pointed out.

"I know, but I think she figured it would be multiple numbers, like a cell or a landline," Lori said, sitting at the computer, "She was probably a little older than me, understood immediately. It worked well." She stopped typing and turned to him, "Thanks for that advice."

He shrugged, "You owe me."

"Kyle owes you," she made sure he knew that distinction.

He didn't have anything to say for a few minutes as she got into her mail and got to the lists, "No, he doesn't owe me anything. I owe him so much more than this."

"What are you talking about?" she asked him, turning to look at him.

"He helped Andy's cancer," he said quietly, "Before she left, he did…something. I could never repay him for that."

"I think this is a good start," Lori told him.

"Maybe…"

"Come on, let's start looking through this," Lori offered.

"Any idea what we're looking for?" he asked.

"Well, this number was called a lot," she said, pointing at one, "We have access to the call location, too, from both ends. That was nice of her to give us."

Josh pointed to another number, "This one, too."

"What?"

"Look. This number was also called a lot," he commented.

She clicked on one number, bringing up data, since it was from the same carrier, "Kinsgly, Grace. My number is the one we need," she clicked on the other one, but nothing came up, "Different carrier, it looks like."

"I wonder who that could be," Josh said, looking at the times, "His calls to this other number last as long as the ones to his mother."

"Some are longer," Lori pointed out, "Whoever that is…"

"What?" he asked.

"I don't know," she said, "I guess it's not that strange, but the fact that his conversations with his mother range from a minute and a half to up to ten, fifteen minutes, and these other ones are almost always at least twenty…kind of strange."

"What, don't picture him as a momma's boy?" Josh asked.

"No…I don't know," Lori said, "Anyway, let's call Kyle."

"You got it? That's great," Kyle said, "We got his phone itself. We're coming back to find the location of the facility he calls Grace at."

"I'm surprised they got it," Jessi admitted.

Kyle held a finger up, "What? It says right on the record where the calls were done at?" He waited a little bit, "Got the coordinates," he said, "We're heading there now. First, go to the other internet browser I have up and keep refreshing; that's the phone I slipped Cassidy. Just be sure he's not coming our way when we go there. Thanks."

"So you have the coordinates?" Jessi asked.

He nodded, "We have to go there now. We need to get this done right away."

"Agreed," Jessi said.

Kyle hailed a taxi and the two went off.

The supposed Latnok facility turned out to be a five story office building. Kyle and Jessi got off a block away and moved that way on foot, wary of cameras, which there were many of. They managed to avoid them with some quick uses of their powers and reached the door, looking inside the main lobby.

"One man at the desk, five cameras in sight," Jessi commented.

"None on us, at least," Kyle replied, pulling his head away. They both stood just to the side of the glass doors, "Ok, any ideas?"

"We could make a distraction and get him away from his post, then check his computer."

"I don't know if his computer would be set up to the main database," Kyle said.

"I still like my plan," she said, "If nothing more, we get him away for a moment, get the blueprints from his computer, and find a database," she said.

"Ok, let's do that," Kyle agreed, "Any ideas on how to get him away?"

She poked her head back out, looking again, smiling, "Yeah, I've got a plan," she said, closing her eyes and focusing. She opened them again, looking at the two elevators in sight. They both came down to the lobby at the same time, both of them opening, then closing, then opening again, as if malfunctioning.

The man at the front desk heard them and got up, heading over to look. Jessi opened the doors quietly, letting them both slip inside. She focused, hitting all of the cameras, making them all record nothing but static until they could get to a blind spot. Once behind the desk, Kyle began to focus his attention on the only camera that could see them, while Jessi moved behind the man and grabbed him, putting her hand around his mouth and another around his chest, keeping him pinned with her strength. She managed to get him into a janitor's closet and lock him inside. He wasn't very noisy, at least.

"Camera is taken care of," Kyle said, keeping his focus constantly up, "Can you?"

She nodded, working the computer from the desk, "Here's blueprints."

He pointed to the third floor, "Computer room; that's our goal."

The two ran for the elevators and got inside, heading up for the third floor. They both waited in silence, sure of no recording devices inside. When it opened, they both got to the sides, glancing out, making sure nobody watched. They got out and moved down the hall, knocking out the five cameras they came across in total.

They reached the start of a hall that led to the computer room, and there were cubicles around on all sides. They listened, hearing nothing, and moved towards the computer room, still working on the cameras.

Jessi put her hand to the knob and started to shake. It opened easily.

"Nice trick," he commented.

"I can teach you," she said.

They stepped inside the white room. Computers were on all sides, large towers, wires, cameras all around, watching. There was one watching the door, but they had expected it and rendered it useless as they entered.

"Take over," Kyle said, making Jessi keep that camera down while he reached out as well.

"What are you doing?" she asked him.

"Every other camera."

"Let me," she told him.

"No; we need to be sure we don't damage the towers," he said, "I have more finite control."

"You doubt me?" she questioned him.

"No," he said, "I just want to be absolutely certain."

She had to respect that as he reached out, "Got it," he muttered, clearly under stress or pain at this point.

They moved through the room until Kyle pointed to a spot, "There," he said, rushing there with Jessi, getting to the single blind spot he could locate. They both released their control as they sat, regaining their strength.

"Now what?" she asked.

"We keep going," he said, "You can keep it up while I get the information copied, right?"

"Of course. Leave it to me," she said.

When they got up, she reached out to knock the cameras out as they moved. When they got to the end of the towers, Kyle pulled out some cords and what looked like an external hard drive. He plugged it all in and waited as he copied the data to his device.

"You sure it's big enough?" she asked.

"I'm sure," he said, "I modified this just for this job."

"Let's hope you're right," Jessi said.

"Got it," he said, pocketing it and reaching out to take control from Jessi, to give her some time to rest, "Let's go."

As they got outside the room, Kyle used a bit of his recovering strength to force the door locked again. For some reason this door only had a normal deadbolt lock, though upon closer examination, this was a new door.

As they started back towards the elevators, they heard voices. They looked down the left path, seeing two people approaching, talking about the towers.

Keeping silent, Jessi reached out, knocking over a glass of water that she had seen on a tray behind the two men. They looked back as Kyle and Jessi ran past as quietly as possible, but not going any farther, knowing that they couldn't get any farther, as they heard the people coming again.

They each pressed themselves up against the walls of a cubicle, on either side of the hallway as they heard the people enter the hall and move away from them, towards the computer room.

They could hear the two speaking of maintenance and the like as they unlocked it and walked inside. When the door closed, Kyle and Jessi went towards the elevators again.

"Can they find out anything is wrong?" Jessi asked.

He shook his head, "No trace," he commented.

"What do you want to do with the guy in the closet?" she asked him.

"I don't know," he said as they got into an elevator, "We'll figure something out."

As they went down, they walked into the lobby, already hitting the cameras. When they moved away from the elevators, they saw Cassidy standing there, "Nice to see you two," he commented across the room.

"Jessi, drop it," Kyle said, relaxing.

She too dropped her control over the cameras. Cassidy already saw them, what did the cameras matter?

"I'll get him out in a bit," Cassidy pointed over his shoulder with a thumb towards the closet, "Good work; I assume you got what you came for."

"We should have known you were coming," Kyle stated, actually meaning that they should have been alerted.

"I ditched that phone," Cassidy said, "Come on, do you think I'm a fool?" He held his hand out, "Phone."

Kyle reached for it in his pocket, pulling it out, looking at it. He genuinely looked like he was going to give it back.

Jessi snatched it from his hand and crushed it, "I don't know why we let the cameras see us, Kyle. After all, we can deal with this guy."

"You're going to kill me?" Cassidy questioned, smiling broadly, "Oh, fun! Nate!"

Nate came out from another doorway, another closet, the electrical weapon in hand, "I get to do something? Glad you brought me along."

"No, you don't get to do anything," Cassidy told him.

"Why call then?" he questioning angrily.

"I want you to be here for something," Cassidy said, "Just in case." He pointed to Jessi, "Kyle, when you were in the hospital, guess what happened."

"What are you talking about?" he questioned Cassidy, glancing to Jessi.

"Cassidy!" Jessi shouted at him.

"She sold you out. So did your mum," Cassidy stated simply, "They stole the formula from your head and gave it to me so I would save your life." Cassidy's smug smile came to him, "I have the clones, Kyle. I don't care that you have that information; I really don't. It's not important to me. But the clones are."

"I don't believe you!" Kyle shouted at him, looking to Jessi, "Jessi and Nicole could never do that!"

"Read me; am I lying?" Cassidy questioned, "Better yet, ask and read Jessi!"

He turned to Jessi, "Is he telling the truth?" Kyle questioned her.

"Kyle…"

"Is he lying?" Kyle shouted.

"No!" she shouted at him, "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry!" Jessi told him, "He…he made me get it for him, from your head, or you would have died. Nicole helped. We…we agreed to do it to save you."

"Is that why you avoided me?" he questioned, getting a weak nod of the head in return.

"Kyle, brother, I win," Cassidy told him.

"You don't win!" Kyle shouted at him.

"Oh, but I have," he answered, "Nate, stand down. I don't need you."

"Fine," Nate muttered, clearly very displeased with having to accompany Cassidy to the action, and then seeing it be avoided.

Cassidy held up a hand, "Later, brother." He turned his back to Kyle and headed out with Nate close behind. Unlike Cassidy, Nate kept looking back.

"Kyle…"

"Save it," he told Jessi, "I'm not someone who holds a grudge, who stays angry, but…you and Nicole should have told me."

"How could we tell you?" she asked him, "We couldn't!"

"I see how you would think that," he said, walking towards the exit, "I need to look into this data. The clone location has to be in here somewhere. That's now my first priority, and then the Latnok students."

"Let me help!" she pleaded.

"I'm sorry, but at this point, it's personal."

"Forget about what I did!" she pleaded him, "Let me help you!"

"It's not about what you did," he told her, "It's all about Cassidy now."

"What do you mean?"

"I thought I walled it all off, kept it all blocked away. I didn't. I need to stop fooling myself. I want to harm Cassidy. I want revenge for what he attempted to do. He thought to strike a blow by making you and Nicole turn against me; or make me turn against you when the truth came out. Now I'm going after him personally, to make him pay for all of this."

Jessi ran after him, "Kyle…"

"I'm sorry, but this is my job alone now. I'm going home to look at the data, then I'm going. Don't follow," he said, heading outside and hailing another taxi. Jessi climbed in with him as they headed to the Trager house.

"We got it," Josh told Kyle, "How'd we do? Better than expected, right?"

He walked past Josh and Lori without saying anything, "Good job," he told them, his back to them, holding the door open with one hand, closing it behind him.

"That was rude," Josh commented.

"Something must have happened," Lori told him, grabbing his arm, "Come on; let's just leave him be."

As the two went into the kitchen, they saw Jessi coming in, "Josh, Lori…is Kyle here?"

"He's in his room," Lori said.

"Did you do something?" Josh demanded of her.

"…I hurt him," she said, "I…"

"What did you do?" Lori demanded, losing it at this point, "We thought you were different! How could you do anything to hurt him?"

Nicole and Stephen were coming down, "What are you guys yelling about?" Stephen questioned them.

Jessi turned to Nicole, "Kyle knows," she said.

"He knows…?" Nicole took it in slowly, "That…how's he doing?"

"He knows what?" Stephen questioned, "What are you two talking about?"

"That's what we're trying to find out," Josh commented.

"Let me tell it," Nicole told Jessi, walking to stand between everyone, "I…I didn't want anyone to have to know about this, I didn't want any of you to worry. In the hospital, when Kyle was…in serious condition, Michael Cassidy offered to help."

"Cassidy offered to help Kyle?" Josh questioned, "What? Why would he do that?"

"He wanted something in return," Nicole said.

"What was it?" Stephen asked her.

"Information from Kyle's head," Jessi commented, "I stole it from his head while he was under, and gave it to Cassidy."

"Cassidy saved Kyle's life after that," Nicole finished for Jessi, "It was all we could do. Kyle would have died otherwise."

"You gave him something from Kyle's head?" Lori shouted at Jessi, "How could you do that? He's too dangerous! You have Kyle and Declan have been trying to stop him and Latnok for so long, yet you did this? You helped your enemy?"

"It was either help him, or let Kyle die!" Jessi shouted at Lori, "What else could we do?" she was breaking down, almost in tears. It was hard on her to have done that, it was hard on her to relive it, and also defend herself from Kyle's family; the people who loved him more than she did.

"Lori, stop," Nicole told her daughter, "The two of us did what we had to do."

Stephen laid a hand on his wife's shoulder, "You could have told all of us. We would have all agreed."

"No!" Josh shouted, "Lori's right; we couldn't! I'm with Lori; there's no way we could have done this!"

"Even if Kyle would have died otherwise?" Jessi questioned through tears streaming down her face, "We couldn't have lived with ourselves!"

"Jessi is right," Nicole said, putting her arm around Jessi, "Josh, Lori, please leave us for a bit."

The two looked to each other and left them, clearly unable to accept this situation. It had happened, and there was no alternative, but they couldn't deal with it now.

"It'll be ok, Jessi," Nicole told her, "Don't worry."

"No…it won't be," Jessi muttered, "Not at this point, it can't be."

["I Saw" by Matt Nathanson .com/watch?v=1_f1-dicuRE]

I had worked it out. I had figured out where to go to find the missing students, but they would have to wait, because of a phone call.

"Kyle, I want to settle things. Come to the location I texted you on my phone; you still have it, right?"

So I followed where he told me to go. I was like a moth into a flame, but what choice did I have? I had to go. I had to stop this experiment again. This time I didn't have a way to stop the growing process; I didn't have a way to commit a small scale genocide, but I had to meet Cassidy. I would find a way to stop this experiment again, no matter what.

Kyle walked among the rows of tanks where the clones were developing, looking at them as he walked. The warehouse that was being used was empty, filled with only the rows and rows of shelves that held the tanks in which the babies were receiving gestation in.

"Cassidy!" Kyle shouted, "I'm here!"

Kyle closed his eyes, feeling the heartbeats of the countless babies around him. They were genuine; this was real. This sick sight was real.

"Kyle, welcome," Cassidy said, walking out from behind a row a bit farther down, hands in his pockets, "Like the place?"

"You're a monster for doing this," Kyle told him.

"I'm not the one who killed them all last time," Cassidy stated.

Kyle's expression darkened, twisting into rage and anger at what Cassidy said. He approached Cassidy, who remained wary, but confident looking.

"You got me last time, and the time before that at the Trager house, but this time is different," Cassidy stated simply.

"How so?" Kyle questioned.

Cassidy had a small grin on his face, "Because this time, your family betrayed you with my revelation. This time, I'm ready. This time, your anger isn't going to be released again. You had it all last time, and you couldn't kill me. You've had nothing but time to think about that, haven't you? You won't kill me; you'll try to control yourself. I have you this time."

"No, Cassidy," Kyle stated, "It doesn't work that way."

"We'll see," Cassidy said, slowly walking closer, pulling his hands out of his pockets and making them into fists. Kyle did the same, though reluctantly, making fists as well.

Cassidy started to run. He shouted and threw a punch, but Kyle blocked it with his forearm and punched him back, in the chest, driving Cassidy a few steps back. Kyle punched him again, knocking him farther back.

The Tragers wouldn't approve of this, but it's all I can do. I died on the inside the first time Cassidy and I fought, and I never recovered. The last time wasn't a fight, but my stopping him from killing. I knew what I was doing, and nothing stopped me.

He saw flashes of his family coming before his eyes.

Josh. Lori. Stephen. Nicole. Declan. Jessi. …Amanda.

He saw the people he loved. He got hit in the face by Cassidy's punch, stumbling and then taking another two in the chest from Cassidy, going down.

I can't fight back. Not because of all of you.

Cassidy started to kick him while he was down, shouting, lost in a grip of rage as he beat on Kyle, seeing blood.

But I must fight back for my own sake. I must fight so that I can stop him; stop the man who threatens all of you.

Kyle rose between kicks and punched him once, sending all of his strength into one blow, sending Cassidy falling into a row of gestational tanks, but he didn't topple them. He slumped down. Kyle grabbed him by the collar and lifted him up.

"Now what?" Blood ran down Cassidy's chin as he questioned Kyle, his eyes burning with hate, with the passion and desire to keep going, "Finish me!"

"No."

I won. I could have ended it there; put a stop to Cassidy's threat, but I already resolved that. I already decided that I would never think of killing him again. All I needed now was someone to save me, to pull me out of this situation, so that I could have it resolved without having to cross that line.

But that wasn't going to happen. Not the way I wanted it to, anyway.

Nate came out from behind another row of tanks, lifting his electrical device that he so favored. He aimed it at Kyle and fired one bolt. Kyle's necklace – Adam's Latnok ring – conducted it well, bringing Kyle to his knees, forcing him to release Cassidy, who never felt a thing, thanks to the ring absorbing it all, and then directing it into Kyle's chest.

"Good work, Nate," Cassidy said, wiping his blood away with the back of his hand.

"I finally get to do something," Nate said, walking towards and looking down at Kyle, smiling viciously, "I want more."

"You're not the one who gets to kill him," Cassidy said, reaching down to his shoe and pulling out a knife that he had tucked away, since wearing a gun would have been dangerous in the fight he knew they would have. He flicked the blade open on the switchblade, "I get to kill him."

Kyle could barely see. He managed to get a look at the knife as Cassidy crouched down to draw it. He could hear Cassidy say one final thing before he lost consciousness.

"Goodbye, brother."

But…my…my family…

[Song ends]