Hello, my amazing, wonderful, readers! I have brought you another chapter, a bit overdue, yes. But that's how it's going to be from now on because school starts Thursday plus I have a job so... yeah there might be a gap between updates :( Sorry. Anyway, in this chapter you may find that I included some lines directly from the book, and I did so shamelessly. I don't own those lines (duh) and you'll easily be able to tell which lines they are because they're the best written ones in like, this entire fic. Anyway, enjoy this... I'd love to say masterpiece but you know...

"Sorry I'm late," Will said as he walked into Social class twenty minutes after the bell had rung.

"It's fine, Will, take your seat," Mr. Brookes said, then eagerly started talking about the propaganda used in World War Two.

Will sat heavily in his seat and tossed his binder on his desk. "You can copy my notes if you want," Alyss whispered to him.

"No, thanks," Will mumbled. Alyss gazed at him in confusion before continuing to take notes.

Will had not snuck out the night before, but was still unable to fall asleep early due to his argument with Halt. He had thought about it all night, weighing the pros and cons of obeying Halt. He had come to no decent conclusion, thinking that it didn't really matter since the odds of him living in one spot were low.

The day passed Will in a blur, nothing new or exciting happened. Until after debate that afternoon, Alyss and Dwayne had won yet another competition, and Will was cleaning up.

"Here, I'll help you," Alyss said as she positioned herself at one end of the table that had to be brought back to a classroom.

"Thanks," Will said and they lifted the table and began to carry it.

"You seem distracted today."

Will shrugged, and continued to shuffle the table along the hallway. "Do I?"

"You do, everything alright?"

"Just didn't get much sleep."

They had reached the classroom and set the table near the far wall. "Thanks again," Will said.

"It's the least I can do since you've been helping with debate."

Will chuckled. "It was my punishment."

"True." Alyss smiled at Will, but her smile didn't quite seem genuine to him.

"What?" Will asked.

Alyss slowly dropped her smile and said, "I can't help but feel that there's something different about you, Will. You're not quite like anyone else I know, you seem distant but not shy."

Will raised his eyebrows at Alyss. "Do you watch everyone this much?"

Alyss rolled her eyes. "I'm simply being observant. Plus, I consider you as a friend, and want to get to know you better."

"Well don't bother," Will snapped, then immediately regretted the words after seeing Alyss's hurt expression. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean that, I just mean that getting to know me would be a waste of your time."

Alyss masked her hurt feelings and stood straighter with her head high. "You can let me be the judge of that. I enjoy your company, and I highly doubt getting to know you would be, as you say, a waste of my time."

Will shook his head and turned to walk out of the classroom. "You wouldn't understand."

"What wouldn't I understand? What could possibly be a good argument for me to not get to know you?"

Will spun around to face Alyss, his shoulders were tense and his fists were clenched. "What you can't understand, Alyss, is that I won't be sticking around here much longer. What you can't understand is that I am living with my twelfth foster family. What you can't understand is that as soon as I'm kicked out of this home, no other foster home will take me in. I'll be stuck in juvenile detention until I'm eighteen."

Alyss's mask had fallen, and she looked at Will sadly. "Oh, Will, I-"

"No," Will interrupted quietly, his shoulders and hands relaxing. "I don't want your pity."

"I wasn't going to give you pity," Alyss said before Will could turn to leave again. "You may think I don't understand but you're wrong."

Will furrowed his eyebrows. "What do you mean?"

"Do you think you're the only kid in the world who's been dumped in the foster system? My father died as a soldier, fighting against Morgarath's uprising when I was an infant. My mother died six years later. I was a foster kid who bounced from home to home until I was adopted only two years ago. So don't you dare tell me that I wouldn't be able to understand, because I know what it's like to not have a family. I also know the joy of getting a family, you can still experience that, Will."

Will stared at Alyss, completely speechless. He regained his composure several moments later and said, "It's too late for me. Halt and Pauline are mad at me, and my social worker says that if I get kicked out of one more home I'll be sent to juvenile detention."

"Then make things right with your foster parents, you have to put some effort in too, Will. You can't expect the adults to do all the work."

Will pondered over this, he didn't want to get his hopes dashed again. However, he reasoned with himself, if he stayed out of trouble his social worker might be able to keep him out of juvie. "Okay," Will said. "How do I make things right?"

"Why are they mad at you?"

"They found out I was smoking, told me to stop, then I flipped out."

"Maybe you should apologize."

"What? Why should I apologize? It's my decision to smoke or not."

"Will," Alyss sighed. "You're underage, so it's not your decision. Plus, they're letting you live with them, don't you think an apology is in order?"

Will muttered some curses under his breath before spitting a barely audible "Fine" out.

"Good," Alyss smiled. "Now, how about you get home and make things right?"

Will rolled his eyes and said, "You are way too optimistic about this."

(Page Break)

When Will got home that evening (after taking the long way from school) he noticed that both Halt and Pauline were in the kitchen preparing supper.

"No, dear, you can't mix it that fast," Pauline scolded Halt.

"Oh yes I can," Halt retorted.

"Just because I can doesn't mean you should."

Will coughed a little to grab their attention, and Halt said, "What's the matter? Got a cold?"

"Uh, no," Will replied.

"Then why are you coughing?"

Will hesitated a bit, shuffling his feet and lowering his head before saying, "I just wanted to say that I'm sorry for yelling at you yesterday."

Halt seemed to glare at Will, making Will feel the need to shrink. Then Halt shrugged. "It happens."

Will looked up quickly in surprise. "That's it? That's all you're going to say? There's no punishment?"

"I never said there was no punishment."

(Page Break)

"Put some energy into it," Halt yelled from the door that led to the backyard where Will was beating a rug with a tree branch. "You missed a spot on the left."

Will swore as he hit the living room rug with a thwack that sent vibrations of pain up his arm. "I had to apologize," he muttered to himself as he continued beating the rug. "I just had to take Alyss's advice. Maybe you should apologize, she said. Just make things right, she said." Despite Will's grumblings, he would never admit that part of himself was at least a tad bit happier that he had apologized, because maybe, just maybe, he sought Halt's approval.

Halt shook his head in amusement at the boy before turning back to the kitchen and pouring himself a mug of coffee.

"How's he doing?" Pauline asked, going through papers from work on the table.

"I had forgotten how much fun having an apprentice could be," Halt said and set his mug on the table.

"He's not your apprentice yet."

"No, not quite yet."

(Page Break)

In the evening after dinner had been eaten and Will had beaten several more rugs, Halt decided to take him somewhere.

"Where are we going?" Will asked, looking out the window at the vehicles and buildings they were passing. Halt was driving his car, and not too gently at that.

"You'll see," Halt made a quick, sharp turn to the right that slammed Will up against his door.

"Aren't you worried you'll get a ticket or something?" Will rubbed his head where it had hit the door.

"Not particularly."

Five minutes later they pulled into an empty parking lot of an old warehouse building. It was grey, and falling apart in various places. Will looked at it with disgust. "What are we doing here?"

"Well if you follow me you just might find out," Halt said. Realizing that Halt was already out of the vehicle, Will jumped out of his seat and followed him to the door. The door seemed a bit unusual to Will. From a distance it looked as though it were a normal, flat door. But up close it seemed to be made of a bunch of palm-sized panels. Halts pressed the left middle panel, which sunk into the door and was replaced by a number code.

"What the hell is this?" Will asked.

"It's a number pad," Halt said sarcastically. "You punch the right numbers in and something happens." Will rolled his eyes as Halt punched in the numbers. "In case you ever need to get in here, the code is 533804."

The panel came back and covered the number pad, then there was an audible click, signifying that the door was unlocked. Halt opened the door and walked in, Will following him hesitantly. The lights were on, revealing the contents that the warehouse held. There was tall stacks of skids placed randomly on the right side of the warehouse, creating shadows and also acting as climbable things. To the left was what appeared to be some sort of obstacle course, with monkey bars, a climbing wall, and-wait was that a mud pit? Will thought.

Halt led him to the end of the warehouse where there was an archery range. "Do you own this place?" Will asked.

"Actually, the people I work for does," Halt said.

"The insurance place?" Will questioned disbelievingly.

"You could say that." Halt went to the rack where the bows were held and grabbed a black longbow, already strung and grabbed an arrow from the pile on the table. He faced one of the six targets that were shaped like people and fired, hitting the dummy in the center of its chest. "You try." Halt showed Will a shorter bow with each tip curved back. "This is a recurve bow, it's not as powerful as the longbow but the curve will give your arrow extra speed and power with less of a draw weight. I had the pleasure of receiving the design of a recurve bow from the Temujai."

"Who are they?"

"Men from the east who train as soldiers, they are also probably the world's finest archers."

"Archers? This is the twenty-first century, we have guns we don't need to use archery."

Halt glared at Will. "You'd be surprised, the public is unaware of most things that happen in our world. The bow is a very under estimated weapon in our day and age."

"And you know all this... how?"

Halt shrugged. "Oh, you know, insurance."

Will still didn't believe Halt, but he pushed his doubts to the back of his mind and said, "Can I shoot it?"

"If you feel that's a good idea, go ahead," Halt said.

Will grabbed the recurve bow along with an arrow and fitted it to the bow. He pulled back the drawstring, aimed it at the second target, and fired.

Whack!

The string had hit Will's forearm and was stung like a be. Will yelped dropped the bow to the ground. There was a red welt forming on his arm and Will glared at Halt accusingly. "That hurt," he said.

"I imagine it did," Halt said.

"Why didn't you warn me?"

Halt shook his head. "You're in too much of a hurry, you rush into things too much. I didn't even have time to give you this." Halt stepped forward and placed a leather cuff on Will's forearm. "Now try."

Will grabbed another arrow, glaring at it suspiciously before fitting it to the bow and firing at the same target. It flew and hit the target on its left side, next to where the kidney would have been. Halt nodded. "Not bad," he said. "Try some more." Halt lifted his own bow and was about to fire some arrows as well but said to Will, "Hold on. Your stance is wrong. Bring your left foot forward and drop your shoulders."

"Did you learn all this from the Temujai?" Will asked before firing another arrow.

"Yup."

"By selling them insurance?"

Halt sighed. "You ask too many questions, kid."

(Page Break)

Will had snuck out again that night, figuring that he wouldn't be able to sleep anyway. It was a warm night, with only a small breeze that barely caused the leaves on the trees to flutter. Will walked into the busy part of the city, completely lost in thought about his day. Despite the fact that he had to apologize to Halt and then beat several rugs, he figured it was the best day he had had in a long time. He got to shoot a bow and arrow for the first time with his foster father in a weird ass warehouse that Halt claimed belonged to Life Saving Insurance. What's not to like?

Will pondered over what exactly this Insurance company specialized in and thought that perhaps there was more to it than Halt and Pauline let on. But before he could consider his theory further someone stepped in front of him and said, "Hey, Will."

Will looked up, seeing a pair of eyes he wished to never see again. "Surprised to see me?" the guy asked, an arrogant smirk on his lips. "Yeah, some of the gang were caught back in Meric, so me, Bryn, and Jerome had to escape to here. Redmont's not too bad, a pretty big city, much bigger than Meric. I bet there's more money floating around here, eh, Will?"

Will swallowed the lump in his throat and said, "I wouldn't know. I quit, remember?"

The older boy laughed, wiping a fake tear from his eye. "Oh, Will, you can't just quit. You were in the gang, and that means you're like family."

Will rolled his eyes. "Spare me the fucking talk, Alda. You and I both know that that's not what a gang is all about. It may have worked on me when I was thirteen, but not anymore."

"Oh why? Did you actually find a family?" When Will didn't respond Alda knew he struck a cord. "You know that a gang like ours is as close to family as you're going to get."

Will shook his head. "Then I'd rather not have any at all." He walked around Alda hurriedly, not wanting to get mixed up with Alda's gang again.

"Meet us tomorrow night at Larry's Diner or we'll introduce ourselves to, what's their names? Right, Halt and Pauline O'Carrick," Larry called after him and Will's heart clenched. He knew he had no choice.

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