Author's notes: Hi! Here's an earlier update because I have tons of stuff to do next week and I have to attend a school party tomorrow. I actually really like how this turned out, may not be the best, but I like it. I hope you do too.

Warning: some nasty languages ahead, although it's very basic. That's because a certain someone is in this chapter and I can't help making them swear because I think it suits their character.

-Before-

The first time they heard the news, everything was a blur that they needed clarification.

The second time, they were in denial.

The third time...they were enraged.

"They're still out there! How can you give up so soon?!" Timmy demanded, his voice cracking near the end. He felt a sick sense of deja vu from the situation, recalling something he would have rather forgotten. Though like before, he was adamant about it, that Tecna and the other Winx were out there, seeking rescue.

He was not alone. "Why would you give up on the girls that saved the world several times over?" Sky nearly yelled at them, his fists clenching. Everyone had given up. If the whole world would have been in danger, the Winx would have stopped at nothing to save the world, that's how righteous and good they were. And now, they were missing, and everyone had given up on them. Damned hypocrites they were.

The two leads of the search, two of the 'best' (pfft. yeah right) officers in the realm, cleared their throats, trying to calm the storm. "Sirs-"

"We don't need your bullshit," Riven hissed as the guys looked at one another and walked off, determination in their eyes as they made plans, making a promise to their beloved.

"We'll find you."

...

Day four in the school, Liz and her suite mates walked to the dining hall for breakfast as several other students walked with them, though the six dorm mates would usually walk together in the mornings like they were friends, they would eventually split up usually without a word as if they never knew one another, and hung out with their own cliques. Not one of them ever complained or even acknowledged it, and Liz and Emma eventually got used to it, sitting with a group of freshmen they befriended sometime during the first four days. Things were...great so far for Liz and the girls. At first, Liz thought the school was gonna force the six of them to be the next generation of their mothers, fighting villains and the like, but other than high expectations and some comparing here and there, it seemed that the school didn't really care, which was nice. Though she's afraid she may have thought too soon.

"What's the square root of one?" Max asked out of the blue as they walked through the halls. She was holding a notebook and a textbook as she tried finishing her homework...while walking. Lana had warned her about it several times but she just couldn't be bothered doing her homework the night before.

"Isn't it one?" Brittany raised a brow.

"This is basic math, how can you not know the square root of one? Or any square root of any number?" Cel snorted. "We learned that in second grade."

"Well, I'm sorry that Melody's curriculum's focus isn't math like Zenith does." Max rolled her eyes, "I bet you can't even play an instrument to save your life."

Cel shrugged, not in the mood for a rebuttal after her brother ranted angrily to her all night that she barely paid attention to, something about an annoying freshman, not that she cared. "Fair point."

"Why does Alfea have mathematics as a subject all of a sudden, anyway? Isn't this a fairy school that teaches us how to be fairies? Not to solve equations?" Emma wondered out loud, everyone shrugged. Legends, or rather, rumours say that Griselda implemented mathematics and other subjects in the curriculum as soon as Faragonda retired. She never offered an explanation.

"Oh! That reminds me," Lana said, turning to Brittany, "What happened yesterday in History Class? I got called into Red Fountain after Kai did some stupid thing and dad refused to go." She rolled her eyes. Apparently, Kai had blackmailed a sophomore into upgrading his gaming system but the guy wasn't very familiar with the device so the doohickey exploded, damaging at least five dorms and injuring several students. 'But at least no one died' was Kai's reasoning as to why he was so nonchalant throughout Headmaster Helia's ranting, much to the headmaster and his sister's frustration.

Brittany tapped her chin, "Nothing much. We're currently analyzing a legend about two kids releasing evil into the world, at least, that's what I think. It's just so cryptic that I can't even understand the second part, something about descendants saving something, and some terms I don't even get, like malum and mem aleph, whatever that meant. I don't know." Though Brittany was an honor student, she's not naturally smart, so there's bound to be some bumps in the road in her academic journey.

"Sounds exciting," Lana drawled as they finally arrived in front of the door to the dining hall. Emma pushed the doors open and the girls were greeted with a surprising sight.

"What the hell?" Max asked, dropping her textbook as she furrowed her brows at the sight. The three tables that were once long that held a third of the students in each table, were now cut into smaller tables that can hold at least six students, sort of like the cafeteria tables at almost every high school in movies. And all the fairies were standing in front of the headmistress and the rest of the staff that stood atop an indoor balcony of some sort, like they were having an orientation. "What's going on?" Max asked one of her friends, Mel, who just so happened to stand at the back.

"I have no idea," Mel shrugged. "When the girls and I got here, the tables changed and the headmistress is going to make an announcement, something about the tables, I'm going to assume."

Max pursed her lips as she and her suite mates shared looks. A few more students came in, also confused with the situation. Headmistress Griselda, upon realizing all the students had arrived, cleared her throat and clapped her hands to silence the students' confused chattering. Once she deemed the students silent enough, she started to speak. "I know the sudden change of tables had confused most of you, but we deemed the change as necessary after some observations concerning some students who fail to find a seat during meals, mostly those who are friendless. So, there will be more tables and chairs for all students and we have collectively agreed that there will be seating arrangements-" At this point, most of the students are reacting negatively to this.

"Why seating arrangements?! Are dorms and classes not enough?!" A student screeched as she hugged her best friend, who was now neither her dorm mate nor was she in any of her classes. Star-crossed friends, basically.

"I'll be screwed if there aren't any nerds seated near me..." Another student muttered, looking at her textbook with her blank homework.

"This is just absurd!" Another yelled.

Griselda pursed her lips as she clapped louder, silencing the students once more. "As I was saying, there will be seating arrangements. To make this easier for all of us, the arrangements will be based on dorms, so that you'll be at least familiar with the people sitting with you." Many students whined while others didn't react much since they sat with their dorm mates anyway, and somewhere in the crowd, a redhead's jaw suddenly dropped. "Now, that is enough whining. This seating arrangement is final. Now, go to your tables." Griselda ended her announcement with a stern glare to her whining students.

"This sucks," Max muttered as she and her suitemates walked to their assigned table. Many students were still whining and others clung to one another as if they were getting separated forever, it would have been a funny sight for Max but she wasn't very pleased with the new arrangement either.

"I know," Brittany said, shaking her head. "And just when Princess Veronica wanted some fashion advice on the dance..." She said as she sat down with the rest of them. She looked at a certain redhead. "Liz, are you okay?"

On the outside, Liz tried to act calm and fine. In the inside, however, one thing ran through her mind.

"I spoke too soon."

"What do you mean you spoke too soon?" Cel suddenly questioned the redhead, adjusting her spectacles as breakfast suddenly appeared in front of the girls, some bagels with eggs and orange juice.

"What?" Liz asked, blinking. She was pretty sure she didn't say it out loud. "You can read minds?"

Cel shook her head. "Not really. I ate too many sight-enhancing carrots when I was younger and now I can read the wri- never mind." Then she turned away as if she never spoke to Liz in the first place. Liz blinked at the pinkette, but she eventually turned away as Emma tapped on her shoulder.

"The Back to School dance is in two days! Aren't you excited?" Emma asked, hoping this subject will help her obviously upset suite mates. She had learned the past few days that they are quite easily distracted, Brittany and Max especially.

"I guess?" Liz shrugged being the introverted fairy she is. "Is this party compulsory by any chance?"

"If you don't want a nose-diving social status and reputation then, yes!" Brittany said a bit too cheerfully. "You're a princess of one of the most successful kingdoms and the daughter of who can be considered a legend, so for someone like you, it's a necessity to join." She added in a more serious tone, she turned to Emma, "Same goes for you, but you wanted to attend anyway so what the hell."

"She's overreacting," Max rolled her eyes, "If you don't attend the dance, then the worst thing everyone will do is treat you like an outcast."

"That doesn't make Brittany's statement any better..."

...

"Fath- Sir?"

He was scanning through student reports in his office when the overwhelming silence he had gotten used to over the years was broken by a familiar knock on the door and his son's voice. He looked up, adjusting his spectacles as he looked back down and clicked his tongue. "Come in," he said. His voice was unusually brief and cold for someone who used to be so gentle and poetic, but things do change, and all the things Headmaster Helia of Red Fountain had been through didn't necessarily change him in a good way. Leon peeked his head through the door, the usually calm and gentle boy was timid with his shoulders tensed. "What is it, Leon-ard?" He asked, forgetting to call the boy by his first name instead of his nickname as they were on school premises.

"A man wants to see you," Leon informed, scratching his head. "Something about recent reports..."

Helia pursed his lips, out of all the people he could have asked, it had to be his son. He sighed, rubbing his forehead as he waved. "Let him in." Leon stepped aside and through the door came another man, his hair spiked as always and his lips forming a sneer. Helia made a gesture for the boy to leave, to which Leon obliged, shutting the door.

The man sat down on one of the chairs in front of the desk rather carelessly, sighing as if he had been through a lot. "That was your kid, right? The boy, what was his name? Lemy? Leo?"

The headmaster sighed. "Leonard, but he now often goes by Leon." He furrowed his brows at the man, "Riv-"

"Man, the kid's such a carbon copy of you. Are you sure that's Flora's son-?"

"Rive-"

"I saw the other guys' kids too. Never knew Sky's brat would be such an asshole-"

"Riven-"

"Timmy's kid was surprisingly cool, maybe a bit nerdy-"

"Riven,"

"And don't even get me started on Brandon's kid-"

"Riven." Helia interrupted with a warning tone, not in the mood for small talk, especially about their friends' children. Unlike back at Alfea, Helia didn't believe in the 'next gen' crap and treated his friends' sons like everyone else, sure he roomed his son with his best friend's son but Prince Hansel chose Prince Stiles as his roommate, and he wasn't even responsible for Rhys and Kai's room arrangements, it was pure coincidence. "I'd like to hear about your reports, not what you think about my students."

Riven frowned as he reclined back to his seat, sighing. "Nothing, Helia. There are still no traces of them, I've traveled around the realms for ten years, asked around, went to deserted places, still nothing. I even asked Sky and the others, they found nothing too. Surprise fuckin' surprise." He rolled his eyes. Five years after the Magic Dimension had given up searching for their beloved famed fairies, devastating their loved ones who were convinced that the Winx were still out there. So the Specialists took it upon themselves to look for their wives, in their own ways of course. But a decade had already passed and they found nothing, no clues, no witnesses, not even dead bodies if they were that negative, and not only that but most of their relationships with their children were strained severely.

Helia pinched the bridge of his nose. "This is a futile search."

"You only realized that now?" Riven asked sarcastically, "I've been absent in my kids' lives for ten fucking years, Helia. I realized that the moment my own daughter had to be pried off of me when she was seven years old."

"I...know what you feel," Helia surprisingly said, glancing at a small portrait of a family. A happy family, full of smiles and laughter and love. Helia hasn't seen himself smiling that genuinely since he watched his daughter walk, or rather, wobble towards him for the first time, or the moment his son showed him a cute drawing of a father and son. It was a time of...bliss and happiness.

It was a time before everything went wrong.

Oh, how he'd wish to live in that time again.

Without being widowed, without prophecies about your children, without the whole school of Red Fountain resting on your hands, without having to look behind your shoulder every now and then in fear that the prophecy might just come true and destroy everything. The time where all his worries only concerned changing his daughter's diapers, teaching his son to not draw on the walls, and the time where she was by his side, living, breathing, with her gentle smile and cute laugh. The time where she was actually here.

Riven rubbed his eyes, tired. "I...I'm tired. I really am. If someone told me that my fate would be a bitter widow in denial with children who are in a dangerous prophecy and definitely hates his guts then I would have avoided these shenanigans in the first place."

Helia's eyes trailed over to the portrait again. "Fate...it's unnecessarily cruel towards us, isn't it?" He muttered, "Our wives who did so many good things suffered a tragic fate, we are fated to be widows and our children...I don't even want to mention it."

"I don't want Max and Rhys to go through what Musa went through." Riven stated unusually in a quiet tone, his eyes cast downwards. "Surely, even something like fate can be changed, right?" He asked. Helia looked down as well.

"Probably."

Author's notes: Hints! So many hints! Maybe not that many but I do hope some of you catch something.

So, yeah, the guys do have a somewhat major role in this story, though not as major as the kids because I don't know if I can handle writing that many characters at once. But still, they have major roles here. Like how Riven will find *SPOILER BEEP* or how Timmy takes *SPOILER BEEP* or even the scene where Helia *SPOILER BEEP*. So yeah.

Trivia: While Liz and Hans were named after literary characters, Emma and Leon were named after a poet and a painter because I'm really getting sick of nature-related names. Leon was named after Leonardo da Vinci while Emma was named after Emily Dickinson. To be honest, I really like their names, instead of say, naming them Rose and...err, Basil. You know what, I really like Basil, let's call Leon 'Basil' from now on (jk jk).

Till next time!