Title: Staying Put

Author: elektralyte

Rating: K+

Characters/Pairings: Sprinklings of Hank/Sheila goodness.

Spoilers: None

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1

Summary: Friends go missing and Hank's behavior arouses suspicion...

Chapter 5

It was dark now. The first moon that had risen was barely illuminating the path before Sheila.

"Bobby!" Where did he go? Sheila was sure she saw him run this way. Honestly, she was going to shake him silly when she found him!

She spotted him up ahead and stomped up to him purposefully.

"Why did you run away Bobby? I swear, sometimes you do the craziest things..."

Her baby brother looked up at her with shining wet eyes.

"Bobby? What's wrong?" Sheila dropped to one knee so she could be eye level with him. All thoughts of punishment flew out the window when she saw his misery.

"I thought I heard her calling me, Sheila. But when I got here all I found was this."

He held something in front of him. Even in the darkness she could see that it was hair. Bright orange hair. She took it from him and it felt wet and sticky.

"Oh Bobby..." She hugged her little brother, the dampness on his cheeks now transferred to hers. Then he stiffened.

Something behind her was growling. She felt Bobby's muscles flex as he gripped his club.

Sheila covered his hand with hers. Then whispered, "don't move."

She rose as slowly as she could, totally aware of movement behind her. At the same time she wrapped her cloak around the two of them. When she was all the way up she cautiously pulled her hood over her head effectively making the two of them disappear.

Whatever was behind them was now snuffling around with confusion. Sheila carefully stuck her hand out of her cloak and tossed the bit of hair as far away from them as she could. The beast, or whatever it was heard it land and ran for it.

Sheila could make out a wolf-like creature with light colored fur. The creature pawed at the hair, then sniffed. It looked up in the opposite direction of the siblings and took off. With her hood still up Sheila pulled her brother the other way and hurried them back to camp.

Hank and the others arrived to find Sheila, Bobby and Uni gone.

"Where are they?" He asked.

"Crap! This is bad! We should have known this would happen," Eric complained.

"What would happen?" Hank irritably demanded.

"I mean the minute we started splitting up people end up missing! Just like in the movies..."

"This isn't the movies. What's with you Eric?" Hank was starting to get mad.

"What's with me? What's with you?" Eric threw back.

"Why don't you just say what's on your mind," he challenged.

"Okay. I was just thinking that maybe Presto here could conjure up some Milk Bone Dog Biscuits for you. So that you won't snack on your friends."

There it was, someone finally came out and said it. Hank stared at his friends in disbelief.

"Do you think I'm a...I'm the....monster?" He couldn't believe he was asking this question.

When Diana and Presto looked down Hank's heart lurched. It was like the incident with the Cloud Bears. What did he do to earn such distrust? He tried to be a good friend and leader but times like this made him want to throw in the towel. He wouldn't though.

I guess I'm going to have to prove myself all over again. He thought.

"Look it's not what you think," Hank began. "I can prove--HEY! Where are you going Eric?"

"I'm going to find Sheila and Bobby and I'm staying as far away from you as I can get!" The dark-haired boy then disappeared back into the forest.

"Why'd he do that? Didn't he just say splitting up was a bad idea?" Asked Presto.

"Trust Eric to break his own rules," a voice spoke from behind them.

"AHHHH!" Everyone screamed.