The inspection of the Antarctica Research Station had gone well – he'd taken Kenji along to show him all of the Zoanoid types that were being worked on. With what his son had done for Chronos, Imakarum thought he deserved a little reward, and they'd had a rather good time. Kenji had been so adorably curious while the two of them had been touring, always wanting to know what some new breed of Zoanoid did or what the function of the various Divisions were.

Of course, he'd had to find some pretext to keep Kenji away while he was interrogating the scientists. Kenji was kind, gentle, and easily swayed by emotion, and while he loved that about his son, the things he did were of necessity cruel. Kenji would never understand that; he would be saddened by the cruelty his own father displayed, and it might even lead him to start questioning the dictates of Chronos and Lord Alkanphel.

That was something that could not be allowed.

So he had sent Kenji off to the cafeteria, or to look out at the vast expanse of snow, or to play his childishly amusing games with the various Zoanoids he found. None of the Lost Numbers were permitted in the same room with his son, of course. Kenji had had too bad an experience with Aptom – though that particular abomination could barely even be considered a Zoanoid – for him to want to risk his son's safety any more.

But now that they had returned to Cloud Tower and were once again under the protection of one of the largest of Chronos' Japanese bases, Imakarum felt at last that he could relax. There was no pressing matter that he had to attend to at the moment, nothing keeping him from simply enjoying his time with Kenji as he'd already delivered his report to Lord Hamilcal. And now he was again making the best of the time he and Kenji had together. It was possible for him to refuse to perform the tasks that Lord Hamilcal asked him to: he was about equal to him in influence, if not in Council ranking, but it would have felt… unseemly to do such a thing. Lord Hamilcal was one of Lord Alkanphel's closest friends, the first of the Council and the one who had discovered Chronos' Supreme Overlord in the first place. Denying Lord Hamilcal anything simply didn't sit well with him.

"Well, now that you've finished your meal, Kenji-chan, what would you like to do?"

"Can we go have cake now?"

Imakarum chuckled; his son had been asking for that very thing almost since they had left the Antarctica Research Station. "Very well. I suppose you've had enough actual food inside you, so you won't get too hyper. I know a good bakery near the Tower," he continued, helping Kenji out of his seat. "Would you like to eat there or come back here?"

"Um," Kenji paused, obviously thinking carefully about his decision. Imakarum thought it was adorable, and Kenji was certainly the only Zoalord whose most important decisions included whether or not he wanted to eat at a bakery. "Is it a nice bakery?"

"It's nice enough as bakeries go," he said, not particularly in the mood to eat in a public place, but willing to tolerate it for Kenji's sake. "It smells like cake most of the time."

"That sounds neat," Kenji said, smiling and picking up a last piece of chicken that he'd evidently missed while he'd been eating. "But… I don't really think I want to eat there. Is that okay, Dad?"

"Of course it is, son," he said, smiling. "Would you like me to pick up a cake for you, so we can eat it here?"

"Yeah!" he exclaimed, nodding enthusiastically.

"All right then," Imakarum said, smiling. "Do you want me to get a chocolate cake again, like last time?"

"Yeah, I really like those."

"All right then," he said, reaching over to tousle the boy's hair. "I'll be back soon."

Standing, Imakarum patted Kenji on the head a last time before he teleported off to purchase the cake that his son wanted.

When he'd finished the meal, which had been really similar to the ones he'd had back home – without scrambled eggs, which kind of sucked – he'd been kind of surprised that Sho hadn't jumped up to volunteer to do the dishes. But the more he'd thought about it, the more sense it had started to make. Sho, for all his helpfulness, was obviously still broken up over what had happened to his friend.

And, now that Tetsuro had told him just how close those two had been, he felt he could understand at least some of what was going on. Maybe not all of it—he hadn't known the guy nearly long enough to claim anything like that—but he could at least make some educated guesses.

"Ryan, there you are!" Tetsuro called, peeking into the room.

He'd gone back to the room where he'd first woken up, craving some quiet time to think about what had happened to him and what he was going to end up doing from now on. He'd also wanted to give Sho and/or Tetsuro a break from having to translate all that Japanese for him. He could make a guess at recognizing a few words from context, but none of the sounds were even remotely familiar and everyone talked so damn fast that he couldn't make heads or tails of what they were saying most of the time. It'd been extremely frustrating, hence his wanting to get away from it.

"Anything specific you had in mind to tell me, Tetsuro?

"Agito wants to talk to all of us in the main room."

Joy. "Okay, just give me a few minutes to get this thing rolled back up," he said.

Originally, rolling out the futon had been just so he'd have something comfortable to lie lay on while he was trying to mull things over. He hadn't figured that it would help him to avoid Mr. High-and-Mighty, but hey; whatever worked.

"Just don't take too long, all right?"

Define "too long". "I'll keep that in mind," he said, grinning.

Tetsuro left soon after that, and Ryan sighed. So much for a restful afternoon. Sho would be there, since "all of us" pretty much automatically included him, so maybe he'd be able to keep Agito from being such a bastard. Deciding that he'd adopt his usual I'll-be-civil-if-you-will approach to the impending situation, Ryan started to roll up the futon to put with the rest of them. He'd found that it really helped if he thought of the thing as a sleeping bag instead of a bed or a really huge pillow. Rolling up sleeping bags was almost second nature to him, what with all of the camping trips he, his dad, and Uncle Albert had been on. Thinking of his dad was pretty much guaranteed to make him morose these days, what with everything that had happened.

He hoped the old man was all right, but the not knowing was really starting to wear on him. Of course, not knowing was a lot better than a few things he could think of, he mused, wincing slightly as he remembered what Tetsuro had been telling him just that morning. He didn't wonder why Sho hadn't told him, since it was pretty damn obvious to anyone who was paying attention that Sho didn't like to think about what had happened back in the 'States. Hell, if he'd been in that same situation, he would have probably felt the exact same way.

Deciding that he might as well bite the bullet now as wait for the His Supreme Assness to come in and yell at him for holding up whatever kind of meeting they were going to have, Ryan picked up the futon and manhandled it over to the pile where the others had all been stored. Heading for the main room (the living room, as he called it, even though no one else seemed to), Ryan wondered for about half a minute what they were all going to be talking about before he decided that since he was going to be there in a few seconds anyway, he could wait at least that long to find out.

"So, here I am," he said, peeking around the threshold even as he slid the door into the wall; these things had always reminded him of Star Trek. Low tech and all, but still. "What'd you want to talk about?"

"Crouger," Agito said, and Ryan decided to ignore the sight inflection on his name; he was being civil here. "We were waiting for you to arrive, what kept you?"

"Napping, mostly. But I had to roll that futon-thing back up, you know," he said easily.

"What did you want to talk to all of us about, Agito?" Natsuki, who was a nice girl and nice to look at in Ryan's opinion, asked.

"With all of the Zoanoids that Chronos has in this area, it is simply not in our best interests to stay here anymore," he said. "I've arranged transportation out of the country for all of us. My forces will be coming here late tonight, since this kind of operation is best carried out under the cover of darkness."

"Wait," Tetsuro said, sounding mildly confused. "I'm pretty sure Zoanoids have enhanced senses even in human form. What good would moving out in darkness do?"

"It would serve to hide us from any of Chronos' unprocessed collaborators in this area." He looked over at the two guys who'd said they were some kind of Zoanoid called a Lost Number—Ryan couldn't think of their names at the moment, but he was sure they would come back to him eventually. "From what Jackson and Hayami have told me, the Zoanoid population in this area is being significantly reduced by Aptom's predation. This will make our escape all the easier."

Only you could be so happy about people getting eaten. Jerk. "So, where are we going to stay? I mean, it's not like we can go back to my house, since Chronos knows about it and all."

"Ryan brings up a good point," Tetsuro said. "Where are we going to be able to stay? We only got this place because Natsuki's aunt knows us and is willing to keep our secret. Even her uncle hasn't been let in on that."

"I know that, as things stand, our position is precarious. But I've been working with some branches of the military that have been made aware of the situation." He paused, probably thinking about how he would talk them all into doing what he wanted. "I have arranged for a safehouse to be prepared for us to stay in."