A/N: Whoohoo! Another update! Sorry again for the long wait, I've been crazy busy, and lazy. But now I'm writing again so rejoice! By the way, this chapter is in Ez's POV. And I don't own most of the characters. Also, I know some of the characters are a little different from the original characters in the books, but I think I'm entitled to a little artistic creativity. In other words, I just can't stay with the same thing too long . I also realized I might have accidentally switched my writing style again, sorry if it was confusing. This chapter will be really long, as a sort of Halloween Holiday/ Sorry for the long time to update treat! Also, just to clarify, I starting writing this before I got the chance to read the last book (which has me begging for more if you were wondering) and so if I accidentally throw stuff in from those, sorry, and if I do it purposely I'll try to remember to warn you. I'd like to take a second (well, more like a line) here to thank all my lovelies who have reviewed this story, you guys's reactions made me laugh and want to keep writing so Yay to you! PLEASE NOTE! After the line in the story, line the one below, there will be a lot of inappropriate language. This is your warning, if you don't like cusses, don't read. I will not to release any important details in the portion. And now back to you feature presentation... ;)

Chapter 14

Of course, there were a lot of things I wanted to do, that I realized I just would never be able to do. Unless Andrew knew someone with the power to walk on water, which, I doubt he did. So I'd settle for trying to get Ryan to trust me little by little. God knows I hated waiting for things, and that this would require a lot of patience, but over the years I've learned that you've got to let people do things at their own pace, regardless of what the thing is. Sure, it'd be easy for me to go into a field like psychiatry and just 'bend' the futures of all my patients so they heal fully and never have another issue, but life doesn't work that way. There's always an unknown factor in human life, one you can't control. People aren't just like experiments or equations, sure they all take time and effort to figure out, but there's never always one solution for 'x'. People function day to day, but they aren't functions. God, I must sound like a total geek right now, referencing my Algebra II class, but it just was the only way to explain this. I tried once to mess with fate, and it didn't end pleasantly.

There was an awkward pause in our conversation, so I prompted it a bit, "Why did Andrew bring you here?"

"To train you to fit in, I suppose. To help Chloe lose her shyness, fear and stutter; to piss Tori off so much she learns self control; to let Simon know that he is still a real sorcerer even if the experiments worked; and to show Derek how to be a kid again, I guess."

I could almost see him shrug, "You guess? You don't know?"

"To be honest? Nope, I don't know exactly why Andrew brought me here. I'm not even sure if he knows why he did. But I do know this, Ez you need to be careful. Our powers, they're things the Edison Group hasn't even begun to dream of, so we have to be careful, if they find out about us, Chloe and the others will be a thing of the past. Ya know why? 'Cause the Edison Group will start a witch hunt for benders." His voice was kind of mournful. But also aloof, like he was talking to a teenager and he was some sixty-year-old professor.

That pissed me off, for some reason. I mean who did he think he was? Coming off all high and mighty, like he knew every little thing? I could feel my face hardening and was kind of glad it was dark. Since it was dark, he couldn't tell I was frustrated. But some god or goddess up in heaven seemed to have a thing more making my life resemble something very not-heavenly, so he noticed my silence. "Ez?"

I stood up suddenly, "My name is Starr. No one calls me Ez."

He stayed sitting, which was a bright move on his part. I know I would have hurt myself more if he stood. I turned to leave, as I started up the stairs he said something to my retreating back, "I don't know what I did or said to upset you this time, but I'm sorry Starr."

I never even turned around, I just kept heading upstairs. And he stayed downstairs. That was how I needed things to stay for now. If he followed me, things would have been ugly. I walked up the stairs and almost straight into Tori who was boldly attempting to eavesdrop at the door. I shot her a look, "Lemme guess, couldn't rope Derek into doing it for you?"

She made a face, and started to defend herself saying she would never stoop to something like that just for the sake of information because she knew I would tell her when I was ready, but she stopped mid-sentence when she saw I wasn't buying it and stated, "It's lunch time, he wouldn't even stop to answer me, let alone get up from the table."

She shrugged her shoulders sheepishly and I laughed, it was exactly the sort of simple comedy I needed to brighten my mood. I could totally picture Tori prancing around the kitchen trying to get Derek to help her eavesdrop and Derek only grunting in between shoveling forkfuls of spaghetti into his mouth. And okay, my mind may have been exaggerating a little bit when it pictured him using two forks to eat, but come on, it was a funny mental picture-one which had me giggling so much the half-wolf himself came out to see what the fuss was about, having finished eating of course.

I'd be lying if I said he expression didn't make me laugh harder. It did, by a lot. It was a strange sight for him, I'll admit; walking into the hall to see me giggling like a fool on laughing gas and Tori just standing there sheepish and confused. Seriously it was a rare occurrence in this house, or so I presumed. It took me even longer to get my giggles in check once Derek raised an eyebrow to question what was happening, because Tori shrugged at that and then Simon came into view, with a bit of Alfredo sauce spilled on his jeans. The crotch of his jeans to be exact.

By this time I was laughing so hard I was close to peeing myself. And Tori was snickering at Simon's jeans too. Simon and Derek were both just confused which had me laughing harder. And I kept on laughing, until I got this really sharp pain in my side, and I ended up hissing in a giant breathe, that, regrettably, escaped no one's attention.

It seemed like Simon paled visibly at that, and Tori, God Bless her, actually looked worried about another fellow human for once in her life. All sarcasm aside, they were all worried and did force me to sit, even though I repeatedly told them I was fine and that there was no need to worry. I hope they won't worry like this forever. It'll get real annoying, real fast. I am so not the kind of person who likes people doting on them and worrying about them, when there is absolutely no cause for it.

Lunch and dinner were quite boring. There was no real drama to note of, unless you count my minor rant about how there was no good stuff to cook in this place and that Andrew needed to take me shopping ASAP so that we could all enjoy food that didn't come from a can, bag or box. He said he would eventually but for now this is what we have to deal with, because we were, after all, living with a half-million dollar run-away and another run-away who may or may not have a reward on her head.

I looked away at that remark. I hadn't exactly run away, per say, but I certainly hadn't had parental permission to come here so I guess he had a point, as much as I wish he didn't.

So that evening I threw a little caution to the wind, and let loose some of my competitive streak, playing cards with everyone. It genuinely shocked me that these kids didn't know how to play ERS or BS or even Spit! Honestly, where have these kids been living, the dark ages?

So what did I do? Well, of course I took pity on these poor, unfortunate souls, and taught them how to play BS first, "Okay, so the object of this game is to be the first to get rid of all your cards. You get rid of your cards by putting them in the center pile, in numerical order. Who ever has the Ace of Spades starts with that and the person next to them then has to put down any 2's they have. If they don't have any 2's they can put down any card, they just have to say it's a 2. And it'll go in order like that, the next person has 3's and so on. Once you get to King's, you start over with Aces'. The fun part of this game is where the name comes in. 'BS' stands for 'bullshit' and you can call it when you think people are lying when they put down their cards. So if Tori has 2's and say she put down two 2's, when in reality she put down one 3 and one 4, I can call BS and then she has to take the pile. But if I call BS and she wasn't lying, I have to take the pile. Everyone got that?"

Simon and Derek nodded, and Chloe looked hesitant, but it was Tori's reaction that spooked me. Her face was calculating, and then suddenly lit up, "Oh Yes! I remember this game! We played it before when we were little, and if the adults ever caught us, they'd put soap in our mouthes."

We both giggled at the memory and then I nodded, "Right on the dot, Tor!"

I started with the Ace of Spade so I put it on the pile first, face down, "Alright Tor, your turn."

She put down two 2's and Chloe giggled at that. God she was so innocent, I wanted to corrupt her so much, but at the same time I almost felt bad about it, since, she was so, innocent!

Simon was next for 3's and he seemed to fumble a bit, deciding on which cards to put down. It felt a little mean to call him out this early in the game, but I had all four 3's courtesy of Tori's deal. So I did what any seasoned player would do, "BS!"

Simon looked up confused, "I'm calling BS on you, did you put down a 3?"

He shook his head 'no', "Then the pile is yours."

I passed the pile to him and his ever present smiled faltered a little bit, "Don't worry, I have a feeling once Derek starts getting the hang of this, you won't be the only one getting called out."

He smiled at that. Chloe was next with 4's and then Derek had 5's. The game progressed smoothly, after a few times of me yelling out "Bullshit!", mainly to Tori, Derek caught on. I'm not sure if I'm the only one who noticed or not, but it seemed like Derek was totally counting Chloe's cards and calling BS for her so she wouldn't have to. Not that she would anyway. Although she did come close once, calling 'Bullpoopie' on Simon. It was a step in the right direction for her anyway. Of course me and Tor got really into it, whenever we were calling BS on each other, sometimes we'd sing it out of over enunciate it. I loved going "Tor, have you been playing in a field again, 'cause I smell BULLSHIT!"

That had Tori confused for a moment, before she doubled over in laughter, remembering the time when we were little and she convinced me to go play in the neighbors' field with her. She ended up falling into some cow poop and reeked the rest of the day. Her mother was so furious when she found out what happened I swear she turned purple. And Simon nearly did too, because he was laughing so hard after hearing the story.

All in all it was a great night, just a bunch of kids hanging around and screwing around like kids do. It felt great, it was so relaxing. Unfortunately, our game of BS ran too long, and so we didn't have time to play any other games, but I promised to teach everyone some other time. And with that we all headed to bed.

A/N: Okay, so that last part really didn't have much for language. I was going to include the ERS story, which definitely would have had a lot of mature language, but the chapter was getting really long, so I decided to put it in another chapter. I hope you all enjoyed your extra long chapter treat, and I hope I get some wonderful review cookies for it. It's one am right now as I'm finishing it, so make my ego explode! XD And to any of you who might be worried about how my plot is straying and involving less and less of the regular cast, don't worry darlings, I still have many tricks up my sleeves!