Kalona

Zoey had begun to cough more and more as time went on. It hadn't been long since he'd stolen her away from the tunnels and the machines they'd had her hooked up to, but it felt like it had been an eternity.

Kalona had already thought of what it would be like when he lost Zoey to the inevitable, death. But he had never thought that it would come this soon. He knew there was a chance that Zoey's body could still reject the change, but he never thought it would because she was so special.

The Red One now had Zoey's head in her lap, stroking Zoey's cheeks and crying steadily. Kalona himself had been in that same place often in the past few days, but Zoey was always asleep when he cried. He'd found it strange that she had not cried yet. It was as if her death meant very little to her. But, of course, he knew why.

Zoey was worried about her death, but not for the obvious reasons. No, she was more concerned about making it to the day she went into labor. She hadn't said a word about it, but Kalona could see it in her eyes, especially when she looked at her stomach.

As Zoey whispered soothing sounds to the Red One, Kalona slowly made his way behind the tent, hoping they wouldn't notice if he was gone for a few moments. Once he was behind the tent, he unfurled his wings slowly so they wouldn't make any noise. In no time at all, Kalona was sitting on a hill not far away. He could still see them from where he was, but he knew he was out of earshot.

He pulled out his phone, noticing his hands were shaking as he did. There were two reasons for this: the first was his obvious fear for Zoey. The second was his fear of telling her friends. The entire reason they were moving from hideout to hideout was because she didn't want them to know. She wanted to pass after giving birth to their child. She had asked Kalona to take her body to the House of Night and leave it there to be found. She feared that everyone would think that Kalona had killed her. He didn't care about what they thought, though.

Kalona pressed the call button once he had selected his son's name in the phonebook. It had taken him a while to get used to this new technology, but – with Zoey's help – he finally figured it out. He slowly bounced from one foot to the other as he listened to the tone that meant Rephaim's phone was ringing.

"Father?" Rephaim answered, his voice anxious.

Kalona felt an overwhelming desire to cry, to pour his heart out to his son. But he restrained himself and said, "Son, you must gather the others and come to the city limits. I will meet you there."

"What's wrong? Has Zoey gone into labor?"

A tear slipped out of Kalona's right eye before he could stop it. He quickly wiped it away, fearing that – somehow – his son would sense his vulnerability. "No, not yet. But there is something we need to share with you. Your Stevie Rae is here. Please come."

Kalona hung up before Rephaim could reply. That had been the first time he had ever said the Red One's name to his son. He hoped that his son would take that as a sign that his father had changed, that he meant them no harm.

"Love," Kalona whispered as he landed near Zoey, "I think you should get some rest."

Zoey's eyes had shut as she lay in Stevie Rae's lap. Kalona gave Stevie Rae a brief but obvious look to get her attention. He could tell right away that she got the message, even with her eyes filled with tears.

"Hmm." Zoey mumbled. "Yeah, I am kind of tired. Help me in the tent?"

After Zoey was safely asleep and tucked in, Kalona grabbed Stevie Rae and walked her down a trail away from the tent.

"Hey, let go of me!" Stevie Rae gasped, yanking her arm free.

Kalona stopped walking and turned to her. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you. Listen to me. I called my son and told him to gather the others and meet me at the city limits. I was wondering if you would stay with Zoey while I go?"

Stevie Rae said nothing. She looked up at him, her eyes squinted as if she were looking for some sort of sign. Slowly, she nodded.

"Thank you. I will be back soon. Please, take care of her. I… I don't know how much longer we'll have her." Kalona whispered the last sentence.

He turned to leave, his wings unfolding, when he heard her say something. She must have realized he hadn't heard her because she said again, "You really do love her, don't you?"

Without turning around, Kalona nodded.

"And you've changed. I can see it." Once again, he nodded. When he didn't hear anything else, Kalona thought she'd finished her piece. But then she said something that didn't think he would ever hear from her.

"Then you have my blessing."

[BREAK; DAMIEN]

"Why do we have to go to the city limits?" Damien asked through his cell phone. He'd been searching every rooftop he came across for Zoey and Kalona by using his air element. Just a few minutes ago, he'd received a text from Rephaim telling him that everyone was meeting at the city limits but there was no reason why.

Rephaim sighed. "Why must I answer this question for everyone? Because I believe I know where Zoey is and it's close to the city limits. That is why I thought we should meet up there."

Damien thought about this a moment. "How do you know where she is?"

"I don't." Rephaim replied, matter-of-fact. "I think I know where she is."

"Well, then why don't you go ahead and check it out? If she's not there, we've just wasted time that could've been spent looking for her elsewhere."

There was a long silence. For a minute, Damien thought he'd lost signal. He was just about to ask if Rephaim was still there when he answered, "Can you keep a secret?"

Oh, no. Damien thought. No more secrets. I hate secrets. They're the whole reason we're in this situation in the first place. But he didn't voice his opinion. Instead he just said, "Yes."

"My father called me. Stevie Rae found them. He's going to meet us at the city limits and bring us to Zoey. Do not tell anyone else." With that, Rephaim hung up.

A flood of different emotions swept across Damien. Relief that they finally knew where Zoey was. Excitement that he was going to see her. Anger that she had just run off without a word. But most of all, fear.

Damien had been the only person to take Aphrodite seriously when she said that something was wrong. He hadn't told her that he believed her, but he did. If Zoey had been in the tunnels when Aphrodite got the feelings she had, he probably wouldn't have thought anything of it. But Zoey had been missing for days without contacting any of them. Yeah, it seemed like she had been going missing a lot lately, but she had never been gone this long. And there was no way she would do something like this so close to her due date unless something had happened.

So Damien was entirely convinced that he would arrive wherever Zoey was to find her in bad shape.

Nevertheless, he took a deep breath, counted to three, and blew it out before going forward. He thought about Jack and – even though thinking about Jack always made him sad – gained strength from the thought.

Damien walked two blocks before realizing that he was completely lost. He now remembered that he hadn't been paying attention to where he was going earlier. All of his attention had been focused on finding new rooftops to check. He started to shake all over as he looked around and couldn't find a single thing that would tell him which direction he needed to go.

"Nyx," he whispered, "please help me. I'm lost and I need your guidance."

As if his prayer had been answered, Damien suddenly remembered something he had been playing with a few days ago. He'd been sitting in his room, growing tired of the book he had been rereading for the seventh time, and thinking about how much more he could do when the gang was in trouble.

After every encounter with Neferet, Damien always felt useless. He knew that he had his air element, but all he'd ever been able to do with it was blow air in someone's face. Sure, it was a pretty strong gust of wind, but it wasn't enough. So, Damien had put his book up nice and neat on his bookcase and walked out to the depot.

He stood there in the depot, guiding the air back and forth in front of him, making scattered pieces of paper dance as he did so. It was then that he realized he could do something pretty cool with his element.

Damien had cupped one of his hands in front of him. He pointed with his index finger to the middle of his cupped hand's palm. He swirled his finger in a circle, focusing as hard as he could as he did. The whistle he heard told him that his idea was working: there was a very tiny tornado in the middle of the depot.

Damien laughed, his heart fluttering with happiness. He twirled his finger faster and faster, all the while laughing. Suddenly, a piece of the old wallpaper ripped from the wall and went straight into Damien's tornado. He immediately dropped his hands, now comprehending just how dangerous his new ability could be.

Neferet, eat your heart out. he'd thought.

Damien then tried out another idea he'd had. He was still successful, just not as much as he was with the tornado idea.

As he stood in this strange place, he decided that he needed to at least try it out. It was his only option.

"Air, please come to me." Damien whispered, loving the rush he felt when air gushed all around him. "You know what to do."

Damien felt the pressure around his ankles first. He had to do a little balancing, but soon he was an inch off the ground. One minute later, he was two feet off the ground. In no time, Damien was flying.

[BREAK; APHRODITE]

"Yes, please explain to me how I'm being ridiculous! Again!" Aphrodite shrieked, tears running down her face.

Darius tried to put his arm around her, but she shook him off. "Sweetheart, I never said you were being ridiculous, just – "

"Not in so many words!"

Aphrodite darted off, leaving Darius behind. She heard him yell something after her, but she didn't pay any attention. As more time went on, Aphrodite felt more and more like something was pressing down on her chest, threatening to suffocate her. She cried all the time, but she didn't know why. Darius and that stupid bumpkin just kept saying that she was depressed over Zoey being missing, but she knew that wasn't it.

She was now hiccupping furiously, tears streaming down her face. She tasted the salt in her tears and tried to spit them out, but every time she opened her mouth more tears fell in. Aphrodite hated that she could barely breathe through her nose and her eyes were so puffy that she couldn't wear makeup without drawing any more attention to her imperfection.

Aphrodite was so upset that she almost walked right by the city limits sign…and Kalona. She turned on her heel and stormed toward him, not even caring that she couldn't control her crying anymore.

"Where the hell is she?!" she yelled, poking her finger in his chest. "How could you take her away now? She's days away from giving birth!"

Suddenly, strong arms were holding Aphrodite's arms to her sides. She yelled and screamed for whoever it was to let her go, but they were so strong.

"Aphrodite, what has gotten into you?" Darius whispered in her ear.

Before she could answer, the rest of their now tiny group appeared. Erin, Shaunee, and Kramisha were jogging toward them. Erin and Shaunee – surprisingly – looked concerned for Aphrodite, and Kramisha just looked like she was annoyed that Aphrodite was throwing a fit. In the back of her mind, Aphrodite wondered where Damien was.

"I'm afraid we can't wait any longer." Rephaim said a little louder than necessary, perhaps to get everyone's attention away from Aphrodite.

Erin and Shaunee exchanged a look. "But we can't just leave – "

A shriek pierced the night air overhead. Aphrodite looked up to see – shockingly – Damien trying to fly, but looking more like he was about to crash. They all watched as he came closer and closer to the ground. Aphrodite gasped when Damien was about five feet above the ground. He was about to crash right into a collection of large rocks.

Faster than anyone could see, Kalona flew up and grabbed Damien just as he was about to hit the ground. They all actually heard the air fly out of Damien's lungs. Erin and Shaunee ran to him, both yelling about what he was doing up there and that it was dangerous for him to try something like that.

Before anything else could be said, Kalona – with Damien in his arms, gasping for breath – and Rephaim started walking down a small trail that Aphrodite hadn't seen until they pointed it out. Without a word, everyone else started trailing them.

Ten minutes later, with Aphrodite silently crying the whole way, they saw the light of a fire and a tent in its light. The next thirty seconds felt like the group had practiced what they would do when they found Zoey. They all paused for a moment, feeling the tension in the air. And then, all at once, they sprinted toward the tent.

As Aphrodite got closer, the knot in her stomach began to tighten more and more. This gave her proof that she wasn't upset because Zoey was missing. It also frightened her more than anything had before.

They all paused at the entrance to the tent, not sure what they should do next. Just as Aphrodite reached out to open the tent, Stevie Rae walked out of it. Rephaim shot forward just as Stevie Rae collapsed, catching her in his arms. At first, Aphrodite thought she had fainted, but one look at her face told Aphrodite that Stevie Rae was exhausted…from crying.

"No, no, no…" Aphrodite whispered, opening the tent.

There she was. Zoey. She looked almost blue in the face, so much so that Aphrodite thought she was dead. For the first time today, Aphrodite couldn't cry. She just stood there, looking at her best friend, feeling her heart turn hollow.

She darted forward, falling to her knees next to Z. The sound must have woken Zoey up because her eyes snapped open.

"Oh, Zoey." Aphrodite whispered, wanting to cry, but unable to. "I'm so sorry."

Zoey gave her a small smile and shook her head slightly, making a strand of hair fall in her face. Aphrodite reached forward to brush the hair back…

"Oh." Zoey gasped, reaching down to her stomach. "That didn't feel so good…"

"Z? You okay?" Shaunee whispered from the front of the tent.

She nodded. "Well, I – " Zoey began to cough violently. Aphrodite felt the warm, wet substance on her face before she saw it on Zoey's mouth. She was coughing up blood.

Everything happened so fast after that. So fast that Aphrodite almost didn't keep up.

Erin fainted, falling to the ground with a loud, "thump!" Stevie Rae let out a wail into Rephaim's shoulder, who was looking at Zoey as if she were a ghost. Kalona flew forward to be on the other side of Z. Shaunee and Damien latched onto each other, both crying. Kramisha just stood there, her dark eyes focused only on Zoey.

Just as Aphrodite looked back at Zoey, Z yelled out in pain.

"I… I can't believe it." Darius whispered, taking Aphrodite into his arms. She didn't resist, even though she was still mad at him for not believing her earlier.

"No." Zoey whispered, so low they almost didn't hear it. A small smile appeared on her face. "Don't be sad. The baby's coming."

I hope you enjoyed this chapter! I had to write it really fast. Lol. Don't forget to tell me what you think in a review!