Disclaimer: I don't own Newsies or any of its characters, but I do own all others.

So there we were, the magnificent three: Lola, Carlos and I running through the streets of Manhattan liked escaped convicts. I guess we were convicts on the run, really – running from our own limitations toward redemption. (Pretty good for a lowly delivery girl, right?)

My first thought was to head for the Lodging House, but considering the kind of luck I had had there the last time, we decided the first stop should be Tibby's.

Isn't it wonderful how intuition works? We ran through the glass door and there was Jack, David, Sarah and Les all sitting a booth looking particularly ornery. Yes, it was going to be a good day.

"Jack!" I said from the doorway. "You're back!"

He didn't shoot back his usual smirk, so I knew this was going to be serious. When we walked over, David gave me a confused look but he didn't say anything. I tried to push the thought out of my head that he was possibly cursing me under his breath.

As surprised as I was so see Jack alive and relatively well, I stuck to my guns and said what I had wanted to say. "You don't look half bad." I couldn't help but get a little flattery in before I launched into my crazy escapade. Jack didn't smile, but I noticed he was holding a newspaper in his hands, like he had been reading it.

"Look, I know we've all been through a lot the past few days." I bit my lip and continued. "All right, some more than others. But we've got an idea, and it's going to work. It's going to bring that crab Pulitzer down once and for all."

There was something slightly off about Jack's appearance, and I quickly realized what it was – his clothes were clearly newly pressed. Curious, of course, but I decided not to press the issue or question the oddities of fate. Lola, Carlos and I sat down where we could and I started to explain.

"Okay, so I was thinking, how can we get the word out about the strike? Well, we tried the rally, but that didn't work because… well you already know why."

The silence was weighing heavier than ever.

"Right. So I thought, what if we make our own headline and print it? We could write about the newsies strike and the war in Cuba… everything we've been telling people to their faces we could make them read, all across the city."

Sarah and Les both threw me huge smiles from across the tale.

"Jack," she said, turning, "that's a great idea!" Sarah said. "After all those things Denton published… Can you imagine?"

I didn't know who Denton was and what Sarah was talking about, but I kept my mouth shut. Jack never took his eyes off of me, which made me quite nervous, really. I could clearly see David's doubt through that weak half-smile of his. And especially when he said, "It could work, but none of us knows how to write an article."

All of us looked down at the table at that point, thinking desperately of which of any of our acquaintances might have the precious knowledge we would desperately need. An article only moves people if it is written well, and the odds were not looking to be in our favor, at least as far as I could see.

"I don't know anyone," Carlos said finally. "Not a one."

"Me either," Lola said.

I heard Jack chuckle and looked up across the table at him. After so much frowning, a smile looked strange on him.

"I know a guy," he said and fluffed up the newspaper. "Look, the answer's right here in front of us."

David smiled at that, and I was as confused as ever. Jack didn't bother to explain his plan to us before he got up and motioned for us to follow him. We half-ran to a middle-class neighborhood in Manhattan, an area I had only been once on a delivery long ago. Baffled as to how a newsie would know someone who lived in the area, I asked Jack where we were headed.

"To Denton's," he said simply.

"Who's Denton?" I asked.

"You'll see," Jack replied with a smirk.

Realizing I wasn't going to get the answer I wanted, I slowed down to ask David.

"He's a friend of ours," he said. "Works for the New York Sun. But we've got to get to him quick because he's about to leave."

"Leave where?" David didn't answer. "Are you sure you can trust him?" I asked.

David laughed before answering. "If we can't trust Denton, we can't trust anyone. He's been with us since the beginning."

I shrugged and kept on running with the rest of the group. I glanced back at Lola to make sure she was still with us and I saw a determined smile on her face of the likes I had never seen before. I took it as a good sign and just kept right on running.

We finally got to the building where this "Denton" lived and rushed up the stairs. Jack knocked on the door and a middle-aged man with beautiful hair answered.

"Did you mean what you wrote here?" Jack asked without a moment's pause. I hoped this Denton wasn't as surprised as I was at Jack's outburst. "'Bout all these sweatshop kids listenin' to me?"

He smiled and said, "I don't write anything I don't mean."

I liked him.

"Well, come on in," he offered. "I was just packing a few things."

Everyone walked in right away, except me. He looked at me funny and I felt rude, so I offered him my hand.

"Izzie Romero," I said as we shook. "Nice to meet you."

"Is that a Cuban accent I hear?" he asked.

I nodded. "Lola and Carlos are from Cuba too." Denton turned around to smile at them.

"I spent quite some time in Cuba last year," he said.

"Jack and Davey told me all about it," I said. "That's where they got the bright idea to convince me to join their strike." There was something about his smile that made me want to talk.

Denton smiled yet again. "So I've heard. It was a pretty smart idea, I think."

I nodded and we went inside. Once everyone was situated, Denton continued. He explained how many people in the city made a lot of money using child labor and the newsie strike threatened to destroy their success. He said he knew that a lot of people were terrified of the strike and its potential to spread.

"Why can't we spread the strike?" Jack asked Denton. "Have another big rally; get the word out to all the sweatshop kids, why not?"

At fist I was confused by Jack's question. Hadn't we already figured this all out? We were going to write the article, and then hand it out. Maybe he was doubting my plan. Maybe I had been foolishly led on all along.

Ah, but my moment of relief came when I realized it was all a ploy. Right on cue, David said, "What are we gonna do, put an ad in the newspaper?"

"No, we'll do better than that. We'll make our own paper. And we'll show everyone that Pulitzer is a scum, just like our pal Izzie here said," Jack said.

Ah, I could see where this was going.

"We'll tell them they gotta join us, that we won't let Pulitzer be a hypocrite," Jack continued. "Isn't that a good idea?" he directed towards Denton.

"Yeah it is," David said. "But what do we know about printing a newspaper?"

We all turned and stared at Denton, every single one of us.

"All right," he said, laughing under his breath. "Where do we start?"

"We gotta start fast. We're gonna need the newsies and you three to circulate," Jack said, looking at Lola, Carlos and me.

"There's something else we need," Denton said. "We need a printing press."

"It just so happens, I know a guy wit a printin' press," Jack said.

"Who?" Davey asked.

"Old man Pulitzer himself," Jack replied.

I was impressed and assumed this newest advancement had come in the aftermath of Jack's arrest, because I certainly hadn't heard about it before. Our newspaper was going to be the best in the history of all newspapers, and we were going to print it on Joseph Pulitzer's own printing press.

"And he isn't going to find out someone's using his press?" Carlos asked, looking shakily at everyone one of us.

"Nah," Jack replied, still jubilant. "It ain't been used it years."

"Perfect," Denton said. "You tell me what to write and I'll do it."

"We gotta write about the price hike, of course," David said, pacing. "And we've gotta write about Pulitzer and the Cubans, too."

"What about," Lola said and stopped when everyone turned to look at her. "Well, what about writing about Pulitzer? I've been asking around and I heard that he's an immigrant himself, grew up really poor. And here he is, trying to make the newsies ever poorer. It looks bad, like he's betraying his own kind, you know?"

I could have kissed her. We all looked at her, especially her brother, with a newfound respect.

"That's a brilliant idea," Denton said, patting her on the back. "We've got to get as much information as we can about Pulitzer's past. We'll combine that with his abuse of the newsies and no one will be able to deny the injustice."

I pushed Lola's shoulder and gave her an approving smile. "Since when are you so clever?" I said.

She shrugged and smiled.

It sure was good to have my friend back.