A\N Hi! UPDATE! Once again a delay…But, a much bigger chapter. Anyway i hope you'll enjoy it! A friendly reminder- next chapter will be last chapter of this story, which means that we are basically 1 step from the end. See you there!
And as always
READ AND REVIEW.
Disclaimer: I don't own Kim Possible.
Chapter 18
Family business
"I can't believe my eyes. It's so beautiful, so magnificent! I missed you so much!"
Ron was crying on his knees before the doors of Bueno Nacho with a small pink rodent doing the same nearby. He was just discharged from hospital. After the operation on his shoulder and removal of the tracking chip he had to stay there for several days. Wound was still there and bandaged, but it healed enough for him to go out. To celebrate this Shena and Kim decided to take him to their favorite and just reopened joint. Ron stood from the ground and dashed inside, with Rufus clinging on his sleeve.
"So far so good." Kim sighed and entered the building.
"Yeah, i was afraid he will make a bigger scene, with fireworks and circus elephants." Shena said with a small smile on her lips.
"I don't think it's possible, even for him. Penguins maybe, but elephants, nah."
"Sometimes i wonder who he likes more me or Bueno Nacho."
Both girls giggled at that. As they reached their usual table, an interesting scene appeared before their eyes. Ron was hugging an awkward guy with glasses.
"H-hey…" Ned noticed girls, while trying to get free from the embrace. "Welcome to Bueno Nacho, uhm… little help?"
"Good to see you too Ned." Shena tugged Ron's ear and twisted it. "Ron, should i be jealous?"
"Ow ouch!" Ron was forced to let Ned go. "No, no, i was just overjoyed to see Ned again!"
"I think he got the point." she released his ear.
"It's good to see you again, Ned." Kim sat at the table.
"Same here." he took out small notepad and pen. "So, have my favorite customers decided what to order?"
"Two, no, three Nacos!" Ron answered immediately.
"Nachos!" Rufus squealed.
"Burrito, extra spicy." Shena followed and sat near her boyfriend.
"And chicken salad for me." Kim finished the order.
"Alright, be right back." Ned wrote it all down and left towards the counter.
While trio, plus small animal, waited for the food, a simple tune came from both Shena's and Kim's purses. It obviously came from their communicators. Girls sighed and Ron hanged his head. It supposed to be a celebration, a day off, but it looks like villains works on different schedules then our heroes. With a bad feeling, girls pulled out their devices.
"What the sitch Wade?" Kim and Shena asked in sync after accepting the call simultaneously.
"Hey! Some information caught my eye. Better for you to see for yourself, read this online article. It was uploaded about half-hour ago. "
Image of Wade change to the article:
"Team Go disappeared!
Four days ago the courageous defenders of Go City, Team Go, went to face another formidable foe. However no one in the whole town saw any member of the hero team since that day. For several years people noticed our guardians patrolling the city every day. However, ever since their departure to the battle with a villain named Caesar, no one saw any of Team Go heroes in city. Maybe they are just recovering from the struggle, or maybe they lost and Go City is doomed…"
As soon as Shena finished reading the article she took her phone and dialed her older brother. Nobody answered. After that she dialed Mego's number, same result. Same story with Wegos's number. Lastly she dialed the Go tower, but answering marching was the only one on the other end of the line.
"Damn it!" she hit the table with fist. "No answer. Something is wrong."
"Wade!" Kim reacted seriously. "Can you arrange a flight to Go City?"
"Already done." Wade boasted. "Taxi will arrive in couple minutes to pick you up."
"Thanks Wade." Shena smiled weakly.
"No problem."
After communicator's screen went black Shena let out a frustrating sigh. She knew her brothers won't disappear without contacting her or leaving a clue to contact. Something was definitely wrong.
"I'm sorry Ron." she said. "We wanted to celebrate it together, but Kim and me must go and look for my brothers."
"No way!" Ron said confidently. "I'm going with you!"
"You can't! Your shoulder is…"
"Perfectly fine! Well, maybe not perfectly. But if you think that i will sit here and eat all this tasty food, while you looking for you brothers, you are wrong! I'll go ask Ned for a takeout, we'll eat on a plane." he said and went towards the counter.
"And you wondered who he likes more." Kim said with a smirk.
In days like this Shena was especially happy for having Ron as her boyfriend. He was caring, funny, loyal, everything she could dream of in a guy. Not so long ago he even entrusted her with a secret of Yamanouchi. She met headmaster of the secret ninja school and was introduced to the history of the place, including lotus blade and mystical monkey power. It was hard to believe that Ron had something THIS powerful inside him, and that Rufus has some too. However the biggest surprise was about Ron's little sister. Who would've guessed that a little girl is one of the most powerful mystic weapons in the world? First time she met her was during a very awkward dinner at Ron's house. Apparently Ron's mother insisted on meeting with his girlfriend, and according to him was very pleased with her. Shena felt really tense at first, since it was like her every movement and word was evaluated, but as dinner went on, the easier it got. After that she even stayed to babysit little Hana with Ron couple times. Needless to say the girl was like a lightning, you blink and you missed her. After the meeting with Yamanouchi's headmaster the secret of how such small girl have so much energy inside became clear. Old japanese man even invited her to visit Yamanouchi School one day, which she would gladly do. Especially since she wanted to have a proper rematch with Yori, who was holding herself during the fight, since it was just for a test.
Team now stood in front of Herald's and twins' apartment door. The flight to the city felt longer than it was for Shena, however for the most part of it Ron was holding her hand, which helped to calm her nerves a bit.
After nobody answered the door, Shena pulled out the spare key her brother gave her last time she visited on Wegos birthday and tried to open the door. To her surprise it was already unlocked.
"Something is wrong." She whispered to the team quietly.
They entered slowly, trying not to make a sound and went through the already lit hallway. Suddenly a young woman with shoulder-length dark hair and violet eyes appeared from the end of the hallway with a gun pointed towards Team Possible.
"Hands up!" she said sternly.
Ron and Rufus were the only ones who listened the order and raised their hand, and paws, upright. Kim immediately stood in a defensive battle stance, as Shego lit her hands with green flame. During this standoff both sides were able to visually examine each other. Woman was wearing a dark red jacket with light beige blouse underneath, a knee-length black skirt and black hi-heels.
"Wait!" said mysterious woman and raised her hand upright, leaving the gun just hanging on her finger. "Your name is Shena? Am i right?"
"Consider of who's asking." Shena answered.
"My name is Pamela. I'm here to investigate Team Go's disappearance."
"Why here?"
"Because they're live here, obviously. Well, except Melvin." woman said in a calm collected tone.
"How do you know that?" Shego became more and more irritated.
"To put it simply..." Pamela made a small pause. "I'm Herald's girlfriend."
"I didn't know that your brother has a girlfriend." Ron noted.
"Neither did i." Shena said. "Whoever she is, she lies."
"I can prove it." woman said, keeping her collected tone.
"How?" Shena asked through her teeth.
"I have a phone in left pocket of the jacket. Look at the pictures."
"One move, and i'll burn your face off."
Shena said that and carefully approached Pamela. She put out the flame on her right hand, leaving left one still engulfed ,just in case, and pulled out the cellphone from the jacket. Device's wallpaper showed a picture of that woman and her brother intimately close to each other, smiling. Shena opened an Images folder to look at other photos saved inside. Pictures of different locations all around the world were mixed with pictures of her brothers. There was a photo of Pamela playing football with Wendell and Wesley in the park, photo of Herald who desperately tried to hold a sushi with chopsticks, scowling Melvin with a mess of the hair on his head as he held a motorcycle helmet in his hands. The last photo she looked at was the one with Herald with only bath towel on leaving a shower. That last one made Shena involuntary shudder and immediately close the picture. No matter how to look, those photos didn't seem to be doctored.
"Put the gun away and i'd say i believe you." Shena said and turned off the flame on her other hand.
"It's good that i like taking pictures." woman smiled and put the gun inside a holster, hidden under the jacket. "Now since we are on a better vibe, let me introduce myself more properly. My name is Pamela Note, I'm the journalist of Go Global News, Herald's girlfriend and a friend of Go family."
"Since when journalists are packing heat?" Ron noted.
"Hey, it is a dangerous job" she smirked.
"I heard about you before." Kim said. "On the news. You are kind of a big deal. Traveling around the world, writing articles from small country festivals to grand political and social dramas."
"Been there, done that." Pamela shrugged nonchalantly. "I was just in another town when i heard the news, just came here myself."
"Wait a second!" Shena raised her brow. "If you are journalist, AND know Heralds secret, how come there wasn't any big reveal news yet?"
"Simple." Miss Note looked straightly into girl's eyes. "Because i love that blockhead, and i like Go family. I will never do anything to hurt them."
Shena still doubted this woman. Considering the Rica incident it was justified to doubt someone who suddenly appeared in lives of people close to you. However somehow she couldn't doubt that look. She felt all confidence and devotion in those eyes.
"This is the cheesiest thing i said in years by the way." Pamela half-smiled. "Anyway, follow me, i found something at Herald's study."
Team Possible went after the young woman to the room. It looked almost the same as Shena remembers it except one, really noticeable thing. One of the bookshelves was moved to the side, showing an open door behind it. It lead towards another room, filled with servers, computers and a giant screen.
"Is this some kind of command center?" Kim asked.
"Looks like it." Shena said, looking around.
"It is actually." Pamela confirmed it and walked towards the panel before the screen. "I was here when you rang the doorbell, trying to get into the system, but it locked under the password."
"And i guess you don't know it. And here i thought you knew everything." Shena smirked and tried the usual GO password.
With a short buzzing sound and a red flash on the screen, the password was declined. Shena growled and tried several more passwords. Birthdays, parents' names, the day when comet fell, nothing worked.
"It appears you don't know everything either." Pamela smirked back at her.
"Let me try something." Kim pulled out kimmuncator, connected it to a nearest open port in the system through a cord and called Wade. "Hey Wade, can you get a password for this thing."
"Done!" boy said through speakers.
Two big words, PASSWORD ACCEPTED, showed up on the screen and went into the system's desktop.
"The password was CHICKEN SOUP, by the way." Wade said and disconnected.
"Why chicken soup?" Shena asked.
"I think i know why." a sweet smile appeared on Pamela's face. "Recently i told Herald that his laptop passwords are far too predictable, and suggested to use something like a word from a random page of the book. He probably chose a cookbook for this one."
Shena really didn't want to trust this person. On one side she showed a lot of proof of being close to the family, on another hand there was no way Herald is so opened up to someone, especially to the point of opening their secret identity. The only way that somebody could found out is by a chance or the act of massive stupidity, like when the whole team jumped out without the disguise the night when Shego from the future came to the tower. They all were half-asleep and was caught in surprise at the moment, but nonetheless it was very stupid act for a secret identity hero group.
"Let's look into the Briefing folder." Pamela opened it, and chose the latest file. "Here it is! Ceasar, civil name Gale Salad, post-graduation student of Go City University, specialization Robotics. Had a mental breakdown a year ago. Created a robot squad to rob banks and ATM machines. Got stopped by Team Go and put in a jail several times, however police never found money he stole. Current plan of action is… defeat the villain, pretend to not see how he escapes, follow him to the lair, defeat again."
A deep sound of two sighs came from Shena and Pamela, as they facepalmed in perfect synchrony.
"Who came up with it? Oh wait, i know who." Shena growled.
"Only Herald." Pamela sighed again. "I can conclude that he and boys followed with this plan and got their asses captured."
"There are tracers built it the uniforms, we can check them from this computer." Shena clicked on one of the icons, making a city map appear, with four colored markings on it fidgeting around a certain area. "Strange, it should show a precise point, and not move like that."
"Maybe they are underground." Kim suggested. "And the signal is weak because of it."
"That's it!" Pamela agreed. "Ok, My car is in the parking area, let's go."
They drove to the marked area. It mostly had office buildings around, with several coffee shops and diners around. Street was crowded with people. Team found their way into a small empty alleyway and searched for a manhole, to get into the sewage system. The map of it was already loaded into the kimmunicator, courtesy of Wade.
"Do we have to go down there?" Kim asked, feeling disgusted from a thought of going there.
"That's the only way." Pamela answered.
"Come on Kim." Ron said with a smile. "It isn't the first time we went in places like that."
"Please, don't remind me." Red-head grimaced.
"Speaking of that, you are not going there." Shena said and gave Ron her communicator. "You are on a lookout duty today."
"What? Why?" he asked.
"You shoulder is not completely healed after the operation, what if your wound would open or infected?"
"But…"
"No buts mister, be a lamb and stay on a lookout, we'll be back soon." Shena pecked him on the lips. "Now, are we good?"
"Y-yeah." Ron said smiling.
"Good." she smiled back. "Rufus on other hand would go with us."
Small rodent jumped out of Ron's pants pocket and climbed on Shena's shoulder.
"I need a little help here." Pamela was trying to move the manhole cover.
"I'll help." Kim walked to her. "On count three. One two …"
The cover was heavy, but two of them managed to lift it enough to move to the side. Pamela, Kim and Shego, with a pet on her shoulder, went down the rusty ladder right into the smelly sewage system. As soon as they descended, the signal on the Kim's kimmunicator disappeared. They could still use a map, downloaded into it, but now there was no contact with Wade or Ron. An approximated location of the Team Go was already marked on it, and the group went towards that direction.
"That guy, is he your boyfriend?" Pamela asked out of curiosity.
"Yes." Shena answered. "Do you have problem with that?"
"Nope, not at all. Just curious. You know a habit from my job." young woman smiled slightly. "He just doesn't look like a type that gets a lot of girl's attention."
"Oh, you'd be surprised." Kim rolled her eyes.
"It's not like my brother looks like a good catch either." Shena scoffed.
"Nice build, puppy eyes, nice ass…" Pamela started in revenge.
"Please stop." Shena interrupted her. "The smell already makes me want to throw up, don't make it harder to suppress it."
"Just making my point." woman kept the smile on her face. "Also, i'm not into Herald just for his body, though it's a pretty good bonus, not gonna lie."
"Hey, there is something nearby." Kim said and stopped. "Do you hear it? A sound, like something is getting wrecked over and over."
The sound was quiet but distinctive enough. Group followed it, while orienting by the map as nobody would want to get lost underground. Several minutes later, they found themselves before a strange place. It was a like a stadium or coliseum was built under ground, but in a smaller scale. Girls sneaked their way on the tribunes, hiding themselves behind columns. Under the tribunes was a circle shaped arena, with barred passageways in a wall. There also were some passages between tribunes. Monitors were hanging from the ceiling. Suddenly someone with a skinny look, dark brown hair, wearing white toga and gold-plated leaf circlet appeared on them.
"Go forth Gladiator, do you duty!"
Five human-size robots, with a skeleton-like upper part, and tank tracks as the lower part, appeared from one of the passageways, and a man, wearing gladiator armor above of blue-black jump-suit, stood in the center of arena. Man used brute force, enhanced by a blue glow to defeat his metal foes one by one. As he ripped head from the last robot before him, he looked at the monitors.
"No matter how many rust buckets you will sent, i will defeat each and every of them, it's a futile and meaningless battle, let's end it, you and me, NOW!" Hego shouted.
"Meaningless?" scrawny man in toga spoke. "You insolent slave. Each time a unit is defeated changes are added into their program, adapting, improving my robotic army. And i can rebuild each one of them in minutes from the scrape you left. And let me remind you your reason to fight."
Some monitors now showed an image of three people, Mego and Wegos, with pale faces and tired looks.
"What did you do to them?" Hego shouted even louder and angrier. "You promised they will be alright if i'll fight your robots!"
"Ow nothing. They just have enough food and water to keep them alive, just to keep them alive." Scrawny man smiled smugly. "And if you won't do what i tell you, they might skip a meal, or give them some poison as a side dish."
"You bastard!"
"If you want your teammates to stay alive, then keep fighting and train my army, Gladiator!"
A new bunch of Robots appeared at the arena and went towards Hego. He had no choice, but to keep fighting them off.
"I'm gonna kill him!" Shena growled as she clawed the pillar with her inflamed hand.
"Calm down." Pamela shushed her. "We need to focus on more important stuff."
"Like what?"
"Getting the boys out. Herald is a big boy, he can handle himself. But you so the others, they looked famished."
"Shit!" flame disappeared from Shena's hands. "You're right."
"Let's sneak around and find boys."
"I'll stay here and look after Hego, just in case." Kim said.
"Good." an idea came into Shena's head. "And meanwhile…Rufus, can you find where that toga-wearing idiot is?"
Rufus nodded to her and jumped from her shoulder, disappearing in tribunes.
"Ok, let's go." Shena commanded.
Meanwhile on a surface, Ron was leaning on the wall, and kicking small rocks under his feet out of boredom. Shena's communicator in his hand beeped its usual melody. As he pushed a button on it, Wade's face appeared on the screen.
"Hey, any news from the team?" Wade asked. "I can't pick their signal."
"Nope, haven't heard a thing." Ron sighed. "Just loitering here, feeling freaking useless."
"I feel ya dude." Wade sighed too. "Ever since i got the time machine pieces i feel more and more useless myself. I can't understand thing that i apparently created."
"Hey, you're anything BUT useless!" Ron said confidently. "I mean, you managed to put a laser in a lipstick tube, and remade toy gun into something that saved the world. All your things look simple, but inside contains all kinds of awesome!"
"Simple huh…simple…" Wade slapped his forehead as hard as he could. "Of course! Of course! I focused too much on its futuristic aspects…I created it, so it should be more simple…Yes yes! I see. Ron, you are the best!"
Screen faded to black. A very confused Ron put the device in the pocket and kicked another pebble.
Pamela, with Shena by her side, roamed the corridors under the tribunes in hope of finding the boys. They saw chambers that looked similar to the one showed on the screen, which meant that it was the right way to go. As Shena looked inside another chamber through a thick glass window built in the metal door, she saw three very familiar figures.
"Found them!" she said out loud, getting Pamela's attention.
Shena engulfed her hands in flame, ripped off the lock and entered the place.
"SIS!" Wegos shouted and hugged her as she entered the room.
"Saved by a younger sister, can this get even more humiliating for me?" Mego whined, sitting on the floor.
"I'm still your older sister, twerp, age here doesn't change anything." Shena smirked.
"Especially since this guy stuck around mental age 11." Pamela entered the chamber.
"Pam!" Wegos exclaimed happily.
"So i guess you do know this woman." Shena pointed at her.
"She's Hego's girl." Mego stood, and walked on wobbly legs towards the open door, almost tripping on his own feet.
"Are you ok?" Pamela asked him with concern.
"He gave us all his food." Wendell said.
"And half of the water." Weasly added.
"I'm ok." Mego said stubbornly. "I just really need a burger."
"OK, let's go get Hego, kick in nuts the one who locked you, and get out of here." Shena said, and lend a shoulder to Mego to lean on.
Slowly, they went back to the columns, where Kim was waiting.
"Oh my gosh." She said quietly as she noticed the crew. "Are they okay?"
"Mego is weakened, but he will live. Boys aren't in any shape to fight either." Pamela answered.
"You guys stay here, while we help Hego." Shena ordered. "Wegos, look after this hero."
"Yes, mam." Wegos saluted.
"Pamela, you probably should hide here too." Kim said.
"Like hell i am." Pam pulled out her gun. "There is no way i'm gonna sit and do nothing, i'll fight instead of my boys."
"Good." Shena smirked and inflamed her hands again. "Let's go!"
They ran down of tribunes and jumped into the arena.
"WHAT?" man on the screen "Who are you women?"
"Shena? Pam? And Miss Possible, what are you doing here?" Hego asked, while bending a robot into the pretzel shape.
"We here to save you butthead!" Shena tore the head from another one.
Pam shot bullets into the visor and tracks of the robot, making it circle around itself until it dropped on the ground. Kim jumped over the one, making it crush into another metal soldier, and used her laser lipstick to finish them off.
"We rescued boys." Pamela said, disabling one more robot with precise shooting. "They are safe."
"This is GREAT!" Hego picked up bended metal remains and used it as a club, hitting up to two enemies at once.
"It's impossible!" man on the screen exclaimed. "Doesn't matter, you can't fight my army forever! Sooner or later you'll be out of juice and i'll remain victorious!"
As he gloated, Rufus finally founded his way to his command room, filled with machinery, computers and of course with a bad guy himself, and immediately started to unplug cords, one after another.
"Fight my soldiers, punish this disobedient crowd in the name of Caesar!"
Caesar suddenly heard low buzzing sound. Half of his computers turned off, and all his robots just stopped moving.
"What! How can it be!" he was panicking, but a small pink shape still caught his eyes. "What are you?!"
Rodent smiled and unplugged another cord, disabling the monitors.
"Argh, you little!"
Caesar tried to grab him, but Rufus swiftly jumped over him, grabbing the circlet in from man's head.
"My circlet!"
Rufus childishly showed his tongue and rushed to the exit, towards the manhole where they entered the sewage system to begin with. Kim and Shego meanwhile understood who caused diversion and turned off the robots and monitors, and, with Pamela's help, started to lead everyone towards the same place.
Ron heard a voice coming from the manhole, but it wasn't anyone he recognized. First one to appear on the surface was Rufus with a Gold-plated circlet in his teeth; right after him, out of breath, a man appeared.
"Get this…..rat…." man in toga panted.
"Ugh, are you perhaps that Caesar guy?"
"Yes i am!" Caesar straightened. "I am Caeser! The Great and…"
He didn't finish this sentence, as Ron's fist interrupted him by landing straightly to his face. An unconscious man now was lying near the manhole, with a bleeding nose. Couple minute later Shena resurfaced, and looked at the body on the concrete, and at Ron.
"You did that?" she asked while the others were getting out of the manhole.
"Yeah, he appeared right in front of me and…"
Ron's speech was interrupted by Shena's lips.
"Shena!" Hego exclaimed in shock.
"What?" she looked at her brother with a sign of irritation. "He is my boyfriend and he stopped the villain from escaping, don't you think he deserved it?"
"I..uh…well… Well he…" Hego desperately tried to find an excuse.
"Oh, come on, boy deserved it, don't be a baby." Pamela said to him.
"Y-yeah. You're right." Higo calmed down a bit.
"Good." she pecked his cheek. "Now, let's all go home, and get something to eat, ok? Police can handle this trash."
Both teams, plus one journalist, went to the Go family apartment, ordering several boxes of pizza on the way there. Not surprisingly everybody from Team Go was fast asleep right at the table after stuffing themselves with pizza. Pamela brought several blanket and covered boys with them.
"Hey." Shena said quietly, to not disturb sleeping ones. "Can i talk to you?"
"Sure." Pamela answered, and followed Shena to the study room.
"Listen." girl started the conversation. "I'm sorry for not believing you."
"It's ok. I wouldn't believe myself in such situation either, it was smart of you to doubt me."
"Ok, thanks i guess. But answer me this. Why Herald?"
Pamela giggled at Shena's totally confused face.
"I first met Herald at the Bueno Nacho place." young woman told. "Not the Mucho Grande one, obviously, there is another one couple blocks away from here. I had a very bad day, my editor really pissed me off, so i decided to kill emotional pain with cheap Mexican food, and there i met him. Manager assistant Hershel Gond, i didn't know that it was a fake name back then. This guy, he has a really cute puppy eyes you know, when he confused, or nervous, he looks so lost, he even stutters. I found it funny, especially since it didn't match his strong build at all. So i started to go there regularly, after work or a trip. After some time, we were like friends of few words. We barely knew each other, but he somehow always noticed how i was feeling that day or another. When i was sad, or irritated by something, there were always something extra on my plate, like more nachos, or a burrito i didn't order. I liked it. I wanted to pay him back for this attention, but he always denied my offers. Kept a certain distance from me."
"Because of hero duty and because of us." Shena commented.
"Yes. But again, back then i didn't know that. And after a while it started to get on my nerves. I decided to dig into the guy, to find what is wrong with him, since i couldn't get him out of my head anyway. And i found out that his name wasn't really Hershel Gond, but Herald Go. It was hard to find, since our mayor made a darn good job to hide the real names of Go family. I presented this to Herald, he was really panicking, and he practically begged me to not tell anyone about this. I couldn't refuse him. I put aside my pride as the journalist, and kept the secret. After that day we were back to the usual routine. But it felt different for me. I felt horrible, thought that he do this little attention signs as a small bribe for the silence. And i was the one who ruined our little moments. Eventually i stopped going in that place whatsoever. I actually thought that i will never see him again. But, around three months ago, he came to my apartment with a paper bag filled with Bueno Nacho's food. Needless to say i was surprised by such gesture. I let him in, he was so nervous. He asked me one of the strangest questions i ever heard from anyone. He asked: Can i give you my trust?" Pamela giggled. "Needless to say i was majorly confused, but his eyes, both scared and hopeful, they just convinced me to say: Yes. And then he told me the whole story, about his family, his secrets, he showed his powers as proof. On one side, as journalist i wanted to tell this story to the world, but on the other side…i wanted to hold him, be near him. You can see which side won over in the end."
"Three months ago." Shena started to remember. "That… That is when i called Herald and gave him my trust issues speech."
"Apparently your speech had a greater effect on him then you thought. And i'm really thankful for that." Pamela said softly. "So, what do you think about me now? Still don't trust me?"
"You know. My brother can be dumb, stubborn, and overall irritating as hell, and he also snores like a boar."
"I know, but i still love him. Including all his downsides. It's what makes Herald, well…Herald!"
"In that case." Shena sighed and smiled. "Welcome to the family."