Shout out to the following who got the answer right for last chapter's question! AngelGoneDevil69, Doomforzombies, Marian9, and incinera - you guys were right on the money! Mission Creek's rival high school is Deerfield High School.

Thanks to Lady Cougar-Trombone, Nicole0725 (you're such a sweetheart!), and raenbc, too, for your reviews! I always appreciate it, guys!

As I mentioned last chapter, this chapter will contain a sensitive topic. It mainly deals with the death of an OC, but I believe that a word of caution is still necessary because it involves more than that. Many other things are going to be explored here. Sure, it would seem inevitable (I think someone has guessed on this happening a few chapters ago), but with the circumstances surrounding it, you'll find that it came in the worst time possible, especially to the main character.

Thus the word of caution.

I will not be hurt if you decide to skip this chapter. In fact, if it will trigger something, I welcome you to completely ignore this. The next entry should be posted within the next week or so, or whenever I'm feeling a lot less under the weather. :)

If you did decide to read, be warned: very sad and angsty Leo ahead.

Episode Tag to: [open tag]

Chronicle 019

Chapter: Lanthanide

Password: *************

Date: 09.14.13

Time: 9:04 PM

Death sucks.

Contrary to what others say, I think it's the most unnatural thing in the world. Really. I haven't heard of anyone who's cried or gotten upset over something as common as breathing. People generally don't feel sorry for each sigh they make. Inhaling and exhaling are what counts as facts of life.

Death, I'm sure, is not—should not.

I know it shouldn't get to me, but it does. In retrospect, he was just a pet. Pascal was a hamster. Life expectancy of hamsters is about a year. Two, if they're of really good breed or whatever, which I guess he was. When I picked him up from the pet store about two years ago, when Mom had just met Big D, the woman there told me, along with how to take care of him, that pets like him do not last long. Maybe I was too excited over having something of my own to take care of and play with that I partially ignored that part.

I really thought he was feeling better. Two weeks ago, he was somehow back to his old self. He ate a little bit more than usual. That offered me some hope so I quickly got into the habit of leaving his cage open so he can run around the room if he wanted to. Before I left, I even asked him to watch over the Chronicle for me, which I parked next to his cage every day. I gave him permission to bite if he felt like it. He seemed okay with that.

Then Grandma Rose got very sick. Mom and I were so busy with visiting her at the hospital that I didn't really have time for anything else. We had a pretty horrible scare, when her doctor mentioned something about moving her to a hospice. When she woke up one time, I asked Mom if I could take her turn to visit so I could talk to her. I did my best to convince Grandma that she had to get well really, really soon. I told her that she hadn't taken Adam and Chase yet to our annual Grandmother-Grandson day when we go to Chicago and go to the car museum and eat good popcorn all day.

She smiled. She agreed that she hadn't, so she would try to get better. She said she'd also do it because she still wants see all four of us walk down the aisle.

And Grandma kept her word. Three days later, she was well and ready to go home.

When I finally got back into my room, after about a week of absence, I saw that Pascal was out of his cage and lying on top of the Chronicle. I started apologizing and telling him about what had been happening. I was telling him about the bottled drinks from the hospital that Grandma had been slipping into my backpack, how I had collected at least a dozen of them, when I noticed that he wasn't moving.

After putting down my bag, I came closer to him to see if he was just sleeping. I called him.

He didn't make any moves or squeaking noises.

I looked at him closer. No rise, no falls. He wasn't breathing anymore.

"Oh." That was all I said.

Wasn't that lame? "Oh"? We're talking about something that had always kept me company, and all I said was "Oh"?

I guess I shouldn't be critical about the whole 'dying is natural' thing because at that instance, I accepted it as true. It's just the way it is. It happened to my goldfish. I got mad at Adam, but that was it. What was so different about Pascal?

It took me about half an hour to find a shoebox to put him in. For one, I couldn't really ask for Mom's help. Not only was she busy with getting Grandma situated back to her home, but the news station had had her working like a mad newswoman for this film festival hundreds of miles away. Big D's out of the question, too. He, Adam, Bree and Chase had been busy with tons of missions for the last week, and I didn't think that they should be bothered with something as insignificant as my pet passing.

When I finally did, I put him in the box and took him outside in the garden. I went to the small plot of land near the trees, where Bree and I were supposed to finish planting the small bushes of roses, and dug a sizeable hole in there. I buried Pascal, and then I planted one of the bushes right above him.

Sitting there, it came to me what was wrong. Looking around, I saw that all the flowers were slowly withering away. Summer's gone, so there's no reason for them to bloom or look pretty. Pascal didn't exist anymore either.

I was the only living thing that's different.

I was back to square one. Actually, I never left square one. I felt very stupid that after all this time, I just realized that. The only difference was that before Mom got married, I was that weird, friendless kid that nobody liked. Two years later, I'm still that weird kid that even his friends don't like at times—only that I'm trying so hard to fit in somewhere I never belonged in the first place.

I tried not to be so mad at myself, but I couldn't do it. Forget Eddy. Pascal was the only one who didn't laugh at my face or accused me of being crazy (not that he could, of course) when Eyebrows was plotting against Adam, Bree and Chase. And when he was sick, what did I do? Leave him. I just left him, and that's not fair. I didn't even try harder.

Still, I didn't want it to become a big issue, so I let it go and didn't tell anyone. Not that they really asked or could ask. I made sure I was out of their line of sight most of the time, under the excuse that I had schoolwork I had to finish. I also invested myself in cleaning up Pascal's cage in hopes of reselling it somewhere so other people can put it to use.

They sensed something was up. Chase asked once what was wrong, when I came downstairs to get the mission summary report pile. I just told them it wasn't a good day. Probably because they knew about Grandma Rose, they left it alone and didn't press for more.

Big D also asked one time, when I was dismantling the feeder in the living room and he was getting his coffee. I just shrugged and said nothing.

"Okay," he said. He came closer. "Hey. You haven't been in the lab a lot."

"I don't want to be in the way."

"Why would you think you're in the way?"

I shrugged.

He said nothing. He sat at one of the chairs while still watching me. "Are you getting a new feeder for Pascal?" he asked.

I shook my head. "No."

"Oh," he said. "That one's not working?"

"It's not needed," I answered while putting the parts back in a box.

"I see," he said. He smiled. "Where's the little lab rat, anyways?"

I covered the box when I was finished. "He's in the garden," I said.

"He is?"

I said nothing.

"You're not going to look for him?"

I stood up with the box. "No. I know where he is," I said. "But it doesn't matter now if I find him or not. It never will."

Big D nodded thoughtfully.

I left before he could say something else.

Later on that day, I overheard him talking to Adam, Bree and Chase when I came downstairs to file the summary binder back into place. They were asking if he found out what was wrong. He told them what he thought happened to Pascal and how his dying made me sad.

Someone laughed. "That's it? That kinda sounds stupid."

I finished what I was doing and went back upstairs because I didn't want to get upset over something like that. But it spilled out later on, when they also came upstairs and found me in the kitchen trying to get something to eat.

"Hey, Leo!" Chase said. "We're going out to get some pizza. Adam's driving. You wanna come?"

I took my glass of milk and plate of cookies, which, ironically, were the same things they failed to notice were spilled on the floor when their 'friend' shot at me, before I answered. "No. I've got something to do," I told him.

"Oh. You need some help?"

I shook my head. "Nope. It's over something that's pretty stupid," I said. "I'm sure it'll just be an insult to your IQ to help a simpleton like me with something so…simple."

That was the last time I saw them that night. I holed up in my room and asked Eddy not to let anybody in. Thankfully, he had the decency of not teasing me, because I was sure a nerve would have snapped if he jumped in. I focused on getting the cage and the pet gears as clean as possible before I went to sleep. The same woman who sold Pascal to us called me back and said they could take in his stuff. She said they could pay me a little for it. I decided that it's not necessary.

Then, she apologized.

Isn't that funny? A stranger, who had not spent any time longer than thirty minutes in the same room with me in the course of two years, was the first one to tell me she was truly, sincerely sorry about me losing something that I didn't think matters but does.

This morning, I got dressed and got my bike ready to go to the pet store. Before I went on my way, I spent some time in the garden to finish boxing up the cage and making sure it was intact and was all there. I was pretty much ramming the parts in. I don't know. For some reason, I just found it very annoying that they weren't fitting back into their mold as they should.

After a while, I think I saw how silly I probably looked taking my frustration out on a few pieces of Styrofoam so I stopped. I sat still, took a breather, and then approached proper packaging as I should.

I hated it. I hated everything about it. I guess what weighed me down wasn't so much as Pascal suddenly leaving but what he meant and what his absence would eventually mean. Half of his life he spent with just me and Mom in our apartment. He kept me company whenever I missed Dad or whenever Mom would stay out so late because of her job or her dinner dates with Big D.

I know it's sad, a pre-teen whose only friend was a hamster, but I didn't really have any choice.

The other half of his life, he spent around triple the number of people but spent much less time with any of them. With me, really, because I met Adam, Bree and Chase and befriended them and left him by himself. The only time I gave him any thought was when High-Brows was bothering me and no one would listen.

It's really telling on how good of a friend I am.

What finally broke me was when I looked up and I saw the rose bush where Pascal was under. It reminded me of the many things that I buried along with him: the many times I wished Dad was still with us; the monthly dinner tradition Mom and I used to have; the jock strap incident the football team pulled on me, which was very humiliating that I didn't tell Mom or anyone else. Eyebrows and everything he was, I guess, was right along those also.

Then I thought about the night when I tried to rescue Big D and Adam and Bree and Chase. I wondered if anyone would be as upset as I am if I had died in those bushes, if I was the one they buried in a box. Would anyone cry? Or would they move on as fast as I found myself moving with Pascal?

As a dude, I have a strict 'No Crying' policy, with the only exception of season finales and appropriate circumstances. Feeling sorry for myself was not included, so I wiped any of the escapees with the sleeve of my shirt.

"Leo."

I looked at the person who spoke, but only slightly. I didn't want him and the others with him to see me like that. "Yeah," I answered instead.

The next thing I know, Mom was sitting next to me, followed closely by Big D.

Big D patted me sympathetically on the shoulder before saying, "Come here. It's okay."

I don't remember accepting his hug immediately, but I do remember mustering all my energy to stop the waterworks.

Mom hugged both of us tightly while telling me over and over again, "Oh, I'm so sorry, baby. I'm really, really sorry."

Soon, Adam, Bree and Chase also came in. After that, things just ran its course. It helped that I wasn't the only one…you know. Mom was, too. So was Adam (I forgot how the guy loves animals). Bree was tearing up a bit, if I'm not mistaken.

I don't know how long we were like that, but it made me feel better somehow.

Earlier this afternoon, after Big D and Mom took me to the pet store to drop off Pascal's former home, I stayed in the Piano Room, deciding whether I should write an entry in the Chronicle or not. I was leaning on not at first, evidently. I procrastinated with the piano for hours, pushing all kinds of keys that did not make sense.

One time, though, I think I figured out how to do the theme for Jeopardy.

Chase came in just before I left. He asked me if he could talk to me. I had nothing else to do, so I said sure.

"Are you mad at me?" he asked after we sat down.

I thought about it. I shook my head. "How can I ever be permanently mad at you?" I said.

"Well, sometimes, you should. What I said wasn't very nice," Chase admitted. "You lost something important to you, and I called it stupid. That wasn't exactly a good 'big brother' act."

I shrugged. "It's okay," I said. "You were right. Pascal was just a hamster, and—"

"—and he meant something to you," Chase said. "Look. I'm really sorry for being a jerk. I guess I was just worried about you. You were acting the same way you did when Marcus was bothering you that I got really nervous. I thought Douglas was out on the lam again and was out to get you. But, I know it doesn't give me any license to do what I did. I'm sorry."

"Don't worry about it."

Chase nodded. There was some silence before he spoke again. "Do you believe what you tell us?" he asked.

"Which ones?" I said. I laughed a little bit. "I tell you guys many things."

"About us being a team," Chase said.

I didn't respond.

"In times like this, you should," Chase said. "I know a part of you tells you that you're an outsider. I can see it. But, truth is, you're not. You haven't been since day one. We are a family. We're all connected in many ways." He made a face. "I mean, you saw Adam and Bree earlier. If you hadn't done well in holding it together as you had, those two would have been a mess."

I laughed.

Chase smiled. "Do you get what I'm saying?"

I nodded. "Yeah. I think I do."

"Just…don't ever feel alone, okay?"

"I'll try."

When he saw that I understood, he got up. "Oh, yeah. Speaking of, Bree's still very upset with me because of what I said so I told her I'll make it up to you guys by buying everyone ice cream. You wanna come?"

It sounded like a good offer, and it was probably what I needed, but I didn't feel like going anywhere yet. "Can I take a rain check?" I asked.

Chase nodded. I knew he was hoping I would go, but if I didn't want to he was not going to insist. "Sure," he said. Then, with one last nod, he left.

After that, my night had been really quiet. With all the squeaking gone, there's nothing to fill the silence.

I know I owe it to Pascal to at least make an entry about him and about the things that happened. After all, he was a part of our chaotic family life. So, for this once, I decided to pick up the Chronicle and write. I hope I did well enough. He deserved that much.

But, to be honest, after this, I don't see myself opening this notebook anytime soon. It just reminds me of how I found Pascal. I don't want to have that image constantly in my head. Not this soon.

I'm probably being too sentimental about this. Other days I would make a joke in defense of myself. I'll probably even graciously take the hit of being called 'Sissy Leo' or 'Softy Leo' in the process. Maybe that'll happen as soon as next week. Maybe tomorrow. I would be game for it.

But not tonight.

Tonight, I'm just another person at a lost over another bridge that burned.

Signed,

Leo Francis Dooley

End of Chapter Lanthanide

Re-Enter Password: *************

Date: 09.15.13

Time: 2:19 AM

Which episode did Leo mention about his pet hamster? Here's a hint: it's towards the end of Season One. Answers not required, reviews are appreciated. Hope to see you guys soon.