And back with Chapter Three!

Why Sunday, you ask? Why not sooner?

Because the ending wouldn't come together just right.

But it's here, so yay.

gg180000: What are you talking about? You have three money right there!

Mia-Teresa-Davenport: Get a room, guys.

"Shut up, Zara."

AllAmericanSlurp: Late? You reviewed around the time you normally do, even if you don't really see it. (I'm a pattern person. I spot them too easily.)

DarkestKing: Aren't we supposed to be avoiding wars here?

"...No."

...Douglas has spoken.

Anyways, let's read! Sam?

"Zara doesn't own Lab Rats or anything you recognize. If you don't recognize it, it's probably hers."

"...If you're a freak like me, wave your flag!..."

Halestorm, "Freak Like Me"

"I can tell by your sarcastic undertones, rude comments and sheer lack of common decency that you and I can be best friends!"

Unknown

Chase

Getting a group of demons together was actually quite hard. I constantly ran into complaints.

"Master likes for me to stay close."

"That sounds boring."

"We've always been hunted. Sit down and shut up."

"Why the hell should I listen to you, runt? You're just a weak little djinni, and a half-breed at that."

See? Hard. And Sam laughing about it didn't help much.

Hold up: I forgot to tell you about Sam, didn't I? She figured out that I wasn't human on pretty much my first day back at school. I know what you're thinking: Can everybody and their fish see planes in this story?!

No.

Samantha - Sam, for short - couldn't see planes. And she didn't catch me changing forms, either, so don't go blaming me.

As it turned out, magic made a kind of humming noise. She described it as the hum of an extended bell toll. And, since moving essence around did technically qualify as magic, she literally heard my disguise.

Weird, right?

We ran in separate circles for a while, though. I had no reason to talk to anyone in the goth crowd, and she didn't feel like talking to me. We even had a few classes together and still avoided each other. We literally had to run into each other on the streets and get in a kind of fight over being in each other's ways on the sidewalk before talking to each other. After our squabble - she wasn't scared of me one bit - we kind of just hit it off. Tasha and Mr. Davenport were a bit worried when she told a story about vandalizing her teacher's classroom after getting a B instead of an A on an essay, but they didn't ban us from hanging out, so yay.

Besides, who better to help me build a small demonic army than the self-proclaimed queen of non-conformists?

If we could build said army, that was.

As yet another imp rolled its eyes and ignored me, scurrying away, Sam smirked, her arms crossed. "Another one for your cause! That brings you up to..." She sarcastically started doing fake math on her fingers before grinning again. "Zero! Gonna move some mountains with those numbers."

I narrowed my eyes at her, wishing I wasn't disguised as a human so that I could pin my ears. "Shut up, Sam. I don't see you helping."

She smirked again. "Didn't you tell me to let you do all the talking when we started?"

I sighed heavily, frustrated. "I didn't say -"

"You went on for five minutes about how you used to be captain of the debate team," Sam interrupted, rolling her eyes as she crossed her arms.

I snorted, more amused than annoyed. "Hey, I got a higher grade on my persuasive speech than you, so suck it!"

She scowled. "You know Marks-A-Lot hates me."

I grinned at the nickname for our speech teacher, Mr. Marks. See, he didn't mark wrong answers with a red pen. He marked the right answers with a red pen. If you made a perfect grade on anything, it looked like your paper was bleeding.

Wait, I trailed off a bit there.

In response to Sam, I let out a snort of laughter. "Excuses, excuses."

Sam punched my shoulder, making me wince slightly. "I bet $10 that I can convince the next demon we find to come hear you out."

I rolled my shoulder a bit, nodding. "You're on!"

With a grin, she walked past me. "Come on, Tiny Tim. Start taking notes."

"That joke is in poor taste, asshole," I huffed, adding my quip undermined when I limped after her.

She's vulnerable! my voice noted ecstatically. Quick, tear out her still-beating heart and eat it!

Holy hell, no! I like her! It was weird, but true. Beneath all the petty banter, she had become one of my best friends. And the demon thing didn't scare her, either, so that was a bonus! Honestly, how many people would walk up to a djinni and insult it?

Okay, a couple. Especially you punks. But not many more, so my point still stands.

Sam stopped suddenly in front of me, holding up a hand to signal that I should be quiet. Whether she heard a demon or a simple charm, magic was obviously ringing through the air. I glanced around, checking the planes until a bird perched on a mailbox became a wiggling wormlike thing by plane four.

I poked Sam's shoulder and gestured at the creature, and she nodded. "Watch and learn, Captain." With that, she just walked right up to the imp. It watched her warily, but didn't move. In fact, it was quite surprised when she started talking to it. "Hey, want to tear something up?"

Ever seen an excited worm? It's quite grotesque when it's twisting and turning around itself. "Absolutely!"

"Junkyard. Seven o'clock. Tons of things to destroy. All you have to do is pretend to listen to this guy for a minute." Sam pointed at me with a bored expression.

The imp was quiet for a second before nodding. "Fine. But only because I want to burn a car." With that, the imp flew off, a normal sight for a bird but a strange one for a worm. I honestly couldn't look away from it, morbidly curious.

Flying worms were frightening things. Imagine one of those fuckers coming at you in the dark!

Sam cleared her throat, smirking and holding out her hand. "You owe me $10. And we're moving the meeting to the junkyard."

I rolled my eyes and pulled the money from my wallet, pressing it into her palm. "Is it really to bribe the demons with, or do you just want to break the windows out of an old car again?"

Sam grinned and nodded, a thoughtful look on her face. "I think I'll take my baseball bat this time." When I rolled my eyes dramatically, she smacked my shoulder lightly. "Don't act like you don't want to help whoever shows up tear up a few junk cars."

I scowled. "Of course, I don't." However, a few seconds of her condescending stare had me amending my statement. "Not without a sledgehammer."

"Ethan was loyal and funny and protective. When we were little, he was the brother most likely to make me cry—and mostly likely to wipe away my tears."

Rachel Vincent, Prey (Shifters, #4)

"Five years behind me, but somehow with his shit together."

David Levithan, How They Met, and Other Stories

Donald

"Bring him here."

"Ha, no. Eddy will freak him out before you drive him off."

Donald frowned. "We can turn Eddy off. And I won't drive him off. I -"

"Don't promise at me," Douglas huffed, crossing his arms.

"Dougie," Donald implored.

Douglas leaned forward, his voice mockingly taking the same tone Donald's had seconds ago. "Donnie."

Donald pinched the bridge of his nose, frustrated. "I just want to meet this guy."

Douglas looked incredulous. "I'm almost 40! And I sure as hell don't need you to approve my boyfriend!"

Too bad, Donald thought huffily as his protective older brother instincts kicked in just a bit more. He didn't know why - he normally couldn't care less about what Douglas did if it wasn't illegal and/or corrupting the kids - but this was somehow different. Donald had never met this Kevin guy. He could be a drug addict or murderer or an abusive monster, for all he knew! Or worse: Another Krane trying to get close to the kids!

Donald shut the thought process down before he panicked. "I just want a face to put to his name. I mean, we could have dinner, talk a bit, maybe take his picture..."

Dougie furrowed his brow, obviously confused. "Why would you need his picture?"

Donald shrugged. "In case I need to hunt him down for hurting you."

Douglas rubbed his eyes with a heavy sigh while Bree and Tasha gushed from the couch across the room. For some reason, they were touched by something he said. Tasha, however, was Douglas' unlikely defender. "Don, Douglas doesn't need you to stalk his boyfriend."

"Thank you," Douglas acknowledged, gesturing at Tasha.

Tasha then gave a devious smirk. "I'll do it for you."

Donald grinned as Douglas' expression became steadily more annoyed as Bree started laughing. That was the woman he married!

Bree pulled out her phone, still grinning. "What's Kevin's last name?"

Douglas started smirking. "Trevino."

Bree frowned after a few seconds of typing. "Are you sure that it's 'Trevino?'"

"Totally. He doesn't have a Facebook page. He doesn't want government robots spying on him." A slight cackle of mischievous glee seemed to bubble out of Douglas.

"Wait, if he's so scared of robots, then what does he think of your hand?" Bree asked just to get some semblance of victory in the conversation.

Douglas rolled his eyes. "He says robots, but it's really artificial intelligence that gets him. My hand can't do a thing on it's own. Annoys him that it's so cold, but that's it."

Bree huffed, her smartassed point effectively shutdown.

Donald sighed and tried again. "Douglas, we just want -"

"Oly's tearing rhinestones off of your shirts in the Lab, Bree," Adam interrupted, walking in the room while texting and somehow managing *not* to run into anything.

Bree gasped and tore out of the room in a split second, a breeze heralding her departure.

Douglas, meanwhile, was frowning at Adam and patting his pockets a bit before scowling. "How'd you get my phone?"

Adam shrugged, not even looking up as he plopped down on the couch beside Tasha. "Asked Yahn nicely."

Douglas sighed, forcing the air between clenched teeth. Wherever Yahn was hiding, it was likely safer than being around Douglas at the moment. After a second, Douglas asked, "Why did you need my phone?"

"Because these guys won't shut up about meeting Kevin," Adam explained. "Therefore, I texted him."

Donald shrugged. It was technically true. A few times a week for the past few weeks, somebody pestered Dougie about meeting Kevin.

Douglas' cheeks flushed a bit as he scowled. "You went through our messages?"

Adam let out a small snort of laughter. "You guys are really mushy. And perverted." Then, his brow furrowed as he finally looked up. "Oh, and I was wondering what this one thing meant." Just as Adam was about to read it, Tasha snatched the phone back with a horrified expression, turning it off completely.

Judging by the mortification on Douglas' face, Tasha had spared them all a few nightmarish mental images.

After a second, Douglas picked up a magazine, rolled it up, and popped Adam over the head. "Don't go through my things!"

Tasha took the magazine and smacked Douglas' arm with it before giving him his phone back. "Don't hit him."

"Besides," Adam chimed in, "you have weird things. Yesterday, Bree found a pack of cigarettes in your room."

Donald bit back a sigh. He had forgotten about that vice. But Dougie seemed to have quit, so maybe it was nothing.

Douglas looked like he was equally annoyed and somewhat surprised. "I haven't smoked in ten years. Didn't even think I still had a pack."

"Bree threw it away," Adam responded with a grin. "Is smoking why your voice is so annoyingly scratchy?"

Douglas scowled. "Shut up. And, again, stop going through my things!". He muttered and turned his phone back on. "What did you even talk to Kevin about? Wait, here it is." He read the screen silently for a second before narrowing his eyes at Adam. "You little bastard."

Tasha hit Douglas with the magazine again. "Language!"

Donald didn't bother to contain his amusement as Douglas shrunk away from Tasha a bit, instead smirking as he asked, "What did Adam do?"

Douglas sighed, deflating a bit in defeat. "Guess who's coming to dinner tomorrow?" Then, with one last glare at Adam, Douglas stormed dramatically upstairs.

After a moment, Adam held out his hand. Without the usual slight pang of loss that came with giving away his hard-earned money, Donald pulled some money from his wallet and pressed it into Adam's palm. Tasha gave them both a disapproving head shake, but Donald didn't care. Adam had said that he could get Kevin to come over, and he did. As far as Donald was concerned, it was $100 well spent.

I know. It was kinda slow, wasn't it? But it'll get better, I swear. Not everything in here will be filling.

So, until next time, feel free to review. Or don't. Whatever.

And enjoy.

*Bows and exits*