Woah, Is this real? Yes. Welcome back. I have been out of the country for 2 years with no access to the computer world so be patient with me as I try to catch up. I'm excited to write again. I can't just leave you hanging. IMPORTANT INFO: several details have been rewritten in the last 8 or 9 chapters. I had to fix things that didn't make sense to me and prepare for future events. SO rereading is beneficiary.

Have fun.

"I need to ask you for a favor." Hellboy said when he ran into me in the kitchen. I paused and looked up at him with a piece of toast hanging out of my mouth. He grinned at me while I chewed quickly and swallowed so that I could reply.

"Bad time?" He asked with a laugh. I glared at him. "You think?" I said once I could speak. "What do you need?" I asked, finally. He was still grinning at me and trying not to laugh. "Well I was wondering… I mean I trust you and so I was hoping you could do this one thing for me." He answered. That confused me. What did he need me to do? I asked the question aloud and he smiled sheepishly.

"Can you watch the cats?"

"What?" I stared at him, praying he wasn't being serious. He let me down. "I'm going to be gone for a while and Clay isn't going to be here to do it and Abe won't be back for another three weeks. Come on, you can do this for me. I'll owe you big time." He smiled as he practically pleaded for me to agree to his request.

"It's not bad enough that I have to stay up at all hours working on Manning's stupid new filing system, but now you want me to cat-sit?" I glared at him and tried to see some benefit that would come from me doing this. It would make you a good friend. Screw friendship, I'm tired.

"How about this, I will get Manning to lay off with the office work if you can help me." Hellboy offered. This sparked my interest. "Yeah and how are you going to do that?" I asked, seriously doubting that he could make Manning do anything. HB only gave me a devilish grin before turning around and leaving the room. He certainly knew how to make an ominous exit.

I wasn't quite sure how he did it, but Hellboy kept his word. Two secretaries found me later as I was organizing some of the BPRD case files and informed me they would be taking over the job. I didn't question their authority to relieve me of duty. My day was made infinitely better and I left them to the hell hole of paper and ink while I went to thank Hellboy.

"Don't know, don't care, but I guess I'm watching your cats for you while you're gone." I announced as I walked into Hellboy's room.

He wasn't there. How embarrassing?

"He isn't in here." I jumped and turned around. Manning stood at the entrance to Hellboy's room looking just as grim faced as always. "Yeah, I can see that." I replied with a roll of my eyes.

"That big red ape sure knows how to throw his father's influence around." Manning glared at me. "What are you talking about?" Manning seemed particularly hostile today. What miracle did Hellboy preform to get this sour-puss to let me get out of work?

"He may have helped you out of trouble this time but don't think I'll let this slide next time." He grumbled before turning around and walking back down the hall. He stopped at the end of the hall and turned back to me. "If you see Hellboy, tell him I don't want to hear about any funny business in Germany. He has to stay out of trouble otherwise you are going to take that responsibility." He turned the corner quickly after that.

I stood there in shock. Did Manning just threaten me? What in the world?

"Is he gone?" I heard from behind me. I jumped again, this time with a 'yelp'. There was Hellboy, standing by his bed. "Where were you?!" I asked; frustrated by this whole situation that had just occurred. "That's my secret." He replied with a wink. He actually winked at me. Was everyone going crazy today?

"So I'm guessing you heard what Manning said." I said as I stepped father into his room. I almost tripped on a cat. He shrugged his shoulders.

"I'm going to be serious right now when I tell you that you need to behave in Germany. I swear, if I get fired just because you do something stupid over there, I'm going to be pissed." I looked at him hard. He wasn't taking me seriously. "Manning won't fire you." Hellboy replied.

"You actually don't know that." He rolled his eyes and stepped closer to me. "I'm not going to let him fire you." He said with a smile. "You aren't going to let him? Since when do you have a say in the matter?" I glared up at him as he stopped right in front of me. His face became very serious for a moment.

"If you don't work here, I don't work here." That was all he said and yet I felt like he had just made a huge pledge of loyalty or something. It was kind of sweet. I let my frustration fizzle away and smiled up at him.

"Fine, whatever." I muttered and looked away, hoping he wouldn't see the blush that decided to light up my face. He was standing a little bit too close and yet he didn't seem to mind.

"About taking care of your cats, how long are you going to be gone again?" I asked realizing I had no idea how long it was going to be before I saw him again.

"It should only be a month but there's something going on in Argentina that we might stop to check out before we come back." He explained. I pouted. "I'm going to be stuck here by myself for that long? Damn, if Manning doesn't kill me, I might just die of boredom." I groaned. Hellboy laughed at me.

"You will be fine. Clay will be back after a week so you can hang out with him. Abe might be back before me so he can take care of you and your arm. Speaking of, how are you feeling?" He asked, turning his eyes on my arm brace. There was still a dull ache in my shoulder and arm but, "I should be able to get out of the brace soon." I said. He smiled at that and patted my head, ignoring or not noticing that I didn't really answer his question.

"See you'll make a full recovery. You have nothing to worry about." I forced a smile to please him but didn't say anything more on the matter.

He didn't know.

No one knew, with the exception of Abe. He hadn't said anything but I could feel that he knew and was trying not to scare me with any theories. There wasn't anything he could do for me right now. So he remained silent and I followed his example. No one needed to be worried about it. I just kept my mouth shut and forced smiles when I needed to. My arm would recover. My body would work fine, but….

I couldn't feel it.

There wasn't warmth or energy. The sixth sense, the sense of power, of electricity, it wasn't where it was supposed to be. It wasn't the feeling that I normally had when I exhausted all of my resources. Nothing was building itself back up inside of me. There wasn't anything left. I didn't know what to do. It had always been a part of me. Without it, I felt cold and alone. I didn't feel like me. Whatever it was that the poison did to my bones; it did something to my abilities. It blocked something or stole something from me and I needed it back, desperately.

Hellboy, Clay, and the others went off on their adventure and I was faced with my nightmare of a reality. I had a plan. It was stupid and the farthest thing from fool-proof but it was the only plan I could come up with. Like I said, I was desperate.

Case-file in hand, (The right one, I might add. The brace was disposed of. I didn't want him to think I was weak or that he had won in anyway. He was supposed to believe that he lost; he made the mistakes.) I walked past the guards looking as confident as ever. They all looked at me suspiciously and/or confused because it wasn't often that an agent made their way down here, especially not a woman.

Welcome to the BPRD high alert detention level. It wasn't a warm and happy place. I tugged at my jacket sleeve so that it would cover up the bandages on my right arm. (I wasn't stupid enough to walk around with my injuries completely exposed.) It was cold down here for sure.

"I have clearance for this." I said to the guard at the door. He sized me up and then took the paper that I had offered him. It was Manning's forged signature at the end of a note explaining my reason for being there.

'The investigation is still underway and we need agent Lightning to question the suspect again for further clarification.'

That's right Manning. If you are going to threaten me after nearly killing me with your office work, then I'm stealing your identity. I'd seen his signature enough times on all that paperwork to know how to copy it perfectly. The guard looked over the note a few times before handing it back to me and stepping aside. I refrained myself from smiling triumphantly.

The easy part is over.

The room was dark and just as cold as the hallway. There weren't any windows or decorations in the room, besides the mass amounts of claw marks and shallow craters roughly the size of a human fist.

My eyes roamed over the brutalized walls, passed the small cot that needed a good cleaning, and finally landed on the hulking figure sitting in the corner farthest from the door. Black and white eyes locked with mine and I tried not to flinch when a menacing, predatorily smirk spread across his face.

"You just couldn't stay away, could you little one." His voice was bone chilling. I kept my breathing even and my voice calm. "You and I are going on a field trip." I announced confidently although I felt anything but that. I stepped back out of the room and let the guards collect him before making our way to the nice little interrogation room a few halls over.

The room was brightly lit, unlike everything else down here. There was a table and two chairs but that was the extent of the room's furnishings. Once the guards made sure the prisoners restraints were secure, they left him to me and returned to their posts, wherever that was.

I waited by the door for a few minutes to calm myself before even thinking about taking a seat in the only unoccupied chair. This was crazy. This was absolutely crazy. I knew he couldn't hurt me here but the fear was still eating away at me. I had come this far why couldn't I continue? Panic started to rise within me when I heard him laugh. I whipped my head around to look at him.

The monster was leaning back in his chair and grinning at me. This was entertaining to him and that pissed me off. Fear was overtaken by anger and I marched to my chair before slamming the file I had been holding down on the table.

"Finally got the courage to talk to me?" He asked with another laugh. I smiled back at him through gritted teeth. "I wouldn't think you would be capable of laughing right now, considering everything that's happened to your family." That shut him up. His face hardened into pure fury and suddenly he looked more like he did back at Chumley's.

"So why don't you tell me how you've been enjoying your stay here, Mykail?" The confidence I was pretending to have actually became a bit real as I watched the oldest of the Ornias brothers sit forward in his chair, visibly shaking with anger.

"You really want to joke about my family after what you did?"

"What I did? I don't remember me doing anything to you three other than defend myself. As I recall, it was your brother who staked you to the ground after beating the crap out of you." Mykail narrowed his eyes at me. "So you had to go and be my big hero; killing him for my honor. Am I supposed to thank you for that?!" He roared hoping the volume of his voice would cover up the emotions that escaped in it.

I stared at him in silence for a second, utterly lost as to what I should do. I hadn't expected him to be emotional at all, at least not yet. He truly believed I killed Karson? Well, this was going to kill him then.

"Nobody told you?" I asked and his burning glare dimmed just a bit to allow confusion to seep in. "You know, Ja-kub was pretty bang up after that night. I don't even really remember him being in the fight and yet he is just so traumatized by it." I watched Mykail to gauge his reaction.

"You leave him out of this." Note to self, Mykail's calm restrained voice was scarier than his angry voice. I felt myself subconsciously glancing at his teeth every time he spoke. Don't forget why you are here.

"Unfortunately, I can't. He involved himself." I said, forcing myself to look up at Mykail's eyes. I cut him off before he could spit a brutal threat in my face.

"Ja-kub killed Karson."

Mykail froze. I gave him time to let the words sink in and observed the emotions fly across his face; disbelief, anger, confusion, sorrow, regret, guilt, and more anger. "You're lying." He snarled at me. "He would never do that. We are brothers. He would never hurt Karson, you lying bitch!" I shook my head and looked at him with pity. "He thought you were dead." I said quietly.

"What?" He sounded as if I had just punched him in the gut. The air left his lungs in that one word and he didn't make a move to draw in more air. He was frozen again.

"He watched Karson tear you apart and there wasn't anything he could do. He thought Karson killed you and that was too much for him to take. The last thing he did before he collapsed was fire three shots into your brother. He killed him and I watched it happen. Look at me and tell me I'm lying to you."

Mykail took time to study my face. His eyes seemed to roam over every inch of me as he tried to process what I had told him. He didn't say anything but he shook his head at me. "Odds are he still thinks you're dead and that he murdered the only family he had left." I said with a sigh and another sad look in Mykail's direction. His eyes darkened which was pretty impressive seeing as they were already black.

"You can't hold us here." He growled. That response I was not expecting. "Yeah we can. Are you kidding me? You tried to kill me and an innocent bystander. Hell, your brother tried to eat me! To make matters worse for you, I'm not just any other girl; I'm a BPRD agent, who gave you plenty of warning in advance that I was not someone to be messed with."

"We have rights." He persisted. "Like hell you do. According to the government, you don't exist, ergo, you have no rights. Plus, I'm pretty sure someone said something about you being from Canada so you have to call them up in order to get diplomatic immunity which I'm almost entirely certain does not apply to mythical, poor-attitude demons. We can keep you here as long as we like and we can keep you little brother even longer unless you agree to cooperate."

Damn, if looks could kill, I'd be dead 30 times over. "What do you want?" He asked through gritted teeth.

"I want you to answer some questions for me."