"What are we going to say to them?" Oliver wondered aloud. "My neighbor has obtained weapons, and are planning on shooting us?"

"We don't know that. Guns aren't just fer shootin'," Allen said. "They could be used to make some fellas afraid o' you."

"Is this is what it is about? Instilling fear into everyone? Are they that starved-"

"Ollie. Ollie, chill out."

Oliver gripped the steering wheel until the leather squeaked, and threw the stick shift into park. "Maybe Lutz is right. We should tell Miss Warden that they are bringing in those things. She would not let me have chalk inside the grounds, let alone guns-"

"She would get the police into this," Allen said as he always did. "What would they do? They'd want to know how we found out 'bout this, an' get us fer associatin' wit' 'em. I don't wanna argue 'bout this again."

With a growl that irritated his already dry throat, Oliver shoved the car door open, escaping its metal confines. "They are already planning on bringing a confrontation of some sort. For now, we just need to plan and be prepared accordingly."

"Shit, we don't even know where anybody is. Everybody is scattered."

Oliver did not say anything, rushing to throw open the front door, and startled Miss Warden with his odd entrance. "Miss Warden! Have you seen any of our friends around here?"

The elder slowly lowered her steaming cup on her desk without breaking eye contact. "I do not make a habit to closely monitor the inhabitants of my youth hostel."

The boy clutched onto a clump of his hair, lowly whining in agitation. She professionally lifted a thin brow. He grabbed Allen's hand, and towed him toward the stair case. "Come on. I have an idea."

"Ollie, if they're outside, shouldn't we-"

Oliver stopped at the top of the steps, turning to poke a finger in Allen's chest. "You need to go around and ask anyone and everyone if they heard where and when our friends, and Crookednose's gang ran off."

"Wait," Allen rubbed the offended area. "Why you wonderin' about that Crooked bastard?"

"I need to know if they left around the time our friends did. If they did, then they must have followed each of us to our respective destinations."

"What? Why?"

Oliver turned from storming down the hall toward his bedroom. "I am just suspicious! You need to see before I say anymore!"

"Babe, where you goin'?!"

He slammed his door shut and twisted the lock. Immediately, he fell to the ground, and snatched a stick of chalk from his pocket, using it to furiously scratch on the wooden planks. "Line, line, triple branch, circle..." Oliver clutched onto the stick so he would not leave it behind as he flopped in the middle oval of the large sigil. "Whisk me away," he told the pattern. "I need to be where Matt is. Matt!"

Such intense emotions prompted the flow to come easy, and Oliver found himself in a patch of cyan grass, outside again so quickly. He sprung to his feet, stumbling back a few steps, but did not allow his dizziness to impede his mission. The park was small, open to the parking lot of a local pharmacy, and did not have a lot to its name besides a few swings and a slide coming from a set of monkey bars.

Matt and Siegmund were on the swings, swaying side to side instead of back and forth, ultimately bumping into one another whenever their seats collided. Somehow, they were pleased with the ordeal, and even the blond was wearing a rare smile. Oliver hurried to them, interrupting the mute latching onto the other boy's chains to take him into his own orbit. "Excuse me!"

They drug their feet against the dirt to stop their antics, gazing at the baker with shocked expressions. "Oliver, what are you doing here?"

"Don't ask," Oliver pleaded, his head still whirling. He lost his footing, and took a sloppy step to the side. "You need to get back to the House right away. It is urgent!"

Both of them leaped from their swings. Siegmund was tense, balling his hands into fists, but of course, Matt did the talking, "Did someone get hurt again?"

"They might be soon if you do not get there! Where are Luciano and his lads?"

"He said he was taking them out to some kind of fancy Italian place."

"Matt, this is Italy! Most, if not all the places, are fancy Italian!"

The blond shrugged, lost for words. A loud beeping startled the three of them, and Siegmund repeatedly attacked his jean's pockets. He produced a black square that made the annoying noise, and squinted at it. "What is that? Oh, I didn't know you had one of those."

"What?" Oliver asked, coming closer.

Siegmund held out the device, revealing a thin screen that was only large enough to show a single line of text. URGENT COME HOME. Allen must have already found them. Matt said, "It's a pager. Who gave that to you?" Oliver stared at the mute's signals, bouncing his legs impatiently. "Oh, Lutz did? Aren't they really old? Yeah, good cell phones are really expensive."

"Come on!" Oliver spat, and darted in the direction of the main road. He glanced around, momentarily lost in the unfamiliar location, until he caught a pub on the corner. Bella had spoken of her grandson visiting there sometime too many, and realized the bakery was a few blocks from his location. He turned the opposite way, toward the House. The other boys easily overtook his limp strides, having longer legs, and were not winded from a draining spell. "I hate running," he hissed through his clenched teeth. Siegmund tossed a look of sympathy over his shoulder.

"What could possibly so important that you had to interrupt my story to those pretty ladies?" Luciano snarled, stomping after the trio once they managed to mingle in the dining hall. Lutz and Kuro followed more quietly, their faces grave from the disaster that Allen must have hinted was to coming. "They were enjoying my recollection when I shared a plate of spaghetti with a kitty!"

"Quickly," Oliver rasped, his throat still a desert from running. "We do not have a lot of time."

"Allen-san's room?" Kuro said questionably. "Of all places, please tell me why we are meeting there?"

Luciano agreed with, "I don't want to get dirty man musk in my nostrils!"

"Everyone else is there already," Oliver snapped. Besides, he liked that man musk. They grumbled, but followed him without further complaint. Even Flavio was there, watching Allen pace around his own bedroom, and trip on a shirt that was carelessly tossed on the floor.

"All y'all are here!"

"Unfortunately," Luciano glanced to the beds, but decided to stay on his feet. "What is this about? I heard that gang of brutes are acting up again."

"They have been," Allen retorted. "You think it was bad an' annoyin' before, but its gon' to get worse! Ollie an' I think they're plannin' somethin' big!"

"You think?" The other brunet raised his eyebrows. "Are you two collaborating with one another like suspicious old ladies against the neighbor's daughter?" Lutz and Kuro exchanged a half amused, half bewildered looks. Flavio must have been chuckling at old memories.

"Do you wanna hear what's happenin' or what?"

Luciano waved his hands in the air. "Oh, shame on me. Carry on."

"Anyway, Ollie an' I were at the bakery, an' two of Crookednose's pals stopped by to bother us."

"That's weird," Lutz grumbled. "Remember those three guys that stopped us on the way to the gelato shop? They were a part of his group, too."

"How can I forget?" Luciano said, "It was not even two hours ago, and they managed to make my head hurt with their stupid words! I didn't even get my gelato!"

Oliver glanced to Matt and Siegmund. "Did you two have a run-in with any of them?"

"Not at all." Matt grimaced. "Actually, some of them were hanging around the park for a little bit before suddenly leaving. Other than their staring problems, neither of them bothered us."

"How many were there?"

"Just two."

Allen made a noise of thought. "There were two fellas at the bakery."

Luciano piped up, "Three of them to the gelato shop."

Flavio propped against a nearby wall, also glancing to the unmade cots. "I just stayed here. All of those snot heads left almost as soon as all of you did."

"They were following us!" His brother gasped. He faltered to glance at everyone with a confused expression. "Why would do they do that?"

"It is rather weird," Kuro muttered, clamping a hand on his own chin. "Are they wanting to intimidate us?"

"Oh, they're intimidatin' all right!" Allen exclaimed. "Just 'fore they left to creep somewhere else, one of the fellas dropped a huge wad o' cash on the ground."

Matt seemed interested. "Did you take it?"

"Naw, the other guy noticed, an' they got it back. Matt, this was several hundred bucks! So I got Ollie, an' we followed 'em! You know that spooky part o' town? Yeah," he continued, even without answers. "They went into this ol' shop, an' eventually, this grown up dude all decked out in a fancy suit came in wit' a briefcase. They were all whisperin' an' collaberatin' wit' one another-"

"There were firearms in the case," Oliver announced. "No matter what they are going to do with them, it cannot be good."

Lutz blurted, "What happened then?"

"We got outa there!" Allen snorted, "We weren't gonna give 'em an excuse to use 'em!"

Luciano clamped his hands on both sides of his head. "How long ago was this?!"

"Uh...you see, we just came from there, but you guys were all scattered 'round town, so we had to get everybody here in one place..."

The room fell silent with baited breath. A distant thump followed by a chorus of whoops made all the occupants simultaneously jump, and scramble into the next room, a bathroom, to crowd around a small window facing the front lawn. The other group was filling into the yard, waving and gesturing to one another as the gang split into three smaller collections.

"What are they doing?" Kuro seethed. "Do they honestly expect to shoot us, with so many other children and Warden-san here?"

Matt growled, "Guns do not necessary mean for killing. They can be used for threatening, or hitting non-fatal areas."

His brother proclaimed, That's what I said!"

"For what?" Luciano yanked on his hair, earning a worried look from his sibling. "They started this, but why? What is the real reason for disrupting the little peace we managed to have?"

Oliver asked himself the same questions. "They followed us around to be snoopy, perhaps, but this, with these dangerous weapons, seems a tad overboard for laughing and generally being happy."

"It's an overreaction," Matt agreed. He glanced behind himself as Luciano made strange, high pitched noises of panic. "They'll grab any excuse to climb to the top. It's the typical fight for power. The more people are afraid of them, the more people will do what they say."

"Fuck no!" Allen spat.

"Um, hello!" Oliver called, "They are children! Miss Warden owns the place, not us, and certainly not them."

Matt gave him a nearly disgusted look, but before he could say anything scathing, Allen put a hand on the baker's shoulder. "He wasn't raised like the rest o' us. He didn't need to worry 'bout all this shit."

"Lucky," Flavio mumbled. Oliver glanced to the floorboards, not feeling lucky to grow up the way he did. Kuro pushed away from the window, and squeezed by everyone for the bedroom door. "Where are you going?!"

"My room is at the end of the hall. I need something for myself while they are still outside."

"I think..." Luciano began shakily, "if we stay inside, we will be fine. There are too may witnesses indoors. However, if you step outside, it's a warzone."

Lutz almost whined, "We have to be cooped in here?"

"I have a job," reminded Oliver. "I need to have outdoor access."

"Then have your legs blown off!" Luciano tossed his hands in the air. "I am not getting this far in my life to get jumped by stupid-" Another bout of foreign slurs. Flavio understood what he rambled about, and looked like he need to pray to something.

"All right, all right!" Allen said, "Panickin' ain't gonna solve anythin'."

Lutz asked, "What do we do then?" He cranked his head back when Luciano almost hit in the face with his crazed gestures.

"We already got that thing with not goin' out by ourselves, an' carryin' a form of protection wit' you at all times."

"Yet they are following us. What is going to stop them now, with their new toys, from confronting a group of us?"

"All of those were defensive tactics," Kuro's voice drifted from the doorway. He held a long sheath that was more than half his height. "This will not let up until we go on the offensive and teach them that we will not tolerate being stepped on."

Lutz tossed a glance to the window. "It looks like they are waiting out there for one of us to step outside." The middle group outside was left to their own devices, casually leaning against the sparse trees. They easily chatted with one another, but Oliver caught their heads lift to their pane every now and again. One of them kept staring, so he shrunk away from the glass. "They have the weapons now, and will be more unafraid as ever to confront us."

Luciano took a loud, shaky breath before putting his hands to his mouth. "What we need to do...we must not kill them, si, si, but make sure they don't kill or hurt any of us."

Allen snapped his fingers in realization. "We can take their stuff! They won't be able to do much without their guns, blades, an' shit."

"I am not certain they are throwing defecation at us, Allen-san."

"You know what I mean!"

"Yes," Luciano sniggled, his eyes narrowing in delight. "We can pawn off their weapons for good money."

Flavio shrugged. "Besides, if they get more, we can do it again. More for you, si?"

"Hey, yeah!" Allen bounced on his toes. "I like the sound o' that."

Luciano jerked a thumb to the window, "We need to find out their formation and numbers, first. These idiots set themselves up for a visual disadvantage."

Matt leaned forward to peer through the smeared glass. "I'm not sure. What if they did that on purpose-"

"Count off!" Luciano claimed, "There are seven of us!"

"Eight. You forgot Ollie."

"I did not! He is not going out there and fighting."

"I am not?" Oliver echoed, sort of relieved.

"Of course. You're the medic person. You have to be kept safe."

"Besides," Flavio tittered, "Can you really fight?"

One of the baker's grand eyebrows twitched. "I am sure I can defend myself when it is necessary."

Luciano swished a palm at his brother. "Let's make sure it does not become necessary. First, we will split into groups, scouting inside of the House. They can see us, too, if you stand in front of the windows, so be careful! The last thing we need is shards in the juglar."

"Be careful around Warden-san as well. Keep your weapons concealed, and act normal, or try to, around her."

"What Kuro said!" Luciano declared, "We will meet in the downstairs lounge. Lutz, Flavi, you're with me. Siegmund, Oliver, and Allen. Kuro and Matt," he gestured to his assigned groups. Siegmund began signing, "Don't complain about it, because I am not going to listen."

The mute was unimpressed, blankly staring after Luciano leaving the room. His brother and Flavio shrugged, and followed after him after a sharp word of command. Kuro begrudgingly scooted closer to Matt, and affixed his sheath to his back, so it should not drag on the floor. Allen clamped a hand on Siegmund's shoulder, and pointed a thumb to the doorway. Oliver wished the other boys luck, earning bewildered glances.

"You be careful, too," Matt rasped, glanced between Allen and Siegmund. "Both of you. Al, you still have it?"

"Have what?" Allen grunted. His hand patted his jacket, hitting something in the inner breast pocket. "Oh! Yeah!"

"Emergency only, Allen. You have something else to fight with, right?"

"Sure, sure. I'll find somethin'."

Oliver said, "The others are not waiting for us."

Once in the hall, Kuro pointed down the corridor. "We will look out of the balcony."

"Cool," Allen bobbed his head. "We'll look out windows."

Pass Oliver's room, at the end of the hall, the window had a tree in front of it. The sharp branches obstructed any view of the side yard. "Great," the baker remarked. "I hope those blokes are not lingering around here. We should try the other window."

Siegmund made a surprisingly loud sigh. Oliver glanced at him, but the mute avoided his gaze. The window on the other end of the hall was equally dirty, and most likely never washed. Allen pointed a fingertip to the glass. "Over there." A small group of Crookednose's buddies were only visible when the baker pressed behind the other teen at the furthest edge of the pane. "They're close to the right most dinin' hall window. Luciano's gang got a better vantage point than this."

Oliver rose to his tip toes to glare over Allen's shoulder, and grumbled like an old man, "They really have nothing better to do with themselves."

Siegmund cleared his throat, breaking their plotting from the window. Kuro and Matt emerged from the balcony hallway, but their agitated expressions portended nothing from the usual. The blond declared, "We should get to the others."