Okay guys, so yeah, that last chapter was not only short, but I ended it on a cliffhanger?

Why?

Well in the words of Dennis Leary 'I'm an asshole, and I'm proud of it'

Anyways guys, life has been a little busy lately. I finally bought a new vehicle, so pretty happy about that, work is work, and because is summer I'm trying to get out Fishing more.

But I'm also checking out some of the movies coming out and I can say one thing for sure.

Go watch 'The Sound of Freedom' its the movie they made about combating sex trafficking and hunting down pedophiles.

I'm planning to go see it sometime this week.

The news of the bombing had quickly spread throughout the kingdom of Atlas as well as through the rest of the kingdoms. Nobody could believe that somebody would try to bomb a school. Winter had been working with the Aesops when a Mantle Police Officer called her and told her what had happened. She had used her glyphs to immediately go down to the Mantle School where the bombing took place to pick up Nala.

"Nala! Oh my god! Sweetie! Are you okay?" Winter checked Nala over to make sure she wasn't injured.

Nala however had her hands curled up close to her face and was shaking. Winter could see the Remnants of Blood on her face.

"What happened?" She asked as Nala spoke up.

"It's not mine..." She said as she looked around.

"Where's your father?" She asked as she couldn't find him.

"He...He..." Nala tried to say but the tears kept her from speaking.

Winter hugged her daughter close to her chest as a sinking feeling made its way into her stomach.

"Miss Schnee. I'm sorry to say this. But Councilman Cotton was taken to the hospital...we're not sure his status." The mantle officer said as THAT caught Winter's attention.

"WHERE?!" She almost screamed as she held Nala close to her.

"Mantle Sinai Hospital. It's about ten minutes away. I was about to take her there myself." He said as Winter looked at him.

"That won't be necessary." She said as she grabbed Nala and activated her glyphs, causing her to hover through the air.

It didn't take her long to reach the hospital. As soon as she arrived she saw multiple doctors standing in her way.

"Miss Schnee, we can't let you in, he's in the ER right now." The head doctor said.

"What happened?!" She asked as she was a little hazy on the details.

"You might want to sit down, and I would prefer we not have this conversation in front of your daughter." The doctor said as Nala was still looking terrified as Winter held her to her chest.

A nurse came over and gently pulled Nala off of Winter's chest and took her to sit down in an area. She knew snacks and a warm drink wouldn't help the poor girl much. But she needed some form of comfort after that explosion. The girl just saw her father get blown up. Right outside of a school where it was supposed to be safe. She was obviously traumatized. And the nurse knew it wouldn't do her any good to hear about the brutal details of her fathers attack.

"You may want to sit down for this Maam." The doctor said as he motioned Winter to follow him behind a glass cubicle.

Winter followed and took a seat across from the doctor's desk as he locked the door insuring that nobody would hear their conversation.

"How is he?" She immediately asked as she heard the click of the locks.

"Well...you'll be pleased to konw he'll live." Winter breathed out a sigh of relief.

"However, he will be bedridden for awhile. The shrapnel tore up his back and spinal cord." That gave Winter a sinking feeling.

"Are...Are you saying he won't be able to walk?" She asked as the Doctor lit a cigarette.

"Well, eventually he'll be able to walk again, but its going to be a long rehab session. You can't take a multitude of nails to the back and spine and expect to walk away without some injuries. Even with his aura helping him heal, the damage was still extensive." The doctor said as he showed her x rays.

"You see, when a regular huntsman is injured and their aura acts up, it can act as a shield, while also having a side effect as a healing factor. But thats with a full fledged huntsman, Jem while being extraordinarily tough for your average human still doesn't have the aura reserves as a normal huntsman." Winter scrolled through the x ray photos.

"While it does provide a healing factor, it doesn't have the same potential as a huntsman. If you were to take Shrapnel, your aura would PUSH the objects out of your body. However due to Jem's aura already being weaker than the average hunttress, instead his body healed AROUND the shrapnel sinking it deeper into his body. In order to remove it, we had to forcefully cut his skin, which caused his already critically low aura levels to fall to zero. We managed to remove all the shrapnel, but his aura will take a LONG time to recover. Thats not even including his recovery time for his injuries. Once his aura has returned to his baseline levels, you will find that his physical therapy will get easier." The doctor said as Winter was just glad he was alive.

"And until then?" She asked.

"Well, until then, he'll have to get around mostly by wheelchair." The doctor said as Winter's face was in her hands.

"Your boyfriend is very Lucky Miss Schnee." The doctor said as Winter resisted the urge to snarl at him.

"Lucky?! Someone almost killed him! And you call that lucky?" She spat at the doctor.

"Yes, if his back wasn't turned to the explosion, he would have been dead." That shut Winter up.

The Doctor stood up from his chair and placed his hand upon Winter's shoulder in comfort.

"Miss, if anything, I think you should talk to your daugher, and let her know that her father is going to be alright." He said as Winter stood up.

"I see, thank you doctor." She walked out of the room.

She saw the Nurse with Nala, she couldn't convince her to eat anything, but she did manage to get her drinking from a juice bottle. Nala's hands were still shaking. And Winer knew she wasn't going to be alright until Jem woke up.

"Nala..." Winter knelt down by her Daughter and held her hands.

"Mommy..." Nala looked at her with tears in her eyes.

"I-its my fault!" She threw her face into Winter's shoudler.

"Sweetie it-' Her daughter wouldn't listen.

"If I hadn't forgotten my lunch! Daddy wouldn't have gone for it! It's my fault!" Nala sobbed into her mother's shoulder as Winter just rubbed her back.

"Sweetie, it's okay, it wasn't your fault." Winter felt like she was being stabbed in the heart with every word that came out of Nala's mouth.

"You actually saved your father's life Child." The doctor said as he came out to assist Winter.

"N-No I didn't." She said as the doctor put his head on top of Nala's head.

"Nala, if you hadn't had said something, he would have been in more danger, I know you're hurting, but listen to your mother, it wasn't your fault, if it wasn't for you...well, I won't say anything about that. But the bottom line is, your father is alive because of you." The doctor knew he was telling a half truth.

But it was true. If Jem hadn't been momentarily distracted by Nala, he would have faced that blast head on, and he would have been killed. It was hardly comforting to a traumatized little girl. But at the very least he could stop her from blaming herself.

"I-Is he going to be okay?" Nala asked slightly calmer than she was a minute ago.

"Eventually he will be." The doctor said as he could see the relief in her eyes, even if her face didn't show it.

Meanwhile the police officers around the school were patrolling and investigating the whole area.

"You think this was an assassination attempt?" One said as they were sweeping the area.

"Doubtful, bombs aren't precise, they're more of a 'to whom it may concern' if someone wanted to kill Councilman Cotton, they could have done it better, this shows someone was trying to hurt as many people as possible." An officer checked under another car.

"We got something." He said as he saw something.

"Call the bomb squad, we got another bomb here!" He said as he called it in over the radio.

"Sergeant! We got another two car bombs over here!" A rookie said as the Sergeant got on the radio.

"Units 731 and 732, be advised, we have potentially live bombs around rear side of the school, we're going to need a disarming team." He called in as he suddenly heard multiple reports of other bombs being found.

Whoever did this must have done a sloppy job if only one of their bombs went off.

Were they just waiting for Councilman Cotton to walk in front of one of the cars?

Hours Later

"Duds!" The bomb squad said as all the bombs were currently on a table.

'I'll say this, whoever made these was incredibly intelligent, but none of these went off. Seems like they only got one right." The head bomb squad member said as he was examining one.

"Most of these are made up on average parts you would find at your local hardware store." One of them said as they had them underneath magnifying glasses.

"Wait, I see something." One of them said as he could see a small etching in the metal.

"What is it?" The Lieutenant of the police force asked as he looked over.

"This etching right here, it looks like someone tried to hide it." He said as the Sergeant looked at it.

"Can you restore it? See if it gives us a clue as to who made it?" He asked as the analyst looked closer.

"Shouldn't be too hard.." He said as all he had to do was run it through the computer.

The machine went to work removing all the scratches and indentations that had been carved into the metal.

And as the emblem became more and more clear, the police departments blood ran Cold.

VERY COLD.

Because the symbol staring back at them...

Was a Robin with outstretched wings.