It has been a hot minute, and much has changed since I began this story. Well... I got super bored and have been itching to create again! I am going to be brutally honest, I think MBC had great potential to be a great show but with so many animation and plot errors, it turned me and others away. I believe if they matured the animation and darkened the plots, it would be great! I am no expert but I always felt this way about the show. I don't know if any of you feel that way towards any other shows but I am always interested in understanding other people's perspectives. Be prepared for darker themes, violence, and language. P.S. The picture is a drawing I made years ago, I hope to create more! Thank you and enjoy!

Chapter 3: Distress

Sam's POV

Ugh! Danny can be such a jerk sometimes! He really hurt Cathy and now she's missing! I knew I should have gone after her. She really needed someone to comfort her. Chris and I were at the park trying to see if she was here but there was no trace of her.

"Where could she be? It's not like her to not answer her VCOM." I said frantically, starting to feel my emotions overcome my practicality. Sam, you need to calm down and be a little more logical. You can't find Cathy when you're frantic.

"I don't know, and I can't track her from her VCOM either." Chris said defeatedly with a big sigh.

I was replaying our fight with Danny over and over in my head. I should have stood up for Cathy more and shut Danny up! I'm to blame for this too. I know we don't have leaders but I should have acted like one and de-escalated the situation. I can feel my fists clenching as I keep visioning Cathy's face, so hurt, so defeated, so… broken.

The next thing we see is Danny all geared up sprinting towards us. Emotions still fresh, I clenched my fists even harder… how could he do such a thing? All she ever wanted was the best for him! As he got closer,I turned towards him and lifted my fist to punch him in the face as hard as I could… but I couldn't. I just stood there with my fist ready to launch shaking with so much rage. Instead of punching him, I felt tears stream down my face and my teeth grit together.

After blinking some tears away, my eyes could finally focus on Danny, noticing he wasn't defending himself, he just stood in front of us looking at me with a remorseful look. It was like he was ready to take the hit like he was regretful yet dissociated.

"How could you! She is our best friend!" I finally said, hearing my voice shake. I slowly lowered my fist and stared him down, yet he just stood there. There was no reaction from him! Say something, Danny! Do something! Normally he would defend himself.This just angered me even more, and without thinking I pushed him back. "We can't track her!" Push! "She won't answer!" Push! "She's gone, Danny!"

No matter how hard I pushed him, he just took it and didn't say anything. Every push I could hear myself breathe heavy and hysterically. I felt more tears pour down my face as I continued to push him. It was when a warm hand touched my shoulder that I finally snapped out of it. All the tense anger I have been feeling seemed to slowly diminish but that soon turned into sadness. Where are you, Cathy? I am sorry I wasn't there when you needed me. Still looking at Danny, my eyebrows furrowed as I whimpered, "I don't know what to do.". As soon as I spoke, I felt myself spin and I was embraced by familiar arms.

"We're going to find her, Sam. It's going to be okay." Chris said. Feeling his voice mumble through his chest, I buried my face into his gear shirt and wailed. Sam, you need to get it together! Get your emotions out of the way now so you're level-headed. It somehow seems impossible because this was a situation that could have been avoided.

Danny's POV

I've never seen Sam so furious. Running up to the group, I was quickly met by her teary golden eyes piercing right through me. I didn't just hurt Cathy, I hurt everyone. I just kept thinking of the pain I caused Cathy from the horrible things I said.

I had this coming, I wish she had hit me.

But she didn't.

Sam began to push me, shouting out how could I do this but I couldn't help but think of Cathy every time she pushed me.I felt myself dissociate to the point where all of Sam's words became muffled in the background and my sight became darkened and blurry. Disconnected with what was around me, I was only left with that painful memory of Cathy haunting me.

Those hurtful words.

Push!

Her devastated expression.

Push!

My words

Push!

The light leaving her bubbly blue eyes.

... And its all my fault.

No longer feeling her repetitive pushing, I snapped back to reality. That was when I noticed Chris was able to comfort Sam. As he hugged her, he was also glaring me down. Dude, you must have really done it this time. As bad as it is think about it right now, I am glad Chris is comfortable enough to know how to console Sam. She's always been tough on herself and thinks she has to maintain this leader-type role, even though there are no leaders and we've been a part of this club for years. She doesn't let her emotions show often, being the practical figure in our group but we all know she holds a lot of it in. So it is good to see her let it out, even during this shitty situation.

Looking down at the grass, I noticed a faint shoe print near a puddle of mud. I crouched down next to it. The street lamp had better lighting down here and I can see the whole print. It was pretty small, and the shoe print looked a lot like the sneakers Cathy wears. I shined my flashlight towards the direction it was going. To the high school.

"Those shoe prints look like they could be Cathy's. They're headed towards the school and I'm going to track them down." I said as I stood up.

Before Sam and Chris could say anything I walked over and gave them a group hug. "I'm sorry, I'll do everything I can to make things up. I promise but right now we have to get her back." I broke away and immediately started following these tracks to the school.

I came to a halt when I heard Sam say, "Did you think we'd let you go without us?" I turned back around to see her and Chris running towards me with their flashlights tracking what few shoe prints we saw as we headed to the high school. Luckily, it wasn't far like the middle school. We got there pretty quick but those few tracks soon stopped once we hit concrete. We immediately began searching the campus, Chris tried to track her VCOM, and still nothing.

"Cathy!" We all called out her name, hoping she was here. "Cathy please come back!" I shouted. As we shouted and looked all over the campus, I noticed a dim light beaming in the woods. As I sprinted over to the light I noticed I was getting pretty deep into the woods. Once I finally reached the light, I shined my flashlight and saw it was Cathy's VCOM! I felt my stomach drop as I processed it was actually hers. I called out, "I think I found something!"

Sam and Chris rapidly made their way over and gasped when they saw it was Cathy's VCOM. I crouched down to pick it up and Chris immediately analyzed it with the A-Scanner. "There is alien residue all on it ... but it's not Cathy's!" he exclaimed.

"Damn it! Where are you Cath?!" I yelled as I put my hands on both sides of my head, feeling a wave of panic start to sink in. How are we ever going to find her now?!

"Guys, not to make this worse but ... look." Chris's voice trembled as if he found something that could make everything much worse than it already was.

Which he did.

Sam gasped and I could feel my eyes widen as we saw what Chris was pointing at with his flashlight.

Blood.

Chris was shaking as he held the A-scanner over the puddle of blood. He gulped, "It's hers."