Siblings

Lucy took a deep breath. This was beginning to get a bit out of control. Though, and she glanced around the crowded room, at least they were older and more experienced than last time.

"The drones say that the fighting is intruding into the creche," Cassidy informed her. She was busily examining a cylinder control panel, having pried off the flat interface.

"Then this is the best time for us to go," Lucy said. "Where's the baby?"

"Oh, Niles Jr. and you're not even asking about me, Niles Sr.?" Her brother said, glomping onto her.

At least she now had a name for it. His arms were thrown around her shoulders, holding her close as he nuzzled her cheek. Lucy rolled her eyes as she heard him sniff.

"You've gotten so pale! And your beautiful hair," Niles half-wailed in her ear.

She felt the cold hardness of a collar brushing the back of her neck. Lucy shot an annoyed look at Court. Court flinched, and abruptly, the collar fell off.

Both she and Niles watched as it rattled on the floor a bit before settling down. Smoke faintly issued from where it was in contact with the floor.

"That was on you?" Lucy asked.

"Just a tickle," NIles said airily, releasing her. "I'm so sad! My dear, adorable sister has shown no interest in my wellbeing despite coming all this way."

Lucy turned towards him, catching an angry look from a brown-haired girl standing not that far away. She was pretty...in a plastic fake sort of way.

"This is Circe," Niles said, noticing her look. He snagged the brown-haired girl's hand and tugged her forward. "Circe, this is my adorable, darling, sweet, magnificent－"

"－yeah, yeah, yeah," Court said, wrapping an arm around Lucy's shoulders.

Lucy was starting to feel like a bone dangling between two dogs. She wriggled free.

"Baby? Remember baby? Small, vulnerable, cries a lot?" Lucy prodded. She grudgingly added a point in the 'not bad' column at Circe's nod of agreement.

"There's a baby," and that was Aarti's mother, sounding scandalized and horrified all at the same time.

Lucy fought off the urge to scream. Everyone seemed to be working off their own scripts and not hers. She sighed as Aarti drifted forward, eyes darting between them all. Aarti kicked the smoking collar towards the wrecked remains of a nearby cylinder.

"Which one did you hide it in?" Aarti asked Niles, warily taking a step back as Niles turned his attention to her.

"Ah, little Aarti! What an interesting child you've become," Niles said, eyes lighting up.

"No," Lucy said, taking a step to the side and blocking his view.

"But I only wanted to－," Niles began.

"－No, to infinite places," Lucy cut him off. "And in front of her mother, no less," she added as Niles opened his mouth to argue.

Niles turned his attention to Aarti's mom with an almost feline grace. Behind his back, Circe rolled her eyes. Aarti let out a breath of relief that Lucy could feel brush past her ears. She glanced back at Aarti, arching an eyebrow to be met with a careless shrug.

"So, you wanted to meet your nephew," Niles said, stalking away.

"Yep," Court said cheerfully.

Somehow, Lucy wasn't surprised to note that her and Aarti's outraged looks slid off of Court's expression of cheerful malice. She made a mental note to have a good talk with him a bit later.

*****

"How much further until we reach the others?" Jebediah asked. He was panting from the run.

He noted bitterly that he was the only one panting. Kuro and Sol were simply floating over the floor. Jebediah still hadn't figured out how that worked. He dearly wanted to figure out how that worked, especially now. Kathryn turned out to be quite the athlete, and there was no explaining Batman's horrific endurance.

Just how much did that man work out?

On his shoulder, Trolli squeaked comfortingly. Jebediah mustered up a reassuring smile. No matter what, he wasn't going to let Trolli try to sacrifice herself again.

"Just a little bit further," Kuro assured him as after looking around again. It was a bit spooky how his eyes became solid black with flickers of light.

"And what about guards?" Sol asked, sticking to Kuro's side.

Side by side, the twins' relationship was more apparent despite the different skin colors. Jebediah studied them for a brief instant before mentally shaking his head. None of the kids knew who their container was, and it wasn't listed anywhere in their actual records. The rumor in the creche had been that she'd exploded rather than gave birth. Jebediah wondered about that but reluctantly accepted that there might have been some truth in the rumors since they were the only ones with the magic tags in their files.

"They're coming," Kuro said, glancing behind them.

Batman whirled back to glare the way they'd come. Ever since he'd seen Kathryn, he'd been quiet and fuming. Jebediah assumed that he must have known either her container or one or more of her genetic donors. It would be good if he did. Jebediah had no idea how to activate Kathryn's powers.

"We have to move faster," Batman said, taking the lead.

Jebediah didn't know if he just didn't care or notice that Sol and Kuro pressed against the wall of the passageway to let him pass, trying their best to meld into the metal. Jebediah sighed. He was going to have to talk to Dawnie about telling scary stories to the younger kids. He knew that there was a storytelling time they participated in every week. While Jebediah had never bothered to listen to the stories, he was aware that Rena would occasionally listen.

The thought of Rena made him steel himself and push forward. She was probably going crazy at the thought of him locked in another lab. He'd had to stop her from torching his last one. At least money was useful for buying expensive, useless pieces of cloth.

"Guards," Sol hissed, slamming to a stop.

Jebediah looked up to see a horde of guards in those distinctive uniforms clogging up the way forward. Trolli hissed, a new expression he hadn't heard before. He glanced at her, one hand coming up to make sure she didn't launch herself forward.

Jebediah blinked as Batman launched himself at the guards. He had to admit that the superhero was doing a rather good job. Then his expression changed as more than a few stun guns started being aimed in Batman's direction.

"Sol," Jebediah ordered.

Sol nodded, making a flinging gesture. Shards of lightning flew, accurately hitting the aiming guards. Kuro surged forward, nearly mixing with the shadows, a vicious smile on his face. Kuro had always been more of the hands on one between the two.

"If only I could help," Kathryn fretted beside him, staring at the ongoing fight.

"Did Mr. Scary drop any hints," Jebediah asked absently, wincing as Kuro embedded a guard in the wall headfirst. From the way the man's legs were still kicking, he was literally embedded and not simply thrust through the wall. "I wonder how that works," Jebediah breathed, his eyes starting to sparkle.

"All I got was that it's backwards somehow." Kathryn huddled closer to Jebediah. "Are we really getting out of here."

"We're not staying," Jebediah assured her. "Just wait until we meet up with the others."

Kathryn nodded, looking around nervously. There was an almost palpable tension in the air that hadn't been there before. Jebediah frowned.

"Trolli," he said, loosing his grip on her. To his slight surprise, Trolli whirled and launched herself behind him, electricity crackling. "That's new," Jebediah muttered as arcs of light cascaded off of Trolli, illuminating the two guards who'd been slowly approaching under some sort of invisibility ability.

They cursed, backing away from Trolli. There was a wisp of black smoke curling up in their wake, signaling that the invisibility was device based. Jebediah narrowed his eyes. He wanted to know just how that worked. Was it biologically based or pure science?

"What do we do," Kathryn squeaked, blinking at the guards in frightened bafflement.

Jebediah examined her. She had paled a bit and was shaking. Clearly, her training was deficient, but perhaps they'd learned by the time she reached training age? He pushed the irritating thought away as he grabbed her arm, slowly retreating towards the fight behind them.d

"Backwards, right?" Jebediah said as a thought struck him. He grinned. "Try saying 'erif' then."

"What's an erif? Kathryn asked and then jumped as a torrent of fire gushed from her hands as if happy to be called.

"Aim for them!" Jebediah said, pointing at the two retreating guards. He abandoned all thoughts of their tech. It would be better if it was completely destroyed instead.

Kathryn held up one hand palm out towards the guards. Then, visibly steeling herself, she called out, "erif!"

Fire blasted out, stronger this time.

Jebediah grinned. This was going to be interesting.