The League of Dangers

[3RD PERSON—MELANIE'S HOUSE]

Chris lets out an audible sigh as he steps off the bus with Natalie and glances down the street at Melanie's house. Well, her house isn't even a house, it's a full-blown mansion. She's the second most wealthy of their friends, right after Donatello. She explained that the money comes from her stepdad—doing god knows what—but in turn, she's very popular at school. Which is what makes her precisely perfect for finding out the whereabouts of Amity. They don't need a house address or anything like that, because Amity is a party girl. She attends every single party and considering it's 4 PM, almost 5, there's bound to be one or two of them at least starting to happen. So, Chris and Natalie walk down her long driveway, all the way to her front gate where the intercom is. Natalie presses the button, and then they wait patiently for the beep. Once it comes, Easton's voice emerges from the speaker.

"What's up Chris and Natalie, what can I do for ya'll?" He speaks through the intercom.

Natalie presses the button, "We just need to see Melanie — it's very important."

"Aw shit, sorry man, she's not home right now, it's just me. She said she's gonna be at Donatello's." He replies.

Natalie nods and lets out a soft sigh, "Alright, thank you."

"No problem." He tells her.

Natalie lets go of the button and then she and Chris walk back down to the bus stop. Defeated by this discovery, they plop themselves onto a bench and Natalie pulls out her phone. Chris leans over and watches as she unlocks it and pulls up their location-sharing app. Natalie gets an idea and hopes to see Trevor and Talia's current location, but nothing shows up except a message saying their phones are dead. They then see that Melanie has turned hers off, yet Donatello doesn't. It says that he's at Wes' house, and it says that Penny is at Wes' house as well, which raises a few questions. Chris begins squinting at how slightly suspicious that is so Natalie decides to call Donatello. After about 4 rings, he finally picks up the phone.

"Hey." He answers.

"Hey Donatello, two questions; Where's Melanie and what are you doing at Wes' house?" Natalie asks.

"Well, answer one, we've got ourselves in a situation, and answer two, I don't know where Melanie is. Is she okay?" He replies.

"We have no clue, so we need to find Melanie, and what's the situation?" Natalie questions.

"Ya'll should just come over here. Penny is over here too but I haven't seen Trevor since we were in school. Talia isn't answering her phone either." Donatello tells them.

"Oh yeah, we have a whole lot to tell you as well." Chris says.

"Alright, get over here, bye." Donatello says right before he hangs up in a hurry.

Natalie looks at her phone and then sighs as she shoves it away in her pocket. Without any further ado, Natalie gets up and starts walking, Chris following behind her. She goes back to the bus stop and they wait there for it to come back, which takes about 15 minutes, but they eventually get on. Like always, they sit next to each other and nobody else. Natalie's eyes glow bright blue and she looks directly at the bus driver. The bus driver's eyes begin to glow bright blue, his facial expression looking blank. Chris watches as Natalie waves her hand and silently whispers a command in her first language, French. She releases her hold and the bus driver's eyes go back to normal as he closes the bus doors, and then reroutes to Wes' street.

"Did you do that?" Chris asks.

"Yes I did." Natalie replies simply.

"What did I tell you? People can't know who you are." Chris warns her.

"I know, but we weren't gonna make it to Wes' house if I didn't do that. Just relax." Natalie reassures him.

Chris shakes his head and then pulls out his phone, opening up his text conversation with Wes. Chris reads over his texts once again and finally gives Wes a reply, telling him that they can talk and that he's on his way. Natalie sees him doing that and pulls out her phone too, reading her texts with Penny. The words said between them stir an emotional reaction in her, but she swallows the lump in her throat to keep from crying. It's bad enough she's never had a serious relationship before, but that means she doesn't know what to do in arguments. She closes her phone and her face drops as she looks out the bus window. Chris notices her face drop and he wants to ask about it, but he can't without feeling like he's placing himself in something he doesn't need to. But, being there for his best friend is more important than worrying.

"Are you okay?" Chris asks.

"Yeah, I'm alright." She says, and then Chris nods, but after about 3 seconds, she starts talking again.

"Okay, well, the other day I went over to Penny's house and we were having dinner. Fine, right? Well it was fine until her parents told me that I've always been such a great friend to Penny. I mean, ugh, a 4-year long relationship and her parents don't even fucking know? It's one thing if she were to tell me about it, but it's a whole other thing when it's being done behind my back!" She rambles on and Chris listens to every word.

"I understand why you're upset, I'd be upset too… I guess we both have something to face when we get to Wes' house, huh?" Chris says, both of them chuckling with each other.

[3RD PERSON—WES' HOUSE]

The bus slowly comes to a stop and Chris looks out the window to see if it's their stop, confirming that it is. He and Natalie get off the bus and then walk a few blocks down to Wes' house. They approach his door, and both of them glance over at each other, quietly debating who should be the one to open the door. Natalie worries that Penny will answer the door and Chris worries that Wes will because they don't want anything to be awkward. So, Natalie takes a deep breath and looks at Chris as she fidgets with her hands nervously. The door isn't gonna open if they just stand there, so Natalie volunteers herself.

"Okay, okay, okay. I'll do it." Natalie breathes out.

"I believe in you," Chris says as he gives her a thumbs-up.

Natalie steps forward and knocks on the door, each knock giving her nervous butterflies. Finally, Ekaterina answers the door, and both Natalie and Chris let out a simultaneous breath of relief. She looks confused at first, but still allows them into the house. Once they enter, they make sure to remove their shoes and leave them at the door as that's a rule in the Sokolov house. After that, Chris and Natalie flash a warm smile at her, and she gives a small one back. She's very quiet, but her silence is nothing weird to them since they both know Ekaterina hasn't talked much since she found out Aleksandr is back. Chris and Natalie walk throughout the house and make their way down the hall to Wes' bedroom. Chris breathes out and swallows nervously as Natalie pushes open the door. They step into Wes' room and find Wes, Penny, and Donatello sitting on Wes' bed. Their heads turn in the direction of the door and Donatello's face immediately goes awkward.

Nobody speaks a word, so Donatello slowly gets up, "Yeah… I'm gonna step out for a moment to call Melanie and let you guys figure this out."

"Wait, I'll come help you," Chris suggests, but immediately gets grabbed by Natalie before he can walk away.

"No way, don't avoid your problems," Natalie says to him.

After that, Natalie, Penny, and Donatello leave the room. Only Chris and Wes are left in the room now, and the atmosphere is thicker than molasses. They can barely look at each other, let alone muster up the words to start the conversation. Finally, Wes looks directly at Chris, but Chris is still unable to do the same. Wes lets out a small sigh and moves to the left of the bed, leaving some space next to him for Chris to sit. He pats the open space, prompting Chris to finally look at him. They make eye contact for a brief second and Chris can feel his walls coming down a little upon seeing Wes' apologetic face. He can tell how truly sorry he is just from his expression, so he folds and sits down next to him.

Wes lets out a sigh before he starts speaking, "Look, I'm really sorry, but there's a really good explanation. I promise you."

"Alright, I'm listening." Chris replies.

"A while ago, I came to the realization that Amity works for my dad. With that new information, I had no choice but to say yes to her little love letter in fear her and my dad would act early and probably hurt one of you guys. I have to be honest with you, she tried to kiss me but I didn't let her. Every single thing I have done is to make sure they don't hurt any of you, because I would never forgive myself if I lost one of you guys. Because you guys are the most important thing in the world to me." Wes explains. "And I didn't even know you liked me." He adds, chuckling dryly.

"Well, I didn't even know either, so that makes two of us." Chris says.

"What do you mean by that?" Wes asks, pulling a confused expression.

"I didn't even know I liked guys. I mean, I kind of did, but I was really scared to come to terms with it because of my parents. Mostly my mom. She's very Christian and the church would disown us— they practically already have now that my dad has been convicted for murder. We can't walk through those church doors without people staring at us, and it's hard to deal with it all without my dad there to remind me everythings going to be okay. I don't even know if anything is going to be okay, and it's making me lose my mind. And then when I saw you with Amity, I officially lost my mind but at the same time realized everything. All this time, I've had feelings for you, and I guess it just took me getting hurt to realize." Chris explains, his voice breaking a bit toward the end.

Wes closes his eyes and then reopens them, maybe hoping all of this is a dream and he didn't hurt Chris. To his disappointment, he has hurt Chris and he feels a pit in his chest, "Chris, I'm so sorry. I never meant to hurt you, and I wanted to tell you myself and explain it, but she just showed up at my house in the morning to walk to school with me."

"Do you have feelings for her?" Chris asks.

Wes shakes his head and looks him in the eyes, "No."

"Do you have feelings for me?" Chris questions.

"Yeah… Ever since we kissed… Ever since we met actually, I just didn't know it yet." Wes tells him.

Chris turns his body to Wes, and they continue their little staring thing. No words are exchanged between them for the next few minutes, and the only noise you'd be able to hear is the sound of their hearts beating out of their chests. Chris silently studies Wes' face, and Wes does the same, both of them starting to notice more tiny details about each other. Like, how Chris has eyes that shine like topaz, or how Wes has pale skin but the pinkest and softest looking lips. They move a little closer to each other and Wes gently threads their fingers together and holds them up, pressing his lips on them to place a kiss on their intertwined hands.

Wes has pale and cold skin, but Chris' skin is sunkissed and blazing warm. Both of them are entirely different people, yet they feel like they were meant for each other. Wes can no longer hold back and he decides to finally close the space between them, pressing their lips together gently. Without hesitation, Chris kisses him back, feeling like his whole life he was waiting for exactly this moment. After a while, they break the kiss, a burst of warmth going through Wes. Nothing else matters around them at the moment, mainly because they have been waiting for this for so long, just Chris didn't know this was what he needed.

"I'm sorry I ran away that day, I was just a little worried about what my mom would think. I worried so much that I forgot to worry about what I thought. And the truth is, I enjoyed the kiss, and I'm not ashamed to say it anymore." Chris says.

"You have no idea how proud I am of you." Wes says with a smile, pulling Chris in for a warm and tight embrace.

Chris wraps his arms around Wes and they pull away from each other slightly, "I don't mean to ruin the moment or anything, but what about you and Amity?" Chris asks.

"Fuck, I didn't think about that." He sighs, "I think I might just have to play it out… but I really don't want to do that to you."

"If you really have to, then you can," Chris says. "We have to do anything to make sure well all be safe."

"And what about us?" Wes asks.

"Well, we can technically be together now. We just have to keep a secret, unfortunately." Chris says, the disappointment present in his tone. "My mom really wouldn't approve as we know."

"We'd probably have to keep it a secret anyways. My mom likely wouldn't approve of us either, she's very traditional. I don't know about my brother, but I'm worried he won't like it either." Wes replies.

"It's settled then. We'll have to hide our relationship from everyone, and just not tell our friends. It will just need to remain a secret for now, you know, lowkey." Chris says, pursing his lips for a brief second.

Chris leans his head on Wes's shoulder and Wes takes a moment to adjust to this new feeling. He isn't used to feeling romantic love from someone, so he's a little stiff for a few moments. Taking a deep breath, he just lets himself relax and then places a kiss on the top of Chris' head. They sit like that for a while, still holding hands with each other and just fully basking in their romantic moment.

[PENNY—WES' HOUSE]

We all wait in the living room, Donatello sitting between me and Natalie to be a mediator. In case you were wondering, I had a very bad argument with my girlfriend, Natalie. She found out yesterday that I never told my parents that were dating each other. But, how do you tell someone something like that when you already know the reaction is going to be negative?

"Okay, I'm gonna accept this call. You guys good?" Donatello asks with two thumbs up.

"Yeah, go accept that call. We'll be fine." Natalie says.

Donatello steps away for a moment and I look over at Natalie, who is sitting in silence. She's got her arms crossed and she's staring at the wall in front of her, her face showing a mix of sadness and anger. I scramble my brain for the perfect words or at least something that can make up for the major screw-up I did. Alas, there's nothing exactly right you can say to make up for lying to your girlfriend, so I just try my best.

"Natalie, I'm sorry you found out about it the way that you did, but I can't let my parents know we are dating. They'd practically disown me." I say to her. "What was I supposed to do?"

"What were you supposed to do? Oh, I don't know — maybe give me some kind of fucking warning or something ahead of time?!" Natalie shouts at me.

"I didn't think you would take it well, I mean look at how you're reacting!" I shout back.

"I'm reacting this way because you hid our relationship without my knowledge! It'd be a completely different story if we chose this together, but you made a choice about our relationship on your own." Natalie replies and I nod my head.

Then, I realize. I went all lone wolf on her, something I promised I would never do. "Fuck, I'm so sorry. I just— I just didn't think you would be on board so I just made the decision for us. Now I realize my fuck up." I say. "I mean, one of the hardest things to do is hiding a loving relationship."

"Well, nobody said anything about hiding it at my house. Just around your parents. We can be as gay as we want we're at my house, okay?" Natalie says with a smile.

"Okay," I reply with a gentle smile back. "Come here."

I open up my arms and she scoots close to me, laying against my body. I wrap my arms around her and hold her close, soothingly rubbing her arm. My cheek is resting against the top of her head, and her head is laying on my chest. I bet she can hear my heartbeat, which to me, is such a romantic thing. And she can probably hear my heart speeding up as I think about how she's the only person who's ever made me fall in love. We then sit there for a bit and silently reconcile our relationship with a snuggle.

[3RD PERSON—BATHROOM]

Donatello picks up the phone as he steps into the bathroom, closing the door behind him and locking it. He had previously called Melanie a few times because he was worried about where she was, yet he never got any answer. She turned off her location and hasn't been telling him where she is, so obviously, he's worried sick. He has no idea where she is or what she could be doing, even if he knows she's safe. There's still always gonna be that worry because he cares about her. After several minutes, she finally picks up the phone.

"Christ, finally you pick up the damn phone, where are you?" Donatello blurts out.

"Calm the hell down, I'm just visiting someone. It's… my biological dad. Just paying him a much needed visit." Melanie replies.

"You worried the shit out of all of us, Mel." He tells her.

"I'm sorry, but this was just something I needed to do alone. No offense to you guys." She responds.

"Seems like everyone's doing things alone." He sighs. "We all just got back together, so come back. The only two we need to find are Trevor and Talia, so we need you here at Wes' house to help." Donatello says.

"Alright, I'll be there in like 20. Bye-bye." She says, and then she hangs up the phone.

Donatello pulls the phone from his ear and lets out a sigh while putting away his phone in his back pocket. He slumps over the bathroom sink and stares at himself in the mirror, seeing a little bit of facial hair starting to come through after his last shaving. But, he notices something that wasn't there before. He turns his head slightly and takes a look at his ear, seeing the top of them are slightly pointed. Slowly, he starts to realize that his ears are starting to turn into elf ears of sorts. Another thing he notices is that his eyes are turning much greener. They were grayish-green before, but the gray in his eyes is getting overpowered by the bright emerald color. He puts on his hood to cover up his ears so nobody asks any questions about it. He unlocks the bathroom door and steps out, then he walks back over to Natalie and Penny to find them cuddling on the couch together.

"Well if all I had to do for you guy to make up is leave the room, I would've left a long time ago." He jokes.

"Looks like communication is still the only thing that works." Penny jokes back.

Donatello and Penny share a little laughter before Donatello starts speaking again, "Alright, I'm gonna go get Chris and Wes, be right back."

After that, Donatello jogs over to Wes' bedroom and knocks on the door. There's no answer from them for a few minutes, so Donatello just opens up the door and steps into the room. He looks at the both of them, seeing that they're hand in hand and cuddling. He raises an eyebrow, causing Chris and Wes separate from each other immediately. They look at him with that face of being caught doing something they shouldn't be doing.

"What? I didn't see anything." He tells them.

Chris chuckles, "Thanks, Donatello."

"Yeah, you have no clue how much we appreciate it," Wes says as they both stand up.

Chris stands up as well and then Donatello walks with them into the living room where Penny and Natalie are. Wes and Chris sit down next to each other, and then everyone looks at Donatello who is standing in front of them. Wes notices something though, prompting him to get up and hurriedly look around his house. Everyone looks at him with worry as he runs around his house, going in and out of every room in a frantic manner. Nobody says anything because they want to see what he's trying to do, but then Donatello stops him from running around and brings him back into the living room.

"Alright man, you're freaking me out now." Donatello says to him.

"My mom, where is my mom?" He asks, and when nobody answers, he asks louder, "Where is my mom?!"

"Uhm, I'm not sure, she was here when we first arrived but when we left your room and came back into the living room again she was gone. I just assumed she went into her bedroom." Natalie says.

"No, that's not right. She doesn't go into her bedroom until her Sitcoms are over. They end at 9:30, it's only 6." Nervousness rushes through him and he feels his heart drop when he realizes what could have potentially happened. "Unless my father took her…"

"Shit, okay, where's Melanie?" Natalie says.

Donatello begins to speak, "She said that she'll be here in—"

All of a sudden the door flies open and Melanie walks in, "I have arrived!"

"Perfect! Now, find out if there are any parties happening." Chris tells her.

"Is this really a good time for that?— I mean, my mom is missing." Wes states.

"If we find a party, we can find Amity, and if we find Amity, we can find your father and possibly your Mom." Chris explains.

They all nod to communicate their understanding, and Melanie pulls out her phone. She opens up her Instagram and scrolls for a while before landing on a post from a girl at their school. The lighting is very colorful and she's surrounded by several other people, including Amity. Melanie searches around a little more and comes to the conclusion that the party is happening at Boden Farwell's house. So with that information, they all go back to their houses to get ready for the party. Chris sends Donatello a text to let him know that he should be the one to get Trevor's van.

Once they're all ready, Donatello sneaks over to Trevor's house and gets his van with the spare key he gave him. He walks over to the door and peeks into the window to make sure nobody is paying attention to him. But instead, he sees Trevor and Talia's dads at the kitchen table, looking absolutely devastated. He lets out a small breath and gets into the car, now feeling devastated. Seeing the twins' dads looking like that really sets it into him that they're gone, possibly kidnapped, or ran away so they didn't have to deal with all this bullshit. Whatever it is, Donatello is determined to bring them back home regardless.