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Fandom [CLOSED] Tokyo Ghoul: Dead Enmity

Adrian didn't so much as falter when the older ghoul flashed her eyes, he stood there, perfectly balanced on the one leg she'd allowed him to keep on the ground, unwavering. Her nails digging into him didn't cause so much as a flinch from the boy. Sure, he was a little confused on how she'd caught his kick, but he didn't look too much into that, he just let her hold his leg in position as he kept up his rather weak attempt at protecting Jackson.

There were voices. So many voices. Were they talking about him? Why? For a moment, Adrian's attention was taken by the people around them seemingly getting pissed off by his sheer presence. He didn't care. If anything if was intriguing... Maybe he should show them again, but...he wasn't strong enough to fight... He just wanted to eat, but this woman...this woman had wanted to hurt Jackson... He couldn't have let that happen.

It was the same man he'd been trying to fight for that ended the commotion, tugging on him, making that woman let go of his foot, causing people to turn away... The minute the boy was free from her grip he took a step forwards, his knees wobbled, and he fell to the ground again, shaking his head. The pain wouldn't go away.

"I'm sorry." Adrian's eyes returned back to their normal state, expression falling as he turned to look at Jackson, "I'm sorry Jackson." Had he upset him now? He hadn't meant to upset him...he just didn't want him to get hurt... Hands curling into fists, Adrian pulled his legs from the ground and wrapped his arms around them. He didn't mean it. He really didn't mean it.


"Well...I mean, dunno how long he's been locked up or anything." Lorn turned to look towards Gloria, "Sometimes they can go a little..." Making a gesture with his right hand circling in front of his ear, he sighed, "I'd say it's worse for kids." He didn't seem too bothered about what Adrian had been doing, if anything, he seemed more intrigued by how the boy acted than disgusted. It was interesting to know they had one of those on board.

"Oh, yeah. Lorn." With a large grin creeping onto his face, Lorn's demeanour changed slightly. He didn't seem to be in thought anymore, just simply enjoying the moment. He took the woman's hand with no hesitation, shaking it firmly. "I mean, there's more than enough people here...I'm sure you're not the only one." Seemingly looking around casually, his eyes locked onto the cabin which Sethe had disappeared into... Was she sulking? "Anyway. All we can do is hope we get back in one piece right? I mean...we came all this way."
 
"No you're not. Don't be." Jackson wished that he could move. He had to sit there and watch the boy sink down to the waterlogged deck, and he couldn't do anything about it. Not without rocking the boat. Even his voice was failing him now.

'Sorry.' Did Adrian really mean that? No... No, no, that was wrong. All of this was wrong. That kid had been poked and prodded and carved up and gassed. He'd seen hell for what, the fourth time in his life? The fifth? There wasn't a point to keeping count anymore; it was too many. But Adrian had been through that again thanks to Jackson himself. He shouldn't have been the one apologising, and yet here he was, humiliating himself over and over...

Oh, that was so him.

Adrian was not the same as the frightened little boy he had been all of those years ago, but he was still him. Some parts of him wouldn't ever change, and that broke Jackson's heart. The man cocked his head downwards, but he still couldn't see the shape of the boy's folded body past the edge of the seat. He could barely speak but it was all Jackson had. So he said, over and over, "It's okay, Adrian. You don't n-need to be sorry. I do, alright? It's okay. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. You didn't do anything. It was me."

*

"Well, y'know how it is. Nobody comes out completely sane after a few years in the slammer... I like to believe I'm still ninety percent, at the least." Gloria couldn't match Lorn's gesture; her hand snapped back to her side too quickly. Her watery eyes could only linger on his circling finger for a second. She found herself escaping to the horizon, watching the black waves churn into the sky where those blinking red lights were. Their scout in the sky... "But God, you're right. I can't imagine someone your age in there. Doing time in a cell, they'd be messed up for life. I feel sorry for their parents."

Sethe's silhouette abruptly froze for a second, then disappeared beneath the window frame again.

"What year is it now, anyways? Two thousand, eleven?" The helicopter lights disappeared behind a cloud, ending the trance that had trapped Gloria's gaze in place for so long.

"Twenty-twelve," someone said, although it was almost impossible to hear them past the hand they had in their mouth. It was their own. They were hungry enough to be gnawing on their own knuckles.

Gloria's mind worked for a couple of seconds, and then she managed a sigh. "Right, must be..."

"Been a while?"

"Yes, actually. How's the speed looking?"

The ghoul removed their shaky, bleeding fist from those trembling jaws. They yelled back into the cabin, "Hey! How long 'til we get to shore?" Out of everybody inside, there was no immediate answer. The boat chugged along over the tides, following Aaron in his chopper. Then Sethe stepped out. She was empty-handed, cold under her thin robes, and she came outside especially to smack that ghoul in the face.

"Shut up your loud mouth! Some people are asleep," she demanded whilst the victim kept nursing what was likely going to become a black eye. "Now close your eyes. And you. And you as well, boy. We will be back to dry land by dawn and we are getting off as soon as we stop. Get some sleep."

Only after Sethe had left did Gloria dare to breathe. She rubbed at the soft skin on her neck and spoke quietly to Lorn, "Talking of people who aren't all there..."

***

"Land ho!"

The hull gave an enormous shudder as it pressed into something solid, something colossal, and the force of the impact was enough to rouse everyone who was lucky enough to have fallen asleep. They awoke to an eerie stillness where the water still lapped at the deck's sides but didn't rise or fall. No rocking. No moving. Just water, salt, the first rays of dawn and miles of sand.

The helicopter had made its landing several hundred metres down shore. It had whipped up a little storm at landing, judging by the crater around its skids, but it and the wind had been quite still for a long time now. Trails of footprints dragged from its open door to the seafront and back. Several ghoulish shapes lingered around the enormous black vehicle, Aaron's huge padded form among them on the ground. He had something in his arms - something small, white and very excited-looking.

"Lorn!" his voice called out, his voice somehow carrying across the enormous distance. He waved with one arm to the fleet just landed. "Over here! Did all go well?"
 
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"Hmph." Lorn grunted as he heard Sethe grumbling towards people, "I guess you can't argue with her," He shrugged, pushing himself away from the edge, "We do need the sleep."

---

Rays of sun illuminated the bay before the boy who never seemed to sleep, Lorn was leaning on the side of the boat, hanging out slightly as they came to a halt next to the bay. It was good to be back on solid ground.

The boat jolted, waking the majority of people up with a groan (from both person and transportation). With a grin, the youngest member of their 'posy' gripped the sides of the floating hunk of wood and jumped the side, landing silently on the ground below. He dusted himself down, sighing as he looked towards the buildings beyond the shore.

"Ghouls one, doves none." He muttered to himself, arms crossed.

The boy's attention was taken as he heard someone call him from across the beach. Several dark silhouettes came into view, but the more prominent figure? That strangely bulky dove that he'd managed to 'recruit.' Grin widening, Lorn jumped off of the wooden platform he stood on and down onto the soft sand below. "Yo." He saluted, putting his hands in his pockets and casually starting to walk over. Others were appearing from the boat now, all seemingly just as glad to be away from that centre, if not more so.

"Everything's good he-" Raising a hand, Lorn started to call to the man, but before he could finish something made it's way out of the shadows. Something dark, almost too quick for even a ghoul's eye to follow. The figure darted behind the child, a hand extending from a dark cloak and extending to take hold of its prey's. With Lorn's wrist in tow, it continued forwards, causing the boy to spin. Then, as quickly as it had moved, it stopped, standing in front of the comparatively smaller male. Time stopped, everything slowed down, and then there was the loudest slapping sound that had ever been heard, followed by Lorn's collapse to one knee.

A few were left in shock, including the recipient of the attack. The perpetrator had pulled up the mask covering their face and as they stepped forwards their hood fell, revealing long, white hair tied up in a ponytail.

"Ach! What was that for cu-" Lorn hissed, but he was cut off again as the individual leaned down and grabbed him by the chin, squeezing his cheeks and forcing him to look him in the eyes. It was then that the boy's expression changed from annoyance to amusement, the closest thing he could manage to a grin on his face. "Oh hello you."

"Imbecile!" The voice that made the exclamation was that of a male, his accent was definitely foreign, but it was too much of a mixture to be able to identify where it was from from just that one word. The word was controlled, with just the right mixture of firm anger and power. "Do not give me your impotent excuses." His foot connected with Lorn's abdomen, kicking the boy rather violently onto the ground, "What game do you think we're playing?!"

"Hey..." Lorn's voice was calm, as he started to feebly scramble to his knees, but he made sure no one was close enough to hear how he spoke, just how he looked... "You're here aren't you?"

"You threw the phone. Didn't you?" The unknown stranger made his way over to Lorn's side, kicking him, "Didn't you?" He got a look he seemed to recognise all too way, expression staying hard. "Of course you did. Do you not know where we are? Do you not realise who you are?! Honestly, I'm surprised you've lived this long with those two brain cells you seem to possess. Don't make me chase you down again."

"Alright dad, God."

"Do not start that. You don't use his name. Get up."

"Geeze."

"Up."

When the boy didn't obey the command immediately, the man grabbed the back of his shirt, practically dragging him to his feet and staring at him with a hardened, unimpressed gaze. "I sometimes cannot tell whether you're three or thirteen."

"Oh you love it." He smiled smugly, "After all, I look too much like-"

"Quiet." Again, the young teen was cut off with another slap to the face, "You're but a nuisance, do not flatter yourself."
 
Gloria made sure to keep her eyes open on her way down. Her knees took the impact of leaping to the ground badly; something or other had twisted or sprained, and she had to hobble with her sad little package of hair and bones to the edge of the new gathering. She tripped at least twice on her way before she noticed what was unfolding before her. One bloodtained-pink hand snapped up to cover her gaping mouth.

Where had the stranger come from? Why was he beating Lorn to a pulp? What the hell was his mismatched foreign accent? Sethe had been too busy hauling everyone off their beached vessel to have any answers, but she didn't need context to laugh. Gloria and several others all jumped away from her in a little shock wave as she bent over double and cackled like a madman. "That's how he says 'hello'?! That man, he speaks my language." Another bout of laughter and another shock wave.

Those two brown eyes slid surreptitiously to one side and checked the horizon as they always did. Right away, Gloria noticed that little speck in the distance: Aaron. He had been so still and calm that he blended perfectly into the background, with his rough sandy hair and fair freckled skin. The only movement to prove he had not been a statue was the little white thing he had been wrestling with, something that looked like an animal of some sort. That animal wasn't in Aaron's arms anymore. It bounced around the man's feet, yipping and snapping at his ankles and almost tripping him up as he came running with his blood-red trident.

Gloria almost jumped clean out of her skin at the sound of footsteps by her ear. She had barely looked away for a second, but in the time that she had spent examining the cityscape, Aaron had sprinted the full length from the aircraft to his master. That little animal thing - probably a dog, judging by its quivering tail and black nose - was way behind, struggling to catch up on its four stiff legs. The Irish woman made quick work of getting out of Aaron's way. He stormed into the scene, every muscle in his body tensed. If not for the slight twitch of nervousness, the look on his face would have been stone hard. He thrust his trident, prongs threateningly sharpened to lethal points, into the space between Lorn and the white-haired stranger and said, "Are you alright, Lorn? What shall I do?"

"Leave him, leave him," Sethe prompted, fluttering a hand about to dismiss Aaron. "Give the gentleman a chance." The blonde man glanced nervously to Lorn. He suddenly turned rather stiff, but managed to remove himself and his trident from the stranger's way.

"Lorn," said Aaron again. His fingers itched to intervene.

Sethe butted in, "Does he have a wedding ring?"

*

"...Adrian, y-you okay?"

His eyes hurt from all of the salty water. His throat hurt from screaming it raw. His nose hurt from all of the frozen air. His face hurt from Sethe's palm. His arms hurt from holding on to the hull all night. His head hurt from thirst he hadn't quenched in days. Everything hurt. Maybe even his legs, which he hadn't been able to feel for years, had found some way to hurt too just to screw him over. Jackson hated this body of his for being so fragile. It let itself get beaten and battered, and then it forced him to sit immobile as he watched Adrian fall apart just inches out of reach. That wasn't fair. That hurt in the core of his chest, inside his ribcage where his weak heart refused to stop beating. Out of everything, that had to be the most painful.

By now, though, the rocking of the boat had come to an abrupt halt. They were beached on some bay or another back in Portsmouth, and that only meant one thing: home. Real home, not like the last time they were here, because this time Jackson had family to lead through the front door.

Finally... Was it possible for a man to feel so broken and so whole all at once?

Maybe. Didn't matter. Jackson has passed out at some point and lost track of Adrian, and now there were too many people scrambling over the sides to get a clear view. The kid had to be on the boat. He wouldn't have dismounted it alone. Hell, he might even be on the floor by his feet, where the man had last seen him the previous night.

Though he couldn't see the boy, he tried again, "Adrian? Where've you gone? Come on, we're here. Help me get off this thing so we can go home, alright?"
 
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The prongs of the trident coming between the two didn't seem to shake the older male, his gaze snapped around to stare Aaron dead in the eyes, expression never changing. For a few moments he stayed like that, then he scowled and turned back to the boy in his grip.

"Tell your little minion to remove his weapon." He spoke sternly, keeping his grip tight.

"I don't see you hold one." Lorn shot back, grin widening as he was pushed to the floor once again with a grumble of something incoherent. "Oh! You meant Aaron!" Staying on the ground, Lorn turned to look at the man trying to defend him, "Don't worry about it Aaron, I can handle this one."

The cackle broke off the conversation between the three as their attention turned to look towards the woman asking whether their company had a ring.

"Oh, him?" Lorn grunted and turned his head to the side, shaking it, "Can't say he's exactly a...people person."

"You're one to talk." The man scowled, crossing his arms again, "I wouldn't rule out the dirt on this sand being cleaner than you." He muttered something that sounded anything but nice, but it wasn't in English, "I told you about making...friends..."

"Crikey, what are you? My father?" Lorn mumbled, finally getting up off of the ground.

"Please, I pity your father."

Whilst the two continued to talk to each other, another individual approached the scene. Having been rather curious as to what could have caused such a distraction, Diana had made her way towards the group, calm as always, arms folded in an oddly similar way to the male in front of her.

Now she stood behind him, a few meters away, jaw slightly agape and eyebrow raised.

"Zephaniah?"

*

Following one of the ghouls moving away, Adrian had managed to snatch something from the edge of the boat: food. He sat with his back up against wood, knowing away on a distorted mess that was probably once someone's hand. At first he didn't hear Jackson's calls, too wrapped up in the meal that he'd found, but as everyone started to move away the boy could make out the man's voice.

"Mhm." Cocking his head to one side, Adrian launched himself to his feet and bounced over to Jackson, dropped to his knees in front of the man again and smiling. "You wanna go?" He blinked innocently, his young features amazingly deceiving, "Okay~!"

Getting back to his feet, Adrian grabbed at Jackson and pulled him up. They were lucky the boy was a ghoul now, for human Adrian would have never been able to lift Jackson for long, he did it daily way back when...but not for long periods of time. Now he was more than able to grab the man and head off of the boat with him.

"Hey..." Looking around, Adrian searched for the source of all the noise he was hearing...but...he couldn't see it. It wasn't quite talking, there was something there...he could hear it but...but no one else was paying attention. "Jackson...do you hear that?" He asked, looking to the left, in the direction of...nothing... What was he doing?
 
"Now there's a real man," Sethe observed, glassy eyes first studying the stranger's discarded mask, and then his fallen hood, his face, that long rope of white hair locked together in a ponytail. The smile on her face was stale. She no longer admired, but inspected, examined, with dancing flames of excitement caged somewhere behind that distant expression. It was all about that question: not who, but what. This was a real man, a fine one at that, but what else was he? Well, he was something new. A rarity.

It was with unsteady arms that Aaron withdrew himself from the confrontation. His weapon, suddenly twice as heavy as it had been before, dragged back through the sand. The trail made a clear divide between Lorn and the hooded stranger; a line not to be crossed. Aaron pretended not to have seen that, but whilst his head was turned dutifully away, he watched through the locks of hair fallen over his eyes.

Lorn continued to toss the stranger's words back at him. That's how it seemed to work - back and forth. They caught each other's arguments like a ball and then bounced it back again like a game of catch. 'What are you? My father?' Lorn had said. The stranger caught the insult and turned it into 'I pity your father'.

"Hmph. Me too," said the old woman without thinking.

She kept watching. Things started to change. When Diana approached, she crossed her arms and made a funny face. Then something happened that made Sethe's eyes narrow and her stale smile tight again. Diana called the man by his name. Zephaniah. Even Aaron turned his head at that, his hair falling to the sides of his face so that his large green eyes could blink in wonder. He asked to Zephaniah, "Sir, are you a friend of Lorn?"

Sethe would have chimed in with a provocative comment, which she had spent the last few seconds concocting. This was interesting after all, and a three-way coincidence was just too good to pass up. But something distracted her; that dog. It was a scruffy old thing. A terrier, white fur stained brown in places by mud, and sand clumped around its nostrils. It must have pained its stiff little legs to run so far, but it had finally caught up to Aaron. Now it was after Sethe for some reason.

The dog pressed its slimy nose against the old woman's ankle. She slid her foot away. The dog followed her movement, and then released a sharp yelp.

"Shoo," said Sethe. The dog barked again, so vigorously that its entire body bounced off the ground. It wrapped its jaws around her leg and greeted her with licks from a slobbery, pink tongue. "Shoo, shoo. Get off."

*

It was almost laughable how close this situation was to old times. A skinny little kid hauling the flimsy ragdoll body of a man twice his size. It was something that Adrian had always done for Jackson - from bed, from a car, from one chair to another. Now it was from the deck to the ground, and after everything that had happened, it felt ridiculous that this one ritual out of everything else had stuck around.

There was no wheelchair waiting on the sand this time. Bella and Dane, both torn up and broken, would take that priority. Adrian would have to hold Jackson for a while longer, but the man didn't mind as much as he was guilty. He could hold Adrian's wrist and feel the pulse of his heart this way.

"I hear it," he said. He had heard most of it. None of it had gone in, but some words seemed to stick. 'Minion'. 'Father'. Something in another language, one Jackson thought he recognised. He was too tired to care, but there were people there they had to check up on - specific people from the other boats, the last of which were just docking now. "You... Want to go check it out, r-right? We can take a quick look. But then we're going to count everyone and go home together. That okay, Adrian? It's not far from here."
 
"Friend?" The male almost scoffed, "Is that meant to be an insult?" He looked towards the boy in question, his face a picture of disgust, but his attention was soon taken by the familiar voice from behind him. The one saying his name.

It was clear in an instant that the two recognised each other, both seemed just as surprised as the other when they met each other's gazes, stunned into silence. They must have stood there for a good twenty seconds before anyone said anything at all about the situation.

"What on earth are you doing here?" Diana was the one to break the silence, shaking her head out of utter disbelief. "You're supposed to be half way across the world right now!"

"I could say the same for you." The white haired male replied, taking a step forwards, "I thought you would have gone to America."

"Yeah, well circumstances change. I had unattended business here."

"Business." It seemed he didn't quite believe that sentence, raising an eyebrow slightly and crossing his arms again.

"Yes, business." She repeated, "But that's not the point." For a split second her gaze landed on Lorn, before moving back to Zephaniah once more, "Why would you be all the way out here? Don't tell me they're still looking for me..."

"No." Shaking his head, Zephaniah too looked back at Lorn for a moment, expression turning sour, "They've got different interests now."

"Wait..." With a furrowed brow, Diana made a head motion that the other seemed to get, judging by the nod that follow, "So you're no longer in association..."

"That would be correct."

Her gaze lingered on Lorn for much longer now, she seriously looked like she'd seen a ghost.

"So does that mean he's..."

"That would also be correct."

"Your boy?"

"Cato's."

"So where's-"

"Listen." Deciding it was best to stop Diana before she started, the red eyed individual stepped a little closer, lowering his voice. "Speaking of such matters in this environment could cause..." He looked around, "Issues. If you wish to discuss it we should speak privately."

"Oi." It seemed the two would not be allowed their space, as in seconds Lorn had moved up to stand in front of the two, "Are you going to introduce me to your friend Zeph?" He asked, looking towards Diana. The two had of course already met, but this new development had caught the boy's attention.

"No." The reply was blunt and completely sure, "If you wish to be an annoying child do it elsewhere."

"Sheesh. Someone's in a bad mood."

"You made me travel to the end of the country for you, if you want a bad mood, I'll gladly show you one."

"I can take a hint." Putting his hands up in surrender, Lorn rolled his eyes and turned away, looking to the dog that seemed to be attacking the woman named Sethe with love. "At least you're having a good time." He joked, grinning, "These guys are more than sour."

*

"Oh. Okay!" Nodding his head, Adrian started towards the others. Hopping up to the scene rather quickly. There were several strange looking individuals who seemed mostly confused or annoyed. He didn't recognise them all. Only a few of them.

As the boy's eyes scanned over the crowd, they landed on one person in particular: the large hulk of a man with blond hair and a big weapon. He knew that man. He...met him...twice.

It took around a minute of staring inquisitively, completely lost in thought, before Adrian realised who the individual was. "Aaron!" The exclamation was child-like, the smile on his face matching perfectly. Aaron liked him right? He'd been nice to him before. He like Aaron. But...what was he doing here? Aaron wasn't a ghoul...and he worked for the CCG, so...what was he doing here?
 
"Uh? No, Sir..." Aaron had been caught out. His voice faltered halfway through, a split second after he realised that he had been drowned out. That was right; he wasn't supposed to be involving himself here, at least according to assumption. Despite the provocation, Lorn wanted him out of this conflict, which appeared to be growing more involved by the second.

Diana spoke in half-sentences, with which Zephaniah also responded. The two stood by the masked boy and spoke a half-nonsense language that only they knew. Aaron couldn't fill in the gaps. Nor could Sethe, who stood to one side, shaking the white dog away every time it came back. But the both of them listened more intently than they should have allowed themselves to do, and both of them were concocting ideas about who, what and why.

Somehow, all of this was about Lorn. That much was clear. Whilst Aaron had to keep sneaking glances back at his master, gaze ever obscured by the hair in front of his face, Sethe shamelessly stared with eerily unmoving eyes.

'They'. She was hearing that word a lot. It was always 'they', 'you', 'them'. No names or acronyms or indicator to any identity. Even more interesting... Sethe's hand went to rub at the bulge of her chin. This had to be on purpose. Nobody avoided names like that in a two-way conversation unless they had a reason.

Somewhere in here, there was a secret.

Damn. She should have brought a notepad for this. That way, the old woman would be able to scrawl some private thoughts down in her own language. Notes, ideas. Something about that name, 'Cato' - who was that? Whoever they were, Lorn was their boy. Hmph. Maybe this kid wasn't an orphan, after all. He had never mentioned a parent out loud.

*

"Adrian! It's nice to see you again!" Aaron called back. "How do you do, Sir?" He stood up straight to be more visible within the crowd, and took a quick double take before slinking from Lorn's side to greet Adrian with a quick salute. He was undoubtedly taken aback by the young man's raw enthusiasm; eyes wide, feet stuck too far into the sand, the larger man kept his distance.

"What?" Jackson thoughtlessly spluttered out the one-word question so violently that he nearly shook himself from Adrian's arms. Aaron? Oh, the investigator from before... The large man with his signature trident. He had appeared so suddenly that it was unsettling, but maybe he could be put to good use. Poor Adrian was so small... He wouldn't be able to bear all of that weight forever. So Jackson said, "Oh, it's you. G-good, you can take over for Adrian, then."

Aaron sighed, "Yes, Sir." The words seemed to deflate him, as though it were a relief just to hear someone's instruction. He finally dared to step closer to Adrian, so that his enormous hands could scoop Jackson up from underneath without accidentally impaling him.

"What's going on over there?"

"The others?" said Aaron. "Well... A stranger has arrived. He's speaking with Diana - I think they're already acquainted."

"Stranger?"

"Yes, Sir. The man with the white hair. Oh... Actually, there's someone else now, as well. You can see for yourself."

*

Sand stuck to Sethe's ankles where the dog had wiped its grubby little nose against her bare skin over and over again. Stupid little rat. It could have picked anybody to annoy, but for some reason it must have found her scent particualrly thrilling - it wouldn't go away, no matter how many times she nudged it, shooed it or even tried to frighten it with a light kick.

"A good time," she snorted back at Lorn, almost spitting with the sharpness of her tone. Her ordinary voice sounded so much like sarcasm that it was difficult to tell if she were about to laugh or rip somebody's head off. "Oh yes, I am absolutely thrilled to bits. You can see it in my bloodshot eyes. Whose pet is this?"

The old woman was expecting to hear from Lorn after that, but the answer she got was quite different. It was a voice that she had never heard before; shallow, lilted. Too adult for a child and yet too mellow for a man. From a distance, it called to her in answer, "She's mine!"

Sethe whipped her head up and laid eyes upon a second stranger. The newcomer was too far away to see clearly, and she had to squint to make out the most obvious details. Much like herself, he was dark of skin, with a round nose and tired brown eyes. He slouched beneath a mop of long black hair, leaning over what looked like a branch broken off a dead tree and waving feebly at the group with a skeletally thin arm.

The white dog went mad at the stranger's approach. It ran in circles around Sethe's feet, yipping and yapping at the approaching stranger. When the old woman leaned down to snatch it up, it bounded out of her reach and nipped at Lorn's feet instead before curling its top lip back in a rebellious dog-grin for its owner.

The stranger finally sloped to a halt. Looking at him again, Sethe's heart quickened for some reason, but she forced herself not to instinctively glance away. The man was thin, impossibly so. His legs draped awkwardly behind one another, twisted around with the knees shaking so violently that it was almost comical. Yet he could not have been old - his skin was tight and glowed with colour. Twenty? Forty? He could have easily been anything in between.

"Oh, Aladdin!" the man said. It was clear now where he had come from - somewhere in America, judging by the clarity and roundness of his accent. Odd. He definitely didn't look like an American. His bright-but-exhausted eyes tracked the dog as it ran this way and that, biting playfully at first Diana, then Zephaniah. Aladdin barked.

"Well, there's a name," Sethe grumbled. She stiffened when Aladdin barked at her from behind.

The stranger wobbled over his stick and sighed. "I'm sorry. I told her not to run away, but she's not so good at listening..."

Aladdin dared to peck at her owner's trousers. She darted away again before he could reach down to grab her with his gloved hands.

"No! Bad! Oh no. She hasn't been bothering you, has she?"
 
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Having been freed from holding Jackson, Adrian bounded up beside Aaron and grinned excitedly. Anyone would have been a little creeped out by his enthusiasm, but he didn't seem to care. It didn't take long for him to find interest in another topic though, namely the events unfolding just beside the three.

"Hey..." Placing his hands behind his back, Adrian leaned forwards and squinted, as a ghoul his eye sight was anything but terrible...yet he over-exaggerated the motion to quite a degree. "Is that a person?" It seemed he was referring to the scrawny man approaching the ground. He was a ghoul, straight off the bat the boy's nose could tell that much, but...who was he?

"Oh no no no." Lorn laughed and shook his head, "Not bothering us at all!" He grinned, looking to Sethe, "In fact I am pretty sure this woman here would love to spend more quality time with her." He hopped backwards, beckoning the dog over just to irritate Sethe that little bit more.

He couldn't say that this man wasn't strange looking, extremely scrawny, to a point he didn't believe possible, seemingly unable to stand correctly... What was up with him? Did he need to some help or something? Was he alone? "Hey Sethe," He glanced up at the woman, trying to stifle sniggers, "Look she likes you."

"Children and animals." Zephaniah sighed, rolling his head and turning his head away from Lorn being immature, "How irritating."

"Tell me about it." Diana mumbled, turning to the person who had just approached. They had to be careful, they'd just docked and so they couldn't afford to stick around too long...especially if there were going to be even more...lurkers. "That's your dog?" She asked the man, "It'd probably be best to keep her away, we're just about to leave anyway..."

"Hey fuckers!" Obviously not caring about half of the shit going on near the coast, Daryl appeared a few meters away, "Y'know some goddamn help from you shitheads would be nice! I ain't doing all this shit by myself, so you wanna hurry the fuck up or what?"
 
The gloved stranger's slouch grew ever so slightly deeper. He cupped his hands over the tip of the stick with which he walked, and leaned his entire weight against it. His knees had turned weak with relief. "Oh, thank goodness," he said. "She always runs away and tries to play with people, but they don't much like it. I thought she was annoying you. Bad girl, Aladdin! Kez won't give you any dinner if I tell her what you did."

The creature's smug dog-grin froze at that threat. It stared at its owner, then away at Sethe.

Again, the man continued, "I'm sorry, can you help me catch-... Wait. Wait, did - did you say Sethe?"

Whatever Sethe was expecting to hear from this stranger, it wasn't her own name. She snapped her gaze away from Lorn to find that the man was making rather unsettlingly intense eye contact. He stared far too vividly at her. She shivered. No way. "Abn 'ukhti?" she tested.

The man stared blankly. "Ab-n... Pardon?"

"Nothing," she said quickly. "What is that you want? Quickly, we do not have all-"

"It is you! You even talk like all of the others!" He quivered with such intense excitement that his knees almost buckled beneath him. Horror rooted Sethe to the spot. She could only stare, her eyes so wide that they were bulbous, as the 'stranger' dragged his feet through the sand to get a closer look. He was too close. His nose was just inches from hers. "This is awesome! Dad talked about you all the time. And Auntie Nailah. Everyone thought you were dead! Awh... I'm so happy. This is gonna make Kez so happy, I..."

Somehow, Sethe jolted out of her trance at the mention of yet another strange name. "Nailah... What? You know her? You know Nailah?"

"Uh... Of course," the stranger said. "She's family."

"Is she well?"

"I... I don't know..."

"What about the others?" Sethe demanded. Her hands, furious and clammy, wanted to grab this 'family's' shoulder and shake the answers clean out of him. But something told her that she would break his frail body by touching him, so she hovered just above his warm skin. "How are they?"

The man's head drooped. "I'm sorry, I don't know that either. It's been a while. But it's okay, Mom, you don't-"

That was it. She didn't care anymore. She smacked the man to the ground, and he landed on his back with a heavy 'oof', his arms, legs and stick sprawled out on the sand. When the initial shock wore off, he nursed the throbbing sore on his face with a hand.

"Augh..."

"Alright, everybody up!" Sethe called suddenly. "We have been in open space for far too long. It is dangerous here. Unless anybody wants to stay here and get picked off again, let us move." She dusted her hands off on the front of her garments and waved her hands up in the air, a summons in unison with Daryl's impatient shouts.

The dark-skinned stranger groaned again. "M-Mom?" he said, his weak limbs scrabbling uselessly to get him back to his feet. The dog came back and made sure that his attempt was a failure by sitting on his chest, pinning him to the ground and covering his face in big, slobbery kisses. His call to Sethe went ignored.

"Hurry up, then!" the woman prompted. "What are you all waiting for, your mother and father? Get moving!"

Aaron, Jackson balanced in his arms like a doll, had been busy staring Adrian down with those big green eyes of his. He managed to meet the boy's curiosity, but unlike him he was quite still on his feet. However, at Sethe's call he straightened up.

Jackson added to the conversation, his mouth still mostly agape at the confrontation he was witnessing, "Bella... And Dane. They - they're still in the cabin. Someone needs to get them. And my chair."

"I've got it," said Gloria. She seemed quite pleased to scurry away from the situation at hand. Despite her weakness, she was oddly quick at climbing up the hull and bursting into the room where the two injured ghouls had slept.

Several others from the boats swarmed back to their own cabins to retrieve their injured allies.

"What happens now?" someone queried. Numerous faces turned to Jackson.

"Uh... M-my place. I've got shelter for anyone who needs it. Daryl, start getting everyone together if you can. We'll all catch up with you. You remember where you're going, right..?"
 
"Huh." Lorn raised an eyebrow at the man's sudden enthusiasm over Sethe, "Seems Zeph isn't the only one meeting old friends today." He definitely didn't forget about the words used: Auntie Naliah, Kez, 'family'. To think, meeting family on the edge of the beach in an old British town... How uncanny.

The boy did however pay special attention to one word in particular, one word the feeble man said before Sethe knocked him to the ground. Mom. He called Sethe his mother. That made Lorn whistle, his eyebrows really raising and lips upturning in a rather confused but impressed smile. This was her child? Okay, now that was too funny.

It was clear in an instant Sethe wanted nothing to do with this new individual, which only made Lorn more intrigued. Why wouldn't she be excited to see her child like most people? He supposed he could relate to the man on the ground, having had the same thing done to him only seconds before.

Glancing back to the woman muttering commands and responding to Daryl's calls of impatience, Lorn walked in the other direction to kneel in front of the individual on the ground.

"Yo." He tipped his head up in greeting, grinning slightly, "Don't worry about it, seems everyone's slapping each other today." Looking around at who was left, the boy called out, "Someone help this guy up! He doesn't look too good! Aaron!" His gaze moved around to look for the man as people started over to check if the male on the ground really was okay, "Make sure he gets back safely, okay?" He stood up, dusting himself off and turning around with a grin, "We shouldn't leave him here on his own if he's hurt after all."

---


"You gotta be kidding." Hood up, the teen stood up from a rather fresh looking corpse of a young woman in a black and red dress, probably on her way to a party before she had met her rather miserable demise. "Money...money...ID..." With every item he mumbled, he shoved more and more into those too large jacket pockets, taking all he could from the dead' purse. "Nice." Once done he dropped the delicate leather to the floor with a thud and turned on his heels, moving out into the light.

Pulling on his hood and letting it fall to his shoulders, Lorn blinked his deep blue eyes, scanning the streets intricately. Where could he go?

After the rather...bold move of inviting that strange scrawny man back to the house with them, he'd made his escape. Sethe was going to kill him for that one, he may not have known her long, but he could tell that much, plus there were so many people there asking silly questions and receiving even sillier answers, he couldn't listen to that anymore. A break was overdue.

"Hm." Spotting a skinny street to his right, the boy crossed the road and slipped inside, disappearing into the dark. He walked for around five minutes, turning down multiple more alleys and streets to find somewhere that was much more secluded. The trashier areas, those were always the most deserted. It's why gangs did so well in them.

Coming to a slightly more walled in area with a low wall to his left, Lorn stopped and sighed. He walked over to the wall and sat down, rummaging through those filled to the brim pockets to find what he wanted. What was it now....yeah...that right.

Pulling out the half full packet of cigarettes was a reminder of how...well he got along with people. They always seemed to have no problem giving him what he wanted when he just asked. He pulled one out, throwing the rest of the packet onto the wall and taking out a lighter.

"Way to slowly kill your internal organs Lorn." The words weren't for anyone, just him, he stared at the tubular item between his fingers, sighed, and then shrugged, "Whatever." With that he placed he cigarette between his lip and lit it.

Something that was really annoying him, that goddamn mask... It was itchy. There weren't any spontaneous mirrors, no people, so... Looking around one last time, the teen placed a hand to the back of his head fiddling with the red material wrapped around the top of his face. He pulled his off seconds later, dropping it over his arm. Maybe taking those bandages off would be a good idea too, but...he looked down. Too much effort.

Lorn breathed in, grabbing hold of the cigarette and removing it from his mouth a he coughed slightly, "Ugh. Why do people do this?"
 
"She can probably crack your skull open with her pinky finger. I'd be careful if I were you, son."

"Oh... Okay. Thanks!" The raw-boned stranger with the dark eyes and long black hair took Gloria's hand in his own worn glove. They shook on the advice and exchanged a quick, broken glance where only one of them smiled with any true warmth. By 'she', they meant Sethe, of course. That old woman had been in something of a foul mood ever since Aaron had dragged her so-called son back to the house. She had wheeled Dane and Bella back home, put the man to bed in a room with Jackson and then gone upstairs to tend to Bella's horrendous wound. For the most part, she kept her distance from the kitchen where Gloria and the stranger drank coffee together. But every now and then she would pass by, or slip in and out for new supplies, and give her 'son' no more acknowledgement than a quick sour look.

Every time she made an appearance, the scrawny little man would clumsily rise from his seat and try, "Mom?" And every time, he would get ignored or shoved back into his seat by a deliberately misplaced elbow.

The assaults got a bit more violent each time - even the seemingly robust Irish woman was becoming tense with concern. That's why she started making off-handed comments and passing on advice. "Some parent," she had snorted into her coffee cup on more than one occasion.

By now, Sethe had not been in for a while. She must have been up on the next floor, dressing up Bella properly for the day. That made for a somewhat long and awkward stretch of nothingness. At least it wasn't silence; the newcomer kept habitually picking at his stick, humming tunelessly to himself with an unreasonably wide smile on his face. His dog slept beneath the table.

"...You going to drink that?" Gloria prompted, jabbing a finger at the man's cup.

"Yep."

He let his crutch rest against the table, and those two trembling hands wrapped around the warm porcelain. It smelled good - even better up close, when he leaned so far forwards that he almost dipped his nose inside. Looked good, too. He drank in the scent for one more second, then slid the cup off the table.

It was supposed to go to his lips, but something went a bit wrong.

The cup tipped on its side after the man's fingers failed to keep a firm grip on the handle. The shining white china plummetted to the floor, spilling scalding black coffee over both ghouls' laps and sending the dog into a barking frenzy.

"Oh no," said the man as he desperately fanned the burning patches on his dirty jeans.

Gloria was shocked out of her seat. Oh, it hurt. But she could only sigh. "Spillage in the kitchen!" she called, "Someone get their lazy behind in here help me clean this up."



*

To hole up in a labyrinth of alleys was about the closest thing to isolation that a person could reach in this knotted mess of a seaside city. The roars of motor engines were muffled by the sounds of closer disturbances; a gull cried. A cat's claws scratched at the hard, slick ground coated in grime from the last late spring shower. It was Lorn and the wilderness of the concrete jungle - but if only he had turned another corner, he would have realised that he did not smoke alone.

Their noise came before they did. From somewhere behind the next wall, two voices echoed back to Lorn's hiding spot. They made throaty noises - not quite screaming, and not quite whispering, but something intense in between. Almost none of their strange duet consisted of comprehensible language. Next, it was their shadows. Stretched under the morning sun, a single, joint shape crept towards the corner of the wall.

"This way," said one of the voices.

The shadow rolled into Lorn's little hideaway, and after it followed the owners. One, a human male, cloaked in what looked like a blanket in urgent need of washing. Pressed between his trembling form and the bricks was his woman, who was not human. She wore only skin where there should have been clothes, and beneath a rolling mane of silken black hair was the type of body that could make a man regret his age, his reputation and the flatness of his wallet.

"How much longer?" the man puffed. His lips were too close to the woman's ear. She instinctively drew away from the heat of his breath and pushed herself further back against the wall, distancing herself from his oppressive stature as much as she could manage.

It took her a moment to utter in an unmistakably Texan accent, "...Twelve whole minutes."

There was a small grunt of agreement, and the pair of them carried on wordlessly from that point onwards. They continued, holding one another's shoulders - the woman reluctantly - for perhaps a full minute of their twelve remaining. The woman must have even been counting the seconds in her head, because her deep brown eyes slid open for the first time on the mark of 'sixty' and flitted downwards to check the half-broken watch on her wrist. A moment staring, and then her focus wavered. Maybe she would have closed her eyes again to look at blackness instead of the man before her, but for some reason her gaze lingered... And then landed on the child sitting just yards away.

She screamed. She snatched her hands away from the man stood over her and cupped them over her own mouth. "What the fuck!?"

A second scream came from the man before he had even turned around. He kept the blanket - towel, whatever it was - wrapped around his waist, but it slipped down from his shoulders when he whipped about to look at the danger.

Two eyes... Two blue eyes, which were definitely too young to be seeing what had just unfolded. Those adults' jaws turned slack with two types of horror. And suddenly, without warning, the man fled. He grabbed at his blanket and skidded around the corner, shouting something that sounded a bit like, "Shit, shit, shit, no, no, no!"

"Hey! Get ba-... Damn it!" The woman almost went chasing after him, but mid-step she seemed to remember herself. She had been left stranded. Naked, vulnerable, shivering in the cold that she had borne for so long. And it suddenly became clear that she was not a woman after all, but a girl.

She watched Lorn. Something behind those sweet brown eyes boiled hatred within itself. In a second she was no longer still and defenseless, because she had stomped all the way to the boy's wall and kicked him viciously in the forehead with one bare foot. "Th' hells you starin' at for, li'l punk? Eyes away!"
 
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"What's...happened here?" A head popped through the doorway in response to all of Gloria's yelling, it was the man who hadn't really talked much, the one who had introduced himself as Harrison that Diana had been practically attacking in the hallway of the detention centre not too long ago.

He walked in, brushing his hair to the side and looking down at the spillage on the ground. "Oh, let me get a towel for thst." Moving away from the spillage, Zeb, and Gloria, the man opened a few drawers, looking for something to clean up the mess with.

Not too long after, he came back with a blue and white towel and knelt down to start helping with the spillage. "If you guys want to clean yourselves up, there's about one hundred and one towels in there, kitchen roll too."

*

"You mean you haven't seen him anywhere?"

"No. I fuckin' told ya didn't I, I haven't seen him nowhere."

"Goddammit, what the hell Daryl?! How could we lose him like that?! It's just not- What if he's hurt? What if he's fucking dead?! What if that kid's dead because of this!?"

"Shut the fuck up for two fucking second will you?! I don't fucking know where he is but, fuck, it ain't gonna help yelling at me like this gimme I goddamn second."

Ten minutes. For ten minutes Dane hadn't stopped arguing with Daryl, first it was about Bella, then it was about Caleb...and then...well then they couldn't find the latter anywhere. They'd lost him, hadn't heard of anyone who had seen him, no one on the boats at least. Dane was getting more stressed by the second, Caleb was missing and he couldn't even look.

"Look." The man awkwardly positioned on a bed opposite Jackson sighed, "We can't have left him behind...it just wouldn't...I can't..."

"Fuck." Daryl let out a shaky breath, turning around, this...couldn't be happening. "I'll check with Aaron, yeah? He was driving that copter, maybe he saw something... There's a lotta people here, just get a fucking grip." With that the man exited the room, slamming the door behind him in an annoyed fashion.

"Mmn..." In the corner of the enclosed space a small, shaking bundle sat with their knees to their chest and their head tucked in. All of the shouting was giving them a headache...

Loud noises weren't good. Adrian hated loud noises... Why did they have to shout like that? He didn't get it, he just didn't get it, they didn't need to yell, they could stop, stop yelling, stop yelling! Stop!

Becoming more and more stressed out by the noises around him, he retreated into his own mind to try and block them out, but that wasn't much better. Where were they anyway? Smelt like Jackson...or...family...but where was his family? Was Leo here? Was Leo coming back? He didn't like all of this. It hurt too much to think so much. Could that stop? How did he stop thinking? Not thinking would be nice...but...it just wasn't happening...

Adrian was working himself up, causing himself to become stressed and annoyed, but he didn't show it in quite the natural way. Instead he just dug his nails into his leg, bit the inside of his cheek, and stayed quiet. You never made noise because that gave them what they wanted... Exactly what they wanted.

*

Honestly, the last thing that Lorn expected to see that day was something as...strange as what he just did. He'd come out here to get some peace, but it seemed you couldn't get away from people no matter where you went. What a nuisance. At least this made things a little more...interesting.

The boy's eyes were glued to the scene as he was forced into a stunned silence, he watched the two notice him, he watched the man run for his life, and then he watched the girl walk up to him and kick him in the forehead.

That woke him up a bit.

In a split second, Lorn had turned his falling over the wall into a rather skilful backwards walkover. He landed on his feet on the other side of the low bricks, an eyebrow raised and a surprised grin on his face, cigarette still positioned between him teeth.

"Whoa, calm it chick, I ain't staring, you came into my line of sight, not the other way around." He grunted, grabbing the cigarette in his mouth and dropping it to the concrete below. It wasn't that important anyway.

The girl in front of him definitely wasn't English, American accent, dark skin, dark hair, probably mixed race of some sort, couldn't have been older than eighteen. She was pretty, but...angry...and also naked.

"Yo." Tipping his head up slightly, he slipped the jacket he was wearing off of his shoulders, revealing the black bandages running up both of his forearms, before throwing it over the wall to land with a thud in front of the female. "Your little...friend's...gone right? Doubt he's coming back," He walked forwards, placing a hand onto the low brick and jumping the wall in one swift movement, "Take it or I guess I'll just keep staring."

Lorn looked down, fiddling with something small in between his fingers. He couldn't help the grin on his face, this was might amusing for him, but most likely extremely awkward for that girl... Not that he was really bothered about that. "Can't you guys choose a better alleyway to get it on in next time? I was having a decent time being all edgy if you couldn't tell."

He kept looking up from the item in his hands, examining this female. Something just didn't add up. She reminded him of someone, someone recent, someone new. It was the foreign accent, yeah, but not just that, the skin tone, the look. It couldn't just be some coincidence. Though, instead of discussing that with her he kept his mouth shut for a little while, keep your cards close to your chest and all.
 
"Thank you very much, Mister," Zebedee said, voice muffled behind a hand as he wiped his chapped lips dry. Coffee trickled through the cracks in the tiles. It wound itself into a little river, meandering towards the open doorway whilst Harrison worked on mopping up the source. The brown of it was staining the floor. Zebedee thought that it looked quite pretty in the way that it left marks behind it like a long, watery footprint - oh, or maybe it was more like a snail trail... It was a very interesting pattern and it didn't always flow in a straight direction, after all.

Something suddenly came into the man's line of sight and stopped the coffee in its tracks. It was a sock. Actually, it was a sock with a foot inside of it, but that was beside the point because now the sock was all wet and dirty. Harrison hadn't cleaned up in time to stop Sethe from stepping on the mess.

"My God's sake," the sock's owner hissed. She shook her foot violently, but none of the water came out. "Neik. Who did this?"

"Hi, Mom!" said Zebedee. He stumbled to unsteady feet spaced out around Harrison's body, awkwardly avoiding falling atop the man by grabbing at his seat with one arm whilst the other reached out. Not for the first time, he was forced to watch the old woman turn up her nose at him and carry on regardless towards the front of the room.

She paused halfway and pressed her coffee-soaked foot down against Harrison's back. "Get down for a moment," she commanded. But the words were not for the person she was stepping on; her eyes were fixed on Gloria.

"What?"

"Down."

"What's going on?" Zebedee chimed in, "Mom, what's-"

He was cut off as Gloria took his hand suddenly and pulled him back into his chair. She had bowed below the table suddenly, and not because Sethe was threatening to hit them to the ground with the raised arm. Her hand wrapped tightly around Zebedee's, she shushed him with a finger over his lips and waited for him to lean down as well.

There was a moment of silence. Sethe tip-toed to the window at the front of the room, twisted it open and leaned outside.

After a while of painful nothingness, Zebedee licked his lips and whispered, "Why are we hiding?"

"No reason, son," Gloria assured him. She had taken over Sethe's job and put a foot against Harrison's back, and every few seconds she dipped her head downwards to check on him. She kept him in check whilst the old woman leaned out of the window, still but for her eyes, which flitted from left to right and occasionally settled on something lower down.

Then, suddenly, she yelled. "Augh! Aughahaha! Ha!" It was a painfully loud noise, followed by a sudden flash of hard, white light from somewhere just out of sight. The acuteness of it all made Zebedee yelp in distress like the dog rummaging around by his legs. It started off barking, over and over, not stopping until Sethe slammed the window shut again. Zebedee had to bury his head in his knees to block out the noise. His ears... They hurt. His whole head was still ringing even after it became quiet again.

Sethe clapped her hands together. "Up," she said. "Clean up this mess, and then one of you get upstairs and help me to tidy the other bedrooms - they are horrendous. Full of bed bugs."

*

"...You'd think Daryl could st-stop screaming for one second," Jackson groaned. His head hurt like hell, but he could not resist the temptation to stare at Dane through the gaps between his fingers. "Fuck's sake. Can't he see he's upset Adrian now? Shit..."

He knew that he was being unreasonable; Daryl had a point. So did Dane. Nobody had seen or even heard any sign of Caleb since God-knows-when, and these people had a right to be freaking out. The kid could have been anywhere. In a cell. Dead. Left to rot somewhere with his guts spilling from his belly. Maybe Jackson should have been freaking out about that too, shaking, crying into a pillow or something. But he had already cried himself dry, and with so many things swirling around inside his head, it felt almost like nothing at all.

First sign of a broken man. Hah... He was so screwed.

"C'mere, Adrian. S-sit up here, it's okay," he croaked past his heaving chest. With one weakened hand, he patted at the dusty bedding wrapped around his two shattered legs. Thank God they were numb.

Caleb... Nothing could keep the boy out of mind now. Not after that ordeal which had pretty much made everyone's ears burst and bleed. He had to be out there somewhere, but... What were the odds? Even if he was alive, there was barely a scrap of a chance that anyone would ever find him.

He was gone. And he wasn't coming back.

"Dane?" the man started. "I'm... Fuck... I- I'm s-sorry. I fucked up, man, I fucked up and l-lost him. I didn't mean it... B-but I know it's my fault he's gone and I am so goddamn sorry. He's gone. I lost Caleb and he's gone and I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..."

*

It was far too little, too late for modesty now. Fine. The kid had seen everything. He wasn't the first and there was no way in hell that he was going to be the last to see everything either, so whatever. It was fine. He was just asking to have his neck broken, but apart from that, everything was perfect.

"That wasn't a friend. That was an asshole," the American girl corrected, her voice a bit too loud for the level of secrecy she had been trying to keep just moments ago. Her eyes had turned thin and sour, but they lingered on Lorn's hand despite her head turning quickly away. She shivered. One hand was cupped protectively over her most sensitive areas. Then, as she quickly snatched the jacket out of the boy's hand, she told him, "And I don't want your stupid charity, by the way." 'My clothes are that way,' she added on silently afterwards.

It took her barely a second to throw the garment on. With one well-practiced swoop, she twisted her arms through the sleeves, zipped the front closed over her chest and sat down with her knees up so that she was covered from her shoulders to her ankles. No more staring for anyone. He could unsee that or risk losing those oh-so-pretty blue eyes of his.

But he wasn't unseeing anything, was he? He was just standing there, with that creepy look on his face. The little prick. He jumps away from her kick, shoves some ugly vest at her and then holds out his ugly bandaged arms for something in return. That's what he was after, wasn't it? Nobody likes a freeloader.

They had been too silent for too long, so the girl finally started with, "Well? I ain't got all day. If you want something then hurry the hell up and spit it out or get back to your mom and dad. I've got people I need to feed with fuck-all cash and a stupid coat... Oh, I am so gonna kill that shithead later."
 
"You're actually considering it, aren't you?"

Two figures stood atop a roof, looking down on a certain house below, one in front of the other. They looked to be comtemplating something, but it was unlikely anyone saw them anyway...not from where they were standing.

"I-I..." The person at the front looked down, rubbing their arm awkwardly, obviously uncomfortable with the situation.

"After everything I've said..." Sighing, the person as the back moved, turning away from the building their companion was longingly staring at and moving to look out to the sea.

"I...I know...I just...I-I d-don't think I-"

"Don't tell me you can't. You want this as much as I do. You've told yourself for too long you don't, but pushing down how you truly feel isn't going to make it go away. You know we can end this." Neither looked at the other as they spoke, one looked uncomfortable, the other didn't need to to get their point across.

"I..." There was no valid argument, they knew that...it was futile.

"You go back there and you'll regret missing this opportunity. Living your life in fear isn't really living is it?" Finally turning around again, the silhouette faced towards the sea walked back to the other, tapping their chin and tipping their head up slightly so the two were finally forced to look at each other. "You haven't lived for years."

There was a silence, a silence where the two of them just stared and did nothing, they just took it in. Then finally the same person spoke again.

"It's yours if you want it, we'll get rid of them both."

"H-...How?"

"There's always a way."

"But..." Again, one moved to the edge of the rooftop to look down at the house from before, "I-I...need him."

"Give it up. He has her. We're about to start the beginning of the end. You don't need him and he doesn't need you."

*

"It's okay." Harrison gave Zeb a slight smile as he continued to clean up the mess caused by the seemingly weak male. Although he didn't get very long to clean all of it up before someone else was complaining. The one woman they probably didn't want to see at this moment, Sethe.

She was quite the personality, and she showed it just as much as ever as she walked over to talk about the spill. However, he didn't expect to suddenly feel a foot on his back keeping him in place.

At first Harrison was confused, although he didn't say anything, but as everyone froze and got down he started to realise that Sethe wasn't doing that for effect. There was something there...something that needed their full attention.

Frozen up, he attempted to listen, but...didn't hear anything useful... Apart from that little click, but that could have been his tongue, and then there was the laughing, which startled him more than anyone else in the room by the looks of things.

False alarm hopefully, Sethe seemed to find the situation pretty funny so it had to be. Scaring them for nothing... Wow...

"Well..." Harrison sat back on his knees, "That was...interesting."

*

"Yeah...well I'm not sure he knows any other way to communicate." Dane muttered, refusing to look in Jackson's direction. They were both so useless right now...what the hell was the point? He should have been out there looking for Caleb, trying to help the kid, this wasn't his fault.

All it ever seemed to be for Jackson was Adrian Adrian Adrian, he put people's lives on the line for that guy...but they stupidly went along with it. So...they were just as bad as he was, they were just as responsible for all those deaths and all of the injuries and Dane knew that. He just wished he didn't, and he just wished Jackson wouldn't wallow in self pity all the time.

"Yeah, I know he is." The man snapped rather suddenly, "No need to remind me thirty times in one sentence. Can't you just shut up for one minute?" Finally, Dane looked into Jackson's direction, his expression hard and annoyed. "If I hadn't gone he wouldn't have, he knew it was a bad idea, he did it for me." There was a pause as Dane took in his own words, but then he swallowed and continued, "You have a hell lot of explaining to do to a hell lot of people and some of them are going to hate your guts. Why you were even allowed to do this I don't know. It was dumb, people have died, Bella almost fucking paid for your mistake, fucking Bella, Jackson. If she'd died..." Feeling himself getting more het up by the second, Dane stopped himself and shook his head, "Y'know, it doesn't matter. Just don't lose that kid again. Because next time I'm not following you into that shit."


*

"Well, I dunno." Lorn shrugged, putting his hands in his pockets, "You seemed pretty friendly with him." After that he looked up to the sky and whilstled innocently, as if pretending he hadn't understood any of what he'd seen before, even though he clearly had. "But whatever."

He kicked his foot along the floor for a moment, then looked towards the girl again, "Oh and it's not charity, I don't give to charity, that's too selfless." With another grunt, the boy turned on his heel and picked up the box of cigarettes he'd placed on the wall before this little meeting. He threw them up in the air, catching them seconds later, and continued doing so. It was something to do.

This girl was intriguing, there was no way he could let her go without at least checking whether his theories were right. Everything about her fit too perfectly in place, it would make sense, MORE than sense, for him to be right. So why not find out? Not like it could hurt.

"You're awfully pissy arn't'cha? Lighten up chick, you've got nowhere to be anyway." He sighed, catching the box again and holding it still in his hand for a moment, "Your 'people' are already being fed. Or...should I say person." Raising an eyebrow, Lorn grinned and put the cigarettes back into his pocket. "I mean...I suppose animals count, but you probably don't feed that little biting shit much anyway." He leaned back, sitting against the wall, "I always wanted a dog when I was younger. Don't see how someone like that could be more responsible than me." Lorn returned his gaze to the girl on the ground and rolled his eyes, "Parents are a pain, don't you agree? They never approve of anything you do."
 
The threat of the lightning flash had disappeared, as had the strange presence looming just out of sight. Zebedee dared to raise his head above the shelter of the table once more. With him came the wary, wild glare of Gloria's wide eyes. Nobody said another word - not for several seconds, at least. But that was before Sethe came back and shoved Harrison back to the ground with her foot. "Actually, it is a nuiscance," she corrected him, her coffee-stained toes grinding into the man's back. "Also known as a human. One with an irritatingly large nose..."

"What the hell's a human doing here?" Gloria shuddered. She held Zebedee's hand between both of hers and didn't notice the way he tried to tug away. As far as anybody knew, Aaron and Jackson were the only humans in the immediate vicinity. There should not have been more than two - if there were any more, it could only mean... "Wait. They're not-"

"Investigators? No."

"Then who?"

There was a short pause. Sethe finally released Harrison, but only so that she could spin on her heel to thrust an arm towards the window. Somehow the backlight made all of the wrinkles on her face look twice as dark, twice as sharp. "Paparazzi!"

Cautiously, Zebedee said into Gloria's ear, "What does 'paparazzi' mean?"

"Cameras, son," said Gloria. She made a point by clapping her hands together over his knee and looking him directly in the eyes. "People with cameras."

"Oh! You mean the girl with the long hair!"

Sethe had to catch herself before she could turn around and make cursed eye contact with the man who called himself her son. Slowly, she removed her hand from the window and let it drop back by her side. Something had piqued her interest, and now her ears were open.

Zebedee carried on, "That's her, right? I saw her. She followed us all the way back from the beach. I even waved at her and she took my picture, she seems pretty nice."

*

Dane was right. It hurt even to think about it, and that wasn't because of the sickening headache drilling at his skull. The ghouls whom Jackson had left behind weren't just faceless familiars - they were people, like Bella and Caleb and everyone else he had so selfishly shepherded into battle. Where were they now? Dead, dying? They all knew whose fault it was.

"Yeah," said Jackson, and then he stopped because he couldn't produce another sound in that moment. He took too long to continue. "I - I know. They can hate me if they want. You too. After all, I messed up again... Again and again, like some kind of goddamn idiot. B-but there isn't going to be a next time, Dane. Alright? I - I'll m-make sure of it. Nobody's ever gonna have to follow me again, and you know why, it's 'cause I'll be dead before the doves come knocking."

*

"Shut up, wise-ass, you're startin' to piss me off," warned the girl through her dazzlingly white teeth. She was shaking now, and not just with the cold. This uncultured little shit kept calling her 'chick'. That made her angry. Not that he knew her name, but he could at least pretend that he knew how to treat a lady and ask for it.

For a moment, she considered just telling him. But that wouldn't look particularly good. She didn't feel great in this disgusting, obviously stolen jacket, either. Maybe she would just take it off and get her clothes back from the next alley along... Yeah. That would be better. This thing stank of human, and she didn't like the brand of perfume spritzed all over it, either.

The girl stood up, keeping her hands on the bottom of the coat to cover as much of herself as possible. 'Stay,' she mouthed. But she didn't even get a chance to turn around before she heard something that made her entire body freeze.

'Your 'people' are already being fed. Or...should I say person.'

"Wh..." With no choice or room for interruption, the girl could only watch the little smoker and listen to his strange words. Her gaze fixed on the box that he kept tossing up in the air, just so that she wouldn't have to look at his eyes. But she would have to look eventually, because how else could she know if he was telling her the truth?

The dog.

This kid knew about that little rat of a dog. He had it somewhere, and that meant... Zebedee didn't go anywhere without that thing...

"The hell... Wait up, what the hell are you tryin' to say?" Forgetting about modesty once more, the girl broke free of her frozen state and advanced upon Lorn, one menacing, bare-foot step at a time. She kicked at the air as a warning, and then she kicked him in the shin, the stomach, and at one point she even aimed for his throat. "Hey, are you listening? Answer me already! What the fuck did you do? Where's Dee!?"
 
"Oof." Harrison sighed, cringing as he felt a foot on his back. Someone was back in the room. Sethe was talking about something to do with humans now, and despite being done with the floor, Harrison couldn't really move himself away from it. Interrupting this woman seemed like a very bad idea.

A human taking photos...that sounded...bad. If those pictures got out...well...they could all be screwed. "What do you think that's...about?" He asked, pushing lightly against Sethe's foot as if to indicate he wanted to get up. A girl following them around? Why was she so interested? These people were definitely a mess, and he didn't really want to get involved in something that was going to cause too many problems.

*

"Oh Jackson, shut up." Dane spat, sighing out of annoyance, "Listen to yourself! Stop wallowing in your own self pity you bloody idiot, sometimes I wonder if you actually think before you open your mouth." He furrowed his eyebrows in something between disappointment and disgust. Jackson was being pathetic, and he didn't want to listen to the guy, but he wasn't going to let him go on like this.

"I think you need to watch what you're saying." Looking over to the boy in the corner of the room he nodded, "You better hope he doesn't understand what just came out of your goddamn mouth. You have no right to die. What? You think it's just gonna be that easy? We're already in this deep, these things don't just go away Jackson. You have no right to take the easy way out whilst all of us have to deal with your fucking mess." He closed his eyes for a moment to calm down, if he could have moved... "And how selfish, how goddamn selfish do you have to be? You have responsibilities now. That kid for one, he's your responsibility, not anyone else's, and you're saying you're gonna be dead when the doves come knocking?" The man grunted, "What a selfish thing to say. I wish he didn't need you, I wish half of us didn't need you, but we do, so don't even fucking think about it you bastard."

*

"You think this is annoying?" Lorn held in a laugh, "Oh you got a hell lot to learn." That cocky grin of his would never leave, he was having fun messing with her, watching this girl get angry for the slightest reason was unbelievably entertaining. Why? He could really be sure, maybe it was just watching those pretty features of her's scrunch up whenever he spoke.

That change in her stance and facial expression when he mentioned the man from earlier that day confirmed his theories, she did know him, there was no doubting it.

As that foot came speeding towards him, Lorn moved his arms in front of the targeted areas, smacking her away. "Oi, why don't you-" Although when she targeted his throat he was quick enough to grab hold of that ankle of her's whilst pushing himself forwards. "I wouldn't do that if I were you." The boy shook his head, still grinning as if he had the upper edge.

"See." He took a step forwards, raising her leg, "I don't know how you negotiate, but it certainly isn't like this." Practically throwing her leg to the side, he walked around her, placing his hands behind his back. "'Dee.'" He repeated the word, letting it roll off his tongue, "Hm."

Lorn wasn't looking at anything in particular, he just wasn't looking at his new acquaintance. That's how he liked things, playing with people's emotions was what he did best. "He's fine. Calm down. In fact..." Spinning on his heels, he pointed a finger at the girl, "You should thank me, had a rather nasty fall at the hands of a rather strong woman, we could have left him there, but we didn't." He shrugged, waving her off with a hand, "You're too confrontational. You should be glad I'm not anyone else, he could have been hurt because of you."
 
"Whatever she's doing can't be good," added Gloria. "Photographers at the window... We probably have a thousand and one people after us at the moment and they've seen our faces. Sethe, do you think that girl knows who you are?"

"She will if she is worth half as much as that camera," the old woman grumbled. "My face makes investigators cry for their mothers - I would like to think that I am famous."

Gloria parted her hands from Zebedee's to stroke at the soft, white skin on her own face. "Yes, I remember... They were all afraid of you. Deathly. So I don't understand why she wouldn't be as well - stick her head in for a picture with the Magpie and run off la-... Was she laughing? Where did she go?"

"Curses!" Sethe was gone as quickly as she had come in. She materialised at the other end of the kitchen, head dipping forwards to peer out through the sealed glass. There was no longer any sign of a strange photographer girl but the stale, lingering scent of her disgustingly cheap perfume.

"I think she ran away," said Zebedee. Nobody really heard him; Gloria wrung her hands together and stared blankly past her nose, lost in feverish thought, whilst Sethe paced up and down on her tip-toes.

The girl was gone. She had a photo... A photo of a ridiculous facial expression, no doubt, but it was a face. Faces could be proof. They had two options here: find and capture the girl, or retrieve the memory card she carried.

For once, it was not a foot pressing down on Harrison's back but a hand. Sethe grasped the collar of the man's shirt and yanked him up to eye level for easy conversation. Still holding him up in the air, the old woman said, "You look like a brave, strong young gentleman. Why don't you go outside and bring this lady back to us, hmm?"

*

For once, Jackson had nothing left to say - well, not through his mouth, anyway. His hands had plenty of retort in them. They clenched so hard that they almost cracked, and then they found every nearby object and threw it across the room at Dane's face with all of the force that the man could still muster. First it was a pair of glasses, newly cleaned but still somewhat scratched and smeared. Then it was a broken watch. A lamp. A set of neatly-folded clothes that Sethe had found in a wardrobe somewhere. He might as well have drowned Dane in domestic weapons, but only about half of the shots hit their mark.

"Don't," he puffed finally, when he had run out of things he could reach. "Don't remind me. I already know it. Yeah, okay, you're right. Adrian's my responsibility. And look at what a great fucking job I did."

An empty hand went out to gesture to the child-like half-ghoul sitting somewhere close by.

"I tried to save this kid from getting turned into a goddamn testing animal, and what happened? Zeplin, Dane. And the CCG. Adrian has been through more shit than you can even fathom, 'cause of me, and y-you still trust me to look after him? The hell is wrong with you!?" There was a quick pause. Jackson glanced down, missing the glasses that he had torn from his own face. He needed to pull the rim down to cover his furious, twitchy eyes. "I'm the polar opposite of what he needs. You keep me alive and he's just going to end up dead. Bella won't be any better off. You're not going to find Caleb. As soon as you can walk again, you get the hell away from me, give the kid to Leo and never look back."

Except that he knew he wouldn't be able to allow that.

'Selfish'. "Don't you dare call me selfish." But it was true. Jackson knew what would happen if he stayed by Adrian's side. He would lose him again, to something worse than either of them had encountered before, and he would keep losing him and killing more people to get him back until there was nobody left but the two of them together. And he would unquestionably take that over passing Adrian to somebody else.

Adrian was Jackson's little brother now. Not Leo's and not anybody else's. If it was destined to be the two of them against the world, then so be it.

*

The girl could not contain a shriek of horror as Lorn lifted up her leg. She fought against his unexpectedly strong grip, wrestling to get her foot on the ground again with a strange, frantic desperation. Creepy little pervert. He came here to boast about taking Zebedee away from her, and then he got all handsy? No... No, no, no. This was so wrong but he had her trapped. Oh, he was doing this on purpose! What was this guy's problem!? She couldn't just walk away from this.

This wasn't fair.

"A... Fall?" Her mouth suddenly became very dry. She licked her lips a few times and stared at Lorn, her eyebrows arched in what looked like either fury or total horror. "I know what you're trying to do. And now you're really pissing me off. Take. Me. Take me to wherever you're holding him or I'll release my kagune and tear your lungs out of your chest."
 
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Becoming quite accustomed to the ground, Harrison couldn't say he much enjoyed being ripped from it by the demanding Sethe. Nor could he say that when she suggested he went out to look for the girl that he didn't cringe. He didn't seem too keen on the idea of following her at all... If fact, he'd love to he anything but that.

"Uh." Bringing his hands together and messing with his fingers, the man made an attempt to come up with some kind of excuse, but he was failing to find a decent one. Disagreeing with that woman at all sounded like a bad idea anyway.

"Does anyone know the direction she went?"

*
"Jackson...Jackson...JACKSON!" Dane was becoming increasingly more pissed off with this man's actions and words. Did he not get it? He didn't understand anything did he? Maybe he was simply still a kid as well, a spoilt brat that didn't understand that not everything could go his way all of the time, brought up in privilege so he'd never experienced something so horrid before. He didn't understand what it was like to lose because when he lost he'd put anything in danger to get what was rightfully his back. Could cost him the whole world, but Dane knew Jackson would kill everyone in that house ten times over for that one kid.

He didn't know if he felt hatred or respect. Maybe it was a bit of both.

"Stop throwing a goddamn temper tantrum and listen to yourself you pathetic excuse of an adult." The man spat, "I WILL get Caleb back, because you nor anyone else have any fucking idea where he is, for all you know he could be absolutely fine." A part of Dane knew that is was very unlikely Caleb would be okay, he was fragile, and that place was the worst for him...but...the more he focused on that the more he wanted to punch in Jackson's skull. If only he could walk...

"Don't call you selfish?!" He almost laughed at the comment, "You see pretty damn selfish to me, all it ever is with you is me me me. You don't think about others you fucking batshit insane dimwit. Come back when you found the other half of your brain, yeah? Please... You're the most self-orientated person I've met! You didn't care about anyone else when you went and sacrificed their lives, psh, you probably still don't, so fuck off with your goddamn complaining and whining. You have no right!"

"Shouting hurts." Adrian had somehow found his way up to the side of Jackson's bed and now hand his hands over his ears, eyes closed. He shook his head, laying it down on top of Jackson's legs and sighing rather dramatically. "I don't like it..."

Even Dane seemed to settle a little after hearing Adrian, he seemed tired...but who could blame him, Jackson wasn't wrong when he'd said the kid had been through hell. He really was just a child, it really wasn't his fault.

"Where're you going Jackson?" With everything finally silent, Adrian spoke up again, keeping his hands over his ears. Hearing through them wasn't a problem, "Can I come?" He didn't look at the man, or even open his eyes, he just spoke quietly, staying laid down.



*
"Oi oi." Lorn grinned, opening up his arms and slapping his chest twice with one hand, "Go on then." He challenged, hopping backwards, "You won't." The boy wasn't at all worried by her threat, it was empty, pointless. She wasn't going to go through with anything she said, so why did he need to be wary? He could play this cocky because he simply didn't believe a word she said, she was just bitter and angry. Then again...he was egging her on more than a little.

Without giving the girl much time to react or reply, his stance changed and he stepped one foot in front of the other, pointing an arm out towards her and dusting his shirt off with the other hand. "And let me tell you why." Dropping his arms, he walked towards her, circling her almost, confident and calm blue eyes locked onto her brown. "You and I both know if I die you're left with no lead," He sniggered, "Which would be a shame, considering there's no one else around here who can tell you where your friend is." Turning on his heel, he broke eye contact and put his back to the older teen, "Waste of good innards as well, at least find a cannibal to eat me first." Now he was just being cruel, avoiding her questions, babbling information...but he couldn't help it, it was too amusing. "I don't see why I should do anything for you when you speak like that. So like, if you'd stop being a bitch to me that'd be much appreciated."
 
Zebedee stumbled so quickly to his feet that his chair almost fell down with him, but Gloria's reflexes saved them both from an unpleasant meeting with the ground. She held him up by the wrist with a sturdy arm. He managed a spry sideways grin at Harrison.

"Whoa, hold on for a second. Where do you think you're going, champ?" said Gloria, one brow raised in a stiff arch. Her fingers tightened as the man tried to tug his hand from her grip. Still the smile lingered on his too-smooth face, and Sethe insisted on watching only with her head turned slightly away. She snorted at her son's feeble attempts, but let Harrison's body muffle the noise.

A sudden lurch and Zebedee was finally free. He swivelled around on his backside to lean in to Gloria and announce, "Just outside, it's nowhere dangerous or anything!"

"You mean you saw where the girl went?"

"No," he said. "I heard all of her little footsteps. They went forwards for a bit and then they went left, to the garden. I was just going to show Harrison the way."

Sethe opened up her hand and dropped Harrison down on the ground. She clapped the dirt off her hands, her grimace deepening as she watched the specks of dust flake away. This house was horrendously filthy.

Though the man resisted, Gloria reached out and took Zebedee's hands again - both of them this time - and met his eyes with a stern glare. "Really? Oh, I don't know about that..."

"I can walk!"

"I know, I know, but maybe it would be better for you to stay put. Sethe, I'll go with Harrison. Sound like a good idea, Kiwi?"

Sethe pursed her lips. "He will manage. If you get in trouble, whistle and I will bail you out. Now go."

"Great," said Gloria. Once more, she let go of Zebedee and stood to the open door. She prodded Harrison in the small of his back. "Come on, son. We're only going to the garden, let's move."

*

Jackson's knuckles groaned with strain. They shook and trembled, blood seething beneath hot red skin. There was nothing left to throw unless he was willing to punch out his own teeth, and with this level of uncalming rage, he was scarily close to making that decision.

"Shut up, Dane, nobody wants to hear you yelling," the man finally said. His voice was unsettlingly quiet compared to the furious shouting from before, like they had finally hit the eye of the storm. It took every effort to reach for Adrian's shoulders and provide the boy with a calming touch. 'There, there.' That kind of thing. "No, Adrian, I'm not going anywhere. It's okay. Sleep if you want to, it... Ugh, Dane. L-look, you're making-... Actually, no. What was it you just said to me again? S-something about not having a right to complain, well, why don't you open your eyes for once and look at who you're talking to?"

Adrian was on his legs now. Good. That had to be more comfortable than the floor, poor kid, and Dane's shouts weren't helping. It must take a long time to get used to sensitive ears. Jackson brushed at the boy's hair briefly.

"Dane, did you hear that or were you too busy screaming? He said he doesn't like the noise. And before you go and call me selfish again for... C-complaining, or whatever, don't. You ever notice how noise is the only thing Adrian complains about? Because you do not know the half of the shit that he has survived and he does not say one damn word about it. Ever. And if he isn't gonna ask other people for help then I'm the guy who has to do it for him, because apparently I'm the only person around here who gives a crap!" Too loud. He steeled himself to lower his voice. "...W-well, me and Leo, anyway.

"A-and anyway, good people died to save Adrian. By choice. And the moment you tell me to shut up is the moment you make their sacrifices worthless, because I can't take care of this kid forever and without some kind of intervention, he is not gonna survive. And guess what? Unlike you, I don't have freak healing powers! I am not getting up and kicking Leo into shape by myself anytime soon, so... Look, this - this complaining - is all I can do for anyone, ever. Don't you ever call me selfish again, ghoul."

There was supposed to be silence following that long-winded outburst. Jackson wanted that to sink in - it was the last argument he had left in him. Any more and he was sure he would burst with rage or melt into the bed like the soft pile of shit he was. But of course, he was not allowed the sweet release of an empty head for more than a couple of seconds.

The door handle flicked downwards momentarily, and soon came a quick, muffled, "Open, darn it!"

Jackson squinted at the door. There was a sudden heave, and it opened just a crack. The handle clicked again, and something slammed into the heavy wood. Someone was there, trying to come in. And a few seconds later, that someone had managed to ram it open with their full body weight.

Zebedee tumbled to the carpet inside the room, then quickly scrambled to untangle the knot of bony limbs he had left himself in. It took a while for him to stand and wave, leaning once more on that branch-looking cane. "Uh... Hey, guys!" he said in that soft American accent. "I was just in the kitchen a second ago, but I heard all the ruckus and came to look. Are y'all watching TV?"

*

"I hate children," the girl muttered beneath her breath as she endured Lorn's speech. Oh, but this boy was no child, was he? She knew that. She knew it and she hated it because he had taken her for a fool - and right now, a fool she was. This Lorn had her wrapped around his little finger, pretending that she could bite if she wanted to when they both knew she had no teeth.

All bark and no bite - in this case, almost literally.

Eventually, she straightened that jacket which was still covering far too little of her well-rounded body. Not for the first time, she tugged down at the hem to stretch it longer. "And I don't see why I should trust you," she lied. "Some pervy British boy who knows who I am? Dude, you're creeping me out to the next level! I swear if you've done anything to Dee, I'll... I..."

I'll nothing, she thought.

This kid was right. She hated his guts - his weird, delicious innards or whatever crazy cannibal talk he was going on about - and she hated them hard. Ugh, cannibals. That word made her stomach gurgle for all the wrong reasons, and suddenly she wanted to be sick. But that was beside the point - she hated him! He just... Oh, he had this all the way he wanted it and boy did he know it. This had to be some kind of abuse. She would make a note to kill him in his sleep if she survived the day.

"Just... Shut up. I'll go to your cabin in the woods, just let me get my clothes." With another tug of the jacket, the girl crossed her arms and tip-toed back around the corner where a little pile of thin garments lay. "And I've got the CCG on call, so don't try anything. I'm getting my friend and then leaving, capiche?"
 
"Uh, yeah." Harrison nodded at Gloria's suggestion to come with him. He even seemed slightly relieved that she'd said something about it, obviously he didn't want to go alone.

Waiting for the others to finish, the man stumbled to his feet and looked around. They were only going to the garden? Why would this girl want to go out there of all places? Oh well...they'd see. "Right, I'm come." Turning away from Sethe and Zeb, Harrison went to follow after the older woman headed out to find the girl taking pictures on their property.

He just hoped this wasn't going to lead to something bigger. Or that they bumped into Diana.

*

Dane wanted to argue with Jackson further, but...he didn't know what to say. Sure, there was a lot he could say, but...it wasn't Jackson that was making him fall silent. It was that kid. The one that so desperately relied on that useless excuse of a man...because, as much as he didn't want to admit it, Jackson was right, he didn't know what Adrian had been through, he didn't know the half of it...and whilst he hadn't been around him long, he'd never heard him complain about any of it. Not even after coming back from Zeplin, the place Caleb had been deathly afraid of.

So, instead of making things worse, Dane gritted his teeth and bared it, turning his head away from the two so that he didn't have to look at Jackson's face. He was livid right now. He was upset. He wasn't thinking straight. All he needed was some time to calm down.

Then there was a click from the door...

"Mmnph." Adrian's head immediately shot up from Jackson's legs as he heard the sound of someone entering the room. The minute he didn't recognise them completely, he froze up, turning his head to the side, "Did someone let him in?" He mumbled, to no one in particular.

The boy had jumped up onto the end of Jackson's bed, making sure that at all times some part of himself was in contact with the man, especially as he got to the far edge to 'examine' Zeb. He was eyeing the man up, this was something new in his environment and he wasn't used to it.

"Hello."

*

It was hard to contain his laughter as this girl continued to speak. She hated children, well, look who was talking, and now she was calling him British? Oh wow... This really was comedy at its very finest. How could someone confuse an Australian accent for a British one? Had she been living under a rock or something?

"British boy. Sure." He scoffed, "And you're calling me creepy?" Lorn couldn't help but raise an eyebrow, finally letting out a laugh and slapping his leg, "Isn't Texas that state where everyone like fucks their siblings or something?" With a wave of a hand, he turned back around and walked over to the low wall, hanging over it and grabbing something from the floor on the other side. Shouldn't forget that. "But whatever, I'm the creepy one."

Once he stood back up, the girl had already moved away to grab what she wanted. He put the item in his hands in his pocket, then crossed his arms, calling over to her. "And I mean, I never invited you to my cabin in the woods, but if you insist." He shrugged, casually making his way to the edge of the alley to make sure no one was around.

It would have stayed like that if she hadn't said something rather...interesting. Really? A threat? A smug smirk crossed Lorn's lips as he turned his head to look towards the girl's voice, "Alright," He started, speaking as if she'd simply proposed lunch, "You do that. But I won't be the one they find...capiche?"
 
"Ya do realise, this would go a lot faster if you stood on your tip-toes."

"I don't have tip-toes, idiot. You wanna go fast, make someone else do it."

Gloria whipped an arm up to the side, barring Harrison's path. She could hear voices coming from around the corner, but that was hardly a surprise... They were loud, carelessly so. It almost hurt to hear so many grunts and gripes - by her sore ears, the woman counted at least three squabbling humans, words folded over one another by the echo of the stone garden wall. She tensed up and kept more still than she really needed to.

"Can't," the first voice sang. It sounded like a girl. "Ryan's setting up shop in the square, won't be back 'til he gets hungry."

A third person butted in, "That could take a whole five minutes."

"Mate," said the second one. It sounded like it was aimed at the third. Gloria bit her cheek and grabbed Harrison's shoulder for good measure - there was no risking a sudden movement now, God, they were barely inches out of sight. "You are literally standing there doing nothing. Take over for a sec, my skinny noodle arms are tired."

"What noodles? I'm only seeing the guns you were flashing at those underage girls about an hour ago."

"Ooohh, like a boss, M!"

"Seriously, I actually think I'm gonna-"

Their conversation was interrupted by a heavy, abrupt thud. Behind the wall, Gloria thought she caught a flash of an arm, or leg, or some sort of soft, fleshy limb. Whatever it was quickly whipped itself out of sight again just in time for the female to release a steady groan.

'Back up a little,' the Irish woman mouthed to the man behind her. But it was apparently too late for that; one of the humans heaved an enormous sigh and suggested, "Take five, anyone?" Then, following some grunts of mutual agreement, a face rounded the corner.

Judging by the scream he made, it was undoubtedly the second human. He had a pale face, blue eyes and ruby-coloured hair sticking out in pointed clumps where it wasn't covered up by a black beanie. His lean shape scrabbled against the floor as he struggled to keep his balance despite the shock of coming face to face with Gloria.

The female human slid into view. Like before, she had a bulky camera sack slung against her wiry form. She sniggered at her comrade's panic from behind his back. "Really, Kermit? Wow. Hey, guess that makes us even for dropping me! Zing!"

"Shut up," said Kermit when he finally regained his footing. He finally forced himself to look Gloria in the eye, and then he traced his gaze over Harrison. "Well, uh, this is... Unexpected. Haha."

"No kidding," Gloria muttered beneath her breath. She definitely was not losing her cool inside her mind. No way. "Harrison, get out here, son. You hear anything I didn't?"

*

For a man who could barely hold up his own head, Zebedee was electrifyingly energetic upon meeting Jackson's gaze. He half-leapt, half-fell further into the room and landed slumped over the foot of Dane's bed, and stretched his face wide in an ear-to-ear grin. "No, guess what?" he prompted at Adrian. "I opened the door all by myself."

"Yeah, we can see that," Jackson muttered, despite the fact that he was struggling to see much at all without his glasses. He had to squint to make out Zebedee as he rolled around the bedroom with that lopsided, lagging gait and eyes too bright for his tired body. Maybe Jackson was still trying to decide whether to be shocked, relieved or angry about this intrusion.

The intruder did not seem to mind. Out of nowhere, he popped up by Dane's side and slapped a hand against the ghoul's palm. Then he did what was probably supposed to be a handshake, but it was more of a quick, weak hold than a shake. "My name's Zebedee, it's nice to meet you!"

Jackson visibly cringed as Zebedee tottered across the room to take his hand and do the exact same 'handshake' and, 'It's nice to meet you!' greeting. The man in the bed failed to make a noise in return.

Finally, Zebedee rolled down the bed to flash his smile at Adrian. "Hey!" he chirped, then reached out to grab the boy's hand for the obligatory greeting. "I'm Zebedee, what's your name? And how come you don't have a bed too? That doesn't look so comfy."

*

In retrospect, 'clothes' as the girl called them were almost useless. Those folds of silk and cotton piled on the ground had turned out to just be a black, skin-tight dress that didn't cover much more than the jacket had, plus a little handbag containing naught but a starved wallet. It was flattering in the least comfortable way. At least she had that jacket to tie around her waist for now.

"Okay, stop for a second. I need to ask you something," the girl said behind shrugged shoulders, breaking a minute-long silence. She kept trying to slump away from Lorn, ditch him somehow without being ditched. It wasn't working. She needed to follow him and it sucked. "I don't know what the hell you want from me, but I do not take you for some kind of dumbass. How did you learn about me an' my friend, exactly? Who - who told you? Nobody knows about us."
 
Harrison had hoped and prayed to every god and deity he knew of that they wouldn't see anything out in the garden, he didn't much feel like dealing with such things now, but of course his prayers were not answered.

Probably because gods didn't exist.

Three people. Before there had only been one, now there was three? An audible sign escaped the man before he was able to contain it. Really? Did they have to do this right now? He wanted to suggest going to get Sethe to help deal with it, but Gloria didn't seem to think that it was a clever idea they made any noise at all... So he stayed silently, simply listening to the conversation going on between the three that were far too close for comfort.

On Gloria's command, Harrison backed up to listen. What were they on about? It...almost sounded like they were trying to carry something? Or open something? He wasn't quite sure... The more he listened, the more obscure it got, after all who decides to take a break in someone else's back yard?

The take five wasn't even his biggest shock, he was startled by the young man that walked around the corner just as much as that man was startled by them. Harrison had jumped and taken a few steps back upon seeing a rather...'alternative' looking man appear in front of them. He, and his friends, had a very odd reaction to the two of them.

"Uh..." Stepping forwards again as Gloria spoke, Harrison swallowed and shook his head, "I...don't think so."

"Hey!" Another voice sounded from inside and a back door was forced open with obviously much more force than was needed, only proved by the loud slamming noise as it hit the wall. "The fuck is going on out here?"

A tall male with all too familiar green hair thrown to one side, stomped towards the scene, obviously more than a little irritated. His eyes landed on Harrison and Gloria first, the people he had seen before, and then they moved to the awkward male he'd taken an immediate disliking to.

"What the fuck?" Daryl scowled, stepping forwards with his arms crossed, "What? You guys having a goddamn party or some shit? Someone wanna explain this piss take to me?" Human. They smelt human... Which meant they were theirs. The fuck was going on?

*

"Uh. Yeah." Dane didn't quite know how to react to this scrawny male shaking his hand, or...trying to, so he simply nodded once and accepted it, watching the man move. He was awfully energetic for someone who looked to be older than Dane himself even, but...he supposed that wasn't a bad thing, it was good to keep high spirits. People in this house forgot that. He wasn't just a little baffled by this man's behaviour.

Everything seemed to be going fine, Jackson didn't pay much attention to the guy, but Jackson didn't like anyone these days anyway...and then there was Adrian...

The boy had been staring at this...Zebedee character like he was some kind of magical creature, only seen once in one hundred years or something. He kept following the man with his gaze, moving forwards, grabbing the bed sheets, and then sitting back again. Hesitating. It was like he wanted to interact, but wasn't quite sure how to...or wasn't quite sure if he was allowed to.

However, soon enough the man had come to him instead and reached for his hand with the same smile and polite greeting. Dane expected that to go down well, he'd expected the boy to just stare and nod, but...that didn't happen. Adrian didn't take well to it at all.

For the first second there was no reaction, the smaller of the two had frozen up like he was stuck in time, eyes glazing over for a moment, but...that didn't last long. In one single movement, Adrian had slapped Zebedee's hand away and set a foot flying into the man's chest, retracting it almost instantly after as he moved himself away.

Dane was stunned, but...he wasn't the only one. It took Adrian a second to realise what had happened, but when he did he'd dived forwards and grabbed the edge of the bed hanging off of it to look at the male he'd attacked.

"Oh." Those large grey eyes widened as he blinking, "Did that hurt?"


*

"Nobody." Lorn put the back of his hand to his mouth, "Sorry to disappoint you, but I think you'll find there are plenty of people who know about you two." He shook his head, putting his hand back in his pocket and ignoring her actual question, who cared about answering it, she was following wasn't she? That meant she wanted to come with him, even if she did seem to try to inch away every now and again. Paranoid much.

"Pft. I'm so dead." The words were mumbled to himself with a little laugh, "She's gonna murder me for this." Without so much as looking at his new companion, Lorn took the packet of cigarettes from his pocket and pulled one out again. He dropped back next to the American walking with him and dipped his hand into the pocket of the jacket he'd given her, pulling out the lighter he'd had hold of earlier, all within a few seconds. "You owe me," Pointing the cigarette at her for a moment and walking backwards, he grinned, "I was dead enough without your ass showing up, now I'm gonna be buried twelve feet under, nevermind six." He made a 'tsk' noise with his tongue, pulling on the bandages around his arms as he spun around again, "People are a fucking nuisance sometimes."
 
Kermit found that his nervous laughter ended up carrying on for just a bit too long. Oh boy, this wasn't good... He had gone and got himself stuck grinning sheepishly at all of the advancing strangers. Two by the wall, one seriously pissed off by the door, and a couple of useless idiots slapping their knees and laughing their asses off in the background.

"Aw, shit!" the girl wheezed and snorted, "You've done it now, man!"

"Okay, okay, whoa," Kermit said. He waved his hands desperately at Daryl, warding off those hostile tones. "Look, man. I know what this all looks like, but we're not doing anything shady here or anything. We can explain. Uh. Little back-up, guys?"

The third person, a round-bellied man with slick black hair, nodded with his hand on his chin. "We're breaking into this house."

"No, Malcolm, no we are not," Kermit corrected.

The girl interrupted, "Let's be real, Kerm, we kinda are."

"No! I mean... We were just... Checking out that window, y'know, see if we can find an old friend of ours. He lives here, maybe. That's all, I swear!"

After that, Gloria decided that she had had enough. Clearly these three were all morons, bumbling around in the garden and pulling some kind of trickery that none of them had any right to try. "Wait," she commanded Harrison, then flashed a quick hand signal at Daryl before advancing on Kermit and his many facial piercings.

"I'm not lying, I'm not-" Kermit defended himself until Gloria dared to flash her red eyes at him. "Whoahoa, oka-ay, she's a ghoul!"

"That's right. Are you going to tell us what the hell is going on now or not? We're waiting," Gloria prompted. She had to show the man her eyes again to make him squirm with discomfort. Apparently the girl behind them found it hilarious that Kermit was cowering before a woman shorter than himself, so she pulled out her huge camera and snapped a quick photograph. That woman shot her a nasty glare in return.

Kermit nodded again. "I already told you, man, we're here to see someone."

"Just show 'er the photo already!" the girl yelled.

"Shut up Roxanne, I know what I'm doing!" he called back. Gloria's lip curled until Kermit fished a Polaroid-looking photograph from his back pocket and thrust it at her face. It was old - the colours were all faded, too bloomed out to make out the finest details. But she could see it well enough. It was an image of a child, lean of shape from head to toe, with a mop of blond hair and a pair of rectangular spectacles. The boy in the picture was sitting atop a newly polished bicycle, a tiny pup of a dog bundled into the front basket. The background matched Portsmouth's scenery.

Gloria snatched the photograph away before any of the humans could object. They wouldn't tell her what to do; they were afraid. Or one of them, at least... Kermit in particular seemed relieved when she left him to greet the green-haired ghoul by the door. "Daryl, check this out," she said, waving the Polaroid photograph in front of his hands. "Who does this look like to you?"

*

The kick sent Zebedee hurling backwards. There was no time for an apology, no breath for a gasp - just a smack, a sharp pain and then stunned silence as his brittle body hit the wall and slid down to the floor. When he could manage a breath, he cried out. That hurt.

"Oughh... I fell over."

Jackson felt the muscles in his arm tightening painfully as he reached out for Adrian. He couldn't make it and he couldn't move to grab the boy. Damn it, something was going to go wrong here. "D-don't worry, Adrian, it's okay. Come here," he insisted with a little beckon of the hand. "What just... Ugh. Dane, is that guy alright?"

"I'm okay!" Zebedee interrupted. He crawled to the edge of Jackson's bed to prove it, although he had one arm wrapped around his chest as he sat up to meet Adrian again. "Are you? Uh..."

"Adrian," said Jackson.

"Adrian! Oh, it's really nice to meet you. I'm Zebedee, but you can call me Zeb if you want to. I'm sorry, I scared you, didn't I... Uhm, please may I shake your hand?"

*

"Wait - what!?" The girl stopped dead in her tracks at the mention of other people. If Lorn could hear her heart beating more and more quickly, she would be a laughing stock... But she couldn't calm down. At least she could still bluff. "Ugh. Hey... If you're trying to scare me, it's not working, so piss off already. I want to get something straight, that I am here to walk and collect and leave, and I am not interested in whatever or whoever you are working for-"

There. In one of the shaky breaths she was trying to force through her nose, she caught it; the familiar odor of a man she knew.

"Wait, stop. I think I got something," she told him.

Her pulse quickened again, but this time not out of fear. She dared to move, to skip a few steps ahead and scout the area for that scent again - just in case she was hallucinating. But the smell only got stronger. It was mixed with many more, but it was undeniable. Zebedee had walked this way recently.

"Yeah... That's definitely his scent. Fading, but fresh. God, what are all those other scents? It's like there were a million other people here... Ugh, and that fucking dog."

These must have been whoever this creepy kid was with. Smelled weird, smelled bloody and rotting and somehow sterile at the same time. Everything carried the same lingering aftertaste that Lorn had on his clothes. It reminded the girl of the doves, and that scared her. But he was with them.

Oh, this was going to be a pain.

"Feel free to ditch me at any moment," the girl called as she began to skip across the path to her destination, "I found him and I'm not waiting around for you, goodbye!"
 
"Yeah, no shit you're breaking into this house." Daryl looked the male in front of him up and down like he was a goddamn idiot or something. They were standing there, in the back yard, sneaking around, of course they were breaking into the house. Though...for some reason they were awfully chilled out about it, at least...that girl and their third member were. They were practically making a joke of the situation. Fucking weirdos.

Gloria reacted to the situation before he did, and in such a way that made Daryl grind his teeth. She did not just do that. Yeah great. Just show them they were ghouls. The flashing of her eyes wasn't necessary, they could have kept that shit to themselves, these guys were pathetic enough as it was.

Honestly, during that moment he was really tempted to dart forwards and murder all three of them on the spot, at least then they wouldn't let it slip that there were ghouls living in this house. However, he knew better than that, he knew the backlash of that and he wasn't about to deal with it. So Gloria made a goddamn mistake, he just had to deal with that mistake. The only good thing that came out of it was the photo that that bloke got spooked into giving her. A photo they shouldn't have had.

Green eyes locked onto the face in the image the second it was held up in front of his face. "What the fuck?" Daryl's eyebrows furrowed and he snatched the polaroid Gloria's hand, taking a step forwards. Sure, it was a child in that photo, a child he'd never seen before in his life...but it looked all too familiar to a man that they happened to have under their care at that moment. The one man who had caused this goddamn mess and ruined their easy going life up in London.

Asshole.

For quite awhile, Daryl didn't say anything, he just stood there, photo in hand, silent. For a man with such a loud mouth that was more than strange, but there were only so many ways he could take this.

"Looks like a whole lotta nothin' to me." Finally speaking again, he green-haired ghoul's voice was a lot tamer, more pissed off, but a lot quieter at least. He walked up to the man addressed as Kermit by his companions and dropped the polaroid to the ground. "Your friend huh?" Those hostile green eyes of his focused in on this guy, taking in every little detail, "Yeah, well your friend ain't here, get me? So you wanna back the fuck up?" He broke eye contact looking around the group for a reaction, "What?" After asking the question he put his hands in his pockets and shrugged, "Don't tell me you seriously think he's still around?" There was a grunt from him as he shook his head, "That guy's fucking dead."

*
"I don't know. Holy shit Adrian..." Dane muttered, wishing he had the power to move his body and help Zebedee up from the ground. That had been one hell of a kick, the guy hadn't even done anything, Adrian just...lashed out. They all knew that boy was dangerous, sure, but...he'd never done that before.

"I think I hurt him Jackson." Whilst Adrian's facial expression didn't change much, it was obvious he was aware of what he'd done to Zebedee. Usually he would have gone over to check, but Jackson had ushered him backwards, and so the boy had obediently followed the command. Still he watched Zebedee for movement, jumping slightly when the man said that he was okay and attempted to get himself up again. "Oh."

He was in awe of this man, he was still like some strange creature to Adrian, and he was looking at Zebedee just like that. However, this man was just like anyone else...fragile. Bodies were fragile. He should remember than.

"It's okay." Upon hearing an apology, even if he didn't quite understand what it was for, Adrian grinned. He didn't need to apologise for anything, he didn't do anything. "Um...okay." There was slight hesitation when Zebedee asked to shake his hand, but Adrian was the first to reach out and grab the man's anyway. "Where're you from?" He asked, not really shaking the other's hand as much as inspecting it, "Your voice is funny."

*

"Nah." Lorn chuckled to himself and shook his head, "You've done a pretty good job of that yourself." He didn't mind this girl following him back, simply for the reason of seeing how Sethe would react to it, after all she didn't like the first one. It was amusing to watch her act to accordingly, or what she believed to be so, when presented with such a situation. Though...he was pretty sure that was a very large chance he was going to be on the receiving end of that anger this time. Disappearing so suddenly probably hadn't helped his case.

Suddenly the girl stopped, causing the younger teen to stop as well. He turned on his heels to look at her as she babbled away about having found her friend's scent. Oh great, so she could make her way there on her own. A grin crossed the young boy's face as he raised an eyebrow, "Don't get lost chick." He laughed, "Or...delayed." The second part of his sentence was obviously a stab at her for earlier, but he wasn't going to stop her from leaving. In fact, he'd race her. Only he had an unfair advantage... He knew where the house was.

An almost perfect memory and an extremely athletic background was probably more than just a little advantage after all.

"See you on the flip side."
 
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