The next day, back on the border of Texas.

Xao:

I sat eating granola cereal in milk- which as far as I was concerned was a superb breakfast. Across from me, at the table covered in a checkered cloth, sat my little sister Ravicca- I guessed Jessica was in front at the moment, as she had decided to dump mustard on her cereal. J-Star sat on my left, Nadine to my right with Kyle and Jessica, and Jaden at the head of the table- we were crowded into the trailer "dining room", but it was cozy.

I grinned at Jessica. "That good?" I asked.

"Nope. Jay mixed in jalapeno juice while I wasn't looking," she said, stuffing her face regardless. "Is tha goph?" came her question back with a mouthful.

"I like it," I stuck my spoon in, took another bite, and- "I like raisin bran too Jay," I just ate the mouthful anyway as her projection faded and I saw that she had switched our cereals while I was looking at Jessica.

"Well, I like your cereal too," Jay commented back with a grin to match mine.

"Well I like you so there," and I quickly kissed her forehead, her responding by tickling my side and making me yelp in laughter.

"Get a room you two!" Kyle tossed in. "Daah!" he then jumped as Jessica pinched his side.

"I do have to find an actual hotter pepper for my next series of pranks- ya'll just wait!" J-Star noted. Jessica gave a huge smile as my girlfriend put a bottle of jalapeno juice on the table. Jessica grabbed the juice, tossed the lid away, and downed it like water.

"Wow is Raven gonna be ticked at me when she fronts," Jessica said practically laughing and slamming down the empty bottle. "Good luck on that point Jay... whoo... I should probably have bread anyway in a bit, this can't be healthy." Kyle got up and got a role from the fridge for her. He put it in front of her, Jessica eyeing J-Star for a few seconds- then ate the roll just like normal.

Nadine closed her eyes, shaking her head. "Lord help me, I'm never going to have an empty nest am I?"

"Considering I won't be an adult for a couple hundred years still, you won't experience it," Kyle said with a grin. "You okay with that?"

Nadine sighed looking around the table. "Better than okay. I've had a noisy home since this young man was born," she pointed at Jaden with her spoon, still covered in milk. "Still noisy and he's grown- it's just more full."

Jaden looked down, not smiling when his mother pointed at him. He swallowed the cereal in his mouth, just nodding.

"Jady... c'mon, smile for us..." Jessica said with a big grin.

Jaden just closed his eyes. He then looked up. "This home will be noisy for a long time to come." He said. He put the spoon in his nearly finished cereal, stirring it. "I guarantee it." He took another bite, nodded his head, and looked at his cereal. He then picked up the bowl to just drink the milk. As he tipped the bowl back Jessica snapped her fingers, a small spark jumping off her fingers and tipping the bowl so the milk splattered down her big brother's shirt.

Jaden paused with the bowl up as Jessica sat giving him a sheepish grin, hunching down and scooting out her chair like she was getting ready for him to chase her. Jaden put the bowl down, looked at her, gave a small sigh, and got up, walking away from the table. "Guess I should change my shirt then," he said. He walked away, taking off his shirt as he traveled back to the boy's bedroom in the trailer.

Jessica watched him go, seeing his muscular back, and commented. "Sure Judith would love to see that- we got a letter from her..." she said, mentioning his girlfriend. Jaden didn't even pause, just going into the room and closing the door.

Jessica tightened her fists, looking at her now rather disgusting bowl. Everyone at the table had given small snickers at her jabs, and we had all waited for the young man to spin around with a smile at the mention of his sweet heart's name, eager for her letter. But during the entire exchange, Jaden had just moved like a robot.

Jessica squeezed out a few tears and breathed in deep. Kyle put a hand on her shoulder, the girl patting his hand as she nodded her head. "I'm gonna tear out Tyrin's throat and force-feed it to him just for doing that to Jaden." She bit her lip looking away from everyone. "I haven't seen him smile in six months... I'm counting."

"He's got a lot on his mind," I said. "I'm pretty sure he'll be alright."

"I'm only going to have him and mom for so long. How dare Tyrin do this to what little time I have," Jessica said.

Nadine reached across the table, messing up her hair a little. "He'll smile again, I promise."

"He used to love my jokes," she said. "Ya know... maybe we really should have quit looking for kids."

"I thought you loved doing that," Kyle said.

"Not at the expense of my family. It's an important job but... I don't know."

"I said it before Jess, but again," Kyle began. "We could stop finding lost kids, but if we do, Tyrin hates us because of the things we've already done to him. We stop being the Tracers, we stop doing that independent of all this as there's no reason to believe he would leave us alone. In fact, we should probably be pursuing Jacobson either way as this isn't ending until we confront Tyrin himself."

Jessica sighed. "So... but when all this ends, just to ask, does everyone want to do something else when this ends? Do any of you not want to be Tracers anymore?"

I shrugged saying, "I'm only here to be with my family. Do whatever I'll be here." J-Star wrapped an arm around me, making her reason for being around kind of obvious.

"I'm here for my friends," Kyle said. "And I'm pretty sure what Jaden cares about is the family. Pretty sure you're the only person here with a mission that actually has a definite direction so- yeah, let's keep going.

"On another note," I said clearing my throat, "Maybe watch your tongue around Jaden a little," I cringed even after I said it. "Hey, I remember his smile too. I know how worried he is... the best thing you can do is stay safe yourself and keep that big smile of yours for him okay? Be nice alright?"

"You should probably apologize for the other day," J-Star pointed out.

"I did twice," she said.

I sat back, trying to think of what I could possibly say in this situation. A few years ago, it was pretty much my job to help this little group of ours make sense of the world. I was the oldest after all. Well, J-Star was older, but she did paperwork as a profession for the longest time so it didn't matter. Still, these days it felt like I never knew what to say.

Behind me, I heard the buzz of a fax machine. A black and white photo dropped into its receptacle, a printed letter quickly following. "What is it?" Jessica asked as I pulled the papers out of the machine on the counter next to the table.

"Looks like our next mission. Justin," I said, reading the name on the photo.

Jessica quickly took the photo from me. She held her mouth, her eyes going wide. "But... he looks so young."

"They're all children," I noted.

"I know but... he looks three..." she looked at the notes under the photo. "He is three." Jessica paused, just holding the photo. "The banshees only give us missions to go after kids they know were kidnapped by traffickers. Honestly, I was hoping we would get a break for a while as that doesn't happen every day, and all- why would anyone steal a three-year-old?"

"There are bad people in this world," Kyle said, looking at the photo with her. "Banshee intelligence on this stuff comes straight from the guys we capture so... well it's probably accurate. They say this kid was stolen, then he probably was."

"Someone traffics a kid that young... how long does he even have to live?" Jessica paused looking at the photo.

Jaden walked back into the room, looking over her shoulder. He grabbed the photo out of her hands without warning and looked at it. He nodded.

"Interior of Texas..." he started to note. "Mom, get Floreen up and you two find a new place for the trailer. I've got a map to the next banshee hideout." He moved quickly, clearing the table as my siblings and I grabbed our bowls before they were cleared too. "Eat fast kids." Jaden tore the second paper sent to us in half handing the bottom half to mom. "Mom, that's the address of the next trailer park. We're headed for the van."

I and the other "kids" downed our remaining cereal quickly as Jaden went into the boy's room. Jaden re-entered the room and dropped some of our weapons and equipment on the table, snatching away everyone's bowls, whatever stage of eating they were in- Jessica sighed as she had barely started.

Jaden tossed Jessica a granola bar. "Eat it in the van kid-" He then pointed at her specifically as she gave a grin. "Eat it normal." Jessica gave a grunt that seemed between a chuckle and a growl.

"Raven will probably be in front anyway," Jessica said back, clipping her scimitar swords, Henry, which she had in her lap the whole time, and Sally, to her sides, the baby blue scabbards looking like plastic toys. She then tossed a backpack on her shoulders.

Kyle grabbed a blue backpack from the table and his own sword, Rita, his other sword, the Blue Assassin, had been leaning at the back of his chair already. He quickly made sure the DNA tracer was in the bag along with several tent stakes and a roll of spare magnets for his wrist device, which he also quickly affixed to his right arm and tightened in place. The roll of magnets slipped on under his shirt. Finally, he tied several small leather pouches to his belt.

Next to me, J-Star grabbed her own sheathed sword and attached it- she had never told anyone even IF it had a name. She then tied her hair back in a ponytail.

I grabbed my own wrist device, a simple pulse cannon, affixing it to my right wrist and belting my sword to my waist- I was one of the few members of my family that actually slept and moved about unarmed normally.

Finally, Jaden slung a shotgun over his shoulders and holstered a pair of handguns.

We had all assembled our various pieces of equipment in a manner of half a minute- as we had drilled countless times.

Mom shook her head, looking at all of us with a bemused expression. "I pity anyone dumb enough to mess with you five." She waved her scrap of paper, reading it over. "The address for where you're going is- good, it's not on here. If Floreen and I are caught they can't trace you."

"Not that the thought of you being captured is comforting," Jaden said.

"I can take care of myself, young man," our mother said, taking the opportunity to pinch her blood son's cheek. The man barely reacted. "Careful when you rip these things ya know? We don't get second copies."

Jaden looked over at J-Star with lowered eyebrows, "Jay are you seriously still in P.J.s?" he asked.

J-Star chuckled as she snapped her fingers, the yellow pok-a-dot pajamas she was wearing vanished and were replaced with jeans and a shirt. "Guys, I wear underwear to bed, c'mon. I don't even own pajamas."

"How could we know that?" Kyle asked. J-star eyed Jaden in particular for some reason on this note.

Jessica grinned. "You could have gone through and rearranged her stuff like I did!"

J-Star reached down and ruffled our resident joker's hair. "Ahh- no you didn't squirt," she said.

Jessica sighed. "Yeah- not yet."

"I rearrange my own stuff too often and stealth isn't exactly your specialty."

"Our other equipment is in the van, let's move," Jaden said.