We marched down to the third floor while Mr. Alan filled me in on the details.

"They found a note in the Commander's office saying there would be a raid," he said. "It's not verified it yet, but the Commander wants to stay on the safe side." He led me into the computer room on the third floor and gestured to the first seat. "So he wants you to do your homework while everything gets sorted out."

Among the blank monitors of the other twenty computers, my screen was already logged in and prepped for my coursework. A light from the monitor projected a keyboard onto the table in place of a normal one.

Steven had me switch to a projector keyboard after I shorted out the tablet one. Hard subjects seemed to draw the electricity right out of me as I ground my brain for the right answers. Like the math questions staring me in the face.

I pulled out the black, plastic seat and plopped down with my fingers drumming at the edge of the rectangle of light. The problems on the screen, though bearing down on me, were old ones. A relieved sigh escaped me before I realized that I had nothing to do but stare at the monitor.

"Would you rather have a screenboard?" Mr. Alan said.

"It's not that. I've just done this already." After absentmindedly answering the first few questions, I logged out and brought up a search engine to look up some news articles. If I had the time, and there was nothing else to do, I could sleuth a little.

The Lieutenant raised an eyebrow at the blue and white news page. "That doesn't look like homework."

"I've finished most of it," I said. "Is it alright if I just browse?" After his sigh and his approval, I tapped on an article about the "Weiss Family Tragedy" and skimmed through the words.

It was a bunch of vague information and a zoomed-out picture of the wreckage of the house. The next three articles were the same. Steven had done a good job at crowd control, considering our house was blown up.

But seriously, burst gas main? Faulty pipework?

At the next tap, he spoke up again. "Chael? You okay?"

After a nod, I opted to stay silent and open another article. More gas mains and pipes. Freak lightning accident. Conspiracy theory that my father went crazy with his powers. Fire that went out of control.

Orphaned children passed on to another electrically-powerful family.

The man stepped behind me and laid a comforting hand on my shoulder. "I can see that you're trying to figure everything out."

"Yes, but everything on the web is useless." In a way, the lack of information shielded me and my siblings from prying eyes, so I couldn't be too upset.

More gas mains. More pipes.

Either the reporters didn't know what they were doing or Steven did a good job keeping them out of the way. At that, I groaned and my head against my arm.

With a wry smile, the Lieutenant said, "You could try your case file. It has more information than those fabricated pieces of work."

"I can't access my file."

"I can."

I stopped typing. "Really? Won't you get in trouble?"

The young man shrugged and smiled sadly. "I can't give you access to everything, but it'll be more help than those . . . articles."

After he leaned over me to reach the computer, the screen changed to another display as he held his hand next to the projector. The hologram sensed the change in handprints and turned the monitor to a dark blue screen with two bars blocking access.

In a few taps, he logged into whatever program he was using. "There we go." Then he turned my head away from the screen. "Don't look."

"Sorry for asking, but why are you doing this for me?" I asked. Behind my head was a series of fast taps on the table.

"When I was around your age, there was this case like this," Mr. Alan said. "It wasn't mine, but it happened to someone close to me. Point is--" he turned my head back to the monitor "--I wanted to do everything I could to figure it out."

"Thank you, sir." I lowered my eyes. "But I don't want to get you in trouble."

"Don't worry," he said. "Knowing your father, he would do the same for you if you'd have asked."

It took me a moment to realize he was talking about Steven and not my dad. "Do you mind if I asked what the case was?"

"Multiple homicides and some scandal with a clinic--" he moved my cursor to the scroll bar and moved the page down "--you can read the info down here."

As I browsed through all the pictures of my old home, it was like walking it again. There were the charred areas, the trampled plants, the shards of glass--all of it. I stopped at the weird butterfly-looking symbol. "What's this?"

"From a group called the Pieris," he said. "They've been in other incidents before this one where they've left their mark."

That explained Steven's reaction when I finally dug it out of my drawer and gave it to him. He had grabbed it from my hand and examined every detail. If he took it into evidence, this was the picture.

The throw-up medicine from earlier must have kicked in again. My stomach grumbled, and in response, I turned off the monitor. The computer wasn't off, but at least I couldn't see the screen.

The Lieutenant's eyes narrowed as his face softened into pity. "That didn't help much, did it?"

Before answering, I let the mild nausea pass. Since it wasn't as bad as a breakdown or puking my guts out for an hour, I didn't think the nanobytes would kick in a numb everything.

"No, I'm grateful," I said between breaths. "Now I have a name for the guys who attacked us. Besides, I'm probably just reacting to the tests from earlier."

After I turned on the monitor again, I tried browsing through more photos. Some of them were close-ups of their weapons, like the guns, and some shrapnel. "Are you close to catching them?" I asked.

"We're doing everything we can."

For the next hour, I absorbed all the information I could about this threat, which wasn't much.At least working and feeling like I was doing something helped the sick feeling go away. Besides, as my dad would say, some information was better than no information.

.-.-.-.-.

Waving goodbye, Mr. Alan left me in with the workers milling about in the lobby after my confinement was up. As I stood there, not knowing where to go, Deryn walked over and greeted me.

"Where'd you run off to?" she asked.

I told her about my investigation but left out the part about logging into my case file. "You know anything about the Pieris?"

"They're a vigilante group, I think," she said. "They've been in the news before."

As we talked a little more about some random things, like music and her day training, I caught a glimpse of Saorise and Ryder standing in the center of the activity with Steven.

"What in the world?" I said.

"What's wrong?" Deryn asked.

I pointed at the kids.

Deryn's eyes widened as she too wondered what the five-year olds were doing here. Little children didn't come to the compound for no reason.

"Their checkup was in the morning, right?" Deryn asked.

"Yeah, something must've happened." I sidestepped the busybodies to Steven and the kids. As the two kids greeted me with hugs, I asked, "How come Saorise and Ryder are here?"

In the next moments, Steven briefed us about Ryder's shocking escapade in the playground and their outburst during naptime. "Since something seemed wrong with their nanobytes, Lindley brought them here."

"But the offices are locked down," I said.

"We sedated the bytes," Steven said, "so they should be okay. They'll be fine tomorrow." Steven kneeled down to the two kids and grizzly-bear hugged them. "Won't you?"

"Yes." Saorise nodded her head to emphasize her words.

In response, Steven ruffled her hair. "Can you two take them to my office? We'll be going home later than I thought."

Deryn nodded once. "Yes, Sir."

With boxes and file cylinders taking up a lot of the empty space, the four of us found odd places to sit in the office. From her spot on the table, Deryn handed the kids some papers from the trash can to draw on.

Since their desk was the carpet, I didn't think the pictures would turn out well.

"He's taking your case pretty seriously." Deryn eyed all the boxes in the room. "I've never seen this place so filled before."

"Yeah, he's busy all the time with it," I said.

Her gaze landed on the scribbling kids. "Must mean he cares about you guys a lot."

"Yeah."

"He's a good guy," she murmured.

Thinking back on the past few weeks, I leaned back against one of the stacks of boxes. "He is."

Rescuing us, comforting us after, and taking us in--he took it all in stride without showing any sign of discomfort besides his own grief. He answered my questions without holding things back, but he tried not to freak me out too.

"He really is," I said. At that moment, a herd of footsteps ran by. "Hey, do you know why everyone was so worried about the note?"

"Yeah," Deryn said. "Someone said it had some pretty weird things. Like, 'Watch out for Five' or something," she said. "Then stamped it with a sharp-looking butterfly."

"The Pieris?" I asked.

She nodded.

"Leaving a warning before an attack is pretty stupid, don't you think?" I leaned next to her on the desk. The kids behind me kept drawing and ignoring our conversation. It was easier to focus on their stupidity than the fact they were coming after us. Again.

"Yeah, it is," Deryn said. "But the Commander's taking some precautions, just in case. Hopefully, its just a scare tactic." She took out a silver bar, which split apart, from her pocket. Between the two rods was a screen.

"Is that a phone?" I asked. Most of the devices I'd seen were thin strips of metal with a hologram-type screen.

"One of the newer ones." Deryn held it out for me to see.

I shook my head. "I might fry it if I take it."

"Wow, really?" With fingers typing something into the device, she paused for a few moments to focus on her text. When she looked up, her face dampened. "Why the long face?"

After a moment, I answered. "Just stressed I guess. I mean with everything that's happened. . ."

Deryn's face softened like Mr. Alan's, but it wasn't pitying. It was like she was sad along with me. "It must be hard."

"Don't worry. I'm fine."

With a small smile, she redirected the conversation. "Wanna hear another pun? It's a good one."

"I've only heard you say one, and I didn't even get it at first."

"That wasn't my fault though." Deryn turned her body so that her gesturing hands were in front of me. "Listen, I got some more."

Ten minutes later, our conversation evolved into us exchanging funny stories and wiping away the cloud over me. After her tale about a chemistry experiment gone wrong, I told her about the first time I broke my friend's phone.

"So Jean was really proud of his score on his game or whatever, so he gave it to me to look at," I said. "But when he gave me the phone, it started blaring his ringtone, which was a bunch of metal crashes."

Deryn giggled. "Then you shocked it?"

"No, I nearly dropped it. But I noticed it was nearly dead, so I offered to charge it for him. But I was still jumpy from his stupid ringtone, so . . . it got fried at the outlet."

Spurred on from her laughter, I told her about the second time I fried Jean's phone. This was a couple years later after my electricity had grown a bit. I didn't need the cord or the outlet that time.

"That's incredible. You're strong enough that you react to phones and things." Deryn's laughter faded but a huge smile stayed on her face. "Seriously, that's just amazing. Not many people have that kind of power."

"If I could get a proper handle on it, it'd be even more amazing," I bounced back her smile. I'd gotten good enough that I didn't shock people on accident, but conductive metal wasn't so lucky.

"And think of when you get proper training in fighting." Deryn stood up from her excitement. "You might even be good enough to--Holy cow!"

"What?" My eyebrows scrunched together as I tried to figure out the stunned look on her face. "What?"

"Their arms," she said.

Specific. Twisting around, I followed her gaze which fixed on Saorise and Ryder.

Their arms were decorated with black lines and poorly-drawn pictures.

With a beaming, cheeky smile, Saorise held up her arms like they were masterpieces at a museum. "Lookie. It's a tattoo."

"You're not old enough for tattoos," I managed to get out. The markers were permanent too since Steven didn't keep the washable ones in his drawer. "Ryder . . . you too?"

"Yeah, aren't they cool?" Ryder smiled brightly and displayed the deformed spaceship on his forearm.

The two looked so excited about their drawings, I almost felt guilty for what I said next. "Deryn, where's the closest restroom?"

"A few doors down." She smiled at the beaming children and let out a small laugh. "Want me to clean off Saorise?"

"Yeah. I'll get Ryder," I said.

No matter how cute or happy they looked, Steven wouldn't be overjoyed to see their "cool" tattoos covering their arms. After writing a note for Steven, the two of us spent the rest of my time at the compound scrubbing their arms clean.

When we left, their arms still had shadows of the art for everyone to see. While Steven led the two kids to the car, I stayed behind for a moment. "Thanks for helping," I said.

Deryn shook her head. "No problem. It was kinda my fault for not seeing it too."

She turned away before I could explain my thanks was for making me feel better.

"What're you looking at?"

The only thing behind me was the sight of a few people walking out of the parking lot covered by an orange sky. Their white coats turned into a cream color under the light.

"Ah, nothing. Just the sky," she said. "Isn't it pretty?"

I held her gaze before looking at the sunset again. "Yeah, it is."

"Well, I'll see you later."

"See you," I said back.

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

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