Chapter Quote:
"She was soft as an angel, but oh, she could love with the fury of a demon."
~N.R. Hart
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Chapter 17: Confoundment

Blaze

Geller worked diligently on compiling a list of possible relatives of the Gray Men who were out to get their revenge on the Razgriz. He had created an algorithm that sorted all the people into categories. Genette helped him figure out what things to put into our specific list. However, as good as the two of them were together, the list still took a couple hours. We'd delayed our mission to gather the list because we decided it was better to know exactly who was leading the crusade against us and our children rather than just knowing the basic group. We learned early on that if you took out the leader of an organization, everything else for them fell apart. It was what people had always tried to do to us, especially to me, but fortunately, thus far, they'd been unsuccessful.

"Hey," Chopper said softly, coming into the room we sharing. I'd been on my own computer watching the security footage of the people breaking onto our base, over and over again, trying to get a glimpse of the drivers and of the people who had snuck into the hangars amongst the chaos. I had a gut feeling of exactly who it was, but until our allies met up with us, I wouldn't know for sure.

My husband sat on the bed next to me, resting his chin on my shoulder and watching the footage with me. He said grimly, "It looks like the kids."

"I know... part of me is hoping that it's them because then I know they're okay. Part of me is hoping it isn't because how bad is it for them that they felt the need to take our planes?"

"That is unnerving. But knowing them, they have a good reason for it. What else is on your mind?"

"I'm worried about everyone. I hate not being able to contact anyone. I'm terrified for the kids, I'm terrified of what is going to happen to us because we fight in the air, not on the ground. This isn't our domain. And what about Snow? He didn't come on this mission because his wife is sick, but he's been keeping in touch to let us know they were both okay. Now he isn't answering his phone, he isn't answering text or email, and I'm worried something's happened to him."

"He might've gone into hiding when he realized people were after the Razgriz again."

"What if he's the one Henri was telling us about? What if the Gray Men have him?"

"Then we'll find him. Just like you found me and everyone else found us. Our family always finds each other, no matter what. Our kids, Henri, Snow, they're no exception. We have a demon on our side. And hell, your uncle might be the Demon Lord, Talisman might be the leader of the dancing angels, and Mobius might be a decider of fate, but we're the demons of Razgriz. We're the most famous legend out there. No matter what continent you're on, no matter what state or country you're in, people know about the Demon of Razgriz. That demon chose us to wear its namesake, especially you. It's a heavy burden to bear, but the demon wouldn't have chosen us if it thought we couldn't."

"When did you become so smart?" I queried with a small smile.

"I've always been smart. I just don't always show it. It makes people underestimate me, and it's always better to go into something underestimated."

"You should write a book."

"When we don't have people trying to murder us, I'll get on that," he chuckled. "Have you eaten anything? Major cooked something for us all."

"No, I'm not hungry," I said. My stomach proceeded to growl, causing both me and my husband to look at it.

"I think your stomach would beg to differ," Chopper remarked. "Come on. Take a break and come eat."

With a small effort, he was able to drag me away from my computer. Upon arriving into the dining room, we took a serving of food and listened to Geller give us a debriefing on his findings. "So I have about fifty names but a few of them stick out. There is Heinrich Mayer, sixty-three years old, and the brother of two Gray Men members, one of which was killed in battle, and the other who was one of Rald's right-hand men. He had connections to a lot of the Gray Men members but never officially came out as one. Then there is Ian Schneider, forty-two years old, former member of the Belkan Air Force. His brother was shot and killed by the Razgriz in the battle of the Vladmir Mountains. He was tried for war crimes but was acquitted, and has shown up in multiple, current reconnaissance photos of the Gray Men."

Geller went through each person, and it took almost an hour just to get through twenty of them. He'd printed off lists of all the names for each of us, so once I finished my dinner, I grabbed one, scanning through the sheet, walking around the room as I did so.

"Helen Hamilton," I said, stopping as I recognized the last name. "Is that-"

"Allen Hamilton's mother," Geller finished. "She kind of dropped off the radar when her son died. She had a lot of ties to the Gray Men, either being friends with them, or hosting their meetings in her house. But after Allen's death, she stopped everything; she quit her job and never left her house. I mean the woman didn't need to work to support herself, she's a multi-millionaire, but she loved her job."

"Something about that doesn't seem right. Where does she live?"

"Anfang."

"That's the closest city to where Chopper and I were held captive. I don't think it's a coincidence that she was so close by the place we were. She might've even held a part in it."

"That's a dangerous assumption to make considering we have forty-nine other names on the list," Bartlett pointed out. "She might just be a mother mourning the loss of her child."

"For twenty plus years?" I countered. "Bartlett, Percy was-"

"Don't go there," he growled.

I went there. "Percy was murdered by the Grey Men, and you're not sitting on your ass waiting for justice to come to the people who did this to him. Neither is Helen Hamilton. That's not the Belkan way. The way we view the Gray Men is the way she views us. She might've been holed up in her house all this time, but I have a hard time believing she's been mourning her son's death this entire time. I would bet everything I have that she's the one behind this."

"Do we have any way to find evidence to support this? Because as much as I agree with you Blaze, I also understand where Bartlett is coming from," Nagase said, strategically preventing what could've turned into a full blown argument between me and Bartlett. We'd been arguing enough recently and while I didn't like it, I was also getting sick of it. My own nerves were frayed and I worried if I lost my temper, I would say things I would regret.

"Genette and I could see if we could access any of her bank and phone records to see if there is anything suspicious," Geller offered.

"Do that. I'm going to-" I was interrupted by a knock coming from the front door. We all fell dead silent, glancing at each other, wondering who it could be. Holding a finger up to her lips, Major stood up and went to the security room to check who was at the front door. She came flying out a few seconds later, running to the door and throwing it open. We hurriedly followed her to see what was going.

"Snow!" I blurted before I could stop myself.

"PJ!" Cipher exclaimed after me.

"And Iris!" PJ added, grinning at his wife. I threw my arms around my wingman, shocked he was here.

"What are you three doing here? How did you find us?" Nagase queried.

"I made a last minute decision to join the party but you had left early. I got in touch with PJ and Iris who were actually only a couple hours away. They joined me and we set off after you. I figured you'd be here based on your travel speed and your destination," Snow explained.

"How's your wife though?" I asked. "She's sick, you should be with her. Being-"

"She's doing better, and she all but told me she'd divorce me if I put her over the rest of my family and my country. I'm in more danger in this mission than she is with her sickness at this point."

"I'm glad she's doing better. It's good to have you here," Cipher said. "We have a lot to catch you up on."

"Then let's get started."
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Jem

"So how exactly did you convince Espada Two and Strigon Two to come fight for us?" Charlotte queried, eyebrows raised.

"Well I connected a bit with Espada Two, and I told Strigon Two that I was his former comrade's goddaughter. If the Strategist hadn't been in the hospital with a broken leg, he would've joined because he said he was just itching to get back up in the air," Shiloh replied with a nonchalant shrug. "Axel and Markus are going to get them."

"When are Bryn, Kit, Talisman, and Shamrock going to get here?" Alec asked impatiently. Talisman, while I'd only met him once in person, was still one of my favorite people. Maybe because he had helped save my mom's life when she was in Emmeria. Without him, I don't think that war would have ended as soon as it did. It may not have even been won. For some reason, I'd always gravitated towards my mom. Will had always gravitated towards dad. But both of us were fiercely protective of our mom and sisters. Even though I knew they could all protect themselves probably better than I, my brother, or my dad could, I still wanted to stop trouble from reaching them in the first place. I hadn't been able to do that with Shiloh when she'd nearly been killed by the Gray Men at Percy's apartment. I wasn't going to let harm come to her like that again.

"They're all flying over as we speak. Talisman and Shamrock should be here by tonight. We'll need to make sure we have the ship lit up so they can see where they're landing. Bryn and Kit are going to be here sometime tomorrow because they have to land and refuel about halfway there," Lux informed.

"Isn't it going to look suspicious to have them flying out here?" Tessa pointed out.

"We agreed that they said they were flying to meet some family from Emmeria. It's true, so they're not lying. They just didn't specify where they're meeting them."

"Okay good. So what's the next step? We have our allies coming. Have we found out where our parents are?" Henry chimed in.

It was Allison who spoke up. "Not so far, but I got in touch with your friend Alex at Versailles. He remembered me thankfully. Apparently Snow, PJ, and Iris have all joined your parents. So, Axel gave me their general whereabouts which is either just outside Belka or just inside. There are safe houses that they're probably using. I also got Alex to tell me your parents' car make, model, and license plate numbers. Did some calculations while everyone was on the phone and now Gilbert, Leonard, and Tybalt are watching intersections in the cities that they most likely would've gone through. There are pros and cons to being in a city. Pros is that it's congested and if you know your way around, you can easily lose someone. Cons is that there are cameras everywhere which means surveillance which means you can always track someone. The Gray Men are most certainly doing what we are, but probably don't have the intel we do."

"How did we ever survive without you?" Alec mused.

"Surprisingly well."

"So what's next?"

"I say we go practice in our parents' planes. If we're going to fly them, we need to know how to dogfight in them. I say we do some practice hops," Shiloh said.

"Let's try not to crash. Mostly because I don't want any of us to die, but also because I don't want to be murdered by our parents for trashing multi-million dollar planes," Will remarked.

"Agreed. Let's go!" Lux ordered, leading the charge with Shiloh out of the training room to go to the hangar.
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Sorry for the late update! Reviews would be lovely :)