When I came to, Sabine slaped me.

"Stupid, idiot!" She screamed, after I help my arms up in defense, this was definitely not how I was used to waking up in the morning.

My face was burning where she hit me and my heart hurt like the dickens. I was in a backstreet alleyway, filth and trashcans littered the walls. It looked like the kinda place I used to sleep when I was ten and virtually homeless, long story.

Sabine had gone off to punch a wall, Justin was talking to her softly trying to calm her down. I couldn't help but noticed how pale he looked. I stood up, shaking out my aching limbs.

Two ambulances and a fire truck drove past.

I don't remember much of what happened, only Worthington's face, and bright flashing lights for some reason? It was then I happened to notice my stellar lab coat was ripped up, and my wings were out.

Oh dear.

"What happened?" I asked, licking my lips to get rid of the metallic taste.

Justin turned towards me before Sabine could explode again.

"We might be in huge trouble now." He sighed and ran his finger though his hair.

"You." Sabine shoved a finger at my chest, her dirty blonde and dyed hair in a mess. "You lost control of your powers and held us up, not only did you destroy nearly a quarter of the building, but you did it all on live television."

My heart dropped into my stomach. Oh dear.

"Television?" I replied numbly. "Like..."

I extended my wings slightly and held up my fingers in mock attack.

Sabine out her hands on her hips and gave me a smile that said oh yes you did and I'm going to punish you for it.

"Oh dear." I said, folding my wings back up into the slits on the jacket.

"Okay, we just need to take a deep breath, and calm down before our getaway vehicle arrives." Justin ordered.

"I'm trying I'm trying." Sabine promised.

"Do you need a free hug?" Justin asked, sincere as a lost puppy.

She stared at him, it was then I noticed just how worn out and beat up she looked. "Yeah, yeah okay."

He waddled over and wrapped his arms around patting her back and cooing softly. She sighed into his shoulder, probably both physically and emotionally drained. I made a face at them and Justin gave me a look that let me know I was being real mature. I shrugged off the torn lab coat, and threw it in a nearby dumpster, I was left with my rumpled grey hoodie. Then I walked out to the corner of the ally to get away from all the mushy mushy displays of affection.

I wondered how long we would have to stand here in this filthy backstreet until our getaway vehicle showed up. I scanned the horizons from my view point and could tell we weren't that far away from Gilligan industries, in fact I could see the smoke in the distance. This wasn't the best part of town either I must say, and if I remember correctly Icie was picking us up. She had also recently turned sixteen and we had all gone out and Mr. Wales had taught us the basics of driving, I mean it's not like any of us had parents that would stick around to do so. I didn't mind Mr. Wales though, he was really nice and acted like an overprotective father anyway. He and Abrianna, the physical therapist who had signed up to chill with us mutants recently, were kind of like the parents of the whole school. Besides it was painfully obvious Mr. Wales had a thing for her to everyone except Abby herself. At this rate I was going to be the only single guy left.

I recognized the beat up old car as it pulled in around the street. There was a girl in the driver's seat with hair more pale than Snow White's skin. I waved to Icie and she went around and switched lanes before pulling up in front of the ally.

"Sorry I'm late." She rolled down the window and leaned out. "I nearly got pulled over and...Oh!"

She was looking past my shoulder and I turned around to see Justin and Sabine had each other's faces locked together. They were kissing, passionately I might add. Gee wiz maybe I was going to be the only single guy left at this rate. At Icie's exclamation they suddenly broke apart and I watched as Justin blushed heavily. I was to far away to hear but they shared a few small words before Sabine pushed past me and opened the shotgun door, that I had been planning to sit it.

"Let's get going shall we?" She asked, looking only slightly flustered, but much more composed then the Sabine who had just slapped me a few minutes ago.

I raised an eyebrow at Justin as Icie joined me in the back seat where the single losers sat. He blushed again and started opened his mouth like a goldfish in attempt to come up with a coherent sentence. Eventually he gave up and turned away so he could concentrate on driving, but he and Sabine shared a look and he started grinning and wouldn't stop.

After an incredibly long drive into more of the open area of California from Los Angeles, we reached the huge whale of a house that was where all of us mutants kids lived. It was way out into the mountain area of  California, which was private, but it was also almost out in the middle of nowhere. There was really only one other house on the street and it was a sweet old lady who gave us cookies around Christmas time. Part of me was a bit happier we were finally back because this was the most permanent home I had ever had, it made me feel safe. I wonder if anyone else ever felt the same way. Part of me was also glad to be out of the claustrophobic car with Justin and Sabine oogling each other like two sticks of chocolate.

Mr. Wales was waiting in the gargantuan archway that was the front door, he had been slightly panicked before sending us off on the mission but he looked okay now that he saw everyone was alive.

"How'd the mission go?" He asked Justin, when his nephew handed him the keys.

"It a huge success I think I can truthfully say." Justin replied proudly.

Mr. Wales, in all of his youthful maturity fist bumped his nephew. "Your father would be proud."

Justin shrugged, giving him a nervous smile. I decided to continue to walk past all of this unnecessary ocean of emotion. I was immediately met with two blondies who were demanding the same information everyone else had for the past few minutes. Only one of them was rolling around in his own set of wheels.

"What happened?" Genny asked. "Do you find anything?"

"Where's Icie?" Dylan asked, looking around and seeing nothing.

"Right here! Guys you will not believe what happened." She exclaimed, fanning her face, this was the first time I had seen Sabine blush in public.

I spotted Tui leaning against a wall, clearly also eager to hear what had happened, but way more cool about how she was going about it. I felt myself relax a little. Out of all the crazy people I met so far, I singled Tui out. She felt special some how, like family. I didn't usually get the urge to be super overprotective, but she didn't mind.

"Hey." I greeted.

"Hi." She replied.

"If you're wondering I'm pretty sure I really screwed things up this time." I sighed.

"Really? So did you find out anything?"

I rubbed my head, thinking back to the morning, it had been quiet a while. "A weird book and a strange file, it's not much but it seems important. I may have also made the news, I don't know yet."

    "The news? Like, tv?" Tui asked, sounding incredulous.

"Yep, and made a new friend. She's a human who hopefully won't rat us out. We were in a hurry." I sighed.

"You didn't bring her back here? For safety measures?" Tui raised and eyebrow, there was a smirk on her lips.

"Well first of all she was so annoying-"

"Of course."

"And we can't just kidnap people off the streets. Besides I'm pretty sure I frightened her with my extreme manliness." I raised one of my skinny arms and flexed it.

"You might wanna loose the man bun then, tigre." She smiled.

I frowned. The my hands shot up the the back of my head as I scowled, remembering how Sabine had made me put my hair up earlier. I tugged my hair loose with one flick of my wrists as I silently thanked her for saying that. I would have gone the rest of the day without realizing it.

    Tui suddenly craned her neck. "Look's like they're looking at the stuff they found, wanna go join?"

    I turned around to see a freshly cleared away kitchen table and a group of scrappy looking teenagers gathered around it. Theo had joined us, along with Wi and Ryan who were not around the table but in the kitchen. Using my keen sense of smell, I strategically hypothesized they were cooking something. I was starving, the long car ride meant we had missed lunch.

    "What's up?" I asked, walking over there and finding an empty space to lean against. I shrugged off my jacket and tied it around my waist.

    "This table." Dylan sighed, his voice sticky with annoyance. It was the only flat surface suspended on legs that came up higher than a regularly sized standing teenager's waist. Fortunately his wheelchair allowed him to rest his elbows on the surface, even though it came up to his chin.

    If you're wondering how he was doing, I would say pretty well? The first night we moved everyone here from Washington I had given up the spare bed to Dylan, back before he had gotten his own personal wheelchair. It was actually the time I finally learned he was now paralyzed. Otherwise I hadn't really hung out with him besides him hanging out with the whole group, which he didn't do that often, and even then it wasn't like he was just vomiting emotions into the rest of us.

    "Sorry Dylan." Mr. Wales apologized, as he walked into the room with a stack of paper in his hands. "This is the only table on the first floor that doesn't have middle-schoolers meandering around. Here are the printouts of the pictures you took Sabine."

    He handed her the papers and she spread them out across the table. I took one in my hands. It was more Mumbo jumbo I didn't understand. I spotted a few chemical symbols here and there, but most of the words were ridiculously fancy.

    Justin tensed. "Speaking of which, had anyone seen my sister all morning?"

    I shook my head, as did everyone else. Except for Will, who had just walked up.

    "I was playing with her after you guys left, said something about wanting to be a pilot like me when she grew up." He shrugged.

    Justin paled a bit. "I should probably find out where she went off too, be right back guys, find someone who can understand science."

    "Hm." I grunted softly. That girl, Anne Marie, had know a lot about science, she had understood what the file had meant.

    "Excuse me." A prepubescent voice chirped from my waist level, Chespin looked up at me expectantly and I realized I was blocking  one of the few chairs at this table.

    The dirty blonde eight year-old climbed up onto the chair. He smoothed his hair once he got to the top as if he had just achieved something huge. Then he took on of the papers we were all looking at.

    "Oh." He blurted. "Biology, wonderful. I know absolutely nothing about the body. Give me chemicals and computers any day." Then he pulled out a Capri Sun, stabbed the straw through the hole and started drinking it.

    "At least we can deduce that whatever this means, it's some sort of biological weapon." Sabine added. "Do you think it's something they might be administering to new Modified Humans?"

    "Do they have anymore left to administer it to?" Genny asked, putting her head in her hands. "I mean weren't Josie, Tui, Dylan and I the only ones left?"

    Theo shook his head. "There are still maybe hundreds of Born-Mutants, not everyone is a To-Be."

    I've found that Theo works at a conversation this way a lot. He'll keep all of his thoughts to himself until the information needs to be shared. I've always found he seems incredibly wise that way. When I do that however, people just think I'm not contributing to the conversation because I don't know anything. Only this is exactly what was happening right now. I desperately racked my brain for something intelligent I could say.

    "Does it have anything to do with hormones?" I asked, remembering it was something Anne Marie had said.

    We all kind of looked over to Chespin for an answer but he kind of shrugged and shook his head.

    "I told you guys don't look at me." He shrugged. "In fact I'm gonna go find something more fun to do."

    "What makes you think that Tyler?" Mr Wales asked, he had been previously trying to stand in a corner watching us figure it out by ourselves but wanted to get involved now.

    I shrugged. I didn't want to say anything about Anne Marie in case he got angry. I mean Mr. Wales doesn't usually get angry, in fact he was more annoying when he got overprotective but still.

    "Hey!" Justin came back, he was holding Josie by the hand she she was skipping alongside him. "How's it going guys?"

"Not so good, a presently this is really advanced science or whatever." Sabine grumbled.

"To advanced for you?" Justin cooed, I had found my eyebrows had nestled closer to my eyes and refused to move every time Justin breathed in Sabine's direction. "Well maybe we should check out this little beauty."

He held up the old, leather bound book we had stolen. "This my friends, is James Worthington's diary."

__________________________________
So Justine is canon now how does that make you all feel

And would you like more of it