“So, um, you always do this for your birthday?” Hannah Daniels asked while she and the rest of the team walked through the small city of Laramie Falls. The six of them (herself, Paul Calburn, Gordon Kuhn, Sands and Scout Mason, and the former Eden’s Garden student, Trouble) had just taken a portal from Crossroads after getting done with their last classes of the day. On special request, they had been given permission to spend a couple days here as a team, since the girl in question didn’t exactly have family to visit so they could celebrate with her.

Trouble, walking slightly ahead of the rest of the group, glanced over toward a distant bowling alley as they walked past. “Every year. I dunno why. I guess part of me just wanted to see the town where I would’ve grown up if…” She trailed off, a grimace finding its way to her face.

“If your parents hadn’t disappeared,” Paul finished, shaking his head. “Yeah, that’s rough. Do you ahh… do you think you would’ve liked it here?” He asked that while glancing toward the same bowling alley she had been looking at. “They’ve got entertainment, anyway. And probably less people or monsters trying to kill you.”

Trouble snorted. “Yeah, that’s the problem, I’m pretty sure I’d get bored. I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s a hard question to start with.” She turned to face the group, spreading her arms. “If I grew up here, I wouldn’t know what I was missing out there. I’d be a normal, everyday Bystander.”

Even as she said that, a glowing figure emerged from the girl and resolved itself into the by-then familiar Vanessa. “Don’t listen to her,” she insisted, “Even if she grew up here, there’s no way Trouble could ever be a ‘normal, everyday Bystander.’ She probably would’ve found some way to become a Natural Heretic, or an Adjacent. For all I know, she would have done a favor for the king of Canada and become a member of his court. But whatever happened, she would not be average.”

“Hey,” Sands started, “if everyone’s stretching their legs…” She nodded toward her sister, though her words were meant for the girl inside her. “You wanna hop out for a minute? It’s not like there’s anyone around here to care. This place is too small and dead to have a dedicated Heretic squad, and we would’ve heard if there was anything special going on.”

Gordon, standing near the back of the group, gave a short nod while speaking quietly. “The headmistress would not have approved our visit if there was any chance of running into t--” He paused, looking toward Trouble herself as he almost said her name before amending, “--problems.”

There was a brief pause before a second, smaller glowing figure appeared, this time coming from Scout. Shortly, Tabbris was standing there, squirming a little as she reflexively dusted herself off and looked around. “Are we sure it’s safe like this? I mean, um, out in the open?”

“Don’t worry,” Sands assured the girl she and her twin had practically raised together, “if we run into anybody that we have to explain anything to, you’re just a little girl who used to be babysat by Trouble’s dad or something. You know, back when you were eensie. So when Trouble visits, she spends time with you, cuz she remembers when you were a baby.”

Trouble, for her part, shrugged. “Sounds fine to me. Besides, believe me when I say we’ll be fine. I’ve been visiting this place for a couple days every year since I went to Garden for the first time. Had a babysitter myself for the first few years, then they just let me come by myself. My family still owns that house, so I stay there. The neighbors called the cops once, but ahh, we handled it. Now they think I’m staying with social services and they let me visit home sometimes. So, mostly they leave me alone. Except for this one couple, the Euphrenes. They live next door and she sent casseroles over the last couple times I was there. I’m not sure why, exactly. But, you know, they were good casseroles, so whatever.”

After a moment of silence had passed, Paul cleared his throat and asked the question that was actually on everyone’s mind. “Have you ever found out more about why your parents disappeared in the first place?”

Hannah gave a quick nod, blurting, “Isn’t it weird that they just vanished and left you alone?”

“Weird?” Trouble echoed. “I mean, sure, but what are my options? Trust me, Seller tried to find them for years. He couldn’t pick up a single clue. Either they took off and hid themselves in a way that even he couldn’t find, or they were eaten by a monster or something. So, if they’re not dead, they don’t want to be found. Whatever it is, I don’t think dwelling on it helps me too much.” And yet, despite her blunt words, the girl’s voice cracked just a little through that, betraying a bit more emotion about the situation than she intended.

None of the others knew quite what to say after that. She was right, of course. If a very well-traveled and skilled adult Heretic couldn’t find any sign of her parents after years of searching, the idea that they could find anything was quite remote. Especially given the other things they already had to deal with. Finally, Scout raised her hand to point at the nearby building, speaking a single, soft word. “Bowling?”

“Hell yeah,” Paul agreed, already gesturing for everyone to head that way. “Come on, let’s go play a round or two. Then we can go see Trouble's old house. Err, you okay with that?” He directed that last bit to the girl herself.

“Whatever,” came the response, accompanied by a shrug. Trouble added, “I’m not exactly in some big rush to get there.

“I mean, it’s not like the place is gonna disappear while I’m schooling all of you.”

********

“Well, that was embarrassing,” Sands noted awhile later, as the group walked down the sidewalk toward the old Chambers house. “Note to self, do not challenge any child of Artemis to any activity which requires projecting an object toward a location.”

Tabbris, walking hand-in-hand with Scout, piped up hesitantly. “I didn’t do very well either, and she’s my mom too.”

“You’re still pretty young,” Trouble reminded her. “Give it a few years and you’ll be destroying everyone at darts and stuff too. And getting perfect scores in bowling, just like your sister.” She added that bit with a nod toward Vanessa. “Then you two can work together to take over the world via an elaborate scheme.”

With a soft snort, Vanessa replied, “I’m not exactly sure what sort of scheme would involve using bowling and darts to take over the world, but it would have to be pretty elaborate indeed.” She paused before adding, “And Tristan would want to be involved.”

“Hey,” Paul assured the blonde girl as he stepped beside her. “We’re gonna find him. And your parents. We’ll figure out what happened to them, where they got sent, and get them back. It just uhh…” He grimaced. “It might take awhile.”

“In the meantime,” Trouble announced while stopping in front of a modest house in the middle of the neighborhood, “we’re here.”

The others all stopped to look at the house. It looked like any ordinary two-story home anywhere else in the city, or in basically any other city in the country. There was nothing out of the ordinary about it. Though the others could tell, with a glance at Trouble herself, that she had very deep-seated emotions about the place. Before any of them could say anything, however, the girl strode right up to the front door, producing a key from her pocket to unlock it. Her voice was flat. “Come on, we can order a pizza or something. And like I said, if any of you think this is stupid and want to get out of here, I get it. It probably is.”

Hannah quickly followed the other girl, shaking her head. “It’s not dumb,” she quietly yet firmly insisted. “If I could visit the place my birth family used to live, I would. But… well…” She flinched, thinking back to the Edge vision she’d had, of the woman who had turned out to be her own grandmother being murdered just after saving Hannah’s mother as a baby. Having seen that, she’d been wondering if her mother’s death in the hospital upon giving birth to her, and her father’s subsequent abandonment, were what they appeared to be on the surface. Did her mother really die of natural causes? And if not, if she had been murdered, how did the baby Hannah survive? Did her father disappear because he saved her life?

She had no idea. It was all just so confusing. So, the girl shook off those thoughts and simply entered the house behind Trouble.

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The others followed suit, soon finding themselves standing inside their teammate’s childhood home. After a little bit of conversation, they spread out to look around while Trouble herself called the nearby pizza place and placed an order. Then she looked over to where Hannah was standing in front of a picture on the wall. “Oh, that’s me and my parents when I was like… six, I think.” The picture was of the three of them at the shore of a lake. She was throwing rocks in the water while her father fished and her mother was cooking a hotdog over a small fire. “Grandpartie took that one.”

“Your… uh, Grandpa?” Hannah asked hesitantly while glancing at the other girl. “How come you didn’t go stay with him when your parents disappeared?”

“I probably would’ve,” Trouble replied with a shrug, “if Seller hadn’t shown up. They think he’s Mom‘s dad, my grandfather on the other side. We visit them sometimes. Not as much as they want.” She stopped, biting her lip a bit pensively while glancing away. “Not as much as I want, either. But it’s better this way. They couldn’t understand what’s going on, what--you know. They wouldn’t be able to remember even if I told them the truth.”

The two of them stood and talked together for another few minutes before heading into the living room where the others had gathered. Sands and Scout were curiously examining the row of DVDs lined up near the television, while Vanessa and Tabbris sat together on the couch in a whispered conversation that had something to do with their mother. In the meantime, Gordon and Paul had started to look over the array of journalism awards displayed on the opposite wall. With one last glance toward one another, Hannah and Trouble each blushed slightly before turning in opposite directions to join the others.

Before long, there was a knock at the door. Trouble went there and checked through the peephole before nodding to the others. “Food’s here.”

With that, she opened the door and Hannah, standing a bit further back, watched as a handsome, dark-haired boy in a black button-up shirt and jeans, who looked to be about her age, handed over three different boxes of pizza (six teenagers worked up an appetite, plus this would be a first for a couple of them) as well as a couple two-liters of soda. While Trouble was counting out the cash, he ran his hand over his backwards baseball cap and looked toward Hannah and the others with a smile. “Having a party or something? You better check that pizza, make sure it’s right. I wouldn’t wanna have to make you wait while I drive all the way back out here. Wouldn’t be the first time this week. Eddie’s a great cook, but he’s getting up there in years, you know? Gets a little confused sometimes.”

After handing the cash over, Trouble opened the top box and checked over the food there. “Yeah, looks right,” she muttered before passing it over to Hannah. She checked the next box before passing that over as well. As she opened that last one, the delivery driver was thanking her for the tip. Her eyes glanced up to reply, when there was an abrupt blast of light from the third pizza as soon as the lid was opened. Standing a few feet back, in the doorway leading to the kitchen, Hannah felt a brief searing pain as she was lifted off the floor by an invisible force and sent flying into the nearest wall. One of the pictures hanging there crashed down on top of her. She could hear shouting through the ringing in her ears. A few seconds passed before the regeneration from that giant cockroach thing she had killed helped enough that she could blink her eyes open and see what was going on.

It wasn’t great. Gordon was lying on the floor nearby, bleeding from the head and apparently unconscious. Trouble was flat on her back just beyond the front doorway, visible burns across her face from being at the centerpoint of the explosion, whatever it had been. She also wasn’t moving.

Meanwhile, Paul was in front of the delivery driver, swinging one of his hand axes. But with a sudden blur of motion, the pizza guy disappeared from where he was standing and appeared behind Paul, lashing out with a foot to kick the other boy in the back. The blow sent Paul flying through the open doorway to crash down on the sidewalk beyond. Before he could get up, the pizza guy slammed the door with a casual two finger flick before touching some sort of coin against it. He spoke a word and glowing green energy spread over the door. “There,” he muttered, “You can just stay outside for a while.”

With that, he turned back just in time to get shot in the face as Scout fired through one of her gun’s scope-portals from somewhere else in the house. It made his head snap backwards slightly and left a pale bruise in the middle of his forehead, but he was otherwise unhurt. That was followed immediately by three more shots. But in that case, none of them hit the mark. The boy snapped his head from one side to the other, moving too fast for Hannah to follow in the best of circumstances, let alone with the way her vision was still blurring.

As he twisted to avoid the next shot, Sands appeared in the doorway to the living room behind him. She swung her mace at the back of his head, but the boy ducked under the swing without looking. His hand caught the back of her neck and, with a grunt, he threw her face first into the wall with enough force to knock the girl unconscious. Then he pivoted, pulling some sort of pistol from his waistband before pointing off into the distance. He pulled the trigger and a blast of light shot out. It burned through the wall and a moment later there was a cry of pain from Scout, followed by a thud.

That done, the boy turned and cracked his neck, raising an eyebrow at the sight of Hannah struggling to sit up. She had to help, she had to do something. She had to check on Trouble and the others, had to--

“No, no,” the boy insisted, “you don’t have to get up on my account. By all means, stay where you are. After all, we’ve got a lot to catch up on, sis.”

The words penetrated, but Hannah had no idea what he was talking about. She managed to push herself to a seated position, staring that way. “Who… who are you? What the hell are you talking about?” Part of her wanted to lunge that way, but she knew she wouldn’t stand a chance. She had barely started to learn how to fight over the past couple months. What was she supposed to do against some guy who had taken apart everyone else so casually?

The dark-haired boy snorted quietly before stepping over to crouch in front of her. He was still too far away for her to grab, and yet insultingly close, as if he was taunting her with knowing how helpless she was. “Don’t you see the resemblance?” He showed his teeth in a sly grin. “I’ve been waiting to meet you for a long time. Pretty much since we were separated at the hospital.”

“The hospital--I don’t--wait…” Eyes widening, Hannah stared at him. “You--you’re--no.”

“Yeah.” He gave a short nod, gaze boring into her. “We’re twins, babe. Mom called me Holden. Hannah and Holden. When we were born, I got picked up and taken off to ahh… well, let’s just say I’ve been with an old friend of the family. I call him Uncle Paschar. You’ll see him soon enough. I mean, since you’re oh-so-special.” A tone that was a mixture of bitterness and mocking entered his voice as he reached out to poke the center of her forehead none-too-gently. “Just had to be in a rush to get out of the womb, didn’t you?”

A slight groan of pain escaped Hannah as her vision swam once more from the boy poking her head. “What?” she asked blearily. “I don’t understand what… huh?”

“Damn, that blast really did hit you hard, didn’t it?” Staring into the girl’s dazed eyes, Holden shook his head. “Let me dumb it down for you. You were born first. They thought I was, but they screwed up and grabbed the wrong kid. And the thing they needed me for requires the oldest. That…” He put his finger against her forehead again, “would be you. Now, you should thank me, because they were just gonna kill you, which would automatically make me the oldest by default. But you know, you are my twin, so I convinced Uncle Paschar to take you instead. You’ll do what they want you to.” With that, he rose to his feet and extended a hand. “You can come with me quietly, or I can start killing everyone here until you do as you’re told. Which is it going to be?”

Before Hannah could find a response, there was a snapped shout from behind the boy. “Hey!” It was Trouble, sitting up with her arm extended. “How about you get the fuck out of my house?!” In mid-sentence, the girl’s cyberform snake, Herbie, flew out of her sleeve and crashed into Holden’s neck, biting hard before shifting into his sword form. As he reeled and shouted in pain, Trouble was on her feet, catching hold of her sword before yanking it further through the boy’s neck. He recoiled, hand snapping up to send a blast of energy that way. But Trouble rolled forward under it faster than he could react. Suddenly, she standing between Hannah and the boy.

Staggering backward while holding his bleeding neck, Holden snapped, “How? You should’ve been unconscious for another hour from that.”

Hannah could hear the grin in the other girl’s voice. “Let’s just say I’ve got a lot of tricks. Like this one. Abracadabra.”

As soon as she said that, the front door swung open, revealing Paul standing there with both of his axes ready. “Okay,” the boy snarled while stalking back into the house, “now I’m kinda ticked off. And for the record, so are the teachers I just called in.”

Looking back and forth between Trouble and Paul, then toward Sands as the girl started to wake up, Holden finally focused on Hannah. “Eh, it was nice meeting you anyway,” he announced. “And don’t worry, I’ll see you again real soon.” With that, he made a sudden motion, holding a new coin in his hand. While Paul and Trouble lunged that way, he threw the coin down while blurting a word. In a flash of light, he had vanished.

By then, Sands was sitting up. Scout, holding her wounded shoulder, appeared in the doorway. Gordon had shifted as well, slowly lifting himself to a seated position as he managed a weak, “What… happened?”

Grimacing, Trouble replied, “Let’s just say I’m glad we have friends this guy didn’t know about.”

At those words, a glowing form stepped out of her before resolving itself into Vanessa, who spoke. “Yeah, and I’m glad I could recall to your body and wake you up.”

“Not to mention this one,” Paul put in, his hand settling on Tabbris’s head as the young Seosten stepped out from behind him. “If it wasn’t for her, I never would’ve broken the spell on that door. Thanks, kid.”

Tabbris, for her part, blushed and squirmed under the attention. “It’s okay, I… I just wanted to help. But… who was that guy?”

“You think it’s true, what he said?” That was Vanessa, looking to Hannah. “About being your brother.”

Hannah, still sitting on the floor against the wall, was staring at the spot where the boy had been. Her voice was dull with shock. “I don’t… I don’t know,” she managed weakly. “But he said I’d see him again, and I believe that. And… and I think there’s a bigger question.

“Who’s Paschar?”