Finally, eX-0281 and eX-0704 had made it to Charlotte's home where she could get help from her mother.

While her father rushed her towards the door, he asked, "Where's your mom?"

"What?" The falter in Charlotte's voice had never sounded so crestfallen until this moment. Given all that had happened to her so far this evening, that was really saying something.

"Didn't you go with her to that protest in Grandesia?"

"No!" Charlotte gasped. All her words tried to tumble from her mouth at once, littered with constant stumbles. "I-I asked her not to go and even drained the b-battery of the bike. I told you not to let her go! Why'd you let her?"

A look of disbelief fell over his face. "You know I'd never try to control your mother like that—"

"But it was really important!" All at once, Charlotte broke down into tears. No longer able to talk, she wailed loudly. With her throat closed up, she could hardly manage to take a breath.

"What protest?" eX-0281 whispered to eX-0704.

His shoulders shrugged in reply. The two of them watched Charlotte's father swing the door open with one hand.

"Men, get inside."

They obeyed her father's snapping voice, watching as he set Charlotte on the kitchen table.

"If your mom's not here," he continued, "then we'll have to get you to the hospital—"

"N-No." Unable to spit out any more words, she shook her head. The ragged gasps kept getting stuck in her throat, making eX-0281 wonder if she needed to get hooked back up to the air tank.

"What happened?" Her father stood protectively next to Charlotte, arms crossed in anger. "Give me a report, soldier."

Before obliging him, eX-0281 pointed a concerned finger to Charlotte. "Does she need an inhaler?"

"No." Her father shook his head, seeming all the more distraught by her present condition given that she did not have asthma. "Lottie," he whispered, leaning back so that he could put one arm around her. "Everything's going to be okay."

When his attention flashed back to eX-0281, his stern, demanding voice returned. "Just tell me: where is Josephine?"

eX-0281 and eX-0704 looked to each other. Because he did not answer at once, eX-0704 tried to do some of the talking. "Well, uh, we don't know who that is…."

"Was Charlotte's mom a part of the mission?" Quickly, eX-0281 shook his head. No, that can't be right. According to Charlotte, her mother was supposed to be here to heal her.

The nearby shotgun tightened in her father's grasp. "I don't know who you two think you are or what mission you're talking about…. But you had better start making sense fast—"

"They saved my life!" Charlotte shouted. "Don't be mean to them." Now composed enough to talk between her wheezes, she managed to get out, "Is Vickie here?"

"Her bike was outside," eX-0281 confirmed.

"What in the world does Victoria have to do with this?" her father barked. Even at a time like this, he seemed to resist the urge to use profanities in front of his daughter.

His heavy boots tramped through the kitchen, and he headed to the hallway with a staircase. Some muffled voices and movement sounded from upstairs—not anyone who had permission to be in the house. Grasping his gun tightly, Charlotte's father headed up.

"Uh, stay with Charlotte," eX-0704 said. Hastily, he ascended the stairs with the good intention to lessen hostilities between the Disco Menace and Charlotte's father.

"Wait…." eX-0281 tried to say, but he had already gone. Glancing around nervously, he wondered: why did eX-0704 have to leave him here?

An awkward atmosphere settled over the kitchen. eX-0281 shifted awkwardly as he stood alone with the sobbing teenage girl. And he felt helpless to do anything about it. "Charlotte…."

"2-281, I'm scared!" She pulled away the smeared goggles and swiped her wrists over her eyes. Thereafter, her arms stuck out as if wanting a hug.

Since Charlotte had spent the last couple hours against his chest, he saw no issue in hugging her again. In his attempt to reassure her, eX-0281 slipped into the official tone of voice that he used around civilians. "It's going to be okay, miss. The situation is under control—"

"No, it's not! I can't go to the hospital. The authorities would identify me from my wounds, I bet. Without a proper [Cure] spell, I'm going to lose my leg! It was a stupid idea—stupid! Why did we freeze my leg?" She cried over the rush of her words and shoved a cheek up against his armored chest. Her thin arms grasped around him with a surprising amount of strength, desperate to cling onto something.

"My mom…" she gasped. "My mom went to the environmental protest. If Grandesia Power Company has attacked it like we thought, my mom could be… my mom could be…." Charlotte could not bring herself to finish the thought.

eX-0281 patted the back of her head robotically. Eyes trained at the ceiling, he had no idea what to do about this. So, he did nothing more than that.

***

Meanwhile, eX-0704 had followed Charlotte's father upstairs to confront the Disco Menace. They walked down a hallway of bedroom doors and stopped at one left ajar.

Through the crack, the lithe form of the Disco Menace hunkered over a bedside. With her mask cast aside, the worried, scarred face of a young woman gazed on at the boy in the bed.

Some quiet sniffles came from Marcel. "Vickie, I'm really sorry."

"It's fine, Marcel." Her hand stroked his cheek tenderly, all love evidenced in her eyes and smiling face. "You've got nothing to be sorry about."

"I didn't listen to you…."

Her head tilted to the side, and the usually abrasive personality had melted away entirely. "It's hard to blindly listen to authority. I don't blame you—not at all."

The moans of the boy lifted into a more somber note. "You told me not to! If I reveal my powers, then the bad people will come. And they did!"

"Yes," the Disco Menace said, nodding, "exactly. It was the bad people's fault, not yours. If they didn't exist, there wouldn't have been anything wrong with what you did. But they do exist—just a fact of life we have to deal with."

Marcel continued in his quiet tears. The words did nothing to console him, but they did not aggravate his emotions either. "I don't want them to exist," he said in his quiet, wavering voice. An odd amount of certainty had fallen over the boy. His small fists clenched at the sleeve of the Disco Menace.

While eX-0704 did not know what had happened, he could certainly fill in the blanks well enough. This was the sort of experience that the boy could take with him into adulthood, even at seven years old.

"Now," the Disco Menace continued, "you've learned your lesson the hard way. We're going to be more careful going forward. But all that matters right now is that you're safe." She placed a kiss to his forehead and draped her body over him in a gentle hug, not quite touching.

Soft, her whisper was barely audible from the hall. "I love you, Marcel. I'd give up the world for you a hundred times over."

As they let the child have this moment with his big sister, the brow of Charlotte's father had become further knotted in anger. He shouldered the door open and stood to the side of the door. "Victoria," he said darkly.

The Disco Menace got up and sent her own livid glare their way. It sent shivers down eX-0704's spine, but Charlotte's father seemed unfazed. The scar that sliced across her jawbone to the tip of her chin accentuated her sharp appearance. Her dark brown eyes almost seemed to smolder from the electricity within.

In a quiet hiss, she said, "I presume we need to talk."

Shoulders square, she threatened to walk through Charlotte's father and eX-0704 as if she could. They allowed her to pass and both flowed out of the room in her wake. The door was shut in a quiet click to hopefully let Marcel have some semblance of peace.

Eyes hooded in disdain, the Disco Menace started by asking, "Josie went to that damnable protest, didn't she?"

Charlotte's father nodded once. "I don't know what you did, but we opened our home to you because you were Charlotte's friend! How could you get my daughter—my family—caught up in this mess?"

"I needed to save my family—my brother." the Disco Menace spat, "Lottie wanted to help, and she did."

"What did you do exactly?" Charlotte's father asked darkly.

"Blew up the central reactor. Caused a blackout in the city. Picked the day of the protest so that all blame immediately shifted to the north sector," the Disco Menace said while grinning. "It was a perfect plan!"

Indifferent, she leaned against the wall and examined her nails. "It's a damn shame your wife was one of those mouth breathers."

The muzzle of the shotgun was raised up to her face. Livid in anger, Charlotte's father said, "You knew she was going to that protest! How could you betray my family like this, after we've shown you nothing but kindness?" Drawing in a deep breath, he sighed and let a darkness fall over him.

The ultimatum was hissed out in a lowered voice. "I just want to hear what you have to say for yourself… before that brother of yours ends up an only child."

The electric eyes of the Disco Menace flared up as she tilted her chin upward. Tall enough to look down on Charlotte's father like that, she took a step closer to the gun. A sideways smirk peeled up one corner of her lips.

"Mr. Bouchard," she intoned crisply, "you've always been good at understanding things Josie couldn't. You either step in line or live with the consequences." The Disco Menace leaned into the gun, pressing her skin against the cool, metal barrel.

The quickened breath was visible in Mr. Bouchard's rising and falling chest. A bead of sweat trailed from his hairline, and his finger tried to curl around the trigger.

"Pathetic," the Disco Menace said. A small [Manifest Thunder] sent yellow streaks down the barrel of the gun, racing towards the hands of Charlotte's father.

"Mister!" eX-0704 gasped and threw [Manifest Ice] at the point where he held the gun. Rather than being zapped, he had his hands frozen in place.

Not expecting this, the Disco Menace tried to disarm him but ended up wrenching around the gun attached to his hands. The ice kept the gun firmly sealed in Mr. Bouchard's grasp.

"Oh," she said, blinking a few times. "Liz!" Quickly, she composed her tone of humorous outrage in favor of rubbing at the back of her neck. "You know, sir, I gave Josie the tip in quite a similar manner, if you catch my drift."

"I… figured that much," Mr. Bouchard said with a dejected look to the side.

"It was part of the plan to make her stay home, but apparently she was quite obstinate on going." The Disco Menace rolled her eyes.

"I know that too," he muttered, "quite well enough."

With a big sigh, the Disco Menace said, "Well, I suppose that I have to go save her, but only because Marcel needs medical attention."

Mr. Bouchard looked uncertain and shifted around in discomfort. With the gun frozen in his hands and its barrel resting against the hard floor, it did nothing to help him in that respect. "I assume they arrested the protesters en masse, but I never received a call from her."

"Exactly. It's not like they would let her out on bail anyway." Snidely, the Disco Menace added on, "As if they would treat an A-class nature mage kindly when they're on the hunt for ecoterrorists. Don't get me wrong. They definitely exist out there, they most definitely did not plan the attack!"

As he stood in the hall between them, eX-0704 felt like a mere witness to the exchange. Eyes flitting between them, he waited for them to refocus on the matter at hand and give him some directions.

"Ha." Mr. Bouchard ducked his head and tapped it against the wall. "I'm terrified for both my wife and daughter. You have to bring Josie back, and then she can heal Lottie. Call me pathetic, but that's the only reason why I didn't shoot you here and now."

"Yeah, yeah." The Disco Menace waved a hand of dismissal. "We can both act tough all we want." A laugh prattled out of her belly, but Mr. Bouchard only glared at her.

After watching the familiar exchange between Charlotte's friend and father, eX-0704 became more annoyed. "Uh, guys. Can we just focus on setting things right?"

The Disco Menace nodded to him. "Bust the ice for Mr. Bouchard, would you?" Back turned, she paused with one hand on the door to the room with Marcel. "Your mana reserves are still high coming in from the outside, right?"

"That's right." While he no longer had his tactical display, eX-0704 could feel the power within his ley lines ready to cast magic. Ever since he had cast that first [Manifest Ice], it had felt as if a connection had been made—his power unleashed.

Per the command, eX-0704 shifted forms and cracked his talons against the ice. This ice… I made! It brought him as much satisfaction to smash it as well as break it. His tail lifted with glee as the shards of ice clattered to the floor.

Mr. Bouchard set aside the gun, leaning it up against the wall. He rubbed his reddened hands together and brought them to his lips. "Will you need any supplies?" he asked whilst breathing into his palms.

"You don't have a sword laying around by any chance?" the Disco Menace asked. "Preferably a rapier."

"How about a discarded pipe?"

"It'll do." With a motion of her fingers, she gestured for eX-0704 to follow. "We'll head out soon." Then back to Mr. Bouchard, she said, "Go back to taking care of Lottie for now."

"You should hurry," Mr. Bouchard snapped as he turned. Once his steps against the stairs faded away, eX-0704 was left with the Disco Menace.

He could not help but wonder: why did he not stay downstairs with eX-0281? As things stood between him and the Disco Menace, he hardly wanted to look at her.

"Um, Liz." A shy hand rubbed at the back of her neck, her eyes also unable to meet his. "Would you help my brother? He's in pain." The way her face turned downwards, dejected with narrowed eyes, she made it look like she did not expect any help.

Without a doubt, he would help—not for the Disco Menace, but for the boy. Even so, eX-0704 hesitated to respond at once as he observed her demeanor. "Would it kill you to say please?"

Her gaze shot up, frustration evident in her tented eyebrows. "Please. The only reason why I'm asking is for his sake," she added on tersely.

"Same here. Only reason I'm helping is for his sake." eX-0704 brushed past her and knelt at the bedside.

Barely conscious, Marcel tilted his head to look on at him with mostly closed eyes.

"What do you want me to do exactly?" A wave of anxiety washed over him along with his uncertainty, and he sent a darting glance back to the Disco Menace for direction.

She knelt next to him at the bedside and ushered Marcel to sit up. "There you go." When she pulled away the blanket and guided him to turn around, she revealed his chest and back.

Red, raised sores and swaths of purple blotches adorned his skin. The marks generally followed the tracts where the ley system flowed throughout the body.

A queasy feeling latched onto eX-0704's stomach at once just as a gasp caught in his throat. This poor kid….

"They had his mana reserves drawn too low for too long," the Disco Menace murmured.

"Manzy."

She nodded grimly. "The sudden influx of mana from outside wasn't good for him either. Luckily, he's strong enough to recover, but could you use your ice to help the swelling and numb the pain?"

They wrapped towels around the relevant parts of his body so that the ice would not directly touch his skin. From there, eX-0704 practiced [Manifest Ice] again, trying to make the ice appear in comfortable curves around Marcel's thin frame. He used the remainder of his Mu to make ice, sighing once he had exhausted his own mana reserves.

Just as Marcel had been still and silent when the Disco Menace carried him across the City of Grandesia, he did not react. Once his sister eased him back down, a strained huff fell past his lips. "Thanks, Vickie."

When his heavy eyes flitted to eX-0704, he said, "Thanks, mister. Sorry I shocked you before."

At once, eX-0704 felt his lips and eyes wavering. "It's okay. I forgive you, kiddo."

Marcel rested with the ice packs across his frame. Though his face looked more pallid than before, his complexion loosened with some degree of contentment. The child had been saved after all. If nothing else, the Disco Menace was admirable in her commitment to save her brother.

Two of her fingers tapped against his shoulder, signaling him to leave. When he followed her into the hall, she held him back by the elbow. "Liz, thanks."

"Of course."

"There's no time to say more right now, but I will when we get back here." Her hand still pinched at his elbow, tight even against his armored body.

The disdain that he had for the Disco Menace softened a bit. Though he still thought her a bad person and should not care about her opinion, eX-0704 wanted acknowledgement for everything that he did for her.

"Are you and your friend willing to come with me to save Lottie's mom?"

"I… I don't know." In truth, eX-0704 did not feel good in the head by any stretch of the imagination. Between the blow dealt against the concrete and the all around horrifying experience of escaping Grandesia, the last thing he wanted to do was crawl back to the company's clutches. "I'll have to talk to 281."

She nodded along. "I was going to suggest that either way. You guys take a break. I'll help Lottie before we head out."

The Disco Menace walked by him, even though eX-0704 followed shortly afterward. They marched down the stairs to rejoin each of their friends, eX-0281 and Charlotte.