Serenity walked up to the policeman and the military liaison discussing where the Sterath should be taken. The soldier seemed to be the older of the two, and appeared to be winning the argument.

Neither of them seemed to notice Serenity consciously until he spoke. “The first place they really should be taken is the hospital, regardless of who has custody.”

The soldier - whose last name was apparently LEWIS - glanced at Serenity then stared at the two Sterath. “Are they injured?”

Serenity nodded. “One is; several injuries. The worst is a fairly nasty slash to the leg, straight through the carapace. I don’t think the other one is injured, but it’s probably best to keep them together. Do either of you have translators yet?”

“Translators? They’re aliens, where would we get a translator?” The policeman’s tag said MCLAURIN, but his accent was pure New Jersey. He must have moved to DC at some point in the past.

Serenity blinked. Wasn’t that known by now? “I know my mother has some …”

Come to think of it, he’d sent a text to his father, but he hadn’t yet notified his mother of anything about the situation.

Captured some Sterath, one’s injured, going to try to get them to a hospital. Do you have a translator available?

“Your mother?” The young-looking policeman, Mclaurin, was the one to speak, but the soldier also looked puzzled. Serenity suddenly realized he hadn’t introduced himself - and even if he had, they probably wouldn’t know who his mother was.

Serenity grinned sheepishly. “Yeah, she’s with the State Department. I sent her a note and asked for a translator. I’m Serenity - that is, Thomas Rothmer?” He wasn’t really sure which name to use. Maybe picking a new name in the Tutorial was a bad idea? Though it had come in handy for getting the word out; almost everyone who came into a Tutorial knew who Serenity was.

“I thought Serenity had wings?”

Why did everyone always ask about the wings? Serenity wanted to sigh but he answered the policeman politely instead. “I do, but they get in the way, so I tend not to have them out in large groups. I can show you if you need?”

While he was talking, a text came in from his mother, telling him to keep her updated and asking for his current location. Serenity sent back a pin of his location but kept the majority of his attention on his surroundings.

The soldier grinned. “I don’t need you to; I’ve been following the news coverage, and it’s shown you both with and without. D’you need him to, Jake?”

When had he appeared on the news without wings? Serenity couldn’t think of an occasion, but apparently it’d happened.

The policeman shook his head. “Not if you’re sure. I’m Sergeant Mclaurin, by the way, and this joker is Sergeant Lewis. I’ll go call for an ambulance while you two figure out how we’re going to move the aliens. I don’t think they’ll fit real well in a car.”

Serenity glanced over at the Sterath and had to admit that the cop was probably right; they wouldn’t fit very well into anything designed for a human to sit.

Sgt Lewis shook his head at Sgt Mclaurin as he left. “I can tell what he thinks is the easy part.”

“Oh?”

There was a smile in Sgt Lewis’s voice that didn’t make it to his face. “Yeah, he doesn’t really want to deal with the aliens. How are we going to get them into an ambulance when they can’t understand us? Hand gestures?”

“Ah, I can talk to them.” Serenity bit his lip. He also needed to do something about Ita, and he didn’t really want to leave her behind. Normally, he’d have wanted to get the captives to a secure location, but handling Ita was likely to be at least as hard, and dealing with someone who could become a supporter was more important. “They surrendered to me … If I have them follow your instructions, will you stay with them? They need to be monitored by someone they know holds their surrender or they won’t feel bound by it. I can stop by to add people but I can’t stay with them long term.”

“I can do that, I think … let me check with Command.”

While Sgt Lewis did that, Serenity’s thoughts returned to Ita. He was about to sneak an alien combatant into his family home. He trusted her, so it probably wouldn’t have been a problem if his parents weren’t who they were. Putting someone with even possibly doubtful loyalties into the house of the Secretary of Defense seemed like a terrible idea.

On top of that, he had to get her out of the building without being seen.

Janice, I’m sure you’re almost here, but there’s a change of plans. I need you to get a hotel room and a trenchcoat or cloak or something…

One and Three were surprisingly willing to be led away from the dilapidated building after they agreed to follow Sgt Lewis’s direction as much as possible. Serenity suspected it was as much to get away from the circus (or possibly Serenity) as it was eagerness at the chance for medical treatment, but at least they were cooperative. The ambulance was followed by several police cars and they were guarded even after they reached the hospital.

Janice was able to locate a large trenchcoat; Ita’s arms didn’t fit through the sleeves at all, so it ended up being more of a tarp than a coat, but it still was less obvious than a six-foot-tall kangaroo with a shell. Janice had parked several blocks away, but with most of the people who’d gathered around the building off chasing the Sterath who showed up late, she was able to walk in and use another entrance without anyone noticing. The trenchcoat, along with Ita’s “irrelevance” charm and the fact that no one was looking for Ita specifically, got her and Janice out of the building and into the Uhaul unnoticed. From there, it was simple enough to get Ita into the motel room Janice selected.

Serenity took longer to escape. He eventually resorted to “there will be a statement about it soon” and ignoring the reporters. He distinctly regretted not sneaking out of the building with Ita, but he eventually made it to the safety of Janice’s rental car on her return trip after returning the Uhaul.

By the time Serenity’s father arrived home that evening, well after dark, Serenity had managed to wash away the memories of two of the Sterath away. He was in the middle of a third when the door closing pulled him out of the trance. “Dad?”

“Wasn’t expecting you to still be up.” Lex walked into the living room and tossed his jacket on the couch. “Heard you had an exciting day.”

Serenity sat up in the couch he’d been lounging in. “Yeah. I need to talk to you about it. First, what happened afterwards? I heard there were some Sterath outside?”

Lex nodded. “Four we’re sure of; three dead, one that I expect we’ll pick up soon. No luck getting any surrenders, unlike you. Two more are being tracked, we’re hoping they’ll lead us somewhere important. Light casualties so far; they’ve been fighting only when cornered. Given the property damage, it would be a lot worse if they were trying to kill.”

“The standard Sterath Group size is eight.” Serenity stated it flatly, suddenly tense again. “Still, that sounds like a Stealth group of some sort; they’re usually pretty sneaky and some Skills can make tracking nearly impossible. Six is pretty good.”

Lex looked at his son and frowned. “You weren’t debriefed after the fight, were you?” He moved to the chair he preferred and sat. “Tell me about it.”

Serenity wasn’t sure if he should be happy or sad at that. His father always cut to the heart of the matter, and he did want to tell him, but he wasn’t sure where to start. “I captured three Sterath, not two. Only - one didn’t just surrender, she …” How would he even continue? He’d have to explain Sterath culture and he still didn’t understand why Ita had done what she did. He knew what the effects were, but he didn’t know why.

“Start at the beginning. You were doing what, checking for portals today?” Lex ignored Serenity’s attempt to start with the important details.

Serenity shook his head. His father always did that. Serenity knew there were reasons he wanted the whole story in order, but sometimes it would have been nice to just give a summary. Maybe he was right this time, though; this way, he could stop and talk about the cultural bits as they came up. “Yeah. We were driving near the area where a Sterath was seen a while back when Dr. Ridge noticed a strange signal; it looked like a portal, sort of, but not exactly like we expected…”

The explanation took hours. It wasn’t the story itself that took long, but the fact that Serenity had to explain an entire host of things that he’d just sort of glossed over with his parents. The strange thing was that his father never seemed upset or concerned that his son was lying; he seemed to take it all in stride. Lex asked a lot of questions, revealing things that Serenity thought he’d already explained; sometimes, he seemed to need the explanation while other times it was almost like he wanted Serenity to think about it a bit more.

The sky was starting to show the first signs of pre-dawn light by the time Serenity finished the story with evacuating Ita and sending the two Sterath soldiers on their way. Serenity felt drained more than exhausted; before he spoke, he hadn’t really made the connection that he felt like he was murdering the six Sterath soldiers more than fighting them, but he also hadn’t quite realized why he’d grabbed onto Ita so strongly. She was a symbol of hope, somehow.

“Get some sleep, son. This would be easier elsewhere, but I think I have a plan. It’ll take a couple days; until then, rest and recover and try to figure out where the bases are. You’ll be far too busy after that.”

Serenity’s sleep that morning was filled with memories of the daily life of a Kaelitha Scout. It was mostly boring minutiae; only Two had ever even seen action. They’d all seen death, of course; that was normal. Less than half a creche would qualify to become a soldier, and of the ones selected for Scout training, only about three-quarters actually made it into a Group. Compared to that, the actual fighting wasn’t bad. Yes, many died, but at least you died with your honor intact. Death in a training accident was a pointless death.

When Serenity woke, he wondered why his burrow was so soft. It took him a moment to realize he was in a bed, not a burrow. It took him another moment to realize that he was shaped like a Sterath; it had felt natural until the first time he instinctively hopped after digging himself out of bed.