While he waited for Janice, Serenity tried to figure out who his team should be. Rissa was obvious, and he’d certainly invite both Raz and Katya as well. Russ would be good, but he was still busy with the Decay-creatures, and Serenity was just as glad not to have to deal with Phoebe.

She was the distinct matriarch of the family, and Serenity didn’t think she’d be happy to have Serenity take Russ away from her, even without the whole “Guardian” thing. Serenity had liked her in the past, but she’d been acting strange ever since she drove him to New York City and they stopped in a parking lot to kill a monster. Really, who does that without warning someone?

Lancaster was out; he was too busy with his new UART position. Moira … Moira could stay with Lancaster; they’d started a relationship in the Tutorial and Serenity had heard that they’d continued once they left. Moira was a competent mage, but she wasn’t irreplaceable.

Echo and Doyle needed to stay in Serenity Settlement and manage it. Serenity wasn’t certain about Nightwitch; she would be a useful addition with her wide-area damaging magic, but he wasn’t certain she’d be available. Even without Nightwitch, though, they were a fairly decent group.

Rissa was the weakest member, but she was also the only healer. Serenity wanted to spend some time with her and figure out what other roles she could play; with practice, a Time mage could probably be a good battlefield coordinator or possibly a true traps specialist; it depended on which way she wanted to go. He’d have preferred to do that in the Tutorial, but Rissa picked her initial Path during the time she was avoiding him.

Was there anyone else?

Well, there was Janice. She’d already said she wasn’t a fighter, but she’d be really useful for coordination and transportation; she’d just be doing the same thing for the group as she was doing for him right now.

Other than that, the only person he could think of offhand that might be available and would fit in the group he was building was Ita. Portal magic was of limited use in combat, especially with Ita’s limitations, but her magic could be extremely useful if it was as flexible as he thought it might be. She wasn’t likely to be a strong offensive mage, but having someone who could cast spells on the others in her team at a distance was valuable.

There were also a lot of other possibilities; had he ignored some options when he didn’t have her use magic while they were looking for hideouts? Was a picture a good enough connection to let her cast a spell?

Serenity wasn’t certain she’d be willing to fight other Sterath, but she’d certainly been willing to give him as much information as she could come up with. Maybe it would work out.

Rissa would cover healing; with luck, she’d also be able to help them stay headed in the right direction. Serenity definitely wanted to find out if she was ready for a new Path; she was still Tier One, and probably would be for a while. Raz was a dungeon expert, and could handle at least some traps, but in this situation he was a very straightforward offensive mage. Ita would be the third straight mage; she was probably more of a support than an offensive caster, but Serenity hoped she’d also be able to handle some battlefield control.

That was the backline taken care of for now. The frontline - assuming Katya accepted - would be Katya and Serenity. At Tier Three, Katya should be able to reliably handle any individual they ran into, so as long as the Sterath stayed split up into small groups to stay hidden, Serenity was confident that the group would be able to handle whatever they ran into. It was probably one of the strongest five-person groups in the world right now, and any competing groups would be invaders.

The place to start, then, was Raz. He was the hardest to reach, since he didn’t have a phone and would have to travel. Katya would, as well, and they were both coming from New York City; he could reach out to both of them by calling Russ.

Before he could call, Janice arrived. She’d rented a new vehicle since the morning; this one was a large SUV. It was parked right behind a News Channel Six van outside the house. Fortunately, no one seemed to be in the van and no one was watching the front of the house - at least, not that Serenity saw. He didn’t even have to sneak to get to the SUV without an encounter with the news media.

As soon as he was strapped in, Serenity called his future father-in-law. Russ answered on the third ring. “Hey, Serenity! How’s it going?” His voice was cheerful and upbeat.

“Mixed. We have some good leads on the Sterath, but it seems like no one else is able to really follow up on them. The police were able to take out one group, but they’ve only got one team and seem to be planning to take some time before they go after the next one. They didn’t say anything about other organizations, and it sounds like there’s a political fight that’s keeping the military out of it?” Serenity wasn’t certain why the Mayor hadn’t called up the National Guard, but some political fight seemed the most likely reason.

“I hadn’t heard you were that close. Send me what you’ve got and I’ll upchannel it. That’s not why you called, is it?” Russ still sounded pretty happy. He clearly wasn’t as worried about the Sterath as Serenity was.

“Yes and no. Can you ask Raz and Katya if they’d be willing to come to DC to help against the Sterath? I know I brought them both to Earth without conditions, but if they’re available…”

Russ laughed. “Katya will ask how much you’re paying and I bet Raz will jump at the chance. Anything else?”

“Yeah. How’re you doing? How’s the fight against that Decay-thing going?” Serenity still felt a little guilty about skipping out on Russ, even though he’d repeatedly encouraged Serenity to go.

Russ finally sounded serious as he replied. “Eh. Not great. We’ve caught quite a number of smaller creatures, like the ones I fought with your help, but there’s no sign of whatever’s spawning them or even what it is. They’re not all decay; there seems to be a whole range. They’re all destructive and they mostly seem to have to do with entropy, but that could just be the destruction. They’re a wide enough range that I’m beginning to wonder if we’re not looking at-” Russ stopped. “No, I’m not going to say it. I don’t want to put it out there. I know saying it doesn’t change reality, but I’m still not going to. If we haven’t caught it by the time you’re done in DC, well, I’ll tell you in person.”

If Russ wouldn’t talk about the monster, maybe he’d talk about his son. “Rissa said Jacob’s doing well, but she didn’t want to say more. I assume that’s good?”

There was a long sigh from the other end of the phone connection. “Yeah. Mostly. Phoebe is - well, Jacob and I are staying at your apartment or with Raz. Jacob’s learning at a decent pace, but she’s not even willing to admit he exists. I’m not sure why; the reason she always objected was for his sake, and you’ve taken care of that.”

Serenity agreed; he’d taken care of the curse on Jacob. So that shouldn’t be the problem, unless Phoebe was so inflexible as to not adjust to it. Or perhaps it wasn’t her that was inflexible? The curse had shown itself to be quite adaptable while Serenity fought with it, trying to free Jacob. He’d even been told to be careful of destroying more, because the curse-giver might notice. He still wasn’t certain who’d warned him, but it seemed like good advice.

Serenity tried to work through the implications. “What if it’s not the curse on Jacob that’s important now? Rissa was also cursed, could that be Phoebe’s problem?”

There was a long pause before Russ spoke quietly. “I hope you’re right.”

When Russ didn’t continue, Serenity tried to pull things back to safer ground. “Ah, Rissa’s fine. Has she mentioned Ita to you?”

“Yes, she did. Something about a Babylon 5 marathon? I think Rissa’s happy to be helpful; she’s been pretty annoyed lately that she couldn’t help you, and all she could do is teach Jacob.”

Serenity completely missed Russ’s hint.

“Teaching Jacob was important! Family matters. Now that she’s back, though, I’m going to pull her in for the next step in dealing with the Sterath - it’ll depend on who accepts, but I’m planning to ask her, Raz, Katya, Ita, and Nightwitch to help me clean up this mess.”

For some reason, Russ sounded amused. “Tell her that. Anyway, I’m off; I’ll talk to Raz and Katya for you. I’ll let you know what they say.”

“Please let Rissa know too; she’ll be arranging their trip here. Or maybe Janice will?” Serenity wasn’t certain. It seemed like the sort of thing Janice would do, but Rissa had arranged his last flight, and Serenity thought they’d probably fly the others down; it was that or a long drive, and Serenity wasn’t certain Russ wanted to leave Jacob alone for that long.

For some reason, Russ started laughing right before he hung up.

Serenity was glad Russ was happy. It sounded like there wasn’t a lot of joy in his life at the moment.

Serenity had intended Nightwitch to be next, but when he looked out of the car, he realized they were almost to the motel where Ita was staying. “It’s dinnertime, isn’t it?”

“Yup! It should be ready for me to pick up any time now; I made the order large enough for the four of us. I’m going to drop you off, go pick up the food, and bring it back.” Janice pulled up in front of the door to Ita’s room. “See you in a bit!”

Serenity was glad that Janice didn’t chatter when he stared off into space. He wasn’t certain if he’d been talking out loud or not, but he didn’t think he had been. He didn’t have to, which meant she might not have realized he was on the phone; it wasn’t like there was a phone visible to cue her in. Before he shut the door, he looked up at Janice. “Thanks, Janice. You’re a big help.”

The hotel room looked messier than Serenity remembered, and Rissa had set up a folding chair and table to hold her laptop. Serenity didn’t have much of a chance to look around the room before Rissa enveloped him in a hug. “I’m glad you made it for dinner! Is Janice behind you?”

“She dropped me off before picking it up,” Serenity admitted without releasing the hug. “Before she gets back, I have a question for you. Would you be willing to help me eliminate the Sterath invasion? I’m not sure I can do it alone, but I’m confident we can put a group together. I’ve already asked your Dad to ask Raz and Katya.”

Rissa smiled and leaned her head on his shoulder. “Of course I will.”