The Freemans needed to be careful.

Hero, Macy, Everett, Kat, and Sydney ran within the Freeman base.

Their shoes slapping against the floor added sound to the long hall, the aspiring kidnappers rushing in enemy territory.

Macy had given Hero a Soynite laser pistol.

A Freeman warrior had ruined Hero's previous Soynite gun, which had occurred several floors above the gray building's first floor.

Hero had returned to the Freeman base. The Exchangers who were not Wade had returned to the enemy's building.

The Exchangers had two tasks to accomplish.

They needed to find Wade Shame.

They needed to find a Pure.

After completing both tasks, the Exchangers would go back to Heaven.

The Exchangers had to put the Freeman base between them in the future, considering how a Freeman-occupied building didn't offer sweet hospitality. The Freemans, armed and unarmed, their warriors and their civilians, were not sweet.

The Freemans weren't like Zoey.

The Freemans weren't like Sydney.

How long would Sydney's sweet personality last? Would committing ten kidnappings turn her into a monster who was only a bit better than the Freemans?

Would Hero return to the girl he had carried in the air?

Hero had revealed his power to Zoey.

The Exchanger had picked the girl off her feet, then he had flown through a hole in a wall. After flying with Zoey in his arms, Hero's desire to reunite her with the woman she needed to reunite with had deepened.

There was a chance Hero and Zoey could stay friends after she reunited with her mother.

Hero was away from his father, but the father-son bond hadn't turned into nothing. The Exchanger had left Zoey inside the fastest Soynite spaceship, but he would return to her. Reuniting Zoey with her mother, Misty Windsore, remained as a plan, one of Hero's several plans.

Hero would find his father. The boy's urge to find Mitch Shame hadn't fled.

The running Exchangers' ears didn't find Freeman voices.

It seemed as if the Freemans had fled.

Hero and his sibling companions had heard a spaceship on the way back to the building, but they hadn't seen the space vessel.

A Freeman Hero had killed had informed two other pale foes about a Soynite girl. Freemans from the base she had attacked were on the way to the base the Exchangers attacked. There was a chance the spaceship the Exchangers had heard was a Freeman spaceship.

Where were the Freemans?

They were not in the hall, which was gray and long, like other halls within the base Hero had rushed through. A hole occupied the ceiling, too small for any Exchanger to climb through.

A bellma flew into the hall, bleeding. Then another.

Hero didn't know if Wade had wounded the bellmas. He didn't know if a different Soynite had wounded the winged creatures, but his valuable alertness raised.

The Exchangers came to a halt.

"Bellmas!" Hero yelled.

He and Macy aimed their guns.

Hero Shame, with confident determination running through him, pulled the trigger.

Blue and bright, a laser fled the pistol's barrel, as if it were as eager to kill a bellma as Hero was.

The laser radiated a glow as it flew toward the flying creature. The glow touched the space surrounding it as its short journey to the Freemans' screeching war animal stayed ongoing.

Like what a Freeman had done, the laser Hero had fired blasted into a creature with wings.

A Freeman laser beam had hurled death into a bird when a flying Hero carried Zoey. The Earth animal's death had been an accident, but believing the Freeman regretted it was almost as foolish as Macy had been when she planned on killing Zoey.

The already bleeding bellma bled more. Its black blood poured out its injuries, then met the gray floor in a gross display. It whined. It whined in agony.

After the bellma collapsed, it flapped one red wing against the floor. Then stopped.

If it hadn't confronted Hero and his siblings, its body wouldn't have hole that gaped and bled. Dark blood poured from those holes.

The bellma took its final, undeserved breath.

The laser beam from Hero's gun had put his target out its misery.

A laser beam from Macy's gun put the remaining bellma out its misery.

"Dumb creatures," Macy said. "They should've died in peace somewhere. Instead of doing that, they decided to attack us."

"I hope there's not more of them," Kat said, grabbing her white backpack's strap with her free hand as she stared at the bellma Hero had killed. The yellow circle on the backpack filled Hero's mind with a better place. She turned her head to a hard wall. "I hate looking at them."

Kat had olive-toned skin. Her skin was darker than the other Exchangers', but she was still like them. Even though cowardice dwelled in her.

Hero stood not far from the hole in the ceiling.

The boy kept his grip on his gun, hoping he wouldn't encounter more bellmas, but also wise enough to know a fool wouldn't expect more bellmas to come. Each Exchanger wielded a Soynite laser pistol. If Freemans made their uninvited arrival, Hero and his allies would deal with them.

"Hero," Kat said. She moved closer to him, then moved her hand from her backpack's strap to Hero's long sleeve. "I'm scared. You kept that girl alive."

"Her name is Zoey," Hero said.

He didn't glare at his sister, but not doing so came with difficulty.

"If she learns too much, she's going to get us killed," Kat said, pointing her dark brown eyes at Zoey's protector. "Do you want all of us to die?"

Macy, Everett, and Sydney stood in a different part of the hall, Macy's fur-covered victim near their feet.

Hero frowned.

"Do you want me to die?" Kat said.

"You're my sister, Kat," Hero said. He set his gun on the floor, then did the same to his backpack. Hero caressed Kat's cheek. "I love you more than anything on Soy. I have a sister. You. I have sisters. Zoey has a stepsister, and she wants to meet her. She's one of the Highs. I need to help Zoey."

Hero had said, "I love you more than anything on Soy."

Soy lacked trees. The planet lacked grass, rivers, and homes. Still, Kat belonged to the same family as Hero. He loved her.

"But-" Kat started saying.

Hero hugged her. As Kat's backpack remained between his arms and his sister, the boy closed his eyes.

Kat dropped her pistol, then she hugged Hero back.

"I love you," Hero said. "But you need to realize that everything is going to be fine."

"I love you too," Kat said.

The hug ended.

Hero kissed Kat's cheek, hoping the affection he had gifted her would make her view him as a hero who could bring greatness to their family.

Mitch Shame deserved to be back with his family.

Hero was among the other Exchangers. Minus Wade, of course. They stood some distance away from Hero and Kat, conversing and watching the bellma Macy had killed.

Kat picked up her gun.

Hero picked up his gun.

Heaven's warriors weren't able to help the Exchangers complete their mission. Hero, Kat, and their siblings needed to complete the mansion on their own. They needed to do it as a family.

A bellma moved through the hole in the ceiling.

The creature bit Kat, sinking sharp teeth into the Exchanger's arm. Screaming, Kat opened fire.

Blue erupted into existence.

When the laser sped toward the hall's other end, a horrible emptiness stayed hooked in Hero. The emptiness hadn't been there a short moment ago.

As Hero moved his right hand, which wielded the gun, red spread on someone's blue jacket.

"Help!" Kat screamed, shooting with recklessness.

Red didn't stop touching gray.

"Hold... still!" Hero said, talking to his sister while she flailed her arms.

Grimacing, Kat stopped flailing her arm, the arm with the bellma feasting on it.

Hero helped Kat.

A laser devoured most of the bellma's head. The almost headless creature dropped onto the gray floor's hardness.

Bleeding and crying, Kat made eye contact with Hero. She lowered her gaze, then her eyes widened.

"It's okay," Hero said. He winced. "I got it."

"What did you do?!" Macy shouted, hurling her sentence at Kat.

"She got... bit," Hero said. "I... saved..."

His knee hit the floor. Even though he had breathed with no issue a short moment ago, he winced as he breathed.

Whose blood poured onto the floor?

Whoever's body the blood came from, Hero moved his legs onto the floor.

Kat dropped her gun. She scurried to the spot behind Hero, kneeled, then cradled him.

Kat's warm body behind him. She held her brother, and her arm continued bleeding. Kat's wound. There was a chance it was the source of the spilled blood.

The bellma had caused more damage than Hero had assumed, it seemed.

"I got you," Kat said. "Help him, Macy!"

Whose blood had poured onto the floor?

Hero's.

His sister had shot him.