Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The afternoon was like any other, really. The spring had been wet, but yesterday the sun broke through the clouds after lunch, and today was sunny and just dry enough. Dad and Papa had taken the boys to the park, and the swings had been dry. Dee had helped Thomas into one of the baby swings, given him a few pushes, and run off to make Dad push him on the big kid swings.

Dad and Papa had been too busy being mushy at first, but eventually Dad came over to give Dee a boost. After one push, Dee made him stop- he was a big kid, he could swing by himself! So, Dad and Papa went back to being mushy and pushing Thomas.

"Hello again, my dark prince," Pa cooed, wagging his eyebrows.

"You sound like your brother," Dad teased, taking Papa's hand and linking their fingers.

"Maybe that's because I'm a man in love," Papa joked, and Dee paused in his swinging as both his dads burst out laughing. The swing didn't stop, but it did slow down a little and Dee could catch the smiles on his dads' faces. Some of the other parents looked up and gave them dirty looks before looking away. Dad and Papa never cared about what other people thought, though.

"I love you, too," Dad said as he settled down, and he leaned his head against Papa's shoulder, reaching to give Thomas another gentle push. Thomas squealed in delight.

Papa nuzzled his nose in Dad's hair, and Dee looked away and grinned. Someday, he hoped somebody loved him like that. Love him enough not to care if they got mean looks in public places, loved him enough to comfort and be comforted. Dad and Papa really were an instance of true love.

The cheerful music of an ice cream truck driving down the street pulled Dee out of his head, and he jumped off the swing as he spotted it coming to a stop.

"Oh, no," Dad sighed, and Dee pouted.

"Please, Dad? Daddy? Come on, we never get ice cream!" Dee whined, running up and grabbing his Dad's sleeve.

"You know why we don't do that, Dee, your papa is lactose intolerant, and we haven't got Thomas checked for it yet," Dad huffed. Dee puckered his lips and widened his eyes, turning to his Papa.

"Papa?"

Papa squirmed under Dee's intent look, and then he cracked. "Okay, okay, we'll go get a cone for you!"

"And Thomas?" Dee was nothing if not a generous big brother.

"Remus," Dad said, warning in his tone. But Papa couldn't resist Dee's even bigger puppy dog eyes.

"Okay, fine! Yes, one for you and one for Thomas," Papa relented, scooping the toddler out o the baby swing. Dad sighed.

"And one for me, if you're giving in so easily," Dad said, and Papa grinned.

"Four ice cream cones then!" Papa proclaimed.

"Papa, you're allergic to milk," Dee reminded giddily.

"Oh, let him, Dee. When he's complaining about his stomach later, we can say we told him so," Dad promised, taking Dee's hand as the four of them began to make their way towards the ice cream truck. Dee grinned. He loved when he and Dad got to tell Papa that they told him so.

As they neared the ice cream truck, Dee noticed his Papa drop his smile for a second. When he looked at the truck to see what Papa saw, he only saw the blonde curly head of an ice cream truck vendor, giving ice cream to some of the other kids. Papa stopped and offered Thomas to Dad.

"Why don't you stay over here with the kids, and I'll go get the ice cream? It looks kind of crowded over there," Papa suggested, and Dad blinked, shifting to rest Thomas against his hip.

"Okay, are you sure you've got it all handled?" Dad asked. Papa nodded.

"Besides, you're right. I don't really wanna be sick tonight, anyway," Papa pressed a sloppy kiss to Dad's cheek, which made him laugh. Dee grimaced.

"Okay, okay, down tiger," Dad teased. He was still smiling ridiculously wide, though, and his eyes were shining. It was hard to be grossed out by your parents kissing when they looked at each other with so much happiness. "Just go get the ice cream before I take the boys home without you."

Papa let out another chuckle before spinning on his heel and jogging towards the ice cream truck. Dad smiled and rubbed noses with Thomas before shifting him a little so he could once more offer Dee his hand.

"Let's go find a place to sit so we can enjoy our ice cream, okay?" Dad suggested.

"Okay, Dad," Dee said, grabbing his Dad's hand in both of his and skipping to keep up with his footsteps. He wouldn't normally skip, except that he was feeling particularly excited today. It was just something about the sun, his dads' smiles, the ice cream before lunch, his baby brother… it felt like nothing bad could touch today, and Dee wanted to get up and dance on the clouds.

Skipping was a close second to cloud dancing.

"Bawoom!" Thomas exclaimed, pointing at a birthday party taking place at a picnic table across the park.

"That's right, Thomas, those are balloons," Dad encouraged, bouncing Thomas gently on his hip as he came to a stop in the shade of a large tree. Thomas squealed happily. Dad lowered him to the ground before propping himself up against the tree. He smiled the small little smile he got when he was enjoying something relaxing. "Finally out of the sun for a little."

"I like the sun," Dee contradicted.

"Sunny!" Thomas proclaimed.

Dad smiled. "Well, I'm glad you two are having fun. That's what the park is for, you know."

Thomas sprawled out in the grass, seemingly busy trying to look at the ants. Dee stuck his tongue out and blew a raspberry at Dad, who just blew one right back.

Papa came back with two wrapped up popsicles and a freshly scooped ice cream cone of peppermint ice cream. Dad grimaced at the peppermint- he was allergic. Papa just handed him a pink wrapped popsicle and smiled, gently passing Dee the cone. Dee couldn't believe Dad was allergic to one of the greatest flavors on the planet.

"Thanks, Papa," Dee chirped, before he began to lick the dripping bits of his cone. Papa just grinned, already busy licking off the pink cream that had slipped down his fingers.

"Strawberry shortcake flavored popsicle for my Emo, and a teenage mutant ninja turtle for Thomathy," Papa announced, unwrapping the second popsicle and handing it carefully to Thomas.

"Weo!" Thomas shrieked upon seeing the green blob with the blue stripe across the middle, a face haphazardly crafted inside. Papa settled down next to Dad, and Dad immediately curled into his side. Dee grinned behind his ice cream.

"So how was the ice cream truck all by yourself?" Dad teased, poking Papa in the cheek. Papa laughed.

"More than fine. The ice cream reminds me, though, we're out of almond milk, aren't we?" Papa asked. Dad frowned as he thought about it, carefully swallowing a bite of his shortcake creamsicle.

"I think so," Dad nodded finally. "Did you need some? We could get some on the way home."

"Oh, nah, nah. I'll get that and some other things after we get some lunch in us. Speaking of, nobody tell your Uncle we forgot about lunch before letting you have ice cream, he'll never let me live it down."

Dad barked out a laugh. "You're so ridiculous, Remus. There are plenty of things Roman won't let you live down that don't involve being lenient with our boys."

Papa gasped, placing a hand over his heart. "My own husband. How dare you."

"Like so," Dad said, pressing a kiss to Papa's cheek before leaning against his chest and continuing to munch on the popsicle in his hand.

"Mmmm. Do it again, then," Papa hummed.

"Let me think. Nah," Dad said cheekily.

"You guys are so gross," Dee laughed, and both Dad and Papa grinned at him.

"Love isn't gross, Dee, I'm just so incredibly in love with your father," Papa proclaimed, wrapping his arms around Dad and holding him exaggeratedly close.

"And I'm just so, so blessed to have your father in my life," Dad announced, draping his free arm over Papa's shoulder. Dee couldn't help but laugh.

They spent the rest of their time at the park running around, playing tag. Dee was absolutely sure Dad and Papa were letting them win, especially once they moved on to hide and seek.

"No way," Papa insisted when he asked. "I'm just a lot bigger, so there's nowhere for me to hide that great!"

"I'm definitely letting you win," Dad contradicted, and Dee kicked him playfully.

They didn't leave the park until half past one, when Thomas was complaining about being hungry. His whines for food quickly reminded the other three Sanders-Castillo family stomachs to be hungry, too. So they headed on home to go have some lunch.

Later, Dee would realize that Papa looked nervous as they got close to home. Later, Dee would realize a lot of things. In the moment, however, he only found himself wondering what Papa was thinking about that made his smile look so strange.

They had mac and cheese for lunch, suggested and begged for by the boys. The two of them helped Dad make a pot, and Papa set the table because he wasn't allowed near the stove. Then they all sat down to eat together.

After lunch, in the doorway, was the last time Dee ever saw his Papa.

"I love you," Papa cooed, his hands lingering in Dad's.

"I love you too, stupid. You'll be back in an hour, won't you? You're acting like this is some kind of business trip," Dad teased. Papa laughed.

"Hey, groceries are serious business," Papa mock argued. Dad rolled his eyes.

"Be safe, Ree. I'll make some dinner," Dad offered, and Papa shook his head.

"I might not come home until after dinner, I have a couple other errands to run. I'll be sure to eat something," Papa assured. Dad blinked, then nodded.

"I'll see you tonight, then," Dad said. Papa's grip got tighter on Dad's hands.

"Yeah, I'll see you," Papa agreed. Then he left.

Dee was not supposed to be awake when Dad called Uncle Roman. Dad had put Thomas to bed at his regular bedtime, insisting that Papa had said he would be this late anyhow. He let Dee stay up an extra half hour past his bedtime of eight, but when Papa still didn't come home, he made Dee go to bed.

Dee didn't go to bed, not when he could hear Dad pacing in the living room. Wringing his hands, dusting the dust-free shelves for busywork, drying the already dry cups. After hours and hours, he heard Dad collapse into a chair and dial a number.

"Roman? Are you busy, it's Virgil. Oh, were you asleep? I'm sorry, I didn't realize it was so late, or, uh- early," Dad said into the phone, his voice trembling. "Have you heard from Remus?"

Dee bit his lip. He couldn't hear Uncle Roman answering.

"Oh god, Roman, he hasn't come home. He hasn't called, he hasn't texted- No, I haven't checked the news for any accidents, I'm terrified!" Dad sounded like he was about to cry. Dee wanted to run to him and hug him, but he also wanted to run away and hide under his blankets. He wished this wasn't happening.

"I don't know if that's worse!" Dad exclaimed in response to something Uncle Roman said. "If they found him, they'd call me, my number is on his phone and in his wallet, I'm listed as his emergency contact."

"Oh god, what if he just left me, Roman?" Dad burst out, and Dee froze.

"That's it, isn't it, he finally got tired of my neediness, and my anxiety, and he just up and left - well what else could it be, Roman!? No, don't come over."

Dee's brain was racing a mile a minute, and yet, his mind was empty. Thoughts flitted through his mind so fast he couldn't think them. His heart was pounding in his chest and his throat felt unbearably dry.

"Fine, you can- you can stay the night, but don't wake up the boys, it took me forever to get them down for bed. Oh my god, he left them too! Roman, I- I can't- oh my god, what if I'm a single father-"

At that, Dee ran back to his bedroom, practically throwing himself into his bed. No, Papa didn't leave . This was just a horrible nightmare and he's fallen asleep in the shade of that big tree in the park, and any minute now Papa would wake him up and hand him a peppermint ice cream cone, and they'd all be together and Papa wouldn't leave.

In a day, Dad called the police.

In a week, Uncle Roman moved in to help Dad around the house.

In a month, the police told Dad that Papa had either left him or died.

In a year, Dad stopped talking about him at all.

In a decade, they were sat around the table for dinner and the news came out.

"You're going to divorce him?" Darius demanded, glaring at his father from across the table. He was sixteen now, old enough to realize several things about the situation with his missing father, and several more things about his ever present uncle.

"I talked to my counselor, and she said a divorce would be the best thing for me to finally move on," Dad said, his voice low as if even he didn't want to believe his words. He looked tired, 

"How're you supposed to divorce a missing person?" Darius snapped.

"Dee, calm down," Roman said, wrapping an arm around Dad's shoulders. Darius hated that nickname. Or maybe he hated the way Uncle Roman always said it. Or maybe he just hated Uncle Roman. "This is a tough topic for everyone."

Thomas didn't look up from his plate, the same guilty expression on his face that meant he was thinking about how he didn't remember Papa. Dad ran a hand through his hair, and dislodged Roman's arm. Good .

"The lawyers she talked to for me said that I could get a divorce with him so long as I make a public notice of my intent. If he doesn't respond, they go forward with the legal process as if he agreed," Dad said evenly. Darius put his fork down next to his plate and pressed his hands together.

"How long have you been thinking about this?" Darius demanded.

"A few weeks. She brought it up at the beginning of the month," Dad explained. Darius took a deep breath.

"You didn't think maybe I should know that you were in contact with lawyers about leaving Pa?" Darius stated acidically.

"Don't take that tone with your father," Roman warned, and Darius scowled.

"You're not the boss of me, Uncle Roman," Darius spat, and Roman sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose with his thumb.

"Look, Dee, I know you miss Remus-"

"Yeah, I do miss my other dad. And if he could, he'd be here with us, and Dad wouldn't even be thinking about a divorce, because Pops loves him," Darius insisted, and Roman looked at Dad expectantly. Dad let out a tired mix of a groan and a sigh.

"Darius, honey… your father left. He has a funny way of showing his love if that's the truth," Dad said. Darius glared at him.

"You're giving up on him. You don't think he's gonna come home," Darius accused.

"Because he isn't. You need to stop worshipping him and realize that your father was not a good man," Roman proclaimed, and Darius shot him a harsher glare than what he'd been leveling at his dad. Dad merely shook his head.

"Remus isn't a bad person. I scared him off, I can come on a little strong. I was talking a lot about the future just before he left, so it makes sense," Dad insisted. Roman looked ready to argue on every point, but he was clearly biting his lip. It was clear by now that no one could change Dad's mind about why his husband left.

There was no way, in Darius' mind, that Papa had just left . Not when Darius could remember so clearly the way that he'd held onto Dad like he was afraid to let go. Not when Darius could still see their lit up faces as they laughed together.

Not when he knew Papa would be livid to see the way Uncle Roman clung to Dad.

"Papa loves you," Darius insisted, his voice shaking with anger. "You can't do this to him."

"Dee, that's enough of that," Roman scolded, as Dad ducked his head and covered his mouth with one hand.

Darius saw his chance. "You still love him, too! Why don't you just look for him? Find him, and-"

"That's enough , Darius," Dad said, lowering his hand and resting it on the table. "I'm going to put a public notice up. Meet up with some lawyers. This is happening, Darius. I can't keep waiting for someone who left us to come back. It's not fair to any of us, especially not to Thomas."

Darius felt like his dad had just run him through the chest with a saber. He glanced at Thomas, who was looking between both sides of the table with wide eyes. Thomas lowered his fork. "Um, sorry?"

"Don't be sorry, Thomas," Dad and Roman both assured, and Darius clenched his fists.

"May I be excused?" Darius demanded. Dad sighed.

"Alright, fine. Let me know if you're heading out tonight," Dad murmured. Darius nodded and stormed off towards his bedroom.

He glared at the photograph tucked in the vanity mirror Roman had bought him when he expressed an interest in makeup. It was an old picture, featuring Dad, Papa, baby Thomas, and Darius. They were happy. They loved each other.

"What's keeping you away?" Darius demanded. "Why won't you just come home already?"

Naturally the photograph did not respond. After all, Papa wasn't around anymore.

Chapter Text

“Ice cream man? Seriously?” Remus demanded, as the group of children began to rush away from the truck with their ice cream. Patton Moras grinned, sliding his huge wire rimmed glasses back up his nose.

“Well, the Professor’s got your schedule bugged, Duke! It seemed the most appropriate cover for what was going on today,” Patton said, already scooping some peppermint into a waffle cone. Remus narrowed his eyes.

“You know my kid’s favorite ice cream flavor?” Remus asked.

“You talk about Little D all the time , Big D! I may be busy with the comms and all that, but I love to hear about your civilian life. It’s a change of pace,” Patton said with a smile. Remus rolled his eyes.

“Gimme a strawberry shortcake creamsicle and one of those dumb cartoon character pops. Uh, a ninja turtle or something,” Remus instructed, pointing at the side of the truck where there were some pictures up. Patton snorted.

“I didn’t come just to spy on your civilian life, Duke,” Patton reminded, and Remus glared at him.

“I figured. Can it wait? I’m having a rest day with my family, it’s on my files. I get three days a week,” Remus snapped. Patton shook his head, handing Remus the ice cream cone and rooting through the cooler on the other side of the truck for the wrapped up popsicles.

“This is an emergency. But don’t worry, I’m just here to let you know the Professor is gonna meet you at the usual place. I’ll be along too, the little angel on your shoulder,” Patton winked. Remus scowled.

“Codename jokes? We’re in a public setting, Angel ,” Remus scowled, leaning into the window to get a good look at the blonde. Yeah, sure enough, he was decked out in a full white uniform with blue candy stripes.

“Well, Duke, I’d make more appropriate jokes if you or the Professor would give me your names,” Patton said, raising one eyebrow.

Remus clenched his jaw. “I think I’d trust you more if you weren’t quite literally living directly out of HQ.”

Patton smiled awkwardly, coming back over to the window. Remus stepped back as the blonde man handed him the two wrapped up popsicles. “Well, not everyone has a family, you know. I’m honestly proud of you, Duke. You’ve got a beautiful family.”

“Did Prof give me a time frame for when to meet him?” Remus interrupted. Patton's smile dropped, his face turning blank.

“The Professor will be waiting for you at three, but he understands that this is last minute. He’s asked you to spend as long as you need to wrap things up. He informed me that the mission is a quick get-in-get-out op, so you shouldn’t be gone too far past dinner,” and now it was Angel speaking, rather than Patton Moras.

“Good to know. I’ll get to him as soon as possible. How much do I pay for the ice cream?” Remus asked, fishing out his wallet with his free hand.

Patton smiled easily. “It’s on the house. HQ can spare a few bucks for ice cream for your family.”

Remus nodded, slipping the wallet back into his pocket and finally taking the popsicles from the counter. “I’ll catch you on the comms tonight, Angel.”

“Relax until then, okay Duke?” Patton called after him. Remus just tossed him a salute over his shoulder, not even looking back.

The rest of the afternoon was nice enough, but Remus couldn’t get the upcoming meet with Prof out of his head. Virgey, his sun-starved little nightmare, had no clue about his work. Virgil was under the impression that Remus worked as staff for this wealthy woman in a mansion a few hours out of town. He wasn’t wrong , it’s just…

Remus wasn’t typically a liar. He hated lying, he was honest to a fault. It’s what made his lies so effective. But, he didn’t lie to his husband. He loved him way too much for that. Instead, he… well, Prof called it lying by omission, but Remus called it only telling Virgil the details he needed to know. Which Prof insisted was literally the exact same thing, but no , no, Remus could never lie to Virgil.

Director Dorothy Dieter was in charge of the entire organization. She had personally recruited Remus, when he’d proven to be a bit of a thorn in their side. He'd been assigned to partner up with Prof, their most successful and duty-bound agent, in order to keep him under control.

Speaking of the Prof, Remus could see his motorcycle outside their usual meeting place. Remus sighed, getting out of the car. He'd pick up almond milk on his way home, surely that could alleviate some of the guilt he felt every time he left on a mission with little word to Virgil.

Inside the warehouse was a setup sort of like a boxing gym. To one side of the eerily empty room was a desk and a set up of about six computer screens, and standing between them stood Logan Croft.

"Prof! What's the deal? Why are they pulling me in on my rest day?" Remus asked, dropping into one of the dinky metal folding chairs. He kicked his feet up and rested them on the corner of the desk. Logan looked up from his notes and maps and pushed his feet down.

"Show a bit of decorum, I already had to wait hours for you," Logan said pointedly, running a hand through his black hair. Remus raised an eyebrow.

"Your little Angel told me you'd be waiting at three. It's barely half past," Remus said.

Logan sighed. "I meant more that I had to wait for this day to be concluded. Otherwise you'd be complaining the entire mission about going back to Virgil."

Remus glared at Logan. "It's V when on the field, Logan. If someone manages to track him down because you're an idiot, I'll-"

"We aren't on the field. And I've got a security system in place here for a reason. A mouse can't so much as scurry nearby without my knowledge," Logan assured. "Besides, you really ought to use code names if you're going to lecture me on codes."

"What the fuck ever! What did you call me from my warm, comfortable, tiny husband and children for?" Remus demanded, leaning forward in his seat. Logan rolled his eyes.

"Well, first I'll remind you that you brought this job on yourself with your misdemeanors. Second, there may be a mole in the organization," Logan stated, and Remus stiffened.

"My family is on file," Remus stated evenly.

"Don't panic, I handled it. The organization has no access to any files connecting you to civilians Virgil Sanders-Castillo, Darius Sanders-Castillo, or Thomas Sanders-Castillo," Logan informed.

"And my brother?" Remus demanded.

"He was a little trickier, as you're identical twins, but I scrubbed his file to its bare bones. No one should be able to identify him from a group," Logan explained. Remus sighed in relief.

"Do we have any clue who the mole is?" Remus asked.

"No, but we have a list of suspects," Logan said. "There are separate agents looking into that. You and I are executing an infiltration mission."

"Infiltration!? Angel said I'd be home by dinner," Remus protested. Logan glared at him, likely for not letting him finish. Remus sighed, rolling his eyes as he gestured for the genius to continue.

"And you will . There's been a base discovered in the next city over, an hour's drive from here," Logan explained. He pressed a button on one of the computers, and the webcam lit up, projecting a map of a building. "This is the building as far as we've been able to scope it."

"These hardly look accurate," Remus commented, studying the size of the building compared to the size of the chambers within.

"I agree, except then I took into account what they're doing here," Logan stated, as he clicked a few things on the screen, bringing a second hologram into view beside the building. This one was of a complicated compound molecule.

"What's this? I'm the brawns, not the brain," Remus looked to Logan expectantly.

"It's nothing we've ever seen before. This is an entirely new compound, elements that would never bond together in nature, forced into an isotopic bond. We've seen isotopic bonds of course, but not like this. The build seems to imply they're creating a drug, only with far more deadly consequences than addiction," Logan lectured, picking out a few of the atoms that led to his thinking. Remus nodded, even if he only understood half of what the Prof said.

"So, killer drug being made in a secret warehouse with rooms that are super big- I don't see your connections," Remus said, folding his arms thoughtfully.

"They're testing it. On people," Logan explained, and a new file opened in the hologram, showing a video of what looked like a homeless teenager. Remus' eyes widened as the teenager was injected with something- to immediate effect.

"Holy shit !" Remus cried out, as the teenager ripped through their metal restraints. It was like something out of a comic book. "They made a super strength serum!?"

"In a manner of speaking. This teenager was found dead with traces of heroine in her veins only four hours after the timestamp of the video. From what our organization knows, we can assume the half-life of the more isotopic elements had died by then, and the rest of the drug killed her," Logan explained, and Remus sobered himself.

"Sucky way to die, but she's probably in a better place now," Remus said. Logan agreed with a silent nod.

"Our mission-"

"Should we choose to accept it," Remus interrupted, and Logan sighed.

"Of course we accept it, Duke, it is our job- never mind. Our mission is to infiltrate the laboratory and steal the compound so our scientists can study it," Logan finished. Remus frowned.

"And, what, just leave more of the compound behind for them to kill more homeless teenagers with?" He demanded.

"Look, Remus-"

"No! Prof, listen! Those homeless teenagers? I was one of them, before my brother tracked me down! My son could've been one of them, if I hadn't adopted him! They're going to keep killing those kids if we don't do something!" Remus protested.

"We're not superheroes , Remus, we're secret agents," Logan grumbled.

"Secret agents can blow up a lab when they need to!" Remus insisted.

Logan pursed his lips. Then, finally, "We'll do what we can. But we can't just blow it up, there are children held inside."

"Do what we can sounds about right," Remus grinned widely.

Remus didn't make it home that night, though he screamed wordlessly for the love of his life many times in the coming years.

"Good morning, Remus!" Antonio announced, as the thick window untinted. His voice came through speakers near the ceiling, and as he walked across the window, food arrived through the automated dumb waiter in the cell wall. Day three thousand five hundred and thirty one had officially begun.

"Fuck you, Antonio!" Remus snarled, slamming a fist against the glass. His hand screamed in agony, and he pulled it back to his chest, hoping he hadn't made anything worse. He should've used his unbroken hand.

"How cute," Antonio chuckled. "Just keep calm and carry on, you have a visitor today."

Ah, right. Today was a rest day, which meant Logan was allowed out of whatever computer nerd room they had him locked up in so he could check on Remus' wellbeing.

Remus leaned with his back against the glass, groaning impatiently as he waited for the door across from him to open.

When the door finally slid open, Logan entered, the door shutting and locking behind him. He crossed over to Remus and took his arm gently turning in over. Remus hissed.

"How's the 'being a puppet of the man' thing working out for ya?" Remus snarked.

"I've almost perfected their serum. At the very least, it won't kill anyone," Logan said, rubbing his eyelids. "Remus, your hand ."

"They said it was to give you incentive. You know, like with everything they've done to me," Remus shrugged. There were scars on his arms and legs that had never been there before.

"It wasn't my fault," Logan huffed. "The lab assistant they gave me spilled valuable chemicals, it set my research back two weeks."

"It wouldn't have been your fault anyway," Remus snorted. "They're hurting me because your family is safe."

Logan smiled ever so painfully. "Yours is too, or you know they'd have started using you in the field."

Remus' heart ached. "It's nearly been ten years. Have you got any word out?"

"It's been hard to get ahold of anyone trustworthy at the agency," Logan admitted, shaking his head. Remus teared up.

"T is probably a lot bigger now, huh?" Remus murmured.

"Little D, too," Logan nodded. Remus dropped his head against Logan's chest, trying to picture his baby boys as anything but what they were last he saw them. "Kids get big fast."

"V probably hates me," Remus whispered.

"Probably. Or he could think the best of you. He could've assumed something happened to make you unable to come home," Logan countered.

"That's worse ! He probably thinks I'm dead, and if I ever go back, he'll hate me even more!" Remus exclaimed. "Prof, please… please tell me we're gonna go home. Tell me I'm gonna get home."

"I can't do that, Remus," Logan muttered. "I don't have that information."

Chapter Text

Roman was still eighteen when he found his twin brother on the streets. It had been a stroke of luck, he’d only been looking for those three months since he’d gotten his own place. He was absolutely overjoyed to be reunited with his brother, and he gave him his couch to crash on, and his shower to clean with, and- well, Remus blossomed, in his own strange way.

They were twenty-four when they met Virgil in a club one night. He was absolutely enchanting, black glitter brushed under his eyes and across his cheekbones, winged eyeliner so sharp it could probably cut a man. Not that he needed his eyeliner to cut a man, when his words and wit were so sharp on their own.

He had a strange confidence about him, and the twins had turned to one another and in unison proclaimed, “Dibs!”

Thus the battle began. At first, Remus had put Virgil off. It was clear to Roman how much Virgil seemed to be uncomfortable with Remus’ advances. Roman however was far more handily dealt with. Yes, it’s true- Virgil soundly rejected both the twins in the beginning. But he hung out with the pair of them still, finding them interesting, and the twosome found themselves hardly ever without a third.

The oddest thing was how naturally Virgil fit with them. Even after that night, when they’d discovered he was far less confident when sober, his sarcasm and dark humor fit wonderfully with the pair. A middle ground between their highly dramatic antics.

So, Roman and Remus fell hard. It was only natural. After all, they were both incredibly hyper-romantic. There were arguments anytime either of them brought up asking Virgil out on a date, there were practically brawls when one of them thought the other had been edging too close to making their dark prince uncomfortable. But both of them flirted with him at the drop of a hat.

It was Remus who asked Virgil out first, on the exact same night as Roman had planned too. Neither of the brothers had been aware of the other’s plan. Their destination? A festival. Roman had planned to spend the evening wooing Virgil, then ask him at the end of the night. Remus had planned to ask him at the beginning of the night, and assure him that they could continue the evening as friends if he said no.

Roman had just returned from a snack vendor with funnel cakes when Virgil leapt up and kissed Remus full on the lips. Roman had spent the entire time the two were dating in swings of supporting his brother and wishing their relationship to end up in flames. The night Remus interrupted their Thanksgiving dinner to get on one knee and propose was the very same night Roman discovered that he could, in fact, hate his brother. But the light in Virgil’s eyes, the joy in his tears… Roman couldn’t begrudge that.

Worse still was the night Virgil became pregnant. It was worse because Virgil was devastated, absolutely distraught. He sobbed with such distress that it tore through Roman’s heart, but Remus had curled around the smaller man and asked Roman to head home and give them some space. As if he could just leave when Virgil was so upset!

The entire pregnancy was hell for Virgil. It was never supposed to be able to happen, he had been on hormone replacements since he stopped birth control, and even so theyd always used protection. He even got top surgery, he hadn’t ever planned for an infant. But he refused- absolutely refused to abort it. He had imagined adopting, but if he was going to give birth, then fine . This baby was going to be born if Virgil had anything to say about it, no matter how dysphoric he found the ordeal.

It was the year after Thomas’ birth that they adopted an older child. Roman didn’t know where the idea came from, but Remus and Virgil had delighted in introducing him to his new nephew, Dee. Virgil explained that he wanted more kids, and maybe they’d adopt some more siblings for the boys later, a younger sister maybe. Virgil wanted a big family. Roman would’ve gladly given him one if he could, the way his eyes lit up as he talked about it.

Roman had finally settled by then. If Virgil was happy, Roman could be happy too. And this way, he was still part of his life in a way. Then, suddenly, Virgil was very much not happy .

When Virgil called on That Night, he sounded terrified. He had asked if Roman had heard from Remus, and immediately Roman thought the worst of his brother. How could a man win Virgil’s heart only to run away? Remus had always been a person Roman had difficulty seeing the best in, but this?

“I scared him away,” Virgil insisted on the first day, after the cops had been informed, with tears in his eyes. Roman ached to tell him that if he scared him away, then Remus was a coward.

“He never wanted a family, did he?” Virgil asked the third night without his husband, his tone dull and flat. Roman longed to tell him that anyone who didn’t want to make Virgil’s dreams come true was a monster.

“Is he coming back?” Virgil rasped on the fifth day surviving by himself, sobs in his throat. Roman burned to tell him that anyone with any intelligence would come as soon as Virgil called.

“When did he stop loving me?” Virgil wondered, on the verge of sleep on Roman’s first night moved into his brother’s little home.

“Anyone who could stop loving you must have lost their heart,” Roman whispered, brushing his love’s hair out of his face before scooping him off the couch and carrying him to his bed.

He contemplated, just a moment, warming the freezing sheets on Remus’ side of the bed. But no. He couldn’t take advantage of his brother’s disappearance to get close to Virgil. He wouldn’t try to steal this man’s heart while it was so fragile and damaged.

Roman spent the next ten years at Virgil's side. Or, as close as his side as he could get. He slept in the guest room at the end of the hall, and he sat beside the man every meal. He drove him to work at the diner and picked him up at the end of his long shifts. He went to meetings with teachers, he attended Dee's eighth grade promotion, and he took Thomas to friends houses.

Times likes these, however, he let himself get as close as possible.

"Am I doing the right thing?" Virgil asked, pulling three tissues out of the box before turning to blow his nose in one of them.

"Of course you are, Virgil. You need to be able to move on from Remus. Your marriage to him is damaging your chances of being happy," Roman explained.

"I just- I can't live like this anymore, Roman," Virgil sobbed, mopping up his tears with a tissue. "Darius looked so angry, though-"

"When isn't Dee angry these days?" Roman asked, cupping Virgil's cheek and turning him so he could look into his eyes. "He's a teenager, and his dad left. He's upset and that makes sense. My brother left and that was his mistake. He doesn't deserve your tears, Amado ."

"Roman… what would I do without you?" Virgil's laugh hadn't sounded right since Remus left. Hollow and wet and pained. It felt like it was tearing Roman apart every time he saw Virgil this upset.

"You were doing so much better, Virgil. Is Dee's anger really getting to you this much?" Roman asked.

"It's- it's the whole divorce thing, I guess," Virgil sniffled, rubbing his face dry with his sleeve. "I guess I'm not ready to let go of… I think some part of me still hopes he's coming back."

Roman scoffed, and Virgil glared at him. Roman snapped his mouth shut and tried to ease away his frown. "Remus has never been one to change his mind. If he was going to come back, he'd have done it that same night."

"Roman, I don't know why it's so hard for you to forgive him, when I already have," Virgil huffed, folding his arms.

"He had everything he could've possibly have wanted and he threw it away!" Roman protested. "I mean, how could someone win your heart and then just- just leave !?"

"I'm really not anything all that special," Virgil huffed.

"Beautiful, smart, and so, so strong? I classify that as pretty special," Roman argued. Virgil looked at him with narrow eyes. He seemed to be searching Roman's face for a long moment, before he dropped his gaze and looked away.

"I think I'd like to be alone for a bit, Roman," Virgil said quietly. Roman clenched his fists.

"Fine. But I'm here for you, Amado . Always," Roman said, and he stood up. He hesitated for a moment, but hurried out the door anyway. Roman had work to get to, anyway, the stage call was in a half hour.

Preparing his packed dinner with Thomas was a breeze. Thomas loved helping him make his dinners. Virgil came out of the bedroom just as Roman was heading out the door. They said their farewells, and he was off.

He was was a block away from work when a woman grabbed his wrist and yanked him into an alley.

"Roman Castillo?" The woman purred, smirking at him with scarlet lips.

"Who the fuck-"

Her finely manicured hand covered his mouth, and her grip on his wrist was like steel. "I'm a… friend of your brother's, you could say."

Roman yanked his face away from her hand. "Then you can tell him to fuck off ! It was all well and good when he pulled this kind of disappearing act on me before, but on his husband ? How low can he get!?"

Finally, Roman yanked his hand free from her grip, turning on his heel and storming off. He couldn't believe - god, what an asshole . Once he was outside of his work, he took a deep breath and smiled brightly.

Today was going to be a good work day. Today was going to be a good work day. He pushed open the door, and a receptionist perked up.

"Good morning, Mr. Castillo! The stage manager is all set and ready to talk to you on Stage 2," the receptionist announced.

"Thank you, Carlos, I'll be there in a moment. Is the coffee machine repaired?" Roman asked.

"Yes sir!"

Eliza stared in shock after Roman Castillo as he stormed off. When he had disappeared, she finally snapped out of her bewilderment and pressed on her comm. "Caesar, I missed the target. But, I found out something that could be much more valuable."

"And what's that, Draco?" Caesar asked, groaning. Eliza ducked into her car- as conspicuous as she could make it, a bright green mustang with purple flames going up the sides- and opened up the file she'd left in her passenger seat. She flipped through the pictures of Roman Castillo, until she found a few with another man in them. The same man in all three pictures, with fading purple hair and green and brown heterochromia.

"Our little Duke in captivity has himself a ball and chain," Eliza smirked, studying the photograph. "And I know where to start looking."

"You better be on the right track, Draco. I have no doubt that missing our current target was a mistake on your part," Caesar sneered.

"Don't get testy with me, Caesar. You're just as small a fry as I," Eliza mocked. "Don't worry, all we need to do to prove my theory is to show the little rat how the cards lie."

"Oh? You think he'll fold so easily?" Caesar demanded.

"I know he will," Eliza grinned. "For the same reason he's kept quiet about his little Brady Bunch this whole time."

Yes, in this photo there they were. The whole little Castillo family. How adorable that he'd managed to have a husband and two kids. A weakness Eliza planned to take full advantage of.

Chapter Text

Darius slammed his locker and whirled around. "What!?"

"Hey, don't get snippy with me, no, ma'am!" Remy Croft scowled, folding his arms. He was ginger haired, with freckles across his face, and he hated them. Darius figured they were better than the huge pale spots all across his own brown skin. It was a thing they did, insisting that the other was in the greener pastures.

"Then stop staring at me!" Darius scowled.

"Hey hey, we don't need to fight," Emile Picani intervened. Emile had soft blonde waves and tortoise shell glasses with large round lenses that made his big brown eyes look even bigger. "Darry, what's the deal? You've been upset all morning."

"My dad's getting a divorce," Darius scoffed.

"That marriage is still viable?" Remy asked, gobsmacked.

" Remy ," Emile scolded. "I'm so sorry about that, Darius. How does that sort of thing even work?"

"Dad just has to put up a public notice, and if Pa doesn't answer then they go ahead and start working through the divorce as if he agreed," Darius explained bitterly. He began to walk down the hall, his two friends quickly jogging to walk at either of his sides.

"I mean, how long does he have to respond?" Remy asked.

"I don't know, I didn't ask," Darius huffed.

"I'm thinking that if this will help your dad move on, then it's probably the best option," Emile chimed in. "I mean, what if something happens to you, and your Dad can't do anything because the law won't let him without your second dad?"

"If something happens to me, maybe Papa will come home ," Darius snarled.

"Darius!" Emile protested, punching his arm. "Don't talk like that!"

"You're not about to go tossing out your self preservation just to parent trap your folk, nuh-uh!" Remy scowled. He looked over his shoulder, then leaned in and held his hand up around his mouth. Remy might have ruled the gossip market, but his personal life was just that: personal. "Besides, maybe it's like with my uncle. Dad says he probably died in one of those explosions ten years ago? In Old Town."

"Pa isn't dead," Darius muttered.

"Did they ever tell you how they met?" Emile asked. "I'm a sucker for a soft romance."

"But it's not soft, he ran out on him," Remy reminded.

"He didn't run out on Dad!" Darius scowled, and Remy held up his hands placatingly.

"Okay, okay, I'm sorry, geez! Even you have to admit it looks bad right now, though," Remy said.

"They met as teenagers, but then they re-met in a club about eight years later and didn't realize they knew each other for a while," Darius stated shortly. "Dad refuses to talk about it anymore, so I don't actually know the details."

"From what you've said, he refuses to talk about your Pops at all," Remy said, lifting his shades to rest in his hair. Darius rolled his eyes.

"I know he still loves him. So I don't understand why he's even considering this divorce!" Darius scowled.

"Sometimes you love someone who doesn't love you back, so you need to let them go," Emile said, glancing at Remy, who didn't notice as he chipped at the black nail polish on his middle finger.

"But Papa loves him , you can't fake the looks he gave him!" Darius exclaimed.

"Darry, babes, what did you learn in class today?" Remy interrupted, and Darius looked at him with wide eyes.

"You're asking about that now ?" He demanded.

"Humor me," Remy shrugged.

"Fine. In English, we talked about the book we're reading," Darius huffed.

"Tell me something someone brought up during the discussion," Remy prompted. Darius opened his mouth to answer, but he found he couldn't remember off the top of his head. Remy nodded. "Yep, we're skipping the rest of the day."

"Wait, we can't skip-" Emile protested, but Remy waved him off.

"Don't worry about it, we'll be fine. Lunch is off campus, so they won't even notice we didn't come back," Remy assured. "My uncle left behind this really cool warehouse at the docks, we can take an Uber."

"The same warehouse where the explosions happened?" Darius huffed.

"The docks, not Old Town, asshole," Remy scowled, smacking Darius' arm.

"Your uncle had a warehouse in the industrial zone? What kind of business did he do?" Emile asked, surprised.

"I don't know, some sciencey shit. Apparently he worked with Dad for the same scientist. Dr. Dieter. Dad's been freelancing ever since she died, I don't know why someone else didn't just take over her company. Dad says it was layoffs, anticipating a stock drop or something," Remy explained. "It doesn't really make sense."

"Are you sure? It makes perfect sense to me," Emile commented.

"It did to me too. Until I found out that there weren't any company layoffs that year. So I dug a little deeper, and there aren't any obituaries for Dorothy Dieter or Uncle Logan," Remy snorted. He glanced over his shoulder, then shut the door to the school building behind him. "So I checked out his warehouse."

"So what's up with his warehouse?" Darius sighed, finally taking the bait. Remy grinned.

"Let's just say, Uncle Logan was totally not some boring lab coat."

"Then what was he?" Emile asked, and Darius found himself just as curious.

"No clue, I can't exactly open his weird computer. But the warehouse is still a pretty rad place to be, if you wanna just chill for a bit," Remy said, tucking his hand in his pocket as he waltzed down the sidewalk, pulling out his phone to call transport.

Thomas hummed to himself, rocking back and forth on his heels and toes. He was waiting for Dad to come pick him up. Then he heard "Excuse me, ma'am, I'm going to have to ask you to leave if you're not here to pick up a child."

Thomas looked over to where Missus White stood, her arm barring the doorway from another woman. This woman had blonde wavy hair and bright green eyes, her nails were super sharp, and her lips were as red as blood. She immediately gave Thomas an uncomfortable feeling in the pit of his stomach.

"Oh, my apologies, I was just scoping the school out," the creepy woman said with a sharp toothed grin. "I'm looking at different schools in the district for my little boy."

"Do you have a visitor's pass?" Missus White demanded. The blonde woman laughed.

"Of course I do, silly me," and she pulled the sticker from her pocket, still attached to the paper. "Eliza Wicca, at your service."

Her green eyes looked beyond Missus White and met with Thomas', and the boy darted to the other side of the room, out of sight of the doorway. That woman scared him, and he really, really hoped she picked a different school for her son. That might have been immature of him, but there was just something about her that made him want to run him to Dad and Uncle Roman.

It was only five minutes until Dad came to get him after that, but it felt like forever while Thomas was still anxious about that blonde woman. When he finally did come, Thomas ran into his arms.

“Thomas? Are you okay?” Dad asked, and he looked way too tired to look that worried.

    “It- it’s nothing, Dad, I just thought you’d be late because of the early release schedule,” Thomas lied, and as his dad walked with him back to the car, he looked around for the blonde lady.

    There was no sign of her, but Thomas couldn’t quite convince himself she was gone. Eliza Wicca . A creepy name for a creepy lady.

    Across the street a camera went off, snatching a snapshot of Virgil Sanders opening the passenger side door for his youngest son.

Darius had to admit the warehouse was pretty cool. A few folding chairs, a boxing ring, some sand bags. Then on the other side a high tech computer lap with a table in the center. The issue was, it looked mightily familiar.

"I think this is where the cops found Pa's car," Darius muttered, taking in the surrounding buildings through the small, age-dirtied windows.

"Ah, and the plot thickens," Remy joked, adjusting his shades. Emile looked nervously around the warehouse, clearly still on edge about cutting class.

"Have you ever managed to open the computer?" Emile asked. Remy hurried over T the lineup of technology.

"No, Uncle Logan locked it with his whole fucking hand. A reading print, you know? Prints and the lines in the hands- they're totally unique to you. He didn't put my hand in the program. Which makes sense! I was like- five. What computer nerd wants a sticky gross five year old touching his cool tech?" Remy pressed a button and the screens all lit up, as well as a palm reading panel on the counter. Remy put his hand on the panel, and it flashed red. "See? Totally invalid. You guys can try it yourselves if you want."

"I'm fine," Emile shrugged. Darius huffed, making his way over.

"I'll give it a shot. After all, the plot thickens, right?" Darius smirked, and Remy smirked right back, glancing at him with steely gray blue eyes over the rims of his shades.

"Impress me, Sanders."

"That's Sanders-Castillo," Darius snarked, placing his hand on the panel. Suddenly it flashed green and the computer screens changed. Remy and Emile both looked at the computers with their jaws hanging open.

A video appeared on the screen, a man wearing black framed glasses and a blue tie appearing on screen.

"Uncle Logan?" Remy whispered. Darius glared are him, but Remy only shrugged uselessly. Emile placed his hands on each of their shoulders, squeezing them in support.

"If you are viewing this video, you are a member of the Sanders-Castillo family. You're here for one of two reasons. Either Remus and I haven't escaped, or- well, let's just say I hope it's that first one. It's year one of our captivity, they've only just stopped monitoring me at all times- I only have so much time for this message before they come back, however. If they catch me, I don't know what will happen to Remus."

"Oh no," Emile whispered, and Darius realized the only thing grounding him in this moment was his friend's tight grip on his shoulder.

"I won't be able to send any further messages, it'd be too risky, no matter how independent my warehouse is from any other servers," Logan Croft stated, glancing over his shoulder in the video. "The computer you are watching this on should be able to get you into contact with Director Dieter. Or whoever is in charge since the incident."

"Dieter?" Remy echoed.

"Virgil- I had your and your son's biometrics programmed because I knew you'd find out eventually. I can remotely set this video to play as soon as you open my computer, but you'll have access to all my unclassified files." Logan looked down at a clock that was out of sight. He sighed. "They'll be back any minute. The important thing is that he loves you. Remus never goes a day without thinking of you. We're trying to get home. I'm not- I'm not one for emotional vulnerability, but- his love for you is a very special thing. I'm sorry."

The video cut out and closed. Darius just stared at the screen, a galaxy screensaver. Emile's fingers dug into his shoulder, and his face felt wet.

"The plot thickens," Remy muttered. Darius whirled on him.

"Shut up! This isn't a joke, Jeremy !" Darius snapped. Remy stepped back.

Emile stepped between the two of them. "Darius, don't-"

"No, Emile! This isn't funny ! I knew- I knew Papa still loved my dad! I knew this whole time! And now I know that he's been- been captured this whole time!? That he was lying to Dad while they were together? Maybe the whole time they were married, even!" Darius shouted, tears still pouring down his cheeks. "Why is it that the first time something good happened to me, so much bad had to come with it!?"

Oh. That was it, wasn't it? Darius didn't have the time to think about that realization.

"Well you're not the only one who found out his family was lying to him!" Remy snapped. "My dad's been lying to me since I was born! My uncle's not even dead , and he said- Dad told me- this isn't a joke to me either, Darius!"

"Guys-" Emile waved his hands.

"You don't get to yell at me because you're throwing the exact same bitch fit you've been throwing since you were five years old!" Remy snarled.

"It's not-!"

"Yes it is, Darius! You've been throwing the same tantrum since you were five and your dad left! I used to let it slide, because you know what? I'd be pretty pissed too if my dad disappeared going on a grocery run! But not anymore! Our boats aren't just the same color, they're the exact same fucking boat!" Remy shouted. "So yeah, maybe coping with jokes isn't exactly the best way to do it! But at least I fucking cope !"

"Okay! That's enough of all that, thank you!" Emile exclaimed, raising his hands between the two of them. "We're all going to take a few deep breaths and talk about this rationally and calmly, okay? We're all friends here."

"Have fun with that," Darius snapped. "I'm leaving."

"Yeah, sure, just go ahead and leave when it comes time to think about your behavior," Remy scowled. "I'm used to it."

Darius ignored him as he stormed out of the warehouse, refusing to respond to Emile's calls.

He spent the bus ride home thinking about what he had learned.

Papa was out there. Papa was trying to come home. Papa loved Dad. Papa was a liar . Dad was divorcing him. He loved him. And Darius…

Darius had lived his life hating that nothing good ever stayed that way. Other kids had families that stayed. Darius had Dad, his baby brother, and his uncle who kept trying to be his dad. People always told him life was like a rollercoaster, but if so, then Darius' rollercoaster had been in a straight plummet for the past ten years.

Why did everyone else get to live in delusional happiness? Why did even Thomas get to imagine his life wasn't missing anything?

Chapter Text

Virgil wasn't surprised that Roman loved him. Well, he was kind of. He was surprised Roman could find anything about him to love. A single father too stressed to even clean himself up properly? He didn't see any appeal. Especially not after Remus had so creatively pointed out that there was nothing worth sticking around for about him. At least, that’s the only way Virgil could interpret his absence.

No, Virgil was unsurprised because he could see it from day one. He just hadn't been looking. It was there all along, in the gentle hugs, in the soft reassurances. Hell- people had called them Misters Sanders-Castillo, and mistaken Thomas for Roman's son. And yes, it hurt Virgil everytime they said those things, and yes, Virgil spotted the proud little glimmer in Roman's eyes everytime.

So that Sunday when Roman had said those things, he hadn't been surprised, so much as he had… put everything into perspective. It was no wonder Darius hated Roman so much, if he'd seen the signs before Virgil had. Any child would hate their uncle replacing their father.

But… but did Virgil love Roman back? He had, once upon a time, he knew that. And he'd loved Remus a million times more. But it had been so long since loving Remus had been anything other than painful, he couldn't remember how it felt before. Did he even still love Remus? Could he even love romantically anymore?

Those were the turbulent thoughts that chased Virgil up until Monday afternoon when he picked Thomas up from school.

"Thomas," Virgil said hesitantly.

"What's up Dad?" Thomas asked.

"What- what do you think of Uncle Roman?" Virgil asked. He tightened his hands on the steering wheel.

"I like him," Thomas said. "Why? Is he leaving?"

"No, I don't think so," Virgil muttered. "It's just, um. Well, I was just asking."

"Do you like Uncle Roman?" Thomas asked. Virgil shrugged.

"He's been a big help. I'm really glad he's around. But are you sure he hasn't said or done anything that makes you uncomfortable?" Virgil asked, looking at Thomas as he slowed the car at a red light. Thomas was staring at him with an unreadable face.

"I'm not Darius, Dad. I'm not gonna be mad if you and Uncle Roman fall in love. You deserve to be happy," Thomas said finally, turning to look out the car window. Virgil took a sharp breath and looked back at the road.

"I wasn't asking because I- no, I'm not falling in love with Roman," Virgil protested. He tried to think about marrying Roman, but his thoughts quickly turned to his wedding. It wasn't the fanciest of weddings, nor was it traditional, but the joy Virgil had felt…

It was a bittersweet memory now, just like all the happy moments he spent with Remus. Was- was he really ready to divorce him?

"How- how do you feel about the divorce, Thomas?" Virgil asked.

"Fine," Thomas shrugged. "You know, I kind of forget that you're technically married. It's always been just us and Uncle Roman."

Virgil's chest constricted around his heart as he remembered Remus cradling little Thomas in his arms. He shook his head to be rid of the memory, and cleared his throat. "I'm sorry about your papa, Thomas."

"You always say that," Thomas said quietly. "It's not your fault. Sometimes… sometimes people leave. Not - not all exits are made equal.”

Virgil swallowed and tightened his hands on his steering wheel. His twelve year old just told him that. In what kind of a world did Virgil live in that his kid was so wise so young?

    Before Virgil chose his name, before Virgil told his parents he was a boy, he was a fourteen year old forced into lovely little dresses with silky black hair he couldn't dye or cut because of all the fuss Grandmother would make. His parents were largely accepting of his need for torn up jeans and baggy sweaters, but Grandmother expected him to dress his Sunday best every day. He wasn’t even Christian.

    It was the winter holidays, so Grandmother was living with them from December 1st to January 31st. That meant if Virgil didn’t at least wear a skirt to school, she’d throw a tantrum big enough to shake the world. It was Virgil’s fourteenth birthday when he’d finally had enough.

    So that was how he wound up at the edge of the roof, purple ribbon in his hair and a silk dress over white tights. He’d stepped out of his mary jane’s before standing on the ledge, and the fabric was damp enough from his sweat that the snow only made him colder. For a long time, Virgil would never learn what brought the other boy to this rooftop, and he had doubted that he’d ever see him again to ask.

    “What’s a girl like you doing on the edge?” The voice startled Virgil, and rather than falling forward like he planned to, he fell backward, right into the arms of a disgustingly smelly teenage boy. Virgil scrambled away, brushing off his arms like he could get rid of the nothing this teen had spread on him.

    “I’m not a girl,” Virgil snapped, in his far too feminine voice. It was not convincing, and he was sure of it.

    “Oh. Parents not cool with the ‘I have the wrong privates’ thing?” The teen asked, and Virgil stared at him. He was surprised, he was devastated, he was elated- he didn’t know what feeling to feel first, they all came so fast.

    “I don’t know,” Virgil sobbed suddenly, and he fell to his knees. “I don’t know if they’d accept me or not, but I know Grandmother wouldn’t, and-”

    “Why is your Grandma making the family decisions?” The teen asked.

    “I- I don’t know?” Virgil managed.

    “What’s your name?” The teen veered onto a new subject matter.

    “I don’t have one picked out,” Virgil shrugged. The teen nodded.

    “Then I’ll call you Prince Purple, and you can call me Rat,” The teen said, grinning and revealing three cracked and broken teeth.

    “Oh, what happened to you?” Virgil asked, wiping his face on his silk skirt. The teen turned bright red.

    “Whoa! Okay, keep that down please, that’s- oh geez.” Rat pulled the silk out of Virgil’s hands and smoothed it back down. Then he cleared his throat, cheeks still pink. “Did you mean my teeth? Yeah, my genetic donor didn’t like his kid going after other guys. I said I was pan, he called that code for whorey behavior. Popped me a new one, threw me out of the house, yadda yadda. Typical asshole routine, you know. I just hope my brother knows to be more subtle, I’m a little worried about him.”

    “Oh god, what if that happens to me!?” Virgil exclaimed, tugging on his hair.

    “It won’t,” Rat snorted.

    “How do you know?” Virgil demanded.

    “My dad was just looking for a reason to kick me out. He and Mom were sick and tired of my shit. I’m kind of a nightmare,” Rat shrugged. He sat down and leaned against the ledge. “How about you, Prince Purple?”

    “I- well, Mom and Dad let me be as ‘tomboy’ as I want,” Virgil explained. “I don’t cut my hair because Grandmother would throw a fit.”

    “Forget Grandma, chop it off,” Rat exclaimed.

    “You think I should?” Virgil asked, eyebrows raised.

    “If you want to, if it’d make you happier, then yeah! It’s better than jumping off that ledge would’ve been. I’ve got a pocket knife, I can help! We can do it right now!” Rat offered.

    “We can?” Virgil stared at Rat wide eyed.

    “We can! It won’t be pretty or anything, but once its cut your grandma can’t make it magically grow back!” Rat pointed out. Virgil grinned.

    “Okay, let’s do it!”

    Virgil didn’t see Rat again for a long time. When he got home, his hair crudely chopped down to above his ears and mud all over his legs, Grandmother was outraged. But Mom and Dad took it in stride. When Grandmother returned in the summer for the family reunion, Mom and Dad reintroduced her to her grandson Virgil, explaining the situation to her. Things didn’t magically get better.

Grandmother still called him by his old name, still referred to him as a young lady, but Virgil didn’t bother to listen anymore. His parents had helped him come up with a name, had stopped offering the spare room to Grandmother as long as she didn’t accept him, and had stopped buying him dresses. They paid for his T and his top surgery, and watched him flourish into a much happier person than he had been before.

    Virgil would remember Rat fondly, and wish him all the best, but he didn’t think he would ever see him again. (Count him surprised when years later, Remus saw one of his old pictures while he was sorting through what to keep and what to burn forever, and brought that night back to the forefront of their memories.)

Remus clenched his fingers. His hand had mostly healed now, in the weeks since Antonio had come to taunt him. He'd seen Logan three times since. Now that the cast was off, it was only a matter of time before Antonio and hjs lot came back to break something else.

Remus sighed and closed his eyes, leaning his head back against the rough cot. He missed Virgil. He missed his fingers in his hair after a rough day, he missed his low drawl, he missed his adorable laugh.

Hey, I'm right here. Don't get mushy on me, hon.

"V?" Remus whispered.

You're tired, huh? My sleepy little bridge troll.

Remus chuckled, turning his head to the side. He didn't dare open his eyes though. It'd scare his husband's voice away. "What does that make you? The goat I'll eat up for dinner?"

I worked really hard on this lasagna, so I'd hope not. But if you're really good tonight, I'll let you have me for dessert.

Remus finally opened his eyes, staring at the empty space beside him. His name was on his lips, but Remus bit his tongue. He wouldn't endanger the love of his life because of a delusion. He leaned forward and hugged his knees.

"When I get out, I'm gonna run back to you guys," he whispered against his knees. "I'm gonna come home, I'm gonna wrap you all up in a big hug, and I'm gonna- I'm gonna tell the truth."

The silence pressed hard against Remus' ears, and finally he squeezed his eyes shut, picturing Virgil as best he could in his mind. But his voice didn't return.

"I need you to be okay," Remus whispered. "I need you to be okay."

He could remember the evening of their wedding in perfect detail. They'd been planning it for nine months, a beautiful summer wedding at night in the graveyard. The whole ceremony was lit up with fairy lights, and the officiate stood behind Richard Sanders' grave. When Virgil had mentioned wishing his father could've been present, Remus had been the one to suggest their wedding be held in the graveyard. After all, he would move heaven and earth for Virgil.

Remus asked Roman to be his best man, and to give him away. Virgil's baby brother Andy had been their ring bearer. His mother had given him away, and the pair had met in front of Richard's grave, next to which the officiate stood.

Remus had worn a black veil of spiderweb patterned lace, and a shimmering dark gown that trailed in the grass behind him. Virgil had been looking absolutely handsome in an incomplete black suit paired with a purple blazer.

The flowers were all dried, and utterly beautiful in an untraditional sort of way.

 Remus had started bawling as soon as they were pronounced husbands, before hiking his skirt up and dipping his new husband and kissing him passionately. Virgil's mother was crying too, and a few other Sanders family members as well.

The cake was triple German chocolate, not a speck of white to be found on it. It had been messing frosted and covered in dusty black chocolates, four layers of cake ready to be devoured. At the very top, nestled in the center of the cake, was a commissioned cake topper- a shared gravestone engraved with their married names.

Remus and Virgil Sanders-Castillo .

Virgil had swiped chocolate frosting across Remus' face, and Remus laughed through tears that still wouldn't stop coming.

Roman's speech was lovely, and when he finished there was not a dry eye around the dinner table. Even Andy was sniffling as he stood up to give his own brief speech. He'd been eighteen at the time, and the speech was clumsy but sweet. Remus sobbed through them both.

His first dance with Virgil as husbands was to the song A Million Dreams . He would never forget how Virgil sang along to him, " However big, however small, let me be part of it all, share your dreams with me~ "

Remus pressed his eyes against his knees, letting the pressure squeeze his eyes to combat the tears building behind them.

Suddenly the intercom crackled, and Remus' head shot up to see Antonio grinning from the other side of the glass.

"Good morning, Remus! I have great news, you're just gonna love it!" Antonio announced. Remus grimaced.

"Fuck you, Antonio!" He shouted. Antonio laughed.

"Oh, you're so funny , Duke! You'll be excited about this news, I promise. We found your family!" Antonio proclaimed, and Remus' heart nearly stopped.

"What family?" Remus deflected.

"Oh, don't play coy with me , Remus," Antonio chuckled. "You might very erased their records in the agency records, but you didn't erase your records in the legal world. Tell me, did you leave your husband on good terms, Mr. Sanders-Castillo?"

Remus lunged at the glass, slamming his fists against it. His recently healed hand tinged in a mild pain, but he ignored it. "You leave them out of this!"

"Oh, poor sweet naive Dukey," Antonio snorted. "You really have no idea, do you?"

"What are you talking about!?" Remus demanded. Antonio pressed a newspaper clipping against the glass, a smirk on his face.

"Virgil Sanders-Castillo is moving on. Or rather- Virgil Sanders. Full stop," Antonio taunted, as Remus scanned the words. He felt a little faint as they hit him.

"No," Remus muttered.

"You know, I was surprised when I found out you were married and kept a secret from me , but to find out you married a tranny? What a trip," Antonio snorted. Remus growled at him. Antonio merely tilted his head and looked Remus in the eye. "And you two had a kid, too. How sad that you didn't get to see him grow up. Guess you should've just given up when I gave you the chance, huh?"

" Fuck. You, " Remus spat.

"Man, if only I'd found out about your secret family earlier! Maybe you'd have been saved a lot of pain. And hey! Maybe your husband wouldn't be trying to divorce you in absentia," Antonio mocked, dropping several papers into the food cubby before letting it lock shut on the outside. As soon as the cubby opened on Remus' end, he snatched out the file.

Seemingly endless photos of his family poured out. His brother, his husband, his boys - oh god his boys .

Remus didn't notice Antonio leave with a roll of his eyes and a smirk on his face. He was too busy looking at how much Thomas and Dee had grown.

Tears were shed, though of what emotion, that was for Remus to puzzle through for himself.

Chapter Text

Patton Moras stood in front of the Croft apartment, shifting his feet uncomfortably. Critic- Christopher said he could come over anytime he found a clue, only three months ago, after Director Dieter was killed by Caesar. But- but this wasn't a clue, this was the whole goddamn conspiracy. Should he really bring this much sensitive information around civilians?

"Get in here already, Angel," Christopher huffed impatiently, the door swinging open. Patton perked up.

"Sorry! Sorry, I'm coming in," Patton assured, entering the apartment.

"Make small talk, the kid's still running around for now," Christopher said, brushing some of his dark hair out of his face. Six year old Jeremy Croft poked his head over the counter.

"I'm not running ," Remy huffed. Christopher rolled his eyes so hard his head moved with them and lifted his circular shades so they rested in his hair. He raised one eyebrow and just stared at the little ginger. Remy matched his gaze for a full minute before huffing and looking away.

"Fine! Bedtime," Remy pouted. "But I wanted to meet Patton!"

"Okay, Patton, this is my hellspawn. Hellspawn, this is Patton," Christopher introduced. Remy made a strange growling sound with his mouth wide open and his tongue hanging out, his fingers forming horn shapes on either side of his head.

"Hi, Remy," Patton greeted. "Your dad has told me a lot about you."

"Did he tell you how old I am?" Remy asked, hooking his chin on the counter.

Patton nodded. "He said you were five."

"Nope! My birthday was a few days ago, I'm six!" Remy exclaimed with a wide grin, throwing up six fingers to the air. Patton gasped.

"Well, happy late birthday, Kiddo!"

"Great, intros done, bedtime, Squirt," Christopher announced, clapping his hands once. Patton shuffled into the apartment and settled down on the edge of a couch cushion as the parent and child argued over bedtime.

The apartment was small, pleasant. Patton knew this wasn't the Professor's apartment, but it wasn't hard to imagine him here. The bookshelf in the corner, he could imagine Prof's fingers skimming the spines, deftly plucking a volume from the shelf. Logan Croft .

Patton sighed wistfully. A door shutting snapped him out of his reverie, and Patton blinked, turning to see Critic- Christopher exiting the hallway.

"Kid's in bed. Lay it on me, any foreign communications?" Christopher asked.

"No, sir. Not a single peep out of your brother," Patton informed, trying not to show any of his concern.

"I figured. They probably killed him when they realized he wouldn't be very forthcoming," Christopher huffed. "The question is: what're they planning with the Duke?"

"They could be clueless as to what kind of danger the Duke may pose to their operations if they don't keep the Professor on hand. Your brother is the only handler he accepts," Patton reminded. Christopher scowled.

"Leaving my brother alive would be far more hazardous to their operations than leaving the Duke a loose cannon. He didn't get the codename the Professor without being a genius, you know," Christopher disagreed. "Hell, he had a computer he trusted no one but himself and the Duke with. I can't even hack into it, though I'm not very good at hacking anyway."

"I could give it a shot?" Patton suggested. It was his job to be good at hacking.

"And what makes you think I trust you?" Christopher demanded. Patton winced.

"I was on their team too-"

"You were mission support . They trusted you to have their backs, and your comms went offline ten full minutes before the bombs at HQ went off," Christopher snarled. He folded his arms and leaned against the wall. "The only reason I trust you here and now is because you and I are the only ones who know Dot is still alive."

"I didn't betray them," Patton insisted, standing up. "All I want is for the Duke and Logan to come back home safely ."

"Yeah, what the fuck ever. Until I see some actual goddamn proof that you aren't with Myriad, I've got my eye on you, Patton," Christopher warned. "So if we didn't hear from my brother, what'd you come here for?"

"I think I know what Myriad wants," Patton declared.

Christopher widened his eyes and turned to him. "Well?"

Patton held up a single folder, and placed it on the kitchen counter. "They want an army. And they're building it up."

Virgil sighed in relief when the front door slammed open and Darius came marching into the living room. “Welcome home, Darius, I-“

“You didn’t tell me the notice already went up,” Darius snapped, and Virgil pursed his lips. Darius folded his arms. “When were you gonna tell me? When the divorce was finalized? Were you just not gonna say anything about it?”

“I didn’t want to upset you. You were upset with me all weekend, and I was hoping some time at school would cool your head, I was going to tell you when you got home,” Virgil explained.

“You posted about putting up the notice in the paper on your Facebook, dad, I got the message loud and clear!” Darius snapped. Virgil winced. Then he remembered what had him pacing ever since he’d gotten a call from the school that afternoon.

“Look, that doesn’t matter right now! I was worried about you today, Darius! I came home from picking up Thomas thinking you were in class, but then your school called! I was worried sick about you!” Virgil exclaimed, eager to change the subject. “Where were you?”

“Does it matter? Maybe if I disappeared, you’d actually look for me,” Darius sneered, and Virgil’s heart skipped a few beats. His hands felt cold and he felt a little faint.

“Don’t say that,” Virgil said, hating how feeble his tone sounded.

“You didn’t even look that hard for him! You just started pitying yourself, as if there wasn’t anything you could do to change anything! Did you even look into his work, or his friends!?” Darius demanded.

“Of course I looked , Darius! I looked as much as possible, but I had you and Thomas to worry about, I couldn’t just leave you two on your own to go hunting for a man who left us !” Virgil cried out. His heart pounded in his ears, and his eyes stung. He hated arguing about this. He could argue about any number of things and he wouldn’t get this close to tears, but one word from Darius about Remus, and his composure came crashing down.

He really had tried. Three months after Remus had vanished, he’d called Andy and left him and Roman to take care of the boys for a few days. After the fourth day with no sign of Remus anywhere, he’d gone back home, insisted that Andy go back to Barcelona, and cried himself to sleep. During that time, he’d tried to contact Logan Croft, a man he knew was a close coworker of his husband’s, but he couldn’t get ahold of the man at all. He only learned later that he’d died at around the same time.

“Well, you didn’t look hard enough!” Darius shouted.

“That’s too far!” Virgil jumped at the voice and turned to see Roman in the doorway, Thomas pressed anxiously to his side.

“Too far? Of course you’d say that. You’re probably glad Pa’s gone, you just wanna fuck my dad!” Darius snapped.

“Darius!” Virgil admonished.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Roman scowled. “My admiration for Virgil is much deeper than that, and I’ll thank you not to diminish my love for him ever again.”

“R-Roman!” Virgil protested, his hands tugging at his hair on either side of his head. This was just an absolute disaster.

“It’s true, Virgil,” Roman insisted. “I love you with all my heart, and I just don’t understand why you keep letting my brother hurt you when he’s been gone for so long.”

Darius let out a frustrated shout and kicked the couch, storming past Roman and shoving Thomas out of his way to go to his room. Virgil started after him. “Darius!”

“Leave me alone!” Darius hollered, before the slam of his bedroom door echoed through the house. Thomas rubbed his temple where he’d bumped it against the doorframe, and Virgil hurried to check on him.

“Are you okay?” Virgil asked.

“I’m fine, he didn’t mean it,” Thomas insisted, looking up at Virgil with big eyes. He looked past his father and towards his uncle. Roman was looking at Virgil rather expectantly. Virgil flushed.

“Oh. Uh, why don’t you go to your room, Thomas? Get started on any homework you might have,” Virgil suggested. Thomas’ gaze bounced from Roman to Virgil a couple of times before he nodded and hurried off to his bedroom. Virgil sighed and straightened up, turning to face the elephant in the room.

“Those were… some powerful words, Roman,” Virgil said. He hated everything about this situation.

“I meant them. You’re positively wonderful, Virgil. Determined, beautiful, and so incredibly strong. Just give me a chance to stitch together some of the pieces of your broken heart,” Roman said, taking Virgil’s hand in both of his and holding it above his heart. Virgil furrowed his brows, his eyes burning as they stared into Roman’s face.

“Roman, I… I don’t know what to say. I married your brother, and…” and there are still some feelings there.

“But in a few months, you won’t even be a married man, and it’s not as if my brother has been a particularly involved spouse,” Roman argued. “Just give me one chance, and if you don’t change your mind at the end of the night, I’ll drop the matter.”

“Roman, no,” Virgil insisted. “I just… can’t. I’ll think about it, but I can’t handle that sort of thing for now. Especially not- especially not right now , I was just fighting with Darius, and Thomas got bruised up, and-“

“End of the week,” Roman interrupted.

“What?” Virgil asked.

“At the end of the week, I’ll ask again,” Roman explained. Virgil blinked. The man really wasn’t going to drop it until he gave a concrete answer, was he?

“One date, Roman,” Virgil relented. “Friday night.”

“One date,” Roman agreed, and a grin flashed across his face.

As Roman began to get ready for work, Virgil couldn’t help but feel the slightest bit like he’d agreed to walk off a pier into shark infested waters. Something about this whole arrangement gave him a bad feeling.

Logan took a sharp breath. This was it, the best possible version of the serum he could make. He looked up, hearing the lock click, and quickly tucked the vial up his sleeve before hurrying to look busy with the beakers and flasks.

The door swung open and in swaggered Antonio Lebarti, the traitor. Logan grimaced. He usually only came into the lab to gloat. Antonio had never been a huge fan of Logan.

“Real smart, you know, Doctor. Scrubbing the Sanders-Castillo files,” Antonio announced, and Logan stiffened.

“Too bad we tracked down Roman, huh? No worries, though, they’re all safe. You know what the hilarious thing is, though?” Antonio asked. Logan’s nose twitched.

“What’s that?” He demanded.

“A Croft and a Sanders-Castillo, best friends,” Antonio explained, sounding a little mocking. He pulled a picture out of his jacket and tossed it onto the lab table.

Logan started at the photograph of his nephew, covered in the pale freckles common to his mother’s side of the family, with the same dark red curls as his father. He took a deep breath and turned his attention back to faking scientific study.

“Oh, you’re no fun,” Antonio huffed. “Remus didn’t even threaten me like he usually does. Ten years has made you boring. He did slam on the glass, but even he knows he’ll never break it. He’s broken enough bones trying, don’t you think? He just doesn’t have the strength.”

Logan blinked as Antonio strode out of the lab. He’ll never break it… he just doesn’t have the strength .

It couldn't be that easy.

Chapter Text

Darius had been avoiding Remy and Emile all Tuesday morning. He didn’t feel like confronting them again about anything that happened the previous day, especially not after discovering his father had already gone ahead and announced his divorce. Then Uncle Roman had- and- god , he could barely stand it! How could anyone just keep going when Papa was still…

Papa was still out there.

Darius sighed as he got out of English. Again, he couldn’t remember anything they had talked about. He thought maybe his teacher had mentioned an essay? It didn’t matter at this point. The important issue was his real life. He didn’t have time to write an essay about… about whatever protagonist doing whatever protagonist-y things! He had a real, actual problem and he didn’t think the cops were going to be able to help.

“Darius!” Oh great, Emile . Darius turned around and spotted his friend tugging along a very reluctant Remy down the hall to him. Darius gave his best apologetic smile as his friends reached him.

“Can’t talk right now, Emile, I’ve gotta book it to the lunch line so I can have time to retake my math test,” Darius lied. Emile frowned.

“We have to address this though, Darius. Maybe after school-“

“Dad tasked me with picking up Thomas from the after school program at the elementary school,” Darius hurriedly supplied. Boy was he glad Dad was working all day at the grocery store today.

“Oh,” Emile said.

“Great, then we’ll talk tomorrow,” Remy decided, spinning on his heel and starting back down the hall. “Bye!”

“Remy!” Emile pulled Remy back to face Darius. Darius felt the way Remy looked at that moment. “Darius, Remy, we can’t keep doing this every time you guys fight. You need to talk to each other.”

“Fine! Darius, I think you’re a whiny bitch, you don’t hear me complaining about my uncle,” Remy snapped. Emile sighed and dropped his face into his hands.

Darius twitched. “Well, I think you’re so deep in denial it’s a wonder you haven’t suffocated in it. There, it’s off our chests, conversation done, I’m going to lunch now.”

“It’s a wonder your dad hasn’t blamed you for your other dad leaving, with that kind of attitude!” Remy shouted after Darius, and suddenly the whole hallway fell silent. Dozens and dozens of eyes were on him now, and they stung like acid. Darius whirled back around to see Emile staring at Remy in horror, and Remy glaring at him over the rims of his shades.

Darius stormed up to Remy and hurled his fist at him. Those stupid, reflective shades clattered to the floor and Emile cried out. Remy tackled Darius, and both began tearing and clawing at one another, hurling insults and spitting out vitriol that neither boy was entirely sure he meant.

People were shouting, but all Darius heard, saw, and felt was an angry, blaring red. It didn't fade until he was sitting in the nurse's office, Remy six feet away, and the teachers announced that their guardians were here.

For a moment, Darius was worried they had pulled Dad out of work, but then he spotted his uncle waiting outside the principal's office with Mr. Croft. Darius scowled and proceeded to ignore his uncle's attempts at weaseling the story out of him. Finally, Uncle Roman entered the office.

“Thank you, Principal Jordan. I’ll be sure to talk to his father about a proper punishment,” Uncle Roman said, as he exited the principal’s office. Darius scoffed, shifting the ice pack against his face. Remy’s dad had already come and grabbed him, and now it was just Darius sitting and waiting for Uncle Roman to act like his dad.

He didn’t dare look up at Uncle Roman as he did that stupid disappointed sigh of his. “What was it this time, Dee?”

“Like you even care,” Darius scoffed. “You’re just gonna tell me why it disappoints you.”

“I’m already disappointed because you were brawling with your best friend like a wild animal,” Uncle Roman said. “Maybe if you give me a reason, I won’t be as disappointed.”

“Fine! He said Pops left because of me!” Darius exclaimed. That wasn’t really it. They both knew now why Papa had left- he hadn’t intended too. No, Remy had implied that Dad blamed him while under the impression that Papa had left on purpose. Darius wasn’t sure which insult was worse. “People don’t just get to say stuff like that to my face and get away with it, not even Remy! Especially not Remy!”

Uncle Roman just gave him the horrible pitying look he always gave him when Papa was brought up. “Dee-“

“Shut up! That name isn’t yours , stop saying it all the time!” Darius yelled. He tossed the ice pack aside and stood up. “Can we just go get Thomas? Please ? I don’t want to talk about this.”

Uncle Roman sighed that little disappointed sigh again, and Darius curled his hands into fists before grabbing his backpack and slinging it over his shoulder.

They spent the next half hour in silence as they drove off towards the elementary school. Darius could see Uncle Roman's jaw shifting, probably still upset he had to be dragged from the theatre to come get him. Well, Darius was not about to take full blame for that. Uncle Roman could go ahead and miss work a hundred times, Darius didn't care.

Thomas was scrawling down his name on the attendance sheet on the clipboard outside the after school program's main building when Uncle Roman and Darius showed up. Thomas had sighed, crossed out his name, and informed the lady at the desk that he was being picked up early and didn't have to stay.

Then he'd sat in uncomfortable silence as Uncle Roman drove them to the park and dropped them off. He had to go back to the theatre, he claimed, and ruffled Thomas' hair.

They could walk home from here. It was only a block away from their house. But Darius loved this park, for some reason, and he always went to go sit under the shade of the huge evergreen in the field. It was a hit or miss whether or not Darius would want to stay in the park.

"So, are we heading home?" Thomas asked.

"You're twelve, take yourself home," Darius scoffed.

Thomas frowned. "I've been twelve for half a month."

"Whatever. I'm going to go to the swings," Darius huffed. Thomas looked over to the play set, the swings awkwardly tacked onto the side with enough space between them for actual swinging to be done.

"I'll come with you," Thomas decided. Darius rolled his eyes.

"Do what you want, I guess," he muttered.

As they walked toward the swings, Thomas asked, "What happened today that pulled you out of class?"

"Got in a fight. Can't tell?" Darius asked, and Thomas frowned as his older brother gestured at his bruises.

"And they called Uncle Roman?" Thomas questioned.

"Apparently. Guess they couldn't get a hold of Dad," Darius huffed. Thomas bit his lip.

"Uncle Roman's kind of like our second dad, so I guess it makes sense-"

"Whoa, okay, stop right there, Thomas ," Darius snapped, his feet coming to a halt. "Uncle Roman isn't anything like a dad to us! He sleeps in our house and pays half the bills, but he is not our parent!"

"Yeah he is! Uncle Roman goes to all my concerts, he gives me ice cream when I get an A+, he picks me up from school- he's basically a dad, Darius!" Thomas argued. He put his hands on his hips. "He picked you up from school just now and talked to the principal! That's super parent-y!"

"Well, he didn't ground me, and if he tried, I'd deck him! He's not our dad and he has no right to act like one!" Darius shouted. Thomas scowled at his older brother.

"You're just mad because Uncle Roman is everything our Papa can't be," Thomas spat, and immediately regretted it. Thomas didn’t remember his second dad. Darius sang his praises whenever Dad wasn’t around to hear it, and Uncle Roman only ever scoffed and scowled about him behind Dad’s back, and Dad refused to talk about him. The only thing Thomas knew about Remus Sanders-Castillo was that he was gone, and he wasn’t coming back. The man might as well be dead, really. Except that Darius insisted he was coming back someday, and Uncle Roman insisted that he was a terrible person. Thomas hadn’t really formed his own opinion, not really.

Remus was… something that happened to them. He was his biological father, and his Dad’s husband, and he wasn’t in the picture anymore but his brother was. And that was fine . Thomas didn’t need a second dad, really. Lots of people had single parents, and besides, Uncle Roman was around. But the statement, as far as Thomas knew, was true. Uncle Roman was here . He was available, helpful, and a stable figure in their lives, and Papa -Remus- just wasn’t .

Darius seemed to disagree, though. Or at least, the sentence angered him. Thomas could see why it might have been upsetting to hear.

“You know, when Dad and Papa adopted me, they said they’d both be there for me. Papa had his arm around Dad, they were smiling really big. Dad was holding you in his arms, and he said to come say hi to my baby brother. I asked if they were serious, and Papa brought me into a hug and promised he’d never lie to me,” Darius huffed. Thomas bit his lip. He’d heard the story before. His big brother talked about it once a year, every June. The anniversary of his adoption. Darius scowled. “Well, if they won’t keep their promise, I see no reason to even pretend you guys are my family.”

Thomas could have sworn his heart stopped. “Dari-”

“No, it’s the truth! Look at us, we don’t even look like brothers! That’s because I’m not your brother, and I’m not Roman’s nephew!” Darius sneered.

“But Dad adopted you!” Thomas protested desperately.

“I was adopted by a happily married couple. Well guess what? As you and ‘Uncle Roman’ love to tell me, that’s not Dad and Papa! I’m leaving, and you can either stay here at the park, or go home ,” Darius spat.

“Darry!” Thomas cried, as his brother stormed away. He wanted to run after him, but his legs were shaking, and his entire body was trembling with the force of his fear. Why couldn’t he-!?

Darius was out of sight around the corner before Thomas managed to move, running two feet across the field before dropping onto his knees and curling over himself, trying to take deep breaths. Thomas hiccuped and tears stung at his eyes.

He scrambled back to his feet and tried to ease his new hiccups. But they wouldn’t stop coming, as endless as the hot tears now coming down his cheeks. He looked around wildly, trying to find anyone at all who might be familiar. Someone he could talk to, someone who could call his dad , or-

The park was full of strangers.

Thomas was alone.

Nine and a half years ago, Christopher Croft scowled at Patton Moras, plucking a file from the table and opening it, studying the pages inside. “What could they possibly be building an army for? They’re mercenaries . They’re called Myriad for a reason.”

“That’s what I still need to find out,” Patton explained. “So, I’ll need your help to go in undercover.”

“Undercover? I don’t believe this. You expect me to trust you in the thick of enemy territory?” Christopher demanded.

“You’re going to have to trust me. It’s me or you, and you have a family you have to take care of,” Patton argued.

“We can call in an agent from overseas,” Christopher suggested, but it was clear he didn’t think the idea very plausible. Patton shook his head.

“The SUN heads told us we were on our own. It’s me or nobody. I swear to you, Christopher, I would never do anything to harm you, or Logan, or even Remy,” Patton assured. He held up a hand. “I just have to do this one thing, and we’ll be able to figure out what they’re up to.”

“Don’t you get it? We’re on our own here. All our agents are either dead or traitors, and Director Dieter is going into hiding,” Christopher snapped. “There’s no more fighting back.”

“There’s one agent you can count on, Critic. Put me in the field. Let me do this .” Patton argued. This was nine and a half years ago.

In the present, almost ten years to the day that the Duke and the Professor were captured, Mordecai Hart bit his lip and studied the test subjects. Most of them were scared, but there was a little girl strapped to a chair furthest from the door. Her face was slick with tears and her entire body trembled.

Mordecai sighed and hurried over to her. He hated to lie, but it wasn’t like what he was saying was entirely untrue. “It’s gonna be okay. It’ll only hurt a pinch, I promise.”

The girl sobbed, and Mordecai looked to where the other agent was injecting one of the pleading subjects. Mordecai sighed, and dipped the girl’s face, rubbing away her tears. “What’s your name, Princess?”

“V-Valerie.”

“Well, Valerie, don’t you worry. I’ll handle everything , you just need to be brave for me,” Mordecai whispered. He always was weakest towards the children that were brought in. He had snuck several of them out of this facility already, and the higher ups had lowered the amount of agents they sent in at a time due to their suspicions. Mordecai was sure he could get away with this one last little girl. “Can you do that, Valerie, can you be brave for me? I’ll be able to get you home, you just need to be brave for a few more hours, okay?”

Valerie nodded, biting her lip. Mordecai rubbed her shoulders. “Just a pinch, Valerie. It’ll just be a pinch, I promise.”

He’d get them all out if he could, but he’d never have been able to get away with freeing more than one child at a time. Besides, what with the security tightening up around him, he’d be lucky to get away with helping Valerie.

He was so close to figuring out what happened to the Professor and the Duke all those years ago. Mordecai Hart, AKA Patton Moras, was not about to give up the goat now .

Chapter Text

Virgil sighed, exhausted, as he entered his home. He frowned at the lack of shoes in the rack, and his heart skipped a beat when he didn’t see Thomas’ backpack, or even a note from Darius. He checked his phone, but he didn’t see any messages from either of his sons. There was a missed call from Darius’ principal. Virgil called Roman.

“Virgil! How was work?” Roman greeted.

“What did Darius’ principal call for?” Virgil asked, and he heard Roman sigh heavily.

“Darius got into a fight with his friend Jeremy. Something about Remus leaving because of him,” Roman explained, and Virgil’s throat tightened.

“Is- is he with you at the theater? He’s not home,” Virgil said, as he double checked the other rooms. Every light was off and every room was cold and empty. Virgil had never come home to an empty house if his boys weren't with him. It was a tad alarming.

“I dropped him and Thomas off at the park, I was running late to get back after my lunch break,” Roman explained, and Virgil pursed his lips.

“And they haven’t checked in with you since?” Virgil asked.

“Not that I know of, I've been busy- What was that, Leslie? No, of course not, can you change the order? No? Hold on, I’ll be right with you- I’m sorry, Virgil, things are hectic. We’re trying to get the set pieces all together before tech week, you know how it is,” Roman apologized. Virgil nodded and made a noise of affirmation, not trusting himself to speak levelly enough.

“I’ll just let you go now, then,” Virgil squeaked, and he hung up. Then he leaned against the wall and slid down to the ground, trying to steady his breathing. After a moment, he returned to his phone and called Darius. He and Thomas were together, he could just go pick them up! Nothing to it.

“What?” Darius snapped, and Virgil let out a relieved breath.

“Are you okay? Is Thomas with you? I noticed neither of you are home,” Virgil said, managing to get back to his feet and entering the kitchen.

“I’m fine. What do you mean Thomas isn’t home? I told him to go home when I left,” Darius huffed, and Virgil’s heart nearly stopped.

“I- he’s not home. I’m alone in the house,” Virgil said. “Darius, where are you?”

Darius didn’t respond. Virgil huffed, “Darius, answer me.”

“I’m outside the group home,” Darius muttered. Virgil spluttered.

“What are you doing there!?” Virgil demanded.

“Sitting. I’ve been here for a few hours,” Darius confessed.

“Why? No, wait. I don’t think I want to hear it. I’m coming to get you, and then you are coming with me to go get your brother,” Virgil announced, as he hurried to get his shoes back on his feet and his jacket back around his shoulders.

“He’s not really my brother,” Darius muttered, and Virgil didn’t feel scared anymore. He just felt angry.

“Darius Cecil Sanders-Castillo, so help me god , you had better take back that statement before I fucking ground you until you turn five hundred!” Virgil snapped. “I am your father, and Thomas is your brother, and we care about you so much. You do not get to diminish our love for you, no matter how self deprecating you’re getting, I don’t fucking care if you’re going through a tough time! This is hard on all of us, Darius! Now take it back.”

Darius was silent on the other end of the line. Then, “You said Sanders-Castillo.”

Virgil tripped over his feet on his way out the door.

“You said Papa’s name.”

“It doesn’t mean anything,” Virgil tried uselessly.

“You still care about him,” Darius pressed. “Why don’t you admit it?”

“Fine! I love Remus so much , and I miss him with everything I am! But he drove off and left me! I looked all over for him, I tried to call his boss, but she wasn’t around, and I- he just left, Dee, and it’s no use to keep clinging onto a man who isn’t there.” Virgil cried out. He slammed the door shut behind him. "Get ready for me to pick you up, I'm getting into the car right now."

"Don't bo-"

Virgil hung up, tucking his phone back into his pocket and starting the car back up. The drive was an anxious one, but not technically very long. It took him only ten minutes to get to the spot where Darius was sitting on the curb, looking into the fenced in yard beside the group home, where parentless children played and laughed.

It was still ten minutes Virgil spent worrying about Thomas. Ten minutes spent tapping his fingers on the steering wheel, spent cursing traffic and fretting about his sons. Ten minutes that stretched like hours.

By the time he pulled over at the sidewalk, he was frazzled and his nerves were utterly shot. When Darius didn't stand up and make his way over for thirty seconds, Virgil jumped out of the car and slammed the driver's side door shut.

"Darius, get in the car," Virgil called, moving around the car and folding his arms.

"What if I don't want to?" Darius scowled. Virgil unclenched his jaw, not having noticed he was grinding his teeth.

"Darius, please. Don't make this any harder than it needs to be," Virgil pleaded.

"You can't force me to just accept Roman as family. Not the way Papa was," Darius snapped.

"I- Darius, Roman is not ever going to replace your father," Virgil said. "He couldn't even if he tried. They're too different."

"But you're replacing Papa with Roman!" Darius protested.

Virgil's stomach curdled. "I'm leaning on a stable supporter because I'm struggling to be on my own. I'm not replacing anybody."

"I'd prefer Uncle Andy," Darius muttered mutinously.

"You barely even know him!" Virgil felt a bit hysterical.

"Maybe not, but at least he wouldn't be flirting with you," Darius quickly retorted. Virgil grimaced at the idea, and shook his head.

"You don't have to accept Roman as a father. I know he won't ever be that to you. But you can't renounce your brother and I just because you're upset," Virgil stressed.

"I'm not," Darius argued. He looked at the ground before looking back up at Virgil. "There's just a lot going on right now. I know I'm lashing out. I'm sorry, but I…"

"What's wrong, Dee?" Virgil whispered, and his son burst into tears and grabbed him in a hug.

"Everything!" Darius sobbed. "It's all wrong and nothing feels like it'll be right again."

"It's okay," Virgil soothed, rubbing Darius' back. "You're going to be okay. Let's- let's start somewhere small, okay?"

"Like what?" Darius muttered.

"We could go find Thomas," Virgil suggested. It wasn't a small thing in his heart, but it was a clear and set goal for Darius to accomplish and repair. Virgil knew things like that had really helped his anxiety as a kid. "You can apologize to him for leaving him alone. He's never been on his own before."

"I know," Darius muttered, looking a little ashamed. "I- I have to apologize to Remy and Emile."

"From what I heard, Remy needs to apologize to you as well," Virgil commented, as he got back into the car. Darius slid into the passenger seat.

"Yeah, but he said it because I hurt him first," Darius muttered. "I keep- I keep hurting people."

"Darius, it's okay. You're still growing up, these kinds of mistakes happen," Virgil assured. Darius scoffed.

"You're too forgiving. I've done nothing but yell at you all week," Darius muttered.

"Well, you're working through some things. Maybe not the healthiest way you could be working through those things, but I'm not exactly the right person to talk to about healthy coping mechanisms," Virgil reminded. Darius snorted.

"You're seeing a therapist for your issues," Darius pointed out. Virgil chuckled.

"True enough. Do you want to see one too?" Virgil asked. Darius frowned. Virgil wished he could just get his son. If there was one thing that Remus had always been better at, it was understanding Darius.

"Let's go pick up Thomas," Darius changed the subject. Virgil decided not to press, and he began to pull back onto the road.

Roman sighed, having just finished helping Leslie and the other set designers gather all the necessary pieces together. He signed out, and called a farewell to the stage manager, who was staying behind for a bit to tie a couple loose ends. Then he stepped out of the theater and took a deep breath. The day had been long, but they'd gotten good work done.

The drive home was almost uneventful, until he saw the last curb he had to turn on bathed in the red and blue light of the police. Roman's heart jumped into his throat as he pulled up in front of his house behind a police car. Two officers were standing out front with Virgil and Darius, and-

"What's wrong?" Roman asked as he jogged up to the four of them. Virgil choked on a sob and threw himself at Roman, dropping Thomas' school bag?

"Oh my god, Roman -" Virgil cried out, and then muffled his weeping in Roman's clothing. Roman wrapped his arms around the small man, rubbing his back. The officers began to mutter to one another, taking a few steps away for privacy.

"What happened, Dee?" Roman demanded.

"I- I left Thomas in the park! He was supposed to come right home, he knows the way!" Darius exclaimed, and Roman could see he was on the verge of tears too. Roman swallowed tightly around the forming knot in his throat.

"Virgil, are you-"

"He left his bag!" Virgil blubbered. "I don't understand- why would someone just take him, I- he's a child !"

"Oh, Amado ," Roman murmured, and he wiped away his tears with one hand, still rubbing circles into his back.

"He didn't run!" Virgil insisted. "He would never , and not without his stuff, but who would take him!?"

"Come now, my dark prince, take a breath," Roman coaxed, and Virgil did, a sharp stuttering breath that had Roman pausing. Oh. Oh . Roman looked at Darius, who was staring at him with mouth agape and watery eyes filled with a horrible hurt. Oh no . Roman opened his mouth to apologize, but the officers came back.

“If we aren’t talking about runaways, is there maybe anyone in the family, perhaps, who might want to get their hands on the boy? A large amount of kidnappings are committed by someone in the family,” the woman officer said, flipping open her notebook and looking questioningly at them.

“Well- no. I mean, their other father has been missing for ten years, by now, he couldn’t be behind this,” Virgil said, shaking his head. “Besides, he- he was a good man.”

Roman paled, suddenly, recalling an encounter he’d had recently. A woman with bold red lipstick and sharp plastic nails. “Unless the divorce notice scared him into action.”

“Roman, that’s enough!” Virgil scoffed, shoving away from him. “He’s your brother , you honestly believe he’d kidnap his own son!?”

“Hey, Remus kept a lot of secrets from me!” Roman protested. Virgil looked at him with murder in his eyes, and Roman internally winced.

“It’s a reasonable motive, sir,” the second officer commented, and Roman watched as Virgil’s nerves visibly snapped. The police man frowned as Virgil stepped closer to him, glaring at him from three inches below.

“Well, then I guess calling you in was a useless endeavor, because your goddamn precinct still hasn’t tracked down my husband!” Virgil snapped. He was getting uncomfortably close to them.

“Dad!” Darius protested, and he pulled Virgil away from the cops.

“Is it gonna take ten years for you guys to find my kid, too!?” Virgil demanded. He spun on his heel and began storming up the lawn and heading towards the front door of the house. “I don’t even know why I called you! God, you can’t count on the police to do anything in this fucking city!”

The door slammed shut, but only Roman flinched.

“We’ll do the best we can to find Thomas, sir,” the police woman assured, tucking away her notebook. Roman perked up.

“Oh, thank you- really, I can’t thank you enough,” Roman said. He glanced at Darius, who was staring at Thomas’ backpack with a blank expression. Roman sighed. He had to give his brother some benefit of the doubt. After all, he had been good to Virgil. For a time. “Have there been any recent cases of missing children you could compare this to? It really would be out of character of my brother to do this sort of thing.”

“Missing children?” The police man huffed. “Well, I’m sure you’ve seen a story or two in the news, dead homeless children being discovered weeks after they disappear? It’s not exactly something you share with a hysterical parent.”

Darius let out a distressed sound, and Roman swallowed thickly. He had seen a story on the news. He’d turned it off quickly to avoid exposing Thomas to it. He took a deep breath. “Well if you could find him, in any condition, we’d be very appreciative.”

“Of course. Keep in touch, the kidnapper may send ransom demands,” the police woman said, and the pair made off towards their car. Roman watched them begin to drive off, their lights and sirens turned off, before he turned to Darius.

“I’m sorry,” Darius wept. “It’s all my fault, I shouldn’t have left him alone-“

“No, no- Dee, you’re barely older than him! You could’ve been seriously hurt. You shouldn’t have left him alone, definitely not, but this sort of thing shouldn’t have happened either. This isn’t your fault,” Roman assured. Darius buried his face in his brother’s backpack.

“I told him we weren’t brothers. What if he dies, like those other kids, and that’s the last thing I ever told him?” Darius blubbered. Roman crouched down and put a hand on Darius’s back, rubbing the same circles he’d done in Virgil’s.

“We’ll see him again, don’t worry,” Roman whispered, though he seriously doubted it. “The first thing you can do when we see him again is get him an ice cream sundae, I promise. He’ll love it.”

“You’re a good actor,” Darius scowled. “It’s almost like you believe that.”

Roman sighed as his nephew stood up and ran into the house, taking Thomas’ backpack with him. He turned to glare at Remus’ old car, a beat up junker Virgil refused to get rid of.

“You’d better be as big a bastard as I think you are, Remus. If someone else grabbed Thomas, I’ll be devastated,” Roman growled towards the man he couldn’t speak to. He hoped his brother’s ears were burning.

That strange woman, Eliza Wicca sat across from Thomas in a tiny metal chair, her leg crossed over the other and her stiletto heel hanging from her toes. Her nails were sharp and plastic and red, and they matched the sharp and plastic heels on her feet. They also matched the sharp and plastic curve of her lips, all of it bright and glossy red.

The chair Thomas was sitting in was also tiny and metal. There were divots in the arm rests that matched the size of his fingers- he knew his fingers were still small from youth. He didn’t have the strength to warp metal like that. He wondered what child did this.

It was easier to wonder about tiny metal divots than to feel frightened. It felt safer, almost, to pretend all that mattered were the little metal arm rests on this little metal chair. But it was hard to stay focused on being unafraid and thinking about metal.

Eliza Wicca was filing her plastic nails into a new shape. They were probably going to be made sharper than before. There were metal cuffs around his wrists keeping him strapped to the chair. They were a little bent and warped on the edges, likely re-molded into a restraining tool. The room was windowless except for one glass panel along the wall behind him. His chair was of the spinning variety, however, and he’d likely be turned around to face it at some point. He’d spotted what was happening in the room beyond, and seen only a hallway. There was another window across the hall, but the room beyond was empty and dark. He didn’t want to think about it.

He didn’t want to think about any of it.

He really, really just wanted to think about the little metal divots in the arm rests beneath his fingers.

The door behind Thomas, next to the big window, slid open. Eliza Wicca looked up with her terrifying green eyes.

“Caesar,” she greeted. “Here’s the kid.”

A man spun Thomas around and grabbed his face by the chin. The man had dark hair and crystal eyes. He whistled.

“Looks nothing like him. Is he really his kid?” The man, likely Caesar, asked. Thomas wondered who they were talking about.

“He’s definitely Thomas Sanders-Castillo,” Eliza Wicca informed with an audible scoff. “I don’t screw up.”

“Fine,” Caesar huffed. He clicked a button on the side of the chair, out of reach of Thomas’s restrained hands. The restraints popped open, and Caesar grabbed Thomas by the front of his shirt, dragging him to his feet. “Come on, kid.”

Thomas stumbles to follow the man, too terrified to do much else but listen. Eliza Wicca trailed in the back, her shoes clicking ominously behind them. They turned down multiple hallways, past a few adults that barely gave Thomas a second glance. Then, Caesar put a code in the wall next to a weird looking door.

The door slid open slowly, and Thomas startled at the sight of a man on the floor, not even looking up at them. Caesar tisked.

“Not even gonna look at me anymore, Duke?” Caesar mocked. The man scoffed, and something about the sound reminded Thomas of Uncle Roman.

“Oh, at least look up at the present we got you,” Eliza Wicca said, entering the room as the door shut behind her. Her shoes clicked again, and the man in the corner finally looked up.

If the sound reminded Thomas of Uncle Roman, then it was nothing to say that his face reminded him of Uncle Roman. It was nearly a mirror copy, the same nose, chin, and eyes, but above his upper lip, which had been curled into a snarl before the man locked eyes with him, was a sloppy, overgrown mustache.

Caesar shoved him at the man, and he stumbled and fell. The Uncle Roman lookalike scrambled forward across the floor and scooped him up, touching his face like it might disappear, and starting to breathe just the smallest bit unevenly.

Not-Uncle-Roman looked up, holding him close to his chest and glaring at the terrifying pair in the doorway. “What do you want!? Why are you doing this!?”

“Oh, come on now, Duke, we spent a long time as co-workers!” Caesar said with a grin that had Thomas shuddering. Not-Uncle-Roman tightened his hold on him in response.

“Then you betrayed us and tried to force me to do the dirty work for Myriad.” Not-Uncle-Roman, or rather Duke? Whoever he was, he was scowling hard at the man and woman still standing in the doorway. “We aren’t friends, so what’s this about? What angle are you playing at!?”

“Maybe I just want to make whatever happens next hurt as much as it possibly can,” Caesar sneered. Eliza Wicca cackled, and Thomas found himself curling closer to the oddly comforting embrace of Duke, whoever he was.

The other two left, using their palms against a reader to get themselves out of what Thomas could now see was a cell. He tried to pull away from the familiar stranger, but the man only cupped his face and looked directly in his eyes.

The man laughed, hollow and sad. “Oh my god, T. You look just like V- I- oh my god, you’re really here!”

“Who are you?” Thomas whispered, terrified and confused, all at the same time.

The man’s eyes started to well up with tears. “T, it- it’s me. I’m so sorry- it’s- I’m your Papa.”

Oh.

Oh?

Thomas tentatively reached up a hand and tugged on the end of Remus Sanders-Castillo’s mustache. The man burst into tearful laughter.

“Still hung up on Papa’s mustache, huh, T?” Remus asked, and Thomas flushed. He dropped his forehead against Remus’ chest and wrapped his arms around him.

He couldn’t put his thoughts into words. He couldn’t articulate his feelings. Here he was, reunited with a man he had never known, and yet he felt like he couldn’t possibly have been anywhere safer. Sure he was trapped in a secret base, surrounded by strangers who had snatched him away from his home, but here… here was as safe as beside his Dad.

“Oh- T, don’t cry!” Rough looking hands began to brush away the tears on his face. “Don’t cry, T, I’m here. I won’t let anybody hurt you. You’re going to be okay if it kills me, I swear.”

Thomas sobbed.

Chapter Text

Valerie was twelve years old, and everyone knows that twelve is old enough to disappear. Or at least, everyone in her old group home was of that opinion. Once you turned twelve, parents stopped looking at you, really. They wanted cute young kids they could raise like their own, or nearly grown kids they could set straight before turning them out into the world. Nobody was looking for a twelve year old.

Valerie had been in her new foster home for two months before she ran away. Neglectful was a kind word for her foster parents at the time, so she ran away from them. Valerie knew how her friends saw her. She was kind, she was warm hearted. But that wasn’t enough for the universe to give her a single break.

Valerie was starting to really miss her few friends- she’d only met one or two nice kids at school before she’d run away- when she was snatched up. And she was homeless, and she was twelve, so nobody cared that she was being taken right off the streets. She was crying the whole time.

She knew she cried way too easily, and she knew she seemed especially young when she was crying. It didn’t help that she was naturally small for her age, or that she wasn’t likely to grow very much.

For once, her emotions worked in her favor. Among all the invisible kids, she was the least invisible to the one person who wasn’t looking at them all with a cold, calculating gaze.

Mordecai Hart probably mistook her for a much younger child through her blubbering. But he was kind, and he was gentle, and he promised he would help her out of this cold, empty place. Well, that’s what he was doing now.

“You’re sure the drug wore off?” Mordecai asked. Valerie scratched at the cotton taped over her inner elbow.

“I don’t feel like it’s still inside me,” Valerie muttered. “It feels… wrong when it’s in me.”

“I know,” Mordecai said with a grimace. “Like ice. Don’t worry, I won’t let them put any more of that inside of you.”

He pushed lightly against her head and she let him guide her into the cart, and watched as he began to cover her with slightly grimy rags.

Then, the cart began to move under her feet. Valerie curled up closer to her knees, hoping that finally she'd be able to go back. Not back to her foster family. But maybe she'd get to see Terrence again.

"Oh, Agent Seraph! Taking the laundry out, then?" Valerie heard a woman say.

"Agent Justice! Yeah, it's the middle of the week. Laundry day," Mordecai said.

"Well, it's your last laundry day, Agent. The heads noticed how good you are with the kids. They want you transferred to the main base," Agent "Justice" informed.

"The main base?" Mordecai spluttered. "Why would they need me there?"

"You didn't hear this from me, but they brought in a kid as collateral. Supposedly they're gonna try and use some guy they're keeping in the field, but he isn't very cooperative," Justice informed.

Valerie was beginning to feel nervous with the woman so close to her hiding place. Her heart was in her throat as Mordecai sooke again.

"Well, I'm sure I'll hear all about it from the bosses. I should keep doing my job, though, if I want to be properly considered," Mordecai suggested.

"Right, right. I always forget the laundry room is in a different compound. How long is the drive?" Justice asked.

"Two hours. I should be going," Mordecai announced, and he began to walk away, pushing the cart once more. Valerie tried not to sigh too loudly as relief eased her tension.

They went undisturbed after that, for a long while. Valerie realized, suddenly, that she had no way of knowing if Mordecai was really going to let her go. But, she was so far already. She really had no choice but to trust the man.

The cart came to another stop, and Valerie heard the distinct sound of a car door wrenching open. The bedclothes lifted, and Mordecai jerked his head to the side.

"In through the back, kiddo, come on," Mordecai said. Valerie climbed out of the cart and into the large black SUV, climbing over the back seat and into the car proper.

The cart was hoisted in after her, securely placed in the trunk. Then Mordecai got into the front seat.

"Strap in, Valerie, we're in for a long ride," Mordecai informed. Valerie's chest felt light and her heart soared.

She really couldn't help the enormous grin on her face.

Emile got out of class at the end of the day, hopped onto his bicycle, and rode all the way across town to the little apartment building Remy lived in with his dad. He locked his bike on the tree next to the full rack, apologized to nature, and hurried into the building. Miss Clarisse Higgins greeted him at the office door, asked him what floor he was going to.

“Floor five, ma’am, I’m here to see Remy Croft,” Emile said. Clarisse laughed pleasantly.

“Alright, kid, well you be careful okay? Orphans your age are going missing all over town you know,” Clarisse warned. Emile smiled tightly.

“ Homeless orphans, Miss Clarisse. I promise, plenty of people will notice if I go missing, ma’am,” Emile assured. Clarisse smiled right back at him, warm and gentle.

“I’d believe it, kid. I can’t imagine there’s anyone at all who’d want to lose you,” Clarisse agreed. “Now you run on up to see your friend. And tell his dad I’ve got a repairman coming in to look at their AC on Saturday!”

“Will do, ma’am!” Emile said, giving a polite salute as he turned and began to rush up the stairs. He slowed his pace before the second flight, not wanting to be too out of breath when he finally arrived to check up on Remy.

The fifth floor was the top floor of the Serenity Building. Not a large building in comparison to a few that were only a few blocks away, in the heart of the city, but certainly the tallest in this part of town. The Croft household had a sweet little welcome mat, and an elegant metal doorknob.

Emile didn’t touch the doorknob, though. He simply knocked the little rhythm from Frozen. The door swung open immediately to reveal Remy himself, shades-less and pressing ice to a swollen lip.

“Are you okay, Remy?” Emile asked. Remy sighed.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. I mostly just feel like a rotten bitch,” Remy sighed, leading Emile into his apartment. Christopher Croft raised an eyebrow from his spot on the couch, and Emile waved.

“Hi, Mr. Croft!”

“Hi,” Christopher said. “Who are you?”

“Dad, don’t be a dick. This is Emile, remember?” Remy scowled.

“Hey, what did I say today?” Christopher demanded.

Remy heaved a put upon sigh and rolled his eyes. “Kids that get into fights don’t get to call their parents names.”

“Exactly. Now go finish your chores before you get to hang out with your little boyfriend, okay? What was it, Emmit?” Christopher looked directly at Emile, who could feel his cheeks burning.

“Emile.”

“Hate it. You’re Kyle now. You can come watch tv with me, my little demon child has to finish up his chores,” Christopher decreed. Emile wandered into the living room and sat down awkwardly on the couch as Remy groaned and headed into the kitchen.

“What are we watching?” Emile asked, looking doubtfully towards the television.

“Some costume art reality show,” Christopher said, examining his nails. Emile glanced questioningly towards the television, where a woman was sticking shaped and molded silicone to a model’s face. He fidgeted there for a moment before a crash sounded in the kitchen, and Remy ran out.

"Dishes are all in the washer, leaving now, bye! Come on Emile, let's go to my room," Remy said, and he began to walk further into the apartment. Christopher rolled his eyes.

"Go on, Kyle, but leave the door open, got it?" He said, and Emile's entire face turned red.

"Yes, sir," he said meekly, before running after Remy.

The first thing Remy did when Emile got to his room was slam the door shut. Emile frowned, but he didn’t say anything. It wasn’t like they were going to get up to anything, anyway.

“You crossed the line today, Remy,” Emile started. Remy rolled his eyes.

“Darius crosses a line every single time he’s in one of these moods, I’m not allowed to get sick of it?” Remy demanded.

“That’s not what I meant. You shouldn’t just let him be toxic, but you can’t just go and actively try to hurt people like that! You know his dad is a sore spot for him,” Emile argued. Remy rolled his eyes again and sat down in the chair by his desk, spinning to grab his computer, and turning back to face his bed. Emile sighed and sat down on his mattress, waiting for what Remy was going to say.

“Six months after my uncle disappeared, Dad started holding weekly meet ups with a friend of his at my bedtime. Eventually, they stopped, but Dad’s email password is my birthday, so just a tip tappity and I was in,” Remy explained, and he spun his laptop for Emile to see.

"This is an email from your dad's friend Patton," Emile said, shrugging.

"It is! But look closer," Remy said. Emile sighed and studied the email. He frowned.

"This says he's getting you a surprise birthday gift?" Emile said.

"Yeah. And look at the date," Remy stressed.

"That's yesterday," Emile muttered. "Why would he try to get you a surprise birthday present five months late?"

"Exactly! Now read it more carefully. There's typos," Remy stated. Emile did as Remy suggested, but he couldn't see any particular pattern.

"I don't get it," Emile huffed, leaning back. Remy scoffed, and placed his laptop on his desk. He pulled out a notebook and dropped it in Emile's lap.

"They're spies , Emile! So I wrote down every typo and the letters they were supposed to have been and I realized they all match up on a Caesar cypher. If A is T, then D is W, which spells 'and' as T-G-W. Got it?" Remy asked. Emile frowned.

"Why do you think your dad is using the Caesar cypher?" Emile asked.

"He only uses the Caesar cypher. He got me a decoder for my tenth birthday and started making me send all my location information to him in it," Remy explained. He noticed the look on Emile's face, clearly, because he added, "I used to think he was just really paranoid."

"Okay, so what does this say?" Emile asked.

"It's an address," Remy informed. "Or at least, a street name. Liberty Street."

"There's nothing on Liberty Street," Emile huffed. "Maybe it's a different cypher, Remy."

"There's not nothing on Liberty Street, Emile. There's the train graveyard," Remy said with a wide grin.

Emile frowned. "That's nothing ."

"Or is it just believed to be nothing?" Remy asked, waggling his eyebrows.

Logan tucked the third and last finished vial of the serum into the waistband of his pants and made sure the needle was safely tucked up his sleeve. Today was, according to his schedule, another visit with Remus. If he timed it right, he should be able to inject him with some of the serum before anyone else could stop him.

The door beeped, signifying that it was unlocking. Logan straightened up and looked towards it as it swung open to reveal- Eliza.

"Why are you here?" Logan scoffed.

"To tell you today's visit is off. In fact, all visits are off. We've got a new collateral, sweetie, and now both of you are going to do what the bosses say," Eliza taunted.

Logan stiffened. He knew his brother couldn't protect he and his family forever. If Logan had only left them some way to access his files, they might've been able to hide in one of his mapped out safe houses. But no, he'd been shortsighted in the worst of ways and let himself forget.

"Oh, don't look so frightened, Logan. Your brother made sure to hide in plain sight once he realized he couldn't hide in the shadows. No one will be able to target he or your nephew without serious backlash," Eliza informed. Logan sighed in relief, but he didn't let his guard down.

"Then what? You found Roman?" Logan demanded.

Eliza laughed. "Oh, we certainly did! And he told us all about the Duke's little play house. How cute, you know, hiding his family from us. Did you know them?"

Logan paled. "In passing."

"Well, you'll be getting very acquainted with little Thomas Sanders-Castillo from now on. Very sweet little boy, you know," Eliza gushed sarcastically.

"Don't hurt him," Logan demanded. Eliza laughed.

"You don't give the orders here, Croft . If you don't want us to hurt the boy, then bring us results. We're still waiting on a longer duration for that serum," Eliza reminded darkly.

"Fine. Then you'll get it," Logan scowled. "Don't touch him."

"We shall see," Eliza chuckled, as she swept out of the room again. Logan glared after her. The door slid shut and buzzed to announce it's lock.

Well then. Remus was out of the question. Logan scowled, and pulled out a vial from his waistband and the needle from his sleeve.

He pulled the cork out of the vial and began to fill the needle. Then he slipped the needle into his own arm.

Ice spread through his veins, and Logan hissed at the foreign feeling. But he would not be defeated by discomfort. He dropped the needle and slammed his fist on the table, his muscles seizing up.

He let out a cry as the metal crumbled under his hand. He crashed to the ground- glass shattered, chemicals splashed.

Logan screamed .

Chapter Text

Remus didn't know how to begin with his son once the boy's sobs ended. All he could think was how much of Virgil he saw in him. His nose had to be Virgil's, as cute and round as it was. His hair was silky straight, but it better matched Remus' brown than Virgil's black. So, he'd let him sleep, and in the morning when he woke up he grasped at straws.

He'd missed out on ten years of this boy's life. Remus couldn't stand to know that. He hugged Thomas even tighter.

"I'm sorry. I'm so fucking sorry." He buried his nose in his hair. He remembered when Thomas used to smell like baby powder. Now he just smelled like hair and faint fruity shampoo. He wanted to hold onto him forever.

"Is this your fault?" Thomas whispered.

"What?" Remus blanched. He cradled his son's face in his hands, locking eyes with him. "No! I'd much rather never have seen you again as long as I live if it meant you were safe!"

Thomas eased away from Remus. "Then don't apologize. Dad does it all the time, I don't want to hear 'sorry' anymore."

Remus' heart ached. "How is Virgil?"

"I don't think you want to know," Thomas stated.

"I do, I do! I know he's filing for divorce, but call me a masochist, I need to know how he is!" Remus pleaded. Thomas gave him an odd expression.

"Darius and Uncle Roman say that Dad hasn't been the same since you left," Thomas hedged carefully. "He blames himself for you leaving."

Remus felt a sudden surge of anger. How dare he be kept away from his sweet husband in his time of doubt! How dare they do this to his family, how dare they do this to him . "That is absolutely not his fault!"

"I'd guessed," Thomas whispered, staring at the cell door keeping them from freedom.

Oh, when Remus got his hands on Antonio he was going to fucking wring his neck . He'd eviscerate that traitor, tear him limb from limb, rip out his entrails and hang him by them. Eliza too.

"W-what about Dee? How's Dee?" Remus asked, his hands hovering between he and Thomas, shaking. Thomas didn't want his touch.

Thomas looked devastated to be reminded of his brother, and fear seized Remus' heart. He'd seen pictures of him only a day ago. What had happened to him? Were they attacked together, had Darius been killed - Thomas hid his face in his knees. "Darius says we aren't brothers."

Remus paused. It felt almost like someone had taken a melon baller and scooped out his heart piece by piece. "He said that?"

Thomas nodded, his eyes watery. "He said that, and then left, and- I don't know if he went home or not."

"Oh." Remus felt his heart ache. He longed to go home, to scoop his family up and squeeze them until all the hurts faded away. "Oh, Thomas, no ."

He reached out for his son, and the boy shied away. Remus dropped his hands back down to his sides. His entire body ached with the need to comfort and be comforted, but he couldn't force it upon his son. The boy hardly knew him.

The door slid open and Remus snarled, blocking Thomas from Antonio as he hurried in. Antonio scowled at him.

"You and that goddamn scientist , you two just have to ruin everything !" Antonio sneered, and he yanked Remus to his feet by his arm.

"What are you talking about?" Remus demanded, kicking out at Antonio's legs as the man tried to drag him from the room. Antonio snorted and with his free hand pulled a gun from his belt, pointing it at Thomas. Remus froze, and Thomas whimpered.

"Stop fighting me, or I'll blow the kid's brains all over the walls. See how pretty a picture such a smart kid makes," Antonio sneered.

"You wouldn't. You said he was insurance," Remus growled.

"That was hours ago, things change . Like your partner deciding to inject himself with three vials of an experimental strength serum and destroying all his research ," Antonio spat. "Draco, grab the kid!"

Eliza stepped into the room and marched over to Thomas, yanking him off the ground by his shirt. She held her gun almost lazily, inspecting it casually. The threat was still clear, however, so Remus didn't try anything.

"Get him out of here. Be sure to let his official handler know the change of location," Antonio ordered.

"I know how to do my job , Caesar," Eliza scowled, and she dragged Thomas out of the room. Remus bit his lip.

"Now, Remus, you're gonna be a good boy and tell me where the Professor's safehouses are, or sweet little Thomas might actually get a bullet in him. I think we both know Eliza's trigger finger is a bit itchier than mine," Antonio said with a smirk. Remus' eye twitched.

Just then, another agent screamed and was hurled through the large glass window. Remus ducked and covered his head with his arms as glass rained down on him, and he heard Antonio shout as the agent slammed into him and knocked him to the ground.

Remus looked up to see Logan, his eyes bright and angry, his hair singed and damp, and his skin covered in minor looking burns.

"Prof, did you just!?" Remus cut off and laughed a bit hysterically.

"No time, Remus, we have to get out of here now if we plan on catching up to Eliza and your son," Logan snapped. Remus sobered up quickly.

"Do you know which way they went?" Remus asked. Logan nodded.

"The garage. It's three floors above us, come on," Logan said, and he pulled Remus through the broken window as carefully as possibly, dislodging broken pieces with brief kicks. Remus cried out as one piece scraped through his clothes and sliced his abdomen. Logan grimaced. "Apologies."

"No time to worry, let's go!" Remus snapped, bunching up his shirt and pressing it against his wound to try and stay the bleeding.

They were running down the hall when Antonio screamed after them, firing his gun. Remus yelped and threw himself to the ground. The bullet slammed into the metal wall. "Shit, he's not down!?"

"What, you think broken glass and a secret agent to the head is enough to keep Caesar of all people down!?" Logan demanded, his words heavy with sarcasm. He grabbed Remus and hauled him over his shoulder like a bag of grapes, and then kept running. Remus smirked.

"Okay, this is very hot, but I am a one man kind of guy, Logan-"

"Oh shut up!"

Darius woke up that morning to Dad yelling at Uncle Roman. He cringed, never having heard his father so angry before. He crept down the hall and stopped just beyond the doorway to the kitchen.

"You don't care about how I feel at all! You've spent the last half of this decade wondering when I was going to move on - well, newsflash Roman! Even if I did move on, I would never have moved on to you !" Dad shouted.

"I just want you to be happy! I never believed Remus would be able to keep this up- I'm surprised he didn't leave earlier for god's sake!" Roman hollered right back. Darius frowned, hugging himself tightly.

"You keep acting like you knew him better than me because you shared a womb! Remus and I were together for seven years, you think we didn't get to know each other intimately!? I've had enough of you insisting he's some monster! Remus is a good man, and you're only upset because I love him and not you !" Dad screamed.

"You won't even give me a chance!" Roman spat.

Darius stepped into the room, taking a deep breath. "Good morning."

Dad's rage immediately fizzled out on his face. "Dee. Good morning. I made breakfast."

Uncle Roman opened his mouth like he had more to say, but Dad glared at him. Darius watched wide eyed as Uncle Roman shut his mouth with a click and sat down in a chair across from him. Dad scooted into the seat next to Darius, hugging him with one arm.

"I called your school and got you the day off because of what happened yesterday. Don't go getting into any trouble, okay? I don't know what I'd do if I lost you too," Dad mumbled. He pressed a kiss to Darius' hair. Darius felt like his stomach was tied to an anchor. Dad smiled sadly at him. "I love you."

"I love you too," Darius whispered. "Are you- are you going to work?"

"I can't afford extra time off," Dad said. Darius felt fear clinging to his insides.

"Be safe please. I don't want to lose you either," Darius said. He knew exactly who would've taken Thomas, and they were probably planning to use him as collateral against Papa. That meant Dad was just as in danger.

"I will, I promise," Dad said. He pressed another kiss to Darius' hair.

"I'm sorry," Darius said weakly.

"None of this was your fault, baby, none of it," Dad reassured, resting his chin on his head. Darius couldn't help but disagree.

"If I had been with Thomas-"

"Darius, no . We don't know what happened. For all we know, if you'd been with Thomas, I would've lost you both," Dad protested. He let out a ragged breath. "I love you both so much, and it would kill me to lose you at the same time."

"I'm still sorry. I still feel responsible," Darius insisted.

Dad sighed and pulled away to look him in the eyes. "Well, what can you do about the situation?"

Immediately, Remy's uncle's lab came to mind. He couldn't exactly explain that to Dad, however. "Nothing."

"Then don't stress over it, okay? I'm going to worry about it, but you just focus on being safe," Dad suggested.

Darius furrowed his brow. "Well, what can you do?"

Dad smiled sadly again. "I'm your dad. I'm always gonna worry about you, whether I can do something about it or not."

"So, what's going to happen now?" Darius asked.

"I called Andy. He's flying over now. Should be around by Friday at the latest," Dad explained. "Then I'm gonna start looking for Thomas. You just listen to your Uncle Andy, okay?"

Darius glanced at where his Uncle Roman was glaring at his meal. He looked back to his dad. "Okay."

"And Uncle Roman is going to be moving out as soon as he finds a place to go," Dad stated, his eyes on the man in question. Roman scoffed. Darius' eyebrows jumped. Dad looked at Darius. "He can still be your family, if you want. You and Thomas can still count on him. But this is a Sanders household now, and I have to start standing on my own two legs."

Darius glared at the table. He knew he had wanted Roman gone. But this way, it meant Papa wasn't family anymore either.

Remus was seventeen, a month from eighteen, when the agency found him. Or rather, he found the agency.

"If we continue to press charges, you will be in prison for a very, very long time," Director Dieter informed him. "You broke into our lab, stole government secrets- and for what?"

"Food and shelter, ma'am," Remus stated, as he wiggled in his seat to try and get his hands free from behind him.

"That was a rhetorical question," Director Dieter informed. "Who did you say approached you asking for this file?"

"Pretty lady, I guess. Blonde hair, green eyes. She said she worked for a Mr. Geheimnis. Sounded sketchy, but she said it was one little file for a year's worth of food money, and a roof over my head, so…" Remus shrugged.

"How old was she?" Director Dieter asked.

"Um. Not much older than me, I think? Maybe younger. Sixteen?" Remus guessed.

"Professor, what do you think?" Director Dieter asked.

A nineteen year old boy stepped away from the wall and flicked on a holographic screen. Remus' jaw dropped. "Remus Castillo. Thrown out of his home at fourteen, living on the streets for nearly four years. Has been in and out of juvenile detention for minor misdemeanors- repeated trespassing, repeated loitering, and the like. Our systems have caught him committing crimes that went unsolved or undetected by anyone else- minor burglaries, the things one needs to survive. If we turn him over for stealing government secrets, he would not be given a simple sentence due to his delinquent history."

Remus furrowed his brow. "Ma'am, I can't go to prison, I have a brother I gotta watch out for-"

"Enough," Director Dieter said, raising one plump hand. She folded her hands. "I have a proposition to make you, kid. You need money to find a place to stay and live. We have a spot open for someone of your bold skill."

"I'll do it!" Remus proclaimed.

"We can't actually hire you until you're eighteen, and even when we do, we'll need to train you first," Director Dieter informed.

"Okay, whatever, I'll fucking do it, are you kidding me? No way would I pick jail over this!" Remus scowled. "So what's the deal, where will I be until I'm allowed?"

"We have connections. Your brother has been looking into hunting you down. We'll drop him some hints. We have reason to believe he'll open his doors to you once he has his own place. Until then, you'll stay with the Professor here. He will be your handler," Director Dieter informed. She and the other agents got up to leave.

"Oh, cool!" Remus said, grinning up at the nineteen year old. The older teen rolled his eyes and pushed up his glasses. The other agents filed out. The door shut.

"Logan Croft," the teen spy said, offering his hand.

"Remus Castillo!" Remus replied. "But you knew that because you're a super cool spy, huh?"

Logan nodded. "Something like that."

"So how awesome would you say your job is?" Remus asked, a huge grin on his face.

"I've only been at this a year, really. But already, I'd say this business is more pain than delight," Logan said grimly. Remus frowned.

"Wow, you're just a bucket of roses, huh?"

Chapter Text

Remy and Emile were definitely not supposed to be planning to skip class. But, well. They had a location to scope, now didn’t they? Naturally, to start, Remy needed to get into his uncle's computer. Unfortunately, his biometrics weren't programmed into it. The only person he knew who could get into it was Darius- or maybe Mr. Sanders, if he was willing to wait until the man got out of work.

So, Remy was forced to wait until he bumped into Darius at school. Except he didn't. At lunch, he reconvened with Emile in the cafeteria.

"Have you seen Darius?" Remy asked, frowning deeply.

"No," Emile muttered, shaking his head. "Maybe his suspension was longer than yours?"

"No way, I was there when the principal gave us our sentences. He should've been back in class today," Remy insisted. Emile frowned.

"We could talk to a teacher?" Emile suggested. Remy shook his head immediately.

"Adults only tell you what they think won't bother you," Remy said with a huff. "I'll just. I'll text him."

"Okay, but you have to apologize if he responds," Emile said strictly. Remy rolled his eyes. Emile was cute, but he was too wrapped up in solving Remy's problems for him. Remy was a big boy, he knew how to handle himself.

He pulled out his phone and sent Darius a message asking him where he was. It only took a moment before Darius sent back the news that Thomas was-

"Holy shit !" Remy exclaimed. Emile jumped next to him.

"What? What's wrong?" Emile asked.

Remy swept his gaze all around them in a wide arc, then grabbed Emile and dragged him into the nearest bathroom. He leaned in close to Emile over a sink. "Thomas got kidnapped ."

Emile gasped, clapping his hands over his mouth. "Mr. Sanders must be devastated ."

"I'm telling Darry to meet us at Uncle Logan's lab and fill us in," Remy announced, already typing the words out.

"Don't forget to apologize and say you're so sorry that this happened!" Emile cut in. Remy huffed.

"I'll apologize in person, what kind of asshole would I be, trying to send an apology over text, when Darry's baby brother just disappeared?" Remy demanded. Emile pouted, but he nodded.

"Fine, fine," Emile agreed. Remy rolled his eyes. He knew when Emile was disagreeing with him, even if the guy refused to show it. Remy wasn't trying to avoid apologizing to Darius! He just didn't want to be misconstrued as insincere. Yeah, that was it. He just wanted Darius to really understand him.

"What are you gonna do to me?" Thomas asked, voice shaking as Eliza Wicca shoved him into the back of an SUV with tinted windows. She pressed the barrel of her gun to his head as she climbed in beside him, and he couldn't contain the nervous gasp as the cold metal touched him.

"Nothing yet. But if Daddy puts a toe out of line, I'll get to do whatever I want," Eliza informed, flashing sharp, white teeth. She turned to the agent who'd climbed into the driver's seat. "Base P36. Step on it."

The car started to move, and then suddenly stopped. Eliza growled, whirling back to look out the window. Thomas followed her gaze and spotted a strange man, broken glasses on his face and burns and cuts all over his body. Eliza lifted her gun and shot it out the back window. The glass didn't shatter, but it cracked and spiraled, and there was hole left behind where the bullet had passed. The man buckled, and the car began to move again but not before the door right next to Thomas swung open, and- and-

"Papa!" Thomas screamed, as his estranged father clung to the now wide open door of the SUV. Eliza Wicca moved her gun to point it back at Thomas, but the man scrambled into the car and grabbed her wrist, pointing the gun skyward. The bullet fired, and Thomas clamped his hands tighter over his ears.

"You are a fucking thorn , Remus Castillo!" Eliza spat. "I should've killed you before you ever even joined up with the agency!"

"You snooze, you lose, Draco !" Papa hissed, and the woman growled in rage, twisting her wrist out of his grip and kicking him in his stomach.

Papa screamed as her heel dug into the bloody spot on his stomach, and Thomas cried out in fear. Papa almost fell out of the car, but he grabbed the seatbelt  and the side of the car door. His upper body hung dangerously close to the speeding concrete, but his feet hooked onto some spots underneath the seats of the car. Unfortunately, this left him defenseless, and Eliza leveled her gun at him.

"This is the end of the line, Duke ," Eliza sneered. "I'll make sure your and the kid's bodies make it home."

Papa's face crumbled, and it looked almost like he was about to accept this. Thomas could not let this happen . Eliza pulled the trigger and Thomas leapt onto her arm, shoving the gun barrel downward.

Papa flew out the car door, and Eliza screamed in anger, shoving Thomas against the closed car door behind her and bumping his head hard. She slammed the other door, then turned to the driver. " Faster , you idiot!"

Thomas looked out the window as long as he dared. All he saw was the body of Remus Sanders-Castillo lying face down in the concrete. He didn't know if he was alive. If Papa was dead… what did that mean for him?

Eliza's gun dug into his ribs, and she was tapping away at her phone with her free hand. Her face was as still as stone, a grimace on her lips and her eyebrows creased in a deep V. Her high heel tapped as she waited impatiently for an answer to her message.

Thomas decided that he didn't want to know what was in store for him. The metal of the gun was much warmer now, and the air smelled like smoke and ash.

Darius was not a good kid, he could admit that. He was a punk, too rebellious for his own good. Still, he felt a twinge of regret as he slid out his bedroom window while Uncle Roman was in the living room. He knew Dad was mad at the man, and if he found out Darius had snuck out? A few days ago, Darius might've relished the ire with which Virgil would speak to Roman with. But this was not what he wanted.

This week had ruined everything. He didn't know how to feel. So much had happened, in such a short time. Darius didn't think he could stand another bombshell. It was all too much, and all of it so far from what he actually wanted for himself, so far from the happy family he kept picturing in his mind.

Darius knocked on the lab door, cutting off his own thoughts. He needed to not think about this. He needed to just focus on one moment at a time, if he could just keep up with each step one by one, then he could probably outrun the tidal wave of Not Okay coming right for him.

The door swung open and Darius was greeted with an armful of Emile. "Oh my god, are you okay!?"

"I- I'm fine, Thomas is the one that got kidnapped," Darius muttered, as Emile pulled him into the lab and shut the door.

"You don't think it's the same people who have your dad, do you?" Emile asked. Darius grimaced.

"I do," he muttered. He looked up to see Remy fidgeting in a metal folding chair across the lab, by the computers.

"Darius," Remy greeted. Darius raised an eyebrow.

"Remigius," Darius greeted back.

"Oh, you know that isn't my name!" Remy snapped.

" Remy ," Emile stressed, and Remy sighed.

"I'm… sorry that I said your dad should blame you if your other dad ever did leave on purpose," Remy said, mutinously. Darius rolled his eyes.

"Whatever. It's not like you're wrong , I do push people away," Darius scoffed.

Remy and Emile both looked at him in surprise. Darius just shrugged, and Remy's face fell into a pitiful understanding. "This is about Thomas."

Darius nodded, his fingers digging into his sleeves. Emile's arms wrapped around him in a second hug.

"It wasn't your fault," Emile said.

"I wouldn't be surprised if it was," Darius snapped. "I said some awful things to Thomas before I left him at the park, and… and I might never see him again!"

"Hey, we'll find him, Darry," Remy cut in. "I already have a lead on a location for one Mr. Patton Moras!"

Darius looked up in surprise. Why did that person matter at all? "Patton Moras?"

"He's my dad's friend. Well, they don't like each other all that much. But he cared about my uncle a lot, they were close," Remy explained. "Could you open the computer for me?"

Darius walked over and placed his hand on the palm reader. "What do you know about Patton Moras?"

The computer booted up, this time without an automatically playing video. Remy took the reins from there, typing furiously and looking through files. “Patton is my dad’s friend. He helps him find freelance work, supposedly. Well, it turns out he leaves my dad secret messages in his emails, which means he’s probably a spy too.”

“A spy,” Darius murmured thoughtfully. He couldn’t help but feel like all this spy business wasn’t nearly as cool as children might think. He’d lost his father to this shit, and probably lost his brother to it, too. He might as well have lost his entire family to it, the way it was crumbling all around him.

“I’ve got it! There’s a safe house my uncle set up in the train graveyard!” Remy announced, jumping up. Darius blinked owlishly.

“Why does this safehouse matter? We have other problems to worry about,” Darius reminded. Emile sighed.

“Remy insists that this is the only way we’re going to get answers,” Emile explained.

“Hey, if we wanna find our families, then Patton is our only lead ! We need to take every avenue we can, or we’re just- we’re just gonna keep losing everything!” Remy exclaimed. Darius’ breath hitched.

“I refuse to lose anyone else. Let’s go.” Darius pushed off the table and began to walk towards the door.

“We’re just going to get ourselves killed!” Emile exclaimed, tugging at his hair. “They’re fully trained secret operatives!”

“And we’re stubborn as all hell,” Remy proclaimed with a dangerous grin. Darius let out a light chuckle at that. His friends always knew how to get him thinking on a different set of tracks.

“Remus,” Logan grunted, as he staggered over. The pain in his shoulder burned so badly he couldn’t focus on walking right. His entire body felt like it was quivering in pain as he made his way over to Remus’ body. “Remus, are you alive?”

Remus groaned and turned over, his hands digging into his bleeding thigh as he curled into himself.

“Good. We have to get out of here- god dammit !” Logan hissed as his shoulder suddenly felt like it was contracting in on itself. He dropped to his knees as what felt like lightning raced from his heels all the way to his teeth, making them feel hollow. He could taste iron on his tongue. Suddenly the bullet that had been in his shoulder was on the floor with a light tink. Logan stared at it blankly as he panted for breath, pain subsiding.

“Logan, your shoulder ,” Remus gasped out, his face going slack in shock. Logan looked at his shoulder and gulped. The wound, where was-

“Where’s the bullet hole?” He whispered.

Remus sprawled against the pavement, laughing in an almost delirious manner. “Logan, what did you do to yourself!?”

Logan tried to shake the panic brewing in the pit of his stomach. He looked around the lot, but all the cars had gone in the wake of the evacuation that had likely been ordered when the alarms went off. He looked down at Remus, the man still freely bleeding from the gunshot wound in his thigh. “Remus, we need to stem the bleeding.”

“What’s the point ?” Remus demanded. “She took my son! I’m god knows where, and my other son doesn’t even think he’s part of my family! My husband is filing a divorce against me because I’ve been missing for ten goddamn years -”

“Remus!” Logan snapped, and the man met his gaze with watery brown eyes. “Get a hold of yourself. You want to see Virgil again, don’t you?”

Tears trailed from his eyes into his hair. Remus nodded. “But I can’t. I can’t go home without Tommy, I can’t face him if I don’t get our son back.”

“Then we’ll rescue Thomas,” Logan assured. “But we need to stop the bleeding.”

Remus lifted his leg with some difficulty, pressing his hands against the wound in a weak effort to put pressure on it. Logan sighed and looked at his hands. Could he risk it? He might only do more damage. He shook his head, instead tearing his sleeve off his shirt and beginning to tie that firmly and tightly around Remus’ thigh. The man cried out in pain, then began to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” Logan huffed.

“Are we gonna be able to save the leg, Doc?” Remus joked. “If we have to amputate, I want something cool to replace it. Like a gun.”

“We aren’t going to amputate your leg,” Logan huffed again, and he slid his arms under his fallen comrade, hoisting him up with an ease that managed to catch him off guard. He almost fell backwards, but he managed to steady himself. This newfound strength still needed some getting used to.

As Logan began to walk, he wondered if perhaps he should be looking for a town. There was no way he’d be able to deduce where the cars had gone, when they’d been unconscious for the escape. He thought maybe they’d been lucky, and seemed dead enough not to check on. But now, that luck had turned sour. He had no idea where they were, the building behind them was on fire, and Remus was beginning to cry in his arms.

“Remus?” He questioned. Remus just shook his head and knocked it against Logan’s chest, hiding the tears from view. Logan looked to the sky, bright blue with the noon day sun high in the air.

He too began to cry, for the life he could have lived, for the sun he hadn’t seen in ages, and for the family he hadn’t allowed himself to properly miss.

Chapter Text

Valerie woke up on a mattress that morning and had been utterly startled. She'd gotten a second tour around the safe house by Mordecai Hart, as she had been too tired last night to retain any information. She'd been introduced to the other kids at breakfast, about six of them. Then, Mordecai had left to return to work, having apparently been summoned to take a promotion.

"So we're… we're actually safe here, then?" Valerie asked one of the oldest kids in the room. Elliot smiled at her. They were tall and gangly and fifteen, with feet and hands and ears that they still had to grow into.

"It's weird to think about, huh? But yeah, we're safe," Elliot assured. Corbin and Sloane nodded from the other side of the table, and Lauren smiled reassuringly.

"Mr. Hart isn't going to hurt us. He comes and drops off supplies and new kids every now and then, but he never lays a hand on us," Corbin explained.

"I didn't think he would," Valerie huffed.

"You're really trusting for someone off the streets, then," Lauren commented. "Kinda like Sloane."

"So I see the best in people! That's a good thing when all of you are such negative nancies," Sloane complained, sticking out his tongue.

"I wasn't on the streets all that long, really," Valerie admitted. She looked around the underground bunker thoughtfully. "Can we ever leave?"

"Leave? Sure. Mordecai offers to help us get wherever we wanna go, but… well, I can assure you, no one who's gone out there has survived very long. Somehow, they're good at finding us out there," Corbin commented. Valerie wrinkled her nose.

"How do you know?" She asked.

Kai straightened up in the corner and tossed a newspaper onto the table, then bent back over to fiddle with the pages he'd kept. Lauren flattened the paper across the table and flicked a small blurb next to a headline about rising gas prices.

"Missing homeless kids turning up dead, it's in every paper," Lauren said. She pointed at the picture of the young girl, her face frozen in a fearful expression, like she'd died from terror. "That was Maria. Mordecai busted Sloane, Corbin, and her out at the same time."

Valerie shuddered. "They're hunting down the kids that break out."

"Which means they're also trying to figure out who did the breaking out," Corbin agreed.

"They're looking for Mordecai," Valerie realized. She frowned. "Do they have any leads?"

"Don't worry about that. We wouldn't be able to do anything anyway," Elliot shrugged. They studied Valerie. " You’re okay, right? It's been a year since I've had any serum in me."

"Two," Lauren spoke up. She looked over to Kai, now tossing a paper airplane across the room. "Kai too, we got out together."

"Corbin and I got out nine months ago," Sloane said. Valerie glanced at the sleeping figure of the sixth resident of the safehouse. He'd had a fitful sleep, and had decided to take a nap after the introductions were made.

"Harley has been here the longest," Elliot supplied, spotting her expression. "He was the first kid Mordecai ever rescued, five years ago. He's thirteen, though. Can't imagine what it's like, being that young and getting pumped with deadly chemicals."

"It's not like many of us are that much older," Lauren pointed out.

"I guess not," Elliot conceded. They leaned back against the wall from the mattress on the floor.

"How do they get away with this?" Valerie asked, disgusted.

"Well, no one cares what happens to a few invisible homeless kids," Kai muttered from the corner. No one argued. Valerie knew that they all had come to terms with this before. After all, they'd all lived it.

Nobody cared what happened to the invisible kids.

A sound rang out, and the kids all jolted. Valerie glanced around at them all, confused. Elliot stood up. "That's the perimeter alarm. Someone's nearby."

"Mordecai-?"

"Mr. Hart programmed the sensors with a code, he doesn't set them off," Elliot explained. Harley startled awake as the alarm kept beeping. The kids all froze as security footage of the above area came up on Mordecai's computer.

"That doesn't look like the lab scientists," Valerie said.

"No," Elliot agreed, putting a protective arm around the two nearest people, Sloane and Valerie. On the screen, three kids were wandering around the abandoned train junction that lay above their safehouse.

"Hang on," Kai interrupted, and he came towards the screen. He pointed at one of the figures, wearing tortoise shell glasses and looking far less comfortable than the other two. "I think that's Emile ."

Logan and Remus probably looked more than sketchy, standing in the road stop gas station, both covered in an odd amount of blood and Remus with a haphazard emergency bandage job around his abdomen and thigh. Still, the girl at the desk merely raised an eyebrow, then gestured towards the first aid kit.

"We stock that daily," she said, sounding bored out of her mind. To be fair, it was a rather remote gas stop. The bathrooms smelt of rare cleaning and piss soaked tiles. The little store was small and mostly stocked with candy. There were only two gas pumps. It was small and out of the way. Perfect to gather their wits about them.

Still, such a young girl probably shouldn't have been that unphased by the sight of so much dried blood. He would wonder if she'd even looked up from her small touchscreen phone, if she hadn't pointed them towards the first aid kit.

There was gauze and wrappings. Logan sat Remus down on the counter and began to wrap his bullet wound properly. Remus chuckled.

"How old are you?" He asked the girl.

"I'm sixteen," she said, frowning. Remus laughed.

"My kid's sixteen too," he said bitterly. The girl looked up from her phone with a frown.

"You're a dad?" She asked doubtfully.

"It depends on your definition of dad- I'm definitely a father," Remus spat. Logan groaned.

"We'll get you home, Remus. You can be a part of their lives, we are so close ," Logan encouraged. "Just hang in there."

"You're a pretty tough cookie, I could be dying here," Remus said to the girl. She shrugged.

"At least you aren't drunk and armed with hunting guns. They tried to rob me at gunpoint. That was a day," she commented, rolling her eyes. Remus cackled.

"I like you!" He announced. Logan's eyebrows jumped and paused in his ministrations.

"I don't need to pay for these, do I? I'm afraid we don't exactly have money," Logan informed. The girl shook her head.

"The first aid kit isn't for sale, it's for use. If you get any blood on the counter though, you have to clean it up," the girl said.

"What's your name, kid?" Remus asked.

"Nate," she informed, and Logan raised an eyebrow. She grinned. "It's short for Nathania."

Logan sighed, shaking his head. "If your parents wanted to name you Nathaniel, then they should have just done it , honestly."

"Mood," Nate hummed, fingering her dirty blonde hair and returning her attention to her phone screen. Logan fastened the bandage and patted Remus' knee.

"Is that too tight, Remus?" Logan asked.

"Hm?" Remus asked. Logan clicked his tongue.

"The bandage, is it too tight?"

"Nah, Vi, I'm fine," Remus babbled, his head sagging a bit to one side. Logan frowned.

"Remus, I'm Logan ," he corrected. Remus snorted, one eye opening.

"I know- kinda hard to see Virgey when it's your voice, yeah?" Remus pointed out.

"Then why-"

"I miss him a lot, Prof," Remus said, and Logan snapped his mouth shut. The teenager eyed them curiously.

"You're the one who said not until we get Thomas back. You're the one who said you couldn't face him," Logan reminded. It had been only earlier that day, after all. Remus laughed sadly.

"I did, didn't I? I forgot. It- it hasn't dawned on me yet," Remus said. Logan nodded. If he hadn't just carried Remus down a barren road, watching the sun rise over his head, seeing animals in the distance, and following the side of the road for hours , he doubts he would be able to come to terms with it. He was glad Remus was lucid enough to mostly walk into the store on his own. It meant he was gaining some strength.

"Is there any chance I could trouble you for a bit of free food and drink?" Logan asked Nate, changing the subject as smoothly as possible.

Nate pursed her lips. "I'm really not supposed to offer freebies."

"Please? I will do my best to repay you," Logan requested. Nate bobbed her head from side to side, as if she were a needle moving between a yes option and a no option. Finally she straightened and shook her head.

"No need to pay me back. I don't spend my money on much anyway," Nate offered. "I get a family discount too, so I'll just pay for it myself."

"Thank you," Logan said gratefully, and the girl shrugged.

"I'll be in the back getting you some colder water. It's pretty warm out," Nate offered, her eyes lingering on the sun reddened skin of Logan's bare shoulders and nose. He nodded at her.

"Could you also bring us a map? We're not quite sure where we are," Logan informed. Nate gave him a bemused smirk.

"Um, you're on the highway, about twenty miles from Hartcaster Bridge," Nate informed.

"Hartcaster Bridge? You’re sure?" Logan pressed.

"Yeah, turn in about fifteen miles on Offshoot Road, and- you know what, I'll just get you that map. Excuse me," Nate decided, and she inched out of the counter space and made her way into the back room.

Logan turned to Remus, who laughed. "I miss them."

"I know," Logan stated. "Your family was everything to you, of course you miss them."

"I- I just want to see him. I won't talk to him, but… we don't know where Thomas is. I just want to see him before I disappear again for some unknown measure of time," Remus pleaded. Logan's face softened.

"Remus. I'm not going to keep you from seeing him," Logan said. "We… we haven't been 'just coworkers' in a long time. I want you to see him again. I want you to be happy."

"Really?" Remus sniffled.

Logan let out a short laugh. "Yes. You're like the little brother I never had. I'd move mountains for you."

"And now you can, Captain America! What luck," Remus proclaimed. Logan rolled his eyes.

"Well, that's the bullet hole treated. I couldn't tell if the bullet was still inside, but from the looks of it, the damned thing went straight through your leg," Logan huffed disapprovingly. Remus laughed out loud.

"Only you would be mad at a bullet!" Remus said.

"For doing more damage? Certainly. But enough of that, I need to properly tend to the wound in your side," Logan said, pulling more gauze squares from the first aid kit. Remus frowned as the haphazard fabric wrappings came away from the wound, fibers tugging at it and pulling away rather painfully. Logan tossed the bloody sleeves and Remus pulled off his shirt.

Logan could tell that Remus' mind was elsewhere. Perhaps focused on his husband, or maybe his younger son. Logan wouldn't be surprised. But as he began to wrap the arrangement of gauze and wind the bandages around the gnarly wound, his own mind wandered.

If it was true that they were only twenty miles from Hartcaster Bridge, then they were only sixty odd miles out from home. Walking would take too long, but Hartcaster Bridge was the entrance to Hartcaster Town. Logan was fit to walk another twenty miles. He'd already covered a shocking amount of terrain today.

Roman was going to be thrown to the wolves. Or worse, Virgil would kill him with his own two hands . "Darius, this isn't funny!"

Today, Virgil was back at the diner, so his work hours were a bit shorter than when he was working at the grocery store. If Virgil got home and Darius was gone , he'd freak out. Roman would probably be mincemeat if he didn't find the boy quickly.

He pulled out his phone and called Darius. That kid was in so much trouble , good lord. If Roman could ground him, he would, but he couldn’t even do that before and he doubted Virgil would appreciate him trying to coparent now. Still, Roman wasn’t just worried about Virgil’s reaction.

Darius answered his phone after the second ring with a, “What do you want?”

“Oh thank god ,” Roman let out a relieved sigh. Even if Virgil didn’t murder him for losing Darius, if anything had happened Roman wouldn’t have been able to live with himself. He was already beating himself up for leaving the kids at the park rather than taking them straight home. However, relief turned quickly to anger. “Where are you!? We lost Thomas yesterday , and you think sneaking out of the house is a brilliant idea!?”

“You’re not my dad,” Darius snapped.

“I’m not! But I have been a part of your life since you joined this family, and I’m terrified , Dee!” Roman snapped right back. He ran his free hand over his face. “Just- where are you? Are you safe?”

Darius was silent for a long moment. Then he said, “I’m with Remy and Emile. We’re at the train graveyard, you know. The abandoned junction.”

“You’re going to give me gray hair,” Roman groaned.

“I don’t have to be your problem. Dad said you were leaving ,” Darius grumbled. Roman bit his lip and glared at the wall. There used to be pictures of the family hung up. Virgil took down most of the ones with Remus in them, so now there was just pictures of the boys. Thomas and Darius were smiling in one, holding up Thomas’ talent show trophy from fifth grade.

“Your family became my problem when my brother married your father. Just because he decided to abandon his responsibility to you guys, doesn’t mean I have to do the same. I worry about you guys,” Roman insisted. He heard Darius growl at that. They had very, very different opinions about what Remus’ disappearance meant. Rather than start shouting, however, Darius sniffled. Roman straightened, alarmed. “Dee?”

“Could you-” Darius’ voice broke on the words. “Could you come get me? Please?”

“Is everything okay, Dee?” Roman asked, and he could feel threads of anxiety wrapping around his lungs.

“I just- I wanna go home ,” Darius wept. “I wanna go home, and I wanna see Papa, and Dad, and I want to hug Thomas, and I want us to be a family again, like we used to be. I want to go home .”

Roman took a deep, steadying breath. He’d been the strong one for Virgil for ten years. He could be strong for his son too. “I’m coming to get you, Dee. I’ll bring you home, okay? Everything’s going to be okay.”

Darius just sniffled.

“And Darius?” Roman hazarded. His nephew made a sound of acknowledgement. “I’m sorry about what I’ve said about Remus. I didn’t mean to… I didn’t mean to make it sound like I think he didn’t love you.”

“Whatever. I know he loves me. It’s- he’s gonna come home.”

Roman grimaced, but he didn’t argue. “I’m coming to get you. I’ll take your friends back to school, too-”

“Don’t bother. They’ve already missed most of the last class of the day,” Darius muttered. Roman sighed.

“You’re all in so much trouble,” Roman said, already heading to grab his jacket and car keys. He heard Darius fumble with his phone.

“I know.”

Chapter Text

Emile heard Darius at the other end of the train car talking to his uncle on the phone. Remy was investigating a different train car, just as equally rusted and overgrown and defaced as this one. He tried to catch Remy's attention, subtle and silent, but his friend was too wrapped up in looking for something.

Emile wasn't even sure what their goal was, here. It wasn't like they could just stumble across a hidden location, what did Remy expect them to find? They weren't spies , and the very idea that Remy had already gotten this far was- was bewildering on many levels, not to mention worrisome.

Emile slipped around the train car. They shouldn't be here. Darius' brother had just been kidnapped, probably by the people who took his dad, which meant Remy had a target on his back too. Besides, Emile would probably get moved to a new foster home if he got caught breaking any more rules. He was already a bit of a "problem child" by the system's rules.

Who knew how many people were after Remy and Darius? Especially with the both of them poking their noses into things they clearly didn't understand, like the top secret spy business that Remy's father was doing a poor job of hiding.

A hand grabbed Emile's shoulder, and he shrieked before he stumbled and fell to the ground, and a hand suddenly clamped over his mouth.

"Shh!" An all too familiar face hissed at him. Emile's eyes bugged.

"Emi?" Remy called. "Are you okay?"

"I'm not here," Kai whispered, a finger to his lips.

Emile nodded, then spoke up as he propped himself up on his elbows. "I'm fine! Just tripped, I didn't see the broken tracks!"

"Do you need any help?" Remy asked.

"No, I'm all good, keep looking!" Emile insisted. He didn't hear Remy protest or make his way over, so he returned his attention to Kai, lowering his voice to a hiss. "What are you doing here!?"

"I've been hiding out in a safehouse- why are you here, I thought you were on thin ice?" Kai demanded. Emile frowned.

"Well, who's fault is that, huh?" Emile muttered. Kai's face hardened.

"You didn't have to do it," Kai reminded.

"I'd have done anything to keep you safe. Besides, I'm fine , got off the hook years ago. They found me a new house still in town and everything," Emile pointed out. "I thought you ran away after that, though?"

"I did. Then I got snatched off the streets like a week later," Kai muttered. Emile felt his chest squeeze tight.

"It's not the same people who keep taking and killing those kids, is it?"

"It is. I'm staying here so I don't turn up dead like the others," Kai stated.

Emile felt a surge of his old protective tendencies. "And you're safe? You've got a roof over your head? People to help you out?"

"Of course I do," Kai huffed. "I can take care of myself, though, you know. I'm not the same kid I used to be."

"Yeah, but… I worry, you know?" Emile said, smiling. "You got any video games in your new hidey hole? I can't even begin to imagine what you did on the streets without your… your whats-its."

Kai snorted. "I've had to get creative. Not a lot of video games when you're hiding from an illegal lab hellbent on killing you to keep you quiet."

"Oh god, really? Kai, what happened ?" Emile asked. Kai opened his mouth, but then he shut it again and shook his head.

"You'd never believe it though- Elliot's with me too. You remember them?" Kai asked. Emile perked up a little.

"They're safe? Oh, that's good! I was so worried, I haven't heard from them in so long," Emile commented. Kai nodded.

"Their dad kicked them out on the curb when they came out to him, and things got worse before they got better, but we're both okay," Kai assured. Emile felt a weight he didn't realize was present be lifted from his shoulders. He hadn't realized he was so worried about the two younger kids, what with his worry for Remy and Darius. He reached out and hugged Kai tightly.

"Eww," Kai complained.

"I'm really glad you're okay," Emile said.

"Well, I… I'm glad too. What are you doing here, though? If you need to get away from your fosters, we'll make room. Anything for you, E."

"I'm fine, I'm fine," Emile reassured, pulling away from the hug. "I'm here looking for clues about my friends' families. They were kidnapped by spies or something."

"Spies. You guys are looking for Mordecai?" Kai asked. Emile's brow furrowed.

"Mordecai?" He questioned.

"Mordecai Hart. He owns this safehouse, he's been getting us to safety this whole time. I've been here for two years," Kai explained. Emile frowned.

"Can you ask Mordecai to keep an eye out for a kid named Thomas Sanders?" Emile asked. Kai raised an eyebrow and cocked his head.

"Kid you're worried about?" Kai asked.

"Well, yes. He's my friend's younger brother, he was kidnapped yesterday by the same people who took his dad years ago." Emile explained. He glanced over his shoulder to see if Remy or Darius were coming around the train car, then turned back to Kai, lowering his voice a bit more. "We followed clues that led us here, according to the evidence this safehouse belongs to a work friend of Remy's uncle."

"So you think Mordecai will know where this Thomas kid is," Kai surmised.

"I do," Emile confirmed.

"I'll ask," Kai offered. "But I don't make any promises as to whether or not it'll work out."

"Of course," Emile agreed.

"I gotta go. I'm not supposed to be anywhere that They can see me," Kai said. Emile suddenly felt the urge to grab Kai and never let go. It'd been so long since he'd had anyone he felt he could lean on, and Kai had always been a lot tougher than him.

"I'm gonna miss you," Emile said. Kai grinned.

"You can handle it. You're stronger than you think you are. You're Emile Picani," Kai proclaimed, as if he'd read his mind. Emile laughed.

"You go get safe, okay? I'll see if I can't convince Remy to go get lunch instead of hunting down the safehouse," Emile said. Kai nodded, and darted through the maze of abandoned train cars. Emile brushed off his clothes and rubbed at his face.

He turned the corner around the train car and spotted a car pulling up at the road, Roman Castillo sitting in the driver's seat.

Remy was pouting, but he looked resigned to leaving. Darius looked relieved to see his uncle. Emile wondered what he'd missed as Darius ran up and hugged his uncle around the waist.

Thomas looked up abruptly as the door to his tiny little cell slid open. He scrambled against the wall, keeping his eyes on Eliza as she stepped into the room, all bright green and plastic. Even her nails had been changed from red to an acidic green. Behind her came a man with round glasses and dark curls. Freckles spotted his face under big blue eyes, and he stared at Thomas like he recognized him.

“This is your new charge, Seraph,” Eliza snapped. “Once we’ve tracked down the escapee, we’ll be using the kid here as collateral. The boss is rather attached to the idea of using the Duke in the field.”

“This seems like an awful lot of trouble to go through for one guy,” The stranger, Seraph, said.

“Yes, well. He managed to break into a top secret government building as a homeless and untrained teenager, and only got caught because he got cocky. You can imagine why the boss would be excited about someone like that,” Eliza scowled. She glared at Thomas, who shrank into his shoulders. “Personally, I’d rather just kill the kid and give up on him. But what the boss says goes.”

Seraph nodded. Eliza handed him a keycard. “You are required to accompany him at all times. If he so much as breathes in a different room than you, you’re dead.”

Seraph looked like he wanted to protest, but he stayed silent. Eliza walked out of the room, and Seraph heaved a sigh, looking down at Thomas. Thomas stiffened. Seraph smiled gently.

“Hey, it’s okay kiddo. I’m not going to hurt you,” Seraph informed. Thomas pressed his lips together in a hard line.

“No one’s hurt me yet,” Thomas managed to say.

Seraph’s eyes went desperately sad. He sat down on the floor, crossing his legs. “My name’s Mordecai. I’m supposed to take care of you while you’re here. What’s your name?”

Thomas mulled his options, but he figured everyone else already knew who he was. “Thomas.”

“Thomas. That’s a wonderful name,” Mordecai said, a calm smile on his face. “It looks like we’ll be spending a lot of time together.”

“I guess so,” Thomas muttered. He eyed the keycard. "I'm allowed to leave this room?"

"Technically, I guess so," Mordecai hummed thoughtfully. "If I'm not allowed to leave you alone, then… maybe."

"What about the base?" Thomas asked. If he could get outside of the base, his chances of successfully escaping would get much, much higher.

"Probably not, kiddo. They took away my original keycard when I came in, so this one probably doesn't have exit permissions," Mordecai sighed. He glanced at the card reader on the door. His voice dropped to almost a whisper, his lips barely moving as he said, "But, there's probably a way I can change that. Maybe I can get you home."

Thomas raised his eyebrows. "You'd help me get out of here?"

Mordecai smiled gently and looked around before settling, satisfied by whatever he had seen. "Of course! I owe your family more than just some ice cream, after all."

"Ice cream?" Thomas asked.

"It's something I did for your father. Something that didn't even begin to pay him back for all I've taken from him," Mordecai explained. Thomas frowned, a vague recollection wiggling in his head like a very loose tooth.

"Ninja turtle popsicle," Thomas muttered. Mordecai nodded. Something bitter rose in Thomas' throat. The man in front of him had the answers to all the questions that had come up while he had spent last night with his absent father. The man in front of him held the key to Dad’s happiness, the secret to Darius’ frustration.

"You're… you're trying to pay back Papa," Thomas said. He was already starting to jump to conclusions, and he needed to keep a clear head. "For what?"

“Because if it weren’t for me, he wouldn’t have suffered. Don’t get me wrong, I would never betray him- the Duke and the Professor were some of my dearest companions. But if I had been better at my job, I could have saved them,” Mordecai explained.

“Why do people keep calling him that? That Eliza woman did the same,” Thomas huffed, annoyed. Mordecai smiled, almost sadly.

“Settle down, kiddo, I’ll tell you all about your dad, the Duke of Destruction.”

Virgil came home after work feeling an ache in his shoulders and a heaviness in his heart. Year after year, all that kept him going was being a stable support for his boys. Remus was gone, but Virgil still had people he needed to take care of. He couldn't let his grief carry him off the edge.

Now that Thomas was gone, Virgil felt that he barely had a grip on that edge. Still, he had to keep going. As it was, he was hardly a good parent to Darius. Now that they… were going through a hard time, he had to be better. He had to be as good as possible.

Virgil stood on the doorstep for several long minutes, taking deep breaths and steadying himself against the uncertainty that years ago would've plummeted him down a dark spiral. He didn't have time for panic.

Finally, he opened the door, pausing in the doorway as he spotted Roman and Darius beside one another. He raised an eyebrow. "What's going on?"

"Darius and I just had an important discussion," Roman explained. "I think we've reached an understanding, right?"

"Yeah, I guess," Darius mumbled. He looked up at Virgil, his eyes watery. “Dad… I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” Virgil asked. Darius shrugged.

“Being angry all the time. Yelling. Leaving Thomas alone after an argument,” Darius explained glumly. Virgil shot a wary glance at Roman, but the man made no indication that he’d convinced Darius to say all this.

“Dee, you don’t have to apologize. I completely understand the stress you've been under," Virgil said.

"Can you just- can you just accept the apology? Please? To make me feel better," Darius asked. "You keep excusing my shitty behavior, and it just makes me feel worse."

"I… sorry. I forgive you, honey," Virgil promised. He lowered his backpack onto the table beside the door and joined Roman and Darius on the couch, finally taking weight off of his feet. He let out a pleased sigh.

"Working hard?" Roman asked sympathetically.

"My boss is killing me." Virgil grimaced as he pulled off his shoes. His feet were aching something fierce .

"You really should find somewhere else to work. Somewhere you won't be on your feet all day," Roman advised. Virgil turned to meet his gaze, studying his earnest expression. He narrowed his eyes. Roman sighed. "I didn't mean to sound like I was accusing my brother of being a kidnapper."

"You didn't sound like it. You were accusing him of being a kidnapper," Virgil stated blankly. Roman winced.

"It's just that- Virgil, my brother was terrible growing up. He tortured wild animals, put insects in my bed, tormented the girls in my class that had crushes on me- when Mom and Dad kicked him out, my first thought wasn't 'oh no, they're homophobic' it was 'thank god'. And- and I feel horrible about it, don't get me wrong! Or I… I don't know how I currently feel about it, but I know I felt horrible at the time, and for many, many years after the fact," Roman explained, his face looking incredibly remorseful.

"He was a kid back then," Virgil protested.

"I know ," Roman insisted. "And when I found him again a few years later, I was so happy to have my brother back. And he'd changed so much, but… he had a lot of secrets."

"Remus never kept anything from me ," Virgil huffed. Roman looked doubtful, and Darius pulled out his phone, face blank.

"Maybe he didn't. Or maybe he lied to you," Roman said. Virgil stood up, walking away.

"You're being ridiculous ," Virgil snapped, going to the kitchen to go make some dinner.

"Just because he told you he'd never lie to you, doesn't mean he followed through! For god's sake, he said he left for milk and then never came back!" Roman shouted.

"Remus wasn't a liar, he was as honest as men come!" Virgil spat. He refused to believe that Remus' promises were nothing but meaningless words. Remus had promised him, very early on in their relationship, nothing but the truth.

"You don't know my brother like I do!" Roman argued, coming into the kitchen after him.

"You don't know him like I do, Roman! You talk about how much of a monster he must be, but he was there for me when no one else was! You could never understand how much he means to me!" Virgil burst out. In a moment, it was like he could no longer hold himself together. He steadied himself against the counter, tears sliding down his cheeks.

Roman sighed, wrapping his arms around Virgil's shoulders. Virgil stiffened under his touch. He looked up at Roman questioningly. The man shrugged. "You shouldn't have to cry about him anymore. Ten years is long enough to let yourself move on."

Virgil's heart unclenched and his lungs expanded, as he sucked in a deep breath. He gazed up into Roman's eyes, surprised. They were filled with such love, Virgil wanted to scream at the pain that knotted his throat. He opened his mouth to say something, anything to get Roman to stop looking at him that way, but no words would come. He closed his mouth.

Roman's hand brushed some of Virgil's silky black bangs behind his ear, and then he was leaning low, into Virgil's face. Virgil didn't even have time to think before Roman's lips touched his. His brain was screaming, his heart beating so fast, he could barely even process what was happening.

After what felt like ages of his thoughts running over one another, Virgil pushed Roman away. "I- Remus-"

Roman smiled bitterly. "I know. That was a goodbye."

"Goodbye!?" Virgil demanded, his voice strained.

"I'll respect your wishes not to see me again. And I'll respect your decision regarding any further relationship between us. So, this was a goodbye. I'll find a place to go by the weekend," Roman explained. Virgil stared at him in shock, his lips buzzing. He swallowed and grabbed Roman's collar.

"Then- then have a proper one," Virgil whispered. Roman's eyes widened. Virgil didn't want to know what Darius was thinking. Virgil didn't think he himself even understood what he was doing. His entire head was screaming at him to take it back, to turn around and pretend he'd never even said a thing.

Roman cupped his face in both hands. Virgil braced his hands against Roman's chest. They leaned in for another, proper kiss.

In that moment the door slammed open, Darius shrieked, and Roman yelled as someone tackled him to the ground away from Virgil.

"You husband-stealing son of a bitch!"

" Remus!? "

Chapter Text

Remus hadn't planned to go in at all. He and Logan were trying to watch through the windows, hidden mostly behind Virgil's car (he kept Remus' old junker, that had to mean something) when Virgil made his way into the kitchen. After only a second, Roman was there too, and Remus felt his heart wrench.

Then, suddenly, his brother was kissing his husband , and Remus felt rage flood his veins. He burst out from behind the car, stormed to the front door. He startled his own son, but he didn't have time to think about that. Not when his goddamn brother didn't know how to keep his fucking hands to himself!

Tackling him had been a poor decision, however, as Roman had immediately driven his knee directly into Remus's gut, hitting his stomach wound just right. Remus cried out, and Logan hoisted him off his brother.

"Get off of me! I'm going to smash in his skull!" Remus shouted.

"You are not , the man is your brother !" Logan snapped.

Then, belatedly, Virgil's shocked greeting registered on his head. He turned to the love of his life and sucked on a breath. Virgil was, somehow, so much more beautiful than Remus had remembered. The photographs had done him no justice, either.

"Vivi," Remus let out a breathy laugh. Virgil just stared at him, eyes wide, cheeks pale. Remus scrambled out of the Professor's arms and stumbled to his feet. "Virgil, oh my god, I'm so sorry."

"You're… you're hurt - Remus, oh my god , what happened, why are you- who the fuck are you!?" Virgil demanded. God, Remus missed his real voice.

"My name is Logan, I did attend your wedding, I believe we met then?" Logan explained.

"What? Wait, you died ! What the fuck is going on!?" Virgil demanded, as he bent to help Roman to his feet.

"Hey, hey, no!" Remus surged forward, shoving Roman away from Virgil. "You stay the fuck away from my husband, got it?"

"Not your husband for much longer," Roman spat. Remus growled at him, baring his teeth.

"Boys, really, don't be juvenile," Logan huffed. He turned to Virgil. "Apologies for barging in, you should draw your kitchen curtains more often."

Virgil's incredibly pale face turned bright red. He leaned over the kitchen sink and closed the curtains.

"You were spying ?" Roman demanded. "How often have you been doing that the past ten years?"

"Not at all, surprisingly. You know, shit happens when you're trapped in a secret bunker, but it's not usually stuff that makes it easy to keep an eye on the brother you're trusting to watch your family and not make a move on them," Remus stated bluntly.

"How did you get out?"

Remus whirled around, spotting Dee standing in the kitchen doorway, looking up at him in watery-eyed wonder. Remus couldn't help the large grin that spread across his face at the sight of his boy .

"Oh god, Little Dee…" Remus said. Immediately Dee jerked forward, wrapping his arms around him, careful around the bandages on his waist.

"I knew you'd come home," Dee said. "I knew it would happen. Thomas would- Thomas would be so happy to meet you, I just-"

Remus felt shame bubble up in his throat as he realized just how much longer he might have stayed away, had he not caved in and come to see Virgil before looking for Thomas. Logan really had saved his ass, breaking out the way he did, too.

"I fucking love you, kid," Remus declared, tugging his eldest son close. "And don't you think for a second I wouldn't have beat the odds for you. Not a day went by that I didn't think of you, and your brother, and my sweet, sassy Virgil-"

"Where the hell were you?" Virgil demanded. Remus turned back around, spotting the rage on his husband's face. Virgil stalked forward. Logan inched out of the kitchen, clearly not enjoying being in the middle of a family dispute. Traitor. Evidently, Remus was quiet for too long, because Virgil folded his arms and asked, "Remus, where were you ?"

"I don't know if you want to know," Remus muttered evasively.

"Oh, fuck you!" Roman snapped.

"Roman!" Virgil hissed. He glared at Remus. "Where have you been?"

Virgil was short, smaller than Remus and smaller than Roman, and almost smaller than Dee. Somehow, it was still terrifying to look into his green and brown eyes.

"I was at work, but I got caught," Remus said. Virgil scoffed.

"You told me you worked for a rich woman as a house cleaner !" Virgil shouted.

"I technically didn't! You just… assumed. Due to some helpful clues," Remus squeaked weakly. Virgil's expression was thunderous.

"What else have you let me 'assume'? And who is Logan - his family thinks he's dead right now!" Virgil shouted.

"I didn't think you even knew the Croft family!" Remus exclaimed.

"I tracked them down when I was looking for you! What else were you lying to me about, Remus!?" Virgil hollered, and with his cheeks red like this, Remus could spot the tracks of the tears shed before his arrival.

Remus reached out to touch his husband, to hold the love of his life, but Virgil smacked his hand away. Remus laughed desperately. "I've regretted every lie I've ever told you, bedbug. But I tried so hard to be completely honest with you. You can ask me anything, I swear, and I'll tell you."

Virgil searched his face. Finally he asked, "Did you have anything to do with- did you take Thomas?"

"I didn't take him away from you. I would never, ever tear our family apart on purpose. But… they took him because they wanted to control me," Remus explained. Virgil sucked in a sharp breath.

"Who are they? Do I want to know?" Virgil asked. Roman scowled.

"You're believing him? This is ridiculous!" Roman protested.

"Roman-"

"Remus has always been secretive, and now he's just mounting up excuses as to why," Roman argued.

"I thought you didn't mean to make him out to be a kidnapper," Virgil snapped.

"You made me out to be a kidnapper !?" Remus demanded. "I'm your brother !"

"You're making me out to be a homewrecker!" Roman scoffed.

"You kissed my husband!"

"Only the first time, he kissed me the second time!" Roman defended. Remus stumbled back, wide eyed. He turned to Virgil.

"You- Vi, you didn't, did you?" Remus asked. He hated how small he felt suddenly, how fragile he felt. Virgil wouldn't meet his gaze.

"I don't know , it just happened -"

"How does making out with the brother of your husband 'just happen'!?" Remus demanded.

"He's been a better 'husband' these past ten years than my actual goddamn husband , and I can't even love him!" Virgil snapped. Roman's eyes went wide at the same time that Remus felt his heart shatter.

"You can't?" Roman asked.

"I… I wanted to try, Roman," Virgil said. "I wanted to try for you, but I just can't."

"Dad, it's okay," Dee spoke up. Remus jumped, having forgotten his son was right behind him. "Your heart wanted Papa. Because deep down you knew he would've been there if he could."

"I would!" Remus said desperately. "Prince Purple, if I could've, I would've, you gotta know. Please believe me."

Something clicked in Virgil's eyes. He opened his mouth to speak, but a phone rang. He blinked. "Uh, one moment."

Virgil turned away from the lot of them, pulled his phone from his pocket, and answered the call. "Andy, hi."

"I've been crying a little, yeah. Don't worry about me."

"That's great, do you want me to come pick you up?"

"It's no trouble, really."

"It was a long flight, and last minute too, I wouldn't feel right making you take the bus."

"Okay I'm on my way." Virgil hung up and turned around. "That was Andy. He's going to be staying here to take care of Darius."

"Why?" Remus asked.

"Because I don't trust the fucking police to find Thomas when they couldn't even find you!" Virgil huffed. He pointed at Roman. "You're still moving out at the end of the week, this changes nothing."

Virgil turned to Remus then, and his eyes showed reluctance as he spoke. " You have until the end of the month to talk to my lawyers- if I were you, I'd let sleeping dogs lie. We clearly weren't meant to be."

"Virgey-"

"And Logan, I'm sorry to drag you into a family argument. You should go home and spend some time with your family," Virgil said. Logan smiled stiffly, a bit uncomfortable.

"In our time together, Remus has become like a brother to me. I wanted to support him while he came to see you," Logan explained. Virgil sighed, his shoulders slumping a bit. He smiled warmly and shook hands with Logan.

"I'm glad to know he'll have a shoulder to lean on," Virgil said. He looked at Remus briefly, then focused his attention back on Logan. "I think he'll really need it."

"And what about you?" Logan asked.

"I've got my boys," Virgil said. Remus almost crumbled right then, but he had to keep his pride while Virgil left the house. He turned to Logan.

"Logie… how do I…?" Remus waved his arms vaguely, lost for words.

"I don't know," Logan sighed.

Remus turned to Roman and glared. "How long were you just waiting for me to screw up then? I thought you got over Virgil!"

"Oh please, you flaked out of half your dates with him, and you thought I didn't hope he'd change his mind?" Roman demanded. Remus snarled.

"I would hope you would've moved on when I made you my best man !" Remus yelled.

"I tried! God knows I tried!" Roman said desperately.

"You clearly didn't try hard enough!"

"I didn't even do anything with him!"

Remus snarled, lunging at his brother, but Logan pulled him back, and Dee ran in front of him.

"Papa!" Dee interrupted. He held out his hands. "Just- just think about what you're doing! He's your brother! If- if you care about him the way I care about Thomas, then you'll regret hurting him."

Remus' heart, if possible, broke all over again. He laughed miserably. "You're so smart, Dee. Who raised you that way, huh?"

Dee's eyebrows lifted, as if he were surprised. "Dad and… Uncle Roman, I guess."

Remus glared at his brother. Roman just smirked at him. Logan sighed. "You're both being ridiculous. Virgil is not something to be fought and debated over- he is a living breathing man who has decided he wants neither of you in his life."

"I'm not fighting over him," Remus grumbled. "I'm calling my brother a traitor."

"A traitor !?" Roman let out a disbelieving laugh couched in a scoff. Remus growled at him.

"Did you or did you not try to steal my family the moment I was gone?" Remus demanded.

"I did no such thing! Virgil came to me! He needed financial help, he needed a shoulder to cry on, and he needed someone to help his younger brother watch your sons while he was out!" Roman argued.

"Uncle Roman!" Dee protested, but neither of them paid him any mind.

"And you used that to your advantage, no doubt," Remus sneered. "'Oh, Virgil needs me, time to live out my ages old domestic fantasies with the man who married my brother '! No, nothing wrong with that at all!"

"That's not what happened!" Roman insisted.

"Isn't it? You've always been jealous, admit it! Virgil loves me !" Remus screeched, scrambling at Logan to try and make the man let him go. Unfortunately his grip was much stronger now, after the serum.

"Loves you enough to leave you?" Roman spat.

Remus froze. The whole room froze. Roman's own face paled. Remus snarled at him like a wild animal, jerking himself out of Logan's grip at last, and he stalked forward, stepping around his son. He stood nose to nose with his brother, glaring at him.

"Get out of my house," Remus growled.

Roman's eyes narrowed and he pushed his brother away from him and folded his arms, straightening his back.

"Actually, I've been paying half of the bills for the past ten years. So I believe this is my house," Roman contradicted. "Get out, or I will call the authorities."

Remus let out an incredulous scoff, but Logan grabbed his elbow. Remus looked back at him, surprised.

"Remus. If we want the element of surprise against Myriad, we can't get involved with the police force right now," Logan reminded carefully.

Remus turned his gaze to his son, who was very pointedly not looking at any of them, his gaze rooted to the floor. Suddenly he felt incredibly out of place here, in the very same kitchen he'd once eaten mac and cheese with his family in before the mission that tore them apart. He huffed and shifted on his feet.

"Fine. I'll go," he stated, and he briskly turned and began to stride out of the house. Logan followed him. He didn't stop until he was on the crosswalk, staring at the blank spot in the driveway where his car was only hours before. The one he left in front of Logan's lab. The one with the almond milk in the trunk. He wondered what Virgil did with the almond milk. It had to have gone bad before Virgil found the car.

"Remus, are you alright?" Logan asked. Remus' shoulders shook, whether from laughter or sobs even Remus couldn't tell. Logan sighed. "It's more than alright if you aren't."

Remus let out a loud laugh, wiping tears off his cheeks. "Hey, Logie? I need a place to crash."

"I have a place," Logan promised.

Remus dropped to his knees, weeping. He felt Logan's hands on his shoulders, felt Logan wrap an arm around him and help him walk down the sidewalk.

Virgil's voice sounded in his ear. Hey, you know I'll never leave you.

He couldn't help but laugh at the idea. Of course this Virgil couldn't leave. This Virgil was all in his head.

"Papa!"

Remus took a deep, rattling breath and whirled around, spotting Dee running towards him across the front yard. For a moment, Remus could see his baby Dee running towards him at the park, but his vision cleared and he realized that Dee was much older now. Darius stopped in front of him, eyes wide.

"I'm- I'm coming with you. You're gonna get Thomas back, right? I'm coming too," Darius proclaimed.

"Whoa- no way. It's too dangerous," Remus stated.

"You were homeless at my age," Darius challenged.

"Yeah, because my parents were assholes! Does your papa look like an asshole?" Remus asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Honestly? Yes. And besides, I wasn't asking for permission. I'm doing it whether you want me to or not," Darius challenged. Remus' lips twitched. Logan sighed.

"Don't say it, Remus," Logan said.

"Is this what pride feels like?" Remus blurted anyway, causing Logan to groan. Darius grinned and fell into step with them as they continued on their way.

Remus couldn't help but feel touched as his son walked beside him. He couldn't help but feel hopeful for the future. Maybe Virgil would give him another chance, too. If only he could turn back and do everything all over again. He never would've left.

"We really shouldn't be condoning behavior like this from your son," Logan stated, and both Remus and Darius groaned at once. Afterwards they grinned at each other, and it was Logan's turn to groan. "Great. Now there's two of you."

Chapter Text

Mordecai was fiddling with the computer in the lab room, Thomas seated in the chair in front of him. He wasn't sure if he was really allowed in this room, but the only lock on the door was easily picked, and there hadn't been a card reader. There was likely only one key, but Mordecai was an expert lockpick.

"So, you're going to rig this to get a message out to my dad?" Thomas asked. Mordecai smiled.

"Of course, kiddo, don't even worry about it. I can swing this, it'll be totally undetectable!" Mordecai assured. Thomas took a deep breath and nodded.

"What kind of message are we sending?" Thomas asked.

"Coordinates only. We don't want to send anything suspicious, and if I disguise it like I'm calling for more security at the base, it'll go totally under the radar," Mordecai informed. Thomas just nodded again. Mordecai wondered if he was following it at all, but he shook the thought out of his head. It wasn't an overly complicated explanation, and Thomas was a bright boy.

"Can… can you send something to my other dad? The one who was around, I mean," Thomas asked. Mordecai raised an eyebrow.

"Your other dad?" Even after Remus was captured and Patton had proved himself, Christopher never told him who the other father was or where he was. He'd been informed years ago that they were in communication, but Christopher never gave him a name or any way to contact him. Mordecai didn't have a direct line to the man, but… he could send something to Christopher. "I'll try, but I can't promise that he'll get the message."

"Thank you," Thomas said, a small smile on his face. He looked incredibly relieved, and Mordecai's heart was about to burst.

He was going to protect Thomas with all he had. And maybe then- maybe then he would have made up for the sin of failing the Professor and the Duke all those years ago.

"Dad's email?" Mordecai asked. Thomas supplied it with only a slight hesitance as he attempted to remember the right address.

"Where are we, anyway?" Thomas asked, watching Mordecai's fingers fly across the keyboard as he protected the email he was sending to Virgil Sanders-Castillo.

"We're in Base P36," Mordecai informed.

"I know that . I overheard the dragon lady saying so," Thomas huffed. He waved his hands vaguely. "I mean where is the base?"

"Ah. We're about two hundred miles west of your hometown," Mordecai explained. Thomas nodded slowly.

"Do you think my dad- the Duke or whatever. Do you really think he survived?" Thomas asked.

"He had to have," Mordecai promised. He smiled to cover up the thought that the only reason Thomas was still alive was his father's survival.

Thomas sighed. "Everything you've told me. He's really amazing, isn't he?"

"Of course he is. And not just because he does daring tricks or saves lives, you know," Mordecai promised, ruffling Thomas' hair.

"What makes him so amazing if it's not that?" Thomas asked, snorting.

"He's amazing because he's your dad," Mordecai said. Thomas looked at him curious. "I can guarantee that he's coming for you, whether I help him or not, kiddo. He's going to use the fact that he's your dad, and he's not going to stop trying."

"How do you know?" Thomas asked. Mordecai grinned.

"Because Remus has never once stopped thinking about his family."

Darius sat on one of the dusty metal folding chairs, watching his Papa take his frustrations out on the old leather punching bag to one side of the room. The other man, Logan Croft, was messing with his computer, studying maps and programs. Darius leaned a bit closer to him.

"So, you've known Papa for a long time?" Darius asked, voice low. Logan looked up.

"Oh. Yes, we've been close work associates since he was eighteen, only a bit older than you," Logan explained. Darius widened his eyes.

"That was before he fell for Dad," Darius commented.

"Yes, well," Logan shrugged, near elegant in his movements. Darius glanced at the bloodstain at his shoulder, seeing no sign of a wound.

"So he really was a spy the whole time?" Darius asked.

"A secret agent, yes," Logan responded. He glanced at Darius. "What did you think?"

"I just can't imagine Papa being any good at keeping secrets," Darius confessed. "Not from Dad, anyway."

"Well, it is something rather unexpected. It probably wouldn't have been a first guess if anyone started to wonder if Remus was hiding anything," Logan said, his tone overly fond. Darius furrowed his brow. Before he could figure out how to continue the conversation, the computer pinged.

"What's that?" Darius asked. Logan raised his eyebrows.

"We received a message," Logan said, and the pounding and smacking of skin on leather stopped. Silence fell in the warehouse. Darius glanced at his father, who was standing with his back to them, fists still raised and body still dancing on the balls of his feet.

Darius glanced rapidly between the two adults as silence reigned. Another smacking thud sounded as Papa hit the bag again. “Well? What does it fucking say, Logan?”

“Don’t take your anger out on me , Castillo,” Logan warned frostily. After a moment, he calmly said, "It’s a set of coordinates.”

“A trap?” Remus demanded.

“Possibly. It’s signed Angel,” Logan informed. Papa crossed the room quickly and suddenly. Darius surged back a bit, surprised.

“That little fucker’s alive ?” Remus demanded.

"Who's Angel?" Darius asked.

"Patton Moras," Papa spat. Darius raised his eyebrows, but he kept silent as the two agents discussed. "How'd he survive!? Antonio said Myriad stormed HQ!"

"I don't have the answer to that question. I thought just as surely as you did that he was indisposed," Logan argued.

As the two argued, Darius pulled out his phone and snapped a photograph of Logan Croft, typing a message out to Remy.

Looking for someone?

It took barely a moment before he reserved a dozen exclamation points in response. Darius snorted.

At his lab. If you're not in trouble with dear old dad, make your way over.

Darius tucked his phone back into his pocket, ignoring it as he turned his attention back to his father's argument.

"So what, he's a traitor!?" Papa demanded.

"Perhaps," Logan said icily. "Perhaps not. We were prisoners, after all, maybe he is too."

"A prisoner who smuggled out coordinates to us? Where do they even lead ?" Papa spat.

"Probably to Thomas," Darius piped up.

"What?" Papa asked.

"You said his name was Patton? Remy's dad has been in contact with a Patton, I don't imagine that's a common name. Apparently he's doing some top secret stuff, figuring out what's going on with Myriad. Maybe he found Thomas," Darius surmised. Logan nodded.

"That is a good point," the agent agreed. "Your son is much smarter than you."

"Well, he's also the love of my life's son," Papa responded with a proud smirk, before the events of that day returned to sink the corners of his mouth.

"You should call Dad's lawyers," Darius said.

"Why should I? V'll just fight me on it, and we'll end up divorced anyway. It'll just hurt more and take longer," Papa scoffed, watching Logan input the coordinates into his map.

"Because a love like the one you and Dad had- have is worth fighting for," Darius insisted. "And you don't know that it'll end in divorce."

"I know that Virgil is ready to move on. And I need to let him and move on myself," Papa declared.

Darius slapped his hand on the table. "You guys were happy together. You were miserable apart, and happy together, so why do you want to stay apart , I don't understand you!"

"I don't know, ask your dad! Because I've only ever wanted what he wants!" Papa cried.

"And Dad only ever wanted what you wanted!" Darius exclaimed. Papa gave him a doubtful look and Darius felt like bursting into tears. "When I was six, you disappeared."

"Dee, I'm sorr-"

"No, I know you didn't mean to. But you're going to listen to me tell this story, because you need to hear it," Darius snapped. Papa shut his mouth, staring at him rather perturbed.

Logan very pointedly moved a few more feet away, trying to give them some semblance of privacy.

"When I was six, you disappeared. That night, Dad tried to act like everything was fine. We had dinner, he hid the fourth place setting like he'd never set it up in the first place, and afterwards we watched part of a movie. Dad brushed Thomas' teeth, he watched me like a hawk while I brushed mine. I remember… vividly, I remember Dad let me have the mint toothpaste he never buys anymore. I called it Papa's toothpaste and he let me use it," Darius described. He could almost taste the mint on his tongue. He took a deep breath.

"Then he sent us to bed. It took him forever, Thomas didn't want to sleep without seeing you, and neither did I but I pretended that I didn't care as much as Thomas did. I cared so much though, partly because you always did the voices perfectly when you read me bedtime stories. The other part was, I was kind of scared. Because Dad seemed scared. So after he put me to bed I snuck towards the living room. Hid around the door and listened as he called Uncle Roman."

"He asked, Have you heard from Remus? He was nervous. Scared. He knew something was wrong, just like I did, just like Thomas did. I'm terrified , he said that. Then," Darius took another steadying breath. "Then he asked Uncle Roman what if he just left me? Those were his exact words. What if he just left me."

"And what could Dad even do? He loved you so much he couldn't be mad at you. Think about it from his perspective for a minute. You left, sure, but he loved you too much to blame you. He blamed himself. Years and years he told himself he hadn't been enough. Just- just yesterday, he told me he loves you with everything he is."

Papa looked at him with watery eyes. Darius swallowed thickly. "That was probably a lot to dump on you."

"I need to hear it. God, I… I love him so much. I never stopped, the thought of coming home to him, coming home to you and Thomas, it kept me surviving," Papa said. Darius sucked in a breath.

"I missed you."

"I'm sorry ."

It was a long while after Roman dropped him off at his apartment that Dad finally addressed him directly.

"Alright, that's it, what's the deal with you? You've skipped school multiple times and the week isn't even over yet," Dad huffed, folding his arms. "Why are you giving me the silent treatment when you're the one in trouble, Remy?"

"You didn't tell me you were a spy," Remy said, making his words clear and to the point. "I don't appreciate that at all."

"Me? A spy? Don't be ridiculous. I can barely work my way around the burglar alarm system," Dad responded, easily and casually. Too casually.

"Are you cover story -ing me?" Remy scoffed, gobsmacked. His dad clenched his jaw.

"I don't know where you got the idea that I was ever a spy, or whatever, but it's not funny. Bad things are happening to kids wandering the street, you should take greater care not to be so reckless," Dad reminded, his tone icy cold.

"I got into your email," Remy said. "Decoded the typos in your messages from Patton. I remember him, blonde, blue eyes, big gold glasses?"

"You really shouldn't look through another person's emails," Dad said.

"I found Uncle Logan's lab . Darius opened his computer . I know for sure, Dad," Remy insisted. "Why didn't you tell me ?"

Dad sighed, shifting a hand through his hair and pulling off his sunglasses. "It has nothing to do with you, Remy. It ended before you were old enough for it to matter."

"Except that Uncle Logan is alive and you told me he was dead!" Remy snapped. Dad blinked at him. He leaned over the table.

"Who told you he was alive?" Dad asked.

"He did," Remy said. "He sent a message to himself- he said he had no choice but to hope someone would be able to open his computer."

"Then the stupid idiot should've keyed me into his system," Dad scowled, getting to his feet. He strode quickly across the room and grabbed his jacket from the coat rack.

"What are you doing?" Remy asked.

"Well come on , Remy, show me the damn video! This is my baby brother you're telling me survived!" Dad snapped. Remy stumbled to his feet.

"I- I wasn't done, Darius sent me a message-"

"On the move, Rem, tell me on the move! Chop chop, I have a brother to smack," Dad said, grabbing his keys and practically flying out the door. Remy crammed his shoes back on his feet, hurrying after his dad.

He barely managed to close the door on his way out, hurrying to follow the whirlwind of his father. That was one way to facilitate a family reunion, Remy supposed.

Chapter Text

Andy was fourteen years younger than his brother, but that didn't mean he didn't give his brother's boyfriend a shovel talk when they met. It must have been quite a sight, a fifteen year old kid threatening a twenty nine year old man. Andy especially had been scrawny, short, and pale as paper at fifteen.

"If you ever hurt my brother, I will make you regret it," Andy had snarled at Remus Castillo, who had raised his hands in defense.

"I won't! If I ever do, you have my permission to shish kebab me," Remus swore.

And Andy had wanted to, almost seven years later. In seven years , Andy would've thought the hurting would come sooner, but no. Seven years after Remus Castillo started dating his older brother, that was when Remus left . They'd been married for four years, and that was when Remus had up and vanished.

Andy couldn't believe it when Virgil called. Andy couldn't believe it even when faced with the house, then emptied of any obvious signs of Remus. Andy couldn't believe it when Roman and Virgil explained the series of events to him. Andy couldn't believe it when he and Roman were taking care of Darius and Thomas by themselves.

He wanted to strangle the man who did this to his brother. The man who wove himself so tightly into their lives, so closely to their hearts, only to rip his strings out of the tapestry, leaving gaping holes behind.

The worst part was how obviously Virgil still loved him. He sat up late at night looking out the window, waiting for any sign of him. He waited by the phone. He ran to the door for every knock and bell ring. He spent weeks driving around to the neighboring cities and looking for that rat .

He didn't really want to leave- Virgil would be alone here if he did, alone save for Roman , who Andy didn't trust not to hurt his brother. But he had things to do in Barcelona, and eventually he had to leave.

Still, he called his brother often, and it pained him to hear how often he would beat himself up over Remus. As soon as the problem became Thomas though, Andy was buying the soonest plane ticket and rushing over.

"Andy, hi."

"Hey, Virge. You sound rough, were you crying?" Andy was freshly off the plane and standing at a vending machine, tucking bills into the cash feeder.

"I've been crying a little, yeah. Don't worry about me."

"You know I'm gonna worry, but fine. My plane just landed, I'm in town now," Andy explained. He watched his Skittles fall from the top row down into the dispenser.

"That's great, do you want me to come pick you up?"

"You don't have to, there's a bus that leads into town," Andy said, snatching his Skittles out of the machine and shouldering his bag once again, heading towards the pickup area. The next bus would come by in a half hour. 

"It's no trouble, really."

"You really can just stay with Darius. I know things have been hard on him. I'm fine," Andy insisted. He tore open the bag and fished out two purple skittles, shoving each one into a different cheek.

"It was a long flight, and last minute too, I wouldn't feel right making you take the bus."

"Alright, fine. Only because you sound like you need to get out for a bit," Andy relented, and he sat down on one of the benches near the pickup area, distant from the bus stop.

"Okay I'm on my way."

"Love you," Andy said as his brother ended the call. He settled down to wait, but his brother arrived before the bus did, and Andy climbed into the passenger side seat.

"Still driving his old clunker, huh?" Andy commented bitterly as he studied the metal around him.

"Remus showed up today," Virgil blurted, and Andy choked on his spit as he sucked in a surprised gasp.

"Excuse me!?" He demanded.

Virgil shook his head, and Andy could see that his brother was shaking. "He said he was caught while at work- I don't- what does that mean ?"

"Wasn't he a house cleaner?" Andy asked, bewildered.

"No. He lied to me, and I don't know how much, but he- he came back, Andy," Virgil laughed, the sound wet and desperate. "He said not a day passed that he didn't think of me. He said he'd never tear our family apart willingly. I feel like it was all some terrible dream, and I'll wake up and I still won't know what happened."

"I call bullshit," Andy scowled. "Never tear your family apart my ass ."

Virgil chuckled. "I know, right?"

"Did you kick him out onto the street?" Andy asked, and Virgil's smile dropped and he pulled his upper lip between his teeth thoughtfully.

"No," Virgil whispered. "I left to come get you before he even left. I just couldn't be there anymore."

"He shouldn't be there either," Andy huffed. "But, I guess if he's still there when we get back, I can demand a decade's worth of reparations."

"Don't get your hopes up. He and Roman didn't seem to be dealing with each other very well," Virgil mumbled. Andy wrinkled his nose.

"I bet they didn't. Roman's been pushing himself onto you nearly this whole time," Andy huffed. Virgil clicked his tongue disapprovingly, though of what in particular Andy wasn't sure.

"I just don't know how I'm supposed to feel ," Virgil said, his fingers bouncing against the steering wheel as he turned into the freeway entrance.

"There can't possibly be only one way. If I were in this situation, I'd probably have divorced him ages ago," Andy pointed out. His brother cringed, and Andy blinked. "You are still gonna leave him, aren't you?"

"I don't know. Maybe. I told him I was still gonna do it, and he has until the end of the month to talk to my lawyers," Virgil said.

"But?" Andy prompted.

"I love him so much," Virgil blurted, as if saying the words any slower would cause them to stick, as if the words were a ticking bomb. "I just want everything to be like it was, me, Remus, and our boys."

"But he abandoned you," Andy reminded. "He left to go buy groceries, as if that wasn't the stereotypical absent father's excuse for running out on their families!"

"He did buy milk, though. It was in the trunk when I found the car," Virgil mumbled.

"Disgusting," Andy grimaced. "But that isn't the point! You told me you want to move on."

"I know ," Virgil said, perching his elbow on the car windowsill and pressing his thumb into his temple. "I know what I said, Andy."

"He didn't even tell you where he's been this whole time- did he?" Andy asked. Virgil opened his mouth, then closed it and shook his head. Andy scoffed. "Then no way! Stick to your guns, Virge, get him out of your life!"

"But I don't want to be without him," Virgil said, and Andy could see him realizing the truth of the words. "I've been without him for ten years, not knowing what I did wrong, or if I did something wrong, and he came back to me! And he still wants to try again!"

"You didn't do anything wrong! He's the one who disappeared and broke your heart! And if he wants to try again, he can, just- let him go, so you can try to find happiness however you want it. If you go through with the divorce, there's nothing stopping you from going back to him- unless you suddenly regrow your common sense," Andy huffed. Virgil pursed his lips as he drove off the freeway at his exit.

"What if we want to get married again?" Virgil asked. "It'd be so expensive. I could use the money for better things."

"You'd seriously want to marry him again ?" Andy demanded. Virgil turned to look at him now that they were stopped at a red light.

"Andy, I love Remus in a way that I never thought I could love someone. I still did when he was gone, for every minute that I missed him I loved him more . I don't know where he was, and I don't know what he was doing, but he came back . And he told me he wished he could have been here for me the whole time," Virgil described, and Andy felt a knot in his throat watching the troubled relief on his brother's face. He turned back to the road as the light turned green, and began to drive them home. "If he's bad for the boys or something, then sure, I'll throw him out faster than he can blink- but I love him ."

"How can you trust him?" Andy asked quietly.

"I just want to," Virgil whispered. "I want to trust him, so I do. Love does that to you."

"Love makes fools of us all," Andy quoted.

"Where's that from?" Virgil asked.

"At this point? Everywhere,"Andy snorted. "I hope you know what you're doing."

Virgil hummed. "Me too."

Way back in the day, Logan and his older brother had been as thick as thieves. Christopher and he were near inseparable. Those days were long past, faded memories that Christopher couldn't even properly reflect on in the years since his brother's death.

While they had once been close, things started to change when their father started to pit them against one another. There was a reason Christopher never told his son what he did, and that reason was Adam Croft, his own father. At sixteen and seventeen, Christopher and Logan were practically at each other's throats, both of them eager to best the other in the family business and earn their father's favor. Christopher made fast friends with other field agent trainees, an expert at teamwork, but Logan had more difficulty. However, in near everything else Logan surpassed his older brother.

Christopher, or Chris to most of his fellow trainees, and the Critic to field agents, remembered vividly the day his father first asked him why he couldn't live up to his younger brother's standard. He'd been righteously outraged.When Christopher was twenty, he watched as his brother became the best agent working under Director Dieter. He'd been so angry. Putting in perspective those years that he and his brother spent angry at one another, Christopher had understood why Logan hadn't keyed his signature into his computer.

When Remy was born, things turned different again. Christopher remembered the first time Logan met his nephew.

Christopher had woken up and discovered a small pale baby had been dropped off on his fire escape in a damp cardboard box. Christopher had been doubtful that the bit was his at first. He was pale, and Christopher was an even brown. But after reading and rereading the note, Christopher looked back at the baby in his grasp and found that he looked… a lot like him, otherwise. He'd come out with ginger curls, and he was so pale Christopher was frightened he'd burn if he turned on the lamp, but his eyes? His nose, his lips? Christopher recognized all of those features from his own family.

Adam Croft would have been outraged to learn of this illegitimate child. So Christopher called his brother, the only person he could trust not to let the baby's existence slip. Logan had come when called, because despite all their mutual ranchor, there wasn't much they wouldn't do for one another.

Logan's face when he looked upon his nephew was one Christopher could never forget. He had never before seen his brother so warm, so open. Logan's stiff face had melted into a warm smile as he cradled his nephew close, letting the boy's pale fingers grip his own darker finger in a vice grip.

"What's his name?" Logan asked.

"The letter doesn't say," Christopher said. Logan's smile faltered.

"Does he have no papers?" Logan asked.

"Given who his mother probably is, I'm not surprised," Christopher huffed. Logan stiffened then, his smile dropping entirely. He didn't snatch his finger away from the boy, but he did look up at Christopher, staring at him with a cold gaze.

"Who is his mother? Why did she leave him in your care in such a secretive manner?" Logan asked.

"I think you know. After all, you know where I was nine months ago," Christopher said. Logan scowled.

"Myriad. You slept with a mercenary fanatic while undercover," Logan accused.

"Don't give me that, Logan," Christopher huffed. "She was different from the others."

"Oh I imagine so," Logan spat. " She was beautiful ."

"Not just beautiful! She didn't seem to belong there either , she- it doesn't matter, she asked me to make sure he grows up with his head on right-"

"Did you break cover with her!?" Logan demanded.

"Oh shut up, Logan! I already know I'm a poor excuse for a spy, you don't need to lecture me for my mistakes!" Christopher shouted. The baby began to cry, and both brothers fell silent, Christopher taking his son from his brother and rocking him.

Once the baby had calmed down, Christopher said, "You have to help me keep him away from our father."

"Father would want to know about his grandson," Logan countered.

"Please, Logan. I can't let Father get his claws in him, he's just a kid," Christopher pleaded. Logan frowned.

"You're asking me because you can't do it yourself. You can't keep anything from Father," Logan stated, not bothering to frame it like a question.

"But you can," Christopher agreed.

Logan sighed, looking at the baby again. "I'll help. I'll also help you forge some papers for him, if you can give me a name."

"Oh. Uh…" Christopher looked down at his baby. The infant cooed, and Christopher's heart melted. "Jeremy. Jeremy Croft."

"Jeremy?" Logan asked, jotting the name down in his phone. He paused, thoughtfully studying the name. "I'm going to call him Remy."

Christopher grinned, and he buried his nose in his son's head. In Jeremy Croft's head. He took a deep breath, taking in his son's baby smell. Logan cleared his throat and Christopher looked up.

"And… do you want to put anything down for his mother?" Logan asked. Christopher thought for a long moment, then he nodded.

"For his mother, put down Melissa Croft," Christopher said. Logan froze, looking at Christopher with wide eyes.

"The mother can't be Melissa G-"

"Don't worry about it," Christopher said firmly. "Just write it down. And don't let Father find out about any of it."

And Logan did. Even six years later, Christopher's son was kept secret from his family, all except Logan. Then everything crumbled around Christopher when his brother died.

Or rather, when he thought his brother died.

Ten years of regrets and half baked apologies swirled in Christopher's gut as he drove his son across town, listening to what he had to tell him. His brother was alive , his brother was here , his brother was safe - Oh, he was going to smack Logan across his stupid, smug face!

Chapter Text

The door behind them burst open as Mordecai was drafting the email to Thomas' other father, and the pair whirled around to see who had caught them. Thomas paled as he saw the man with the dark hair and the crystal eyes again.

"Well, well, well," Caesar said loudly, his hands on his hips. "If it isn't Patton Moras."

Mordecai stiffened beside Thomas, and Caesar jerked his chin. The three agents behind him rushed forward, and one grabbed Thomas' arms. Thomas struggled, but he stilled as he saw that the other two had detained Mordecai, and Caesar was approaching the computer.

Thomas glanced at the screen, spotting the loading symbol, and grit his teeth. He had to do something to distract the man. "My dad's gonna kill you when he finds me!"

Caesar turned, staring at Thomas blankly. "I'm not scared of the Duke, brat. I've had him under my heel for ten years."

"I didn't mean him ," Thomas scowled. "I meant my dad . He's gonna tear you to pieces!"

Caesar chuckled. "I'm not afraid of some pant packing pansy, either."

"Maybe you should be, especially talking about him like that ," Thomas challenged, and Caesar stepped towards him.

"Leave him alone , Antonio!" Mordecai shouted, and Caesar rolled his eyes before turning his back to Thomas to face the spy.

"Patton, you aren't exactly in a position to negotiate. This cover was a clever one, but I knew ' Agent Seraph ' was behind the escaped children," Caesar declared. He folded his arms. "It wasn't until I saw your face just now, however, that I realized just how tricky you were being. Who else survived the explosion that day, Patton?"

"Nobody. Just me and Christopher," Mordecai -Patton?- spat.

"Christopher!" Caesar barked a laugh. "Oh, if the boss didn't care so much for the value of his life, he'd be dead a hundred times over by now. He's the one who sent you?"

"I sent myself. I'm going to stop Myriad's plans. You discovering me is just a minor setback," Patton growled.

"God, I wish I could kill the Crofts just to get it through your fat skull- you lost , Patton! You lost ten years ago!" Caesar sneered. Thomas glanced at the computer as it chimed suddenly, and Caesar looked over, alarmed. "What did you send?"

"Just a message," Patton huffed. Caesar grabbed Thomas' arm and gestured at the agent.

"Well? Track that email, now!" Caesar sneered. The agent hurried to the computer and began typing. Thomas struggled to be free of Caesar's grip.

"If the higher-ups listened to me, you wouldn't have even been anywhere near the kid- now look who's just been proved right again! I deserve a promotion," Caesar laughed bitterly. Thomas glanced towards the still open door.

This was probably going to fail horribly. Thomas slammed his foot down on Caesar's toes, then drove his knee up into the man's soft spot, making the agent shout and double over. As soon as he was free, Thomas took off like a shot towards the door.

A fifth agent stopped him in his tracks, filling the doorway.

"Caesar," Eliza Wicca said, sounding unimpressed. "You almost lost the brat?"

"Fuck off, Draco," Caesar spat.

Eliza grabbed a handful of Thomas' hair and tilted his head back so he was forced to stare up at her blank expression. He reached up and grabbed her wrist, trying to ease the tugging pain prickling across his scalp. "You know, brat, we don't technically need you in safe condition anymore. In fact, I could think of a whole host of things we could send your daddy dearest to make him come crawling back- so I'd watch the rebellious streak, alright?"

Thomas breathed in sharply.

"Let go of him!" Patton snapped. Eliza looked up, her eyebrows raised.

"So how big of a traitor are we dealing with?" Eliza asked, taking in the situation.

"A mole," Caesar informed. Eliza grinned and Thomas didn't want to know what she was thinking.

"Caesar, I managed to track the most recent sent message," the agent informed. Thomas felt ice run down his spine as he thought about his father.

"Oh? Where was it sent?" Caesar asked, having collected his dignity.

"A safe house, it looks like. In some kind of abandoned train station," the agent by the computer said. Thomas glanced at Patton, confused, but the man's face had gone horribly pale.

"Oho, look at this! Are you nervous, Moras?" Caesar demanded.

"You're not going to find anything important there," Patton claimed, but the lie was obvious. Thomas fidgeted, but Eliza's grip in his hair tightened and he winced, freezing again.

"Eliza, why don't you take a squad down there and scope the place out?" Caesar suggested. Eliza's grin widened and Thomas shivered.

"I'd be happy to, Caesar."

Logan didn't even jump as the door to his lab slammed open. He turned around, keeping his face blank as he saw his brother storm in, his nephew in tow.

"Logan Berry Croft!" Christopher sneered, immediately doing as he always did and taking up all the attention for himself. He was trembling as he approached.

"Christopher," Logan responded, his words carefully void of emotion.

"You fucking asshole ! Ten years I thought you were dead! And you didn't even let me into your stupid computer that apparently had emergency messages!?" Christopher demanded.

"How was I to know that this one was the mission I would never return from?" Logan asked. "I'm not in the habit of failing, Christopher, unlike you."

"Oh, nice one, jerkass. Tell me, who out of the two of us has been in captivity for ten years again?" Christopher demanded.

Logan couldn't help but crack a smile. As soon as Christopher spotted his smile, he grinned right back. His older brother surged forward, pulling him into a hug.

"I'm so glad you aren't dead, you fucker," Christopher said.

"You and I both," Logan said, relaxing into his brother's embrace.

"Are you gonna tell him about your stupid self injection, or should I?" Remus asked, and Logan stiffened. Christopher pulled away.

"I'm sorry, what ?" Christopher asked.

"I was being forced to concoct a serum for Myriad," Logan explained. "To keep the serum out of their hands, I injected it into my body and destroyed all my records."

" What ."

"It has had interesting effects, such as healing chemical burns with no scarring, pushing a bullet out of my body, and-"

"And making him hella strong, it's kind of hot!" Remus piped up, and Logan heard two teenagers fake wretching.

"Ah! Yes, how has my nephew been, hello Remy!" Logan said, trying to change the topic entirely. The teen froze upon being addressed, looking up at Logan with wide eyes peeking above a pair of dark shades.

"Oh shit, this is super real," Remy blurted.

"Yeah, yeah, neat- Logan, what do you mean interesting effects - did you not test this serum !?" Christopher demanded.

"I- technically no?" Logan hazarded. Christopher made a strangled noise and punched his arm. Logan barely felt it. He wondered if that was because of the serum, or if his brother had only hit him halfheartedly.

"Oh my god, you're going to die -"

"I will not, I've been working very hard to make the serum harmless," Logan interrupted. Christopher looked at him thoughtfully.

"I'm going to trust that you're okay for now. But you talk to me immediately if anything feels off," Christopher warned. Logan nodded, and he saw Remus get to his feet.

"Hey, Logan and I have each other's backs, Mr. Croft," Remus assured. Christopher glanced at Remus, then frowned.

"You're Virgil's husband, right?" Christopher asked. Remus flushed.

"Hopefully," Remus said.

"Virgil is currently looking at divorce," Logan informed, and Christopher snorted.

"You should've told him," Christopher said.

"Oh, look who's talking!" Remy scowled, and Christopher glared at his son, pushing his head gently.

"Don't sass me, kid, you're still in trouble," Christopher snapped. "I just meant telling your partner is different to telling your children. I had no secrets from your mother."

"You certainly didn't," Logan agreed disapprovingly. His brother groaned.

"Look, it's in the past ! Besides, she's none of your business, Lo," Christopher huffed.

"I would've told Virgil, but I didn't… I didn't want him to freak out," Remus huffed. "This though… this was worse."

"You think?" Darius asked. "Remy, can we go talk outside?"

"Dad?" Remy asked.

Christopher rolled his eyes. "Sure, whatever. If you two fight again, you are grounded until you are dead and buried."

"Fine! Jesus, Dad!" Remy protested, and he and Darius left the warehouse. Logan frowned.

"They fought?" he asked.

"Yesterday the kids freaked out on each other. Don't worry about it," Christopher said, waving his hand. "So, I haven't gotten a call yet, so I would assume that Myriad thinks they still have you guys in their pocket. What's the damage?"

"They have my son," Remus snarled.

"They've got Thomas?" Christopher asked, horrified.

"Just how well do you know my family, Croft?" Remus demanded.

"Virgil and I know each other well enough. Our boys are best friends, it happens," Christopher explained away. "How are we gonna handle the Thomas situation?"

"We got coordinates from Patton," Logan informed. "Darius says he's working for you."

Christopher groaned. "I'm changing my password, I can't believe this."

"That's a yes, then?" Remus asked.

"Yeah, Patton's undercover in Myriad right now," Christopher informed. "If he sent you coordinates instead of me, then it had to be something you guys would be invested in, so…"

"He found Thomas," Logan concluded. Darius had already concluded as such, with less information.

"I don't trust him," Remus scowled. "Patton is the reason we got caught in the first place. He cut off comms!"

"I didn't trust him at first either. But he's been putting his neck in the line to save kids for the past several years. I don't trust him with you guys, but I trust him with Thomas," Christopher declared.

Logan hummed lowly, thinking over everything he knew about his old comrade. "I trust Patton with my life. One mistake is just that- a mistake."

"I still don't trust him," Remus grumbled. "But… I trust you, Prof."

Logan couldn't help his smile. "Then we track down the coordinates. Let's make haste."

"Do either of you have a secret garage under this bunker?" Christopher asked. Logan shook his head, and Remus grinned sheepishly. Christopher sighed. "Looks like we're storming a base in a minivan, boys."

Virgil sighed as he got out of the car and began to help his brother take his luggage into the house. He paused in the middle of the living room, feeling a shiver go down his spine.

"Is everything okay?" Andy asked, with that flat tone of his.

"I don't know," Virgil muttered. He wandered deeper into the house. "Roman? Darius?"

The guest room door swung open and Virgil saw Roman lean against the door frame, folding his arms. "Virgil, welcome back."

"Roman," Virgil greeted. "Where's Remus?"

Roman scowled. "He left. After he was out the door, I went to start packing my things."

"Okay," Virgil said, and he swallowed. He tried to ignore the voice whispering that Remus would leave for sure this time. "Um. And Darius? How is he?"

"I think he's in his room. He said he needed to think," Roman said. Virgil frowned.

"You didn't check in on him?" Virgil asked.

"I didn't think he or you would much appreciate me doing so," Roman huffed. "I have to start phasing myself out of his life, don't I?"

"What? No. That's the opposite of what we discussed," Virgil said, startled.

"That was before their other father came back," Roman pointed out, his tone bitter and cold.

"A father who just left again," Virgil pointed out. His heart was beating too fast now. He was so… so confused , so upset . Roman's expression shifted slightly before falling back into a careful blank expression.

"I may, in my anger, have threatened to call the cops on him," Roman said. Virgil blinked, and suddenly he felt a hot flash of anger.

"Roman, this isn't your house -"

"I know that!" Roman snapped. Virgil stared at him as he sighed. "I know, Virgil. But my brother and I… we've always been each other's heels. We push each other's buttons, if we try or not. He's probably off sulking somewhere nearby, anyway. Even I have to admit he's besotted with you."

"I don't know why you would say something like that," Virgil muttered.

"Anyone would be crazy about you, mi Amado ," Roman said. Virgil flinched.

"Don't call me that."

Roman's face shuttered. "You know what that means?"

"I asked a coworker today," Virgil explained. That had been an uncomfortable conversation. He frowned and ran a hand through his hair. "Why are you so hung up on me, Roman? You could have anyone else in the whole world."

"I don't want anyone else," Roman countered. "I want you."

"Do you actually love me, Roman, or are you clinging to the memory of a love that died a long time ago?" Virgil demanded, and he saw the taller man reel back as if he hadn't expected the question. Virgil sighed. "I'm gonna go check on Darius."

Roman returned to his packing, and Virgil left him behind, walking down the hall to go check on his son. He knocked on Darius' bedroom door.

"Darius? Honey, I'm back, and Uncle Andy's in the living room, why don't you come say hi?" Virgil called through the door. There was no response, and Virgil swallowed, his throat feeling too tight. He pressed his ear against the door, hearing nothing. He knocked again. "Darius?"

"Where's my nephew?" Andy called, poking his head into the hallway. Virgil breathed in sharply, grabbing the doorknob and shoving the door open, looking around.

Darius' bedroom was empty.

" Roman !" Virgil shouted, and the man popped out of the guest room at the end of the hall, looking at Virgil with confusion. "Where the fuck is my son!?"

"He's not here?" Roman asked, his face paling.

"Shit," Andy muttered, and the three of them spread out through the house, double checking every room for any signs of the teenager.when they regrouped in the living room, Andy was looking anxious, and Roman was even paler than before.

Virgil scowled. "Roman, you better have some goddamn idea of where my kid is, or you can say goodbye to even looking at either of them again-"

"How is this my fault!?" Roman tried.

"This is the second time one of my sons has gone missing while they were supposed to be in your care, so don't try that shit with me, Castillo," Virgil spat.

"I left Darius in charge of Thomas, and I expected them to go home, we've never had trouble dropping them off at the park before!" Roman pointed out.

"And today?" Virgil demanded. "After the shitshow that has been this week, you thought ignoring my son to let him do as he pleases was a good course of action!?"

"I will admit, today is my bad, but I thought we'd made major strides in our relationship this afternoon, I didn't realize he'd run off the moment I wasn't looking!" Roman shouted.

"Of course he ran off, you chased away his father !" Virgil hollered.

"Okay!" Andy interrupted. "This is getting us nowhere. Both of you need to calm down. Let's walk through the day. What happened?"

"Well, Darius seemed… a little out of it in the morning when I left for work. When I got home, he and Roman were kind of getting along for once," Virgil explained. He hesitated to continue. He didn't want to relive what happened with Remus yet.

Andy noticed his hesitation and cleared his throat. "Well, Roman? How'd the day go from your perspective?"

"When Virgil left, I started working on some paperwork and box office calls for work," Roman began. "In the afternoon I noticed that Darius wasn't in the house anymore, so I called him, and he answered. We argued for a bit, and then he asked me to take him home."

"He snuck out ? Where?" Virgil demanded.

"The abandoned train junction," Roman said. Virgil tried not to tug his hair out.

"Okay, we're going there first," Virgil declared, but just as he did, his phone vibrated. He glared at it as he flipped it open and took a look at his text messages. All there was was a string of numbers and three letters- TSC. Wait. "Thomas?"

"What is it?" Andy asked.

"I… I think I was just sent Thomas' coordinates," Virgil said, noting how the numbers were organized. Andy snatched his phone and studied it.

"Whoa. These are definitely coordinates," Andy muttered. He was an outdoorsman and a bit of a sailor, so Virgil figured he would know. "Are we going to follow them?"

"We should. Thomas needs us," Roman said.

"But who sent this? And what if it's a trap?" Andy scowled. "Do you ever think with your head, dude?"

"We're going," Virgil declared, and both of his boys' uncles looked at him in surprise. Virgil didn't answer their questions before storming into his bedroom, Andy and Roman at his heels. He reached under the bed and slid out a large box and shoved the lid open.

Andy whistled lowly and Roman spluttered in surprise. Virgil pulled the pistol out of the box and turned to the men behind him.

"If it's a trap, we'll just fight back. I am getting my son back, and anyone who tries to stop me isn't going to like what happens next," Virgil declared.

"Where did you get that?" Roman demanded, his voice squeaking.

"And how can I get one, hot damn," Andy commented.

"It's Remus'. I always wondered why he had one. I don't know about you guys, but I get the feeling his job is a lot more dangerous than washing a rich woman's clothes."

Chapter Text

Darius stopped just outside the door, leaning against the wall as Remy exited the warehouse. Remy turned to him, folding his arms.

"So, Darry, what's the dish?" Remy asked.

"I'm sorry," Darius started. Remy stared at him and lifted his shades into his hair.

"What?"

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be such a dick," Darius elaborated carefully. He felt his insides twist a bit and wondered if honesty would always feel so awful. Remy let out an awkward laugh.

"Dude, I was a bigger dick."

"Well, yeah, but not without reason. I know I've been… rough around the edges. Pretty much for as long as you've known me," Darius admitted, mulling over his words. "I don't want to just say I was going through something and excuse myself, because it's a terrible excuse. The truth is, I wasn't… coping. And I'm sorry you had to deal with that."

Remy hummed softly. "And if your spy dad leaves again, what then?"

Darius sucked in a breath, fear striking at his core at the idea. Remy just stared at him impassively. He had to answer.

"Then that would suck. I'm not gonna lie, I'll be… I'll be really, really hurt. But I know you'll be there to help me learn to heal, right? You won't take any more of my stagnating bullshit, that's for sure," Darius chuckled.

"Dude, I'm totally here to offer you a hand. You just gotta want to take it," Remy declared, a grin on his face. "But hey, don't let me off so easily. I hit you in your soft spot, and that wasn't okay."

"I mean, it's not like I thought it was true."

"True or not, it hurt you. I totally deserved to get smacked down for that," Remy joked, pulling a laugh out of Darius.

"I never like fighting with you," Darius admitted. Remy looked surprised at that.

"Here I thought you liked fighting with just about anyone," Remy said.

"Yeah. I told you, I haven't really been coping."

Remy nodded, and lowered his shades back over his eyes. Awkwardly, he opened up his arms, silently offering a hug. Darius considered. He wasn't usually one for hugs. He'd been accepting a lot more hugs than usual lately, due to the high stress of the week, and really he still could use a few more.

Darius wrapped his arms around Remy, hooking his chin over his friend's shoulder. Remy's hands were warm on his back. Remy pushed his face into Darius' shoulder. The hug was long, but Darius didn't want to pull away. Something about this awkward, uncomfortable hug was making him feel so, so much better.

"Emile would be proud of us," Remy joked, his word's muffled in Darius' shoulder.

"For talking about our feelings, or for hugging it out?" Darius asked. Remy smacked his shoulder.

"Both, you loser."

The hug lasted another moment before the two of them reluctantly pulled apart. Darius went to the warehouse door, and pulled it open, entering to dead silence.

"Uh, Dad? What's up?" Remy called.

"I think your uncle is about to blow a gasket," Mr. Croft informed. Darius glanced at Logan, then at Remus, whose lips twitched into a smirk.

"We are not storming a mercenary cult base in your government registered minivan with recorded plates," Logan said icily.

"Do you have a better idea?" Mr. Croft asked. Metal creaked under Logan's hands, and Darius watched with wide eyes as the scientist straightened up, leaving the table warped like clay where he'd been gripping it.

"No," Logan admitted. "No better ideas that do not involve theft."

"I'm for theft," Remus declared.

"Duke, think of the children!" Mr. Croft exclaimed with an over dramatic gasp.

"Well, I've already technically kidnapped Dee, and there are a few graves I plan on filling- might as well go all out on the criminal spectrum," Remus retorted, a savage grin on his face. Remy took a sharp breath beside Darius.

"Are you guys going to get Thomas right now?" Remy asked.

"Every moment we waste is a moment they have to move him," Remus growled.

"We are," Mr. Croft announced. "You two are staying here."

"What? I'm not staying," Darius said.

"We are not taking a teenager into what is about to become a deadly suicide mission," Mr. Croft said icily. "You're staying here with Remy, so we don't have to worry about you."

"If you're going to find Thomas, I have to be there!" Darius argued. "He needs me, and he's my brother!"

"Sorry, but this kinda situation needs a certain amount of skill. You're not there, kid," Mr. Croft informed, folding his arms. Darius glared at the three adults.

"I already said I was coming with you. You already said-"

"We had a severe lack of knowledge as to what we were getting into when we originally agreed," Logan interrupted. "Now we have a location, an inside man-"

"If we can trust Patton," Remus grumbled.

"-and some semblance of a plan coming together. Your presence would only be a hindrance," Logan finished.

Darius scowled. "I'm going to save my brother."

"No, you're going to stay here," Mr. Croft said. "Look- this is why I didn't tell Remy about any of this for so long. Living this kind of life? 0/10, do not recommend, in fact, 0 stars, fuck this shit. You guys just stay civilian, okay?"

Darius went to argue, but Remy put a hand on his arm. "Darry, let's just let them go."

Darius glared at his friend, jerking his arm out of Remy's grip. Still something in Remy's tone had Darius slumping his shoulders.

"Yeah, fine."

Logan went to one side of the warehouse and pressed a brick, sliding it into the mortar around it. Darius and Remy both watched with gaping mouths as suddenly one of the warehouse walls pulled open, revealing a hidden room filled with gadgets. Darius tried to get a good look inside of the room, but by then Remus and Mr. Croft had grabbed everything they seemed to need, and the secret door began to slide shut again.

Mr. Croft and Logan left the warehouse, but Remus hung back. "Look… you get they're just trying to keep you safe, right?"

"They? Not you?" Darius asked.

Remus snorted. "Nowhere safer for my kids than by my side. Besides, you're Vi's kid too. You can handle yourself."

Darius smiled, his whole chest uncurling in the warmth of those words. He turned his smile into a smug smirk at the last moment. "Nowhere safer? Patently untrue."

Remus clutched at his chest with his free hand. "You wound me, Junior! You wound me! The sass! You really are your father's son!"

Darius had absolutely no hope of hiding the genuine grin that spread across his cheeks as easy as warm butter on hot toast. His father left the warehouse to join the other adults outside. Darius turned to Remy, who was smirking at him.

"You're such a daddy's boy," Remy snarked, and Darius flushed.

"Lies and slander. You had a plan, Jeremy?" Darius needled.

"What makes you say that?" Remy asked.

"You told me to give up. That's very out of character, you busy body," Darius pointed out. Remy snorted and grinned.

"You'd think if they wanted us to stay out of trouble, they'd be more secretive about how to access their high tech secret gadget room. Or, you know, make sure we aren't in the same room as their supercomputer?" Remy gestured at the warehouse around them. "Just because we aren't working with them, doesn't mean we won't be helping to get Thomas back."

Darius grinned. "This is why you're my best friend."

"Oh don't let Emile hear that, he'll be crushed!"

Patton cursed his soft heart and immediately felt guilty for doing so. He'd done so much good, but it was easy to forget how much he'd really done when his life was at stake… admittedly, because of that good. His life had been nothing but the mission since he'd been a stupid teenager. He'd just wanted to do some good. Bring a noticeable positive change to the lives of the young kids he had rescued. Breaking them free of one cage and putting them in another had not been his plan, but it looked like that was all he'd be able to do before his life got cut short.

Still, there was one child he had to save. One child that he couldn't let Caesar and Draco spirit away into the night.

Thomas was trembling in Draco's hold, over by the door, and Patton was quickly calculating a plan in his head. Patton wasn't a traditional field agent. That had never been what he was trained for. He was good with computers, codes, and security. He was the eye in the sky. But nobody needed an eye in the sky right now. And nobody needed the fly on the wall he'd been for the past nine years either.

Thomas needed somebody to step up. Patton needed to live. The only course of action was to stand up and fight head on for once. The door slid shut behind Draco, and Patton made up his mind on a course of action. Patton jerked his arms and slammed his entire body towards the captor on his left, who crashed into the row of computers with a shout.

Before the other agent could react, Patton whirled around and grabbed her arm, leveraging her over his shoulder and flipping her over his body and sending her feet first in Caesar’s direction.

“Goddammit!” Caesar shouted, catching a combat boot with his face. Patton didn’t wait to gloat, instead tearing a keycard off the downed agent and leaping towards the door. Caesar growled. “After him!”

Patton grabbed a chair on his way out, and once he was out of the room, he slammed the chair leg into the card reader. He didn’t bother to wait and see if his actions had affected the door, though. No, that would be a time-costly mistake, and he had to catch up to Draco and get Thomas. Instead, he bolted down the hall, ignoring the shouts and the gunshots behind him. Maybe he should’ve snatched a gun. He’d never had to fire one before, but it was in his training, he probably still remembered. Best not to push his luck, though.

Patton was down the hall and running up the stairwell when he heard Caesar behind him yelling, “He’s heading to the roof, don’t let him get up there!”

Patton groaned, jumping onto the banister and glaring up the stairwell. He saw Thomas look down towards him, as gunshots exploded below them, and Draco dragged the boy higher up the stairs. No time to lose then. Patton leapt across the stairwell, grabbing the other side's banister and climbing up to a position from which he could jump again. He tried not to think about how far he would fall if he screwed the jump up. He tried not to think about the agents trying to shoot at him. He tried not to think about how he had never had to do something like this before.

Just like training, Patton thought to himself, remembering the intensive training sessions back when he was a much younger man. It had been nearly fifteen years, but he knew he used to be able to do it. He hadn’t lost shape. He might be a bit rusty, but he needed those skills now, and he wasn’t about to let himself fail. Half of success was determination anyway, right?

Patton leapt again, managing to dodge a bullet as he caught himself on the third flight of stairs and climbed up the banister again. He flipped over the banister and started to run up the stairs. He’d bought himself enough of a lead now that he could probably outrun the agents below. He shook out his arms as he ran. He'd need to check his arms over when he was safe, to make sure he hadn't injured himself.

There were only four more flights of stairs, and Patton found as he dashed up them that he was definitely more out of shape than he'd thought. Not enough to hurt his chances too badly, thank god, but he was definitely going to have to be efficient with his getaway. Shit, how was he gonna get away if he caught up and got Thomas back?

Patton burst out the rooftop door and caught sight of Draco shoving Thomas into a helicopter on the opposite side of the building. The blades were already going, building up speed and ringing in Patton's ears. Thomas screamed, his mouth forming words Patton couldn't read or hear from across the roof in the golden sunset.

Patton broke into a run, trying to get to the helicopter before it started to fly away. Draco spotted him as she was strapping Thomas into a seat, and Patton could tell she was shouting at the pilot. She pulled out a gun and cocked it, aiming at Patton.

Bullets hit the ground around him as he ran. The helicopter was beginning to lift off from the ground. Patton jumped, hands outstretched. One hand caught on the lip of the door, and the other scrambled for purchase before wrapping around the landing skid.

Draco's words were mostly eaten away by the rotor blades beating through the air, but Patton caught that she was calling him foul, foul names. Her neon heel slammed into his hand and he cried out, his arm swinging away from the helicopter. Then she leveled her gun and aimed. The bullet hit him right in his other elbow, and with a cry he let go of the landing skid. He dropped the six feet the helicopter had risen, and felt the wind knock right out of him.

Patton blinked stars out of his gaze, barely noticing until the pain stopped whiting out his vision that the helicopter was getting further and further into the sky, and that Draco had slid the helicopter door shut as it took off.

The rotors were far enough for Patton to hear the shouting and hollering of the other Myriad members as they poured out onto the rooftop. Patton crawled to the edge of the roof, trying to get away as he heard Caesar approach. A foot on his injured elbow had him crying out as he froze, however. He looked up and met eyes with the man.

"Looks like you failed, Patton. Just like you always do," Caesar sneered.

"I don't care how this ends for me. I know you'll get what's coming to you," Patton said through gritted teeth. "We both know that Remus Castillo is not a forgiving man."

Caesar grinned. "Let's test that theory. Someone's coming here for a damsel… and I bet I know who. Let's give him one."

Patton's eyes went wide, and Caesar brought the but of his gun down hard. Caesar's slimy grin was the last thing Patton remembered seeing before he blacked out.

When Emile was dropped off at home in the afternoon, his foster family was in the kitchen cooking. Mrs. Wence and her son were animatedly talking about the upcoming school holiday, and the plans for it. They didn’t seem to notice him coming in through the front door.

"I'm home!" Emile called.

"Welcome home," Mrs. Wence called back, barely pausing to look up before returning her attention to her son. Emile frowned a bit. He sighed and went to his bedroom, sliding a duffel bag out from under his bed. He checked the food he had stored away inside. A loaf of bread, some peanut butter, some canned vegetables, and three bottles of water. Some fruit snacks and cheesy crackers were in the pockets, too. The bag was just supposed to be for himself, in case he needed to leave for a bit, but he could give it to the others.

It hadn’t been difficult to sneak back out of the house. Well, if you could call it sneaking.

Mrs. Wence and her son were enjoying their portions of dinner in the living room, the television playing a dramatic film of some kind with dingy lighting and bloody characters. Emile kept his distaste to himself and slipped into the kitchen, filling a bowl with a couple of large helpings of the fried rice on the stove before sliding that into his bag as well. At least Mrs. Wence always made enough to feed a small army. Then, he slipped out of the house with a cheerful, “Goodnight!”

“Goodnight!” Mrs. Wence said mindlessly, her hand in her son’s hair. Emile tried not to feel too upset that she hadn’t asked where he was going. After all, he’d been anticipating that. Instead, he focused his thoughts on getting to the abandoned train station. The walk would take him only a half hour if he was fast, and he had to be careful walking on his own through the city anyway.

Especially since he could almost fit the target profile of those… whoever they were, who were taking kids off the street and leaving them dead weeks later.

Emile knew how to get around without drawing attention to himself. He was glad his wardrobe currently consisted of plain colors, browns and whites and blacks. He was also glad he hadn't yet had permission to color his hair. Anything that kept him from standing out was useful when he was sneaking off in plain sight. In brown and white and cream, he fell to the wayside of perception, ignored for people and items and things in brighter colors.

The train station was beyond a street of dingy apartment buildings, tucked away and sandwiched between the houses and the freeway. It was a large lot of abandoned train cars, and half torn up train tracks, and Emile had never really appreciated it before. However, with the knowledge that this large train lot was keeping a couple of his close friends safe, Emile found it growing on him.

Emile found the trapdoor easily now that he knew how it was disguised. He knocked, and the trapdoor opened.

"Emile!" Elliot's voice greeted him, and immediately Emile grinned. It was nice to see them smiling, after the last memory he had of Elliot was the anxious look on their face as they went back home.

"I brought snacks!" Emile said, patting his duffle bag. Elliot grinned.

"Food is very welcome, but even if you came on your own, we'd still be happy to have you," Elliot said, before dropping down the ladder and leaving room for Emile to climb after them.

The bunker below was rather utilitarian, with a row of computers along the far wall, a couple of metal tables around the room, and only one proper cot, but several used sleeping mats scattered about. More importantly there were several people huddled in the room around one of the metal tables.

The group of children gathered around the table were all watching Emile as he watched them. Elliot coughed politely into their hand. Kai rolled his eyes and stood up. "Everybody, this is Emile. Emile, this is everybody."

"Uh, hi," Emile greeted.

"Hi!" A pale boy with brown curls greeted, smiling. "I'm Sloane."

The black boy next to him nodded in greeting, waving two fingers in an aborted salute. "We've been staying here for a while. Not often we get guests who don't become permanent residents."

"What Corbin means is, we haven't really talked to anyone from outside the facility in a while," a girl piped up, leaning on her folded arms. "I'm Lauren. Kai's told me a lot about you."

"All good things, I hope?" Emile asked, smiling.

"Not in your life," Kai said.

"All good from where I was standing," Lauren joked, making Kai flush crimson.

"Anyway, you know Elliot, so the last ones in our little squad are Harley and Valerie," he said loudly.

"Hello," Valerie greeted, with a tiny wave. Harley merely hummed an almost dismissive greeting, folding a sheet of paper into a swan.

"I brought some food," Emile said. "It might not be a lot , but I figure some is better than none."

"You're a peach," Lauren declared. Her eyebrows danced a little as Emile began to unpack the various snacks and some of the bread. He pulled out the tupperware bowl of rice as well.

"So, how long have all of you been here?" Emile asked, as he unpacked the peanut butter. "Anyone allergic?"

Elliot shook their head, as they started looking around the base for utensils. "No peanut allergies. Unless Valerie has any?"

"Not me," Valerie said, shaking her head. Emile nodded.

"We've all been here for different amounts of time," Kai said finally. "Mordecai gets us out of the facility in small groups. Valerie just joined us."

"And you all stay here?" Emile asked.

"If we leave, we risk getting found by them again," Harley piped up. "That's a death sentence."

Solemn silence filled the air. Emile coughed quietly and accepted the forks and the small plastic knife Elliot offered him. He spread some peanut butter onto a few of the pieces of bread, portioned out a few crackers for each of his new friends, and then carefully began separating servings of rice.

"So, does Mordecai bring you food usually?" Emile asked.

"Yeah, he usually comes by every day," Lauren said.

"Usually?" Emile asked.

"We haven't seen him today," Kai said. He fidgeted a moment before reaching across the table and beginning to pass crackers around to the others. "We did get a message a while ago, but it didn't say much. Just some numbers."

"Weird," Emile hummed. "Do you guys have any way to check in with him yourselves?"

"It's not exactly safe," Corbin said, trading his peanut butter sandwich for Sloane's fried rice. "He sends us messages to the computer here, but sending outgoing messages can be risky. We were gonna wait to see if he shows up before tomorrow morning, first."

"Alright," Emile said trepidatiously. "Well, good thing I brought food then."

"Life saver," Elliot declared, a smile on their face. Emile blushed. He opened his mouth to alter the course of the conversation, but before his quick wits could pull into gear, a sharp ding resounded.

"What's that?" Emile asked.

"That's the alarm," Kai said. "The one that let us know when you and your friends showed up."

"Mordecai?" Emile asked, though he felt that that would be too lucky.

"He doesn't set it off," Lauren said, and Emile felt dread curl in his gut. He followed the others to crowd around the screen showing the security feed of the abandoned train station above.

"Who is that?" Lauren asked.

"I don't know. Doesn't look like they're with Myriad though. Maybe they'll leave," Elliot said, sounding hopeful. Emile blinked at the screen, thinking maybe he had to clean his glasses. What was Mr. Sanders doing here so late?

Chapter Text

"It's guarded, alright, but not very well," Chris muttered, lowering his binoculars and settling back into the front seat. The minivan was actually quite comfortable. Remus would have to think about getting one for his own family, if everything turned up roses and daisies after all this.

"That doesn't sound right," Logan huffed. He had that irritated little scowl that Remus was used to seeing whenever he was sporting a new injury.

"It could be meant to be a trap," Chris offered.

"Ooh, leave it easy to get in, leave the bait out in the open, then snap !" Remus agreed. "We're riddled with bullets."

"That would mean they know we're coming," Logan said quietly.

"I never did trust Patton," Remus muttered. Logan glared at him.

"Well, I do . Kid couldn't do betrayal even if it flirted with him until kingdom come. I'm worried about him, if they know we're coming," Chris interrupted.

"We all know your trust is impaired," Remus said.

"Oh, like how your leg is impaired?" Chris snapped. Remus glared, shutting his mouth with a click of his teeth. So he was still wounded. So what? He'd walked across a desert wounded, sort of, and he'd walk across another. It wasn't going to stop him from finding his son and bringing hell down on the people who took him.

"Children," Logan said. He turned in his seat, looking at Remus directly. "How is the leg, by the way?"

"It's fine," Remus said, only mostly lying. It still hurt, naturally, if he would let himself linger on that. He didn't really have the time to be nursing injuries though. "Exactly what you'd expect from a day-old gunshot wound."

"That sounds like the definition of not fine," Chris mumbled.

"I can handle this rescue," Remus insisted.

"Oh right, this occupation is literally the worst," Chris groaned. He leaned his forehead against the top of his steering wheel. Remus looked at Logan, who shrugged.

"Chris has never enjoyed our jobs. He does have a point, though. You really should be resting with a wound like that," Logan pointed out.

"No time. They have my son, this isn't me being a trained machine, it's…" Remus hesitated, taking a deep breath to steady himself for his coming admission. "I'm already a bad enough dad, okay? I promised I'd keep him safe, and they took him, Logan. I was holding him for the first time in years , and they took him right out of my arms."

Chris breathed in sharply.

"I'm not sitting this out. I can't," Remus finished.

"I know. I wouldn't make you. But we're going to be careful. I don't like the look of this situation," Logan said. "The three of us will need to be extra alert."

"About that," Chris spoke up. "I can't go in with you unless things break bad."

"What?" Logan asked.

"Logan, you were dead . Melissa was dead. Dad was dead. Remy was a kid, I didn't have a job anymore! I didn't have a choice," Chris was quick to excuse. Remus' eyes widened.

"What did you do?" Logan asked.

"I mentioned how I haven't gotten a call about you escaping," Chris said carefully.

"You're with Myriad?" Remus demanded.

"No!" Chris exclaimed. "No, I would never ."

"Then what are you trying to tell us, Christopher, because it certainly sounds like you're working with Myriad," Logan said coldly.

"The Myriad boss, Mr. Geheimnis? He's Remy's grandfather. He pays child support, gets visitation, and in exchange for him not just killing me and taking my kid, I promised not to stir up trouble. That's all! I don't work for Myriad. I wouldn't ," Chris insisted. "Especially not when I thought they killed you and Dad. They check in on me regularly, is all. We have a deal."

"I can't believe this," Logan muttered, pinching the bridge of his nose under his glasses.

"I know I should've said something before we got here," Chris said. "But you need to understand, Remy was the only thing I had left. I had to do it."

There was an unbearable silence between the two brothers, as Remus just looked at each of them for a long minute.

"I never woulda pegged a crime lord as the sentimental type," Remus blurted out to try and ease the tension. Logan huffed an aborted laugh.

"So here's what we know. Myriad knows where you live. They don't want to use you or Remy as collateral against me and Remus, or they already would have sometime in the past ten years," Logan started.

"They're under the impression that I think you're dead," Chris added.

"Right, thank you. They know Remus and I have escaped, though, so they may check on you soon, to make sure you haven't been contacted," Logan continued. "They are unaware you're in contact with Patton, I assume?"

"As far as I know. Mr. Geheimnis made it clear that the moment I step a toe out of line, he's getting rid of me," Chris said.

"Why doesn't he just do that anyway?" Remus asked. "Like I said, it seems a bit more sentimental than you'd expect."

"Melissa died saving me from the blast that killed everyone else," Chris said solemnly. "I'm not gonna pretend that wasn't for Remy. Mr. Geheimnis knows that too."

"So it's about respecting his late daughter," Logan suggested.

"Still surprisingly sentimental," Remus muttered, but he didn't say anything else. Just because the Myriad boss had even a shred of decency, that didn't mean he wasn't still a shitty, horrible person.

Logan stiffened in his seat. "The guards are leaving."

"They're going inside?" Remus asked, craning his neck to try and get a better view of the building.

"No… they're getting into a car," Chris said cautiously.

"Wait, what?" Remus asked.

"Why are they abandoning their post?" Chris asked, turning to Logan, who was turning slightly gray.

Remus lunged from his seat and out the car door, running toward the base. He heard Logan and Chris rushing behind him, but he didn't pay them any mind. If the guards had abandoned the base, then Thomas wasn't there anymore. Either they moved him, or worse they had—

Every door was left open. Remus stormed into the base wild eyed, his heart pounding in his chest, only to be met with hall after hall after hall of empty rooms.

"No," Remus snarled. "No, no, no goddammit !"

He slammed into a door with his foot, the sound of metal crashing against the wall echoing through the hall.

"Remus!" Logan shouted. "Calm down!"

"They moved him ! They knew we were coming!" Remus spat.

"We guessed that already," Chris reminded, with a heavy note of caution in his tone.

Remus growled, turning to punch the door he'd just kicked. Logan caught his wrist before it hit the metal.

"You are going to hurt yourself further. Then how much help are you going to be for your son?" Logan's eyes were sharp and cutting behind his glasses. Remus scowled, yanking his wrist free and stalking further down the hall.

"Right. Well, let's make sure this base is a complete bust before we leave. Maybe we could get something from their computers," Chris suggested.

"They'll have wiped as much as possible by now," Logan muttered. "But it wouldn't hurt to check. They couldn't have had much time."

Remus growled, but he didn't argue, instead looking into every empty room they passed. Chris stopped at one door.

"Security cameras. I'll check these, you guys keep looking through the ha-"

A pained whimper interrupted Chris before he could finish the sentence. All three of them whirled around, staring at one closed door among dozens of open ones. This door, unlike the others in this hall, was a sliding door, with a keycard slot beside it. Logan dug his fingers into the seam and pulled the door open with a deceptive ease, the sound of metal sliding against metal screeching in their ears.

The sight that greeted them was gruesome.

There was a man lying on the floor inside a far too large pool of blood. The same blood that stuck dark curls of hair to pale skin, and soaked through black clothes and made it shiny under the white lights above. As Remus, Chris, and Logan entered the room, one blue eye wearily opened behind broken lenses.

"Patton," Logan whispered, horrified. Patton coughed, shifting on the floor. One arm was held close to his chest, guarding his ribs rather pathetically.

"Lo?"

Remus snarled, slamming his foot against the wall. They'd missed his son. The people who had him had left this for them to find. He shouted wordlessly and kicked the wall again.

"Remus!" Chris chastised. "We don't have time, we have to get Patton somewhere safe."

"Can you stand?" Logan asked, his words going soft and gentle as he kneeled beside the body.

"'M okay," Patton insisted through his split lip, his words slurred from what was likely a concussion. "Arm's broken, not my legs."

"Damn you," Remus snarled.

"Remus!" Logan snapped.

"No, Logan! Damn him! He should have died before he let them take my son!"

Blue eyes watered, though from pain or emotion it couldn't be discerned. "I tried. I'm so sorry, I tried , I swear."

Remus lunged at him, but Chris pulled him away, his arms hooking under Remus' and hands locking behind his neck.

"We are not attacking the half dead guy," Chris declared. "Logan, pick him up. Let's find somewhere clean to treat those wounds."

Remus bucked in Chris' hold. "Let me go ! I'm gonna kill him!"

"No! If you haven't noticed, we need all the help we can get, and Pat's on our side!"

Logan carefully began to collect the fallen agent, and Patton let out pained whines as he was lifted. "I'm sorry. If we had more supplies…"

"It's fine," Patton insisted, offering Logan a shaky and false smile. Remus thrashed in Chris' grip.

"Where's my son , Moras!?" Remus demanded. "Where'd they take my son!?"

Patton's face fell. Remus screeched, rage tossing in his stomach like an ocean in a storm, desperate not to be consumed by the despair that was eating at the edges like Charybdis.

"I don't know, I'm sorry."

Remus snarled, tearing free from Chris' grip and storming out into the hall. At the end of the row of doors, he saw a flash of purple and he blinked rapidly, his ranchor squirming miserably under the weight of a single question.

Virgil's voice in his ears whispered miserably, How much more will the life you chose take from us?

Thomas was terrified when, instead of yet another bland white building with few windows and a large parking lot somewhere in the middle of nowhere, he was brought to a large manor in the hills. The helicopter had landed on a pad in the garden, and people in fancy suits had come to greet Eliza, whose nails dug into Thomas' skin in a way that was growing sickeningly familiar since the morning.

The garden they were led through was gorgeous, and there were flowers from everywhere, but instead of marvelling at the beauty Thomas could only feel terrified as he was led through hedges and flowerbeds.

The manor itself was a large building in dark browns and blacks, with violet drapes in every window. The front door was stained glass in abstract shapes.

The inside of the manor was impressive too. Hardwood floors, wine red rugs, burnished gold accents. Mirrors and paintings and tapestries were hung on almost every wall, and wherever there wasn't one of those things, there were decorations like crossed swords, or taxidermy heads, or mounted antlers. It was definitely the home of a rich man, and not one Thomas was particularly keen to meet.

Eliza was led wordlessly through the manor to a specific room, a study it appeared, as they entered. There were several bookshelves against the walls, laden heavily with leather bound books, the kind Thomas hadn't imagined were real but had seen in every movie that had fancy libraries. There was also a large window that overlooked the garden, and Thomas could just see the helicopter at the edge of the window. In front of the window, there was a large desk, elegant and dark wood with several engraved pens, a globe, and one framed photograph of a young woman with red hair, next to another framed photograph of— Remy ?

The large chair behind the desk spun around and Thomas tried to shrink into Eliza's shadow. Her nails dug deeper into his arm and he froze. The man in the chair was imposing, the coldness in his gaze terrifying to the extreme. If there was any comfort to be gained anywhere in the room, Thomas would've fled for it upon meeting the gaze of the man. As it was, he just cast his eyes to the fuzzy dark carpet and hoped against his better judgement that this wasn't the end of the line.

There was no way they were planning on letting him live, not when they were showing him all of this . Not when their faces were all unmasked and their identities laid bare. Not when the only reason they even had him was to manipulate his father, who clearly didn't like being controlled. Thomas was going to die in the end, he could tell. It was a terrifying thought, but he clung to the idea that they'd wait. He had time if they waited. They weren't going to kill him so soon, not when they went through so much trouble to keep him.

"You know, Eliza, you pride yourself on being one of my best," the man drawled, breaking the silence.

"I do, sir."

"Then how is it that you've had to move this captive twice in a single day?" The man asked. His hands laid flat on the wood of his desk then, calm and silent. Somehow, Thomas still thought he might as well have slammed them against the wood. His flinch was hard to hide.

"It seems we underestimated our enemy. They are not quite as defeated as we thought," Eliza said, her words short and clipped. Her nails dug deeper into Thomas' arm.

"That is a grave error, Eliza. They were supposedly defeated a decade ago."

Eliza's grip on Thomas' arm slackened a bit, and her shoulders fell. "I'm deeply sorry, sir."

"Take him to a guest room. We'll deal with this problem in the morning," the man declared.

"Of course, Mister Geheimnis," Eliza said, and she began to move.

"Not you, Eliza. I was speaking to Lionel there. You have other things to attend to, in order to begin making amends for your mistakes."

Eliza froze. But her taloned hand fell away from Thomas and a man who was standing at the door stepped forward and grabbed Thomas' other arm. The man at the desk, Mister Geheimnis, looked at Thomas with cold eyes.

"I hope you will find your lodgings comfortable. You may be there for a rather long time," he said. Then Lionel dragged Thomas out of the room. He stumbled to keep in step with the man. The last thing he saw of the room before the door closed were Mister Geheimnis' eyes, boring into him. Eyes that were a terribly familiar steely gray color.

The halls on the way to his new "room" were just as dark and imposing as anywhere else. Thomas tried his best to map the halls as they went, but each twist and turn led to a hallway nearly identical to the last. The layout was dizzying, almost.

He'd lost track of where they were by the time Lionel opened a door and shoved him inside. Thomas barely had time to take anything in before the lock was clicking into place, trapping him inside. Thomas turned, smacking his hands into the door like that would do anything. He wasn't sure if he dared to call out. After a moment he turned away from the door and looked back at the rest of the room.

The bed was large and plush. Everything was made from a dark, reddish wood, and the sheets were embroidered. There were two windows, both large with cushions on the sills. Outside, he could see the garden. It was a beautiful room, and it didn't seem anything like a cell, really. He'd spent enough time in cells in the past thirty hours that he felt he had a leg to stand on for such a judgement. He wandered over to the bed and sat down on it. He sank two inches into the mattress.

This was an awfully nice room for a prisoner. Thomas tried not to wonder about that. He tried not to wonder how long he had left before he stopped being worth the trouble, either.

Instead, he wondered what Darius was doing. He desperately hoped that the last time they spoke, the time Darius blew up at him, wouldn't be the last time they spoke at all. He hoped that his brother was doing alright without him. He always had been closed off. Thomas wondered, if they ever saw each other again, would Darius be more open? Could they become closer?

Remy popped up in Thomas' mind unbidden. The photograph on Mister Geheimnis' desk was a curious thing. And their eyes… their eyes matched.

Remy never had looked much like his father. Their matching ginger curls were about all that they had in common at a first glance. Remy didn't even look mixed race, as pale as he was, and Thomas knew that the Crofts had trouble with well-intentioned people getting the wrong idea about what was going on before. Thomas also knew that Remy's grandpa had him over for the weekends during summer vacation. But why would Remy's grandpa kidnap him , if indeed this man was who Thomas thought?

He was clearly a bargaining chip, though he was still shocked that they believed his father had survived being shot off a moving vehicle . A bargaining chip for what though? And for how long? It was clear that his father, Remus, wasn't going to let them manipulate him. So what would become of Thomas?

He had to leave. He couldn't just sit by and wait any longer, every moment was a moment they had to change their minds about keeping him alive. Not only that, but his stomach was growling loudly and he couldn't remember when he last ate. Besides, he was left alone now. He hadn't been alone since they kidnapped him.

Filled with a brand new sense of determination, Thomas rushed to the window and began to feel around the frame for a latch. After a few minutes, he had to give up. The windows wouldn't open. Although the glass didn't look like anything special. He tapped it. It sounded normal, though he admittedly didn't know if there were sound differences between sturdier types of glass. Even so, he wouldn't be able to break it with his bare hands.

There wasn't much in the room. The only thing he might be able to lift that could possibly break a window was the lamp on the bedside table. Thomas went over to it and scowled. It was bolted down to the surface of the bedside table with screws. He grumbled, looking around and finding nothing else. He went back to the lamp on the bedside table and tried to wrap his fingers around one of the screws.

After several long minutes, the screw rolled under his fingertips and Thomas sighed. It was still tight in the wood, but he'd managed to get it moving. It would take a long time, but he had all night.