"No pressure," the pudgy man said. But he felt comforted. He had as much support as someone could ask for. He motioned towards the backpack that held the Heaven's Eye with his chin. "We better get this inside. I'm gonna need to work with it for a while . . . match my will to its. Whoever created this thing had serious mojo and I don't want to make any mistakes."

“We'll get you set up," Anya said, giving the man a hug. He got a stiffy just being NEAR a woman like Anya.

“Hey guys," said Nathan excitedly. There was another man beside him when he emerged from the building.

"Snake?" Mindy exclaimed, embracing the thin man. Snake was one of the Strays who had left after the last battle with the Hellspawn. He was a thin man whose Talent was the ability to run at tremendous speed across or even up most any surface.

"Yeah," he said with a blush. "Nathan told me what was up and and I felt like crap for leaving anyway so "Don't," Mindy interrupted. “Don't beat yourself up over it.”

Arthur nodded. “No one should be here unless they're sure they want to be."

Snake nodded back. “I'm sure now."

Tarloh had just got done hugging Mindy and her brothers as well as Arthur. He picked up Natasha and Robbie in a single bone-crunching hug.

“Careful,” Robbie gasped. "We're still in a lot of pain.”

Tarloh put them down. “Let's go inside. I figure we all have stories to tell, and it will be easier if we're all there at the same time.”

"Where's Red?" Robbie asked, looking around.

Tarloh looked towards the head of the trail that led towards the cave. "She's up there. Follow the scent. You may want to have a few words with her," he said mysteriously.

Robbie's eyes opened wide. “Wait. That's the voice you use with her whenever she needs to talk to me about something stupid I did."

"Yeah," Tarloh said, leading the others inside.

"Screw that," Natasha mumbled as she looked at Robbie. "I'm going with you!"

The two of them wandered up the trail and found Red applying brick and mortar to the front of a cave, creating a fairly serviceable looking wall with an opening for a door. It didn't take much to notice that she wasn't moving as well as she should be. She had some visible bruises and cuts on her arm that were in the process of healing. She hadn't noticed them yet because they were downwind of her.

“Hey Sis," Robbie said.

Red spun around, an enormous smile creeping onto her face. She dropped what she was doing and picked up her “Little” brother in a fierce hug, though it obviously pained her somewhat to do so.

"Hey, I'm okay!" he said. While they did love each other, Red hadn't always been so overt in her affection towards her only remaining kin.

"What's got into you?"

"Nothing," she said, suddenly trying to compose herself.

"Then what the hell happened?" Natasha asked, touching a bruise on her cheek.

“Oh that? It's . . . " Red sighed. What was she going to say? That she ran into a door? And that it was carrying a knife and brought a couple of friends? "I'm okay. Really. It looks worse than it is.”

“If it WAS worse than it looked, you'd be in a pine box," Nat grumbled.