23 - Assessment//Lea, Foley

They walked home in complete silence.

Though Lea wanted to stand tall and face their situation head on, the truth was that this was all too much for her. Somebody had set out a fake Noiz to lure them out and capture them, and they'd succeeded.

Paxton, the nerdy boy who admired her family, had been taken.

There wasn't much thought to their current state, Lea had merely leaped off the building they'd last seen the rose gold phantom on and undone her transformation. Without a word Lea had done the same, and they'd started walking from the very center of town to the suburbs. To Lea's house.

Just like when her father had been arrested, Lea would find a spark of hope take over for a moment. When it was her dad, she imagined that they'd gotten the wrong guy, or that the theater troupe had forgiven him and set him free.

Now she imagined Paxton breaking free of the net and running off, she imagined him being at the door when they arrived at her house. He would be worried out of his mind, and he would push his glasses up on his nose fifty times in a row.

It made her pause for a moment, but the truth always crashed back down on her. She had no idea who had taken Paxton, no idea who Nora was so focused on catching, and no idea if Nora had any ideas of her own.

When they arrived home, Waco gave them a large smile from behind his walker. Lea could tell that his leg was bothering him more than normal, but she couldn't even find it in herself to stop him as he led them to the couch and offered them some hot chocolate.

"What's up with you two?" he asked as he handed them each a cup. The top of each cup was overflowing with marshmallows, just how Lea liked it, but she couldn't cheer up. "Where's Paxton?"

"Are you guys in a fight?" he continued. He took their lack of answer as a yes. "I've been in fights with friends, and it always seems like the end of the world, but you'll get over it."

He stopped speaking when he noticed Nora was on the verge of tears. Lea shrunk into herself, away from them both.

"Okay!" he said, clapping his hands together and almost falling sideways. "No more Paxton talk! I have a better idea."

-HEIST_ON-

There were quite a few advantages one had when they were a politician with high standing and above average charisma. No matter how ridiculous the words that came out of your mouth were, people always gave you some latitude to explain yourself.

If you played your cards right, you could even get the on your side. Shift the narrative your way.

Deanney had practically doubled over laughing when Mr. Foley mentioned magic, and Navy had grabbed the blood pressure kit for an emergency test. These were trying circumstances after all; they had just kidnapped a teenager.

But once Navy was satisfied with his blood pressure and temperature, and Deanney had gotten the humour out of her system, they both started to come around. How could they not when it explained all of Paradox City's eccentricities?

They had both seen the red monster that had terrorized the city last week, and Deanney had watched as a thousand volts of electricity passed through a young man who had ended up just fine.

By the time the boy finally woke up, they were on board to help Mr. Foley discover this brave new world where the Very Great Thing was just within his grasp.

He held up the blue stone, wrapped in it's strange metal trappings, and his own purple stone, clear as day in it's translucent shell, and watched as they glowed when they came in close proximity. It made his spine tingle in glee.

"I'm going in," Deanney said, grabbing a plastic bag and exiting the office.