He scrubbed at the smudge. Nobody stopped him. They knew Ghost would have wanted it that way too.

"Nobody wants to kidnap me." They'd had plenty of opportunities. He went out alone all the time. He'd even lived on the street for a time. No one would have even noticed he was gone if he'd been taken then. Not a soul.

Now, Svetlana at least would notice. Alister would notice when he didn't show up when he was supposed to. Eros and the kids too... They were all in this together now. Jude had thrown his lot in with them.

The handprint ended up smudging around more than going away and Katrina thought it was time to leave. Jude wasn't sure where the towel should go. He wet it down again and wiped at the brown smudge. The outline was left and that made it hard to ignore the fact that it was a hand shape.

Somebody had been here that wasn't supposed to be. Jude gripped the towel in his fist, ducked under the tape and stomped down the stairs. How did this all get so messed up?

“Makes sense to me.” He nodded and spoke quietly to Katrina. He looked to Jude and felt a near heart breaking sympathy for him, His questions went unanswered, It was reasonable, He wouldn’t be as contained as Jude managed to be right now, He wasn’t sure how to Handle it. He followed Jude out and waited for Katrina near the door carefully wiping the door knob after she let it go.

He didn’t know what to say, so He didn’t He looked over Katrina’s features that were a mixture of emotions, these people were in pain and he was clueless as how to help. Or what he was helping with. The most he could do is be sure his shoulders were there to lean on.

“we better catch up, this has got to be harder on him then he is letting show.” At least he was stomping now, angry was better than the icy calm he had been showing thus far.

Jude sounded so confident that no one wanted to kidnap him. Katrina wasn't so sure. She'd met at least one sick and twisted individual who kidnapped people for no reason at all that she could tell. Other people, she had heard, got kidnapped because they had awesome mutations that they wanted to take advantage of. Well, Jude had a pretty awesome mutation now, which could potentially make him a target, too.

“Just, be careful, okay?”

He hadn't been kidnapped yet. That didn't mean someone couldn't develop an interest in him later. Or maybe someone was already interested, and hadn't yet been successful.

Katrina nodded somberly. Yes, this probably was hard on Jude. It was plenty hard on her, and Ghost was just her friend, not part of her family like she was for the age shifted french boy. As for Sebastian, she knew him more like she'd know a character from a book she'd read a hundred times; she'd observed him and dreamed possible futures about him, but, again, not family.

The little illusionist walked out of the apartment, feeling a little dazed. There had been so much bad in there, so much negative energy that the feeling of life in the place was completely gone. It was hard to imagine that not long ago it was a home. Now it was just a cold, awful crime scene without anyone certain what the crime actually was.

The lifelessness seemed to follow them even out of the apartment. Lifeless hallways, lifeless stairway, lifeless clinic...

"So, I spoke with someone down at the department, and they said..."

Shin stopped talking. His eyes had swung away from Kealey, up to the back stairs of the clinic. Katrina and some others were there.

Why were Katrina and some others there?

"Hey, guys..." He trailed.

Somehow, he suddenly got the impression Kealey and him weren't going to get to pop in and out of the apartment, getting some things in a snap.

Kealey had been walking next to Shin, eager to hear what he had found out from his cohorts at the police station. Technically their apartment was still the scene of a crime. Or crimes. Something bad.

How could they stay there, knowing what had happened to Ghost, just down the hall? And Sebastian? And Jude? The whole thing was worrying, but Kealey knew she couldn't get too down about it. Shin was already giving himself enough grief, he didn't need hers on top of it all.

In fact...why was she being so negative in general? Hadn't she been the one to tell Shin that they'd figure things out? That somehow they'd find a way to help.

Shin spoke more, not about the police station, and Kealey was pulled from her thoughts by the realization that they weren't alone, and that she'd found the source of her negativity.

Shin had asked the only question Kealey had to start, so she simply looked up at the children on the stairs. Waiting for what she hoped were answers.

He was mad and entirely too pessimistic. Where were they? Where was anybody?

> "Hey, guys..."[/color]

Shin. And Kealey. It was like magic. He didn't have a summoning power did he? No. Aedus was supposed to be lava. Jude needed to go see Svetty.

"I..." He had questions. He really did. But instead his eyes started watering and his throat started closing. This was horrible. Manly men didn't cry in front of pretty ladies like Kealey. He used the back of a clenched fist to wipe at his eyes. "What happened?"

Aedus raised an eyebrow at the pair that Jude just ran into at the bottom of the stairs…the blonde x-man from the Skating rink, Kealey and her x-man boyfriend? Hopefully the man wasn’t the jealous type. He didn’t exactly look dangerous, but then what mutant did? Well some of them, but plenty didn’t. He looked at Katrina out of the corner of his eye; she was consumed with the same mood that he had been after leaving that particularly heinous scene. He walked down the stairs keeping pace with Katrina; he would have rushed down to Jude’s side if he didn’t recognize the pair as some of the good guys.

He was however still curious to hear what they had to say. If there were clues in the increasingly confusing tale of what the heck was going on around here. He took up a position to the back of Jude to remain unobtrusive.

Shin and Kealey.

Coming up the stairs.

Jude, speaking to them, expecting them to know him.

From their eyes, though, they didn't recognize him. They were both looking at her for all the answers. Which was all for the better, since Jude sounded a little choked up at the moment any way.

“Jude,” her voice was quiet, “we'll find them.” Katrina stepped forward and down a step until she was even with the twenty-something preteen boy and put a comforting hand on his arm. She'd give him a hug, too, if he wanted one.

To the adults, she spoke up so they could hear better, “Shin, Kealey. I'm glad we bumped into you.” Though, 'glad' might not have been the most accurate term for how she was feeling. Relieved was more like it. A little relief and a little hope in a little boat in a sea of worry and sadness and confusion.

“We... we're trying to find Ghost and Sebastian.” Once she got started, the rest of the story just came rushing out. “The apartment and the shop where Jude and I work got trashed on the same day, and Ghost and Sebastian have also been missing since then, and something is really, really wrong. Ghost is pregnant and Sebastian was building a crib, and everything in the whole apartment was smashed including the sewing machine and the mirror and there was blood in the bathroom, a hand print, and in the sink...” she took a deep breath, then continued he eyes getting a little watery, too, even though she was trying to help Jude keep from crying, “and you live here, so we were wondering if you two know anything that could help us find them.”

Her ashen eyes, wet but not yet dripping, looked from one adult to the other. Sad, but hopeful, too. “Anything at all?”

He'd known it was bad. He'd heard from the police, about what was suspected to happen. About how Ghost was suspected dead. Of who the prime suspect was. That rumor had even spread to where he worked. In fact, he'd probably helped a bit in its spreading. But still, hearing it from out of the mouth of babes.

By which, he of course, meant Katrina was still young. Practically a child. Nobody's kitten, yet.

It was shocking. Hearing it. From out of the mouth of such a young girl. In such detail. After trespassing on what was technically still a murder scene with two unknown adult males.

He had not caught Jude's name mentioned. He did not know of this Aedus guy. Kealey had not shared that specific tale of hot drinks.

All he knew was what he had been about to tell Kealey. And he could recite that. Although it sounded to him like... they already suspected the worst. And unfortunately for them, he lacked anything in that ball of knowledge he held that he could share with them to point them in a proper direction.

Shin's heart (and his face!) sank. "I'm sorry. I don't. I just know what they're saying down at the police station. About how Ghost is suspected... dead. And how they think Sebastian might have..." He couldn't really finish that sentence. After all, it was crazy. To think Sebastian could do that. He felt silly. In fact. This whole thing had to be a joke. A cruel... joke. That nobody in their right minds ever would laugh about. "I still can't quite believe that. And."

Shin looked to Kealey. Somehow, a decision had been made in his head. He couldn't. After all of this. He simply couldn't. "I don't think we're going to live here anymore."

All Kealey could do was nod and listen. The emotions of the newly assembled group were so heavy, so, so...hopeless that it was making her eyes water. Shin spoke, and if possible...things got worse. Her eyes brimmed and she sniffled, wiping them with the back of her hand. It wasn’t true. It just wasn’t. Ghost wasn’t dead and Sebastian hadn’t...hadn’t...

Katrina wanted to know if they knew anything, and her sad hope pushed the blonde’s mood down even further. There were people with Kat, but Kealey couldn’t focus well enough to look them over. They were helping, and Kat didn’t seem like she was in any danger from them. They were inconsequential.

Then Shin said something that made her look up. Up and over at him, narrowing her focus to his emotions and digesting the statement he’d just made.

She shook her head and finally spoke. ”No. I don’t think we will.” They hadn’t spoken about it...but the decision felt right.

”Ghost is alive. I know she is.”

”But we weren’t home. We...didn’t know.”