by Saless
Chapter 56

The reporter went on, but it was mostly a repeat of what she'd already said. "I guess we got out of there just in the nick of time." Mike said with a weak chuckle.

"This could be bad. What if they figure out it was us?" Sarah asked, a tinge of panic beginning to appear in her voice.

Erica wrapped an arm around her and pulled her close. "There's no way they could do that. Even if they figured out we were there, we'd just say we have no idea what happened and there's no way they can prove otherwise. Just make sure not to be seen lobbing any fireballs around!" Erica said with a chuckle.

"That goes for you, too, Mike. Yours and Sarah's powers are the most visible; you'll need to be careful not to let anyone see you using them. I'll spend as much time working with Vash to hone my abilities as I can, so I can sense when we're being watched or not." Jill said.

"Don't worry too much, Jill. Getting all worked up and jumping at our own shadows is the surest way to let anyone looking know that we have something to hide. So long as we stay calm and act as if nothing is going on we'll be fine." Erica said.

"Erica's right, we need to be careful, but if we're too tense we'll give ourselves away." Mike said.

"Okay, then why don't we relax with a movie?" Jill suggested. The others agreed and Sarah picked out a movie. The couch was too small for all four of them, but Erica solved this problem by pulling Sarah onto her lap.

Soon they'd all put their worries aside and were enjoying the movie. Sarah fell asleep again only a short while after the movie started, and Mike and Jill joined her by the middle of the movie. Erica never fell asleep, but saw little of the movie anyway as her attention was completely taken up by Sarah.

Erica was stroking Sarah's hair, long after the movie had ended, when she finally woke up. "Hey sleepy, how are you feeling?" Erica asked softly.

"Mmm, comfy!" Sarah replied, snuggling deeper into Erica's arms.

Erica giggled and kissed the top of her head (she couldn't reach anything else), "Feeling better, I take it?"

"Mm hmm." Sarah agreed.

"Well I hope you don't need me to go anywhere anytime soon, my legs fell asleep an hour ago." Erica said.

Sarah titled her head back to look up at Erica and said, "Want me to kiss it better?" with a wicked grin.

Erica blushed and stammered, "Uh, well, your kisses always do make me feel better."

"Good!" Sarah exclaimed, and reached up and kissed her. They both lost track of the world for a while until Mike cleared his throat loudly and they separated, both blushing furiously.

"Sorry to interrupt." Mike said sheepishly, rubbing his sore neck. "I guess we slept through the movie."

Jill roused beside him and started crawling into his lap. Surprised, he was about to say something when she latched her lips onto his.

"I think maybe she's picking up your feelings again." Erica said, grinning.

"I don't mind, so long as she doesn't take his clothes off!" Sarah replied with an answering grin.

*Sigh* I can see my work is far from done here. Vash grumbled. Soon after Jill started relaxing and slowly sat back from Mike. We need to start on that training. Vash said to her.

Jill looked over at Mike and then to Sarah and Erica and blushed. "I did it again, didn't I?" she said.

"Hey, I'm not complaining!" Mike said, laughing.

"Even so, I think Vash is right. I'd better get working on that training sooner rather than later." Jill said. She moved over to the recliner and laid back. Vash jumped up on her lap and curled up.

"Well, I guess she's going to be indisposed for a while." Mike said.

"Did you guys bring in all the stuff from my car while I was out?" Sarah asked. Mike shook his head. "Why don't you do that, and I'll make dinner."

"With my help." Erica said.

Sarah smiled, "Once you get your legs working again, anyway, right?"

Erica grimaced, "Yeah, there is that."

"Legs fall asleep?" Mike asked. Erica nodded. "Try massaging them, get the blood flowing." With that he went out to start hauling stuff in.

"Want me to massage your legs?" Sarah asked. Erica nodded and lay down on the couch. Sarah worked on her legs until after Mike had brought his first armful.

"How's that?" Sarah asked.

"Much better, thanks." Erica replied. Sarah helped her up and they went into the kitchen to get started on dinner.

Mike finished well before the others and sat on the couching watching Jill. When Sarah called out that dinner was ready he touched her shoulder to get her attention and told her.

"Oh, thanks Mike. I'll be right there." Jill said without opening her eyes. He shrugged and went into the kitchen to eat. Jill, and Vash, did join him shortly thereafter.

After dinner they turned the TV back on, but there was nothing else on the news about the damage they'd done. "Is it a good thing, or a bad thing, that they're not talking about it anymore?" Mike asked.

"I don't think it really means anything. Unless they come up with some theory about how it happened it's just a curiosity right now. And I doubt they'd share their theories with the press." Erica replied.

"And who is 'they'?" Jill asked.

Erica shrugged, "The police, fire department, whoever is investigating it. I'm sure someone is, but there's no telling who. If we're really unlucky it could even be the FBI or Homeland Security."

"You don't sound too worried about that." Jill said.

"Like I said, they don't have anything on us. There's no proof we did anything. Although, it might not be a bad idea to find a place to hide our weapons and such, just in case they search the apartments." Erica said thoughtfully.

"Do you really think that will happen?" Sarah asked.

"Probably not, but it wouldn't hurt to be prepared. But where can we hide it?" Erica wondered aloud.

"I suppose we could hide it at my parents' house." Mike said doubtfully.

"No, then we might get them in trouble. It's got to be somewhere where they'll never look. Or can't look!" Erica exclaimed, looking at Sarah.

"What?" Sarah asked.

"We can hide our stuff in another world. You can't get any safer than that!" Erica replied.

"Except when someone walks off with it." Jill said.

"Not if we use a world that has no life on it." Erica said. "Sarah has a book of short stories that has a story that ends that way."

"More than one." Sarah said. "That could work. I'll get it." She looked through her books and came back with it. "What do we want to stash there?" Sarah asked as she looked for the story.

"Just about everything. Even most of the stuff that isn't an obvious weapon is far too valuable for us to have." Erica replied.

"What about my ring?" Jill asked, fingering the ring she'd worn since Vash gave it to her.

"I think you can get away with that." Erica said.

"Here it is." Sarah said. "Want me to open the portal now?"

"You might as well; we should scout it out before bringing our stuff." Mike said. Sarah opened the portal and they stepped through. It opened onto a city street that was eerily quiet. Cars were stopped in the middle of the street, but there weren't any people in them.

"This is creepy." Jill said.

Sarah nodded, "Yeah, but it's exactly what we need. We just need to pick a building to stash our stuff in."

"Just about any building should do." Erica said, looking around at the surrounded structures. "That one is empty, let's use it." She said, pointing at an obviously empty storefront. The door was locked.

"Mike, can you get this open?" Jill asked.

"I guess, but I'd have to use one of my larger forms to force it and I might do more damage than I want." Mike replied.

"I think I can get it." Sarah said. She touched her index finger to the lock and a blue glow gathered there and flashed into the lock. The whole door shook and the lock fell out on the other side.

"I guess that practice did you some good." Erica said. They walked in and found the empty store was clean except for a fine coating of dust.

"I don't feel comfortable having our stuff sitting out here where it can be seen from the street. Maybe we should use the storage area in back." Jill said.

"Jill, we're the only ones on this entire planet! There's nothing to worry about." Erica said.

"It's no big deal; we can open the portal there as easily as in here." Sarah said. Erica shrugged and they went into the back. It was as clean as the rest so Sarah went ahead and opened the portal.