A Birth day

Marcus and Angus had both heard the inhuman growling.

"So, can we take a moment here?" Marcus asked. "You left a hospital bed and came here to go toe to toe with a demon in your pajamas? That sounds like fun. Doesn't your family do anything normal?"

"This is normal for us," Angus said not taking his eyes of Rachel. Well, it had been Rachel. He wasn't sure if Rachel was in there at all at the moment. He took a couple paces over towards Rachel, but Marcus held him back from going any farther.

"Give it to us!" The voices screeched at him. Angus opened the box, and Marcus picked up the rock.

"This?" Marcus asked.

"Noooo. You cannot have it! He has to give it to us, not you!" The voices were angry with Marcus now. Angus took the rock back from Marcus and the thing started to glow in his hand, and then it made sense. Somehow ownership of this dark rock had transferred to Angus. That was why Marcus wasn't allowed to handle the rock. He didn't own it. Anise went over to Angus.

"It's not the rock, I don't think. That rock has energy. I can feel it. Its the energy and power in the rock it wants."

"Dark energy, is it?" Angus looked at her. She nodded. "Well, I can fix that." He held up the rock to show the entity that he had it. and the spirits began to shriek that Angus couldn't have it, but Angus didn't want them to have it either. So he used a wee bit of wandless magic and his own strength, and he formed his fist around the rock and then crushed it in his hand, the dark energies screaming with a deafening high pitched scream, and a foul looking and foul smelling dark smoke. Then it faded away. The entity in Rachel screeched and left her, and when it left, Reginald left her as well, leaving her in a limp heap on the grass.

"Marcus," Angus called, feeling like he had to sit--right that instant. Marcus lowered him onto the ground quickly, so he could sit.

Jack looked at Marcus and chuckled "That's Angus for ya" he said moving to stand close to him. He saw the stone and watched what Angus did to it "So he gone for good?" Jack asked moving to help sit Angus down along with Marcus Ruby followed them down to the grass transphiguring his PJs to proper attire.

"shame I liked those Pajamas on you" Ruby said "So what was that?" she asked, "because it looked like something from that witch" She meant the witch he had fought in the woods when he had saved the boys.

"yeah wasn't that off the staff of that black witch who took the boys?" Jack said but then looked to Marcus "We should get him home" he said Ruby looked at them.

"I'll make sure Evan, Rachel and the kids are okay," she said to them hoping they would agree to see Angus had just been threw surgery and needed to heal.

"It was a dark entity. I don't think it ever was human," Kate said. ' They feed on energy. It would have given them some significant power, I think, but Angus cut that possibility right off. Well done, Angus."

"No, this was from the tunnel under Ruby's old house," Angus said. "I was escaping and I picked it up. It looked important, so I took it, figuring that if it really was important, I'd have a bargaining chip if I got caught again. I just never gave it any thought of it afterward and tucked it away as a souvenir, I guess."

"Well, you were right, it was important," Robert said.

"The dark entities are gone," Anise said. "And that guy is gone--at least for the moment. He couldn't leave because the entity had him trapped. I don't know if he's gone for good or not."

"I'll get him home," Marcus said. "You lot stay and do what you need to do. I just wanted to give him a moment to rest before I took him home." Robert went over and crouched down in front of Angus and put his hand to Angus's forehead and deliberately transferred some of his own energies into Angus, knowing Angus was spent.

"There. That should get you home," Robert told Angus.

"Thank you," Angus said. Robert nodded , and he and Marcus helped Angus to his feet.

"Take care of him, Marcus," Robert said. Marcus nodded, and he ported Angus back home.

"So, anybody got a broom?" Michael asked, looking at all the destruction around them.

"Let's get to work, Boys and Girls," Robert said, going over to start checking Evan and his family, checking with Evan.

Ruby breathed out when Anise told them Reg was nowhere around " good riddance" she said and looked to Robert as he gave Angus some energy then they left. Now both Jack and Ruby wondered what they were to do, casting a water spell they both moved to the house and snuffed out any smouldering wood. Jack moved to Robert and looked at Evan "How is he?" he asked as Ruby moved next to Robert checking Rachel and the kids.

Once both were sure the clean-up crew were there and fixing the house they walked over to Robert "We should get back." Jack said Ruby motioned to some men where they should go and how it was to look.

"Thank you for all your help, Everyone. Simone and I will stay for a little, and then we'll be back," Edward said. "We couldn't have done it without you."

Marcus took Angus home and transfigured his clothes back to pajama trousers and helped him back to bed. Robert took Anise home and then went back to the main house to check on Michael. Anise was quiet now. Too quiet.

"Anise," Angus called. She obediently went over to him. "What's bothering you?"

"Nothing important," she said.

"No, no,' Angus said. 'Sit down here and talk to me. What is it?"

"Sometimes I'm a better fit with my own kind," she said.

"You're with your own kind," he said, trying to remind her she was human first. She explained how she had defended Robert and how differently the humans had reacted from how she would have been treated at home, where she'd have been praised for defending Fenrir.

"Sometimes, its just too hard," she said quietly.

"You're right,' he said, putting his good arm around her. "Sometimes, life is just plain hard. You made a judgment call, and I' won't fault you for it." She laid her head on his good shoulder and they just talked about how much she wanted to just fit in, and how much he thought she already did fit in. As he reassured her, he was starting to feel his eyes getting heavy, and he made sure he told her that he was very proud of her and that he liked having her as part of his family. Then he kissed the top of her head, reassuring her.

Jack and Ruby both nodded to Robert as they tied up loose ends and then headed back to the duplex, Ruby appeared then paused seeing Angus with Anise and smiled moving to kneel beside the bed she sighed " Anise, Im proud of you today" she said smiling to her " you controled yourself, " she said softly and kissed her forhead before heading to Edwards side and over to Simone and Caprice " how has she been?"she asked sitting down and looking at her " how do you do it, teens are hard, one minet I think Im doing good and the next its as if I i brought down their whole world." she said looking at Simone.

Jack returned and headed up to his room where he saw Jess sleeping , he washed up and changed into jeans and a fresh tee before heading down to grab a cup of coffee and check for any mail that had been delivered.

"I think maybe you might be misreading, just a little, what you're seeing," Simone said, "Sometimes being human is hard. I think we've probably all felt at times that sometimes being human stinks. Sometimes we'd like to be omnipotent, able to know things that are beyond our understanding. Or being perfect--doing every single thing right the first try. And I think for the girls, they struggle even more to try to adjust and adapt. I think you might be seeing some grief and maybe a little homesickness.

"I'm sure they miss their mother, and actually, I don't envy Phoebe's position at all, being a human in a pack of werewolves. I'm sure she has tried her best to raise them to have some of the same human morals and ethics that all humans do because, from what I've seen, the girls aren't entirely without values, despite whatever intent Fenrir had to want his pack to be purely animalistic. I'm sure Phoebe wanted to raise daughters and not 2 legged dogs because they're good girls, as much as any other sixteen year old girl is.

"Remember that, despite Jack's and Jessie's understanding of pack traditions, they were raised human too. Anise and Ginger don't have that. For Anise, the skirmish she was just in surely had to be confusing. If that incident with Rachel had happened in the pack camp, Rachel would have surely been killed, no doubt about it, especially for any outsider that attacks the alpha. Anise was only doing what pack rules told her she had to do--protect the alpha. I don't think she forgot who the alpha was for one second. She knows Robert is the alpha, and she likes him and believed she was doing the job that was surely expected of every member of her pack.

"You gave her some human structure because we don't do things that way, and she heard it. It wasn't wrong to give her those guidelines. Now, though, I think she feels punished, and it confuses her about why you wouldn't want her to protect our alpha from being strangled. I think it's only natural that she grieves sometimes that our world must seem really upside down from what she came from and that sometimes she doesn't fit
.
"The fact that she trusts both of you enough to tell you how she feels says a lot about how much she already loves you both. And, if you noticed, Angus never said you were wrong or undo what you wanted to teach her. Nor did he say she was wrong. For now, he's just helping her deal with the grief of living in a place that has to feel like an entirely different world to her. Give her the space to grieve a little. Ginger has had time alone while she was in sickbay to grieve about the trauma that she carries from being held in a cell for two years and about being removed from her pack because she's a liability to them, but Anise hasn't had that alone time by her own choice. She's been right with us from the moment she opens her eyes until bedtime."

Simone got up and looked in on Angus and Anise and saw Angus had dozed off, and Anise was still with him, like a child with her father, cuddled tight to him, his strong arm around her, and her head still on his shoulder, and she was slipping into a light doze of her own. Not saying a syllable, Simone motioned to Ruby and pointed them out to her.

"Look," Simone said softly. "That is security. She's home, and she feels safe again. Looks like it's all good again for her." Beyond them Andrew and Ginger were out on the deck with the baby, and the baby was in the moses basket in the fresh air while Andrew helped Ginger with a homework assignment.

Ruby listened to Simone , just listened to her talk she felt better for Simones words but still felt as if she'd done something wrong, walking over she saw Angus and Anise sleeping together, anise on top of the covers and Angus underneath. Ruby smiled " yeah, they do look peaceful." she said then looked out the window " so does Andrew and ginger." she said and looked to Simone "Thank you" she said simply as she then gave her a hug " guess I should start dinner for every one." she said " mind helping?" she asked having no clue as to what to make.

Jack headed back to the main house washed off the smell of fire and smoke and sat down in the living room his ribs now showing their displeashure at being moved around so much, he chose to ignore it as it was simply an ache he could do with out.

"Certainly," Simone answered Ruby. "How about I make a big kettle of Mullagatawny soup and maybe a loaf of soda bread, and you can make some mini chef salads of some sort--you know some sort of version of a chef salad but just in a side salad size. It'll all be quick and easy, not a lot of clean up, with plenty of leftovers if someone who is working a later shift gets the nibbles later on."

She gathered up the ingredients for soup and soda bread, brought them over to Angus and Ruby's and put on a large stockpot full of homemade Mulligatawny soup and put two large loaves of soda bread in the oven to bake. While that was going on, she found some fresh peaches and apricots in the pantry and made a quick fresh peach-apricot jam to go with the bread and a cinnamon honey butter.

Andrew came in from the deck and woke Angus and Anise so Angus would be awake enough to eat something for lunch, and Ginger soon followed laying her books temporarily on the desk.

"You'd better get onto your homework," Ginger told Anise. "We've got a history reading due tomorrow for Robert, and a geography paper due for Michael."

"Wasn't there something else too?" Anise asked.

"You should write these things down," Ginger frowned at her. "We were supposed to listen to three pieces of music--one classical, one jazz, and one piece of Scottish folk music."

"Where am I supposed to find those?" she sighed heavily, frustrated.

"Radio," Angus told her. "Ive got a small radio upstairs in my closet. I'll go up and get it after..."

"No you won't, Idjit," Marcus scowled. "Accio, Radio!" The little old transistor that still worked well to pick up wizarding radio stations floated down to Marcus. "One of us will show you how to use it after lunch," Marcus told them.

Ruby smiled and nodded to Simone " all right" she said and moved to the kitchen to gather things for the salad, she cut the lettuce and tomatoes placing them into a bowl along with cucumber, then she wuickly whipped up a light dressing to go with it making it taste nicer . Once finished she saw Angus and Anise awake " hey sleepy heads dinners almost ready" she said sending the salad and dishes over to the table . she looked back up hearing Macus accio a radio " its just two knobs that turn so you can find the chanel yu want" she aid and walked over as she dried her hands taking on she turned it to the right the other to the left and soon music played from it making her smile.

Returning to the kitchen she made a warm bottle for Caprice and set it on the table " Marcus could you bring Caprice in please." she asked