“Lucy’s alive…” Naser told himself for what must have been the hundredth time that morning. “She’s... alive… h-holy shit…” 

   The young doctor barely got any sleep last night. The news of his sister’s continuance made sure of that. At most, he got maybe an hour’s worth of slumber in his office before the restlessness snapped him back into the waking world. Since then, he had wandered the halls of the hospital like a specter, occasionally doing the work expected of him as a physician but mostly hovering somewhere between lucidity and unclarity. As night turned to dawn, he had found his mind wandering too much. Grabbing several cups worth of espresso, he had excused himself to the hospital’s rooftop to get fresh air and hopefully get his thoughts back on track. Unfortunately for him, fresh air brought him neither peace nor clarity of mind. The coffee kept him wide awake, yes, but wakefulness proved to be more a curse than a blessing.

   Naser walks past the small communal area used by patients and staff alike, past the helicopter landing pad used for the offloading of critically injured patients or the occasional CEO visiting them, and towards one of the edges overlooking the city of Volcaldera. Downing the last of his espresso and crushing the paper cup in his hand, and letting it get carried off by the wind, the ptero cast his gaze towards the cityscape. As he did, he feels his brows crease as something in his chest starts to burn. “She’s out there somewhere,” he whispers, grabbing the railing with both hands and grasping the metal with enough force to make his knuckles go white. “She’s out there… and only Anon knows where…” He shuts his eyes, grits his teeth, and hisses furiously as his grip on the rails tightens. “ANON!!” he screams at the top of his lungs.

   Naser breathes raggedly as he allows the anger in him to bubble over. For a moment, he expects to think of terrible things to do to the caveman who had caused him and his family so much vexation for four years. But as he feels the anger boil again, Naser realizes that his rage isn’t aimed at his former friend...

   Naser lets go of the railing and brings his shaky hands up to his eyes. In his palms, he can still feel the memory of Anon’s smooth skin pressed against his scales as his digits wrapped around his once good friend’s neck, squeezing to snuff out his life. The shame grows again in the ptero’s heart as he realizes how close and how willing he had been to kill his old friend. The guilt only grows as he remembers that he is supposed to be the very antithesis of death. His hands were pledged to protect and nurture life, not take it away...

   ‘What kind of doctor am I?’ Naser woefully ponders as he shuffles towards the nearest bench. As he takes a seat, he shifts his thoughts away from his attempted malpractice. Instead, he focuses on the good that had come out of the ordeal and the reason why even if he was still angry at Anon, he couldn’t bring himself to hate him anymore…

   ‘Lucy. He saw her. He confirmed she’s still kicking. After all these years, she's still alive…” He whispers, a smile spreading across his lips as tears once again well in his eyes. Sweet memories of his sister’s antics play in his mind as the young doctor does his best to every good time he shared with Lucy. He stops himself before the bad memories can fully flow. He wants only to feel the joy of that moment, even if a big part of his soul’s telling him that he doesn’t deserve it. 

   Not after…

   “Doctor Naser. There you are.” a voice snaps the young ptero out of his thoughtfulness before the bad memories can take complete control over him. “Been looking all over the hospital for you,” Director Joshua, Volcadera Bluffs General’s head doctor, and Naser’s topmost boss says before walking up to greet his junior. He hasn’t taken more than a dozen steps before he notices Naser’s troubled expression. Soon as he does, he slows his pace and takes a deep breath. 

   Without saying a word, he walks past his junior. He turns his attention to admiring the morning scenery on the horizon instead. “Beautiful morning we’re experiencing today, aren’t we?” He asks in a melodious, sagely tone.

   “Yes, Mr. Joshua,” Naser says before letting out a sniff and wiping his eyes clear. He then takes a deep breath and slaps himself on the cheeks to psyche himself up.

   The elder archelon nods as he turns to face Naser. “You holding up okay?” he asks in as gentle a voice as he can muster.

   Naser nods and smiles at his boss. “I… I just had a rough night.”

   “So I hear,” Doctor Joshua replies as he walks up to stand right beside Naser’s bench. “Do you mind?” he asked, pointing to the spot next to the ptero.

   Naser shakes his head and scoots over, giving his boss more than enough room to take a seat.

   “You didn’t go home last night at all, did you?”

   “N-no,” Naser answers intermittently.

   “Were you that worried about your brother?” The director asks, all the while smiling warmly at Naser. “He should be well and ready to be dismissed later today if I’m not mistaken.”

   Naser nods and tries to give his boss a warm and confident smile. Instead, he finds his lips unable to maintain any sort of smile for more than a few seconds.

   Doctor Joshua sighs and removes his glasses, bringing out a small handkerchief and proceeding to wipe his glasses clean. “Something else’s on your mind, isn’t it?” the elder dino asks as he continues wiping the lenses of any blemishes.

   Naser shuts his eyes and stands up from the bench. The mixture of excitement, regret, joy, and sorrow almost causes his body to go haywire.

   “I-I’m sorry, Mr. Joshua. It’s just that I… I recently found out from none other than my b-brother that my—our—sister… is still alive!”

   Dr. Joshua’s eyes lit up with genuine excitement. “That’s wonderful news!”

   Naser rubs his head and begins pacing back and forth impatiently. “Yes, absolutely wonderful… except that I haven’t seen her in four years, a-and we didn’t leave on the best of terms… and also our parents may or may not hate us for…” Naser stops at that thought and grabs his head with both hands, all the while letting out a groan of pain. “I… I don’t know what to feel right now! I want to be ecstatic that a family member I was convinced was dead for the last four years is alive. At the same time, I don’t know what she’s been up to or if she even remembers me or if she WANTS to remember me. There’s also the problem that only my brother knows where she is, and we have to go and find her, and then our parents will get involved and who knows how they’ll react a—”

   “Doctor Naser,” Director Joshua snaps in a stern yet comforting voice. “You are making a mountain out of a molehill here. You have to relax, take a deep breath, and roll with the punches that life’s dealing you.” He stands and walks up to the young doctor, all the while looking deep into his eyes with a wisdom that only decades of life experience can bring. “Part of living is learning how to adapt to all the surprises life brings us.” he puts a hand on the young ptero’s shoulder and gives him a sage grin. “If you’re willing to work hard, adapt where necessary, and never give up on yourself and those you care about, there’s nothing you can’t achieve.”   

   The elder dino taps Naser on the shoulder a few times before walking past him. Naser follows his boss with his gaze, the archelon's words ringing in his head and helping dispel much of his previous unease.

   “Doctor Naser,” Director Joshua suddenly starts, snapping the young ptero’s attention back to him. “You’ve had a rough time with your brother and now with your sister by the sounds of it. So after you complete this morning’s tasks and discharge your sibling, I’m giving you the rest of the week off, barring an extreme emergency, of course.”

   “W-what?” Naser stutters his question, completely dumbfounded by his boss’ words.

   Director Joshua only guffaws at his junior's reaction. “Go help your brother. Reconcile with your sister. Get some actual sleep and stop drinking so much espresso. That stuff’s not good for you young'uns,” the elder dino commands, all the while adjusting his glasses.

   “Bu-but—”

   Director Joshua raises a hand, stopping Naser’s words before he can fully form them. “Doctor’s orders,” he says before allowing himself another hearty laugh. “Now, if you excuse me, I have a nice hearty breakfast with the missus waiting for me. See you in a week!”

   Naser can only watch in utter dumbfoundment as his boss leaves the roof the same way he had come.

   Perhaps for the first time in the last day and a half, Naser felt what he needed to do next. His emotions weren’t all settled yet, but he at least knew with which foot he needed to start walking.

   That was far more than he’d known in the last four years. 

 

***

A few hours after his rooftop situation, Naser walks down the hospital hall. As he does, he looks down at the clipboard in his hand. He scans the name printed in the standard type-font Volcaldera General used on all their paperwork: 

   ‘Anon Y. Mous - Discharge approved by Dr. Naser Aaran.’ 

   The pterodactyl can hardly still believe where he was going and for what purpose. He hated Anon’s guts a day prior and wanted nothing more than to strangle him and leave him dead in some ditch somewhere. 

   Of course, it was a morbid form of thinking, one that a doctor shouldn’t even consider in the first place. “So stop thinking like that,” Naser snaps at himself during a rare moment when there aren’t other members of his hospital’s staff within earshot. “Focus on the here and now.”

   The here and now… now that was another can of worms Naser still can’t wrap his head around. Barely one week back in Volcaldera, and he had already found the person that for the last four years had kept the fire of hate burning in his soul. Yet not one day after meeting him, all of that hate had been snuffed out at the revelation that person had brought with them...

   Naser still wanted to hate Anon. A part of him felt like he needed that hate to keep going, much like how a junkie needs their next hit of drugs. Yet, just like an addict, breaking the dependency was the best thing to do. In his case, letting go of the hate had led to him seeing things differently. Now for the first time in what felt like forever, he felt a sense of hope. That absolution could be around the corner. It still didn’t change the fact that he found his situation surreal... like something out of a Twilight Zone episode.

   Naser picks up his pace and reaches Anon’s room. Without so much as a knock, he opens the door and walks in. Thankfully for Naser, Anon’s already dressed in the same attire he was found in, only clean of filth. The only sign left on the human now that showed he had suffered physical harm were the white bandages dotted across his face.  

   On seeing the human wearing his plain black turtleneck, navy blue pants, and black wool beanie, Naser can't help but feel a sense of longing for the old. Somehow, he imagined that Anon would still be wearing the same outfit he had donned in high school, even four years later. Seeing his new wardrobe was a sobering reminder of how long a time four years were. At the same time, he also wondered if Anon’s spartan fashion style resulted from his time in the navy or if it was personal taste.

   Naser walked up to the caveman and fixed him with his most professional gaze. Last he checked, he was still a doctor, even if he had come dangerously close to throwing all that away a day earlier. Whatever other feelings he might have for the human still, he was now his physician first and foremost.

   “Well, Anon, aside from the lacerations to your face, you're fully detoxed and have suffered no permanent brain damage. That means that as your physician, I can officially discharge you… on the condition that you don’t drink or smoke or do anything stupid, harmful, or stupidly harmful to yourself for at least a month.”

   Naser finishes his word in stunned surprise. He had expected his every word to taste like vile, but now that he was more or less on good terms with Anon, it felt like he was trying to care for an old friend. Granted, the human was an old friend. It so happened that he did something that he found unforgivable. But whatever beef he might still have with the petite caveman no longer mattered. Anon had given him hope of seeing his little sister again. Hope he had all but given up on years ago.

   Despite being given the go-ahead to leave, Anon couldn’t find it in himself to move an inch. Something kept his feet rooted to the ground. It was almost as if some invisible weight still lingered over him. He reaches into his pocket to instinctively search for a cigarette, only to realize that he has none on his person. He can’t help but grumble at his little blunder, his shoulders dropping and his brow furrowing in mild agitation.

   Naser takes notice and raises an eyebrow. “What’s wrong?”

   Anon sighs. “I’m so used to smoking away what ails me that not being able to… fucking sucks.”

   Naser lets out a single chuckle and puts the clipboard under his arm. “Cry me a river,” Naser replies with a mocking grin. “I’m surprised we didn’t find lung cancer or some other fucked up shit in you after all those years of smoking and drinking.”

   Anon lets out a grumble, his disposition dropping further. “I’ve only been smoking hard for the last few weeks. Fucking navy doesn’t allow smoking on their ships, especially the warships.”

   Naser’s eyes broadened. “So you were stationed on a legit warship? And here I thought you wound up in some dinghy.”

   Anon shakes his head. “I wish. I wound up in an aircraft carrier. I spent most of my days around live munitions and jet fuel.” The human put on an exhausted smile. “You can imagine what would have happened if I smoked around that?”

   Naser has a few flashes to old WW2 movies he saw when he was younger where ships exploded left and right. It makes him cringe a bit, imagining such fireballs caused by a smoking sailor.

   Putting that image out of his mind, Naser instead turns his thoughts to a question that's been burning him since finding out Anon had joined the navy. “What exactly did you do in the navy?”

   Anon fidgets his body around before letting out a sigh. “You’ve probably seen my record by now. Might as well come clean.” He walks up to the sofa chair Stella had been using hours earlier and takes a seat, all the while keeping his eyes square on Naser. “After I dropped out of High School, I had no real prospects in life. My dad only paid for the Skin Row apartment for four months extra after I graduated high school. After that, it was either college or the service. Since I dropped out, I naturally chose the service.”

   “Why the navy, though?” Naser asks.

   “Because the navy was the only armed branch that was willing to give a high school dropout like me a chance. Also, a lot of the ships want small-stature people. Me being a literal runt of a human was perfect for ‘em.” Anon bitterly laughs as he stretches his arms upwards. “Also, the navy got me the fuck out of Volcaldera. I was at boot camp within the week. After surviving that wonderful experience, I was stuffed into a carrier and sent to sail the seas for four years. It would have been five had it not been for my accident on those stairwells.”

   “You still haven’t told me what you did in the navy,” Naser comments impatiently.

   Anon grimaces and shoots a glare towards Naser. “I’m getting there. I’m getting there!” He let out a snort and continued. “Anyway. Once I was a full-fledged seaman—don’t you dare fucking laugh!—” Anon barks and points a finger towards Naser, who only raises a hand in a sign of peace “—I joined the PACT program so I could get myself some engineering know-how. Aside from that, they taught me a bunch of other stuff you’d expect to learn on a warship: munition loading, electrical know-how, survival training, physical conditioning, and over a hundred ways to clean a ship with only a toothbrush and seawater." 

   "That sounds..." Naser started but found he had no accurate quip regarding that last thing Anon mentioned. "...Interesting," he only said before shaking his head. 

   Anon let out another chuckle. "The one thing I didn’t expect to learn was the glorious art of CQC. Guess they wanted us fit and ready to fight off pirates or some bullshit like that.”

   “CQC?” Naser asks.

   “Close Quarter Combat,” Anon replies with yet another tired sigh. “How to fight hand to hand and with certain tools like knives. If you’ve seen MMA, it’s kinda like that, only a hell of a lot less flashy and more deadly.”

   Naser’s eyes swell again. “Wait a second then,” he looks at Anon with a bewildered stare. “Are telling me that back when I was… strangling you, you could’ve—”

   “—Reversed your choke and snapped your neck several dozen ways? Probably,” Anon finishes Naser’s words with a bitter grin on his lips. “I didn’t because… a part of me knew I deserved that strangling. Plus…” Anon looks at Naser with a soft gaze. “I… I guess I trusted you enough not to kill me.”

   Naser blinks a few times, almost as if his brain was having a hard time processing the information it had received.

   “What about you?” Anon suddenly asks, breaking his train of thought. “What has the prodigal son of the Aaran’s been up to these last four years?”

   Naser visibly flinches at Anon’s words, but he does his best to keep a scowl from forming on his face. “I went straight to medical school as soon as I graduated. I didn’t give myself any breaks or anything.”

   Anon raises an eyebrow and lets out a whistle. “Damn, and here I thought you’d propose to Naomi or something. How’s she, by the way?”

   Naser’s expression darkens. His only reply is to look down to the floor.

   Anon catches the mood right away and shakes his head. “Fuck. That bad, huh?”

   “Naomi and I…” Naser starts but stops himself. He takes a deep breath and forces a smirk on his lips. “Naomi and I went our separate ways shortly after graduation.”

   Anon raised an eyebrow in response. “She dumped you, didn’t she?”

   Naser puts a hand on his face and shakes his head. “Damn… Is it that obvious?”

   Anon shrugs and gives his old friend a warm yet sour smile. “A bit. Though I’m mostly going by the fact that Naomi was a bitch.”

   Naser’s surprised to hear the words come out of Anon’s mouth. A part of him wants to punch the human for even daring to say such a thing about his ex, but deep down, he knows his old friend—turned one-sided enemy, and now back to a friend—is correct.

   Anon leans back on his chair and lets out a chuckle. “Did you know that Naomi tried to set Fang and me up back in the day?”

   Naser’s shoulders slump a bit at Anon’s words. Some part of him had always suspected, but he never dared to accept it for fear of what it would mean. But hearing it from Anon all but made it an irrefutable fact, and it stung at his soul.

   “I… I guess I suspected it…” Naser answers meekly.

   “Naomi thought that if Fang and I dated, your sister would magically get ‘fixed’ of all her problems or some idiotic bullcrap that only Naomi could think up. Barring that, that our dating would keep Fang from bothering you so much. That bitch Naomi could then have you all to herself to do as she pleased.” Anon sat back up and looked at Naser with sunken, tired eyes. “Too bad she picked me to date your sister. I was probably the worst person she could have chosen for the job..”

   Naser wanted to say something in rebuttal to Anon’s words, but harsh as they were, his words rang true. Naomi had shown her true colors in the end, and everyone fell into her ploy without any means of seeing the truth until it was far too late. Anon may have been responsible for breaking Fang’s heart, but that only happened because Naomi forced them together in the first place. Still, as bad as things got in the end for them, Naser knew that Anon and Fang had shared a connection. They had enjoyed good times and had made each other happy. At least before their apocalyptic break-up. 

   While Naser didn’t believe in multiple universes, he hoped to god that there was a reality out there where everything turned out alright and that Anon and Lucy had found some semblance of a happily ever after...

   The room goes quiet for about a full minute. After that minute passes, Naser walks up to the now-empty medical bed and sits down, setting the clipboard to the side as he staring deep into Anon’s eyes.

   “Anon, I’ve already told you that I believe you about Lucy, but I need to know the truth. Did you really see her a week ago?”

   “Yes. I really did.”

   “W-where!?” Naser asks in more of a panic.

   “She was playing in some shitty pizzeria called ‘Pizza Time’ back in Skin Row.”

   “W-what did she look like? Was she well-fed? Was she thin? D-did she still have all her extremities attached!?”

   At the question, Anon hesitates. He doesn’t want to break Naser’s spirit any more, but something tells him that lying about Fang’s physical state wouldn’t help anyone. ‘Naser deserves to know the truth too…’ the human reasons as he decides he’s done keeping things from others.

   “Fang, she… she looked thin. Malnourished, even. She had this gaunt look to her like the last four years have worn down her spirit to the point where she’s more of an automaton animated by neurotransmitters than a person...” Anon sighs as the bitter memories of the day he had failed for the second time in his life flood back in. “She… she literally looked right through me, as if I wasn’t even there, and I was sitting so close to that stage…” He gives Naser a look full of regret. “I… know I said she was still alive, but the way she looked… I would say that only applies to her physically…”

   Naser Stands up and glares daggers at Anon. For a few moments, the fires of hatred again ignite within the ptero’s soul. For the faintest of moments, he considers cursing out Anon for what he did, how his actions led to Fang’s current state of living death… but that fire dies as quickly as it ignited as the young doctor remembers Anon’s words the last time they met.

   Instead of punching the human as he originally wanted, Naser winds up grabbing anon by the sides of his shirt and forcing him to stand up, so the two are eye to eye with one another. 

   “You saw Lucy looking like that and just walked away!?” Naser shouts at Anon’s face. “What is wrong with you!?”

   Anon shifts his eyes to the side, his expression dropping as he silently agrees with Naser’s assessment of him.

   “W-well!” Naser shouts, all the while shaking Anon. “Don’t you have anything to say!?” 

   Naser’s brow only furrows when Anon gives him no answer.

   “No,” Anon whispers in reply.

   Naser lets go of the human and takes a step back, his eyes shimmering as tears begin welling in them.

   “I know… that what I did was cowardly," Anon finally says as he sets his eyes on his friend's teary gaze. "I don’t need a reminder of that. I’ve had a whole week to think back on how I once again ran away instead of facing my mistakes like a fucking man. But like I told you, I’m done running, and I’m done being a little bitch about it!” Anon puts a hand on Naser’s shoulder and gives him a dead-serious look. “Soon as I’m out of this hospital, I’m going to go find Fang, and I’m going to do what I should've done a week ago!”

   Naser breathed deep and returned Anon’s intense gaze. “Y-you better,” he says with some resentment, yet also with hope.

   Anon tightens his grip on Naser’s shoulder, prompting the ptero’s eyes to widen a bit. “You should come with me,” the human says, a faint smile forming on his lips. “You’re Fang’s brother too. She—they—deserve to know that you’re still out here caring about their wellbeing, even after being gone for years.”

   “W-what?” Naser asked, stuttering as his brain tried comprehending Anon’s words.

   “Come with me to Pizza Time or wherever else she’s going to be playing next. We’ll meet her together, and together we’ll let her know that there are people who still care!” Anon put his other hand on Naser’s shoulder and brought him close enough that the two were only inches away from bumping noses. “If you’re there, you two can reconnect and be family again. I mean, it’s what you want, right?” 

   Naser takes a step away from Anon and turns away from the human. As he does, his shoulders sag, and his head slumps forward. Not one second later, the young doctor’s body begins to tremble, almost as if someone turned his blood ice-cold.

   “I… I don’t think I can do that, Anon…”

   “What?” Anon asks in shock.

   Naser turns around, his eyes now sporting tears ready to roll down his cheeks. “I don’t think I can do that!” he shouts.

   “What’d you mean that you can’t do it?”

   Naser shut his eyes and grits his teeth. “I can’t do it because… because…” he brings up his sleeve and rubs his eyes before fixing Anon with a glare. “Because I’m also a fucking coward!”

   Anon doesn’t say anything as Naser tries his best to compose himself, all the while the scowl on his face slowly gives way to a frown full of shame. “I also ran away from everything!” he snaps in a rage that isn’t entirely directed at Anon despite his eyes fixing themselves firmly on the human’s eyes. “I chose to separate myself from this place and everyone I grew up with because I couldn’t handle the stress, the pain, the responsibility that I had to—needed to—find Lucy!” He sniffs and again tries to wipe his eyes clear of tears. “I even turned my back on my parents in their time of greatest need…” He clutched his hands tight, all the while scowling more and more furiously. “How can I possibly face Lucy when I haven’t even grown the spine to face my own mother and father!?” He slams his fists on Anon’s chest. “What kind of brother does that? What kind of person deserves to reconcile with a sibling when he can’t even bring himself to reconcile with his parents!?”  

   Anon’s reminded of Fang’s emotional outburst back on the roof of Volcano High all those years ago. Just like he did then, he keeps his mouth shut. Not because he didn’t have anything to say, he had plenty to. Rather, because something told him that Naser, much like Fang had back then, didn’t need anyone patronizing or to have other's ideals forced upon them. 

   Naser needed someone to support him in his greatest time of need.

   ‘He needs someone better than shitty ol’ me, though,’ Anon thinks as he grapples with what to do next. He knows he’s not the ideal person to be giving support to anyone. But given the lack of people qualified for it, he was the nearest person who realistically could. At the same time, he was also dealing with a person who had thrived off hating him for the last four years. Hell, he had tried to kill him. His sudden change of heart notwithstanding, how did one go about supporting such a person?

   ‘I guess the first thing he needs to do is bury the hatchet with his parents,’ Anon reasoned. Of course, that was also true about him. It was clear that Fang’s disappearance had also affected the Aarans in ways that younger Anon could have never have hoped to comprehend. Yet apologizing to Fang’s parents was a terrifying prospect. So much so that he would have much preferred to save that particular apology for last, after he hopefully got Fang to be on friendly terms with him at the very least. Yet, with Naser now in the picture and the weight of his baggage, saving that particular apology for later had gone from something that he could put off for later to needing to be done ASAP.

   ‘Fuck,’ Anon thinks as it slowly dawns on him that there’s no getting around what’s to come. ‘I don’t think I can do this alone, though…’

   At precisely the moment Anon thought that, the door to the room swung wide, almost as if kicked open. Less than a second later, in pops a lime-yellow stegosaur with a big wide grin on her lips and cheerful glow that bordered on the ludicrous. 

   “Hoi, Anon! I’m back!” Stella shouts with all the subtlety of an atom bomb. The stego is no longer sporting her previous Natsuki-inspired tracksuit, but rather is back to wearing an outfit that seems to be a direct callback to her high school outfit: black jean shorts slightly longer than her old pair, a white shirt more on the slim-fitting side—which help accentuate the curves and muscles that she’d put on thanks to her cardio workouts over the last few years—and a pair of black and white retro sneakers that probably belonged more in the late 80s or early 90s than the present day, all wrapped under her now trademark twin-bunned lime green hairstyle.

   Both Anon and Naser turn to look at Stella with varying expressions. Naser, for his part, welcomes the sudden shift in the room’s mood, thankful that Stella’s sudden appearance brought about some form of levity to the serious conversation he’d finished having with Anon. 

   Anon, on the other hand, can only close his eyes and put a hand over the ridge of his nose. ‘Stella doesn’t have an off switch, does she?’ he asks himself.

   “No, I don’t think she does,” Naser answers with a warm smile forming on his lips. 

   Anon turns to Naser and gives him a quizzical expression.

   “You still mumble,” Naser replies matter-of-factly to Anon’s non-verbal question.   

   “Of course I do,” Anon tells himself as he shakes his head in frustration.

   “Of course you what?” Stella asks, stepping into the room and closing the door behind her. “Did I interrupt a live-changing dialogue between you two or something? I-I can wait outside.”

   “You’re already here,” Naser answers as he takes a step away from Anon, all the while doing his best to bury the previous grief he had brought to bear. “Me and Anon… we were just talking about… stuff...” Naser takes a deep breath to steady himself before stuffing a hand into his pants pocket, all the while smiling in feigned confidence. “You know, catching up and whatnot.”

   Stella’s eyes grow to the size of tea plates. “Oh!” she announces as her expression brightens considerably. “That’s SO good to hear then!”

   “S-Stella,” Anon starts, his full attention finally turning towards the genki dino, “What are you doing here?”

   Stella raises an eyebrow at the question. “What am I doing? I’m here to see you, of course!”

   “I get that much… but WHY?” Anon asks again, taking a step forward to emphasize his words.

   Stella puts her hands behind her back, the posture once more making her look like she couldn’t be more than a year out of high school. “Do I really need an excuse to check up on someone dear to me?” She asks the human.

   Anon’s only answer is to cross his arms and raise an eyebrow.

   Stella rolls her eyes, puffs her lips, and crosses her arms. “Oh fine!” she snaps, turning her gaze towards Naser, her brow furrowing in the process. “I also came here because I heard Naser shouting and was afraid he was trying to strangle you again.”

   Naser rubs the back of his head and gives the anime-loving stego a sheepish grin. “Yeah… that was not my best moment in life…”

   Stella replies to Naser’s words by walking next to Anon and grabbing him by the arm while glaring at the young doctor.

   Naser again sighs and looks away from the two. “I’d really appreciate it if… if you two would keep the whole... strangulation... situation to yourselves…”

   “Only if you promise never to do it again!” Stella snaps, her grip on Anon’s arm growing tighter.

   “I-I swear it!” Naser answers with a mixture of fear and shame.

   Stella turns her eyes upwards as she ponders on what to say or do next. 

   In the meantime, Anon slips his arm out from Stella’s grip and clears his throat. “At any rate,” he starts, once more turning to face the ptero. “I’m sorry you feel that way… about your folks.”

   Naser’s expression again sours as he’s reminded of his problem. He leans against the nearest wall and ponders on what to do next. So long as he still had the regret of his parents, it would prevent him from facing Lucy. Yet meeting his parents wasn’t a pleasant prospect for him at all. ‘Especially after I…’

   Naser winces as the memories lash at his being. ‘No. I can’t face them. Not after I said all those things to them…’

   Stella’s the one to clear her throat this time, causing Anon and Naser to turn their attention to her. As they do, she paces towards the middle of the room to stand facing the two males.

   “The two of you are at a critical crossroads in your lives,” Stella starts in a voice that Anon recognized as her ‘mystic’ mode. “Anon,” she says, turning to face the human. “You know what your destination is, but you don’t know where to begin this journey or if you’ll have the courage to see it through to the end.” The stego turns to face the young doctor. “And Naser, you fear the journey’s start because of something you said or did in the past that’s shackling you with fear.” Stella closes her eyes and brings her hands together in what almost looks like a praying motion. “For the two of you to really heal, you have to take an initial step forward, and that step lies with an apology.”

   Anon and Naser look at each other in confusion. “But we already buried our respective hatchets,” Naser says matter-of-factly.

   Stella snapped open an eye and looked at Anon and Naser with mild annoyance. “Not an apology to each other, dummies. An apology to the Aarans.” She gives a nod and again crosses her arms behind her back as she opened her eyes and alternated her gaze between human and ptero. “It’s been four years since the catastrophe with Fang, and since then, they have no doubt been suffering, not just because of their missing daughter, but also because of their wayward son.” She fixes Naser with a serious gaze. “Just like Anon, you left suddenly and without a word. You knew your destination, but you gave no one a roadmap of what roads you would use to get there. Because of that, you might as well have become a ghost. If what I heard is true, you haven’t even kept in contact with your parents in years..”

   Naser’s head dropped as he looked to the floor.

   “And Anon,” Stella says next, her full attention turning to the human. “While your journey to Fang is more direct, you’re going to have to eventually confront the Aaran’s about your part in their daughter’s disappearance. Thankfully, you have both the conviction and knowledge now to face them with a head held high!”

   Stella gives the pair a warm smile as she reaches into her pocket and pulls out her trusty tarot deck. “Right now, you are a literal hope bringer, Anon. The Aarans think their daughter is dead, but you know the truth, one they deserve to know.” She shuffles her deck expertly, just like she did earlier with Anon, and draws the top card. She holds it facing towards her as her gaze again shifts between Anon and Naser.

   Anon, swallowing a lump that had formed in his throat, looks Stella in the eye. “What card is it?” he asks, baffled that he was going along with something he considered to be trashy superstition days earlier.

   Stella puts on a wide simper as she flips the card around, revealing it to Naser and Anon. “Upright chariot!” she cheers as she walks up to Naser and offers him the card.

   Naser, with a shaky hand, takes the card and inspects the art. It depicts what looks to be a T-rex dino with a crown and regal armor atop an opulently ornate chariot. At the head of the chariot, two regal sphinxes, one white and one black, pull the chariot forward, their faces a mixture of human and dino features.

   “The chariot card signifies that you have some hard work ahead of you,” Stella says, causing Anon and Naser to pay close attention to her. “It may be resolved quickly, but the labor you are undertaking will probably tend towards the long and difficult. You will quite possibly experience rough roads, long uphill slopes, dead ends, and painful setbacks. This hard road will instill in you a strength of purpose, the ability to succeed through organization and endurance, and confidence possessed only by those who have done what they thought they could not. Harnessed correctly, few forces can stand against individuals like that…”

   Naser once more looks down at the card in his hand. Not once has he ever believed in such occult practices as tarot cards or psychic readings. As a doctor, he believes in the rational and the physical. There is no room in medicine for the supernatural. Yet, something about Stella’s reading filled him with intrigue and purpose. Even if Stella’s reading was nothing but a bunch of smoke and mirrors bull, her words about finding absolution with his parents remained true. Facing his own past mistake and correcting it was the first step towards bettering himself. 

   Otherwise, he would wind up living the rest of his life unable to move on... 

   While Naser continued to stare at the chariot card with wide eyes, Stella walked right next to Anon again and gave him a toothy smile. “And you don’t have to worry about anything,” she said, all the while jabbing his arm with her shoulder. “I’m going to be keeping you company throughout this journey.”

   Anon blinked about five times before realizing what Stella meant by her words. A bead of sweat formed at the idea of having someone tag along with him, especially if that someone had admitted to having liked him in high school a day prior.

   “Uh… isn’t Rosa going to be pissed that you’re not showing up to work?” Anon asks earnestly.

   “Of course, she’d be mad! But she’s also the one who gave me the mission to look out after you. Just in case you decided to beat yourself up again!” she flashes the human a peace sign and gives him a wink.

   Anon rolls his eyes at Stella’s words. ‘Course, leave it to Rosa to still care about others, even when they weren’t the best of friends towards her in the first place…’ 

   “Well, it wasn’t all Rosa’s idea, you know,” Stella suddenly replies, her cheeks growing flushed at her words.

   ‘Damn. Mumbling,” Anon thinks to himself before the total weight of Stella’s words hits him. 

   “Wait, wait, wait!” Anon snaps, taking a step away from Stella. “You WILLINGLY offered yourself to be my tail during this whole fiasco?”

   Stella gives Anon a sympathetic ear-to-ear smile. “Course! You really think I’m going to miss out on an IRL redemption story to rival the Zuko arc?”

   Anon put on a smile as he shook his head and shrugged. Not like it changed anything about his goals. Plus, it would be nice to have the company of a person that never actively hated him to begin with. Especially now that he was going to be walking right into the den of a very angry, very violent pterodactyl... 

   Having come to terms with the fact that he had a permanent party member, Anon turned to Naser next. He walked up to the young doctor and put a hand on his shoulder in a show of camaraderie.

   Naser looked up from the card and onto Anon’s eyes with fear at first. Still, slowly, that fear dissolved as newfound determination began to take its place. The young doctor would be lying if he said that his stomach wasn’t filled with ice at the prospect of facing his parents again, but he wouldn’t be doing it alone. Anon was with him, and together the two could face the storm that was approaching.

   Every journey started with a step. This was the first step. The most critical step... 

 

***

It’s several hours later. The sun had long set, and night had brought with it a frigidity uncharacteristic of that time of year in Volcaldera. Naser, Anon, and Stella stand outside of the Aaron residence, a very different expression on each of their faces: Fear, determination, and enthusiasm, respectively. 

   As the pale moonlight shines upon the household Naser and Fang once called home, and there is a certain level of anxiety within the human and pterodactyl’s hearts. The last time the two were at the Aaran residence, their respective outlooks on life were brighter. Now the surrounding darkness felt like an apt reflection of what had become of their individual lives. Only the moonlight served as a beacon for what they needed to accomplish next.

   Anon breathed heavily, his body quaking with warranted regret as he remembered his last visit to the Aaran residence. He remembers the faces of Fang’s parents. He remembers the hopeful and sunny disposition of Mrs. Samantha, her joy of knowing her daughter was going to prom almost overwhelming. He remembers Mr. Ripley’s scrutiny over Anon, and his parting words of warning before the human excused himself to ‘feed’ Metal Gear RAYmba, a lie that he still couldn’t believe had worked. How right Mr. Ripley had been to distrust Anon with his daughter. Even following the old parental stereotype, Anon had proven the ptero patriarch’s worst fears correct.

   Naser, meanwhile, took just as heavy a breath as Anon as he too began remembering the past. His memories were initially good. He remembered getting along well with his parents. He remembered all the good times he had playing with Lucy when they were young. He remembered those carefree days before the accident. Then, his memories sour as he recalls the accident that left his wing crippled. He recalls the dour mood as he felt Lucy’s anguish over her role in the event. How it started her down a dark path of insecurity and self-loathing. How it shaped her life from that moment on, leading to a spiraling of worsening problems as Lucy became Fang, Fang became non-binary, and Fang stopped thinking for herself, instead clinging on to anything and everything Trish told her to do, shaping his sister into something that by the end he could barely recognize as the once cheerful and energetic pirate princess he had grown up around. From there, the memories became bittersweet. He remembers vowing to make up for his sister's faults, excelling not because he wanted to, but rather because he needed to keep his parent’s wrath away from his sister. He remembers meeting Naomi and thinking that she was the one. He reflects on his high school career, joining the track team and rising to become its captain, and his eventual rise to honor student. And, of course, he remembers prom night. How he had expected to see Anon and Lucy there, only to find out later that they never attended. That they instead had their own private prom, after which everything fell apart…

   Naser glanced sideways towards Anon, his brow furrowing and his hands curling into fists. A part of him rightfully wanted to strangle the human again for it as the fire of righteous indignation ignited in his soul once more. But as the young doctor inspected the eyes of his human companion, he too could see the pain that a past full of torment was assaulting him. He sighed, unfurled his fists, and let go of his anger for what felt like the millionth time that day. Anon may have been the cause of four years of pain for him, but he was also the catalyst for his now experiencing change.

   As the anger faded, another memory came to Naser, one he had tried long and hard to suppress. He had no defenses against its overwhelming assault against his heart. How could he fight against it when every fiber of his being told him he shouldn’t?

   Naser takes a step back from his old home, all the while shaking his head. “No,” he whispers as he completely turns away from the Aaran residence. “I… I can’t do this…”

   Both Anon and Stella turn to look at their ptero companion with concern. Being the only person whose heart wasn’t burdened by painful memories, Stella walks back and grabs Naser by the arm. “What’s wrong?” the stego asks, light-blue eyes scanning the young doctor’s visage for any possible clue. 

   Naser shifts his eyes to meet Stella’s gaze. For one moment, he stares deep into those light-blue pools in the hopes of finding some relief from the thorns gripping his heart. After about five seconds, he shuts his eyes tight and janks his arm away from Stella’s grip before slowly shuffling towards the sidewalk’s nearest curb. At this point, he sits down and buries his head in his hands.

   “N-Naser… you… you okay?” Anon asks, unsure as to whether or not he should approach his troubled companion.

   Naser slams a fist on the hard concrete and lets out a groan of pain. “No,” he hisses through clenched teeth. “I… I thought I could forge through the memories, but I just fucking can’t!”

   “They can’t be that bad,” Stella says in her best attempt at cheering the ptero.

   “You don’t understand,” Naser snaps as he looks up at the moon. “The reason I’m so fucking afraid of going back home…” He inhales unevenly as he shuts his eyes. “...I said some really fucked up things… before I left…”

   Naser allows the memories he had so desperately tried to suppress overcome his being, sending him back to what was perhaps the worst single night of his life…

 

-Four Years Earlier-

   Almost a month has passed since Lucy ran away from home. Dad turned all of Volcaldera upside down in search of her—them—I honestly don’t even fucking know anymore. All I know is that ever since Lucy up and left, everything's gone to shit. 

   Graduation is only days away, yet I can’t feel any joy about it. How can I when my sister’s fucking gone missing? Even worse, dad won’t shut up about how this is all my fault. Doesn’t he know that I did everything that I could to keep Lucy on the straight and narrow? It’s not my fault that she went and got herself indoctrinated into that enby bullshit by Trish. Not my fault she ended dating some deadbeat asshole that broke her heart... It’s not my…

   Fuck. Fuck you, Anon. Seriously. FUCK. YOU. You were my friend. You were Lucy’s friend. I thought you could be the one to pull her out of her rut finally. To give her the support she deserved and that I obviously couldn’t provide. I fucking TRUSTED you! Instead, you turned out to be another asshole in a very long line of assholes I seem to be surrounded by...  

   Fuck... even Naomi, the girl I thought would stick by me for the rest of my days, dumped my sorry ass. She didn’t even give me a good reason. She only said that I had changed and that our relationship wasn’t going to work out anymore. That I wasn't good enough for her either and that we were better off seeing others more like each other...

   Well, of course I fucking changed! My sister’s fucking gone missing! Did she expect me to laugh it off like it's nothing? Like this is another one of Lucy’s personality reinventions? Fuck, for all I know, Lucy's probably dead by now. I mean, no one vanishes for close to a month without leaving some trace behind. I mean, for fuck’s sake, dad’s the police commissioner! He moved earth and sky and brought in every possible resource to search for Lucy, and even then, he found no trace of her anywhere! And who does he blame? Me, of course. Only Naser, the perfect son of the Aaran family... 

   Well, I’m done getting blamed. I’m done with everyone looking at me like I could have prevented this bullshit. I’m done with Trish yelling at me like I was supposed to know that Anon was bad news. I’m done having to endure Reed’s look of distant disappointment every time our eyes meet. I’m done taking my mother’s silent judgment over my inability to keep my sister from vanishing. I’m done bearing principal spear’s stoic gaze of dissatisfaction.

   I Am. Fucking. Done!

   I slam shut my suitcase with as much force as I can before picking it up. I give my room one last look before turning around and storming out of the door. If I stay there another second, I will wuss out and not go through with it. I honestly can’t think of a more horrible way to torture myself. A part of me wants me to reconsider what I’m doing. I know it’s stupid and reckless and petty, but I’m all out of fucks to give. I head down the stairs as quickly as my legs can carry me. The sooner I get out of this house, the sooner I can move on from all the bullshit.

   “Where are you going, Naser?” my father’s voice stops me in my tracks. I sigh and turn around. My dad is sitting there on the living room couch, a half-empty glass of something that smells like paint thinner in his hands.

   I glare into my father’s eyes but don’t give him an answer. He should already know by the suitcase in my hand what the fuck I’m doing.

   My father downs the last of his drink and stands up from his seat, walking up to me and using his considerable bulk to try and intimidate me. “And just what the hell do you think you’re doing?” He asks me like I’m some kind of child.

   “What does it look like I’m doing?” I answer in the most resentful tone that I can muster.

   Dad looks me up and down, almost like he’s sizing me up like I’m some kind of criminal. Who knows, by how he’s been treating me for the last month, I might as well be a criminal in his eyes.

   At that moment, my mother walks into the living room. She takes one look at the suitcase in my hand, and she rushes towards me, grabbing my arm like that’s somehow going to prevent me from storming out the door.

   “W-why?” She sobs out as tears flow from her seemingly permanently squinting eyes. “Why a-are you leaving us too?” She tugs on my arm as if that’s somehow going to change the mind I made up hours ago.

   I can’t take it anymore. I forcefully snatch my arm away from my mother and fix her with a furious glare. “I’m leaving because I’m tired of being perfect!” I shout, causing my mom to take a step away from me in fear. “I’m tired that no matter how hard I worked or how much I sacrificed, it never once felt like I was doing anything for myself, but instead to please everyone around me!” I snap my eyes towards dad, who I can tell is getting real close to bringing out the golf clubs. Frankly, I don’t give a fuck anymore. “I’m tired of always having to live with the knowledge that I had to excel to keep you from giving Lucy shit over an accident that happened years ago!” I point an accusatory finger at my father, then turn back to look at my mother. “And I’m tired of having to be oh so perfect for a girlfriend who up and left me the instant I stopped being the absolute best!” I balled my hand into a fist and grit my teeth so hard I could almost feel the enamel getting worn off. “I’m tired of being what everyone wants me to be… and I’m not going to take it anymore!”

   Father rushes me with a speed I had never seen before in my life. Before I can fully process his movements, he grabs me by the collar of my shirt and slouches forward so that we’re almost eye to eye.

   “You’re a real selfish brat right now, Naser,” Dad tells me in a tone that’s dripping with venom. “I suggest you stop with the melodrama and get your head out of your ass before you hurt yourself.” 

   I slap my father’s hand away before shoving him away, albeit partially unsuccessfully due to his sheer bulk. Still, he gets the point as he looks at me with a shocked yet absolutely pissed expression.

   “I’m not the one that needs to stop being selfish, dad,” I say with as much vitriol as I can pack into my voice.

   “What’s that supposed to mean,” my father hisses through clenched teeth.

   “Not once did I ever see or hear you support Lucy’s life choices. You only acted like she was some object that needed supervising. You never really understood her plight, the guilt she carried on her conscience. If you just tried to understand her for what she wanted to be and not what YOU wanted her to be, she wouldn’t have felt the need to run away and possibly get killed!”

   “And you think you’re acting any better than your shithead of a sister!” Father roared at me. “You’re making the same fucking mistake!”

   And there it was. The real feelings dad had towards Lucy. Hearing him call her a ‘shithead’ almost felt cathartic. It verified all my emotions leading up to this moment. In a way, I almost wanted to thank him. He’d made my decision all the easier for me to take.

   I let out a bitter chuckle and turned away from my father. “Then maybe Fang had the right idea,” I say without so much as caring about what my words did to my father. Or my mother, for that matter. Though in the case of my mother, I did feel a little bit bad. I know she tried her best with us, but in the end, she didn’t do anything to stop Lucy—or rather, Fang—from going down the path she wound up traveling. She shared as much guilt as my father did...

   With those thoughts in my head, I make my way to the door, head held high and determined not to look back no matter what either my mother or father says to me. 

   As I grip my hand on the door handle, I hear my father roar, which gives me enough pause to hesitate.

   “Naser! If you walk out that door, then you better never come back to this house. You hear me!”

   I don’t say another word as I turn the door handle and swing the door open. I don’t stop as I shut the door behind me, and I walk down the walkway leading to my house. I do pause for a second to look back at the home I’d probably never again return to. As I do, I hear the sound of shattering glass, followed by the wails of my mother as she no doubt falls on her knees weeping at the loss of her son.

   I only turn right back around and finish making my way towards the Nas-Car. I stuff my suitcase in the trunk and make my way to the driver's seat. A slight sense of bliss fills me as I realize that I’m doing something that won’t help me achieve some kind of perfection for the first time in my life. Of course, that bliss is quickly overtaken by fear of the unknown future. Where would I go now? What will I do? 

   Whatever it is, it’s going to be my choice. No one else’s...

 

-Present Day-

Naser let out a groan as he finished telling Anon and Stella something he had kept secret for close to four years. 

   Soon as his words are done, he again buries his face in his hands and sighs. “I was so determined to escape from all the responsibilities and pressures of my life… except that I wound up doing exactly what I would have done anyway had I not had that outburst.” The pterosaur began to laugh bitterly. “I went to medical school like I was going to anyway and became a doctor as I would have anyway. My whole little rebellion accomplished nothing except getting me disowned and turning my family against me!” He let out a single sniff and brought up his head, looking Anon directly in the eyes. “That’s why I’m so afraid of speaking to my parents again. That’s why I’m so afraid of meeting Lucy again…”

   Anon, who had been quietly listening up to that point, looks to the floor in stunned silence. In his mind, Naser’s hesitation sprung from his own perceived failures, that he was greatly exaggerating his guilt and working himself up over nothing. But after hearing the real reason for his old friend’s hesitation to come home, he could completely understand the trepidation. 

   In some ways, his mistake was almost the same one he made with Fang four years earlier…

   ‘This… complicates things,’ Anon thought as he wondered what to do next.

   “Complicates things? Yes. Stops him from reaching his goal, no!” Stella suddenly snapped as she grabbed Naser by the arm and forced him back to his feet. “You’re already here!” she points to the house behind her, all the while looking deep into Naser’s eyes. “Just… take the plunge and make amends! I’m sure your parents will understand and forgive you!”

   “God damned mumbling,” Anon whispered as he looked at the scene playing before him. While he understands the exact train of thought that Stella had in mind, he still can’t help but feel like it’s not going to be satisfied in any way. Naser’s mistake isn’t something he can sweep under the rug with his parents. He cut ties with them, and they, in turn, probably cut ties with him. His actions and words led to his familial exile, something that is not so easily reversed. Something told him that Mr. Ripley was the kind of person to hold a very long, very spiteful memory of something like that…

   Naser glares at Stella and snatches his arm back. “That’s easy for you to say!” he shouts, his cheeks turning a shade of red from anger, embarrassment, or both. “You weren’t there to see their faces that night! How they looked at me like I was committing high treason!” He shuts his eyes and turns away from the lime-yellow stego. “This… this was a stupid idea,” he mutters, hanging his head in defeat. “I’ll just… wait in the Nas-Car,” he whispers as the ptero staggers back to his car.

   Stella turns back to face Anon, her eyes full of sadness and defeat. She looks to be on the verge of tears.

   Anon feels an Anger bubble in him. In his mind, he wants to march up to Naser, slap some sense into him, and drag him back to his house… but he knows that he’s projecting what he wants now. It wasn’t that long ago that he, too, was precisely where Naser is now, a man afraid of his past, too broken and numb to even consider fixing his situation despite absolution lying literal feet away. A man so shackled by his fears that he was willing to turn away when all he had to do was reach out and grab that which tormented him so…

   ‘No,’ Anon whispered. He exhaled deeply and turned to face the Aaran residence. He still needed to apologize for what he did that night at the beach. Even if nothing got fixed that night, Fang’s parents at least deserved to know that their daughter still lived. He was the reason she left them… making amends was the right thing to do, even if it was painful and potentially even dangerous…

   “A-Anon?” Stella called out the instant she noticed the new fire burning in her friend’s eyes.

   Anon, for his part, gave her a nod and smile before storming up to the Aaran household’s door, at which point he rang the doorbell without a moment’s hesitation.

   Stella’s eyes broadened in awe and horror. ‘Oh my Jebus! That b-baka actually did it!?’ she thinks, her mind reacting far faster than her body can to the audacity and craziness of Anon’s act.

   It takes less than ten seconds for the sound of heavy footsteps to approach the door. Anon wills his body to stand its ground despite every single one of his brain cells telling him to run away. He knows what he’s exposing himself to. He knows what will happen the instant Mr. Ripley lays eyes on him, but he can’t back out now. If his apology is the last thing he does in his life, it will at least be his best way to go out. 

   A just reward for a life full of bad decisions…

   “How many times do we have to tell you, bastards, we’re not interested in anything you’re sell—” Mr. Ripley roars out the moment he opens the door. The instant he locks eyes with Anon, his eyes fill with the kind of hate only a father who’s forced to look upon the face of his child’s killer can have. His whole body trembles as he clutches his hands shut so tightly that they pierce the palm and draw blood.

   “What is it, honey? Mrs. Samantha asks as she finds her way next to her husband, only also to be struck numb by the sight of Anon standing before her. Unlike her husband, though, the petite matriarch's expression is far more challenging to read. There is anger present, yes, but there is also sorrow, almost as if seeing Anon before her was akin to seeing the ghost of a past she had tried so desperately to move away from...

   “A-Anon?” Samantha asks in a quiet, broken voice. Before another word leaves her lips, Anon finds a gigantic bloodstained hand wrapped around his neck, easily lifting him off the ground and holding him at least three feet above the ground. 

   Instinctively, Anon tries to grasp the gigantic dino hand constricting his breathing. As his hands fruitlessly try to lessen the terrible grip slowly squeezing the life out of him, he locks eyes with Mr. Ripley’s amber orbs. They are awful, wrathful burning spheres that hold within them such overwhelming anger that Anon finds it amazing the elder ptero hasn’t snapped his neck like he so very easily could.

   “How fucking dare you show your face in house!” Mr. Ripley roared as he lessened his grip just enough to allow Anon a breath of precious air before again constricting his neck. “HOW DARE YOU COME BACK AFTER YOU TOOK MY DAUGHTER AWAY!”

   Mr. Ripley tightens his grip. Unlike Naser’s chokehold, the human has no hope of reversing the elder ptero’s terrible grip. Anon can only let out a strained gurgle as he feels his hand go numb. It suddenly dawns on him that he's on the verge of dying. That only makes his past regrets seem all the more terrible. With the last of his strength, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a piece of paper. In it, he wrote the exact address of where he had last seen Fang. He had scribbled it down, knowing full well that he might not live to see the following day.

   So long as that information was known, he could at least die with some peace in his mind...

   Samantha rushes forward and grabs her husband’s arm. “STOP!” she shouts as she desperately grips onto the matriarch’s burly arm. “You’re killing him!”

   “That’s the idea,” Ripley answers coldly and distantly. He was done being nice. He was done being idle. For four years, he had let the pain fester in his heart. Now that he had the one responsible in his grasp, he would not waste his opportunity to achieve some form of absolution. Even if it meant damming his soul to hell...

   Stella looks around her in a panic. She knows well she has no chance of stopping someone as big and robust as Mr. Ripley, but she's not going to stand by as she watches the life of someone precious to her get snuffed out. ‘Even if I made no difference. Even if I get hurt in the process, I’m not letting Anon die!’ She thinks as she musters all of her strength and wills her legs to move.

   But before she can spring forth to action, a blur of brown and orange rush past her. Before her mind can finish processing what her eyes had seen, she hears the voice of Naser, letting out a roar of fury. The stego turns her attention to the scene in time to see the young doctor attempt to tackle his father. 

   While Naser’s form isn’t nearly large enough to leave a dent on Ripley, the force of his sprint, combined with the element of surprise with which it occurred, causes the patriarch to lose his wind temporarily. More importantly, the blow is enough to force him to loosen his grip on Anon’s neck, all the while pushing him further into the house's foyer.  

   Anon Falls on the ground choking and gagging in a desperate attempt to bring oxygen back into his lungs. The previous strength Stella had been putting into rushing and tackling the elder ptero she puts towards hurrying to Anon's side. Wasting not a second, she picks up the human and helps him sit against a nearby wall, all the while checking his neck for any wound that would prevent him from adequately absorbing oxygen.

   Meanwhile, Ripley lets out a roar of rage as he readies his fist to smash down on whoever dared interrupt his attempt at obtaining justice. Before he can make contact, the assailant jumps back and fixes him with a glare full of mixed emotions ranging from rage, regret, fear, and finally to… happiness? 

   Ripley manages enough breaths in his lung to cool some of his rage. In that moment of sudden clarity, he recognizes the face of the ptero now glaring back at him and standing guard over the body of the human he’d been so joyously strangling seconds ago.

   Ripley’s expression flashes with mixed emotions at the sight of the son he thought he’d never see again. Anger at his daring to show his face in his house again. Joy at seeing him again despite their previous fallout. Relief at seeing him not only alive but also healthy and strong. Finally, back to anger, not just as the fact that he had come back after what he did four years earlier, but that he was protecting the one who had caused all their pain and misery in the first place. He couldn’t wrap his mind around that last part, and it filled him with such bitterness that it was starting to make him see red.

   Ripley opens his mouth to shout at his son. He’s cut off when Samantha rushes forward and wraps Naser in a tight embrace, her arms and wings forming a protective cocoon over her child as she allows herself to weep. “My son!” she says through the sobs. “M-my N-Naser’s back home!” Her grip over her son grows tighter as her tears begin to stain Naser’s trademark arboreal jacket. “I-is it really y-you!?”

   Naser, for his part, returns his mother’s embrace. “Yes,” he whispers, trying his best not to break into sobs of his own. “It’s really me. I-I’m back…” 

   Naser broke off from his mother’s embrace and turned to meet his father as much as he hated to. He again fixes the elder ptero with a glare as he takes a step forward so that the two are standing within arm’s reach of each other.

   Ripley narrows his eyes and puffs out his chest in a display of intimidation. It doesn’t work quite as he intended, as Naser only intensifies the glare in his eyes. As elder and junior ptero continue their stand-off, the very air grows heavy as the dinos seemingly prepare to enter into a no-holds-barred brawl.

   “STOP IT!” Samantha shouts at the top of her lungs, jumping between her son and husband, all the while putting her hands up and spreading her wings as wide as they can go. “Stop this nonsense, NOW!”

   Samantha, the usually laid back and relaxed housewife of the Aaran household, snaps her regularly closed eyes wide open and sets her visage into a deep and terrible scowl, one she brings down upon both her husband and child. Almost as soon as that terrible gaze falls upon them, the two pteros lose whatever swagger they were building and shrink back in fear.

   “Now, you two listen to me!” Samantha starts, her voice cold and barely holding back the rage bubbling in her chest. “I have been waiting for the day that our family returns to some semblance of togetherness for four years. FOUR YEARS!” she snaps, all the while shifting her gaze back and forth between her warring son and husband. “Now that our boy has returned home, we will try to be a HAPPY family!” The petite ptero matriarch snaps her glare directly at Ripley. She takes a step forward, all the while jabbing a finger into the ptero patriarch’s chest. “And I will NOT have you ruin this with your stupid machismo!” She then snaps her glare back to Naser, who can't help but take a step back out of fear. “Or you with your rebelliousness!” she hisses through clenched teeth. “The two of you are going to make up this instant, or so help me I’m going to smack the two of you around until you do!”

   Ripley’s brow fills with dozens of beads of sweat. He uncomfortably shifts his gaze around the foyer, looking at everything and anything that wasn’t his son or wife. 

   Finally, after the piercing and hot glare of his wife breaks through the last of his rage-created defenses, Ripley clears his throat and takes a step towards Naser. With a heavy sigh, he softens his gaze and raises his hands. “Naser… m-my boy… I… m-missed you,” he says in a voice that almost comes off as bashful.

   Despite his previous rage, Naser is surprised to hear his father sound so vulnerable. Vulnerability was already a concept he was convinced his father had never learned or actively ripped out of his brain, so to see it happen before his eyes left him with a feeling that he can barely describe. Gradually though, the feeling supplants whatever negativity he might have harbored towards his dad, to the point that the reason he had once feuded with him became less and less critical. With a final sigh to dispel any negative emotion from himself, Naser looks at his father’s eyes, the corners of his lips rising ever so slightly in the process. “I… I missed you too, dad…”  

   Samantha claps her hands together and once more shuts her eyes as a smile returns to her lips. “See, was that so hard?” she asks in a sweet yet vaguely threatening voice. She quickly rushes to the front door and shuts it, ensuring that whatever other shouting happened, it would stay inside the Aaran residence.

   Both Naser and Ripley let out a nervous chuckle before sighing in relief.

   Crisis averted for the time being.

   Naser looks back to Anon. Despite the human’s best efforts, he was still struggling to breathe, even with Stella helping him sit upright.

   Wasting not one second, Naser rushes towards his friend and inspects his neck. He lets out a hiss as he realizes that while there was no external damage, the force of his father’s grip very nearly crushed the windpipe. There would be definite bruising and soreness, maybe even another visit to the hospital if it were bad enough...

   Naser looks at Stella. “Help me get him up,” he tells the still shocked stego. She follows the order without question. “Hold him up and steady,” he tells her as he lets go of Anon’s arm and turns back to face his father, all the while his brow furrows and his eyes sharpen. 

   “That was way out of line, dad!”

   Ripley shoots Anon a glare before setting his sight back on Naser. “Why are you defending that piece of scum? You know well what he did to this family.”

   Naser hesitates for a second. The dying amber of his hate threatens to set his soul alight once again, but he snuffs them out by telling himself that he was past that point in his life. ‘Besides…’ he thinks before taking a deep breath of air and steeling himself for his words to come. ‘He’s doing something I was too cowardly to do for so many years…’

   “Dad… I know what Anon did. Believe me; I have lived with that knowledge for the last four years too.”

   Ripley crosses his arms. “If you know, then why ar—”

   “DESPITE that,” Naser snaps, cutting his father’s words off and causing the elder ptero’s eyes to go broad with surprise. “Anon’s the reason I’m here tonight. If it wasn’t for his… lack of self-preservation… I would have kept on living without once thinking about making amends with you and mom...”  

   Naser’s words shake Ripley to his core. He shoots another glare towards Anon, who, for his part in all of this, continues to stand there supported by a woman he was sure he’d never seen before, holding on to his neck and still attempting to breathe. How could that human be both responsible for his daughter’s vanishing and the return of his son?

   “Dad,” Naser says as he takes another step forward. “I’m sorry… that I also ran from this family four years ago. It was the biggest mistake of my life.” He shut his eyes and sighs wearily. “I was so convinced that running from all of this would lead me to a better life... when the reality was that it led me to repeat so many of the same mistakes. Worse yet, it turned me into something I wasn’t!” The young doctor takes another step forward and once again stops only an arm’s length away from his father. “I stopped socializing for fear of losing my friends and loved ones like I did with Lucy and Naomi. I tossed myself into my schoolwork and did nothing else in a desperate attempt to prove that I was still perfect when that perfection was what was killing me. I pushed my body and mind to the brink daily so that I could focus on getting that damn degree when that only caused me physical and emotional anguish... and for what? Only to return home an almost broken man desperate to one day find his sister and make the one responsible for her vanishing pay…” Naser puts his head on his father’s chest and lets out a mournful sob. “C-can you find it in your heart to forgive a stupid, idiot boy for all of his mistakes?!” The ptero cries out, unable to keep his composure any longer. 

   To say that Ripley is stunned by his son’s words is an understatement. Within the ptero patriarch, a fierce battle rages between his mind and his heart. His mind told him that he couldn’t let go, that he couldn’t forgive. One didn’t just forget four years with a finger snap. His son had made a grave mistake, and he deserved to be punished as gravely for it. If he didn’t, could he call himself a lawman at all?

   Ripley’s heart, however, sang a very different tune. It told him that punishment wouldn’t magically turn back the hands of the clock. His child had returned to him and was within arm’s reach, begging for forgiveness for a crime that wasn’t even all his in the first place…

   It was that final recognition that stung the hardest for Ripley. In all his stubbornness, he first gave up on Lucy and put all of the world’s weight on Naser’s shoulders. When Lucy ran away, he blamed Naser for failing to be a good brother, neglecting to realize that it had been Naser and only Naser who had ever truly cared for Lucy. If there was anyone who had failed Lucy in her most significant time of need, it was neither Naser nor Anon as he had believed for so long. 

   The chain of failure had started with him…

   Tears welled in Ripley’s eyes as he embraced his son for the first time in four years. “Son,” he starts, his voice barely holding together as it threatens to burst into sobbing. “I’m… sorry too. I should've never put so much pressure on your shoulders. I Shouldn’t have ever given up on Lucy as I did. I… I…” Ripley increases the tightness of his embrace on his son, who in return also embraces his father all the harder. 

   The hug between father and son lasts almost a full minute. By the time Naser breaks it, his eyes are puffy and red, though the smile on his lips speaks another story, one of joy and peace after so many years of regrets and sorrows. He turns to face his mother, an apology already formed in the tip of his tongue, when she merely rushes forward and hugs him again like there was no tomorrow.

   “It’s okay… my sweet little Naser. I f-forgive you!” Samantha managed to say between sobs of joy. 

   Ripley moves forward and also hugs his son and wife, wrapping the two in a protective cocoon with both his arms and wings.

   While by no means a complete family yet, in that fleeting moment, the Aaran’s felt like in the old days, before the pressures of life and disappointments about the future battered and tore at their dreams.

   For one moment, Naser, Ripley, and Samantha dared to believe they had found a small piece of peace once again… 

   Despite his best efforts to keep his presence as diminished as possible, Anon lets out a string of painful coughs, which nearly causes him to double over as the pain racks at his throat. The only thing that keeps him standing is Stella’s diligent grip. 

   Ripley lets go of his family and walks up to both Anon and Stella. His previous expression of bliss vanishes the instant he locks eyes with the human. “I… I don’t understand you... You’re the reason that Lucy ran away... yet you’re also the reason my son came back…” Ripley grimaces as he again moves to grab the dainty caveman. 

   Before Ripley’s hand can get anywhere near Anon, Stella slaps it away, which causes the ptero to stop in his tracks and flinch in surprise. The stego then begins dragging the human away from Ripley and towards the house’s main entrance.

   Ripley turns to face his wife with a flabbergasted expression on his face. The diminutive ptero shakes her head in reply before pointing to her husband and making a strangling motion with her hands.

   It takes about two seconds before Ripley’s eyes widen as the realization hits him like one of his golf clubs to the head.

   Meanwhile, Stella is making some headway dragging Anon, who for his part is doing his best to struggle against the stego’s grasp. “Let… go… of me,” he hisses at his dino companion.

   “It’s okay Anon, I’ll get you out of here!” Stella boldly declares as she tries her best to lift the human over her shoulder. Of course, the moment she manages to get his feet off the ground, Anon’s weight, combined with her awkward footing, causes the stego to collapse backward. She hits the ground pretty hard, leaving her partially addled. 

   Anon, meanwhile, is flung backward at least five feet. He winds up striking his head against a nearby wall, causing him to see more than a few stars.

   Seconds later, Anon feels a strong hand lift him off the floor and stand him straight. It takes the human a few seconds for his vision to fully return, by which time he realizes far too late that the one who picked him off the floor had been none other than Ripley.

   Swallowing very painfully, Anon looks up to meet Ripley’s eyes. Instantly, he feels the very warmth leave his body. At the same time, he also feels a strange sense of ease. ‘Sooner or later, I was gonna get killed,’ he thinks as he mentally prepares for Naser’s father to grab his neck once again, this time finishing what he had started minutes earlier.

   But before Ripley could have his shot at strangling him, he needed to get the guilt off his chest.

   “I… I understand if you never forgive me…” Anon whispered in a strained, raspy voice. “I know... I have... no right... to apologize for... what I did to your daughter... but…” Wasting not one single second, the young man bows his head before Ripley. “I’m truly…. truly sorry... for my actions... that night...!” 

   Ripley lets out a sneer as he drags Anon forward. He even slouches forward enough so that he’s face to face with the human. 

   “I’ll never forgive you for helping to kill my daughter,” Ripley hisses, his words colder than the coldest glacier on earth. 

   Anon takes the patriarch’s words and shakes his head. “You’re wrong… about... Fa—L-Lucy,” Anon manages to say despite his ravaged voice doing everything it can to fail him.

   Ripley’s eyes snap wide, and he grits his teeth in absolute fury. “What did you say, punk!?” he growls, his face coming dangerously close to Anon’s.

   “Fang’s... alive…!” Anon barely manages to rasp, his voice giving into a cacophony of coughs seconds after he managed to speak those crucial words to Ripley.

   Upon hearing Anon’s words, the ptero patriarch locks eyes with Anon and grabs him by the shoulder, albeit a bit more gently this time. “W-what did you say?” He asks the human in a flabbergasted tone. 

   “Fang’s… alive…” Anon repeats, all the while trying to stop his heart from beating faster than an anime fan who somehow managed to score himself a date for prom night with the head cheerleader. “I don’t… I don’t know... what she’s been doing... for the last four years... but I saw her playing a shitty gig... a little over a week ago at a pizzeria in... Skin Row…”

   “O-one week ago!” Ripley shouts in a mixture of pain and rage.

   Anon flinches at the ptero’s raised voice. He glances to the side and notices how Samantha and Naser are helping Stella back to her feet. She looks a little worse for wear but overall seemed to be unharmed. Anon let out a sigh of relief, though he wasn’t sure why since Stella had caused him to fall earlier with her ‘rescue’ attempt. Still, he couldn’t fault her for trying.

   With that particular burden off his shoulders, and his newfound determination pushing him to say what needed to be said, Anon once more narrated his life up until he met with Naser. He told it all, from his return to Volcadera after four years in the navy, to his running across Fang by complete chance, to his regret for not speaking to her when he had a chance, to the subsequent week and its mocking dreams of a better life, to his drinking and smoking and self-harm and eventual hospitalization. 

   On hearing his friend end his tale, Naser leaves Stella’s side and stands beside the human, also looking his father in the eye. With a deep sigh to steel his nerves, he picks up right where Anon left off. He, too, tells it all and tells it truly, including the moment when he tried to strangle Anon before his realization hit like a train full of bricks. 

   Anon takes a step forward and approaches Ripley with a determined look in his eyes. He’s aware of the danger he’s putting himself in by just being that close to the still furious elder ptero. Still, a part of him isn’t afraid anymore. Much like with Naser before, he couldn't afford to run, not if he could fix all of the mistakes in his life.

   “Mr. Ripley,” Anon starts, his voice still raspy and weak but also filled with newfound courage. “I may… have made many mistakes… in my life… but I’m done… running and hiding… from them...” He fixes the ptero with a grin. Weak at first, but growing with confidence with every passing second. “I will… set things... right with Fang… and I will… bring her back home… even if it’s… the last thing I do… because… this is my second… chance… and I am not… wasting it…!”

   Ripley’s face is a mixture of strong emotions. Anger, confusion, regret, despair, happiness, and perhaps strongest of all, hope. He can only look at the human with confoundment, his previous words about how he couldn’t understand the human buzzing in his mind. A part of him wanted the simplicity that came with hating the human. Yet, from hearing his tale and feeling the regret in his voice and seeing the shame in his eyes, the elder ptero found any reason to despise Anon fading by the second. After all, how could he hate someone who had already suffered so much and had come out stronger for it? How could he hate someone so determined to right all his wrongs?

   Ripley bitterly chuckles to himself. Much as the idea seemed alien to him in this world, perhaps in some other place and time, Anon would have made a good husband to Lucy...

   Samantha walks up to Anon without saying a word. Anon, for his part, is startled by the sudden appearance of the petite ptero, but he tells himself that whatever she had to say to him, he more than deserved. He locks his eyes with the matriarch’s closed eyes. Even so, he can still feel her gaze pierce right through him, exposing his every weakness to her perception as if she had x-ray vision.

   The matriarch of the Aaron household breathes deep, and without a single moment of hesitation, slaps Anon across the face, causing the human to stagger sideways a bit, as the impact of the slap is both so sudden and so powerful. ‘God, it feels like I just got punched by a martial arts champ!’ Anon manages to cobble together in his brain as he instinctively rubs his cheek, which feels like it’s swelling with every passing second.

   “That’s… for breaking the heart of my little pirate princess…” Samantha says coldly. Anon readjusts his posture and nods, accepting the blow as well-earned. He readied himself for another when he sees Samantha’s arms twitch. He closes his eyes and prepares himself for the pain that's to come.

   But what came next wasn’t something the human expected.

   Samantha lets out a sob and lunges forward, wrapping her arms around Anon, locking him in a tight embrace that made his muscles ache from the surprising amount of force the petite housewife could generate.

   Anon does not return the embrace. He does not feel like he deserves to...

   “Thank you for bringing my son back to me,” Samantha sobs into Anon's shoulder, which suddenly becomes sodden with tears as the ptero lets herself weep freely. Less than ten seconds later, Fang’s mother breaks the embrace and makes her way next to her husband, who finally appears to be composed enough to speak again.

   “Anon I…” Ripley begins, his voice coarse and uneven, almost as if he was struggling to maintain his usual gravely demeanor. “I don’t… I can’t…” Ripley shuts his eyes and lets out a loud groan before he again fixes Anon with a glare. Only, this glare isn’t one of hatred or anger or resentment. Instead, it's filled with something Anon never thought he’d see from Fang’s father…

   “Dammit, kid, you’ve given me the one thing I never thought I’d have ever again…” He snarls and points a finger at the human. “I swear in the name of Raptor Jesus, if you are fucking lying to us about our daughter, I’m going to mount your head on my wall, damn be whatever jail time I have to face!”

   Anon again painfully swallows as he nods.

   The elder ptero walks up to the human and grabs him by the shoulders. At first, Anon believes he’s about to get strangled again, but that fear’s put to rest when Ripley, much to the human’s shock, brings him in for a hug of his own. 

   As if the embrace wasn’t already surprising enough, he hears the ptero patriarch break down into silent, dignified sobs, all the while his grip on the human grows tighter and tighter.

   “Thank you for giving this old man hope again,” Ripley whispered through barely contained sobs. “Thank you…”

   Anon brings up an uneasy hand and pats Ripley in the back. As he does, his determination grows ever more potent than before, supplanting whatever doubts he might have had in the past about his next course of action.

   It was time to set things right with Fang...