"Yayaaa! I'm hungryyy!"
"Yeah, yeah stop yelling! Your stomach is loud enough.", I had my back towards Lan while I made dinner. It was the night they were finally coming back, the week they were gone the five of us didn't leave the couch much and binged many shows, the only time we left was to go surfing and bathroom breaks.
I heard the front door open and the familiar voices of my parents. Running into the hallway that connected to the door I saw two figures and ran, giving them a big group hug. "I missed you guys so much."
"Wow Ri, way to cut the line.", Kam's sarcastic voice made me let go and look at my siblings with an apologetic smile. Although she was just teasing it was rude of me to jump in, it just puts me on edge when any one of these six are gone for more than a few hours, and they know that.
"What is that beautiful smell! Ri, did you cook?", Pa stuck his nose in the air and started sniffing. A small nod was all it took for everyone to rush into the kitchen and start serving themselves, Mama stood beside me chuckling to herself while giving me a side hug.
"Come on Butterfly, before they eat it all!"
~
As we ate dinner around the table it felt like everything was how it should be, for that short week it felt weird without Mama and Pa here. I love when we sit together as a family and I know they're safe because everyone is right in front of me. Yeah, I have major separation anxiety.
"So the mission went well and there shouldn't be any work for a while, but that doesn't mean we aren't going to train.", a loud groan was heard from Dylan. "Is there something wrong Lany?", Pa looked her in the eyes and crossed his arms.
"I don't want niñita as my partner."
Pa raised an eyebrow with a little smirk, "Oh?"
"Lan I'm always going easy on you, but it's okay I want to be partnered with Alex.", I made eye contact with Alex and he smirked. When we fight it turns more aggressive than a practice fight and we end up with many bruises and occasionally broken bones, while the others just have a few scratches.
"It's not up to me. You all know that your partners are picked at random by the hat, and there'll be more at training cause Jake and Monica are coming over.", Pa said while getting up and taking the dishes.
"That's only two people Pa, hardly 'more' people.", Remy put air quotes as he spoke while helping him with the dishes.
Playful conversation about tomorrow was heard throughout the kitchen when a sudden light ringing was heard from Pa's phone. Mama grabbed the phone and told the boys to continue the dishes while the rest of us sat on the kitchen bar stools facing the sink. While she was gone Pa brought up the idea of having a family vacation soon and thought it would be the perfect opportunity to take a break for a little while. This recent mission they went on seemed to be a little more challenging since they were gone for more then three days and they were called in by Monica. Monica and Jake are both very well trained so them calling in for my parents means something terribly wrong happened. Pa and Mama started doing more online helping and rarely went on a physical missions ever since we came because they wanted more time with us.
"Theo.", we all faced Mama as she re-entered. The atmosphere drastically changed because just like every other couple, calling the other by their given name means something is wrong.
Pa wipes his hands and goes to grab Mama's shoulders, "What happened?"
"I got a call from the agency social worker and they recently got a call from a man."
"Okay?"
"He wants to see Riya."
It was deadly silent. There was only one man in the world that would willingly want to see me enough to call the agency for me, but he's dead. I killed him with the rest of those psychos that found joy in tormenting little kids, so there shouldn't be any reason for someone to want to see me. I knew everyone was thinking the same thing, the five of us saw each of us kill one of those motherfuckers and made sure they would never come back. So who called?
"Ma. Who called? Cause that sick bastard was killed with the rest of those assholes.", Alex had clenched his fists and was trying to keep his anger down while asking.
"No, no it wasn't him.", she glanced at Pa and with just one word everything stopped. "His name was Odin. Odin West."