A Birth day

Aria looked at Marcus and smiled to him understandingly. " its why I'm here, that and to keep Ruby worrying herself into an early grave." she added with a chuckle as she saw Ruby pull a tongue at her and smile. Aria placed her hand flat on his chest to show him she understood his words.

Ruby looked up as Angus spoke again about what had happened " that's her nurturing side, but even Jack doesn't break his wolfsbane potion dose, that's dangerous." she said finishing putting the washer on to clean the dishes from dinner. Aria moved from Marcus and headed down to the girls room.

"hey guys, how's it going?" she asked as she staid by the door way, leaning on the frame. " so, how badass were you? " she asked folding her arms across her chest hoping to get Anise to give her a clue if she'd taken her potion again and if not maybe she could get her to take it by talking to her.

"Well, you can manage the first, but I don't know about the second," Marcus teased Ruby a little. "We found a batch of ten intruders on the estate, and we didn't know what the hell they actually were. They didn't look like werewolves. Didn't look like anything any of us had ever seen. Fenrir actually figured out that these were metamorphs trying to look and act like werewolves but since these idiots hadn't seen a werewolf they had cobbled together some idea about it and had come out with a hodgepodge of things. Seems they were camped up in the northwest sector and using it as a base, trying to find Angus to kill him. Apparently if they turned in his corpse, they'd get a payment for it. Those morons actually asked him if he could be dead for a little while so they could correct the payment." He watched Aria go downstairs to talk to Anise

"I'll take her myself off to somewhere tonight so that if she hasn't taken her potion, she won't have a chance to hurt anyone..." Angus said, thinking, wanting everyone to be safe.

"Angus," Marcus said, "that's not the way to solve it, you know. Think. I'll wager Aria went to see if she will take her potion now that she's back. Either way, though, I truly believe she needs to have to face Jack or Jessie. Jack was her job supervisor over the summer, and she has some respect for him. And Jessie's family. They're going to want her back on her potion because if she isn't, they're not going to let her be around anyone else in this house. She can't hurt them. Theoretically, she could kill everyone here if its not controlled. This is one time you need to step back."

"I can't think she would deliberately not take it," Angus said. "She's not perfect, but we aren't either. And she loves this family. She'd never do anything that would hurt us. But I don't get it. Maybe she just forgot."

"Probably. I'm sure it's something simple like that," Marcus replied.

Anise looked up at Aria when she asked how badass she was.

"I never thought I was," she told Aria. "But I've had the training. Got hired on, got permission to work missions the same as everybody else here. Not better than. but not worse than either. There were monsters. I don't know what they were, but Mitzi was trying to fight them with some local wolves--an eight year old with a bunch of wild dogs. Against monsters. What was I supposed to do? I jumped in, just as any of you would have done. And then he chews me out because I'm sixteen? What the hell?"

Ruby chuckled at Marcus and listened as he spoke about what had happened that day around Angus. She finished up cleaning and walked over to them nodding her head " sounds like quite a fight" she said " and I hope you told those men where to go, you playing dead so they can get paid, such idiocy " she said and sat down beside Caprice and Diamond.

Aria heard Anise and nodded " sounds like a good move, something even I would have done, protecting the weaker person, but I get the feeling its about more than disobeying your dad, um Angus, I think he's more concerned because you didn't take your potion, you have taken it now, right? look, I know it tastes bad, but Robert is working on adding flavour to it, I promise" she said with a chuckle as she stayed by the door way. Aria stood upright and looked at Anise " Okay, I'm goanna say it outright, do you want to stay here, because I know forgetting your potion will net you going back to the camp, you want to leave every one who cares about you, just because of one mistake , trust me you don't want to burn these bridges." she told her knowing she would either listen or throw a fit at her, but she knew being honest to her the only way to make her understand what she would lose in the long run.

"Yeah, it really was stupid," Angus agreed with Ruby. He sighed heavily. "I really do need to go talk to Anise" He knew Anise was his responsibility, and he had to go try to resolve it. Anise was young, impulsive and had a fiery temper, and she wouldn't calm down easily. "I'll be back."

"Good luck," Marcus said as Angus headed downstairs. He stood outside the bedroom out of Anise's sight as Aria tried to talk to her.

Ginger, who had been silent at first, now spoke up.

"We both need to go see Robert, and we know it. She's sort of protecting me," Ginger said.

"No..." Anise started, and Ginger stopped her.

"It's my fault," Ginger insisted. "It was an accident, but it happened. We only took enough in our small travel potion bottles for two days. That's all the bottles hold. We didn't consider we wouldn't be able to get home after that. Evan did try to help us find a potions maker that had wolfsbane in Italy, but there weren't any, not that he found. We were out before we got home. We share one big bottle of potion here, and when I went to put the stopper back in the bottle, I dropped the whole thing, and the bottle broke. We lost the entire bottle. She never got her potion, and its my fault. We know we need to get some more from Robert, but this all went out of control with the pack. I can go over and see him..."

"No, just screw it," Anise was angry. "If Angus wants me to go back to the pack, then I'll leave right now..." She started to rip clothes out of the closet to pack them.

"Give me one minute," Ginger said to her softly. "Let me go see Robert for more potion. It won't take a minute..."

"No. If he doesn't trust me, then I'm outta here," Anise said. "Some family I picked..." Angus made a soft noise behind Aria to alert her that he was there, without alerting Anise, in case Aria wanted to try to handle it.

Ruby chuckled and nodded her head watching as he got up and walked to the stairs leading to the girls room. Aria heard some one walk down the stairs and heard Ginger then nodded " so a genuine accident, Ginger could you talk to Anise, I'll go talk to Robert about more potion for you, he always has stock, so shouldn't be a problem " she said turning she saw Angus and sighed heading back up to the main room. " I got to go talk to Robert about more wolfsbane potion for the girls , turns out Ginger dropped the bottle and I guess they were two scared to tell Angus for fear of getting in trouble" she said to Marcus before he headed over to the main house she first thought he'd be in his lab but seeing Yu hobble up from the med bay she headed down and saw Robert " ginger dropped the bottle of wolfsbane, possible they can have another bottle please and anise is not doing so well without it, I left Angus to deal with it." she stood waiting for his response.

"So," Angus said to Ginger and Anise. "It seems we have two different issues here. You both didn't get a chance to tell me about the broken bottle of potion, and I'm sorry I didn't give you time to explain. However, the other issue here is that, as much as I know you want to help when a mission comes up, you're still underage. You ask me before you just launch yourself. Our circumstances are entirely different when it comes to that. You both have a signed contract as part of our fighter team, and I'm proud of you both for that. However, you might want to re-read that. It says you have to get our permission before you go on any mission. You didn't ask Ruby or me. You slipped out, and that's a problem. And that's the part that isn't okay. That's the part you're grounded for, no more, no less. I do trust you, but if you think that Robert will support you in sneaking out to join any mission, you're mistaken. So, until I decide otherwise, you're grounded. You're part of our family, and I don't want you to not be here or to not be a Donohue. That hasn't changed. This does not need to be a catastrophe. You're grounded for a a bit, and I'll let you know, before bedtime, how long you're grounded for. Now--put your clothes back in the closet. Am I making myself clear?"

Anise sighed heavily, not sure what she wanted to do.

"Yeah, sure, just a minute," Nigel said. "I've let this one bleed long enough. I'll be with you in a moment, Aria." He finished the bleeding wound on Yu's leg and then finished cleaning up the leg. "It's closed now, so you're not leaking on my floor anymore. I'll wrap it to provide you a bit of support, but you should be alright to take that off by morning." He wrapped a dressing around the leg and then a supportive sports tape to provide it a bit of additional support. He got out a bottle of pain potion, and handed it to Yu. "In case you need it. The directions are on the bottle. You can take a dose every six hours if you need it." He got out a pair of plain blue surgical scrub trousers and handed them to Yu. "Can't let you go out without trousers, can I? It should cover your bum to get you home. Questions?"

He opened the medicine cabinet, looking for wolfsbane, but all he could find were large bottles.

"Odd. All he has are these big bottles," Nigel said. He opened the bottle and sniffed it and then re-corked it. "Yeah, it's wolfsbane alright. Well, that's all there is, one size evidently fits all. That should do it for them. I'll let Robert know they're restocked now. Depending on how long she's been without it, she could be in trouble tonight when it gets dark. If there's a concern, you'll have to get her to a safe place for the night, unless Robert has some other back up plan for such emergencies. I suppose, with five werewolves on the grounds, he certainly has to have an emergency plan. I just don't know what that is. Let us know if there's any trouble."

Yu watched as Nigel treated his wound and wrapped it then gave him some blue trousers to wear " none" he said simply as he slipped on the trousers best he could " thank you" Yu nodded to Aria as he moved out of the med bay and back to the cabin to change . Aria stood with Nigel as he looked for a bottle of wolfsbane but only found large bottles and no small.

"That's fine, we can split it into two smaller bottles in the duplex to stop this happening again" she said picking up the bottle he had just put back down. She heard him as to let him know if there was any trouble and she shook her head " no trouble, just teens being teens " she said smiling as she held the bottle close to her and moved back to the door " Please let Robert know we've taken a bottle , just so he knows, thank you" she said and quickly headed back to the duplex.

Ruby found two medium sized bottles each designed differently and washed them setting them out on the counter. She saw Aria return with a large bottle and chuckled " what no small ones?" she asked and Aria shook her head as she set it down. " okay lets separate the potion." Aria held the funnel while Ruby pored it till one bottle was fill then she emptied the last into the second sealing both before she placed the stopper back in the big bottle now empty. " okay that should do them "

Nigel nodded, agreeing to let Robert know.

Angus left and went upstairs, giving the girls some space.

"Well?" Marcus asked.

"I think Anise was intending to go awol," Angus said.

"That could have been disastrous to have an untreated teen werewolf on the loose during the full moon,' Marcus replied.

"Yes, but I don't think she'd thought about that."

"Well, you know she probably climbed out one of those little basement windows," Marcus said.

"Certainly," Angus said. "That's how I'd have done it."

"Did you secure the windows down there?"

"No, and that was deliberate on my part. I don't want her to feel trapped here. If she takes that chance and dashes off, I'll go and find her and bring her back, but hopefully, she won't do that. She's still grounded, and I tried to tell her exactly why and that I would decide how long she'll be grounded between now and bedtime tonight. That'll give her time to think. I'd better go make some sort of supper." He headed to the kitchen to see what he had to work with. He found two nice pork tenderloins, made a honey garlic sauce for them and put them in the oven and then got out some potatoes and a head of cabbage to start making a big batch of colcannon. He found a fresh panettone in the freezer, and decided to make a bread and butter pudding and add some chocolate chips to it to add some extra sweetness.

Anise picked up two bottles and walks to the living room " we got a big bottle and split it down one for each girl" she said showing Marcus as she held the bottles " bottles are Ruby's idea, I guess so they won't mix them up" she added as she handed them to Marcus " you want o give them the new bottles or shall I?" she asked.

Ruby saw Angus enter and begin to cook " how is she?" she asked him " we replaced the potion for both of them" she added placing plates back in the hutch along with cups and glasses. She watched him start cooking and watched him " looks like a good meal."

"Breaking it down in different bottles is a good thought. At least if they break one, they'll have one left," Angus said. "I don't care who takes them downstairs. It's going to be at least a good thirty minutes or so before I can do it. I have to get supper cooking."

"I'll take them," Marcus said. "I'd rather him finish cooking supper. I'm hungry." He took the bottles from Aria and went downstairs. The girls' bedroom door was still open, but the clothes appeared to be put away. Marcus knocked on the open door and then he handed the bottles to the girls. "New potion. So far as I'm concerned, you make a choice about taking it or not. You know what happens if you don't take it. So it's completely up to you."

"We never intended not to take it. We were just out," Ginger replied.

"Yes. I know. Supper's on, so we'll call you when its ready." They nodded, and Marcus went back upstairs.

"Thanks," Ginger replied as Marcus left.

"They okay?" Angus asked.

"Let her cool off," Marcus suggested. "The clothes appeared to be put away, or at least I didn't see them."

"Thanks," Angus said.

"If she ran, would she go back to the pack?"

"No," Angus said. "That much, I'm sure of. I know Dennis is still there, but when we got the girls, Fenrir was making a choice to remove Ginger from the pack because she's, generally, just too thin and fragile to survive in the wild. Anise would never go someplace where Ginger couldnt' go."

"So where do you think Anise'd go?"

"I think she'd try to make it on her own," Angus said. "but I'm hoping she wouldn't choose to run off because I grounded her. I guess thats on her."