“Aunt Rea!” Joseph yelled into the house as he pushed the door open. “We’re back!”

Yurea came into the entryway from the kitchen.

“What happened to you boys?!” Yurea gasped, rushing forward to examine Odin’s rather battered face.

“Well, uh, we ran into Tezzo.” Odin winced as her fingers grazed one of his bruises. “The good news is we won.”

Yurea pursed her lips and shook her head. “That stupid boy…” She muttered irritably. “What are your parents going to say when I tell them you all got into a fight?”

“Oh please, Aunt Rea…” Manto said, her voice trembling. “You can’t tell them about this! They’ll never let us leave Avalon again! Especially Ryan and me.”

Yurea looked into her small niece’s face. The look of desperation on Manto’s face was enough to break her heart. Which it did. The Titan woman bit her lip as her parental instincts wrestled with her feelings as an aunt.

Finally, she sighed and shook her head ruefully. “All right. We’ll keep this… incident… between us. But I mean it, you hear? Not one word. The last thing I need is Pryvani Tarsuss or that bodyguard of hers coming after me because their boys got hurt on my watch.”

Odin grinned. “Well, Rixie’s really a sweetheart once you get to know her.”

“Hmph.” Yurea’s eyebrow raised sardonically. “And your mother?”

“Hey, I could really use a drink of water…” Odin muttered evasively.

“That’s what I thought.” Yurea rolled her eyes. “Come on you three, let’s get those scrapes and bruises cleaned up. After that, I think it’s best you all stayed inside today.”

“By the way, where’s Rehva and Ryan?”

“Right here, Mom.”

Yurea turned back around to see her daughter coming up the sidewalk towards the door, with a bemused looking Ryan riding on her shoulder. Like the others, Rehva had a couple bruises on her armas and shoulders, but otherwise looked perfectly fine. Even happy.

Perhaps a little too happy…

The Titan woman’s eyes narrowed, but she shook her head and turned towards the bathroom to get the first aid kit.

“Kids.” She muttered. “Sometimes I’m glad I only had the one…”

“Good news Ryan.” Odin told the human as Rehva caught up with the rest of the group. “Yurea’s agreed not to mention our little adventure to our parents.”

“Good.” Ryan sighed, rolling his eyes. “Because I would really like to be allowed to leave Tayas Mons again in the next few decades.”

“Your mom suggested maybe we should keep to the house for the rest of the day.” Joseph told Rehva.

“Probably not a bad idea.” The young teen sighed. “Come on, we can watch a holovid or something. Well, after mom patches us up, anyway.” With that, she lead the way to where Yurea was waiting with her med kit. Ryan was still riding on her shoulder.

*.*.*.*

Joseph awoke with a start. He glanced over at the other side of the room where both Odin and Ryan were still sleeping peacefully. Joseph, however, had been roused from his sleep by a rather pressing need.

Five minutes later, Joseph stepped from the bathroom. He yawned deeply and rubbed his eyes, looking forward to returning to his warm bed and the sleep that waited. Unfortunately, about halfway back to the guestroom, a small rustling sound caught his attention. For a moment, Joseph considered ignoring it and going back to bed.

Then it happened again.

Joseph decided his curiosity had been sufficiently piqued, so he went in search of the source for the noise. He travelled down the hallway, past his cousin’s room, to the far window at the end. Through the glass, Joseph could just see the first rays of the morning sun peeking over the horizon. Sitting on the windowsill, knees curled to her chest and her face buried in her arms, was his sister Manto.

Joseph stepped closer and he could see, by the way her shoulders shook silently, that Manto had been crying.

Awkwardly, Joseph cleared his throat.

Manto’s head shot up and she looked over at her brother, her eyes were wide with surprise.

“Wh-what are you doing awake?” She asked, hastily rubbing the tears from her face.

“I had to pee.” Joseph replied quietly, suddenly finding it hard to look his sister in the face. “What are you doing up?”

Manto sighed and turned back to the window, resting her chin on her knees again. “I couldn’t sleep.”

Joseph scratched the back of his head. There was a small part of him that wished he’d just gone back to bed. “I um… were you…were you crying?”

“No!” Manto spat irritably. “I was not crying!”

Joseph sighed and shook his head. He recognized her tone, having heard it quite often as the two of them grew up. He knew she was lying.

“Yes you were.” Joseph responded with his usual tact. “Now come on, out with it.”

Manto glared at him for a moment, before sighing exasperatedly.

“Fine, yes, I was crying. Are you happy now?”

Joseph shifted uncomfortably. “Geez Manto, of course I’m not. Why were you crying?”

“Don’t worry about it, Joseph!” Manto growled. “Just leave me alone.”

Joseph sighed, and pulled a chair over to sit next to his sister. “It’s because of what happened today, isn’t it?”

Manto looked like she was about to yell at him again, but instead her shoulders slumped and she seemed to deflate before sitting back on the windowsill.

“It’s not that big of a deal, Joey.” She muttered instead.

“Are you crazy?” Joseph responded. “That jerk was a few seconds away from killing you Manto. And you’re telling me that’s no big deal?”

Manto shot to her feet and turned to face him. “Damn it Joseph, do you think I haven’t realized that? I can still see the bottom of that assholes shoe as it hovered above me, ready to crush me. I can still feel the dirt falling on my head. Not that you care or anything.”

“Don’t be stupid!” Joseph hissed. He was angry but still trying to keep his voice down, and not wake the others. “Obviously I care. I was ready to kill that kid, before you waved me off. Damn it Manto, you’re my sister. How dare you say that I don’t care about you? Hell, we’re practically twins.”

“We’re not even genetically related, doofus.” Manto muttered.

“Right, like that’s ever mattered in our family.” Joseph snorted, rolling his eyes. “I just mean we were born pretty close together.”

The two of them fell into a somewhat uncomfortable silence, as the sun outside rose into the sky.

“I’m just sick of it.” Manto muttered suddenly.

“Of what?”

“Of being small!” Manto buried her face in her arms again. “I’m sick of being tiny in a giant world. I’m tired of being looked down on in our family.”

Joseph sighed and shook his head. “Damn… for someone as smart as you are, you sure are dumb sometimes, Manto.”

“Excuse me?”

Joseph rolled his eyes. “Look, I’m not going to pretend that I know what it’s like to be as small as you are, but if you think the rest of us look down on you… then you’re not nearly as smart as people say you are. Manto, you’re the oldest. Sure it might only be by a couple weeks, but that’s because human pregnancies are shorter, hell if the rumors are true, we were conceived at the same… um, – anyway my point is, the rest of us look up to you.”

“…Really?”

Joseph rolled his eyes at the sardonic look his sister gave him.

“You know what I mean, Manto. You’re the oldest, and believe it or not, the rest of us follow your example. Do you think just anybody could wrangle as many siblings as you have to, regardless of how big they are?”

Manto shrugged.

Joseph narrowed his eyes. He reached out to the windowsill and plucked his sister from her perch.

“Hey wait! What…?”

Joseph knew he was committing taboo by picking up a smaller person without their permission, but at the moment he didn’t care. There was something more important at stake. The young man ignored Manto’s protests and gathered her into his hand. “Look, sis… I’m not trying to say you don’t have a right to be scared. The universe is a lot bigger out here than it is on Avalon. I’m just saying you don’t have to face it alone. You’ve got our parents, and Ryan … and Odin. And if all else fails, I’m here too.” Joseph smiled self-deprecatingly.

Manto snorted and rolled her eyes. “Since when are you all mushy and sensitive?”

Joseph shrugged. “Don’t tell anybody, you’ll wreck my reputation.”

*.*.*

Rehva smiled as she leaned against the doorjamb to her bedroom. She’d been awakened by the siblings arguing and had been eavesdropping on the latter half of their conversation. She hated what that lout Tezzo had done to her cousin, but she was glad the siblings had each other to lean on. It almost made Rehva wish she had a brother or sister.

Their conversation seemed to be winding down, so Rehva felt this was a good time to make her presence known. She stepped out from behind the door, stretching her arms above her head and faking a yawn.

“Oh. Good morning!” Rehva muttered, rubbing her eyes. “Did you sleep okay?”

“Great.” Manto turned towards her cousin. “Although I don’t really sleep much anyway.”

“Must be nice.” Rehva yawned again. “I’m going to get some breakfast. Do you want some?”

“Always.” Joseph laughed.

“Should we wake Odin and Ryan?” Manto asked, still seated in the palm of her brother’s hand.

“Nah.” Joseph chuckled. “I’m sure they’ll come running when the food is ready.”

The trio stepped down the stairs towards the kitchen, walking carefully to make as little noise as possible.

“I never thanked you for what you both did yesterday.” Rehva said once they reached the bottom of the staircase. “Tezzo is a jerk, so I appreciate the way you two and Odin stepped up to him as his friends.”

“Oh, well, I mean Odin did most of it.” Manto muttered, shrugging.

“Odin is also not the size of their thumb.” Rehva responded, chuckling. They stepped through the kitchen door, and Rehva made her way to the refrigerator. She pulled the door open and took out a pitcher of a dark blue liquid.

“Neither am I.” Joseph joked. “But she’s right, Manto. What you did was very brave. And you’d better hope our parents never find out about it.” He set his sister down on the counter and opened one of the high cupboards, taking out two glasses and a small plastic container the right size for his sister to use.

Manto smiled, despite herself. “Well, Ryan did a lot too.” She picked up the glass her brother had carefully filled for her and took a sip of the sweet, and tangy juice.

“Oh I already thanked Ryan.” Rehva smiled impishly, as she reached into another cupboard.

“Yeah… I’m not really sure I want to know.” Manto muttered, with a pained look on her face.

“We didn’t do anything worse than I’m sure you and Odin get up to, little cousin.” Rehva retorted, as her face split into a wide grin. “Not that I can blame you there. Rich and handsome? Hold on to him tight, Manto.”

“All right.” Joseph sighed, rolling his eyes. “This conversation just got really awkward.”

“Sorry.” Rehva laughed, breaking a roll of bread into pieces before handing one to Joseph and a much smaller piece to Manto. “We’ll stop before your ears start bleeding.”

“Thank you.” Joseph took a bite of his bread, and then drank a large gulp of his juice.

“Although, I do have some friends who might be interested, Joey…” Rehva teased.

Joseph swallowed. He stroked his chin, thoughtfully. “Well if you really think they would…”

“Okay!” Manto raised her hand. “New topic, please.”

Before either of the larger teens could respond, there was a thumping noise from outside the room. A moment later, Odin tromped into the kitchen with a still half asleep Ryan perched on his shoulder.

“Hey…” Odin yawned. “What’s the meaning of making breakfast without us?”

“I told you so.” Joseph winked at the girls. “As soon as the food was ready.”