My Inner Demons S2 Continued

Until there is Peace

~With the gang, Appolline's medical center~
          After Ava had recovered from the shock of the attack, Noi wasted no time rushing her back inside Mersedith's protective barriers.
          "Noi, we need to go to Appolline's office. Pierce and Leif are in there, and we can meet up with Asch and Rhys there, to tell them what happened." Ava panted. She hadn't realized how far she had ran when Marcos yelled at her, but then it was the guilt and regret that fueled her. Now it was only exhaustion.
          Slowing down his pace, Noi tapped his armband in a specific rhythm a few times and said, "Everyone's on their way. Can you run, Princess Ava?"
          Ava nodded, "Yeah, just, just gimme a sec. Whew. I'm a bit winded. One more second. Ok, almost ready. Like, ten more minutes."
          Noi, despite their situation, laughed and picked Ava up, "I got you princess."
          Ava blushed and clung onto Noi as he ran with inhuman speed. In a few minutes, they were next to the ladder leading up to Appolline's treehouse.
          "Lady's first!" Noi said, then leaned in to whisper cheekily, "I learned that from Socky."
          Ava managed to laugh and climbed up, waiting for Noi at the top before they both walked inside the office.
          Pierce was staring moodily out the window, and Leif was furiously pacing across the length of the room. Asch was playing a fun looking game of see-how-long-you-can-light-something-on-fire-before-a-disaster, and Rhys, of course, had his nose buried in a book, trying to appear calm, but his teeth were worrying at his lips. Ava blushed and shoved any thought of Rhys' lips far, far from her mind.
          Pierce was the first to notice her, and exhaled in relief, his biceps relaxing. Leif saw her, too, and before Ava knew it, four large, buff Daemos were in front of her, glaring her down. Noi scooted a little bit closer to her.
         "Care to explain?" Asch said menacingly.
         "I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" Ava said, putting her hands up in surrender, "I wasn't thinking, but-"
         "No, you weren't." Leif said angrily, "and that's gonna get you killed!"
          "You shouldn't have run away, and you especially should have payed attention to your surroundings. You went outside the Mersedith borders, for goodness sake." Rhys said condescendingly.
          Ava turned red, "Shut up. You guys don't scold me! You're not my dads! I can do what I want. You guys keep telling me you want me safe, you want to protect me, but you never even told me where the border ended! You never taught me how to defend myself-"
          Ava broke off, too embarrassed to continue. She had planned to storm off, but there wasn't a lot of space and awkwardly climbing down a ladder would look silly, so she just stomped over to the farthest armchair and picked up a book, not caring about its contents.
         "We're sorry, Princess." Asch said begrudgingly, after several long moments of silence.
          Ava nodded, too exhausted to stay mad. Besides, she needed to tell them what Zex said to her before he... passed away.
          "Zex told me that it wasn't King Bracken that was obsessed with me. He said that Lady Bish paid her 'telepath pet' to make the king go mad."
Asch straightened up a bit, his eyes darkening at the mention of his father. Ava understood a little bit. If her fathers had gone mad, she would still love them, too. And she would be horrified that someone was going into their head.
But still, Ava continued, "And Zex also said that my father had cut a deal to grant my immunity from her. My father. They took my family!"
Rhys shook his head thoughtfully, "No, I don't think they did. No humans can travel to Daemos with an unrealistic amount of power. All of us here combined barely created enough power."
          "But Lady Bish could send Zex to our world." Ava pointed out.
          "Zex is Lady Bish's pet. Because of this, he can transform into a cat form at will. This change of form makes Zex more... transparent, and he can pass through the 'walls' of our worlds with more ease." Rhys explained.
"Well, why did Zex say Lady Bish made a bargain with my father?" Ava demanded.
Rhys shrugged, "Perhaps he was bluffing, or trying to scare you. He's dead now, so we'll never know."
Ava's stomach flipped. Her mind went back to her clothes, still covered in blood, Zex's blood.
"I'm going to go change." Ava announced and hurried toward the door. At the last second, before leaving the treehouse, she looked back at all her friends, "Um... goodnight. And thank you."
There were so many things that sentence applied to.