Author's Note: I'm ba-ack! A huge, heartfelt sorry for being gone for so long. Unfortunately, that's the way life goes sometimes. But I'm back. This chapter is short, I know, but it's a pretty critical turning point, as you will soon see. I hope I still have some fans out there, and if you're reading this, I hope you're pleased with what you get.

Fifteen Years Ago:

Sam peered again at her alarm clock. It was a little after two in the morning, and everyone would be

asleep. Well, everyone except for the normal patrolling agents stationed at BPRD headquarters, but

they would not impede her progress to the library, or even find it odd. She had the habit of going there

nights when sleep was hard to find, but a good book wasn't.

This particular night, however, she was going to sneak a pair of ancient tomes from a secret annex off of the library and hide them in her room. It had taken her all of a week and a half to summon up the courage, days spent monitoring both Abe and Broom's literary habits to see if the books would be easily missed.

Recently, she had had her fifteenth birthday, and as a special gift from Abe and Broom, she was shown the annex and assigned to help Abe with a research project that would involve the old books. She had been researching with Abe for a little over two years now, and they had a familiar, complementary style. Both would start on the same project, then Sam would begin to chafe at Abe's methodical and orderly fashion. Not that she wasn't orderly when she was finding new information, but she wanted to find more, faster, and would begin to leapfrog between subjects, often finding something new, sometimes finding a connection that Abe had missed.

The cold hall floor was a shock to her feet as she gently closed her door and began to creep down the hall, reminiscing about what had led her to this mission. After about a week of going through the standard troll and fairy stories with Abe, she had begun to look further around the room. Every day for another week, she unearthed older and older books and flipped through them with fascination. One illustration in one book had caught her eye. The drawing could have been Red, if he had let his horns grow, blew something other than cigar smoke from his nostrils and had a flame atop his head. She noted the title "Filius Cado Unus," and filed the book away where she could find it again easily.

The second book that filled her with both fascination and dread had an illustration similar to the first, only the flames on Red's head had a crown articulated in them, and the roughly drawn figure was tearing down trees and homes while screaming humans looked on. "Prenuncius Ruina" became another book placed for an easy find.

The problem was, she ruminated to herself after assuring that Abe was indeed asleep in his tank, she didn't feel comfortable reading books like that in front of Abe or Broom. They wouldn't need their Latin-English dictionary to tell them the tiles in English were "Son of The Fallen One," and "Harbinger of Destruction."

She didn't want questions, she didn't want them telling her not to read such upsetting things. She wanted to study what was written at her own pace, relying on her translation dictionary and the language lessons she was taking. She certainly didn't want anyone to think that anything in an old book was going to make her scared of Red, someone she loved like an older brother.

On the contrary, she was trying to empower herself with knowledge. Everything she had skimmed through in those books had looked like predictions and speculations. Maybe there was a way to prevent what happened in those pictures. The only way to find out was to study those books cover to cover.

She paused outside of the passage door to the annex. Nearly five years practicing her telekinetic skills, she was pretty sure she could crack the door and summon the books to herself. Opening the door all the way and clambering into the annex would just make way too much of a racket. Plus, if Abe woke, an alibi was more plausible if she was away from the door.

Sam closed her eyes and stood still, holding her arms out for what she hoped would land in them. She focused, just picturing the two books, picturing them moving from where she had placed them earlier in the day, pictured them lifting slowly and easily into the air together, pictured them moving quietly through the air, still together, pictured them moving easily into her waiting her arms. She didn't open her eyes until she felt the weight of the books.

Looking down quickly, she saw they were more dusty and fragile than she had recalled from just earlier in the day. She hugged them to her chest, hiding the titles, and feeling the nagging feelings of anxiety and curiosity lift away as she stole away to her room and hid the books. She had done it, and now she could sleep, both because she had gotten the books and because TK still made her tired.

Present Day, November, Near Trenton, New Jersey:

Zinco's cell phone rang in the distinctive tone he had reserved for Rasputin, his master. Despite his riches, he would be nowhere without Rasputin's near obsessive study of the occult, which had given him his long life span, on top of other things.

He had been sent on a recognizance mission, and the instructions had been simple: Find Bruttenholm's pet, see with whom he was associating, and learn his habits. His first reported results had angered Rasputin, as he had expected they would. The one they called Hellboy was no longer cloistered away at the BPRD headquarters. He hadn't been spotted in the area since his purported heroics three months previous.

Rasputin's voice was like a cold vapor through the speaker.

"Fenwick. He's with his friends on a farm in Fenwick, Connecticut."

"How should I proceed, Sir?"

"I will make this my game. Smoke them out of their little rat hole so they have to run back to Bruttenholm's hiding place. Try to keep as many alive as possible, especially Sherman."

Zinco hung up and signaled to his driver.

It was a peaceful night in Sam's house. Lily was tucked away in bed, Red was watching a prison reality show he had recently become addicted to for some unknown reason and Sam, Liz and Abe were in Sam's bedroom, looking over some of the research she'd gathered on her laptop. Sam was wishing she still had those books she had secreted away to her room at the BPRD so many years ago.

The trio was chatting, sometimes debating, sometimes pontificating, sometimes just falling into an easy pattern that had come to all of them again after about a month of living together.

Everything was shattered at the sight of Red's panicked face in the doorway, holding a fretting Lily in his arms. She was wrapped in her favorite princess blanket and whining in confusion at his interruption. All Sam could think was that she hadn't even heard him come up, Abe hadn't even told her he sensed the activity.

"Fire. We gotta get out now. I got your car keys, Sammy." He stated all of this while moving into the room, shifting Lily's position, and helping both women to stand.

"Fire?" Sam said uncomprehendingly. "My house? Put it out, let's put it out. It can't be that big."

"It is. It came from the basement and into the kitchen. I didn't even smell it. Now let's go!"

Lily began to cry. This propelled Sam somehow, and she ran to her closet, hooking her purse over her shoulder and grabbing her gun case from the top shelf. Her laptop was still in the other hand.

"I'm behind you. Go! Get Lily out!"

The other three adults turned to comply, when Lily shouted. "Mommy, Mommy, I'm scared!"

"It's okay, Lily, go with Uncle Red. Everything's okay."

"You're lying!" Sam heard her daughter scream as she was carried downstairs quickly. "It's not okay, you're lying to me!" Lily was sobbing as she screamed.

Sam made to follow behind Abe, made it down the stairs and into the living room, where flames were already hungrily consuming the walls and furniture. In her shock, she stopped. What happened? How? How did they not notice the house was burning? Was this an accident, or deliberate? If it was deliberate, who would burn her house down? Who wanted to hurt her, hurt them?

She had been struck dumb, still holding her purse, her laptop and the case containing her Glock, as she continued to watch her home burn. Suddenly, she felt a powerful arm go around her waist and literally lift her off of the ground.

"Everybody's in the car." Red assured her as he carried her out. She still continued to watch the fire destroy her surroundings, then was shivering in the cool of the night. Luckily, her spell was broken at the sensation of the air.

Sam broke away from Red and they both headed to the truck. "Did you find the blankets in the cab? Lily and Liz need blankets."

"Found 'em. Where are we gonna go, Sammy? We'd stick out at a Holiday Inn."

"Yeah, tell me about it." She turned to Red. "It's gonna be cramped, but you're gonna have to ride in the cab. The cover ought to keep you warm." She looked at the house again, then let a few tears fall as she watched how fast it was burning. "The place is totaled. I guess we're going back to the BPRD for now."

After securing Red, she got into the cab, checked the heat on the idling truck, then grabbed her GPS navigator, setting it for "Western New Jersey Waste Treatment Facility," the code name for BPRD headquarters.

Looking behind her, Lily was falling asleep again, cradled by her Uncle Abe. Liz was simply watching her as she pulled into the road and placed a 911 call on her cell.

"That fire was deliberate," Sam finally said when they reached the town limits sign. "For the house to burn so fast, without us even noticing, they had to use some kind of accelerant." She let more tears fall, then pounded her fist on the steering wheel. "I didn't want to go back there yet, Liz, I honestly didn't, but I don't see us with any other choice. They have to take us there."

"They have to house us, but they can't force us to take any missions," Liz asserted, only guessing at the pain Sam was suffering from. She put a hand to her belly, which was only now beginning to round out and show the presence of the babies.

"They won't have to house us long. I have insurance, good insurance. When the fire marshal rules arson, I'll get a big payoff and we'll get a different place." She sighed, then absently wiped tears from her face. "At least I was smart enough to put those papers in a safe deposit box at the bank. Any clues on how to build a fireproof house?"

Liz shook her head sadly. She was feeling pain of her own, pain from losing her safe haven, pain for her friend, and the pain of, for once, being the victim of a fire she had no hand in. "No clue."

"Me neither. We'll figure it out. All of us."

And Liz knew she meant more than just building a fireproof house.