I looked at the friend. He was red-haired, with a red beard, and very blue eyes, and hooked his thumbs into his belt in a way that I wanted to describe as forced-casual.

“I’m Victoria. Antares if you want to use something fancier,” I introduced myself.

“Tony. I got the rundown on the group from a distance,” he said. He shook my hand. “I’m keeping an eye on things at Lookout’s house on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, making a dinner, breakfast. Usually there are two of us there at a time.”

“Because I really need that much supervision,” Lookout said.

“We supervise each other, too,” Tony said.

“They thought we should send someone here for this meeting to supervise and ensure we know what’s going on,” Natalie said. “Tony’s a friend of a friend of mine that’s in family law.”

“We saw each other a few times when we did the big friend group get-togethers. You know the kind, where you say hi to a bunch of people that are three degrees of separation away from you, but you don’t ever really talk to them,” Tony said.

“I know the kind,” I said, smiling.

“We’re talking now,” Natalie said.

“Everything’s okay on the home front?” I asked. I looked at Lookout.

“Okay enough,” Lookout said. “Quiet.”

“We’ll figure out something more long-term later,” Tony said. “For now, quiet isn’t the worst thing.”

“No power all last night,” Lookout said. “It’s terrible. No TV, no movies, no computer, can’t run half my tech.”

“Build a generator,” Cryptid said.

“I’d have to box it up, and I’d have to make it big if I wanted to get energy from nothing, and it takes resources, and it takes time. And oh, duh, I can’t build in the dark, so I’d need a generator to build a generator. See my problem? Ugh.”

“Ugh,” Cryptid echoed her. “Try harder.”

“Go easy, Cryptid,” I said. “Why don’t you go for a walk?”

“Whatever,” he said. The camouflage that cloaked him slipped around his body as he moved, adapting to the surroundings within a few feet of him with each step or so.

“Come on,” I told Lookout. “You two okay on your own?”

“Capes are neat,” Natalie said, in a way that made me think she was being sarcastic. “We’ll crowd-watch. Right?”

“Yeah,” Tony said.

“What are we doing?” Lookout asked.

“Checking in,” I said.

There were too many things I needed to know, wanted to ask. Some were past, some present, some future.

And Lookout needed some distractions, because as far as I could tell, her home life was less mired in the bad, but there was also a distinct lack of good in it. I could imagine it was lonely.

As I took her hands, my eye fell on my mom, who was talking to my dad.