Ghost Scarab

Sponge Bob

The sound of Marc, Axel, and Brandon's arrival is what woke me up. I was still nestled against Raven who was currently watching Sponge Bob of all things.

I watched Marc and Brandon enter the bedroom, each carrying two bags. I blinked the sleep from my eyes, "I'm surprised you got here so fast."

"Private plane," Marc answered simply.

"The Academy has a private plane?"

Marc smirked at me, tilting his head in my direction with a cocked eyebrow. "You can hire a private jet at the airport pretty quickly. Anyone can take one as long as they are willing to pay."

I nodded, I had never been on a plane so it wasn't surprising that I didn't know that.

Marc move further into the room and dropped his bags on the empty bed. He was dressed in a distressed blue shirt, worn jeans, and work boots. I wondered if he had been at a worksite before he was called away.

He eyed me snuggled against Raven, "Comfortable?"

"Sponge Bob," Raven stated as though that explained everything.

"Seriously, he's got you watching Sponge Bob?"

"Good show," Raven said sounding a bit defensive. "Patrick's funny."

"Actually I fell asleep," I said in response to Marc, sitting up and stretching a little. "What's wrong with Sponge Bob?" I had never actually seen the show, so I had no idea why Marc was reacting to it the way he was.

It was Corey who responded, "It's not Marc's favorite show, but Raven loves it. I think he learned English by watching it."

"Only a few words," Raven said as Brandon moved from behind Marc. His shirt was grease-stained and there were holes in his jeans. He collapsed onto the bed we were on, sitting close to me.

"Ugh, I hate flying," he said.

There were now four people on the bed and it was far too crowded to be comfortable. I started to get up but was stopped when Brandon took hold of my wrist. He peered closely at my hand, inspecting Raven's artwork. "Why are you marking her?"

"She's going to get a tattoo," Raven responded with an unwarranted amount of certainty.

"She never said she was going to get a tattoo, and that is not a decision you can make for her," Corey said reasonably.

"You shouldn't get a tattoo, it makes you identifiable," Brandon said. He rubbed his finger over the birdcage and when that had no effect he licked his finger and rubbed the mark again. There was still no change to the drawing and a pulled my hand away in case he decided to try licking it next.

"What's wrong with being identifiable?" I asked, curiously.

"Think about it like this," Brandon said. "When you picked pockets, you didn't want to stand out. You definitely didn't want anything that would make you easily identifiable, right? You tried your hardest to be forgettable."

I nodded in response even though he probably meant it as a rhetorical question and Brandon continued, "Well we have to do the same."

I looked over at Raven, who was covered in tattoos, "But what about Raven, he's covered in tattoos, how does he get away with it?"

Brandon shrugged, "Sometimes you need to have tattoos in order to blend in. But it is inconvenient if you want to be able to do a wide variety of jobs. Raven is limited in terms of the jobs he can do."

"How is he limited? He was able to meet with Mrs. Gunther without alarming her, he cleans up nicely."

Raven looked extremely pleased with my statement causing Brandon to scowl slightly and Corey to smile in amusement. It was Corey who responded, "Well it stopped him from helping us when we were looking for you. After all, if he had been a part of the group when we first found you at the mall, it would have been way harder getting you to trust us. Not that you did trust us at first, but you understand what I'm getting at, right."