The Animal's Daughter

Chapter 12

*Victor's POV*

I woke up on the couch with Alex curled up next to me. Graydon was next to her and used Alex as a pillow. On the other side of me was Gracie with her head on my leg. She held a stuffed bear close to her. When did the other two come down here?

I looked back at the clock to see it was 11:00. Never thought I would sleep late again when I got the kids. Screw it, the team is away and I don't want to wake them up so I just leaned back. I was about to fall asleep again when Graydon rolled off the couch. Him falling on the floor woke the the girls up. Great. Now everyone is awake. Gracie sat up and stretched as she yawned. Alex just laid back down.

"What do guys want yo do today?" I asked getting up.

"Sleep." Alex replied.

"Can we go somewhere or something? All we do is sit at home or go to the base." Graydon said standing up.

"There's a creek about a mile away from here. Want to go fishing?" I asked them.

Graydon said yes and Alex had no clue what fishing was. I told them to go get dressed while I fixed us something to eat.

*Alex's POV*

I threw on a pair on jeans and a T-shirt that Victor got me since he hated the crop tops Kitty gave me. I laced up my boots and threw my jacket on. I met the other two in the living room. Victor came up from the basement holding a box and weird looking poles. He gave one to me and Graydon and gave him the box.

We walked out the back door. Victor carried Gracie on his back while he explained to me what fishing is and how to do it. Before long, we were at the creek. Graydon walked upstream from us. Victor showed me what to do and then walked downstream a bit with Gracie. I put the worm on the hook and threw out my cast and waited like he said to. After a few minutes I had a bite. I reeled it in and held it up. It wasn't very big but it wasn't tiny either.

"Way to go kid." Victor said walking up.

He took the fish off the hook. He strung it up from its tail and hung it up until we ready to leave. We spent a couple hours out here. We caught about 12 fish. Victor and Gracie caught 5, I caught 4 and Graydon caught 3. We were packing up to leave when Graydon pushed me into the creek. Cold cold cold!!! I'm glad I know how to swim, but the metal bones kinda makes it hard.

When I went to get out, Graydon offered to help me out by sticking his hand out. I grabbed his hand and pulled him in. He hit the water face first. Victor and Gracie were laughing from the banks. When Graydon's head came above the water's surface, I jumped on his back dunking him back down. I went to swim over to the bank when he grabbed my foot and pulled me back. He splashed me in the face before trying to dunk me. We fought in the creek for a while.

"Alright, knock it off. Come on so we can get back to the house." Victor said laughing at us.

I looked over at Graydon and I could tell he was thinking the same thing I was. We got out of the water and walked over to Victor.

"Hey, Dad." I said.

"What?" He asked turning around.

I took the chance and ran up and hugged him. Graydon followed and hugged him too.

"Dammit, get off." He said trying to sound mad, but failed at it.

"I hate both of you." He mumbled as he gave up.

"But we love you." I said as he started to walk off while we clung to him.

Gracie followed us giggling like crazy. I let Victor go and picked her up. She squealed and squirmed around until I let her go. Victor picked her up and carried her since she struggles to walk in the snow. Graydon walked beside me until he pushed me down.

"Tag. You're it!" He yelled running off.

I chased after him and tackled him. We wrestled in the snow until I kicked him off me.

"You're it!" I yelled and took off running.

He chased me around but never caught me. Before we knew it, we were back at the cabin. Victor and Gracie went inside while Graydon and I started a snowball fight. Gracie eventually came out and joined my side behind the wall of snow I built. Victor came out and joined Graydon after he cleaned the fish. Boys vs. Girls.

We fought our little war for a while until Victor said we had to go inside. Graydon and I took showers and changed clothes before joining our little sister in front on the fire place. We watched TV and talked until Victor brought us food. Fried Fish and French fries. Guess we're eating in the living room tonight. Today went by really fast. I never thought I would ever have this much fun.

We ate, talked and threw fries at each other. Well, Graydon, Gracie and I did. Victor just yelled at us to stop making a mess. After we ate, we just hung out and watched some weird movie. We all plied up on the couch. Gracie and I were curled up next to Victor while Graydon sat on the floor in front of me. Victor took Gracie upstairs when she fell asleep only to come back down to see Graydon passed out too. He picked him and carried him upstairs. He came back downstairs again and sat down on the coffee table in front of me. I knew he wanted to talk about last night now that they were asleep.

"Alex, what happened in your nightmare? I want to help, but I can't if you leave me in the dark." He said.

"I don't want to talk about it... But maybe I could show you." I said staring at the floor.

"It's you're choice, cub. If you're not ready, then that's fine. I don't want you to do anything you don't want to." He said as rubbed my shoulder.

"No, you should know." I said looking at him.

I put my hands up to his head and stared into his eyes as I showed him everything. All of my haunting memories. Once I was done, I put my hands down and looked at the floor again. Victor engulfed me in a bear hug and held me close. He pulled me in his lap.

"I'm so sorry I never came for you sooner." He whispered into my hair.

"It's ok. You didn't know about me." I said to him.

"Yes, I did. Your mom told me about you after you were born. I came and saw you once when you were about a year old. But I knew I had to stay away because people were going to trace me back to you. I got worried after your mom never sent me anymore news about you. That's when I found out you were missing. I was told you were killed with your mother. If I had known you were alive, I would have come for you and killed everyone of those bastards." He told me.

I felt tears building up. I tried my best to fight them back, but they fell anyway. Vic... Dad wiped them away and kissed my forehead. We sat there like this until I felt sleep consuming me. I slowly closed my eyes and tell into a dreamless sleep.