eleven
we're not in kansas anymore.

"GOING SOMEWHERE?" ALARIC questions a few hours later when he finds Hope and Isabelle trying to sneak out of the school with only two overnight bags and Alaric's keys. Both girls turn around with guilty facial expressions, but Alaric's eyes widen once he sees his keys in Isabelle's hand. "Better questions, where the hell do you two think you're going with my keys and without telling me?"

"I miss the twins," Isabelle pipes up, saying the first thing that comes to her head. It's not a lie, but the next part is. And it's not a good lie either. "So Hope was gonna drive me to the airport, so I could fly to Europe and surprise them."

"At 3:00 a.m.?" Alaric counters, only for them to nod in unison. He, however, isn't buying the lie at all. "Hope, you don't even have your driver's license. And neither do you, Isabelle. You two were gonna commit grand theft auto, which is a felony. You're ditching school right before the midterm exams begin. So tell me, why shouldn't I suspend you both this very second?"

"Because you love us so much since we're your favorite students right after Lizzie and Josie," Isabelle deadpans, giving him a cheesy smile. Alaric frowns at her, knowing she's not wrong as Hope holds up her bracelet. Alaric glances at it, unamused.

"And what is that?"

"It's basically a supernatural compass. If this thing is glowing, that means that Landon's in trouble. And it's glowing. So me and Izzy are going after Landon."

Alaric sighs, giving them a troubled look. "Then we're going, and I'm driving."

"Yay!" Isabelle beams, but it's clear she's tired. "Road trip!"

The others don't seem as elated as they climb into Alaric's car. And they don't know it yet, but Landon's in Kansas looking for his mom. He has no idea what he's walking into. None of them do.

They drive all the way to Kansas, only to find that the compass leads them to a house that's surrounded by a large group of people. The trio climb out of the car, only to find a tall, raven haired man in a worker's jumpsuit approaching them. "Can I help you?"

"Yeah, I hope so," Alaric nods at the house, pretending to just be a curious stranger as he points at the various workers spraying and examining the house with different objects. "So, what's going on here?"

"Gas leak," the man answers, only for Isabelle to hear his heart skip a beat. Isabelle smirks as he continues his lie. "Don't worry, though, we have it under control."

"I bet you do," the Castiel girl remarks, the smirk still on her lips as he raises an eyebrow at Alaric.

"You wouldn't happen to know who lives here, would you? We tried knocking, but no one's home."

"Uh, we're looking for-" Hope begins, only for Alaric to cut her off.

"The highway. See, we're lost, and we... well, we saw you guys, and we thought we'd ask for directions."

"Yeah, at the end of the road, you make a right," the man states, looking at them with an odd expression, as if waiting for them to slip up. "Can't miss it."

"Cool. Thanks," Alaric smiles falsely before looking at the girls. "All right, let's go, Jessica and Veronica."

Hope and Isabelle both narrows their eyes at their headmaster before getting into the car. Hope then scrunches her nose at him. "Jessica and Veronica? Really?"

"He was lying," Isabelle informs, choosing not to comment on Alaric's terrible choice of fake names.

"I know," their headmaster breathes, starting the car. "I've been apart of enough cover-ups to smell one a mile away, but all I know is they wouldn't have asked about Landon if they had him, so... we gotta find him before they do."

At that point, it seems like the whole world is chasing Landon. But only one person is actually with him right now-his mother. Isabelle, however, smirks when she sits back in her chair, and feels her powers leading her towards Landon. She directs them to a shady looking motel, and finds the exact room.

Alaric kicks the door in, and walks in hastily, only for a raven haired woman to press a gun to his temple. He puts his hands up to show he's not a threat. "Uh, I'm looking for Landon Kirby."

"And who the hell are you?"

"People who care about him," Hope pipes up, using her powers to take the gun from Landon's mother. Her and Hope then walk into the room together. "So tell us where he is before I blow your head off."

Alaric grabs the gun from his charge's hands as Landon's mom, Seylah grins. "You two must be Hope and Isabelle. I've heard a lot about you two."

Landon then comes out of the bathroom, gasping once he sees the trio. They then sit down, telling Seylah about themselves. Finally, Alaric makes a remark, not pleased with Seylah. "Well, now you know about us. All we know about you is that you gave birth to Landon, he says a monster attacked you, and now there's some sort of fake gas company coming after you two. So, I think it's time you start filling in some blanks."

Seylah then sits on the edge of one of the beds in the room, telling her troubling story. "When I finished my service in the army, I was recruited by an intelligence organization. The States sounded like a better life. I didn't know what I was signing up for, but soon I learned that things like you two exist in this world."

She glances at the teenage girls at that part before looking at Alaric. "My job was very much like yours. To keep the supernatural world a secret. Whenever a monster went bump in the night and risked exposing the truth, I tracked it down and brought it back to headquarters."

"Not all supernatural beings are monsters," Isabelle speaks up, disgusted with how this woman thinks about supernatural beings. But she's unfazed by Isabelle's statement.

"You are to me. But sorry, I can't tell you guys where headquarters is. You all seem morally inclined enough to do something stupid, and there's too much blood on my hands as it is. A few years in, I saw something I shouldn't. I became the hunted instead of the hunter. I wanted to know what was happening to the monsters. Because even though I spent all that time studying their every move, I couldn't remember them at all. So I started taking notes. I realized my memory was being erased. The question was: how?"

"Malivore," Alaric realizes it at the same time as Isabelle and Hope. Seylah then gasps.

"How do you know about Malivore?"

"Landon took a knife that belonged to our school's collection," Alaric explains. "Now monsters that shouldn't exist have been coming after it ever since."

"He means I stole it. And then I, like, um, woke it up or something," Landon corrects the older man before blinking a few times, dumbfounded. "What's Malivore?"

"A hell dimension, kind of like Edom," Isabelle exclaims, making him look at her like she's crazy. "Except when demon's are banished to Edom, they're remembered. When supernatural beings go to Malivore, it's like they never existed."

"The last monster that came for the knife was a Necromancer who screwed us over and returned it back to Malivore," Hope adds onto what Isabelle said. "Long story. But he said that the knife was one of three keys that kept Malivore contained, so why are monsters still coming for you, Landon?"

"I have no idea," he deadpans, unsure what to say so he uses sarcasm to cover up his fear. "Didn't really get a chance to ask the last one. He just tried to eat me."

"Gross," Isabelle pretends to gag as Alaric looks at Seylah tiredly.

"As you can see, it's been a rough semester."

"It will only get worse if you don't go home and forget you heard the name," Seylah huffs firmly, crossing her arms. "Just like we forget anyone who's ever been there."

"You have to tell us more-" Landon begins, only for her to cut him off. Isabelle listens as she talks, and hears her heart beat change, something that signals she's lying.

"I don't know who your father is. My job was stressful, so I had flings to blow off steam. Got pregnant, and I'm not equipped to be a mother. Sorry. I thought I was giving you a better life."

She storms out of the room, only for Isabelle to follow after her. She finds Seylah sitting on a picnic bench near the hotel pool, drinking tequila from a flask. Isabelle sits down next to her, only for Seylah to offer her the flask.

"I'm under age," Isabelle points out, never having been offered alcohol by an adult before. It's all kinds of wrong.

"Doubt it's ever stopped you before. Look, you already know everything I know."

"If you worked in the supernatural world, you've probably heard of the Castiel family," Isabelle declares, only for Seylah to nod. "I'm Isabelle Castiel, the only one left of my family. I have the werewolf gene, and haven't triggered my curse yet. But my angelic blood heightens my senses, so I can hear a person's heartbeat. I know you were lying about not knowing who Landon's father is. You should tell him the truth."

"How about I tell you instead?" Seylah suggests, and Isabelle nods, meaning she's listening. "Just to see if you believe me. Because I'm still not sure that I believe what I'm about to say, and I lived it. The organization I used to work for guards the portal to Malivore. When I realized I was having memory lapses, I started writing everything down. Drawing maps. I wrote about the creatures I captured and where I took them. Each entry ended there."

"Where did you take them?"

Isabelle asks the question out of curiosity, but Seylah simply shakes her head. "Nah, that's not important. One day, I snuck in by myself. And what I found was a black pit, locked away. It's an actual pit, filled with tar, uh, or something. When my former employers discovered that I was trying to remember the things they made me forget, they tossed me into the pit. I don't know how long I was in Malivore, only that I felt isolation and loneliness. And then, one day, I found myself back here. I woke up in the middle of nowhere, covered in mud, absolutely no idea how I got there. Turns out two years had gone by, but there was a bright side. No one I worked for remembered me. But I wasn't exactly free, because I was pregnant."

The entire time, Isabelle is listening intently to her heart, and it's steady. And as far fetched as this woman's story is, she knows Seylah is telling the truth. "I believe you."

"Really?"

"Well, my ancestor is a literal angel, so what most people think is the impossible seems pretty possible to me," the young witch chuckles, making Seylah laugh. But her face sobers up as she continues.

"It was easier for me to leave Landon in a small basket on the steps of a local church. I was selfish, and now I'm tired. I've spent eighteen years trying to stay off the grid. To remain erased. I can't be his mother. Not in the way he needs me to be. Sorry."

Seylah goes to her car, and Isabelle follows her. "You can't just leave. Do you really want Landon to remember you as someone that left him twice?"

"No. He won't remember me at all," Seylah pulls a gun out and shoots Isabelle in the neck with a tranquilizer. The Castiel girl stares at her in shock, holding onto her neck in pain as she falls to the ground, unconscious. "And neither will you."

Seylah drives away, leaving Isabelle in the parking lot. She's found a couple of minutes later by Landon, Hope, and Alaric. But they're running from a monster, so Landon lifts her into the car before they drive away as fast as possible. Hope uses a tracking spell to track Seylah to a place in Fort Valley.

When they get to Fort Valley, Alaric presses down hard on the brakes to keep from hitting an electric fence. And when he does, Isabelle shoots awake with a gasp. She pulls the tranquilizer dart out of her neck with a wince before looking over at Landon, who's sitting next to her in the back seat. "Your mom shot me."

"Now she's trying to erase herself," Landon tells her as the four hop out of the car. They jog towards the fence, only to see a Triad sign. "Maybe the electric fence stopped our fishy friend."

"I don't think so," Hope mutters, pointing to a gigantic hole in the fence.

"Fishy friend?" Isabelle echoes, wondering just how much she missed.

"I'll catch you up on everything later," Hope heaves as the group climb through the fence and run as fast as they can towards the Triad building.

But they stop in their tracks once they spot a gigantic monster. It looks like a fish with legs. Landon moves towards it, only for Hope to pull him back. "Hey, stay back. He's dangerous."

"I have to get in there," Landon grunts, yanking himself from her grasp before running towards the monster and the building. Isabelle and Hope both go after him as Alaric yells at them, struggling to keep up with the three teenagers.

"Wait, guys, be careful!"

But they don't see the monster trigger one of Triad's security measures-a bomb. The bomb goes off, instantly killing the monster and causing Hope, Landon, Isabelle, and Alaric to go flying back, hitting the ground so hard that they lose consciousness.

Isabelle and Hope can only speculate about what happened after that. But it's not hard for Isabelle and Hope to put two and two together. Seylah went to Triad. And then she went to a Malivore. Triad, no doubt, tried to stop her and failed. She had a reason to fight. That's why she most likely beat them. And then she was erased.

And that's why the next morning, Isabelle, Hope, Landon, and Alaric woke up, confused, in pain from the blast, and having no idea how they got there.

"I don't think we're in Kansas anymore."

The group drive back in silence, and as soon as they get back to school, Isabelle and Hope go to Alaric's office, them being the only ones that remember Kansas, their memories coming back to them in bits and pieces.

They tell Alaric everything they know, and then Isabelle takes a deep breath. "So... what should we do?"

"How am I supposed to know?" Alaric scoffs, crossing his arms. "I don't remember doing anything you two just said. But I think the only question we should be asking ourselves is: why do you two remember?"

"Isn't it obvious?" Isabelle shrugs, only for them to shake their heads. "Dr.Saltzman, you're human. And I now know that Landon must be supernatural. But me and Hope, we're special. We're loopholes that shouldn't even exist."

"That's probably not good in this situation," Hope purses her lips before pulling the artifact Landon had on their trip found out of her bag. "This, Dr.Saltzman, is the urn you don't remember. I figured it was better to have it here than to leave it laying around."

UNEDITED