Storm met them at the front door, looking less than pleased. "How could the three of you not have any idea what Lenny was planning?"

"Because he's obviously more intelligent than we gave him credit for," Ziva mumbled as she passed Storm and headed directly toward her office.

"I can't believe I had to fly back from Washington for this!" Storm pushed past them, her stride angry as she moved further down the hall away from them.

Ziva glanced out a window as she passed, ya know if it weren't for the storm clouds and lightning outside, you'd have no clue she was pissed. Pffft, sure and if you didn't own a clock you'd never know morning from the night.

"Sorry, Storm. We had no idea he hated all of this or us." Craig dragged down the hall like, well like, he'd just lost his best friend.

Storm glared at the three of them in turn and then shot a glare at Logan before she turned and shoved her office door open. She stopped dead, blocking the entrance.

Ziva and the others pushed their way past Storm into the office, eager to see what could have stopped an angry Storm in her tracks. Skylar slapped a hand over her mouth to cover her shocked gasp.

Storm's anger exploded, outside there was a clap of thunder loud enough to set off car alarms three states over, large hailstones fell from the sky. "Mellissa, what is going on in here?"

Mellissa froze in place and turned slowly toward them, moving carefully since she was perched on the ladder that ran the perimeter of the room, giving access to the books on the shelves. "Um, nooothing. Why?"

"You ... my office ... whipped cream!" Storm spluttered.

It was going to be damn hard to get whipped cream out of leather-bound books, Ziva thought as she glanced around the room. Also hard to scrap it off the ceiling, she wondered how Mellissa had managed to get it up there.

Mellissa looked around as if she had just realized she was in Storm's office. "Oh, yeah right." She climbed down the ladder, jumping off before she reached the bottom step; she clutched the can of whipped cream in one hand. She paused and frowned at the group, lifted a finger, and pointed it at each one in turn. Her lips moved as she counted silently, her brows drawn together.

"Hey, someone is missing. Where's Lenny?"

"Not here," Storm answered tightly.

"In a place that's far, far better for us. Hopefully a lot hotter too," Ziva muttered.

"Oh, oh, oh, so he's in He ..."

"That's fine, Mellissa we don't need clarification!" Storm glared over at Ziva.

"But, Ziva means he's in He ..."

"No, no we're good, Mellissa!" Storm quickly shot at her.

"No, really I know where he is! He's in He ..."

"Ziva!" Storm said frantically.

"Yeah, good, he's in Hawaii. Nice and warm," Ziva told her with a grin.

Mellissa's lips were moving again as she counted on her fingers. They could just barely hear the letters she was saying. H-A-W-A-I-I. She looked up at Ziva and shook her head. "That's too many letters, Ziva. I know what word it is, Logan says it all the time. It's like hello, but without the O!"

Storm slapped a hand against her forehead. "Logan, you need to stop swearing in front of them!"

He shrugged. "Not my fault they listen when they shouldn't."

Storm ignored him and turned back to Mellissa. "What did you do to my office?"

"Nothing. It wasn't my fault! It was Angela and Stevie's idea!" Suddenly she looked at the can of whipped cream in her hand, seemed to realize that it was incriminating evidence, and tossed it over her shoulder. The vase on the shelf immediately behind her shattered when the can struck it. "No one saw that, right? I mean, vase pffft what vase?"

Angela and Stevie came skidding into the room, took one look at the gathered adults, and turned back around to flee. Mellissa yelled at them, "No way if I'm stuck here you have to stay too!"

"The three of you are grounded for two weeks. Who was supposed to be watching you?" Storm said through clenched teeth.

"Ummmm Rogue, but I think she went to a movie with Bobby."

"Fine. Rooms. Now. I'll deal with Rogue later." Storm pointed out the office door and the three scattered as quickly as they could.

Once the curtain climbers fled, Storm turned to the remaining occupants of the room. "Logan, I want a complete report of what happened on my desk by tomorrow morning."

"Report? You want me to write a report?" His tone clearly said she was insane.

"Yes, I do. You led this little expedition, you write the report. I want to know what exactly went wrong."

Ziva let loose with a snort. "Lenny's an evil little water gnome, how hard is that to figure out? I could have told you that the second I laid eyes on him."

"Enough, Ziva!" Storm snapped out. "Report Logan. You three rooms and stay there."

"What? Rooms why? We didn't do anything wrong!" Skylar gave her a wounded look.

"Because until we figure this out you can bet there will be speculation about whether the three of you helped Lenny in any way at all," Storm told Skylar gently.

"Oh, I see," Skylar replied quietly.

"Great so the fish stick skips over to the side of darkness and we get punished. Fabulous. Story of my life." Ziva slumped her way out of the office without another word.

Storm scowled after her. "Sometimes her attitude reminds me of you, Logan."

"But without my fabulous good looks," he said, stuck the stub of a cigar in his mouth and left the office.

Craig sent Storm a nod and ushered Skylar out of the office. They hurried upstairs and found Ziva stretched out on her bed.

"So, what do we do now?" Craig asked as he dropped down next to her feet.

"Rot."

Skylar rolled her eyes. "Ziva, come on we have to do something Lenny was our friend!"

Ziva propped herself up on her elbows. "No. He was your friend, not mine. I didn't like the guy, remember? I only tolerated him because of you and Craig."

"Fine, whatever. Skylar and I will find him on our own," Craig told her as he rose from the bed.

"Oh, please do not try and guilt trip me into this useless endeavor. You can't find him. Miss. Barbie could have teleported them anywhere. Forget it, Craig, you'll only get into more trouble with Storm." She dropped back down on the bed and flung an arm over her eyes.

Skylar gave Craig a pained look. "She has a point, Craig. Where do we even begin to search for him?"

Mellissa came skidding into the room, stumbled to a halt, and looked around frantically.

"Problem there, Mellissa?" Craig asked her as Angela and Stevie ran in behind her.

Mellissa promptly shoved the TV remote at him without a single word and sprinted from the room, followed by her faithful troops. Craig stared at the remote for a full five seconds before the significance of it hit him.

"Oh shit! Mellissa!" he shouted and leaned out the door, but the hallway was empty. He never understood how exactly those three could disappear so quickly. He pulled his head back into the room and tossed the remote at Skylar.

Her eyes went wide. "I don't want it!" She tossed it back at him.

"I don't either! He'll kill whoever he finds with it! Especially if he's missing a game of some sort!" Craig said in a panic.

Ziva groaned and sat up again. "God, you two are idiots." She snatched the remote from Craig and stalked out into the hallway, she came back within three minutes.

"What did you do with it?" Skylar asked.

Ziva smirked at her as she lay back on her bed. "Flung it into Storm's room."

Craig made a choking sound. "You didn't?"

"Did."

Craig shot Skylar a look and then shook his head. "Okay, let's figure out where to look for Lenny."

"Water. Look by the water. Polish Springs will stay near the water."

Skylar smiled brightly at Craig when Ziva flung out that answer. "She's probably right about that. He'll feel the most comfortable around water. It is his main defense."

"Right, you know how many bodies of water that means?" Craig looked skeptical.

"A lot. Stay in this area first and work your way out." For someone who didn't want to help, Ziva was being awfully helpful.

"Right, so Skylar ..."

She stared at Craig. "Skylar what?"

He waved a hand in the air. "Can you hop into one of the computers and narrow the search a bit?"

Her nose scrunched up. "Oh yeah, great. Become one with the computer, Skylar. Find this out, Skylar. Yeah, it's what I live for, invasion of the information superhighway. Do you know how hard it is to navigate the Internet?"

"Um, not from the inside but I've gotten pretty lost trying to Google things sometimes," he replied.

Ziva struggled to stifle her laughter from her spot on the bed. Craig leaned down and slapped her ankle. "You aren't helping any!"

She lifted her arm and stared up at him. "Wasn't trying to."

"I can see that." He sat back down by her feet.

Logan stomped into the room, it was easy to see the angry scowl now and recognize that he and A'Cadia's angry looks mirrored one another. "Have you seen the little brats? They took the TV remote again."

"Nope, haven't seen them. Thought they were confined to their rooms?"

He shot Craig a 'yeah right' look. "And you honestly believe those three would stay in their rooms?"

Craig didn't get a chance to answer before Logan stalked from the room. He turned back to Skylar, who had vanished. "Where'd Skylar go?"

Ziva pointed at the laptop open on Skylar's desk.

"Oh, well guess all we can do is wait."

"Park your butt on Skylar's bed!" Ziva snapped when he tried to make himself more comfortable on her bed.

"Fine."

Craig went and sat on Skylar's bed with his back against the wall and his eyes on Ziva. Her arm was still covering her eyes. He wondered if she was going to take a nap. A tiny grin pulled at his lips, he could take a peek at her dreams if she did. The smile vanished immediately at the thought. She'd murder him if he did that. He turned his thoughts over to Lenny. All this time he'd thought Lenny was his best friend, when in fact Lenny hated him. He'd done nothing, as far as he knew, to cause Lenny's hatred. That didn't seem to matter to Lenny however. He'd let his hatred blind him to the fact that Craig really was his friend.

Skylar popped out of the computer, eyes wide, she zeroed in on him. "Craig! We are in trouble!"

He jumped up and wasn't surprised to see Ziva sitting up and staring at Skylar. "What's wrong?"

"Lenny was in the computer system just before we left to begin the high school job he searched through the database. He copied files, Craig. Direct from Storm's private files. Files meant for the X-Men team!"

"Oh, this gets better and better," Ziva said, with a twist to her lips.

"What files?" Craig asked, ignoring Ziva's snarky reply.

"The files were for something called Compound 13. I can go back and search the files for more information, but I didn't want to hang about in Storm's stuff in case she's using the computer."

Ziva narrowed her eyes at Craig as he slowly dropped back down onto the edge of Skylar's bed. He looked shocked, lost, upset, she wasn't certain exactly what it was, there seemed to be a lot of emotions plaguing him right now.

"Craig, what exactly do you know about this Compound 13?" she asked.

He combed his fingers through his hair and stared down at the carpet between his feet.

Skylar wrung her hands and shifted around. "Craig, the files all traced this Compound 13 back to someplace called De Loray Laboratories." When he said nothing, Skylar shifted again. "Craig?"

His fingers dragged slowly through his hair again. "De Loray Labs was run by my family. More specifically, my father. But, my grandfather is the one who started the company. My dad took over when he retired. Compound 13 was supposed to be a breakthrough for the lab. A way for mutants to hide if necessary. My dad hated how the world treated mutants and he wanted to give us a way to hide. What Compound 13 was supposed to do was temporarily suppress a mutant's powers for a couple of hours. Make it easier for us to work, go to school, lots of things, without having to worry about hiding our powers on our own. Hide in plain sight, help us gain control of our powers, give us a fighting chance against the prejudice out there."

"Did it work?" Skylar asked.

"No, not exactly."

"What do you mean "not exactly"?" Ziva asked.

"Something was wrong with the formula, it either permanently suppressed the mutant's powers or," he stopped speaking, swallowed, looked at them both, and then continued, "it killed them outright. It destroyed De Loray Labs. Someone leaked information about Compound 13 and told the press we were developing a weapon to use against mutants. We lost everything. The government shut down the lab. It didn't matter what my father said, no one cared to hear the truth."

"Who would volunteer for a test like that? You would have to be insane to want something like that tested on you! I can't believe your father found volunteers!" Skylar's voice held a note of disbelief.

"Most didn't have anything to live for anyway," Craig answered with a shrug.

"What does that mean?"

He blew out a long breath. "They were criminals. Life sentences, no chance for parole. They figured they didn't have anything to lose."

Ziva and Skylar shot each other a look before staring at Craig once more. He rose and began pacing. "If Lenny somehow manages to reproduce Compound 13 we are screwed. He could use it against the school."

Logan walked into the room, a triumphant smile on his face. He brandished the TV remote! "HA! Little munchkins hid it in plain sight! I walked by Storm's room and there it was sitting on the end of her bed! Now I can watch the game!"

None of them said a word; they waited until they were sure he was gone before speaking again. "So, do we tell Storm about this?" Ziva asked.

"She'll think I told him about it!" Craig replied in a panicked tone.

"No, she won't, Craig! I'll show her where he was in the computer system. It looked like he was searching through the files at random until he found something that interested him," Skylar reassured him.

"We find him, bring him back, and prove to Storm and Logan that not only did we not have anything to do with Lenny's defection, we deserve to be on the team," Ziva told them as she rolled off the bed and stood.

"We?" Craig asked her.

She sighed. "Yes, fine I'm helping. Let's go."

"Go? Go where exactly?" Skylar asked.

"I haven't gotten that far yet." Ziva stopped in the doorway.

Craig shook his head. "First we make a list of places that seem obvious for him to go and then we rush off to find him. Sound good?"

Skylar nodded enthusiastically. Ziva sighed, rolled her eyes, and then finally nodded.

"Goody! We're a team again!" Skylar clapped happily. "I'll jump into the computer and drag through all of Lenny's files and his emails. See what I can come up with."

"Good idea. We'll regroup after that." He turned for the door but made it only a step before he was stopped by Mellissa as she rushed into the room.

"Oh my god! Save us! Logan told Storm about the remote, he wants her to lock us up, so we stay put and don't cause any trouble!" She grasped the hem of Craig's shirt and stared up at him in desperation.

"Storm isn't going to lock the three of you up, Mellissa. Stop it."

"She will, or Logan will break out the claws!" she wailed up at him. Stevie and Angela stood back with hangdog looks and trembling lower lips. Amazing how the three of them could turn that on and off at the drop of a hat.

Craig wasn't buying any of it. "Try staying in your rooms for once and doing as you're told and maybe you wouldn't have to worry about the claws."

Stevie snorted—how he managed it with a finger up his nose, not a clue—and then looked out into the hallway before speaking. "Right, like we'd ever do that!"

"Just go before I call Logan myself. Wouldn't want me to do that, would you, not while he's watching his game."

Mellissa released his shirt and stepped back. "I hate you," she pouted. Her tone wasn't at all convincing.

"Mmmhmm, right until breakfast rolls around then I'm your favorite guy. Now go on."

Angela stuck her tongue out at him before following Stevie and Mellissa from the room. It was made less effective by the wide grin on her face and her fluffy tutu bouncing as she skipped off.

"Right, I'll get a move on Lenny's computer!" Skylar disappeared. Craig nodded to Ziva and fled the room.

She dropped back down on the bed, arm over her eyes, and decided now that Lenny was gone, maybe this place wouldn't be so bad.