Two Birds One Stone

Zora smiled and kinda laughed at the image in her head. Things had certainly changed in the last half a year, and she could see how shocking it would be for those who knew Jude and Broen from before, to know they were good friends now.

"I think Frederick would definitely be surprised. Although, he doesn't realise his son is not the same as he was in Halcyon, and I'm not sure he cares," she said with a slight frown. It was just a feeling on her part. The overly concerned father act had bothered her since she knew Broen's family life had been difficult.

"You know, I don't even know if Broen has seen Frederick or not. He keeps that part of his life away from me, and I understand why, but... I worry the same, I know he is slightly more agitated than before, but I am not sure if it's because of Frederick, or if it's a combination of everything, his father, people from Halcyon.." she said her voice trailing off.

"Ohh..." Zora said in surprise, suddenly remembering the conversation with her aunt, "I heard, but vaguely, Celeste had mentioned a student dumping holy water on another. She hoped it was a prank, but didn't say who was involved exactly. I didn't know it was a Halcyonite."

"Hopefully, the school can calm those fears. It's crazy to even think that, but people often run with the version of the truth that best suits them," she stated, really hoping nothing bad came of the situation. The Halcyonites didn't need or deserve that, especially since they had lost everything and were rebuilding their lives.

"Maybe Celeste can help somehow, I know she's taking students under her wing at the moment, trying to help them adjust to life on the island. I'll ask if maybe she can help somehow," Zora offered, wishing she could help somehow.

Nodding, she pursed her lips, "I agree there, when people go silent it's usually for two reasons, because they don't want to be found, and something is up, and both aren't good in my mind," Zora said as she turned her coffee cup nervously. "And I also think Frederick is up to something, but I don't know what. I mean he was a man that lived off his reputation, what people believed him to be, now he's nothing, and those types of people don't often do well with being anonymous." she mused.

"Has anyone seen him lately? And do you even know where he could be?" she asked Jude, silently in agreement with his idea that Frederick wanted to re-establish himself and wondering, if maybe, just maybe they might be able to find out what he was up to.

"I mean, even if it were not overstepping, would Crawford even talk to you now?" Zora asked questioningly, "You did tell him to take a hike, he may suspect something is up if you did." she reasoned.

"And what's more, I have no idea what a life of being a hero is like, but you do, no? What do you think he would do to re-establish himself? How far would he go?" she asked very seriously, having a very scary flashback to Woodland for some reason and hoping Crawford wasn't about to stoop so low as staging something to make himself known. That thought was horrible and conjured up latent feelings of anxiety that still plagued her every so often.

Zora listened to Jude and then almost sighed in frustration at it all. Instead, she did the next illogical thing possible, "If you knew, or if anybody knew where he was, I'd offer to go and speak to him myself. It is possible he'd talk to me..." she explained.

"I know Broen won't be too thrilled about the idea of either of us talking to his father, but this not knowing. This uncertainty isn't good either," she stated more calmly than she felt. Zora wasn't exactly sure Broen would not go ballistic on her for even suggesting such a thing, however, the old adage of "keeping your enemies close" kept going through her mind.

"Yes, I completely and utterly agree with you there," Zora said very truthfully, "I am concerned, and I know that you are, and it's probably best to just sit down with Broen and propose the idea. I mean what can it hurt?" she surmised.

"He is already on edge, and I think not knowing what Frederick is up to is making it worse. I think Broen thinks Frederick will somehow cause problems for him again," Zora told Jude as she fiddled with her coffee cup, "and I think this silence is not helping any. It's sort of like waiting for the hammer to fall, and I really don't want that to happen, I want to stop the hammer from falling if I can."