"Lucy?"

"Huh?" The windian looked up, startled to see Ray standing beside her desk. With a quick glance around the classroom she suddenly realized that aside from Ray, the classroom was completely empty. "Did the bell ring?" Lucy blinked in wonder and looked over at the clock.

"Yea, a few minutes ago. It's lunch time... are you alright?" Ray scratched his head. The raven-haired windian sighed.

"Yea... I guess I was just thinking, that's all." She stood up from her desk and went to pick up her books but Ray managed to beat her to that task. She gave him a thankful look as the two walked out of the classroom and into the hallway.

"So..." Ray walked beside her, searching his head for something to say. "How's your day been so far?"

Lucy paused outside her locker and turned to Ray, staring up at him for a moment. In a sudden movement she caught Ray up in a hug and bured her face in his uniform shirt. "I miss my brother!" Ray stared at her in surprise for a moment and Lucy sniffed, doing her best to hold back the tears that were now slowly slipping from her eyes. "I didn't think it'd be this hard, but it's horrible!" She sniffed again.

"Lucy..." Ray glanced around. Thank Landon the halls are empty... He looked back down at the windian before him and sighed. "Lucy you'll get through it, I know it's going to be hard, but you'll get through it..."

Lucy stood up, wipping her eyes and sniffing. "I know... but it's so hard, Ray..." She sighed. Ray offered her a comforting smile and brushed a few strands of hair out of her face.

"C'mon, we'll go sit down with the group in the cafeteria. You know, none of them saw you yesterday... Frank and the others seemed pretty surprised when I showed up." Ray chuckled lightly. "Well, I guess not Frank since I had already seen him earlier, but he was talking with Ellen and Kate and everybody when I showed up, they all seemed pretty surprised to see me. Frank just grinned, looked at his friends and said 'I told you so.'" The dragon chuckled again as he rubbed the back of his neck.

"They asked you where you had been..." Lucy looked up at him for a moment. Ray sighed and nodded.

"I told them the story... off on a trip." He shrugged lightly. "They asked me a few other things like 'where to' and 'how was it' but that was about it."

Lucy nodded. "I guess I'd kind of like to go see them, but I'm going to go and try and find Janet again... I've got a bad feeling right now." Lucy rubbed her arms. "Janet's gone back to the WINGS..."

Ray fidgeted uneasily at the mention of the windian group. "What about Jason? I didn't see him at all yesterday until he came home, and he didn't even say much to me... know anything about him?"

"Jason..." Lucy's voice took a cold tone to it. "I could care less about Jason."

Ray rubbed the back of his neck again and looked at the raven-haired windian. "Lucy, you don't still blame him for... that... do you?" Lucy was silent with her response, she just rubbed her arms and turned her gaze to the floor. Ray sighed and continued. "You know it's not his fault..."

"He could have done something." Lucy replied sourly as she began walking once more towards the cafeteria. Ray hurried to follow her.

"Lucy, we all could have done something! Jason... have you ever asked him about it? Jason may have run other times, but I don't think he would have just left Brandon behind then."

"He's left us behind before." Lucy's tone was still angered as she turned to face Ray. He could see tears welling up in her eyes again. "He left us at the Inn, he left in Springton, and he left that night after the attack! What makes you think he didn't just run out on Brandon too?"

Ray sighed and looked down at the windian, a soft look in his eyes. "Lucy... in defense for the guy, Jason's been through enough lately to last him a while."

"We all have, Ray!"

"Lucy..." Ray put his hands up to interrupt her for a moment. "Look, you can't just go around being mad at the guy. Come on, it wasn't his fault. You saw that Jason wasn't with us when we left in the first place... he had stayed behind, Lucy. He had tried to help, I'm sure of it..."

"Well he didn't do a very good job..." Lucy blinked back her tears and sniffed. Ray placed his finger under her chin and gently tilted her head up. The dragon gazed down at her with gentle eyes.

"Lucy... do you really think Brandon would want you to be mad at Jason like this? Go find the guy, go talk to him." Ray motioned with a nod of his head towards the cafeteria. "Find out his part of the story. Please don't be mad at him like this..."

Lucy sighed and finally gave a weak nod of her head. "Fine... I'll go and try to find him." She took her books back from the dragon as she once again began to make her way towards the cafeteria. "Ray, I don't think I'll be sitting with you today. I've got a couple of people I need to hunt down now."

Ray nodded as he walked into the cafeteria with her, the two making their way to the outdoor part of the lunch room. "Alright, I'll just tell them you said 'hi.'" The two then split up to go their seperate ways.