"A man's private thought can never be a lie; what he thinks, is to him the truth, always." – Mark Twain

That Saturday marked the beginning of an upward trend in the weather, according to the Weather Channel. It was to begin a few weeks’ worth of (predicted) balmy weather with very comfortable evenings all throughout Destiny City and the surrounding areas. Under normal circumstances, this would mark perfect patrolling weather, allowing the senshi to disperse into multiple areas of town to conduct surveillance and keep the city safe without having to worry about a sudden burst of rain. This is what made Christa angry.

She was cooped up indoors under house arrest by her father. After having to concoct a story about how her injury occurred, the teen was told not to leave the house at any point within the next week, unless accompanied by Benjamin (her father) or her younger brother Zachary. It was becoming quite apparent to Ben that his daughter’s behavior was drastically different than in her younger years, and much more reckless. He knew the divorce affected everyone differently, but Christa’s pedal-to-the-medal approach of keeping herself occupied was becoming quite dangerous. He didn’t once think that the normally bookish teen would suddenly try out for a summer track and field team, only to come home with bloody cuts, bruising and other injuries he couldn’t see after tripping over a hurdle. That Christa was interested in sports at all was a shock in and of itself, but when the teen refused to go to the hospital for immediate care, enough was enough.

None of the Calloway family knew about their daughter’s other occupation as a space-trekking super heroine, and she had no intention of ever letting them know. Christa could not gauge what sort of damage this would cause not only to her bond with the remaining members, but what kind of danger it might put them in. Simply swearing them to secrecy would not be enough to keep details from leaking. Zach would tell his friends “in confidence” that his sister suited up by magic and patrolled the city at night, and the rumor would spread from there. Benjamin would be wracked with worry at night, waiting for his daughter to come home. It would interrupt her patrolling schedule to say the least. In essence, like every other senshi, she kept her activities as secret as possible. How she kept Zach from finding out was a miracle. She would leave the house as silently as she could in the late night hours and return in the early morning after a rigorous patrol. Sleeping in was much easier during summer break with no job, and she could say she was up all night reading or writing. It was an acceptable routine until the injury set in.

That’s when the lies started.

Christa couldn’t fool herself – she was lying ever since she took up the mantle of Kallichore. She knew she had to, for the greater good, but they were white lies. Believable, because they were part of her normal routine. She’d finished school with acceptable grades (part of the decline due to the divorce) and had sailed into summer vacation in preparation for senior year with relative ease. Her father did not wish to press his daughter for a job. If only he knew that she already had one. Christa often contemplated what she could or would do to explain to him where she’d really been that night. What would she say? Would it make any difference? In her mind, the conversation was completely glossed over as part of a writer’s active imagination. She would then be forced to transform in front of him to solidify the deal, so to speak, earning her a rift between herself and her father. It was all portrayed in a very negative light and the teen could find no positive and selfless reason to reveal her identity. Therefore, the issue hadn’t come up since the initial realization. Christa rather liked it that way.

But now that she was under forced house arrest and supervision, her father’s trust in her was fractured. Christa could tell he didn’t believe the story of the hurdle. It was too out of character. In protest, she explained how much she’d been working out lately as a way to release stress and get out of the house. Truthfully, she had gone on several jogs during the day, but her toned body had no other proof to exist. As far as Benjamin Calloway was concerned, his daughter woke up one day and suddenly had the body of a track student. This just doesn’t happen overnight. Just a simple jog would not produce muscle like that – not in the time span it seemed to take, but the father of the house wanted to believe his daughter. He wanted to believe she was just sorting something out in her head like she always did and kept mostly to herself. That was normal, teen girl behavior. Deep down, he wasn’t buying it. Not in the slightest.

The Weather Channel droned on and on about how perfect the weather was going to be that weekend, and the gray haired teen couldn’t stifle the groan of disappointment that escaped her lips. She was trapped in a well-loved reclining chair with her leg propped up on pillows and covered in ice. While her injuries could have been much, much worse, being incapacitated for any length of time wasn’t something she had ever planned for. The nurse at the hospital explained the care of the wounds, removed any foreign objects, added stitches when needed and wrapped the leg in bandages before sending them on their way. Christa’s shoulders, back and side fared much better with only minor cuts, scrapes and bruising. What she wanted to do was to soak it in salt, scream in pain and call it done. She wanted to henshin that night and go patrolling - being stuck in the house simply made her antsy and more agitated. Her father, naturally, had noticed, and took this opportunity that fate had presented to speak to his daughter.

The older man sat on the couch next to her, eyeing the still cold soda she’d left on the side table. Christa nowadays opted for water more than anything else, or clearer sodas with no caffeine. There was a bag of carrots, half eaten, next to the can. Benjamin picked up the remote and turned down the volume. The teen cast a sideways glance at him, a knot forming in her stomach. “Honey, we need to talk.”

This, of course, was the dreaded sentence in anyone’s mind. That simple sentence spoke volumes about what was to come. It spelled dread, anxiety, anger, frustration, exasperation, defeat, concern, sadness, guilt… That simple sentence spelled a whole host of unwanted and undesired emotions stemming from situations that were foreseen or completely unpredicted. Christa knew this day was going to come at some point. She knew she couldn’t skirt along that easily for as long as she did. Benjamin had suspected something was going on that his daughter wasn’t entirely truthful about, and it took him this long to pin her down for questioning. But if Ares had seen anything in the new recruit, it was that Christa was an analyst and she would not back down or give up easily. There would be hell to pay otherwise, and not just by her. “Sure. What’s on your mind?” came the attempt at calm. Inside her chest, her heart was racing.

“It’s just been so… You’re not you. I don’t know where my Christabelle went, but you’ve become so… I don’t know. Different. You’ve changed, and not just for the better. You were never reckless before. Not like this. I mean, I’ve seen you have that look in your eye about a book or a story you were writing, but not about sports. Not about friends. It was always up in your head and now that you’ve gone and hurt yourself, you know me, I’m worried. Worried sick. Hell, even Zach has said something. You’re hardly home anymore. I don’t know where you go or what you do when you get there. You sleep in all day. I didn’t say anything at the hospital because I didn’t think it was right to bring it up in front of the nurse. Just tell me what’s going on in that head of yours, Christa.” After a brief pause, Benjamin sighed, like a great weight had been lifted from his sore and aching shoulders. He’d been carrying a boulder on his back for months now, and Christa knew it. None of them could hide that from one another.

Listening intently, the teen knew her ears were burning. She could feel it. And yet her brain was in full gear, processing and editing the story she would tell to him to make him feel better about the changes going on. She would omit everything but the basics – she made new friends at school and during her times exploring different activities and she wants to spend time with them and experience new things. She’s learned to run and exercise, she’s reconnected with her cousin Melinda and the list goes on. She couldn’t tell him about the faux messiah of the Moon Princess, whose existence was severely doubted in Christa’s mind, she couldn’t tell him about her idol Ares and the Blood Moon Court. She couldn’t tell him about how she’d gone from a senshi to a super senshi with hard work, blood, sweat and tears. Nothing about knights or midnight patrols or asking Polaris about the white wings of an Eternal, or Europa about the other moons of Jupiter. She certainly couldn’t tell him about her visit to the moon for which she was named, and how there really was a civilization that once thrived there. The fact that the Negaverse was out to kill all of them and that the agents were hiding in plain sight… none of that could leave her lips, no matter how desperately she wanted them to. She knew, above all, it was dangerous, and Ares would never approve.

Therefore, she recanted the highly edited story she can created in her mind to him, hoping it would ease his anxieties. There was some relaxing in her father’s face when she was finished, but the doubt had not disappeared completely. Christa was frustrated at her own inability than anything else, and more horrified that she would be disappointed in her inability to fabricate a story than to tell the truth. What kind of person was she evolving into? Did everyone else have this problem, Negaverse or otherwise, or did they all come clean about their identities to their loved ones? It wasn’t like she could ask any one of the enemy – she could only speculate. She hated speculating.

“Can I at least meet one of your new friends? I mean, not that I don’t believe you!” A lie. He didn’t believe a word and Christa knew it. “Just… for my sake, bring one of them over for dinner sometime. It’ll feel more real to me that way.” The teen agreed, knowing full well up and asking one of the senshi from the Blood Moon Court (Melinda aside since she was family) to come to dinner in civilian form would be out of the question. She didn’t know any of their identities outside the Court, and that fact was becoming increasingly obvious. Hell, she didn’t know some of them within the Court! There were so many names to keep track of and it was a wonder she would recognize any of them by sight at the very least. A pat on the top of her head signaled the father-daughter conversation had come to a close, leaving the teen in a very precarious position – who would she invite over, and would they even consent? It was a huge leap and while the Blood Moon did vow to protect its members in any way possible, Kallichore wasn’t close enough to anyone in particular to ask such a favor.

Under normal circumstances, Christa adored situations that were not easy to solve. But this? This was a circumstance where an easy solution would have been a blessing. At least, with the injury, she had time to think.

(Word count: 2,040)