The days became warmer and the snow melted. Grass pushed up through the ground and the trees were filled with leaves. Their gray boughs became strong and brown, insects began to buzz, and the birds returned to the trees. The school semester started, as evidenced by Jeremy Morrison returning to school and Mr Sanders coming by train every day to continue Anna's studies. Indiana's schedule became more consistent, going to Marshall College during class times and staying for his office hours, before returning home around 6PM on most days.

One day, in the midst of Anna's lessons, a knock came at their front door. Mr Sanders left Anna to her Greek reading practice to answer the door, only for her to become immediately distracted once her ears perked up and heard a familiar voice. She looked to her right from her seat at the dining table, seeing her tutor standing with the front door open.

"Is Anna home?" Jeremy asked.

Sanders sniffed, "Yes, but she is in the middle of her lesson."

"What lesson?"

"Her Greek lessons," the tutor said evenly.

"What's that?"

"Greek is a language that the cultured and educated must learn to show their breeding. Run along now, child. She shall be done in two more hours," Sanders dismissed, and the shaft of light coming from the door began to narrow as the door swung closed.

"Wait, is that school? But it's Saturday!" Jeremy shouted.

"Anna has extra activities on Saturday. You will see her at three o' clock in the afternoon. Good day," Sanders firmly said, before the front door clicked closed.

Anna frowned, ears lowering as she looked back down to her books. The chair opposite her creaked as Sanders sat back down, his sunken eyes examining her closely as she stared down at the Greek symbols on her page, not really reading any of it.

"Speak plainly, Anna. You are upset that you cannot play with your friends on Saturdays?" Sanders eventually said.

Anna swallowed, before nodding, "Everyone else gets Saturday off. I just get more work..."

"Your study of the Greek language is foundational for your future, Miss Jones," Sanders said, steepling his hands in front of him, "When you are grown up, if you choose to take a career of academics like your father, people will look down on you if you do not know your hellenistic languages."

A pit formed in her stomach as she propped her head up with her forehooves, clamped down on her cheeks. Her eyes scanned the pages, but once again weren't actually perceiving anything.

"Yet, there is a thin line between discipline and the total eclipsing of a child's spirit," Sanders seemed to finally acquiesce, suddenly slamming a red bookmark onto the current page of Anna's textbook.

She looked up at him, eyebrows raised and a tiny hint of hope in the back of her mind.

Sanders gave her a long, hard look in return, hand still on the edge of the bookmark, "In the future, you shall discuss with your friends as to when they wish to play with you on Saturdays. You will then inform me in advance and we shall take no longer than three hours' break for you to play. Do I make myself clear?"

Anna nodded emphatically, her wings already beginning to flex as she inched her chair away from the table.

"You are dismissed early," Sanders simply said, snapping the book shut in front of her.

"YAY!" came her cry as she took flight, then zipped out the door and over the hedge, straight towards the neighbor's house. As she flew away, the smallest smile came over Philip Sander's face.

Anna followed Jeremy through his house and towards the back door. She wondered, for a second, why they didn't just take the side yard, but then he stopped to open a cabinet next to the door and pulled out a bat and a small, white ball.

"You like baseball? Usually girls don't like playing sports, but you kinda look like a tomboy," Jeremy said, shouldering the bat, "No offense, but you wear pants which isn't something girls usually do."

"Uh, none taken?" Anna tilted her head. Was he implying girls wore nothing below their undies? She knew that wasn't true, "What's baseball?"

"You haven't heard what baseball is!?" Jeremy said incredulously, before he shook his head in an exaggerated fashion and opened the back door, "C'mon, most of my friends are already here and I wanna introduce you to 'em."

Before Anna knew it, she was outside in the green, recently cut grass outside the back of the Morrison home. Over the fence, she could see her own, barren yard just adjacent and the oak tree that towered over it. A swing set had been built in one corner of the Morrison yard, and around it a bunch of boys sat.

"Whoah. What kind of dog is that?" one of them, a slightly rotund boy with short, brown hair, said while pointing at her.

Anna felt like shrinking in through the sleeves of her shirt when Jeremy frowned, "Hey! She ain't no dog! Her name's Anna. She's my friend!"

"Sorry," the kid quickly apologized, "Hi Anna. I'm Bob. I'm from Sunflower Lane."

"Hi..." Anna muttered, turning her eyes to the next kid, who was currently idly kicking back and forth on the swing.

"I'm Tommy. I live two blocks away, by the main street," the child, who was lanky with curls of black hair, said.

"Hi..." Anna said again, shifting uncomfortably between her hooves.

Jeremy lowered his bat, tapping Anna in the side with the blunt end of it, "Anna's never heard of baseball before. We gotta teach her the rules before we play."

The children stood, brushing themselves off. Tommy raised an eyebrow as he took a leather mitt and put it on his right hand, "Who hasn't heard of baseball?"

Anna, heart thundering and glancing nervously around, was lectured to about the rules of the sport. There was a ball, a batter, a pitcher, and outfielders. The batter hit the ball as hard as they could and tried to run around a diamond-shaped field before someone could hit him back with the ball. Anna was a bit clueless on how this sport was meant to work with only four people, but she was told that she'd be an outfielder first since she didn't know a lot about the game.

"This kind of sounds like cricket..." Anna muttered softly, walking back a few paces outside of the diamond the other kids had established using stones from the garden.

"What's that?" Bob asked, looking at her from across the diamond. He was the other outfielder.

"It's something they played in England," Anna said.

"Whoah, you've been to England?"

"My grandpa's from there," Tommy said, standing in the center of the diamond with the mitt and the ball tucked inside of it.

"What's it like?" Bob pressed.

"A lot more rainy," Anna said, watching as Jeremy silently performed a few practice swings with his bat.

"More rainy? Gee whiz, it already rains so much here! We've been lucky it's been so dry this spring so far."

Indiana walked up the stairs leading to the front door of the Morrison residence, raising a fist to knock politely on the front door. After a moment of placing his hands in his pockets and waiting, the door handle twisted and swung open, revealing Mr Morrison standing with a wooden pipe sticking from between his lips.

"Dr Jones!" Morrison greeted enthusiastically, "Come to collect your daughter?"

"Yeah. She's supposed to be doing her Greek lessons today, so color me surprised when her tutor told me she'd been dismissed to go over to your place," Indiana muttered, stepping through the door as the other man gestured him inside.

"Well, she's definitely having fun," Mr Morrison chuckled softly, "They've been at it for hours now."

Stepping into the kitchen, giving a casual greeting towards Mrs Morrison, who was working on dinner, Indiana spied his daughter through the window of the back door. It seemed it was her turn to bat, and a ball was launched towards her by a the Morrison boy. With a signature 'THWOCK', the ball was knocked into the ground, where it bounced and hit the fence. Dropping the bat, Anna began to sprint, only to get smacked in the back of the head by a throw from the outfielders, who were other kids that Indiana didn't recognize. Laughter was audible through the walls as the children reset their game.

Indiana calmly opened the back door and stepped outside onto the lawn that was, to his slight embarrassment, much better kept than his own. His original intentions were to immediately call Anna back for dinner, now that it was around five. However, he couldn't help but feel a little spark of joy at seeing her happy.

Of course, as soon as the children caught sight of the adult in their midst, the laughter stopped. Anna waved, "Hi Dad."

"Having fun?" Indiana asked, folding his arms.

Anna nodded vigorously.

"In about an hour, it's dinner time, okay?" Indiana said.

That statement deflated Anna slightly. Apparently, two hours of play was just not enough for her. Still, she nodded again, this time with less energy.

Wordlessly, Indiana turned around and re-entered the house, closing the back door behind him. He began to stroll back through the Morrison residence towards their front door, in order to return to his own house to prepare a simple dinner. Though, as he passed the kitchen, Mr Morrison intercepted him before he could reach the front door.

"Me and my wife would like to invite you to stay for dinner," Mr Morrison said, "If you aren't too busy?"

Mrs Morrison turned her head away from the stove, "I know it's hard work with the semester starting and all, but we've hardly gotten to see you since Christmas time!"

Indiana took one look back towards the kitchen to see the potatoes, casserole, and pie that was being made. As soon as he took that moment to assess the half-prepared dinner and drink in its smell, he made his decision and smiled, "If it wouldn't be too much of an imposition."

"Not at all," Mr Morrison shook his head, "Rebecca always makes too much food, and we're running out of space in the icebox for leftovers!" he held out a hand, gesturing for Indiana to follow him into the lounge.

Moments later, Indiana sat on an armchair across from Mr Morrison. The long day of sitting in a stiff desk chair during his office hours bled out as he reclined on the soft cushioning of the armchair. Through a nearby window, he could see the children playing in the backyard. His eyes followed Anna as she fluttered around the three other children.

"You said your Anna was learning Greek?" Mr Morrison asked, refilling his pipe, "Planning on making her a doctor?"

"The tutor has either Latin or Greek as part of his lesson plan. I already pay him enough just for the standard schooling, so I may as well let her learn an academic language at the same time," Indiana shrugged.

"Must be even more expensive than private school," Morrison shook his head, "I suppose your reasoning is to keep her away from bullies?"

"Kids tear apart other children if they have a strange looking nose," Indiana grimaced, "Imagine what they'd do to her."

"I imagine it would be quite lonely, though?" Morrison puffed a bit on his pipe, "Not being able to socialize with other children during school hours... not that this is a criticism, mind you! I think you've definitely made the right decision."

Indiana had his hackles raised, but relaxed a bit at Morrison's clarification. In the end, he gave a slight nod of agreement, "She's definitely gotten shy. I'm glad her and Jeremy have hit it off."

"Well, every child has wanted a pony for Christmas at some point," Morrison chortled, lips curling up around his pipe, "She's very close to being one. Hard for a child not to like her."

"Hard for a lot of people not to like her," Indiana frowned, "The reason she ended up in the papers was because someone tried to kidnap her. I realized in that moment the most I could do was have him gotten for theft, like he'd stolen a goat from my farm or something."

"That court case must've been so stressful," Morrison gave a sympathetic frown, "Bigger than just you as well. You made the government admit that being human was more than just looks. Means someday maybe they'll have to admit Blacks and Jews are humans too."

"I hope so," Indiana snorted, "It'd be my biggest contribution back to this world."

Only a quarter-hour after Indiana had shown his face in the yard had the children grown tired of baseball. Anna, for her part, was still filled with energy as they packed away the sporting equipment and tossed the rocks back into the garden. Never before had she felt so invigorated, had so much fun. Her previous shyness had been completely shattered, and she took to her new friends like a man in a desert to an oasis.

While Anna had been told not to fly during the game, as it was cheating to be able to fly laps around the diamond while the others couldn't even reach her, she'd been of great utility in recovering lost balls. Usually, the boys had to be careful not to actually knock the ball over the fences, as it would be forever lost in another yard. Now, though, they could swing for the fences and have Anna just fly over and snatch the ball back.

"You wanna see something really cool?" she asked, hovering a few feet off the ground while the boys sat down and rested.

They all nodded vigorously.

With a confident grin, Anna shot up towards the clouds above. Beating her wings, she ascended at maximum speed, an infinite well of energy and a desire to impress her new friends bankrolling her flight. Eventually, the air grew thin, signed by her breathing automatically changing with the altitude. From below, the boys gaped as a greyscale rainbow followed her towards the sky.

Moments later, she arrived at the cloud layer. Looking around, Anna quickly identified an appropriate cloud. Grabbing it from above, she pushed it back down towards the ground, steering it back towards the back yard of the Morrison residence. When she was a few meters above the ground, she allowed the cloud to coast towards the grass below while lying on top of it in a casual position.

"Holy crap!" Tommy shouted as the cloud lowered right down into the yard.

"Hey! That's a bad word!" Bob said, pushing Tommy with a thrust to the shoulder.

Jeremy, frozen in wonder, reached out towards the cloud and passed his hand through it several times.

"What do you think?" Anna asked, pulling off a thin, white strip of the cloud and beginning to chew on it like it was a chunk of cotton candy.

"Holy cow!" Tommy exclaimed, getting shoved again by Bob.

"That's so cool!" Jeremy said, continuing to wave his hands through the cloud, "I always wanted to touch a cloud!"

"I can do something, even cooler," Anna grinned toothily.

Indiana frowned as a cloud eclipsed his view of the back yard. He supposed it was only inevitable that Anna showed off her... abilities. Mr Morrison, for his part, looked over his shoulder and hummed, "What a strange fog..."

At that moment, Mrs Morrison walked in, wiping a pair of wet hands off on her apron, "Dinner's ready whenever the kids are."

Indiana checked his watch, "I gave her an hour about forty minutes ago. Will it still be hot by then?"

"Sure," Mrs Morrison smiled, sitting down on the couch, "How is the semester going, Dr Jones?"

He grimaced. It was long, tiresome work. Worst of all was the fact that the work was boring. As an assistant teacher at Oxford, he thought it would just get less boring when he started to have more authority over the course subjects. This, however, had not turned out to be true now that he had dove into the standard, professional work of a college professor.

"...It's alright," he eventually said, "It pays the bills."

Mr Morrison cocked his head, "Do they pay you well?"

"They pay me the industry standard rate," Indiana responded, "It's just... it's boring sometimes."

"I can relate," Mr Morrison nodded, "Have to do whatever will provide, right?"

"Is there a Mrs Jones?" Mrs Morrison asked, tilting her head.

Indiana Jones shook his head, "It's a solo show, for now. Plenty of women, nobody who was right for me I'm afraid."

"Must be quite hard," said Mrs Morrison, clasping her hands together, "On you and her. Are there any womanly influences in her life?"

"Not aside from her babysitters," a pause, "Probably why she's such a tomboy," Indiana chuckled, "But for now, she's stuck with me."

Suddenly, rain began to fall on the side of the house. Every adult in the room went silent, looking towards the yard in confusion. Rain dripped down the windows of the back side of the house, yet on the front, there was sun and not a dark cloud in sight.

"That's Anna's doing," Indiana eventually explained, "You see, somehow she can-"

Indiana was suddenly blinded with a brilliant, white light as an explosion rocked the house.

Anna finished jumping on the cloud, compressing the several she had gathered into one, dark raincloud. Something rushed down through her into the cloud, and then rain began to fall from its fluffy, vaporous reaches. Screams of surprise and laughter came from below as the boys were suddenly pelted with an ice-cold rainshower, retreating to the far reaches of the yard away from the deluge.

With a frown, she noticed that something was... different feeling about this cloud than the one she had used at sea, and the others she had experimented with since. She felt her fur standing up and her mane and tail rising, almost like she had been rubbing herself over the carpet. She paused for only a moment, before bouncing on the cloud a few more times. Each time she hit the cloud and she felt that strange... thing move around through her, the static in the air grew, until suddenly...

KA-BOOM!

Anna's ears rang as she froze in fear, standing on top of the cloud. Her eyes were filled with white-hot afterimages of the yard, blending into muted and blurred colors as she stumbled about. Her ears rang, though the sound quickly diminished as normal hearing returned. She could hear her father calling out to her as she shook her head, trying to get the dots out of her eyes.

After a few moments, her senses returned to her. Indiana looked up at her with a horrified look on his face, the Morrisons stood behind him, while the three other children crowded around the two adults. Below the cloud, which was quickly dispersing as the wind blew long smokey tufts off of its side, a large black scorch mark had been drilled into the ground.

"Dad..." Anna said, the ringing finally leaving as she looked down at the big, black spot that had been burned into the grass right in the middle of the backyard, "I think I made lightning."

Mr Sanders peered over the top of his notebook, making eye contact with Anna, who was busy eating her afternoon snack. She had just finished midterm exam for Greek, and was waiting expectantly for the results to come through. She tried her best to analyze her tutor's face, though the ever-stoic man simply placed down his notebook and clasped his hands in front of him, not betraying a hint until he spoke.

"Dare I say it, Miss Jones, but perhaps you may be on your way to speaking the language fluently," Sanders closed the book, "A-. You had some issues with pronunciation, but otherwise a flawless work. Keep this up, and you may become trilingual."

Anna pumped a hoof, before pausing and tilting her head, "What's trilingual mean? Is that like bilingual?"

"It means you are fluent in three languages," Sanders muttered, giving a glance towards the clock on the wall as he began to pack his books.

"But I only know German and Greek," Anna frowned, looking down at her half-eaten scone.

"English, German, and Greek are your languages, Miss Jones," Sanders intoned, perking up very slightly as the sound of steps on the cobblestones outside came through the front door, "Your father is only fifteen minutes late this time, it would seem."

The door opened, the familiar scent and frame of Indiana Jones filling the doorway. Under one arm, a beige wrapped paper package was held. He kicked off his dress shoes and placed his hat on a rack before catching the eye of Sanders, "How'd the exams go?"

"Very well," Sanders muttered, closing the clasps on his book bag, "Your daughter has, once again, proven herself to be intelligent in matters lingual," he lowered his voice in an unsuccessful attempt to hide his next words from Anna's constantly panning ears, "Her mathematics, however..."

Indiana waved him off, "We're all allowed to have our weaknesses," then, raising his voice and looking up the staircase, he shouted, "ANNA!?"

"Hi," Anna said, from just a few feet away as she sat at the dining table.

Jumping slightly, Indiana turned and blinked, "Oh. Hi. Didn't see you there."

"Have a good afternoon, Dr Jones," Sanders muttered, taking his hat from the rack and journeying out the door past Indiana.

"You too," Indiana said, kicking the door closed behind him with a leg, before walking over to Anna and plopping the package down on the table in front of her, "Hey. Remember when you hit yourself with my whip?"

Anna reached to the back of her head and rubbed the long, sensitive scar that had grown over the spot. Fur had refused to grow back properly along the space, leaving a permanent U-shaped scar across her neck and down to her shoulders. All in all, it was definitely hard to forget, "...yeah."

"Still want to learn how to use one safely?" Indiana asked, folding his arms.

"Mhm..." Anna nodded, looking towards the parcel, "What's this?"

"Belated Christmas gift, since we were too busy on actual Christmas to get you anything," Indiana said, holding out a hand towards it, "Open it."

"Thanks, Dad," Anna said in a practiced, almost rote manner as she reached out and began to tear apart the paper packaging, covered in international stamps and covering a cardboard box. She reached to tear open the box, but was stopped as Indiana grabbed a knife and cut open the tape keeping it closed.

Looking inside curiously, her eyes widened as she laid eyes on the contents. The scent of preserving chemicals and freshly tanned leather drifted out from the box, coming from a tightly coiled bullwhip. It was almost the exact same color and texture as her father's, though as she eagerly reached in and pulled it out, she found it was significantly downsized. Still very large, though not completely, unreasonably unwieldy.

"Six foot long. Kangaroo hide, extra long fall," Indiana said, a hint of nervousness to his voice, "Do you... like it?"

Anna had to admit, she'd only ever been curious about her father's whip. She thought it was cool how he used it in all of his stories, and the times she'd seen him practice with it in real life. She never really imagined giving it more than just a practice try in real life. Still, to express all of that to her father was not something she wanted to do, so she simply nodded.

"Well, if you'd like to, we can do some practice with it this afternoon, unless you have something planned with your friends?" Indiana asked, jerking a thumb towards the back door.

"Sure!" Anna, in fact, did not have anything planned that afternoon. It seemed that her father had forgotten the Morrisons were out of town until the following week.

Moments later, they were in the back yard, amongst the grass that had been neglected and allowed to overgrow for a few weeks. Still, the grass was not high enough to tickle more than Anna's chest, allowing her to watch her father as he coiled his full-sized bullwhip.

"Okay. Since whips aren't really meant for people who walk on all fours, you should probably learn most of this stuff while flying in the air," Indiana began, standing a safe distance away from Anna with his own whip drawn.

Anna obliged, taking off slightly, holding her coiled whip to her chest. She wore an old bike helmet on her head, to protect her ears and head if she whipped herself again.

"Alright," Indiana gripped his own and let it unfurl onto the ground, "Okay. First thing you should know is that the key to using a whip is that it's really not about strength. It's about precision, and doing the right moves to make the cord go exactly like you want it. If you force your whip around, you'll just make the cord go crazy and hurt yourself or somebody else," adjusting his grip on the handle in a finely-practiced motion, Indiana started with his hand behind him, before smoothly moving the handle into the air and then flicking back downwards. The cord responded in suit, flying fully into the air before cracking downwards with a signature 'WOOT-CRACK'.

"That's called the Cattleman's Crack," Indiana explained, "You gotta get the cord all the way into the air before just flicking downwards with your... uh, fetlock. You put more force into pulling upwards than you do throwing downwards, or else the cord will go lazy and try and nick your ears. Try and get the up in the air part right and the rest is easy."

Anna let her whip unfurl, and then spared a glance towards her father. He responded by placing his hands on his hips and giving an encouraging nod. Eventually she made a strained inhale and pulled the whip up, before throwing the handle down. The cord, in return, after coiling all the way behind her head, came down hard and smacked the top of her helmet before bouncing back down towards the ground.

"You got the up in the air part. You just flicked down too late and too hard, you got this," Indiana encouraged, taking his own whip to show off the move one more time.

Anna nodded slowly, before hovering back slightly to reset her position after being knocked forward by her mistake, prepping her whip to try again. Raising the handle up, she once again knocked herself in the head with the whip cord. But, before Indiana could correct her again, she gritted her teeth and tried again. This time, the cord narrowly missed her helmet and made a faint "Swish!", but lacked the vital crack at the end.

Indiana smiled, folding his arms, "Almost there."

Anna smiled back, before trying one more time. The cord flew high into the air, before coming down with a loud snap. The sound of a supersonic "CRACK!" echoed through the yard and off the neighbor's houses.

Eyes following the end of Anna's whip, Indiana blinked as he swore he saw a wind rustle through the bushes lining the edges of his yard. Whips didn't make that much breeze, and he assumed it must just be a wind that he couldn't feel from where he was standing.

"Good job!" Indiana said, pride dripping from his lips, "The secret to really mastering whip cracking is figuring out that right amount of strength to get the cord fully extended. Now, let's work on mastering it today, and maybe I'll start you on the overhead stuff if you're quick enough?"

"Yeah!" Anna cheered, adjusting her grip on the whip once more.

Every day, after school, father and daughter would take to the back yard. Indiana would bequeath his knowledge of standard circus tricks first, as that was how he, himself was inspired to learn. He could definitely tell that Anna had not been as enthusiastic as he'd expected at first (in all fairness, whipsport was a fairly specialized hobby), but as it became a common thing for them to spend some time in the outdoors spending time together and shooting the breeze between practice, she warmed up quickly.

It made sense, Indiana supposed. Usually, the most he'd do for her is come home, cook a simple dinner - something with a taste he couldn't spoil with his poor skills - and then chat over the dinner table. It was something him and his father would do, not that he particularly wanted to emulate him, but instead it was the only thing he really knew how to do in regards to parenting.

Now, though, he thought back to the times when him and his father had done things together like this... or rather, the lack of times this had happened. His father had personally taught him Greek, but the study had been rote and unchallenging to Indiana. Otherwise, there would just be nothing. Just dinner, studying, and showing up when Indiana got in trouble at school.

Anna Jones... Anna Mary Jones, had been the person to take part in his life. Up until he was 12 years old, that is.

As Summer approached, though, the lessons would not continue. Indiana had been chasing a lead for a long time, and now he was raring to get out of the library. After 7 years of study, teaching, and research work, he'd begun to yearn for the old days... and look ahead to the possible profits of a little bit of independent digging. His next target was back in Egypt, and as soon as the mid-semester break started and he could have respite from teaching, he was off like a rocket, leaving Anna in Marcus's charge.

She'd still be there when he got back. He had to do what he had to do and provide, after all.

Author's Note

Apologies for the long wait while re-editing this chapter. I could never land on a version of this chapter that I was satisfied with, but I eventually got there. I have a lot of sort of 'slices of life' to go through in the following chapters to develop the characters.

In other news: Indiana Jones and the Great Circle has been added to the list of things that will be covered... and its presence has done an estimated 20,000 words worth of damage to pre-existing material that was meant to cover its time period.

I wouldn't have made the decision to put it in if I didn't think it was worth it though.

Also, by the time you read this, it will be my birthday :)