Cade knew that his dad was weird. And not in the way that he just had some weird quirks about him-he was weird. But he loved him. He was weird because he was always getting asked out on dates, but he never said yes. Not even once. Cade had overheard some of the ladies in town talking, about how his dad always looked a little sad; and how some people thought he was waiting on a special girl to come back to him. No one ever mentioned the scars that covered his body, but Cade knew everyone thought about them. He did too. He grew up on stories about a hero named 'Gregory' and Cade never said that it was obvious his dad meant himself. But he grew up on stories about this hero. On stories about a queen who always fought for what was right, and she was fierce and brave and everything a ruler should be. Stories about a mean old rat who underneath it all cared; and about a bat that had saved the heroes life. They all had good endings-the hero and the queen lived happily ever after, and the evil was defeated. But Cade knew somewhere that that wasn't true. Because he saw his dad looking at an old picture sometimes; and once he had snuck in to look while he was away. It was him-much, much younger-but it was his dad and a girl, and they looked so happy. He had never asked for those stories again.

He knew his dad was weird because apparently it wasn't normal to have swarms of bats living in your attic. And it wasn't normal for them to only sleepily glance at you when you went up into the attic. His dad said that they were friends of a friend. He said once that another friend had taught him to see in the dark, too. And his dad had tried to teach him, but his dad wasn't a great teacher, and Cade wasn't the best learner. He could do it with loud sounds, but he didn't think he would ever get to be as good as his dad-who could walk around in the country dark completely unbothered. He knew that his dad was weird. And Cade knew that out of all the weird things about him, the weirdest thing was that he had adopted Cade. Because he could've had any life he wanted, but he chose the one that had Cade and two dogs (Ares and Phobos-great big German Shepherds that Cade adored) in an inherited farmhouse out in West Virginia. He chose the life that let Uncle Ben and Uncle Eli visit, bringing with them letters that his dad read and then kept locked up in a box. He chose the life that kept pieces of the Underland in it-because eventually Cade found out-and Gregor told him the real stories of the queen and the gnawers and the fliers, and he showed him the photos-the ones he had, as well as the ones that Eli took while they visited. There was a video of a boy named Hazard, who Gregor said was all grown up now. There was also a video of a wedding. The same girl from the photo married another, but Gregor said that it was okay. That they had reached an understanding a long time ago.

Cade didn't press it.

Sometimes Gregor let Cade write his own letter to get taken back to the Underland, and once, Gregor and Cade let Eli take a video of them to bring down to the Underlanders.

So maybe they were all weird. But they were unabashedly happy with the lives that they had chosen.