Pizza Time

"What is it?"

"My gun is gone." I said, and flipped Liz's bed over.

"Oh, your father had it." She said absently as she rolled her shirt cuffs.

"What?!"

"Look I will tell you the whole story on the way to your father's house." She said, impatiently bouncing on the balls of her feet in the hallway.

"Deal." I said as I bolted for the door. With my hand on the freezing doorknob, I asked suddenly, "Does your car go fast?"

She chuckled darkly for a moment before she said, "The question is not 'does it go fast' but rather, 'how fast do you want to go'."

"So, 'how fast do you want to go?'" I mimicked, getting a queasy feeling in my stomach.

She smiled toothily and purred, "Very, very fast indeed."

The queasiness had just doubled in the pit of my stomach. To say I was worried by this sudden appearance by this part of her personality was a generalization teetering precipitously above outright folly. Trying to assuage my fears, I said jokingly, "How fast could that possibly be? What, fifty, sixty miles per hour?"

As I locked the door, I could hear her chuckle. It was not a nice chuckle. A shiver ran up my spine as I heard that chuckle. What she whispered afterwards made me reconsider whether I wanted to take a cab, or, in an extreme case, drive myself.

"Yes," She whispered revenantly, "and then I'll shift into third gear."

* * * * *

My car has a theoretical top speed of seventy-five miles per hour. I say theoretical because the highest I've taken it is sixty-three miles per hour in a thirty-five mile an hour zone. I thought I was going fast then. From my position, glancing edgewise at the instrument panel as the trees on the side of the road blurred past, and my body clenched in the seat tightly in fear, the speedometer needle surged past one hundred and twenty miles an hour and kept going as the engine roared like a lion.

"I'mnotgonnadieI'mnotgonnadieI'mnotgonnadie." I moaned/prayed over and over quietly thought tightly clenched teeth, hopefully quiet enough not to disturb her from her driving, lest she wrap the small car around a telephone pole or a tree.

"You are going to die," she agreed, "but not now." She said as she shrieked around a station wagon in a squeal of tires, and a loud trilling, quickly fading honk from the station wagon Ekataren just cut off while doing a hundred and thirty in a fifty mile an hour zone. Closing my eyes didn't help. My fertile imagination took the sensations and the sounds, and made an image in my head that was far worse than what was outside the Smartglass windshield. "Oh, come on. I'm not even doing a hundred and sixty yet." She said, her eyes dancing in the light from the heads-up-display on the Smartglass windshield.

"So what happened?"

"Your sister opened the door and we walked in together, I closed the door behind me, your father came out of your room holding a stun gun, and raving. A pistol was thrust into his waistband, yours I think."

"Then what happened?" I asked, only to shut my mouth in fear as she slalomed the small roadster around three midsize cars with a squeal from roadster's adaptive tires.

"I yelled, Liz froze, and your father shot us. Your sister took the brunt of the shot, and I only caught the corona. Your father kicked me a few times in the belly, raved a little longer, and then I passed out. Then you woke me up, and I was naked."

"That's it?"

"What do you mean that's it?! You father is guilty of assault, battery, kidnapping, and of being an asshole."

"I didn't think there's a law--ohm'god!" I gulped as she neatly swerved into the oncoming traffic lane to pass a minivan, passed the minivan, and then neatly swerved back just before an oncoming car nearly slammed into us, a chorus of shrilly beeping horns faded behind us.

"There should be. It would be a popular one, I think. Bloody hell, it would reduce the overcrowding of the world at least."

"Gaa!" I said, now just covering my eyes.

"You know," Kat said conversationally, "this car has a maximum computer regulated speed of one hundred sixty one miles an hour. I fixed that problem ten minutes after I got it. Do you want to know how fast we're going now?"

"No!"

"One hundred eighty five miles an hour. At night, through moderate traffic. But you could hardly tell. This is certainly a lot more fun during the day."

"How long until we get there?" I asked, my usual rather manly male baritone now a manly male high soprano squeak.

"The computer says a few more minutes." She said nodding to the heads-up display in front of her, before suddenly wrenching the wheel over, skidding across three lanes of traffic onto the off ramp with a squeal of protest from the tires. It was then I promised myself never to ride with her ever again. "Nice night." She said to no one in particular.

The computer was precise as ever, a few minutes later, the car grumbled to a stop across the street from my house. As the engine died with an abrupt growl, I looked around curiously at my childhood home.

"So, what are we going to do?" I asked quietly, looking through the windshield at my front door. My stomach churned and tried to twist itself into small knots, as I felt all the subtle horrors and fears of my childhood had come to life and manifested themselves in this house, a physical form for all of my childhood terrors.

"We are going to knock on the door, then request that he, your father, give us your sister back."

"If that doesn't work?"

"Then I become guilty of battery, and you become guilty or kidnapping. Re-kidnapping... Un-kidnapping--"

"--Whatever." I cut her off, "So you attack my father, and what about my mother?"

"If afraid she is your department. She didn't stun me and take my clothes off."

My mind quailed for a moment, but for only a moment--why not? "Sounds good enough to me." I said, surfing a wild wave of wholly feral energy, "Let's go."

We exited the car and walked up to the front door of the house. Christmas lights shone brilliantly from every nook and cranny in a veritable rainbow of colors with a brilliance even a blind man couldn't help but see. As we walked closer, I couldn't help but think of the part in the movie where the hero is about to discover he just walked into a minefield, or his friend is really the horrible flesh-eating monster from the eighth dimension that had already eaten the rest of the cast. This was too easy; I nervously waited for the other shoe to drop.

While my skin was crawling and I kept thinking this was somehow a trap, we were able to walk to the door unmolested. When Ekataren pressed the doorbell, it didn't explode, but trigger a muffled chime somewhere deeper inside. I would have unlocked the door with the key I had on my key chain when I left on that cold night, years ago, but I threw that in a storm sewer a month after getting my place, as I tried severing all ties to the past. If I knew then that I would have used it now, I would have kept it. Hindsight is such a dick.

Unsurprisingly, there was no answer. Experimentally, Ekataren tried the doorknob, and with a click, opened quietly. She looked at me questioningly, and I just shrugged cluelessly in response. We entered quickly, eyes darting around the living room, idly noting a few changes. There were a few more terra-cotta angels overflowing the room's small nooks and crannies, the furniture was new, and the TV was hideously large and obscenely expensive. I mentally calculated that for the price of the Idiot Box alone, I could keep Liz and myself well fed for months.

"Yuck, I hate this kitschy shit." Kat whispered as she toed a two-foot tall porcelain angel sitting next to the door, cherubic face, closely tucked wings, with a delicately hand painted freshly tazered expression of joy, "If this represents your parent's taste, killing them might be a favor to the world."

"My mother buys those." I whispered back. Or at least did, last time I cared to check.

Kat snorted and padded deeper into the house, heading towards the kitchen. I gave one last look at the angel, and resisted a sudden impulse to throw it through the TV. After a long, hesitant moment, I followed her.

Well, at least the dinnertable was exactly as I was when I left it, I thought as father stood up from his place at the table, "Ah, my own Judas, and his harlot." He said with a sick smile. Ekataren surged forward, only to skid to a stop when Father pointed a gun at her. "Ah, ah, ah. No, stay right there, and be obedient, as a woman should, for once."

"Father, where is Elizabeth?" I asked.

"My daughter is being cleansed of your evil as we speak, by my woman."

"Sean, what does this drunken sow of a man mean?" Ekataren said quietly, her hands held open and away from the pockets of my jeans.

"It means that my sister is being beaten within an inch of her life by my mother somewhere in this house."

Ekataren's eyes narrowed as she hissed to my Father, "You will beg for me to kill you."

"No you won't. I have one simple demand. Renounce your ways Sean, and come back to the family. Let's all be happy again. You can even keep your strumpet. I think that's more than fair."

I walked forward slowly, my mind in a whirl. Surviving, and living. The muzzle of the gun looked big enough to swallow my fist whole. Let's be a family? No, I see you for who you are Father, you don't want a family, you want slaves to do your bidding; how dare you call Ekataren a strumpet! "Father, where did you get that gun?"

His smile took on a zealous edge, "From you. It's your gun. I thought it only just that I slay you with your own sword, Judas."

My smile became as thin as a razor's edge. "Well, father, there's a problem. We don't want to see you or mother anymore, and I'm here to get her. Now drop the gun, it's worthless to you."

"Worthless? I have a gun, and your sister is being punished. I see nothing wrong." He said condescendingly.

I took an easy step forward, "Well, see, there's the problem. Does the word 'biometrics' ring any bells in that bat-clogged belfry? The gun'll never work for you." Ekataren's smile became quite feral as father's arrogance slipped.

A part of me wanted to piss my pants, before passing out in terror, but a fiery warmth from within gave me the bravado of ten men as my father sloppily lined up the crosshairs on my head, then pulled the trigger. The hammer clicked, and nothing happened--and then Ekatarenmoved. I'm certain it's possible to describe what she did later, but I'm certain it would take high-speed cameras, and an instant replay to truly understand what she did. I only say her bright eyes, and her feral smile for a moment before she seemed to strike like a serpent, somehow covering the space between her, and father in a few dance-like steps as her hands a blur in front of her. I was awed at the fluid grace of my valkyrie.

Father had only one instant to react before she was upon him. I saw fear in his eyes, and I rejoiced. In that instant, he cocked his hand, and threw my pistol at Ekataren as he backpedaled furiously. Ekataren slapped the pistol aside contemptuously, which flew into my surprised hands just as Ekataren reached my father. Her face turned slightly and for the fleeting of moments, I saw her smile. Her sad, terrible smile that I pray I never see again. It was a demon's grin, filled with an almost bottomless, inhuman hate. Yet, it was an angel's smirk, bright with a promise of terrible things to come. A faint patina of regret, and a peculiar sorrow tempered that ghastly, inhuman smile, however. I would not have to worry about Ekataren this day; I would have to worry when I did not see the regret, or the sorrow. On that day, far in the future, I would fear her, and to fear for her--but not today, and not now.

The situation looked well in hand, I told myself, there was nothing for me to do here, and plenty for me to do elsewhere. Time to go, Sean, there are things to do, and people to see, my inner voice screamed at me as I turned and sprinted for the stairs.

I crept up the last few steps, and stood quietly on the landing, my ears cocked for sound. The fight downstairs seemed to be winding down as I ghosted from door to door, listening for anything. My hand had just touched the doorknob of my old bedroom door, and I was about to give up and head up to the third floor landing, when I heard a muffled groan that sounded like my sister. Resisting the impulse to kick the door in like in a cop show, I quietly turned the knob, and gently pushed the door open. The door opened without a sound, moving easily on its greased hinges to fetch to a placid stop against the wall. With my gun held in front of me like Samson from "The Creature from Time!", I crept into the room, buoyed by a heady fusion of outrageous fear and murderous rage.

My sister. That was the first thing I saw, before the rest of the room percolated in to fill in the rest of the picture. My sister was naked, lying facedown on a bloodstained mattress. Her upper body was bloody, which soaked the mattress. She was bleeding from gashes in her back. Mother held a sharp knife in her hands. Her hands were bloody. My sister moaned in pain, her eyes unfocused. An empty syringe lay discarded some distance away. A small bottle, half filled with a clear liquid, lay on the floor nearby. My mother was smiling. My sister was drugged. My mother was okay. My sister was hurt. My mother hurt her. My sister needed help. My mother was fine. My mother did this to her.

I suddenly remembered a computer game I played years ago. I was a counter-terrorist assaulting into a home taken over by the then-fictitious terrorist group, 'the red hand' who was holding an ambassador's family hostage. The placement of the AI was random in the house, but their reactions were not. This reminded me of a similar situation: I had just opened the door, interrupting a terrorist from executing the daughter of one of the hostages downstairs. He turned to look at me, just as mother now did. My gun came up, just as it did in the game, the sight picture was perfectly centered on the bridge of his nose, just as it was my mothers. Coldly, emotionlessly, I pulled the trigger, and the terrorist dropped to the floor, his head splattered over the far wall in a runny splash of blood, bone, and brains. I took a shaky breath to clear my vision before speaking gravelly, "Mother, get up, and back away."

Her mouth moved, for a moment, and my ears heard her voice say, lagging behind her mouth, like she was badly dubbed, "Don't stop me, I'm exercising the Satan out of her!" her eyes were bright, and feral.

"Mother," I said in a voice hoarse with fury, "drop the knife and back away."

"You must be in league with Satan too!" She said as she came to her feet, holding the knife before her threateningly.

"Mother this is a loaded gun. Drop the knife and back away, or I'm going to shoot you."

"Spawn of Satan, afraid? I'm the instrument ofGod!" She bellowed manically, her eyes bright.

"Mother," I said, lowering the gun slowly until it pointed at the floor, "how about you put the knife down, and I'll put the gun down, and we can talk about this, okay?"

"Shoot me, spawn of Satan! I'm protected by God!" she screeched and charged.

In a move I couldn't duplicate even if I wanted to, seemingly hours of watching Hong Kong blood operas clicked into my head, and I somehow grabbed her wrist with her free hand while spinning, propelled by her charge. I twisted her hand just enough for her to yelp in pain and drop the knife before jerking her forward, and in a flashy spin, the butt of the pistol held in the fist of my other hand collided with the back of her skull with a muffled crack that stung my hand. She took a half-step and then fell to the floor; dead, dying, or simply out cold, I did not know, but I lined up the pistol's sights with the back of her motionless skull anyway; I knew this was my only chance, my only choice. It would be an easy shot, an effortless shot--a can't-miss shot. I stood there, my sister moaning now and then, my pistol out, my finger already took the slack out of the trigger--all I needed to do was just squeeze.

As my finger tightened slowly on the trigger, in my mind's eye, I saw her forehead exploding outward in slow motion in a spray of gore; splattering over the floor of the room I grew up in. I could end it all right now. Pull the trigger once, maybe twice, grab my sister, do the same to father, and I'd never have to worry about this happening again. But as my rage threatened to spiral out of control, and I was a hairsbreadth from that final act, something snapped inside me and I just lost my taste for vengeance. I would admit later that I would have liked nothing more than to empty the magazine into her head, wiping her face (and the rest of her head) from existence. I would say that I wanted to just stop this insanity before it got any worse, which would sound rather high-minded when I would say it, but as my finger on the trigger relaxed, all I wanted in the world was to be leftalone. Maybe blood was thicker than water. Maybe I was a gutless coward. Maybe I was over-civilized. Maybe I hadn't been desensitized. Maybe I just wasn't a killer. Maybe, despite my hate and loathing, I still loved her. I don't think I'll ever know the answer to that question, and a small, petulant part of me never wants to know.

"Sean? Is that you?" Liz asked weakly, and I saw that her eyes were swollen almost shut. She mewled pitifully and tried to move, only to stop and moan as the gashes weakly spat blood to run in thin rivulets down her back, following the contour of her ribs, and finally flowing into the already soaked mattress.

"Yeah, it's me. I'll get you out in a second. Just hold on, okay?" I said, my eyes darting around the room in a near panic. I couldn't carry her, she weighed too much, and I couldn't drag her since that might hurt her more. There was a lot of blood on that mattress. I needed to get her to a doctor. I needed a spare set of hands. Ekataren!

As if on command, I heard Ekataren's angelic voice call hesitantly, "Sean?"

"Here! Drop what you're doing and get in here, on the double!" I bellowed, and rolled the bottle over with a nudge from my shoe. The bottle was marked reassuringly with a professional looking label in block English, but I wasn't one of the handful of drug names I could recall from memory. My eyes darted to the door as Ekataren sharply inhaled, her eyes wide before they narrowed dangerously as she put the scene together. "Bloody hell Sean, why are you normal, when your wanker parents are this bloody insane?"

There was a growing part of me that hungered for companionship right now, a sane, normal human to hold me and whisper softly in my ear, someone to help drive the demons away, at least for a while. I wanted to burst into tears, rage at the world, or just slip into the gentle numbness of catatonia. Liz moaned, and I just became unfeeling ice, because that was needed now. "I've already told you; I'm not normal, nor nice, nor kind," I said emotionlessly, shaking my head slowly, "I'm just a different type of insane." I kicked the bottle away, venting a small measure of violence at it.

"The safe kind?"

"Is there ever such a thing?"

"Fair enough." She said sagely, as she looked at Liz's back.

"Any ideas?"

"Is she drugged?"

"I think so. It needed a needle, but came in a prescription bottle with my father's name on it, so it can't be that bad." Liz moaned in counterpoint. "I think." I finished meekly.

"Bloody bastards."

"Quite possibly. Any ideas?"

"Ambulance?"

"You have the money for it? I don't. And do you want them to find out what we did here?"

"Shite." She said feelingly.

We looked at each other for a moment, and then back at Liz, before we said simultaneously, "Carry her."