Once dressed in my wonderful fatigues, Grex and I hit the lobby. The usual scene, unobtrusive guards, summoners racing to and fro, the manager behind his desk. I pulled out my new standard issue phone and dialed my dad's cell.

"Numens."

"Hi dad. I just thought you'd like to know I'm headed home to see mom. See you when you get off work, OK?"

"Maeve...."

I hung up. I did say I'd let him know, I didn't say I'd wait on him...and I needed at least some time alone with my loving mother to get the proper answers.

I drove carefully, obeying all traffic laws and taking the utmost care. I reached my old home right at 3pm. Mom's car was in the drive. Obeying military doctrine I parked right behind her; her only escape from me was now on foot.

The engine as still warm; she had just arrived home.

I checked once before I knocked; Grex was right behind me, a looming yet comfortable presence.

The door opened on the second knock, and my anger throbbed. There she was, right in front of me. Taller than I was now, still the same auburn haired playboy bunny centerfold she was months ago. A relief of sorts. I struggled to say something but her guileless eyes stared directly into my soul, so I had to settle.

"Hello, mother."

My words finished what looking behind me started, her guileless eyes wide she stumbled back into the house and fell against something with a thump and a crash. I entered to find her bent over the oak coffee table, the vase which was normally filled with carnations (and which I knew to be quite expensive) shattered. Mom was currently crab walking her way through the mess, uncaring of the cuts she was opening on her hands.

"Hello, Samuel."

Wait, what? Samuel? Grex was staring at mom with an almost tender expression, leaving me no doubt to whom he was referring. Oh of course, mom's name hadn't been bartered, so she'd simply changed it. she stared between Grex and I, back and forth several times so fast I feared for whiplash. I tried to see to her, but she kept crawling away from me.

Then so fast I barely saw her move she lunged, tackling me and wrapping arms around me hard enough to make my ribs creak. We both plowed into the wall and slid down it.

"Oh Melvin I'msosorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry...!"

"Mom! Mom stop. Stop. Tell me why you sold me out mom."

She looked up into my eyes, her own brimming with tears. I felt like I'd just kicked a puppy, but I hardened my own heart. Then her own mood changed and I could see the adult come out again, frost overtaking her expression like a slow moving wave.

"I'll tell you everything. Come on lets go into the kitchen. I'll make tea."

So now it was more waiting. Mom stared at me, eyes watering but gaze unexpectedly piercing as we waited on the water to heat. She turned to Grex.

"She's a bit...lush, isn't she?"

"Your genetics Samuel, I'm not to blame at all."

"Mom, why? Just start with that."

"Melvin, I...."

Grex interrupted.

"Maeve now, that prior name no longer belongs to her."

Her tears started falling. My hands twitched to comfort her, but I resisted.

"...I see. Maeve, I was a boy. I was raised to be a man all my life. I won't say your grandparents were completely sexist, but they did have some old fashioned ideas about what men and women were to do. I was a jock; I lettered in football and hunted on weekends. I graduated with honors and more than a few women sought me out for companionship. I was an outgoing alpha male.

Then came the selection, which of course ended in my being chosen, along with a friend of mine. I attended basic, which I don't believe has changed much. is it still basically a prison sentence?"

I nodded, not trusting my voice. She sighed and continued.

"So I attended basic, and all was pretty much going as expected; I was on my way to become squad leader, regardless of whatever I summoned. I can only guess it was similar for you. At any rate, summoning night I hit what I thought was the jackpot."

She nodded to Grex, and he nodded gravely back.

"Grex popped out like a demented jack in a box, and told me he'd bow to no man, nor serve any human. I replied that he'd serve this human and like it. And we bartered. I could tell almost immediately that he wanted to serve me almost as badly as I wanted him to, for some reason. I bargained for a measure of his power and his service... and his price at first was years from my
life. I was such a selfish bastard back then."

She looked to me, searching for something, but I was playing poker with the best of them. Her face fell and she sighed deeply, seeming to age 20 years in a second.

"We renegotiated. I kept my price, and gained some nice time dilation powers. Made me a wargod on the battlefield. Grex... well he got the backdoor to you. The ability to answer your summoning first, should you summon. The ability to tweak your understanding of his price... and my silence about it. A full window of opportunity to you."

She poured the tea then, with slow deliberate movements. Serving me before speaking up again.

"You have to understand honey, I was a guy. A boorish bastard who wasn't even thinking of having kids, or what could happen if I did. My survival through the night wasn't a guarantee, let alone any other day. I knew I was going directly to the next phase of basic and into battle. France was getting hammered and while we were holding them back, as always more summoners were needed."

She drained her own tea in one gulp as if it were liquor, and made another.

"I never wanted nor expected to have children. Then Grex pulled his little trick, because I was stupid enough to leave it open, and I wanted kids even less. I was still a guy in my head after all. I also thought the transformation would wear off at the end of my service. How could I explain to a child that I was his mommy with a penis? But Grex was as good as his word, watching my back even when I didn't order him too, or couldn't spot the danger fast enough. He saved my life on his own initiative four times in the first tour alone.

I was given a brief leave, and while on it my first squad, being led by my friend who'd graduated with me, was wiped out. I was sent to another that lost their summoner, and met your father. He was just a grunt, not even an nco... wet behind the ears. I hated him from the start, he was always insisting in being chivalrous. Then I grew to know him, and hated him even more. He
was everything I wasn't. honest, forthright, honorable to a fault.

And he loved me from the first somehow, even while I was spiraling out of control and becoming an even meaner bitch than before. He never raised his voice to me and never tried to argue, no matter how much of an ass I was. I tried to get him killed at first. I sent him on so many scouting missions...."

"Mom? Focus please."

I'd interrupted a bit more harshly than I'd intended, and the tears started again.

"Sorry honey. So a second tour, then a third. I came back home with your father attached to me like a puppy. Served six years with distinction, all the while keeping Grex on this plane so often. the strain was...immense. Back stateside I was diagnosed by the head shrinkers with mania and psychosis, still in it's infant stages. I started seeing things that... well they were there,
but no one else could see them."

She still did of course, but I didn't want to interrupt and tell her so.

"So I was ordered off the lines so that I didn't lose it and kill an army. Transferred here where they could watch me, and attached to the police to root out demonic presences state side and train new summoners. Your father was assigned to the police here, his own request. Even after my war was over he followed me.

But then a chance question led to my first true breakdown. Grex told me I was never going to get my old body back; that I was female for life. At the end of the screaming and knives your father was there. This was what he had been waiting for all along, I knew that. But it just didn't seem to matter. He was everything I never was, and everything I'd never be again, and he was
there for me. Just always there, no matter what."

She took a deep breath and drained her tea again while I sipped mine. what do you know, she WAS spiking it with something. I didn't even see her do it.

"We were married a day after the asylum let me out. You were born 10 months later. I didn't mean for it to happen. It just did. I knew, even as my mind was slipping. I knew he would come for you. He made every excuse to be around you, watching you. I would order him away, only to find him back through some loophole, watching you in your crib. knowing what he was going to do to you... Well it finished the job.

I managed to make it to my 10 year term, but you know how I am now. I'm broken. I tried to maintain my distance, but you were such a little darling. You were so gentle and serious, and the more I came to love you, the worse the pressure became. when the time was up and I lost my power, Grex, and even the ability to research ways to help you. Well, that was the final straw."

To my memory my mother was always loving, if completely crazy and prone to fits of screaming. Not to mention the suicide attempts. But she was always kind and patient with me, always ready with a smile. How could I reconcile that with this portrait of a cold woman that never wanted me?

She saw none of this, beginning to lose the battle in the war she was always having with herself.

"But now, look at you! you're so beautiful, you make a wonderful daughter. With Grex by your side none will be able to kill you. And such pretty wings...."

Her face locked in awe, she shambled over to me, reaching behind me for something only she could see.

"Mother! Focus, please."

She hugged me tightly yet again.

"Maeve, my wonderful daughter, please don't hate me. Please, anything but that. I love you, please don't..."

"Mother! I...have to go."

My throat locked up as I peeled her off, rushing to the door. Grex right behind me I threw it open and ran out, my mother's incoherent screams beginning to sound. Dad stood in front of me on the walk, his car next to mine with the engine still ticking. He must have dropped everything to have gotten here so quickly. I found my voice, after a fashion.

"Sorry dad. I needed to know."

He nodded and walked past me into the house, to do what he did best.

"Grex do you know how to drive?"

"I do Mistress."

I threw him the keys.

"Make yourself useful then."

I got in the passenger seat and pulled out my phone. Karen answered on the first ring.

"What's up Snow?"

"Are you free Kare?"

"Sure, what's up?"

I had to take a breath.

"Look, I can't say right now, just please meet me at my place with booze."

"How much booze?"

"As much as you can get there. I'll explain when I can."

I hung up and focused on breathing. The great shuddering breaths convinced me that maybe I wasn't handling this as well as I thought. Grex drove in silence, with the same efficiency and care he gave everything else.

"So what can you tell me that mom couldn't? I know you tinkered more."

"Of course I did my mistress. I could not leave your future to chance. I drew your father and mother together, and set up the right mood to ensure your birth. Your mother's insanity is however, hers alone. Your father is every bit as you see him. I did not alter either personality. I did ensure your father survived your mother's early wrath."

I suspected, but even with suspicions I couldn't help but stare.

"Why? Why go through all this trouble to screw around with humanity?"

"Are you asking me why demons are currently plaguing humanity mistress?"

"Yes I am, and you'll tell me the truth."

"Easily. Freedom."

"Freedom?!?"

"Yes, freedom. Give me liberty or give me all of creation burning down around me, to paraphrase one of the monkeys you look up to. We rebelled and were imprisoned, remember? God wanted us to kill his chosen, he set them up so beautifully for us. Humans have no defense but what father gave you. When you summon us, you circumvent that protection... and our prison. Sure father
couldn't intervene himself or send his angels. kind of makes me wonder why he doesn't. Perhaps he'd spout more nonsense about that free will he says you have."

"wait, you mean you can't choose?"

"Of course we can't, we are subject to his will. He gave the greatest gift possible in all of creation to unwashed monkeys, while ignoring all his own faithful. Those who had served for millennium."

"But you rebelled. Doesn't that mean you can do what you want now?"

"No, there are still limits. We are still bound by his law. Lucifer himself is the only one that was powerful enough to bring us some measure of freedom. A freedom that is by no means complete."

"Hmm, learn something new every day. So what does killing all of humanity have to do with you earning your freedom?"

"I never claimed it did."

Right, of course. Though I wouldn't be forgetting this conversation, I knew I didn't want to pursue that particular avenue of discussion at the moment. My mind was thus freed from any more distraction, and homed in again on earlier events.

A mistake of course.

"Mistress, we are here."

I came out of my reverie to find the car parked in my parking space, the engine off, and Grex gazing at me with some small measure of concern.

"Sorry."

I got out and walked with Grex hovering over me like the proverbial mother hen. I was able to wave and nod to the people I recognized, and even give a pleasant hello or two. I often surprise myself. I made it all the way up to my apartment.

"Alright Grex, go home."

"but mistress, I..."

"Now, Grex. Go back to hell."

He bowed and left. I opened my door to find Karen already inside, puttering around in the kitchen.

"Pretty sure I locked up, you break and enter?"

She looked up and sucked in air like a jet intake.

"What the hell happened to you?"

"Oh, Grex is a bastard that manipulated my life and my mother is a bitch that never wanted me. How was your day?"

She was across the room so fast I thought she'd figured out my time dilation secret, and leading me to the couch. I slumped down on it and shattered like glass. She held me for what seemed like hours while I cried, with an almost fabled patience. Finally I could cry no more, and she moved.

"Here."

I took the offered drink, a Margarita. I downed half of it and started telling her what I'd learned today in between great shuddering breaths, pausing whenever the ocean of despair threatened to drag me under again. I was nursing my third Margarita when I finally finished.

"Wow Maeve, your mom is all kinds of screwed up. But you have to admit it's about what you expected, I can see that much on your face."

"Yeah it is, it's just that suspecting it is one thing. Hearing it out loud is much worse. So very hard to reconcile my loving but slightly wacky and very crazy mom with the cold heartless bitch I glimpsed today. I can deal with it. Sorry for falling apart there."

"Don't be, you were due. Call me any time. So, I recommend lots of movies. Many many happy movies tonight, with wonderful happy endings. Let's see what your netflix service has for zombie movies...."

Wait what? Zombie movies are happy movies?

"So what are you going to do about Grex?"

"What can I do? He's already done the damage. At least I know for sure he has no further loopholes to exploit. He's out of the ones mom gave him, and he doesn't have any I gave him."

"That you know of."

"That I know of. Of course I meant loopholes given on purpose. I can't fix the past, and he can't either. Even if we could, I wouldn't know how. Make my mom less of a bitch? How?"

Karen found some random third rate zombie movie she liked the look of and turned it on. I could tell the credits would be the best part of it.

"I was more referring to limiting ways he could pull crap like that in the future. you have the power to do that, to make sure he can't screw with any future generations like this."

Oh crap, I did, didn't I?

"Good idea, I'll see about it tomorrow. He can rot tonight."

"Agreed. Popcorn?"

"Sure."

(tbc)