Author's Note: A Retroactive Continuity, or Retcon if you will, is the altering of previously known facts in order for the universe to conform to new story lines. This is mine. This is a retcon of Hellboy in the Dark Horse Comics Universe. Mike Mignola and Dark Horse owns the character and all rights associated with him/her/it. Elements of the Witchblade series will be mentioned in later chapters. Witchblade is published by Top Cow Comics. Picture Credit: JPRart

Chapter 1

I remembered a few things before I woke up, first of which was that it was very cold. Sounds of things rolling around on a tiled floor, footsteps, a really odd smell. It was somewhat like a hospital, but not really. During all of this, I couldn't really move. Perhaps a flick of a finger, but that was all. Then someone spoke.

"Friday, April 5, 2010, 0953. Subject: female. Name: Gemma Saunders. Age: seventeen. Weight: one-oh-three. Height: sixty-four inches. Reported cause of death: drug overdose. Now let's see what we have to see, Ms. Saunders."

That's about the time that my eyelids decided to cooperate with me. The guy standing above me was wearing a blue surgical gown and rubber gloves. What concerned me most was the very sharp scalpel in his right hand descending toward my chest. His eyes flicked to mine and I saw him jerk just a little.

"God, I hate it when they do that."

His empty hand covered my eyes and closed them only for me to open them again when he pulled back. But this time I tracked his movement, and my muscles finally decided to give up their stubbornness. Air rushed into my lungs like I had been diving and broke to the surface. A squeak sounded and then something metal crashed to the floor, but I was too busy enjoying the taste of semi-fresh air to really care.

~O~

Have you ever had to submit for an MRI, much less two of them, pretty much back to back? While I didn't remember much in the way of… well, pretty much anything, I did know that I was really claustrophobic. I screwed up the first test by squirming too much, then they got the bright idea to use one of the open MRI machines. Supposedly they were a little more expensive, but I wasn't paying for it, so I really didn't care.

It was afterward that a couple, man and wife at first guess, arrived with mouths agape and amazement covering their faces.

I was sitting in a small room, tapping my heel in a even staccato, while a vampire -- see definition: blood technician -- was pulling her fourth vial full from my arm. While I found out that I hated needles as well, I didn't scream or anything. Worse things than being poked had happen to me over the years. Now if I could just figure out how I knew that, I'd be one step closer to solving my little memory problem.

"Gemma?"

Recognizing the name that the coroner provided, right before he was about to start his Y-incision on me earlier, I tilted my head and made an educated guess as to the identity of the two late thirty-something couple standing at the doorway grasping each other for support.

"Mom?"

The vampire pulled her needle and applied a bandage and cotton ball, before almost being trampled by the lady who I was assuming was my mother. She screamed quite a bit, accompanied intermittently with statements of disbelief and thanks to God.

~O~

I was dead for thirty-seven hours. Rigor had set in after three, which explained why I couldn't move very well. The impossible part of all of this is, that unless I was the new daughter of God, then I was a one of a kind medical miracle. One doesn't just wake up in the autopsy room after going through rigor mortis. Sure, there have been cases where people have been buried alive, but that was before modern medicine could verify death six ways from Sunday. When your muscles harden up and your blood pools along your back, inside your body, that's pretty much a sure sign that you won't be making anymore plans for the distant future, or the near future for that matter.

The doctors wanted to perform about fourteen thousand procedures to find out how I did it. My parents just wanted to get me home. They compromised, hence the awkward drive home.

I stared out of the window at the city as we drove along. It was familiar. The layout was like a picture in my head, a map for lack of a better word. I knew each street name before we came upon them. All the businesses were familiar, and strangely enough I even knew a few names of the staff inside, or at least I think I did. The only way I'd be able to actually prove that would be to go into one of them. The trouble was that several of them were strip clubs. I could see how well that conversation would go over with my parents, so I left the subject alone for the time being.

"How much do you remember about what happened, Gemma?" Mom was turned around in her seat, staring at me inquisitively.

I shook my head. "Nothing."

She frowned. I hadn't revealed to anyone, as of yet, my memory loss. It was stupid, I know. Obviously, the best people to help me recover my lost past were the doctors, but something inside was telling me to shut up and give it time. Bringing the parents into my confidence was unavoidable. Sooner or later they would wonder why I didn't actually know their names, or our phone number, or some other equally innocuous bit of information that everyone takes for granted.

"There's a lot I don't remember."

The car noticeably slowed and I saw Dad looking at me through the rear view mirror. "What do you mean by a lot?"

While I wasn't exactly embarrassed or intimidated, I did feel bad about keeping something as important as partial memory loss to myself. Looking to the side, to avoid his eyes, I went ahead and revealed my secret.

"I'm not exactly sure. I can tell you the quickest route to take to the Arena downtown during rush hour, but I don't remember where we live."

The seatbelt pinched my left breast when he hit the brakes. Oww! That was surely something I didn't remember. Who would have thought that my tit being squished would actually hurt! Luckily, there was nobody behind us. It was the middle of the afternoon, and the schools would be letting out soon, but until then traffic was still somewhat light.

He swerved the car while my mom squeaked in surprise at the abrupt turn off into the Chili's parking lot. Once he had found a suitable parking space he killed the motor and turned around in his seat. Doubt hung heavy on his face. Resignation found its way to every premature wrinkle.

"Are you saying you don't remember anything?"

My head shake was smaller this time. "No, I know lots of things, but almost nothing about me."

"What's that supposed to mean?" His voice was harsher this time.

"Dan." Mom interrupted. Her voice was warning. "This isn't the time for arguments. We've just got our daughter back."

His lips thinned and frustration melted. "You're right. Sweetheart," he said when he found my eyes again. "When we found you…" The gambit of emotions played between my mom and dad. "I swore that I'd make amends, that I'd be a better dad if only you weren't dead."

I kind of wished that I knew what he was talking about, but I could only look at him passively.

"It looks like we've been given that chance." He looked over at the restaurant. "How about we get something to eat and go over what you know and don't know, okay."

That sounded great. "Okay."

~O~

We waited until drinks and appetizers were served. Apparently being dead meant that I hadn't eaten anything in almost two days, because I was virtually wolfing down the queso and chips. Mom was looking at me like I had suddenly sprouted pointy ears.

"I thought you hated cheese, not to mention chili," which was the dip mix at that particular chain of restaurants.

I shook my head like I didn't have the answer to whatever changed my tastebuds. That's when I saw a waitress that I thought I knew. She was older, maybe early to mid thirties, but she was put together very well. I blinked at exactly how well I knew she was put together.

A picture of her hovering over me without a stitch of clothing on, came to the forefront of my head. Sweat running across her body, her mouth open in an involuntary response to the pleasure she was receiving, her pendulous breasts swinging in front of my face…

I shook the image from my head and almost swallowed an unbitten chip.

"Gemma?"

Holding up a finger for her to hang on, I caught the attention of the waitress in question as she was passing by. "Excuse me."

She stopped and smiled at me with an expectant look.

"I'm sorry." I apologized. "Is your name Maggie?"

She looked down at her name tag, which confirmed my assumption. "Yeah, sweetie. Do I know you?"

I needed to add something else since I may have subconsciously read her tag, which would explain how I knew her name. "Maggie Forrester?"

The waitress's eyes darted to my parents and then back at me. "Up until three months ago." She waggled her fingers on her left hand where a wedding ring showed. "I'm a Gibbons now."

Without waiting for anymore preamble, I asked, "Do you know me? Have we met before?"

Mom took hold of my hand. "My daughter just got out of the hospital today. She's having trouble remembering things."

A quirk of a smile played at the edges of Maggie's lips. "Amnesia? Really?"

I shrugged. "Sorta."

Another customer must have gotten her attention, because she smiled and nodded in their direction. "Sorry, I've got another table. But if it makes you feel any better, sweetie, I never forget a face. I'm a waitress; that's my bread and butter. We've never met, and I'm really curious as to how you knew my maiden name. Good luck."

Both my parents were staring at me now.

"I swear, I have no idea…" Thoughts of flipping this woman over in bed ran through my mind. The odd part was, that in the memory or whatever the movie in my head was, I was taking the part of the guy. There was definitely thrusting going on and it was most assuredly coming from my point of view. Unless there were attachments involved, in the form of sexual aides, then that was impossible.

"Let's put that aside for now," Dad suggested. "Tell us what you remember about your everyday life. Us," he thumbed between himself and my mom. "Home, friends, your job, school. Let's stick with the basics."

Good idea. "Uh…" I looked at Dad and my mind went totally blank. Switching over to Mom, the same. So, I closed my eyes and tried to pull up our house, my room, friends, the job that he mentioned, school. Opening my eyes again, I cringed just a little. "I got nothing."

They looked at each other, and Mom took the lead this time. "How about something simple? What's my name?"

"Mom?"

Her eyes narrowed like I wasn't taking her seriously.

"That's all I remember, and not even that. I only made the connection because you picked me up at the hospital."

~O~

Lupper -- see definition: Lunch/Supper hybrid -- didn't go very well after that announcement. Dad was all for bringing me back to the hospital, but Mom would have nothing of it. Apparently watching soaps all of her life made her an expert on amnesia. Her insistence in bringing me home and surrounding me with familiar places, people, and things would eventually jog my memory. In truth, I couldn't fault her reasoning. From what I could remember, doctors hadn't come up with a magical pill or therapy that could return a person's memory. Maybe she was right.

The rest of the drive home was filled with on-the-spot testing. A series of names, schools, and supposed high points of my life were peppered at me, all drawing shakes of my head to the point I was stating to get a neck cramp. When we pulled up into the driveway, the one story house with the garage in the back didn't look the least bit familiar.

Great.

The utility room, kitchen, living room, and bathroom was all new to me.

"The next one is your room, honey." Mom was leading me around by the hand while I acclimated myself to the new surroundings. The door was closed and when she opened it I almost yakked at the overwhelming color of black and purple.

"This is my room?" I said with incredulous curiosity.

Mom looked at me in surprise, but then toned it down. "I think you were going through a rebellious phase."

I stuck my head in and looked from right to left, taking in the Manson posters and the creepy white eyes the singer was sporting. "If I do that again, you have my permission to smack me upside the head."

"Oh, thank god."

A giggle found its way up from my insides as I took her in. She reached up and cupped my face, looking at me like she hadn't seen me in months. Her eyes were shining and I could see that she was on the verge of tears, so I tried to cut that off in the bud.

"I'm gonna grab a shower and change into something other than hospital green."

"A shower? You never take anything but baths."

Shrugging, I explained. "I have a feeling that's not the only thing about me that's changed."

~O~

She left me alone to explore my room, which I did to excess. After finding some shorts, underwear, and a tee shirt, I headed to the bathroom and ran the water so it would warm while I stripped off the scrubs that the hospital provided. With that out of the way, I stared at my image in the mirror. That was one of the more disturbing things that I didn't remember. Me.

Everything around me was bigger, or at least I remember things being smaller. From what the coroner said, I was five-four. In other words, I was short. The body in the mirror spoke of a lithe figure. I could see my ribcage and neatly tucked waist before my wider hips rounded out the package. My breasts were a mystery. I couldn't shake the feeling that they weren't supposed to be the way they were. Don't get me wrong. They looked fine with my body type, small, B-cup at best, small areolas and average sized nipples. They were cute. Everything about me was cute.

The rapidly fogging mirror told me that staring time was over and I adjusted the water to a more acceptable temperature before stepping in the tub and drawing the curtain.

~O~

Everything was wrong. I let my hands do their thing without thinking too much about how I cleaned myself, just like most people in the world do every day. Unless there was some reason to concentrate on a particular area, a person doesn't give much thought to the action. What was so wrong about this particular task was that I kept getting distracted because things weren't right. It felt like I was missing something or that there were extra steps to take that I was omitting.

When I got to my legs, I had to actually think about shaving them. And when I was about to turn the water off I remembered that there were other places that I needed to shave as well. It was exhausting. Never in my life do I remember actually spending more than ten minutes in the shower. But since I didn't remember my own parents names, I chalked it up to another amnesia event.

Drying my hair was another matter. Try as I might, I couldn't figure out the turban thing. That's what I was supposed to do with long hair, put it in a towel turban until it was ready to be blow-dried.

Tension kept increasing in my chest for every inexplicable problem I ran into. The black cotton bikini type panties, while not unusual, were… off. The bra threw me. I knew the mechanics of the device; that was easy enough, but slipping it over my arms and reaching back to attach the eye and hook was… new. An experience that, at seventeen years of age, I should have been having for years, was new to me.

The shorts were snug, where I thought they were supposed to be loose, the tee shirt barely reached the top of the shorts and refused to be tucked.

~O~

My hair took forever to blow dry and I considered having it cut so I didn't have to deal with the twenty minutes of extra time it took. However, I was fairly pleased with how I looked in the end. Comfortable.

Mom and Dad were sitting at the breakfast table drinking tea. They watched me as I headed over to the coffee maker I had spotted on the way in. It took me a few moments to find everything I needed, mainly the coffee grounds. They were in one of the decretive canisters beside the flour, sugar, and tea bags. Yeah, I had to open all of them before finding the proper one.

"Need any help?" Mom offered.

"I got it. Thanks." Once it was started I turned around and leaned against the counter with my arms crossed. The looks on their faces told me something else was wrong. Dad was looking at the coffee maker and Mom at me. "Let me guess. I hate coffee."

Mom sipped at her tea and tried to look like she missed my observation. Dad just pursed his lips in confusion. It was becoming annoying. At Chili's I'd ordered a medium-rare cheese burger, when apparently I was previously a vegetarian. I never, ever drank soda. I ordered a Coke, not diet, no less. Now I was drinking coffee. I suppose being dead alters your tastebuds.

"You normally drink mint tea," Dad said.

Mint? Ugh. I hated the taste of mint. I can barely stand the taste of toothpaste. "Well, that's definitely changing."

I'm a first cup of coffee type of person -- see definition: Holding mug under the drip until full -- it's the only way to find coffee that's strong enough. A mug of straight espresso is actually more my style, but that shit is expensive, so I usually cheat and do it the frugal way. Dad actually smirked behind his mug with the tag and string hanging out of his mug. Someone else likes their beverages strong.

Hey, cool! I finally have something in common with one of my parents! Maybe I wasn't a total clone, born out of test tube.

Once I was seated and sipping at my own black coffee, I set it down. "The doctor said I O.D.'d."

Mom flinched. Dad paled.

"Heroin."

Heroin? The hardest drugs I'd ever voluntarily taken was Tylenol. I even hated taking cold medicines… and how in the hell could I know that and not remember my parents names?

That's when Dad noticed my arms. "What?" I asked at his mystified look.

"The tracks are gone."

"I had tracks?"

He took hold of my right wrist and spun my arm around to take a closer look. "You've been wearing long-sleeve shirts for the last year. I wondered why until I saw your arms. They were covered in red welts. Now there's only one."

"That's where they took my blood."

He nodded and kept looking for evidence of my addiction. "Gemma, I found you on your bed with a needle sticking out of your arm. You were cold."

~O~

Revelation after revelation. Hanging out with the wrong crowd, rarely eating, grades failing, constantly in trouble in school, you name it. I was a terrible daughter. They blamed themselves for not pushing hard enough, for not taking me to therapy, for not searching my room or my computer.

In the end we agreed on starting anew. I told them to take my computer and toss it if they wanted. There was one off to the side of the living room if I needed to use it for school. Mom and I would go through my room the following day and get rid of anything suspicious that might question my resolve to acquire their trust, not to mention I had to rid my walls of my questionable music tastes.

They were more than happy with my choice and new attitude, if unhappy with what caused it in the first place.

Mom and I spent the rest of the evening ridding my room of paraphernalia. I found a seriously used bong and a sandwich bag half full of pot underneath my bed. That and a small wooden case of jewelry the likes of which I was unfamiliar with.

"Those are for piercings."

Oh, duh. I guessed that's why I had a hole above my navel. Lifting my tee up a little, my mom saw and frowned with disapproval. "Gemma, why didn't you ever…" She paused for a second. "Well, what's done is done. That'll never heal up properly. You might as well pick one out."

Keeping it simple, I chose one with a flower on the end which would settle nicely in my navel. It took me a second or two to figure out that the little ball thing unscrewed. That's an odd feeling.

Mom stared on then looked back in the box. "What are these little ones for?"

She held up one that looked like a tiny silver barbell. My brows bunched up in confusion. Where else did kids get holes punched in themselves nowadays?

"Oh god." I ran over to the hand mirror on my dresser and picked it up, looking around for some light. Mom flicked on the bedside lamp and was scouring my nose, eyebrows, lips, tongue, all for naught. My face was, thankfully, intact. I almost thought I was in the clear until I saw Mom staring at my breasts.

"You don't think…" she whispered. Her eyes met mine and she saw that I had the same thought she did. "Close your door, Gemma, and take off your top."

I blanked for a second, almost embarrassed, but she was my mom, she'd obviously seen me naked countless times. It was still a little weird. I did as she said and unfastened my bra as well.

We found two more holes punched through my body at horizontal angles. What would possess people to shove needles through their nipples and hang jewelry there, I have no idea. Weren't earlobes enough?

"Oh Gemma."

"I'm sorry, Mom. If its any consolation, I'm throwing these away." The holes in my nipples weren't as noticeable, and hopefully would heal over time. The navel piercing was just too big. That would be there forever.

She kept quiet for a while after I got dressed and we attacked my closet. The vast amount of clothing that could have only been acquired at Hot Topic was overwhelming. I did set aside a couple pair of leather pants and a vest looking thing, but most of it went into a pile on the bed.

"Are you going to donate these to Goodwill?"

I almost snickered at that. "Uh no. There's a place over on Sheppard and Eleventh that buys clothes if they are in good shape and in style. It should supplement a normal wardrobe, or most of one anyway."

Seeing the look on her face I shrugged. "This is the kind of information I have in my head."

When we got to the back of the closet I found more normal clothing, but it was mostly stuff that was in style five years ago. But jeans were jeans, and if I didn't mind showing off my midriff then I would have plenty of shirts. There were a few shirts that were pretty much timeless. They would do for now.

At an intake of breath, I heard the top close on a box. Turning around I saw Mom handing me a shoebox, or actually a bootbox if you wanted to be specific, and her face was very red. I almost didn't want to open it. "Is it bad?"

This time she shrugged her shoulders. Leaning my head back, I lifted the top up a little, like whatever was in there was going to bite me. Well, apparently I was sexually self-satisfied.

"I'm almost afraid of finding anything else in here."

An explosion of giggles shot out of my mom's mouth. "Gemma, it's nothing to be embarrassed about. Everyone masturbates."

I dropped the top off the box and reached inside to withdraw the black ten inch, very realistic, jelly dildo and watched as it flopped to one side. "Yeah, but do I really need King Dong here to get the job done?"

Of course Dad chose that moment to come into the room. "How are my girls doing?" He came up short there, staring at the huge thing in my hand.

"Well, apparently I'm difficult to satisfy." He stared, open-mouthed at the thing until I dropped it into the green garbage bag at my feet. "I don't think I can re-sale that."

I didn't think that I'd be exploring my sexuality with the extra from a porn flick. I guess there was something to be said for having amnesia. Everything is new again. Though I was kind of put off at how I knew the dildo was realistic looking. That pretty much meant that I had seen actual male equipment at some point. That made me somewhat nervous as to the results of the blood tests. But if I survived death, then perhaps a STD wouldn't pose much of a problem.

"Should I ask?"

Mom looked over to Dad. "I'm treating this like a guest was living here and we evicted her for our daughter to come live with us. It's less stressful when we find something like that."

"Or this," I said as I pulled out a red PVC catsuit.

One look at the fetish outfit and dad turned to leave more revelations to us. "I'm going to watch Sportcenter."

A pang of need followed my father. For some reason, I wanted to watch Sportscenter as well. Maybe I was a onion-layered; I was obviously into just about everything else at some point, why not sports as well?

The catsuit went into the trash too. It was crotchless, so probably not resalable.

~O~

Once the bedding was changed I almost felt somewhat normal. Another shower rid me of the accumulated dust and the creepiness I felt at voiding myself of a teenaged life of debauchery. From the looks of my life, pre-death, I was well on my way to living on the streets pimping myself out for anything to keep the drugs coming in. As sad as it was, I was glad I died and lost my memory.

Well, that was until I woke up minutes past midnight. While there was a drawer full of lingerie at my disposal, I felt better in a simple over-sized sleep-shirt. Actually, I felt more normal if I were just sleeping in panties, that I couldn't stop thinking of in terms of simply underwear, but I was trying to tone down the porno portion of my previous life. I was leaving my door open so my parents would be more at ease with my nocturnal activities. So, not wearing something to cover up my breasts wouldn't really look good if my dad checked on me.

Once I saw the red glowing digital display on my clock, I knew I had many more hours of no sleep ahead of me. Turning over didn't do any good. Fluffing my pillow did nothing, nor did staring at the ceiling. I was wide awake and antsy for some action.

Throwing the covers off I stood up and looked at the moonlight streaming through the window. There was more than enough illumination to navigate the unfamiliar room without fear of stubbing a toe, so I made my way to the window and moved aside the shear fabric that someone thought would be good for filtering light, because it didn't do jack for blocking it.

There was a decent sized pool in the back yard, glowing blue. I wanted to do something to rid myself of the energy running rampant through my body, but swimming unattended didn't seem like a good idea at that point.

I could probably get away with closing the door and going through a calisthenic routine. That idea was nixed right away. It would only be a decent warm up for me. I needed exhaustion to put me to sleep. Finally giving up the ghost, I slipped on a pair of bunny slippers that were hidden deep in the recesses of the closet earlier and snuck past my parents closed door to the other side of the house, into the living room.

Unable to satisfy the need for physical exertion, I made some cocoa and sat down in front of the television, flipping through the channels.

Another half hour had passed before I'd settled on some reality ghost hunter show on the Sci-Fi channel. It was comical, the way everything was in night-camera mode with the actor's eyes glowing to add the extra creepiness factor. Added to the fact that I knew everything they were doing was wrong and staged for maximum audience believability.

"Gemma?"

I looked to the hallway entrance and Mom was standing there in her housecoat squinting at me.

"I'm sorry, Mom. Was the TV too loud?"

She shook her head and shuffled the walk of the newly awakened toward me. "I had a nightmare and went to check on you."

"I couldn't sleep. Nervous energy, I guess."

Mom sat down beside me and gestured for me to snuggle up, which as a dutiful daughter, I thought I performed admirably. She pulled me in until I was tucked under her arm. With a contented sigh she looked at the TV.

"What on Earth are you watching?"

"Ghost Hunters Gone Wild or something equally stupid. I was waiting for someone to run at them in a white sheet with holes poked out for the eyes."

Feeling a light kiss on top of my head, I smiled at the intimacy of a shared mother-daughter moment.

"Those shows give me bad dreams. I always think I hear the same things at night if your father goes to bed early."

I patted her hand on my shoulder. "You don't have to worry, Mom. This house is one hundred percent ghost free."

"And you know this how?"

Without thinking about what I was saying I just told her. "Evil spirits can't enter homes like ours. We care for each other too much. They can only squeeze in when there is discontent. Since my return we are completely discontent-less. That, and no ectoplasm in the kitchen."

Mom laughed quietly. One of the guys on the show was dipping his fingers in some sticky-gooey substance and staring at it in awe. That's when I broke into laughter.

"What's so funny?"

I pointed. "That is so not ectoplasm. It's not sticky like that. It's more of a WD-40 and Tapioca pudding mix. More oily and lumpy."

"Been ghost hunting have we?"

That took me back for a moment. "Uh…" A picture of darkness flashed before my eyes. A marble bust flying through the air at me, and then me ducking to the side and throwing something that looked like sugar or… salt. Salt definitely. Tears of the angels in solid, Earthly form, was a sure way to keep evil spirits or demons away.

"Gemma?"

"Sorry, I thought I was remembering something."

TBC...

Author's Note: A Retroactive Continuity, or Retcon if you will, is the altering of previously known facts in order for the universe to conform to new story lines. This is mine. This is a retcon of Hellboy in the Dark Horse Comics Universe. Mike Mignola and Dark Horse owns the character and all rights associated with him/her/it. Elements of the Witchblade series will be mentioned in later chapters. Witchblade is published by Top Cow Comics. Picture Credit: JPRart

Chapter 2

I fell asleep in Mom's arms around three in the morning. The smell of coffee brewing woke me at seven. This time I wasn't wide awake. Dad was already sitting in his armchair reading the paper. I mumbled morning salutations and found my way to the bathroom to relieve myself. Imagine my confusion as I was standing in front of the toilet, with the seat up, grasping at my crotch.

"What the hell am I doing?"

There was that confused feeling again, but this time it was more pronounced, like I was actually missing something. Once I had assumed the proper position, I looked back at the evidence with a clearer mind. The panties, bra, clothes in general were proper, but unfamiliar. And now standing in front of the toilet like I was going to pee… like a man.

Why was I used to doing male things? Did this have something to do with waking up in the morgue? Was my brain literally fried?

Everything seemed wrong, and it was beginning to grate on my nerves.

With a sigh, I decided to immerse myself in the role of a young woman. Maybe if I dove full force into feminine things then I could kick start my brain back to where it was supposed to be.

~O~

Nothing I found in my closet was suitable. I was a modern teenaged girl. There was nothing but jeans, running shoes, flats, and sandals, along with a plethora of shirts that might as well have been clothes for a boy.

I wasn't surprised to find Mom standing at the door, watching me. After only one day, she was starting to become a constant in my life, always hovering. It would become annoying if she kept it up, but for now it was comforting to know that she was there for me. What frustrated me was that I still couldn't remember a damn thing about her or Dad.

"Can't find anything?"

I shook my head. "I was looking for a dress, but apparently I'm a tomboy."

Mom's eyes widened in surprised delight. She held out her hand. "Come with me."

I was led through her bedroom into her vast closet. In the very back, there was a separate section of brighter clothing that didn't seem to match my mother's style. She was more of a Suzie-Homemaker.

"I bought these for you last year, before you decided to wear black as a fashion statement. They never made it into your closet, but I held on to them." After selecting one she held it out for me. "Here, try this."

Well it was a dress, and it was the exact opposite of black. I looked at it for a second and tried to figure out how to put it on. There were no obvious zippers or buttons, but the upper portion seemed somewhat stretchy, so I deduced that it was supposed to be slipped on.

Mom looked at me expectantly, and I knew she was waiting for me to strip. The nightshirt came off. I wasn't wearing a bra to bed, so the only thing I was wearing were black bikini panties. I pulled the dress on over my head and tugged it down until it was in place. Mom beamed at me.

"I knew you'd be beautiful if you wanted."

It was sleeveless with two wide shoulder straps that melded into a wide vee showing what little cleavage I possessed. There was that weird feeling again. Something in my head didn't mind exposing anything from the waist up, but only showing off my upper chest with hints of breasts was odd. The dress ended right at my knees, open and billowy.

"You'll need white panties so they won't show as much."

As much? Just how thin was this thing? I just nodded. "I'll go change."

Then I was exposed to exactly how it felt to have a dress brush against my smooth legs. At the door, I turned around. "Do you think you can help me with my hair and make up?"

I think I'd just made her day. She held her hands together under her chin and grinned. "I'd love to, sweetie." Just how bad of a daughter had I been?

The panty switch was easy enough, considering I didn't have to take off any outer layers to get to the ones I was wearing. When I swapped them out with plain white ones, I stepped back and looked at myself through the full length mirror in the corner.

Yep, with the sun streaming through my window, I could see the outline of my body through the dress. It was way thin.

There were a pair of flat white sandals in my closet that I thought went well enough to slip on before I returned. When I got back, Mom directed me to her bathroom to wash my face.

~O~

Now I knew something was wrong. There was no doubt in my mind. Mom fixed my hair in a long braid that hung three-quarters the way down my back. Everything felt very tight and unfamiliar on my head. The make up, while light wasn't something I'd ever experienced. The taste of the gloss on my lips was wrong, the weight of the mascara on my lashes was heavy, even though it wasn't very thick, and the eyeliner popping out my eyes stung slightly when applied. Everything that was done was performed for the very first time.

All of these clues led me to the belief that either I had never worn makeup and had my hair braided, or…

Shaking my head, I tossed that stupid thought from my brain.

While waiting for Mom to get dressed, I went through my purse to find any more clues as to my strange experiences. The wallet contained several pictures of unknown origin. I took them out, one at a time. Some contained little messages or names that I could associate with each person. Some even had me in them as well. And there I was with make up on.

"Jesus." A cigarette case with five pre-rolled joints inside.

I kept the Bic lighter, and tossed the handful of condoms as well. At least I knew I wasn't a virgin and that I practiced safe sex. Thank god. Though the thought of a guy mounting me from the front or from behind left a nauseated feeling in my stomach.

If what I remembered about the waitress at Chili's yesterday was correct, I might had switched teams or was at least bisexual. With another gander at the pictures of certain boys in the wallet, I shook my head. Definitely a lesbian. The guys just weren't doing it for me.

Well that's one more talk to have with the parents.

A zipped up pocket revealed four tampons and two panty liners, accompanied with a half empty bottle of Midol. Frosty winters ran down my spine. Intellectually, I knew that it was a natural function of every female mammal. However, the thought of participating in this at any time in my past was unacceptable. This was not something that I would have forgotten. This left further credence to my outlandish suspicions.

I closed the revealing pocket and then upended the purse on top of my bed. Empty gum wrappers, pens, various half-used pieces of makeup fell out, along with a crumbled five dollar bill, a can of pepper spray, and a few business cards.

The cards were innocuous enough. One of them even had a message on the back: Call me anytime and I'll return the favor. Thanks for the B.J.

That one immediately went into the trash. There was no telling upon what conditions I'd have to meet for calling the mechanic or the plastic surgeon, so those cards went as well. I did keep the investment banker's card. After I checked that out, I'd toss his. As secretive as I was before I died, there was no telling if I had some hidden bank account somewhere that was feeding this guy money for stock market gambling. But considering my previous drug problem… well, that was probably a longshot.

…

Speaking of which, why wasn't I spazzing out for an armful of heroin? From what I remembered, the stuff was mega-addictive. Shouldn't I be in the corner shaking or dribbling up white foam or something?

With a shake of my head, I cleaned up my mess and stuffed everything back into the purse.

My forehead felt weird. With all of my hair pulled back, it felt like I was going for a face lift the hard way. After a few deep breaths I calmed myself and vowed to find out why all of this was so unfamiliar and felt so wrong.

~O~

Living up to my parents agreement, we returned to the hospital. It didn't take too much understanding to find out that I was the A-number one priority for a small team of doctors. How many people wake up after being dead for so long? It was like I was royalty and the petri dish that Alexander Fleming accidentally left open overnight, combined. They just had to figure out if I was a freak of nature or the metaphorical penicillin for death.

Mom and Dad sat in front of the cherrywood desk in the doctor's office while I was seated to the side with my legs crossed at the knee. While that particular position felt odd, it also felt right at the same time. Wearing a dress and sitting with my legs splayed apart or with a foot kicked up on a knee just didn't exude good manners. Mom was pleased, either way, at my method of decorum. She just smiled at my legs and posture, giving me a contented nod.

"The blood tests came back totally clear of any toxin or opioid. Considering how she was found, it would be medically impossible to rid her system in so short of a time."

I added a little something to the doctor's search of answers. "You need to add pot to that. Mom and I found a bag of the stuff in my room last night."

He glanced over at me with a quizzical look. "You found? You mean you didn't know that it was there or you forgot and ran across its presence?"

My cheeks may have reddened slightly. "Uh, forgot, in the bigger sense. I don't remember anything about my life before I woke up yesterday."

The doctor leaned back in his chair to take in the recent development. "Nothing?"

I shook my head. "Oh, I'm a fount of knowledge when it comes to pretty much everything else, but my family, life, home… nothing."

It was easy to see the wheels spinning in the doctor's head. "I suppose a post-traumatic retrograde amnesia isn't out of the question or maybe even transient global amnesia considering the… " he paused for a moment. "I'd like to set you up for a couple of tests, if you are willing."

I glanced at my parents and then shrugged. "I guess."

~O~

It was past one o'clock before I was released for the day. I'd never seen actual doctors working on the weekends before. Sure they're at the emergency rooms and hospitals in general, but the amount that I saw hovering around any room I happened to be in was short of astounding.

After dropping Dad at a friends, Mom and I loaded up the family truckster and headed toward the resale shop to see if I could unload the demented wardrobe that I had accumulated over the last year. A quick stop at the local Taco Bell and I was in beef burrito heaven.

"Your diet certainly has changed. I've never seen you eat so much red meat in my life."

With my mouth full, answering was problematic, so I waggled my eyebrows at her instead.

"You better ease up a little, or all of that will go straight to your hips."

Which probably wouldn't be a bad thing. I was skinny as a reed, probably due to the heroin and vegetarian diet. My bras, of which I wasn't currently wearing, indicated that I was a thirty-two B-cup. The way my waist was tucked in I guesstimated somewhere in the twenty-two to twenty-four inch. While my hips did widen a little larger than my bust, it wasn't by much. Combined with my five-four height, I was petite to say the least.

Amazingly enough, I didn't spill anything on my white sundress.

Once we were off the freeway and into the Village, a local shopping district dedicated to the rich and frugal, not to mention the artsy side of the city, I seemed to relax. It was like everything was very familiar, like I had spent a lot of time in this particular area.

"Did I used to come here?"

Mom shrugged. "We're twenty-five miles from home, sweetie. So unless you hitched a ride from your friends, I really don't see how."

With a frown, I tried to remember my friends to no avail. "Maybe it's better that I can't remember them. I can't imagine that they wouldn't know about my drug problem or even got me started in the first place."

Mom didn't say anything, but I could see out of the corner of my eye that she agreed. "I've never been the one to tell you who to be friends with, Gemma. Maybe I was wrong."

Giving her a gentle smile in return, I tried to ease her guilt. "It's turning out for the best. You're getting your daughter back, right?"

Mom nodded.

"Oh, turn right here. It's two blocks down on the left."

"How did you find this place?" She asked before thinking about it. "Never mind."

I giggled. That was new. I don't think I've ever thought of myself as a giggler. I was more of a belly laugh type of person, but I suppose that was the past and this was my future.

After we pulled up, I jumped out and went around the back to open up the rear door to the SUV. Four cardboard boxes lay in the back, along with a hand-truck. While I had a sense of being much stronger in the past, I couldn't handle any more than a single box, and that was pushing it. Clothes were heavy!

Mom helped me drag out the boxes, one at a time to set on the hand-truck before I heard someone behind us. "Can I give you ladies a hand?"

His Buffalo Exchange name tag read, Stephen. His smile and wandering eyes said that he found me attractive. My gag reflex told me that his tone body and boyish good looks weren't of any interest to me at all. "Uh, sure. Thanks."

I stepped back while he unloaded the other three boxes and wheeled the hand-truck around before speeding off to the front door. Mom secured the minivan while I followed Stephen to the Buy counter on the right side of the store. Looking around, I spotted several signs that indicated where the women's sections were. For a moment I was confused at all of the titles for each section: Misses, Woman's, Petite, Maternity. Figuring I was petite, I knew where I would be heading.

The three ladies behind the Buy counter looked on with interest while Stephen unloaded a box in front of each of them. The fourth girl was the one that was designated to talk to me.

"First time in?" I nodded. She smiled at me. "We'll look through what you brought in and see what we're interested in. Were you looking to buy anything today or do you want cash?"

Seeing the selection they had was large, I answered. "Trade definitely."

She nodded. "Okay, well have a look around and I'll find you when we have a total for you."

Mom finally caught up and looked interested in what the ladies were doing. I took her elbow and steered her toward the Petite section. "They have to check the clothes out."

She was amazed at what all was there and the diverse selection they had. "I'm raiding my wardrobe and coming back tomorrow," she said with a grin.

Almost an hour later, the Buy girl found me and gave me a figure. "There were a few things that we didn't buy; the rest we can donate for you or I can pack them back up."

I waved a hand. "Donate away."

~O~

Four large bags later and I felt confident enough that I had restarted my wardrobe. It definitely wasn't an even exchange, about a third actually, but at least I wouldn't look like a skank.

"Look, Starbucks!"

Mom and Dad's coffee was okay, but I was jonesing for something with a bit more kick. The thirty dollars I had left over from the resale was more than enough to satisfy my caffeine urge.

Mom went to grab a table while I stood in line. That was probably a good thing, considering the girl that took my order was someone else that I knew from my past.

Just like the waitress at Chili's, a visual memory went up in the television screen of my mind, this time it had sound as well. She was a lot younger than the thirty-something waitress. If this girl was twenty-one then I'd be surprised. She was fresh and clean, but in my memory she was wild and sweat-soaked, screaming out with unrestrained passion.

She made change and handed me an assortment of bills and coins before I leaned in. "I know this is going to sound weird, but do you know me?"

She blinked a couple of times and then really looked at me before shaking her head. "No."

There was a line behind me, so I wasn't able to interrogate her any further. I moved to the side and waited for my coffee. While I stood there, I watched her move. She was all too familiar to me. I knew she was double jointed in her hips, and loved her sex hard and fast. Her nails were long enough that I remember the feel of them trailing down my back, digging in, and leaving marks behind. She loved to bite my shoulder when she reached her orgasm.

Jenny Halverson, that was her name, and when she came, screaming my name, she called me… no, that can't be right.

"Triple espresso and Mocha Latte?"

Shaken from my vivid memory, I realized that the crotch of my panties were damp and my nipples were erect and popping the front of my sundress. Well that pretty much confirms that I'm a lesbian. Great, like I didn't have enough problems.

I took the two cups and went to sit down.

"Cold?"

"Hmm?" Mom discreetly gestured to my chest. I guess I won't be leaving the house without a bra on anymore. "Um, not exactly." When she raised an enquiring eyebrow at me, I elaborated. "I think I'm a lesbian."

No, I didn't time it so that she'd spew coffee all over my sundress. Her eyes froze on me for a moment before turning to the cashier. "The blonde girl?"

Without looking I nodded. "I remember… sex." It wasn't talking about the act that made my face feel like it was about to explode from embarrassment; it was the thought that I was telling my mother intimate details of my gayness and about a lover that she can actually put a face to. "Except she doesn't know who I am and I remember her calling out my name, except that it wasn't my name."

That seemed to throw Mom off her track. "Not your name? What did she call you?"

I took a sip of espresso and marveled at how much I'd missed the bitterness. "Red."

She blinked at what I'd revealed. "Is there any reason you know that she would call you by a that name?"

I shrugged.

We were about halfway through with our drinks when the line at the register died down to nothing. After steeling my nerve against making an ass of myself, I rose and moved to the end of the counter where the girl was restocking muffins when she spotted me.

"What else can I get for you?" she asked cheerily.

I glanced to the side to make sure we were in relative solitude. "I need to ask you a question."

Her eyebrows raised for a moment, like this wasn't standard operating procedure for a Starbucks employee. "Uh, sure. I guess."

Thinking I was going about this the wrong way, I changed tactics in mid-play. "I know this is going to sound like a soap opera cliché, but I just got out of the hospital yesterday and I have a weird kind of amnesia."

This time her eyebrows disappeared into her bangs. "Really?"

With a nod I continued. "The thing is that you look really familiar, and I know your name, but I don't know how I know you." It was sort of a lie, I knew her in the biblical sense, but I wasn’t going to tell her that at this point. "Do you know or did you know someone named Red?"

That took her off guard. She closed the display case she was working on and her face turned a light shade of pink. "If you're his girlfriend or something, it's over. We only saw each other the one time. He hasn't come around since."

I raised my hand in a calming gesture. "I'm serious. I'm not some jealous… I'm a lesbian. Not into guys, thanks. I really do have amnesia."

She looked over to her co-workers and then back at me, judging me for a moment. "Hold on a sec. I'll take a break and tell you what I know."

Pointing back toward Mom, I said, "I'm right over there."

She nodded and I returned to the table.

"What did she say?" asked Mom.

"She's taking a break." As an afterthought I asked Mom a favor. "Some of what I'm going to reveal is kind of personal. If you could save your questions until we get some privacy I'd appreciate it."

She looked at me over her cup, paused for a second and then nodded. That was about the time Jenny-of-the-biting-shoulder showed up and positioned a chair at the end of the table. A frozen coffee montage was set on the table and I was given the wary eye.

"Thanks for taking the time… I know this is kind of strange."

She nodded.

"What can you tell me about Red?"

Jenny eyed Mom for moment and then looked back at me. "How much do you know about what goes on…" Her posture shifted, uncomfortable with the topic. "After dark."

This time, I got uncomfortable. "Uh."

I suppose something in my eyes confirmed her suspicions. "Red saved my life. I was attacked and he took care of the problem."

Leaning back in my chair, I stared off at nothing in particular. "What was it… specifically."

Goosebumps rose on her upper arms. "If you don't know then I'm not sayin'."

"Gemma," Mom started.

I held up a finger to forestall her question and asked Jenny, "Was it pale? Smelled like rotten meat? Hungry?"

The cashier's eyes kind of glassed over for a second. "Yeah."

Images popped up in my head: pulling Jenny away from the thing's grasp and planting a boot in its face. That's how I… or rather Red acquired her carnal affection. "Did he give you a phone number, address, last name, anything?"

Jenny shook her head. "I asked but he said it was best that we didn't get involved, for my safety." At my frustration she inquired, "What's this have to do with you losing your memory?"

I twisted my coffee back and forth on the table. "Things he's done keep popping up in my head. If there's any answers to be had then he might know."

An expression dropped over her face, pity and reluctance. "Look, I'm not sayin' you'll find anything, but you might want to check out the Services section in the Houston Press." She stood and pushed her chair back under the table. "I gotta go."

~O~

The ride home was tense. Especially since I was intently perusing the classified ads in the back of Houston's main Alternative newspaper. It wasn't like the National Enquirer or anything. The Press was primarily geared toward the younger generation, maybe eighteen to thirty year olds. Club openings, gay community goings-on, artsy-fartsy stuff littered the contents. They were famous in the city for their personal ads which rivaled Crag's List in their debauchery, which I had skipped and mainly concentrated on the Services section as advised by Jenny-of-the-biting-shoulder.

"Are you going to explain what all that was about back there, Gemma?"

"Hmm?" I said, looking up from the paper.

"This Red fellow and how you knew about something that was pale, hungry, and stank of rotted meat."

"It was a ghoul."

"A ghoul."

I nodded, absentmindedly, while I continued searching through the ads. "A Zombie that's been brought back specifically to kill. If the person who brings it back loses control it attacks and eats him then goes on a rampage until it gets put down. Once it has a taste for flesh it transforms to a Ghoul."

Finally finding something worthwhile I had a small eureka moment. "Aha!"

"What?"

I read the ad for her. "Unnatural things happen? Meet something you can't explain? Need help?" and a phone number followed.

Absentmindedly, I reached for my cell that I kept in my coat pocket. It was then that I realized I wasn't wearing my coat, and I didn't have a cell phone. A growl rumbled up from my throat.

"What's wrong?" asked Mom.

Quashing my frustration was becoming harder and harder. I took the time to fold the paper up so that the notice I'd found would be still be visible. "Everything is off. Nothing's right."

"Sweetie, it'll get better."

I turned to her. "Will it?" I said, just short of snapping at her. Mom's mouth opened a little and I could see her uncertainty. "Just now, I wanted to reach into my coat pocket and grab my cell phone. I didn't think about doing it; it was just a habit born out of reflex."

"You don't have a cell."

"And I don't have a coat either, but I remember always wearing one, even in the summer."

Her eyes drifted to me and then returned to the road.

"Mom, ever since I woke up in the morgue, nothing's been right. It's like I'm someone else stuck in this body."

"Gemma, don't talk like that." She sounded nervous, like she'd seen it too and didn't want to admit the truth.

"Tell me I'm wrong then." I held up my hand and started ticking fingers off. "Red meat, coffee, memory, knowing people I shouldn't have any business knowing. Then there's the other side. I hate drugs. I had a cousin that O.D.'d when I was a kid..."

Mom snapped her head around and looked at me like I was crazy. "All of your cousins are perfectly fine."

I pointed at her. "There, see, another one. I remember..." Pushing myself, I brought up a face and the name was on the tip of my tongue. "Ca...Casey, Cathy, Catherine! That's it, Catherine Cox! She was my first cousin on my mother's side of the family. Ha!"

"Gemma, I don't have any nieces with the name Catherine. I don't have any nieces on my side of the family at all. I'm an only child."

Palming my face I looked out the side window. "Damn."

"Language."

I rolled my eyes.

The remainder of the trip home was spent by me trying to recall the rest of my extended family. Three additional boys on my mother's side and two girls on my father's. There's where things got a little dicey. The last names of my cousins on Father's side was Broom. It was originally Bruttenholm. My grandfather immigrated from Europe during the second World War and changed it to Broom to avoid...

Wait a minute.

He was twenty something when he immigrated and got married. Father was born in forty-seven and I was born in seventy-six. That meant I was thirty-four years old, not seventeen.

Red. Red Broom. What kind of parents name their kid Red Broom?

I shook my head. It wasn't Red Broom. It was Alfred Broom. That's my real name. Not Gemma Saunders.

I just had to convince Mom that I wasn't a lunatic.

"What in the world?"

Looking up from the ad once more I saw what had her in a quandary. There was a silver SUV with blacked-out windows sitting in our driveway. A really creepy feeling trickled down my spine.

"Mom, keep driving. Don't slow down."

She gave me a quick glance. "Do you know who owns that..."

"Dammit, Mom. Go!"

She hit the brakes instead. The creepy feel intensified, just as the last ray of sunshine dropped behind the horizon. I made a grab under my right arm but my revolver wasn't there.

"Aww crap."

TBC...

"Gemma?"

The back door of the silver SUV opened and someone stuck their head out, looking directly at me. I probably should have said some-thing. Its face was a very pale bluish color and it looked off, but I knew the reason was because it actually had scales and not skin.

"Mom, if you don't get us out of here in the next ten seconds we're both dead."

Popping my belt, I grabbed the seat-back release and pulled it while I tumbled in the rear of the minivan. I heard Mom suck in a breath while I scrambled underneath the bench seat and pulled out the tire jack and more importantly the tire iron.

The sound of glass crunching made me spin around right when a scaled arm reached through the passenger door window for Mom. She shrieked and backed away, not wanting it to touch her, like it was a scurrying cockroach. With all of my might, I swung the tire iron and laid it across the forearm hearing a satisfying crunch of bone. With my other hand I swung the jack across the seat into the thing's face, knocking it out of the van.

"Go!" I yelled.

It didn't take anymore convincing for Mom to slam the minivan into drive and floor the accelerator. A half a block away she screamed at me. "What was that!"

"Sewer Fairy." Her eyes flicked to me in the rearview mirror. "They're not the nice butterfly looking things in myth. They want nothing more than for man to be wiped off the face of the planet so they can have their wilderness back."

She took a right at the second corner and I looked out the back window to make sure we weren't being followed.

"How do you know this?"

The moment of truth had arrived. "Mom, I don't think I'm your daughter anymore, not since she died anyway."

"But..."

"It's kind of hard to explain." Before she had a chance to protest, I cut her off. "Circle back around. They're probably gone now."

She shook her head. "We're not going back there."

Setting my hand on her shoulder, I eased into a calm voice. "They don't want to be exposed any more than necessary. I'm kind of surprised they tried to make a hit in suburbia in the first place. They must have been desperate."

Reluctantly, she followed my instructions. It took a few turns since the layout of the streets weren't exactly block patterned. We paused at a stop sign and I looked to make sure that the area was clear.

"We're good. Pull right up into the garage and shut the door before you get out, just in case."

By the time we entered the house, I could see the shock hadn't worn off. I set some water to boil and grabbed the phone right after. Punching in the number from the ad, I stared at Mom sitting in a chair at the breakfast table looking lost and a bit disheveled. A mechanical click sounded and then an automated voice arose.

"Please state the nature of your problem. We will get back to you as soon as possible."

I hit two-seven-seven-three and the machine clicked off, switching to a ringing tone afterward.

"Hello?" His voice was generic male and unremarkable, like anyone you would meet off the street.

"Codename Red-4355269-Theta. Patch me through to Blue."

Mom looked up at me, staring like she didn't understand what I just said. My memory was coming back to me in leaps and bounds.

A couple of clicks later and there was a long pause, then a voice that was very familiar came through. "Who is this?" He sounded kind of angry.

"Abe, it's me. Don't ask me how it happened. I don't have a clue myself."

I heard a sigh, like someone was trying to restrain himself. "Prove it. Tell me something that only Red would know."

This time it was my turn to sigh. "That's the problem. My memory is like Swiss cheese. Look, research it yourself. Contact Memorial City Hospital morgue. Gemma Saunders woke up during an autopsy two days ago, no medical explanation."

"Two days ago?" Abe sounded a lot more interested.

"Yeah." Noticing a stack of mail on the counter I recited the address where we were at. "Is there any reason a sewer fairy would have it in for me?"

"Dammit." There was another long pause. "I'll check your story out. Stay put."

The line disconnected.

Mom kind of kept to herself for the next hour. I made her three cups of chamomile tea and kept myself busy with unloading the minivan and storing away my clothes. Full dark was already around when Dad made it in. He was standing at my doorway.

"Hey," I said as I was folding up the shopping bags.

"What's wrong with your mother? She won't say anything to me."

I paused for a moment as I tried to figure out a way to explain what was happening. "I'm starting to get my memory back."

A smile lifted his lips. "What? That's great."

I shook my head. "It's kind of hard to explain."

He turned serious again. "Is this about the drugs?"

"What?" I was momentarily confused and then chuckled a little. "No, nothing like that." I started to just lay it out for him, but with nothing and no way to prove myself I'd just sound like a raving teenager. I sure as hell wouldn't believe me. "There's some people coming over... hopefully."

Luckily, I didn't have to say anymore as we were interrupted by the sound of the doorbell going off. Dad looked down the hall and then back at me.

I pointed in the general direction of the front door. "That's probably them."

He didn't appear satisfied that his home was about to be invaded by people he didn't know, but I could see the curiosity on his face nonetheless. Stepping back he waved his hand for me to proceed him. Mom was on the couch looking at the door with something akin to trepidation. I suppose if I had just been attacked by a mythical being and I didn't know about them being real, I'd probably be the same way.

"It's okay. They're the good guys," I said, trying to reassure her.

She didn't say anything as I crossed the floor to peer out the right side window that bordered the door, just in case. When I saw Abe's face, the tension in my gut eased a little. I unlocked and opened the door.

"Abe."

He was a lot taller than me, maybe six or seven inches, late-twenties with short brown hair, close-cropped on the sides. His knee coat was open and I could see his standard issue service belt with its many pouches that held a number of items used in combating the creatures of the night. Well, that and the .357 resting on his hip. Sometimes those same creatures are pretty big.

Movement from behind him caught my attention. A girl, in her mid-twenties with dark brown hair raised an eyebrow at me.

"Lez?" I said.

She rolled her eyes. "It's him."

Her name was actually Liz, Elizabeth Sherman, but I always called her Lez, for obvious reasons. She was a lesbian and try as I might I could never talk her into giving me a shot in bed.

I smirked and stepped back. They took the gesture as it was meant, an unspoken invitation. You're never supposed to invite anyone into your home. There are many natural protections on a person's house that are easily circumvented by two simple words: come in. Vampires, fairies, zombies, basically anything that is supernatural and in solid form. Ghosts, spirits, unbound souls, spiritual travelers, and others were somewhat harder to keep out.

Abe eyed my Mom and Dad and they returned the stare.

"Guys, this is my... mom and dad." I listened to how that sounded. While they weren't actually my real mother and father, they were at the moment. "Mom, Dad, this is Abe Zapien, and Liz Sherman. They're here to help."

Dad was eying the weapons that were hanging from their hips. Liz took the hint and reached into her pocket to retrieve her identification. "We're federal officers, Mr. Saunders. No need to be alarmed."

Dad took her I.D. and looked it over. "What B.P.R.D.?"

"The Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense," I answered.

Abe looked me over. "I thought you said you couldn't remember anything."

"My memory is coming back. Bits and pieces."

Dad didn't look too convinced. "Paranormal? Like ghosts and vampires? Are you serious?"

"Dad," I warned. "Ask Mom what happened this afternoon."

His face went from laughing disbelief to serious when he turned to her. Mom's skin was whiter than normal. "Julie?"

She looked down and covered her face with her hands. "It's true. We were attacked."

"Yeah, what's up with that?" I asked my friends. "I don't remember ticking off any fairies recently."

Liz turned to me. "You don't remember finding..."

"Liz," Abe cut her off. "We still don't know if she really is Red."

I saw him digging into his coat pocket and withdrawing a set of ancient looking goggles.

"What's that?" Asked Dad.

"Schufften Goggles," answered Liz. "They allow the user to see things that are actually there instead of what our eyes show us."

Abe donned the old leather apparatus and a number of focusing lenses shifted about until they stopped. "Whoa."

After a moment he took them off and handed the set to Liz who just held them up to her eyes without slipping the restraint over her head. her mouth ticked to the side with amusement and she passed them to Dad.

"What are you guys seeing?" I asked.

"You," says Liz. "The real you."

~O~

Mom and Dad didn't take the news very well. I had a large amount of sympathy for them. Not only did they lose a child, but they find out that her body is being possessed by a spook hunter. Male no less. Dad still didn't believe it until Liz gave him a sample of the nightlife. She's a pyrokinetic, the only one among us with actual powers, and nothing says I believe! like a fist full of blue and orange flames inches away from your face.

Abe, Liz, and I retired to the breakfast table in the kitchen to give my parents time to themselves.

"What do you remember about the Thirteen Artifacts?" asked Abe.

From the way he stressed the words, I guessed that they were capitalized. I shook my head. "I got nothing."

Abe grunted. "The first is the balance..."

Liz interrupted. "We don't have time for a history lesson, Blue." She turned to me. "You need to know about four of them and a general overview."

Abe shrugged and gestured for Liz to continue.

"There are thirteen artifacts floating around the world. Individually, each possesses a power to be reckoned with. The legend goes that if they were all brought together under one person that controlled the thirteenth... well, the end of the world as we know it."

I squinted my eyes for a second, trying to make sense of what she was saying. Looking at Abe was no help; he just shrugged again.

"Okay," I nodded. "Go ahead."

Liz sipped at her coffee, then put it down and held it between her hand as if to warm them. "There's the Angelus and the Darkness, pretty much what you expect them to be: the light and the dark, opposing forces that have been battling each other since their creation. They had a brief truce and created a third being, the Witchblade. It's the balance between the two, keeping them from each other's throats."

"The Witchblade," I confirmed. "You make it sound like they're people."

"They are. The artifacts can look pretty much like anything, but mostly disguise themselves as jewelry: a necklace, bracelet, whatever. But don't be fooled, they're sentient."

"Right," I conceded.

"These three are otherwise known as the Trinity, the most powerful of any of the Artifacts. We've come across a few of the others over the years and actually posses two of them. The Spear of Destiny we hold until the rightful owner is revealed." She sipped at her coffee again and then looked hard at me. "The other is the one that you need to know about. There's a prophecy involved."

At the utterance of that word, prophecy, I cringed. I did know one thing above all others: I hated prophecies. "And this has what, exactly, to do with me?"

She looked at Abe and he took over. "There's been some conjecture as to whether or not you are the one the prophecy is talking about. It spoke of one with the aspects of two. We never really knew what it meant, until now."

It didn't take a genius to figure out that I was of two aspects at the moment: male and female, in the same body.

"Okay, so I'm the person in the prophecy. Now what?"

Abe leaned forward and became deathly serious. "It means that you are the wielder of the Thirteenth Artifact: The Right Hand of Doom."

"That sounds kind of ominous."

~O~

Before leaving, Liz and Abe made arrangements for the following day, laid some additional protections around the house and left me with my supply belt, my old supply belt. Liz swapped my .357 out with M1911A1 that would actually fit my smaller hand and still have decent stopping power.

Mom and Dad were cordial enough while guests were still in the house, but once Abe and Liz were gone, I turned from the closed door to see them sitting together, huddled on the couch, hand in hand.

I wound up the belt and set it beside the armchair where I sat down. "I'm sorry about all of this. You guys didn't ask for or deserve this so soon after..."

It was Dad who got voted spokesperson for the two. "You're really not our daughter?"

I met his eyes for a brief moment and then dropped them to the floor, shaking my head slightly. "I'll leave tomorrow morning if you want."

Mom jerked and covered her mouth before tucking into her husband's shoulder. Dad just stared off at nothing in particular. "That's our Gemma's body."

He didn't say it in anger or accusation which was what I was expecting. It was a defeated sound, a tone that spoke of helplessness and despair. "We'll never have the chance to..."

Say goodbye? See her laying in a coffin covered in pancake makeup, in a dress she'd never have ever worn? Bury her?

"I understand, and that's why I want to leave the decision up to you."

His eyes tracked to me in confusion.

"It's your daughter's body. While it would be within my power to just take off and never see you again, I think doing so would be morally wrong."

Mom dabbed a tissue at her eyes and finally looked at me. "What are you saying?"

"I don't know." Wringing my hands a few times, it took effort to keep looking at them. "Ever since I deduced what had happened, I keep trying to figure out why this specific body, why this specific family."

"What happened?" asked Mom. "To the old you, I mean."

"Abe said I was in a fight with the fairies and I was overwhelmed. They wanted to kidnap me and make a trade for something the BPRD has. I killed myself so they couldn't use me."

Dad blinked at me and Mom sucked in a breath. I smiled grimly. "I'm a Catholic, you see. I was expecting to wake up in Hell, but instead, God or someone with some serious power put me into Gemma's body."

"What's so important that you had to risk your soul?" asked Dad.

I shook my head. "The thing they're after..." I stopped before I spilled secrets that nobody should know, but seeing the torment they were going through, I felt if anyone deserved to know why this was happening then it was them. "If it fell into the wrong hands, it could bring about the Apocalypse."

We were all silent for a good two minutes after that revelation. Then Mom broke the tension. "So, you're like a holy warrior?"

I actually snorted at that. "Hardly. I have bad habits. I don't go to confession nearly enough..."

"You sacrificed your immortal soul to save humanity."

When she said it that way, it sounded all self-sacrificing and noble. I really didn't think of myself that way. "It's part of the job."

She pursed her lips and then looked at Dad with hope and determination. He shrugged his shoulders deferring to her judgment.

"You'll stay here with us," she declared.

To say I was gobsmacked would be an understatement. "I..."

"I know you're not our real daughter, but... well, I think we lost her a long time ago." She was struggling for what to say, something that didn't sound awful coming from a mother who had just lost her only child. "It sounds bad, I know."

"I don't judge people like that, Mom."

A small smile rose on her face. "It would be like seeing her have a second chance."

I didn't know who was more delusional, me or her. I kind of understood her point of view. She'd given up on the original Gemma. Did that make her a bad mother? It would be idealistic to think so. However, I wasn't one to enforce my view of a perfect family upon her. It's very easy to look in from the outside and declare her an awful mother for not controlling her child, but she was the one who had lived with a drug addicted and disaffected teenager for years on end.

Part of me wanted to just run back to the BPRD and try to forget anything about them. Another part wanted to actually have a set of parents. My mother died when I was only six and my real father was so absorbed by his work that I wound up being raised by the people around me, those that worked for him. Living with the Saunders' was a second chance for me as well.

"I'll be keeping odd hours. You already know about some of the things I do."

Dad looked down at my belt laying on the floor. "How dangerous is your job?"

I peered at him with as much seriousness as I could muster. "Life and death, almost every day. And now, with this fairy business, it's only going to get worse, but I'll have an advantage that the others won't."

"What's that?" he asked.

"I'll show you tomorrow, if you want."

~O~

I slept through most of the night, this time, only waking at three in the morning to find Mom sitting on the couch with sleep tossed blonde hair and black bags under her eyes.

"Morning sweetie," she said upon my entrance. "Couldn't sleep?"

I shook my head and watched as she patted her lap. Sitting on the couch, I leaned over and lay my head on her legs. Mom's fingers immediately started threading through my hair. It was a comforting gesture that I'd never experienced. We were a sorry pair: a negligent mother and a... I really didn't know what I was. We were both looking for a second chance and there it was.

~O~

Dad woke us up with the smell of eggs, bacon, and biscuits cooking. It was a Saturday and conveniently he didn't have to go to work. Once we polished off the last of the breakfast it seemed like we were ready to face the real world.

Knowing something of what to expect at work, I dressed in a pair of the black leather pants, boots, and black pull over with three-quarter length sleeves. Mom, braided my hair and helped me with minimal makeup.

My supply belt was the hard part. It was way too long. For the time being, I just punched a new hole in the length so that it would serve and then tucked the extra length under and over so that about five extra inches hung down my left leg. It felt odd sitting there, higher than normal, over my hips. The holster for the .45 had to be moved to the front, in a cross draw position, otherwise it painfully dug into my side when I sat down.

I checked all the pockets to make sure all my protections, amulets, extra clips, and various other tools of the trade were present. Withdrawing the rosary that normally hung from one of the pouches, I crossed myself and kissed the cross saying a silent prayer for Gemma and giving her thanks for the use of her body.

Dad arched an eyebrow at me as he held the back door to the garage open for Mom and me. "You look dangerous."

I sighed and gave him a rueful grin. "You have no idea."

~O~

They were shocked when we pulled up to the Houston Astrodome parking lot. It was kind of funny.

"I thought they closed it down because of structural issues," commented Dad.

"That's the official story, yeah." Pointing to the west side ticket booth, I said, "Just park anywhere over there. About seven years ago we recognized an increase in activity in the area that was far beyond normal, we relocated the headquarters from Connecticut. New York City was the place to be for about fifty years, if you were an up and coming player, now it's here."

"Why the change," asked Mom.

I shrugged. "It happens. Places of power shift from major cities around the world. When my father originally started up the BPRD at the beginning of World War II, it was in London, before that, Istanbul, and before that, Hong Kong. Now it's Houston. I dread when it's L.A.'s turn."

Dad pulled up to the closest parking spot available. There were a couple of SUV's and a few civilian cars scattered about. Two security guards were on watch by the main gates behind the old ticket booth. They were eying me with something akin to curiosity mixed with disbelief. Working for the BPRD, you tend to see the weirdest stuff. A short girl decked out for trouble was tame in comparison.

Flashing my temporary pass that was in my supply belt, until I could arrange for more permanent ID, got us past the guard station and into the elevator that was just beyond the gates and to the left. There were two sub basements beyond the three that were already in the Astrodome. That's where the heart of the BPRD lay.

When the elevator doors opened Liz was already there waiting for us. "Security called and said you were on your way down."

Of course.

She nodded at Mom and Dad. "Good to see you again, Mister and Missus Saunders. The first stop is Security for your ID's."

We were photographed, fingerprinted, retina recorded, DNA sampled and aura read, all of which were documented in the local data base and imprinted on the official identification that I was presented. Mine was a duplicate of my previous ID except where obvious gender changes had occurred. It even held my previous status as Special Agent in Charge. I was really wondering if I'd be demoted because of my current age.

The Federal Government doesn't employ agents with my status below the age of thirty. Acquiring the experience needed to fulfill the requirements just isn't possible. However, I suppose there was always a loophole to leap through for every rule.

Mom and Dad were presented with simple permanent visitor status. they wouldn't be able to go anywhere without an escort, but they could still get inside without any hubbub.

Once we were processed Liz pulled me aside. "I'll give the nickel tour to your new family. You go meet with Abe. He's waiting outside your quarters."

I relayed the arrangements to Mom and Dad and then made tracks back to the elevator to sub-basement five. Living quarters, official offices, and the strategy room were located on S-5.

The more I saw of the place, the more it was cemented in my mind. A very large percentage of my memory had returned, it was the little bits and pieces that were driving me nuts. I'd spent the better part of the previous night trying to remember everything about the Thirteen Artifacts and the prophecy that pertained to me and the Thirteenth Artifact, but still held bupkis in the end. Pass codes to enter the deepest levels of the Pentagon, no problem, crap that actually pertained to me making a life altering decision, nada.

When I turned the final corner that led to my room, I saw Abe cross-armed and leaning against the wall next to my door.

"You could have waited inside," I said.

He shook his head. "Nobody's been in since you left it Tuesday night."

I pressed my hand against the sensor pad and punched in my security code before hearing the lock release.

Like the man said, it was exactly the same: a one bedroom apartment with a kitchenette, and office. Well it wasn't really an office. It was supposed to be a living room. Like my father before me, I was a workaholic.

"Make yourself at home."

I logged in to the computer and sent a request for the last three day's status reports before turning around and seeing Abe still standing there looking at me.

"What?"

He gave me the once over. "You're exactly the same."

I looked down at the boobs currently restrained inside a sports bra and covered by my black top. "I think I'll beg to differ on that one."

He rolled his eyes and strode toward the kitchenette, more specifically the medium sized refrigerator located therein. Pulling out two beers, he looked critically at me for a moment. "Are you even old enough to drink?"

I flipped him off. "Bite me."

I got my beer tossed at me for the gesture.

"What I'm getting at is that you don't act any different because of the..." He popped the top on his can and motioned toward my body.

"Because I'm a chick now?"

Abe shrugged.

I popped my own top and sipped at the opening before taking a long pull. At least my taste buds hadn't changed, thank god. "I woke up with no memory. I spent the better part of two days being a girl. While parts of it were unfamiliar, everything ran perfectly fine. I survived."

Turning the desk chair out I swiveled it around and sat down. "When I finally figured out I was once a guy, I felt so relieved that I wasn't going crazy that I didn't care. I knew I'd been killed and figured it was some messed up hoodoo that dropped me into Gemma Saunders' body in the freaking morgue. Seeing as how I was dead before, I'm kind of counting lucky stars and all."

During my explanation, Abe made himself comfortable on one of two armchairs I had for times just like this. "So, you're cool with being a girl then?"

I sighed then took another pull. "Not really. I was in great shape before and this body... I'm short and I can't lift crap for weight. It's going to take a lot of work to get back onto the street."

"You're SAC, new body or not. Doctor Broom made sure nobody could give you any shit before he died. You can push the issue if you want."

"And be responsible for not holding up my weight out there and getting you or Liz killed in the process?" I shook my head. "No thanks. I'm grounding myself until I can hold my own. Maybe six months. I'll do tech duties and observation until then to keep in the loop."

Abe smirked and finished his beer, crumpling the can afterward. "I find it very interesting that you're more worried about not being able to fight than you are about losing your balls."

I rolled my eyes and spun around to face the computer screen. "I don't need to be psychoanalyzed, Abe. Take it somewhere else."

You ever notice how psychoanalyze is spelled? If you were to break everything down into it's component parts it would mean crazy ass-fucker. Pardon me if I never felt like going down that particular road.

"That's avoidance I'm hearing, Red."

Opening the first folder of reports and enlarging it, I said, "My name is Gemma Saunders now."

TBC...

There wasn't much of anything transpiring in and around the Greater Houston Area. Since Red's death, things had gotten suspiciously quiet. Several teams were sent out to roust the local fairy community. While the teams weren't received with open arms, they weren't attacked either. It all sounded too planned to me.

Abe waited for me to get caught up and helped himself to another beer. He knew there wasn't anything to see, and he also knew that I had other business that needed taking care of at HQ. After filling an overnight bag with some essentials, I locked everything down and walked with him to the elevator where we returned to S-4 and met up with the tour at the trophy room.

"I thought Kennedy died in '63," said Dad as we walked into the room.

Liz shook her head. "That was actually Jackie that got shot. They swapped bodies the night before and..." She shook her head. "It's a really long story, that I'm sure Red would love to tell you."

I smiled knowingly. Liz hated doing the tour thing; I have no idea how Abe talked her into it. "I'm going by Gemma now."

"Right, fine, whatever." She looked at Abe hopefully, expectantly. "We ready to do this thing?"

Nobody was talking about it for a reason.

"What thing?" asked Mom.

I looked at her. "The whole reason behind everything that's been happening the last few days. Come on and enjoy the show."

Mom grabbed my hand and laced her fingers through mine. The others were a few steps ahead of us when she leaned in and whispered. "Is that beer on your breath?"

"It was only one, and I only drank half," I said with a small measure of guilt.

She breathed evenly for a couple of seconds before continuing. "I've already lost one daughter because I wasn't willing to be a nag. I'm not going to make it two."

I stopped and stared at her. There was a part of me that wanted to defend myself, saying that I was actually thirty-four and could make my own decisions about my life, but I could see the pain in her eyes. "Okay."

Mom blinked at my backing down. "Really?"

With a nod, I assented. "No more beer. May I have the occasional glass of wine, maybe after a particularly grueling mission?"

She thought about it for a moment and then nodded. "At home, with me or your dad."

"Fair enough. Thank you."

I guessed she suspected something extra, because her eyes narrowed. "Do you have any other bad habits I need to be aware of?"

I swallowed and cringed. "Cubans."

She gasped. "Cigars? Absolutely not."

Damn. "Yes, ma'am."

She shot the can I trust you look at me.

"Hey Abe."

He stopped and looked back. I motioned for him and when he returned he looked at me and Mom.

"After I leave, can you go into my room and remove the beer and..." I swallowed again. "The Cubans."

His eyes widened. "Are you serious?"

I looked at Mom and nodded. "I promised Mom."

He whistled low and long. "Can I have the Cohiba's?"

My mouth twisted just a little with resentment. "Sure."

Abe almost skipped ahead of us with delight. Mom looked on with confusion until I explained. " Cohiba Silgo VI's run about five hundred and fifty dollars for a box of twenty-five. I've got about a hundred and fifty left from when we saved Fidel's butt from a rampaging mountain troll. They were a gift."

"That must have hurt."

I shook my head slightly. "You have no idea."

A second later I was engulfed in a hug. My hands came up a few seconds after and returned the gesture.

"I know you could argue with me. I also know you are a lot older than you appear, Gemma. Thank you for being a good daughter."

There. That was it; the whole reason I made the decision to stay with them. I'd never really been mothered. Relaxing into her embrace and sighing with a modicum of contentment was worth the loss of the beer -- maybe not the Cubans so much. That would need several hugs to get over. I had the feeling that Mom wouldn't mind giving them out.

She still had a firm grip on my hand when we entered the room I had been dreading since the previous night. We completed a semi-circle that Abe, Liz and Dad had started, with all of them looking at the thing sitting horizontally on a pair of tripod stands. It looked like a gigantic four fingered hand -- well, three fingers and a thumb, if you want to get technical. Oh, and it was red.

"Any idea what it's made of?" I asked.

Abe shook his head. "Nobody's been able to chip away a sample to analyze."

Dad offered his insight. "I looks like it's been carved out of solid rock. What's it called again?"

"The Right Hand of Doom," answered Liz.

Mom squeezed my hand. "That sounds kind of ominous."

"Yeah, that's what I said." Nobody spoke for a half a minute until I broke the silence. "What exactly is this thing supposed to do?"

Abe crossed his arms in what I remembered was his lecture pose. "The vast majority of the Thirteen Artifacts exhibit a symbiotic relationship with the host." At the tentative look on my face, he clarified. "It doesn't feed off of the host. It kind of urges them in certain directions to further its goal or the reason for its existence. In return it provides protection and in some cases mystical powers, weapons, etcetera."

I gave the hand a wary eye. "And you want me to put it on?"

He shrugged. "It's not a matter of want. It's a matter of prophecy and what happens if you don't."

Dad got into the game. "Prophecy?"

Seeing the academic gleam in Abe's eye shot a warning through my head, so I cut him off at the pass. "Short version: If the Thirteen Artifacts are held by one person then, Apocalypse. The prophecy says if I don't carry the Hand then someone else will get it and that'll happen."

Dad's mouth tensed up. "So you have to carry it then."

I nodded. Steeling myself, I sighed. "You guys want to wait outside in case this thing doesn't do what you think it will?"

Mom's grip tightened. "I'll stay."

Giving her a warm smile in thanks, I shook my head. "I want you safe. This is my job. You can watch through the glass."

Reluctantly, she went with Dad and Abe. Liz stuck around for a moment. "Gook luck. Try not to die or anything this time."

She didn't mean anything by it. Playful banter and grim humor was all an intricate dance we always performed.

"Bite me."

Once I was alone, sort of -- they were all standing in front of an observation window -- I gave then a encouraging smile and turned to face the Right Hand of Doom. Judging by the size of the thing, the forearm portion of the stone would almost reach my elbow. It had a handy-dandy hole located on the flat end just big enough for a short seventeen year old, blonde, heroin addict's hand to slip through.

I set my bag by the door and unwound the rosary from my belt and said a single Hail Mary and a single Our Father before settling it around my neck. Without any further fanfare, I walked up to the Hand and jammed my arm inside as far as it would go.

A tingle ran the length of my hand, traveling up my arm and across my body. It didn't hurt, only feeling like I was standing outside while it was misting, while naked. Then the Hand shrunk, folding in on itself until I could see only my skin and a very intricate bracelet encircling my wrist with a bright red gem the size of a silver dollar as its centerpiece on top. The red band that served as the setting had tiny script all along the outside. From careful observation, I could tell it was all one piece. There were no hinges or openings that might indicate how to take it off, which led me to believe that I'd be wearing it for some time to come.

"Gemma?" It was Abe's voice sounding through the intercom.

I turned around and saw everyone standing there, expecting something to happen. I shrugged. "I think it's done."

Since the anticlimactic scene was over, I eventually talked Mom and Dad into going home while I caught up on my daily duties. Abe confiscated the beers in my room but didn't have an idea of what to do about the Cohiba's since I had the only humidor large enough to keep them all fresh and it was built into its own room. The bastard did swipe one of the boxes for himself though.

They took pictures of the inscriptions for someone to try their hand at a translation. They needed all the luck they could get with that one. Everything we'd come across concerning the Artifacts were written in a seriously dead language that nobody recognized and without some sort of Rosetta Stone to work with it was pretty much a useless task.

I spent the afternoon on the firing range trying to get used to the .45. My aim was for shit... still. When I was a guy, I was never any good with range weapons of any sort. I could hit the target if I concentrated and went thorough the motions properly, but where it actually hit on that target was anyone's guess, and never the same place twice.

"God, you suck."

Popping the clip out, I set the pistol on the counter in front of me and collected the empty clips for reloading.

"Did you need something, Lez?" I said while turning around.

She was leaned over on the counter lining the back wall, looking like she really didn't want to be there. "Abe said you wouldn't talk to him about..." She gestured at me. "Your thing."

I rolled my eyes and set the clips on the counter, sliding over a box of ammo so she could help me. "Sorry you got roped into the caring sister routine."

Liz sighed and started feeding rounds into a clip. "Is there anything you need to know?"

For a second, I actually thought she cared. I eyed her and then shook my head. "Mom's there for the care and feeding of a teenage girl instructions."

She stopped and spread her hands, looking stupefied. "What is that about, anyway? Mom, Dad? Since when did you adopt a family?"

I shrugged. "Sort of fell into it. They were there when I needed them and didn't have a clue what was going on, and they have issues they need to deal with. Gemma Saunders wasn't little Mary Sunshine, if you get my drift."

Liz cocked her head to the side ruefully. "You're not kidding there. I pulled her jacket when we were checking you out."

That kind of surprised me. Mom didn't mention anything about her being a criminal. "What?"

Liz nodded. "No priors, but she's been under surveillance by HPD and the DEA. She ran with some seriously messed up people. Never got caught though."

I sighed. This was something that I couldn't tell Mom or Dad. It would crush them. But I could do something about it. "Can you send that file to my computer?"

Working on her third clip, Liz looked up at me with a bit of wariness in her eyes. "I know that look; even if you aren't yourself anymore."

I smiled somewhat evilly. "Want to go make some noise tonight?"

"Red," she groaned.

"Gemma."

"Whatever."

"I owe it to her parents, Liz. And maybe I owe it to her a little too."

She pushed the full clips back to me. "It's not our jurisdiction."

I shrugged. "Maybe it is? How else do you explain what happened to me. Maybe it's demonic worshipping heroin pushers. Maybe they've been cutting their drugs with fairy dust..."

I stopped and blinked. Liz's eyes widened. "Oh hell," she muttered.

"Aww crap."

"There's a lot of history here. Try to keep up," I said.

The SAC of the DEA's team that's been running surveillance of Gemma and the doinks she's been hanging out with was sitting in our strategy room supremely pissed off about a seventeen year old H-addict he's been keeping tabs on for the last six months actually works for the BPRD.

"Ever heard of Changelings? I'm not talking about shapeshifters. I'm talking about fairies that slip into kids rooms at night and swap them with one of their own."

"No." Obviously he was a man of few words.

He had on a black DEA windbreaker with a crisp white shirt and black tie underneath. His fingers were laced together and sitting atop the boardroom table. Little tinges of red and white -- See definition: skin discoloration due to applied pressure -- were alternating around his knuckles that let me know he was barely holding himself back from a string of obscenities.

"Good, it saves me from arguing the false information most people think they know."

I nodded at Abe and he lowered the lights a little and lit up the presentation screen at the end of the table. A peaceful night scene with a cute little tyke all snug in his bed and a open window to the side. It would have been just fine if a creepy green skinned demon looking thing wasn't sneaking inside at the time.

"Fairies have the ability, not to swap the bodies of kids with their fairy twins, like legend has it, but to eat the souls of the kids and then take over their bodies. They accomplish this with the use of Fairy Dust."

The SAC leaned back, confused. "You mean like Tinkerbelle?"

I looked at Liz. "Did I say anything about Pixies?" Re-centering on the SAC, I said, "Tinkerbelle is a pixie, not a fairy. Two totally different things."

"Right." He rubbed his eyes, looking like he was getting a headache. "So, fairy dust. I'm guessing that's not good."

"Good guess."

Abe went to the next picture, which was one of a forest fairy snorting a line of brown powder. "For most of the fairy population, it's kind of like a drug, nothing hard core. Think of having a drink at the end of the night to take the edge off -- about that strong."

The picture changed again to show a sewer fairy sprinkling the same dust over a sleeping preteen.

"Sewer Fairies use it to weaken the hold the soul has on humans." The lights came up a second later. "Now you have to ask yourself: what would happen if these same fairies were to supply this to drug dealers to use as a cutting agent. It works all and good, sprinkling it over a sleeping kid, but if that same kid injects it into his blood?"

I left it hanging there for a few seconds.

"We noticed a rise in activity of the sewer fairies over the last six months or so, and they've recently made a play for an object of power to cement their hold on the city. Agent Sherman and I think they are about to try a stranglehold, supplanting a large amount of humans with their own kind, all at once. That's why we need to move on them now."

The SAC looked at me like I'd just made the whole thing up. "Where's your evidence?"

I thumbed toward myself. "Me."

Another picture flashed across the screen. It wasn't very clear because the lights were up already, but there I was. "Alfred Broom, SAC of the BPRD. Dead in the line of duty by sewer fairies when they made a kidnapping attempt for that article of power I spoke of earlier. When his spirit was released it moved to this body, forcing her soul out and replacing it my own. That's one of the reasons I'm not a gibbering idiot looking for her next fix."

Pulling up my sleeves I showed the SAC there were no track marks. If he was as good in surveillance as the average DEA agent then he would have had pictures of Gemma shooting up at some time, most likely with the tainted heroin.

"The process cleanses the body of any recent injuries, infections, whatever."

He frowned, but didn't have enough reason to disprove our theory. We received a lot of leeway in regards for reasonable suspicion. It was the nature of the business. A lot of things didn't make logical sense, but were true nonetheless.

"We just need to know where they are mixing their shipments at," I said.

My hands were shaking and I felt the urge to suit up and jump in one of the SUV's going on the takedown. However, I wasn't up to the task. Since the so-called Right Hand of Doom was little more than costume jewelry at the moment, breaking my own self-assessment of my readiness wasn't warranted. I couldn't justify entering the upcoming battle, but I did insist on going along as backup and as an observer.

My old duster was about ten sizes too big for me. I preferred it over a regular coat because of all the pockets. A paranormal investigator had to be prepared for any eventuality. That means carrying a lot of crap around with you. You never knew when a pound of salt sprinkled in a protection circle would be all that stood between you and a screaming banshee... well that and the earplugs.

I did find a replacement. It wasn't black, which sucked. Instead it was camel colored with a heavy mantle. As all BPRD uniforms, it was saturated with protections against evil and threaded with lightweight Kevlar. We kept the local Catholic church busy -- with the blessings, not the sewing.

Swapping out my street boots for ones that actually worked, were made for chasing down dark things running through sewers, and reinforced enough so that a kick to the face actually meant something, I felt almost human again.

Our main transport was a makeshift garbage truck. The general public didn't know about the after hours freakiness and we'd hoped to keep it that way. It had never been in service and we loaded it up with the latest goodies. That's where we were sitting, waiting, and observing, an old rice drying facility that was supposed to have been shut down a decade past.

"Infrared shows eleven bodies at seventy-four degrees Fahrenheit."

I smiled grimly. "Sewer fairies."

Abe turned around and pointed at the blueprint layout. "We've got four exits in this area. We'll be spread pretty thin. Gemma, are you up for covering the main exit on the south side so they can't bolt that way?"

I nodded. "No problem."

Any rookie could have done the same thing. My job consisted of firing off a few rounds in the general vicinity of the door if it happened to open, forcing whoever was back inside to find a different exit. Even with my bad aim, I could literally hit the broadside of a rice drier, and if I happen to actually hit a fairy in the process, well then, so much the better.

The tech guru on the trip handed me a sub-vocalizer which I strapped around my neck, and a ear bud in my left ear would let me hear what was going on inside.

While Abe was giving everyone else their assignments, I tuned him out for something funky happening with my new jewelry. It seemed to be humming, but with a sound that only I could hear. I took a look at the smooth red jewel and I couldn't tell if it was sparkling or if it was simply reflected light from one of the many monitors.

"Everyone activate your beacons," said Abe.

I reached down to my belt and depressed the device.

Abe double checked the monitor. "And were all active. Okay guys, let's hit it."

A low pitched whine sounded while the back end opened up and spat out seven standard BPRD assault members in military night ops uniforms, and then Liz and Abe followed them. I brought up the rear since my position was closer. Taking out my .45, I pulled back the slide and introduced a cartridge into the chamber, checked to make sure the safety was still on, and holstered it again.

The ammo of choice was basic lead. Cold iron was the ideal for fairies, but it doesn't really transition well as ammunition. We had some sweet weapons at headquarters that had a high tech delivery system for special ammo, like holy water, silver shavings, explosive rounds, and so forth. But the thing only held four rounds and could blow a very large hole in just about anything it encountered, including cinder-block and most metal doors. I'd never be able to handle the recoil with my diminutive body. I could barely do it with my old one.

Two minutes went by and I received the two click signal that everyone was in position and ready for the word. My place was ten feet away from the double front door that you could find at any storefront. It was made of safety glass, but that wouldn't stop a .45 from penetrating.

My bracelet started humming again and I felt more focused than I had been in weeks -- from what I could remember anyway.

Two more clicks sounded and the raid was on.

I pulled the .45 out and fingered off the safety. From my vantage point, about forty feet away from the front doors, I braced my arm on an empty recycling dumpster and took aim. The wait wasn't for long.

Two figures blurred behind the tinted glass. When the door opened and I saw they were fairies, I let loose with four rounds. One of them hit the lead fairy and the other back-peddled and fell down inside the entranceway.

"Red has one down and another holding back." I said for the benefit of the observer in the truck that was recoding the raid. Red wasn't just my real name, it was my codename in the field as well. Abe was Blue, and Liz was Orange.

"Copy, Red."

I heard shots in the distance, muffled by the layers of walls within the building.

Over the ear bud, I heard Abe yell. "Pull back. They're coming from the floor. Dammit!"

I lurched forward and then stopped myself. I'd only make things worse.

"Abort! Abort!"

I didn't know who was yelling that, but it should have been Abe. I keyed in. "Orange, status."

A woosh of flame exploded out of the west side windows and then reeled itself back in.

"Red! It's a trap. I'm nuking the place"

I dropped the half empty clip and loaded one fresh by the time I was halfway to the door.

Abandoning the cover of the dumpster, I ran toward the front doors.

I raised the .45 to pop a round of lead into the fairy that pulled back earlier. As soon as I his the window that exploded, I hopped over the mess of glass and felt a warm surge of something coming from the bracelet.

The Hand was reappearing and with it, a whole lot more. The sleeve of my jacket ripped apart to accommodate the massive size of the forearm portion. Fury ran through me at the thought of Abe and Liz being taken as I was only days earlier, and I wasn't going to let the same outcome happen this time around.

The first door I came to was locked, which explained why the second fairy stayed put in the lobby. It was solid metal and no matter what they show on TV, you can't just shoot at the lock once and it magically open. All shooting at a doorknob accomplishes is breaking the knob and permanently trapping you on the wrong side.

I reared back and kicked at the door. It didn't even shutter.

Looking at the Hand I yelled in frustration. "Do something!"

That may or may not have been a good idea.

The arm it was attached to washed a wave of something upward turning the skin red. Tendrils escaped from the fingers and shot to my legs and torso, not to mention my face. I tried stepping back, but that was a fruitless endeavor.

Tingling sensations rippled across my body, the main portion concentrating on my forehead and my ass. I heard fabric tear again and then I felt like nothing, and I mean nothing on the face to the Earth could hurt me.

Glancing upward I noticed two long horns had sprouted from my head.

"Aww crap."

"Red! Come in!" Liz was calling for me.

"Orange, the Hand has activated itself." I hoped.

Another whoosh of flame sounded behind the door. Looking at the massive stone hand I that was hanging on the end of my arm, I clenched it into a fist and was determined to see what it could do.

Pulling back I shot it forward with everything I had in me.

The door exploded off its hinges and launched itself across the room, taking out five or six fairies in the process.

"Hell yeah!"

It was the main portion of the drier's facilities. Charred walls and burning fairy bodies were flopping around. Liz had taken the majority of them out. The rest were being mopped up by Abe and his men while Liz leaned against the west side exit door, exhausted from her efforts.

One of the fairies that hadn't been caught in the wave of flame skidded to a stop in front of me and tried to backpedal away from my stone fist, but it wasn't exactly fast enough. I snapped it out and grabbed it by the neck, holding it while it squirmed and lashed at me with its clawed hands.

I smacked it a couple of times to the side of its head, with the pistol, just to get my point across and it went limp.

"Red?"

I looked up to see Abe standing about twenty feet away with a wild look in his eyes.

"Hey Blue, how's tricks?" He glanced at the Hand and back up at me. I shrugged. "I guess we know what it does now."

Abe leaned to the side and looked behind me. "Red, you got a tail there."

I craned my head around and looked at the four foot appendage, thick at the base and tapering until the end. It was swishing back and forth angrily.

"Huh."

TBC...

Author's Note: A Retroactive Continuity, or Retcon if you will, is the altering of previously known facts in order for the universe to conform to new story lines. This is mine. This is a retcon of Hellboy in the Dark Horse Comics Universe. Mike Mignola and Dark Horse owns the character and all rights associated with him/her/it. Elements of the Witchblade series will be mentioned in later chapters. Witchblade is published by Top Cow Comics. Picture Credit: JPRart

Chapter 5

Sitting with a tail sticking out the bottom of my spine was problematic, so I took position at the back of the truck watching the lone surviving sewer fairy while everyone else was watching me. It's not every day that that a fellow teammate turns into the feminine version of Satan, except without the barb on the end of her tail and a big stone hand where a normal one should be.

I tried to revert back to the way I was. It was possible, I knew. If it wasn't then, the hand wouldn't have disappeared in the first place back at headquarters. However the only thing I'd managed to accomplish was to shrink my horns to two inch, sawed off stubs on my forehead. I still had the red skin, the tail and a giant right hand that David Haye, current Heavyweight Boxing Champion of the world, would envy.

The fairy was eyeing the Hand with annoyance and me with anger. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that it was pissed about me screwing up its race's plans for world domination, or city domination, or rice drier domination, or whatever.

I squatted down and smiled at it. "Going to save us some time and tell us where all your buddies are that were going to do all the body-snatching?"

Even though it had its hands tied behind its back, it still leaned forward and snapped at me with its dagger-like teeth. I brought up the stone hand and thumped its forehead with my middle finger. My eyes widened a little when his head slammed off the back of the truck.

"Huh." I'd have to take it easy for a while until I learned the limits of my new strength.

Abe leaned in. "We can't interrogate him if he's got a concussion, Gemma."

I spread my hands, innocently. "What?"

Abe rolled his eyes and shook his head. "So," he glanced back at my tail hanging there. "Feel any different?"

Standing up I slipped my hands in my pockets, well, one hand anyway, the other wouldn't fit. "Top-notch actually. You saw what I did to that door, right?"

He nodded. "Your strength is back in spades. Does that mean you're activating yourself again?"

He was referring to my agent status. "Probably. You can't deny having a heavyweight to open doors would be advantageous."

It was one of the most dangerous portions of the job, the person who went into a dangerous situation first. Plus there was the added benefit of seeing Satan's feminine side enter the fray would have on the bad guys, or bad things out there.

"True." He paused and stared at me for a few moment. "What about your adoptive parents?"

I pressed my lips together. Issues. Issues.

After the fairy was taken to containment for interrogation. I started feeling normal again. My skin receded to a normal color and the horn-stubs disappeared. The last to go was the Hand, when it revered to the bracelet again.

My clothes were a little looser, liked they were stretched out by someone else wearing them, not to mention the new draft I had coming out where my tail had tore my pants. Liz was with me in the debrief room where we were writing up our reports.

"Hey, I'm back to normal!"

She looked over her shoulder at me. "You look rumpled."

I shrugged my shoulders. "I was in a fight. What do you expect."

Liz shook her head. "No, you destroyed a door and captured one fairy, otherwise they didn't touch you."

She stood and motioned for me to stand as well. Then she checked the slack I had at my waist and pinched a bit of low grade leather at my thigh. "It looks like you bulked out and then went back to normal after. You're going to need clothes that will adapt to your change." She looked behind me at the four inch wide hole in my pants. "Not to mention what you're going to have to wear to accommodate your tail."

I didn't get what she was talking about. "What do you mean?"

She shrugged. "You've got a couple of options. Either high waist skirts, which are back in now, so good timing there. Or ultra-lowrise pants. I mean the butt crack displaying type, and those went out of style two years ago."

Neither option sounded ideal. Granted, I had the hips to pull off the low-rise pants so they wouldn't fall down in the middle of a fight, which would lead to all sorts of embarrassing scenes. However, fighting in a skirt sounded like it was right outside of a comic book, no matter what all those so-called superheroes out there in the world today manage to pull off. And there was no way I was dressing up in a spandex swimsuit with my butt hanging out.

Liz saw the look on my face and chuckled. "We'll figure out something. Maybe a breakaway flap or something to let it through."

I nodded at that idea. "Thanks. I'd appreciate not looking like the super-floozies out there."

Her lips twisted to the side in amusement. "I thought you liked looking at Jade and that Giant-girl."

"Giganta."

"Whatever."

"Yeah, well. I'd rather not have the bad guys checking me out or copping a feel when the occasion presents itself. You saw what American Dream did to the guy that let his little head do the thinking during a take down."

That video went viral in one day. The world found out that afternoon that it was completely possible to insert a baseball bat into a very uncomfortable place.

"Better get used to it. Some guys don't know the meaning of the word no." She looked at me expectantly. "You should know all about that."

"What? Me?" I was seriously affronted by the accusation. "When have I ever touched you in a way that you didn't or wouldn't approve of."

She smirked at me. "You haven't, or else you'd have charred nubs where your hands used to be. Face it, Gemma, as Red you didn't have the equipment that I was interested in."

I cocked my head to the side and smiled seductively. At least I hoped it was seductive. I hadn't really taken the time to practice that particular gesture in front of a mirror. "And now?"

Her eyes widened a little and she started laughing. "Now, you're jailbait. No thanks."

My shoulders sunk, defeated. Now that I'm a lesbian, I was too young for her. "I'll be eighteen in two months."

Liz sat back down at her desk and turned to the computer to finish her report, laughing harder at my misfortune.

I grabbed the keys to the Jeep Rubicon I'd owned as Red from the motor pool office, where they'd stored my vehicle while they decided what to do with it, me being dead and all. At least I was mobile again, and speaking of being mobile, I had a cell phone, finally.

Granted, it was Red's and not Gemma's. I checked the screen and it hadn't been updated as of yet like most of my security profiles inside the BPRD proper. It was easy to do it inside since everything was computerized, but switching out the title for the Jeep, and arranging for the cell to be under my new persona was going to take a couple of days.

I pulled up to the curb in front of the house, seeing as Mom and Dad only had a two car garage, and grabbed my overnight bag before hopping out. Taking a moment to check out the area before proceeding to the front door wasn't because I was now female, although that's always a good idea for anyone, regardless of gender. It was because we still didn't know whether or not we'd gotten the majority of the sewer fairies with the night's takedown, or why it was specifically me they were after.

Needless to say, my left hand never strayed far from the .45 until I was relatively safe.

I let myself in to find Mom sitting on the couch watching TV, and Dad coming in from the hallway that led to our bedrooms.

Mom looked relieved to see me. "Hi sweetie."

I smiled at her. "Hey Mom."

"Everything go okay at... work?" She seemed uncomfortable talking about what I did. It was understandable. Not everyone is good with the fact that the monster under the bed is actually real.

"Yeah, fine." I secured the door and turned back around. "We found out what the bracelet does."

Dad got more interested in the conversation at that point. "Really?"

I nodded and sat down in one of the armchair's while he sat beside Mom, closer to me, on the couch. Setting the bag on the floor, I bent over and unzipped the top to pull out a Polaroid that Liz took of me in Satan-mode.

"Don't freak or anything. I look entirely different, but it's still me underneath, alright."

Dad gave me a lifted eyebrow and held out his hand. Then his eyes nearly fell out of the sockets, he'd opened them so far. Mom sucked in a breath of air. When they'd come down off the shock, both of them looked at me and I tried to look innocent.

"Kind of scary, huh?"

Mom nodded.

"There's a good side though," I said, trying to find the silver lining. "I'm like super strong and tough. I'm going to be really hard to hurt when I'm like that."

Dad swallowed and asked, "How tough?"

I shrugged. "Well tonight, I smashed a steel door in a steel frame across about twenty or thirty feet of floor space and took out six fairies, all with one shot of the Hand, and I didn't feel a thing."

Mom covered her mouth with her the palm of her hand. "You were out fighting tonight?"

A guilty feeling crept along my face. "Uh, sort of. I was just going along as back up," I quickly divulged. "But it wound up being a trap and I had to help out. I didn't actually do any fighting."

Dubious looks were coming from both of them.

"Really!" I stressed. "We took out... I mean they took out a really large nest of sewer fairies, so this might all be over with."

My face was getting redder by the second and it wasn't from anything the bracelet was doing. "Guys... you know what I do for a living now. This can't be a surprise."

The silence I was getting from them was making me extremely nervous. That was until Dad finally broke it. "Gemma, we know what you do, but that doesn't mean we want you doing it or aren't going to worry what you're up to or if you're safe when we aren't there."

I looked down at the carpet and nodded. Desperate to change the subject I saw something else in the bag that might do the trick. reaching down I pulled out two picture frames.

"I thought you might want to see what I looked like before... well, before all of this."

The first picture I had was with Father and I in his library. I was about ten years younger. It was right before he died from lung cancer. The thing was, he never smoked a day in his life. Go figure.

"That's an old one with Father."

Dad blinked at it while Mom looked over his shoulder. She stared at it oddly for a second before Dad handed it off to her and I passed the newer one to him.

"That one was taken about three months ago. You already know Abe and Liz."

It was the three of us soon after we'd returned from DC, officially being thanked by the President for thwarting an Ice Entity from going on a rampage in Alaska. Anwar wasn't closed for oil drilling to save the environment or to let mooses mate, or anything stupid like that. It was the home to deadly carnivores that like to eat entire populations of small towns for making too much noise while the Entities are trying to hibernate.

When I looked back at Mom, her face was white and she was staring intently at the older picture of Father and me.

"Mom?"

She looked up at me and her eyes were all glassy, like she was about to cry. "Where... where did Red go to High School?"

I leaned back. That wasn't a question I ever thought she'd ask. "Uh, Fairfield, Connecticut, Ludlowe High School, class of ninety-five."

She swallowed painfully and breathed for a few seconds. "Did you used to be known as Alfie Broom?"

How in the world? Nobody had called me Alfie since High School. "Yeah. Red's real name was Alfred."

Mom looked up at the ceiling and laughed the laugh of insanity for a moment, and then dropped backward on the couch.

"Julie?" Dad said with concern in his voice.

I stood up and rounded the coffee table to check out if Mom had just gone over the deep end. Maybe it was just too much for her and she'd finally broke.

Her eyes found me and she started laughing again except this time it seemed like she was on the verge of crying.

"Mom, what's wrong? How did you know my real name?"

She stopped laughing and tried to compose herself. Dad was watching the two of us and it looked like he really wanted to know the answer to that question as much as I did.

"Gemma," she barked out a single laugh, but held it in after. "Does the name Julianne Edwards mean anything to you?"

I formed the word no with my lips, but something stopped me and the image of an eighteen year old brunette came to mind, not to mention the loss of my virginity, as a boy, eighteen years ago. Julianne was my first, an upperclassman that I'd swooned one night after her boyfriend dumped her the day before the homecoming dance. I was the back up running back for the team and the girl I was taking had developed strep throat.

We'd hooked up through a mutual friend and after a rather intense evening wound up in bed. She'd avoided me after that. It wasn't really seemly for a senior to be dating or having sex with a sophomore boy. I remember after about three months she transferred out of the school and I'd hadn't seen her since.

All of that returned to me, along with the picture of her face, which was being superimposed over the features of the woman with tears running down her face, sitting on the couch in front of me.

I knew then exactly why Gemma had been the person who's soul had been destroyed by the fairy dust, at that particular moment when I'd shot myself in the head to avoid capture by the sewer fairies.

Gemma Saunders was my daughter.

"No..." My throat tightened. "That can't be right."

Mom leaned forward, and I almost tripped over the coffee table trying to back away.

"Gemma?" Mom said, almost pleading with me.

"What? What's happening?" asked Dad, not understanding a thing that was going on. It still hadn't clicked in his head.

I held a hand to my stomach, feeling like I was gong to be sick. "It can't be right. No."

Turning toward the door, I unlocked it and heard Mom yell something behind me, but I was too far gone at that point, off in my own little world of self-denial. "No."

Twenty minutes, it took me to drive back to the BPRD, and during that short span of time I sorted the entire timeline out in my head.

Julianne left High School because she was three months pregnant with Gemma. She probably thought that a sixteen year old boy was ill fit to support and raise a child, and she was most likely right in that regard. However, she never told me. I deserved at least that much.

We went our separate ways, her getting married and them raising Gemma as their own. Then I pop up in Houston and Gemma gets started running with the wrong crowd, starts mainlining heroin laced with fairy dust. She was a coincidence as far as random events can be taken.

My little girl was a drug addict.

Then I went a got myself in a situation that I couldn't get out of.

At the same time as that was happening, Gemma was shooting up with her last hit, and instead of me being shot down to Hell as was right and proper for killing myself, I was drawn to her, knocking her soul free and taking her body as my own.

I killed my little girl.

I killed my little girl.

"Gemma?"

Liz saw me blow past her office and down the hall. I ignored her and headed straight for the armory. I heard her call my daughter's name again as I placed my hand on the scanner and punched in my passcode.

With the security we had at headquarters, actually reaching the armory was next to impossible. It's why nothing inside was locked down. I made my way to the specialty side of the room and eyed the choices.

Liz managed to make it to the door before it closed and soon she was right beside me.

"What happened? Why are you crying?"

I swiped at my fallen tears, angrily then decided on the Samaritan. Taking it down off of its shelf, I hitched the catch onto my belt beside the .45 and started grabbing all of the speedloaders that were available.

"Ever wonder why, Liz?"

She kept her tone nice and even as she nervously watched me make my preparations. "Why what?"

My eyes flicked to her. "Why Gemma?"

She shook her head ever so slightly. "No."

I stared long and hard at her. "Did you do a background check on the Saunders family?"

A confused look on her face prefaced her question. "Of course. On the first night. What did you find out?"

I didn't bother checking what kind of loads I picked up. I only know I took them all before turning and grabbing two more boxes of shells for the .45.

"Dig deeper, on her mom's side," was all I said before leaving the room.

Taking the elevator to S-5 I made tracks for the strategy room and picked up a thick file, the observation report from the DEA. It would have all of the names and locations that I needed to know about.

By the time I'd made it back to the elevator, there was someone waiting for me.

"Get out of my way, Abe."

He didn't move from in front of the call button. "What's the plan?"

My hand clenched on the folder. "Kill everyone that had a hand at killing my daughter."

His eyes unfocused for a moment then became clear again. "Oh shit."

Abe was always the sharp one. He made the connections a lot faster than I thought he would.

"Yeah, now, you want to move out of my way or do I get to move you?"

He sighed. "The place is in lockdown."

I folded the file in half as best as I could and jammed it in an inside pocket. "Call it off, Abe. You know what I have to do."

He shook his head. "I can't do that."

My eyes narrowed at him. "You mean you won't."

He didn't answer, so I let the rage and anguish that had been building, loose itself. Abe's eyes widened as I changed in front of him. The rush returned, cascading across my body as the Right Hand of Doom reformed itself. Before the transformation was complete I raised it and watched as Abe ducked and the Hand smashed into the elevator door. I grabbed a hold of it to pull it out of the wall, flinging it to the side.

"Jesus, Red! Stop!"

Taking out the Samaritan, I released the front half that fell forward into the loading position and held the barrel with the Hand while I found the explosive rounds. There was only room for four, but that would be more than enough. Snapping it closed, I shoved it back in its holster.

"You've got thirty seconds to tell everyone to clear the way. I'm not fucking around, Abe. I think you realize that, right?"

He nodded his head and stared at me like he didn't know me at all. "You think Gemma would have wanted you to do this?"

I scowled at him. "I think Gemma would have liked to have been raised with her real father in her life. I think she would have liked not to have him kill her. I think she was never given the choice either way. And I think the people responsible for her demise need to have their existence wiped off the face of the Earth in a greasy smear."

"So you're the judge, jury, and executioner?"

"Damn right. Who better?" I knew he was stalling me, and decided to end the discussion right there. I leaped up into the elevator shaft and grabbed a hold of the cables inside with the Hand. My tail seemed to have a mind of its own, keeping my balance and preventing me from swinging from side to side as I pulled myself up at a pretty alarming rate of speed.

I didn't stop at the ground floor but went one level higher and exited on top of the elevator shaft. Before leaving I pulled the beacon off my belt and tossed it inside.

Abe took my warning to heart. Nobody tried to stop me. He knew I would plow through them easily. No, Abe had different plans for me and if knew him as well as I thought I did, they involved setting a trap at one of the targets.

After I jumped into the Jeep and left the area, I reverted back to my human self. The rage was still there, but I was directing it toward the more tactical area of my brain. The first ones to pay the price were the ones that were responsible for the drugs. The first one that gave her the needle and encouraged her to inject that living death into her arm. Then I'd work my way up from there.

I parked under the I-10/Highway 59 interchange downtown. It wasn't the roughest part of town, but I definitely wouldn't want to be down there without some means of defense. Taking my time to ease back on the anger, I double checked the clip for the .45, while I studied the layout for the single story house I was about to invade.

I wouldn't exactly call the area it was in, residential, but the house wasn't alone on the street. The windows were boarded up and the only visible access were the front and back doors, both of which usually had a single guard that ambled around to alert the people inside if the cops showed.

I didn't care about making a bust, I didn't care about evidence, I didn't care about anything other than the people inside not making it away before I had the chance to have a nice chat with them.

A couple of gunshots rang out in the air, off in the distance. I stilled for a moment and then stuffed the .45 back in its holster.

A vagrant pushing a shopping cart passed on the other side of the street and I could smell his stench from where I stood. Reaching down, I took off the rosary and set it on the seat before I closed the drivers side door. It wasn't God's work I'd be doing that night, and I wasn't going to pretend that it was.

I stashed the .45 in the left hand pocket of my coat and buttoned the front up so the Samaritan didn't show. The lowlifes inside would know Gemma. She'd get a free pass for some money or maybe even for her body, just so she could score another hit.

My little girl.

I felt my face heat up and the bracelet almost begging to be released from its confines, but knowing that it needed to stay hidden for just a few moments longer as I blatantly crossed the street to the front of the house.

The guy in the dirty white tee shirt ticked his head up and flashed the weapon that he had in his hand. A Glock, one of the more recent models. Then he smirked, knowingly.

"Gem Gem. Whatchoo doin' out this late on a school night, girl?"

"It's Saturday," I said as I made my way up the walk. "My parents found my stash and I need something to take the edge off."

I didn't know if I was pulling it off, but he seemed to buy the act. When I reached the porch I quick-stepped to the landing with the guard. He nodded his head up and looked at me expectantly.

"You know the drill, sweet tits. I got to see the goods before you can go in."

Taking my hands out of my pockets I held them wide. "All yours."

He smirked again and stuck his Glock down the front of his pants --dumbass. When he finished popping the last button on my coat he opened it up and saw the Samaritan.

"Holy shit! What the hell, Gemma?"

The Right Hand of Doom grabbed him by the neck while I completed my transformation and I made sure to include the horns and all.

"I'm not Gemma anymore," I growled.

We both made a play for his Glock, but I was quicker and he was choking to death. Before taking it out I pulled the trigger twice then turned toward the door using his body to open it up, the hard way.

The front room was relatively small and there was only one guy that was armed, standing only three feet away. I leaped forward at him and he screamed like the devil had come to claim his soul personally.

Apt.

I crushed his gun with the Hand. The minor fact that his fingers were still wrapped around the grip, was only gravy to fuel my anger. Shooting him once in both knees made sure he didn't go anywhere soon. Five kids and a middle-aged loser were stoned out of their minds on who knows what, were probably having a hell of a hallucination due to my appearance. Those that could, stumbled out of the front door. The others just trembled.

Two guys made it from the back, with the heavy weapons. By this time I, was already by the entrance to the hallway, and slammed my regular fist into his face. I'd forgot I still had the Glock in that hand and it would up making a mess of his jaw. The second guy wasn't as lucky. He whipped his Uzi at me. Uzi's were old and reliable, not to mention cheap.

The Hand grabbed the barrel and squeezed as a number of rounds decided that they didn't want to be fired anymore and exploded the housing in his hands.

I snapped my left hand out and pistol whipped him unconscious.

Four? That was it? I expected the last guy, the other guard, around back to get away but that wasn't my concern at the moment. I'd track him down later. Double checking to make sure I didn't miss anyone, I swept the two bedrooms, one of which held some of what I'd been looking for.

Little packets of brown power were stacked on the table. The last room was the kitchen which was empty. I grabbed a hold of the gas stove and jerked it from the wall, tossing it to the side.

When I returned to the front room, the guard that was at the front door was whimpering into his cell phone.

"No, we can't have that," I said. Squatting down next to him, I smiled. It wasn't genuine. "Tell them."

Tears were escaping his eyes, and if there wasn't a chance that this was one of the guys that had defiled my little girl then I would have felt bad for shooting his dick off. As it was, I wanted everyone to know who was coming for them.

Maybe it was the blood loss; he dropped the phone. I picked it up and growled into the phone. "Who is this?"

The voice on the other end didn't say anything at first. "You're dead. Nobody fucks around in our neighborhood."

I laughed. "I'm sitting right here, buddy. All I see are a lot of guys grabbing themselves and crying. Judgment's come for them, and they've been found lacking. Why don't you come on over. Bring your friends. I'm throwing a party, and the roof, the roof, the roof is on fire."

Flipping the phone closed, I tossed it to the side so I could concentrate on the guy about to pass out from blood loss, with maybe a little shock thrown in. Smacking him a little on the face, focused his eyes on mine.

"Who was the one that got Gemma involved in this shit? Tell me and I'll kill you nice and easy, don't tell me and I start removing more body parts until I get tired of you screaming, and right now, I'm kind of enjoying the sound."

He didn't waste any time. "Mar'in... Mar'in..."

I didn't recognize the name. "Mar'in? Who the... oh, Martin. Sorry I couldn't understand with all the blubbering."

Looking back at the other three. "Which one of you is Martin?"

They didn't answer, but maybe that had to do with two of them being unconscious. I grabbed dickless and hauled him up by the scruff of the neck with the Hand. "Point him out and I'll end the pain."

He shook his head, or tried to anyway. "Your boyfriend," he mumbled.

"My..." My teeth ground together. Gemma's boyfriend started it all. "Fine. You get your prize."

I dropped him and then turned to the two remaining teens that were stoned out of their gourd, to drag them from the house. They wound up on the sidewalk by the street. Giving the area a glance, I was sorely disappointed in the response time of the local police department.

Pulling out the Samaritan, I aimed for the open doorway and fired off a single round. I was kind of surprised at the lack of kick. It wasn't much.

The resulting explosion, on the other hand... that was a sight to see.

TBC...

Author's note: You might want to go back and read the last chapter since it's been a while for this update.

Part 6

The gathered natural gas in the kitchen made sure the small explosive bullet was more than effective. The back half of the house exploded up and out, shredding what was left of the dilapidated heroin den. Hopefully the four remaining guys inside didn't die instantly.

On the way back to the car, I stripped the Glock and tossed most of the pieces down a storm drain. Before I'd closed the driver’s side door, I heard the distinct sound of fire truck sirens in the distance. At least they were on their game.

While I waited around, I flipped open the file and ran my red finger down the list of names, people involved in the DEA's surveillance. Martin Pierce was subject number ten. Retrieving an address where he laid his bedroll down at night, I put the Jeep into gear and headed to the Brewery Tap, four blocks over.

It started off as a trendy micro-brewery bar, specializing in one hundred and two different kinds of beer on tap, most of which was made in Texas. It was a popular hangout for the rollerblading kids that liked to skate on the empty streets downtown after dark.

That was ten years in the past.

More recently, it was a drug den that was always passed over by HPD's narcotics division for the right amount of cash.

I ground my teeth. They'd have to pay as well. If the pukes that ran drug enforcement actually did their job, then maybe my little girl wouldn't have met up with guy that stuck her to begin with.

I really hated dirty cops.

~O~

The Brewery Tap was at the crown of a T-intersection and I was parked at the foot, watching it through my rearview mirror. It seemed busy enough, a nice normal front with less than nice cliental.

I wasn't going play around this time. This one was going to be messy.

With the Samaritan in one hand and the sound of stone grating against stone in the other I stepped out of the Jeep and made my way to the bar. People out front got a load of the red skin and horns when I passed a dim streetlight and decided discretion was the better part of keeping their heads attached to their necks. They bugged out rather quickly.

The front door was already open.

Cigarette smoke and the smell of sweat drifted out the door before I stepped inside. Frank Sinatra was crooning the highlights of living in the Big Apple, but that was about all I heard when everyone inside got a look at me.

I stood there and let everyone take me in for a moment. A glass shattered to the side and I heard a few muttered curses and a plea to God in a foreign language before I announced my intensions.

"I'm the Devil and I've come for my due. Anyone who helps me gets to walk out of here in one piece. Now, where's Martin?"

Several heads turned to the guy behind the bar, not to mention several fingers pointing him out. The neon lights didn't do too much for his complexion, which was getting paler by the second.

I raised the Hand and crooked a beckoning finger. "Come on, Martin. It's time to go to Hell."

He stared at me. I saw his hands shaking. Then he pulled a runner. Without even thinking about it, I leaped forward, up and over the bar, landing right on his heels, to grab his shoulder, slamming him down to the floor. He started screaming right away.

"Oh God, Oh God, please! I'm sorry. Whatever I did, I'm sorry!"

The sound of chairs scraping against concrete alerted me that the patrons were escaping while they had a chance. I gave them a cursory look over my shoulder to make sure none stayed around and tried to be a hero.

"Please don't kill me! Please don't kill me!"

The smell of spent urine added to the smoke and sweat. Standing up, I took Martin with me and body slammed him onto the top of the bar. "Shut up, Martin. Redemption time is over. We're at the penance portion of the game now. This is the time where you get to confess all of your sins and accept your punishment for the part you played in killing my daughter."

His eyes widened and his bowels loosened. Then he screamed. I think I broke him. He wouldn't stop screaming and trying to scramble away, so I holstered the Samaritan and grabbed the closest bottle of booze and started pouring it into his open mouth.

On his next inhalation of breath he stared choking. It was nice seeing him struggle. It soothed a savageness that I felt somewhere deep inside.

"The word is that you started my little girl on heroin, gave her the first shot."

Once he was able to breathe, it was nothing but denials. "No... I swear!"

I blinked at him and smiled. "Are you saying that you didn't provide Gemma Saunders with armful after armful of that crap?"

He didn't deny it this time. He only whimpered.

"Red."

The Samaritan was out and pointed before I had even finished turning my head to the door.

"Get the fuck out of here, Abe."

Martin was past whimpering and into full on crying by this point and I was just getting started.

"I can't do that."

I grabbed Martin by the throat and lifted him off the bar. "This is the piece of shit that killed Gemma. Her boyfriend. You get that, Abe? She trusted him to do boyfriend shit: bring her flowers, take her out to movies, and try to feel her up after dates, not get her so stoned that she couldn't remember the right dosage to fill the needle with so she wouldn't kill herself."

Slamming him back on the bar, I held him down with the normal hand and the Samaritan planted on his chest, and pointed a stone finger at him.

"You fucked her, did you? Got her nice and stoned and then fucked her. Well that shit ends now, tonight."

I brought my Hand down between his legs and squeezed, making sure he never thought about violating anyone ever again. He didn't stop screaming after, until he passed out from the pain.

"Red." I closed my eyes in annoyance. The sound of Frank Sinatra died down and I could hear Abe's footfalls on the concrete floor. "Just kill him and let's go."

I shook my head. "He's got to suffer. Just like Gemma suffered."

"You've just crushed his entire pelvic region. Don't you think that's suffering enough?"

"No. They all have to pay," I whispered.

"Who's all of them, Red?" he asked. "Everyone that played a part in Gemma's life? The dealers I get. The boyfriend I get. Hell, even the drug suppliers I get. But what about her parents, and you, and everyone at the BPRD that didn't act soon enough to stop the damn fairies from doing this in the first place? Do we all deserve to pay?"

Mom... Julie.

It wasn't until I felt Abe's hand on mine that I had realized my eyes were closed and leaking tears.

"Let's go."

I'd reverted back to my Gemma form before we'd made it to the door. Liz was standing guard outside.

"Burn it," Abe said. "Nothing but ash."

She nodded once and reached out to set a hand on my shoulder, giving it a single squeeze before entering the bar. A second later, I heard the tell-tale sound of her powers activating.

~O~

Dad was waiting for us by his car when we got back to headquarters. I watched as he pocketed his cell phone. Worry was dragging on his face as I stepped out of the passenger side of the Jeep. Abe insisted on driving back, not that I blamed him.

"Are you okay?" asked Dad as he slowly approached.

I shook my head. "Not really."

We both stood there, with me avoiding his eyes and him looking at me, not knowing what to do.

"I'm going to stay here tonight."

"Gemma..."

I finally gathered enough courage to look at him. "The people that sold Gemma the drugs and the guy that got her hooked... I took care of them tonight. They won't be destroying anymore families."

He blinked at me and then swallowed before glancing at Abe, who was holding himself back by the driver’s side. My instinct told me that Abe was probably throwing non-verbal signals at Dad. When his eyes returned to mine, I licked my lips and fidgeted.

Dad gave me a single nod. "Thank you." He cleared his throat. "We'll see you tomorrow morning then?"

I nodded.

Then he did something that I wasn't expecting. He stepped into me and wrapped his arms around my back in a comforting hug. Turning my head, I set it on his chest and sighed away the tight feeling that was in my own.

He wasn't Father, and he wasn't even Gemma's real dad, but for the moment it was enough to not be rejected for either reason. The man seemed to care either way, and not a lot of guys out there can reach that level of compassion given what he had faced over the last few days.

He backed away and I straightened up.

"I'll be home after breakfast."

~O~

The elevator worked, sort of. We had to bypass the safety setting that got triggered when I tore off the door on S4, until it got replaced. I grimaced. That was probably coming out of my paycheck.

Abe escorted me to my room and waited while I took a shower. He was sitting at my desk, puffing away on a Cohiba and nursing a shot of tequila that he must have gotten from his room. I never touched the hard stuff, well usually.

All I had to wear was my old clothes which amounted to an old dress shirt and that was about it.

Abe coughed and then averted his eyes when he saw me. He waited until I found my way to a chair and covered my lower half with one of Father's afghans.

He kept his eyes away from me when he decided to address the situation. "This can't happen again, Red."

I sighed and looked at a blank corner where the wall met the ceiling. "I'm not done yet. The suppliers have to be dealt with and then there are the rest of the sewer fairies."

Silence sat between us for a good thirty seconds.

"Will that satisfy you?"

I rubbed at my temples, trying to ease the tension. "Nothing would satisfy me, but at least I'd know there won’t be any more teenage girls that are dead because of them.”

The chair he was sitting in squeaked as he sat forward. “That Hand, Red. You’ve really got to watch yourself.”

My eyes ticked to the bracelet. The stone almost pulsed with energy. It was like I could feel the contentment it felt. I knew it was sentient in some way. For now, it seemed like our goals were one and the same. I’d deal with it later.

“I’m tired Abe.”

~O~

The next morning I dressed in the clothes I had on the night previous and headed out. I was in no mood to be coddled by Abe and after the show I put on I didn’t want to see Liz’s face at that moment. The only thing that was on my agenda was to get home and change out of my work clothes and into something that made me feel a little less like a monster.

The traffic was sedate, being Sunday and all. When I came to the intersection of Stella Link and feeder road of the Loop, I looked to the right, frowned and briefly closed my eyes. The local church that keeps the BPRD loaded up with blessings and all, Corpus Christi Catholic, was right around the corner. It’s where I would go before most particularly dangerous missions. I used to have a pretty good relationship with God. Now I wasn’t so sure.

A car horn sounded behind me. Casting a glance in the rearview, I turned my blinker on and made a right. Me and God had to have a little talk. Granted he didn’t do much, conversation wise, on his side of the fence, but it had to be done all the same.

Leaving the Samaritan under the seat, I checked the forty-five in the cross draw holster. It was kind of frowned on to bring weapons like that in the house of God, but I already had enough sin on my shoulders.

When I entered the front doors, I paused at the water basin, dipping the tips of my fingers in and traced the cross over myself. I’d already had Father’s rosary wrapped around my left wrist and the crucifix firmly in my palm.

“May I help you?”

Father Sanchez had his office at the front of the church so he could pounce on anyone he didn’t recognize. I suppose that would be me in that instance. Without saying anything, I pulled out my ID and handed it over.

Watching his eyebrows raise and then his doubtful gaze settle upon me gave me hope that even those of the Cloth needed something other than blind faith to believe.

“It’s me, Padre. We need to talk.”

I waited until he got one of the sisters to watch the front before he led me to his office and shut the door. He didn’t even bother starting in on me; he just picked up the phone and called Abe.

I took my regular seat in the corner, furthest away from where I knew he perched. After a brief chat, he sat the phone in its cradle.

“Abe is happy that you decided to stop by.”

A scowl dropped over my face.

“Would you like to tell me what happened?”

With a reluctant sigh, I brought him up to speed on everything. Not a lot fazes Father Sanchez. Me killing myself and waking up in my daughter’s body didn’t even result in a tick of his cheek. He’d seen a lot. It was one of the reasons that he was the goto guy for the BPRD.

When I got to the part about finding out that I was my own daughter, he stopped me. I guess he’d seen something in my face.

“Do you need Confession, Red?”

I closed my eyes and ran my fingers of them. “Not yet. For confession to actually work, I have to regret my sins.” Looking up at him, I clenched my fingers around Father’s crucifix. “Thing is, I don’t.”

Shaking my head, I stood up. “I’m sorry. This was a mistake. I shouldn’t have come here today.”

“Sit,” he ordered.

It’s kind of odd to hear a priest give sharp orders like that, but the Padre and I go back a couple of years. He knew my attitude and he also knew that I respected him. Reluctantly I sat, but wound up squirming in my chair.

“You’re treading dangerous waters, my son…” He paused and shook his head. “How do I refer to you now?”

“Gemma, please. I’m not entirely Red anymore.”

With a confirming nod, he continued. “Very well. As I implied before, you are at a crossroads. I am unsure as to the implications of your suicide. Your mortal life was ended by your own hand, however God chose for you to remain on the mortal realm. It’s not hard to assume that you serve a greater purpose with your return.”

Pressing my lips together, I looked up at him and then away again.

“That it is in your daughter’s body that you returned… it’s confusing. Perhaps it is a penance you serve for your role in her life, or perhaps it is a reward for what you were willing to sacrifice by not letting that relic fall into the hands of those that would bring about the end of days. We aren’t meant to understand the will of God.”

The idea that my semi-resurrection was a reward hadn’t really occurred to me. All the indicators pointed toward punishment. In my eyes they still do.

“What I can’t condone is the killing of those responsible.”

I looked up at him again, biting the inside of my lip in order to keep my mouth shut. It wasn’t surprising that the Padre wasn’t an old school, eye for an eye type. That’s where our interpretation of the Bible differed.

“They have to pay, Padre, and some of the people involved are police. I won’t see justice done otherwise.”

“Justice or vengeance?”

An amused grunt escaped from my throat. “It’s got to be one or the other? I was always of the opinion that they ran hand in hand.”

“That’s where you would be wrong. It is not for you to decide who is guilty or not. There’s a higher power at work here. Leave the judgment to Him.”

It was a bitter pill that he was trying to make me swallow and I didn’t know if I was capable of that anymore.

The Padre stood and walked around the desk to stand before me. “Resume your duties, Gemma. Leave the apprehension of the guilty to me. I have certain connections in the HPD internal affairs division that will see to it those responsible pay for their role in this crime.”

He said his priestly mumbo jumbo and made the sign of the cross over me. I didn’t feel any better, but I still hadn’t had my chat with the big guy yet.

~O~

Before entering the chapel I dipped a couple of fingers in the fount up front and crossed myself. It being the middle of the day, it was deserted enough that I knew I wouldn’t be bothered and the Padre would see to it the nuns kept their distance.

I sat on the second row of pews and looked up at the crucifix. My eyes followed the sad bloodied face of Christ.

“Hey, it’s me again. I know you have a lot things you’d rather be doing than listening to me right now, but if you could spare a few minutes I’d appreciate it.”

I shifted a little and bowed my head.

“I’m really messed up right now. The Padre thinks this is all part of some plan of yours and if it is then I guess I’ll deal with it like I always do. If you could give me a little bit of a break here with all the drama I’d appreciate that too. I know it’s not like there won’t be more, but dying and coming back as my own daughter… man, that was a little cruel, don’t you think?

“Anyway…”

Gripping Father’s rosary, I brought it up to the back of the pew in front of me and just stared at it.

“Okay, I take it all back. Just… just… I don’t care what happens to me. Just make sure Gemma gets a decent place up there with the rest of you guys. She didn’t deserve any of this. I should have been there for her. But I guess that’s all part of your plan, huh?

“As much stuff that I’ve gone through… everything that I’ve lost… you owe me. Make sure Gemma is in a good place and I’ll call it square.”

I unwrapped the rosary from my wrist and stood to make my way out. The Padre was standing at the back. When I made it to his side he held out his hand for a shake. Instead I gripped it and left the rosary in his grasp.

“Give it to someone that needs it. I’m kind of done here. Have a nice life Padre.”

Before I left he called out one last thing to me.

“Red, you can abandon God, but he won’t abandon you. I’ll be here if you ever want someone to just talk to.”

I paused at the door and then opened it, leaving without looking back.

End, for now.