Estranged [Completed]

Remembering

The answer was August. Kalei didn't figure it out until September. Luckily, Samantha's death certificate read "August twenty-eighth."

After her sessions, Kalei usually tracked down Terin. The first time she saw him, she claimed she wanted to know more about Xamic, but she really just wanted to know how her family was doing.

He told her what she wanted to know, that Xamic was an unrepentant frat-boy genius who lived only for the high. Then, without any further prompt from Kalei, he told her that her family was safe. After that, she dropped the act and just asked him every time she saw him. He never gave any details, but he always told her they were safe. After a while, the conversations became a simple glance and a reassuring nod. Kalei could call Terin a lot of things, but she could never call him a liar.

"Grandpa" was the weirdest name to call him. She was still trying to wrap her head around that one.

At first, she was revolted to be related to the man who had killed her parents. But it made sense. The love in his eyes when he saw Mom. The hug. The tears of joy on his face. The sheer horror when he'd realized what he had done. It made sense. And now she knew why he was so adamant about keeping her away from Fenn and the girls. She got it now. And she could respect what he'd been through. She couldn't forgive him, but she could respect him.

Kalei wondered if Jenna knew, but she didn't bother to ask. She never saw her sister and she never asked to find out where she was. It was better that way. Kalei didn't want anything to do with Jenna after what she had done.

When Kalei wasn't working on her memories, or just sitting around wondering how the hell she ended up here in the first place, she found Erit and helped him track down information. There weren't many leads. Mostly just addicts who would tell them anything they wanted to hear, and dead end tips called in by concerned civilians. After a while, Erit pushed Kalei to spend more time sorting out Samantha's memories. The more their leads fell through, the more he became convinced that Samantha could provide key information.

During one of these solitary memory meditations, Mar came up and paid Kalei a visit. She asked, "No hard feelings about leaving you in that cage, right?"

Kalei shrugged. "You were just keeping yourself out of trouble. I can't hold that against you."

"Damn right." Mar sat down next to her. "You know, things have gotten a lot stupider since you left. I got assigned to a team of fucking kids. One of them spends so much time focusing on his nails that he damn near walks into a wall if you don't steer him in the right direction. I'm trying to get Terin to reassign me to whatever you're working on."

Kalei was touched that Mar wanted to work with her again, but she was also a bit surprised. "Why do you want to work with us? You don't even know what we're working on."

"I don't care. Whatever it is, I'm sure it's a hell of a lot better than patrolling the fence with a bunch of piss-heads." Mar leaned back. "So, you visit your sister yet?"

Kalei gave Mar a sideways glance. "Since when do you know I have a sister?"

"Hell, everyone knows. I can't believe I didn't see the family resemblance sooner. But hey, your sister don't make it easy with all her crazy haircuts and makeup. Anyway, Shenaia, Jenna, whoever the hell she is, I hear she's got a pretty sweet room down on the third floor. Rumor has it she's got—"

Kalei cut Mar off and stiffly replied, "No. I haven't been to visit her. Now bug off. I've got meditating to do."

Mar grunted, bemused. "That's harsh."

Kalei didn't see the humor in it. "You want to talk about harsh? Some man is dead because of her! Who knows what kind of family he left behind, or how many people will miss—" Kalei cried out as a shooting pain sliced through her skull; it felt like an ice pick had just emerged in the core of her brain and was trying to make its way to her forehead.

"What is it?"

Kalei held up a hand to shut up Mar. One of Samantha's memories was working its way through. Kalei's own memory of the man lying on the ground shifted to one of the man standing up. But he was lying down – now he was standing up – down – up...Her mind fought the contradiction, but another burst of pain hammered into the invisible icepick. With a mental shove, Kalei forced the two memories apart. She tried to focus on the new one— to pull it through gently before it ripped itself through whatever barrier her mind had erected between herself and Samantha.

The dead man was standing; talking, even. He seemed wary as Kalei-Samantha asked him for directions. The man tried to brush her off, but Samantha pulled off a glove and showed him clear nails, assuring him that she was harmless. At that, the man relaxed a bit.

Samantha put the glove into her pocket and asked if the man lived nearby. He said he lived just up the street, and asked her to repeat where it was she was trying to go. Samantha smiled and said that he could give her directions on the way, and offered to help him carry his groceries home. She could see his well-toned muscles bulging beneath the weight of so many bags. The man politely refused, noting that he only had a couple of bags.

That was when Jenna showed up. She emerged from a side street, haggard and frantic. When she saw the two on the sidewalk, she gave a painful grunt and bit down on her fist. But then she recognized Samantha. "Hey, can you hook me up? I need—"

While the man with the groceries was distracted by Jenna's arrival, Samantha's ungloved hand shot out and closed around the man's arm. 

He screamed.