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I banged the bathroom door shut. "I hope you have makeup with you, Cindy..."
"Right here." She pulled a small compact out of her pocket. "I wish I hadn't messed it up like that..."
"I know you don't want to talk about it," I said quietly as she washed her face, "but what..."
"Just a sec..." She wiped the last smeared makeup off with a paper towel, and licked her lips nervously. "Dawna...remember when I told you about being a street kid in Barton?"
"Yeah," I said, then "Don't tell me this started then!"
"I had to," she gulped. "Otherwise I would have been arrested..."
"What were you doing then?" I asked. When she didn't answer, I went on, "Let me guess...were you some ninja assassin or something?"
"You've been watching too many movies, Dawna!" she snapped. "No, nothing like that, of course..."
"Then what?"
She started to cry again. "Please...don't hate me...I had to eat...what else did I have to sell?"
"Oh." I got what she was talking about then. "When you were eight?"
"There's always been creeps in the world," she said, not looking at me. "It helped that I looked younger..."
"But Leon caught you."
She wiped her eyes and started putting makeup back on. "I wasn't the only one. I'm sure he had it going with all the girls...but I was the only one to get a decent job. One that could keep it going... I guess I should have dumped him when I got the janitor job. They wouldn't have fired me for that then...but I was afraid. Please understand, Dawna."
"Of course I do!" I wasn't sure what to make of this. "I've had hard times too, I was just older and luckier then you. But...Cindy, the station wouldn't have fired you over that, would they?"
"They have a reputation to keep up, sweetie. Finding out that their star reporter had been a...well, it would have threatened it. And I'm sure Leon would feel no shame in threatening to tell the world if I wasn't sacked." She dabbed at her lipstick with a paper towel. "You have remarkable presence of mind, Dawna. That Sniper line...well, at least our obsessing over him has done some good!"
I was triumphantly happy the moment before we stepped out of the bathroom. I was not the next. Gambino and the alien Mother were strolling down the hall toward us. "Oh, great!" I muttered. "Cindy, can you distract him?"
He'd already seen me. "Dawna, what happened to you?" he said quickly. "I know you had blond hair when you were a baby, did it turn black or something?"
"Yeah, with the help of a bottle of dye!" I snapped, deciding it would be best to be rude. "Anyway, I thought you were busy trying to have me destroyed when I was a baby."
"No..." Gambino said slowly. "I only wanted that...thing to be destroyed. When the Labtechs found out how to make you human, I didn't mind." Cindy tried to say something, but he went on, "I suppose I should have kept you, like I did with Gino. But..." Either Gambino was acting very well, or he was really upset. His purple eyes were filled with tears. "I couldn't take remembering how much pain I'd caused... I loved your mother, Dawna."
"Then why did you make her be the..." I spat the next words at him. "The mother for one of your experiments?"
"I didn't make her...she wanted to be. She wanted to be the mother of my heir, in body, not just in genes."
"But you killed her." I glared at him. "And tried to kill me, and then ruined the life I had when you killed my family..."
"Your family?" He seemed truly surprised. "You mean in Aekea?"
"Yeah," I snapped, "don't act so innocent. You had that crane fall on my house, didn't you? It was just lucky I wasn't there!"
"When...when was this?" he asked haltingly.
"Just after New Years."
"You know I wasn't around then."
"Ohreally?" I laughed bitterly. "What about Gamgino?"
"I had no idea..." He looked at the alien Mother, but she was staring the other way. "Dawna, untill tonight I thought you were safe in Aekea, being a normal teenage girl..."
"Working in a factory and happy with life?" I said sourly. "Yeah, I would have been if my whole life hadn't been squashed as flat as the Von Helsons."
"I didn't do that!" he shouted. "Dawna, I want you to stay here. It's not safe for you...someone wants to wipe out all of our family, and they know that you're..."
"Well, it would help if you were a little more careful with hard drives and passwords!" I shouted back. "You didn't even notice that I already knew who I am, did you? Well, if you hadn't lost that G-Corp hard drive, and hadn't made the stupid password my name with Gambino on the end..."
"You saw that?" Gambino said in a much quieter voice. "Oh, gods... Dawna, you should never have seen that. I never meant you to know..."
"Well, I BLOODY WELL DON'T CARE!" I screamed. "I'm glad I know the truth, and that you killed my mother and don't care about me!" I ran the other way, past Cindy, who was white under her makeup, past a girl who was drunkenly staggering around, ignoring his shout of, "I loved your mother, Dawna! I didn't mean that to happen!"
I was lost for ages, but finally got outdoors. I vaguely remember sitting down beside the helicoper to wait for Cindy and Mike...
The next thing I knew, it was getting light, Mike was shaking me, and I felt horribly sick. "What are you doing here, Dawna?" he asked. "Cindy was worried sick..." I replied by being sick.
I spent the rest of the weekend in the room at the Hotel De Gambino that Cindy had got me, saying that the station would gladly pay the bill. I decided I would never drink another glass of champagne if I could help it.
I had to take another frightening helicoper ride back, but now I'm happy to be home again. Cindy's at work again and left me home again, but Lady Luck's here, and I feel safe. I've decided to forget my encounter with Gambino. I don't need to deal with him, I don't want to deal with him, and I have all the family and happiness I want here. Dealing with him would just ruin things.
I know that if he reconized me as his daughter, I'd have all the power and wealth I could want. I also know I'd lose every bit of happiness I have by becoming a corrupt, paranoid, rich pig like him. I'll take happiness!