"Joan, I'm leaving," Mom called. I said nothing, but I watched as she left the house. I was alone for the first time in ages, and I was going to have fun.

God sent me a message yesterday afternoon. He wanted me to treat myself to a little bit, so I bought myself a series of books and I'm going to sit down and read them whenever no one's around, just so I can get lost in my own thoughts for once.

I was through the first ten pages when the phone rang. I ignored it and kept reading, expecting that it was a friend. It rang again five minutes later, but again I ignored it. I then heard a car pull up in the driveway. I scoffed and considered showing in an ugly gesture, but I decided not to, especially when I realized it was someone else and they were banging on my door. Whoever it wanted to get our attention was banging on the door, pounding it so hard I could feel it on the floorboards of the stairs. It scared me, so I stopped. I then heard a voice say 'go for it' and a boot busted through the wood. I ran upstairs and into my parents' room, locking the door behind me. I looked around, looking for some sort of weapon. My dad's guns were with him because he was on-duty, and his other gun was in its case. I scoffed at his 'security issues' and listened to the men. There were at least two, I knew that, and both were talking downstairs. I couldn't understand their words at all, so I kept searching.

Mom had a baseball bat under her side of the bed, but those men were huge to my frightened eyes, so I put it back down. I went into their closet and felt around the edges. A shoebox had a small pistol inside with my mother's initials. I picked it up and checked to see if it was loaded. I then thanked my dad for teaching me how to use a gun as I went down the back stairs towards the kitchen.

The largest of the two men sat eating the sub sandwich I had saved for my lunch. I wanted to shoot him right there, but I felt someone's presence behind me. I turned to see a small girl.

"Wait until they're together, then shoot one wherever the other's gun is pointing. While they're arguing, get them both," she whispered. Her voice was too high for them to hear, but I understood every word. The smaller man came into the room.

"Why are you eating? Come on, man, we're here on business! I asked you to look for anyone. Have you been upstairs?" he asked. He was gesturing with his gun-holding hand. I fired a shot where he was aiming, right into the mans stomach. He screamed in pain and the two began squabbling over the shot.

"You shot me!"

"I didn't even touch the trigger!"

"How the hell do I know that? The wound is near where your gun was pointing, and now…," he started, but they were even with each other, pointing weapons and everything. I fired once into the smaller guy and then again into the large guy. After a minute, the small man stopped squirming, and the large guy was gasping for air. I ran upstairs to my phone and called the police. They sent an ambulance and a fire truck within the first five minutes, but they didn't arrive themselves until it was too late. The paramedics and firefighters were waiting on the police to tell them to go inside, and the police were waiting to make sure it was over. Either way, the police held up everything and I had killed two men.

"Ma'am?" the officer called. I looked up to him from in front of my closet. I was still in my school outfit, complete with black eyeliner, but sudden tears had turned me into a teenage girl who looked like a zombie. He led me to an unmarked car, and I had to wait for the paramedics to check me out. After that, I was driven to the police department and my finger prints were taken.

"Am I being arrested?" I asked shakily. The woman shook her head and led me into an interrogation room. My father and another man then entered the room. I walked up to my dad and cried into his shoulder. He patted it softly and asked me to sit down.

"Joan, I need your statement on what happened," he whispered. I nodded and told them the story. The other man wrote everything down and without saying anything back. When I was done, he got everyone in the room to sign the statement. He then left.

"What's going to happen to me?" I cried. Dad sat down in the chair across from me.

"The investigators will determine the motive, but otherwise nothing will happen," he replied softly. "You were brave today, Joan. I'm proud of you. This lets me know that my little girl is growing up into a little warrior. It makes me happy to see you cry too. You need to show more emotions, Joan. Now, we need to call your mother."

We called her, but she didn't answer. We were sitting there five minutes when the phone rang. An accident had happened, and she was in the local emergency room with my brothers. We immediately left the police department, after telling them where we were going.

When we got to the hospital, the boys met us and told us what had happened. Mom was at an intersection near the house. She called me and got no answer, but no one knows why she called because she didn't leave a message. Well, at the next intersection she noticed someone following her. They hit her from behind at the next intersection, and now Mom was in surgery for her neck. Dad immediately excused himself from us and called into the station for more details. I then told the boys what happened to me. We all agreed that it was strange that two incidents would happen at once. We all agreed that the person following Mom must have made a mistake by hitting her. We decided that they were watching her to see when she was coming back. That was probably the second call, we concluded.

"Kids, we have to go," Dad said suddenly. We didn't even see him enter the waiting room. We left our spots, having to pace ourselves to keep up with him.

"Dad, what's going on?" I asked. He shook his head and led us into the elevator. He stopped it in between the floors.

"We're being targeted. We're about to spit up, but it's for the good. We'll meet up again, I promise you, but you must obey what I'm telling you. Joan, my secretary is picking you up. He has dark hair. Boys, each of your drivers are blondes. Mine is a red head. We'll be driven around on the highways until dark comes, then we'll all be led to a safe house. Mom is safe here. Now, are you ready?"

We all nodded in response, and we let the elevator start again. When it stopped, we went separate ways to look for our cars. Each were blue, unmarked, Chryslers with their visors down. I quickly found mine and got into the car. Dad's secretary nodded to me and handed me a hat and sunglasses. I then noticed another man in the backseat.

"Who's that?" I asked.

"He's fine," he replied, driving us to a highway. No one followed us as we drove around for two hours. None of us said a word, and when darkness hit we started driving north from where we were. I fell asleep then, having nothing better to do, but I could only dream about the gunmen and the little girl giving me my plan. When I woke up, another gun was in my face. It was the man in the backseat, and Dad's secretary was dead.