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Author's Note: FFnet's formatting rules are stupid, but at least it saves me the trouble of having to go through and format every single line of pesterlog.

This is my take on what it would have been like for Dirk to grow up and raise Dave as if Sburb never happened. Obviously there's quite a bit of canon divergence, though I've tried to finagle it into something at least reasonably compliant. I'm sure it'll be jossed in the end, regardless.

- March, 1982 -

Your name is Dirk, and you are one, two, three, four years old. You're not quite sure what your last name is. You've heard it before, but every time you try to pronounce it, you mess up, so you've given up for the time being. It's Tuesday morning (you know because your mommy told you), and she didn't go to work today, so that she can take you to the doctor instead. You're not sure whether to be scared or pleased. On the one hand, you like your mommy way better than the babysitter who doesn't let you play with your toys. On the other, the last time you went to the doctor, they gave you a shot, and you cried. The fear of it happening again keeps you on your best behavior as your mommy leads you by the hand through the pediatric clinic.

The tiny, square patient room has a basket full of toys so wonderful and distracting that you almost forget why you're here. You gasp when the door swings open and a towering man in a bow tie and white coat looks down at you with a clipboard in hand.

"My man, my man!" he says, and in one fell swoop he lifts you high into the air and onto the paper-covered examining table. Your short little legs stick straight out in front of you as you stare at him. "What have we got here?"

You're not sure what you're supposed to say, and you freeze up, but then your mommy starts talking for you.

"Still the same problems as last time. Sensitivity to light, headaches, and sometimes he refuses to play outside."

Your four-year-old brain isn't able to comprehend much of what she's saying, but the doctor must get it, because he nods and marks something on his clipboard. "The results of the test from last time prove it. It's what I expected; he's displaying certain genetic markers for ocular albinism that make no sense. They can't have come from either you or your husband. Are you absolutely sure your husband is...?"

The doctor trails off, and you turn to see what he's looking at. Your mommy. You want to hide when you see how angry she is, though you don't think it's you she's angry with.

"I am one hundred percent certain," your mommy says.

"Very well. My apologies."

The doctor pulls out his otoscope, though in your head you call it the 'stupid shiny light'. You grimace even before he's gotten it up to your eyes. "Sorry, little man," he says, right before he flicks it on and practically blinds you. He has his thumb planted right above your eyebrow, so no matter how you wince and try to squint, you can't get away. Finally he lets you go and you slap your hands over your eyes, watching the colors dance as your temples throb. Stupid shiny light.

"As it is, his vision is normal. If we want to keep it that way, though, I suggest that he start wearing sunglasses that are large enough to protect his peripheral vision."

"What about when he goes to school next year?" says your mommy. "They won't let him wear sunglasses in class, and if they do, he might be teased."

"I'll write a letter to the the school explaining the situation. They'll let it slide. And, well, getting made fun of for wearing sunglasses might be better than the alternative in this case..."

You open your eyes again to see your mommy and the doctor both looking at you like they're sad.

You don't like it.

- June, 1991 -

Your name is Dirk Strider, and at thirteen years old, you are an utter twerp. It's not that you're angry or violent, or you have an awful home life; just the opposite, in fact. Your family is thoroughly middle class and white bread. Your problem is that you're bored.

Your parents are conservative socialites who sneered at hippies in the sixties and sneer at you and your friends today. So what if you mark up your skin with homemade tattoos, or wear wifebeaters? They look good on you, especially with your ubiquitous sunglasses. Who cares if your haircut is a little wild? Your mom's sporting an unironic Bob Ross bouffant. Your parents chase you and your friends out of the house and yell at you to be 'respectable', whatever that means.

You know it's tired and cliched, but you decide to rebel. You channel your boredom into misbehaving at the school you're already way too fucking smart for, you tell your mother her shoulder pads make her look like a linebacker, you tag buildings, shoplift a few things, and get caught.

"I'm disappointed in you," your father says after the first time the cops bring you home. You mostly tune him out as he bitches at you about responsibility and how you're making him look bad, blah blah, but one thing he says sticks with you, and it's something you'll recall later with a little more humility than you have now.

"One day you'll really get yourself into trouble, mister, and when you come looking for help, you'll wish you hadn't burned so many bridges." You yawn at him and his face gets redder and redder, making his blue eyes stand out that much more. "Get a hobby!" he screams.

You take up deejaying just to piss him off.

Maybe mixing had started off as another form of rebellion, but it proves to be surprisingly cathartic. You spend all of your allowance money on a massive set of headphones and you lock yourself in your room with your new turntables, experimenting with your parents' Burt Bacharach records. Eventually you get your own, Aretha Franklin and James Brown and Herbie Hancock, and you learn to loop and mix the drum break sections over other songs. You get a drum pad and learn to make your own breakbeats. You get a nice tape deck and start recording some of the stuff you come up with. You get a synthesizer and teach yourself how to play. You save up for months, buy a couple of amps and start performing at your friends' parties. You start getting paid for it.

You call yourself DJ Strider. It's totally predictable, but hey, in an ironic way it's sort of cool.

Get a hobby, your dad said. Best piece of advice he ever gave you.

- March, 1995 -

Your name is Dirk Strider, and you have never been so drunk in your life. Of course, you're seventeen, so it isn't like you have much experience to fall back on. You've been playing at this club for over a year now. Everyone here knows you're underage, but your new fake ID came in yesterday, and suddenly, no one gives a shit. You've had four beers, a whiskey sour and a Tom Collins, and your head is spinning faster than your turntables. You feel incredible.

The music is thrumming through your headphones, but even through the pounding bassline and the alcohol haze, you sense when you're being watched. When you open your eyes, there's a woman standing in front of you below the stage. She's the right age for clubbing, mid-twenties, but her weird-ass scientist getup is a little out of place here. There's no mistaking the way she's looking up at you—you've seen it before in the eyes of a hundred horny kids closer to your age. The woman's pert mouth is turned up in a smirk. You obligingly lift a headphone so that you can hear what she has to say, though you're pretty sure you already know what it is.

The woman's voice is rich and low when she leans in and speaks, cutting through the background noise with ease. Her breath smells like a martini. "Nice shoes. Wanna fuck?"

You're glad she can't see the way your eyes widen behind your shades. Even if you'd expected to get hit on, damn, that was forward. You quickly recover your cool and plaster your poker face back into place.

"Okay, lady. Let's assume for a moment that we've already gone through the basic pleasantries. Nice to meet you, pleasure's all mine, et cetera. Let's also assume for both our sakes that in the course of our introductions, you never asked me my age, giving both of us plausible deniability should anyone else have overheard what you just asked me." You're proud of how sober you've managed to sound.

She processes your words for a moment, and you can tell the instant it dawns on her by the way the corners of her mouth turn down. "Really? But I saw you at the bar getting drinks earlier."

"That doesn't mean anything," you shrug. "I'm only seventeen. S'what fake IDs are for."

Her lips quirk in amusement. "Naughty boy."

"I try."

You wait for the woman to leave, but she's still hanging around at the end of the next song, and the next, until you pull your headphones off again, exasperated. "Look. Do you always make it a point to hit on vulnerable, inebriated minors?"

"Not usually," she grins, cheeky as ever, "though I'm sure you're used to getting hit on all the time. But you should know that I don't do this..." she motions vaguely, "...type of thing very often."

"Special occasion?" you ask, flicking the mixer with one hand and seamlessly shifting from one song to the next.

Her eyes run up and down your body, lingering appreciatively on your biceps. "More like... exceptional circumstances."

Jesus Christ, she's tenacious. But you can't find it in you to be annoyed, because you're getting macked on by a woman way too old for you and you're pulling it off. You are the coolest coolkid. It's you. Maybe that's why you decide to take her up on her offer, despite the fact that you usually don't go for women—or perhaps it's simply your curiosity, which you never could resist.

"Alright," you say with an amused sigh, "but I'm sure you don't need me to tell you we can't be seen leaving together. So here's how it goes. My shift ends and I bust this joint at 12:30 on the dot. You wait ten minutes. Not eight, not twelve, ten. You follow me out, casually, and I'll be waitin' for you in the alley behind the dumpster. Got it?"

"Yeah, I'll be sure to check them out! Thanks for the rec, Mr. DJ!" the woman says a bit too loudly. You're confused for half a second, and then you notice the couple that's gyrating dangerously close to within earshot. The way the woman smirks at you assures you that she got the message, though. You slip her a business card for good measure, and she takes it before fading back into the crowd standing closer to the bar.

It's eleven now; just enough time to come to grips with the idea that you've agreed to a clandestine sexual tryst with an older foxy scientist chick. It's not like you're a virgin or anything, but it seems different, more real when it's not another seventeen-year-old you'll be putting the signature Strider moves on. You sure as shit hope you're able to impress your mystery woman. You take another long swig of your Tom Collins—you need it.

Your set ends at twelve, and by then you're soused enough that your hands don't shake as you pack up and captchalogue your turntables. You pick up your pay at 12:23, stop to take a leak at 12:28, and at 12:30 and zero seconds you are casually shaking the water from your hands in the alley behind the club.

Mystery woman has beat you there. Goddammit, why does no one ever listen?

"Awfully fast, aren't you?" she muses.

"I have my ways." You flashstep behind her, to make a point, but aside from the flutter in her hair your sudden presence causes, she doesn't react. Normally this would annoy you. Now it just makes your tight jeans feel that much tighter. Damn, you love a challenge.

Other nights you take the bus back to your parents' from the club, but you allow yourself to get tugged toward a cab parked on the adjacent corner. The cab has a built-in car phone, and you think about asking to use it to call your parents, but you're not sure that even you are capable of writing something that lame off as irony. If your parents flip about you being out all night, you'll just tell them you crashed at a friend's. They'll get over it.

The two of you end up in a seedy hotel toward the edge of town, paid for in cash by the woman, who still hasn't told you her name. That's cool with you, though. If she wants to be all aloof, well, that suits you just fine. You're a little surprised when she starts stripping first thing when the door closes, but hey, that suits you too. You start stripping in kind.

"Rainbow Brite panties?" the woman asks a little incredulously after you've peeled off your straight-legged black jeans.

You lift one shoulder, unabashed. "It's ironic."

The woman quirks a brow.

She'd remarked earlier how fast you are, but when all your clothes are off and you're on the lumpy bed together, you show her how intense and thorough the Strider moves can be when it comes to foreplay. Any facade of sobriety and decorum she might have been wearing goes flying out the window when you touch her. She shudders, murmuring drunken filth into your ear. She writhes as you trace a slow, deliberate path down her sternum with your tongue, your fingers searing into her hips. She screams as your lips close around her clit.

She's already come twice by the time you finally get around to sticking it to her—score one for Strider. A combination of alcohol and previous success has ratcheted your confidence all the way up to dizzying heights, and you crouch on all fours over her with a grin. You don't flinch when she reaches up and gently plucks the sunglasses off your head.

"Beautiful," she says softly as she stares into your uncovered eyes. She's one to speak; her own eyes seem to have an impossible pink sheen in the dim light that's more than a little sexy. Of course it's even more gratifying to watch those eyes drop closed in unbridled pleasure when you ease into her.

Thanks to your practically nonexistent refractory period, you manage to get off three times in the two hours you have the hotel room.

It's only after she's called you a cab and you've sneaked back into your bedroom at home that you realize that neither of you mentioned anything about protection.

- April, 1996 -

It's an unseasonably hot April morning when you are awakened by a godawful racket outside your apartment door. Somehow you're able to sleep through several rounds of your alarm clock going off, but this sudden—well, whatever it is—has you flopping gracelessly from your bed and onto the floor. You let out a curse, push yourself to your feet and shimmy into your jeans.

It's seven in the morning, not even ironically cool. You swear you're going to have a talk with the landlord. You didn't split your parents' joint to live in a...

Oh fuck.

The closer you get to the apartment door, the more the sound, which you'd taken to be a cat or a bird, resolves itself into something else. Holy shit, that's a baby. It's screaming its head off about something, and it doesn't stop when you open the door.

There is a baby on your doorstep. Why is there a baby on your doorstep.

This early in the morning your brain isn't exactly up to speed, and so your first reaction is to panic. You start to breathe faster, your fingers tightening around the door frame, until your natural Strider chill kicks in. You tamp down on the panic and force your body to relax. So there's a baby on your doorstep; ain't no thing. Somebody probably just misplaced it.

"Did anybody lose a baby?" you call down the deserted hallway.

You wait a couple of minutes, but you don't see or hear anyone rushing to come to their apartment door. Makes sense; you suppose they would have heard the baby before they heard you anyway. You shuffle over to the window near the top of the stairwell and peer down at the city streets below. No cops, nobody looking around in a panic, nobody entering or exiting the door to your building. Nobody around at all.

Some unseen slight causes the baby to start crying louder, high, piercing wails that hurt your sensitive ears something fierce. "Alright, alright," you grumble, and you crouch down to get a closer look. The thing is wrapped in a red blanket and seated in baby carrier with the sun hood drawn down. You push the hood back to reveal the baby's face—and you pause.

It's maybe four months old, pale skinned, with hair so blond it's nearly white. And when it opens its eyes, the irises are red.

Your fingers shoot to your face to run along your cheekbones, just under your own unnaturally orange eyes. Sure, shades are cool, but they've always served multiple purposes. With your shades on, no one can tell what you're thinking or where you're looking. But more importantly, they serve as a barrier between the rest of the world and your freakish eyes. A rare 'recessive gene allele', you remember the doctor calling it. An inherited oddity.

There's really only one explanation for the equally unnatural eyes looking up at you, for the fine, silver-blond hair, for the face that you can already see bits of yourself in.

Fuck.

It's an hour later by the time your brain quits racing and you can think rationally again. You've looked at it from every angle, examined every detail, and there's pretty much no way this kid isn't yours. It's been over a year since your one-night-stand with that foxy scientist lady, and while you'd worried a bit at first about forgetting a condom, you hadn't heard from her since then. Just when you were starting to relax...

It's too ironic, even for you.

The baby makes a gurgling noise from where you'd set the carrier on the sofa beside you. You peer blearily through your fingers at it as though blaming it for the fucked up mess your life has suddenly become. What kind of person leaves a baby outside somebody's door these days, anyway? What the fuck was going through this woman's head when she decided this was a good idea? You're barely eighteen, only freshly moved out on your own. What if you were planning to go to college? You weren't, but it's the idea that your entire life for the next eighteen years has just been dictated to you that rankles you. A huge part of you is terrified, but a significant percentage of the rest of you is angry. This isn't fair.

"God fucking dammit," you groan in despair as you reach into the carrier to pull the baby out. It comes out easily. You're not an expert at holding young children, but its head doesn't roll off, so that's a good sign. You take a stealthy peek inside its diaper, feeling wrong, though you know it's ridiculous. This is your child for fuck's sake. Oh, okay, it's a boy. Definitely a boy. Your son, then.

There's something stuffed in the back of his diaper. Dangerous place to hide something, you think bitterly. There's a huge wad of cash, all in hundreds, which your heart jumps hopefully at, and a slightly crumpled photograph. You pull the photo from the baby's diaper and rest him on your lap to get a better look at it. Your mouth goes dry. It's a Polaroid shot of two babies. Not one, two. One of them is the baby currently wriggling where he lies cradled between your thighs. The other, a baby girl, looks just like him. A twin? When you flip the photo over, scrawled on the back in messy pink chickenscratch are three words.

'Dave and Rose'.

A son and a daughter. You have a son and a daughter, and until an hour ago, you had no idea they existed. But why would their mother leave one with you and keep the other? Unless she'd left them both, and one of them had been kidnapped before you got to them. The idea is ridiculous and shouldn't make you nervous, but it does. You twist around and frantically start pawing through the baby carrier, looking for any sort of clue to the contrary. You find it. There's a book stashed under the lining of the carrier, the only other thing inside. When you see the title, you're caught between intense relief and burning fury. 'The Single Dad's Guide to Raising a Healthy Son'. What kind of passive aggressive bullshit is this?

You guess you could give the baby boy (Dave, you remind yourself) up for adoption. That would be so much easier. If you don't, he'll have to live with you, and holy shit, baby-proofing and burping and feeding and changing diapers and fuck fuck fuck. Your other options are kind of limited. You could try and find the mother, but you have nothing to go on. No name, no idea what she does, no clue where she's from. You could get the police involved. They might be able to backtrack, cross-reference hospital records and birth certificates and find her that way. But if she won't take him...

Idea. You very gently set Dave back in the carrier and pace toward the phone. You dial your parents' number, pretending not to be anxious and mentally schooling your voice into something normal.

"Hello?" Your mom answers the phone.

"Mom," you say, trying for casual, but your voice quavers.

She must be able to hear it, because she makes a noise in the back of her throat, a pitying sound. "Dirky. What's wrong?"

You fall silent for a moment, trying to coerce your racing thoughts into something coherent you can tell her. "It's... complicated." But Dave makes things easy for you. He chooses that very moment to let out a screech in the background that quickly turns into a wail.

"Dirk, is that–" she says breathlessly, and you can practically hear her mouth drop open. "Oh my god..."

"Yeah," is all you're able to respond with.

Before she can say anything else, your dad picks up the other handset, and you can immediately tell he's livid. "What the fuck do you think you're doing calling us?" he growls. "Didn't I tell you I never wanted to speak to you again?"

He did, but up until now, it hasn't mattered to you. "Please, Dad," you say, and you hate the way it sounds like you're begging. "I don't know what to do here. I... this is your grandson, for fuck's sake."

Your dad's voice is cold when next he speaks, and you remember what he said to you all those years ago about burning bridges. "I'd have to have a son to have a grandson. I don't know what you're talking about."

A click and the line goes dead. You hang up the phone in its cradle, feeling a little numb and a lot resigned, and you scratch at the skin under your eye with a pinky. "Fuck." It's just an itch, goddammit. You're certainly not thinking about how difficult it would be to give up your kid, or what it would be like to grow up wondering why not one, but both your parents had abandoned you.

You want to fight it, but deep down you know your decision has already been made. You know what you have to do.

It's easy to establish for sure that you're the father of the baby; a quick paternity test takes care of that. Tracking down his mother or any other information about him proves more difficult.

"It's like I told you, Mr. Strider," the cop is saying, "if he wasn't born at a hospital, there's no telling whether there's so much as a record of his birth. There are no children named David born in Texas in the last six months that are unaccounted for."

"What am I supposed to do then, make him a new birth certificate?" you ask, running your fingers through your hair before pulling your cap back on.

The cop nods. "Go to the clerk of court with a doctor's educated guess as to when he was born, and they'll take care of it."

So you do. The pediatrician who examines Dave places his age at about four and a half months, which lines up with when he was conceived. When you have his birth certificate made, you list his date of birth as December third. What to put in the 'name' blank takes a bit more thought on your part. You entertain the idea of renaming the baby something ridiculous like 'Ziuqrotset', just to spite his mother, but in the end you think 'Dave' suits him just fine. David Julian Strider. (Okay, so it's the tiniest bit ridiculous and self-indulgent, but at least the kid won't get the joke until he's older.)

"Welcome home, Dave," you say as you kick open the front door of your apartment. You have to stop in the doorway and stare for a while just to convince yourself you're in the right place. It's so clean. "Welcome home."

- June, 1996 -

It's a massive adjustment to move from underemployed lowlife to father, but you're coping. You've cleaned up your act, tossed your pot stash and your liquor, and cut some of the worst of your asshole friends out of your life (not that they want anything to do with you now that you have a kid). You've been taking all the odd jobs you can, working from home or scraping together change to pay a babysitter. And though it would probably have killed your own father, you suck it up and go on welfare. It's not so bad.

Your sex life has taken a hit as well, though not necessarily by choice. No matter how adorable people seem to think you are while carrying around a miniature-you, it also makes them less likely to come home with you.

Oh well; you know firsthand how careless one-night-stands can end.

At least Dave is a good baby, so you're told—everything you've learned about them you learned in the past two months. He eats when he's supposed to, sleeps through (most of) the night, and doesn't cry much. He doesn't laugh a lot either, but his eyes are bright and attentive and follow your movements when you're tooling around the apartment.

The only bad thing is that you're not quite sure he knows who you are. The parenting book, which you'd never admit you'd looked at, talks about how babies don't begin to form real attachments to people until they're several months old, and while Dave is just entering that stage, he hasn't known you for long enough to truly understand you're his caretaker. Sometimes he looks at you like you're a stranger, and if he starts to cry, no amount of cuddling and shooshing will calm him down.

Tonight is just one of those nights. It's been a long day, so you don't blame Dave for being a bit fussy and cranky. You do need to go to bed eventually, though, so his stubborn refusal to fall asleep is going to be a problem before long. You try walking around with him and rubbing his back, but he's not having any of it tonight. Finally Dave gets so frustrated that he begins to wail full-out. You resign yourself to the fact that you need to try something different.

"You really don't want me to sing, little dude," you warn him as you bounce him in your arms to no avail. "I'm pretty sure I'm horrible at it." Not to mention that you don't know any lullabies. As a young child you'd always preferred to fall asleep on your own over listening to stupid nonsense songs. But maybe it doesn't have to be something traditional—after all, is anything about your situation traditional?

"I hope this works," you mutter as you switch on your stereo and drop a CD in the tray. You pick the slowest mix you've got, a mellow trip hop track you'd composed earlier this year. The disc spins up, and after a short burst of static, the music begins to play. Like magic Dave begins to quiet down by degrees, at first fascinated by the sound coming from the speakers, and then soothed by the low, pulsating drone of the synths.

In five minutes, he's out like a light.

Of course, not everything about childrearing is sunshine and roses. The next morning you get a dose of just how shitty having a kid can be sometimes. Between last night's little episode and your own typical insomnia, you got maybe four hours of sleep, and you're not really in the mood for Dave to start screaming first thing in the morning.

"Jesus dick," you say, rubbing at your eyes with the heels of your hands. "Come on, little dude, I don't need this right now. Please?" Dave, of course, continues to cry.

You lean down over the crib wall to open the crotch snaps of the baby's footie pajamas and then recoil in horror. "Holy fuck! How does this even happen? How high do you even have to be?"

Dave hasn't just crapped his diaper. He's crapped it, and somehow gross baby shit has leaked out of the leg hole and down his leg. You just stand there for a moment, hardly able to fathom it.

Such is life.

- December, 1999 -

Dave never does call you 'Dad'. Even at only three, he seems uncomfortable referring to you with such an endearing term, and instead he settles for the more indifferent 'Bro'. You don't correct him. He understands that you're his father now, anyway. When he skins his knees or has a nightmare in the middle of the night, it's you he goes to. He never wants you to kiss it better. All he ever wants from you is your signature one-armed hug, and an "It's okay, little guy". Reassurance. That's something you're comfortable giving him. You want him to understand that you can't always just fix things when he gets into trouble, but at the same time you hope he knows you're there for him. You have his back.

It's the day before Dave's fourth birthday when he gets his first taste of bullying. You've been taking more and more odd-jobs to make ends meet, and finding babysitters to cover the hours you're gone has simply gotten infeasible, so you've enrolled him in a daycare. He doesn't really like it; not that you blame him. He's spent most of his life alone with you, encounters with other children limited to sporadic trips to the playground or doctor's office waiting rooms. It's not that he's shy, but he's aloof, and other kids pick up on that. They try to force him out of his shell, and when Dave resists, the older children find ways to dig at him.

You come to pick him up one day and he's frowning pretty fiercely, eyes trained on his tiny Converse. "What's wrong?" you try to ask him, but he refuses to say anything until you're driving home in your beat-up Chevy.

"He called me a name." Dave slouches as low in his car seat as he can go, kicking his feet up on the back of your seat. You glance at him in the rearview mirror and try not to chuckle at how intense the furrow between his brows is. It's time to be a good dad.

"Who called you a name?"

"Boy with the orange hair."

Oh, that kid. You'd seen him the first day you'd brought Dave in and you remember wondering whether his parents had fed him bovine growth hormones. He looks at least six, though he's Dave's age, and Dave... Well, he's sort of small. He'll probably do the same thing you did and shoot up like a weed in his teenage years, but for now, you wonder if you oughtn't teach him a few things about self-defense.

"What'd he say?" you prompt, since Dave doesn't seem awfully forthcoming.

"He said I gots alium eyes. He called me a space alium."

"Alien," you correct him before it really sinks in. Oh.

Of all the things Dave inherited from you, his strange eyes are the toughest to deal with. You're intimidating enough with your shades on that adults usually don't stare at him in public, but you've witnessed several children sneaking glances and a couple of double takes. It's something that you didn't notice when you were a child yourself, but Dave is frighteningly observant sometimes. This is the first time anyone has said something directly to him about his eyes, however. You figure you should run some self-esteem damage control.

"Are you an alien?" you ask him, and he glares at you in the mirror with a surly pout.

"No. I'm Dave!"

"Right. So why do you think that punk called you an alien?"

Dave thinks about it for a minute, but he comes up with nothing, so he stays silent.

"It's 'cause he's jealous. He's a punk, and you're Dave Strider. Everybody knows that Striders are the coolest kids there are. He's jealous that you're a coolkid, and he's not."

"What's a coolkid?" Dave asks.

You pull up into your parking spot outside the apartment building. Dave hops out of his car seat when you unbuckle him and shrugs into his backpack. The building you live in has had a busted elevator for three years now, and while you'd always carried Dave up the ten flights to your apartment before, today you stop at the base of the stairwell and look at him.

"A coolkid is somebody who does his best and doesn't let anybody tell him he didn't try hard enough. A coolkid always keeps his head, as tough as things might get. A coolkid challenges himself to do bigger things and to be better."

You know at least half of this goes right over Dave's head (easy to do when he's this small), but he catches on to what you're asking him to do.

"I gotta climb the stairs?" He cranes his neck looking up the stairwell to the ceiling high above.

"Not all of them," you assure him. "I just want you to try."

He glances at you doubtfully, but he reaches up and grabs the railing, taking the first step without hesitation. You follow right behind him as he climbs stair after stair, watching his dubious expression morph into determination, and after a while, to desperation. His steps get slower and slower, and finally he stops, after five and a half flights of stairs, wobbling a little. He turns to you like he expects you to be upset, but you're grinning at him full-force.

"That was amazing, little dude; Fuck, I didn't expect you to make it more than two flights."

Dave gets immensely pleased at the praise, his whole face lighting up. "I did my best, Bro!" But then he looks up at all the stairs still left, and his smile fades a little. "We're not at the top."

You bend down and scoop him up with one arm, balancing him against your hip. "Most important coolkid lesson," you say as you begin ascending the stairs again. "A coolkid knows that it's okay to ask for help sometimes. 'Specially from his dad."

He beams at you the rest of the way up the stairs, and when even you're a little out of breath at the top, he crows in your ear, "I warned you about stairs, Bro!"

Finally you're in front of your apartment door and you set him down on jelly legs as you fumble for your keys. You have an idea. "Got an early birthday present for you," you say once you're inside. Dave is collapsed in a boneless puddle in the middle of the floor, but he perks up at your words and looks at you expectantly. You leave him where he's sitting for a moment and go to dig around in the box of stuff you keep under the futon where you sleep. You find them at the very bottom, under a pair of ironically terrible acid wash jeans you never could bring yourself to get rid of. You go back to where Dave is sitting. "Hold out your hand."

He does, and you drop the miniature pair of shades into his open palm. It takes him a second to parse exactly what he's holding, and then he looks at you like you just handed him the keys to his very own brand new pony.

"Those were mine when I was your age," you explain to him. "They're the universal symbol for 'coolkid'. You earned 'em."

He unfolds them and puts them on, and in that moment your heart beats harder in your chest, because he looks exactly like you. Your son, your little boy. You spare a thought for Rose, as you often do, and wonder who she's growing up to be.

You cough once, hard, to stifle the overwhelming rush of ridiculous, sappy affection blossoming inside you, and say in a perfectly level voice, "You are the coolkid. It's you." Of course, it does nothing for your cool when Dave gives you his biggest, brightest little-kid smile.

Who knew passing on the torch would feel this good?

- November, 2001 -

You finally get to relax a little when Dave starts school, and since it's free, you have a bit of extra money to your name. You'd had to sell a lot of equipment to pay for shit when Dave was younger, but now you're able to slowly start buying pieces back. It's not long before you're making mixes again and playing clubs when you get the chance.

Dave invites you to school when his kindergarten class has a Parents' Day, his eyes brimming with poorly-concealed pride as you demonstrate to the other kids your sicknasty means of a living. You're pretty certain at least three kids ask their own parents if they can be DJs when they grow up.

DJ Strider has returned, and people take notice. And with Dave in school all day, you have some free time, and you're finally able to get some ass. Carefully.

Dave is the only child in his class without a mother. You know there will come a day when he asks about her, but you're still not prepared for how young and small he looks when he finally works up the nerve to question you.

"Bro?" he says one day, clambering onto the couch beside you. At five years old, his legs still have plenty of growing to do before they reach the floor.

"Yeah, little dude?"

Dave looks you in the eye through his sunglasses, which is rare for him, and that's how you know he's serious. You pause your video game and set the controller down.

"Do I have a mommy?"

Oh.

Fuck, what do you tell him? You run through several options in your head. Lying is out; you were lied to as a kid enough to know that it can ruin your trust in someone, and you have more respect for Dave than that. You could refuse to answer the question, but you can already picture the way Dave's head would fall, the lines of his shoulders slumped in sadness. You can't do that to him, either. So you settle on the truth.

"Everyone has a mom, little buddy. Even you."

"Babies come from their mommies," Dave agrees tentatively. "But... if I have a mommy, how come I've never met her?"

A sigh escapes your lips unbidden, and Dave thinks it's directed at him. He actually looks chastised. It makes your heart hurt to see him like that, and so you wrap a strong arm around him and pull him close, knocking his sunglasses askew. "It's alright, Dave. I probably should have told you this a long time ago." You fall silent for a moment as you struggle to put your thoughts to words. It's hard. Being a father and helping your kid grow up. It's hard and nobody understands. But you have to try, for him.

"It's like this."

You start at the beginning. You tell Dave how uncool you were as a kid, watching as his expression twists into one of disbelief. You tell him all the dumb stuff you did as a young teenager and about all the growing up you had to do. You tell him about the night you met a special lady while you were playing at the club, and while you're vague about the details, you intimate that that was the night his mother had gotten pregnant.

"I didn't know your mom was pregnant with you until after you were born. One day I opened my door, and there you were."

You spare a thought for the photograph in your wallet, of the sister Dave doesn't even know he has. Your daughter. Maybe someday you'll tell him about her, when the time is right—but not now.

"The lady left me here?" Dave sounds so confused, unable to comprehend exactly what happened, but distress is already tugging the corners of his mouth down. "Didn't... didn't she wanna be my mommy?"

The sound that comes out of your mouth then is one you'll deny making until your dying day. It takes you zero effort to scoop Dave's small body into your lap, and so you do. He squirms at first. He's upset, and his first reaction is always to run and try to hide it, but his strength is nothing compared to the corded steel of your biceps.

"Hey," you say, low and comforting in his ear. He settles down a little. "There's something I want to say to you. I might not know your mom's reasons for leaving you with me, but I do know this: I want to be your dad. I'm happy to have you here."

It's the closest you've ever come to saying 'I love you' to the kid, and even though you don't speak the words, you think he picks up on the sentiment. He smiles, just a little. You smile back.

- July, 2004 -

Dave is eight years old when he first starts mixing. You've seen him pretend, pantomiming spinning with paper plates when he thinks you're not looking, but there comes a day when he balls up and tells you his intentions for real.

"Bro," he says, coming up behind you while you're on the computer, and fuck, he's getting better at flashstepping every day. You decide to ignore him for a bit, just to see what he'll do. If he really wants something, he'll find a way to ask for it.

"Bro," he says again. You can feel his indignation at being ignored. Casually, you drop a VST into a mixer track and adjust the sample FX channel. "Hey, Bro. Bro. Dirk. Dirk Strider. Dad!"

You jerk in surprise and accidentally switch on half a dozen notes in the step sequencer. Trying to cover your reaction is pointless; Dave knows it gets you every time. "What," you say as you swivel around in your computer chair.

Suddenly he seems a little less self-assured, his eyes turned downward behind his shades. Interesting. "I, uh. Wanted to know if you'd teach me. To spin and stuff. Like you do."

You sit very still in your chair, watching Dave sweat while secretly you're struggling to keep your smile contained to your eyes, safely hidden behind your shades. You don't know that you've ever been so proud of him. You're not about to lose your cool, however, so you grace him with a level, "Sure."

You're at least as anxious as Dave is as you push yourself out of your chair and lead him over to your mixing equipment. He looks around in awe at all the electronics, which, up until now, he hasn't been allowed to even come near. He's reverent, shaking slightly with awe when you guide him by the shoulders to stand in front of the mixing board.

"A'ight, tell me what this is."

Dave, ever eager to impress you, immediately launches into an explanation. "It's the mixing board." He points to the various knobs and sliders covering the console. "Master volume. This is the channel input stuff, where you can control input volume and gain and pre-amp. Output's over here. These sliders are the graphic equalizer, and here's where you split and send tracks. The big slider in the middle is the crossfader."

"And this?"

"It's a step sequencer, like the one you have on your computer program. These lights represent each quarter-beat. You turn them on when you want a note or a drum beat to play, and you make a rhythm that way."

"What about this?"

You point at one of the turntables, and Dave looks at you like you're slow. "It's a turntable, duh."

"Nope," you correct him, and he cocks his head. "It ain't a turntable, it's your brand new playground. Your passport to adventure, little dude."

"Wait, what?"

"Have at it."

And you flashstep away, absconding so you can have a private moment with the vanilla ice cream you have stashed in the freezer for times like these. You're allowed.

It's maybe ten minutes before Dave actually works up the nerve to start experimenting with the equipment, but then you hear him tentatively playing with the crossfader and laying breakbeats down over another song. When you're over your embarrassing feelings-fest and you can keep a straight face, you go back in and gently guide his hands over the console, explaining how things work in practice.

Together, you make a pretty sick beat.

- September, 2007 -

Dave is eleven when it happens. You'd bought him a computer for his birthday several months ago, to go along with the mixing gear you'd given him for his tenth, but ever since he downloaded that chat client he's been holed up in his room doing nothing but talking to his new online friends. You suppose you can't blame him for that, considering how reclusive the two of you can be sometimes. It's rare that Dave has friends over or that he goes to visit someone else. Over the internet, he can pick and choose friends who appreciate him for who he is, better than he might at school.

He's been talking to you nonstop about his three new buddies over dinner, as if he isn't totally enamored by them and is acting perfectly cool, thank you very much. "John's my bro," he says as he scoops a spoonful of macaroni onto a chicken nugget. "You know, in a non-you kind of sense. Lower-case 'b' bro. He's kind of a pity case or whatever, though; kid's terminally uncool. Where do you even get a chumhandle like 'ghostyTrickster' anyway? Though okay, his isn't as weird as 'tentacleTherapist'. That's Rose Lalonde. She lives in New York."

You drop your fork.

"Rose?" you ask, your mind flitting to the photo in your drawer as Dave gapes at you. Play it cool, Dirk, it's just a coincidence. Plenty of kids named Rose out there. "She your age?"

Dave continues to stare at you through his shades, suspicious, but he adds, "Yeah. Her birthday's the same week as mine, actually."

Estimated date of birth, December third, 1995. Huh. "You got a picture of this kid?"

"Okay yeah, I'll just go open up my porn folder and get it. I fap over other eleven-year-olds all the time, lemme tell you." He can tell you're still agitated, which makes him nervous. It's when he resorts to sarcasm the hardest that you know he's feeling off-balance. But he gets up anyway, dumps his empty foam plate into the trash, and heads off to his room. You follow.

You stand behind Dave where he's seated in his computer chair. It takes him a few clicks, but finally he opens up a folder obfuscatingly titled 'Marmoset Spunk' and scrolls through a few photos. There's a few blurry webcam shots of some goofy kid with an overbite and glasses, another goofy kid with an overbite and glasses, and then he stops on one last photo and says, "There."

Oh god. Oh fuck. You kind of want to sit down, but there's nowhere to sit, so you just stand there and try not to sway. The girl in the photo is fair-skinned, her hair a light ash-blonde, with eyes a delicate and unnatural shade of violet. Though her face is less angular, and her eyes rounder, she's otherwise the spitting image of Dave. Or you. You wonder how the hell Dave hasn't noticed, but then again, he wouldn't be looking for it. He still doesn't know.

"There, are you convinced she's not Pedobear or whatever?"

"Yeah..." you say, distracted. "Get out of the chair."

Dave turns to look at you like you've just grown a second head. "Why?"

"I'm gonna try and talk to Rose's mom. I... need to make sure of something."

He looks at you like he wants desperately to disobey, his hackles raised. You've never done anything like this before, and you don't have an excuse to give him. But you're not quite ready to tell him the truth, either, and what it is you suspect. Finally he pushes the chair back from his desk and gets up, but he isn't happy. "I'll just go chill in the living room, then."

You hardly acknowledge him as he leaves, you're so unfocused. The computer chair lets out a protesting squeak when you drop into it. You doubleclick, start Pesterchum, wait and twiddle your fingers while it signs you in under Dave's chumhandle.

Once you're logged in, it's three whole minutes before you're able to click on her name in the chumroll.

- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT] at 18:12 -

TG: Rose?
TT: Why the punctuation all of a sudden, Dave? Have I finally begun to rub off on you? Will you be speaking in complete, coherent sentences soon, rather than your usual poorly-rhymed keysmashes? That would be ironic.

Your throat gets strangely tight at your first glimpse of the purple text. Your brain is running a mile a minute, wondering over and over, Could it be? It might be her. What if it isn't? What if I never find her? What if it is her? That might be worse, if I have to deal with her mother. Wait, no. How could I think that? She's my—

You cut off that train of thought before it can leave the station. You're not even sure she is who you think she is... but you can and will find out.

TG: This is Dirk Strider.
TG: Dave's dad.

As soon as you press the return key, the 'chum is typing' at the bottom of the window disappears, replaced by 'chum has entered text'. There's a short pause, about five seconds, and you wonder what kind of reaction the girl on the other side of the screen is having. Then the 'chum is typing' message returns, followed by a new line of text.

TT: Oh.

You're not sure what kind of response you were hoping for. A sudden realization? A shy "Daddy?" in lavender type? Yeah, right. Irrational as it is, you're not quite fast enough to stifle the pang of disappointment that springs up in your chest. But Rose keeps typing.

TT: Have I done something wrong?
TG: No, not at all.
TG: Is your mom around, Rose? I wanted to talk to her.
TG: It's nothing bad, I just like to keep track of who Dave chats with online.
TG: I'd like to get to know her, if that's alright.

There's a longer pause this time, and you wonder if you've managed to frighten her away. You'd be unbelievably pissed with yourself, had you been this close to tracking down your daughter only to lose your chance with your stupid excited-puppy eagerness. You breathe shallowly until her reply pops up on the screen.

TT: Luckily, I think she's sober.
TT: I'll go find her.

Of course, after that, your nerves only get worse. You think back to that night when you were seventeen, clueless and stupid and way too young. You wonder for the millionth time what she was thinking when she seduced you. That old familiar anger comes bubbling back to the surface, because after all, who was she to derail your life and leave the consequences on your doorstep? But you push that thought away the moment it enters your head. You can't stomach it with Dave sitting in the next room. And when the purple text pops up again, the anger is replaced by an even stronger desire. You have to know.

TT: yes?
TG: Mrs. Lalonde.

She's quick to correct you.

TT: ms lalonde please
TT: i never married
TG: But you have a kid.
TT: do you have a wife, mr strider?
TG: Touché. But my circumstances were kind of odd.
TT: were they now
TG: Yeah, you see, I was only with Dave's mother for one night.
TG: I had a one-night-stand and got a baby out of it.
TG: Woke up one morning and there he was on my doorstep.
TT: that sounds like the plot of a soap opera i distinctly remember seeing in the summer of 1986
TG: It does, doesn't it?
TG: But here's the weird thing.
TG: When I found Dave, there was a photo stuffed in the back of his diaper. It was a picture of Dave and another baby who looked exactly like him.
TG: And do you know what was written on the back of it?
TT: enlighten me
TG: 'Dave and Rose.'

You always were quick to get to the point, especially when emotional, and right now your hands are shaking where they hover above the keyboard. It's her. You're sure of it now; you can taste it. You almost bark out a laugh just thinking about the sheer irony, that you hadn't found the woman in twelve years and Dave managed it in one, without even trying.

TT: what an interesting coincidence

Hell, no. Hell fucking no.

TG: Listen, Lalonde.
TG: Don't play stupid with me. I know it's you.
TG: The least you can do is tell me the truth now, after eleven fuckin' years.
TG: You owe me that.

- tentacleTherapist [TT] is now an idle chum! -

TT: ...alright.
TG: Alright?
TG: That's IT?
TT: what do you want me to say dirk? im still trying to process it myself and i realized what was going on a whole week ago
TT: out of all the people on the internet she could have chosen to talk to rose found her brother
TT: the chances were astronomical
TT: i promise you i had no hand in this
TG: I don't care about that!
TG: I just
TG: fuck
TG: I just want to know why.
TT: i wasnt meant to get pregnant; i was only looking for some fun that night
TT: i made a mistake when i spent the night with you. you were too young and i should have known that
TT: when i found out i was pregnant i panicked
TT: my career had recently taken off. i could hardly handle one child much less two
TT: i did the only thing i knew to do
TG: You dropped Dave off with me and never looked back.
TT: you misunderstand. giving up my child, even to his own father, was the most difficult thing i have ever had to do in my life
TT: EVER.
TT: besides do you regret it? do you wish id never left dave to be with you?

You think of Dave sitting on the couch in the living room, pretending not to be nervous while you chat with the mother of his good chum, and you can't summon even the slightest shred of regret at having to raise him.

TG: Of course I don't regret it.
TG: Dave's my son and I love him.
TG: I don't regret sleeping with you, I don't regret him being born, and I don't regret having to raise him.
TG: What I do regret is that he's grown up without a mother, or even knowing that he has a sister out there.
TT: it was your decision not to tell him about rose
TG: What was I supposed to say?
TG: Surprise, kiddo, your mommy didn't have enough room for you, so she dropped you off with me and fucked off with your sister to New York. Guess you weren't special enough!
TT: thats not how it went and you know it
TG: Fuck. I'm just angry, alright?
TT: im sorry dirk. i know ive made things difficult for you
TT: ive fucked up us all rather spectacularly havent I?

You lean back in your chair and sigh, rubbing at the bridge of your nose under your shades. You're still angry, and you probably will be for a long time, but it's faded now, dulled to glowing embers. Talking to Dave's mother has helped you understand some things. Others you can still hardly fathom; you now wonder in an entirely different light what it must have been like for her to leave Dave behind. Now you can picture her regret, and how she must have cried. You're forced to admit to yourself (so long overdue) that you're not the only one who's suffered.

You figure you ought to reconcile, in case there's some way of salvaging this.

TG: What do we do now?
TG: Does Rose even know about me? Or Dave?
TT: ive told her the bare bones about you which was all i knew after that one night and from your business card
TT: she doesnt know she has a brother
TG: I think we should tell them.
TG: Before it's too late.
TG: We can't keep this from them anymore.
TG: We have to be careful about it, but I want Dave to know he has a family.
TG: And I want Rose to know she has a dad who loves her, too.
TT: i agree
TT: but how do we fix this? how can i even begin to set things right?
TG: ...You could tell me your name.
TT: its roxy. roxy lalonde.

You don't emerge for a whole hour, and when you finally make your way back to the living room, Dave hastily adjusts his position on the couch to seem more casual. As if he has a reason to be on edge right now. You sit down gingerly on the other cushion, staring at him from the corner of your eye. You've been trying to work out a way to say the things you need to say to him, but your carefully constructed speech disappearifies. You'll have to wing it.

"I don't get it–" Dave says at the same time you say, "There's something I have to tell you." His eyes dart over to meet yours but quickly slide away, and he swallows. "Yeah?"

You were going to lead up to this, but when it comes down to it, you're just not that good at saying anything other than what you mean. "You have a sister."

Beat. Dave turns to face you with his whole body, his mouth hanging open, and then he musters a weak laugh. "Ha ha, Bro, real funny. None of the chicks you've brought home have turned up pregnant; I think I'd know. None of the dudes, for sure."

"It's Rose. She's your twin."

This time Dave is stunned into total silence. Slowly, without any sudden movements, you reach into your back pocket and pull out the worn Polaroid of baby Dave next to Rose. You hold it out to him and he takes it with an unsteady hand. Now that he's looking for it, the resemblance is unmistakable, and you can see in his face the moment it truly dawns on him.

He goes as white as a sheet, and a noise that's halfway between a laugh and a sob escapes his mouth. "What?" His voice is soft, breathless, unbelieving. "What?" It's like it's all he's capable of saying.

"It's true. When your mom—and her mom—left you here, she left that photo with you."

Dave's expression contorts into something wounded, angrier. It's more open than you've seen him in a long time. "Bro, what the fuck? How could this happen? How could you not tell me?"

You let out a shaky sigh and pull away your shades. Years of schooling your emotions to reflect indifference has left your eyes as the only true indicator of what you're thinking, and you need Dave to know how you feel. He refuses to make eye contact. You try not to treat it like the slap to the face it is.

"Dave," you say, desperate. "I hadn't spoken to your mother in twelve years. I didn't know why she did what she did, only that she made a choice to leave you with me and take Rose with her. I didn't know what to say. How was I supposed to explain that to you? Tell you you have a sister, but you'll probably never see her? It was hard enough having to explain things when it was just your mother."

"But I found Rose, didn't I? Fuck, what were the chances? And if I hadn't happened to run into her... what? You just wouldn't have told me?"

You don't have an answer for that, and so you say nothing. You reach over to touch him on the shoulders, to comfort him the only way you really know how at the moment, but he jerks away like he's been stung. Before you can chase after him he's off the couch, flashstepping out of reach.

"This is not cool," he says, voice cracking. "Just leave me alone for a while. Alright? I have to think about this."

All you can do is nod.

It probably makes you a bad father, but when Dave is at school the next day, you hack the password on his computer and read his pesterlogs from last night after your talk. He'd spoken with that John kid, and Jade, and while they'd noticed something was off about his demeanor, he hadn't told them any specifics. You save his pesterlog with Rose for last.

- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT] at 22:25 -

TG: hey
TT: Hello, Dave.
TG: so i presume your mom told you
TT: Yes.
TG: welp
TG: guess this puts a damper on our torrid long distance love affair
TT: I'm really not in the mood to joke around right now. My emotional state is, understandably, I think, sort of fragile.
TG: yeah i guess
TG: my bad

- tentacleTherapist [TT] is now an idle chum! -

TG: i guess the hardest thing to understand is why
TG: dont get me wrong bro is pretty much the best ever
TG: but whyd she take you and leave me
TG: seems pretty arbitrary
TG: why not take both of us or leave both of us
TG: or leave you instead?
TT: I suppose she thought it would be easier for us kids to relate to our respective parents if they were of the same gender as we are. Father-son, mother-daughter, that sort of thing.
TG: that makes sense kind of
TG: fuck
TG: im just having a hard time believing this
TG: my chill level is at an all time low
TG: ice caps shrinking hole in the ozone penguins getting heatstroke
TG: al gore weeping softly into his organic free range chicken salad
TG: the works
TG: …
TG: dont tell anyone
TT: Your secret is safe with me, dear brother. No one will know of the regrettable slip in your perfect, ironically chill mask. What moment of weakness?
TG: okay okay sarcastic much
TT: My apologies. I'll try to rein it in.
TG: you know its surprising we didnt figure this out sooner
TG: seeing as one of us can usually guess what the other is thinking
TG: and thats when were not already thinking the exact same thing
TG: freaky twin shit
TT: It does seem rather obvious in retrospect. You have the Lalonde good looks.
TG: fuck no
TG: its you who has the classic strider pulchritude
TG: but thanks
TG: i guess
TG: fuck this is weird
TT: Agreed.

- tentacleTherapist [TT] is now an idle chum! -

TG: so whats mom like
TT: Here, why don't I tell you about her.
TT: Then you can tell me about our father.
TG: deal

- December, 2007 -

It takes you a couple of months to save up enough money for plane tickets to New York (Lalonde had offered, but you refuse to let her pay more than half). The first of December finds you standing in the airport terminal at IAH, emptying your pockets of spare change as you go through security. At least you'd remembered to pack your more questionable items in your checked luggage.

Dave has been uncharacteristically silent the whole time. When you'd first thrown the idea of visiting his mother and his sister at him, he'd just shrugged, though you got the feeling he was interested. You hope you interpreted it correctly; he's harder and harder to read these days.

One thing you're sure of is that he hasn't forgiven you yet. Every time you reach for him he twists out of your grip, and it pains you more than you care to admit. You secretly hope that this trip will shake him out of it, and allow him to heal and eventually forgive you.

Both of you spend the whole plane ride with your headphones on, listening to your mixes. If you didn't think it would rankle Dave, you'd compliment him—he's almost as good as you now. But neither of you can bring yourselves to say anything. Dave only breaks the silence when you've gotten your luggage and exited the airport in New York for the parking lot Lalonde's agreed to meet you in.

"Fucking cold," he says, and he shifts around in his oversized parka, puffing steam. He's terrified. You wish more than anything that he'd let you wrap an arm around him and tell him it's going to be okay, just like you did when he was little. You settle for a quick pat on the shoulder.

He tries to shove you off, but the motion ends up aborted when a woman's voice says, "Hello."

It's Roxy Lalonde, and holy fuck, she hasn't aged a day. You feel as though you've stepped back in time. You manage a wave, but Dave is stock still, frozen in anxiety and apprehension. Standing next to Roxy is Rose, your little girl—except to you, she was never little. She's already a graceful young lady, floored as she seems to be by your presence.

This is the awkward part. Nobody's rushing to greet anyone else; after twelve years, where do you start? But then Dave lets out a wounded noise and closes the distance between himself and Rose in three long strides. Before she can react, he crushes her in a genuine, entirely unironic hug, and then she squeezes him back. You can't help but smile at Roxy. She starts walking toward you, and the next thing you know your feet are bringing you closer as well. You meet in the middle, exchange a warm, if brief hug, and turn to your children.

Dave and Rose have finally broken apart, though Rose has his hand gripped tightly in hers. They're facing you and Roxy, Rose looking into your eyes as if searching you and memorizing you. Dave is looking at his feet.

"Go on," Rose says, and Dave drags his eyes upward, watching you from over his shades. He can't bring himself to make a move, but that's okay—you'll make it for him. You step forward, crush him in a tight hug, and you feel him drop Rose's hand to return it. The past two months' worth of animosity drains away in an instant.

"Bro," he says a little hoarsely, but it's not your turn to hold him now. You pull back, smile a rare smile, and guide him by the shoulders to his mother.

It's just you and Rose left now. Rose seems to be rapidly regaining a handle on her cool. She's a formidable kid, and you can respect that. "I feel like we're in John's stupid favorite movie, and I'm dear sweet Casey," she says, and you have no idea what she's talking about, but it makes sense to her. Then something in her snaps, and suddenly you have an armful of girl. After eleven and a half years of waiting, you're finally holding your daughter.

It's a pretty great feeling.

Much of the anxiety has eased by the time you've made it to the Lalonde household and unpacked. Rose and Dave are chatting in the massive living room, leaving you to make conversation with Roxy in the kitchen. She's still just as charming (and attractive) as she was that night twelve years ago, though time and motherhood have made her pleasantly warm.

"I know we said this was the kids' birthday present, but I have real gifts for them as well. I hope you don't mind."

"Not at all," you shrug. "Doubtful the kids will mind, either." Roxy passes you a colorful martini and you take it, raising an eyebrow. You expect it to be gross, but turns out to be one of the most delicious alcoholic beverages you've ever imbibed.

"Practice," Roxy winks. "There was a time when I was drinking a lot more, when Rose was younger. I haven't much felt the need as of late."

"That's good, I suppose," you nod. You've tried to abstain since Dave was born, but if there was ever a time for a drink, it's now. "You and Rose get along well?"

"Pretty well. Sometimes neither of us are exactly open about what we're thinking, and one or the other of us will mistake a genuine gesture for passive aggression. We never argue, though. And Dave?"

You glance over to where Dave has his lower lip tucked under his teeth in a spot-on impression of the Egbert kid, and you chuckle a bit. "He's a good kid. A little sarcastic sometimes, but it's the age. I was a little shit when I was that age."

Roxy follows your line of sight and leans against the counter next to you. "He sure looks like you."

"Your nose."

"And Rose has the shape of your eyes—and your elocution."

"We made some good kids, didn't we?" You can't help but smile at her as you say it. Every so often that old familiar anger will bubble up, suggesting that you should be furious with Roxy and not making friends with her, but you never take it seriously. However you may have thought she'd wronged you in the past, things have turned out pretty okay. You've more than made do. You've done your best, and you haven't let anybody tell you that you didn't try hard enough. You've always kept your head, as tough as things got. But so has Roxy. So have Dave and Rose.

Let's face it; when it comes to being coolkids, Striders and Lalondes are simply the best there are.

- January, 2009 -

The kids' twelfth birthday is the first time they meet, but it isn't the last. Though it's been decided that Dave will continue to live with you, and Rose with Roxy, you find every reason you can to get them together for sibling bonding time. Not that they need it. They'd taken to each other immediately, exchanging witty barbs and enjoying companionable silences, and now they're closer than plenty of siblings who grew up together their whole lives. Still, it was nice to have Rose over for the first half of last summer, and to send Dave to New York for the second half.

It's the tail end of Christmas break at the moment, and the Lalonde house is the most crowded it's ever been. You and Dave are there visiting, but so are the Egbert kid and his father, and the fourth Musketeer, Jade Harley, and her grandfather (and her dog). Every day has been a riot of pranks, science experiments, indoor fetch, hash rap-offs and impromptu psychotherapy sessions. Dave keeps a straight face but you know that this is the most fun he's ever had.

You're the youngest of the gathered parents-slash-guardians, but whatever differences you might have, you all have a lot to talk about with the kids around. Mr. Egbert tells you about how John is an aspiring magician, and his strange fondness for Nicolas Cage. Roxy talks about how Rose is the first chair violin at her fancy performing arts school. Harley brags about Jade and the regional science fair she won with her project on cold fusion and String Theory. You tell the others about Dave's most recent accomplishment—a local radio DJ had picked up on one of his mixes, given him some airplay, and now a representative of a decently-sized record label has expressed interest in signing him.

The most interesting part of the trip by far, however, is when you and the other adults spend an evening out on the balcony and chat. Ostensibly you're looking at stars, but after several of Roxy's martinis, you're all engaged in a half-drunken conversation about life.

"It's crazy... crazy how things... come together, yanno?" says Egbert, gesticulating wildly and slopping vodka onto his slacks. He doesn't even seem to notice. "Our kids. All the circumstances that led up to our kids. Bringing them here. It's like they were all meant to be best friends."

"No, no, I know what you mean," Roxy smiles. Her voice and her movements are steady, but you know she's drunker than she puts on by the light blush that's settled across her cheeks. It gets darker when she looks at Egbert, and you tamp down on your misplaced jealousy and focus on what she's saying instead. "I'm certainly glad to have met all of you. It feels... right to be in your collective company."

You have to grunt in agreement to that. "I never thought I'd make friends with the likes of some of you," Egbert and Harley look over, "but I've been pleasantly surprised. Y'all are pretty dope." Nice save.

Harley adjusts his bow tie like he's pleased, then pauses. "I do agree," he says hesitantly, "but... and perhaps this is the alcohol speaking, have any of you ever felt that something's missing? That somehow, we've all forgotten some huge, monumental thing we were never meant to forget?"

You lean back in your deck chair, blinking behind your ever-present shades. You'd never, ever thought about it, but now that Harley's said it, it feels like a slap to the face from something that's always existed in the corner of your eye, just out of sight. You see flashes—endless ocean, pink, green and cyan text, purple Gothic spires, a boy that could have been a young Harley in another life...

You glance at the others' similarly dazed expressions and infer that it's a shared experience. Holy shit.

"If we have forgotten something, am I the only one with the impression that it was just between our families?" asks Roxy. "Nobody else in the whole world?" One by one, the rest of you nod your assent.

"No one has ever spoken about this to me before, so I wonder," Harley muses. "Perhaps it isn't just a conspiracy. Perhaps we've been reincarnated for some purpose."

"Or it could just be that we're all shitfaced," you mutter, even though you're much, much soberer than you were just a minute ago.

"Could be," Roxy laughs.

The talk of missing things has ended, but though the conversation around you continues on to other subjects, you're left feeling uneasy and you don't know why.

When you finally make it back inside, the kids are already huddled up in their sleeping bags on the living room floor. You crouch down beside Dave's bag and just look at him for a while as his chest rises and falls in the rhythm of sleep. No one stirs, no one wakes, no one does anything at all. You have no explanation for the sudden surge of protectiveness that rises in your chest, other than a vague sense like a reverse echo leading up to... to something. Something big. Something that's going to happen, and soon.

Very soon.

- April 14, 2009 -

You wake up on your futon in the morning with a phantom ache in your chest and a head full of memories of things that never were. You blink away the bright morning sun, fumbling around on the coffee table for your shades until your fingers brush against them. When you put them on, everything goes dark and you can think again.

What the hell happened?

It's like you have memories of multiple lives, layered one on top of the other. You remember the Game twice over. Your miserable excuse for a life before. A series of foster homes, drugs, women, and one day a meteor bearing a kid with your eyes. Or was it crushing loneliness, robotics and the smell of sea salt? You'd named the baby Dave. Or was he your 'ancestor', separated by hundreds of years and the extinction of the human race? Through some innate sense you'd known the kid was important, and you'd trained him for the day when he'd have to save the world. You'd learned to hold a sword on your own, with no one there to teach you. You'd taught Dave to hold a sword at four years old and to use it at six. You'd taught yourself to read, and to speak English based on the videos he'd left you. You'd taught Dave how to fend for himself for food and comfort. You'd taught him how to emotionally distance himself from anything that could hurt him. You'd never quite mastered showing emotion on your face, not after growing up without any human contact. And however lacking your parenting skills may have been, however stunted you'd been, Dave and his friends had succeeded. You'd helped, of course, but ultimately you'd met the pointy end of your own sword and cashed in your chips with Davesprite there to watch. Ultimately, you'd stood with him as the whole group of you had stepped forward to receive your prize. But with the game won, neither of the timelines you remember even matter. Neither of them ever happened.

Instead, there is a new, third timeline. This one. The timeline in which, paradoxically speaking, you have always existed, but Sburb never did.

The part of you that remembers the Game begins to panic. You have to see Dave, to know he's okay. To reaffirm that he exists, without the Egbert kid's ectobiology hijinks to call him into being.

Heart pounding anxiously in your chest, you slither off the futon and into yesterday's jeans. You dart as quietly as you can—which is very quietly indeed—toward his bedroom. The lack of smuppets littering the floor is strangely both a relief and a disappointment. When you see the Dave-shaped lump under the ratty comforter, you let out a breath you hadn't realized you'd been holding. Stupid, stupid, dumb. Of course Dave is here; you remember him being here in this bizarro timeline (no, the correct timeline, you tell yourself).

You stand there for a moment and allow yourself to take him in. This Dave is the slightest bit softer than Sburb Dave. The arm that sticks out from under the comforter is thin and wiry, the hand strong, but the calluses resemble those you get from scratching records rather than gripping a sword. The haircut is the same, as are the clothes strewn about the room, and the folded set of aviators on the nightstand that he'd gotten from Egbert as a present.

Without the need for constant vigilance, lest he be caught with his pants down in the event of a midnight strife, this Dave doesn't have the hair-trigger wakefulness that his alternate self had. Still, you stand there hovering over him long enough that he begins to stir under your gaze. His eyes crack open a sliver. When he catches sight of your shadow, they shoot open, blinking away the harsh glow around your silhouette. As soon as you see the look in them, you know—he doesn't remember. He doesn't remember the Game, his other life, not a thing. Perhaps this is the best gift of all, one last kindness from Sburb for saving this universe. He reaches for his shades and crams them on.

"Jesus dick, Bro! What the fuck are you doing in here?" he yells at you, as if you're not in his room all the time. Admittedly, you're not usually standing over him like a creeper. He pushes himself off his bed to stand in front of you, pointing an accusatory finger at your chest. "How long have you been there?"

You don't have an answer for him, all the love and affection you have for him smacking you in the face like a tidal wave. When you'd raised him in the world of Sburb, you had to temper everything you said with indifference, not because of some ridiculous bro code of no homo, but because it was necessary to ensure his survival. You were forced to hide your feelings behind your shades, your stoic line of a mouth, and ten different levels of irony. You couldn't let him love you. In this world that is not the case. Here, now, you are allowed to hug your son and tell him how much you love him. You can tell him how proud you are of everything he's accomplished, in this life and in the Game. You can tell him that you need him, that he's the best thing that's ever happened to you, that he's literally saved your life.

And so you do.

"Shit," Dave says softly, his face pressed into your chest as his hands come up to curl tentatively into the back of your shirt. You can almost hear him thinking 'what the fuck', but his tone reads touched and pleased. "I... I love you too, Dad."

Your name is Dirk Strider, and your happy ending is just the beginning.

- Epilogue -

On the kids' fourteenth birthday, Roxy and Rose come down to visit you in your Texas apartment. It's a little cramped with all four of you, but if hard-pressed to actually describe the situation, the word you would use is closer to 'cozy'. Especially when you and Roxy are sharing your futon.

Sometimes you share these knowing looks between the two of you. After that morning, you'd spent hours on the phone with her, talking about everything you remembered. Hearing her similar tales of slathering canine jaws and aquatic alien overlords made your thoughts weigh a little lighter. You're there for each other, when she has nightmares about the Game, or when the memory of love found and lost—Jake—gets too burdensome for you to handle on your own. And though neither Dave nor Rose remember their accomplishments from the Game, you do. It's difficult not to say, "Remember when..." when you know Dave's feeling insecure and down on himself, but you know he's better off this way. You brag to Roxy instead. It makes you so proud, not just of what your children had become and what they'd achieved, but to know that you were a part of it. You had been the one to raise Dave, to gently guide him toward the role he was always meant to inhabit. The brave young Knight before whom the younger version of yourself had stood in awe.

That thought gives you an idea, as the twins sit at the table and prepare to blow out the 28 birthday candles between them. You duck around Roxy and snag Dave's camera, deaf to his protests, and you snap a quick picture of them. It's the perfect candid shot. Dave's halfway out of his seat, ironic pink party hat askew, and Rose has her hand over her mouth to hide her smug laughter. A half second after the picture is taken, Dave wrenches the camera from your hands, but the damage is done.

You make three copies of the negative later. One you keep for yourself, one you give to Roxy, and the third...

You haven't so much as spoken to your parents in almost fourteen years, though you'd be lying if you said you'd never thought of them. When the nights got long and lonely when Dave was young, when he'd gotten sick or scared, when you wondered whether you could go on, you'd ached for what you'd lost. But the bridges your father had once bitched to you about burning were two-way, and he had tossed his torch to the rotting ropes when you'd asked him for help and he'd never looked back.

Perhaps those bridges could never be rebuilt, but no gap was so wide that you couldn't lob a shuriken of 'I told you so' across its distance.

You make a photocopy of one tattered old Polaroid and tuck it in an envelope. Behind it, you slot your glossy new print. You think about writing a letter, but you don't need words to convey your feelings. When your parents see the photos, they'll know.

My children are mine, and not yours.

This is what you've missed.

This is what you could have had.

You hope to hell it'll chap your dad's ass (and let's be honest, it probably will). You scrawl an address from memory at the center of the envelope and leave the top left blank, drop it into the mailbox and flip up the flaggy doodad with an air of finality.

You don't need your parents, or their approval. You carry everything you need in the matching photographs that hang in the warm, bright space within your heart.