The only reason this story is here is because I had a dream while I was coming down from a sugar high. Pixie Stix… you can't just have one. You end up eating the whole box. Top that off with Cool-aid and chocolate, you're gonna have some screwed up dreams.

A WARRING FAMILY

KINDERGARTEN:

Connor sighed, glaring at his younger sister while their mother talked to their teacher, "Nice going, a fight on your first week."

Jaser glared right back at her older brother, "Shut up, he asked for it."

Connor raised an eyebrow, "What did he do?"

"He knocked over my sand castle."

"So you hit him?" Connor asked, slightly impressed. He was in second grade, and no girls started fights with boys.

"No." She said, "I pushed him down, jumped on top of him, and then I bit him."

He was so proud.

But their mother was incredibly mad.

FIRST GRADE:

Her anger issues got her in trouble all the time, from kicking, to punching, to biting she did it all.

Eventually their mother snapped, and took Jaser over her knee.

She shaped up after that.

SECOND GRADE:

After she stopped getting into fights, Conner started realizing just how smart his sister was. After two months in second grade, the teacher offered to have her skip second grade, and just go right into third.

Connor was in fourth grade at the time, and he was happy his sister moved into a classroom closer to his. He could keep a better eye on her.

THIRD GRADE:

Jaser began to develop a type of style, all her own. Well, that's what their mother called it, Connor just thought she was trying to copy him all the time.

He was still in fourth grade, and Jaser had started dressing like him. Baggy jeans, funny t-shirts, Vans, and hoodies. Connor wore a white and blue hoodie, Jaser had an orange one.

He got annoyed at first, but the realized how much she must look up to him if she wanted to dress like him.

FOURTH GRADE:

Connor was in his last year of Elementary school, and scared. Scared because his little sister's anger issues seemed to be coming back.

He was sitting in the principle's office with her, waiting for their mother to come pick them up. She had gotten into her first fight since first grade, and he was a bit pissed at her.

"Why would you get into a fight?" He hissed.

She looked up at him, a pout on her face, "He called me and my friends a bad word."

Connor raised an eyebrow, "Wait… what word?"

"Whores."

Once Connor explained to their mom what happened, she didn't punish Jaser. After all, she had beat up grown men for similar exchanged words before.

Connor cornered the boy behind the school the next day, planning to give him a black eye, but then saw he already had one. His sister had given it to him.

So Connor settled for breaking his nose, and called it a day.

FIFTH GRADE:

It was the worst year for Connor. Not because he started middle school, he wasn't afraid of that.

He was upset because he couldn't keep an eye on his little sister anymore.

So to make up for it, he convinced their mother to let them take a karate class together. He fell in love with the art, as did Jaser.

SIXTH GRADE:

He thought it would be like elementary school again, they would be tight. His friends would become her friends, just like elementary school.

And that's when he noticed the changes in Jaser.

She used to bug him the second they got home to help her with her homework, to play with her, to teach her what his class was learning, all day every day. But now she left him alone.

She left him alone for the most part, did her homework in the kitchen while their mother cooked or cleaned, watched TV by herself, and started using the phone a lot. She called her friends and talked for hours. On the weekends, she started going to sleep over's at her friends houses.

Her friends… another change.

Jaser never had her own friends in elementary school. Connor's friends were her friends. But now, she had a ton of her own friends, all girls. And Connor didn't like them.

Jaser's friends were girly, glittery, and loud. All they talked about were clothes and boys. They talked back to their parents, they passed notes in class, and cursed behind the teachers back. They were all bad influences. He tried to talk to their mom about it, but she just said, "It's a phase, it'll pass. She'll find out for herself what those girls are really like."

SEVENTH GRADE:

He waited for Jaser to get affected by her bad friends. For her to start wearing skirts, and make up, and say 'like' five times every sentence. For her to obsess of boys in their school that were complete assholes. For her to start… cursing.

But the strangest thing happened.

She didn't.

She changed her style a little, sure. She had always worn her hoodie like Connor, un zipped. But when her baggy orange one got ruined due to a very playful pit bull, her mother immediately bought her another orange hoodie, but this one wasn't baggy. It was a little loose though. Jaser stopped leaving it unzipped, she'd zip it all the way up to the top, and walk around like that all day, summer or winter. The material was very thin, so it wasn't overly hot in the summer, and when winter rolled around, she'd just pull a big jacket over it.

She stopped wearing Van's too. She found that they felt big and awkward compared to the converse she had taken to wearing.

She stopped wearing baggy jeans, and went for boot cut.

But that's all that changed about her.

But there were even more changes he didn't expect. Her friends changed, for the better. They still wore glittery and girl things, but their grammar improved. They stopped cursing all the time. They were respectful to their parents, and teachers.

They had never been a bad influence on Jaser, she was a good influence on them.

EIGHT GRADE:

Connor moved onto high school, and joined the wrestling team. Jaser kept studying martial arts, so he felt better about letting her stay in middle school without him. The alternative plan was to somehow cram everything he learned during eight grade himself into her head over the summer. He still thinks she might have been able to do it, if she wanted to.

She started going to the library to do all her schoolwork, and hardly get home in time for dinner. Connor suspected a secret boyfriend. But then he found out she had been snooping where she shouldn't have been.

How did he know?

He hacked her laptop.

She had been looking into mom's marriage and divorce papers. He never knew she was interested in finding out who their dad was. To him, his mother was enough. More than enough! She was everything he needed. Connor knew Jaser needed a father figure, every girl did. He had tried to be that for her. But apparently wasn't good enough.

So he confronted her in her room one day. "Do you know who our father is?"

She paused, looking up from her novel. Her eyes met his, and he knew the answer. She said it out loud anyways. "Yes. I know his name. I don't know him though."

"Why did you want to know?" Connor asked. "I always thought… that I was enough."

Her eyes widened, "Connor, you… you're my brother, and I love you like my brother. You couldn't be any better of a brother. You look out for me, and you make sure that I do what I need to do. I was just curious, that's all. I wanted to know his name, but I'm not going to track him down or anything."

Connor nodded, "Good. I was just… you know-"

Jaser rolled her eyes, "Being my brother-dad. Yeah, I get it."

NINTH GRADE:

Jaser went into high school. It was a bit scary for Connor, because he knew what went on in the bathrooms and the janitor closets. Drugs and sex. He watched her like a hawk for the first three months, kept boys away from her, and begged her to find better friends than she did in middle school.

Jaser had glared at him, "Connor, you're smothering me. Now piss off."

Didn't stop him from keeping the football team away from her. Damn jocks and their steroids.

And of course, Jaser started hanging out with the wrong kids again. She hung out with the kids who did drugs behind the school. She hung out with the girls who were so loose they had taken about eight pregnancy tests in their lifetime. She hung out with the kids that would deal drugs. She hung out with the cutters.

Connor tried to talk to her about it, but she just brushed him off, and went back to doing her homework.

So again, he went to his mother.

"And I just feel like she should not hang around them." Connor finished.

His mother nodded slowly, "I didn't realize… she was keeping such bad company. Have you noticed any changes in her?"

Connor hesitated, "Uh, no, not really."

"So she hasn't been badly affected by them at all?"

"Not yet, but this is different from middle school. Those girls were just disrespectful, these kids are criminals and crazy people in the making!"

His mother nodded, taking a sip of her tea and sighing in thought. "Well, unless she starts acting out, I fully agree with her choice of companions."

"What!?"

"Think Connor, her friends in middle school matured because of her influence. How do you think she's going to help the people she's with now?"

While Connor could understand that, he still didn't like her friends. So he did what any big brother/father figure would do.

He stalked her and all her friends.

They went to the skate park, and her friends smoked weed. She drank a soda.

They went to the movies, and tried to sneak into a rated R horror movie.

When they got busted, she took them to see Men In Black 3 instead.

She suggested they go to the library to get some studying done, and they all laughed in her face.

Then she ordered every single one of them a taxi ride home because they were all still high.

And he kept following her. Once she walked home, he climbed up the tree next to his window and snuck into his room so she wouldn't think he had been out. The first thing she did was slam his door open, and snarl at him, "If you ever follow me around town again, I'll castrate you, numb nuts!"

"But, how did you-"

"You taught me how to stalk people Connor!"

He watched way to many spy movies… and maybe acted them out way to much.

But hey, Native Americans tended to have flat feet. A trait he would later realize had been passed down to her as well.

TENTH GRADE:

Connor had a very uncomfortable talk with his mother the first week of his eleventh year, while Jaser got of talk-free on her first week of tenth. The talk started with, "Connor, have you thought much about your future?"

And then he realized what a dumb ass he had been for never once considering it.

His mother ended the very face-slapping talk with the sentence, "Just think about it, okay? I want an answer by the first week of the second semester."

He freaked out.

He ran into school, and talking to his friend Kenny, whose tribal name was Kanen'tó:kon. Every kid who lived at their reservation had two names, a tribal name that was pretty much only used on the reservation, and a legal name used everywhere else. Connor's was Ratonhnhaké:ton, and Jaser's was Kaneonuskatew.

"I don't know man, I have no idea what I wanna do with my life." Kenny said, shrugging. "But my mom asked me this morning too. I figure I could just live off of my stereotype, and own a gas station."

Connor rolled his eyes. "I'm serious. I feel like an idiot who thought summer would never end."

"I wish summer would never end! Summer rules." Kenny said, slamming his locker shut. It bounced open again. "And I don't have to deal with lockers that break the rules of physics when it's summer."

Conner rolled his eyes, shutting his locker gently. "Forget it. I'll find something else to do with my life."

Kenny gently closed his locker, and it popped open again, "This is getting ridiculous. And dude, if it turns out you're not smart, and have no natural skills, you can just join the army!"

Connor paused, "Well, that's an idea I guess. But we have thousands of soldiers. Why would me joining the ranks make any difference?"

"That doesn't matter, you'll have free food, free bad, and you'll get a paycheck."

"But, isn't it about serving your country, and being dedicated to something greater than yourself?"

Kenny laughed, "You have so much to learn about the real world bro."

Connor shrugged, "Any options other than the Army?"

"Marines. Delta Squad. Green Beret's."

Connor grunted, he'd think on it later.

ELEVENTH GRADE:

By Connor's senior year, he knew what he wanted to do. He wanted to be a cop. His mother was enthusiastic about it, and he was already looking to take college courses in criminology so that he could move up the line faster. He didn't want to be the average Joe cop, he wanted to be a detective.

Jaser got the same talk from her mother, but she actually had an answer the first time.

"I wanna be a lawyer."

Her mother looked a bit shocked for a moment, but then asked, "Um, what kind of lawyer sweetie? Do you want to work for businesses or, or defend immigrants-"

"I wanna put bad guys in jail." She said.

He mother paled. "You mean a prosecuting lawyer?"

Jaser nodded, "Yeah, it would be awesome!"

Connor grinned right along with Jaser, "Cool! I bring in the baddies, and you lock em up!"

They fist bumped for the first time since middle school.

Connor should have been watching his mother, maybe then he would have insisted Jaser pick a different job.

But looking back, it wouldn't have deterred her. Something's are just in the blood.

TWELFTH GRADE:

Jaser had trouble adjusting to the fact high school was nearly over. But everything was intact with her. She had done duel enrollment her last year, so she was all set for a four year college. She had worked hard and gotten a scholarship for a good college three towns over. Connor was happy with her hard work, but hardly got any time to tell her so with all his work at the academy.

He had planned to do two years of normal police work before bumping it up to detective, but his IQ said different. They offered him to do six months of regular cop before taking the test for detective. He studied criminology at the community college, and got ready for it.

Jaser and his mom were so proud of him when he came home in uniform, gun and all.

COLLEGE:

Connor hardly saw her after that. He got a phone call every month or so, saying she was doing great, and she loved college. She came home for Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.

Their Mother asked her if she already had plans for Valentines Day. She just laughed and said, "No boy there is worth the time. They're all in frat houses, wasting their brain cells."

Connor sighed in happiness that his little sister wasn't dating.

But then she turned right around to say, "Maybe once I'm in law school, the boys there will be better."

Connor just prayed that these next four years wouldn't fly by. He wanted to keep his innocent little sister completely naïve of boys.

But that's where the boy subject was dropped. She went on to say that the political science course she was taking was very interesting.

But then during her second year of college, her and Connor both hit a devastating road bump. Their mother got remarried.

She fell head over heels with another man, and married him after only knowing him for two days. His name was George. When Jaser and Connor found out, they went into hyper drive mode. Connor pulled background check after background check, of him, his relatives, friends, and coworkers. Jaser talked to every lawyer she knew from lectures they had given at college, trying to dig up whatever she could on the man.

And then they met up for lunch over spring break. Connor growled at the files, "This makes no sense. No ends here are meeting up."

Jaser nodded, "Maybe we're missing something. How far back did the background check on George go?"

"To the hospital he was born in." Connor said, tiling his head as he looked at the print, as if a different angle would reveal something he had missed.

"Nearly all his close male relatives are ex-cons, several of his female cousins have been busted on prostitution charges, and his own parents other has ties to the Russian mob..." Jaser trailed off, "Oh hell."

Connor looked up, "What? You find something?"

Jaser nodded, "I heard about cases like this. George is in Witness Protection. He probably got caught by the FBI, then cooperated with them. He gave them information on crimes that outweighed his. his record gets wiped clean, he gets relocated, and basically doesn't have to pay for his crimes."

Connor stared at her, "That happens?"

"In high profile crimes? Ones dealing with the Russian mob, Italian mob, human trafficking? Absolutely." Jaser leaned back in her seat, sighing. "And there's absolutely nothing we can do about it. The minute we make a fuss, the FBI comes in here, and relocates him. Since he and Mom are married, they'll relocate her too. Best we keep him where we can watch him. But still, we better tell Mom, just make sure she knows who she's sharing a bed with."

They did. She already knew. And she didn't care. "I know who he used to be, but he's changed. I love him, and I will never stop loving him."

Connor went over the edge. He threw himself into work, took the detective test, and passed. He had to chose which sector he wanted to go into, and for him it came down between homicide, and special victims.

He called up Jaser, they had gotten much closer since their Mother ran off to Florida with George, leaving them both her house. "I just don't know which one to go with."

"Then pick whichever victims need you more." She replied, then hung up.

LAW SCHOOL:

Connor had climbed to the top quickly in his unit, gaining jealousy from his fellow employees, and admiration of his superiors. He had gotten a Bachelors degree in criminology, and an Associates in Psychology. The FBI called him, asking about recruitment.

His immediate response was, "Absolutely."

And Jaser got her last required year of law school done. She was offered to go another year to specialize, but she turned it down, and came home for the summer.

She roomed with Connor for a few weeks, discussing her future.

"What do you plan on doing?" He asked.

She shrugged, "I was thinking New Jersey, or DC."

His eyes widened, "But, those are the most crime filled-"

"And that's why I need to be there." She said, "Connor, the only reason I because a lawyer was so I could put away creeps. I might as well go somewhere that I would always be of use. Right?"

Connor bit his lower lip, before nodding, "Fine. But I'm going with you."

Jaser narrowed her eyes, "Connor-"

"I just got accepted into the FBI. I'll request to be relocated, Jersey, DC, wherever you want to go." Connor pleaded with her, "Please don't leave without me Jaser, I… you're the only family I've got left."

So they went to New Jersey together.

They settled into an apartment, and Connor was at work the next day. Jaser decided to go right into a very specific field, federal prosecutor. She now worked for the FBI as well. Same building, different section.

She gave a gentle knock on the office door titled H. Kenway.

"Charles? That you?"

"No." Jaser opened the door slightly, seeing a middle aged man, sitting behind his desk, one hand in his desk drawer. He looked at her curiously, and shut his drawer quickly.

"Can I help you Mrs.?"

"Uh, it's Jaser, sir. I'm here about a job-"

"Ah, yes." he mumbled, leafing through a few files, pulling out a very thin one. "Sit down will you?"

She sat down hesitantly, a bit shaky at her first job interview. Connor had assured her that morning she would get the job, her credentials spoke for her very highly.

"Very shallow record here though." Mr. Kenway pointed out, "No outstanding job records. I see you worked at a few restaurants, and one department store, but you have no experience in the legal department."

Jaser shrugged sheepishly, "Law school took up a lot of time, and-"

"Yes, well we did hope for a more experienced person." He pointed out, staring at the file rather than looking up at her. "That being said, these are some of the best credentials I've ever seen."

He finally looked up to meet her eyes. "Tell me, was it necessary to get bachelor's degrees in Criminology, and Social Sciences?"

She grasped for a handhold, "I just-"

"I mean, it's fairly obvious that you're only getting a job here as a starting point. A few years here, and then you'll be off to business law, backing some million dollar company." He sighed, leaning back in his chair, "So hard to find a dedicated-"

"Sir!" Jaser suddenly snapped. She had tried to keep a cool head here, not wanting the side of her to much like her brother to run free. She wouldn't lie that she had a temper, but she was trying to choke it back down. "I don't want to here you finish that sentence. I'm insulted by the implication you think I'd move onto a career in business law. I only went to law school with one thing in mind, and one only."

His laid back eyes seemed to spark with a little interest, "What's that? Money?"

"No." She growled, "I don't give a damn about money! I wanted to help people. All I've thought about since I got my license was putting sick pedophiles, rapists, and murderers away."

He seemed to regard her differently. "Tell me, what are your thoughts on the death penalty?"

"I believe that any case of intended pedophilia, rape, or murder, to any person, should be a needle in the arm." She didn't even flinch.

He raised an eyebrow, "So you believe if a man kills one person, he should be killed?"

"This country was built on the principle of an eye for an eye, sir."

He chuckled for a moment, "You know, any other law office in this country would kick you out the door for saying that?"

She was silent.

"But here, we believe in the death penalty. Firmly." He stood from his chair, reaching a hand across his desk, "Welcome aboard."

She shook his hand, "Happy to be here."

He nodded, "I'll try and get you set up with a field agent, I'll have to see who might be available."

A thought crossed her mind, "Uh, could I put in a request for an agent that might still be available?"

He looked take back a bit, "Well, if you know one, by all means."

"His name in Connor, he just started today."

Mr. Kenway shook his head, "Sorry, we always put the ones fresh out of the academy with a more experienced agent. I think I might already have one in mind though. He's a bit… head strong, doesn't always look before he leaps. Think you could put up with that?"

She laughed a little, "I've lived with my brother for twenty-four years. I can handle this guy."

He nodded, "Very well."

Mr. Kenway took a few steps past her, opening the door a crack, "Charles?"

He pulled away from the door, and a man she assumed was Charles entered quickly, "Yes sir?"

"I'd like you to meet Mrs. Jaser. I'd like you to show her the ropes around here so to speak. Jaser, could you wait outside?"

Jaser stepped outside of the office, and Haytham turned to Charles, "I want her paired up with Hickey."

Charles sighed, "I'll try and slap the barbarian around to ensure he isn't inappropriate with the poor girl-"

"No." Haytham said, staring out the window of the office to watch Jaser as she looked around the hall. "Let's see just what she's capable of. Hickey will be perfect for testing her limits."

Charles found it difficult to believe this girl could be capable of withstanding Thomas hickey for more than a few hours.


I've redone this chapter, mainly the part about their mother. She still lives! And there is great reasoning behind that.