It Takes One to Raise One

Sequel to the incredibly long titled No One Takes Down Hit Girl But Hit Girl. As before, Mindy is telling this story to someone, much as Dave does during the movies. Welcome and thank you for reading and reviewing. Title courtesy of Makokam.

Well, I didn't take her directly home. That would have been stupid, especially since I was still in costume. I backtracked to the alley where I had hidden my normal clothes and tried to preserve my secret identity.

I looked at her nervously. "Look, ummm… Wait here for a few minutes, OK?" I asked, when we got close to where I'd hidden my stuff. "I have to go fight more crime but my partner will come out in a few minutes. She'll find you a place to stay." The girl just stared at me. "She's about my height and kind of sounds like me, but we're totally different people. Wait here, OK?" More staring. I decided that a lack of response indicated agreement and disappeared into the alley to quickly change. It didn't take too long but I didn't want her to disappear so I shoved everything into my bag as fast as I could. I didn't notice that my wig was peeking out.

When I came back out a few minutes later, I tried to pitch my voice a little higher and change my speech pattern a bit. "Hiya kiddy!" I bubbled. "Hit Girl asked me to take care of you. Shall we go get something to eat?"

"How fucking stupid do you think I am?" She yelled back at me. "I'm six, not three, asshole! You're Hit Girl! I don't forget who you are just because you walked out of site for a few damn minutes. Or think you're someone else just because you took off some bullshit mask! What did you do? Get shot in the mother-fucking head?"

She was understandably confused when I laughed uncontrollably at the last comment. Finally I pushed myself back up from brick wall that I had leaned on to catch my breath and looked at her. "Sorry, I had to try. You won't tell anyone, will you?"

"Tell them what? That the purple drapes don't match the carpet? Like that's a fucking surprise? I still don't know shit!"

"Drapes?! Carpet?!" I replied, confused. She pointed at the purple wig that was peeking out of my bag and then pointed at my crotch. Then at my regular hair and my crotch. She had to do it two more times before I finally realized what she was saying and started laughing again. I also began to understand exactly why I drove Dave so insane. "Right, sorry. I don't think you're stupid. OK – yes, I'm Hit Girl. But you can call me Mindy. "

"I can fucking call you that? Or that's your name, bitch?" She shot back.

Ok, now I could empathize when Dave said I swore too much. It was kind of difficult to communicate when everything you heard involved 'shits' 'fucks' and 'bitches'. "Yes. My name is Mindy. If you stop swearing, I'll find you someplace to stay. Sound good?"

"My mom just died and I'm alone on the fucking street! Of course it sounds good, you stupid cu.." She began then stopped when she noticed my eyes had flashed from amused to pissed. "Umm, I mean, yes please?"

"Better." I said then looked her over. "Let's get you something decent to wear first."

"You mean pillow cases and fat guy's shirts aren't the height of fashion?" She asked sarcastically.

"No, definitely not." I replied. Better, I thought. Smart ass but without the swearing. I could work with this. So, we headed off for an early morning of food and shopping.

A couple of hours later, her stomach full of breakfast and finally in some decent clothes, she totally blew the tough girl routine by cuddling up next to me in the cab and falling asleep on my lap. We got to safe house and I took her inside. It was a bit of a struggle to carry both her and all of the shopping bags but I was still happy that Dave had already left for school. He'd been worried when I hadn't gotten home at the usual time but a quick exchange of text messages had reassured him that I was OK and just enjoying the morning. I hadn't told him about Bethany yet.

Yes. Bethany. The little ball of attitude and dirt had a cutesy princess type name. Ahh, who was I to judge? 'Mindy' didn't exactly come off as bad ass. I put her on the couch and covered her with a blanket. She instinctively pulled it around her until she was just about cocooned in the thing. Then she was dead to the world and I felt safe enough to crawl into my own bed. Within a minute or two, I joined her in slumber.

Apparently it was still a day for surprises. I was yanked out of sleep by a screeching noise coming from the living room and Dave yelling 'OW' repeatedly. I ran through the door and found Bethany wrapped around Dave's head and pummeling him with all the strength that she had in those six year old arms. I could see that Dave didn't want to hit back but was starting to get tired of being hit in the head and so I jumped into the fight and pulled her off of him.

Almost simultaneously, I got a "What the hell, Mindy!?" from Dave and an "I can take him!" from Bethany. I ordered the fighters to their separate corners and tried to figure out what had happened. It turned out that Dave had gotten home from school and didn't notice Bethany when he went to sit on the couch. He'd almost squashed her and triggered some sort of defensive response. I gathered that she'd been attacked while she was sleeping more than once and that the other times weren't so innocent. Dave just kept staring at me, his expression changing from anger to accusation, to confusion, to amusement and then back through the emotions again. He was kind of like that spinning wheel on 'Wheel of Fortune' and I quickly realized that I'd better stop him at the right spot or I'd end up 'bankrupt'. I tried waiting for amusement to come back around unfortunately he stopped all by himself on anger.

With his emotions barely controlled, Dave started to speak. "What in the fu…" He looked at Bethany, obviously not wanting to swear in front of her but unable to come up with another word. Bethany didn't help things when she helpfully added "Fuck?"

"Mindy, can I see you in the other room?" Dave managed to get out through teeth that must be cracking by now. Then, with more fear then I felt when sneaking into the warehouse to rescue Daddy, I followed him into the bedroom and shut the door.

OK. I was in for it. I'd never seen Dave this angry. Not at me anyway. I sat down on the bed and tried to look as innocent as possible. It didn't work.

"Why is there a kid in the safe house?" Dave asked in a tight voice.

"Girl." I said. "Not kid. Bethany. She's six." I replied, trying to keep things light.

"OK. Why is Bethany in the safe house?" Dave growled.

"She didn't have any place else to go?" I tried, already knowing that it wasn't going to work.

"And why was that?" Dave said, with this feeling that he was waiting for me to fall into the trap so that he could pounce on me.

"Well, there was this fight. And, I managed to pull of one of those 'one shot, one kills' like in that Sniper movie we watched last week…" I tried to explain before Dave interrupted me.

"You killed her Mom?" He said, the accusation almost dripping off the words. I stopped babbling and just sat there in shock. How dare he accuse me of that? How dare he even think it!? When I didn't manage a reply, he continued. "You did! You killed her mom and now you think you can just take her place! Mindy, how in the hell can you…"

This time I interrupted him with a slap. Well, kind of a slap. Most slaps wouldn't send 180 lbs of muscle flying across the room. He looked up at me from the floor. "No! I didn't kill her fucking mom! I killed the son of a bitch that killed her mom! And then the girl fell of the balcony they all were on and I caught her! And then she was crying and then she was swearing then she was eating pancakes and, FUCK IT DAVE! I couldn't just leave her there! I mean, sure, I'm Hit Girl and all tough and stuff, but I'm not a god damn monster! I'm a super hero Dave! Super heroes save people. Or, at least we try." I ran out of energy about the time that I stopped talking.

"So now what?" He asked. The anger had pretty much drained out of him.

I sat back down and put my face in my hands. "Now? I don't know. But I'll figure it out, OK? You've just got to give me some time."

"We." He said. I looked up startled. "We will figure it out. You and I made a deal. We're partners. Equal ones, not screwed up like Batman and Robin. Or Buffy and Xander." I smiled at his Buffy reference.

I dutifully repeated the line from Buffy. "No more butt monkey." Then finding strength in his support, I continued. "Fine. We're partners. We'll figure it out together. And Dave? Thanks. I love you."

"I love you too. Now I'm going to find an ice pack." Dave pulled himself to his feet and opened the door.

He was greeted with a scream of 'Nobody slaps Hit Girl!" and a gunshot that splintered the molding next to the door. She must have pulled one of my pistols from the bag I'd brought my costume home in. Fuck, I knew better than to be that careless with a gun. We both dove for cover and then spent the rest of the afternoon trying to convince Bethany that I'd slapped Dave instead of the other way around. Dave kept trying to explain it to her rationally while I kept suggesting that he just show her the red hand print on his cheek to prove it. He'd then remind me that if he showed his head, Bethany might shoot it off. I was having fun. I'd never conducted hostage negotiations before and I found it an interesting change of pace.