Warning, the M rating is definitely in effect for this chapter.

Chapter 10 - Part I; I Don't Even Know You

Ten months after the funeral (Aug 2187)

That righteous fury that had overtaken Sydney the day of McKenzie's birthday party left her almost as quickly as it had come. She wasn't built to sustain such overpowering negative emotions such as anger and hatred for long periods of time, and she had instead been filled with a deep, sorrowful resignation towards her dad's condition. She recognized that nothing she could do would fix her dad or help him get better and it killed her. The part of her that loved to help people didn't want to admit defeat but the rational part of her brain overruled it as a hopeless situation and she knew something had to be done.

There hadn't been anything quite as dramatic as his display on her sister's birthday, but he never showed any signs of getting better like he had. She couldn't figure out what had caused his 'fluke' that had made her think he was on the path to recovery. She was almost glad he never seemed inclined to pretend to be recovering because another false alarm would have been devastating. The disappointment she had felt the first time when her bubble of hope had been shattered was enough to make her never want to experience that pain again.

The rest of the school year had passed rather uneventfully, relatively speaking. She'd had a great first season of skyball and had thankfully been able to stay dedicated to the sport even throughout the rollercoaster that her life had been. Academically-wise, her and Tucker had, as usual, gotten all A's. And as usual, Julia had barely passed. Her parents were livid of course, but unfortunately for them, Julia saw their fury as a victory and it only reinforced her bad habits. Anything that pissed her parents off was a plus in Julia's book.

As soon as school had ended she had moved a lot of her stuff to Julia and Tucker's houses so she could be anywhere but her house as much as possible. She had signed McKenzie up for as many summer programs as were realistic so that she could get her sister out of the house, too. She set up sleepovers at the little girl's friends houses so that she could keep her sister somewhere else over night. On nights her sister didn't have a sleep over she stayed at home, but every other night she stayed at either her best friend's house or her boyfriend's. The Rolden's completely understood the situation and were perfectly willing to let Sydney stay there as long as she needed to. And, as much as Julia's parents fought with their youngest daughter, they respected Sydney a great deal. They hoped that she would be a positive force in their daughter's life and pull her out of her rebellious tendencies. Little did they know that the influence was really running the other direction, but regardless, they also opened their home willingly to her after they became privy to the situation.

Unfortunately, she knew that crashing at her friend's houses couldn't be a permanent solution. One, she wouldn't be able to stay at the Kaleen house for long. The parents of the house may have liked her, but she could only stand their uptight tendencies for so long before they started to drive her mad. And two, she couldn't stay at Tucker's house for long because, no matter how much the family adored her and would house her for as long as she needed, they couldn't afford to have her stay with them. Tucker was an only child and with just the three of them, they could manage. But Tucker's dad didn't have the most illustrious job and his mother didn't work, so they really could only support their own family somewhat comfortably. If Sydney and McKenzie were added to the mix, there was no way they could carry the extra weight financially.

This forced Sydney to look at the harsh reality of her situation. Even though she would be 16 in a couple of months, there was absolutely no way she could single-handedly support her and her sister. Their dad had, finally, gotten fired, and while they were still fine because of how much their family had saved up, it wouldn't last forever. And with the extremely slim prospect of their dad getting better and getting another job, the sisters wouldn't be able to stay with their father. She knew she eventually had to address her dad's situation and somehow do something about it, but who would blame her for trying to keep together the last bits of shredded illusion that her family was still cohesive and whole.

Sydney shuddered at the thought of orphanages or foster homes for her and her sister if they couldn't find anywhere else to stay. Because she considered those as last resort, she had thrown herself into searching for another means and place for them to live. Currently she hadn't come up with much, but she knew she hadn't exhausted all her options so she hadn't given up hope.

She had brought it up a lot with Julia and Tucker in an attempt to solve her predicament. Obviously both of them offered up their homes without a second thought, but she politely, well in Tucker's case politely, explained why she couldn't stay with them permanently. Julia had reluctantly agreed to the fact that her parents were insane, but Tucker hadn't accept her reasoning as quickly. He had argued heatedly that they would have worked something, anything, out to help, but Sydney had continued to refuse until Tucker grudgingly accepted that it would have been extremely difficult to do. He brought it up every now and then, but she always quietly and kindly refused.

Besides the housing situation, Sydney's summer hadn't been half bad in terms of how summers went. The first few weeks school had let out, her and all her friends had lived it up. They stayed out all night doing stupid teenager things around town and had gone to quite a few parties. Then the novelty of summer wore off slightly and they all vegged at each other's houses being the lazy kids that they were. Sydney hadn't felt more normal in months than she did the first two months of summer. Not allowing herself to stress over the fact that she couldn't help her dad alleviated a lot of the tension that had been hanging on her shoulders. She still had to look after her sister, but McKenzie was great and rarely added to her sister's burden.

-.-.-.-.-

"Shit, why does the summer always go by so fast?" Julia moaned as they lounged in their friend Skyler's pool.

"Time flies when you're having fun?" Tucker quiped.

Julia lowered her sunglasses and scowled at him, raking her hand across the water and splashing him. "Don't be a smart ass," she grumped.

"Hey, don't be hateful. Don't ask a question that you don't want an answer to," the blonde boy retorted.

Julia just snorted, "Whatever," and closed her eyes.

"She is right, though. It sucks that we only have a few more weeks until school starts," the owner of the pool added. His house had been a central hang out point for their group of friends since he was the only one with a house big enough for a pool.

"Yeah, it feels like we barely got to do anything at all," their friend Darci pouted.

Carla rolled her eyes. "I seem to recall that you were busy going on cruises with your parents all summer, so don't you freaking complain about time slipping by."

"Oh right, and I seem to recall that you decided to sleep your way through Europe a few weeks ago," Darci shot back at the older girl. Everyone else laughed at the blush that exploded across Carla's face because it was a half-way true accusation.

Tucker looked semi-shocked because Carla wasn't really a promiscuous girl. Sydney was the one to splash him then to wipe the look off his face. "Jeez, Tuck, she didn't actually sleep with them-"

"So you say," Julia muttered, earning a mock glare from Sydney at being interrupted.

"Ahem. She just sort of rampage dated. Although I guess..." she trailed off.

"No! I'm not some slut like Julia over there," a laugh from the group at the long standing joke which wasn't even remotely true, "I just... sampled many different cultured members of the opposite sex," Carla defended. And she really hadn't slept with anyone, but she had definitely enjoyed herself.

All the boys in the group made disgusted faces and pretended to gag, which earned them splashes from the girls, which led to an all out water fight. It only died down because Skyler's mother said she wouldn't bring them food if they got her wet. After eating, they settle down under the patio and tried to decide how they were going to spend their last few weeks of freedom.

After some discussion, Julia shut them all up and just said, "Let's throw the biggest fucking end-of-summer party for our whole class."

"Shit, Julia, that's like 600 people, are you an idiot?" Skyler pointed out.

The petite raven-haired girl glared at him somewhat for raining on her parade but, had to admit it was somewhat outrageous. "Okay, fine. Not everyone, but all the people we know," she amended. "It'll be hella awesome and people would love us for it."

Most of the friends nodded in agreement, Tucker obviously just scowled, and decided it was a pretty great idea. "But where would we have it? Even if we only invited 100 or so people that's a lot of space and a lot of booze," Carla pointed out.

"Fucking logistics," Julia muttered, but cleared her throat and spoke louder. "Alright, those are legitimate problems, but we have at least two weeks to figure that shit out. I say we have it the weekend before school starts so it'll be the last fun thing on everyone's mind. That way everyone will be talking about how kick-ass our party was when classes start."

They all agreed to that and started planning.

-.-.-.-.-

The first week before they planned to have the party seemed to whizz by as they all fervently hammered out the details for the party that they had decided to throw. Coming up with the location had been the hardest, but one of their more... shady friends, had told them that he knew of an abandoned warehouse downtown. They had been extremely skeptical at first, but once they all went down to check it out, Tucker dragged by Sydney and Julia, they realized it would be perfect. Not to mention, Julia knew how to bypass the locks on the doors and how to hack the mainframe of the warehouse's security system to make it seem like they hadn't even been there. And because of its size, the group realized they could invite way more than 100 people. It also hadn't been in as poor a condition as they originally thought it was going to be, with the main hanger mainly just having a few dusty old boxes shoved against one wall and all the offices on the second floor being in great shape.

They also decided that since they were going to invite a lot more people, they would charge a miniscule fee of 1 or 2 credits at the door to help them cover the cost of the booze, which they were all fronting the money for themselves. They figured they could make the party almost club-like, and therefore people wouldn't mind paying the ridiculously small payment before entering. They figured the warehouse could hold up to 400 people or thereabouts, so they thought they'd be able to cover the cost pretty easily.

Julia knew she could reroute all the speakers in the building and link them up to someone's omni-tool for all the music. Pretty unanimously they decide to let Skyler be the DJ because he easily had the best taste in music out of the lot of them. He eagerly jumped into his roll and spent all his time coming up with a huge playlist of all the most popular galactic hits. He became exempt from the rest of the planning process because of his new duties. He'd have to come up with hours of good music, so they left him to his research and musical selection.

Besides music and dancing, they figured there should be some other activities for people to do, so along an entire wall they decided to set up holographic simulators for everything from snowboarding to a weird salarian game that involved a lot of jumping. The people who didn't get too wasted would enjoy and appreciate those. The only problem with that was Julia didn't know how to get a hold of all of them through her magnificent hacking abilities, so they did have to rent a couple, the cost of which would hopefully still be covered by their entrance fee.

When Tucker was done being horrified, he gradually realized how impressive the whole set up was and how much effort his friends were putting into it. He didn't want to come off as too much of a hypocrite, because he did go to a few parties, but he was reluctant with this one because he'd never thrown a big party before, and neither really had anyone else in their group. He initially stayed somewhat removed from all of the planning, but slowly got into the preparations as the party got closer. He even somehow got roped into make invitations for the whole thing.

All in all, when everything was smoothed out and accounted for, they figured they had a really good shot of pulling the party off. They were going a little old school by just having tubs of ice for the drinks, but renting an actually frosting machine like most bars used would have been way too expensive. So when they tallied all the costs up, they figured that if the full 400 showed up and they just charged 1 credit, they would be good and covered.

They had a little under a week after everything was said and done before the party, so they sent out the secret invitation to people's omni-tools. They emphasized that it was a secret party for their grade only and listed the where and the when for people. Julia added her own little snipit to the bottom of the message that read: 'I know you will fucking tell people no matter how secret we make this shit, but at least keep it in the 'fam', okay assholes? Don't fucking tell the upperclassmen; we're gonna make them jealous as shit when they hear about the best damn party ever that the freshman had. So keep your fucking mouths shut!' She even signed her name by it, which instantly made people laugh and relax because, even if they had previously been pissed about being cussed out, it was Julia, and everyone knew she was nuts. But for the most part, the future sophomore class kept the event to themselves.

-.-.-.-.-

Sydney made sure that her little sister had somewhere to sleep over the night of the party so she wouldn't have to worry about her. She knew she'd end up crashing at Julia or Tucker's house after the thing was over and she felt a lot better about it knowing McKenzie would be with an adult.

They'd decided to have the party the last Friday night before school started back up so kids would have the whole weekend to recuperate. Her, Julia and all their friends were running around getting everything ready for the night; making sure they had all the drinks ready, making sure none of the sims shorted out (which some had, making Julia flip her shit), and making sure that they'd thoroughly hacked into the security of the warehouse so they wouldn't get busted. They, which basically meant Julia, had added as much sound dampening software to the mainframe as they could so that the music wouldn't escape the walls of the warehouse. They'd tested it a couple of times earlier in the day and, for the most part, it worked. Thankfully, the building wasn't in a highly populated area so there wasn't a very high chance someone would hear them and call the police to complain.

Sydney was back at her house getting ready since there was only an hour before she was going to show up to the party. Julia had assured her that she wouldn't need to be there early, so she figured she'd arrive when it was starting to get into full swing so she could see it in all its glory.

She had dropped McKenzie off at the friend's house that she was staying the night at and was now getting ready. She went to her closet to get the outfit she was going to wear and laid it out on her bed before she went to go take a shower. Afterwards, she toweled off most of the dampness from her hair and then stood in front of the mirror to braid it up into an intricate style that her mom had taught her. It was great for the party because not only would it keep her hair out of her face, it also looked amazing. Not that anyone would really be paying attention to her hair, but it made her feel good.

She went back to her bed and pulled on her clothes, which consisted of a white tanktop with thin layers of fabric flowing down it and a loose, sky blue skirt that flowed to just above her knees. It was summer time and it was almost unbearable hot on some days and beyond humid. There was a chance the temperature would drop a few degrees as the sun went down, but the humidity would remain hanging thickly in the air. And she knew the inside of the warehouse would be sweltering after a few hours, so she dressed in as little fabric as possible but as modest as she was able. She put on the necklace her mom had given her when she turned 10, which had a little sheep charm on the end, and slipped on her sandals (no way in hell was she going to be stupid enough to wear heels) and went down stairs to eat before Tucker came to get her. She'd have to drive of course, but it was the gesture that counted.

She skipped down into the kitchen to grab some food but stopped dead when she saw who else was in the kitchen as well. He was leaning on the counter sipping some water and scrolling through things on his omni-tool. He hadn't noticed her yet and she was staying frozen at the entrance to the kitchen just staring at him because... Is that a fucking smile?

She made a weird choking sound in the back of her throat and that alerted her dad to her presence. They looked at each other for a few seconds before he smiled, yes smiled, at her bigger and set his water down. "Hey, honey. How are you?"

Sydney couldn't even form coherent words when he spoke and all she did was blink at him in utter surprise and confusion. "Wha...?"

His forehead crinkled at her loss of words and he walked over and started to put his arm around her. Every muscle in Sydney's body locked up and froze as his warm arm wrapped around her upper body and pulled her into a side hug. She then almost fainted from bewilderment when he kissed her forehead. After the fiasco of McKenzie's birthday, she hadn't had any physical contact with her dad whatsoever, so her mind was shrieking in confusion with the sudden affection.

Frowning a bit at the tenseness he felt from her, he asked, "Are you alright? You look pale." His tone held concern and love and it freaked Sydney out.

She was freaking out because one, her father was awake. She couldn't remember the last time they had crossed paths with each other. Two, he smiled. That in and of itself was the leading contributor to her currently muddled state. And three, he was talking as if he didn't have a care in the world, like his months of erratic and destructive behavior hadn't happened. All those things were flying around in her head and the only thing that made its way out was, "Oh. I'm just hungry."

What the hell?! No, I'm not just hungry, what the fuck is going on? she berated herself. All she managed was 'hungry'? What was wrong with her?

The statement made her dad's smile return and he went to the fridge saying, "Oh, I'll make you something to eat." He rummaged around and listed off some things, "I could make some pizza, or spaghetti. Or it looks like we have some left over grilled chicken."

That's because I made that yesterday for me and McKenzie! her mind raged, but she still just stood there frozen, like her body wasn't allowing her to act adversely to the situation even if her brain was screaming at her. She'd wanted this normalness for so long that it seemed her muscles were moving on autopilot to take advantage of the situation. "Grilled chicken sounds good," she eeped out.

"Alrighty," he said cheerfully. Jake pulled out the container and put the chicken on a plate before he stuck it in the microwave. He turned back to look at her and noticed she still hadn't moved. "Are you sure you're okay, honey? You seem a little off."

Hell yes I'm 'off'! Who the hell are you and what have you done with my dad? "Uh.. I'm fine? Hungry..." was all she repeated. She somehow drifted to the kitchen table and sat down, waiting for the food to finish heating up. She cleared her throat and allowed some of what she was thinking to slip out, "How... Do you feel okay?"

Her dad looked at her like she was being silly and said, "Of course I feel okay. Why do you ask?"

"You... I mean..." she stuttered to a halt. Does he really not realize what he's been doing? "You've been... sick. Don't you remember?"

He scrunched his face up like he was trying to remember a really old memory, but then shrugged. "I don't remember being sick. But even if I was, I feel fine now. Great, really," he finished with a smile.

Jeez, that smile's creeping me out... How in the world can he not remember? How can he be acting like it was nothing? "That's... uh, good," was all Sydney managed. What is happening...?

The microwave beeped and he hopped up to get it for her. He set the plate of chicken down in front of her and got her a fork and knife. He also got another cup of water and set down by her as well. Sydney was too stunned to move for a few moments and just sat there staring at her food dumbly. When was the last time someone else served me food instead of the other way around...

"Well, aren't you going to eat?" he inquired, "You look like you need it."

"Uh-huh..." She mechanically reached out and picked up her utensils and started to cut the chicken. She barely tasted it as the food moved down her throat and she continued to stare dazedly at her dad. He had returned to his omni and was scrolling back through it.

After a silent, and, on her end, awkward meal, she set her fork down and leaned back in her chair, admitting that she did feel better after eating. Okay. Focus. There has to be a reason for this.

She cleared her throat to get his attention but before she could talk, he said, "Oh, you're done. Here, let me clean up for you." He leaned over and picked up her plate, placing he fork and knife on it, and took them to the washer.

"Thanks," was all she weakly said. She berated herself and imagined Julia yelling at her, Get it the fuck together, sheep-head. She shook her head and refocused on her dad. She cleared her throat again and said, "Dad."

He turned to look at her with the strangest look on his face that she had ever seen. "'Dad'? Why'd you call me that, honey?"

Her jaw hung open like he had lost his mind. "Be-because you're my dad... Duh."

He walked over to her with a look of great concern on his face and knelt down by her chair. He raised a hand to her forehead to see if she felt warm. "You really don't look very good. I'll make you some tea and you can lay on the couch." He then trailed his hand down her face and cupped her cheek before...

Planting a small kiss right on her lips.

Her mind was absolutely blank for two seconds before Sydney exploded out of her chair, knocking it onto the floor, and brutally shoved her dad backwards. "WHAT THE FUCK?!" she screamed. Her eyes were wild and her breath was heaving from utter shock and revulsion. "DAD! What the HELL is WRONG with you?!"

Jake had just as much confusion in his eyes as she did but without the disgust. "Woah, calm down. What's the matter, Hannah?"

The name brought her to a complete and absolute standstill, not a muscle in her body moved as she locked up, but her brain went into overdrive. What the FUCK?! Shit, shit WHAT? Fucking hell?! WHAT?! Hannah? He thinks I'm MOM?!

"H-Hannah?" she choked out, not fully registering what he had just said. "W-Why did you call me that?"

He slowly stood up, keeping his eyes on hers at all times. "Because that's your name, sweetheart. Hannah." He reached out a hand toward her and that snapped her out of her frozen haze.

She smacked his outstretched limb away from her as hard as she could and she backed up away from him, terrified. Horror etched its way across her face as realization dawned on her; her dad's behavior of the past couple of minutes clicking into place with awful clarity. He... he thinks I'm Mom... He... Shit, he thinks...

"Dad..." she stated slowly and quietly, like she was trying to calm a snarling beast. "Dad, Mom is gone. I'm Sydney, your daughter." She tried to keep her voice as rational and calm as possible, but she still continued to back away from him. The part of her brain that had grown up since her mother's death and taken on the role as caretaking in the house was trying to get through to her dad, but the teenage kid part of Sydney, which was losing out only by the tiniest of margins, was babbling incoherently with fear and terror. No... fuck, God, no. Shit, what do I do. Shit. FUCK!

"Sydney?" Jake snorted. "You'd think I'd know my own daughter. Hannah, why are you acting so strangely? I think you're the one who's sick," he said, and took a step toward her.

That step forward was all it took for the terrified, teenage Sydney to break out from underneath the rational adult part of her brain. She picked up the chair that was on the floor and she chucked it at him screaming, "You stay the fucking HELL away from me!" Tears started to roll down her face as she backed away further and out of the kitchen. "Oh God, oh God. Shit, stay away from me," she sobbed.

"Han-"

"NO!" she shrieked, "Get the fuck away from me!" She turned and bolted through the living room towards the front door. She ripped it open and stumbled down her driveway and onto the street. She sprinted away from her house and with liquid fear trailing down her cheeks, all she could choke out was "God, no..."

She continued down the street until a voice in the dark called out to her, "Sydney?"

It was like her feet were bolted to the ground and her muscles froze on the spot. Someone came up behind her and wrapped their arms around her. The touch snapped her from her stationary position and she started thrashing and screaming incoherently, "No! Please, no! Get away from me! Mom's gone! She's gone, leave me alone!"

But when the voice spoke again, and all she heard was concern and love she stopped mid-punch and listened to his soothing voice. "Syd, it's alright, I've got you," he murmured into her hair, "Shh, I'm right here, I'm not letting go."

The calmness and security of his words seeped into her haze of terror and slowly wrapped around the panic in her mind. Instinctively she turned in his embrace and wrapped her arms around his waist and crushed herself against his chest, her tears staining his shirt as they continued to fall unchecked down her face. A gentle hand caressed her hair and another rubbed warm, soothing circles on her back. "I've got you. You're safe," he whispered one more time.

"Tucker," she choked out through her throat that was tight with anguish and clutched him tighter. "Tuck..." He held her in the middle of the street as her body was wracked with sobs. Slowly, she calmed down in the encirclement of his strong arms and she eventually pulled away to look up at him with blood shot eyes. He saw absolute horror in her eyes and the terror in them shook him to the bone. But, the soul-clenching fear slowly become overshadowed by betrayal and anger until all he saw was steely fury and enraged hurt. Her only words were, "Get me out of here."

A/N - So... yeah, basically wtf right? Yeah... 10 and 11 were originally one chapter, but it grew too big so I split it. And now you get left with the mother of all cliffhangers. But hey, it matches my mood:

It seems I spoke too soon in my author's note from chapter 5. I'd said I'd never been to a funeral of someone really close to me (thank goodness) but this week I'll being going to my grandpa's. So I'll upload this one, let you hate me for leaving you at such a cliff hanger, and hopefully sometime after the funeral (which is on tuesday) I'll upload the next part. I never wanted real life to mess with this, but it seems I was being a wee bit optimistic with that. You guys are awesome though, and it makes my day when I see how much you guys have taken to this story. So. Keep being awesome, and I'll get my sh*t together as soon as I can and get back to you.