Mako's Message: Oh boy. It's another "long" one. Still not the longest, but easily second longest. I gotta say, I don't know what possessed me to stay up and write this. I guess I'm just eager to please my fans.

Man, I just don't know. Today was traumatic, but I got through it, I got some cleaning done, I got some other projects done, and I wrote four pages of this. I really thought I'd have a lot to say but I guess none of it worth mentioning because i've forgotten it. Or I'm just too sleepy to think properly.

Anyway, this I did want to say: The game exists. And everything I said about it is true. EVERYTHING.

I didn't want to go over to Dave's with my crutches, and my leg hadn't bothered me in a couple days, so I figured this would be as good a time as any to try and ditch the fucking things. It went pretty well. I walked around the house, did some stretches, some katas, and all was good. Hell, I even jogged around the block a few times.

Everything seemed fine.

Then when I walked in, Marcus saw me and said, "Hey, you're leg's all better?"

I stopped, ready to say, "Yes, my leg is great and I couldn't be happier," but as I turned around…

IT FUCKING GAVE OUT ON ME AGAIN!

Marcus ran over to help me but I stopped him. I didn't need his help. I stood up and stood on the fucked up one, I hopped on that leg. I did a fucking back flip right there in the hallway, stuck the landing, and held my arms out and said, "See? I'm fine."

Marcus just shrugged and said that as long as I sure I was okay he wouldn't say anything, but he'd more than happily take me to see a doctor if I wasn't.

I assured him I was then went upstairs to continue testing my leg in private. I really don't know what is wrong with it. It seems fine 99% of the time and then WHAM! Pain! The pain isn't even unbearable, I've dealt with far worse. The problem is that it makes my leg give out completely. Sometimes I can catch myself before I fall but…

God damn it pisses me off. I can kick your ass but I can't trust my own fucking leg.

Marcus called up to tell me it was time to go not too long after that. I had to rush to get ready since I'd been trying to figure out what sets my leg off all morning.

So far the best I've come up with is that it happens if I put my weight on it "wrong". I just have no motherfucking clue what wrong IS.

So whatever. I'll deal.

This is the first time I'd gone to Dave's house. It seemed kind of weird when I thought of it. But then, Dave always picked me up from my house when we went out, and the first couple of months after everything happened with D'Amico, I was just so busy getting things moved into Marcus's house, getting medical exams and testing for school, that I just didn't think about it. I was happy to just be passing some texts back and forth.

Well, actually, I have been there before. But I was uninvited that time and we only saw his room. Oh man he was so freaked out. The look on his face when he saw us was hilarious. I couldn't resist fucking with him though, even if I was impressed by his display of balls by walking into that drug den.

Man, he was so out of his element. I don't know what he was thinking. But I guess that's part of what I liked about him. He decided to just jump into the world of crime fighting feet first without any idea of what he was actually getting into, but he didn't even look back when the realization hit him. Even though he failed miserably when he confronted Rasul, he still held his ground, gave it his best, and didn't freak out until he knew he was fucked.

Kind of a shame. I'd have liked to see how that would have turned out if he'd had a real weapon, or even a real goddamned Tazer instead of that pussy little knock off.

So this was the first time I'd gone to his house on an invitation, and I was going to meet his dad.

When we got there, his Dad let us in. I caught a glimpse of Dave trying to ditch a frilly pink apron as Marcus introduced us. Dave's Dad (whose name is Casimir, by the way. Thank god he named his son Dave. With a last name like Lizewski he's got enough working against him.) said that I was "a cute little thing."

I decided then and there that I was done with pigtails forever.

I excused myself as Marcus and Casimir… I really can't call him that. I think I'll stick to something like Mr. L. That at least sounds a little cooler. As our parents talked I went in to talk to Dave, who showed me what they were cooking for dinner. They really went all out. The turkey was huge, they had three different kinds of potatoes, two kinds of rolls, lettuce and fruit salads, two types of stuffing, four different pies, six different vegetables and some polish dishes I can't remember the names of. Dave said it was the first time they'd had guests for Thanksgiving in a long time and that they had just eaten frozen turkey dinners last year.

I guess they wanted to make up for it and impress us at the same time, and they succeeded.

Since they'd pretty much finished everything and just needed to wait for the turkey to finish cooking, Mr. L and Marcus sat down in the living room and I followed Dave up to his room when he said he wanted to put on a fresh shirt.

I poked around while he was changing, just out of idle curiosity. I wasn't really expecting to find anything interesting. There were some magazines about martial arts and video games, comic books, a catalog of swords and knives, posters of comic characters, movies, and hot chicks, some weights, a pull-up bar, and his computer, nothing out of the ordinary. Then, for some reason that I can't think of I looked into the trash and there was half a condom wrapper.

Suddenly images of what Dave and Katie would get up to in that room flashed through my mind and I found it very hard to think about anything else. I was stuck in a state of half horror, half fascination at the idea of Dave and Katie fucking on that bed.

I didn't snap out of it until Dave put his hand on my shoulder asking if I was okay.

I told him I was, but I've spaced out like this so many times I think he was still worried. I'll have to make sure it doesn't happen again. I don't want to worry him over something stupid.

We went down stairs and Mr. L asked me how I was handling being in a new school. It was kind of a weird question if you ask me, since I'd been there for almost three months already, but I guess he was just trying to make conversation.

It was kind of stiff at first, but we relaxed pretty easily after we got talking. Mr. L seemed really interested in some of Marcus's stories from being a detective, and Marcus seemed a lot more interested in getting to know Mr. L when it came out that he was dating a black woman.

All in all it was really nice, and I started wondering if this was what having a normal family was like.

Then…while our parents were reminiscing about high school and the girls they'd dated. Mr. L asked if Marcus had seen Katie, and said how proud he was of his son for managing to attract the most popular girl in the school… Specifically, he said, "You have to be pretty kick ass to get a girl like that."

Marcus immediately shot me a look that spoke volumes, since I'd told him that Dave hadn't told his father about his adventures in crime fighting. I didn't know what to say. I looked at Dave, (who looked even more freaked out than Marcus did) questioningly and he just shook his head rapidly. Marcus decided to just agree and change the subject.

After we ate our parents sat down to watch some football and Dave and I went back upstairs to his room. Marty had sent him a game he wanted to show me, he said he was sure I'd love it. It was an old style, 8-bit platformer called "I Want to Be The Guy". The music was good, but I was otherwise uninterested. The game had four controls, move left, move right, jump, and shoot, so I figured the game couldn't be that hard.

Boy was I fucking wrong.

I died in an explosion of gore about five seconds in from a death trap you couldn't have known was there. So I tried again, got passed the first trap, and died again. I tried again, got the same result. After four tries I finally got to the next screen, and ya know what? I fucking died again! I couldn't last more than a minute in that game. It was fucking sadistic. It got to the point that I slammed the keyboard down and yelled, "What bastard designed this game, because I'm gonna kill him!"

Dave just laughed and said, "The bastard that knows he's a bastard for designing this."

He showed me the trick to getting through the second room. Get this. It's to DIE. And then instead of hitting retry you wait, and watch the teleporting platform until you have the patter memorized, then to try again and leap to where it will be, because you can't jump to them before they disappear again if you wait for them show up first.

That fucking game stole four hours of my life.

I'm not gonna let it beat me though. Oh hell no. I will not lose to that fucking thing.

I probably would have kept playing but Mr. L called up to say that "It's a Wonderful Life" was coming on and wanted to know if we wanted to come watch it. I wanted to keep playing, but Dave told me I should take a break before I got so pissed off that I'd break his computer.

I conceded that giving it a rest would probably be a good idea but vowed to return and kick it's ass.

Dave laughed and said, "You sure are something else, Mindy." I'm not sure what he meant, but I'm pretty sure it was a good thing so I let it go.

I must have worked myself a lot harder than I thought that morning, because I fell asleep.

I had this weird dream that started in Dave's room with me in my Hit Girl suit. I was telling Dave that we'd meet again and blew him a kiss before climbing out the window. And then I was shot in the back, and fell out the window into an alley, were D'Amico started beating the shit out of me. And again, I couldn't do anything to defend myself, I couldn't even move, all I could do was lay there and take it.

And then Dave grabbed him, and the tables turned around completely. Dave was just fucking his shit up left and right and there was nothing he could do about it. Dave kept wailing on his ass until he was an unrecognizable bloody mess. Except, it wasn't D'Amico anymore, it was some kid.

He picked me up and held me in his arms, and told me that he would always be there for me. I nestled against his chest and I felt safe. I knew that Dave wouldn't let me get hurt if he could help it.

Then he said, "That's right. I'll always be there fore you, because I love you," and then he tilted my chin up and kissed me. Just as I started to kiss him back, the sudden realization of what was going on hit me and I guess it shocked me awake because the next thing I knew I was laying there on the couch, half freaked out, half pissed off and wondering where the fuck that came from.

And then, to make it even more awkward, I realized I was using Dave's leg as a pillow and he was stroking my hair.

He didn't notice I was awake, and I sure as hell didn't want him to. I looked around the room hoping I'd see something that could help me get out of there, but all I saw was Marcus and Mr. L asleep in a couple armchairs. Dave seemed to be the only one still awake and he was watching The Late Show, so I decided to just lay there and watch with him.

The Late Show was actually ending and The Late Late Show was coming on so I decided I didn't really mind the situation. After a few minutes though I started to drift off again.

That was about when the remote fell out of Mr. L's hand and hit the floor, loudly, waking us up. Marcus decided that we should get going so we said our goodbyes and "nice to meet you"'s and "see you soon"s and headed home.

I'm honestly really tired (Marcus said he wasn't surprised we all fell asleep considering how much turkey we ate) and I should go to bed, but I'm really not interested in having another freaky ass dream.