A/N: This chapter is all traumatic emo and everybody's freaking out. I hate over-the-top drama, but I felt it would take something *really* severe to move the Thompsons, Liz in particular, from wary, distrustful contempt toward actually caring about Kid. I also like writing Patty's absolute lack of boundaries, so she gets to be the catalyst for she and Liz learning some deeply personal things about Kid.

Patty loved Saturday mornings. There were always pancakes for breakfast, and after they were eaten she could do whatever she wanted all day long. What she wanted today was to wake Kid up and make him take her out on his skateboard again. Liz said Patty would get killed riding on it, but everything scared Liz these days. Patty wondered why her sister, who used to be so brave, was such a 'fraidy cat all of a sudden. She didn't waste too much time puzzling over it though; she needed to think of a good way to make Kid get out of bed. The housekeeper said Kid had a lot of get up and go, but that it took a while for the getting up part to happen. Patty had found that poking him in the forehead or pulling on his long eyelashes helped a lot.

She kicked off her slippers, carefully opened the door to Kid's room, and entered at a dead run. Her feet were loud on the wooden floor, but Patty was fast and there was no way he'd get out of the way in time if he heard her. She landed in the middle of the huge bed and yelled "Get up!" but Kid wasn't there. Patty eyed his clock suspiciously, checking to make sure that it wasn't later than she'd thought. Nope, she was right, which meant it was unusually early for Kid to have woken up all by himself. But he had, and missing her chance to scare him annoyed her.

She flopped onto her back in the middle of the bed and stretched her arms and legs out. It was so big she couldn't touch the edges of the mattress . Probably even Liz couldn't do it. She wondered why Kid needed such a big bed. Maybe he fell out at night otherwise? No matter how big it was, Patty thought her bed was much nicer. Hers had a whole canopy instead of half of one, and the wood was painted pink. Plus Kid didn't have lace on his curtains, or roses on his quilt. He didn't have a single stuffed animal, either, even though he'd given her one; a yellow kitten. Now that she had a place to keep stuffed animals and allowance money to spend, she planned to have an army of them. Maybe an whole separate room full. If the house could have an entire room just for storing silver, extra stuffed animal space didn't seem out of the question.

But that could wait for another day. Right now she needed her pancakes and the promise of a skateboard ride immediately afterward. Getting out of the big bed took some scootching but she finally got her feet on the floor. She peeked into Kid's study, thinking maybe he was in there reading the papers or doing his homework, and just ignoring her. He did that sometimes. He also did homework on the weekends, and Patty thought that pretty much proved Liz' conjecture that he was completely insane.

Kid wasn't in the study, or in his closet, so Patty trotted across the room and listened at the bathroom door. She could hear water running; mystery solved.

"Kid, can we go out on Beelzebub after breakfast?" she asked through the door. There was no answer, so she tried repeating the question a little louder. When he still didn't reply, she huffed in annoyance and opened the bathroom door. He was in the shower and couldn't hear her over the water running from all those shower heads he had. Until they'd moved to The Gallows, Patty had never seen a shower with more than one. They made getting clean look like fun, but they were too loud. She'd have to stick her head inside if she wanted him to hear her, but then her nightie would get soaked. It was a new one, with a purple bow on it, and she liked it an awful lot. It would be a shame to get it all wet and yucky. Plus if she did she'd have to change, which was out of the question because on weekends she was allowed to have breakfast in her PJs. Patty yanked the gown over her head without hesitation, tossed it aside, and pulled the glass door open.

"Kid! can we go for a-"

She more than made up for not scaring him earlier. He whirled around, yellow eyes wide under a cap of soapy hair. He gave a shocked little squeak and clapped his hands over his eyes. Which meant he couldn't see her, but she could see him. He wasn't okay with that. He wasn't okay with that at all.

"What are you doing? Get out! Get out, get out get out!" he screeched, trying to cover his eyes and his body at the same time. The last woman to see him bathing had been his mother, or maybe his nanny; either way it had been a long time and Kid wanted to keep it that way.

"You couldn't hear me. I want you to-"

"GET OUT!" Kid tried to shove her back out the door and Patty banged her head on the wall. She hated it when people hit her, and instant, red-hot anger boiled over. She'd learned not to let someone get away with hitting her; if she did, they usually didn't stop.

"Don't you push me!" she snarled, punching him on the side of the face. She'd been aiming for his nose, but all the soap and water made everything so damned slippery. He staggered backward and she continued her assault. She knew you never give the other guy a chance to recover in a fight. Keep on hitting, watch his arms, go for the head and the crotch. All the sprayers and knobs came in handy; there were lots and lots of places to bang his head against.

Kid was trying to cover up and claw the shampoo out of his eyes at the same time. He could have knocked her out with one good smack, but then he'd have to move his hands. And he couldn't hit a girl, could he? Especially not a naked girl. There had to be some sort of special rule against that.

Patty bashed his forehead against the edge of the tiled shower seat and the entire world disappeared for a minute. When he forced his eyes open, he saw blood spattered against the white tile. He grabbed at his temple and his hand came away crimson. Red against white, running brightly down the drain. His stomach lurched and suddenly, he couldn't breathe.

He'd already had a bad morning. The nightmare that had woken him was still gnawing on his mind; a white dress, blood and pain. He curled up, trying to hunch away from Patty's anger. Anger, blood, white tile, pain. Blood. Pain. Blood never came out of white things. It would fill in all those little crevasses in the grout between the tiles. He could to scrub it with a wire brush and it still wouldn't go away. He looked at his hands. There was blood under his fingernails and he couldn't stand that. Couldn't stand it. He just couldn't.

Patty hit him in the head again.

"Stop hurting me!" he screamed. It wasn't like any screaming Patty had heard before. It was hoarse and shaky and creepy-sounding. She stepped back, awed by the damage she'd done. There was an awful lot of blood. She should probably stop hitting him and see how bad he was hurt. She turned off the water and tried to look at his forehead but he wouldn't let her.

"Com'on Kid. Lemme help!" she put her hands on his face, but that just made everything worse.

"Don't touch me! Don't hurt me!" he looked at her, but not like he was seeing her, and it was like he couldn't get enough air. He was shaking and acting so weird that it scared her. Liz had told her to act nice, and she'd blown it. Her sister would be mad, but she needed help.

"I'll be right back!" she promised Kid, who was trapped in his own private hell and couldn't have cared less. Dripping water, Patty ran as far into the hall as she dared

"Liz! Liz! LIZ!" she screamed, reaching out with her voice and her soul as loudly as she could. Then she hustled back to the shower and tried to help Kid some more, still calling for Liz. Maybe if she squeezed his head she could sort of push all the blood back in...

Liz had just started toweling her hair dry when she heard her sister yelling.

"Patty?"

She dropped the towel and raced through her bedroom. In the hall she could hear Patty screaming her name, but it was too far away to be coming from her sister's room. Liz followed the sound to Kid's bathroom and stared in horror. Bodies squirmed behind the red-smeared glass walls in the shower and pinkish water was leaking out of the open door. Liz slipped on it as she reached the opening, heart threatening to pound its way right out of her chest. Patty was in her panties, soaking wet and covered in blood. Kid was in there with her, just as bloody and completely naked. They appeared to be wrestling.

"You little fucker! What did you do to my sister?" Liz dropped to her knees, leaning into the shower and trying to separate them. That involved crawling right into the damn thing on her hands and knees and her robe fell halfway off in the process. She reached Patty and spun her around, searching wildly for wounds.

"Where did he hurt you?" she demanded frantically, "What did he do to you? Can you transform? I'm gonna put so many holes in him..."

She would kill him. Reaper or not, there had to be some way to put an end to him. No amount of money or fancy housing could make up for some little piece of shit molesting her sister. She'd thought she was protecting Patty by bringing her here and had walked her right into danger, instead...

"He got mad 'cause I came in here and he pushed me!" Patty wailed, "So I hit him. I hit him a lot...and now he's ...there's something really wrong with him, Liz. I'm so sorry!".

Liz was jerked out of her adrenaline-fueled rage "Wait...what? You hit him? You're not hurt?"

"No, but Kid is and it must be bad, because look at him."

Liz looked. He was rolled into a ball, hyperventilating and clawing at the tile. He was raving about being hurt and trying to scrape the blood off the white walls.

"Oh, fuck, Patty. What did you do? Kid, come here and let me see." she demanded, grabbing his arm.

"Don't hurt me anymore!" he pulled away from her with incredible strength and Liz fell backward, sliding into Patty. Then she was being lifted bodily by strong hands and looked up into Lord Death's stunned face.

"What the...what's happening here?" he demanded, gasping for breath. He'd felt Kid's soul ignite with terror and pain; it had nearly knocked him over all the way down in his office. He'd dashed up the stairs in a panic, which wasn't at all reduced when he saw three children in various states of gore-drenched nudity on the shower floor.

"Kid's hurt!" Patty sobbed, "I punched him a lot and now he's really, really upset."

Lord Death could feel just how upset his son was, and that it would probably get worse before it got better. He hadn't seen a breakdown this bad since the first one. The memory shot through him, and protectiveness burned through his fear and worry with white-hot intensity.

"Are either of you hurt?" He asked Liz, who was fumbling with her robe, trying to cover herself.

"No." her voice was small and for the first time since he'd met her, without the faintest him of bravado. She looked terrified, and so did Patty, but he had other things to deal with right now.

"Then you need to get out of here. Go to your rooms and get cleaned up." his voice was harsh, and his eyes were glowing. Patty was so scared when he hauled her out of the shower she thought she might wet her pants. She wanted to get her new nightie out of the corner, but didn't dare ask for it.

Liz grabbed her by the arm and dragged her away, not even worrying about her little sister being bloody and naked in front of the shocked maids gathering in the upstairs hall.

"We are in so much trouble. Oh my God, are we in trouble." she moaned, breaking into a run.

RESPONSES!

REDEADED - Congrats on finishing "The Revival", my friend! It was awesome :) Hope this chapter, which was inspired by an actual brawl that took place between a couple of our kids over a shower cap when they were about five, doesn't scare you away from kids ;) (I know it won't!) Thanks for being a reader and an inspiration, buddy!

Zoeyangel - I love the idea of Lord Death having to learn how teenage girls roll - a chick flick movie night may have to make its way into the story! SO loving "Black and White Roses" - you know how to work those emotions!

DeathEzio - Lord Death is kind of a hapless dad and he gets distracted easily. I love writing moments when he connects and shows how hard he's actually trying, even though he doesn't get things right a lot of time (is reading Patty a story about guillotining a *really* good idea?). More info about Kid's mom is coming in the next chapter, and there's more about her in chapters 17, 34, and 47 of "Life Lessons". We'll learn a lot more about her in the sequel to that story!

densekohai - I'm so glad you think I handled Patty's issues okay. *Everybody* is an angry, freaked-out mess in this chapter, but we're going to have some really sweet, honest, family building moments between Liz and Lord Death in the next chapter!

RICEBALL300 - I'm so glad you liked it. Thanks so much for reading and reviewing it!