"You should meet him, Casey," said Nareesha.

They were in the fog, sitting together with Milda. Milda still wasn't speaking, but at least she looked at them now. It was so odd--being locked in the asylum, in this little room, seemed to have been good for her. She'd been sitting with her head down, hair hanging in her face, and now she peeked up through the strands, looking first at Nareesha, then at Acacia.

Acacia wrinkled her nose at her little sister, but didn't address her. She knew Milda wasn't ready to talk to her yet. "I don't need to meet him. I've watched him with Kitten, and you've given him the stamp of approval. I trust your judgement."

"I didn't say you need to," said Nareesha patiently. "I said you should. It's only polite, seeing as how he's been so good for Kitty." Acacia scowled, and Nareesha stood up. "Come walk with me for a minute." Acacia followed her, and they moved through the swirling grayness till the copper shine of Milda's hair was only a faint reddish smudge, then Nareesha said in a low voice, "It's not just for Kitten's sake I'm asking you. I want you to help me coax Milda into coming out."

Acacia twisted her shoulders, obviously uncomfortable and upset. "You think I don't want her to talk to us?"

"No, I said 'come out'. Acacia, you don't really want her to stay locked in here for the rest of her life, do you?"

"She's safe here."

"She's not happy. You can be solitary if you must--God knows you had enough of it when you were dealing with The Bitch and The Bastard after Kathleen faded into the background." She smiled. "I'm not being vain, but you remember how much better it was when I arrived."

"But she has us here."

"We're not enough," said Nareesha firmly, "She needs the world, Casey. She's the one of us who was truly meant to be out among other people--you know that."

Again Acacia frowned. Yes, she knew it. She'd talked with Dr. Clyde almost as much as Nareesha, and she'd come to accept a few things. Oh, she still saw nothing inherently wrong in the way things were--all of them sharing one physical body--but now she did admit that it was distinctly odd compared to how things were for the rest of the world. She knew that they were all a part of each other, but had sprung from that scared little girl who'd seen her father die, then been thrown into a living hell of exploitation and abuse. All three of the sisters had been born of necessity. Acacia from the raw need for physical survival, Nareesha from the need to blend into society, and Milda... Milda had been born because they needed someone who could live as people were meant to live--with others, not just among them. Nareesha was right. Milda belonged with the world, and if she wasn't helped along, she'd never go out again. That would be wrong. Acacia could almost see her fading gradually back into the background till she was nothing more than a vague, lost presence--like Kathleen. She couldn't let that happen.

"Joel?" said Kitten.

"Hm?" Joel and Kitten were sitting cross-legged on the floor, each with a fat pad of art paper in front of them, and the big box of crayons within easy reach. Joel was concentrating on his picture, tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth as he tried to get the shading just right.

They were alone in the room. Well, Dr. Clyde wasn't there. He was visiting a patient in the next room--a man who had been found carrying a suitcase full of severed hands and feet. "And the really odd thing, Pumpkin," Clyde had told Joel, "Is that apparently no two of the limbs came from the same body, and they still haven't turned up any corpses with those bits missing. I'd really like to know just what the hell he did with them, and what significance they hold for him. I mean, why hands and feet? Sexual organs I could almost understand..."

"Hand me that purple crayon, would you?," Joel continued. "I want to draw Dr. Clyde in the pajamas I gave him last Christmas."

"Dark purple or..." she squinted at the waxy stick. "lie-lace."

"That's lilac, and the dark one."

"Lilac? Um, Joel, I don'ts wanna say yous wrong, but Nareesha is teachin' me to read. L is el, I is eye, l is luh, a is aye, an' c is see. Lie-lace."

"It's called phonetics, and I don't understand it either, but trust me, and hand me the purple."

She sighed. "Okay." She handed over the crayon, then selected a bright green crayon and began to draw a dress. "I'm gonna draw the dress Casey wants when we gets out."

Joel glanced up, and said doubtfully, "Are you going to go away?"

"I 'spect so, someday." She gave him a coy smile. "You miss me?"

He nodded firmly. "I'd miss you an awful lot." He tapped his chest. "I'd hurt here. But I don't know if you will get out, Kitten. You're in an awful lot of trouble."

Kitten sighed again. "Mean ol' Bastard. He shoulda just died 'stead of makin' Casey kill him."

"Dr. Clyde says there's a lot of people out there who need to die, but usually they don't, or at least they don't nearly soon enough. Anyway, you can't just leave when you want to. None of us can."

"Not even you?"

"Nope."

Kitten cocked her head, clearly puzzled. "Don't you just live here?"

"I live here, but I have to live here." Joel was coloring harder and faster. He didn't like to think about the time before he lived at St. Lucy's.

"But howcome? Was you bad?"

"No. I danced too much."

There was a moment of silence, and when the girl spoke again her voice had lost the light lilt of childhood. "You mean they locked you up for dancing? That's the most fucked up thing I've ever heard."

Joel froze. The only thing that moved was his eyes as he lifted them to the girl sitting beside him. Her posture had changed. Gone was the slight awkwardness of someone who was still too new to their body to be entirely comfortable in it. Now there was a certain alert tension in the way the girl sat forward, looking at him. There was none of the languidness that he'd come to associate with Nareesha, either, and he knew that Milda and Kathleen didn't come out. That left only one possibility, and that possibility terrified him. "Hello, Miss Acacia." He made sure that his tone was scrupulously polite.

They say that dogs can sense fear, but cats are pretty good at it, too. "Don't wet yourself, kid. I'm not gonna do anything to you. I just had to comment, though. They really locked you up for dancing?"

"For dancing too much," Joel corrected her. "I made myself sick. I heard one of the doctors talking once, and he said it was almost like the story of The Red Shoes come to life--where a girl puts on magic slippers and can't stop dancing, till she falls dead of exhaustion. I used to dance for hours and hours and hours. I'd forget to eat. Y'see, I'm not scared when I dance."

Acacia smiled slowly. "Testify, brother. I know exactly what you mean. You're in control, and you can let it all out. All of it--pain, anger, joy."

Joel found himself smiling. "Yes! You dance, don't you?"

"You better believe it, Joey. What kind of dancing do you do?"

"All kinds. Modern, jazz, tap, but mostly ballet."

"Tippy-toes dancing, huh? That's cool. You have to have a lot of control for that. But don't you just dance? You know--twist, frug, hully-gully, watutsi, hitch hiker, madison--stuff like that?"

"I used to watch American Bandstand, but most of those you need someone to dance with. I... I haven't been too good with people."

Acacia snorted. "You seem to be doing all right with Kitten." She leaned over and poked Joel in the thigh--and not gently--but the boy was careful not to react. "You've got the legs for it--lots of muscle." Acacia stood, movements sharp, but graceful, and went over to the transistor radio that Clyde had bought for the sisters. She snapped it on and tuned it away from the jazz that Nareesha favored, finding some rock and roll. She faced Joel and crooked her fingers at him. "C'mon, Nijinski. Show me what you've got."

Bright, bouncing, infectuous music poored from the little box. 'I should have known you'd bid me farewell.' Acacia was bouncing back and forth, first right, then left, on the balls of her feet. 'There's a lesson to be learned from this and I learned it very well.' Now her arms started pumping up and down in counterpoint, then she added jerking her shoulders in time with the music.

Joel watched, round eyed. She was doing so much at once, and doing all of it with power and grace. 'Now I know you're not the only starfish in the sea. If I never hear your name again it's all the same to me.' "This is The Pony," she said. "Come on!"

Joel stood up. He watched her closely for a few seconds, then tried. He really DID try, but he stopped quickly, blushing. "I'm no good at that." Acacia stopped, putting her hands on her hips, staring at him. "I'll say you are," she said bluntly. "But then The Pony is a little advanced for a beginner. Maybe we should start you off with the basics." Another song was starting. "Fee fee, fi fi, fo fo fum. Look at Molly, now, here she comes. Wearin' her wig hat and shades to match, she got high-heeled shoes and an alligator hat...' Acacia started swiveling her shoulders and hips briskly, in opposited directions. "The Twist." Joel just watched her. "Move your ass!"

Joel, startled, jerked into motion, and was dancing almost before he knew it. He did a sort of full body stutter for a second or two, but by the time they reached the end of the first 'devil with a blue dress on' chorus he'd gotten the rhythm. Acacia grinned almost fiercely. "By George, I think he's got it!"

Joel's face lit with delight. He had a dance that he'd never done before, and he threw himself into it, body and soul. He watched Acacia, and soon he was varying the movements, snapping his arms up and down, side to side, dancing as smoothly as any regular on American Bandstand. He laughed joyously. During his years of obsession he'd used dancing almost exclusively to hold off the darkness of his life. Too seldom he'd used it to express joy.

Then, near the end of the song, he did a spin--and saw Dr. Clyde leaning in the doorway, watching. He hadn't even heard the door open. Joel froze as quickly and as completely as an ancient Greek who'd just seen Medusa. Joel blushed deeply, and he cringed, whispering desperately, "I'msorryI'msorryI'msorry!"

Clyde stepped forward quickly and put his hands on either side of the boy's face. "Calm down, Joel. I'm not angry with you for dancing."

"You... you're not? But I already danced today, and I promised I'd only do it for an hour a day."

"I know, darling boy, but I made you promise because you were dancing for the wrong reasons. You were dancing to hide from the world." He pointed at Acacia. She was still dancing, though in a more subdued manner than before, as she curiously watched the exchange. "You're dancing with someone, you aren't isolating yourself, so in this case a little more is a good thing." Joel drooped in relief, laying his arms across Clyde's shoulders, then resting his head there, and Clyde patted the boy's back soothingly. He looked over to Acacia and said, "Can I take this to mean that you aren't going to try to emasculate him?"

Acacia gave him an almost disgusted look. "It'd be like killing a kitten."

"You're exactly right. Joel is one of the vulnerable ones. He couldn't hurt anyone except by accident." He kissed the boy's cheek. "Could you, darling?"

"I like her," Joel murmured. "I was afraid of her at first, but she's nice."

Acacia rolled her eyes. "Please. I have a reputation to maintain. Look, I gotta go. Joel, right?" The boy nodded. "It was a blast. We gotta do it again, soon." She reached out and poked him sharply in the shoulder. "As long as you don't try to close dance with me, we'll get on fine." She sat on the edge of the bed. The men watched as her eyes unfocused. For a moment the amused cynicism of Nareesha looked out at them, and she said, "Well done, Joel. There aren't many testosterone producing beings who can elicit more than tolerance from Casey." She blinked, and then said in a high pitched, childish voice. "You dance good, Joel." She giggled. "Casey called you Joey. Can I call you Joey?"

"Sure." Joel sat back on the floor. "Now I need the pink for the flowers on the pajama tops."

Nareesha looked at Acacia. "Well?"

Acacia folded her arms. "You're a sneaky snot, Nareesha."

"Of course, darling. It's my main purpose, but why do you say that?"

"You knew that if I got closer to him I'd see it."

"See what?"

"Quit trying to play innocent--I know you better than that. I'd see that he's something like Colin." She scratched her chin. "He's not built the same way, but the color of his hair, and the shape of his face... Mostly it's the way he looks at Clyde, though. Colin used to look at Milda like that--like she was the beginning and the ending of the world. So yeah, she needs to meet him. Let's go talk to her. It may take some work."

Bill Landrue chose his moment carefully. Really, all he intended to do was look in on the mysterious and fascinating Bahste girl--see if she was worth any further effort. He waited until Dr. Clyde and Joel were in the cafeteria, and the nurse on duty in the hall was engrossed in another one of her endless romance novels. He waited till she seemed distracted by a particularly juicy passage, then sneaked quickly into the side hall and made for the girl's room.

When he went to unlock the door, he found that it was unlocked again. He filed that fact away--it might be useful if he was caught. He still had a little caution--after all, she was on the violent ward--so he didn't just walk in. He cracked the door, ready to slam it shut with all his body weight. Then he peeked in.

What he saw made him relax immediately, and made his hopes rise. Kathleen Bahste was hot, and probably a little simple. Of all things, she was playing with a Barbie doll. How dangerous could someone who played with a fashion doll be? He'd really only wanted a good look at her but hell... When oppertunity knocks, and all that.

~*~

When the door swung open Kitten looked up happily. "Hi, Joel! I gots..." Her voice trailed off. It wasn't her friend Joel, or her other friend, Dr. Clyde. It was someone new, and Kitten disliked him on sight. She didn't like the way he was looking at her. He was smiling, but it wasn't a nice smile. "You go away."

Inside the fog, Acacia and Nareesha looked up alertly. The man hadn't even spoken yet, but the girls knew he meant no good. They'd seen that sort of look often enough from The Bastard. Instantly Acacia was vibrating with rage and hatred, and she leaped to her feet, ready to plunge through the mists and evict Kitten from their body, so she could take care of this sudden menace. Nareesha grabbed her arm, and Casey growled, "What are you doing? Let go. I have to go take care of that guy for Kitten."

"Wait, Casey," said Nareesha. "She'll never be able to be on her own at all if she can't take care of herself. Give her a chance."

"But Nar..."

"Please, Casey. She'll be so proud."

Looking unhappy, Acacia agreed. "But if it looks like she's on the losing end for even a second, they'll need a scoop to pick him up after I'm finished."

~*~

"That ain't very friendly, little lady." Bill stepped inside and shut the door.

"You're not my friend," said Kitten firmly. "I don't like you."

"You don't know me. Maybe we can be good friends." He came closer, his eyes crawling all over Kitten.

"No. I don't want to be your friend. You go away or... or... or I'll bite you!"

"You do that and I'll have to slap you around." He reached down and grabbed her arms, dragging her to her feet. "I don't wanna do that. I don't enjoy marking my women up, no matter how much they deserve it, but I will if you get too smart. Now listen--I'm an attendant here, and that means that you have to do what I tell you to. You're going to do it, and you're going to keep your mouth shut with everyone else if you know what's good for..." The girl hissed--hissed. "Oh, you're a smart one, aren't you?" He slapped her. "Settle down if you don't want..." Again she hissed, and this time her eyes flared red.

"What the fuck?" Bill Landrue had seen a few odd things in his time at St. Lucy's, but never anything like this. His shock had an unfortunate result--his grip tightened.

Landrue was a strong man, and he'd never been a gentle man. His surprise made him squeeze so tight that the girl was going to have a bracelet of bruises around each upper arm. This time Kitten yowled with anger and pain. She jerked her arms, pulling free easily. If he'd been able to form a straight train of thought, Landrue would have expected the girl to run, so her reaction came as a total shock. Instead of running, she sprang on him, knocking him to the floor.

She landed straddling him, kneeling on his arms, and her hands went around his throat. She banged his head on the floor. "Bad man!" She banged it again, and again. "Bad, bad man!

"Get off me, you crazy bitch! I'll see that they wrap you in a straight jacket for the rest of your life." He twisted and thrashed, throwing her to the side. Kitten rolled, coming to rest in a crouch, glaring at him with bared teeth. "I'm gonna have to wait till you're in restraints before I do anything with you, but before I go..."

If he had left then he might have been all right. Instead he aimed a kick at her head. It was his last mistake. Moving like a flash she caught his leg, leaned forward, and bit his calf. Landrue yelled. He was protected by his pants, but she was still giving him a deep bruise. He tried to shake her loose. "Let go, cunt!"

Kitten growled, a rumble deep in her chest, and jerked her head. The fabric of his pants leg tore and the second time she bit him she drew blood. The third time she removed skin and flesh. Landrue couldn't shake her loose. Almost frantic with rage, fear and pain, he leaned over to grab her hair--but he was off balance. He fell. Kitten let go of his leg, but only so that she could pounce on him again. She swarmed up the length of his body. This time when she got her hands around his throat she didn't bother with banging his head. She'd seen that that didn't work, and she was a sensible girl. Instead she let her now long nails pop through the skin to give her a better grip. Then she started to squeeze as hard as she could.

He couldn't breathe. It was ridiculous. This woman who talked like a baby and fought like a Fury was strangling him. He battered at her, thumping his fists against her face and head, but it didn't work. She just snarled and tightened her grip even more, twisting her fingers slightly so that the nails did more damage, and soon the blood loss was quickening Landrue's quick slide into oblivion.

~*~

Clyde's pager went off, and he pulled the walkie-talkie off his belt. The other walkie-talkie was at the nurse's station, so he said, "Speak to me, my little dove of mercy."

This usually got a giggle from whoever was on the other end, but this time the woman's voice was tense and urgent. "Doctor Clyde, come quick! There are scary sounds coming from the secure section. I can't go because that worthless Bill Landrue is nowhere to be found."

Clyde was on his feet and moving before she'd finished speaking. "I think I know where he is. Just sit tight, Louise. Don't you dare go down there alone."

"You don't have to worry about that."

Clyde swept past the nurse's station with the edges of his lab coat flapping with the motion. As he went past Louise Purdy called, "You want me to call Bill again? Maybe Mister Costas?"

"No, and hell no. I can handle this." As he went around the corner he called back, "Has there ever been anything I couldn't handle?"

As he'd expected, the door to Kathleen Bahste's room was ajar. "Oh, you stupid, stupid man. Stupid and predictable." A growling sound was emerging. He was a little surprised that there wasn't any more noise. He would have expected Landrue to be doing a bit of screaming. What he saw when he entered explained that.

Bill Landrue lay in the middle of the floor, limp, staring up at the ceiling. His face was slack, thick tongue protrudeing, and his neck was a mess of cuts and purple bruises. The blood was making a thick puddle beneath him.

The girl was crouched in the corner, hair in her face, licking blood off her fingers. There was something about the gesture that said it was more from a desire for cleanliness than hunger. It was as if she were too fastidious to allow the blood of someone so foul to remain on her a moment longer. Clyde put his hands on his hips. "Well, Casey, I saw this coming."

The girl paused in her ablutions. "He was bad. I kilt him."

Clyde's eyes widened. "Kitten?"

The girl nodded. "I jumped on 'im like a mousie. But he wasn't a mousie. Too big." She smiled, and it was sharp and fierce. "He was a rattie."

Clyde returned the smile. "You know, Kitten, I think that your sisters don't need to worry about you quite as much as they do."