Run: One helluva mess.
Run
Chapter One
By Tobias Young
This is the story of a family torn apart by a few sentences and a pair of over zealous police officers. This is the story of a man and his daughter, living a life on the lam. This is the story of Joseph and "Cat" Cartwright, and how they ran.
"Ugh! Dad! You can't just barge in like that!"
Catherine Cartwright laid snuggled deep in her blankets, surrounded by a veritable storm of plushies and pillows. Her scales were warm, warmer than they would be under all the blankets. Her father, Joseph, looked down at her, a smile cracking on his lipless face.
"Sorry to intrude, Cat, but you've just got to see this."
She poked her forked tongue out at him. She'd hated her nickname everyday of her life, and made no bones about telling people.
"Dad, I'm sixteen. Honestly, I've outgrown that name. But fine, I'll be down in a sec."
"Fantastic, give me a few minutes to get set up, okay? Good."
He walked towards the stairs. As soon as she was sure he was gone, Catherine grabbed at the pile of clothes on the other side of the bed. She threw a selection of men's clothes out to a naked, semi-erect, orange-scaled gecko in the backyard. She started to put on her bra, leaning out the window.
"Brian, you all right? You didn't have to jump."
"Sorry Cat, but if-"
"GOD! Why does everyone call me Cat!? It's annoying!"
"Sorry! But anyways, if your dad found out what we were doing," He drew a claw across his neck, "Shhhhhk! I'm a corpse in the trash bin. So, what are we doing later?"
Cat raised her arms up in a defeated shrug. "I dunno, what do you wanna do?"
It was at that inopportune moment that Joseph walked back in. Cat was leaning out the window, pulling her panties on one leg at a time, everything beneath her tail on display.
"Cat, what's taking so long, I- Oh! Oh God! ...Um, I- I'll be downstairs."
Catherine smacked her face, and stopped dressing. She reprimanded herself quietly, and, clad in a silk nightie and her slippers, headed for the stairs. On the floor below, her father was wearing a bizarre costume, and said only one last sentence.
"Well, Cat, this is what I wanted to show you!"
Outside sunning herself, Cat's mother could only hear what happened. If she had seen it, this whole mess would never have occurred. Sadly, she did not see it, instigating a disastrous turn of events that would utterly destroy her wish of a simple home-style family.
This is what she heard:
"Dad, please stop."
"But Cat, it's gonna be so much fun!"
"Dad, seriously, this is getting weird. You of all people shouldn't be doing this."
"Relax, honey, you're getting too worked up. Besides that, it's just been too long. But God is it gonna feel great!"
*Heavy thump noise*
"DADDY! TAKE IT OUT!"
Her mother's eyes widened in horror at the sounds, but she knew this was no time to stall. She rolled off of her chair, grabbed her phone, and ran out the back gate.
Now, what really happened:
Catherine gracefully made her way down the stairs, being greeted by her father in the most ridiculous costume she'd ever seen. He wore a dark denim jacket, a black t-shirt, and jeans that had apparently gone through a food processor. A massive battle-ax shaped guitar was slung low over his shoulder. Black paint was smeared onto his normally yellow scales, making his eyes look sunken. And, the weirdest bit of all, on his head perched an obviously fake mohawk of pink spikes. As soon as he saw her, Joseph's eyes lit up.
"Oh, there you are! Listen; let's just forget what happened, kay?"
He went back to setting his music equipment up. After a second, he looked back up.
"Hey, a few of the guys from my old band are reforming for a concert next week, it'd mean a lot if you came to listen. Whaddaya say?"
He punctuated his sentence by winging his guitar over into his claws, mimicking a few chords on the fly. Cat could hardly believe what she saw. Her father, the biggest embarrassment of her life, had once been part of the most famous punk band to have ever played. She thought of him playing out on the stage, and all of her schoolfriends laughing hysterically. She'd never be able to show up in her classes again. She decided to speak up.
"Dad, please stop."
He responded by pouting, his dark eyes rolling up into his head.
"But Cat, it's gonna be so much fun!"
He returned to mimicking riffs, making little scratch noises at the appropriate time.
"Dad, seriously, this is getting weird. You of all people shouldn't be doing this."
He seemed to ignore her, focusing on getting the band's old gear running again. At Cat's protestations, he looked back. He looked back at her, but also back at the past. His band, Alleyway, up under the lights, the crowd roaring, and the female crowd flinging underwear, ahhh...
"Relax, honey, you're getting too worked up. Besides that, it's just been too long. But God is it gonna feel great!"
With that, he slapped the guitar's cord into a solid wall of amps, and played one low note.
The sheer volume brought Cat down to her knees. All of the amplifiers had been set above eight, and from where she stood, Cat had taken the full brunt of the noise. She pointed one claw towards the guitar's cord, and screamed as loudly as she could,
"DADDY! TAKE IT OUT!"
Joseph slapped the strings flat, halting the noise and leaving a faint humming in the air.
"Sweet Jesus, are you all right?! Oh, I'm so sorry Cat! I'll go to the shed, and get some ice. You stay here, and don't do anything, okay?"
Cat only sniffled in response, the tears streaking down her cheeks.
"Angel Falls Police Department, what is the nature of your emergency?"
Fiona, Catherine's mother, was sobbing into the phone in ragged breaths.
"Please! Send some cops over; my husband is raping my daughter! Save her!" "Stay calm, ma'am. Now, did you see it happen?"
"No, but my daughter was screaming and I heard her body hit the ground. She screamed 'Daddy, take it out,' and she needs help! Please, hurry!"
The woman on the end of the line sighed and started filing through her contacts list.
"I'm sorry to hear this. Name and address please?"
Fiona was in hysterics at this point, sobbing and screaming into the phone.
"Fiona Cartwright, 4264 Sheffield Avenue, get those cops here NOW, DAMMIT!"
The other woman mumbled her last sentence, said her goodbyes, and went to rouse the cops.
* * * * * * * * * * *
"Why we put the icebox back here, I'll never know."
Joseph was stumbling through half-rusted bicycles and bits of lumber in the backyard shed. He looked through all his old memories of this place. As a newly married couple with an egg on the way, they decided renovate the house entirely. Like all such couples, they gave it up, saying what they had done (which was move all the crap to one shed) was sufficient. A creaking noise behind him made Joseph break back to reality, and crack his head against a support beam as he spun around. Rubbing his head and cursing under his breath, he sat down to recover. After a decent time, maybe fifteen minutes, he stood back up and resumed tunneling through the rubbish.
He found the icebox, humming quietly, in the back corner of the shed. He reached in, shoveling ice into a plastic bag as quickly as he could.
"Finally! Hey, she said we lost these during the move!"
He grabbed his golf clubs, and his eyes bulged out as their weight strained his back. He sighed wearily, and took his favorite 5-iron out with him into the daylight.
Catherine dried her eye on a pillow, waiting for her father to return. Without warning, the front door was blasted off of its hinges by a massive, boot-clad footpaw. The paw belonged to a mastiff dressed in a bulging blue officer uniform. His gun was drawn, carried in leather gloved hands. He took off his sunglasses, and scanned the room. Only Cat was in the room, petrified at the intruder. He turned to her, and cracked a smile.
"Catherine Cartwright? Name's Officer Dufresne. (That's pronounced Du-frayn) I need you to come with us, now hurry!"
Despite his rushed manner, he was genuinely happy. It's not every rape victim that gets away without a beating. "A_t least the bastard had_ some decency..." Terrified, Cat grabbed his outstretched arm, and ran out the front door.
The first inkling Joseph had that something was amiss were the five police officers with drawn pistols, all aiming for his chest. Their leader, a stern female bluebird, winged down from roof. She had a cruel glint in her eyes.
"Joseph Cartwright?"
Joseph dropped the ice and the club, placing his claws behind his head.
"Yes? What's going on?"
"Sergeant Emma Prescott, AFPD. You're coming with us!"
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Well, what do you think? I take all criticisms as improving points. Tell me what you like, tell me what you loathe.
And Jack, if you're reading this, yes, it's based off of Julia :(