When they arrived home, Conrad and Rebecca acted quite strange. Conrad was the whole time absent from the rest of his family, as he remained in the garage after he parked the car. Rebecca picked a Hawaiian pizza out of a box freezer, and put it in the oven after she thawed it out. It almost looked as if they had a fight earlier, and can't stand the sight of each other. It wasn't the first time today that Starla had seen the uncomfortable atmosphere between the two adults. When they drove away from the zoo, the atmosphere tightened, it even affected Starla and Alexandr's way to communicate with each other. The only time when Conrad spoke, was when he told the two children to put on their seat belts, because there were patrol officers nearby. Rebecca made a sarcastic remark a few minutes later about the silence in the car, while she turned on the radio and tuned it according to its best wavelength.

At the dinner table the atmosphere stiffened more, as Rebecca made small talk to her daughter. "How was today?" she asked.

"The animals were cute..."

"Yeah, and fluffy." Alexandr interjected with a laugh, but stopped when he saw Rebecca's frown.

"What did you do there?"

"Uh... I fed the baby lions, and patted the sheep. Alexandr got quite out of hand with the word petting in 'petting zoo'." Starla laughed.

Rebecca grunted. "That's good." She said as she took a bite out of the pizza slice she picked.

"So." Conrad looked at his son. "Did you enjoy today?"

With a mouth full of crispy dough and toppings, Alexandr smiled. "It was amazing! When can we go again?"

"Soon."

Starla hated this conversation, and wished for it to go away, she also wished the night to go fast, and to bring the morning, because putting someone on the spot in a conversation wasn't right. For her, it felt as if they were being questioned by police officers, for robbing a petting zoo or something, because the questions just kept coming. "Can you give me another slice please?" She asked.

"Sure darling." Rebecca said, picking the biggest slice and placing it on Starla's plate.

"Thank..."

"Did you went into the reptile exhibit?" Conrad interjected.

"The girl was talking, Conrad!"

"Well I was also talking, so too bad, Hun!"

Starla took a bite, but then the memories of the night her father got dragged away by the police, played off in front of her. She remembered more and more of that day, than she had managed to do in the past seven years. – The hallway light was on. "It's the police! Open up." Voices yelled at the door to their apartment. "You called them, son of a..."

"Chris, I didn't."

A slap echoed. She could see a buff figure, entering and walking down the hallway. A gun being loaded with ammunition. A few bullets fell, with one rolling down the hall. "You should die!" her father yelled, then a shot was fired. A woman screamed.

"MOM!" Starla yelled and then ran into the hallway.

"You!" her father yelled, pointing the gun at her. "You called the cops. I love you..."

"Shut up!"

The front door bounced off a bang, followed by voices saying. "One... Two... Three..." Then the bang played off again.

"I am your dad, and you should obey my requests." She knew what he meant. The lust he had been fulfilling for over three years. Raping her for at least two times a day, before putting her to sleep.

She saw her mother, as she crept out towards her father, hand held outwards, ready to grab the gun. When she got hold of the gun's barrel, she yelled. "Run my little girl, run to door!"

Starla took off running down the hall, looking back once, before a shot was fired. Her mother's eyes grew wide, and her dad kicked her to the floor. A blood stain on her mother's shoulder grew bigger and bigger. The door burst open and the police shot her dad with rubber bullets. Her mother was going into shock, paramedics treating her. That was the last time she saw her mother, as she grabbed a backpack and went with the social worker. The last thing she heard before the door closed was: "Clear!" – "Starla, I'm here." Alexander said, as he stoked her thirteen year old curly hair.

"Where am I?" She asked with tears flooding her whole face.

"You yelled for mom, or I think so, and then you took off running into the foyer, and then you ran up the stairs and shut a door. Mom and dad are very disappointed with your table manners."

Starla stopped crying, washed her face and dried it off. "I just want to go and sleep Alex... I had a tough night." She pushed him out of the way and walked to her room.

"Sweet dreams..." Alexandr said, as this sister closed her door.

<>|<>

Later that same evening, Alexandr was awoken by his parents yelling. His room was situated on the other side of the hallway, close to their room, so he figured that Starla would still be a sleep. It didn't sound like the normal fallouts his aunt and her husband had, when they looked after him. He threw the green and red striped comforter from him, and opened his door. His parents' door was open, and he could see his dad's hand gestures as he yelled to his wife. Alexandr thought that he should eavesdrop on his parents, to find out what ticked them so off, when they picked him and Starla up from the zoo. He stuck half of his body out, to see that his dad stepped out of the room. Alexandr jolted back, and saw that his dad closed the door to muffle the yells.

"Rebecca you are really childish!" Alexandr heard, when he stood against the wall to his parents' room.

"Me, childish?" She laughed "We lied to the kids, we lied to the foster home, and we lied to everyone."

"Shhh."

"Shut up, and let me finish." Rebecca said, as she slapped her husband.

"What was that for?"

"You said this fight was supposed to sound real. Well, was that real enough?"

Alexandr's mouth jolted open, he went ice cold. – It's the same... – He thought.

"Tone it down a bit, we don't want to attract attention."

"Fine." She sighed. "Now, tomorrow is the day it must happen right?" There was a silence, and Alexandr thought that his dad nodded. "We have the two children, so the ritual can begin."

"Ritual? Two children?" Alexandr whispered to himself, softly.

"Yes, soon you and I can be immortal and we can terrorise the whole world." Conrad laughed, and Rebecca soon followed.

Alexandr's face loosed its colour, giving him the appearance of a ghost. His legs felt as if they were gone, and he was floating, as he neared his sister's room.

"Starla, Starla." He whispered, trying to wake his sister up. "Starla."

"Uh... Alex..." Alexandr put his hand over his sister's mouth.

"Shhh..."

"It's half past one, what's the deal?"

"It's mom and dad... I know now why they wanted us..."

"Come to the point, so that I can go back to sleep." Starla said as she switched her bed light on.

Alexandr turned it off, as soon as her hand left the switch. "They'll know, we're awake. Leve the light."

"Why do have a white face, were you trying to scare me?"

"Listen to me, mom and dad are using us." Starla laughed. "It's true. They were fighting, and then mom said that the fight was supposed to sound real. They were faking it."

"For what?"

"A ritual, they are planning a ritual..."

Starla sighed. "Alex, they are..." a yawn escaped her mouth. "They are adults, they can have romantic rituals, when they want too."

He shook his head, but figured that Starla didn't saw it. "No."

"Then what." He stayed silent. "Come on Alex, it's getting late, and mom and I are going to the fabric store..."

"No you won't." he took a deep breath and continued. "I overheard them quarrel and then mom said that they had the two children, so the ritual could begin."

"What ritual?" Alex could hear the tension and worry in her voice.

"Immortality..."