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Sammy is taken to the police station and the escort her to an interrogation room.  Her mother arrives a couple of minutes later.  A few moments later two detectives come in.  They sit down, sort out some files and then start a tape recorder.

"I'm Detective Ford, this is my partner Detective Harrison.  We'd like to ask you a few questions about the attack on Elrod Janush."  They proceed to advise Sammy of her rights and then have her and her mother sign a form indicating they did so.  Mom seems entirely too calm for some reason.  "Ms. Sammy, you don't mind if I call you Sammy do you?  Do you know a boy named Donald Douglas?"

"Donnie?  Yes."  oh god is this about Elrod...

"A witness came forward, someone who saw this Donnie, you said, this Donnie at the Janush house the night of the attack.  We're curious if you'd heard anything about them maybe having an arguement?"

Sammy appears to be absolutely miserable.  "I don't know if its true or not, but a while after I got to the hospital, somebody told me that Donnie..."  She looks at her mother pleadingly.  "There's a girl at school named Torrance Shipman.  She's a paranormal who can plant ideas and feelings in people's heads.  I was told..."  She takes a deep breath.  "I was told that she made Donnie think things that weren't true.  That Elrod said some really mean things to me.  But he didn't!  And that Donnie got angry in my behalf and... but this girl, she also made Elrod's friends think that he wanted them to beat up Nick Hurley.  She wants Elrod, but he doesn't want her, and he told her so, so she got mad.  She's been trying to make me get into fights with her at school, but I won't..."  Her hand reaches up to rub at the hidden tattoo on her collarbone.  "If Donnie hurt Elrod and it was his own stupid idea, he deserves what he gets.  But if Torrance made him do it, I want her to pay for it."

Both men take notes as Sammy give her statement.  Her mother is there, holding her hand.  when she finishes they turn off the recorder and ask her to wait while they go out of the room.  About twenty minutes later they come back.  They go through the same set of motions
they did when they first arrived. 

"Sammy, we just talked to your school.  We also know that you've been surrounded by some pretty strange ocurrances this year which is why we wanted to check out your story.  The Principal tells us that this girl Torrance came to him a couple of days ago and said that she was afraid of you.  That you'd made some threats after she accidentally broadcast some kiss between you and another guy all over the school."  Ford refers to his notes, "And now she's in the hospital."

"Here's how we see it."  Harrison begins, "You kissed this guy, and then it got out.  So your boyfriend had his friends knock this guy Nick around.  You found out about it and sent your boy Donnie to bust up Elrod.  Only, things got a little out of hand maybe.  You weren't there, you didn't know Donnie was going to go too far.  So now maybe you found out this Shipman girl saw Donnie when he attacks Elrod.  So, you ask someone else to maybe see if they can keep her from telling us.  Only she's already told us, so now you're looking at two counts of conspiracy."

"Enough."  Mom's voice is clear and almost echoes in the small room.  "This conversation just ended."  she slides a business card across the table.  "Our lawyer.  If you're not charging my daughter we're walking out the door and any further interviews will be with our counsel present."

Ford looks like he's about to talk, a smile spreads across his face like some sort of ballon being inflated.

"Is that clear detectives?"  Sammy felt it, the little shift in the air that made mom's voice that much louder and clearer.

Both men nod.  "We're not charging her, but don't take any trips out of state until we get this sorted out.  We will be in touch."

Mom gets up and her and Sammy leave.  Mom is quiet as they make their way from the building, and all the way to the car.  Once behind the wheel she starts to cry.  "Sam, what's going on?"

"I told them the truth, Mom.  I didn't tell anybody to beat up Elrod.  He didn't say anything to me that would make me that angry, and if he did... I don't need Donnie Douglas to fight my battles.  Everything I said about that girl, it's true.  She did something to me the other day, it made me want to rip her to shreds... I barely kept myself together, but the anger...  it made me call up so much power, it took everything I had not to get swept away by it.  The problem is,  I can't prove she did any of it.  She can twist people's heads and make them believe or feel anything she wants.  I'm the one who went to the Principal the other day and said I was scared, but its all twisted up..."  she pounds her fist against the palm of her other hand.  "I didn't know we had a lawyer.  It's going to come out that I'm paranormal, isn't it?  We're not going to be able to hide it anymore."

"I believe you honey.  I'm not sure if your powers are going to get out or not.  We'll have to see."

Sammy stares out of the car window, past the condensation left behind by her breath.  "So what do we do now?"

"Well, we see what the police do.  They have conspiracy in mind, that's bad.  We have to hope that we can get this sorted out without having to resort to drastic measures.  They make it sound worse then it is, but honey.  It sounded bad.  The boy you kissed get beat up, then a friend of yours beat up Elrod.  Too many coincidences, and the police hate those."

"Its not a coincidence.  She made all of it happen, Mom.  All of it!  I just don't know how to prove it.  She's not going to confess to anything.  She's probably laughing her ass off right now."

"Well, we can only hope.  They said she was in the hospital."  Mom looks at her watch, "They'll have picked up Donnie by now.  Is he the type to roll over on you for this?"

"No.  I don't think so.  I hope not."  Eyes widened with fear, she looks at her mom.  "I don't want to go to jail."

"Honey, that wont happen.  Mommy might have an ace to play if it comes to that.  Not that I really want to, but if it's the only thing that's gonna keep you out of jail we have a back up plan."  Mom starts the car.  "Now we just have to explain to dad."

Sammy winces.  "Yeah.  Mom?  There's something else.  I'm... stronger now.  When I was filled with all of that power, it changed me some more.  A lot more, I think.  I don't have to breathe anymore.  And I have a tattoo that showed up out of nowhere when Colin kept me from changing completely to whatever it was that was pulling me in.  He said something about it being my link to humanity, it keeping part of me human.  How much of that does Dad need to know?"

Mom's expression grows more nervous as Sammy's explanation goes deeper.  "Ah, let's just start with the part about you maybe getting arrested for having your boyfriend beat up."  She sighs, "Right after I tell him that I have powers, which is why you have them."  She starts shaking her head.  "This is turning out to be one heck of a day."

The confused Sammy face returns.  "Mom, he knows you have powers; he's known forever.  He told me so.  He also told me he was going to tell you he knew about you, so you wouldn't worry about it anymore.  I guess he didn't.  Nobody else in the family knows though."

Mom starts to chuckle softly, and her expression lightens some.  "Just when you think you know that man he goes and surprises you again.   "  She puts a hand on Sammy's.  "No matter what happens, we're going to get through this.  You just have to have faith that things will work out."

"So we lead in with possibly being arrested, and follow up with the tattoo if he doesn't stroke out?"  Sammy suddenly looks hopeful.  "You know, this might be the one good thing about Elrod already being 18.  If he doesn't press charges, doesn't this all go away?  He knows all about what Torrance has been doing. I told him all about it, and he saw it for himself when Jeff and Andy beat up Nick and claimed that he told them to do it.  So if he says no, it has to stop, right?  Because if he doesn't, then he basically is saying he doesn't believe the Torrance story.  If he doesn't believe, that means he might have told those guys to do what they did, and that opens him and Jeff and Andy up to a suit from Nick."  The hope drains away.  "I hope it doesn't have to go there."

"Let's try to get past the we went to the police station and got interrogated part, then worry about the rest of it."

"OK."

They drive for a few minutes.  Sammy says "I'm sorry this happened Mom.  I didn't start it, and now I'm kind of sorry I didn't finish it before now.  There was never enough proof for me to be able to act without looking like a bully or a crazy person, so I held off.  Yet here I am."

"Honey.  You're special and that means you're likely to bump into all kinds of stuff like this in your life.  I just hope that your father and I were able to give you the tools you need to get through it, to make the right decisions.  You were right not to act out of haste.  doing the right thing sometimes means taking some lumps.  It's part of life."

"I suppose."  She sighs.  "Does this mean I get home schooled now?  I don't think they'll want me back in the building until this is all cleared up."

She fumbles for her phone and sends out a message to Sarah and Colin.

Cops think I made D hurt El.

As they're riding along, another thought crosses Sammy's mind.  "Mom -- you or our lawyer needs to find Mr. Heep.  He's a science teacher at school.  If he hasn't been touched, he knows about me.  I haven't been around him much lately, so Torrance might not know about me working with him.  He knows I've been helping to protect people at school when things have gone bad.  Maybe he can convince them where I can't?"

"Okay.  I'll see if I can talk to him.  For now, try not to worry too much about that.  We've still got a long way to go before we have to worry about witnesses and all that."

OOC:  I'm done here if you are

OOC: okay.