The cafe was completely deserted, yet surprisingly looking like a cafe even in the otherworld.  Grimy cloth tables, a long single bar with old stools worn away with rust, a row of drinks with a coffee maker and other appliances in the centre.  It was certainly spacious despite the boarded-up windows.  Nothing in the place offered him any respite or comfort, the rust and cobwebs keeping him from sitting down anywhere.  The strangest thing however, was the fact he couldn't hear the Feral outside.
No stomping, no roaring, no terrible crushing of monsters underfoot.  It was either waiting for him, or it had completely disappeared.  He ignored it for now and merely counted his blessings, exploring the cafe further.  He felt as if the town had made him come here, engineering his way here with the mysterious tape recorder and the giant monster chase.
	"Okay town, I'm here.  The fuck you want?"
He knew nobody would answer, throwing his hands up with a sigh as he walked further in.  The drinks were outdated, the coffee maker was bust, and the food was unsalvageable.  Yet there was something intriguing behind the bar.  A doorway to the basement, down a well-lit flight of stairs that lead to a dark hallway with a door at the end.  Something about the scene was familiar.
A flicker of a memory came to his head.  Yet he had nowhere else to walk.  He sighed and shook his head, knowing the town's aura was making do this, and knowing also he had no way of fighting back other than to face what it offered him.  He made sure his weapons were loaded, deciding to summon up another set of bullets from his hands before heading down.

The experience was still unnerving for him to be able to suddenly create ammunition, and in all honesty, he still felt rather uncomfortable about it.  He was just starting to get used to his powers over fire, water, ice and wind, but this wasn't an element.  This was something tangible, something manufactured, something he could copy.  He had to wonder what the true capabilities of his nanos would have been for "the Armee".
Loaded up with 19 bullets, including the 9 still in the clip, he headed down the basement's hallway.  The door intrigued him enough to open it.
Normally it would have been a classic scene from a horror movie.  A single chair with bolts and restraints, well-lit by a single bulb hanging above it with various storage shoved up against the walls.  But to James, it made him shiver with an intense fear.
Charred scabs of flesh laid upon the seat, with a single green bottle blackened on the inside.  The bottle had been bolted down expertly to stick out at the edge of the seat.  Judging from the position of where it was, he could only guess one thing that would be put inside it.  He knew this was where it had happened.  He recognised this chair.  He wished he hadn't.
	"W-what...why is this here?  This can't be the same room...n-no it can't be."
	"I thought I told you to go back upstairs."

The moment he heard that world-weary female voice, his heart skipped to almost make him clutch his chest.  The voice came from the shadows, as footsteps softly came.  Grey smooth skin slowly came into the light, dressed in an open-top shirt and jeans, followed by a bottle-shaped nose with a bulbous forehead.  James couldn't even register her existence here, until she spoke again.
	"You know yer not allowed down here."
	"...S...s-s...s-s-s..."
	"You tryin' to be a snake now James?  Spit it out, been ages since I last saw you."
	"S-s-sarah...n-no.  You can't...th-there's no fucking way."
	"What are you talking about?  Where the hell you been?  I thought I told you to stay put in that hiding room until you were safe.  You know how worried I been for you?!"
	"Oh god..."
James started to break down into tears.  It looked like her.  It sounded like her.  It was DEFINITELY Sarah.  But she couldn't exist in this town.  It was impossible for her to be.  This town didn't exist in his world...did it?  He wasn't even sure anymore, and the dolphin didn't help matters as she walked closer.
	"Hey hey, it's okay kid.  Come here."
She gently embraced him, holding him closely as he weeped into her shoulder.  He hadn't felt such warmth in years, but something about it was off.  There was a stiffness in the arms, as if it were an obligation.  Everything was wrong somehow.  This very room was wrong and he knew he couldn't be back home.  It was impossible.
	"L-let go."
	"Huh?"
	"Let go!"
He pushed himself away from Sarah, who oddly did not resist.  Instead she merely looked weirdly at him.
	"What's got you all spooked Rex?  Too cool to hug an ol' girl like me now?"
	"Th-this isn't...this can't be real.  You can't be here, there's no way you can exist here!"
	"What the hell are you talking about?  I been searchin' fer you fer years.  The Armee can't put me down, you know that."
	"Do I?!  If I did, would I be trying to get back home still?!"
	"Kid, calm down.  Now get back upstairs an' do yer chores.  And don't come back down here again, you know why."
	"Really?  Do I know why?  Why don't you tell me?"
	"Tell you what?"
	"Why you have this room!  Why you have that chair!  Why you have somebody's dick flesh ROTTING in that chair!"
	"...you wanna know?"

He nodded firmly.  He had to know, he needed to face through this, keeping his belief strong that this wasn't Sarah.  But his mind was struggling to face it.  He only became more terrified when the light suddenly flickered out, dropping him into pitch black darkness.  The bulb flickered back on again, with a new occupant in the room.
A rotting human corpse now sat in the chair, tied down, the bottle jammed against his crotch.  James' eyes twitched in fear.  Sarah stood behind the chair, eyes sickened by the look of it.
	"You just can't keep away, can you Rex?"
	"S-s-sarah?"
	"You always said you could handle the harsh street life, but you can't even handle the shit I have to do to make the streets safe fer li'l boys and girls.  Creeps like this bastard here, wandering around, free to pick 'em up and violate them."
	"L-look, fine, you wanna deal with them yourself, but this is...this isn't-"
	"Isn't what?  Isn't right?  Is killing a boxer in the alleyway right?"
	"Th-that was an accident, you know that, I didn't mean it!"
	"Is blinding a li'l boy right?"
	"I was SEVEN, and he was a bullying prick!"
	"Is lying in court and framing an innocent kid right?!"
	"I...n-no."
	"Exactly.  You don't get to tell me what's right, James.  Maybe you should think more about others instead of yerself."
	"I WAS!"
	"Yeah right."
	"I was thinking of you!  I did that for you, to stop you!"
	"...what the hell are you on about?"
James panicked at having to explain, shivering with the horrible feeling of having to tell her all this again.  He had done this before, but it hurt him to do it all again.
I fixed all this before goddammit, he thought in frustration.  Why do I have to do it AGAIN?!
	"Well?!"
Sarah's disapproving tone jolted his words to come forward.
	"S-sarah...I couldn't...I couldn't tell you about Delaney.  I knew what you'd do to him.  I didn't want to see you do it again."
	"Do what again?"
	"Th-THIS!  This fucking shit, right here!"
	"...wait...Delaney was a pedophile?"
	"I found out one day, while I was doing my errands, but he covered everything up good.  I stalked him out for a while, that's why I was hanging around that area!  I wanted to get him to the police, report him and put him in jail.  But I couldn't find any evidence.  And then I...I remembered what you'd do to him if you found out."
	"You did?  You...didn't tell me?"
	"N-no."
	"So you covered fer him?!"
	"No!  I-i told him to leave town and never come back, or give himself up to the police!  But we got into a fight and I-i-i just pushed him and he fell and his neck cracked hard and he wouldn't move and I couldn't tell you about him!"
	"WHY NOT!?"
	"Because you're a monster!  A fucking torturer!"

He was crying at this point, his knees weakened from pouring out his emotions once again.  He hated this before, and he expected the same words to come.  But unfortunately, the dialogue now changed to something more personal from Sarah, as she spoke with a snarling tone.
	"And how are YOU any different?!  You remember everything you did to Bob after he killed yer girl?"
	"Wh-wh-HOW DO YOU KNOW THAT?!"
	"I know EVERYTHING James.  Did you forget who the fuck I am?  I'm the local neighbourhood warden.  If I hear a fly shit itself, I KNOW about it."
	"A-and what does it matter huh?!  What about me and Bob?!"
	"You can't be a goddamn hypocrite by telling me right in my face I'm a monster fer torturing a bunch of kiddyfuckers and YOU raped and gutted a guy who killed yer girlfriend!"
	"THAT'S BECAUSE OF YOU!  I LEARNT IT ALL FROM YOU!  YOU THINK I ENJOY THIS?!"
	"OF COURSE YOU DO!  Don't you fuckin' lie to me, I know what you were like!  I know you had an anger inside ya fer years just BEGGIN' to come out and you needed to blame someone fer causin' it!  Whatever you think of me, don't you DARE blame me fer-"
	"I DO BLAME YOU, BECAUSE YOU MADE IT WORSE!"
	"What?!"
	"I was already bad, fine, I was just a punk.  I blinded that bullying fuckhead when I was a kid, I don't regret that.  But I didn't mean to kill that boxer, THAT I regret!  But every time I saw you go down into your basement and hear you torture some guy, no matter what he was, I had to bear with it!  I had to let you do it!  And you know what?!  ...I stopped caring after a point.  I stopped caring about...what limits there were."
She merely shook her head sternly in disappointment.  She wasn't accepting his words, her eyes cold as steel.
	"Whatever excuse you make, yer still accountable."
	"Fine.  But I'm gonna tell you something now.  You think that's something a mother would do?"
	"What?"
	"A real mother would be a good example to her children...she'd love them, teach them to fix their mistakes, not do everything for them but do just enough to keep them on the right track.  You...you're a fucking hypocrite."
	"What the hell did you call me?"

She walked forwards slowly, a hand sliding down her waist to the holsters.
	"A hypocrite!  That's right, you wanna know why I'M a hypocrite just now?  Because of YOU.  You told me that murder was fucking wrong except for self-defence, but those pedos and kid-killers weren't exactly fighting back were they?!"
	"Are you defending them?!  You better not be!"
	"I'M NOT!  But you taught me the law was always doing good!  You taught me what the law was about!  Why didn't you turn them in?!"
	"Because they deserve worse than jail time Rex!  I could have had kids!  But the world decided fucking NO!  I coulda been a good mother, I had every reason to be the best goddamn mom and have a life that DIDN'T involve all this!  Children are...the most precious gift to the world."
She shook with the first tears that James had ever seen from her in a long time.  It only made the entire experience all the more surreal, before she snarled:
	"And then THESE fuckers come along and taint them.  They taint them, they rape them, they abuse them.  They abuse and destroy gifts to the world, gifts that are our fucking future!  It's like they're mocking me, destroying what I can't have.  I could have protected my kids from them, but if I can't have any kids...then these bastards sure as hell can't either."
	"Then you know what that makes you!?  That makes you the worst fucking mum I ever had."
Silence thudded between the two of them.  James was shivering with tears at the sight of this other Sarah, who merely stood horrified at such a thing.  He was struggling to keep himself composed, the truth hurting him as much as her.  The worst part was, he had said the same thing to the real Sarah.  It hurt him just as much as it had before.
	"...J-james...I...I-i-"
	"Wh-what?"
	"...I can't believe you would say that."
	"Well it's true!  The only reason a mum would kill is to protect herself or her family.  You?  You're not standing up for anyone, you're not helping the police any!  You're just a fucking butcher."
She sighed at hearing such a thing, the shock wearing off of her as she seemed to accept with resignation.  Until she brought out her gun and passively began to load it up fully.  James suddenly stiffened at the sight of lead sliding into steel.  She shook her head at the raptor, a stinging sneer upon her face.
	"Yanno what James?  Maybe yer right.  Maybe I am the worst mother you ever had...if I were one."
	"Wh-what?"
The click of the barrel locking back into the gun sent a chill down James' spine.
	"Maybe I never had a son after all.  Maybe...he was my third miscarriage."
She pointed the revolver at him, her eyes blank and unblinking.  James was shaking with fear.  This wasn't meant to happen.  She would never do this.  This wasn't how the memory went.

	"S-s-sarah.  P-please, don't do this, I-i didn't mean-"
	"Too late kid.  Now, it's your turn to kiss my girls."
	"Th-this isn't you!  This is someone else, this isn't you!"
She fired at the moment he dodged, hitting the wall behind where his head was as James brought out his handgun.  Sarah stood at the other side of the bloody well-lit chair, a blank face upon her as she aimed once again.
	"You don't deserve a mother.  Not me, not anyone."
She fired once more at him, the raptor yelping in horror at seeing the one he loved stare upon him with a twisted snarl.  The light swinging above her only made her more terrifying, a boogeyman that was disturbingly too close to a real build.
	"I don't expect you to understand Rex...you spiteful little-GARGH!"
He pulled his handgun out quickly, firing a single shot at her in fear, shaking at what he had just done.  She clutched her belly, gasping a small laugh of disbelief.
	"Khah....hhhahaha...You...you shot me."
	"You're not Sarah...y-you're not who she is."
	"Now yer fucking dead.  Yanno what they do to kids who shoot their own mothers?  They abort them."
	"YOU'RE NOT MY MOTHER!  MY MOTHER WOULD NEVER DO THIS!"
He fired once more before rolling away as she fired back.  Neither of them hit the other as James maneuvered himself quickly towards a stack of metal kegs, her shots piercing through a few of them.  He waited for a lull in the gunfire before standing up and firing off as quick as he could.  A few of them hit, but nothing fatal due to how much his hand was shaking.  Her voice turned all the more furious with him.

	"You ungrateful little BITCH!  After everything I done for you!"
	"YOU'RE NOT SARAH!  SHE'D NEVER DO THIS!"
	"Then why am I here huh?!  Why am I in yer head?!"
	"This fucking town, it's just screwing with me, you're just a fucking trick!"
	"You sure that's just the town and not you?"
	"Wh-what?!"
She fired again when he was distracted, catching him in the leg as he screamed from the deep strong pain throbbing in his foot.
	"Brings back memories don't it?!"
	"AAAAAARGH!"
	"How fitting.  The very thing that brought us together, a bullet in yer foot.  Now I'll be sure to end it like I shoulda done."
	"N-NO!  FUCK YOU, YOU WHORE!  YOU'RE NOT SARAH!"
He pulled himself up against the wall and fired at her torso, shooting right in her thigh as Sarah bent down with a yell.  She was undeterred, but it gave him enough time to run around and hide elsewhere for better maneuvering.
	"JAMES!  You BETTER apologise fer that!  I will fuckin' DROWN you!"
	"LIKE HELL YOU WILL!  I'd never shoot Sarah!  What does that make you?!"
	"A woman about to get rid of a fucking pest!"
She fired once more at where James was hiding, missing but somehow hitting close enough to make him panic and scarper, a bad mistake for the raptor when he scrabbled from his hiding spot to get shot in the arm, twisting into a bad fall.
	"AGH!  F-FUCK!"
	"Stupid kid.  How the fuck did you survive back when yer real parents died?"
	"S-SHUT UP!  S-SARAH PLEASE, DON'T DO THIS!"
	"You started this kid!  Now, you gotta end it."
	"NO I DIDN'T!  YOU STARTED THIS!  YOU AND YOUR FUCKING TWISTED SHIT!"
	"I took you in!  You do what I say!  If yer own mother did the shit I did, would YOU do this to her?!"
	"SHE WOULD NEVER DO THIS!  YOU'RE THE ONLY MUM I HAVE NOW!"
	"STAND UP AND ACCEPT IT JAMES!  ACCEPT WHAT I AM!"
	"NO!"

He shot her once more as he got up, wounding her in the leg as she went down with a thuggish shriek, lying onto the floor.  Her strength was unbelieveable in how resistant she was.  James' hand was shaking, struggling to keep his aim upon her through eyes wet with pain and grief.
	"I tried to block it all out.  I told you to stop doing it, I TOLD you what it was doing to me!  You can't be a mum and a fuckin' mobster at the same time!"
	"F-fucking...hijo de puta MADRE!"
Now he was truly terrified.  She had never swore at him in such words.  In fact, he'd never even heard her curse with those words.  She had always hidden that side of herself.
In his fear, she fired a sneaky shot from underneath herself, shooting straight through his thigh and causing James to buckle with a scream.  He fell to her level, as he tried to roll out of the way and away from her sight in a dark corner.  He scrabbled away in fear, watching her spit venom from a language she had made forbidden to herself.
	"You knew I was a tough ol' bitch.  You knew I couldn't be the perfect mom."
	"But you didn't!  A-agh!  You never knew that until I told you!  Until I had to TELL YOU, because you were torturing people!"
	"People who deserve to die, James!  Yanno what a real mother does?  She keeps the world safe for her li'l boy...nngh...I did it f-fer you."
	"BULLSHIT, you told me yourself I'm not a kid anymore!"
	"Do you REALLY believe that?  The way you acted, the way you got into trouble all the time, you practically were.  A little mariconcito like you BEGGING to get killed...I had to keep the streets clean of anyone who'd hurt my boy."
	"Shut up, stop making excuses!"
	"I'm not the one...who keeps trying to block me away.  You think I'm just some other Sarah in a mirror, with buttons fer eyes who wants to trap you in my other room forever?  Just...accept it James.  You don't need me anymore."
	"That's not true!  I need you Sarah!  Why else would I keep going?!"
	"Cuz yer the one who hasn't accepted it yet!"
She fired once more, but he managed to roll out of the way just in time, panicking as he tried to aim once more.  He couldn't get a good bead on her, the raptor struggling to find a good shot.  She had disappeared from his view somehow, the light starting to flicker and create more shadows to bewilder him with.  He looked around fearfully, trying to see her.
Instead, he felt her.

The dolphin barrelled into his side from the darkness, and piled on top of him.  James started to panic and thrash at her with his claws, trying to stop her from shooting him by grabbing the wrist her revolver was in.  He screamed into her face, begging her to stop, her ferocity like the stuff of nightmares to him.  He knew there was only one way out of this, and he struggled with his last thought before it, roaring out:
	"YOU!  ARE NOT!  MY MOTHER!"
Before she was about to reach for her sawed-off shotgun in her other holster, James had acted quicker.  He plugged her chest with several bullets from his handgun, hot red spurts shooting out of her back, spraying onto her head.  Her body turned limp, as a gurgling groan came from her lips.  Her eyes turned softer, losing their heated anger.  The revolver fell to the floor, somehow shattering into several parts.  The chamber fell loose, rolling away with a single bullet left within.
James slowly rolled her off of him, staring down upon her.  Upon realising what he had done, even if it wasn't truly her, his eyes began to drip tears onto her face.  She shuddered with the feel of her body struggling to stay alive.

	"J-james...hhHHhh..."
	"D-don't...please...don't say anything."
	"I'm sorry.  I'm...sorry fer all this."
	"Don't...just don't."
	"You...finally surpassed me, fer once."
	"N-no...no I haven't."
Whatever he was seeing before him, now that she was near death and completely harmless, he saw the Sarah he knew.  A sense of compassion, a release of all his frustration and anger had been expelled from him by those few shots into her.  He looked upon her bloodied chest, which shook and sputtered with every breath she took.
	"Yer...trying to get back home to me...arentcha?"
He nodded, his lips shaking as he struggled to not break down before her.
	"W-why...why you tryin' to get back home?  You never cared about the city...did you?"
	"You...you're the only one I have left!  You're right!  I don't give a fuck what happens to the city, I don't care if it all burns to the ground, I just want you!  I just want you to be safe!  I...I love you Sarah."
	"I love you too James.  You...y-you...were the son I never had."
	"THAT'S NOT TRUE!  You had me!  I'm your son, I always will be!"
	"Don't stop then...you always had the right idea to keep going...just...don't be so blind to everything else around ya."
	"S-s-sarah...please-"
	"Don't s-stop James.  Never stop...find yer way...b-back to me, when yer strong enough."
	"H-hhhoh god..."
He took her hands into his, squeezing them tightly together, the warmth still remaining within them as he kissed them tightly.
	"I...I love you...m-mummy..."
	"Shhhh...I'm sorry James.  I'm sorry for...being a bad mother.  We all make mistakes.  Just...have to accept 'em."
	"B-but...but..."
	"Don't.  Please...hhhh...te quiero...hijo mio-"
	"NO!  T-tell me in English!  You'd...you'd never say it like that!"
	"Hhhh...I.......m-my son..."
She could barely say half of it, mouthing her words as her eyes flickered.
	"I love you too...m-mum.  ...m-mummy?  M-mummy?!  P-please, don't leave me!  I need you!  I NEED YOU MUM!"
All he could do was watch Sarah's body turn cold before his eyes.  Her eyes began to glaze, her head falling back as he weeped upon it.  He tensed his fists, furious at this other world, his rage flowing outwards as he wailed with despair.  It was what he had always feared, the one thing he never wanted to see.
He screamed Sarah's name, screamed for his mother until his throat gave out.  When his tears dried out at last, his eyes reddened and rough-edged, he began to snarl with a vengeance.  Whatever he had slain, he was going to make the town pay.
He reloaded his handgun with shaking fists of fury, storming back up to the cafe with a roar that echoed throughout the hallway.
James Campbell didn't give a fuck about what would happen next.