-15 years later-

Penny Cooper stared incredulously at her daughter. Michelle was five years old and Penny was fairly certain she'd just watched her murder another child in cold blood. Cameron, the six year old little bully that had been giving her daughter a hard time had been unceremoniously shoved out of the tree he'd been climbing to chase after her. Michelle didn't seemed terribly bothered that Cameron lay damningly still at the base of the tree.

She wasn't sure how long she stared up at her remorseless baby girl, but it couldn't have been too long before someone else noticed Cameron's small corpse and screamed. Penny took off like a rocket, bypassing the dead little boy entirely to make her way past the branches and to her kid.

Penny quickly gathered her daughter into her arms and shoved her surprised little face into the crook of her neck.

"Don't lift your head until we're back in the car." She commanded softly in her best mom-knows-best, no nonsense tone. "We're going to pretend Cam fell by himself and that seeing that made you sad and scared. I need you to shake, like when you laugh, but be very careful not to giggle okay, otherwise the other grown-ups will know you're not really crying."

"Why?" Came Michelle's childish voice, curiosity all but seeping from it. She'd gotten a lot more from Sheldon than her pretty blue eyes.

"Because mommy doesn't want you locked up, okay sweetie? Killing people is illegal." Penny whispered, rocking her daughter and making shushing sounds Michelle had no need for. But her daughter took direction well, and dutifully began shuddering with laughter.

Penny was so glad she was an actress as she placed an expression of mute horror on her face and carefully began to make her way back down to join the others and deal with 'the tragic accident.'

To be fair, Michelle had gotten more than her blonde hair from Penny as well.

Madison Cooper stared at the dead boy on her floor and promptly freaked the fuck out.

She dropped the bat she'd cave his skull in with like it was on fire and tried to process what just happened.

Okay, so Jake had been a huge dick. It's not like it was news, he was a total loser, and you could have knocked her over with a feather when he'd actually shown up to work on the history project Miss Williams had assigned. And maybe, if he'd actually just done that, just worked on their assignment, instead of spending the past hour calling her Dad all sorts of names, and saying some really crude shit about her mom, he'd still be alive.

But all she knew was that he'd called her dad a freak for the third time in the last ten minutes and she'd reached for her bat. Her Dad wasn't exactly a normal guy, she was aware, it was kind of hard to miss, but he was a great fucking Dad. He'd been there for every stupid school event since pre-school, had never forgotten a birthday, actually listened to what she wanted for gift giving Holidays, and could name every single observable developmental milestone she'd gone through since birth. At sixteen it had gotten a little embarrassing in the last few years, but she still loved him, and so Jake couldn't be allowed to continue to attack her family the way he had.

So she made him stop; permanently.

And now there was a corpse in her room so it was time to call in reinforcements.

x

"What the fuck-Maddie!" Andy Cooper hissed at his twin sister when he saw the dead guy in her room. "Is that Jake Fenn? What the fuck is he even doing here? You got blood everywhere."

Andy ran a hand threw his dark hair and narrowed his green eyes at his twins awkward smile.

"We had a history project. Miss Williams made him my partner." She shrugged at him, sure in the knowledge that he would help, which-she wasn't wrong. He loved his sister, he just hated the stupid shit she got up to. He sighed at her and Maddie pouted, "I helped you with the poison to get rid of Chad Moore last year!"

"You did." Andy agreed, Chad had been a been such a bullying bastard, he'd more than earned his ricin poisoning, "And because we actually planned that out, no one knew I killed him and we didn't even have to deal with his body."

Maddie looked down, finally grasping the concept that he was mad at her for making such a mess for them to deal with. She was always so impulsive, she was just lucky that it was homemade pizza and personal shooters Wednesday. Mom would still be at the park with Michelle, and Dad would be preoccupied making personal Pizzas for all of them until seven o'clock exactly. They had two hours to deal with this mess.

"Should we risk going into the kitchen for garbage bags, or should I see what I can dig up in the garage?" Maddie asked.

Andy shook his head, "We're on the clock, you know we have to be back in time for dinner or mom and dad will know something's up. Just grab the shower curtain, it was getting dirty and I was going to change it out soon anyway. I'll go get the duct tape from my room while you wrap him up."

Maddie smiled, her twin was the best.

x

Michelle Cooper was wondering if she was in trouble.

She wasn't quite sure. Mommy wasn't yelling like she usually did when Michelle did something wrong. But she had done something Illegal, and Michelle knew that meant something bad. Only bad boys and girls did illegal things. Usually, when she was bad she was punished. Daddy had explained how punishments helped you learn from bad behavior and taught personal responsibility.

But mommy had helped her cover up the bad thing. Mommy had lied, even though you weren't supposed to, to everyone about what happened. She'd told the other mommies and daddies that she'd seen Cameron slip and fall but that she'd been too far away to do anything about it. Mommy had cried about how terrible it was and how much therapy everyone was going to need. Michelle was very confused about everything. She was very glad that they had finally made it to the car and she could stop hiding her face in mommy's neck and pretending to laugh when she couldn't make a sound.

She was less glad about it when Mommy turned around with a frown and said, "You are in so much trouble when you get home young lady."

x

Penny felt like such a hypocrite for punishing her daughter. But she had to, Michelle had almost gotten caught killing her fellow five year old. Her kid was just five years old and killing people. That wasn't okay. Not that being any older and killing people was any better, really, but at least with age came enough experience to know you had to cover your tracks.

She'd managed, even as a panicked sixteen year old, and only because she understood that it was murder, no matter how justified she'd felt in the moment. She'd known she'd go to jail for it and managed to cover her ass at the last possible moment. She just wasn't sure how exactly one went about explaining to a kindergartener that murder was definately wrong by societal standards, but in their house it was more of a matter of whether or not you got caught.

X

"Wait a second," Andy said in that shitshitshit tone Maddie had learned to hate by age three. It always meant that Andy had just thought of some great wrench in their plans. Maddie had lost count of the number of punishments that had been heralded by that tone. What was the point of thinking ahead so much when you'd still get got?

"What?" Maddie snarled, dropping Jake's legs into the trunk of the car.

"Did Dad see Jake come in?" Andy asked.

"Well yeah," Maddie replied, "Who do you think let the asshole in?"

"Fuck." Ady muttered, "You know how suspicious it is to be the last to see a missing persons! Shit, I was just gonna tell you to text him asking where he was a few times so no one would think he'd ever shown up. We can't do that if Dad knew he was here. Fuck."

Maddie scowled, "Can't we just ask Dad to lie? I mean, I could just tell Dad that I didn't want anyone knowing I ever associated with the creep, especially if the police are asking about him. Don't you think Dad would do that for me?"

"Well yeah," Andy said, "The only problem with that is that Dad is a terrible liar. Do you not remember all the twitching over Santa? Or the Tooth Fairy? The Easter Bunny?"

"Okay. But-like, who's actually gonna ask Dad outright 'Was your daughter the last person to see Jake Fenn?" Maddie sighed in relief, it was just Andy overthinking like always. "I'm pretty sure they'd ask me anyway, not dad. Have you thought about where to stash him yet?"

Any sputtered, "Why is it my job to figure out where to stash him? You killed him!"

Maddie scoffed, "So what? Your the smart one! You started me on the whole murder thing. Do you think I would have even thought of killing him as an option if we hadn't gotten away with murder before?"

Andy snorted, "Uh? Have you met you? Let's be real, with your temper you would have killed someone with that bat eventually."

Maddie didn't want to admit to the likelihood of exactly that. She'd always been a hot head and held the dubious honor or being the only Cooper ever called into the principal's office for fighting. Still-there was quite a jump between the willingness to wale on someone at the drop of a hat and burying a classmate.

She scrubbed at her blonde curls in agitation, "Do you have somewhere or not if this was so inevitable?"

Andy sighed, dramatic and obnoxious as only a twin brother could be, "You're gonna have to speed if we wanna get there and back in time."

To be fair, Maddie is not usually freaking out about the dead body in the trunk when she's behind the wheel. She is genuinely a good driver, speeding or not. Better than Andy even, despite his anal tendencies and willingness to keep his hands on ten and two. When she hits what seems to be some poor homeless hitchhiker it is entirely the guys own fault.

He should know better than to stand at the side of the road.

So she floors it and doesn't turn back, what's a hit and run on top of the body in her trunk anyway?

Andy won't stop laughing at her which does not help the situation at all.

Rude.

X

"Sheldon," Penny hisses as she storms into the kitchen, "We need to talk!"

Sheldon takes in her disheveled appearance, and hopes there are no bodies he needs to dispose of. He's almost done with everyones Pizzas and he is particularly fond of their pizza nights. There is something very satisfying about teaming up with Penny against their progeny.

His children are his pride and joy, he always makes time for them to bond.

"Michelle killed some poor kid today!" Penny exclaimed, pacing up and down the kitchen like an anxious leopard. Sheldon had to blink slowly as he processed that. He couldn't claim he didn't harbor any murderous impulses at the tender age of five, but he had to admit that none of his attempts had ever been successful. He felt strangely proud of Michelles accomplishment.

"Where is she now?" Sheldon asked after his daughter.

"In her room, I grounded her! What the hell else am I supposed to do? I'm not mad at her for killing the little brat but she did it in front of everybody. I don't want her locked up Sheldon. I don't want her to end up in some mental institution. Especially not when shes so young, I refuse!" Penny was getting steadily more and more hysterical as she imagined what would have happened had Sheldon accompanied their daughter to the park, or if anyone else had been looking at Michelle at the time.

None of her precious babies would ever spend any time behind bars if she had anything to say about it. No matter what they did, they were her kids, and it wasn't like Penny had any morals these days, there was nothing they could ever do to turn her against them.

Sheldon sighed, "I suppose we can talk about it after dinner. I'll explain it in a way she can understand. She's too much like us to understand why it's wrong using social convention."

Being a father had its ups and downs. Still-he loved his wife and children. He wouldn't trade them for the world.

Penny kissed him her thanks, Sheldon was a fantastic husband.

X

Andy sighs internally in sweet relief when they make it home by the skin of their teeth. Settling down to enjoy his margherita Pizza and hoping his father didn't question the excess of dirt under his fingernails.

Madeline shot him a smug look as she reached for her own meat lovers monstrosity and silently gloated over her superb driving skills. He wished he could mock her relentlessly about that unlucky hitchhiker she'd hit, but their parents were at the table. It was fine, there would always be time to poke fun at his twin after.

"I killed Cameron at the park today." Michelle chirped around her proportionally small personal ham and cheese pizza. "Why is killing people bad daddy?"

The table went completely quiet, tension mounting in the air as the children watched their parents for a reaction.

Maddie and Andy blinked at their little sister in complete sync. Someone had started a little too early on their very sketchy hobby. They shared a look across the dining room table, they were both curious about what their parents would do about it.

"It's a matter of perspective, Michelle. Why did you kill Cameron?" Their father replied, seemingly unconcerned.

"He wouldn't leave me alone. He was always taking my toys and pulling my hair. I told him id make him stop forever if he didn't stop by himself but he didn't listen. So I made him dead like Rex. You can't do anything once you're dead."

Rex had been the twins dog they had rescued at a beach. He'd been about five when they found him so getting a good decade out of him wasn't too bad. The twins had taken his passing two months ago pretty hard, but Michelle had been mostly curious about death. Sheldon remembered answering hours worth of questions. Perhaps he'd been too thorough in his explanations and inspired his little girls rather final solution to her problem.

Sheldon cleared his throat, "What you did was wrong Michelle. If your mother hadn't lied about how Cameron fell you would have been taken away from us. You are in trouble for doing something with consequences we can't protect you from. Once the authorities get involved they would send you to a mental hospital at best and prison at worst. We don't want anyone to take you away from us so you will adhere to your mother's punishment over the matter."

"Oh," Michelle said, voice small. "So I really can't play video games for a whole week?"

"You can't," Sheldon sentenced, voice stern. Penny desperately stifled her laughter, she'd been rather flustered when she was punishing her daughter and she'd defaulted to the worst one she'd ever given. Her daughter was a gaming addict as bad as she'd ever been. Frankly, it was a little ridiculous that that was the only consequences to her

Murdering someone and it was still more than she'd ever had to face about her own.

Maddie and Andy shared a look of complete synchronicity, twin telepathy was a real thing. Maddie bit her lip, "Actually, dad, mom, we have something to tell you."

X

Yes the Cooper clan now bonds over murder. Hey, if it works for the Addams family...Here is the epilogue and I may be too happy this is actually getting posted according to plan but fuck it. I will take the little victories. Hope you guys enjoy it, Happy Halloween!