Work Text:
1968
Leigh Reed, Casey and Nikki’s mom, is diagnosed with brain cancer. She is in the hospital a lot, and their father Nick turns to the bottle. Nikki, being only four, is having difficulties adjusting to the new information. She doesn’t necessarily understand what is happening. Casey is older by four years and takes it upon herself to help her sister comprehend. Slowly, the months pass and Leigh is worsening in her hospital bed.
1974
Nikki is ten and gets into trouble for fighting at school. She is bullied for having no mom, an absent dad, and living in a trashy trailer park in the middle of nowhere. Casey skips her school to teach her sister’s bullies a lesson. Nick has gotten abusive at home, so Nikki and Casey form a secret hideout away from other people where they can vent and be themselves.
1979
Nick is overly drunk on the anniversary of Leigh’s death. He has no job and the trailer is crumbling. Nikki is fifteen and has been selling what little she has on the streets for extra cash. Casey is nineteen and has a terrible job as a candy striper, working the night shift. Nikki comes home from a tough sophomore day, smoking a cigarette despite knowing Casey doesn’t like the habit. Her father seems a bit lucid as he smacks it away from her. Before she can react, though, the man shoves her against the door, mauling at her skinny jeans.
“Daddy, stop!”
“C’mere, li’l bitch.”
He slurs, taking a swig from a bottle Nikki hadn’t seen. She ducks beneath his arms and reaches for a large butcher knife from the block on the kitchen counter. Things have been going downhill for a long time. She and Casey are fully aware of this, but Nikki’s sister wants her to at least graduate high school first. High school is full of perverted and immature boys, and right now, her own drunken father is reminding her of them. He sloppily drags himself to his feet, shouting at Nikki for being disobedient. He makes a grab for her hair, but she swipes the knife in his direction.
“What the hell!? You cut me!”
He shows her the small cut dripping with blood. She tightens her hold on the knife as the last sliver of her daddy’s memory disappears behind a clouded anger. He drops the nearly empty bottle and lunged for Nikki’s throat. Screaming, she raises the blade and stabs him in his abdomen. It hits his nearly destroyed liver, causing him to gasp in pain. With something else taking over her mind, Nikki tears the knife out and stabs him again.
“You’re my baby.” He gasps out. “Why’d you do this?”
“I’m not your anything.” She declares resolutely.
The next thing they hear is a sharp intake and the unmistakable sound of a six-pack crashing on the tile floors. Nikki’s head snaps up to see her sister. Nick’s limp body slides off the knife still attached to Nikki’s hand. Casey takes in the scene in front of her and sets her things on the table. She sidesteps the spilled drink and takes Nikki’s hand. Wordlessly, she vehemently scrubs and scours the weapon while also cleaning Nikki’s hand. She rips off the bloodied piece of fabric of Nikki’s shirt. She also tugs out Nikki’s dirty laundry and drops a scattered pile by their father.
“Take off your shirt.”
Nervously, Nikki does so. Casey hands her a wrinkled shirt and also makes her change from her jeans to a pair of jogging shorts.
“Now, you are going to go to my clinic and ask for me.”
“Why?”
“Nicole Erica Reed. Listen to me. Go to my clinic and ask for me.”
Nikki nods, understanding that Casey must be formulating a plan. She takes the back way by the railway tracks and runs along them toward the clinic. Once Nikki eventually arrives at the clinic, she spots Casey’s secret boyfriend Snapper locking up.
“Hey, Snap!” She tries to mask her nervousness with a false cheerfulness.
He looks up startled but softens once he realizes who she is. “Hey, Nikki. What’s going on? Is Case with you?”
Nikki pulls a frown. “No, I was hoping she was with you. I was wanting to talk to her about something.”
“Well, sorry. But Casey’s shift ended a while ago.”
Nikki kicks the dust, and Snapper offers her a ride. She jokes that Snapper just wants to see Casey but accepts the ride. Once they arrive at the old trailer, there is a slew of cop cars. Nikki jumps out and runs to an ambulance after catching a glimpse of her sister. Casey has some slight burn marks and a few scratches on her face. An EMT is beside her, taking blood pressure.
“Casey! What happened?”
“Hey, Nikki.” She smiles softly. “I got home when someone was robbing the house.”
“Cassandra Belle…” Nikki warns under her breath.
Casey doesn’t pay her any mind, and Snapper insists he takes them back to the clinic to have her looked at. After some insistence, Casey agrees. Nikki climbs in back to talk to her sister.
1980
Nikki has been placed in the foster care system, but Casey sees her as much as possible. The murder trial continues, but it appears Nikki and Casey are in the clear. While the girls have some time alone – Casey is off work, Nikki is out of school, and they’ve smuggled Nikki away from the system officials. Nikki hates feeling trapped. They’ve escaped to the local park that is now under construction.
“Last year, I wanted to get a job and work with you at the clinic,” Nikki confesses.
“And now?” Casey places a hand over Nikki’s jittery ones.
“Now?” Nikki repeats with a sigh. “Now, I just want to get out of here. Completely leave town and start over.”
Casey leans over and envelops her sister in a soothing hug. Nikki melts to the touch. Casey has always been Nikki’s mother figure, and this is highly important. Nikki suddenly tenses up and her breathing becomes irregular. Casey catches on quickly and hesitantly pulls away. Wordlessly, Nikki focuses her eyes on a figure coming toward them. Casey’s eyes widen when she realizes she’s staring at a carbon copy of their dead father, walking toward them. She grabs Nikki’s hand and tugs her away.
“Someone’s fucking with us, Nikki. He’s dead. We need to go. We need to go.”
The urgency in Casey’s voice outweighs her words. The tone triggers Nikki’s legs to move.
1981
The trial comes to a close, and neither Reed sister is arrested for the murder. Unfortunately, Snapper is framed. Following the trial, charismatic bad boy Paul Williams has just closed his first private investigation. He thanks Nikki for helping him move forward in the world, and they form a secretive relationship, despite her being only seventeen. Casey is wary of him, being the only person Nikki has told. After an unusual four months of dating, Paul unintentionally passes down a venereal disease to Nikki. They break up almost instantly, with Nikki drawing to Casey for comfort. Casey, however, is being harassed by a secret stalker, who eventually shifts his focus to Nikki by the holiday season.
1982
Casey goes behind Nikki’s back to hire Paul. When Nikki finds out, she gets mad at her sister and goes to seek comfort from Snapper’s law representative. Greg welcomes her to his apartment, and they slowly form a relationship. He eventually introduces her to Rose Deville. The woman is a friend of his and has been for a long time. Nikki has recently turned eighteen and she accepts Rose’s offer to join a modeling agency. She is beyond shocked when, on her first day, Rose instructs her to strip down to lace panties and a see-through wire bra. She does as she’s told, never mind how uncomfortable she feels. Six months pass with Nikki’s rates raising. She receives an influx of cash but feels dirty. She begins to get violently, purposefully ill.
1983
Nikki resists an older, demanding customer. He keeps pushing her into something that scares her and reminds her of her father. The man, Tony, has a heart attack and falls off the bed. Terrified and sick, Nikki runs for her life. Rose catches her and begins stacking up evidence. In a few hours, Rose and her ‘models’ have returned the customer to his apartment. The man’s roommate, Tony, is charged for the murder. On behalf of Rose, Greg becomes the representative. Rose threatens Nikki not to testify, claiming she will have Greg killed and frame Nikki. Not wanting to pull Casey back into her screwups, Nikki and Paul merge with the New World Commune.
1984
Nikki is called alone to the chapel by their elder leader, Ian Ward, for a christening on her twentieth birthday. He claims to perform a cleansing, stripping her to nothing to bathe her and flush her from within. While he is already inside, Nikki comes to her senses and realizes what has been happening. She tries to gain control of her facilities, only for him to knock her out cold and continue to have his way with her. Used and betrayed, Nikki conveys her newfound information of the New World Commune to Paul, snapping him out of the sickening trance.
1985
After long, straining months of endurance, the cult is exposed. Paul leaves Nikki behind after she refuses to have an abortion. She runs away to Chicago, crying out for her sister. Casey finds her during Nikki’s seventh month. They struggle to make ends meet, squatting from one broken, ramshackle apartment to the next. Some nights, they sleep in alleys. Casey buys a gun off the street and carves off the serial number. They use it for protection. Late one night a month later, Nikki goes into labor early. She and Casey break into the back of a church for water and shelter. Nikki passes out during labor, and Casey helps her birth a son. The nuns of the church arrive then.
“You and she may stay here until Sunday.” The leader amongst them announces. “But the child will come with us.”
Casey looks down at the bloody, screaming child in her arms. She looks to her sister, who has struggled between the thoughts of raising her rape baby or giving the child away to someone who could do a better job. Casey now faces this decision. With her heart thumping in her stomach, she turns to the religious sisters. Casey snips off the cord and hands over the baby.
“His name is Dylan.”
1987
Casey had lied to her sister to spare her. Nikki, now twenty-two, believes she has lost her first-born child. Greg does not believe that Paul and Nikki had joined a cult. He instead chooses to believe that they had reunited, so he decides to leave Nikki. Casey helps her run away to Genoa City. There, Casey obtains a job as a candy striper once more while taking nursing classes at a local community college. Nikki, with not having much under her belt and no superfluous monetary excess, decides to put her promiscuous skills to the test. She becomes a stripper at a bougie discotheque and develops a romantic interest in a man named Kevin Bancroft.
Kevin’s mother Allison despises Niki and her career “choice.” The woman discovers a pornographic film entitled Hot Hips and claims the starring actress is Nikki. Since her face is never shown for more than a second, and Nikki doesn’t remember all her exploits, Kevin easily trusts his mother. While Nikki and Kevin’s relationship is strained, Nikki has a fling with a rich business tycoon from the club. He, Victor Newman, makes Nikki feel more complete than any other relationship has. It soon becomes apparent that Nikki is pregnant with her (second) child.
“Is the baby Kevin’s?” Casey asks her sister, placing a hand over the baby bump.
“It has to be.” Nikki insists. “Victor and I, we were careful.”
“Careful doesn’t mean perfect.”
Kevin’s mother had hoped Kevin would leave Nikki due to the porno, and it happens. Casey and Nikki soon learn that a felon named Tony DiSalvo is distributing the film.
1988
Casey wants her sister to be careful, but Nikki isn’t thinking clearly. In order to get things done in the quickest way possible, so she elopes with Tony in the high hopes she could get her hands on the picture privileges. Through a slight investigation, Casey uncovers the truth. Nikki is not in the film at all. She also discovers that, while married to Tony, Nikki is still technically married to Kevin. Tony divorces her upon hearing the knowledge. Nikki is with Kevin and Casey when she gives birth to her second child and first daughter, naming her Victoria.
1989
Paul and his new business companion, Andy Richards, scrutinize Tony and his pornographic film corporation. Upon learning several rumors and possible truths behind the stars in Tony’s films, Paul and Andy kill the proprietor. Casey convinces Nikki that it counts as a divorce, and the girls take Victoria and seek help from Victor.
1990
Victor gladly takes in the girls. Victoria is one, Nikki is twenty-six, and Casey is thirty. Victor and Nikki achieve a marriage ceremony, with much more zealous than any of her other relationships. Victoria swiftly imprints on Victor, lulling him into the family.
1992
A woman named Veronica Landers poses as Victor’s recently hired maid Sarah Lindsay. Veronica exposes her psychosis by shooting Nikki at her home. Casey confronts and protectively attacks the woman. Victoria is merely three and had been with her father (Victor) at the time in question. Late in the year, Casey is diagnosed with breast cancer. She and Nikki have been through a lot growing up. They have been through thick and thin, and there is no way this will stop them. Casey will battle the cancer. She will win. Casey and Nikki have each other and they will always win.