TW Fic: Learning to Run
Title: Learning to Run
Author: nancybrown
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Mica, Lois, Rhiannon
Warnings/Spoilers: post-COE
Words: 3500
Summary: Mica Davies has been working for Lois for months, but now Lois has something important to tell her.
AN: Sequel to Learning to Walk, written for Trope Bingo square: secret child
***
The reason Mica liked working for Lois was that she felt like a real life spy. She'd met the woman whilst spending her free time haunting the boards, the right boards. It seemed everybody in Cardiff had a second cousin with a dentist who knew something about Torchwood, but the people who really knew what they'd been, what they'd done, and what had happened to them after, those few told their tales on a private website that had never seen the light of Google. This suited Mica fine. She loved the feeling of secret knowledge, and hearing tales of mysterious organisations dedicated to saving the world from aliens and whatnot. And she knew it was all true, except maybe that bit about the paradox of the missing year. That seemed too weird to be real, even for Torchwood, no matter how much LeoLad insisted.
She knew them by their handles, and a few by their names, though she'd kept her own identity quiet. Nobody would take a fourteen year old seriously, so she was going by the handle Lady_Cotton and pretending to be in her late twenties. Lois (or Lion87Pride) had met up with her at a coffee shop one day, treating her like an adult, and giving her the final pieces of information Mica had wanted about her uncle's death.
"I was there," Lois had said. "I watched. I'm sorry."
Mica had been doing her favours ever since, researching and running errands, and telling herself this must be like how it was. She wasn't doing anything illegal, Lois assured her and Mica agreed. Just, look up this government official, yeah? Not his official biography, mind, but see what you can find of his school records. And this woman here, can you check her credit records for the past three months?
Okay, some of it probably was illegal. But it was fun.
Mica wore her most casual outfit to the coffeeshop today, hair pulled back in a neat ponytail, jeans scuffed just the right way, typical teen, don't look here unless you're a cute bloke. Lois was already sitting at the table, still wearing a pretty hat and scarf that conveniently shielded her face from passers-by. "I have it," Mica said, sitting to open her handbag. The drive she'd copied her latest searches to looked as anonymous as anything, and disappeared into one of Lois's pockets.
"Thanks. Fancy a snack? I've already ordered." Her face was furtive, Mica noticed. Normally, Lois was warm and friendly, but today, she watched around herself uneasily.
"You all right, then?" Mica asked in a whisper, taking her own look around. The shop had the normal allotment of wankers, uni students, and businesspeople on their java breaks. Nothing out of the ordinary, but if they were being followed, maybe that was the best way, yeah?
"I won't be able to contact you for a while. I have to take a trip."
"Not a holiday."
"No." Lois dropped her own voice. "I think you should be safe, but we shouldn't be seen together. Which is why I'm sorry to be leaving you with this."
Lois pulled a folder out of her satchel, placing it on the formica table but keeping her hand atop. "Before you look, I need to ask an important question. Do you prefer hard truths or comfortable lies?"
Mica opened her mouth and Lois raised her hand. "Don't say what you think a character in one of your books would do. This isn't a game, or a story. Right now, I am ready to walk away, and you can't go with me. You can go back to your life, and grow up to be an interesting young woman with her own choices and career, and you can be safe and happy in that world. Or you can open this file, and choose door number two."
They each sat back a moment, mirroring each other's position in the booth. Mica already knew what she'd choose, had known ever since she started investigating freaky and clandestine occurrences all on her own. Knowing there was a door number two, how could she be expected not to look?
Mica opened the folder and began to read the documents.
After a while, Lois gave her a tissue from her handbag, and treated her as enough of a grown-up not to mind her to blow. She was less kind when the waitress returned with her order, handwaving Mica's distress away with a mouthed: "Hormones, poor lamb."
When Mica had pulled herself together enough, she asked what she knew must be a stupid question. "Why didn't they tell me?"
"I imagine they were planning to when they thought you were old enough, but after he died, and under the circumstances, they thought it'd be best for you not to know." Lois's face was kind, even as she kept up her worried glances around them. "Your parents love you. They've raised you the best they could, you know that."
"Is my birth mother still alive?" The words felt strange on her tongue. She'd read the phrase in books.
"She is. Her current address is attached at the back. Mica, I think you should talk with your parents before you approach her." Lois wolfed down her food between her words, daintily managing to speak without muffling her words or showing her chewed food. The trick of someone who'd had to eat a lot of meals on the run, Mica realised. "And you can't tell them how you found out, nor anything about me. They shouldn't know we've been talking."
"Because it's safer that way," Mica said, bitterly.
"Here." Lois took back the folder and scribbled something else down on a pad of paper. "This is an email address I'll use to contact you when I can get in touch again. I'll only use this one to communicate with you. Do you have a disposable account I can contact?"
Mica nodded, writing down one of her old alias accounts, Lady_Eomer_91. Lois was really leaving her, dropping a bombshell in her lap and walking away. "Can you tell me what's going on?"
Lois shook her head. She left money on the table for her food. "I think it has to do with what happened before. I have someone to track down, and I'll know more then. In the meantime, keep your head down."
"I will."
And she was gone, leaving Mica with too many questions.
***
Six Months Later
***
Mica shivered in her jacket, wishing she'd brought something warmer tonight. Temperatures had plunged today, and she'd been too caught up with rushing through her schoolwork to have time that she'd utterly missed both the change and the news reports. And she prided herself on paying closer attention to the news than most people. It'd be embarrassing, if anyone ever noticed her comings and goings. Other than Mam, no-one ever did.
"Not back to the park again," Mam had declared, seeing Mica shrug on her favourite jacket. "It's dangerous after dark."
"I know, Mam. That's the point." Mica had her mobile, her notebook, and a large can of mace. She'd told her parents she was helping with the neighbourhood watch, taking a turn to keep her eyes peeled for suspicious characters. And it was true, to an extent. True enough that Mam allowed her to go out for a few hours, as long as her work was done, and that Dad puffed up his chest a bit, calling her his little copper. He'd even bat David on the back of his noggin, yelling at him to straighten out and do something useful like his sister.
Of course, David was in that stage where he'd be a snot and say Mica wasn't his sister, and storm up to his room or out with his friends. ("Revolutionaries," David called them, dedicated to raging against the system. They had a band in Joey's mum's garage. Mam and Dad called them David's idiot layabout mates.) Then Dad would shout, David would shout back, Mam'd get into it, and Mica would cheer on whichever one she thought was winning tonight, because a good row was better than telly and also because they wouldn't notice when she went out.
Tonight's rendition of "why I'm glad I'm adopted" had been cut short before anything could catch. Mam had said, "I'll make you a deal. No park tonight, but you can go to the city centre, yeah?"
'Deal parenting' was this year's rage in Mam's magazines. Mam even wrote an advice column for one of the small ones, a rickety outfit called Modern Mum that just loved deal parenting. "Don't treat your children like your dogs, telling them to sit and stay and fetch. Teach them to negotiate." Mam had stopped saying 'No' -- not that 'no' had worked on Mica or David for years anyway -- and started saying, "That's what you want, is it? This is what I want. Let's bargain."
Mica considered the deal. Plenty of opportunity to run into alien nasties in the city centre. The specially-refitted mace can only worked on the Weevils. On the other hand, she wasn't there to fight, just to observe and call into the proper police. Whatever they claimed, Cardiff Heddlu was well aware of their infestation issues, and a quick text to Cpt. Davidson generally got someone out in a hurry when she spotted trouble. "Agreed. Back at ten?"
"Nine. Tomorrow's a school day."
"But it's Friday. All the kids will ditch anyway."
"If you intend to go to university, you can't ditch. School tomorrow, home by nine."
So it was that at eight-thirty, Mica had walked past the warm glow of the shops and restaurants of the city centre, looking for anything suspicious before she hopped a bus to get home on time. Her mobile beeped with a text from her mate Jane. With a sigh, Mica replied. She'd call when she caught the bus. Yes, she'd seen how Gav had been looking at Jane.
As she put her mobile away, she became aware of two things she didn't much like. First, her aimless feet had taken her out of the bright lights of the city centre proper and into a much darker side street. Second, she was being hunted.
She heard the creature's heavy breath. Weevil? Something worse? She had her spray can in her hand, mobile ready to dial 999, but she couldn't see it. Invisible? She wouldn't put it past some of Cardiff's nastier locals, but how could she know.
"Duck!"
She reacted to the shout almost before she understood the word, felt something brush over her hair as she fell to a crouch and scrambled back. Two figures struggled briefly. Only one was human. Shaking, Mica found her own grip again, and made it to her feet as the human punched an alien type she'd never seen before.
"Get back," she said, and as the other human pulled away for a moment, she filled the alien's face with a cloud of stinky mist. "Stay upwind," she warned her helper.
The alien's jaws were on a weird double-hinged face, all mindless slavering and scar tissue from god knew what battles. It roared at her, clearly weakening, and fell over.
"What did you spray it with?" asked the human. Boy. He was a boy, a little older than she was. Cute, she noticed next, and couldn't help the blush.
"Um. Neurotoxin. Sedative. It's, um, something I found on the Internet. Yeah." How dark was it, anyway? Because her face was so red she was probably lighting the whole alleyway.
"Nice," he said. "Come on, we don't want to be here when it wakes up."
"Wait." Mica texted her location to the Heddlu report line, with a warning. "There. The coppers'll be around to fetch it." Together they hurried out of the alley and towards more people. "Thanks for warning me," she said a bit awkwardly. "I'm Mica. I handle this sort of thing all the time."
She sounded stupid. Oh god.
The boy gave her a quick nod, either taking her at her word or accepting her assessment that she sounded like an arse. "You're welcome."
He didn't offer his own name. In the light, she got a better look at him. He was tall, and a little older than she'd first taken him, maybe one of the uni students who hung around the pubs trying to look cooler than the kids who went to the student pubs. His light brown hair was cut in that wavy style she mocked on the boys at school, but he made it look good, a little pretty and a little dangerous. He caught her appraising glance, and stepped half a pace away.
"No more aliens tonight," he chided, and turned to walk the other way.
She ought to say something cool, or just ask him his name, but then he was too far down the street and she'd sound shrill. "Bye," she managed, and kicking herself for being a dork, she made her way to the bus stop.
As she boarded, her mobile vibrated again. Jane. Mica opened her phone, and thought, 'Alien.'
She barely listened as Jane pattered about Gav, about maths class, about her mum. Alien. All right. Cardiff residents weren't as dim as certain extraterrestrial-hunting organisations might have wanted to believe. Lots of people other than the police knew about the aliens and worse. In fact, her friend Sion's mams ran a little business where they gave tours of the weirdest places in Cardiff and sold postcards with green men from Mars badly Photoshopped into scenes around the Bay. They even had one with a Martian explaining to a police officer that on his planet, that's how you said hello to a sheep. Aliens weren't a secret, they were a joke.
When she got home, only ten minutes past her curfew, ("Let's agree that next time you get home on time, and I'll let you go out again.") she logged on to check messages before bed. Her mind was still on the boy, name unknown, and she clicked on message after message, deleting spam and stupid forwards from Jane's sister. She went to delete more spam from an unrecognised address, when her brain clicked out of boy mode and into researcher mode.
Lois.
If you're still in, meet me Saturday at noon at the coffeeshop. No name, no nothing, but it was the address she'd left. Mica had forwarded the disposable account when she forgot to keep checking it.
She stared at the message.
***
Lois had cut her hair. Instead of the long braids she used to wear, her hair was as short as a boy's. She looked thinner, too, like she had missed a lot of meals since they'd seen each other. Mica's granddad Rick, Dad's father, had got cancer and wasted away with no hair. Was Lois sick?
The woman smiled. She didn't look sick, not like that. She looked weary, though. "I'd hoped you were coming."
"Hi." Mica felt shy around her now. Lois was a stranger all over again.
"How've you been? Did you have that talk with your parents or did you decide to keep it to yourself?"
Mica nodded. "I talked to them. Said I found out by accident." Mam had cried. Mica had cried more. Dad hadn't shouted, for once. "It was like you said, they'd been planning to say something, and then he was dead, so they thought I'd be happier not knowing."
She'd looked up her birth mother, surprised to discover Mam'd been sending her photos as Mica grew up. "My birth mother, Vanessa, she's interesting." That was the best word she could think of for someone who had piercings everywhere visible she could have them, and probably more where Mica couldn't. "She does art design for a web advertising firm. Lives with her dog. She's nice." Vanessa said the dog was a wolfhound; Mica thought he was part carpet and part halitosis, but he was friendly. Vanessa took her out shopping a few times, buying her clothes Mam wouldn't let her be seen in public wearing.
"So you're doing okay? I'm glad. No fights?" Lois almost seemed disappointed. Had she expected Mica to abandon her parents? Her smile moved into something warmer. Maybe she was just tired.
"No. David's a prat, but David's always been a prat. What about you? Where have you been?"
"Away," Lois said breezily. "I had to look up some old friends." She played with her coffee cup, eyes shadowy. "Mica, I asked if you were still in. I'm asking again. My investigation has become more dangerous. I think you're still safe, as long as you don't go trumpeting around about who you are. But I'm involved in things that aren't safe, and I honestly don't think I should involve you any further."
"I've been hunting," Mica said, chin tight. "I go out spotting Weevils and worse. The other night, I took down an alien I didn't know. I looked it up. Male Klesshon." She said it with some pride. True, she'd had some help, but those things were fierce.
Lois said, "And I'm very proud of you for it. But this is bigger. People are dead. Others have gone missing. It's all tied back to the reason why your father died."
She got the same chilly, upset feeling in her stomach she always did when Lois mentioned the man she'd thought was her uncle. "You told me he was killed by the 456. Torchwood tried to bluff them off the planet. They showed their strength." There'd been more detail, barely, but it was a firmer story than the one she'd grown up hearing.
"That's what I saw happen back then. I've spent the years in between learning why any of it happened at all. I think I'm close, Mica, but two people who were closer to an answer have been killed. People I knew. One of them I liked quite a lot." The CFL bulb, hidden by a trendy lamp at their table, was still harsh enough to make Lois's thin face even more gaunt. "If you want to walk away, you can do it now, and know that you're absolutely right to do so. Or you can come with me."
"Come where?" Mica's heart hammered. They'd only met in public places. She knew about meeting people online. Lois wasn't exactly a friend, she was some lady who did private investigations involving aliens, and she gave Mica odd jobs to help her. Mica didn't even know where she lived. "I don't think I can."
"All right. That's a sane decision. More than a lot of people make." Part of her seemed disappointed, but Mica read relief, too. "Have a wonderful life, Mica Davies." With a pat to her hand, Lois got up and gathered her satchel. "Stay off the boards for the next few weeks. It's not going to be pleasant there." And she left Mica sitting at the table, stewing in hurt and confusion.
Lois was walking out. If she left, Mica would never be able to contact her again, would never be able to change her mind, or to find out what she'd meant.
Her life yawned ahead of her. She'd keep up with the neighbourhood watch, keep scrolling through page after page of information and speculation. She would get older, go to uni, find a boyfriend, settle down, gradually forget all this with aliens and conspiracies. These were fairy tales for foolish little girls to believe, and for strangers who wanted to confuse and manipulate them with impossible stories. Mica would grow up to take care of her parents, and develop a friendly relationship with Vanessa, and remember her father as some distant relation who'd died in a terrorist biological attack. Her own children wouldn't even know his name, and Mica would grow old and die, secure and safe and warm and protected as a fledgling chick under a mother's wing.
She almost ran out in front of a car, missing the place that Lois had turned to walk down the street.
"Wait!"
Lois didn't pause. She did, however, slow her steps until Mica caught up to her, panting. "I want to know why."
"I don't have all those answers yet. I can't promise you we'll find out."
"But we'll try?"
"That I can promise you."
Mica fumbled for her mobile. "The deal is," she texted to her Mam, "I will be out with Jane and Sion until after dinner. When I get home, I'll do all the washing up and I'll tidy my room. Love you."
***
The End
***
(Yes, clearly part of a longer story, but I couldn't get the good parts written to my satisfaction before the Trope Bingo deadline. I can finish and post it if anyone actually cares about this story series other than me.)
Author: nancybrown
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Mica, Lois, Rhiannon
Warnings/Spoilers: post-COE
Words: 3500
Summary: Mica Davies has been working for Lois for months, but now Lois has something important to tell her.
AN: Sequel to Learning to Walk, written for Trope Bingo square: secret child
***
The reason Mica liked working for Lois was that she felt like a real life spy. She'd met the woman whilst spending her free time haunting the boards, the right boards. It seemed everybody in Cardiff had a second cousin with a dentist who knew something about Torchwood, but the people who really knew what they'd been, what they'd done, and what had happened to them after, those few told their tales on a private website that had never seen the light of Google. This suited Mica fine. She loved the feeling of secret knowledge, and hearing tales of mysterious organisations dedicated to saving the world from aliens and whatnot. And she knew it was all true, except maybe that bit about the paradox of the missing year. That seemed too weird to be real, even for Torchwood, no matter how much LeoLad insisted.
She knew them by their handles, and a few by their names, though she'd kept her own identity quiet. Nobody would take a fourteen year old seriously, so she was going by the handle Lady_Cotton and pretending to be in her late twenties. Lois (or Lion87Pride) had met up with her at a coffee shop one day, treating her like an adult, and giving her the final pieces of information Mica had wanted about her uncle's death.
"I was there," Lois had said. "I watched. I'm sorry."
Mica had been doing her favours ever since, researching and running errands, and telling herself this must be like how it was. She wasn't doing anything illegal, Lois assured her and Mica agreed. Just, look up this government official, yeah? Not his official biography, mind, but see what you can find of his school records. And this woman here, can you check her credit records for the past three months?
Okay, some of it probably was illegal. But it was fun.
Mica wore her most casual outfit to the coffeeshop today, hair pulled back in a neat ponytail, jeans scuffed just the right way, typical teen, don't look here unless you're a cute bloke. Lois was already sitting at the table, still wearing a pretty hat and scarf that conveniently shielded her face from passers-by. "I have it," Mica said, sitting to open her handbag. The drive she'd copied her latest searches to looked as anonymous as anything, and disappeared into one of Lois's pockets.
"Thanks. Fancy a snack? I've already ordered." Her face was furtive, Mica noticed. Normally, Lois was warm and friendly, but today, she watched around herself uneasily.
"You all right, then?" Mica asked in a whisper, taking her own look around. The shop had the normal allotment of wankers, uni students, and businesspeople on their java breaks. Nothing out of the ordinary, but if they were being followed, maybe that was the best way, yeah?
"I won't be able to contact you for a while. I have to take a trip."
"Not a holiday."
"No." Lois dropped her own voice. "I think you should be safe, but we shouldn't be seen together. Which is why I'm sorry to be leaving you with this."
Lois pulled a folder out of her satchel, placing it on the formica table but keeping her hand atop. "Before you look, I need to ask an important question. Do you prefer hard truths or comfortable lies?"
Mica opened her mouth and Lois raised her hand. "Don't say what you think a character in one of your books would do. This isn't a game, or a story. Right now, I am ready to walk away, and you can't go with me. You can go back to your life, and grow up to be an interesting young woman with her own choices and career, and you can be safe and happy in that world. Or you can open this file, and choose door number two."
They each sat back a moment, mirroring each other's position in the booth. Mica already knew what she'd choose, had known ever since she started investigating freaky and clandestine occurrences all on her own. Knowing there was a door number two, how could she be expected not to look?
Mica opened the folder and began to read the documents.
After a while, Lois gave her a tissue from her handbag, and treated her as enough of a grown-up not to mind her to blow. She was less kind when the waitress returned with her order, handwaving Mica's distress away with a mouthed: "Hormones, poor lamb."
When Mica had pulled herself together enough, she asked what she knew must be a stupid question. "Why didn't they tell me?"
"I imagine they were planning to when they thought you were old enough, but after he died, and under the circumstances, they thought it'd be best for you not to know." Lois's face was kind, even as she kept up her worried glances around them. "Your parents love you. They've raised you the best they could, you know that."
"Is my birth mother still alive?" The words felt strange on her tongue. She'd read the phrase in books.
"She is. Her current address is attached at the back. Mica, I think you should talk with your parents before you approach her." Lois wolfed down her food between her words, daintily managing to speak without muffling her words or showing her chewed food. The trick of someone who'd had to eat a lot of meals on the run, Mica realised. "And you can't tell them how you found out, nor anything about me. They shouldn't know we've been talking."
"Because it's safer that way," Mica said, bitterly.
"Here." Lois took back the folder and scribbled something else down on a pad of paper. "This is an email address I'll use to contact you when I can get in touch again. I'll only use this one to communicate with you. Do you have a disposable account I can contact?"
Mica nodded, writing down one of her old alias accounts, Lady_Eomer_91. Lois was really leaving her, dropping a bombshell in her lap and walking away. "Can you tell me what's going on?"
Lois shook her head. She left money on the table for her food. "I think it has to do with what happened before. I have someone to track down, and I'll know more then. In the meantime, keep your head down."
"I will."
And she was gone, leaving Mica with too many questions.
***
Six Months Later
***
Mica shivered in her jacket, wishing she'd brought something warmer tonight. Temperatures had plunged today, and she'd been too caught up with rushing through her schoolwork to have time that she'd utterly missed both the change and the news reports. And she prided herself on paying closer attention to the news than most people. It'd be embarrassing, if anyone ever noticed her comings and goings. Other than Mam, no-one ever did.
"Not back to the park again," Mam had declared, seeing Mica shrug on her favourite jacket. "It's dangerous after dark."
"I know, Mam. That's the point." Mica had her mobile, her notebook, and a large can of mace. She'd told her parents she was helping with the neighbourhood watch, taking a turn to keep her eyes peeled for suspicious characters. And it was true, to an extent. True enough that Mam allowed her to go out for a few hours, as long as her work was done, and that Dad puffed up his chest a bit, calling her his little copper. He'd even bat David on the back of his noggin, yelling at him to straighten out and do something useful like his sister.
Of course, David was in that stage where he'd be a snot and say Mica wasn't his sister, and storm up to his room or out with his friends. ("Revolutionaries," David called them, dedicated to raging against the system. They had a band in Joey's mum's garage. Mam and Dad called them David's idiot layabout mates.) Then Dad would shout, David would shout back, Mam'd get into it, and Mica would cheer on whichever one she thought was winning tonight, because a good row was better than telly and also because they wouldn't notice when she went out.
Tonight's rendition of "why I'm glad I'm adopted" had been cut short before anything could catch. Mam had said, "I'll make you a deal. No park tonight, but you can go to the city centre, yeah?"
'Deal parenting' was this year's rage in Mam's magazines. Mam even wrote an advice column for one of the small ones, a rickety outfit called Modern Mum that just loved deal parenting. "Don't treat your children like your dogs, telling them to sit and stay and fetch. Teach them to negotiate." Mam had stopped saying 'No' -- not that 'no' had worked on Mica or David for years anyway -- and started saying, "That's what you want, is it? This is what I want. Let's bargain."
Mica considered the deal. Plenty of opportunity to run into alien nasties in the city centre. The specially-refitted mace can only worked on the Weevils. On the other hand, she wasn't there to fight, just to observe and call into the proper police. Whatever they claimed, Cardiff Heddlu was well aware of their infestation issues, and a quick text to Cpt. Davidson generally got someone out in a hurry when she spotted trouble. "Agreed. Back at ten?"
"Nine. Tomorrow's a school day."
"But it's Friday. All the kids will ditch anyway."
"If you intend to go to university, you can't ditch. School tomorrow, home by nine."
So it was that at eight-thirty, Mica had walked past the warm glow of the shops and restaurants of the city centre, looking for anything suspicious before she hopped a bus to get home on time. Her mobile beeped with a text from her mate Jane. With a sigh, Mica replied. She'd call when she caught the bus. Yes, she'd seen how Gav had been looking at Jane.
As she put her mobile away, she became aware of two things she didn't much like. First, her aimless feet had taken her out of the bright lights of the city centre proper and into a much darker side street. Second, she was being hunted.
She heard the creature's heavy breath. Weevil? Something worse? She had her spray can in her hand, mobile ready to dial 999, but she couldn't see it. Invisible? She wouldn't put it past some of Cardiff's nastier locals, but how could she know.
"Duck!"
She reacted to the shout almost before she understood the word, felt something brush over her hair as she fell to a crouch and scrambled back. Two figures struggled briefly. Only one was human. Shaking, Mica found her own grip again, and made it to her feet as the human punched an alien type she'd never seen before.
"Get back," she said, and as the other human pulled away for a moment, she filled the alien's face with a cloud of stinky mist. "Stay upwind," she warned her helper.
The alien's jaws were on a weird double-hinged face, all mindless slavering and scar tissue from god knew what battles. It roared at her, clearly weakening, and fell over.
"What did you spray it with?" asked the human. Boy. He was a boy, a little older than she was. Cute, she noticed next, and couldn't help the blush.
"Um. Neurotoxin. Sedative. It's, um, something I found on the Internet. Yeah." How dark was it, anyway? Because her face was so red she was probably lighting the whole alleyway.
"Nice," he said. "Come on, we don't want to be here when it wakes up."
"Wait." Mica texted her location to the Heddlu report line, with a warning. "There. The coppers'll be around to fetch it." Together they hurried out of the alley and towards more people. "Thanks for warning me," she said a bit awkwardly. "I'm Mica. I handle this sort of thing all the time."
She sounded stupid. Oh god.
The boy gave her a quick nod, either taking her at her word or accepting her assessment that she sounded like an arse. "You're welcome."
He didn't offer his own name. In the light, she got a better look at him. He was tall, and a little older than she'd first taken him, maybe one of the uni students who hung around the pubs trying to look cooler than the kids who went to the student pubs. His light brown hair was cut in that wavy style she mocked on the boys at school, but he made it look good, a little pretty and a little dangerous. He caught her appraising glance, and stepped half a pace away.
"No more aliens tonight," he chided, and turned to walk the other way.
She ought to say something cool, or just ask him his name, but then he was too far down the street and she'd sound shrill. "Bye," she managed, and kicking herself for being a dork, she made her way to the bus stop.
As she boarded, her mobile vibrated again. Jane. Mica opened her phone, and thought, 'Alien.'
She barely listened as Jane pattered about Gav, about maths class, about her mum. Alien. All right. Cardiff residents weren't as dim as certain extraterrestrial-hunting organisations might have wanted to believe. Lots of people other than the police knew about the aliens and worse. In fact, her friend Sion's mams ran a little business where they gave tours of the weirdest places in Cardiff and sold postcards with green men from Mars badly Photoshopped into scenes around the Bay. They even had one with a Martian explaining to a police officer that on his planet, that's how you said hello to a sheep. Aliens weren't a secret, they were a joke.
When she got home, only ten minutes past her curfew, ("Let's agree that next time you get home on time, and I'll let you go out again.") she logged on to check messages before bed. Her mind was still on the boy, name unknown, and she clicked on message after message, deleting spam and stupid forwards from Jane's sister. She went to delete more spam from an unrecognised address, when her brain clicked out of boy mode and into researcher mode.
Lois.
If you're still in, meet me Saturday at noon at the coffeeshop. No name, no nothing, but it was the address she'd left. Mica had forwarded the disposable account when she forgot to keep checking it.
She stared at the message.
***
Lois had cut her hair. Instead of the long braids she used to wear, her hair was as short as a boy's. She looked thinner, too, like she had missed a lot of meals since they'd seen each other. Mica's granddad Rick, Dad's father, had got cancer and wasted away with no hair. Was Lois sick?
The woman smiled. She didn't look sick, not like that. She looked weary, though. "I'd hoped you were coming."
"Hi." Mica felt shy around her now. Lois was a stranger all over again.
"How've you been? Did you have that talk with your parents or did you decide to keep it to yourself?"
Mica nodded. "I talked to them. Said I found out by accident." Mam had cried. Mica had cried more. Dad hadn't shouted, for once. "It was like you said, they'd been planning to say something, and then he was dead, so they thought I'd be happier not knowing."
She'd looked up her birth mother, surprised to discover Mam'd been sending her photos as Mica grew up. "My birth mother, Vanessa, she's interesting." That was the best word she could think of for someone who had piercings everywhere visible she could have them, and probably more where Mica couldn't. "She does art design for a web advertising firm. Lives with her dog. She's nice." Vanessa said the dog was a wolfhound; Mica thought he was part carpet and part halitosis, but he was friendly. Vanessa took her out shopping a few times, buying her clothes Mam wouldn't let her be seen in public wearing.
"So you're doing okay? I'm glad. No fights?" Lois almost seemed disappointed. Had she expected Mica to abandon her parents? Her smile moved into something warmer. Maybe she was just tired.
"No. David's a prat, but David's always been a prat. What about you? Where have you been?"
"Away," Lois said breezily. "I had to look up some old friends." She played with her coffee cup, eyes shadowy. "Mica, I asked if you were still in. I'm asking again. My investigation has become more dangerous. I think you're still safe, as long as you don't go trumpeting around about who you are. But I'm involved in things that aren't safe, and I honestly don't think I should involve you any further."
"I've been hunting," Mica said, chin tight. "I go out spotting Weevils and worse. The other night, I took down an alien I didn't know. I looked it up. Male Klesshon." She said it with some pride. True, she'd had some help, but those things were fierce.
Lois said, "And I'm very proud of you for it. But this is bigger. People are dead. Others have gone missing. It's all tied back to the reason why your father died."
She got the same chilly, upset feeling in her stomach she always did when Lois mentioned the man she'd thought was her uncle. "You told me he was killed by the 456. Torchwood tried to bluff them off the planet. They showed their strength." There'd been more detail, barely, but it was a firmer story than the one she'd grown up hearing.
"That's what I saw happen back then. I've spent the years in between learning why any of it happened at all. I think I'm close, Mica, but two people who were closer to an answer have been killed. People I knew. One of them I liked quite a lot." The CFL bulb, hidden by a trendy lamp at their table, was still harsh enough to make Lois's thin face even more gaunt. "If you want to walk away, you can do it now, and know that you're absolutely right to do so. Or you can come with me."
"Come where?" Mica's heart hammered. They'd only met in public places. She knew about meeting people online. Lois wasn't exactly a friend, she was some lady who did private investigations involving aliens, and she gave Mica odd jobs to help her. Mica didn't even know where she lived. "I don't think I can."
"All right. That's a sane decision. More than a lot of people make." Part of her seemed disappointed, but Mica read relief, too. "Have a wonderful life, Mica Davies." With a pat to her hand, Lois got up and gathered her satchel. "Stay off the boards for the next few weeks. It's not going to be pleasant there." And she left Mica sitting at the table, stewing in hurt and confusion.
Lois was walking out. If she left, Mica would never be able to contact her again, would never be able to change her mind, or to find out what she'd meant.
Her life yawned ahead of her. She'd keep up with the neighbourhood watch, keep scrolling through page after page of information and speculation. She would get older, go to uni, find a boyfriend, settle down, gradually forget all this with aliens and conspiracies. These were fairy tales for foolish little girls to believe, and for strangers who wanted to confuse and manipulate them with impossible stories. Mica would grow up to take care of her parents, and develop a friendly relationship with Vanessa, and remember her father as some distant relation who'd died in a terrorist biological attack. Her own children wouldn't even know his name, and Mica would grow old and die, secure and safe and warm and protected as a fledgling chick under a mother's wing.
She almost ran out in front of a car, missing the place that Lois had turned to walk down the street.
"Wait!"
Lois didn't pause. She did, however, slow her steps until Mica caught up to her, panting. "I want to know why."
"I don't have all those answers yet. I can't promise you we'll find out."
"But we'll try?"
"That I can promise you."
Mica fumbled for her mobile. "The deal is," she texted to her Mam, "I will be out with Jane and Sion until after dinner. When I get home, I'll do all the washing up and I'll tidy my room. Love you."
***
The End
***
(Yes, clearly part of a longer story, but I couldn't get the good parts written to my satisfaction before the Trope Bingo deadline. I can finish and post it if anyone actually cares about this story series other than me.)