C H A P T E R O N ENothing But Red and Bck2019 November 9, Saturday“...I do not like to waste people, Stef, but I do require your compliance. You have, ultimately, the same choice all our girls have to make, at one time or another: to accept my methods, or reject them.”
Stefan forces a few breaths out. He’s not really even being given a choice here. Py the Judas goat or go somewhere terrible and unknown with a serial rapist. It’s a false choice, but he doesn’t want to be complicit in this horror show. Sure, he wants everything that’s coming, but he can’t just allow this woman to use that to hurt others! Even if the boys are bad people, Stefan will not be used like this. Sure, maybe one of them really wants it deep down, but all of them? Hell no!
Sure, Stefan understands the idea, at least in a basic sense. The way that they see it, the only way to remove extreme cases of toxic masculinity is to remove all of the masculinity. It makes a strange amount of sense, but there’s no way that it’s the only way. Deradicalization techniques exist for this reason. Sure, she says it’ll all come flooding back once they go back to the real world, but if taught right, there’s no reason why that would be the case at all. Men can be well-adjusted to the throes of toxic masculinity, why not give them a shot at it first before forcing them to be women!
With that knowledge, Stefan cannot allow his moral compass to break at the first sign of an easy out. It’s the most one-sided choice he’s ever been offered, but if that one side was forcing him to torture people to do it, (which it is!) he can’t abide by it, and must make the hard choice. A reverse Omes, where one gets to be happy, and the rest get, on some level, tortured. He’d walk away from that. So he must walk away here too, to whatever awaits him beyond.
“Well, Stef, what will it be? Do we have your cooperation?” Beatrice asked, with a slight smirk on her face.
No going back from this.
“No.”
Beatrice’s face betrays her shock. “Sorry, did I hear you correctly? You would want to wash out?”
“You didn’t give me much of a real choice. I don’t want to wash out, but I also cannot be actively complicit in these people’s torture. You give me no choice but to wash out.”
Beatrice is utterly fbbergasted. She didn’t seem to expect this answer at all. She put all her money on the obvious winner, and the underdog beat them. “You do realize that washing out is a horrific outcome for you, especially given you actively want our care, correct?”
“I know,” Stefan says. “But I said it before, and I will say it until the day that I die, I will not allow myself to be used like that. I’m desperately tempted to accept your offer, but I just can’t do it. I can’t walk out there, and pretend for them like everything’s going to be fine, while actively working with the very people set to inflict traumas on them. It’s just not something I can tolerate. I may want the care, but I know they don’t. I understand your methodology, I just can’t abide by it.”
Beatrice doesn’t know where to go. She’s now beginning to realize that the reality that she built around has fallen apart, and is beginning to realize the actual choice she set on him. He barely even thought of it as a bluff, but honestly it may have been a smart idea. Make her face what she is asking of him, and in turn maybe she’ll lessen the blow.
It takes a few minutes before she can conjure up a response. “Listen, Stef, I didn’t actually think you would make that choice. But I’m not willing to send you to that same pce. I can’t do that. Maybe you think of me as some unflinching monster, but I’m an aunt to my sisters first. And I can see that you just can’t deal with a part of the program provided it’s official. So, I’m willing to offer you a new deal. We pretend to wash you out, but in reality you’ll actually be going to an extremely private transition facility that can help you in just the same way as here. You can live there for as long as you need to get all your surgeries in order, covered by us, and when you’re done, you can waltz right back into your life. Everything sorted, and no need to be complicit in anything at all. So, what do you say, Stef Riley?”
It’s a far better deal than washing out, that’s for sure. “How do I know you’re telling the truth?”
“Because I have no reason to lie to you at this point, Stef. You already know all of the big secrets. I see no need to tell you lies to make you believe I am better or worse than I am.”
She doesn’t seem entirely wrong. He just has to hope that she’s telling the truth.
“Okay.”
“Then it shall be done! Come with me, Stef Riley,” Beatrice utters this with a newfound confidence that was previously lost when things didn’t go her way.
The corridor is strangely dark, as they move through the basement. An eerie silence is only broken by the heels worn by Beatrice, as they make a loud announcement with every step toward the cell wing. No one is around to tell Stefan how stupid of an idea this is. Why wash out, even if it’s fake? Is it just some conviction to morality that he forgot about a good while ago? What’s the point in doing it now?
But he knows why. Just because you didn’t follow a basic sense of morality at some point in the past does not mean you shouldn’t now, whenever that now is. It doesn’t seem like whatever is going to happen will be all that bad at least. Just a pce where he gets the same level of care as here, but without all the baggage.
They eventually get to the end of the hallway, and turn to open the door into the cell wing. It’s nearly pitch bck, save for one light six cells down. “This is a bit of a tradition when we wash out someone, leave one light on for him. There’s normally a whole spiel I give to washouts, telling them how they are a failure, but there’s no need for that with you, you just need somewhere different. Right here, this cell should suffice.” She opens the door to the second cell, and Stefan steps inside the pitch-bck cell. Beatrice graciously turns on her phone’s torch so he can find his way to the cot. He goes over, sets himself down, and gets into bed. Hopefully he can actually get some sleep after all that happened today.
***2019 November 10, SundayChristine awoke slowly to the day, the autumn sun just beginning to shine into the room. She had an okay night’s rest, but not that great, what with all of the events occurring te into the night, but she and Paige got to bed at a decent hour, silenced their phones, and had a great time all to themselves. The Hall can afford to wait a little bit for today.
She grabs her phone anyway, just to do a cursory check, and sees Consensus lighting up. What could possibly be causing that?
Oh.
@Sponsors @3years Announcement
Washouts: Decn Shaw and Stefan Riley
What the fuck?
No, this can’t be happening!
For what reason could that have even had the opportunity to happen? Unless Aunt Bea did it herself. Did she react that badly to figuring out the truth about Stef?
Christine wakes Paige up with a violent shake. “Get up, we’re headed to the security room, get something on, I don’t care what!”
Paige stretches. “What’s with the energy? I just wanna lie here ughhhhh!”
Christine screams. “They’re washing out Stef!”
Paige immediately gets off of the bed and practically runs into an outfit. “What the fuck? I thought Aunt Bea might react badly, but this?”
“Yeah, seems like Consensus agrees with you on that, practically everyone is horrified by what’s going on, and they don’t even know he’s trans yet! They hear about that and I swear we’ll see riots.”
They get ready as quickly and carefully as you can when you’re enormously stressed, and practically throw themselves down the stairs. The second years are all confused, and frankly Christine does not have the time to tell them about the horror show down there yet.
Christine gets down to the security room, and storms up to Maria. “Open the cell wing. I need to talk to Stef. Now.”
Maria, almost automatically, says “Christine, you know what our principle is for washouts, they cannot be seen-”
“Shut up Maria! You know as well as I do this is wrong! Stef does not deserve to be washed out and you know it! Don’t py games with me, Maria,” Christine hisses, as she walks straight down into the cell wing. It doesn't open. She yanks out her phone, and opens up the lock anyway, not like secrecy about it matters anymore, what with everyone knowing about her access at this point.
Stef is being kept in Cell 2, so she walks right in, and wakes him up.
“What the hell is going on?” Christine says
“Christine? How’d you- Oh yeah you can kinda just do that.”
“Not important, how on earth did you get washed out?”
Stef clears his throat. “Okay, so Beatrice came down to my room, and chewed me out, talked a bunch about how I’d been taking advantage of Dorley, and tried to convince me to become directly complicit in the boys’ torment, and I couldn’t bear with that. She said to become a goat or wash out, and I will not be a goat, so I didn’t really have a choice.”
“Stef, washing out is serious business. No one knows where you go except the highest rungs, and everything I hear makes it sound like hell. You do not want to go there when all that’s happened is a light moral disagreement. I’m taking this straight to Bea, come with me.” She starts to yank Stef’s hand when he interrupts her.
“That’s not what’s happening at all. She told me after I chose that, because she frankly wasn’t expecting me to, I would be taken to a boutique private transition service where they’ll give me the same level of care as I would here, but without all the moral hangups this pce has.”
Haven’t heard Beatrice pull that one out before, not like she’s ever needed to, Christine guesses.
“I still think it’s a terrible idea, what about us? You have friends here, you don’t need to leave us just for that. What about that boy Aaron? He’ll probably be worried sick.”
“I know. I know,” Stef says, dejectedly. “That’s the one thing that makes me want to just abandon my moral compass. I hate it, but I can’t do it. I just can’t make myself do it, I don’t have the strength.”
“Seriously Stef, I get it, but this is not the time to stick to a moral compass. You need what we can offer, not just the transition care, but the sisterhood. Stef, I don’t care about your hangups, you need to understand that you are throwing that away for no real reason. What were you even going to have to do? The same shit you were already going to do? Why do you have hangups now?”
“I always did! I think what happens here is frankly absurd, even if it works! There are other ways to help these people than just forcing them to be women. Sure, this pce is good at what it does, but maybe we should strive to see what else can be done that doesn’t require cutting people’s balls off!”
“And you washing out will change that?”
“No, of course not! It’s just my moral hangup. I can’t just let that go. Christine, I’m sorry, but I am doing this.”
Christine looks away from Stef, dejected. She knows if she was smarter, if she was better, she could probably pull this idiot out of his funk, but she just can’t quite make the right words come out.
“Okay, if this is what you want, I won’t actively try to stop you by force. But I’m not going to just let you do it without a fight up there for you, okay?”
Stef simply gives a thumbs up, and practically immediately falls asleep.
Christine makes her way out of the cell wing, and goes up the stairs. She can hear the cacophony of the arguments as if it was coming through the walls.
“-don’t understand, what could even be the reason to wash Stef out? Shit, he hasn’t even been tased! He chills out with Pippa and tries to do our job with Aaron! Give me one good reason why I don’t just storm in there and take him out of that cell!” Tabby yells at Aunt Bea.
“Information came to light st night that resulted in our need to remove he-him from our facility, and washing out is the way we-”
“Information, huh? Information?” Pippa practically squeals, “Do you not want them to know what you’re doing? You monster!”
“Pippa, an expnation beyond that is not needed at this time,” Aunt Bea slowly delivers, barely able to keep her composure. Christine is frankly shocked she can even have any given what she’s doing.
“Oh, I think some context might be really important for this, actually, Beatrice.” Pippa snarls. “Have you even told them why she’s being washed out? You disgust me.”
Noise erupts from the crowd that has gathered in the security room.
“What?”
“Wait, Aunt Bea, are you washing out a trans girl?”
“There’s a trans girl down there?”
“Silence!” Aunt Bea yells, having completely lost composure after that utterance. “Fine, yes, Stef Riley is a trans woman. I gave her the same choice that all of you had at one point, and she chose to wash out.”
“How are we supposed to even believe you on that?” Tabby says. “This looks an awful lot like you finding out someone wasn’t exactly what you wanted them to be, and you’re punishing them for it!”
“No, she’s telling the truth,” Christine utters. “I just talked to him, her, whatever, and she said the exact same thing as Bea is saying right now. As insane as it sounds, that’s what happened.”
Tabby continues, “But why washing out? If she needs the care here, throwing her to the wolves like that is monstrous!”
Aunt Bea holds up a hand. “She is not being washed out in the traditional sense, I’m not a monster, good god. She’s going to be taken to a private transition facility called Crighton Acres, where she’ll get the same level of care as here, and be able to resume her normal life or whatever else she would like to do. She is not going to be abandoned or thrown to the wolves or whatever you think I might want to do. She will be taken care of, I assure you.”
“Are you just going to make her forget all of us? Will she even be allowed to come back?”
“Yes,” Bea says. ”I fully intend to raise her an invitation to come back when she’s gotten her treatment, hopefully this is just a quick bump in the road for all of us.”
“What do we even tell the boys down there then? Sure, Decn’s easy to expin, but how do you expin someone like her washing out? It just doesn’t make sense,” Jane utters.
“Actually, it’s rather simple. You tell them that some information was found while going through the files that makes Stef incompatible with the program, so he is being removed from the intake. It might result in some problems for some time, but it keeps the threat of washing out fresh in their minds.”
You know what? Not even that bad of an expnation, you wouldn’t even be lying all that much, just by omission. Nice work, Aunt Bea, even if you had to make a trans girl leave because she wouldn't do your dirty work. She hopes it’s hard for her to sleep for a while after this. It probably won’t be, but a girl can dream.
“You know what, fine,” Tabby murmurs. “It’s not great but it's better than nothing I guess. What about the ones who just won’t believe it?”
“They’ll have to,” Bea says, coldly.
With the impromptu meeting adjourned, news is sent out in Consensus, and everything is reacted to in waves. You could easily tell how far someone was in reading the announcement, from them talking shit about Stef washing out, to the sheer anger upon learning that they were washing out a trans girl, to mostly apathetic acceptance upon learning that she’s just going to a different transition facility. No one had a really good sense of how to respond to that, since it hasn’t happened before, not in the entire history of the Hall.
Many were still confused, wondering why someone like her would want to wash out, knowing exactly what was going to happen here, but others could kind of get the idea that Stef didn’t want that moral weight on her shoulders. Some even agreed with the general idea, that she feels that she had to subscribe to what many of the Sisters already feel is a complicated moral puzzle at the best of times.
Ultimately though, this was a problem that was going to be discussed over the length of months and years, not days, so Christine grabs Paige and takes them both back to her room. Hopefully they can get back to that zy Sunday.
***He’s been looking for him all day, and there’s no sign of him anywhere. His room is empty. The st time he saw Stef was through the common room door. All he gave was a thumbs up. Did they make him do that? What if he got washed out? The sponsors won’t tell them anything, even if they were down here, which they aren’t. No one is, it’s just the boys, seemingly now down to six.
What even is washing out, anyway? Do they just carve you up and throw you into the North Sea? Do they hunt you for sport? Do the washouts ever see the sun again? Will he ever see the sun again? Aaron doesn’t know. He can’t know. Because no one is around to help him through this. Stef was the one real friend he had down here, and they may have just taken that from him, too.
Aaron has been trying to stop from hyperventiting, but it’s getting tougher the longer the day goes. No one has given him any answers. Though even if they did, it’s not like it would help all that much. Stef was the only one who could calm him down, but now he’s just stuck with, who? Will and Adam? Maybe Martin, if he could respond to stimuli? Raph and Ollie seem like they’re doing pretty badly. Even if they don’t know for certain that Decn is washing out, they can make an educated guess. Not the hardest game of Connect the Dots.
And washing out seems more real than ever. He remembers how Will said that washing out is just a boogeyman. Well it might be happening to two people right now. And if it’s happening to Stef? It could happen to any of them at any time!
After what feels like an eternity, the door to the common room opens, and a couple sponsors come flooding in. He sees Pippa, and makes his way over. Maybe she knows what’s happened to Stef!
Pippa notices him coming over, and seemingly freezes up a bit. Hopefully not a bad sign, but who knows anymore. “Hey Pippa, um, where’s Stef?”
Pippa just stands there for a second before her composure returns. “Stef is currently still in the cells, we’re still figuring out what exactly is going on. Some new information came to light st night, and we’re not actually sure if he’s a good fit for this pce anymore.”
“What do you mean? Is he being washed out? What are you doing to him?” Aaron looks at her, worry in his eyes just as much as it is in his head.
Pippa looks on, seemingly trying to find a way to phrase what she’s trying to say. “I don’t know yet, Aaron. I’m as in the dark about what’s happening as you are. The only thing I know is that he isn’t in danger.”
That’s some politician talk if he’s ever heard it. It’s not confirmation that Stef is washing out, but she’s being exceptionally cagey about it, so it might as well be. He decides to be blunt.
“Is he being washed out, yes or no?”
“I don’t know.”
Holy shit he’s being washed out, isn’t he? What other expnation could there even be? Aaron is on the verge of tears, something that has come a bit easier to him recently. Maybe the stress of the situation has been changing how he reacts to certain things, he doesn’t know. All he knows now is that there’s nothing protecting him now. If even Stef, the man who would never hurt a fly (except Decn, which frankly was deserved), and seemed to be almost friends with some of the sponsors, could get washed out, then anyone can. And that’s a terrifying thought. One mistake, and he might get taken to wherever they go, if they get to go anywhere at all. He still can’t rule out that they just take all your organs and sell them on the bck market.
“Hey, you alright?”
Pippa and Will are sitting next to him now, Pippa waving a hand in front of his face. Did he miss something?
“Hey, you were gone for a few minutes, you alright?” Pippa seems genuinely concerned. Maria seems to be coming over as well, that same concern in her eyes.
“I don’t know yet, I-I need some time. Could I get some time in my room please, Maria?”
“Absolutely, Aaron. Come on,” Maria says, taking his hand in hers. Will asks the same to Tabby, who also agrees. None of it makes any sense. Why are they showing compassion when they just potentially sent two people to their deaths?
They exit the common room, and turn to make their way to the bedrooms. Aaron knows he needs to ask this to her now before he loses the chance to, when whatever story they’ve come up with becomes ironcd. “Why is Stef being washed out? He didn’t do anything!”
Maria guides him into his room, and follows him in. They sit down on the bed.
“Pippa wasn’t lying to you. She told you that we found some information that potentially made Stef incompatible with being here, didn’t she?” Aaron nods. “I’m not quite able to tell you everything yet, because even I don’t quite know, but this isn’t a traditional situation for us. I’m going to see if I can get permission to give you the full picture in a few days, provided that you don’t tell any of the other boys about it. Can you promise me that?” Maria asks, seemingly with genuine care, something he doesn’t usually get to see from her.
Aaron, after a minute, nods. “Okay.”
“Thank you, Aaron. Legitimately, that means a lot.” Maria gets up, wipes imaginary crumbs off of her red dress, and leaves the room, leaving Aaron alone with nothing but his thoughts.
Maybe they are telling the truth. Maybe they aren’t lying to him again, but it feels like something is being held back from him, like the axe is about to fall. There must be something else to this, there’s too much infrastructure here. How long are they going to be kept here? When does the twist happen? If people have gotten out of here, how is this pce still running? It seems like washouts are enough of an occurrence that they have a term and procedure for them, so what do they do here?
Aaron doesn’t know. The stress is building up again. Hopefully those answers come, maybe they’ll help, but knowing his luck, those answers will just make everything worse. He doesn’t really even feel the energy to masturbate to try and destress, he hasn’t been able to get it to do much recently, anyway. Who knows what that’s about, it’s probably nothing.
***2019 November 13, WednesdayStefan is still sitting in the cell. He just finished doing some yoga, for old times’ sake. Unless something goes horribly wrong, it’s the st time he’ll be in one of these cells. Probably the st time he’ll be here at Dorley Hall. The idea is both comforting and scary. He knows the people here care about him, which just makes it more difficult to stay. He just can’t live with the guilt it’s causing him to suffer. The complicity in so many crimes, even if those crimes have a positive impact on the world in the end. Hopefully they work out some deal so that he can at least see Melissa. That’s the thing that most tempts him to stay. He wants to see Melissa more than anything. That cold January day changed his life. For the better? Honestly, he can’t really tell.
A couple of the sponsors and other third years have come down and tried to make him see their side, to see reason, to see that the sisterhood is here and waiting. And sometimes he just wants to give in, to let them take him out of that cell, become a cog in the machine, and let the guilt wash over. It would be so easy.
But the easy path isn’t always the correct one. Stefan knows this all too well. Even if he hasn’t followed it in the past. He should have just tried to do it all himself.
And where would that have gotten you? The whole reason you sought this pce out was that it was impossible to do it yourself!
He knows that nothing besides this pce could really help him, but it can’t be helped. He knows that at least this pce that Beatrice is sending him to might at least be a suitable substitute. Hopefully he can just get what he needs and can finally move on from this complicated section of his life to a better time.
A knock on the gss signals that the time has come. The PMC’s are here, and it’s time to leave. No turning back now. Stefan prepares himself, and follows all their instructions carefully. A blindfold is put over his head, and darkness fills his vision, gring into his retinas with shadow. He moves seemingly through the basement, and they go much further than would be possible unless they’re taking him to an exit he was previously unaware of. Maybe it’s the back exit he heard about but never got to see himself. After a couple minutes, he is attacked with a fall chill, before being guided into, he guesses, a van.
Noise is all around him, as people move around to seemingly no end that Stefan can currently discern. He swears he can hear an argument about who gets to drive, one that seems stupid, but hopefully this guy can get there safely. A lurch forward suggests that the van is now in motion. He can hear a loud snore, before someone shuts whoever did it up. Is Decn in here too? Did they get put on the same transport? Oh god, did Bea lie to him to make sure that anyone that wanted to stop him from doing this could be ignored?
It could be that, but it also could just be that it’s more efficient to use one transport and drop him off after taking Decn to his destination, or vice versa. Stefan hopes with a desperate need that it’s the second option. Not much to do now but that. Sleep is seemingly coming easier with no light to stave it off, and Stefan sees no reason to fight it. Wherever they’re going, hopefully everything will be alright.
***Bea checks the outside cameras around the back exit, looks at the van with the soldiers. Stef (Steph, Stefanie, Stephanie, whatever she’ll call herself one day) gets into the van, followed closely behind by Decn. They get ready, all get into the van, and it finally drives off. This is normally where she leaves it be, but she needs to do it differently this time. She wants to make sure that she knows exactly when Stef has made it to her final destination, Crighton Acres. Peckinville’s secretive private transition facility. It’s mostly used by Peckinville staff, but its services are theoretically open to those with the right connections or a lot of cash. Luckily, she has the former. Elle has assured her that Crighton Acres is ready for her to show up, and will be giving her nothing but the five-star treatment.
Bea hopes that will be enough. She has gotten more conflicted about her choice in the past few days. Should she have even made that ultimatum in the first pce? It seems now in retrospect to have been pointlessly cruel, to demand of a girl who just wanted to transition a forced choice: to obey or suffer eternally. She should have never had to make that choice. It was far too cruel, if Bea would be honest with herself. She should have just let her be, like so many of the girls have said to her now. But it is done, and Stef will be happy in the end, having still gotten exactly what she wants.
An hour after the van leaves, she gets her first check-in. She’s having them check-in with her as well as Peckinville because she doesn’t want to take any chances with this transport. She has the location info up on her ptop, and she will be here until both of them are delivered to their respective final destinations. They give the signal, their location verbally, and then they hang up. Simple.
The morning sun streams through the windows behind Bea. It’s a rare clear day out today. She would love to take a walk, perhaps, once this whole situation is done. Maybe go into the forest, and live in the autumn leaves and shadows. For now her office, with its warm wood-grain finish, will have to suffice.
A soft knock on the door signals that Maria is at the door. “Come in.” Maria opens the door, and sits down in the chair opposite her.
“Was this the right move?” Maria says. “Why didn’t we just have her come up to the first or second floor instead?” Maria seems to sulk. Bea rarely sees her like this, she hasn’t been like this in years.
“I don’t know, Maria. I did it, and I still don’t know why I did it. Why did I continue to force that choice on her? Wouldn’t any trans girl have tried to get in here knowing what she did? Stef was right, transition care out there is abysmal. Of course if given the option, they would choose to come here! Why should they be punished for trying to survive? Oh god Maria, I shouldn’t have done what I did. At least she’s still going to get the care she needs, thank god. Those people are professionals at what they do, honestly they’re probably better suited for Stef’s case than we are.”
“Are they? Stef needs a sisterhood, too. That’s not something that that pce can provide.” Maria looks on.
“I’ll contact her about coming back when she wants to. I think she’ll accept. Once the problems of the basement are through, her objections to the program will likely die off. They almost always do. It didn’t seem like she objected to it in its entirety. Maybe she just thinks that there are other ways to reform them. And maybe there are! I don’t think so, but, well, isn’t that what I’m supposed to say? If Stef is right about that, it throws all of Dorley into question.”
Maria throws up her hands. “Maybe that’s not the worst thing. What she thought we did, this transition center for trans women from broken homes, isn’t the worst idea. Sure, I think what we do here is important, but it’s good to consider our options. Are we still doing the best thing we can?”
Bea continues to be unsure of that. Could they be doing better by evolving once more? Honestly, she’s not sure, and that scares her a little. It’s not 2004 anymore, times have changed. Has she been left behind? She certainly hopes she can change with the tides, at least.
“Maybe you’re right.” Bea rexes for a moment, lets the sun bathe her face. “How’s sponsoring been treating you? Is the boy Aaron doing well?”
“No, he hasn’t been doing well, frankly he’s been falling apart. I promised him answers, but I didn't know what I could say until Stef was properly gone, and the washout was officially announced to the boys. He freaked out, talked about how we were probably busy torturing Stef while ughing at them from above. I guess I want some good advice on what to tell him.”
Maria needing advice, a rarity seeing how long she’s been around. Guess there’s always a time for everything. “Tell him the truth. Or a version of it. Tell him that we found out that she’s actually a trans woman, so she was never supposed to be here in the first pce, and that we washed her out to cover for her being moved to a pce that can actually help her, not this boys’ facility. Clearly they did care about each other, maybe we can set up some controlled video calls? Demand his silence in return, and he should come around.”
Maria, unsure, asks: “What if he responds poorly to finding out that she’s trans?”
Bea has already figured this would come up. “I doubt it. I looked at his online history, and I generally found no anti-trans sentiment. He even followed some trans women. He may have been a devil, but he doesn't seem to have been a bigot. Maybe he’ll prove me wrong, I hope he doesn’t. Besides, even if he is, it’s not like it’ll matter soon anyway.”
It’s getting close to the second check-in. They decide to sit in silence for a bit, but Maria decides to eventually go down to talk to Aaron. They should be calling anytime now.
Anytime now.
They were supposed to call 5 minutes ago, and yet they haven’t. They were pretty precise st time, so it doesn’t make much sense. She decides to call them. It goes straight to voicemail.
What?
That doesn’t make any sense. Maybe the connection is down? They are in the middle of nowhere, near Sudbury, maybe the connection there is faulty? They seem to have slowed down a lot, but the car is still sending out pings. The van does send along its data through satellite, so maybe they’re working, but the phones aren’t. Weird. Why is the car going so slowly? Traffic, maybe? It’s too small a road to show that on Maps, though.
She calls again 15 minutes ter, no signal.
She calls again. No signal. She calls again. No signal. She calls again. No signal. She calls again. No signal. She calls again. No signal. She calls again. No signal. She calls again. No signal. She calls again. No signal. She calls again. No signal. She calls again. No signal. She calls again. No signal.
It’s been 3 hours, still nothing. The car has barely moved, maybe a half-kilometer in that time. Every failed call she’s gotten a little more stressed, by now it’s practically bursting from her chest. She calls Elle, desperate to solve this.
“Hi, it’s Bea. I know this is on short notice, but could you check Hedingham Rd, around the intersection with Church Rd, near Sudbury? Yes, with a helicopter. I need to check that the van is still there. As soon as possible. Have them call me, unless you want to do it yourself. You want to? Okay. Bye-bye.”
While she’s waiting, she calls again. No signal. She calls again, no signal. She calls again, no signal. Finally, she gets a call from Elle.
“Bea, I don’t know how to say this, the van isn’t there. There’s no traffic, there aren’t any vehicles where the location tracker suggests. Bea, we don’t know where they are.” She hangs up the phone.
Panic grows in Bea’s mind like cancer. It threatens to overtake her, and Bea lets it. Did she just lose another girl? It’s just like Val. No, it’s worse. She couldn’t have saved Val back then. She could have protected Stef, though. And she failed. She sees red, nothing but red and bck.
Bea lets out a primal scream. A scream so loud it seems to shake the hall itself. She keeps her head on her desk as she bawls. Not again, Bea. Not again. You can’t lose another girl!
Minutes ter, though it feels like an eternity in Bea’s mind, Maria runs in. “What happened, Bea?”
Bea raises her head, slowly, as though it were made of lead, and looks Maria dead in the eyes. “The van is gone, Stef is missing.”
