"Miranda," Ellie said. "No converting people. Not here. Not around me."
"You seem to have the wrong impression of why I'm here, why you're here. You're here because that one insisted. He absolutely refused to play nice without having you checked out. Now, personally, I would have rather just killed him, but Rebecca Anne wasn't having it. There's too much at stake right now to be making professors disappear at the university where most of us are going. Maybe after the city is ours, maybe after we can come out to the world as the rightful rulers of the human race, they won't notice a missing nutty professor or two."
Ellie's eyes went wide at the continued, blatant threats against her father. It felt so wrong to her, so sacrilegious as to go against him. Yet, what surprised her the most was her father's response to it. Even in the face of those threats, he was smiling. He was thrilled to be there, in the center of it all, in the heart of an alien invasion, something that he had always dreamed of being a part of. Except, in those dreams, he was always stopping it, not helping it on. Not having a daughter that was a part of it.
"Make no mistake," Miranda said. "I'm not just tagging along to help you, to check on you, or anything sentimental like that. You're my prisoner. He's my hostage to keep you in line. If either of you try anything stupid, you're both dead before either of you can blink an eye."
Ellie almost laughed out loud at her words. It was happening again, just like last time. Keeping one in line by threatening the other. Even with all their plans, all their warnings to each other not to let this stop them, it happened again. There really was no way to stop it, to prevent someone using your love against you.
"You don't scare me, Miranda," Ellie said, despite how shot her nerves were. She wanted nothing more than to run away from this alien by her side. If only she could run from herself as easily. "I kept up with you just fine at school. One on one, I'm sure I can take you."
"Maybe," she allowed. Instead of continuing her threats, though, she nodded at someone heading their way.
The tall man in the scrubs emerged from the crowd like a fog. He walked straight at the three of them, unperturbed by the people walking past him, getting in his way as often as not. His eyes, his dead, black, abyssal eyes, were locked on them the entire time, not bothering to look aside at the people around him. Not bothering to look anywhere but at them. The man was stunningly attractive, even to Ellie. She knew, without any doubt, that had she swung that way, she would be all up on him.
"Hello," he said, in a deep, sultry voice. "This her?"
"Yup," Miranda said. "She got a little bump on the head."
"You're lucky I was on shift tonight. This place is a madhouse, but I don't even think they would have missed it."
"Why do you think I had them bring us here? So, can you manage it?"
"You sure it's nothing serious?"
"She bumped her head against a desk, then the floor. Nothing more than some of us had been through before. She just needs to scan normal."
"It's just... if this gets back to me, if something happens..."
"We'll keep an eye on her," Miranda said. "I promise, she'll be well looked after. I wouldn't threaten your position here for anything. We'll be needing you in the months ahead."
"What have you gotten yourself into this time, Miranda? What would Mom say about all of this?"
"Mom would have been fine about all of this. She would have been on my side, on our side. She had been very vocal about it all back in the day."
"Yea, back before people were dying off. We've lost too much already to be gambling on... whatever your plans are. I can't help you if you get yourself in trouble. What about the council? Wait, who's he?" He nodded towards Dave, making it clear that he hadn't noticed the human in their midst.
"Her father. He's cool, for a human."
"Uh huh. That's what you said about your last pet. I'm not cleaning up any more of your messes, Miri."
"Oh, come on, Xander. This is hardly a mess. I've got this all under control. Just get her checked off and I'll handle the rest. Trust me."
"Yea... Well, honestly, with how busy it is, it's not even that hard," Xander said. "Things like this happen a lot more often around here than it should anyway. It just takes a little nudging. What about the stiches, though? That I can't help you with. I'm a tech, not a nurse."
"Don't worry about the stitches. I've got the stiches. By the time someone comes around to look at it, she'll be completely healed up. You know how quickly we heal. They'll put it as a misdiagnosis by the paramedics and send us on our way."
"Fine, but you owe me."
"How about I pay for family dinner next week? You can even tell Dad that I skipped out on a couple of weeks. He'll be furious at me for a change."
"Perish the thought that his pride and joy skip out on starting college to make an honest day's living, right? Fine. Done. So, what about you?" He turned to Ellie for once, finally done talking about her like she wasn't there. "I'm sure your head is spinning about all of this." He smiled over at her, sliding up next to her and leaning against an empty section of bed.
"Don't bother," Miranda said. "She's gay."
"Ah. What a shame. What a waste. We could have had so much fun. Oh, well. I'd better get this in, then." He slipped off, quickly disappearing into the crowd as easily as he had appeared.
"And, with that, we're out of here." Miranda said. She moved forward, slipping around the bed and gesturing for Ellie to get up.
"Oh, no," Dave said. "Na uh. You said--"
"I said we'd take her to the hospital to get checked out. They checked her out. Now we're checking out."
"Not until they really say she's good to go. I don't care about how fast you Hulandans heal. My baby girl isn't leaving until someone in a white coat says she's good to go."
"I could probably find a white coat just lying around somewhere."
"You know what I mean. Someone in a white coat with a doctorate.
"It's fine," Ellie said, physically blocking the argument between the two of them as she sat up on the bed. "I'm fine. I'm not ready to go just yet, though."
"That's not your decision," both of them said at the same time.
"I want to check up on Becky. You know, the girl you tossed off a roof today? She's at this hospital, right?"
"She might be," Miranda said. "It's not like I was keeping track of her while I was trying to escape from you or track you down. You know, a lot of my life is wasted on you, considering you haven't even known about us for most of your life. Most of us spend our whole lives in our little communities."
"Yea, well, maybe that's the problem," Ellie said. "Maybe you don't care about humans because you don't spend any time with them."
"Oh, we spend time with them, in school and all that. We just don't consort with them." She shuddered emphatically, like the very thought of even touching a human disgusted her. It seemed odd to Ellie that the alien would find humans disgusting. "They're just a means to an end. An unfortunate infestation of this world that needs to be dealt with, before they deal with us."
"Well, why don't you have your brother track Becky down? If she's alright... I just want to make sure she's going to be alright."
"Yea, right," Miranda scoffed. "I'm not leaving your side in any of this. Remember, you're my prisoner."
"I'll do it," Dave said. He hopped off the end of Ellie's bed, managing to bump into three people in the crowded hallway in the process. "Sorry, sorry."
"Letting you go would be just as bad as leaving you two here alone."
"You have my daughter here, alone, in the middle of a crowded hospital. Neither of us want to cause a scene and it's not like I'm going to just abandon her in your custody. She's injured and shouldn't be walking around here like that, but I'm the least conspicuous. Besides, as Becky's teacher, I'm just a concerned adult looking after her wellbeing. They're more likely to tell me if she's here. I can at least try to find her father. He'll know more than they're likely to tell me. I'll go looking for him once
I find out if she's here. I shouldn't be gone for more than twenty minutes, though that's plenty of time to get an honest opinion from a real, human, medical professional. Once I'm back, if we have that, we can go. Deal?"
Miranda stood there for a moment, looking around them like she was trying to spot a familiar face in the crowd. At first, Ellie almost thought that she hadn’t even heard the question, so preoccupied as she was at looking anywhere but at the two of them. "Fine," she mumbled, barely audible over the general din of the room. "But no funny business, and no angel. If I see that guy, we're out of here, and you'll never see your daughter again."
"Angel?" Dave asked.
"Her dad," Ellie said.
"Ah, okay," he said. He smiled, like the comment was some kind of joke that he wasn't in on. "I'll be back as soon as I can."
Dave wove his way through the crowd, heading for the front door and disappearing soon after. Ellie watched him go, watched as he seemed to melt into the crowd. As she did, she somehow felt like it might be the last time she ever saw him. Like he wasn't going to be coming back. It wasn't some sense that he would abandon her, not now, not ever. Even after everything she had put him through, all the secrets, the twists her life had taken over the years, he had never faltered. He never once looked at her like she was anything but her daughter. Anything but the apple of his eye. Sometimes, however, even parents don't have a control over if and when they leave their children's lives.
As she watched him go, she recognized someone, some girl she had often passed at school. Normally, she wouldn’t have even noticed the girl, just another face in the crowd. But there was something that drew her attention. Perhaps it was the panicked, pain stricken look on her face. Perhaps it was the blood on her shirt, a shirt that looked like it was two sizes too big on her. She lumbered over to the desk, tears flowing down from her big, brown eyes. The nurses and administrators at the desk barely glanced up at her, but then she practically screamed three words over the cacophonous noise of the room.
“I was raped,” she shouted. The words silenced the rest of the room for a terrifying second. As one of the nurses came around, escorting her out of the ER and into somewhere more private, the noise of the room spiked back up to its normal level, ignoring her panicked declaration.
When the girl and the nurse left the front desk, another face caught her eye, one almost as familiar as her father's. At first, as the face bobbed in and out of the crowd, she thought she had just been seeing things, like the person she thought she saw wasn't really there. However, as he came closer, his face showing up more and more through the crowd, it became clear that he really was there. And it made sense that he would be there, too.
After all, wasn't it she who had contacted Agent Gorning? With Becky’s name right beside hers? Why wouldn't he show up in the hospital that they probably were both in. She only wondered which one of them he was looking for. Which one he would find first. And what he would do if he ever found out that she was an alien, too.
Chapter Fifty-Two
The Girlfriend's Father
Ellie wanted to wave Agent Gorning off, though she wasn't sure how to do that without drawing Miranda's attention. Besides, if he wasn't there to see her, if he was only looking up Becky, she didn't want to attract his attention either. There was no telling what the alien next to her would do, if cornered by an actual law enforcement officer who actually knew who, or what, she was.
Agent Gorning stood off to the side, an imposing figure amongst the crowd. The front desk in front of him was harder to see than he was, as the people continued to swarm around the full room. The two people standing next to him, flanking him, seemed to move through the crowd as he did, suggesting that they had come in with him.
The more she focused on Agent Gorning and the two agents that flanked him, the easier it was for her to see them and the area around the front desk. Agent Gorning told the other two to stay at the front desk, his words coming to her through the intervening distance, over the noise of the room, as clearly as if he were standing right next to her. She started to wonder if this was some new ability, new alien power that she had discovered, almost by accident or instinct. Or, perhaps, it was just her brain playing tricks on her. If one looks for something, often their body reacts as if they found it. And Ellie was certainly looking for more unexpected abilities.
Ellie looked over at Miranda, half wishing she could ask her about it. Ask her what powers they had beyond the ones she already explained. Did they even have powers at all, or was it just the added strength and intelligence she had talked about before? And that was just the start of the whirlwind of questions flooding her mind. Miranda had been helpful enough so far, but she didn't want to get reliant on her. She didn't want to start seeing her as anything but the enemy. And that was what she was, the enemy. She was holding her there against her will. She was responsible for the conversion, and eventual death, of probably dozens, possibly hundreds, of people. It was a slippery slope to think of her as anything but dangerous.
More importantly, she wanted to make sure that Miranda hadn't noticed the new arrivals. It was difficult to determine what she saw and what she didn't. Her eyes, still black as night, could be pointed in any direction, even as she seemed to be staring forward, lost in her own internal musings. She could be staring daggers right as Agent Gorning without Ellie knowing it. Ellie hoped that they would be able to make it out without a confrontation, between her captor and her girlfriend's father, whether or not he'd be able to rescue her from Miranda. It seemed unlikely to her that they'd both make it out of any such conflict alive, and she needed both of them. Miranda, captor or not, was her only connection to that world. The only one that had been open and honest about stuff that she should have known all along. That she should have been a party to for her whole life.
Her eyes inadvertently flickered back to the front desk. She was both elated and crushed to notice that Agent Gorning wasn't there anymore. That she once again couldn't make out anything of the front desk. She hoped that was a good sign, that she had been as hidden from them as the door was from her. If they had just come for Becky, had just heard about her arrival at the hospital, she'd be able to save him from whatever fate Miranda would try to subject them to. It was only a matter of time before Ellie managed to rescue herself. She didn't need any cavalry; she never did.
"Ellie, hey," Agent Gorning said. He suddenly appeared right next to her, in the space that her father had vacated just minutes earlier. Without any prompting, or even acknowledgement, he leaned into Ellie, giving her a deep hug. "How you doing, kid? It's a bit scary out there these days, huh?"
"Uh..." Ellie said.
"Who's this?" Miranda said. She had stiffened when he came over to them, a stiffness that she could feel in the very air around them.
"Oh, sorry," Agent Gorning said. He broke the hug, offering his hand to Miranda for shaking. "Hi there. I'm Hank, the father-in-law."
Ellie smiled at that, at the little inside joke that had been going around in the family for the past few years. She also loved that he had introduced himself as Hank, rather than his official title. No need to clue Miranda in that he was in law enforcement. She wondered briefly if the fact that he was enforcing the rules against demons would have normally put him on the same side as Miranda and the other aliens, as they were most noticeably against the demons. But given their own status in legality, it was difficult to say.
"Miranda," she said. She stared at the hand, rather than taking it, making it clear that she had no intention of doing so.
"Right," Hank said, lowering his hand. "I checked at the front desk but they're being rather tight lipped about Becky. Is she here?" He looked around Ellie, into the two rooms on either side of her, but neither would have given him any information.
"Um... no, I'm not sure where she is. How did you know I... we were here?"
"Her, uh... her father called me. We had already been in the area, looking into... everything." He eyed Miranda for a moment, suspiciou
sly, but didn't say anything about it. "You know, that thing you were talking about? Anyway, we got a little sidetracked with the blackout and everything. I don't know what she told you about her, but Becky and her dad are kind of old friends of mine."
"She said you helped her out after her mom died, but she didn't go into much detail. Did you know her dad is a... a you know?"
"Yea, they're on our radar. Mostly quiet, though, so we don't bother them. This new one, though, that's... That's a bit much, isn't it? Completely caught us by surprise."
Miranda glared at Ellie, or, at least, she was pretty sure she was. It was hard to tell. The conversation was starting to go exactly where she didn't want it to. Miranda's hand reached out, grasping her on the arm tightly. Fortunately, Hank didn't notice. Or, if he had, he was doing well to hide that fact.
"Anyway, why don't I go looking for Becky's father?" Hank asked. "Maybe we can find out a little more about her situation, okay?"
"Sure," Ellie said, her voice a little higher of a pitch than normal.
Hank nodded to her before heading off. He didn't disappear into the crowd right away, his height making him easier to follow as he rounded the corner towards the elevators. Ellie was grateful that he left. But, at the same time, she wished he had stayed. She wished he had saved her from Miranda and the dangerous aliens that she hung out with. It was clear, though, that that wasn't going to be happening.
"Come on," Miranda said, pulling her off of the bed. "We're leaving." Miranda pulled her along, easily making her way through the crowd, which seemed to be quite willing to part around her.
"What about my father?" Ellie asked.
"We don't have time to wait for him to come back. What did you tell them? About us? About who, what we are?"
"I told him everything I knew at the time, which wasn't much."
"When?"
"What?"
"When did you contact him? Was it before or after your little road trip to the psych ward? Because you knew an awful lot after that, didn't you?"
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