Mia's skin prickled. Sifting through records took her twice as long with the constant flickering and buzzing of fluorescent lights. With each page telling the same story, she found it hard to care about the next. She found it hard to care about the search at all. She had to anyway, if not to look professional for her boss, then to keep herself from feeling.

If she let herself feel, she'd lose it.

"Ranger Wattson?" Captain Galhardo asked again. She'd only just registered the first time. "Has your search–?"

"No, sir." Mia remembered the rest of his question. "I haven't seen any other deserters in Lunaria. None gone longer than a few days, anyway."

"Hmm, so it's just Ranger Hook and–" the other one. "That doesn't leave us much to work with. You haven't received any updates from the other pairs?"

She checked the group chat for courtesy's sake. Nothing new came in aside from Jun praising her. Nice, but not substantial. "None, sir."

Galhardo sighed, replacing his reading glasses with sunglasses. "Please ask them to report their current activity." He stood up. "In the meantime, there's an important phone call I need to make."

"You're leaving?" Mia took care not to sound too excited.

"It's confidential. That, and you've demonstrated diligence, sound reasoning…" He fumbled with his tablet. "You may conduct your search in any way you see fit while I'm gone. I will try to be back in a reasonable timeframe, but if I'm still gone by 18:40, please return our files."

"Understood, Captain."

With a nod, Captain Galhardo excused himself, and the weight of his presence left Mia. The lights didn't. Their buzz filled her mind. Her thoughts buzzed like TV static, meaningless and overwhelming. Though she heard her phone vibrate, it took her a moment to remember what to do about it.

'We're still on stakeout duty~' texted Roxie. 'What are YOU doing? <:3c Tell me tell me tell meeee'

Another followed, this time from her mother. 'I see your "friend"' And another. 'Did he leave you all alone in there? He seems lacking in tact. And who is he on the phone with?' Yet another text came. 'I know you're trying to play cool but if you want my advice, you should lock things down fast. With a ring. Don't make my mistake lol'

Mia did not need her advice. She didn't need Roxie's friendship. She needed a sensory deprivation tank. Rarely did she ever have what she needed, so the next best thing was muting her phone and staring at sheets of paper laying on the table. They were blank. Safe. Free of life-altering information.

"Ms. Rose?" The archivist leaned into the doorway. "Sorry, Ms…?"

She hesitated. "Wattson."

"Ah, thank you, Ms. Wattson. Taking a break from your research? How goes it? Do you need anything?"

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

Nothing he could give her, except maybe… "Are there photo records?"

"Yes indeedy, we have military personnel records sorted by date of separation. What timeframe are you looking for?"

"Eleven years ago."

Proof. She couldn't be sure if she fully understood those files until she saw photographic proof. Maybe she'd find out she made a mistake, laugh it off, and go back to life as she knew it.

"Here you are, Ms. Wattson. Records from ten to fifteen years ago." The archivist handed them off to her, and she thanked him. He stopped a little before he left the room. "By the way, I've never seen your father around. Is he–?"

"You won't." Mia refused to elaborate.

He seemed to get the hint when she tore open the records. "I'll leave you to your research."

Soon, she located that fateful year, flipping past men named Albertson, Boone, Carter, and so on. Her breath hitched when she hit the likes of Valentines and Vaughns. Vega, Vincent, each new vowel raised her heart rate. She struggled to turn the page when she got to the first Vogel.

Not long after, her eyes landed on a certain photo. A man stared back at her, freckled, bespeckled, and topped with cropped red hair. He looked like any one of her brothers, or all of them at once. This could easily have been the same face that told her names of different rocks, the same face that kissed her goodnight. The same one that left her and her mother distraught.

It had been eleven years since she last saw that face. All pictures of him had been destroyed one way or another, and the man she remembered had blond hair, never red. That brought her back to square one: Thomas Voltaire could be her father, but was he?

And what if he was? That'd make him Timothy Wattson, the talent agent who saddled her mom with dreams of stardom and too many kids. Once the consequences came, he left them all to rot in a glittering prison with sickly skies. Mia spent years telling herself that story, even though it never explained why he left most of his belongings behind.

A new one started writing itself. Thomas Voltaire, a family man caught jaywalking. He was called to appear in court one morning, unaware he'd be ripped from his family. That didn't explain why he took his ID and some belongings, why he left without saying anything, or why he lived a double life in the first place.

Some part of Mia held onto hope that the man behind her happiest memories cared about her, even though she knew she would've been better off letting go. If she tracked him down only to find out that he never cared, it'd feel like losing him again.

But heartbreak had to be better than living with so many loose ends. How could she go on not knowing her own name? Was she Mia Wattson or Mia Voltaire?

One person knew her father's face better than she did, but the archive rules forbid her from taking a picture of Voltaire for comparison. She only had one option. Picking up a pencil and a sheet of paper, she tried to draw him.

It took quite a few tries. Mia was no artist, but she finally landed on a drawing that looked like the specific human man pictured in the photo. Her other sketches were lucky to capture one of those traits.

The frustration of getting his features right helped distract her from the bigger issues. She expected Galhardo to be back any minute, so she appreciated being able to save face. What wouldn't help her save face was a page full of doodles. She folded them up and stashed them in the purse she found.

Looking at it brought to mind her older sister Katie stomping through the house, huffing at something their parents said. Mia thought of her as a whiny teenager then. After taking her place, she realized how strong she had to be to babysit all five of them. Maybe that's why she never worried much about her running away.

With no money for a space shuttle, Katie had to still be in Lunaria somewhere. She knew how to take care of herself. These things helped Mia believe in her survival. If they crossed paths, what would her sister have to say about all of this? Maybe they could whine together. Just the thought kept Mia from screaming.

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