Chapter Text
Malibu, California, 2001.
The night she was taken, she remembered it clearly.
The day had started off wonderful, with her father promising a beach trip on the weekend over eggs and bacon on toast.
He'd been promising a lot of things lately, a beach trip, a pet dog.
A new shiny something else he'd promised.
It was always a promise and always a promise broken, much to her mother's anger and the girl's disappointment.
Her parent's had been fighting a lot lately too.
It was impossible to ignore the tension between her parents, the low hum of arguments lingering in the air as they ate breakfast.
Her father had left soon after and, in a hurry, dressed to the nines in a shiny suit.
He'd brushed off her attempts to follow him, muttering something about work, leaving her mother to soothe the silent tears that followed.
Her mother had tucked her into bed that night and promised her a picnic, a pet rabbit or piano lessons if she went to sleep without complaint.
Her mother's beautiful smile, the one that was becoming more and more sad as days went on and her eyes that always held so much laughter and joy, had hints of sadness.
She didn't like it when her mother was sad.
Her beautiful mother with careful delicate hands that played joyful music that bought her father to tears. Her mother who was brushing stray hairs from her forehead, her voice barely more than a melody. “Sleep well my love,” she whispered.
The girl had nodded, clutching the blanket tightly. Her mother lingered for a moment longer, the ethereal glow of her face framed by the nightlight, before shutting the girl's bedroom door with quiet grace.
Her father wasn't back in time to say the three things she knew so well that it had become a nightly prayer. The absence of his voice pressed against her chest like a stone.
Her mother promised that he would be there when she woke up.
You are safe. You are loved. You are wise.
She woke up to a man shaking her shoulder instead.
A man who woke her was dressed in a uniform. His badge gleaming faintly in the moonlight.
His voice had a drawl.
It was calm, steady, the kind adults use when they want children to listen.
“Sweetheart,” he said, “you need to come with me. I’m afraid... I'm afraid something terrible happened. Your mom and dad…” He let the words hang heavy. “They didn’t make it. You’re not safe here.”
Her tiny fists rubbed at her tired eyes open.
She was confused. Where hadn't her parents made it?
It was dark outside still and this man was not her father.
Without a word, he scooped her up into his arms and carried her out of her bedroom. Down the long hallway, the sound of heavy shoes pattering across wood, until he paused.
The door to her parent's room lay wide open.
On her parent's bedroom wall, dripping and jagged, was a red smiley face.
It's mouth stretched too wide, its eyes crooked and running.
Her mother lay on the bed.
Her beautiful mother.
She was still and red ran down her-
The girl's breath hitched. She buried her face in the man's shoulder. He smelled like leather and smoke. She clung to his uniform, refusing to look back.
He carried her outside to a waiting car.
Sacramento, California, 2013
Almost twelve years later, the Alexandria Cemetary church had become a remanent of a short-lived battle. The grounds were surrounded and slowly being gutted from the inside out.
Police stormed to the alter, flashlights cutting through the gloom. A man’s body lay sprawled on the ground, his eyes wide, his face waxy and gray.
A pigeon could be heard in the rafters, cooing away.
“Clear the main floor!” Agent Abbot ordered.
From down the side corridor came a shout: “We’ve got a lock—back room!”
"Get it open! I want every inch of this place searched."
They forced the door open.
Inside, the air smelled of mildew and stale candle wax.
A girl sat in the corner, chained to a radiator.
Her curly blond hair hung in knots; her skin was pale as porcelain. Her green-brown eyes, wide and feral, flicked to the officers like a trapped animal.
She couldn’t have been more than sixteen or seventeen years old.
Her eyes widened at the sight of uniforms.
She shrank back against the wall, shaking her head. She pressed back into the wall, her chains rattling, her breath coming fast and shallow. When an agent reached for the chain that held her, panic surged.
Her body went rigid.
Her chest tightened, and a strangled scream tore from her throat.
She pounded her fists against the wall, thrashing against the chains.
"NO! GO AWAY!" she screamed trying to kick the nearest agent.
“It’s alright,” Abbot slowly entered the room, lowering his weapon. “We’re the FBI.”
The moment he stepped closer, she lashed out—kicking, twisting, hissing words they couldn’t understand. “Stay away! Go! Don’t touch me!”
She spat at the floor, her chains rattling, pressing her body back into the wall. The terror that had kept her alive erupted in raw, desperate defiance.
“She’s chained,” another officer called out. “We can’t get her out if she keeps fighting.”
Abbot knelt down in front of her at a safe distance. His hands raised and visible. “It’s okay. You’re safe,” he said, his voice steady and calm, repeating the words as if they were a lifeline. “I know you're scared.” he said softly. “You are probably confused. But they're gone. He can’t hurt you anymore. You’re safe.”
Her gaze flickered toward the nave of the church, toward the dead body, and then back at him. The girl flinched. Her voice cracked when she spoke.
“They had a badge too.”
Abbot exhaled, steady but heavy. “I know. But they're gone now. They can’t hurt you again.”
Her gaze flicked past him, toward the nave where the body still lay.
“Dead?” she whispered in shock.
Her blonde curly hair was wild.
“Yes,” Abbot said. “Dead.”
Her eyes brimmed with tears.
Slowly, he gestured for an agent to break the chain.
She didn’t fight them.
If anything, all of her energy left her, and she slowly sagged to the ground.
She didn’t bother attempting to flee.
Where could she go?
She'd been locked up here for days, her foster parents murdered in front of her, she'd been kidnapped by two cop psychos with guns, her friends were probably only beginning to realise she had gone missing, and she had no way of contacting anyone else to let them know if she was okay.
The agent stepped closer, voice gentler than the others.
“Sweetheart,” he said softly. “What’s your name?”
The girl’s lips parted. She blinked once, twice.
Her throat worked as if the word were lodged there, waiting.
Her name? They wanted her name? She was-
And then—
The lights in the church flickered, the wind groaned through the building, and she finally spoke.
“My name is Charlotte. Charlotte Jane”