The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 3086 by Angharad Copyright© 2016 Angharad

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This is a work of fiction any mention of real people, places or institutions is purely coincidental and does not imply that they are as suggested in the story.
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“Not Cindy Highsmith?” I said hoping in one sense it wasn’t but in another that it was. She was sensible and if they’d been abducted, she’d help Danni remain calm. I just hoped neither of them were tempted to act the hero in front of the other.

“Yes, d’you know her?”

“Yes, has anyone told her mother?”

“The headmistress has.”

“Would somebody please tell me what’s happened?”

“The girls were out with a couple of teachers supervising them. The two missing ones, your Danielle and Cindy, took a couple of boxes to some old people’s flats, that was the last they saw of them.”

“Let me get this straight, the two girls went into some old people’s flats and didn’t come out again?”

“That’s about it, Cathy,” offered Andy.

“So logic would suggest they’re still in there. Have you done a house to house?”

“We’ve searched every flat, they’re not there.”

“Well somebody must have seen something.”

“You’d think so, so we’re doing house to house enquiries.”

“By the time you get round all of them it’ll be dark—they could be dead by then.”

“It’s slow but gets us results, Cathy.”

“Can I speak to the teachers who were supervising them?”

“One is in deep shock, the other is down at the station trying to help us. Before you ask, we’re checking all the CCTV cameras in the area. Go home, we’ll let you know if anything happens—honestly.”

I made sure they had my mobile number and went out of the room. I arranged for David to come and get the rest of the girls with the minibus thing. “C’mon, I’ll take you home,” said Jim.

“They’re still alive.”

“How d’you know?”

“I do.”

He shrugged, he’d encountered the weird side of me before and was only alive because of it, he therefore didn’t say anything.

“I need to go and sit somewhere quiet, where I can pick up on their energies.”

“What the other girls as well?”

“Yes, she has the healing energy too, if I can tune into it, I can find them.”

We found an empty classroom. It seems once the news got out people appeared and took their kids home. Can’t say I blamed them. I sat looking at the photo of Danielle. She was quite a pretty girl, yet as a boy she hadn’t seemed at all feminine, so it surprised me when she went all girly, encouraged by Cindy and Pia.

I could remember thinking it was weird that Cindy, who was already a transitioning child transsexual, was more butch than Danny when he was in feminine mode, admittedly, the makeover was by Julie or Phoebe. Julie thought Danny was being weird and predicted he’d drop out and that he was only doing it as attention seeking reasons. I challenged him to do it for a month and we even went up to Scotland where we met with Allie who then killed herself because she was bullied by her transphobic father.

We, Danni, for she was in girl mode, went up to the funeral. She stayed in girl mode out of respect for her friend Allie. I didn’t stop her because I thought it would work itself out and she’d revert to being a boy, albeit one with some greater understanding of women. It didn’t happen. Her friend Pia mutilated her in such a way that the only repair they could do was to give her a vagina and clitoroplasty. As she was presenting as female—ie, ten coats of mascara, girl’s hair style, the surgeons assumed the gender reassignment surgery would be welcomed. It wasn’t initially, then some while later, it seemed she had a road to Damascus conversion and went back to playing football and was now a fully fledged England women’s international with several goals to her credit.

In what I think was one of her most insightful moments, she discovered she could play at the top levels of the women’s game but probably not the men’s. As Soccer was her whole world, she made an informed choice and for the moment she seems happy with it.

I remembered her scoring as a schoolgirl against Croatia. She scored a hat trick after coming on as substitute. People still talk about her overhead scissors or bicycle kick, whichever it was, that scored her second goal. She was lucky that no one really associated the very girly schoolgirl with the boy she’d been. Apparently, that shot was one he’d been renowned for and coincidentally as she appears he disappears. Now it’s sounding like a Gaby story.

Sitting quietly while Jim went off to try and rustle us up a couple of cups of tea, I watched in my mind that goal over and over and begged it to show me where she was. I tried to wrap her in blue energy, to protect her. I also asked her to let me know where she was so I could find her and rescue her.

Jim appeared with Sister Maria. She looked very upset and we hugged while she kept saying she was sorry and promising she wouldn’t rest until both girls were found. I asked her to be quiet. She nodded and left the room like a dog with its tail between its legs.

I drank the tea which had stayed reasonably warm.

“Any luck?” asked Jim.

“Not yet.”

“I’ve found out where the flats are, I’m going to take a look see.”

“Not without me, you’re not.”

“I thought you were going to sit quietly here and tune into them?”

“If that’s where they were last seen, that’s where the trail will be warmest.”

“That makes sense, that’s where the tracker dogs will start from if they haven’t already.”

“Are they going to be able to follow a car or van?”

“What?”

“The dogs.”

“Of course not.”

“No, but I can.”

“Can you?” he said sounding very uncertain.
“Let’s go then.” He took my arm and walked me to this hire car. “Which way?”

“South west.”

“What Southampton?”

“I can see loads of bracken.”

“That could be anywhere round here.”

“New Forest. I can see ponies. Can’t this thing go any faster?”

“Whereabouts in the New Forest? It’s quite a big area.”

“Just keep driving, I’ll tell you when to turn off.”

I looked at the road, we were on the motorway heading at speed towards Southampton then it’s not too far away that we begin to hit the New Forest; an area I don’t explore enough. It’s a national park so has protections which much of the ordinary countryside doesn’t have. It’s populated by commoners—people who have inherited rights to graze their animals on the common land, mainly ponies, some bigger horses, pigs and even some long horn cattle. In truth they’re probably over grazing it and at some point there will be a cull of ponies as half of them nearly starve when the weather gets cold and they’re threatening a cold winter this year.

Sadly all wildlife has to be managed or the more adaptable species crowd out the more vulnerable ones and extinctions occur. Okay they happen sometimes anyway, even when conservationists are trying to prevent it, it’s life and rarely as predictable as computer models.

“Are we getting warmer?” he asked.

“Yes, but only because the sun is shining—they’re still alive, that’s all I can say.”