Chapter Text
Anne Savisa Boonchuy was last seen at 6 years old.
She was wearing a light pink shirt, and jean shorts with little flowers sewn on. She had light-up sneakers that she begged her parents to get for her, and her hair was half up, half down. She was last seen walking to the bus stop, along with her two best friends, Sasha Elizabeth Waybright and Marcy Regina Wu.
Everyone knew her name, but no one knew her fate. Such were the whispers at temple, the pitying looks and cooked food always given in her name. So they could focus on bringing her home, the women said. So they could find the monster who did this, the men said.
Neither ever happened.
The case was just as cold as the day it first opened; there were no witnesses, there were no cameras, there were no suspects. Her parents sent her down to the bus stop as they always did, but when the driver opened the door, no one was there to get on. No one knew she was missing until her teacher called an hour later.
It was a case that baffled all the true crime podcasts, all the detectives, everyone. It was as if the three had vanished without a trace of ever existing. Of course, everyone suspected foul play to some extent. Press hounded their house, dug deep into their lives to an invasive degree, trying to find a single flaw in their parenting that surely was proof they had gotten rid of their beloved daughter. Or maybe it was a creep who snatched the innocent girls right up from under everyone’s noses. Murdered, dumped in a ditch somewhere, people debated. Databases were scoured, suspects called and then released when no connection was found. Some even tried to claim they’d seen the girls, but it was always a lie.
Each parent was questioned endlessly, pouring deep into their lives to try and find some sort of connection, some tangent that they could go off of. Sasha’s parents were wealthy, did they have any enemies? Marcy brought a music box to show and tell that day, where did they buy it? Anne never liked going to temple, was there a reason why? But every possible avenue turned up nothing, just an empty bedroom and empty hearts.
The searches were endless. Late into the night, dogs and humans and helicopters scouring Los Angeles and all its surrounding suburbs for three little girls who vanished without a trace. But one by one, people gave up hope. First onlookers, then the police, then the parents. The Wus couldn’t stay, they couldn’t bear the pain; they moved out east. The Waybrights, who’d already divorced, threw themselves into their new families.
As the years dragged on, with gray hair and crows feet and aging cats, the case was closed, the girls pronounced dead, and the world kept turning, leaving them without answers, without closure. The years went on, one by one, and Anne Savisa Boonchuy never came home. Her face, once all over the nightly news, now relegated to milk cartons and long faded posters.
Anne Savisa Boonchuy was never seen again.
Anne Savisa Plantar was first seen on the I-5.
The driver that spotted her was a bit of a wreck when he called the police, which was understandable. The way he described it, a dirty, disheveled kid dropped out of the sky and onto his windshield while he was stuck in traffic. For a moment, they both looked at each other in confusion, and then they both screamed.
And then she stabbed his windshield with a sword.
Thankfully, the glass didn’t shatter, merely puncturing and splintering around the wound. But it was enough of a distraction that he flinched violently, and when he opened his eyes again, she was gone.
Of course, at this point they didn’t know she was Anne Savisa Plantar. They thought she was just some teenager who got a bit too wild with her LARP. The difference, however, was that no juvenile delinquent matched her appearance, and as the days ticked on without an answer, a few officers were dispatched to investigate. Lo and behold, not too far from the site of the accident, the rising smoke and discarded food scraps that told of a camp. And so, off they went.
“What kid just carries around a sword?” the woman officer asks her partner.
He shrugs. “Kids are into anime and stuff, maybe she was coming back from a convention?”
“Yeah, but the guy described it like she was actively trying to attack him.” She pushes aside a large fern. “Like she wasn’t even human.”
He tiffs. “Yeah, sure. She’s just some runaway who had too much sugar.” They finally follow the footprints into a larger clearing, just off the side of the highway. Despite ongoing drought, the plants bloom almost neon green, too bright to be naturally grown. Cars are still audible at this point, though only slightly. Why would a child run into the woods, instead of towards the city? It was almost like she didn’t want to be found. “Tracks seem to stop here. Uh, hello? Kid? Are you here?” she calls out. “I’m Officer Kim, this is Officer Duncan. If you could just come out we want to-!”
She never gets to finish her statement, because her feet give out from under her, and she’s suddenly upside down. For a moment, all she can do is gape openly at her partner that stares, equally bewildered. Then both of their eyes gravitate towards the rope tied to her ankle, and a bitter anger takes hold.
“You rotten little-!” She squirms uselessly in the trap, trying and failing to pull herself upright. Duncan lets out a bewildered laugh. “Oh yeah, laugh it up! Still think it’s just a kid on sugar?” she sneers. He opens his mouth to answer, when the trees rustle wildly, and a girl steps out.
She’s willowy, skinny for her age, with wild brown hair and wearing a chestplate straight from the renaissance fair. Her blouse is patched and dirty, and she’s missing a shoe. She grips the sword in both hands, her legs spread.
“Ha! Caught ya!” She bares all her teeth, but doesn’t quite smile. “Thought you could get the best of ol’ Anne, eh? Well you didn’t!” She glances up and down, as if she’s never seen another human before. Committing their details to memory. “Huh. I kinda thought you guys would be taller.”
“ Let me down !” Kim screeches, once again flailing her foot.
“Woah, okay, everyone calm down.” Duncan holds up his hands placatingly, but it does little to sway her. “What’s your name, kid?”
She rolls her eyes. “I just said it’s Anne.” Did these people not speak the same language? She never had any issues before.
“Anne what?”
“It doesn’t matter. Just go away!”
“Well, I can’t do that. You’ve got my friend all caught in your trap.” At this she falters, hesitant. Her lip dances between her teeth. There’s a whisper in the breeze, too quiet to be audible, and Duncan can’t tell if it’s from the woods or the highway. Almost like voices.
She relents. “Yeah, fine.” with an effortless swing the sword cuts through the rope like butter, sending Kim plummeting to the ground with a cry. “Ok, I freed your friend, now will you leave?”
“Sorry kid,” Anne grumbles about being called a child, but the attitude drops when Duncan pulls out his handcuffs. “No can do. You assaulted an officer, and you broke a car window. I gotta bring you in.”
“What?” Her face falls into sheer panic, pure despair plain on her features. “Take me where?”
“To the station…?”
“The heck is that?”
He blinks. “You know, when you commit a crime…?”
She turns sheet white. “You’re taking me to prison? No no no, I can’t go to jail! Stay away from me!” Her hands shake around her sword, gripped tight. The two officers approach her, backing her into the trees.
It sucks to see a kid this afraid of the law. No doubt she’s been through some crazy stuff to be so afraid of authority, but it’s his job. “We don’t want to hurt you, kid, but you need to come with us. We need to contact your parents.”
“I don’t have any parents,” she insists, backed up against a trunk. Her eyes dart wildly to the side, wide with fear. “O-or maybe I do. I dunno. Listen, I’m sorry about your foot, can we just- pretend this never happened?”
“Resisting arrest,” Kim warns, grabbing her taser from her belt. It’s the signal Anne needs to attack, and she charges with a guttural scream.
Kim thrusts the taser towards her, but Anne meets it with her sword, slicing the taser clean in half. Sparks fly from the broken end that Kim holds. All she can do is stare, bewildered. The sword is real? Who gives a minor a fully functional sword? She thought it was a prop!
Anne circles her arms with the sword, disarming Kim almost immediately. The broken taser drops to the ground forgotten. Kim takes a step back, and Anne moves forward. Her eyes, once a dark brown, glow neon blue. Curly hair floats against gravity.
“What are you…?” Kim gasps.
Anne stands up tall, eyes swirling and voice deeper. “I am Anne Plantar, and I’m not from around here.”
Her back seizes up, and Anne Plantar goes down with a cry of agony, the splitting cracks of electricity cackling through the air. Her pupils shrink down to pinpricks, scrambling to try and get up like a feral cat. Her muscles spasm, sending her sprawling.
“No… p-please…” Her eyes drift to the woods. “I need…” she whispers almost inaudibly. The fight drains from her, eyes drooping as she falls bonelessly to the ground. Her muscles seize and relax like the ebb and flow of the ocean, before finally settling to her rest.
Where she stood is Duncan, a grim and concerned look on his face. “Get her in the car. We’ve got a lot of paperwork ahead of us.”
If she was uncooperative in the woods, she’s even less so in the station.
“Let me go! I’m telling you, you’ve got it all wrong!” She insists, handcuffed to the table. Her wrist is rubbed raw from straining, soon to turn a blue-black if she keeps it up. “I need to get-go find-get outta here!”
Across the table, a detective sighs. This wasn’t exactly what he expected to be doing with his day. One moment, he’s working on a top secret mission, the next, he’s playing cleanup for the LAPD. Poor Mr. X, how far you’ve fallen, he thinks.
“I think I understand perfectly,” he insists. “It’s you who’s got it all wrong, kid.” Without her weapon, she’s just a child, and she reacts as such by slouching into the stiff chair provided. She’d fall over if not for the handcuff pulling at her arm.
“So,” he tries again. “From the top. Where are you from?”
“I’m from Wartwood.”
“Uh huh. What county is that?”
Anne raises a brow. “What’s a county?”
“It’s the bigger name for the area you live in.”
Seems simple enough. “Frog Valley.” Except that’s not a real place. Well, it’s a park in Virginia, apparently, but it’s certainly no county. He asked her to point it out on a map, and she shook her head. Apparently, no map would help him.
X steeples his hands. Perhaps a different approach is needed. “Tell me, who gave you that sword?”
“A friend,” she sasses.
“A friend who knew you were too young to possess a lethal weapon?”
“Hey! I’m plenty old enough!” her voice cracks. “It’s totally normal to have a sword! My friend Sasha got one for her birthday!” Technically it was her second one.
The detective raises a brow. “And how old did she turn?”
“14.” X gives pause at that. The timeline matches up, the disappearing and, if his hunch is correct, reappearing… hang on a second.
He flashes her a winning smile, but it barely even fazes her. If anything, it pisses her off more. “I’m sorry, what’s your name again? Your full name, please?”
Anne uncurls from her seat. If she’s going to give her family name, she’s going to give it with pride. “Anne Savisa Plantar, daughter of Weed and Petunia Plantar. Granddaughter of Hoppediah Plantar.” She wasn’t their daughter for very long, and she only faintly recalls them. Their smiles, their voices, the details are gone. But she loves them nonetheless; they took in a strange child from the woods and gave her a family when she had none. They gave her the Plantar name and made her protector of her siblings. They taught her all they knew about who she was, taught her about the world she was new to. And when they couldn’t figure out how to get her home, they opened their hearts to her. She is a Plantar, and she is proud.
“Savisa… Plantar?” He echoes. “Weed and Petunia are… interesting names…” she doesn’t react. “Is that… your legal name? Your… birth name?”
For a moment, the air is electric. Gravity reverses on her, suddenly she is floating, she is not here, she is on a playground, she is laughing, and she is not alone. She reaches her arms up to a face that she’s tried to remember so many times the memory is destroyed.
Marcy told her once, that the more you try to remember an event, the more the memory gets corrupted. That every time you remember, you’re just remembering the last time you remembered it. She didn’t listen, of course, simply trying to live off memory alone, but the older she got, the more warped it became, and soon, there was simply nothing left.
It haunts her.
“...No.” She admits. “I was… someone else. I don’t remember who. But… I was someone. To someone.” A hole in her heart left empty, raw. She’s tried to fill it, and so far, she hasn’t been able to keep it filled for very long. She never wanted to burden her family with this ache, this pain they can’t cure no matter how great they are, and the only other people who understand her are too far away.
X’s face is unreadable. “Just sit tight while I check a few things.” He buzzes to be let out, watching from the corner of his eyes as Anne curls back up again. Her bangs cover her eyes, but do little to hide the tremors raking across her body. The handcuff clacks against the table.
“Don’t worry, kid, we’ll sort this out.” he says, before leaving the room.
The moment the door is shut, his face turns to steel. He thunders down the hall, and police scatter like stray cats. He slams open the room of archives, practically a room of allergies at this point. Shouldn’t this all be digital nowadays? Honestly, it probably is, but finding a cop capable enough to get him what he needs will definitely take more time than just throwing open drawers until he finds the right file.
“Let’s see… Boer, Bonnet… There.” In bright red sticks out Boonchuy. Compared to the others the file is practically starving, barely a few dozen papers. He flips through them, and sure enough, from just earlier this year, is a digital recreation of a 14-year-old Anne Savisa Boonchuy.
It’s not an exact match, no AI is perfect, but the frizzy hair, the wide eyes, the pointed nose… it’s definitely the same person. He glances at the photo, then back towards Anne Plantar, who sits glumly behind the one-sided mirror.
He doesn’t wait; he grabs the first officer who dares to walk by the door. He pulls them in by their badge. “Get me the Boonchuys on line 3.”
The house is quiet when the phone rings.
Oum Boonchuy looks up from where she’s been stirring the same food for almost 10 minutes. She didn’t mean to, she just got lost in thought.
In the years since their daughter’s disappearance, as much as it hurt, as much as they wished to stay in the past where they were happy, they had to move on. Their business, made popular by them frequenting the news, eventually died back down to a more manageable size. Sometimes, they think about moving back to Thailand, where the memories aren’t as sharp, where they don’t bleed whenever they walk by the small bedroom that’s gone untouched for so long. At first, they wanted to keep everything exactly as it was, a token to their daughter, a way to remember her by. But the longer she didn’t come home, the older she got, the more a fear of her returning to a house made for a long dead child grew. It hurt to get rid of the couch with stains from her juice, to replace dusty toys and scrub doodled on walls. But life went on, wherever she was, and so they had to as well.
The phone rings again.
“I’m coming, I’m coming,” she grumbles, setting the bowl down. Who even calls a house phone nowadays? But when she looks at the caller ID, and sees the familiar number from all those years ago, her stomach drops like a piece of lead.
She’s seen that number far too many times. It’s imprinted on the back of her brain, it’s in her worst nightmares. There’s no telling what they want, but she can’t keep them waiting. “สวัสดี.”
“Good afternoon, is this Mrs. Boonchuy I’m talking to?” A crisp, polite man sounds through the receiver.
“Yes, this is she…” Oum runs a finger over her wedding band. Her heart is pounding so loudly she almost misses his name.
“I’m from the LAPD,” Yes, I know, “How are you?”
“I-I’m fine,” she never liked American greetings, asking how people are when they clearly don’t care. Her feet move of their own accord, pacing around the kitchen table.
“Good, good,” X soothes. The crackling in the phone line weighs heavily on her, every second she remains on this line the shackles of despair pull her further. “I’m calling because we have a new, very promising lead on your case, and we’d like you to come down to the station as soon as physically possible.”
Her heart stops.
In all the years of looking, there was never a lead. Never a trail, a leading theory, a main suspect. The only calls she’d ever gotten were for digital age-ups, for record keeping, for interviews with cable tv shows. They’d spent years praying for this call, and it chooses to come now? Now, when the scar is so delicate, when it’s been so long? How did it take them this long? Why did it take them this long? She has a million questions. Her voice fails her.
“A-are you sure…” Oum manages. “Really?”
“I’m fairly sure. I don’t want to get your hopes too high buuuuut…” she can hear the smile in his voice. “I do think you should get down here. I have something I need you to see. Or rather, someone.”
Her legs give out. The phone clacks across the hardwood floor, skittering away as she heaves for breath. Her hand cups her mouth, and she finally cracks, letting out overwhelming sobs. Her brain was silent, save for a single loop running through her mind: my baby, my baby, my baby.
“What was that noise? Is everything ok!?” Bee runs in, quick to try and help his wife. “What happened?”
“She’s-! I-! ลูกสาวของฉัน…!” Bee turns ashen, falling down beside her. He never wanted to see his wife like this again, they’d been such a mess before… he doesn’t dare to ask what set her off.
“Hello? Are you coming down to the station or not?” X’s voice rings over the speaker. Bee freezes, turning to stare in disbelief at his wife.
She wipes her eyes. “We gotta go. Now.”
Each minute feels like an eternity in her little prison. Is this human jail? It’s not too different from Toad Jail, all things considered, what with the restrained movement and constant badgering. Yet, it’s… wrong. Too sterile. There’s nothing else in here. At least Toad Jail has some bones to keep you company.
Anne has only been to Toad Jail once before, for pushing the buttons of the tax collectors. It was just for one night, but frog damn if Wartwood wasn’t furious when it happened. The toads of the South Tower and Wartwood had the world’s most uneasy truce, after all, and it all hinged on two outsiders. Hop Pop and Grime would always glare daggers at each other during their playdates.
“No. Focus.” It’s hard to ignore the ache in her chest at the thought of home, but she has bigger fish to fry. First up, getting out of these chains.
The blue powers are new to her, sporadically appearing since she turned 13, but she’s never been able to summon them on command. “Please,” Anne whispers, closing her eyes. She takes a deep breath, reaching into the depths of her soul, calling for help from wherever the magic comes from. I need to save them. You’ve always appeared when my family was in danger, and they’re in danger. Please, please work.
Her hair rises off of her neck. Her stomach lifts into her throat. When she opens her eyes, she’s surrounded by a blue aura.There’s lightning tearing through her veins and sparking out her fingertips. The world moves in slow motion, each breath feeling miles away from her lungs.
She barely has to pull against the handcuffs before they tear like wet paper.
Relief floods her veins and the magic leaves her, taking her energy with it. Before… before she left, the King said something about stones, and a power from them. But Anne never got to ask him before everything went to shit.
“Ok. Step one is complete.” She flexes her free fist, moving it this way and that to get the kinks out. “Step two: bust outta this joint.”
The door flies open from a single solid kick. X spits out his coffee.
“WE WILL NOT BE CONTAINED,” Anne yells, sucker punching an officer in the face and taking off down the hall like a bullet.
For a moment, all the adults can do is stare in shock as this child makes out like a bat out of hell. “What are you just standing around for!?” X yells to the officers. “Stop her!”
They take off, but she’s damn fast , and slippery too. She slides across the tiled floor, dipping low and out of reach. And then just as quick, she’s vaulting over top of a desk, on all fours, no less, rolling out on the other side and running off without even pausing for breath. One officer tries to follow her, but hits his stomach on the desk. “Wow, this is sad,” she smirks. “Are all humans this clumsy, or is it just you guys?” To think that this was going to be a challenge. Please, she’s fought crickets harder than this. She just needs to find where they put her sword, and then she’s home free.
The building is like a maze, with random words like Dispatch and Booking helpfully tacked on to doorways. None of these say exit! How big is this place, anyway? It couldn’t be too big, this place has nothing on Toad Tower! She almost skids past it, but immediately backs up when she spots a room labeled armory.
“Bingo,” she grins, ducking in just as a stream of guards rush by the door. “Fan out! Block the exit! We can’t let her escape!” X barks, striding behind them. As their voices fade, Anne finally takes stock of the room she’s in.
Oh boy, is this an armory unlike any other.
The walls are lined with heavy suits, covered in a strange black material, vests padded beyond belief. It’s definitely armor, but it’s made of cloth, not metal. There’s helmets with glass visors, and goggles, and wow, that’s a lot of gadgets! If Marcy was here, she’d be going insane.
Marcy…
Frog, she hasn’t had any time to really process what happened to Marcy. It was all so fast, and bright, the light from the portal and Andrias’ sword blinding, surely she’d been mistake when she saw it deep in her gut-
“Focus!” Anne hisses, slapping herself in the face. “Focus.” Her sword isn’t here, which means one of the stupid officers had it. She needs a weapon…
Her eyes land on a small black gadget, not too unlike Marcy’s crossbow. It’s probably the same, right?
“Hey, I think the kid is in here!”
Her head whips around, brandishing her new weapon. She throws the door open.
“Security has really increased since we were last here,” Bee remarks dryly.
They’ve been standing at the entrance for at least a few minutes now, waiting for someone to come buzz them in. After all the sweet talk over the phone, and a car ride well over 3 times the speed limit, now they decide to take their sweet time?
Oum’s leg bounces so fast it almost reaches escape velocity. Her leg is about to fly up into space and achieve orbit around the Earth.
“They said, ‘we have someone for you to meet’, and we are here, not meeting!” she cries, throwing her hands up. “I just- I wanna- AGH!” What was that superhero her husband likes to joke about? The Hunk? The Bulk? She wants nothing more than to be that right now. So typical of LA. Get your hopes up, and then crush them into the singularity.
“Hey, take it easy,” Bee places a hand on her shoulder. “If this is real…” he gulps. His Adam's apple quivers. “If… this is real… then we’ve waited this long. What’s a few more minutes?”
“But that’s just it,” Oum moans. “It’s been over 8 years. Half of her life. We’ve missed so much, and I don’t want to miss a second longer.” A warm, calloused hand greets her own, finding its partner easily. It's almost second nature to them.
“I know.” Bee says. “We’ve got this. I’m sure everything is going to be ok.” As soon as he speaks, the buzzer dings, and the door unlocks. “See! What did I say!” He throws the door open. “I’m sure everything is going to be just fine.”
“SHE’S GOT A GUN!”
“WHO GAVE HER A GUN?”
“I AM THE QUEEN OF THE JUNGLEEEEE!”
Standing on top of the welcome desk, brandishing a gun, is Anne. Of course, she has no clue what a gun is, or how it works, just that everyone is very afraid of her with it. And what is Anne but a teenager, run mad with power over the adults who pissed her off?
“Um.” Bee mumbles.
“Oh thank god you’re here,” the Boonchuys turn to see X, beads of sweat running across his bald head. “Your child is a feral delinquent with superpowers! Can you please try and get her under control!?” He turns back to Anne, where she is using the gun as a bludgeoning tool on any officer who gets too close.
All words leave Oum’s mind. There’s no sound, no taste, the only sense she can even comprehend is the sight of this girl, this child, her daughter . There’s no mistaking it in her eyes, in her hair, she knows this face. She’s held this child in her arms before. She’s sung her to sleep, she’s combed her hair, taught her Thai, made her breakfast.
This is their daughter.
She’s terrifying.
She’s beautiful.
“Anne…?” her voice is quiet, but it registers nonetheless. Every single cell in Anne freezes, the gun clattering to the floor, thankfully empty. She makes eye contact.
The room falls into a total hush. Everyone holds their breath.
“I…” Anne studies her face, his face, their faces. “I know that voice.” She’d forgotten it so long ago, once it was the only memory she had left, before it too, was gone. She sees their faces clearly now, in the last vestiges of memories, in the few wisps she had left. Their faces slot in perfectly, as if they’d always been there.
She drops down to the floor. They move closer, as if under a spell.
“I know you,” Anne’s voice is so far away. “I… I know you.” It’s not a statement, but a question. “Mom…? Dad…?”
They can’t answer. Not with words. They just pull her close and cry.