Dexter at Dawn
Chapter Two
by Technomad
Arya Stark proved to be an adaptable person, fitting into our little household as though she'd always been part of it. She and Astor were soon firm friends, and Astor helped her a great deal with the school work she had to do to catch up to her age mates. Cody kept his own counsel, as usual, but didn't seem to mind having two big sisters in the house instead of just one. Rita enjoyed having another girl to talk to, and made feeding Arya up a personal project. She'd been undernourished when I found her, but with Rita's wondeerful cooking, she was soon looking fit and healthy.
Having Arya did involve some changes, though. We had to rearrange the rooms yet again, putting Astor and Arya into one room by themselves and giving Cody what had been "Dexter's study" after being converted from Rita's sewing room. This presented a problem for me. I had things on my computer that I did not want anybody else accessing, such as data on possible future playmates. My box of microscope slides with drops of blood on them from my former playmates was easy enough to deal with. All I had to do was put it into a closet that was seldom used. If it were found...well, I am a blood splatter specialist, so I had an excuse for its existence ready. As for the computer, I had that locked down with a password that I didn't think anybody could guess, and made very, very sure that the only time it was on was when I was there, using it. So far, nobody else at our house had shown any interest in my computer. Astor and Cody had their own machine, which they mostly used for schoolwork and games. Rita could be trusted to keep her hands off, and Arya apparently had never even seen one before arriving in Miami, much less learned to use one.
Arya did have some odd habits, though. She would go through strange exercises every day, often with a long straight stick. "A girl misses her Needle," she explained, and then had to go on to explain further that she didn't mean sewing or work with cloth.
That said, she was fascinated by Rita's sewing machine, and said that her mother and sister would have given anything for something of that sort. "Where a girl is from, all clothes are made by hand," she told us. "This business of manufacturing them in bulk, in standard sizes, did not exist."
When I had found her, I had noted in passing that she was oddly dressed, in clothing that was nothing like anything I had seen before. It was modest enough, but nothing like the stuff for sale in the stores. I'd not paid any attention though. Distracted Dexter had had enough other stuff on his plate to make that seem like an issue of no importance.
The more I thought about it, though, the more I thought that her stories of another world might not be the fantasies of a diseased mind. She was quite consistent in her descriptions of the places she said she had been, and her stories about her birth family were interesting. Her father, apparently, was one of seven great feudal lords, but had been betrayed and executed by a tyrannical boy king.
At her description of this boy king, I felt my Passenger stir and take an interest. Had he been in proximity to us, I might have added his name to my list of potential playmates. His cruelty and capricioiusness argued strongly, to me, that he would, one day, blossom into a creature very like myself, but restrained by nothing. Not the Code of Harry, not the laws of the land, not anything. Someone like myself, with all the power of an absolute monarch, was a thought that chilled even my blood.
After her father's execution, Arya said she had escaped the capital city of the land, and ended up wandering hither and thither, always seeking to return to her home. When she'd finally managed to make it there, the place had been taken and sacked some time earlier, and after a reunion with her older sister, she had left to sail across the sea and find new lands.
She couldn't explain how she had ended up off Miami. She was amazed to find that seasons here were for a few months at a time, and said that where she had come from, seasons often lasted for years at a stretch. At least Miami, with its more-or-less perpetual summery weather, was a taste of home for her.
Of course, life went on, and I had other claims on my time than the interesting job of trying to figure out the riddle of Arya Stark's origins. Crime, in Miami, is like the ocean. It never goes away. And Dutiful Dexter, with a family to support (although Rita's work, involving juggling figures in various foreign currencies around, and then converting them into dollars, did help a lot) had work to do.
Arya was curious about what I did. "A girl does not understand," she said. "Why is it that people here make such a fuss over murder? Where a girl is from, if the killer is highborn and the victim is not, it's not even a crime." The look that flashed across her face when she said this told me that she had some bitter memories.
"That's how it is, Arya," I said, as I packed for another jolly day looking at blood splatter and making the nasty stuff make sense so that my colleagues could arrest yet another murderer. "There are no privileged classes here. Here, everybody is equal." Honesty prompted me to add: "At least, in theory."
"A girl finds that strange," she said, cocking her head to one side. "But a girl finds she likes that idea. Being noble, where a girl comes from, is not all privileges and no penalties, but the lives of the smallfolk are often far worse." A cloud passed across her face. "Particularly when the great houses play their game of thrones."
I wanted to ask her what she meant, but time was pressing, and rather than deal with another of Deborah's infamous arm punches for being late, I just waved goodbye and got into my car, heading out into the savage Miami traffic to look at yet another dead body.
When I got home that evening, I was in a bad mood. The bodies I had been called to were both children, a boy and a girl about Cody's age. Their mother, or her boyfriend, had apparently tired of their incessant unreasonable demands for food, and had solved the problem with a large butcher knife. The loving couple were in custody, but it fell to Disgusted Dexter to analyze the blood splatter in the place of slaughter to make sure that they spent a long, long time as guests of the State of Florida.
As I worked, the Dark Passenger kept whispering suggestions of what to do if somehow, either of the two managed to elude justice. I put their names on my mental list of prospective playmates, and made a mental note to keep an eye on the news. While child-killers, when caught, rarely if ever get bail or reduced charges, it could happen. That raddled old whore, Miami Justice, can be capricious, and between the parents' minority status and the fact that our prosecutors are overworked, underpaid and prone to make mistakes, they could somehow slip through the cracks.
Astor, Arya and Cody were all glad to see me, as was Rita. "Oh, I'm glad you're home!" Rita exclaimed. "Here, sit down...I'm working on dinner...Astor, please get Dexter a cup of coffee...we'll be ready to eat shortly…"
For Rita, that was pretty clear, and I sank down into my favorite easy chair with a happy sigh. Depressed Dexter rapidly gave way to Domestic Dexter, and I prepared for an evening of connubial bliss. Astor appeared by my side, holding a steaming cup of coffee. Like Jeeves in those stories by P.G. Wodehouse, she seems to just magically appear when needed. I wondered idly if she would be interested in being a domestic servant when she was older.
"Next week is 'Take Your Daughter to Work' day, Dexter," Rita said, coming in from the kitchen, where heavenly odors were wafting my way. "Do you think you could take Astor?"
Astor looked at me. I looked at Astor. Then Astor turned to Rita, and said: "I'd rather go with Aunt Sergeant Deborah." Ever since Astor had learned that Deborah, despite looking like a supermodel, was a police sergeant, who got to carry a gun, ride around in a police cruiser with a siren and lights, and boss big burly male policemen around, she had harbored an intense desire to be just like her. Deborah was amused and flattered at having acquired a Mini-Me, and I thought that she wouldn't much mind having Astor along. Astor was well-behaved and quiet and would do as she was told.
"I think that's an excellent idea, Astor," I said, before Rita could jump in with some of her patented verbal dithering. "Maybe I could bring Arya along to work."
"A girl would be honored to accompany you," Arya said. "A girl also thinks that Astor and Sergeant Deborah would make a good pair."
"I'll have to ask Deb, but I don't think she'll mind." My stomach rumbled, reminding me that the mighty machine that is Dexter was in need of fuel. "In the meantime, is it time to eat yet?"
When I called Deb to broach the idea of Astor riding along with her, she was pleased with the idea. "As long as she promises to stay out of the way if things get hairy, she's welcome!" she assured me. When I passed the news on to Astor, she raised an eyebrow. From her, that's what a squeal of joy would be from a normal girl. But, of course, she and Cody could never be normal. Their abusive, drug-using father had seen to that.
On the Big Day, I loaded Arya and Astor into my car and headed for work. Other police workers and cops were there, many of them with young girls by their side. I looked around, and spotted Deborah quickly.
"Hi, Aunt Sergeant. Thanks for letting me come along," Astor said. She's quiet, but thanks to Rita's good influence, she's always well-mannered.
Deborah gave her a smile. "It'll be interesting to have you along, Astor. I know you're thinking about a career in law enforcement. This'll let you know what a day in the life is like." She opened her car's side door, and Astor got in.
Arya Stark turned out to be no trouble at all. It was a fairly quiet day at first, and she watched me catching up on paperwork and filing. "A girl thinks this work looks easy enough," she remarked, at one point.
"There's more to it than meets the eye, Arya," I told her. She had said that "Miss Stark" wasn't quite correct, and that we were free to call her by her given name. I had never run into anybody named "Arya" before, but in the multi-cultural mix that is Miami, it didn't particularly stand out.
She opened her mouth to reply, but just then, a familiar thumping in the hall outside my office told me that we were about to have a visitor. The door opened, and Sergeant Doakes came in.
Once, Sergeant Doakes had been a hard-charging asset to the department, but after he'd had a close encounter with a disgruntled ex-friend of his, a rogue surgeon who had taken great pleasure in amputating his feet and tongue, he'd had to get used to a whole new lifestyle. Even though Daring Dexter had tried to save him...and I really had...he hated me now, just as he'd done before his unfortunate experience.
Doakes was the only person (other than, now, Cody, Astor and Arya) who could apparently sense what I was. He'd been in Special Forces in the army, and had a Dark Passenger of his own. Not that he could do much with it, but he still lurked around the department, plotting revenge on Doomed Dexter.
"Hello, Sergeant Doakes," I said. I've always made a point to be polite and friendly to my colleagues, even colleagues who'd dearly love to see me strapped into Old Sparky. "Arya, this is Sergeant Doakes. Sergeant, this is Arya Stark. You may have seen her on TV."
Doakes nodded, giving me a Glare of Doom. Being immune to his glaring, I turned back to Arya, explaining what I was doing. "We keep careful records of all we do here, Arya," I told her. "We want to be sure we convict only guilty people, if only to ensure that they don't get away and keep on killing." Which was a load of codswallop, to borrow a term I'd heard on a British TV show I'd watched with Rita. We kept careful records to ensure that in the case of someone getting away, we could prove that we'd done all we could.
For some reason, this seemed to make Sergeant Doakes even angrier. He gestured at me. "Ooo. I. Goa. Ge. Ooo." His Dark Passenger, invisible to most people, reared up and hissed angrily at me, and my own Passenger flared up, answering the challenge.
Arya had apparently seen this. As I've said, she had a Dark Passenger of her own, and I could sense that she'd killed repeatedly. "Sergeant. A girl does not know why you are here. A girl thinks you should be elsewhere." She stood up, staring into Doakes' eyes, utterly unafraid of him. He'd creeped Astor and Cody out when he encountered them, but Arya was clearly made of very stern stuff. Not surprising, if what she had told me about her past had any resemblance to the truth.
Doakes was clearly nonplussed at running into a girl her age who not only wasn't afraid of him, but was clearly quite willing to finish the job that the rogue surgeon had begun. He stared at her as though she were a ghost. "Ooo. Url." he said.
"Yes. A girl is a girl. A girl has been a girl all her life. And a girl thinks you should be somewhere else, Sergeant. Unless you have some business with my guardian?"
Doakes had no snappy comeback availble. He turned and stumped away. When he was gone, Arya turned to me.
"A girl apologizes if she handled that situation wrongly, Dexter. A girl does not understand what such a person is doing on a police force." For a second, a look of real puzzlement crossed her face. Normally, she kept up a very good poker face.
"He was hurt badly by a very bad person, Arya. He's been let stay on the job so that he can collect his full pension. He'll be eligible for it in a few years." That is, unless something happened to him before then.
At the moment, the Code of Harry forbade me to harm Sergeant Doakes, no matter how obnoxious he was, no matter how much he wanted to make me into Discredited Dexter. But, it occurred to me, Arya Stark might see things differently. She had never heard of the Code of Harry, any more than Cody and Astor had.
If Doakes became a problem, but did not fit into the rules of the Code of Harry, Arya Stark might well be willing to take care of business. From what I had seen, she did not like Sergeant Doakes, and she had told me once, one evening when Rita and the children were otherwise occupied, that her first kill had been a stable boy who was trying to prevent her escaping the royal castle after her father's fall.
Arya seemed to like me, and I didn't think she'd mind ensuring my safety and freedom, if it came down to that. But I hoped it wouldn't. Doakes could barely make himself understood, if at all, and I had taken good care to ensure that evidence of my hobby was nonexistent, or not recognizable for what it is. The only souvenirs I took were drops of blood, and I am a blood spatter technician. I could explain those away, if it came down to it. Unlike some of my late unlamented playmates, I didn't keep identifiable objects, much less a cadaver collection, such as I had occasionally run across. The thought alone was appalling.
With Doakes gone, we went back to our work. I showed Arya the microscopes, explaining how we used them in our work, and she caught on fast, as always. For someone who seemed to have been living in a medieval morass, she was rapidly becoming functional in twenty-first-century Miami. I could see her in a few years' time, out on the streets tangling with traffic with the best of them.
For once, I was not called out to deal with some bloody crime or other, and Deborah seemed to be occupied with something for which she didn't need me. Maybe Astor could take my place at her side? I thought about that for a second, before discarding the idea. Astor was still far too young to be Deborah's full-time companion. She had school to go to, and even in the summer, I was sure Rita would have a giant conniption at the thought of her little girl going along to murder scenes. She and Cody had taken their sights of such things calmly before, but Rita was not able to accept that this was so. The Miami Police would also frown on any such thing.
So, until Astor was older (if she was still interested; she was young and something else might capture her attention) it would be Dragged-Along Dexter acting as his sister's companion. Deborah liked having me there, not least because I had often had valuable insights into a murderer's psyche that allowed her and her colleagues to capture some sick and twisted psycho. While Deborah was aware that I was a sick and twisted psycho myself, she had apparently made some sort of peace with that idea, and happily accepted my help.
When we came home, Deborah was just dropping off Astor. "I hope you had a good time?" I asked politely.
Deborah grinned rather wickedly. "This girl's got real potential," she said. "If she joins the force, she might wind up as Chief one day!" Astor nodded, smiling slightly. From her, that was what squeals of joy would be from most girls her age. I'd heard some of her girl classmtes calling her "the Vulcan" because she was so deadpan.
"A girl also had a nice time. Everybody was nice to a girl, and a girl learned a great deal about what Dexter does," Arya said. She was telling the truth. Arya was always polite and courteous, and my usual co-workers...Angel-no-relation, Camilla Figg, and the rest of the crew...had all been very favorably impressed with her.
"Well, come on in! Dinner's about due to be served!" With that, I herded the female flock in, to be greeted with heavenly odors from the kitchen. Cody greeted us solemnly. Since he wasn't a girl, he hadn't been invited along, but it didn't seem to bother him.
Rita was glad to see Deborah, as always, and had no problem setting out an extra plate for her. Over dinner, she told us some news that had come for her at work.
"Dexter? Cody? Astor? Arya? I was told today...my boss and I...we're going out of town...just for a few days…" I was familiar enough with Rita-speak to be able to interpret it. I didn't suspect her for a second of hanky-panky with her boss. The few times I had met him, he had looked at me like he was stripping my clothes off. If he had looked at Cody, or anybody Cody's age, that way, I'd have definitely put him on my little list of people who might merit a visit from me and the Dark Passenger.
"So I'll be gone...it's just a few days...you can take care of yourselves, can't you?" Astor and Cody exchanged glances, then nodded silently. During the time when their abusive, drug-addicted father was living with them, they had been forced to learn to shift for themselves in many ways. Now that I was part of the family, it'd be a lot easier, if only because there'd be money for things.
"A girl hopes you have a good time. A girl can cope." Arya put in her two cents' worth, and Rita beamed.
I looked around at my three little predators. With Rita out of the way and unable to overhear, it might be time for a "Harry Talk," like the one I'd got from Harry when I was about fourteen and he'd caught on to my Passenger's existence.
(Author's note: I'm going with the book age for Arya, to make her more compatible with Astor. This story is set some time after Dexter in the Dark and before Dexter by Design. I'm using book continuity, not TV-show, since I'm more familiar with them.)