Note: The original request from Frogster: Deryn says that the local papers wrote about how her dad had saved her and his being awarded the Air Gallantry Cross. I figured the paper would mention Deryn's (real) name, which might necessitate a reveal if Alek ever somehow got a hold of the papers - of course, he'd have to do so in Glasgow.

Well, of course! Though I'm afraid you're getting this in a two-parter… hope that's all right. :D

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"The nicest thing is to open the newspapers and not to find yourself in them."

George Harrison

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It shall take a bit of sleuthing.

Alek arrives in Glasgow with little more than the name Dylan Sharp and the restless, undefined urge to see his old friend. It's been years – nearly five – and he never meant to lose contact like this, but somehow he has. They promised letters, they promised visits, and then weeks became months and months became years, and it wasn't until Alek wrote 1920 on a document that he realized how long he'd been missing the midshipman's easy, steady friendship.

After a morning of thinking and plotting, he ends up in the offices of The Glasgow Herald, sipping lukewarm tea as a harried editor tries to simultaneously help him and get a newspaper published.

The editor fields six complaining reporters and three messages from his secretary before scrubbing a hand through his (already disheveled) hair and turning back to Alek. "Who was it you were asking after, sir?"

"A man named Sharp," Alek says, "who received –"

"Aye, right, the Air Gallantry Cross," the editor says. He rummages about in his desk and comes up with a cigar, which he offers to Alek with a quirk of his eyebrows. Alek shakes his head. The editor shrugs, then clips and lights the cigar with one hand, shaking out the match. "Years ago, that was – sort of thing you don't really forget. Bloody tragedy."

It was an open flame which had caused that bloody tragedy, but Alek declines to point this out. "Would you happen to have a copy of that story?"

"Oh, aye, in the archives, or the morgue files, more like. Here, I'm a bit busy, but I'll have Nevin take you – Nevin! Get your arse in here!"

One of the complaining reporters pops into the editor's office, looking exasperated. "Aye sir?"

"Air Gallantry Cross from '12. June, I think it was."

"Right, that," Nevin says. He's got one hand on the doorframe as if he expects to make a hasty escape at any moment. "The balloon fire. Christ, Innes couldn't take the smell of burnt meat for months – why?"

The editor points at Alek with the cigar. "This Clanker – no offense, sir - wants to see it. Take him to the archives."

Nevin looks cross. "Now? But I have –"

"Now!" the editor barks, banging a fist on his desk. Nevin heaves a sigh.

"Well, come along, then," he says truculently to Alek, shoving off from the doorframe. Alek abandons his tea, hastily thanks the editor, and follows.

They weave their way though the crowded bullpen and into a lift operated by some sort of fabricated creature – almost, but not quite, like a monkey. Almost, but not quite, like a loris.

Alek wonders if Dylan still has Bovril. At the time, he'd told himself that the loris would be much happier with Dylan and all the other beasties of Britain. Perhaps that was only wishful thinking to make himself feel better about the separation.

If so, it didn't work.

"Archives," Nevin tells the creature, sounding impatient. The fab pushes a button, pulls a lever, and then hangs on the lift's cage, staring at Alek without blinking as they begin to descend. He quirks a smile at the creature.

"Damned odd story to be looking up," Nevin says. Conversationally – but with a reporter's sharp-edged curiosity.

"Yes," Alek says. The truth is much too complicated, so he condenses, as he did for the editor: "His son saved my life during the war. I'd like to thank him, but I haven't the slightest idea where to start looking."

Nevin glances at him with new appreciation. "So here you are. Clever. Well, that's not half a bad story. I'll get you settled and have a go at some investigating myself, aye? Better than that bloody daft thing I'm supposed to be doing." He rolls his eyes, and Alek realizes the man's protests of busyness to the editor were just for show.

The lift lurches to a stop. The fab chitters, pulls a lever, and pushes another button that makes the doors open. It seems to enjoy its work.

Alek trails behind Nevin again. This storey appears to be nothing but storage and is almost entirely deserted, save for a sleepy-looking clerk behind a desk. The Herald's offices all smell thickly of paper and ink, but here especially; the musty smell tickles at Alek's nose and threatens to make him sneeze. Dim light slants in from narrow windows, set high in the walls. It mainly illuminates dust motes.

Nevin greets the clerk, then leads Alek into a maze of shelves. They're piled haphazardly with enormous folios, cheaply bound, some mere bundles of newsprint tied with string.

"June of '12, June of '12… Oh, aye, here it is." The reporter pulls one of the folios and drops it into Alek's hands. "Take that over to the table – that one, below the window there. I don't remember the day, but there's no missing it – it was our headline for weeks."

"Thank you, Mr. Nevin," Alek says.

Nevin grins. "Leave you to it, then," the reporter says, turning and departing with considerably more pep than he's yet displayed.

Alek takes a seat at the indicated table and opens the folio. It doesn't take him long to find the first article.

TRAGEDY ON GLASGOW GREEN

It takes up nearly three quarters of the front page. Alek remembers, keenly, the night Dylan had told him about his father's death – how absolutely shattered the other boy had been. Reading this now almost feels like a violation of some sort.

He shakes off the feeling and skims the rather breathless prose for any useful details. Right away he learns two things: first, that Dylan's father was named Artemis, and secondly, that he died saving his young daughter.

Daughter. Not son.

"That's not right," he murmurs, frowning. Did Dylan ever mention having a sister? He can't remember, but he thinks not. Regardless, it wasn't a girl who was pushed to safety.

Something cold pricks at his stomach. He ignores it. Newspapers make mistakes all the time, as he well knows.

Alek reads to the end of the article – which dwells in ghoulish detail on the blaze itself – and doesn't glean anything further. He turns the pages of the folio, looking for the next story.

That one is essentially a long obituary, heaping praise on Artemis Sharp for his heroism. It discusses his neighbors' opinions of his mad act, his long-held enthusiasm for ballooning, and his inexplicable desire to take his daughter aloft with him.

Daughter. Not son.

The cold prickles become a slither. He swallows and reads on. Mrs. Sharp refuses to comment, as does her son – and for a moment Alek relaxes –

- but the son's name is Jaspert.

And the daughter's name is Deryn.

And she does talk to the paper, with a reckless bravado that horrifies the reporter: "Da loved flying, and I'm the same. I'll not stop just because of this."

That's Dylan. Alek can hear his friend saying it – his friend whose voice never really lowered, who sometimes – in moments of great stress or fear – sounded oddly girlish.

Dylan. Deryn.

All of her meticulous deception laid bare by yellowed newsprint and fading ink.

He draws in a shaking breath.

"God's wounds," he says, voice equally unsteady. Memories flicker past his mind's eye like scenes from a newsreel. Comments, gestures, glances that never quite made sense are now all too obvious. "You never told me."

And suddenly it's too much. He closes the folio, stands in such a hurry that the chair scrapes against the floor (though the noise doesn't seem to wake the drowsing clerk), and walks blindly back towards the lift.

The fab scurries around, pulling levers and chittering at him, but he can't pay the thing any attention. His thoughts are in a mad, roaring jumble. He must leave Glasgow – immediately. He'll go back to his hotel. Book passage home. He can pretend he never came. He can pretend his long-lost best friend died in the war and was not, in fact, a girl in disguise.

What a fool he was.

What a fool.

Nevin is waiting for him when he gets off the lift. "You're in luck," the reporter says, cheerful, holding out a slip of paper with an address scrawled across in bold writing. "Widow Sharp takes the Herald."