The Dress Looks Nice On You (Mia)

[Ginny Campbell]

Mia was the last person on earth Ginny would ever have expected to be buying dresses with. Well, maybe not the last, but she was definitely up there. Distracting parents from behaviors they would disapprove of was, however, something she understood, even if her own shortcomings were rarely related to her performance in school; she was proud of her grades. On the other hand, she was intimately well acquainted with mischief and had frequently had capitulated to her mother's other desires (such as doing extra chores unasked) to ease any displeasure her escapades had derived.

"Great." She had scouted out the mall earlier, planning their route through the land of (largely expensive and brand name) clothes. Macy's was the first stop on the list, both because it was bound to have a larger selection than the smaller stores and because her mother had given her coupons. She certainly wasn't about to say no to money saving!

"What kind of dress are you looking for?" Ginny asked, idly browsing the sale's rack. "Planning on goin' all out with flowers and ribbons and crap?" Even envisioning her friend outfitted in such a manner was difficult; she doubted the other girl could bring herself to stoop to that level. On the other hand, most every dress that wasn't vomit-inducing cute was hip-hugging sexy, and sexy was not the way to win a mother's approval. "Just don't dress super girly to dinner or my dads'll wonder what's up." Any behavior out of the ordinary was bound to trigger suspicion, and that was the last thing they needed.

"Wow, why are these all short sleeved? Do fashion designers all live in the tropics or something? Good lord!" Even the sweater dresses were impractical for Vermont winters. "Well, this one might work. It's cute." She held up a cowl-necked sweater dress, grey on grey striped and short sleeved like the rest. "Just wear a turtleneck and leggings so you don't freeze to death."

[Mia Keystone]

The mall was not Mia’s natural environment. She looked around with suspicion at the people hurrying around under the nasty halogen lighting. Ginny, on the other hand, was handling it like the native she was. She had a game plan and everything, and again Mia was reminded how good Ginny would be at her operations, if she tackled subterfuge and espionage the same way she tackled shopping; straight out Sun Tzu’s The Art of War.

Eyeing the racks and racks of dresses at Macys with distain, Mia rolled her eyes at what she assumed, (had better have been) a joke. ”Yeah, hot pink too if they have it,” she retorted, flicking through the dresses quickly. She paused at a leopard print one and pulled it out, holding it against herself. ”This just screams me, I feel this is more me then I have ever been.” Her tone was dryer then the Sahara desert and she quickly tossed the dress back in case Ginny called her bluff. The blond did that sometimes. It was one of the reasons Mia liked her.

Still, the technopath looked at the dress Ginny had picked out with obvious dislike. ”It’s gray.” she pointed out obviously. ”I’d look like, 50 years old if I wore that. I’d rather the leopard spots.” Given Mia was often mistaken for a 14 year old due to her hight and round face, the comment was extremely facetious. ”I need one for the dance too,” she muttered, chewing on her lip rings as she pulled out a red shirt-dress and frowned at it. ”Well, not a dress. I ordered the Pacman one but...” the dress was low at the front. Mia was not so good about that. Her ladies had grown up a bit too fast for her, and it was perhaps the one thing about herself Mia was a little uncomfortable with.

”You tried talking to, ah,” Mia paused for a moment and considered. Dr Campbell? Campbell? Doc? James? J-dawg? ”Ah, your dad again? Now you’re here and all?” For all that Ginny’s dad occasionally looked at Mia like he was worried she may actually kill a cop and hide him in her house, the short girl had a soft spot for her old recruiter.

[Ginny Campbell]

"If you want hot pink then check the children's department, that's more their thing." Ginny commented, pointing toward the escalator. The children's section was up a floor, though whether it was really better stocked with hot pink she didn't know. She imagined that 11-year-olds were more likely to choose hot pink (or have it chosen for them) than anyone shopping in the Juniors department.

She raised an eyebrow at the dress Mia chose, trying to hide a snicker at the mental image it invoked. "Oooh, leopard print, good choice. You addin' fake nails and some giant rings to that equation?"

"No grey. Duly noted." Ginny returned the dress in question to the rack, rummaging about some more. "But the problem is you're not gonna find another dress as cool as the Pacman one. Especially not one that your mother will approve of. I mean, we could go by Hot Topic, but yeah, not really clothes designed to impress the parents. They do have a lot of hot pink there, though!" She grinned; Mia may have meant her initial comment facetiously, but hot pink was favored by female mall punks everywhere. The idea of her friend turning mall punk was hilarious; she was much more likely to burn them with scathing remarks than emulate their fashions.

"What's wrong with the Pacman dress, anyway? Your date not like Pacman? Should we have looked for a Streetfighter dress or something instead?" She hadn't met this Reeves guy, but if he was as into computers as Mia said he was then how could he not appreciate a Pacman dress?

"Yup. He knows you're coming over." She confirmed. Of course, she hadn't asked permission; she'd instead said Hey, dad, so Mia and I are going to that dance your school is having, right, and we're going dress shopping this afternoon so I invited her over for dinner so we can discuss hair and nails and stuff after. That's cool, right?

"Only problem is Chase went and got himself injured." She scowled; that was entirely unfair of him! Didn't he realize that getting assaulted made their investigation more difficult? And once again she wasn't given any details at all; her father claimed not to have any. Maybe that was even true. The point remained that if he was recovering from an assault it was going to be difficult to catch him doing anything untoward.

"You found out anything so far or you waitin' for your surveillance?" Maybe she'd been able to dig up something useful while at school...

[Mia Keystone]

”Thinking about a fake tan too,” Mia smirked, rolling her eyes. White trash; it was always funny. Still flicking through the dresses, Mia paused at a bright purple coat style dress and pulled it put. It looked sort of like a trench coat, and it was purple. Two things Mia liked. She held it out to Ginny with eyebrows raised in question.

The mention of Hot Topic had the technopath scowling as she shook ehr head in disgust. ”Or I could stack rocks on my head until I die,” she pointed out helpfully. ”Both sound so fun.” Still she grinned a bit, mostly at the thought of how little Ginny would like to have to wade through the puck princess tweeners who hung around outside Hot Topic.

They needed to die in a fire. The store too.

Mia self-consciously crossed her arms over her chest. ”Don’t care if Reeve likes pacman,” she scoffed, not even bothering to point out he was not a date but a partner in crime. ”It’s more to do with the fact I have two bowling balls where most girls have tits,” she pointed out bluntly, the offending articles still under her arms. ”And given that I’m the size and build of a prepubescent boy, it looks weird if they start poking out everywhere. I’ll look like a porn star. A Pacman sponsored porn star. Do you want me to change my name to Bambi Ghost?”

Hold the phone...

Mia put down the dress and looked over quickly. Her ears had perked up at the sound of a new mystery. ”What happened to Chase?” she asked, and then shook her head and Ginny’s question. ”Didn’t happen on the school grounds, or I’d have known,” she muttered, chewing on her lip rings. That was interesting... Mia didn’t think many people could really hurt Chase, the whole mental thing would stop an ordinary mugger. So what the hell had done it? Something else she’d try and find out that night. ”What exactly is wrong with him, do you know?”

[Ginny Campbell]

"Tanning salon or spray on?" Ginny smirked. If Mia got a tan, natural or otherwise, nobody would recognize her. "That might make a good disguise, now that I think about it."

She scrutinized the purple dress Mia was holding out for inspection. "Why don't you go try it on and see how it looks?" She suggested after a moment, completely unable to visualize whether or not it would be flattering. Some dresses looked cute on the rack and then didn't fit well at all. On the hanger it looked very Mia, but they needed to see what it looked like on first.

"What? No love for the baby bats?" Ginny teased, raising her eyebrows in mock surprise. "But you'd look so cute in hot pink petticoats with a Nightmare Before Christmas top." She was relieved that her friend wasn't inclined to take her up on that offer, though. She didn't want to deal with the gothlings any more than they wanted to deal with her.

She rolled her eyes at the other girl's complaints. Oh, boo hoo. Ginny wished she had Mia's proportions. "You will not look like a porn star!" She disagreed. "And anyway, if you don't care if Reeve's likes Pacman then why are you going with him?" Was it just because he was another technopath and therefore understood her better than others would? Or was it just because he was, as she'd mentioned over IM earlier, that he was interested in sex. Which reminded her of their very odd conversation regarding Jonah and his experience or lack thereof.

"So does Jonah like Pacman?" Maybe she'd changed her mind about virgins and was going to use the Pacman Porn Star dress to woo him. Or the Mia equivalent.

She sighed and shook her head when the topic returned to her step-father. "Dunno, he broke a bunch of bones and stuff. He can't use the stairs so he's in my room. I don't know what went down, because as usual nobody is telling me anything." She scowled in displeasure. She hated that they didn't trust her enough to tell her what was going on. "Plus side, he's totally high on pain meds so he shouldn't interfere with us too much."

[Mia Keystone]

(ooc: sorry this took so long, i started a reply TWICE and both times lost it so I got downhearted. here it is)

”Would have to be spray on,” Mia replied seriously, flicking through green dresses with mild interest. They were all too flimsy for winter though. ”Salons just don't give me that shade of carrot I love.”

Mia heaved a huge but I don’t wanna sigh and flicked the dress over her arm so she could continue looking. ”I’ll wait till I have a few to try on. Hate change rooms. There’s always someone in there who hasn’t showered in weeks,” she muttered and shook her head. It was why her wardrobe was almost entirely made up of things bought online; no fuss, no muss. Also, wicked t-shirts and no stupid teenagers.

With a grin, Mia tossed a particularly ugly maroon slip dress at Ginny and laughed. ”Fat fucking chance, Campbell. She ran a hand through her hair and shook her head in disgust. ”Mental image that will stay with me for a week now! The technopath was already plotting revenge; Ginny was going to find out just how she would look in a furry costume. Thank you photoshop. The mind’s eye was nothing compared to Mia’s imagination.

”Because he’s a tech,” the girl explained, rolling her eyes. ”Makes planting mics and cameras easier. Not to mention he can design that shit.” He also looked pretty good without a shirt, and would understand why playing Red Dead Redemption could actually be a huge turn on. ”And of course he likes pacman. That’s not the point, Gin!”

And then Ginny hit on the point and Mia’s scowl twisted as she scuffed a toe on the carpet. Course Jonah liked pacman. But Jonah had seen Mia in a dress on about.. two occasions. Both of which, they had been disguises. And she’d have makeup and shit on (when Ginny helped her, because Ginny was good with that stuff) and yeah... it would be very different. NOT THAT IS WAS A BIG DEAL!

Mia was not so good at lying to herself. Even if she wasn’t sure why she was doing it.

The technopath chewed on her lip rings absently as Ginny explained the damage. While the other girl seemed very determined to discount this as anything worth looking into, Mia was starting to wonder about just who could deal out such a beating to a BAMF jedi. ”Lucky bastard. Got some pretty nice painkillers when I broke my collarbone learning how to jump roofs.” A nasty little thought occurred to her then. Who could hurt Chase, AND James, and who would want to? And why? “You heard of the MSAD?” she asked, going for casual sounding.

[Ginny Campbell]

(ooc: it's fine, I don't mind waiting. takes me awhile, too, sometimes. like this time!)

"Fair enough," Ginny shrugged, scrutinizing a knee-length ruby red dress with a black belt about the waist. "Is red too in the spirit of the holiday for you?"

She rolled her eyes at Mia's explanation that Reeve's was merely her partner in crime. She made some valid points; as another tech meta he would be very useful for their project. That did not explain why Mia was being so weird about what dress to wear. "Yeah, but what is the poi....ohhhh." She breathed; the shorter girl's reaction to the mention of Jonah did not escape her attention. Ha. So the questions regarding his sexual experience weren't solely the product of idle curiosity, after all.

"You know you didn't answer my question," She pointed out, elbowing the other girl in the ribs. "Don't worry, you won't look like a porn star. I'll do your hair and make up classy, no guy will be able to resist." She promised, by which she meant I'll make you look stunning for my date. She liked Jonah well enough -- he was as patient as Annie was when it came to her attempts at sign language -- but she had no romantic interest in him.

"Have I heard of what" She shook her head, wondering what this had to do with her step-father. "No, what is that and what does it have to do with Chase?" She assumed this question was the result of some information Mia had gleaned about the trainer; so her friend had been spying already. Good, they were one step closer to discovering whether or not her hunch was correct, then. Although what was this MSAD? She'd never heard her dad or Chase mention such a thing. "Is it some kind of drug?" If Chase had gotten involved in illegal drugs, then that was a possible explanation for any sudden change in behavior. That would make her feel less awful for her initial positive judgment of the man.

[Mia Keystone]

Ginny’s little revelation was not subtle, and Mia glared. ”What?” she demanded, eyeing her taller friend. ”No ohhhh, none of that. Don’t even think about... whatever you’re thinking about,” the girl went on, still eying Ginny with suspicion. She had that look in her eye, the Campbell ‘I’ve just figured something out’ look. Mia knew it, and it did not bode well for her.

But the red dress was nice. Mia shrugged and added it to her pile. Her family took valentines day, or at least, the Japanese version, seriously enough that Mia wasn’t bothered to wear red. Since the dress was a ploy to make Mrs Yumi Keystone happy, the red was maybe a good idea, if she could get white belt instead. They were the colors for celebration in Japan after all.

”Lies and slander, I did so,” Mia grunted, rubbing her ribcage and nudging Gin with her hip in retaliation. ”You’re looking all crafty. I know that look,” Mia tilted her head and frowned, ”Hell, I own that look. You think you know something.” Had she said too much, or something dumb? Fuck, it was getting annoying, having to watch herself and her mouth so closely when she was used to letting it run off on it’s own. With a quick glare at Ginny, Mia added a black dress with a sweetheart collar to her collection and decided for now she’d let the subject drop before she gave herself away completely.

It wasn’t like she had anything to hide, really. People were just making guesses and assumptions that had no actual basis on real life.

Ginny’s denial of any knowledge of the MSAD was genuine, and Mia paused a moment before telling the girl anything. Telling Jonah had lead to them both breaking and entering a celebrity's home to steal files she’d sold to a terrorist. But still, Mia believed in honesty, with her friends anyway.

”Meta supremacy group that’s operating near the school,” she said quietly, ”Because, logically, Meta supremacy want to attack a school full of metas for brain washing us into likening the humans., she kept glancing up at Ginny to gauge her reaction, her scowl making it very clear how little this idea appealed to her. Or even made sense. ”Head of security accused me of being part of them, doshe didn’t know I had no idea what he was talking about. Do know though.” With a sigh, because Mia knew Ginny wouldn’t want to budge from her theory, she didn’t start sprouting her theory about how Chase had REALLY gotten hurt. She could bring that up at dinner.

[Ginny Campbell]

Ginny sniffed defensively. "I was thinking about dresses." She lied, "don't tell me not to think about the very reason we are here today." She knew Mia wouldn't buy it, but she couldn't prove Ginny was thinking
about anything less innocent. Like, for instance, what she was going to do with this new information.

She laughed and returned the hip bump, sticking her tongue out at her friend as she did so. "Duh, of course I know something. I know lots of things. I know that you're going to wow all the boys at the dance. So many of them will ask you to dance with them you won't even have time to bug anything. Or that's what would happen if they weren't all terrified you'd out all their secrets."

The description of MSAD was not what she was expecting. At all. "Wait. What?!" She had stopped in the middle of the aisle, staring at Mia in disbelief. "So....back up a minute. There's a meta supremacy group. Here. And my dad didn't tell me?!"

Great, thanks a lot, dad. I'm human. "A little warning would've been nice." She mumbled, clearly miffed at such important information being kept from her.

As annoyed as she was (she couldn't very well be careful if she didn't even know some hate group existed! She'd had no idea she and Annie were walking into enemy territory just visiting their families) she couldn't help but laugh at the idea of Mia participating in any sort of supremacist group. "Wow, he doesn't know you very well, does he." She snickered, finally realizing she was blocking the aisle and hurrying to follow Mia over to the next rack. "But what does this have to do with dad and Chase?"

A thought dawned on her, one even more horrifying than the idea of her step-dad abusing her father. "You don't....you don't think Chase is...is one of them?" After all the times she'd stayed under the same roof as him! Maybe that's why her dad didn't say anything. And maybe she was why Chase was hitting her dad; he was a traitor, having a human daughter. "Shit! Mia, what're we gonna do? What if his cronies find out we know about them?"

[Mia Keystone]

Mia just glared at Ginny though narrowed eyes, but let the other girl change the subject. She’d find out... soon...

Then suddenly she was spluttering with laughter. ”Oh GT, no. Just no,” she shook her head, still smiling at the idea. But Ginny took the words out of her mouth; people either found her too intimidating just too damn weird to want to dance. ”That, and I think they know that I don’t just need technology to take them down a peg,” she added, wiggling her eyebrows up and down and clenching a fist just in case Ginny was missing the whole I can hit, hard, in soft places thing.

”Hey, they’re not going to start telling that shit to all the kids,” Mia reasoned, realizing that she was sounding a little like the security guy who had told her about them. ”I mean, Doc would so have told you if there was a chance you’d be in trouble. Come on, like he would let you visit if there was the tiniest chance something would happen to his ickle baby,” Mia smirked, but she was being honest. James was obviously hugely protective of his daughter, which was why he had been... well... surprised when Mia had announced during a visit to his office that not only had she met the Campbell girl, but that she was in fact pretty wicked awesome and that they had exchanged IMs and they were going to be friends.

His expression had been a cross between a rabbit in the headlights and a cat having it’s food taken away. She’d offered him some chocolate for the shock.

”Anyway, come on, I’d totally kick ass for you. Like that time that random guy called out at you,” the technopath went on, poking Ginny in the shoulder. ”And yeah, apparently I’m on the watch list. Because I am single handedly showing all the flaws in their cyber security.” Rolling her eyes, the short girl shrugged; it was funny now, but at the time it had been infuriating and down right intimidating. Ginny didn’t need to know that though.

Mia shook her head and picked up another dress at random, adding it to her pile. One of these would work, right? ”Gin, come on. Your step dad’s a mental meta. Like some human thug could work him over like that,” Mia started, but the look on Ginny’s face made her stop short. ”Hey, GT,” she said slowly, grabbing the girl’s arm. ”If something’s happening to your dad, I’ll find out. And we’ll make sure it won’t happen again. Someone comes after us, we take them out. Don’t stress. It’ll be ok. Promise.”

Sentimentality over, Mia turned back to her dresses. Eye contact after being sappy like that was not fun. ”Come on, I want to try these on.”

[Ginny Campbell]

"Mmm. So they want everyone to be in the dark, just great." Ginny sighed, rolling her eyes in disgust at that idea. "That's just dumb, if they want people to be safe they need to know what to look out for."

Although Mia did have a point, her father would certainly try to keep her safe if possible, but that wasn't taking into account all the pieces of information they had. "But if Chase is all anti-human and stuff and is hurting dad then maybe he would be afraid to say anything if it was dangerous."

She snorted at the thought of the security team trying to outsmart Mia. "Right. You're definitely the first person I think of when I think meta-supremacist. The security people are idiots if they think that. They should thank you for exposing their weak points before someone more hostile exploits them. Or, you know, maybe they could hire you or something. Not waste their time going after you when there are gangs running loose."

Chase had a downright scary power, the kind that would make him an asset if he were fighting for the right cause, but if he were working with some meta-supremacist group there was no telling what sort of havoc he could wreak. "Yeah, I guess." She replied doubtfully, wishing she knew how he'd gotten knocked around.

"I'm not stressing!" She denied, pulling out a blue dress with sequins around the neck and glancing at the tag; too large for either of them. She shoved it back violently. "Of course we'll take them out. They'd better not try anything." She scowled at the dresses on the rack as if expecting some enemy to jump out from among them.

They would find out what was going on and they would put a stop to it.

"Mmkay." She agreed, following her friend to the dressing room. "I can't deny the chance to play dress up with Mia Keystone. I might never get the opportunity again."

[Mia Keystone]

”That’s what I said!” Mia exclaimed, shaking her head. Was she forgetting she had also cursed and insulted security’s intelligence? Nope. Ginny would know by now that Mia’s version of articulation always involved a few insults and swears. It drove the point across . ”I mean, terrorist, sure, maybe I see where they come from on that,” because anyone who said otherwise was a dirty liar, ”but not anti human. I do not have a tortured past. No one killed my brother slash lover slash father slash pet parakeet. It was so fucking stupid.”

Mr Dalton might disagree, that stupid, non robot sounding voice in Mia’s head pointed out, but she muted it quickly and did not mention it to Ginny. Was she ashamed? No, that emotion did not exist in her limited range but she was not exactly going to start telling everyone she may have gotten a teacher into seriously hot water.

Wincing at the sequins, Mia raised her eyes even as Ginny put the dress back. ”keep it and we can fabulous them to death?” she suggested archly, shifting her own modest pile onto her other, not so achy arm. ”Throw in some jazz hands? Ollie could help.”

Trudging into the nearest empty cubical and trying to ignore the smell of feet (Mia hated feet, they were like mutated useless hands) she tugged off her shirt and pushed down her jeans and pulled on one of the dresses (the red one) at random. With a slight squint she peered into the mirror then shrugged. It was hard for her to tell. It just looked... like a dress. The red made her look pale as though.

”I look like a vampire,” she declared as she swung the door open hard enough for it to bounce back against her hand. ”The Dracula kind, not the glitter twat sort.”

[Ginny Campbell]

"I don't know, I'm not sure terrorist would be what I'd think of you as. I mean, terrorists blow people up and stuff, I can't really see you doing that." Ginny disagreed. Mia could be extremely misanthropic and verbally abusive and she had no sense of privacy, but Ginny didn't think she would go in for killing people. "You're more Julian Assange than Bin Laden. An enabler at the most, but not a terrorist yourself." Maybe Mia would surprise her and use her computer knowledge to kill and terrorize rather than just being a nuisance and sharing information she oughtn't.

"What! No way, I thought for sure you had an angst-filled history. You're not emo?" She sighed dramatically, admiring a yellow sundress. It would clash horribly with her hair and it would be far too chilly at this time of year, but it was cute. "If you have to be emo to be a terrorist they'd better arrest ninety percent of the mall." Maybe the boy she'd run into earlier today was a terrorist; he'd acted bizarrely enough.

Ginny took the sequined dress back off the rack, peering once again at the tag. "It might even be Ollie's size." She commented, holding it up to Mia, "What do you think, should we be nice and get it for him?"

She followed Mia into the dressing area, waiting outside the stalls while the other girl changed. She quirked an eyebrow at her friend as she sashayed out into the corridor. "We can change that if you want, I'll bet Bath and Bodywork's has body glitter." At least, they had when she was ten so she assumed they would have a similar product now. "Dracula would approve, though, I'll give you that. He liked girls who showed a little skin." She winked.