By the time the walk was over, Rowan had told the Colonel as much as she dared about her encounter the night before. She omitted the fact that she’d been spying on his cadets, choosing instead to claim she was merely out for a stroll beneath the stars. Something about the Colonel made her feel awkward about flat out lying to him; he never questioned the validity of her statements or accused her of uttering a falsehood, but she got the niggling feeling that he could see her fabrications as easily as the clothes on her body. 

“And that’s all you remember from last night?”

“Yes sir; I ran straight home and went to bed.”

“You didn’t wake your father?” Blanchard inquired in a casual tone.

“No… I didn’t think he’d want to be disturbed for something he’d probably write off as overactive imagination.”

The Colonel nodded in response, arms folded behind his back as they arrived back at the end of the street from whence they’d come. 

“I don’t suppose you happen to know what caused those footprints leading to your house do you? They appear to have come from the direction of the disc, but the prints are much too large to belong to a normal sized human.”

“Gosh no,” Rowan lied through her teeth, “I woke up this morning and saw Daddy and his friends looking at them in the dirt outside the house; it was all very unsettling. What could have made prints that big but left behind no other clues?”

“What indeed.” Colonel Blanchard inclined his head respectfully to Rowan to signal the end of their conversation. “Well, I must be back to work young lady; it was a pleasure talking to you. You’ve been a great help.” 

Rowan smiled and curtseyed in response, a feeling of relief washing over her as the Colonel opened the door to his car to step inside. As she turned to leave however, she heard the Colonel clear their throat. Glancing back at him she found the man looking at her in a matter of fact way.

“By the way Miss Rowan, when you feel like telling me how exactly you managed to make those prints, please come visit me at my office. We have a lot to discuss in less public settings than these, but it has to be your decision whether you come or not.” He wasn’t threatening her, even if it felt a bit like he was. Rowan’s entire body blanched visibly as he said the words as calmly as if she’d admitted it herself. “If you decide to keep the secret to yourself though, I beseech you not to repeat the process in a public or visible place. If the public catches wind of what’s going on or you’re able to be identified, I’m afraid I’ll have no choice but to take you by force. Since I don’t want to do such a thing, please,” he paused, “come see me soon… or at the very least, don’t get caught.”

The car door closed with a hefty ‘thud’ and the vehicle drove away, leaving the petite little lady to stew in her juices, embarrassed and confused. She wandered about the town for the rest of the morning quite plainly, feeling no more compulsion to hide; what more could be done after all? In spite of her best efforts she had been found out, and yet she wasn’t entirely repulsed by Blanchard’s offer. The man had seemed quite reasonable, at least to her. Surely it couldn’t hurt to go and have a word with him in private?

She paused in mid stride and realized with dull certainty that she didn’t actually have a clue where Colonel Blanchard’s office was. He had said he was in command of the local air force base, but it was hidden away behind miles upon miles of tall fencing patrolled by men in cars. She’d never even seen the air force base, let alone been to it. 

Still, he wouldn’t have made the offer if he didn’t think that she could get easy access to him, right? Perhaps if she went to the gates of the base immediately, she would be allowed to just walk right in and talk to him. Turning on her heel, Rowan plowed face first into the second masculine chest of the morning, though this was one she knew very well; William Hill.

“Whoa! Watch your step there little lady,” he said with a smile as Rowan stumbled backwards, a blush shooting across her cheeks, “y’almost knocked me clean over.” 

Rowan opened her mouth to respond, but upon seeing the gaggle of young women either side of the military study, could only muster a faint mumble of apology. 

“Hey, don’t sweat it; just make sure you don’t walk into a tree or something, alright?” The women either side of William giggled at the comment. Rowan couldn’t quite tell if he was making fun of her or not, but the doubt was enough to make her quickly push her way through the crowd with her head down, trotting briskly off across town in the direction of the airfield. 

“Stupid, stupid, stupid idiot.” She chided herself in a quiet, mortified tone of voice as she rounded the nearest corner. “You just ran headfirst into the most handsome boy in school and squeaked like a darn mouse. Assertive, assertive, assertive, that’s what mother always said.” Her fists clenched until her knuckles were white and she drew in a deep breath, exhaling gradually in an attempt to calm herself. 

“Okay,” she continued in a one-woman conversation with herself, “so, we’ve already decided that being bigger might help, and that’s a start; he’ll definitely see you if you’re bigger. But you don’t want to be too big, otherwise he might run away from you, and making William Hill run away from you is certainly the worst outcome.” A brief image flashed across Rowan’s mind of herself in black and white, stomping around town and breathing fire as the citizens ran for their lives. She shuddered and pushed the thought away to make room for more positive thoughts. 

“What if?” She pondered to herself. “Well? What if?” The voice in her head repeated the question. “If this colonel tries to lock you up, maybe you could just… grow. If they tried to punish you, you could just… grow. If they tried to experiment on you against your will, you could just… grow.” 

Her mind’s eye filled with that same image of herself towering over the rest of her little home, little toy-sized army trucks scattered around her feet with a handful of soldiers dangling between her fingertips. That same heat appeared once again in her belly as she imagined William Hill in the palm of her hand. Her teeth gnawed on her lower lip, a pink tinge in her cheeks as the rest of the fantasy melted away until only the two of them remained. Her fingers closed around him greedily, the smile on her face growing wider and wider as she imagined herself bringing dear Will closer and closer to her legs and… and… 

A tightness in her clothes brought about just enough discomfort to bring her crashing back to reality.

“No no; no time for that now. Let’s think about this though; William is training for the military. He wants to get a job in the armed forces. So if you get in the good books of this Colonel fellow, that will absolutely make you look better in Mr. Dreamboat’s eyes, right?” She let the idea waft about in her brain for a few seconds in search of potential flaws, though she couldn’t locate any obvious errors in logic. “So the first step is to go straight to the air force base and sign up for whatever it is the Colonel wants to talk to you about.”

Driven pleasantly along on her feet by blind optimism, Rowan found herself quickly traversing the streets of Roswell until she’d arrived outside the main road gates of what she assumed was the air force base; the sign was a bit of a giveaway after all. 

The fellow standing guard just outside the gates raised a hand gently towards her and held it palm up.

“Halt there young Miss; what business brings you here?”

Already her heart had leaped into her throat; perhaps this wasn’t a good idea after all. She froze on the spot, resisting the urge to simply turn tail and run as fast as she could until she was back home. 

“Uhh… I… I’m… uh…” She paused, gathering her resolve before pressing on, “I’m here to see Colonel Blanchard. He’s expecting me.”

“Is he now?” The young man asked with an amused smile, as though he didn’t quite believe what he was being told. “You’ll have to excuse me a moment; I have to radio in. What was your name little Miss?”

“Rowan.” 

“Got a surname there Miss Rowan?”

“Sure do.”

There was an awkward pause before the soldier chuckled to break the tension.

“Well fair enough; none of my business really.” He marched over to the booth built into the gate, stepping inside and setting about the process of contacting the rest of the base. Rowan stood in the middle of the open ground, nervously scuffing her shoes on the dusty road. She glanced back over her shoulder at the rest of Roswell, trying to sift through the multitude of conflicting notions in her mind. 

After what felt like considerably longer than the thirty seconds it took, the guard returned from his post and informed Rowan that a car would be along to pick her up shortly. Doubt immediately flooded her thoughts; she hadn’t told anyone where she was going, so what if they locked her up? What if they did worse than lock her up? Not that her father could do much against the entire armed forces, but he would at least be not worrying about her constantly. The tension must have been showing on her face, as the guard cocked an eyebrow at her.

“Everything alright there Miss?” 

“What? Oh, um, yeah, I just… my papa might be a mite worried about me is all.”

“Well shoot, would it make you feel better if you could call him? Does he have a phone?”

“No, he doesn’t. We did, but it got broken a while back and we haven’t got a new one yet.”

“You could write him a note? You leave it here with me, and next time a patrol goes out I’ll see to it that it reaches him.” The guard smiled pleasantly as he awaited Rowan’s response.

“That would be swell, thank you!” She followed him over to the booth, gladly accepting the note pad and pencil she was offered. Scrawling a quick message as to her whereabouts, she folded the paper and left it behind the counter. A brief instinct reminded her that she didn’t know whether or not she could actually trust this guard, but she was a good soul at heart and decided she would give him the benefit of the doubt. 

Almost as soon as she’d stepped outside the booth she heard the sound of a car approaching along the long, dusty road. The crunch of tires on gravel filled her ears as the vehicle she’d seen earlier that day pulled up beside her. The passenger side door was opened from the inside, revealing a rather handsome young man in sunglasses and a driver’s cap. 

“Miss Rowan? Please take a seat; the Colonel is waiting.”