Halcyon Calling, Episode 13: All Fall Down

Suddenly everything went quiet, and the video feeds in the control room changed to all show the same thing. It was Custodian Op'a'an. She wanted a report. I couldn't help there. It had to be Gary, pretending to still be a Peacekeeper, Billy, doing illusions to make things look normal, and Balae reading the consoles to feed them the info they needed to make it convincing. Although I was useful when Balae needed a console smashed up. Time to let the badger rage out again.

Op'a'an was dealt with for the moment and we needed to get down to the reactor room. There was an access tunnel, but it was awful. All mucusy on the inside, and pulsating slightly. I was doing OK until we came to the vertical drop though. I probably could have climbed down by myself, but after the disaster at the tower block I was a bit scared. I asked Carmilla if she could do the thing with the webs again, and she said yes, but she could only take one person that way, and of course that would have to be Gary. Balae could float herself down, and Billy had his climbing gear. So we ended up swapping roles, and Billy carried me. I think that made him appreciate all the times I carried him. Although I don't think it was as hard for me to carry him as the other way round.

We all got down in one piece, but there were a bunch of Peacekeepers in the reactor room, including one of those really big ones. Carmilla wanted to know if we were going in quiet or loud. I guess she didn't know we have our way of doing things. Quiet, until we have to get loud.

Balae went in first, after making herself very tiny, and then I couldn't see what she was doing but it was like there was an invisible angry cat in the room with things getting knocked over all over the place. Billy went in, and found himself face to face with the massive Peacekeeper, but I was ready for it and charged in to knock him out of the way before his fist could connect. It felt good to just let go for a little while.

Then the bombs were set, and I was ready to go and look in the secret room. Except Carmilla wasn't. I didn't know how we were going to convince her, but Balae had it all figured out. She told Carmilla everything, about the shadow, and what Harold Winfield and everyone else had done to stop it, and how the answer might be in that room. She had trouble believing it, but me and Billy told her it was all true, and she could trust Balae. Then Balae had some more to say. Stuff she'd figured out for herself, about how Faustus still had his powers, and how that meant he was in league with the shadow. And Carmilla believed that. It all made sense. That was why he wanted us to blow up this factory. Nothing about stopping the Asterions, or protecting people. He just wanted to take away our only shot at stopping the shadow.

For the first time I actually felt sorry for Carmilla. She ripped off that demon mask she was wearing, which must have reminded her of Faustus. And if that wasn't bad enough, her spider face opened up a bit, and Billy freaked out and ran away. I tried to warn him, but it wasn't enough. So now she was heartbroken on top of everything else. And she was looking at me.

So I did something I never thought I'd do, and gave her hug, while telling her that I had thought I was going to have to rip her face off for hurting Billy but it turned out it was the other way around. And she hugged me back, and I think she called me 'sister', which was a bit weird, but she seemed a bit happier. Enough to come with us down to the secret room anyway.

Billy was the first down, and Carmilla was the last, which seemed like the best way to handle it at that point. Carmilla lost her grip on the way down, but I managed to catch her. Then we had a look around, and the room was full of giant brains. They had to be running simulations, because every so often one would flash up a notifaction saying 'Simulation Terminated: Solution Requires Causality.' I didn't know what that meant, but Balae did, and together we worked it out.

The Asterions didn't know one specific thing about the shadow, and that was that the reason Harold Winfield and everyone had been able to change reality was because of the shadow making them stronger. And if they'd waited longer, and fought for longer, they would have got strong enough to change reality even more, and got rid of the shadow forever.

And the problem with that was that it had made all of them kind of messed up. I could see that was hitting the others really hard, and I was afraid they were all about to give up on the spot. Except that wasn't how I saw it. I reminded them that we'd all come in here knowing we might die, and we'd prepared for that. At least, I had, and when I said that I could see that I wasn't the only one. And we all knew that even if we didn't die, the shadow was coming and we were all going to die anyway. But now we actually had hope. There was a way to defeat the shadow, and it wasn't going to be easy, and it certainly wasn't going to be fun, but we knew we could do it. We could be heroes.

And I guess neither of my friends wanted to be heroes the way I did, but then they didn't start out where I did. What mattered is that they were still with me. And the five of us got out of there, and once we were clear of the factory, all five of us put our hands on the detonator and we pressed it together.

And then I went home and gave Tiffany her Peter Rabbit book back.

Since then we've all become a bit famous. There wasn't much government left once the Asterions left, so Billy and his dad are sort of leading while things get put back together. Balae doesn't have to hide being an alien any more, and a lot more space whales have shown up. It seems like everyone at the Gull is looking after one of them now. Carmilla didn't get back together with Billy, which is probably a good thing. I still see her quite often, but we don't really have much in common, besides our past.

I convinced Tiffany to introduce me to her parents, and I think they've kind of made me her unofficial big sister. So I've been spending some time with them. Besides that, I seem to be spending most of my time training. There's a big fight coming when the shadow arrives and I've got to be ready.

After that, I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know what I'll remember, or if I'll even still be me. But if I can keep hold of this journal at least I'll know that I wasn't a guard dog, or a victim, or a troubled youth. I was a hero.

Halcyon Calling, Episode 12: Disco

I was pretty nervous arriving at the disco. I was still pretty sore from the falls earlier, and now I was going to be in a room full of people I didn't know. It's a good thing I arrived with Balae. I don't know if I could have gone in otherwise. I heard some people say some mean things, like asking why there was a man in a dress. But there were people saying nice things about me too, and Balae looked really cute in her bow tie, so I held on tight and we went in.

Billy and Carmilla were already there. Carmilla looked amazing, of course. They'd got a table with Sanjit and Hugo, and I asked Balae not to leave me alone with Hugo. I'm not sure she understood why. Turns out Sanjit is smarter than he looks. He'd figured out that Balae is an extra-terrestrial, even though she's done really well at pretending to be human and even managed to fool an Asterion. She talked some more about classic cars, and I didn't understand a lot of it, except for the part about how you shouldn't dissect a horse, but it was fun.

Carmilla wanted to go to the loos, so I had to explain to Balae that the three of us had to go together, and it was because we were going to have a conversation there. Except we got stopped on the way by the headteacher, Dr Hart, who was going on about how Carmilla and me weren't students and that meant the insurance was invalid. I didn't think that was a problem because Billy and Balae invited us, but he seemed really worried and I couldn't let him kick us out. So I told him that I was there to be emotional support for Balae because she'd never been to a disco before, and that he should put us on the insurance as staff.

That seemed to be enough to calm him down, and he said something about his daughter and then left. Carmilla figured out that his daughter was Claire, who was being mean to Billy earlier. She said she was going to do something about it. I was a bit worried she might be going to eat her, but Balae was pretty sure she wasn't. All the same I did take Balae to the loos once Carmilla went off after Claire.

I don't know what Carmilla wanted to talk about, but I told Balae that we were establishing an alibi. She got that straight away. All those James Bond books have really paid off. I didn't have a briefcase, but I did have my clutch bag. We couldn't have a conversation about the boys we came with, since we were there with each other, but I got out my makeup so we could talk about that. Quite loudly, so that the other girls would hear and everyone would know that's where we were while Carmilla was doing whatever she was doing.

Except somehow we did end up talking about boys, because I told Balae all about that time in the pub when Hugo kept pointing all the things about me that make me look weird, and how that really upset me. She'd missed it all because she was getting drinks at the time. I felt a bit better after saying all that, and Balae told me she didn't think I look weird, but then Carmilla came back saying that Claire had had to go home and we should go and dance.

Carmilla was an amazing dancer, of course. I don't think I danced very well. I was a bit scared of accidentally punching someone, and I was a bit tired, and I wasn't used to wearing high heels. After a bit I went to have a sit down and drink some water. Sanjit had sneaked some vodka in but I didn't bother because there was no point.

Then Hugo came over and sat down next to me, and I looked for Balae but she was on the dance floor having fun, and I didn't want to interrupt. I figured I'd just have to put up with him for a bit. He actually apologised for upsetting me in the pub, which was nice. Then he said I was beautiful, and gave me a corsage, so I guess Billy was right and he does like me. And I didn't really know what to think about that, but it was a really nice white rose, and nobody's ever given me flowers before. So I said that I hoped his hand was OK, and he said it was and I hadn't broken it.

I kind of wished I hadn't said that, because I think he was going to leave, but after that he changed his mind and asked me to dance. And there was no way I was going to dance with just him, so I said we could go and dance with Balae and Carmilla, and then I had to stop him taking my hand on the way to the dance floor. But then I was back dancing with Balae, and I didn't care what Hugo or Carmilla or anyone else was doing because we were having fun.

It wasn't until after I got home that I realised I'd hardly seen Billy all evening. I expected him to be showing off Carmilla all evening.

The next morning my feet were a bit sore but the rest of me was feeling better. It wasn't the 48 hours the doctor had told me I should rest for, but I didn't have time for that. Today was the day we were going to attack the Asterion factory. I thought I should leave a note for Tiffany, just in case I didn't come back, but she was watching the door and saw me coming, and opened the door before I could leave.

I couldn't exactly tell her what I was doing, and I didn't know how to explain to a four year old that I might get killed and never come back. I tried, but she wasn't having it. She wanted me to promise I'd come back. And I didn't want to do that, because I didn't want to lie to her. And then she went and got her copy of Peter Rabbit, and gave it to me, and said I had to come back to bring it back. I didn't want to, but I couldn't say no either.

So if you're reading this because I'm dead, it would be nice if someone gave her her book back.

I met up with the others. Carmilla had brought the AV, Splinters had given us the semtex, and Billy had brought Gary, Ygirel's former host, to pretend to be a Peacekeeper. Getting into the place was easy enough. The Asterions didn't realise Gary wasn't Ygirel any more and we were soon on our way to the holding cells. Except we needed to be in the control room. We'd planned how we were going to hijack the transport vehicle. The signal to start was when I headbutted one of the guards, and the others took out the rest while I threw him over the side.

There was a hairy moment getting into the control room, when Gary almost lost his nerve, and we did get in but with a huge number of Peacekeepers. No way we could fight them all. But Balae spotted some kind of cable and used it to set off an alarm, and Billy made some illusions to hide us while we got into cover while the Asterions all ran around panicking.

Halcyon Calling, Episode 11: Falling

We met up with Carmilla again, and this time she was dressed normally and was ready to plan getting our hands on breathing apparatus. She knew about an Asterion AV that had what we wanted on board, so we just had to find a way to intercept it. Billy looked at the flight path and said we could do it on top of the building where he lived, and Balae said she could make a device that would attract their attention to get them to come down. My role was going to make sure we didn't all get killed by Peacekeepers. Carmilla made some comment about that which might have been supposed to be mean, but I didn't care.

We all went home to prepare, which for me just meant picking up my costume. What I really wanted was to see if my dress had arrived yet. It had, and the parcel was next door with Tiffany. She insisted that I opened it while she was there, and I promised I'd let her see me wearing it before I left for the disco. She asked if I was going with someone because that was what you did, and I asked how she knew that when she's only four years old. I think she's watching TV that's not really suitable for little children.

Anyway, I got my stuff and went to the Gull in case Balae needed help carrying stuff. It was pretty crowded for a week day. That guy in the fancy clothes that everyone calls Twat was there, so I gave him the finger and he told me he liked my hair. I was going to say hello to Splinters, but she was playing two games of draughts at once with Barry, with Pastel Betty interrupting to talk about the rules. So I just waved and walked past.

Balae's idea for distracting the Peacekeepers was a drone she'd added some extra features to. She also made it look like a bee and it was incredibly cute. I'm glad Billy wasn't there as I don't think I'd like him to see me go all gushy over a cute robot. I can't help it though. I love bees. Bees are so amazing.

Balae did need help, but not with carrying stuff. She didn't like the quiet in the flat. It was a bit weird, without Castor and Pollux arguing. She said they still hadn't come out of their room, and I thought it must feel very lonely being on your own when you're not used to it. I said I'd come round to pick her up before the disco so we could go together, but I could see that wasn't enough, and she needed my help right now.

I suggested that she could write a letter to Castor and Pollux, or give them a little gift, and it would probably make them cry but not in a bad way. She listed off all the situations she's noticed when humans cry and how she knows how to tell the difference now, and really it's amazing she understands us at all, let alone that well.

Anyway, her dads hadn't eaten anything since they went to hide in their room, so we made them some food. I know how to cook, but only the things Abeni taught me and some easy stuff from my online learning courses, and there wasn't the right things in the fridge for any of those. There was loads of some cheese called Chevre though, and we found some noodles and some soy sauce and stuff, so we put them together.

Balae figured out a way to get the bee drone to carry a tray, and we opened the door a bit and had it carry the tray in. I couldn't hear anything from inside, but after a bit the drone came back and one of its legs was pointing upwards and had nail varnish on, so I think we did alright.

Balae put the bee drone in a cat carrier, picked up her own costume, and off we went.

We met Billy and Carmilla on the roof of the tower block. Balae set up the bee drone, and we all hid at the base of the mass damper and waited for the AV. It landed just where we wanted it, and we started climbing up the damper. That's where things started going wrong.

One of the Peacekeepers spotted Billy climbing up, and was about to shoot him with his arm cannon. I got in the way just in time to knock the arm out of the way, but then the Peacekeeper kicked me in the legs. After that it was all a bit of a blur, because I was getting hit so much, although I think I saw Carmilla biting one of them, until something happened with Billy that I'd never seen before, with psychic energy lashing out all over the place so we all had to hit the deck to not get torn up by it.

That took out the last of the Peacekeepers, but there was no way we were going to be able to use our original plan to fly away in the AV. Carmilla got the box we needed out of there. Balae said she'd get rid of the AV. I picked up the remains of the bee drone which were back in the cat carrier, and me, Billy and Carmilla started climbing down the outside of the tower.

I don't know if it was the cat carrier getting in the way, or just that I was in so much pain, but I just couldn't keep a grip on the wall. Suddenly I realised just how tall that tower block was, and what a long way it was to the ground, but I barely had time to think about fast I was falling when something grabbed me and then I was crashing through a window.

I think that knocked me out for a moment, and when I woke up I was in even more pain and Carmilla was lying there unconscious with her mask broken. She was still alive, but I didn't know how long that was going to last. I looked for a first aid kit in the flat we'd just landed in, but I couldn't see one and I was too dizzy to look properly. I had no idea how to do first aid on her anyway, after everything the compound did to her. She needed a hospital, but I couldn't take someone like her to a hospital. Then I remembered to look for my phone. The screen was cracked, but it's not like I haven't cracked screens before. I phoned Faustus.

I'll say this much for Faustus. He doesn't do all that enigmatic silence on the phone like Ariadne used to do. I told him Carmilla was hurt and needed help, and where we were. He gave me an address to take her to. So now I just had to get her there.

The flat door wasn't a problem. I smashed right through it. Carmilla wasn't very heavy. I thought about the number of stairs though, and decided I could get down a lot faster by sliding down the cables in the lift shaft. I guess I did get down a lot faster, since I lost my grip again, and I could have stopped myself but that would have meant letting go of Carmilla. So I let myself fall, and used myself to cushion her landing.

I was past all sensible thinking by then. I'm not even sure what happened while I was running through the streets, although I think I attracted a lot of attention and broke a lot of stuff. The important thing is I got Carmilla to the doctor and I could finally stop and lie down.

I woke up because of even more pain. I was in a kind of dentist's chair and the doctor was fixing my dislocated shoulder. I screamed a bit, but once it was done I felt a lot better. She told me she'd treated everything she could find, and that seemed to be everything. She also said I had concussion and shouldn't do anything strenuous for the next 48 hours, which seemed like an awfully long times just then. I asked if Carmilla was OK and she got one of those serious looks adults get when they don't want to tell you the answer, but Carmilla was kind of OK. She just wasn't waking up.

There was something familiar about the doctor. She was giving me the same look Abeni gives me sometimes when we eat together, but it wasn't just that. I asked her if I'd seen her before. That's when she told me. She was the one who created me and Carmilla. She hadn't wanted to but they'd made her do it. I thought I'd feel angry if I ever found the person who did this to me, but instead I just felt really sad because it wasn't her fault.

I asked her how she got out, and she said she escaped with Carmilla after I escaped. Maybe knowing that I'd got out inspired them to escape too? I hope it did. She was worried about Faustus being bad for her, which I thought he probably was. I asked if she knew why Carmilla hated me, and she said something really confusing about hating the things you hate in yourself in others.

I was late for the meeting up with Billy and Balae, and I still had my phone, so I called Balae to ask if she could come and get us. I was in no shape to be running anywhere, and neither was Carmilla. The doctor had somewhere else she needed to be, so she asked me to talk to Carmilla to see if I could get her to wake up. I think she wanted to hug me, but I wasn't ready for that, and she left.

I thought maybe I could annoy her into waking up, since if she didn't she was going to have to keep on listening to me talk and I knew she hated me. That didn't work. Telling her she had to wake up because she had to go to the disco with Billy and there was no way I was going to have my friend miss out on that didn't work either.

So I thought about what the doctor had told me, and I talked to her about how I understood about what happened at the compound, and that when she woke up she should talk to me about it, because I would understand. Then I saw she'd started crying so I held her hand while she woke up.

When she opened her eyes they were black shiny spider eyes, and I told her she'd have to tell me where she got her contact lenses from, and then she laughed. She blinked, and her pretend blue eyes appeared again. They didn't give me that feature. We talked a bit about how they'd made her to be an assassin, which was why she had to look human and all the changes were on the inside. While they didn't care what I ended up looking like.

Then Balae came in shouting that she'd stolen another car, and it was time to go.

So now I'm home, and getting ready to go out. I didn't have time to shop for shoes properly, so I just went to the place that does shoes for drag queens because they have my size and asked for some shoes to go with a shiny black dress. They gave me these silvery glittery shoes with big platforms and I think I'm nearly seven feet tall with them on but they look really nice. And I've done my makeup, which covered up all the cuts and bruises I got while I was fighting and falling off things.

I showed Tiffany my outfit like I said I would, and she said I looked really pretty, and normally when people say that to me they're making fun of me, but I don't think she was. I think tonight I might actually look pretty.

Wicker Valley, episode 25: The Ward

Before I could do anything though, time seemed to freeze. As in, everything stopped, but I could still see what was happening. I saw Agnes go to each of the others in turn, and talk to them. Finally she came to me. I think she could tell I'd been able to see, even though I couldn't hear the conversations, and I don't think she was happy about it. But she put her hands on me and gave me a vision.

It was Michael and me, fighting side by side in a battle. We were winning, but at the same time, I was changing. I saw my claws fall away, and my wings shrivel up, and when I tried to remove my armour, it wouldn't go. That was my future, Agnes told me as the vision faded away. But it didn't have to be. She could give me what I really wanted. The thing I tried so hard to find. A normal life, with Michael alongside me.

I know a thing or two about temptation. That was a good one. I wanted to believe her. But if there's one thing I've learned since I came to Wicker Valley it's that I don't get to have a normal life, because I'm not normal. So that's what I told her. And I told her that there was a war brewing, which was nothing to do with us. I wanted to protect this town, and right now that didn't mean siding with her.

Then she was back by the fallen tree, and time was moving again. I looked at the others, and asked if we were all on the same page. We all were except for Robin. And Alabaster. I did wonder where he'd been since he ran off after we came back from the past.

Elizabeth was understandably focussed on Alabaster. He did kill her after all. And Michael was trying to stop Robin in some way that didn't hurt him too much. I went for Agnes. I took her by surprise - I think that was the first time she'd seen me teleport - but it didn't help. My claws didn't even seem to make contact with her. Then Michael was calling me back, and magic was flying and Robin was screaming and Agnes had some kind of little bag with her like the ones she planted on us, and I tried to take it off her but she hung onto it. Agnes sent that nice little demon that's been hanging around with Elizabeth to attack her, and I had to yell at him to go away. Which he did, just in time to stop him stabbing Elizabeth in the face. And then Mary showed up.

Mary took Agnes away, and I asked her to look after my aunty, because she is still one of the few members of my family I've ever managed to get on with. We bundled the tied up Robin into the van and took him back to the junkyard for a lie down in the oubliette while we had a rest in the panic room.

We shared the different things Agnes had offered us. Michael had been offered restoring his brother's ability to walk. Adam was offered being made the head of the Foundation - or destroying it completely. Which made me feel pretty damn lucky that we'd all ended up on the same side.

After I shared mine, Elizabeth started in on the comments about me and Michael having found true love, which seemed a bit premature after one kiss. I could see Michael turning bright red. And I ended up telling them the reason I'd been holding back all this time. I was afraid of ending up like Agnes. My family do things to extremes, and while I didn't know what that looked like when it came to love until I met Agnes, that thought has been there since the day I had to stop Rusty from killing Michael.

After a nice cup of tea and a sit down, we remembered that the point of all this was to bring down the ward, and we should check on that. I teleported to just inside where the ward had been. It was still there. And it was stronger now. Enough that I could just about see it shimmering away. And I couldn't get through it, by teleporting or otherwise.

I went back to tell the others and we got back in the van and drove to the nearest road accessible part of the ward. There we found a car that looked like its insides had been painted red. Obviously the ward had stopped the people but the car had kept going. The police were there, and we encouraged them to set up barriers on all the roads out of town to make sure this didn't happen again.

So now we had to do our part and take down that ward once and for all before anyone else died. We'd got the focus, but that wasn't all. And then there was the matter of that bag Agnes had been using. It felt a bit weird asking Elizabeth to sniff my hand where I'd been holding it to see if she recognised the herbs, but she did. A hex bag, used to drain power off someone. In this case, clearly it was being used to drain Mary.

We were all pretty sure that Agnes' basement was where we needed to go to disrupt the ward, but how to get in there? Adam suggested I just teleport right in, but I couldn't do that. I'd never seen her basement. Adam then had an idea involving sending in a drone, but I had to explain it didn't work like that. I could go to places I'd been before, and people I knew well, but somewhere I just saw on camera wouldn't work. And this turned to be academic, because it turned out that in this timeline, Adam kept biscuits in the drone box.

They were chocolate hobnobs though, so we all ate some while we came up with a plan.

Michael was the distraction, with Elizabeth watching from nearby for backup. He took some cinnamon bun cake from the Wicker Stop as a peace offering while I snuck round the back with Adam. I got inside and went down to the basement. It was dark down there. Unnaturally dark. I wouldn't have known what to do if Toby the grotesque hadn't shown up again. At some point I need to ask him some questions, but for now I needed his help. He said there were dead things on the floor. And some things that weren't dead. He guided me across the room, and there I found the casting circle.

The sigil was drawn in blood, ringed with plant bits and hair, probably hers and Mary's. I wondered if I should just plunge my claws in to tear it apart, but decided on a more scientific approach. Peroxide. Now I'd been here once I could teleport back in, so I went to the chemist, bought some peroxide, and came back to destroy the circle. I got a bit too close to some of the other stuff down there as I did so, but my armour activated and that was OK.

Then Agnes was down there with me, grabbing onto me, driving her claws into my shoulders, and a moment later there was a sudden pain in my back and a much worse pain in my soul. She'd ripped off my wings.

She was standing there holding them, saying "what have I done?" over and over, and all I could do was say the same thing. And then we had a whole lot of company.

Mary seemed to be a whole different person when Michael was holding her arm. I was in too much shock to really understand what was going, but Agnes's hex bag got taken off her and disintegrated, and Mary did some kind of magic to reattach my wings. She also had some answers for me about the armour. She called it the armour of the divine protector, and said something about me being a protector for Michael. And she seemed to know something about why or what Michael had been chosen for as well.

Mary seemed to think it was strange that a hellspawn had ended up with this armour, but for me it was starting to make sense. My family take things to extremes. I guess for me that meant extreme rejection the roll of the family matriarch that they chose for me. Something to think about in the future though, because first we had to check on the ward again. At last. It was gone.

Halcyon Calling, Episode 10: Choices

Balae asked me about the little girl who was waving at her when she arrived, so I told her about Tiffany and then remembered about the picture in her art book. I told Balae about it, and the different title, and hoped she'd be able to figure it out.

We needed to look at what was on the USB drive we got from Mrs Wilkins, and I didn't think it was a good idea to plug it into my laptop in case it exploded or something. So we decided to go back to the tailor, because he was good at tech stuff and would know what to do.

Balae told him a bit about what we were planning, and he seemed pretty keen to help but wanted to know more details. And that seemed fair enough, so I told him we were going after the Elizabeth Park factory, and then he got all weird and told us to get out of the shop. I was a bit worried I'd messed everything up somehow and I didn't know what we were going to do. But then Billy gave him a good talking to and convinced him that he still wanted to help us. Adults are so confusing sometimes.

He took the USB drive into his back room and told me and Billy not to touch anything. I decided the easiest way to not touch anything would be to not be in the room with all the breakable things, so I went back into the shop. I wanted to have a look at the clothes. I needed something to wear for the disco and I couldn't exactly show up in ripped denim. I knew I couldn't afford anything in here but I thought I could have a look at the suits and maybe get some ideas. It's hard to get girl's clothes in my size and shape but I figured some men are this size so I'd be able to get a suit that fitted.

Then I saw the dress.

It was made of silky looking black fabric, but it was shiny like bird wings and looked blue or green depending on where I stood. I decided to risk touching it, and it was so light I could barely feel it. And the strangest thing of all, it looked like it might actually be my size.

Then I heard the others calling me back in, because Mr Taylor the tailor had figured out what to do about the factory. There was a power core and we needed to overload it by just the right amount so that it would blow up enough to destroy the factory but not enough to create a black hole and destroy the whole planet. Which sounded complicated to me, but Balae seemed to know exactly what to do. There was something else though. A secret room underneath the power core. So secret it wasn't even properly shown on the Asterion's own plans. So obviously we were going to have to get in there and see what was up.

While I was staring at the dress, Balae had got a message from Harold/Ariadne, who she's decided to call Hariadne now, wanting to meet her at the science museum. He said to come alone, but obviously we weren't going to let her go completely alone. We were going to wait outside so we could come and look for her if she was gone too long.

I tried not to look at the dress on the way out but couldn't help sneaking a glance, and Billy must have noticed because he started asking Mr Taylor about it. He said it was an experimental fabric he was testing, and he'd had to make the dress big because the fabric didn't work in small pieces. And Billy was saying I should try it out, so I offered to test it for him, and he said yes! So long as I didn't go doing any superhero type stuff in it. So going out dancing should be fine. I gave him my address so he could have it delivered to me.

We went to the museum, and Billy found a place for us to hide in an old statue while Balae went up to the roof for the meeting. She looked really upset when she got back, and it was pretty obvious why. Harold told her that when him and everyone else changed reality to get rid of the shadow, it wasn't actually gone. It just moved to where the Asterions come from, which is why they came here, and now it's following them here. The shadow is the bigger fish that he meant when he told her about the painting. He told her the Asterions were looking for a way to stop the shadow, and if we blew up the factory then we'd destroy their research and then there'd be nobody to protect us from the shadow this time.

We went back to the Gull and Switchblade, through the sewers this time because it was after curfew and peacekeepers were descending on the museum. Balae made sure we got all of them together - well, all of them except Faustus anyway - so she only had to tell them about it once. She told them, and at the same time the TV did a news broadcast about how Harold Winfield had been killed by the peacekeepers. I thought they'd be able to help us figure out what to do, but Abeni and Mrs Stodgely both ran off and Castor and Pollux went and hid in their bedroom.

Me and Billy stayed over because it was after curfew and there was nobody to stop us anyway. We needed to make a decision, even if none of the adults were being any use. I didn't know what to say, except that I really wanted to look in that room in the factory that Mr Taylor told us about, because that had to be where the Asterions were doing their secret research about stopping the shadow. But Billy still wanted to blow up the factory because even if they could stop the shadow we'd still be living in the grip of the Asterions. And Balae agreed. That was all I needed to hear. I wanted to blow up the factory too, but I wasn't sure if that was the right thing to do or just badger rage. But I trust them both, and if they both want the same thing then I can trust myself too.

It was really quiet in the morning with no fighting. I thought about making breakfast, but Balae thought it might be nice to go out to a cafe and that did sound nice. We waited until Splinters arrived so we could tell her Castor and Pollux weren't well and ask her if she could get us some semtex. She said she knew someone, and then she took us out to a cafe for breakfast. She talked to the staff in another language while we tried the food. I think it was Indonesian and it was very hot, but I'm used to Abeni's Nigerian curries so it was fine.

Splinters said she'd sorted out the semtext for us, and then asked us about our love lives. I don't know why she thought I might have a love life, but she remembered Billy's friend talking to me. She must not have paid much attention because I really didn't like it and I had to shout at him to make him stop, but for some reason when she found out his name was Hugo she seemed to lose interest.

Anyway, Billy had actually asked Carmilla to the school disco, which meant he was the only one of us who actually had a love life. I don't know why but Splinters asked if she was a monster, and I said yes because she's like me, except that she's pretty. And Splinters got all weird, asking if Billy didn't think I was pretty and I don't think either of us wanted him to answer that, but Balae said she thought we were all pretty and that really cheered me up. So on the way out of the cafe I waited until Billy was far enough ahead not to hear me, and told her she was pretty too. I hope it made her feel better too.