The Torc

(Book 1 – The Emerging)

By

Tanya Allan

The Torc (Book 1 – The Emerging) - Copyright2015 Tanya Allan

The author asserts her moral right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

All Rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, copied, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written consent of the copyright holder, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

Any adaptation of the whole or part of the material for broadcast by radio, TV, or for stage plays or film, is the right of the author unless negotiated through legal contract. Any commercial use by anyone other than the author is strictly prohibited.

This work is fictitious, and any similarities to any persons, alive or dead, are purely coincidental.  Mention is made of persons in public life only for the purposes of realism and for that reason alone.  Certain licence is taken in respect of medical procedures, terms and conditions, and the author does not claim to be the fount of all knowledge.

The author accepts the right of the individual to hold his/her (or whatever) own political, religious and social views, and there is no intention to deliberately offend anyone.

The Author

With enormous experience of life, the author brings to life some of the nastier sides of the human condition, with many of the better attributes.  Having started writing as a teenager, but never publishing anything until the half century loomed, Tanya successfully brought together elements of the real world, her dreams, fantasies and failed aspirations to breathe life into three-dimensional characters and situations that warrant further attention.  Known for producing happy endings (for the most part), but also keen to see true justice is seen to be done, which unfortunately doesn’t happen as often as it should in real life.

Now concentrating on writing, the author enjoys foreign travel, family, faith and furry friends.

My thanks to my editor Tom Peashey

Author: I Am Woman: The Dani Affair,Escape From Iran and Madam President

Books by Tanya Allan

Her AMAZON.COM PAGE: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B004VTB5OQ

A Chance would be a Fine Thing (Knox Journals Book 1)

A Fairy's Tale

A Girl can but Dream

Amber Alert

A Tale of Two T’s*

A Wedding and Two Wars (Knox Journal Book 2)

Beginning's End

Behind The Enemy

Dead End (Candy Cane 2)

Dragons & Stuff!

Emma*

Every Little Girl's Dream #

Extra Special Agent

Flight or Fight

Fortune's Soldier

Gruesome Tuesday*

In Plain Sight*

In The Shadows

It Couldn't Happen, Could it?

Killing Me Slowly*

Marine I: Agent of Time*

Modern Masquerade

Monique*#

Queen of Hearts*

Ring the Change

Shit Happens - so do Miracles*

Skin*

Tango Golf: Cop with A Difference

The Candy Cane Club

The Hard Way*

The Other Side of Dreams

There's No Such Thing as a Super Hero

The Summer Job & Other Stories

The Torc (Book 1 – The Emerging)

To Fight For a Dream*

Twisted Dreams*

TWOC - A Comedy of Errors

Weird Wednesday*

When Fortune Smiles

When I Count to Three #

Whispers in the Mind*

Whispers in the Soul*

*Paperbacks can be found here: http://www.feedaread.com/profiles/368/ # = Published on KOBO.COM

Prologue

England – Autumn 2009

Sidney Rawlings, known as 'Sid the Snake' to his few friends and most of the officers at the local police station, breathed out and wiped the sweat from his brow.

A small man, no taller than five-two and weighing less than a hundred and twelve pounds (eight stone); he made good use of his small stature in squeezing through very small spaces. He'd burgled his first house when just twelve years old and had never looked back. Except, of course, for the five occasions when he'd looked back from the dock at his weeping mother, as he'd been taken down for increasingly long stretches of imprisonment at Her Majesty's pleasure.

This time was different, or so he told himself. It would have to be, as he was almost forty years old and wasn't as supple as he once had been. Also, he really didn't want to be sent away for Her Majesty's pleasure ever again. The dear old Queen could get her pleasure from some other distraction; racehorses, perhaps?

This time he couldn't get caught, as there was no way anyone could possibly know it was him. He stayed on the roof and watched as the police and security officers completed a fruitless search of the building and surrounding area. As the last police car withdrew, he eased his aching joints and prepared to climb down and make good his escape.

If a burglary was successful as a direct correlation to the amount of research and preparation, then this job was as good as done, for Sidney had excelled himself this time!

The building was ultra modern, with all the latest high-tech security systems in place, as well as a small army of security personnel. There were four separate buildings operating from this collection of premises on a brand new industrial estate on the outskirts of Slough, in Berkshire. All were potential targets for a good burglar. However, only one was his specific target on this Saturday night, Garratt Electronics.

Old man Howard Garratt had retired some twelve years ago as computers were just beginning to explode across the technological market. Giles Garrett, his nephew (Howard had never married, so had no son or daughter to whom he could pass on the company) had stepped behind his uncle’s desk and, unusually, taken the company into the twenty-first century in spectacular fashion.

Giles had been a computer geek as a child, and hadn't changed now he was in his forties. He had been writing programs as a seven year old, so was now the UK equivalent to a certain Mr Gates over in the colonies.

His speciality had proved to be a memory system that revolutionised data storage. It was only just beginning to impact the domestic and small business market, but already most large businesses and organisations had bought into his product.

The GG/Plus System was exceptionally compact and was capable of storing almost unlimited data, backing up and retrieving data within nano-seconds and, most importantly, was about as secure as one could ever get. Cloud, Dropbox and other internet based systems were okay, but if you wanted 100% secure, you couldn’t get better than GG/Plus.

This building was the major UK site of the company, in which all the hardware was developed, manufactured and stored for eventual distribution.

Much of the hardware was small enough to hold in the palm of one hand, so Sid's backpack would hold several million pounds worth of very sellable technology.

All windows and doors were sealed and watched by electronic sensor systems and human eyes through a secure CCTV system. There was no way into or out of the building that wasn't covered by some form of security. All, that is, except one.

The A/C system was almost as high-tech as the products being manufactured, but it had one flaw, and Sid intended to take advantage of the flaw. That flaw was the air intake duct.

Because of the size of the building, the fact that an even temperature was essential for the products being developed and manufactured and that it had to be easily maintained and accessed by humans, there was one duct that was almost big enough for a child or trained monkey to slither through.... or Sid the Snake.

Sid had entered the secure compound by simply scaling the wire fence at the rear. Then, by climbing up the exterior of the building at the back, he gained access to the roof. By carefully removing one of the domed duct covers, he revealed the single shaft that disappeared into the gloom of the building.

Although not that large an opening, it was sufficient for him to squeeze his small frame down. He had to remove all clothing, except his briefs, a webbing belt with small tool kit, and his shoes. Having smeared grease all over his body, he slithered down the duct, pulling his pack behind him, attached by a cord to his wrist.

Half an hour later, he'd removed the retaining screws of the duct in the ground floor warehouse area and dropped soundlessly to the floor. Within another fifteen minutes, he had removed sufficient memory chips to fill his bag, replaced the duct cover and was making slow progress back up the duct towards the roof.

Somewhere in the bowels of the building he heard an alarm, so knew that his presence in the warehouse had been discovered either by motion sensors or temperature sensors. Confident that his access and egress would be undiscovered, his plan was to remain hidden firstly within the duct, and then on the roof, under a military-spec, heat-retaining blanket that he had brought along for just the purpose.

Sure enough, as he rose from the bowels of the plant, he could hear the familiar and hated chrupp-chrupp of the police helicopter as it made its way towards his location. He simply waited within the duct for the helicopter to hover and use their hi-tech, heat signature camera on the roof and then start to run increasing circles of search pattern away from the location. He emerged as it moved away, slipped under his blanket beneath the over-hanging parapet of the roof, hoping that the blanket's specifications were as he hoped and expected.

The heat signature camera and other technology on board the helicopter were the bane of his life, and he owed the last two stretches inside to the technology on helicopters.

Although they had already checked the roof, they returned for just one more look. It seemed to hover directly above him for what appeared to be an eternity, eventually making larger circles and eventually disappeared to the east. His one hope was that the helicopter's two negative searches of the roof would render any further searching by police or security redundant. His hope seemed to bear fruit. The police cars and people on the ground gradually dispersed, and he was alone again.

He had just dressed once more in his dark clothing, feeling slightly light headed with relief and satisfaction when he felt a slight breeze against his bare cheek. The night was incredibly still, so this breeze cooled him, so he sensed that he was no longer alone.

Spinning round, he saw, much to his surprise, a tall girl standing a short distance away with a smile on her face and her hands on her hips. She looked directly at him, displaying no surprise or fear.

“Who the fuck are you?” he asked, stepping towards her.

It was only then that he realised that although she was but a few feet away, there was no safe surface between them, for she was standing on fresh air. That is, she was perfectly stationary, but her feet were some eighty feet from the tarmac of the car park below. She was floating in mid-air!

He stopped himself before he fell over the parapet, doing a passable imitation of a man just about to fall from a great height, including the mad flapping of arms and the justifiably terrified expression.

For the first time this evening, he felt fear. Not the apprehension that he might get caught, as he was used to that. This was different. This was the fear of something inexplicable and something he could neither control nor comprehend. This was compounded by the fear of knowing with a degree of certainty that, unless a miracle happened, he was going to go back to prison.

He stared at the young woman, as if by seeing her properly, she might disappear or something equally useful.

She didn't.

Her long fair hair floated slightly as she worked to retain the same altitude. She looked remarkably normal to Sid; in that she was attractive, with a nice figure that went in and out in all the right places although as she was wearing a dark sweater, tight dark leggings and high heeled boots, he wasn't best able to judge in the dark. It was hard to gauge her age, but she was certainly no more than eighteen or nineteen.

The only thing that wasn't dark was a faintly glowing circlet of dull silver or grey metal around her neck. His avaricious eyes were drawn to it, as he subconsciously appraised its value and saleability, despite being in a very vulnerable situation.

“Good morning Mr Burglar. I'm so sorry to disappoint you, as you so nearly got away with this one, didn't you?” she said in an educated and delightfully pleasant voice.

On his belt, he knew there were various tools. One of which was a gravity knife. Half turning away from her, he hid that side from her view and slipped the knife from the belt, opening the blade with a flick of his wrist and throwing it at her as hard as he could.

As the blade headed rapidly for her ample chest, so Sid felt the risings of remorse and not a little guilt as he mentally started to add murder to his list of previous convictions.

He would never forget what happened next. In fact, for the next ten years, as he lay on his bunk in Brixton Prison, he'd have nightmares about it.

The blade was true and directly on course to impact the woman in the centre of her chest, between her delicately rising breasts.

When it was literally a hair's breadth away from her, it simply stopped. She lazily reached up with her left hand and plucked the knife from the air, closing the blade and wagging the index finger of her right hand at him.

“You nasty little man; how dare you?” she said, the tone of her voice sounding remarkably like Miss Pickles, his first primary school teacher.

Floating towards him, she then reached out, grabbed him by the neck and springing with her legs against the parapet, launched vertically off into the night sky with him screaming.

Ten minutes later, the bell sounded on the external door of Slough Police Station custody suite. Bearing in mind that this door was within a secure compound, this was unusual in itself, as no one had opened the exterior gate to enter the compound.

There was a CCTV camera on the outside of the door. Those inside looked at the monitor, and simply saw what they assumed was the top of someone’s head against the camera.

Christopher Smith was the Custody Sergeant, so he opened the door to find the diminutive Sid staring wide-eyed and gibbering soundlessly. In his hand was a large bag with 'SWAG' written thereon. Across his chest was taped a single piece of A4 paper. The sergeant reached out and took the paper, amused that Sid slid soundlessly to the ground. The sergeant smelled fresh urine and was surprised to see that the diminutive burglar had wet himself.

Sergeant Smith read what was on the paper aloud to the few officers that had come to see the commotion.

“I, Sidney Rawlings, have burgled Garratt Electronics. I entered the A/C duct on the roof and gained access to the warehouse to remove the contents of this bag. I used a special blanket to evade detection by the helicopter's thermal imaging camera. This blanket is still on the roof along with a few assorted tools that I used to help me gain access. No one helped me, and I wish to make a full confession.”

It was signed by Sid in what appeared, to Sergeant Smith, to be blood. Actually, it turned out to be red felt pen, but was suitably dramatic.

The policeman looked at the gibbering wreck of a man on the ground, who had just started to steam gently.

“Is this right?” he asked. “You've just screwed the Garratt building?”

Sid said nothing, but nodded. Then he started to weep, so the sergeant helped him to his feet and took him into the warmth and relative safety of the police station.

Had Sergeant Smith looked up, he would have seen the girl smile in satisfaction, as she turned in the air and, using the roof of a nearby building as a springboard, appeared to fly rapidly away across the dark sky.

One

How it all began, a long, long, long time ago....

As the first fingers of dawn stretched up over the mountains, the animals and birds in the forest changed their tune. As the nocturnal beasts all found their hidey-holes for the day, the day creatures started to awaken and called out to each other. It was breakfast time, so from the very smallest to the very largest, life entered once again into a battle for survival.

By the time the sun rose above the horizon and its warmth spread across the lush, verdant land, the level of noise had increased markedly, as had the evidence of their presence.  Multi-coloured birds flitted across the tree tops, and a myriad of small mammals shook the trees as they scurried amongst the branches. On the forest floor, rodents and lizards vied for the multitude of insects in the piles of rotting vegetation and new shoots.

Far to the north, enormous tendrils of glacial ice continued their inexorable march southwards, covering whole vistas with their white mantle. Great beasts of these lands slowly migrated south, ahead of the great white cliffs, to find warmth and food, as the icy glacial deserts offered little comfort for all but the hardiest creatures. The vast grasslands and forests became more crowded, offering the predators a whole new menu from which to choose.

Into this scenario came a ship. Not with sails that floated on water, but a cylinder that sped between the stars. It was an exploratory scout ship with a crew of six. This new world offered their entire race a hope that was all but forlorn and almost lost. For their home world was no more, destroyed when their sun had burned itself into a giant nova and disintegrated. Enormous colony ships, each with many thousand individuals, were launched and sent out in the vain hope that one of the many small scout ships would find a habitable world upon which they might continue their existence.

After four years of confinement, the crew looked out upon this blue and green gem with optimism that none had felt for many years. Selecting a region that would offer the most compatible climate and potential for habitation, the ship landed by the border between a large forest and an expanse of grassland. The crew were eager to conduct the tests that would confirm or deny them their chance to colonise this beautiful place.

After several days of tests, the senior science officer informed the captain that the air was breathable and unless there was something as yet undetected, their kind could live here with little or no difficulty.

“I have yet to conduct more tests, but we can venture out with just bio-masks. Once the other tests come back clear, we can inform the colonial authority that we have found the one!” he said.

It was a momentous occasion, and one that all six wanted to be part of. However, the captain insisted that only three would be outside at any one time, so they drew lots to see which team would be first. Things after that, however, did not go entirely to plan.

“They’re crazy!” said Jay Bee, closing the airlock and entering the main living cabin. “I mean, they’ll attack anything, either because they feel threatened or to eat it!”

“Or both at the same time,” said Heera, with some feeling.

“I thought this world would really be the answer, but unless we can deal with them, we can’t leave the ship or send for the colonists,” muttered Kayra, the leader of the small expedition, stirring some uninteresting looking food in a bowl.

“You decided to land here,” Heera said bitterly.

“Okay, but I didn’t hear you complain,” Kayra retorted angrily.

“Okay, quit this, it doesn’t help. We all decided that this looked like a good proposition. Shit, anything looked good after four years in this bucket. If only we looked more like they do, then they’d accept us,” said Jay Bee.

They lapsed into silence, each to their own thoughts. Kayra looked at one of the monitors to the other three crew members who were still outside, erecting a palisade. They’d landed on a small plain in the foothills on the edge of a large mountain range on one of the larger continents. There was a lush green valley below, similar to a tropical forest on their own planet; before their sun had gone nova and rendered all life extinct, that is.

They’d spent the first few weeks gathering samples and establishing that it was habitable, with sufficient oxygen and relatively harmless bacteria and micro-organisms. The gravity was slightly greater than they were used to, but by such a small margin as to have little impact. After the first six weeks, they’d ventured out without full suits for the first time. Morale was high and all six were in good spirits.

It didn’t last.

They’d discovered that the planet, apart from looking perfect and being almost ideal on the micro-organism front, also was host to a myriad of life forms, most of which were lethal, and that included the flora as well as the fauna.

Amongst the fauna, there were enormous beasts, quite capable of dismembering any of the crew with little difficulty. Then there were smaller, highly efficient killing machines that were equipped with high speed, teeth and claws that seemed designed simply to kill anything that moved, regardless of size. Some were mammalian, some flew, others were reptilian, while even more lurked in the water, ready to remove a limb or simply strip flesh from the body if one were foolhardy enough to venture into a puddle.

However, all these were nothing compared to the dominant species of mammal.

Nicknamed “the Brutes” by the crew, for they found them ugly and disproportionate. These creatures had a degree of bestial intelligence, the proof of which was their ability to design and adapt to their surroundings and to make and use crude tools. All their tools seemed designed to kill, rip, shred, dismember or otherwise cause death or harm to anything that was stupid or ignorant enough to get close enough.

The Brutes lived in family groups, often with as many as a hundred individuals ranging from the old and infirm to the very young. Some sheltered in caves, while others sewed the hides of their prey together and stretched them over frames of sticks to form crude shelters. They lived a nomadic lifestyle, not that different from the crew members' ancestors from pre-history, moving to new killing fields when the current one was spent. They ate nearly everything they came across: animals, birds, fish, reptiles, grasses, fruits, nuts, roots, berries, and probably each other if times were hard. The crew were intrigued whether their digestive systems would be so eclectic.

The very old were never that old, not by the standards of the crew, at any rate. This new species seemed to die in their third or fourth decade. A few lived longer, but many became infirm, so had to be left behind to die when the tribe moved on to find food elsewhere, having eaten everything in one place. Newborn offspring, if defective in any way, were simply abandoned and left to die outside the settlement. They never suffered for long, as there was always some helpful scavenger ready to put the little things out of their misery.

They had only a rudimentary knowledge of medicine, capable of dealing with broken limbs only by binding them in a roughly straight fashion. If deep wounds were ever inflicted, by deliberate act or accident, then more often or not the victim contracted some form of infection and died. Their whole way of life rendered the term, survival of the fittest, as very apt.

The few attempts at making contact had failed, as the crew had been attacked without hesitation, forcing them to use their weapons and retreat back to their ship.

It was with deep regret that the crew had been forced to use potentially lethal force against the Brutes, as this was strictly against the guidelines of the Colonisation and Exploration Program. Although they attempted to use such force only as and when necessary to safeguard their lives, they knew that one or two of the natives had died, or had certainly been seriously wounded. After all, their weapons were designed to kill, so it was little wonder that some died at the inexpert hands of the crew who were not highly trained in their use.

Their task had been simply to locate and identify a host planet where their few remaining people could set up a colony with a view to living in harmony with existing life forms, culminating in a joint existence that would benefit all.

There was no way they could live in harmony with these creatures. The wild beasts were simple to deal with, as already they had identified the predators and those who would kill to defend their young, but in the main the prime concern was this dominant species of mammal. For a start, they looked gruesome, they didn’t follow the same genetic pattern as the crew, and they seemed hell bent of destroying anything they didn’t understand.

Initially categorised as barely intelligent, it was this intelligence that turned out to be the most fearful, as the brutes learned surprisingly quickly. For example, they now knew the crew’s hand weapons had an effective range of only fifty paces. After the first few occasions when the crew had used the weapons, the brutes rarely came closer than that range. Instead, they would hide and try to ambush the crew at any moment. Their ability to blend with their surroundings terrified the crew, as did their accuracy with the lengths of pointed sticks used as javelins

“I’ve been thinking about that,” said Heera.

“What?” asked the other two in unison.

“Looking like them. I mean, how hard can it be?”

“Well, apart from the fact they’re taller than us, have a completely different skeletal structure, have unnatural gender configurations and all that fur,” said Jay Bee

“It’s not fur,” declared Heera.

“It looks like fur.”

“It’s hair.”

“Now you’re splitting hairs,” chuckled Jay Bee.

Heera threw an empty carton at Jay Bee who ducked and laughed all the more.

“I think the answer is in our weapons,” Heera said, serious once more.

“Our weapons, how?” asked Kayra

“Well, I’m not the engineer, so you’ll have to ask Graton, but I think the principle of Matter Disruption is the key.”

“I don’t see it, unless you want to blast holes in all those creatures. I think we’d need a hell of a lot more weapons.”

“Okay, what little I remember from my science class, matter disruption is an off-shoot of matter transformation, isn’t it?”

“Possibly, go on.”

“Well, each of our blasters has a small reactor and a projector. The reactor creates and stores the energy and the projector simply discharges it, focussing the energy in a fashion designed to kill or disable the target. What would happen if you take out the reactor and, instead of attaching it to a projector, configure a transformer that transforms our physical shape to be more in keeping with the local aborigines?”

The other two stared at Heera with astonishment. Jay Bee started to laugh, but cut it short when he became aware that Kayra wasn’t laughing.

“I’m not sure it would be that easy, but you’ve possibly got something there. Go get Graton, and we’ll see if we can rig up something.”

Kayra was right; it wasn’t easy. Indeed, it took Graton, aided by all the others, a further six weeks to rig up a prototype that was too heavy to lift, let alone carry. But it worked, sort of.

The science was complicated, but based on the principle that all matter comprised of atoms, then once those atoms were identified and coded, then the power of the matter transformer could reconfigure any one atom to appear as another. This could work for one minute particle, or a series of particles that comprised a larger form, like a body.

The prototype was configured to a small mammal that they’d caught in a trap. Once initiated, they managed to change the appearance of the mammal into that of a fish, taking as a model another specimen that floated morosely in a small glass tank. The new fish then exploded, spreading intestines and goo all over the small laboratory on the ship.

“Shit!” said Graton with some feeling.

“It worked,” pointed out Kayra, wiping some slimy stuff from her face.

“Not for any length of time, I think the power needs to be turned down a little.”

“You should have put it in a tank of water,” suggested Heera.

“Then the mammal would have drowned before the change took place. I think we ought to limit it to similar species. It had to alter the DNA and I think that might have been the root of the problem.”

“Can you make the device smaller?” Kayra asked.

“How much smaller?” asked Graton.

“Small enough for us to carry, like a time piece or similar?”

“If I had a fully equipped lab like I had back home, maybe. Here, I very much doubt it.”

“Then we’re wasting time. Unless you can design something that we can carry unobtrusively, then we may as well not bother.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“Oh, and how different are the brutes’ DNA compared to ours?”

“Without taking a sample from a captured specimen, it’s difficult to say. We have sampled some blood from that incident where we almost got killed, but there wasn’t very much. From the little we got, they’re not as different as our external differences would suggest,” the scientist said. “In fact, we’re closer to them than the fish was to that small mammal.”

“That’s encouraging, I think,” muttered Kayra.

“The main problem is that of gender.”

“You mean because they have only two and they’re permanent?”

“Exactly.”

“I can’t imagine having to exist as one gender for the whole of my life. It doesn’t seem fair that only fifty percent of the race ever experience the joys of childbirth.”

“As someone once told me, whoever said life was fair?” Graton said.

“Why do we need to align ourselves so closely to the brutes, can’t we just make ourselves similar enough to pass?”

“They’re extraordinarily astute, for savages. They’ll spot any differences and before you can react, they’ll attack. From what we’ve seen, even if they see other brutes just like themselves, they still attack first and then ask questions later. No, we have to be able to literally become like them, even down to the DNA. Once we get to that stage, we have to work on gaining the trust of a small group.”

“This is too much. The Colonial Administration would not stand for this on such a scale. Our people can’t live like this. We would be better employed leaving here and seeking an alternative world.”

“Or wiping out the brutes, that’d solve the problem,” said Jay Bee.

“No it wouldn’t. We’d have their death on our conscience and all our laws forbid it.”

“It wouldn’t bother me,” admitted Jay Bee. “They’re ghastly creatures, and don’t deserve this wonderful planet. If we leave them, they’ll ruin it in a few years and probably make themselves and everything else extinct.”

“I’m not sure another planet is out there, but I agree, logistically it’s a nightmare. However, if we could find a small part of this planet that is free from the brutes, we could set up an isolated colony and develop to such a stage that we need not fear them. By the time they spread that far, we would be numerically and technologically superior, and they would have to live in harmony with us.”

“Or be destroyed,” the captain said.

“Possibly, but you know how sensitive the Colonial Administration is about genocide. No, we’d have to be patient and just grow quietly without any contact with them.”

“That would take centuries. The Colonial Administration might not be quite so bloody politically correct if it’s a simple case of the survival of our entire race!”

“I agree, but what alternative do we have?”

“See if you can construct a device, if only to give us the time and opportunity to finish our preliminary tests. Then we look for a suitably isolated site.”

By this time, many of you may have guessed that the crew members were not human and that they now stood on the Earth during what is called the Stone Age, as the last great Ice Age spread from both poles.

They were beings that were neuter until puberty and then progressed to become male. This allows for the more adventurous and aggressive nature to be spent in sporting and keen business pursuits, after which they mature and settle down as females. The last phase before returning to neuter at what would be termed menopause is that of mamale. Having a wealth of experience, maturity and knowledge, they are ideally suited to rear the young that the youthful males and steady females wish to produce.

The female selects her mate from the host of willing males. Then after sexual contact, the fertilised egg is passed in a pseudo-sexual encounter to the infertile third party, the mamale. The mamale will allow the unborn child to grow in her womb and give birth, after which she will suckle the child for the two month period before they join its parents in the family unit until such time as that child experiences puberty and becomes male. This is the signal for the small unit to break up, as one or both of the genetic parents may well have changed to the next phase.

Graton, the science officer was the only mamale, while the Captain, Karya was a female. Jay Bee was the only male left, as all but Graton had been male when the ship had launched. Graton was now pregnant with Kayra and Jay Bee’s unborn child.

“Oh, and I’ll need a couple of brutes to work on,” Graton said.

“Live ones?”

“Yes, one male and female, and both must be alive.”

“That may be difficult,” the Captain said.

“Without it, I can’t do it.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Kayra said, leaving to see whom she could persuade to complete such a task.

* * * * * *

G’mom was tired, as he’d chased this deer for many days’ walk in but a few hours. Although wounded, the deer was big and strong, so had not gone down as G’mom had desired and expected after he’d thrown the spear. The weapon had penetrated the side of the animal, but had fallen loose after the first part of the chase.

He’d passed beyond his tribal lands deep in the forest, where his people lived among the trees. He was now heading up and out of the forest, in the land of the Lani. He, as a member of the Banna people, had no quarrel with the Lani, but if the deer fell on their land, they had first right to it, so he would be forced to return home with nothing.

At last, by a small stream in a dell, he saw the deer collapse. He could see no Lani, so he pounced, killed and butchered the animal as quickly as he could. Normally he’d preserve the hide, but being so far from home, he used his flint blade to cut the hide into strips and squares to form parcels in which he could place the meat for his journey home. He’d just cleaned himself in the stream, drunk deeply and was preparing to leave when one of the flocks of birds in the trees took flight, apparently alarmed about something he could not see.

He crouched, spear at the ready, listening and watching, but nothing moved. After what seemed an age, he relaxed, bent and was picking up his load of meat when he felt a sharp pain in his left buttock.

Thinking he’d been stung by a striped insect, he glanced down to see a strange dart protruding from his behind. At that moment two of the most hideous creatures he had ever seen emerged from the bushes and advanced towards him. He roared his defiance and fear, raising his spear, but sank to his knees before being able to throw it, and then collapsed onto his face, unconscious.

JayBee breathed a sigh of relief and then, together with his colleague Fytin, they dragged the helpless human to the nearby ground car, placing him into the cage alongside the unconscious form of a human female they’d caught an hour previously.

Graton had his specimens.

It took several months, so it was soon after giving birth that Graton announced that the device was ready. The human specimens had been returned to a location close to where they’d been originally found. Now their DNA and brain patterns had been configured into the device’s memory chip.

The crew assembled in the small science lab and watched impatiently as Graton finished feeding the infant and placed it into a small crib.

“Right, by using the best micro-technology available to me, I have been able to construct a device that, I hope, will allow one individual to mimic a brute. I have taken a reactor from a weapon and with a transformer and a Direct-mind-control unit from a suit, I have come up with this,” Graton declared, holding up a distinctly odd device.

They all looked at it.

It wasn’t what anyone expected.

“How does it work?”

“In theory it does everything you asked of me. Using the data that I collected from the two specimens, this device firstly tunes into the mind of the wearer, and then projects and transforms, through the wearer’s physical form, the correct image of the indigenous natives, even down to blood type, DNA and brain patterns. In short, you not only look like they do, but your body works like theirs and you think like them too.”

“You said it was an image. I thought it transforms the body to be the same as the brutes?” asked Fytin.

“In a way, it does, but as soon as you remove the device, the effect is reversed and the wearer returns to normal.”

“In theory? Haven’t you tried it out yet?” Kayra asked.

“Ah, as you know, I have approached each of you over the last few weeks, and unfortunately none of you seems willing to be the test subject.”

“Let me hold it,” the captain asked.

Graton handed it over to her, watching as she turned it over in her hands.

“It looks like something to put round a prisoner's neck,” she said.

“It is, sort of.”

“This will hardly make us inconspicuous. I mean, it’s very obvious.”

She held it up for all to see.

It was a C shaped torc, made from a dull grey metal, thicker at the rear and with small globes of metal at each end. At no point did the device's thickness exceed a centimetre in diameter, and actually it looked relatively delicate and inconsequential. It was rigid, so there didn't appear to be any way that any of the crew could hope to fit their neck through the two inch gap between the globes. As their necks were slightly thicker than a human, this was quite an obstacle.

“It’s only obvious because we aren't used to wearing such ornaments. The brutes wear ornaments not unlike this from time to time, so shouldn't draw any extra suspicion. I accept that they have yet to discover metal, but that is a minor factor. The power plant, micro-chips and transforming projector are located in the rear where it is slightly thicker. I've used the last of the Guayxa metal, it's a rare commodity that is now even rarer after our planet’s destruction.

“The alloy is about the strongest metal we've ever known. Some say it's the hardest metal to have ever existed, and certainly it is far harder than anything that we've found here, so far. Even the diamonds that are reasonably common here are not able to scratch the surface of this substance. Let me show you,” she said, taking a bar of dull grey metal. Taking a large clear gem, she tried to scratch the surface of the bar, but failed to make the slightest mark.

“You see, it can be made so thin and yet remain exceptionally strong.  However, the technology inside the torc is the clever bit. Using a combination of technologies, I've achieved something that would win awards if we were still back home. Firstly, the mind of the wearer will complete the final picture through the mental booster and matter transformer. I had tried to use a simple projector, but that was, as the dead rodent showed us, not exactly reliable. Instead, I've locked the Brutes’ DNA code into the transformer, and by linking it with our own, it simply uses the transformer to alter our DNA code and with our mental image to help, generates a finished product that will retain our individuality while rendering us as close to resembling them as possible.

“Secondly, I've managed to place a small force field generator in each torc, thus rendering the wearers virtually indestructible to any form of physical attack. Even micro-organisms and noxious gases would be kept out. Thirdly, by linking it to the force field generator, I've succeeded in linking the mental communications chip with the generator, so the wearer can literally manipulate force to either throw a bolt of energy or to reach out and use it as a tractor beam, to bring an object to you, or move you to a larger object.”

“Won’t the wearer get hot or suffocate?”

“No, the force field has the quality to filter air through, you will know it is there, but no one else will see or feel it. Only the wearer can remove it, and there is a special way of doing that. But I haven't told you about the best bit yet.”

“There's more?”

“Oh yes. I've managed to use an anti-gravity cell from the ship to link into the mental coms unit. So, if you need to jump, or even fly a short distance to escape a horrible fate, then you can do so.”

The crew were astounded, each staring at the grey device in front of them.

“How about language; can it assist in translating their dreadful grunts?”

“Ah, I’m pleased you asked. I have inserted a microprocessor with a full analytical program. Once you are mentally tuned to the device, if you want to speak in their language, you tune in and think in your own, and it will transmit to you the words in the other language, and it will translate anything spoken to you in the same way. It is completely silent, operating on a mental level only.”

This impressed everyone.

“What power source does it use?” one asked.

“It's a simple thermal cell that converts any natural heat or light into energy and stores it indefinitely or until used. Technically, it should never run out of juice, unless kept on ice in the dark.”

“How do we get it on?” the captain asked.

“Hold the two ends at the same time for about twenty seconds and it will tune itself into your DNA. Once it is ready it will allow you to open it and place it around the neck. If you let go at any time, it will return to the original shape and become stiff and immovable once more. It simply can’t be forcibly taken from you, unless they sever your neck.”

“Why did you need two test subjects if there is only one type of torc?”

Graton smiled, holding up a second torc.

It was similar to the first, but slightly smaller

“This is the female version.”

“What happened to the subjects?” someone asked.

“Oh, we couldn’t risk keeping them here. We’ve put them back from whence they came. I don't think either of them was aware of what happened.”

“What happens if one of the brutes manages to get hold of one?”

“Indeed, it is so sophisticated, that even if one of them should wear it, then it would align itself to their DNA without causing them any harm. They could wear it all the time and never know what they were wearing. They would, of course have access to the special powers, but without knowing what it could do, the chances of them doing it and surviving would be limited.”

“What, no harm at all?” asked JayBee, sounding almost disappointed.

“No harm, unless a male wore a female torc or the other way around. In which case, they would align to the gender of the torc. There would be an added problem if they wore it for too long. Because they are of the same DNA as the programmed device, if they were to wear it for longer than around five of their days, then their body would take on the changes as permanent and the torc would be redundant.”

“You mean they’d just be that new gender and that’s it?”

“Yes, but the powers that it held would still work, only they’d not be able to return to their original gender.”

“So, they couldn’t change back, ever?”

“Not unless they were able to use the male torc. I suppose, it would be best if we don’t allow them to get hold of one, wouldn’t it?”

The crew were not that interested in what would happen to the brutes.

“All this is fine, but do these things work?” the Captain asked.

“That, I’m afraid, is up to two of you to test.”

* * * * * *

The Lani people were afraid of the monsters that lived on the mountain.  A hunting party had found them several moons ago, but despite being many hunters, three of the monsters breathed death at them and disappeared unhurt.

Unlike any of the beasts that the Lani had ever encountered, the tales were now a regular part of the camp fire story-telling. Small children were threatened with the monsters if they failed to obey their parents. Paintings on the hides depicted the squat and ugly forms of the monsters, with their hairless domed heads and enormous eyes. Two of the surviving hunters would tell the tales until everyone in the tribe knew them by heart, but for one young woman, her secret was something she could never share, for to reveal it would cause the others to kill her.

Phullima had been that other captive, caught while gathering berries and placed in a cage. Although unaware of her plight until later, her experience shocked and frightened her.

Because the two crewmen had delayed returning until they had caught a male, the anaesthetic that Phullima’s dart contained had begun to wear off prior to their return to their ship.

She first became aware of strange sounds and unusual movement. She moved, finding her hands and feet were bound as she lay against something soft and warm. Opening her eyes, she saw she was in a cage and that a strange male was lying next to her, bound in a similar fashion.

She was in a box made of poles, but the poles weren’t wooden, neither were they stone. She licked one and found it had a strange and very unfamiliar taste. The floor was firm, yet soft and pliable; almost as soft and spongy as moss, but perhaps as firm as bark. It was a strange substance. She couldn’t get a grip with her teeth to test its strength.

She remembered the dart, but couldn’t reach the sore place on her buttock. The movement ceased and the strange noises finished at the same time.

Believing she was a captive of another tribe, she feigned sleep as her captors sounded as if they might be coming for her. She realised that she needed all her wits if she was to hope to escape. She dared not think what possible reason they could have for capturing her and a strange male from yet another tribe. This man was snoring, so she knew she couldn't count on his help for a while.

She heard strange noises, which after a while, she worked out were voices, but not like any she had heard before. With strange whistles and clicks, they seemed unlike man-speak, and she'd heard many different tribes to know that they all sounded similar, even if they couldn't understand each other. These noises did not sound as if they were made by human throats.

Indeed, when she risked peeking at her captors, her breath caught in her throat and she passed into blissful unconsciousness, for her captors were the monsters!

It was, therefore something of a mystery when she regained consciousness to find herself back in the forest, lying at the feet of the unknown hunter, whom she had last seen bound and unconscious next to her in the strange cage. At his feet were the wrapped hide parcels of meat that all hunters carried away from their kills.

This time he stood, towering above her, and not looking too happy.

“What did you do to me?” the man asked. His dialect was strange, but she understood him, so she guessed him to be a Banna hunter, as his clothing and face scars would indicate. She had known a few Banna, and their language was not dissimilar to the Lani.

“I didn't, the monsters did,” she said.

“What monsters?” he asked.

She explained her story to him, and he became increasingly nervous, hefting his spear and eyeing the forest as if the monsters were about to return.

“I remember them. We must go,” he said.

“My village is that way,” she said pointing to the west.

“Mine is that way,” he replied, hefting the meat onto his broad shoulders and nodding to the south.

She looked at him critically.

“Have you a woman?” she asked.

“Not yet, why?”

“You have now,” she said, taking some of his load from him and so allowing him more freedom to use his spear to protect them both. He examined her and after a few moments, smiled and nodded, turning away and starting to walk east.

“What do they call you?” he asked as she walked beside him.

“Phullima, and you?”

“G'mom.”

She smiled and felt safe for the first time in ages.

History fails to reveal what happened to G'mom and Phullima, but I'd like to think they had loads of children and they all thrived and prospered, but for all we know, they could have all been eaten by bears.

As for the crew on board the scout ship, history wasn't kind to them.

For all their science and technology, the crew suffered at the hands of the smallest predator of all – micro-organisms. They lasted another six months, having ironed out the bugs in the two torcs. Their first effort was reasonable, but failed to maintain the transformation for longer than a couple of hours at a time.

Unfortunately, one of the crew, Fytin was actually with some humans at the time. She was trying quite successfully to trade some crude tools for some food. The torc ceased working and suddenly the humans had a weird-looking monster appear in their midst. Despite wearing some protection she was seriously wounded and died a short while later. Graton took her death personally, so after repairing and improving the torcs, withdrew and became unapproachable.

Within a month of Fytin's death, the first symptoms of the disease appeared, and a few short weeks later the last crew member, the captain, died. Her last act was to lift the ship off and fly up out of the atmosphere. There she detached a small satellite that repeated the message in their language as a warning for all her kind never to land of this planet. Knowing that the organisms were deadly to her kind, she simply set the craft to fly towards the sun. She died some two days before the air ran out. Eventually, the craft and dead body were burned to a crisp long before they reached their destination.

What about the torcs? I hear you ask.

Shortly before her last flight, the captain buried the ashes of her crew with her infant and her dear friend Graton. As she looked out at the beautiful vista before her, she felt a heavy sadness of knowing what might have been. Instead, she knew that the brutes would grow and multiply, dominating and probably destroying everything that was beautiful.

The torcs were a testimony to the intelligence, ingenuity and imagination of her people. Therein lay an even greater sadness, that none would ever know of what they had been able to achieve.

She was in a quandary, for should her people find this planet and heed her warnings, then given the advances in medical science, it might be possible for them to make this place their home. However, they would need the technology in the torcs only if the brutes were still an issue.  If she left them in space and another civilisation, perhaps even the descendents of the brutes themselves found them, then that could be disastrous. If she left them on the planet below, then the only creatures to find them would be the brutes, and the chances would be slim that the devices would survive the thousands of years that it might take for these beings to advance to a civilised state, if ever.

It seemed a shame, but she originally intended to keep them with her on her final journey. However, there might be a chance her people would come here, and the metal was so rare as to be immediately identifiable to any of her people.

She returned with the torcs to her ship, and flew slowly over the changing landscape below. She flew north, over the advancing glaciers, until she decided that this was as good as anywhere.

She didn’t want the brutes getting hold of them, but she didn’t have the heart to destroy all that effort by her dear friend. Instead, she set the craft to hover, and threw the torcs onto the ice.

Their warmth melted the surface and she watched as they slowly sank from view.

They would keep on sinking, until their energy was spent. Then, if the glaciers ever retreated, they would fall into the ocean below and settle on the bottom forever.

If, and it was an infinitesimal if, her kind ever found this place and managed to conquer the disease that killed her crew, they might just locate the torcs and put them to use. Otherwise, they should remain where they were until the Brutes managed to kill themselves and possibly the entire planet of abundant life.

Those rather insignificant circlets of metal were the only evidence of her and her people. Nothing else remained, not even a boot print, to tell their story. It should have been a different story, but as she turned her eyes outwards, she cried for her kind.

Two.......

England.... Autumn 1954.

Jacob Morely sat on his elderly Massey Harris and ploughed the lower field, hoping that the tractor would last the job, but fearing he'd have to stop several times to coax the old beast into life again. He'd love a new tractor, but until business got better, he'd have to make do.

It was only nine years since the end of hostilities, but he still carried the stigma of never having gone off to fight. People were funny. They wanted meat and potatoes, so he'd been classed as especially useful so as to stay and keep the farm going. But now it was all over, even the children in the village called him Old Custard or Yellow Jake.

He was over sixty-five now, so what he really wanted was to sell up and bugger off to somewhere that no one knew him. However, Oxfordshire was in his blood, so he knew that he would never leave. He did not believe that his wife Maggie would want to go as the kids were all settled up hereabouts.

The Thames Valley had been his home all his life, as it had been for his father and his father before him. The wide, flat plain of the river was particularly fertile, as it was often re-invigorated by the flooding river Thames, depositing the silt from further up-river each spring.

He sighed and concentrated on keeping the furrows straight.

As he watched he saw a brief gleam of something different. It made him smile when he read about people finding stuff in the ground, and they often said that it gleamed at them. Stuff that’s been buried for any length of time never gleamed; it was always covered in mud and so the only thing that caught the eye was the shape not being either earth or stone.

He’d dug up lots of stuff over the years, particularly since the war, with all the aircraft falling in pieces across the Home Counties during the Battle of Britain, not to mention the German mines and bombs. He’d dug up one bomb and had to wait for a day for the army to come and diffuse it. In the end, as it was in the field and not close to any buildings, they just blew it up. He was left with a bloody great hole in the middle of this self same field, and so now was forever unearthing pieces of shrapnel.

That’s what he thought it might be. If it was, there was always a chance that something metallic could harm the plough blades.

He stopped immediately and raised the plough. Just the other day there was something in the papers about a farmer turning over a golden Celtic torc worth many hundreds of thousands. The farmer didn't get it all, but he got enough to stop worrying about foot and mouth and potato blight.

Having stopped the tractor, he cursed briefly as the engine stalled. He dismounted and ran back to see what he'd uncovered.

For a moment he couldn't see anything, but then something too regular to be soil or stone caught his eye. Bending down, he grasped the article and pulled it from the sticky earth. On cleaning it with his hands, he discovered he was holding a simple piece of grey metal bent into the shape of a C. It was lighter than it looked.

It wasn't gold, so that was Jacob’s first disappointment, and he didn't think it was silver either. It was too dull and plain to be lost jewellery, or treasure. Due to the weight, he thought that it looked as if it could be an old bit alloy from an aeroplane, possibly fallen from a German bomber during the war.

Turning it over in his hands, Jacob tried in vain to see any markings or writing, but there was nothing. He tried to bend it, but it held fast, so that precluded anyone using it as jewellery, for no one could open it. He made his mind up; it was a worthless piece of wartime junk. It looked too new to be anything else.

He was about to throw it into the tangles of brambles at the edge of the field, but something stayed his hand.

It could have been the natural instinct not to leave junk around, or perhaps he might have felt that some relic collector might just give him a few quid for it. He wondered what it had been and who made it.

However, the tractor was a more pressing problem, as he knew that the longer he left it, the harder it would be to restart the darn thing.

Jacob slung the metal onto the small gap between the seat and the rear mudguard and took the starting handle to the front.

It took seven or eight swings to get the motor reluctantly spluttering into life. By that time he was sweating and feeling his age.  Cursing the antiquity of his machinery and his own body, he remounted and continued to plough.

By the time he finished and drove back to the farm, he had completely forgotten the semicircle of metal.

Life as a farmer in the nineteen-fifties was a tough one.  The age of mechanisation was just dawning, but most who ran small farms couldn’t afford the latest models and variety of machines that were being pedalled by the manufacturers.

The industry was flushed with defunct military models, so new ideas based on redundant military vehicles were being brought into life annually. Most were not ideally suited for agrarian work, but the old age of the farm worker was passing at the same time.

Jacob recalled the high levels of manpower needed at harvest time and other key stages during the farmers’ year. Men were returning from the forces to find that farmers no longer needed them or could no longer afford them and the new machines. Unemployment rose, and hard times were experienced by all.

Jacob’s tractor kept going to see 1954 out, and the weather over the winter was particularly harsh. He used the old machine to help many people get their cars out of difficulties when the snows came in February, and then again, after the floods, he pulled distressed motorists’ cars from the swirling floods.

One of these was a very grateful businessman called John Parnell.

John ran a development company, so he bought land, built whatever he felt was needed and sold the whole lot at a vast profit.

He was on the way to a crucial meeting with the county council planning office. A big chemical company who wanted to relocate due to an expansion programme were interested in some land he had acquired. John had bought a vast area of agricultural land in the vague hope he could apply for a change of use and render it far more valuable.

Agricultural land was far cheaper than commercial or residential land.  With high unemployment, a lack of effective housing and a desperate need to entice commercial prospects into the area, all county councils were eager to do their bit to solve some of the problems that every region suffered.

As a result of Jacob’s old tractor, John was able to make his meeting, in which the planning committee approved his change of use, which in turn allowed for his sale to the chemical company.

In short, Jacob’s old tractor helped make John Parnell a millionaire. John was not ungrateful.

It was a pleasant April morning. Jacob was up before it was light to milk the small dairy herd, as he did every morning. These days it seemed to be taking longer and was harder for him. He felt weary and slightly depressed. Neither of his children was interested in taking on the farm, so he wondered how much longer he could go on.

As he returned to the house for breakfast, he saw a large black car sat in front of the house.

It was vaguely familiar. As he got closer, he saw the chauffeur sitting reading a newspaper in the driver’s seat. He then remembered pulling this car from the floods, with the chauffeur and the well dressed gent in the back.

Maggie was in the parlour, which was rarely used except for special occasions.

The well-dressed gent was sitting in his chair by the fire drinking some tea from one of the Sunday-best set.

“Oh, Jacob, this is Mr Parnell, he says you’ve met before,” Maggie said.

As Jacob entered, the man stood up. He was still well-dressed, in a suit and tie, with a sleek dark overcoat over the back of the other chair.

“Mr Morely, you might not remember….,” John started to say.

“I remember you right enough, and the car. What can I do for you?” Jacob asked, interrupting him.

John smiled, appreciating the abrupt and matter-of-fact nature of this old farmer.

“Well, that day was a very important one for me. By pulling me out, you did me a bigger favour than you could possibly know. I felt that there must be someway I could pay back that favour to show my appreciation.”

Jacob scratched the back of his head.

“Well, we don’t need for much, do we Maggs?”

“Not really,” she said. “There is that old tractor; you’ve been saying how much you’d like a new one; haven’t you?”

“Aye, that’s right enough, but then I’m as knackered as the tractor. There’s no point getting a new tractor if I’m not able to carry on.”

Maggie fell silent, as her husband’s failing health was a subject that neither of them dared raise.

John regarded the pair for a moment, taking in the tired décor, the aged furniture and un-modernised farmhouse.

He had a thought.

“Tell me, Jacob, how big is this farm of yours?”

“A little over four hundred acres, but some of that is woodland.”

John did some sums in his head. He had paid a little over five pounds an acre for some farmland recently, although in a less fertile region.

“Have you no family that are interested in the business?” he asked.

Jacob glowered, as if unwilling to even think about the subject.

“Our son works for a firm of accountants in Oxford. He did his national service and simply said he wanted to give his children a better quality of life,” Maggie said.

“Hmph; the boy had a great life here. He never wanted for nuthin’!” muttered Jacob.

“While Cecily met a nice young man at college and they’re now married with a little one on the way. Her husband works with his father in the watch and jewellery business,” Maggie explained.

“No farmers then?”

“Hmph!” said Jacob, staring out the window.

“I was going to offer you a new tractor, but I’d be interested in having a look at the farm and perhaps making you an offer,” said John.

“Why; you’re no farmer?” said Jacob bluntly.

John laughed.

“No, but I know the value of good land and how to make the most from it.”

“Would you farm it?” Jacob persisted.

“No. As you said, I’m no farmer. But I could probably sell it off and make a profit. I’ll make you a better than fair offer and give you enough to retire and not have to work another day on the land.”

Jacob’s eyes misted over. He said nothing for a minute or so.

“My father farmed this land, as did his father and his before him. I dunno if I could live without the farm.”

“We all have to retire at some point, so perhaps it might be an idea to leave while you still are young enough to enjoy retirement.”

“What would I do?”

“What do you enjoy doing?”

“Farmin’!”

John found he had nothing to say. This man’s life was his farm; if one removed it then Jacob would probably die, having no purpose left.

“Then let’s talk tractors!” John said.

That was how Jacob acquired a brand new Massey Ferguson Tractor. It made him the envy of his few friends and also made his job a lot easier.

He died of a heart attack three years and four months after John’s visit. Jacob had left the farm and his entire estate to his wife. There was a clause in the will that should his son wish to farm the land then he would receive the farm and half his estate on condition that the farm wasn’t sold within twenty years of Jacob’s death.

His son, having just been made a partner, wasn’t interested.

Maggie called John Parnell within a couple of days of the funeral.

John, now even wealthier, remembered the old man and the farm. He made her an offer that was still more than fair. Having no more money worries, Maggie bought a bungalow close to her daughter and took up full-time granny work. She never wanted to see the farm again.

That was how John Parnell acquired the Morelys’ farm and whatever contents that Maggie left behind.

He planned to maximise his investment by selling it off in lots, including the newly renovated farmhouse and outbuildings. It did not preclude a purchaser bidding for everything, but he believed he would get more by splitting it up.

All remaining contents were to be auctioned. There were quite a few, as Maggie had no desire to keep any of the agricultural equipment, the livestock or indeed, even many of the household furnishings. Her new bungalow had a fitted kitchen and fitted cupboards throughout. Most of the furniture at the farm belonged to Jacob’s grandfather, so was showing its age. She was only too happy to use some of her new-found wealth to buy some new furniture and crockery.

Autumn was starting to creep in unannounced, as the leaves started to change. It had been a pleasant summer, so there were a few blackberries remaining on some of the bushes less accessible to the rambling seekers.

It was the first weekend in October 1957, and Alfred Tibbsen, the auctioneer, was early to arrive at the farm. He had made a previous visit to assess the items and to see whether it would be worth moving them to the main auction house.

There were too many bulky items, so he had made the decision to conduct the auction at the now empty farm house, in the yard, or the barn if wet.

The livestock formed part of Jacob’s estate, so they had already been sold and the monies due had gone to Maggie. For the remainder, John had made an offer based on the auctioneer’s assessment, which she had accepted.

“Morning, Mr Parnell,” he said, as John stepped from his big black Daimler.

“Ah, good morning Mr Tibbsen, looks like the weather will hold,” John said.

“I hope so, sir.”

“Has there been much interest?”

“A fair amount, yes. More for the land and buildings than the contents, but as it’s a nice day, I’m sure we’ll attract a few of the curious. I should think there’ll be some bargains to be had.”

“Indeed. I feel it’s quite a sad thing, as the Morely family have been farming here for a long time.”

“I knew Jacob’s father, and a more cantankerous old sod you couldn’t hope to meet,” Alfred said, cheerfully.

“Jacob wasn’t exactly welcoming,” John pointed out with a smile.

“No, but he would do anything for anyone if there was a need.”

“I’m sure,” said John, watching as the first potential customers arrived. Most were local farmers driving dilapidated Land Rovers, but there were a few others. Several estate agents and property speculators appeared, attracted by the possibility of grabbing the house at a bargain. They were to be disappointed.

John had investigated acquiring change of use for the farm land, but even with his contacts it was almost impossible. The area was dedicated farmland, surrounded by farms, so unless there was a change in policy from both central Government and the Local Authority, there was no hope of building houses or commercial properties this far away from civilisation. His best bet was that several neighbouring farmers would seek to add extra land to their farms by buying a few of the lots of land that were for sale.

The house and buildings, however, were different. If the land were to be snapped up by neighbours, they wouldn’t want surplus house and dilapidated farm buildings. These would make a nice little profit by being renovated and converted into living accommodation and sold on to London commuters.

The shortage of capital in circulation would mean that it was unlikely that a single investor would but the lot, but it was possible.

As predicted, the interest in the land was considerable, so the six lots combined went for more than double what John had originally paid. Admittedly, the land prices were rising almost daily, so he was well pleased.

The house generated some interest, and went for six thousand pounds to a couple who wanted to move to a bigger house from the city. They had three children and were attracted by the large garden. John was pleased as it was a good thousand more than he had anticipated. There was no doubt that the six hundred pounds he had spent on the renovation had been money well spent.

The barns and outhouses went to a speculator who did exactly as John suspected. He would renovate and convert into a home, turning several thousand pounds profit in the process.

Lastly, the contents of the barns and house fell under the hammer.

Needless to say the newer tractor sold quickly for a reasonable price to one of Jacob’s old friends. The rest of the items went, even if they were somewhat archaic and out-dated. None went for very much, but the old Massey Harris attracted not one bid, even for a single pound.

At the end of the day, John said goodbye to the auctioneer, and looked round the empty farm. The old tractor seemed to be regarding him with a squint, as the headlights were crooked.

“I know a good scrap metal dealer; he might just come and take it off your hands, sir,” said Alfred, just prior to leaving. He handed John a small piece of paper with a number written thereon.

John thanked him and watched as he left. Then he walked over to the old beast, placing one hand on the rusting engine cover.

“Well, you old bugger, what the hell am I going to do with you?” he asked.

Always recalling a childhood dream, he clambered onto the metal seat and played with the gear stick and steering wheel. He smiled.

John had adored tractors as a little boy and always wanted his own. However, he’d been a soldier in the war, in tanks. He’d served in North Africa, in the Eighth Army, and then up through Italy and finally into Germany itself. That had cured him of any desire to be mechanised ever again. He hated even driving himself these days, so employed a chauffeur.

He looked around, playing with the levers and knobs. Not that there were that many. On glancing down to his left, he saw a small square metal tin; the sort in which a ploughman might keep his sandwiches. To the right, were an old hammer and a semicircular piece of grey metal.

The tin contained several nuts and bolts, the origins of which had gone to the grave with Jacob. The hammer was rusty and the shaft rotting, so there was little value in either the box or the hammer.

As for the last bit of bent metal, not being a farmer, he put his ignorance down to just that, ignorance. He imagined it was something to do with a coupling for a plough or similar. At any rate, the whole issue was just a lump of scrap metal. He left them all where they were.

George Findlay looked like a scrap dealer, with a dirty face, a beaten up cloth cap and an old leather jerkin, as worn by the soldiers in the armoured corps.

He turned up at the farm with an ex-army transporter. John smiled, as he recalled seeing many similar ones transporting tanks to and from his unit.

George regarded the smooth-looking businessman with shrewd eyes. Both men belonged to different ends of the social spectrum, but a spark of acknowledgement seemed to ignite.

John noted the jerkin.

“Tanks?”

“REME, sir. I was with a heavy recovery unit.” The ‘sir’ came automatically as soon as George heard the other man speak.

“Where did you serve?”

“Africa with Monty, and then…”

“I know, Italy and up through the back door. I was the same. Bit of a bugger, wasn’t it?” John asked, smiling.

George took his hat off, revealing an almost totally bald head.

“It had its moments, guv’nor. You?”

“Dragoons; we started out with Cromwells and then they were replaced by Grants and Shermans.”

“Phew, those Yank jobs brewed up nicely if hit in the wrong place,” George said. “Mind you, they were easier to work on than a lot of our jobs.”

“That’s true, but then most tanks we had were liable to blow up. The damn Germans had far better guns and   armour. We used to call Shermans the widow-makers. They were fine going forward, but I hated showing my arse to the Hun.”

“Officer?”

“I was a major when demobbed.”

“Didn’t fancy staying on, then?”

“No, I’d done my bit. How about you?”

George smiled.

“I rose to a corporal once, but I got busted for a misunderstanding with a Redcap.”

“Ah, not the first, and you certainly weren’t the last. What happened?”

George shrugged.

“He thought I’d had too much to drink and I thought his dad had been to bed with a monkey.”

John laughed. It was like a breath of fresh air being with this old soldier. The years fell away, and both men relived the camaraderie they felt during those awful days.

“Ah, and he won?”

George grinned.

“Yeah, I suppose.”

“Right, now you’re here, you might as well look at the old girl,” John said, leading the way to the old tractor shed.

George looked at the elderly tractor, rubbing his chin and sucking air in through his teeth. John could see the indecision in the other man.

“Look, I’m not that bothered, I just want it gone. I’ve sold the farm and all the land and the new owners don’t want this as a sitting tenant. What’s it worth to you?”

George pulled up his sleeves and tinkered with the engine. John, like so many men of his class, sat back and admired a magician in action. A few minutes later, George inserted the starting handle and after half a dozen turns, the engine spluttered into some semblance of life. It sat there chugging, wheezing and belching dark fumes out of the exhaust pipe that sat like a locomotive’s steam funnel on top of the engine.

“It goes then?” George said, unnecessarily.

“So it seems; after a fashion,” agreed John.

“That makes a difference. I suppose I can use this in my yard.”

“Oh?” John asked, sensing that he might at least make a few pounds.

“It’ll need some work.”

“Of course it will.”

“Parts may be a problem.”

“Undoubtedly.”

“Five pounds?”

“How about twelve?”

“Ten?”

“Done!”

John shook hands warily with the scruffy ex-army mechanic. Then he watched him drive the tractor onto the flat-bed transporter.  Clearly the vehicle was designed for a much larger vehicle, for it looked rather lost and forlorn sitting there, still squinting at the world. John actually felt sorry for the old tractor.

George counted ten grubby pound notes into the impeccably clean hand of the ex-officer.

They shook hands once more, and John watched the tractor disappear from his life forever.  Just as the transporter drove round the corner, there was a metallic clang as something fell off and landed on the road. Oblivious to his loss, George kept on driving and so John walked to the corner to investigate.

It was that curiously curved lump of metal that had been on the tractor.

He picked it up and was surprised at how little it weighed.

“Looks like something from an aircraft, sir,” said his chauffeur, who had seen it fall as well.

John handed it to him.

“Chuck it, or something, Baldwin, there’s a good fellow,” John said, returning to the car.

Frost glanced around the vicinity and in the absence of an obvious receptacle; he placed it in the boot of the car with the intention of throwing it away later. He then drove his employer to his next meeting. Both men soon forgot about the farm, the tractor and the lump of metal.

John owned three cars: the Daimler that he used when on mundane meetings, the Rolls for the better sort and an old Austin Healy that he used for his own recreation very occasionally. The latter had not been out of the garage for several weeks.

On Saturday mornings, when Neil Baldwin took a couple of hours to wash the cars, he occasionally allowed his son to help him. Little Billy was only five, but was a bright and helpful little boy. He adored the big cars and would pester his father to let him help, just so he could sit in the back and smell the richness of the leather and polished walnut.

It was Billy who found the metal thing when his father was cleaning out the boot of the car. Not that it was dirty or even looked as if it might get dirty.

On seeing it he grabbed it and lifted it out of the boot.

“What’s that, Billy?” his father asked.

“Dunno, it was in the boot, dad.”

Neil looked at it and remembered from where it originated.

“Ah, a bit of junk from the farm. Go put it in the bin, there’s a helpful chap, Billy.”

Billy headed towards the dustbins, holding both the knobs on the ends of the C. The metal warmed slightly and suddenly became pliable, bending almost like a piece of stiff rope. Billy stopped and made it go in a straight line, like a rod. As soon as he took his hands off it, it reverted to the ‘C’ shape.

“Wow!” he said to himself. “That’s good.”

Instead of throwing it away, he went indoors and put it in his wardrobe in a box with his other special things. One was an old bomb-sight that his father had given him from a German bomber that had been shot down near where he’d been stationed in the RAF during the war. There was also his father’s box of soldiers, an old steel, British army helmet, a Lee Enfield bayonet and a box of used .303 cartridge cases.

Over the next few years, he looked at them occasionally, with friends or even by himself. He never managed to get it to change shape again, so once he left home for university, he forgot about them all. The box was placed in the attic with a lot of other stuff, and William Baldwin managed to live for fifty more years without them.

Three

Heathrow Airport   January 2009.

The British Airways flight from Accra was full, as always. Having taken off at a minute or so before midnight on the previous evening, it was early morning as the weary travellers walked the marathon distance to the immigration all to line up for their passports to be checked.

Most of the non-Europeans wore inadequate clothing for the freezing temperatures outside, so the British winter was about to be a shock to many of them.

Shortly before reaching the hall, the dark young man in the crumpled suit and the elegant young Asian woman in western dress split up. He dropped back and allowed her to walk on ahead, alone.

Clutching a Portuguese EU passport, he joined the line for EU citizens. She was ahead of him, to the right in the British passport queue, but in the automated scanning line. Only those people with the microchip in their passports could access these machines.

He watched as she approached the machine, went through the procedure of placing the passport in the right position, and to stand in the correct place for the robot to take her photograph. As she walked through, she did not look at him. He breathed a sigh of relief and approached the front of the queue.

It was his turn.

He walked forward, and handed his passport to the girl at the desk. She wore a new uniform of the Border Agency. The last time he came through, they were all in civilian clothes. This was definitely more intimidating.

She scanned the passport, examined the photograph and stared at him, openly determined to find fault.

“Mr Gomez, your reason for coming to the UK?”

“Work; my company is looking at expanding into the UK.”

“What is it that you do?”

“We trade in herbs and spices not normally available in Western Europe; most of ours come from West Africa and further afield. You have a lot of Asian spices, but not necessarily from other places.”

“How long will you be here?”

“Just until I can make the contacts and see if there is a good potential market.”

She stared at him for a moment, then, with a half shrug, stamped his passport and handed it back.

“Enjoy your stay; next!”

The man called Ben Gomez did not allow himself to relax until he was down in the baggage hall. Indeed, he went to the toilet and sat in a cubicle and shook for a moment. Then, he washed his hands and face, and breathed in and out a few times.

With a smile of triumph, he left the toilet, found a trolley and joined his female companion next to the baggage carousel.

“Okay?” she asked.

“Finally,” he said, smiling for the first time.

She simply nodded and they stood in silence watching for their cases.

Benjamin Gomez’s real name wasn’t Ben Gomez. It was a Portuguese name, but Ben had no Portuguese blood, neither had he ever been anywhere near any Portuguese colony or country where the language was spoken.

He chose the name because it was common in West Africa, up to the Mediterranean, and within Europe itself, not to mention the myriad of islands that Portuguese sailors landed on and fornicated with the native girls.

Most people called Gomez were, like him, of dark Mediterranean, Arabic, or Middle Eastern appearance, and so no one would question his heritage.

He chose Ben because of the Jewish origins, and nobody looked for a Jewish, Islamic terrorist. His real name was Mohammed Mehmet Khan, but he hadn’t used that since he was fifteen. His real nationality was vague, as he was technically a Palestinian, but he had never been there either.

His parents were Palestinian activists who had gone to Lebanon in the eighties, and then to Syria, and then to Pakistan by way of Afghanistan. They had spent time in Libya and even Iraq. Ben was born in Syria, long before the civil war. In those days, Syria was actively opposed to the Zionist state of Israel and their American and other western allies.

Ben met Shamin in college in Pakistan a couple of years ago. Ben was not actually studying at the University of Karachi, but he used the facilities whilst pretending to be a student. The security measures were laughable, and he was actively working to recruit people to the cause.

He called himself Akram in those days, and he liked Shamin the first time he saw her in the library.

Ben’s parents were killed by a joint operation against an insurgent’s stronghold by Afghanistan soldiers, with support from American troops and British air support.

He had been in Syria at the time, helping set up a training unit to train Islamic militant volunteers to fight for their cause. It wasn’t as if he was a fanatical Islamist, as he wasn’t convinced there was any God at all, whether he be Allah, or the Jewish Yahweh. He had read somewhere that the Christian God was supposed to be in three parts. How did that work?

Actually, religion had nothing that Ben wanted in life. The religious fanatics were mad, in his eyes. However, they wanted to bring death to the Jews, Americans and the British, so in that they were agreed. The fanatics, however, had the resources and means to take the fight to the enemy. Not that Ben had ever considered what his ultimate aim was, simply to bring death to people like those who killed his parents. His motive was simply revenge. He had no idea as to the actual soldiers responsible, neither did he care. These people were sent by their governments, and the people selected the government, so it was on the people he would reap revenge.

He was only twenty-two at the time but looked younger, so he was a perfect choice to head off to recruit intelligent and educated people to send into these infidel nations to obtain a useful place in society and then launch a coordinated attack on the unsuspected underbelly of these monsters – the fat and unbelieving civilian population.

Pakistan was an ideal hunting ground. There was a huge Pakistani population in the UK; many were already UK citizens, and some held dual nationality. Even at the university, there were many students holding British passports, of which most were of Pakistani origins, and all were Moslems.

Shamin was one of these. Ben had learned English, but not to a good standard. Many of the educated people spoke English in Pakistan, as they did in India. For this reason, Africans and UK Pakistanis came here to study as it was a lot cheaper than in the UK or US.

She was actually studying psychology, as her father wanted her to become some type of doctor. Actually, he hoped to marry her off to a friend’s son, as the friend was a very wealthy and influential man, but he knew that Shamin was too English, and would refuse to comply. Not that she was anti-arranged marriages as such, she was actually extremely socialistic in attitude, and opposed wealth being held by individuals when there was so much poverty being experienced by so many.

By sending her to Pakistan to study, her father hoped she might embrace some of the culture and be more amenable to his plans.

He hadn’t taken Akram, or Ben, or whatever his name was, into account.

It started with a conversation about some of the gruesome news reports that hit the TV on the previous days. It became clear that Shamin might be as pretty as a picture; a slight and rather dainty-looking girl, she was anything but in her heart.

Ben actually flinched in the tirade of anti-capitalist rhetoric that came from her like steam coming from an over-pressurised boiler.

She suddenly looked more attractive from every perspective.

It was easy for him to spout similar anti-western feelings, with which she was able to identify a fellow believer immediately.

They became lovers after three days. After a week, as he shared his plans (such as they were) she became his first recruit. Her first task was to re-write his plans, as he had wanted to go to America.

“America is too far and they are totally neurotic over people like us. Britain is a soft touch. They are so terrified of upsetting anyone with a dark skin, we will be able to walk in and do whatever we want. It is totally corrupted and needs to understand the reality of life!”

The new plan was for her to complete her final year, and then return to Britain and get a legitimate job there. He was able to acquire, at some cost to his sponsors, illegal papers with which he planned to accompany her, followed, after a few weeks or months, by some other recruits, who had yet to be trained.

With the cell firmly entrenched in Britain, they would sit tight and become the epitome of good little immigrants.  Then, with time on their side, they could select their target(s) and wait for the best time to strike.

These were not mindless martyrs, but committed fighters who intended to live to run away and to destroy lives another day.

They collected their bags and walked towards the arrivals concourse.

“My father will be waiting for me, so he mustn’t see you. Go to the Underground station and take the train to Earls Court. You have the map to the Balmoral Hotel, so go there and wait for me to call. It might be a couple of days, as I need to get us somewhere safe,” she said, just before they went through the last doors and into the public domain.

“What about the money?” he asked.

“Keep it safe. I will come and get you when I find us a place. We can pay for it then.”

She kissed him on the cheek and walked through the doors ahead of him.

Not only her father, but it looked like her whole family were there to greet her. He ignored them and walked past, heading for the elevators and escalators to the underground station. He was very nervous, but also excited. This was what he had dreamed of.

Suddenly, his excitement gave way to fear, as two heavily armed police officers approached him rapidly. He couldn’t move, so stood stock-still unable to take his eyes from their machine guns.

They brushed past, heading off into the crowd behind him. He felt slightly sick, but was able to force himself to walk onwards.

These were nothing like the khaki cad bullies who police most of the places in which he had lived so far. These were wearing more equipment than most of the soldiers in Pakistan: body armour, pistols, the HK MP5s, CS spray and auto-lock batons. These were not the fat, lazy infidels of which he had read. Perhaps this might not be as easy as he had imagined.

Just before he descended into the depths, he glanced back and saw Shamin leave with her family around her. He already felt more alone than at any time in his life.

Four

England.........Spring 2009.

“I'm sorry Mr Baldwin, but there's nothing for you today,” the girl said.

William Baldwin sighed, ran his hands through his thinning hair and thanked her, putting the phone down.

“Well?” Carrie asked from the kitchen.

They'd celebrated their silver wedding anniversary just five weeks ago, three days before he was made redundant.

“Nothing.”

“I'm sorry, love. Have you tried the thingy agency?”

“I've tried them all, and no bugger wants a fifty-nine year old with bags of management experience just as everyone is downsizing and releasing staff left, right and centre.”

Carrie tried so hard not to let her concerns show, as she knew her husband was trying as hard as he could to get a job. She just felt he was being a little choosy. After all, he'd been offered an office administrator's job that paid twenty thousand and he turned it down, as he was used to earning four times that.

Their few saving graces were that they'd all but paid the mortgage; their two children had left home after completing university, so they weren't as desperate as many.

However, William recently had a health scare, in that he had a heart murmur and was in the middle of a series of tests and consultations with a specialist. Coupled with the stress of losing his job, Carrie was very worried about him.

“I'm going to take Compo for a walk, as I need to clear my head,” he muttered. Compo, the Jack Russell, on hearing the magic ‘w’ word, was off the sofa and waiting by the back door.

Carrie sat on the sofa and cried, as she hated seeing him so hurting. Just after he’d left, the telephone rang. It was William’s sister Linda. She and her husband lived at Cookham, in a nice house overlooking the Thames. Carrie wasn’t that fond of Linda, as she felt that her sister-in-law was a snotty bitch. For the sake of her husband, she was always pleasant to her.

William’s father, Neil, had died five years ago aged eighty-four. His mother had been three years her husband’s junior, and had stayed on in the home that had been bequeathed to them by a grateful employer. John Parnell had died of cancer aged seventy-nine and had left his elderly chauffeur a house and one hundred thousand pounds for thirty years loyal service.

Indeed, it was John Parnell’s generosity that had enabled Neil to send all three of his children to university and to see them in good jobs and settled before he died. William went into management for an engineering firm in West London, while Linda became a consultant for a promising interior design company and married a financial adviser called Graham. Billy’s brother John (named after Neil’s employer) had been the baby and he was now a head teacher of a grammar school in Amersham, Buckinghamshire.

“Hello Carrie, it’s Linda. Is Billy there?”

“No, he’s just popped out with Compo,” Carrie sad, sensing that Linda was upset.

“It’s Mum, she’s been rushed into hospital with chest pains and breathing difficulties.”

Oh God, not another thing! Carrie thought.

“How long ago?” she asked.

“I just got the call. I tried to get hold of John, but he’s busy. Graham is in Brussels again, so I’m heading to the hospital with Kenneth now. I was hoping that Billy would meet me there.”

“He shouldn’t be too long, Linda. I’ll tell him as soon as he comes in,” Carrie said, reluctant to share their own problems with an already distraught sister-in-law.

Billy and Carrie lived in a small village in Buckinghamshire called Denham, on the outer fringe of West London. They'd moved here because his previous office had been in Acton, and this was an easy distance for commuting straight down the A40. After getting married, they had lived in Ealing, but both had become fed up with the hustle and bustle of London, so it had been an easy decision some twelve years ago.

Then, life had been good. He had been a successful manager of a branch of a big Multi-national Engineering Corporation. His salary had given them a good standard of living and paid for things like school fees, expensive cars and lovely holidays. Therefore, the slide after being made redundant had been that much harder. They had some savings and investments, but they wouldn't last forever.

He hadn’t shared with his wife that the specialist told him that the arteries feeding his heart needed a triple bypass otherwise it was 78% likely that he would suffer a massive heart attack within twelve months. Carrie knew he was having heart problems, but not the extent to which he required surgery.

He walked into the country park and wandered aimlessly for half an hour. His mind was turning over many things, not least his personal demon, his health.

He did what he always had done. He shrugged it off and buried the fear deep in his subconscious. He made his way home.

Carrie met him at the door with the news of his mother.

He got to the hospital in time. He found his sister and nephew, Kenneth, sitting in the A & E holding his mother’s hand. They had not yet managed to secure a bed in the High dependency Unit.

“Oh, Billy!” Linda exclaimed and collapsed on him, crying. He peered over her shoulder at the still form of his mother on the bed.

She was still in her nightdress and wore an oxygen mask over her face. A urinary catheter tube disappeared up into her groin and ended in a bag by the bed. Several IV tubes fed into her arm from a variety of plastic bags. A heart and breathing monitor bleeped and did what monitors do.

She was breathing in short raspy movements. He didn’t think she looked like his mother.

“What did the doctor say?” he asked.

“They think she’s got pneumonia. The pain is fluid on the lungs.”

“When did this start?”

“I saw her on Sunday for lunch. She was fine then. She had a bit of a sniffle, but claimed to be okay. On Monday she called the doctor who told her to take some Ibuprophen and keep drinking fluids. I popped in on Tuesday and she said she didn’t feel like eating. I noticed her breathing was a bit wheezy, but she told me that I was fussing. I offered to take her to the doctor, but she said she was fine. You know how she was. Anyway, I asked her neighbour to keep an eye on her, and it was she who called the ambulance today. She’d fallen going to the loo, possibly sometime in the night.”

While she was telling him the tale of woe, two doctors came over. The older one introduced himself as the senior consultant.

“Your mother is very sick,” he said.

They could both gather that.

“I have to be honest; it’s not uncommon for people of your mother’s age to fail to recover from an infection like this. But we’ll do all we can. I just think that perhaps you should prepare yourselves for the possibility that she may not get better.”

“You mean she’ll die?” asked William, disliking the man’s inability to say it as it is.

“I’m afraid so.”

That started Linda wailing again.

The doctor muttered some inanities and wandered off. A nurse bustled up and said she had to attend to things. She asked them to step out of the way as she pulled the curtain round the bed.

“How long have you been here?” he asked his sister.

“I’m not sure, a couple of hours.”

“Why don’t you go and ring Graham in Brussels and let him know and then grab a coffee?”

“Are you sure?”

He smiled, squeezing her hand.

“Of course. I’ll sit with her. If it’s going to be the end, then at least one of us will be here.”

The nurse pulled back the curtains and smiled at them.

“All tickety-boo now. We’re trying to get her a bed in the HDU, so it might not be long,” she said.

Linda kissed her mother, as if she knew she would never see her again alive. Then she bustled out of the A&E, grateful for the release for a while. Kenneth lingered for a moment, staring bleakly at his grandmother on the bed.

“That doesn’t look like her,” he said.

“No, you’re right, she doesn’t.”

“I’ve never seen a dead person,” the lad said.

“Well, let’s hope you don’t have to just yet.”

The boy almost smiled, but then just nodded and followed after his mother. William watched him go. He was a pleasant lad, a bit wet, though; didn’t have a lot of get up and go, but William didn’t think kids today did.

William sat on the ubiquitous plastic chair and took his mother’s hand.

He had no regrets, as he had a good relationship with both his parents. He just felt an overwhelming feeling of sadness weigh him down. If she died and he was unable to get a job, and then his heart.......

The wave of depression hit him like an express train.

At that moment the monitor attached to his mother sounded an alarm.

His next clear and conscious thought was of confusion. That might sound daft, but one moment he was by his mother’s bedside, and the next he was in a hospital bed looking up at his distraught wife.

“Oh God, Billy?”

He frowned, wondering what had happened, but then a tall man with a dark face and a white coat stepped into view.

“Mr Baldwin, I must tell you that you’ve had a heart attack. Your mother, I’m sad to say, passed away and we suspect the shock of that triggered your attack. You’re stable now, but you need a by-pass operation as a matter of urgency.”

“Mum’s dead?” he asked. Carrie nodded, sobbing into her handkerchief. William knew it wasn’t for his mother.

He shrugged, strangely relieved that the old girl didn’t have to see him like this.

“She had a good innings and she’ll be happy to be with dad again,” he said, which made Carrie wail the harder.

“Your brother is coming in, and so we’d like you to rest now.”

Billy took Carrie’s hand.

“It’ll be all right, love; you’ll see.”

John arrived to find his sister Linda and the sixteen year old Kenneth in the relatives’ room. John resembled their mother more than their father, while Billy was not unlike old Neil. Kenneth was like neither of his parents. He was a tall lad, but slender and fine of feature. Linda had dark brown hair, greying now. Graham, on the other hand, was almost totally bald. No one was quite sure where Kenneth’s fair hair came from, until Billy remembered that their mother had been fair. She went grey at an early age, so none of them remembered.

“What’s happened?” he asked.

Linda dissolved in tears, so Kenneth had to tell his uncle what had transpired.

“Grandma’s died and Uncle Bill had a heart attack.”

“Bloody hell, when?”

“Just after grandma died, they said. It was the shock or something like that.”

“Is he all right?”

“Um, I think so, but the doctor said something about a by-pass.”

“Where’s mum?” John asked.

“In a side room; they said we can see her if we want, but Mum said we’ll wait for you.”

The trio went along to speak to the A&E sister, who took them to where their mother was laid out in the side room.

“She looks peaceful, now,” John said.

“She looks better than she did earlier; more like she used to look like. She looks asleep,” said Kenneth.

Linda just cried.

“This is a rum do; where’s Bill?”

“He’s in A&E waiting for a bed in the cardio unit.”

They sat in silence with the dead woman for a couple of minutes.

“Still, she’ll be glad to be with Dad again,” said John.

“That’s just what Uncle Bill said.”

“At least it was quick.  It’s the lingering death I don’t want.”

Linda cried some more.

The nurse came in with a green carrier bag.

“I’m sorry for your loss, Mr Baldwin, Mrs Frost. These are your mother’s personal affects. Please let me know if there’s anything we can do at this sad time.”

John thanked her and took the bag. The nurse stayed for a moment, but as there did not seem to be any questions, she told them about what they had to do, having included a card with a number of the bereavement service at the hospital.

“Please call and make an appointment. They’ll issue the certification and tell you what you have to do to register the death.”

John felt tears sting his eyes at the mention of the death certificate. It was so final.

“Thanks,” he managed to grunt.

The nurse smiled and left them alone.

“Have you seen Bill?” he asked his sister.

She nodded, still crying.

“Is Carrie here?”

Kenneth said, “Yes, she with him.”

“I’ll go see if the old sod is all right, I suppose. Are you coming?” he asked Linda.

She shook her head.

“I want to stay with mum for a minute or two. Take Kenneth, if you like. I want to be alone,” she said.

Kenneth went with his uncle, back along to A&E.

“Are you okay?” John asked.

“I suppose.”

“How’s school?”

“All right.”

“Got a girlfriend yet?”

Kenneth frowned; every time John saw him he asked the same stupid questions.

“No, not yet.”

“You’ve plenty of time.”

They arrived at Bill’s booth in A&E to find two porters and the nurses busy preparing to move him. He looked rather grey under the oxygen mask.

Carrie was crying quietly, out of the people’s way. She almost smiled for her brother-in-law and nephew.

“How is he?”

“Stable, but he needs an urgent by-pass. Apparently he was told this by the specialist a while ago, and kept it to himself.”

John frowned.

“Why?”

“He didn’t want to worry me. What with being made redundant and now his mother…” she tailed off, crying again.

The staff nurse approached him

“Hello, are you family?”

“I’m his brother.”

“Good, then we’re moving him up to the cardio ward. The specialist has seen him and it looks as if he’ll be detained for possible emergency surgery. He needs a triple by-pass.”

“Is he critical?”

“Not exactly; it is serious, but he’s in the right place. I understand he was on the list, so this way he’ll get done a little quicker.”

“Do we need to stay?”

“That’s up to you. He’s been sedated and is on various drugs to assist the blood flow. If I were you, I’d go home. We’ll call if there’s any news or change. I understand you’ve had a rough day?”

“That’s one word for it. Thank you.”

She smiled briefly; that smile that busy professionals give when they know you’re hurting and there’s nothing they can really do to help.

“Give it half an hour and then you can ring the ward direct for any updates,” she said, writing a phone number on a piece of paper. “This is the direct line to the ward.”

Moments later, there was a new bed rolled into where Billy had been and the three of them had to move away. They regrouped with Linda in the relative’s room with the dead woman.

“Graham is on his way, Carrie; do you want to come and stay for a while?” Linda asked.

“I don’t know what I want. I think I’d rather go home, but I’m not sure I want to be alone just now. It’s closer to the hospital where I am, and then there’s Compo. I can’t just leave him.”

“I’ll come and stay for a day or so, if you’d like, Aunt Carrie?”

“Won’t your mother need you?”

“As Mum said, Dad’s on his way home, so he’ll probably get there before us. I’m on school holidays, so I’ve got my iPad, so I can revise and stuff just as easy with you than at home.”

“I’ll follow you back to Cookham, then,” said John. “I can collect your stuff and take you back to Denham before going home.”

“Are you sure, John?”

“It’s the least I can do. I’m on holiday too, or as much as a headmaster ever can be.”

So, as Billy slumbered in a drug-induced sleep, his family tried to deal with the double whammy of a bereavement and serious illness. Of all this he was blissfully unaware.

Carrie did not like to admit it, but she was grateful that young Kenneth had come home with her. He was a nice young lad: easy-going and not difficult to deal with. Billy often said he was a bit wet or a bit of a poof, but she found Kenneth a nice-looking boy who was polite and respectful.

Their eldest son, David, was working for a company in Singapore, in the Far East. He’s been there for three years, and adored the life. He was a computer genius, having sailed through his university doing IT and system management. To be perfectly honest, Carrie had no idea what he did. He just worked with computers; that’s all she knew.

Melissa, two years younger than David, had recently left University and was in America. It was supposed to be a six month break, but it had been over a year now. She had gone as a tourist, but was offered a job in LA. She was a designer, specifically in fashion, but had been prepared for a struggle to find a job in the UK, which was why she took a break when she could at least afford it.

She had fallen into the job by accident. She’d been staying with a friend she had met skiing in Colorado. This girl’s mother was a fashion designer for some of the rich and famous. Melissa had seen some of the designs and obviously started talking shop.

Having a portfolio on her laptop meant that Georgia (the mother) was able to see what Melissa was capable of.

Two months later she applied for her green card, having been sponsored by Georgia and was now working for her in one of the most prestigious companies in California.

Carrie had spoken to both the children, and told them emphatically not to come home. Billy would be devastated knowing that they’d had to drop everything for his sake.

“If things get bad, then I’ll call, but in the meantime, just watch and wait,” Carrie had told them on Skype, when they last spoke.

Kenneth sat on the floor of his bedroom at his aunt’s house playing with Compo. He liked it here, as it was away from his mother for a while, and he adored the dog. The feeling was quite mutual, as no one paid as much attention to him as did Kenneth.

Kenneth and his parents had a Jack Russell called Basil, who was a litter-brother of Compo. Their friends, the Standens, had a Jack Russell bitch called Lucy who had a litter of six, and the two boys were slow in finding homes, so Linda and Carrie took one each.

Recently, both his parents had been ‘on at him’ for various things. In the main he felt they were anxious for him to fulfil their expectations of him, rather than encourage him to explore and attempt to fulfil his own.

He felt quite melancholy, which was not uncommon. It wasn’t the fact his grandmother was dead, as he had not been that close to her. He saw her at family gatherings, and that was about it. He had not been that close to his uncle, who now lay ill in hospital, as he actually found Uncle Bill rather a dinosaur in his attitudes.

Kenneth was a slender youth, with rather too long hair and a definite effeminate air. He was an arty child, much to his father’s disappointment. Graham was a rugger-chap, who had only just stopped playing it due to time constraints. Kenneth was not into team sports, enjoying swimming and partaking in badminton, if pushed.

Although he dearly wanted to, Kenneth was unable to pursue his own fulfilment, for that would require a complete change in gender. He was as convinced now as he had been when aged just four that he should have been a girl. When however, one is the only child of ambitious parents, it is tougher than tough to voice one’s feelings.

He had, in the naivety of youth, expressed just such a desire when he was around five.

He had been laughed at by both his parents, and the idea pooh-poohed as being the ‘silly notions of a child!’ he had tried again when around nine, and then again at twelve. Each time both parents became quite cross and told him he was being ridiculous, as boys just didn’t become girls, unless they were very sick. Kenneth didn’t feel sick. He hadn’t voiced the feeling again for a while, despite it taking over almost every waking moment.

It was so ever pervasive that he had no particular desire to formulate any form of ambition, as it was all so irrelevant somehow. If he couldn’t be a girl first, then nothing else mattered.

He tried dressing in his mother’s clothes when alone in their home. He received a little thrill, that aroused him, but it was the image of what he could have been rather than the clothes or their feel on his skin.

He had not repeated the experience, as it just brought it home what he was really like and what he was missing.

He had few friends. The boys tended to call him names and treat him like something odd, which he admitted that he probably was. The girls didn’t like him because he wasn’t what they looked for in boys. A few of the odd-ball girls saw in him the lonely and sensitive person that they were, and because they were on the fringes themselves, they tended to band together for a bit of companionship.

Now he had the house to himself, as his aunt had set off early for the hospital. Left in charge of Compo, Kenneth was almost happy.

He liked their house; it was big and rambling, with many places to explore. Today, he decided to explore the one place he had never managed to get to, the attic.

It took him a while, as there was a lot of junk in this house. But, in a small wooden box, which had once brought fruit from some distant part of the Empire, he found a really odd collection of bits that intrigued him.

The small box of old .303 shells was of not much interest, and neither was the old bomb-sight. The bayonet and helmet were in quite good condition, so Kenneth idly wondered how much these were all worth.

There was a small box of metal soldiers, lead probably that pre-dated even his grandparents. They looked to be WW1 soldiers marching.

He almost ignored the strange ‘c’ shaped object, but when he put the box back, it fell out and landed with a thump at his feet. He picked it up, surprised as to how light it was.

As with everyone who saw it, he wondered what it could be. It was rather like a torc that one of his RPG characters wore in one of his games. She was a thief and sorceress, and she wore the magic torc that gave her invisibility.

Kenneth was only truly happy when being in character as the girl. None of his on-line co-players suspected that he wasn’t a real girl, and that really pleased him.

He turned it over in his hands, disappointed that he could see no Celtic runes on the item.

If it was meant to go round a neck, then it was not pliable enough for him to open it. He held the two orbs at each end. To start with, he thought he was imagining things, as the whole torc started warming up. However, just as his grandfather had discovered, after a few moments, it suddenly seemed to soften and became pliable.

It opened with no difficulty, so he wrapped it around his neck and released the orbs.

It closed slightly, just enough so it would not come off. It stayed warm. Unbeknown to him, it was now activated and aligning with his DNA.

He was about to try to take it off again, when he saw a large trunk at the end.  It was a leather trunk, and seemed very old.

It was covered in dust, indicating that it hadn’t been opened or even moved for a long time.

The catches were stiff, but opened after a little sweat. Inside were several items, all covered in very thin paper.

Carefully, he investigated by taking out the first item and carefully peeking under the paper.

They were all items of women’s clothing. Most were evening dresses, carefully folded. As he investigated further, he found that the top six dresses were all held in an insert-tray that sat on the top part of the trunk, with other items possible kept below.

He lifted out the tray and found two compartments below. In one, were lady’s underwear, foundation garments and stockings. In the other, were ancient cosmetics: bottles, tubs and tubes. Most were dried up and useless, but then he saw a red, leather box, like a hat box. In it he discovered a long, blonde wig made out of human hair.

It was at this point he began to feel strange; not ill, or unwell, just very odd. He felt faintly dizzy, almost as if he was on the deck of a moving ship. He sat down on an old chair. It helped, a bit. Then the itches started; nothing serious, just a sort of tickly tingle. It started at the top of his head and seemed to travel down his head to his neck, across his shoulders and down his arms and torso. It stayed in his groin and abdomen for quite a while, almost becoming uncomfortable. Just as he began to panic, it moved on down his legs to his feet and then gradually disappeared.

He sat there for a moment, rather breathless and confused.

Was he allergic to the dust?

That was it; he was having an allergy attack. Connie Rogers, a friend at school, got terrible asthma whenever dust or grass pollen floated around, so it must be something like that.

He sat for a moment, feeling slightly better. The tingles had gone, the dizziness had passed. Idly he felt slight discomfort from his chest, as if his shirt was scratching, somehow. Without looking, he moved his right hand up to alleviate the feeling and then he stopped dead.

Without moving anything else, he looked down. He felt almost that his heart had stopped, for suddenly, there, on his chest was a perfectly formed pair of female breasts, pushing out his tee shirt like a couple of enthusiastic puppies. The nipples protruded, bringing the thin material to two points.

“Wha…?” he said, aloud. Then he clamped one hand over his mouth.

How had his voice changed?

Even to his ears, he sounded like a girl.

Then hardly daring to hope, he thrust his hand down the front of his jeans.

“Yes!” the girl shrieked. “Oh, my God; I’m a girl; I’m a girl; I’m a girl! Yes!”

In one unbelievable moment, she realised that all her dreams had come to fruition.

How?

Her hand immediately went to the torc at her neck. It was still warm, the same temperature as was she. It was a magic torc! No, it couldn’t be.

“There’s no such thing as magic; is there?” she asked the empty attic. Unsurprisingly, the attic didn’t reply. Placing her hands to the two orbs once more, she held them. The torc became pliable and she was able to remove it.

As soon as she felt the tingles start, she replaced the torc, so she remaining as a female.

“Okay,” she announced to the attic. “If it’s on, then I’m a girl, but if I take it off, I’m a boy again.”

How it worked was of no consequence to her. The single fact that it did was all she cared about.

She immediately stripped off her hated boy’s clothing and for an hour, she became a fashionable debutante wearing her grandmother’s clothes from the chest. Actually, they might even have been from the generation before that. She didn’t care, for she was in heaven for the first time in her life.

She had the body she had always wanted, and was able to be free for the first time ever.

Free?

She was hiding in an attic and knew that before long she would have to become the boy again.

That was not free, not by any stretch of the imagination.

No, this had to be planned and dealt with very carefully. There were too many people to upset and too much at stake. Done wrongly, she could be separated from the torc and doomed to a life of misery.

Reluctantly, she took off the clothes, and packed them all away as neatly as she could. She closed the trunk, and pushed it back to where she had found it.

She then left the attic, still wearing the torc.

Her first port of call was her aunt and uncle’s bedroom. For there she knew there was a three-door wardrobe, the doors of which were made of mirrors.

She stood, naked, in front of the mirror, marvelling at the miracle that had befallen her.

She then sat on the end of the bed opening her legs. Yes, it was a vagina. As far as she could see, and from the limited distance to which her probing fingers could reach, it was a vagina like so many others. It was sensitive, too, or at least one little button was.

For the first time in her hour and a quarter of existence, the girl who now called herself ‘Keira’ masturbated and experienced a multiple female orgasm.

She realised, without any doubt that her ambition was now to find a man who could fuck her brains out.

She smiled, as that thought was exceedingly dirty and base, and yet, at this precise moment, if a personable young man had walked into the room, she would have opened her legs and invited him in.

Breathless and not a little confused, Keira walked into the bathroom and sat on the bidet. Directing the spout towards her vagina, she played with herself in the water. She told herself she was washing the excess moisture away, but she had too much fun to justify that excuse.

Once cleaner and dry, she tried on some more contemporary clothing of her aunt’s, paying particular attention to the underwear. Then, feeling guilty, she undressed and replaced the clothes as best she could.

She then dressed in her old tee shirt and jeans, posing in the mirror. She was tempted to apply some makeup, but actually she didn’t need to. She looked feminine enough without any, particularly with her hair brushed out and down, instead of back.

Her breasts, although not enormous, were big enough and there was no doubt as to her shape. She had changed beyond all recognition; even her face was a feminine version of Kenneth. This wasn’t necessarily that much of a feat, as Kenneth was not exactly the most macho of young men in the first place. He did, however, have a rather prominent Adams Apple and a square chin. These had now vanished, almost instantly.

The realisation that she could not be like this all the time made her feel really melancholy.

“Just until I finish school!” she said aloud again, once more marvelling at the sound of her voice.

Downstairs, Compo barked, so she went to the window and looked out. A delivery van was on the drive and a young man in a baseball cap was walking to the back of the van.

Feeling brave and slightly excited, Keira walked downstairs and, after shutting Compo in the kitchen, was ready to open the door as soon as the door bell sounded.

“Hi; Mrs Baldwin?” the man asked. He wasn’t English; Polish probably, with an accent like that.

“No, she’s my aunt.”

“She lives here, right?”

Keira wished she was wearing something that exposed some cleavage, so she stretched slightly so her young but ample breasts pushed out the front of her shirt.

“Yeah, but she’s gone to visit my Uncle in hospital.”

“Can you sign?” he said, thrusting a big parcel at her.

“If you like.”

He gave her the small electronic gizmo and directed her to sign with the plastic stylus.

She signed, ‘K. Ambrose.’

“Thanks,” he said, and was gone.

Okay, then maybe not the first personable young man; perhaps the next one?

Five

“Hey Kenneth, wait up!”

Reluctantly, Kenneth stopped and waited for Connie to catch up with him. The school bus that had just dropped them off passed them, heading to the next drop-off point in Cookham.

Connie was slightly plump, but still quite pretty, if it wasn’t for her thick spectacles and uncontrollable, frizzy hair. She was about Kenneth’s only friend, as he was hers. They were both misfits, but for different reasons. Kenneth didn’t want to be around people because he knew he was the wrong gender, while Connie was so desperate to be liked that she put people off. Kenneth initially felt sorry for her, so unwittingly sent her the wrong messages. Connie now believed that Kenneth was her boyfriend.

“What’s the rush?” she asked, breathless.

He shrugged.

“I just want to get home.”

“I thought you hated it at home?”

He shrugged again and resumed walking.

“Have I done anything to upset you?” the girl asked.

“Nope.”

“Are you sure? I mean, you seem to be avoiding me.”

“I’m avoiding everyone.”

“Why?”

“I want to be alone.”

“Why?”

“Coz I do.”

He walked quickly and said no more. Connie wheezed a bit, but kept up with him. Eventually he stopped, turned and looked at her.

“Look, what’s with always wanting to be with me?” he asked.

It was her turn to shrug.

“I thought you liked me.”

“I do, Connie, but I don’t need to be with you all the time.”

“You’re not; most of the time you’re by yourself. Most boys want to be with their girlfriends.”

He sighed, knowing what she felt about him.

“Look, Connie, I’m not like the other guys. I like you, but not like that.”

“Are you gay?” she asked, fearing the worst.

He sighed again, as this was the conclusion everyone drew.

“If I let you in on a secret, will you swear never to reveal it, even under torture?”

Her eyes widened a little, but she nodded rapidly.

“I swear.”

He looked around, like he imagined a spy would, and then leaned close to her.

“I’m really a girl!” he whispered.

For a moment her eyes widened even more, but then she laughed. It was a funny little laugh, nervous and uncertain.

“No, you’re not!” she said, but with considerable uncertainty in her voice. Kenneth smiled as he heard it.

“Come on, I’ll prove it to you,” he said, and resumed walking.

Five minutes later, they arrived at his house. It was a nice house, much bigger than Connie’s. She liked coming here, as it gave her something to aim for in life.

Using a key, Kenneth opened the front door. Basil, the little Jack Russell came and yapped at him in excitement, so he made a fuss of him. Then he let Basil out into the back garden.

“Are your parents out?”

“Both at work. Dad is away again; Germany, I think. Mum won’t be back until half-five at the earliest.” He paused. “No, it’s Thursday, so she might drive over to her brother’s house to check on how he’s doing. I expect she’ll rollup at about eight or nine.”

“Is that the one who had a heart attack?”

“Uncle Billy, yes. He was discharged a few weeks ago after a triple by-pass operation.”

Connie knew that Kenneth was an only child, as the lad had bemoaned the fact many times.

“I like your house,” she said, looking at a large cabinet with all sorts of exotic ornaments on display.

“Whatever. Wait here, I’ll be back in a minute,” he said, heading from the stairs.

She followed him, as he knew she would. He didn’t care.

She followed him into his bedroom. She had been here several times. She hoped beyond hope that one day he might ask her to join him on the bed.

She sat on it now, still hoping.

“Well, do you want proof, or not?” he asked.

She laughed, still rather uncertainly.

“Do you have a pen?” he asked.

“Why?”

He held out his thumb.

“Make a mark, any mark you like on my thumb,” he said.

She took out a red felt-tip and drew a little heart on his thumb.

“Wait here, I’m going to change,” he said, opening a drawer and taking a metal hoop from it. Leaving the door open, he walked across the landing and into the bathroom. He closed the door.

Connie stood up and walked to the window and looked out to the large garden below. The River Thames flowed majestically past the house at the bottom of the garden. She wished she lived in a house like this. Oh, to have money!

On hearing a noise behind her, she turned and nearly died of fright.

There, in just a bra and panties, and a plain metal thing round her neck, was a very pretty girl who looked a little like Kenneth. Only, unlike the beanpole Kenneth, this girl had a figure that Connie would have happily killed for.

“Shit, you startled me,” she said, but then frowned. “Where’s Kenneth?”

“Ta-da,” said the girl, lifting her arms up in time-honoured show-biz fashion. Then she held out her thumb towards the confused girl.

The truth dawned on Connie like a slow leak of very cold water. There was no one else in the house, and there, on the thumb, was a little red heart.

“I told you, Connie; I’m not like the other boys!”

It was about half an hour before Connie calmed down enough for Keira to be able to explain a little of what she had been through. She did not mention the torc, or how she discovered it. Instead she claimed to have been a girl all along and just hid it from the world.

“Why?”

“My parents are in denial,” she said. “They were only able to have one, and they wanted a boy. They made me pretend to be a boy all this time.”

Connie was gullible, but not that gullible.

“No, that’s bollocks; you’re too different to the Kenneth I was at school with today. How do you do this?”

Keira sighed, working out how she could explain the inexplicable.

“You’ve heard of hermaphrodites, yes?”

Connie nodded.

“Yeah, they’re people born with both a penis and a vagina.”

“Okay, well, I’m like that, only I can control what I am by my mind. If I think I’m a girl I can be one, and likewise revert to being a boy if I concentrate. I can only be one or the other, not both at the same time.”

Connie looked at Keira with that expression that said ‘I don’t believe you.’

“Seriously, it’s all in the mind. You’ve heard of ESP, and telekinesis, well, it’s like that.”

This time Connie laughed.

“Yeah, right, like I believe that!” she said. “Okay, prove it; fly across the room!”

Keira wasn’t quite sure who was more shocked, her or Connie. I mean, it is one thing to talk about it, but a completely different thing to fly across the room.

One minute she was standing by the door, and literally the next second she was across the other side of the room by the wardrobe.

As Keira stood there, somewhat shocked to say the least, Connie wailed and sat on the bed.

“How the fuck did you do that?” she demanded, almost hysterically.

Keira absently raised one hand to the torc around her neck.

“I told you, I have powers,” she said, somewhat hesitantly.

“This is fucking creepy. It’s impossible, that’s what it is!”

Keira turned and looked at her.

“Look, you wanted to know my secret, and now I’ve told you. Do you really want to know the truth, or will you just cry and run away and tell everyone?”

Connie suddenly looked frightened. Keira’s voice held a hint of menace.

“The truth?”

“Can you handle the truth?” Keira asked, rather melodramatically.

“I don’t know,” Connie replied, suddenly feeling less sure that she actually wanted to know.

“That’s honest. Look, this is heavy shit I’m going to tell you. This is real X file stuff, so you either walk away now and that’s it, you just forget everything you’ve seen, or you swear to keep silent and I’ll allow you to know the truth.”

“If I don’t?”

“Don’t what? Keep silent?”

Connie nodded, looking increasingly alarmed.

“I said I have powers, so you’ll suddenly find you won’t remember jack shit, but you won’t know it, because you won’t even know you ever knew it.”

Connie was confused and frightened.

“I need a pee!” she declared.

“Well, truth or mind-wipe?”

“Truth; but can it wait until I’ve had a pee?”

Keira nodded her head towards the bathroom. On entering, Connie immediately saw the window was too small for her to fit through. Instead, she sat and relieved herself.

Part of her was frightened, as she didn’t understand, but a greater part of her was curious, and a little in awe of this strange girl whom she discovered she didn’t know at all.

Keira was enjoying herself. She had no idea where she was going with this, but if the fat girl blabbed, then it would all be proved to be a vivid imagination.

On a whim, she focussed on the PC monitor on his desk in the corner. Then she imagined picking it up through mental power alone. To her delight and surprise, the monitor rose a few inches off the desk, stopping only because the cable reached its limit. She carefully lowered it again.

“Cool!” she said to the empty room.

Connie returned looking less worried.

“Better?” Keira asked.

The other girl nodded.

“Come and sit down.”

It was a very different Connie who walked home about an hour later. Usually, she was a bubbly person, often without good reason. She was one of the world’s optimists. She would be the girl who was given a box of horse poo for Christmas, and believe she had been given a pony, but it was hidden by her parents first, just for her to have fun looking for it.

She walked into the kitchen silently and simply sat down at the table.

Her mother was slightly startled, as normally Connie entered like a mini tornado and never silently.

“Are you ill?” she asked.

“No.”

“What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.”

“Was school okay?”

“What’s with all the questions?” Connie asked testily, standing up and heading to her room.

Her mother heard her door slam. Now she was really worried.

Aston, Connie’s younger brother, grinned and shouted, “Connie’s on the rag!”

Without really thinking, his mother slapped the back of his head.

“Don’t you ever say such a thing again, that is cruel and heartless!” she said, knowing it was also untrue, as Connie wasn’t due for another ten days.

Connie lay on her bed staring at the ceiling.

“Aliens do exist, and I’ve met one!” she told herself. Then she thought about everything she saw the alien do.

“I’m not born of Earth,” Keira had told the gullible Connie, dramatically. “At least, I was actually born on Earth, but I was conceived many light years away. My people are not like you, but through a highly sophisticated seeding programme, we were able to use the womb of a human female who thought she was infertile and by pairing human DNA with our own, I was planted in her womb and permitted to grow with the appearance of being human.”

“S.s.so what do your people look like?”

“Different. We have not possessed organic or corporeal bodies for many millennia.”

That flummoxed Connie.

“You what?”

“We don’t have physical form. My people are pure energy and spiritual beings.”

“Um, if you were born here, how do you know all this?”

“I was ignorant of my origins until quite recently. Through telepathy, my people contacted me and informed me of my origins, my powers and my purpose here among you humans.”

“What’s that?” Connie had asked.

“To serve and protect a weaker and vulnerable species!” Keira had said, barely able to keep a straight face.

“You mean like a superhero?”

“They are just comics, whereas I am real. I have to finish my Earth Education before undertaking my true calling, but I may have to get some experience first, with lesser activities of justice.”

“But why do you have the ability to change sex?”

“Camouflage,” Keira invented on the spot. “You’ve seen superman, and isn’t that pair of specs and a floppy fringe a lousy disguise?  If you have a superhero who is growing up and has yet to master whatever powers that exist, and she’s obviously female, then when you try to find her, you won’t look at any males, will you?”

“Gosh, how clever!”

“You see, up until this point, all my powers were latent, so I just didn’t know I had them. But now I’ve had the call, so to speak; I’m beginning to learn how to master them. It’s a vulnerable time – a time in the old days that lots of people used to be burned as witches, so we learned to hide.”

“You mean you’re not the only one?” Connie asked.

“There’s another safety feature. If there are we won’t know until we’re fully developed and can seek out any others. You see, if we banded together, then we’d be even more vulnerable, and could give the others away unwittingly.”

“That makes sense.”

“I’m almost ready to come out of hiding now, so it’ll soon be time for me to be a girl all the time.”

“How will you cope with school and stuff?”

“I’m not sure; it might be tricky.”

“What about your parents; won’t they be shocked and angry?”

“Probably,” said Keira with a naughty grin. “Now, do you want to see what I can do?”

Connie had just gaped as she watched Keira use only her mental power to lift objects like the next door neighbours’ Jaguar six feet in the air and then lower in again.

“Now you know why I am not exactly encouraging people to get too close to me. You have wanted to be close, so I trust you. If you ever betray me, you will never know what hit you!”

Connie had left at that point, walking home as fast as her legs could carry her.

Meanwhile, the ‘alien’ was having fun discovering just what she really could do.

She had no idea how she managed to do these things, but she did connect it to the torc. She knew she could fly, well, sort of. It was more an exaggerated jump, as if someone switched off the gravity. She could move things by her mind, and possibly throw bolts of energy. So far she’d made a real mess of the fish tank. It had taken ages to clear up, fortunately none had died.  Two rolls of kitchen paper and the hairdryer had managed to dry the carpet, which was just as well, as she discovered she couldn’t dry things with her breath.

As an experiment, she took off the torc, and discovered that without it, Kenneth was powerless. It was a no brainer, so the torc went back on without delay.

She hoped that the story she wove for Connie would have the desired effect. Actually, it was quite useful having a ‘normal’ as a sort of side kick, as there would be things she needed that Kenneth would be unable to acquire, but Connie would be able to purchase without drawing attention to herself.

At present, she planned to become Keira whenever she could, at least once a day. She grinned as she looked forward to leaving school and home. Then she could be Keira all the time!

However, the joy was short-lived. She had to have a strategy to ensure that she could make a seamless transition from Kenneth to Keira without too much hassle. That was a real problem, and one she would have to think carefully about.

She couldn’t just appear one day and announce that she’d been a girl all along; it wouldn’t wash. No, there had to be a way.

Six

After Connie had left her on that first introduction to the torc’s powers, Keira was desperate to know exactly what she was capable of. She was still chuckling about the wild story of the alien impregnation of her mother, and wondered if Connie really was as gullible as she appeared.

On taking off the torc, she steeled herself for the change back. She didn’t actually mind, as she knew that it was only temporary.

Kenneth examined the torc, but found it revealed absolutely nothing about its functions, capabilities or origins. There were no markings, no cracks, seams or any features visible.

The metal was smooth and curved into a ‘C’ that left too small a gap to fit a neck. He tried bending it, and failed. But, when he held the orbs at each end, the metal gradually warmed to his body temperature and very gently it straightened and allowed him to place it back around his neck. Once on, it remained warm and closed gently, so it fitted neatly. There was no way it could be removed, except through decapitation. She wondered if anyone else could make it bend or straighten. She made a mental note to ask Connie to try, just so she knew.

Keira was used to the tingles now, and took them in her stride. She just felt it a shame that she had to hide away indoors when she so wanted to go out and live as a girl.

She held that thought.

She was not exactly the same as Kenneth, so there was nothing stopping her going out of the house. She just had to make sure she was Kenneth when she came home to her parents or met anyone who knew her, him, or whatever.

She wanted to go and buy herself proper girl’s clothes and just do girl’s stuff. She paused, realising that she had nowhere to keep the trappings of a second life. It was bad enough being an only son, but to be so constrained by pushy parents made anything like this hard to manage.

The clothes she wore were all boys’ clothes. She had no decent underwear, and really hadn’t a clue about makeup or anything like that.

Oh! Why was everything so complicated?

She glanced at the clock and swore. It was almost five-thirty, so her mother might be back at any moment. In any case, she needed to get her homework done.

She went back to her room and opened her school case. She groaned, as it was French homework. She didn’t like French, so reluctantly she took out her books and settled at her desk.

She got a small thrill every time she saw her breasts pushing her shirt outwards; equally, when she brushed against something unexpectedly it made it very hard to concentrate. She was about to stop and change back, when she idly read a passage of French.

Miraculously, the passage translated itself in her mind. She tried a different passage, and almost as quickly as she read it, the translation popped into her mind. After doing her homework in about four minutes, she went on the internet and found an Italian website.

As she read a passage, she instantly was provided with an accurate translation. It was the same with a German site, and even a Japanese site.

She placed both hands on her torc.

“You little beauty!” she said, grinning from ear to ear.

“Okay,” she said to herself. “What exactly can you do?”

She took out a piece of paper and began to write.

CHANGE GENDER

TRANSLATE LANGUAGES

ASSIST IN FLYING/LEVITATION/ANTI-GRAVITY?

MOVE OBJECTS/TELEKINESIS

SHOOT BOLTS OF ENERGY?

Then she stopped.

“Is that it?” she said, reading the short list. Actually, just the top one would have done her, she thought, but the others were a neat bonus.

She looked down the list, at each in turn. When Connie had likened her to a comic-book superhero, she had dismissed it, but actually, it wasn’t far from the truth. Yet superheroes were fictional, weren’t they?

Basil the dog sat on the rug, looking at her, hopefully.

“Do you want a walk, Baz?” she asked.

Baz wagged his tail, looking enthusiastic.

Okay, now, what can I wear that is okay for both a girl and a boy? She thought to herself.

In the end, she wore a tee shirt and a pair of shorts. The trainers were plain white and didn’t discriminate, except she thought that her feet were slightly smaller as a girl

She ran down stairs and left a note for her mother, just in case she came home early.

Homework done. Taken Baz for walk.

Leaving it on the kitchen table, she attached a lead to the dog’s collar and led him down the garden to the gate at the bottom. There was a public footpath than ran along the bank of the river, so she turned left and let the dog off the lead. Basil ran on ahead, heading towards the fields.

It was a lovely September day, almost warmer than it had been in July and August, so she enjoyed feeling the sun on her face. She felt the joy of fulfilment bubble up in her chest and released it as a laugh. An elderly couple coming the other way frowned.

“Sorry, but isn’t it a lovely day?” she asked them.

In the end, both smiled and agreed. Remarking how nice it was to see a young person who wasn’t morose and miserable.

“But everything is wonderful!” she said, leaving them staring after her.

She came to where the path entered a field that broadened out with woodland beyond. Basil knew this area intimately and set off to explore the place where he had found rabbits in the past.

Keira sat on the grass and watched the river flow past. Several boats were on the river, the occupants of which waved and nodded amiably at her, which she returned.

Idly she thought about this gift she now possessed. She was intelligent enough to realise that if handled badly then there would be those who would seek to find out what she had and try to take it from her. She regretted letting Connie know, but perhaps that could be turned to an advantage.

She touched the torc with her fingers, wondering how it came to be, and what sort of hands put it together, and why.

Was it an ancient artefact from a lost civilization like Atlantis? Or, was she quite right in thinking it was from an alien visitation to Earth?

She wondered how old it was. There was no indication obvious just by looking at it. The question arose; was it magic or scientific?

She never used to believe in magic, but that was before she could lift a car with the power of a single thought. It didn’t seem heavy or hefty enough to contain such power, but maybe all it did was accentuate power that was already there.

Regardless, she felt an overwhelming gratitude towards the unknown maker or makers. In one crazy moment, her dreams were fulfilled, her prayers answered and her ambitions formulated beyond her imagination.

The world was hers to do what she willed, now, and she was not going to pass up the opportunity.

Using her finger, she pointed at the water and made patterns as if her hand actually touched the surface, while in fact she stood ten feet from the edge. She looked around and saw too many people, either on the water in boats or walking dogs. She wanted to try to see how high and fast she could fly, but knew she’d have to wait until later.

Basil came trotting back after she called him. He did not seem to either notice or mind she was now a girl. She started back, returning along the same path that she had taken to get here.

As she reached the gate, she met her neighbours, Ruth and David Watson with their Labrador - Ben.

“Oh shit!” she muttered. She did not have the time nor the opportunity to take the torc off and allow the few moments to change back.

“Hello Basil,” said Ruth, making a fuss of the little dog who greeted her as an old friend.

“Oh, hello; I thought for a moment you were Kenneth,” she said as Keira approached. “But I see I was wrong. This is Basil, isn’t it?”

“Oh yes. I’m Keira, Kenneth’s friend. He’s at home finishing his homework, so he asked if I could take Basil out.”

“You are very similar to Kenneth, are you related?”  David asked.

“Not that I know of,” she said.

Ben decided to chase a Spaniel, so their attention was diverted. Keira left, breathing a sigh of relief.

“Okay, girl, you just learned something – not in your own back yard!” she said to herself as she walked rapidly home.

Her mother had not returned, so she took off the torc and changed back to normal.

Normal?

No, she changed back to being Kenneth, and couldn’t wait to return to normal; to be Keira.

Linda came home a little before eight, to find Kenneth sitting on the sofa with the dog on his lap, watching TV

“Have you done your homework?” she asked, seemingly distracted.

“Yes, and I’ve fed the dog and had some supper.”

“What did you have?”

“There was some pizza left from yesterday.”

“Oh, was there enough?”

“Not really, so I made a bacon sandwich as well. How’s Uncle Bill?”

“Not too bad. He’s getting stronger each day. He and Carrie went for a walk today, just around the flat bit in the country park. They had a cup of tea at the visitor centre.”

“That’s good.”

“Did you walk Basil?”

Kenneth was about to say that he had, when an idea came to him.

“No, I had some French homework to do, so a friend took him to the woods for me.”

“Oh, what friend; Connie?”

“No, you haven’t met this one; her name’s Keira.”

“Oh, a school friend?” Linda asked as casually as she could. She was beginning to be very concerned over Kenneth, fearing that he might be gay, as he appeared to have no inclination to meet girls; apart from that dreadful Connie, who didn’t count.

“No, she goes to a girls’ school, I think. She lives along the road somewhere. I’m not sure where.”

“Oh? How did you meet?” Linda asked, thinking that Kenneth was being deliberately evasive; as if he was hiding something. She remembered her first boyfriend, of whom she knew her parents would disapprove. She was equally vague and evasive about him.

“She walks dogs as an after school cash earner. She asked if I wanted Baz walked. I told her I couldn’t afford it, so she said she’d do it for nothing if I helped her set up her computer.”

Linda frowned.

How does she know you’re good with computers?”

“She knows Connie, so I guess she told her.”

“Ah!” said Linda, things were becoming clearer now.

“Was Baz all right with her?”

“She never said he wasn’t. She said she met those two from next door with their Labrador, Ben.”

“Who; David and Ruth?”

“Yeah, that’s them. Apparently, they wanted to know if we were related.”

“Why?”

“I dunno, perhaps we look a little alike, I’m not sure.”

“I’d like to meet her; when is she coming around again?”

Kenneth shrugged, pretending to be intent of the TV show.

“Kenneth?”

“Sorry, I’m not sure.”

Linda gave up the interrogation, heading into the kitchen to make herself a cup of coffee.

The kitchen was tidy, as it always was after Kenneth had been there. This was another reason she suspected he might be gay, as he always tidied up and even made his bed every morning. All her friends with teenaged sons complained that they were slovenly, scruffy and unkempt; they never tidied up and left crumbs everywhere. Hell, even Graham, her husband, was like that and he was in his mid-forties.

She and Graham did not communicate as much as they ought to, but they had had a few conversations regarding their son’s possible sexuality. Graham wouldn’t have it that Kenneth might be gay. Despite Linda feeling that it was a distinct probability, her husband denied all the evidence that she listed

“He’s just a sensible boy who’s probably a late developer,” Graham said, repeatedly. He conveniently forgot that by the time he was a year younger than Kenneth, he was avidly attempting to get into Tessa Bryant’s knickers behind the bike sheds.

Linda was still anxious, as to have a gay son would be the kiss of death in the tennis club. She could imagine Amanda bloody Perkins smirking behind her back. Oh, and the indignity of it all if he brought some horrible boyfriend home and had an expectation that they’d accept such a disgusting relationship. She conveniently forgot about her ‘unnatural’ relationship with Yvonne.

She carried her cup into the sitting room and sat on the sofa next to her son. The dog came over to get some love from her.

“Ken?” she started.

Kenneth groaned inwardly. Here it comes again, he thought.

“Mmm?”

“I don’t want to sound naggy or like a typical silly mother, but if there was anything wrong, you would tell me, wouldn’t you?”

“Probably not,” he said.

She hadn’t listened.

“You see, we do love you and want the best for you, but we’d like to know if there’s anything bothering you.”

“Yup, I know, that’s why you’ve consistently ignored me whenever I do share stuff.”

“You see, there are times when a mother knows that something might not be quite right, and, well, if we can help in any way, please let us know.”

Kenneth turned to his mother, who looked embarrassed.

“You want to know if I’m gay, right?”

Linda blushed a bright red.

“Not especially, just anything that might be, you know, not right.”

“So, you’re saying that being gay is not right?”

That silenced her for a moment, but she quickly denied that she didn’t mean not right as in wrong, but not right as in, well, as in ill or something, and managed to dig a deeper hole for herself.

“If it’s any consolation, I’m not gay, in that I am not a boy that is attracted to other boys, okay?”

Relief flooded from her almost tangibly.

“Oh, thank God for that. You have no idea how relieved that makes me feel!” she said.

“Do you remember when I was about five, I told you that I should have been a girl?” he asked, deflating her euphoric moment.

“No, should I remember?” she said.

Linda at first denied, it, but then admitted that she did recall the conversation. She began to experience a feeling of dread; as if she knew what was coming next. She hoped she was wrong. Having one of them would be worse than having a queer as a son. Oh my God, what would they say?

“But that was just silly talk, you were too young to know about such things,” she said.

“I am sixteen; do you think I’m still too young?”

“No dear, I’m not suggesting anything like that.”

“I have, ever since I was about four, been convinced that I should have been female. I told you then, and a couple of times since, and each time you told me I was mistaken and to get those silly notions out of my head. Well, the notions are still there, and, as I’m seventeen next year, I fully intend to explore the possibility of finishing my life as a girl. Every waking moment of every single day I know that I am a girl inside. It even invades my dreams when I’m asleep. Every night when I go to bed, I pray to wake up a girl, and every morning I wake up disappointed. Now, is that what you wanted to know when you asked if anything was wrong?”

Linda was silent, as she just couldn’t think of what to say.

“So, when I say I am not a boy attracted to other boys, you have to believe me. You see, I think that inside, I am a girl, with normal girl feelings that I cannot express or experience because of what’s on the outside and what society demands of me.”

Linda started to say something, but couldn’t find the words.

“I’m sorry if my attempting to find some degree of happiness or fulfilment interferes with your plans for me, but there you go. This is my life, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to allow anyone to make my decisions for me. If I make mistakes, then that’s fine; they’ll be my mistakes, but you can forget whatever you have planned for me, as I’m going to go my own way, come what may.”

“But, your father and I know what’s best for you, dear!” she said.

Kenneth looked at her.

“Does Dad know you and Yvonne Marchart are having an affair?”

Linda went deathly pale.

“If that got out at the Tennis club, it might be worse than having a transgender child. I suggest you get your own house in order before you start organising mine. If there’s nothing else; I’m going to my room. Good night.”

“No, Kenneth, wait; we need to talk!”

Kenneth said nothing, but carried on up the stairs.

Linda stood at the bottom of the stairs and shrieked his name.

“Kenneth!”

He stopped and turned to look at her. She was shocked at the contempt and disgust in his expression.

“Oh, what will we talk about? Getting some psychiatrists who can talk me out of these silly notions perhaps?  I don’t think so. How about the fact you demand of me while you carry on a lesbian relationship behind Dad’s back, thinking nobody knows, and claiming it’s only because he’s been shagging his secretary for months?”

She stared at him.

“No? I didn’t think so. Unless you’re prepared to talk sensibly about what steps I can take to become female, then I think this conversation is over. Every time I have mentioned it, you belittle my feelings and tell me I’m mistaken. Well, I know what I want, and as I’m an adult soon, it seems that I shall prevail, whether you accept it or not. As for whether I’m attracted to boys or girls, I think I’m screwed up enough to bother about such trivialities. I have to get my body in line with my brain before I worry whether I’m a dyke like my mother or like boys.”

Linda still couldn’t think of anything to say. The bottom was in the process of dropping out of her world. She was more concerned over what they would say at the tennis club and of her husband’s reaction, than she was of her hurting son.

Kenneth went up to his room, shutting and locking the door.

With enormous relief, he placed the torc around his neck once more, and became the person she knew she should always have been.

Feeling amazingly calm, she sat and quietly read. Her mother knocked on the door for a few minutes, bleating about having to talk. Keira didn’t answer her. She went from pleading to threatening to crying and shouting. Eventually she went away.

She’d discovered her parents’ indiscretions through her time on the computer and through simple observation. What her parents thought was secure wasn’t, not from someone who was an amateur hacker of some skill. Emails were not the best place to manage an affair, or affairs in her parents’ cases. Okay, they weren’t exactly specific, but even a child of six could read between the lines and figure out what was going on. It was so obvious when one examined the fact that Linda and Yvonne were both the wives of busy men. And yet they seemed to spend an inordinate amount of time together. When Linda had claimed to have been at the tennis club, Kenneth had seen her going into Yvonne’s home and the greeting they had was not just a friendly peck.

Graham never went anywhere without Stephanie, his secretary. She was, admittedly, gorgeous and intelligent. One email said everything, except the fact they’d be fucking, as she had booked them a double room at the hotel in Frankfurt.

In a way, she regretted coming out with it all, but now she knew. Linda’s reaction simply confirmed her suspicions as fact, so she felt a surge of power and she now had a degree of control over them both at a sensitive time in her life.

Still, she did not feel particularly close to her parents, either of them, as neither of them seemed to actually give a damn about their one and only child. If they did, they had a very strange way of showing it.

At around ten, she set her alarm and slid into bed, naked, and went to sleep immediately, at peace and with a smile on her face.

Seven

The alarm buzzed at her bossily for a little while. It was pitch black and the clock’s illuminated digits were the only light.

03:00 it said.

“Shit!” said Keira, but then remembered who she was, and grinned.

She got up, relished for a moment, the feeling of the cool air on her naked body. She felt the excitement and wonderful feeling of completeness bubble up, threatening to break out into joyous laughter. Instead, she controlled it, slipping into a black tee shirt and black jeans. She desperately wanted to get some proper girl’s underwear, and a bra.

That thought stopped her.

A bra.

Such a simple piece of clothing, but the fact that she required one was a huge thing in her life.

The only shoes she had were Kenneth’s school shoes, which were definitely boy’s shoes, and a pair of trainers. The latter would have to do.

She opened the bedroom window and looked down the garden. Carefully, she climbed out of the window and sat precariously on the sill for a moment.

“Okay, this is it!” she said, and mentally prepared to fall into the flowerbed below.

She didn’t fall, but she didn’t exactly soar, either. She floated gently, staying at the same height and not moving much at all.

She looked down and saw the ground about twelve feet below. She was flying, just not like Superman. Actually, it was more like just not falling. It took almost an hour of fiddling about for her to master moving around. It required great concentration to work on altitude, velocity and direction all at the same time. She had to push off something in order to attain any velocity. Altering direction was difficult, and would take practice. Also, stopping was interesting. Just as she worked out how to get some considerable speed up, she realised she had no idea how to stop. One just couldn’t stop dead, and she almost hit several trees in the process of controlling her stopping procedure.

It dawned on her that the device simply counter-acted gravity rather than provided an ability to fly. Suddenly she was weightless in a heavy world, so mass and inertia still had bearing, while things like air friction complicated the factors. It was all down to her, as she had to think herself heavier and lighter to time the jumps. So, by setting off, she could become so light as to soar, but then gradually increase gravity to drop to a given point to take the next jump.

It was nearly four-thirty when she managed to fly in a series of very long jumps to Maidenhead, a bigger town a little way to the West on the Thames.

She worked out that she could mentally increase gravity so as to fall slowly to get a chance to use her legs to initiate another jump, altering course at the point of jump.

It took a great deal of practice, and she got it wrong frequently, ending up with her feet in people’s fishponds, and at one jump, almost crashing through a greenhouse.

She found it fun, if a little knackering. Once at the town, she set about trying to find criminals to apprehend in the act of their crimes.

Superman and the other fictional superheroes never seemed to have a problem finding criminals to deal with. She immediately thought of the animated movie, The Incredibles. Mr Incredible listened to police scanners to find out what was happening. She mentally started a shopping list.

Then, to confound the situation, it began to rain. She then discovered the hard way what police officers found out through experience, that criminals don’t like the rain either. Depressed and somewhat deflated, Keira made her way home, without one crime-fighting escapade to her credit and getting completely drenched in the process. It was only as she was getting close to Cookham did she mentally attempt to stop the rain from hitting her.

To her amazement, she realised that it worked. She was surrounded but a sort of opaque shield that prevented any moisture getting through.

Then she had another thought. If it stopped rain drops, was it stopping all air, too?

She stopped – stationary at an altitude of a couple of hundred feet. She breathed normally, watching the rain run down the invisible shield that surrounded her. Because she was already wet, the water ran down her and pooled at the bottom of the cocoon-like form. Entranced, she watched the little puddle as it grew. A single thought released it through a tiny hole that she created.

“Cool!” she said, grinning broadly once more. She had discovered something else about the torc.

If it worked with water, then perhaps it would work with bullets and sharp pointy things, or even fists!

She returned to her room in the same way that she had left, leaving her with the problem of soaked clothes to try to explain.

She towelled herself dry, using the hair dryer on her long hair. It seemed a little longer now, but perhaps that was her imagination. She thought of going to the kitchen to use the tumble dryer, but that would wake the dog. Instead, she decided that her mother wouldn’t be interested in searching her room, so she could tumble dry it at her leisure after washing the clothes.

As she got back into bed, she was a little disappointed, but pleased she had discovered something new. As she touched the torc, she wished she could leave it on and be Keira all day and every day from now on. However, that would mean facing some real problems at school, not least with the school system.

She could at least be Keira until she had to get up.

It was perhaps fortunate that she had locked the door when she had gone to her room on the previous evening, because she forgot to re-set her alarm for school time.

“Kenneth! Are you still asleep?” said Linda, banging on her son’s door at seven thirty.

Keira awoke, bleary-eyes and confused. As she sat up in her bed, her duvet fell away, revealing her ample bosom.

“Shit!” she said, grabbing the torc in a panic. Within moments, Kenneth was back.

“I’m awake, Mum; I’ll be down in a mo.”

Linda was doubly worried now. Having had a sleepless might, thinking on that bombshell that Kenneth had dropped on her, she now had to deal with something that had never happened before. Kenneth had never slept in before.

“Are you all right?” she asked, through the door.

“As much as I’ll ever be,” he said, morosely, as he really didn’t want to be Kenneth.

“Are you sick?” she asked.

There’s a thought.

Could I call in sick today, and spend it as Keira?

No, homework has to be returned, and besides, French might be interesting.

Ah, no, it won’t, as I can’t wear the torc – bummer!

“I’m fine,” he said, and reluctantly got dressed.

Breakfast was quiet. Linda had a million things she planned to say, but when faced with a miserable son, it all dissipated somehow.

Eventually she drew breath and said, “I’ll speak to your father about what we spoke about.”

Kenneth looked at her and gave a half smile.

“Yeah, as if that’ll make a difference. We both know what he’ll say.”

“You don’t have to be sarcastic,” she admonished.

“I’m just saying it how I see it. He will never be convinced that I’m transgendered, as he just doesn’t accept it’s a genuine condition. I’ve heard what he says about all those reports we get in the papers and TV. He just thinks transgendered people needed firm handling when they were young and a decent psychiatrist can cure anyone of the silly notions of being the wrong gender.”

Linda was silent, for she, too, had a similar attitude, if the truth be told.

Kenneth looked at her and smiled again. It was a sad smile.

“See?”

He washed up his cereal bowl and collected his bag.

“I suppose you’ll be late again?” he said, as he headed for the door.

“What do you mean by that?” she snapped.

He stopped and slowly turned.

“My God, you’re touchy today. I simply mean, I suppose you’ll be late today, as you have tennis club; don’t you?”

“What are you inferring? That I’m never here?” she asked, defensively.

“No, I don’t have to infer anything. You never are here.”

With that, he turned and walked out.

“Oh, bloody hell!” said Linda and burst into tears.

Connie was already at the bus stop. She watched Kenneth approach with some trepidation. He looked like a normal human, and he looked to be in boy mode today.

“Hi,” she said, cautiously.

“Oh, hi Connie.”

“You okay?” she asked.

“Not really. I don’t like being in male mode. I had an argument with my mother. I told her I wanted to be a girl, and she’s having a hissy fit.”

“We can’t do that, here, on Earth, I mean,” Connie said.

“Huh?”

“We can’t just change sex like you can. It just isn’t done.”

Kenneth smiled, he wasn’t certain that Connie believed all that shit about being an alien, but she clearly had.

“So I’m discovering,” he said, and left it there.

Connie, for a change, was silent; reflecting on the person sitting next to her and all that went with him, or was it her?

The day did not start well, for as they walked into school, Roddy Myers, a boy who had been on Kenneth’s case since year five, decided to have some fun at his expense.

“Hello Girls, ooh, aren’t we looking hot today!” Roddy said, putting on an exaggerated feminine walk, with limp wrists and a wiggly bottom.

“Fuck off, Roddy; you just look more of a raging queen than you really are!” said Kenneth.

Not perhaps the wisest words to someone who was a good thirty pounds heavier, but timed to utter perfection by accident.

Just as Headmaster Martin Pettifer rounded the corner, he saw the large and robust Roddy Myers punch a smaller and more slender student in the head, causing said student to fly backwards and end up unconscious on the floor.

Roddy knew he was in the brown and pungent as soon as he saw the expressions on the faces around him. He turned slowly to find Mr Pettifer standing with his hands on his hips.

“You, Mr Myers; to my study, now!”

Roddy opened his mouth to put his case, and then thought better of it. He slunk off, to a gradually growing slow handclap from those witnesses who had been present.

Two more members of staff rushed to the unconscious Kenneth, who was just beginning to come round.

“Right, Connie, you were right next to him; what the hell caused that?” the headmaster asked.

“Roddy just came up and mocked us, and when Kenneth had a go at him, Roddy hit him for no reason,” said Connie, without hesitation.

“What was Roddy doing?”

“He was hinting that Kenneth was gay, sir,” said a new voice. Martin turned to see Colin Hendry, the deputy head of school.

“You saw it happen, Colin?”

“Yes sir. Kenneth and Connie were just coming in and Roddy put on an over-the-top camp walk, and made some comment, something like, ‘Hello girls, don’t we look sexy today’. I took it that he was taunting Kenneth for not being macho. Kenneth, justifiably annoyed told him to fuck off, and might have said that it made him look like a queen. Certainly, Roddy was entirely out of order, sir.”

There was a general muttering of agreement from the other pupils. Two girls came forward to state that they saw the same thing, and it was an unprovoked attack.

Mr Pettifer was slightly taken aback. Normally, the students closed ranks and denied seeing anything.

“Right, all of you who saw what happened, give your names to Mrs Shearing. Mr Cooper; take this young man to the nurse, and ask my secretary to call his mother.”

With directions issued, Mr Pettifer returned to his study to deal with Roddy. He was not looking forward to this, as Roddy had had his last warning a week and a half ago for bullying some younger students. The problem was that Roddy intimidated most of the staff members as well. His father was a big man; a big noise on the local council and a hard-headed and, allegedly, a ruthless businessman.

He knew that this time, he might have to suspend the boy. If he did that, then he could expect an instant and vitriolic backlash from the boy’s father.

The man was on the education committee of the local authority, so, theoretically, could do immeasurable harm to the school by turning down grant applications and insisting that cuts to the school’s budget be implemented.

If young Kenneth Frost decided to make a formal allegation of assault against the boy, and the police arrested him, then the adverse publicity might ruin the school. It would, however, take the matter out of his hands and the miscreant would get his just desserts. If however, young Frost was not given the option, then his family might sue the school.

Martin sighed, as he imagined that Roddy’s father was probably a Freemason along with the local police commander. The chances were that the boy would get a caution and his father would not rest until he, Martin, was removed from office.

Linda and Graham Frost were quite forceful people, but they were nothing compared to the senior Mr Myers.

He arrived at his study to see Roddy looking unrepentant and belligerent, sitting on the chair in the corridor, waiting for him.

He stood as Martin approached, glaring at him, almost daring him to take assertive action.

“You, young man can sit and wait. I have to speak to the witnesses and then decide on the most appropriate course of action. There is, of course, the question whether to inform the police about this matter,” Martin said, bluffing.

Roddy smirked and sat down; as if he knew that it was a bluff.

Martin swept past and entered his study, sitting behind his desk. He sighed. There were eight hundred and seventy-five pupils in the school, and eight hundred and seventy of them were fine, most of the time. The handful that weren’t fine made his life miserable.

Meanwhile, in the school nurse’s rooms, Kenneth had made a full recovery. Mrs Verity was a nice lady, and probably a capable nurse, but she had a tendency to fuss. She was insistent that as he had been knocked out, even for a brief time, a doctor should see him.

She tested him for double vision and whether he could count fingers, just in case he was concussed. He wasn’t. The telephone rang.

It was Mr Pettifer, and he wanted to know whether Kenneth wanted to press charges.

“What for? Roddy’s father can make life hard for the school, everyone knows that Myers can do what he wants and no one has the balls to punish him. He should have been dealt with in year six.”

Mrs Verity agreed entirely, but nevertheless told the head master that he didn’t wish to press charges.

As the Head master was handed the list of witnesses, he frowned. Nine pupils and two members of staff had obviously had enough of Mr Roddy Myers. They were all willing to testify that Roddy conducted an unprovoked attack on a smaller and weaker pupil after taunting him in a homophobic manner.

He sighed again; the press would love this!

Linda was not even available to come to telephone. Her mobile was switched off, and her business line was answered by a secretary who simply said she was in an important meeting and there was no ways she could be interrupted. Even when they told her it was about her son who had been injured, the girl said she would pass the information and get back to them.

The secretary interrupted the meeting, somewhat reluctantly, and Linda told her she was much too busy. She stated she would call the school at the earliest opportunity. This message was passed back to the school.

The fact that her son had been attacked was an inconvenience she could do without. She was in the middle of a crucial negotiation with a very smart, up and coming company that was looking to upgrade their swish new headquarters in Reading, overlooking the Thames.

Graham was still in Germany, so she felt very aggrieved that Kenneth was being such a pain.

The meeting went on for another half hour, and then they broke for a coffee. Linda called the school and spoke with Mr Pettifer.

“Is it absolutely necessary that someone comes to the school?” she wailed.

“Mrs Frost; your son was knocked unconscious by another pupil. I would have thought that his welfare was primary in your mind!”

It wasn’t; securing a lucrative contract was. Kenneth was an inconvenience.

“Fine, if it’s absolutely necessary, then I’ll get there when I can!” she snapped and hung up. She had no intention of setting off until she’d won this contract.

“She doesn’t sound particularly caring,” the nurse said to the poor boy on the bed after the news was passed to her.

“Oh, she cares, but not really about me,” Kenneth said, in a resigned sort of way. “You see, mum is spiralist. She has her sights of bigger and better things. She wants to be seen as one of the leading interior designers in this country, if not Western Europe. Dad is a high-flying financial wheeler-dealer, always somewhere exotic making deals worth billions of pounds, dollars, Euros or yen. I see him perhaps one day a month, if I’m lucky. Mum spends most of her free time at the tennis club. She’s having an affair with one of the members there, but she thinks nobody knows.”

“Is the man married?”

“It’s not a man,” Kenneth said dryly. “Besides, Dad has been screwing his secretary for the last eight years. Why do you think Mum never goes on the business trips with him?”

“Oh dear Lord!” said Nurse Verity.

“So, you see, my little life isn’t really important, unless I start to rock their cosy little boat.”

“That is so sad.”

“It’s life. What a boring world it would be if we were all boring and normal, wouldn’t it?” he asked.

“I’m just so pleased that you are so normal, considering,” she said.

“Oh, but I’m not. You see, I’m transgendered. I want to change sex and be a girl, but it embarrasses the hell out of my parents, so they’re in denial. I have to wait until I’m seventeen before I can see a doctor and do it by myself.”

It was a rare moment when Nurse Verity was made speechless. This was one of those moments.

Mr Pettifer made a decision. He called in the defaulter, having steeled himself and spoken on the telephone with the boy’s father.

Actually, the conversation hadn’t been as bad as Martin had thought it might have been. He was not to know that Richard Myers was actually despairing of his son and his antisocial and arrogant attitudes.

He was just as bad at home, showing little respect for his father or mother, and leading his younger sister astray in no uncertain terms. The responsibility for his behaviour must rest with them, the parents for they admitted that they were not as strong with him as they should have been. They had simply not been firm enough with him early on, allowing him far too much freedom, and not giving him quality time so they could learn from positive role models.

When Martin Pettifer suggested he was considering suspending Roddy, Richard for once agreed that it was probably the best course of action.

“Has a report been made to the police?” he asked.

“Not as yet. The victim was knocked unconscious and so his wishes have yet to be sought.”

“Hmm. Might I speak with the boy?” he asked.

Martin was shocked, as he wondered if this was a strategy to dissuade Kenneth to take any formal action. He became defensive.

“I do not believe that would be appropriate,” he said.

To his surprise, Richard laughed.

“I understand, Martin, but I’m more than happy to meet him in your presence and give you my word I won’t bully the poor chap.”

Martin dithered, as Richard had surprised him with his accommodating attitude.

“Oh, very well; but only if he’s willing to speak to you,”

“Agreed; you suspend my son, and I’ll come to pick the little bugger up. I’ll drop in on the injured boy before I take him home. He can bloody well wait for me.”

It was a more confident Martin who summoned Roddy into his study.

“Myers, you are suspended from the school pending a report to the board of governors. The victim of this attack is too unwell to make a statement at this moment, so I have informed your father of the circumstances and he is coming to collect you. You will be informed of our final decision in due course.”

“All because I hit that little queer? He won’t make any statement, because he knows what’s good for him, or should I say her? My dad will break you, and then see how high and mighty you are!”

The boy arrogantly strode out, leaving the door open.

Martin smiled, anticipating that, perhaps, just this once, he would get the last laugh.

Back in the sick-bay, Kenneth grabbed his pack and took out the torc.  If only he’d been able to wear it before, then none of this would ever have happened. He knew, though, that he just couldn’t wear it, as the consequences would be disastrous. The last thing he wanted to do was draw undue attention to himself, as he never wanted to risk losing his precious torc.

“Can I go back to class if my mother isn’t coming?” he asked.

“The headmaster thinks you ought to go home and take the day off.”

“Why?”

“You were unconscious.”

“I’m not now, though, am I? I’m fine.”

He was asked to sign a form to say that he was leaving the sick-bay on his own accord and against the advice of the nurse.

He was a little late to his French lesson, which was no bad thing.

“I’m pleased to see you up and about, but I suppose it would be too much to ask whether you actually did your homework?” the French teacher asked.

Without a word, he handed in his work, and went to sit at the back.  He did not participate, other than he managed to stay awake, despite a cracking headache.

At the end of the lesson, he was making his way to his next class when the Headmaster sought him out.

“Ah, Frost, I thought you were going home?” he said.

“My mother is obviously too busy, sir.”

“Then perhaps you could come and give me your side of events. I’ll notify your next class you’re otherwise engaged.”

Once in his study Mr Pettifer was slightly concerned as to how best to deal with this pupil. Kenneth had made his way through the school with minimal fuss for the last four years or so. He was a bright student who lacked drive and commitment, according to all his teachers. They also said he was distracted and not giving all his attention; had he done so, then he would be excelling across the board. Now he had spoken to the school nurse, it seems there is a valid reason to be somewhat distracted.

“I’ve spoken to Nurse Verity,” he started by saying.

Kenneth sat there and waited.

“She says that you feel well enough to return to class; are you sure?”

“I’m still alive.”

“Would you care to tell me what happened?” Martin asked, trying to sound as non-judgmental as possible.

“Roddy insulted me and didn’t like it when I gave some back. He hit me; end of story.”

“What did he say to you?”

“He put on a walk that suggested that I was gay or effeminate; so I told him to fuck off.”

“And he hit you?”

“That’s the sum of it; yes.”

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’ve been better, but I think I’ll survive.”

The Headmaster looked a little uncomfortable.

“The nurse also informed me that you stated that you believe you are transgendered?”

“Yes, I did. Is that an offence too?”

Martin frowned, as the boy was being very defensive. Under the circumstances that wasn’t exactly a surprise. He regarded Kenneth and wondered what makes someone feel transgendered. The boy looked reasonably normal, whatever the hell that was. Okay, so he was slender and slightly effeminate, but no more or less than many other teen-aged boys with large-scale hormone changes going on. He tried to sound less abrupt and more sympathetic.

“Of course it isn’t, but it helps me get a clear perspective on what is happening. Have you told anyone else of this?”

“I suggested to Connie that I believed I should have been a girl. To my knowledge she hasn’t told anyone else.”

“How do you come to the conclusion that you are indeed transgendered?”

Kenneth shrugged.

“When it is there every waking moment of every day, one gets to understand that it’s all that matters, and has been for as long as I can remember. School doesn’t matter, home doesn’t matter, being rich or poor doesn’t matter, having friends doesn’t matter, and even having a romantic entanglement doesn’t matter. The only thing that becomes important is the possibility that I might, one day, become the person I should have been born as. For me that would be as a girl. I can’t speak for anyone else.

“I’ve known since I was four that I should have been a girl, my parents have refused to entertain the concept, so I’m stuffed. I need to see doctors and people, but they’ve refused to accept that there is such a thing as a transgendered person, and particularly that I might be one if there was. Their attitude towards gay people is like something out of the ark, so it’s little wonder they’re not encouraging me to follow my heart.”

“Have you spoken to a doctor?”

“Not yet; our GP is a personal friend of my parents, so I’m not likely to get much help there. I’m seventeen soon and will be legally entitled to make my own decisions without reference to my parents, so I can wait a few months.”

“So your parents know?”

“They know, but I don’t think they appreciate the full implications. They believe it’s a phase I’m going through, and a good shrink would be able to cure me.”

“You disagree?”

“Cure me of what, exactly? Look, sir. I’m a girl in a boy’s body. There’s no other way of looking at it. The body can be changed even though the mind can’t. There is one cure and it takes time to bring that body into line with my mind. The evidence is that it doesn’t work the other way around. Don’t you think I would have gone for that if it would have worked?”

Martin sat there with his fingers arched in front of him, with his elbows resting on the desk.

“Roddy’s father has expressed a desire to speak with you,” he said, changing the subject.

“Why?”

“I don’t know, but I am confident he means you no harm. I suspect that Roddy is causing some measure of disquiet at home as well, so I’m of the opinion that Mr Myers is unsure as to how best deal with him.”

“He should have walloped the little sod a long time ago,” Kenneth said with some feeling.

“Quite; but I suspect he will be interested to know whether you wish to make a formal allegation of assault against Roddy.”

“I suppose you are interested, too?”

“Of course, I’m always concerned about the image the school presents to the community, so adverse publicity over activities in the school can be potentially harmful. That notwithstanding, it is essential that we challenge and deal effectively with bad and unacceptable behaviour, no matter who is responsible.”

“Talking to the police means court and statements and the newspapers. I’m not into all that. I just want a quiet life. I would like Roddy dealt with so he’s kept away from me.”

“I think that can be arranged. I’m afraid I can’t advise you regarding Mr Myers’ request. I have no idea why he wants to speak to you, and am not certain whether it would be a positive thing. You might, however, be able to give him a fresh perspective about his son. On the other hand, he might have a different agenda entirely.”

Kenneth shrugged.

“I’m not bothered; I can always tell him to go away, can’t I?”

“Of course, and as you are under seventeen, the law requires an adult present. If your mother isn’t going to be here, then I would be happy to step in.”

Kenneth thought for a moment.

“That would be fine, thank you, sir.”

“Now, that deals with the Myers, I suppose we will have to discuss your gender problem. If you’re not feeling up to it, then perhaps we could do this another time?”

“No, I’m fine, sir. I’d rather get it over with, as I’ve been hiding for too long. I should have spoken out a long time ago; only my parents are still in denial.”

Martin looked a little crestfallen at the prospect of having to discuss this now, but he forged on.

“As you know, this school abides by the local authority guidelines with respect to equal opportunities and respecting the different, ah, life-style and sexual orientation, and, um, gender related issues to which both students and staff adhere. I have to admit that, to date, there have been no such issues in this school, so the matter has not surfaced before.

“I would need to confer with the board of governors and check the guidelines for further guidance, but I would need to know whether you intend to initiate transition whilst a pupil?”

“I hadn’t planned to, but then I hadn’t planned to tell anyone either. I suppose you could put it down to the bang on the head, but now it’s out, I would also have to check things as well. Put it this way, sir; I’m a male at the moment, and I have no great desire to start wearing girl’s clothes and prancing about in makeup and making an arse of myself. I want to be a girl, yes, but I’m rather reluctant to become a clown and have everyone laughing at me more than they already are.”

Martin stared at Kenneth with fresh eyes. Here was one switched-on young man.

“I am relieved to hear you say so. I will, of course, be available to support and assist you while you are a pupil here. If I can render you assistance in getting some help, say with a medical referral, then I would look into it for you. I have a duty of care to ensure you get the most from your education, and as I perceive that your family life is, ah, somewhat difficult in this area, then I will see what I can do to alleviate the situation.”

Kenneth felt the unexpected sting of tears spring to his eyes. He was not used to adults offering constructive help. Their standard reaction was discouraging and hyper-critical. To come across one that was the opposite was strange and a little unsettling.

“Thanks,” he muttered.

“I would be happier that a doctor examined you after your little fracas this morning, so what would you say if I arranged for a doctor to come here, and after they’ve checked you over as far as the old head is concerned, you can have a chat about the other?”

Unable to speak, Kenneth smiled his thanks and nodded his agreement.

Then, if you’d care to go back to see the nurse, you can rest for a bit and I’ll see what I can arrange. Would you like me to try your mother again?”

“No thanks, sir; she’s made her priorities very plain.” Martin rose and opened the door, for a moment, it felt as if the young person was actually a girl, but it was but a fleeting moment. He watched as Kenneth walked slowly back to the medical wing. He felt inordinately sorry for that young man and everything that he was about to face in his life.

Eight

Guilt is a great motivator, but often it motivates too late and insufficiently to undo all that needs undoing, or to mend all that requires mending.

Richard Myers was a driven man. He was driven by several different factors: pride, greed, ambition, desperation and more recently, guilt.

He was very proud of his humble roots. His first wife had often told him (before divorcing him) that he was boring on the subject. He never forgot that he started out with nothing, and so everything he saw around him he had achieved himself and with a lot of hard work.

His father had been a milkman, while his mother had been a cleaner at the local council offices in south London. School in Brixton had been tough in the seventies and early eighties. While riots were happening on the streets, not a lot was happening in the classroom.

The norm was somewhere below average, and anything above that was subject to ridicule and often violence from one’s peers. Richard had been bright, but he was also a realist. In class he pretended not to work, often deliberately failing tests so as not to shine out. However, when the national exams arrived, he passed with A grades, confounding his teachers and parents alike. All expected him to fail, so the natural assumption had been that he cheated somehow.

However, after being interviewed and check-tested, they discovered that he as a bright boy and he had indeed worked hard without anyone knowing.

However, scholastic subjects are fine and dandy, but actually do little to prepare the vast majority of ordinary children to become adults in the real world. Richard was no exception.

In his final years at school, he ran an illegal tuck-shop. At the weekend, he would cycle to the Cash and Carry and buy sweets, fizzy drink cans and crisps (candy, soda and chips for our US cousins), transporting them in a rucksack back to his home.  Each day he’d smuggle a small quantity into school to augment the rather revolting school dinners and turn a healthy profit.

It was a natural progression to supply cigarettes alongside the other items. He came to the notice of a local drug dealer, who was impressed with the ease by which Richard attracted a broad clientele. Richard was given an offer he couldn’t refuse.

Only he did refuse.

Well, to be honest, he didn’t so much refuse as approach the local police and speak to the detective sergeant in charge of the drug squad. In short, he volunteered to become a paid informant. The police encouraged him to go into business with the drug dealer, and adding weed to his list of available products.

Six months later, Richard had still not got caught; either by the police or the school authorities. As a result of his intelligence, the police raided six addresses in the Brixton area and arrested fifteen people, recovered over a million pounds worth of drugs and boosted the Metropolitan Police’s flagging public image to such a degree that the sergeant was promoted and received a commendation.

Needless to say, no one knew about Richard’s part except for one policeman who wasn’t going to say anything as he was rising nicely thanks to Richard’s assistance.

Richard received an informant’s fee, which, being a small percent of the cash seized, turned into a considerable sum. This had two effects on Richard. One, he was untouchable as far as the local police were concerned, and two, he was able to step into the shoes of those who were now languishing in Brixton Prison. After all, he now had a lot more cash with which to buy merchandise.

Incidentally, none of those arrested were aware that he was an informant, so he was able to continue his ‘work’ unimpeded by the police or the other criminals.

He left school at sixteen after his O levels in 1982.

By the time he was twenty-two, he was a millionaire. He knew it was a matter of time before either the police, or the opposition caught up with him, so he sold his ‘dealership’ to an old friend and former customer called Larry Evans. Interestingly, four months later, Larry was found up an alley with his throat cut.

Richard went respectable. It was an easy task, as he had no police record and was able to finance just about anything he wanted to. He bought a small premises with a yard, into which he brought four limousines: big, black and beautiful. He then hired a team of six drivers, all female, big and beautiful. He paid a retired police driving instructor to become the manager and to teach them to drive properly. He then hired out his cars with their exotic drivers. The joke was that he, as the owner of the business, couldn’t get insurance to drive his own cars, as he was under twenty-five.

He was a hit with the business world, particularly amongst the Arab business world. After two more years, aged just twenty-four, he signed a contract with two Middle Eastern airlines for their first class VIPs, as well as several private companies and individuals.

He bought eight more cars and recruited more female drivers and some female minders. The next step was to recruit male personal protection personnel, as most of his high profile customers seemed to expect it. These were all ex-police or army, and many had been discharged for excess violence.

In 1991, he sold the business for a huge profit and moved his cash into property. He bought up huge swathes of land that were not yet ripe for development, but a good source informed him that in five years the value of the land would be quadrupled.

His source was wrong; the value went up by a factor of ten after just three years!

He found himself on a rollercoaster of his own making, and he was unsure whether he wanted to get off, or even how to get off.

In the meantime he married Sharon, his girlfriend from their schooldays, and they had Roddy in 1993. The marriage didn’t last, as he was, by his own admission, never there and not exactly faithful.

His second marriage to Caroline, the daughter of an impoverished landowner from Wiltshire, was a whole new experience. For the first time in his life, Richard slowed down and became the epitome of respectability. His father-in-law was able to restore his family home to its former glory, imparting a fair degree of respectability to his son-in-law in return.

Their daughter Natalie was a good deal younger than Roddy, and she was very much the clone of her mother. Roddy, on the other hand, was a chip off the old block. Richard did not like seeing the reflection of himself at sixteen, but without the intelligence.

Tall, good-looking and impeccably dressed, Richard no longer looked like a milkman’s son made good. His hair was turning silver, but he was slim, trim and very fit. After all, he spent enough time in their gym and pool at their home on the River Thames. However, although he tried hard, when stressed, the ‘South London’ boy was evident.

He wasn’t sure what he hoped to glean from his meeting with the boy Roddy attacked. The meeting was perhaps sparked by the guilt he carried for failing to parent his son when he needed it, a lot more and a lot earlier!

Mr Pettifer accompanied him to meet the boy, whom they found in the sick-bay, sitting in a small lounge watching TV.

He was a pale and slender boy, slightly effeminate, but good-looking and alert. Richard decided that the long hair was what made him look faintly girlish. He personally didn’t like long hair on a boy, but he shook off the prejudice, and made an effort to be non-threatening and genuinely concerned.

They sat on the neighbouring chairs and the boy turned the TV off as they sat down.

“Kenneth, this is Roddy’s father, Richard Myers. He wants to make sure you’re all right and assure you that Roddy will not trouble you again.”

Kenneth looked unimpressed and somewhat sceptical.

Richard laughed.

“Okay, I can see you’re not convinced, and I understand that completely. This is not a case of me trying to be over protective, which, I admit, I might have done in the past. You see, young man, I have a problem with Roddy, much of it of my own making, and I need to understand him better if I am to sort him out. Can I just ask you some questions?”

“If you want.”

“Mr Pettifer has explained about this incident, and I am not bothered about it, to be completely honest. I am sorry it happened, and am grateful that you do not wish to pursue charges, although, perhaps that might give Roddy the sharp shock he may need. I don’t happen to believe that the criminal justice system would deliver him a sharp enough shock, as all it appears to do is play at giving penalties to criminals these days.”

This statement surprised both Kenneth and the Headmaster.

“No; what I need to know is what makes Roddy do the things he does. I understand you’ve been a year-mate of Roddy for a few years?”

“Yeah, a few.”

“Have you crossed swords with him before?”

“About every week for as long as I’ve known him.”

“Why?”

“Good question; I certainly don’t know. We don’t mix in the same groups, we don’t share many classes, and I’m not into the sports he plays. I keep out of his way for the most part, and yet, he will seek me out to be deliberately intimidating and aggressive.”

“Is it just towards you, or are there others?”

“I’m not the only one by any stretch of the imagination, but he does like picking on me.”

“And you don’t know why?”

“I have a suspicion,” Kenneth said.

“Yes?”

“Now, I’m not the most macho bloke, but he picks on anyone smaller, boy or girl. However, when he picks on me, he mostly seems to derive enormous pleasure from accusing or suggesting that I’m gay. Yet, my suspicion is that he’s struggling with his own sexuality, possibly feeling attracted to me, and hating himself for it. Therefore, the only way he can deal with it is to become aggressive towards me,” Kenneth said, glancing at the Headmaster.

Richard sat there, both shocked and surprised. He blinked several times, on the verge of returning an angry denial on behalf of his son. However, as an intelligent man, the boy’s words sounded quite reasonable. The silence drew longer, so Kenneth began to feel awkward.

“Can I say that whether I am gay or not is irrelevant? As it happens, I’m not, but I have done nothing to entice or attract Roddy, or even to deliberately annoy him, so one has to ask why he consistently picks on me with homophobic insults.”

Richard nodded. He had never considered this. He had considered most things, but never this. He reflected on his own attitudes to homosexuality, and knew he’d been vociferous about how unnatural and disgusting he felt all gay people to be. He felt a little more guilt settle on his shoulders. One never knows quite what psychological baggage you pass on to your children without thinking. If Roddy was gay, or even questioning his sexuality, and knowing that his father had such extreme views on the matter, how would he deal with it?

He stood up.

“For a young guy, you’ve an extremely wise head on your shoulders. You’ve given me things to think about that I had not considered, so for that I thank you.  Roddy will not be returning to this school, as I think we’re going to have to rethink his education, and, well, we’re going to have to do lots of stuff if we’re going to get him sorted.”

Richard shook Kenneth by the hand, thanked the Headmaster and went off to collect his son.

Mr Pettifer regarded Kenneth in a new light, for the second time.

“Just to let you know that Dr Anne Dobson will be here at one thirty. Once she has seen you, then I suggest you stay here until the time to go home.”

“Thanks sir.”

Linda was euphoric, as she had secured a contract worth over six figures for her company. The only fly in the ointment was Kenneth, whom she had completely forgotten. She rang the school to be told that he had gone home by bus as usual and he appeared to have recovered.

She felt angry that he was, yet again, burdening her with trivialities that prevented her from achieving her potential. The next emotion she experienced was guilt for feeling the way she did. Then she felt angry towards her husband for caring more about his job than he did her, and never being there to share the burden that was their son.

By the time she got home, early for a change, she was in a foul mood.

She left her car on the drive, instead of putting it away as normal. She had arranged to see Yvonne later, just to give her a chance to unwind and vent her spleen to someone who cared.

Coming in the back door for a change, Linda walked into the kitchen to find a strange young woman sitting eating toast at the breakfast bar. Homework was spread around the worktop.

She was a pretty girl with a lovely figure. How Linda wished she had a figure like hers. She was dressed in a tee shirt and shorts. She looked at Linda and then at the clock, with an expression of undisguised shock on her face.

“Hello, you must be Kenneth’s new friend. I’m Linda, is he upstairs?”

The girl struggled to gather herself. She closed her mouth and stood up, wiping her fingers on her shorts. The gesture was hauntingly familiar to Linda.

“No,” she said, “He isn’t.”

The girl’s voice was well modulated, but although definitely higher in pitch than Kenneth’s, there was, once again, a similarity.

Linda stopped, frowning, as her brain told her one thing and her reasoning told her that it was impossible.

“Where is he, then?” she asked, still playing the denial game.

“You really are blind, aren’t you? I mean, I get more sympathy and understanding from complete strangers than my own mother.”

“Kenneth?” she asked, uncertainly.

“No, of course I’m not Kenneth. How daft would that be?”

Linda felt relief flood her whole being. The relief was mingled with confusion as she sought to make sense of what the girl said. Her relief was short-lived.

“I can’t call myself Kenneth with tits like these, can I? I call myself Keira when I’m a girl.”

With that, she lifted her tee-shirt, showing Linda that she was one hundred percent girl underneath.

Linda’s eyes rolled back in her head and she slid soundlessly to the floor.

“Oh, bugger it!” said Keira, finishing her toast.

When Linda opened her eyes, she was lying on the sitting room sofa. Kenneth, yes, it was Kenneth, and he was sitting in the chair next to her doing some homework. He looked up to see she was awake.

“You okay?” he asked.

She frowned, trying to remember what had happened. Then she did, and gave a little shriek. Such was her uncertainty that she doubted her own memory.

“Kenneth?”

“Duh; who else would I be?”

“Oh God, it must be the stress. I thought you were a girl. I must have imagined it.”

“No, you didn’t imagine anything. I am a girl.”

She stared at him.

“No, you’re not!”

“We’ve talked about this, mum. I am a girl; but at the moment, I’m in the body you gave birth to.”

“Huh?”

Kenneth; and she could see by the complete absence of breasts that it was her son and not the girl she had seen in the kitchen, Kenneth sighed and rolled his eyes.

“I never meant for you to see the real me, but I wasn’t expecting you so early,” he said. “I knew you’d freak out.”

“The real you?”

“Oh, you are so thick sometimes, mum. I’m a girl, so as you guys made me a boy I have to be a boy when I’m around you and at school. The rest of the time I revert to who I should be – and that’s Keira.”

“Keira; isn’t that the name of your friend?”

“No, it’s me. I met them from next door and didn’t think you’d want them gossiping about me being a girl, would you?”

Linda was confused.

“But you are a boy!”

“Not all the time. And, once I leave home, I will never be again.”

Linda snorted. It was partly disbelief and partly disgust at the very thought.

Kenneth put his pen down and fiddled with his collar. Linda couldn’t see what he did.

She sat up and looked at her watch. She realised she was going to be late with her assignation with Yvonne. However, when she next looked at her son, she gasped, for the girl was back.

“How the hell did you do that?”

“Mind over matter. It’s what I’ve always wanted, so I’ve made it happen,” Keira lied.

“That’s impossible!” Linda declared.

The girl laughed at her.

“Yeah, of course it is. Just because you don’t understand something, or don’t want that something to be true, you state it’s impossible. Well, I’ve got news for you; not only is it clearly possible, but very soon I will be attending school officially as a girl.”

Linda stared at her, all thoughts of meeting her lover dissipated.

“You what?”

On the advice of the headmaster, I met a doctor today who has taken me on and is referring to a gender specialist. Clearly, they are not aware that I can actually change my gender, but I will play at going down that road so I can be legitimated in the eyes of the law. As you can clearly see, I won’t need surgery, but I plan to reveal that I must be inter-sexed after a little while, so they can get me all legal very quickly.”

Linda sat there, too shocked to say anything.

“So, I shall be a boy for some of the time, but mainly I will be a girl, certainly at home.”

“Over my dead body! You will not...”

“Well, I see I will have to inform the local press about the love affair between two prominent tennis ladies, and, oh yes, some photographs taken after last summer’s BBQ might be fun. You never checked to see if I was at home, did you?”

Keira took out two forms from her bag.

“These are medical consent forms. They allow me to start along the road, so to speak. Strictly I won’t need them in a few months, but I don’t feel like waiting. You will sign these now, and I will guarantee that those photographs will not be shown to anyone.”

“This is blackmail!”

“No, actually blackmail is making unwarranted or illegal demands with menaces. My demands are both legal and reasonable, and the menaces are purely my duty as an honest person drawing attention to the dishonesty and lack of morals of a supposedly respectable, married woman.”

Linda gaped at her.

“Now, mother dear,” she said, handing her a pen. “Sign!”

Linda signed the forms without reading them.

Keira checked the signatures and then nodded.

“Thanks. Now, as our lives have to coincide from time to time, we need to clarify a few things. Firstly, our relationship is going to undergo a subtle change. Although I am your child, I have noted that you are about as pleased to have me as a child as I am to have you two as parents. Why you ever bothered having me, I have no idea, but as you clearly have, and then failed to uphold the basic responsibilities of decent parents, I think I am within my rights to declare my independence clearly as from this moment.

“With that in mind, I am no longer at your beck and call to be ordered about and forced to comply with your social requirements so as to boost your standing and self-esteem. I will no longer attend any family functions or be present when you bring clients here to impress them with your lovely home unless I choose to do so, and I will decide whether to attend as Keira or Kenneth.

“Two, although I live here, supposedly under your tender care, please note that for the last eight months, I have done my own washing and made most of my own meals. Those ready meals you buy from various supermarkets you happen to be passing are, quite frankly, crap! So, I will continue to get my own food, and I will not eat anything you provide. While I have to attend school and am legally not an adult, then I accept that I have to, by law remain under parental supervision. I will keep to my room, and those shared areas of habitation, like the kitchen and sitting room. I won’t make a fuss if you bring your lesbian lover home, so I do not expect you to make a fuss if I bring home any friends, be they male or female.

“Third, you can forget about the old ideas of bedtimes and telling you where I am going. You do your thing and I do mine, okay?”

“Your father will have something to say about this!” Linda said.

“No, he won’t, for the same reason you will just accept the new status quo. Dad has been shagging Stephanie for so long; I’m surprised that there is anyone left who doesn’t know what he’s up to. Why can’t you two just accept your marriage is a sham; you’re crap parents, and both go and shack up with your real partners and live in some semblance of contentment instead of being professional miseries living a pretend life in a pretend world?”

Linda opened and closed her mouth a few times, resembling a goldfish. No words came out.

“Now, I need some clothes and some makeup, so I’m meeting Connie and we’re going by bus to Maidenhead. I suppose you’ll be at Yvonne’s when I get back; is her husband still in Canada?”

Linda said nothing, but the mouth was still moving.

“Well, in that case, why don’t you stay the night?”

Keira simply put the forms in her bag and walked out. Linda heard her go upstairs. A few minutes later she came down again and then Linda heard the front door open and bang shut.

Linda felt light-headed and a little nauseous.

“I’m having a break-down; that’s what’s happening; this is all a bad dream. I’ll go to bed, and when I wake up, everything will be back as normal!” she said aloud as if to make it happen.

Her phone buzzed at her. It was a text from Yvonne.

R U CUMING?

“It’s not a bad dream, is it?” she asked the phone.

The phone didn’t reply.

Connie sat as far away from Keira as she could; which wasn’t very far, as they were next to each other on the bus.

She could handle things when Kenneth was around, but this girl scared the pants off her. She knew that Keira could do strange things, and was not quite sure how safe she was.

“This is nice, isn’t it?” Keira said.

Connie smiled half-heartedly.

“Oh, you don’t have to be scared, it’s not like I’m going to do anything outrageous, or anything. I have had sixteen years of this planet, so I understand how to behave.”

“What happens if we meet anyone we know?” Connie asked.

“You just say that I’m your friend Keira, okay?”

“Okay, but, like, where do you live; or go to school?”

“You don’t know that, as we’ve just met. I’m a cousin of a friend from school.”

“Why are we going?”

“I need some girl stuff; you know; clothes and shit like that. I haven’t a clue, so need help.”

“Oh.”

“Don’t look so worried; what could possibly go wrong?”

Neither girl was aware, but Keira was about to have her second less than successful attempt to impart Justice.

Words could not hope to describe Keira’s emotional contentment as she and Connie settled down for a coffee in Cafe Nero in the Nicholson’s Shopping Centre. Connie couldn’t believe that the very pretty girl opposite her was the same person as Kenneth, her friend from school. Now wearing a new dress, underwear and shoes, she looked radiant and ecstatically happy. Although Keira’s bank account (actually, to be perfectly honest, it was Kenneth’s bank account) was reasonably flush, Keira didn’t want to spend more than she had to.

The shops were stocked with a huge range of clothes, but many were out of her self-imposed budget. Keira was happy just wandering up and down the aisles, looking at stuff she had never dared look at as Kenneth.

There were also some charity shops, but there was something slightly tacky about wearing stuff that some stranger had worn and then got rid of for whatever reason. After an hour of frenetic shopping, she came away with several tops, a couple of skirts, two summer dresses, underwear (yes, she now owned four bras!), tights, makeup and five pairs of shoes. She wore some of the underwear, a dress and a pair of shoes on leaving the final shop. Connie was actually feeling useful, as Keira never stopped asking for her advice and opinions.

Keira, for whom shopping had never been either a leisure pursuit of even a pastime that Kenneth enjoyed, was in a different realm.

“This is fun!” Keira said, sipping her coffee.

Connie had to agree. This was perhaps better than just hanging around Kenneth’s room watching him play computer games. However, suddenly not having a boyfriend was rather disturbing.

“He never was, Connie,” Keira said.

Connie jumped.

“Can you read my mind as well?”

“No, it was obvious from your expression. You miss him, don’t you?”

Connie nodded again.

“If I’m honest, I know we never had a thing going, but it made me feel sort of better believing that we might, one day.”

“You know now that it was never to be, Connie.”

“Yes, I suppose I do.”

“What time do you want to head home?”

Connie shrugged.

“My parents think I’m doing homework at your place; Kenneth’s place, that is.”

Keira smiled.

“Your boyfriend’s place, you mean?”

Connie reddened slightly.

“Aren’t they bothered that you’re alone at a boy’s house?”

“No, to be honest, I think they’re relieved. Dad is never there, as he works shifts at the Fire station, and mum is happy as long as I’m out from under her feet.”

“Oh yes, she works at two jobs, doesn’t she?”

“Yeah; what a great future we have ahead of us,” Connie said sarcastically, glancing quickly at her companion. “At least, I have.”

“What’s that suppose to mean?”

“Well, your parents are rich, so you’ll go to university and then, I don’t know, I suppose then you’ll be doing all sorts of wonderful things in secret.”

“The future is not written, so you can be whatever you want to be,” Keira said.

“As long as you have the money and or the opportunities.”

Keira smiled.

“Actually, you’re brighter than you look. But, the secret is in making your own opportunities.”

“Even if I get good grades at GCSE and then A levels; there is no way I can afford uni, what with the loans and living expenses. My folks just can’t afford it.”

“That’s what comes from having five kids!” Keira joked.

Connie looked down into the dregs of her coffee.

“I would love to be able to do what you can do. Hell, I’d just kill for a body like yours; you can keep all the super shit. I just want not to be the fat girl with the specs!”

Keira was silent. She felt very sorry for Connie, who, if the truth be known, was a lovely person. Her weight was probably due to insecurity and low self-esteem leading to comfort eating. Keira thought it might be a spiral downwards; in that the more she ate, the bigger she became, so she got more depressed, so she ate more, and so on. Even now, Keira had a coffee and that was it, but Connie had two enormous chocolate chip cookies.

“How about we do a deal?” Keira said.

“What?”

“I’ll help you get a body like mine, and you help me be a girl on this damn planet; what do you say?”

“You’ve got some super-power that transforms bodies?”

“No, but together we can get you slimmer through less crappy food and more exercise.”

“I’m not sure I like the sound of that.”

“Lots in life are choices. You can choose to be whatever you want to be, in spite of everything and everyone around you.”

“I suppose I could try,” Connie said, half-heartedly.

“No, Connie, you will do it, because you want to, and not for any other reason. Look, I’ve been watching all the people walking past. Only about one percent of men and women are anywhere near possessing something like a good figure and good looks. There are some with great facial features, but with a body that’s awful, and vice versa. We have a daft idea of the ideal person, which is a shame, because of the amount of money we all waste in pursuit of a perfection that is unattainable and in the end pretty useless.”

“You’ve got both; a great body and a face to die for.”

“Yeah, but I’m screwed to hell and gone. Believe me, you don’t want my hang-ups. You tell me that you’d like to be slimmer, which is great, because slimmer is fitter and fitter is healthier, but don’t do it for me, or other people, do it for yourself. Do you really want to be slimmer?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Then now is the time to make that decision. Say to yourself, ‘I want to work to make myself fitter and healthier.’ Now you’re committed, and I’m committed to helping you; okay?”

Connie smiled and nodded.

Keira looked at her watch.

“Okay, one more shop, and then we’ll go home, okay?”

“Okay.”

Robert Dyas is a home-ware and gift shop, part of a chain and one of its retail outlets was in the town of Maidenhead. It boasts many departments and loads of stuff for all the family. Kenneth was a gadget fiend, so Keira was as well. As they browsed, Keira saw a woman looking very furtive as she walked around the store. She wasn’t looking at the goods, but was watching the other shoppers.

Keira immediately suspected she was a shoplifter casing the joint in preparation of a thieving spree. Keira kept her under observation and watched as she wandered, seemingly aimlessly, touching something her and another thing there. She held a shopping bag that Keira was convinced held her swag so far purloined.

The woman was dressed casually, in a pair of jeans and a pink top. She had long hair tied back in a pony-tail, and Keira guessed she was in her mid twenties.

Anyway, as she was following another woman out of the shop, Keira grabbed her and pushed her up against the window.

“You’re a shoplifter!” Keira said, triumphantly.

“No, I’m fucking not! I’m a store detective and I was following a suspected thief!”

Keira felt about one inch high.

She apologised and let the woman go.

Swearing, the woman ran after the real shoplifter, so Keira grabbed Connie and they ran the other way, towards the bus stop.

“What happened?” Connie asked.

“Nothing,” Keira replied.

“Something happened.”

“Okay, I made a mistake. I have just learned to be a little more observant and to take greater care when selecting potential customers.

“Customers?”

“Yeah, customers for my attention. Crime fighting is not as easy as I thought it might be.

Nine

Ray was a car thief. Actually, he was a lot of things, and wasn’t awfully good at most of them. However, at taking cars that didn’t belong to him, he was actually quite adept. Unfortunately for Ray, the cars he targeted were the fancy new and expensive ones; you know, the ones with the hi-tech security systems that you just can’t steal without the key and fob.  Unfortunately, very few people leave their keys lying about, so if you want the keys, you have to go into the home or office and steal them.

There wasn’t much money in the old and beaten up Fords and Vauxhalls that one could steal with a screwdriver and a hammer, but even they were getting harder to pinch these days.

Ray was paid reasonably for his skills. He suspected that all his merchandise was in a container and in a foreign land within three days of his taking them. He also suspected that his fees were considerably less than the price that the next man in the chain received.

However, heroin is an expensive habit, so a regular source of income for very little outlay kept him happy.

That meant that in order to steal these fancy cars, Ray had to become a burglar, at which, he was mediocre, to be honest.

You see, people fill their garages with junk and leave their £100,000 cars on the drive. Okay, so they lock them, but then walk in the front door and plop the keys on the hall table next to the door.

You would be surprised to learn the amount of cars that are stolen by the crooks using the keys that have literally been fished through the letter box off the hall table.

Ray was fishing.

Gerrards Cross is one of the most expensive places in the UK (outside London) to buy a home. Within just twenty-five minutes of a central London railway station, most of the bigger homes on the Dukes Wood estate were valued at somewhere in the region of one to two million pounds, and many were double that!

Apart from the occasional fishpond, there is not a body of water in Gerrards Cross that one can consider catching a fish.

Still, Ray was using a fishing rod in Gerrards Cross. To be specific, he as fishing at Honeysuckle House on Dukes Wood Drive. On the drive behind him was a Bentley and a brand new Range Rover Sport. He might have been pleased to know that in the large, locked, double garage was a rack of indifferent wine, four bicycles that no one used any more, two sets of golf clubs, a windsurfer, a kayak that was last used four summers ago and a go-cart that was last used in 1997. Oh yes, and six old kitchen units stood where the workman had left them in 2006 because the lady of the house wanted to put them up in the garage to put things away for storage, but no one could be bothered to get round to it.

Ray was aiming for the Bentley keys, but wouldn’t mind if he could snaffle the Range Rover keys as well.

It was three in the morning, and Ray knew that there were no police at the local police station any more. The government cuts reduced the police to one Police Community Support Officer operating two days a week out of Burnham.

“Ah!” he breathed. “Got one!”

Delicately he handled the fishing rod, so as not to displace the keys that he had just snared on the end. With a big blob of sticky stuff, the keys were now secure.

He started to pull the rod back, and with it the set of keys.

“Excuse me?” said a pleasant female voice from behind him.

Ray froze.

No, it was his imagination, there’s no one behind him, for he would have heard them on the nice crunchy gravel.

Without moving his hands, he risked a quick peek behind him.

There, nothing!

“I’m up here,” said the same voice.

He turned a little too quickly and the keys fell off his fishing rod on the parquet floor.

They lay there forgotten as Ray looked up at the girl who floated five feet from the ground.

“You’re a naughty man, stealing these nice people’s cars, aren’t you?” she said.

Ray looked at her. She was a pretty girl, with long fair hair. She had normal clothes on, just a black sweater that showed off her boobs okay, and a tight pair of black leggings. Her pink trainers were hardly the superhero type. He guessed she was around sixteen or seventeen.

“Shouldn’t you wear a mask?” he heard himself ask.

“Why should I bother; who the hell would believe that you were caught by a flying girl?”

He blinked a couple of times.

“Caught?”

“Oh yes, you see, you’re nicked, I think they say.”

“Like fuck I am,” said Ray and set off across the gravel at a run.

Now, in being pretty mediocre at most things, Ray was actually quite nimble on his feet.

He wasn’t fast enough, for he felt a hand on the hood of his hoodie, and then next moment his feet no longer touched the ground. It was as he realised the rooftops were below them that he started to panic. You see, poor Ray wasn’t good with heights.

At around one hundred and twenty feet, the girl stopped. Ray took a swing at her with his fist. All that happened was that his fist hit something akin to an invisible brick wall and he felt shooting pains from his damaged hand.

“Okay,” said the girl in a cheerful tone. “We’re going to play a game now. I will ask you a question, and you will answer the question. If you refuse to answer or lie to me, I drop you. It’s easy, really, if you want to live, you just answer the questions and answer truthfully; okay?”

Ray was too busy looking at the ground below.

“Oi!” the girl said, raising her voice. “I was talking to you. Do please have the decency of attending to me when I speak!”

Ray stared at her.

“Huh?”

Sighing, she repeated her statement about the game they would play.

“You’re mad!” he said, feeling more than slightly worried.

“No, I’m very dangerous and you are possibly going to die very soon. Now, question number one – what is your name?”

Police Constable Debbie Harris was bored. Contrary to Ray’s inaccurate idea of how many officers were on duty, Debbie was actually a police officer and on duty. She was one of six that covered the South Buckinghamshire area this fine night.

Night shift in the Eastern Sector of the South Bucks division of the Thames Valley Police area was hardly the centre of crime and disorder. Boasting the towns of Gerrards Cross and Beaconsfield, plus several substantial villages in between, it managed to include some of the most expensive housing in the UK. It also managed to possess a minimal amount of more basic housing, so most of the criminals that preyed on the wealthy came in from outside.

It covered the area right up to the Denhams that bordered with the Metropolitan Police area to the east and Hertfordshire to the north. To the south was Slough, in Berkshire, a large industrial town with all the advantages and problems that one normally associates with such a place. To the west was South Bucks West, including Burnham, Taplow and the Farnhams.

Last year the robbery statistics for South Bucks East caused the senior management team severe depression because the numbers of robberies doubled – from one to two. And the second one was a fourteen year old who was pushed over at Beaconsfield Fair when another fourteen year old took his mobile phone.

Debbie was somewhat startled and surprised when she had to brake suddenly as a man appeared in the middle of the A40 in front of her police car.

She got out of the car quickly and walked up to the man, with her right hand on her CS spray canister on her belt, just in case.

“Are you bonkers? You’ll get yourself killed if you fuck about in the middle of the road!” she said angrily.

Ray Lewis wasn’t listening, as he was staring into the sky and dribbling gently. It was at this point that the officer noticed that his arms were bound with duct tape and there was a notice pinned to his chest.

She read it out loud.

“Hello, my name is Ray Lewis. I’m a nasty little man. I was trying to steal cars from five properties in Dukes Wood drive this morning. My fishing rod is still stuck in the door of Honeysuckle House. I live in Vermont Road on the Britwell Estate in Slough and there are three stolen cars in my lockup round the corner. The keys for the lockup are in my lavatory cistern at my house. The man I steal cars for is called Michael; he’s a Pole, and lives somewhere in Langley. I don’t know the address, but he drives a BMW on a 54 plate. We meet at the Ghurkha Pub.”

The girl stopped reading, as disbelief hit her expression.

“Is this right?” she asked.

“Huh?” said Ray, still staring up into the sky. She noted that a small puddle was slowly growing at his feet, and there was a distinct smell of urine.

“Have you been trying to steal cars, as this note says?”

“Yes, love; just, take me in, please?”

“Yes? You mean this is all true?”

“Fuck me, what more do you want? Just get me somewhere safe, away from here, please!” the last please was almost a shriek, so Debbie arrested Ray and cautioned him, as she was trained to do. Ray ran to the back of her car and tried to open the door, but without free arms he couldn’t.

“Let’s go, now!” he said, still staring into the sky.

“No way, mate,” said Debbie, as she used her radio to call for a van. “You’re not getting in there with piss all over your pants!”

As they waited for the van, neither observed the girl who floated up by the top of the trees.

Keira smiled as she felt a feeling of satisfaction.

Ray was her third attempt at administering justice. He was her first success, as the previous two had been messy and hardly what anyone would class as a resounding success.

Kenneth’s second visit to the doctor was due in the afternoon, after school a week later. The dust had settled at school, and he was a lot more at ease than before. Spending all the time at home after school as Keira was excellent, but it was just a shame that he had to return to being Kenneth for school.

On the previous evening, Keira had met one Ray Lewis, as he attempted to steal cars. Much to her delight, this event had gone right, and so she felt justly proud to have completed it.

She was also quite tired when she finally got to bed at around three in the morning, so it took a supreme effort to return to being Kenneth and go to school. His mother was not in evidence at breakfast. Kenneth checked her room and saw that her bed was still made. That meant she had probably stayed over with Yvonne for the third night in a row.

He sat through his lessons with his mind soaring the skies as Keira.

Meanwhile, Linda was actually at the doctor’s surgery; a different one to the one her son/daughter was seeing. She was seeing her doctor for very different reasons.

John Chapman had been the Frost’s GP for a little over fifteen years. He was a friend of the family as well, and so the concern in his voice was genuine.

“Why exactly do you think you’re having a breakdown, Linda?” he asked.

“I think I’m hallucinating.”

“Go on.”

“This is so difficult. I have been working very hard recently, as my work is very demanding, as you know. Well, it all started when Kenneth got into a fight at school.....”

John listened, but with only half an ear. He had known Linda and her husband for many years and, yes, they were friends, but not close friends. Linda was a rather pretentious woman, with airs and graces that quite annoyed John when taken in large doses. John got on well with Graham, playing golf with him occasionally.

His ears pricked up when Linda said something ludicrous, he even stopped doodling on his notepad.

“Kenneth was a girl?” he asked, unable to mask his confusion.

“No, but yes, well, no, because she called herself Keira.”

“Sorry, you’ve lost me. Who was this girl?”

“It was Kenneth, but she had breasts and called herself Keira” Linda repeated.

“So, where was Kenneth?”

“You don’t understand, she was Kenneth, but obviously had changed sex.”

John stared at her. He had initially thought she was just having one of her silly moments, but now he started to believe that she was genuinely sick.

“Okay, go back a little. Prior to this you mentioned that you had a conversation in which Kenneth mentioned that he felt he was transgendered and wanted to become a girl, yes?”

“Yes, but..”

“No, please, let me just get there slowly. If I’m to help, I need to know where the problem lies. Now, after this conversation; what happened?”

“He said some cruel things and went to bed.”

“Cruel things?”

“They don’t matter,” said Linda, unwilling to go into their extramarital affairs with the doctor. “What matters is what happened when I came home early on the next day.”

“That’s when you came into the kitchen to see Kenneth dressed as a girl; yes?”

“Yes, well, no.”

“Which is it?”

“He was wearing his tee shirt and shorts, so he wasn’t dressed as a girl, he was a girl. Those were his normal clothes.”

John stared at her.

“Was he, sorry, was she wearing makeup?”

“No, I don’t think so. She had a lovely complexion and a very nice figure, though.”

“A girl’s figure?” he asked, making the curves in the air with his hands.

“Yes, well, she was a girl, wasn’t she?”

“Okay, what makes you so sure that she was a girl?”

“She showed me her boobs, for goodness sakes. They were quite substantial, I can tell you!”

“That’s when this girl said she was called Keira and not Kenneth, yes?”

“Yes.”

“And you fainted?”

“Yes, I think so. I woke up in the sitting room, on the sofa. Kenneth was there, doing his homework.”

“Kenneth or Keira?”

“Kenneth, this one had no breasts.”

“Ah, that’s nice; how easy to distinguish between them. So, Kenneth was sitting doing his homework, without breasts; yes?”

“Yes, but...”

John held his hand up again.

“He was sitting there, having moved you somewhere comfortable, yes?”

“I suppose so.”

“Then he told you that he was able to switch between being a girl and being a boy, right?”

“That’s what he said.

“And you believed him?”

“Well, yes, I suppose I did.”

“Why?”

“Well, the girl looked very like him.”

“But not identical?”

“No, she was a female version of Kenneth.”

“Did you ever see them together?”

“No.”

“Have you seen her since?”

“I haven’t been home; I daren’t.”

“Quite. Perhaps it’s best I speak to Kenneth about this.”

“No, you can’t!” Linda said, quite heatedly.

John was intrigued.

“Why on earth not; there could be a very rational explanation for what you think you saw?”

“Kenneth might say things that I don’t want him to say!” she said, clearly getting distraught.

John frowned. Linda was showing some clear symptoms of paranoia and a real sense of being disconnected to reality. He had seen this before in people with high-powered and stressful jobs. There was a general inability to deal with both home-life and work. Often, one or the other would descend into an unreal type of chaos, involving hallucinations and the imagination creating an artificial reality in which rational and logical thought was conspicuous by its absence.

“Where is Kenneth now?”

“I hope he’s in school.”

“Good; now, does he attend as Kenneth or the girl?”

“Keira.”

“Quite; does he attend as Keira?”

“He says he has to go as Kenneth until he’s legally accepted as a girl.”

John nodded, making some notes on his pad.

“Does anyone else know about his intended transition?”

“He says the Headmaster knows, and some doctor that the school sent him to.”

“What doctor; do you know?”

“No; just that it’s a woman.”

“You don’t know her name?”

“No.”

“Now, I understand that in gender dysphoria cases where the patient is under seventeen, parental consent is necessary for the doctors to undertake various courses of treatment. Have you been made aware of this?”

“Oh yes, he made me sign a form.”

“Made you?”

Linda balked. If she mentioned what Kenneth threatened her with, then ...

“He told me I had to.”

“Why?”

“He said he’s been a boy long enough and he has to be a girl now.”

“Have you spoken to Graham about what has happened?”

“He’s abroad, on business, again. We haven’t spoken in days.”

John was aware, as were most people who knew the couple that Graham was screwing his secretary, but he thought that Linda didn’t know. Clearly from her tone of voice, she did!

“Okay; so I think I have an idea of what you believe has happened. I’m not a psychiatrist, so will confer with a colleague of mine. In the meantime, I’ll prescribe some medication that will calm you down a bit. If these help and some of what you might be imagining disappear, then we’ll reconsider, but if things continue, then I might have to refer you to someone more qualified.

“I will also contact the school. As Kenneth’s GP I should have been kept in the loop if he’s been referred to another doctor. However, as I am a friend of the family, he might consider that I am too close to you, as a family, to deal with this little problem objectively. I can understand his reasoning, although I’m sure I could handle this little problem without much difficulty.”

He wrote her a prescription and handed it to her.

“Come and see me in five days. If anything untoward happens in the meantime, give me a ring; okay?”

Linda was convinced that John thought her own diagnosis was correct and that she was having a mental breakdown. However, she took the prescription, thanked him, and left. As she drove to the chemist, she called Yvonne and told her the news.

“How have you been since I last saw you?”Anne Dobson asked Kenneth.

“Okay, I guess.”

“No headaches or anything?”

“Nope.”

“About the other issues, did you tell your mother you’d seen me?”

“Yes; but I think she’s having a breakdown.”

“What makes you say that?”

“She’s behaving very oddly. She hasn’t been home for about a week.”

“So, you’re on your own, or is your dad at home?”

“Dad’s still abroad on business.”

“You’re on your own, then?”

“I’m used to it.”

“Does your mother drink?”

“A bit.”

“Tell me a bit about her.”

Kenneth did, keeping it clean, but stressing how important her job was to her, and how unimportant he felt. He alluded to, rather than explained, his ‘suspicions’ of his parents’ infidelity but was not specific.  The picture he painted for the doctor was of a young man with obvious dysphoria and a definite conviction that he should be female. He was subject to neglecting parents who were wealthy and so career orientated that it was almost to the point of abuse.

“Have you had contact with anyone from the social services?”

He laughed.

“Don’t be ridiculous; they set dogs onto social workers in my road.”

Anne had to prevent herself from laughing. She found Kenneth remarkably mature and level headed for a teenager with problems.

“Last time you shared a little with me about how you feel and that you firmly believe that you should be a girl. If you could press a button and change gender right now, without any surgery of anything else, would you do it?”

“Yes. I’d even do it, knowing that I had to have painful surgery and have a lifetime of hormones.”

She smiled and wrote on her pad.

“Does it ever happen?” he asked.

“Does ‘what’ ever happen?

“A change of gender, as in the stories on some websites; you know, a normal guy goes to bed and wakes up a genetic female.”

It was her turn to laugh.

“No, it never happens.”

“It would be good if it could, though, wouldn’t it?” he asked.

“It’d save the NHS a fair sized lump of money, and all that time and effort in undergoing transition, hormone treatment, laser treatment, GRS and facial surgery, not to mention the stress and angst among the family and friends.”

“I reckon it’s possible,” he said, with a surprising amount of confidence.

“What is? An instant change?”

“Yes. I mean, they say that in some cases the mind can control the body, don’t they?”

“Not in this sort of case.”

“Why not? I mean, just because it hasn’t happened yet, it doesn’t mean it can’t happen.”

“Well, we’re dealing with several different medical issues. One, the DNA is pretty distinct and in only a handful of cases can it get confused. Then you have the genitalia. It is still impossible to grow female reproductive organs inside a previously male body, or vice versa. Then there’s the psychological side, which is highly complex and has to be handled delicately.”

“Then I’ll be the first!” he said, with a smile.

Anne liked Kenneth. Yes, he was clearly a troubled teen, but he was amazingly astute and bright, as well as possessing a highly developed, if a somewhat cynical sense of humour.

“Obviously, taking your age into account, and that you are still in school, we have to tread carefully. The school has written to me and I intend to write back to confirm that you have been diagnosed with a gender dysphoria, so in layman’s terms, you are a transsexual who is about to undergo assessment for transition from male to female. Surgery is not always an option, every case is different, and every person is different.

“One of the difficulties is preventing too much masculine development, so as you are sixteen, you have already initiated puberty, so we will do what we can to stop that, and reverse it to a degree by using hormones.”

She paused, observing that he did not seem particularly interested or even concerned about the prospect.

“If you go down this route, you will have to take female hormones for the rest of your life; you realise that, don’t you?”

“Not if I change properly. I’ll be able to make them myself, if I do that.”

She smiled, trying to be patient.

“Kenneth, don’t get your hopes up; I’m telling you it won’t happen.”

Kenneth thought for a moment. Then he leaned over her desk and took a plain piece of paper.

“May I?” he asked.

Anne looked bemused but nodded. She watched as he drew on his right index finger with a black felt tip pen, and then placed his finger print onto the plain piece of paper, signing it: K. Frost. The K was very ornate, almost artistic and slightly feminine.

“I tell you what, doc; if you keep my fingerprint and signature, so when I come back to see you as a girl, you can compare them and prove to the world that the impossible can happen; okay?” he said.

“Perhaps we’ll do that next time, then?” she said, playing along with the joke.

“Okay; so there is a next time?”

“Yes, as your psychologist, I will be with you all the way through.”

“Oh, I hadn’t realised you were a psychologist.”

“I’m not a GP, but this is a clinic that specialises in all forms of trauma, particularly psychological. I also deal with physiological issues, mainly head injuries as it relates to the brain. That’s why Martin Pettifer asked me to pop up and see you last time when you were knocked unconscious. Is that okay?”

“I suppose so, but, as I said, I won’t need you that long.”

Anne smiled.

“We ought to have a little bet on it,” she said.

“Okay; what? A hundred pounds?”

“Oh, good gracious no; how about a box of chocolates?”

“All right. A box of chocolates says I’ll be a genetic female before Christmas.”

“That late?” Anne joked.

“Okay; then how about before the GCSE results come out in August?” he said, perfectly seriously.

“Kenneth, it would be wholly wrong of me to enter into a wager of this kind with you. We both know it’ll never happen.”

“Maybe you’re right, doc,” the boy said, with a smiled.

Anne felt relieved, as it would do Kenneth no good to have an unrealistic expectation.

“I know I’m right. So, back onto the hormone regime we were talking about. In a week, I will have worked out exactly what I think you should be taking. I may have to contact your GP to ascertain a full medical history, but that is also professional courtesy. He will not be in a position to interfere in any way, so don’t worry about that. You are under my care now, so I will have your medical file transferred to me.”

“Okay. I’m happy with that.”

“Excellent; do you have any questions?”

“Not really. I know the sort of thing people would ask is how long will it take and will it hurt, but I’m pretty damn confident I know exactly what is going to happen, and when.”

“Oh, you are; are you?” she asked, smiling at his amazing optimism.

He stood up.

“Oh yes; you see, I know I’m right just as much as you know you’re right. The difference is that I really, really know I’m right, whereby you just know you’re right.”

She was still smiling as she wrote up his notes and her secretary buzzed her.

“Yes?”

“A new referral has just been made, Doctor, a Mr Myers for his son Roderick.”

“Oh yes?”

“He’s another sixteen-year old with problems.”

“Tell me a teenager that hasn’t,” she said. “What sort of problems?”

“I believe it’s sexual, Doctor.”

Anne rolled her eyes.

“Sex as in gender, or sex as in orientation?”

“I’m afraid they never said.”

“There must be something in the water,” Anne said. “When do they want to come?”

“Mr Myers said it was quite important, so they’re happy to have the next available appointment.”

“Are they local?”

“Yes.”

Anne looked at her watch.

“Can they be here by five-thirty?”

“I can ask them.”

“Do that, Sylvia, and if they can’t slot them in tomorrow after school.”

“Right doctor.”

Anne continued writing, but then recalled that the assailant who attacked Kenneth at school was called Roddy. She put two and two together and felt a deep sense of foreboding.

Ten

Kenneth stepped off the bus and walked the two hundred yards to his home. As he turned into his drive, he saw his father’s Mercedes in the drive. He checked the garage and saw his mother’s car was not there.

“Oh, bloody great!” he said, sighing. He wondered if his mother had spoken to his father.

“Hello sport!” said his father, jovially, as soon as Kenneth walked in. That answered that question, he thought.

“Hi Dad. Good trip?”

“Excellent, truly excellent. How are the exams going?”

“They start next week, Dad. I thought you knew?”

“I probably did, but you know how it is?” his father said. “Where’s your mother?”

“No idea; I haven’t seen her for days,” he answered, quite truthfully.

“What?”

“I think I saw her car at the Marchants’ house on the way home,” he lied, and went upstairs to let his father process the information.

Once safely in his room, with the door locked, he put the torc on and became whom she wanted to be again.

“Hi boobs!” she said, as her chest expanded once more.

Keira settled down and did her homework. It was simple revision, as her GCSE exams started in a week’s time. She found it much easier to digest and store information while wearing the torc. She wondered if it was part of what it did or was simply psychological. She just wished she could wear it for the exams; particularly French.

Graham was in a quandary, he was aware that things at home were not perhaps as perfect as he would wish, but he felt that it was too late to change the way he was, and he was no longer certain that he wished to remain married to Linda.

Many times he told Stephanie that Linda didn’t understand him. Well, it was true in reverse; he didn’t understand her at all. They had grown apart, each following their chosen careers to fame and possible fortune. Graham felt a little guilty over Kenneth, but reasoned that he was the male, so his role was to bring in the money, so it was Linda’s fault that she decided to carve a career for herself instead of being at home for their son.

Their son.

Graham did not feel connected to his son. The boy didn’t like the things he liked and seemed to deliberately look, sound and dress in a manner of which he disapproved. Kenneth lacked the respect that Graham felt he should be given. Instead, he was almost insulting and sarcastic, about which Graham couldn’t understand. Hadn’t he provided the boy with everything money could buy?

Kenneth would have agreed; he had everything a sixteen year old boy would want, whether they were gadgets, bikes, music equipment, books, computers, tablets, smart-phones or simply a healthy bank balance.

However, he would have happily swapped them all for having parents who actually cared and loved him.

Still, first things first; Graham rang the Marchants’ phone number.

Yvonne answered.

“Hello Yvonne, it’s Graham, is my lady wife with you?”

There was some inaudible whispers and shuffling, and eventually Linda came to the phone.

“Graham, what a surprise. I wasn’t aware you were coming back today.” Her voice had a tremor in it, as if she was shocked and surprised.

“Obviously; I did send you a text and left a message on the answer-phone at home.

“Oh, I haven’t been home, and, and my phone is switched off.”

Graham frowned.

“Have you seen Kenneth?” she asked.

“Yes; he told me where you were.”

Graham was sure he heard her say ‘fuck’ under her breath.

“What else did he say?” she asked.

Graham was now suspicious. Stephanie had made a semi-joking suggestion that Linda and Yvonne seemed rather more than good friends, so, he began to wonder just how good that friendship might be.

“He told me everything!” he said, lighting the proverbial blue touch-paper and retiring. He was very grateful that he was not having this conversation face to face.

Linda started to wail, blaming him, Kenneth and life in general; in fact, just everything and everyone but her. Graham couldn’t keep track, but at the end of the miles of confused gibberish was the statement, “Yvonne loves me and is far better for me that you are. I’m leaving you!”

“Fine, then I won’t expect you back!” he said, putting the phone down.

He sat there for a moment; allowing his heart-rate to subside once more. He almost smiled, for he felt surprisingly calm. Then, picking his phone again, he dialled another number.

“Steph? It’s me. You were right, Linda was at Yvonne’s place, and it seems they’ve been shagging for a while.”

He listened for a moment.

“No; Kenneth told me that he saw her car there, and I put two and two together. Obviously Kenneth probably knows but wasn’t saying, so I pretended that Kenneth told me everything. She came out and confessed all; at least I think she did. She went on for a few minutes, but wasn’t making much sense. She accused Kenneth of being two people. I’m not sure what she was on about; perhaps she’s finally flipped.”

“No, you’d best not come round. I’ll check on Kenneth and pop round to see you in an hour. It looks like the way is clear!”

He put the phone down and smiled. He was not aware that someone else in the house heard every word.

“The bastard;” Keira said to herself. “He’s put me in the frame for telling tales. Well, we’ll see about that!”

Keira dressed in one of her more sexy dresses, applying her makeup to give her a look older than sixteen and very different from her male look. She ensured that her door was unlocked, and slipped out the window to the garden below. Skirting round the house, she made her way to the side door (that was the back door into the kitchen).

With a large whisky in his hand, Graham was sitting at the breakfast bar, going through his pile of post. He looked up in some surprise as a very attractive young woman waltzed into the kitchen without knocking. Basil made a fuss of her, and she obviously knew the little dog very well. If he didn’t know a person, Basil could bark for Britain. He simply rolled onto his back for her to rub his tummy.

After stroking the dog, she looked at Graham without any qualms.

“Hi, you must be Kenneth’s dad. I’m Keira. Is Ken upstairs in his room?”

Graham blinked a couple of times, lost for words.

“And you are?” he stammered.

“I told you, I’m Keira,” she repeated, as if it explained everything. “I’ll go up, then. See you.”

Graham was left staring after her.

Now, he had his suspicions that Kenneth might be gay, after various vague conversations relating to gender issues. This was a welcome rebuttal of those suspicions. However, it was rather too casual, and well, this was his house, wasn’t it?

He followed her into the hall to see that she had already gone upstairs. He followed and by the time he reached the landing, he heard the sounds of Kenneth’s bed springs and a very feminine gasping, saying, “Yes! Yes! Oh, Kenneth, yes!”

Embarrassed and not a little shocked, he stood there for a while, dithering. Did he go in and interrupt? Did he leave them to it and confront them afterwards? Did he say nothing and pretend he didn’t know?

Too many decisions and no clear route to the correct answers.

He decided against interrupting them, as he felt that it wasn’t the proper thing to do. At least the boy wasn’t gay; that thought kept returning again and again. Instead, he returned downstairs and continued to sift through his mail.

Twenty minutes later the girl came down, smiled at him and left through the front door without saying anything. By the time he reacted and went to the door, she had vanished.

He walked up to the road, but she was nowhere in sight. Scratching his head, Graham wasn’t sure what to do. He returned to his whisky, drained it and poured himself another – his third.

After a couple of minutes talking himself into going up to confront his son, he actually managed to bring himself to go up and knock on his door.

Kenneth was relieved he took as long as he did.

“It’s open!” he said.

“So, young man, what have you to say for yourself?” Graham said, on confronting Kenneth, who was washing his face and still only half dressed.

Kenneth actually wasn’t sure how he managed to change so quickly and remove the makeup in time. The dress and underwear he had quickly stuffed under the bed.

“What are you on about, Dad?”

“That girl who was just here; how dare you entertain a young woman under my roof!”

“What girl?”

“What?”

“What girl, Dad; no one has been here all afternoon?”

“Don’t lie to me; I saw her. She said her name was Keira.”

“I know Keira, but I’ve not seen her today.”

“She was just here, I heard you two together!” Graham was getting quite high-pitched in his frustration.

“So what did you hear, Dad?”

“I heard you and she, um, you and she were, er, you were, you know, you were doing it!”

“Doing what, Dad; revising for my GCSEs?”

“No, you were fornicating, damn it!”

“You mean like you and Stephanie, or Mum and Yvonne?”

Graham was stunned into silence.

“What did you say?”

“You heard, Dad; so don’t come all the high and mighty. It’s been an open secret for months. I’m surprised that you thought that nobody knew.”

Graham stood there, feeling the blood drain from his head. He held onto the door frame to steady himself.

“Everyone?”

“I should think so. I’m not sure about Yvonne’s husband, though, but I’m not sure he cares. It’s his money, or so Mum says, so he does what the hell he likes and lets Yvonne do the same.”

“How do you know this?”

“Mum can’t ever have a quiet conversation on the phone. Plus, she seems to like putting it on speaker because she’s usually doing something else at the same time. I’d have to be deaf not to overhear.”

“Um, does she know about, er, about Stephanie and, um, me?”

“Probably; just about the whole world knows.”

“It isn’t what you think.”

Kenneth regarded his father who now seemed to be much smaller and far less of an ogre.

“I don’t give a shit, Dad. You’re never here; Mum is never here, so what the hell does it matter what I think? You don’t give a shit about me or my problems, so I think it’s probably better you just go away, don’t you?”

With that he turned back to his books.

“Don’t you dare speak to me like that; I’m your father!”

“Well, you’ve done a crap job so far. Close the door on your way out. I don’t think either of us needs to say any more; do you?” Kenneth said, keeping his back to his father and picking up his history text book.

Silently, after staring at his son’s back for several moments, Graham realised that he had lost whatever respect his son had for him. He retreated, quietly closing the door behind him.

After another large whisky, he left to meet Stephanie. Watching his Mercedes leave the drive, Kenneth called the police.

“Hello, is that the police? I think my Dad is driving under the influence and might kill someone!”

“Yes, it’s a brand new Mercedes and he’s heading towards Bourne End.”

“Do I have a registration number? Yes, as it happens I do, and I also know where he’s headed.”

After furnishing all the relevant information, Kenneth sat back and became Keira again.

“Right, that’s sorted them. Now we can concentrate on my bloody exams!”

Richard Myers almost had to use bodily force to get his son from the car and into the clinic.

It had been a nightmare week for the family. Roddy had been at his worst. Temper tantrums, sulks, violent outbursts had marked the first day of his suspension. On day two, Caroline Myers had taken Natalie to go and see her parents in Wiltshire, notifying her school that there was a family emergency. It was a private school, and so they didn’t quibble.

That left Richard and his son together by themselves. Roddy was a big lad; but Richard was bigger and knew how to fight.

He hoped they wouldn’t have to, but on day three, Roddy erupted into a violent rage and Richard had to restrain him the only way he knew; with a well placed punch.

When Roddy came round, he burst into tears and had yet to stop sobbing after another couple of days, except when he poured his heart out to his father in a constant stream of woe, interspersed with bouts of sobbing and self-pity.

Richard was at a complete loss as to how to deal with what came from his son. It seemed that that kid Roddy had hit was on the button when he suggested what he thought might be the problem.

Through the tears and hysterics, Richard discovered that Roddy knew he was gay and had fought the feelings ever since they first surfaced when he was about eleven. For five years he lived in violent denial of his feelings; becoming instead the most aggressive of homophobes.

With a mother he had not seen for eight years, and knowing that his father had voiced his strong feelings against anyone who was different in sexual orientation, to the point of stating that he believed they all should be exterminated, the boy was left with little choice if he was to meet his father’s approval.

“But why attack that kid; what’s his name?” Richard asked.

“Kenneth,” supplied Roddy. “I don’t really know.”

“He suggested it might be because you like him and that makes you react in anger because of your denial,” said Richard.

To his surprise, instead of an angry retort, Roddy had simply nodded.

“Maybe,” he said.

Richard came to a point where he really had no idea how to deal with Roddy and his problems. He called Mr Pettifer for advice.

“There is a psychologist I know who runs a clinic that specialises in psychological traumas. They deal with all kinds of issues, including gender confusion and sexual problems.”

Richard gratefully took Dr Anne Dobson’s number and rang her as soon as he put the phone down on the Headmaster.

Her secretary answered, and he was offered an appointment that every evening. He took it.

“Get in the car, we’re going to see a specialist,” he told Roddy.

“What sort of specialist?”

“A doctor who might just be able to help you.”

“I don’t want to see a doctor.”

“What then? Do you want to stay in your room for the next forty years?”

Roddy had moaned and groaned, but he had got in the car. He moaned and groaned on the way, and when they arrived, displaying extreme reluctance to exit the car.

However, Richard was able to pry him from the car and eventually sat with him in the doctor’s consulting room as Dr Dobson regarded them both from behind her desk. Roddy stared at his feet.

“Mr Myers, would you like to go and ask the receptionist for a coffee or something, and give me a little time with Roddy by himself?”

Richard glanced at his son, but when the boy didn’t react, he stood up and complied with her suggestion.

Alone with the morose boy, Anne came around from her side of the desk and sat in the now vacant chair next to Roddy.

“Right, Roddy, dad’s gone, so it’s just you and me.  Now, for me to be able to help you, and I believe that I can, we need to have an understanding. The first rule is one of basic manners; if I ask you a question, the polite thing is to answer that question; can you do that for me?”

Roddy looked up and nodded.

“Now, can we go one step further and try to use the voice? Silence is not a good way to initiate any form of dialogue.”

“Okay,” he said, with belligerence heavy in his tone.

Anne raised an eyebrow.

“Now, that’s not a good start. I don’t know what your problem is, but we need to be able to talk to each other without the trappings of sulks, huffs, moods and temper. If you want me to help you, then we have to agree that this is a two-way exchange, and I, sure as eggs is eggs, will not go any further if I am to deal with a stroppy child who wants his own way. Do we understand each other?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Now, I suppose the first question is where to begin? Why don’t you tell me why you think you are here?”

After ten minutes, Anne was almost regretting encouraging the taciturn child to talk to her. Now her problem seemed to be how to shut him up! She had only asked one question and he was still going. His answer was without form or logical form; instead it was an outpouring of a very confused and frustrated teenager with serious sexual and emotional issues.

She correctly identified serious markers that, if not dealt with, could indicate that this young man was a likely candidate to become a prolific sexual predator and offender; even becoming a potential serial stalker and possible killer.

Within his initial rant, for that is clearly what it was, Anne confirmed that this was indeed the young man who had assaulted Kenneth.

These two boys were as different as one could get, and she sighed wearily. This one was going to give her sleepless nights!

It took all the allotted appointment time to calm the boy down and to get some idea as to what lay at the root of his problems. It appeared that his father’s high expectations and hard attitude towards anything remotely ‘queer’ had imprinted deeply into his son’s psyche. So, then he began to realise that he was attracted to other males, his psyche rebelled against his feelings and created an inner conflict that manifested in violent aggressive acts towards anyone that was either of a slightly camp appearance, or to whom he was attracted.

Poor Kenneth Frost had a foot in both of those camps.

She smiled at the thought of that very bad pun.

“Okay Roddy; how do you think Kenneth feels at being on the receiving end of what must be years of abusive behaviour by you?”

“He must hate me.”

“I think that might be one emotion, can you think of any others?”

“Fear?”

“Possibly, although he seems brave enough to stand up to you and to return some of the abuse. Someone who feared you might have walked away. Why do you think you reacted the way you did when he stood up to you the other day?”

“I don’t know.”

“Could it be that part of you felt conflicted in the way you spoke to him?”

He shrugged.

“I was just angry.”

“Was it towards Kenneth you felt the anger, or to yourself?”

“A bit of both?” he asked, as if unsure.

“I don’t know, Roddy, as I wasn’t there. Is making your father proud of you important?”

“Yes.”

“What do you think he’s feeling right now?”

“I dunno.”

“If you were in his shoes, what would you feel?”

“Disgust at having a queer son.”

“Is that all?”

“Hates me for being a bully?”

“Ah; we’re getting somewhere. So, if he’s feeling disgust and hatred, why has he come here with you and not beaten you up or locked you in your room?”

Roddy blinked several times without speaking.

“You see, I rather think that he loves you because of being his son. He might not understand about being gay, and might even have strong opinions about being gay, which does not mean he is right, but for the moment, what matters is that you being gay is not an issue for him. If it’s not an issue for him, why should it be an issue for you?

Roddy simply stared at her, looking surprised.

“This queer versus straight thing is a fallacy. Nothing is black and white as our society would like us think. There are people who fluctuate between being attracted to the opposite gender and then towards person of their own gender. You’ve heard of school girl crushes on older girls and female teachers?”

“Yes.”

“It happens to boys too. Some boys need to affirm their admiration in a sexual manner. It could be that they want to dominate others, to show they are more assertive, and it sends confused messages to the brain. Others, particularly those who might have had a weak or absent male presence in their lives, can seek affirmation from older or more assertive men. You can have a child who has several brothers and sisters, brought up in a loving home by two balanced parents, but one of the children might be gay, and no one knows why. For some, it’s a passing fad that changes as they grow older; for others, it’s more permanent. Nothing is carved in stone, and all people are different. One’s sexual orientation doesn’t make you any less of a person; if you look back in history, some of the giants in just about every aspect of human achievement have been gay.

“Now, start from this point; your father is sufficiently concerned about you to bring you here, probably knowing that I am not in the business of ‘curing’ anyone of their sexual orientation. What I do is help both the patient and their loved ones come to terms with whatever they are and give them the necessary desire to be useful members of a society that is often very cruel and unkind towards anyone that might not come up to what they think is normal. Your sexual orientation is secondary to who you are, as long as you choose it to be so. You can choose to be a nice person, or a nasty one, whether you are straight or gay makes no difference. But if you can’t deal with the conflict within yourself, how can you ever hope to form any relationships with anyone else?”

“I dunno.”

“No, neither do I. Let’s go back one; do you want to go through life knowing that others believe you to be an unpleasant person?”

“No.”

“So, what do you think you can do about it?”

“I dunno.”

“Okay, if you were your father, what do you think he wants you to do?”

“Not be queer.”

“Take that out of the equation for a moment. You are attending a school that has just suspended you for violence, not for being gay. You have to face the consequences of your behaviour, not your inner feelings. You agree that you feel anger and frustration, and you aren’t sure why. What is your first task?”

“Huh?”

“If you could wave a magic want and make something in your life go away, what would it be?”

“Being queer.”

“Okay; say it’s gone. You are still suspended, people still look at you and think you’re a bully, so what do you need to do?”

“Change my behaviour?”

“Good, but what comes before the behaviour; as the behaviour is usually only the result of what’s going on in one’s head?”

He looked blankly at her.

Anne sighed, as he was proving to be a tough nut to crack.

“Life is mostly about choices. Often we make choices that are the easiest and give us an advantage of some sort. Some can be to avoid disadvantages, but a few are made for us by either other people or circumstances. Now, your behaviour towards others, particularly some boys, is governed by your attitudes. As you’ve been growing up, you have been forming attitudes. These are passed to you by your parents, their behaviours and attitudes; your peers and everyone with whom you come into contact, regardless of whether it has been a positive interaction, negative or even neutral.

“Over the next week, until we meet again, I want you do make me a chart with three columns. In the left hand column I want you to list all what you think are your problems, as you see them, not from any other perspective. Can you think of any problems?”

“Um, anger?”

“Is that a problem or a result?”

“Huh?”

“What makes’ you angry?”

“Oh. I’m not sure.”

“Then you need to think about it. Any others?”

“Aggression and violence.”

“Again, what makes you resort to violence?”

“Bullying, picking on people. Er, frustration, um, being attracted to boys.”

“Okay, how do you get on with girls?”

He shrugged.

“Okay, I’m not that bothered.”

“All right, is how you relate to girls a problem?”

“Possibly.”

“Then put it down, along with anything else. Then, in the middle column, put against the problem, your attitude towards that subject. For example, against girls you might put fear or mistrust. Against bullying you could put anger, but it could be self loathing. In the last column you need to associate observable behaviour that seems to appear. So, against bullying, you have anger, and lastly violence, do you understand?”

“I think so.”

“Good; once we have the chart, we will make a fourth column and look at why each happens that way, so look for the cause.  Once we understand that, and this will mean you opening up to me and telling me everything that makes you Roddy, we should be able to help you iron out any kinks; okay?”

The boy nodded, giving her a weak smile – the first.

“Shall we get dad back in now?”

“I suppose so.”

“If you go and ask him to come in, then you go and get a drink and relax for minute, as you must be tired.”

Richard came back in, and sat there as Anne outlined her strategy for Roddy to delve into his mind and relist on paper where things were going wrong.

“Once we have this chart, we can explore it together, all three of us, and work out a strategy for Roddy to overcome some of his problems, and thereby remove some very negative attitudes and behaviours that are causing him the problems in the first place. One of these is your attitude towards homosexuality.”

“Mine?” said Richard, surprised.

“Yes. Part of the problem, in my opinion, is that you have voiced such a vehemently antagonistic attitude towards gay men that this has instilled within your son a real conflict of late. As he is increasingly finding himself attracted to boys, his knowledge of your feelings, and his own attitude that is wholly supportive of your attitude so he will meet your approval, is tearing him apart. We need you to affirm your approval of him as an individual, regardless of sexual orientation, if we are to make progress. We’re not asking you to suddenly change your spots, as I know some attitudes and values are hard to change, what I am asking you is to show unconditional love to your son, regardless of whether he is gay or straight.”

Richard was silent for a moment.

“So, it’s all my fault?”

“I never said that, but your attitude is not helping things within his mind. To be honest, having a mother who left is another factor that we will have to talk through. These are all factors, with a lot more that will only come out if he knows that you love him regardless.”

“I do, though.”

“Have you ever told him?”

“Well, not in so many words.”

“Three words, Mr Myers, just three little words; I love you. You could add, something like - ‘nothing else matters’, but that’s optional.”

It was a very thoughtful pair who drove home that evening.

Keira cursed as the doorbell rang. On peering through the curtains, she saw a police car on the drive. Kenneth had called the police three hours ago, so he thought nothing had come of it.

“Shit!” she said, and became Kenneth.

The policeman was a big man, even if he was only around twenty-three.

“Evening, is this the residence of one Graham Frost?”

“Yes, he’s my Dad.”

“You’re Kenneth, yes?”

“Yes; was he drunk?”

“He’s been involved in a road collision a few miles down the road. He was taken to Wexham Park Hospital with a suspected fracture to the spine. They now think it’s just whiplash, but he was required to give a specimen of blood as it is strongly suspect he’d been drinking. However, he became agitated and angry and punched the officer. He’s now in Slough Police station, and he gave a specimen of breath that was double the legal limit. He’ll be held there until sober enough to charge. He will be bailed to this address to attend court next week.”

Kenneth invited the officer in and went to the study, taking down the calendar.

“Next week? He won’t be here next week; as he’s booked into a conference in Budapest.”

The officer frowned.

“But he does live here?”

“Occasionally. He’s not been here for the last three weeks, and well, he is due to fly out in a couple of days. Did he not mention it?”

“No, he didn’t. Is your mother at home?”

“No, she’s shacked up with her lesbian lover down the road. I think Dad was going to see his secretary, as they’ve been having an affair for years. He certainly spends more time with her than here.”

The policeman scratched his head.

“For real?”

“For real; oh yes, it’s all fun and games in this house. I’m supposed to be studying for my GCSEs with all this shit. I called it in to your control room that he’d had several whiskies before setting off earlier. I was afraid he’d kill some innocent motorist.”

“How old are you?”

“Seventeen next birthday.”

“You’ve ten times his sense. It sounds like you’ll be well shot of them both.”

“Yeah, well, we never get a choice as to whom we are born, do we?”

“Ain’t that the truth? Are you okay?”

“I suppose so; if I can get my revision done in peace.”

“Okay, I’ll call this in, they might decide he’s a flight risk and keep him in overnight for court in the morning. He is up for assaulting the police officer as well.”

The officer left, leaving Kenneth slightly numb. He had imagined his Dad getting stopped and possibly being breath-tested. Still, the silly bugger had pranged his car and ended up in hospital; how stupid was that?

Should he feel guilty?

As he went upstairs, he tried to analyse his feelings towards his parents. He recalled times in the past when he had had fun times with them, but even the good times were marred by the fact that usually they took him to grandparents or other family members while they just had to do this or that, usually relating to one or other of their careers.

He felt an overwhelming sense of sadness, as he knew that so many of those he knew had families that actually did things together and, despite not being perfect, at least cared about each other. Kenneth felt as if his parents didn’t care at all about anything other than themselves. They didn’t even care much about each other in the better times, and definitely not now!

He looked at Basil, and patted his lap for the dog to jump up. He licked Kenneth’s face and wagged his tail.

“Time for Keira to take you for a walk, Baz!” he said, reaching for the torc.

Twelve

“Right, put your pens down, and stop writing!” said Mr Fuller, the invigilator. “Place all your papers into the envelope provided and sit and wait for it to be collected. All spare paper will be taken from you before you leave.”

Kenneth breathed a sigh of relief. Four weeks of solid exams were over.

He felt pretty optimistic, as all the papers had seemed far easier than the mocks they took some months ago now. Perhaps the torc had assisted him to remember stuff, or perhaps now his gender problem was about to be permanently sorted had allowed him the brain space to concentrate. Certainly, he no longer thought about it all day and every day. He smiled, for most of the time when not at school, he was Keira, so it was all academic anyway.

It had been a turbulent four weeks; not just because of the exams. He had managed one meeting with Anne, as he had to cope with a lot of distractions. One problem was the time spent fending of Child Services from the local council. His father had been to court, pleaded guilty and apologised to everyone for being an arse. He had come home, a contrite and very much more subdued man, particularly as he was disqualified from driving for a year and fined £800 for the drink-drive offence. For thumping the policeman he was given a conditional discharge, because he was in hospital and thought that his wife had sent the man to steal his wallet. The fact the court believed him to a degree said a lot about the Justices.

However, it came to light that a juvenile (Kenneth) had been left on his own for days, if not weeks at a time as the parents had been so involved in their respective careers. The first Graham knew of this was when the police had informed the court that Linda had not been at home for a week, and that Graham had been abroad for two. It was a real revelation and reality check for the man. To say he was shocked to the core would be quite accurate. He had been so focussed on his career and his life that he had forgotten that with marriage and children (even if just one child) came responsibilities. He was not truly aware how much Linda was equally distracted by her career, believing her to be a part-timer who was mainly a mother, instead of a very part-time mother and almost full-time career woman.

Oh yes, and his Mercedes was written off when he hit that tree.

After the court case, Graham and Kenneth had met with the Child Services. Graham admitted full responsibility and claimed blissful ignorance as to the true state of affairs. He told the woman that he was now going to have to work from home so as to be available for his son.

“It’s a bit late for that now, as he’s almost an adult!” she had said, looking at the sixteen year old.

However, she accepted his promise that if he needed to commute then he would get someone to drive him, and only go out when Kenneth was in school or otherwise safe. Kenneth guessed that the person most likely to do the driving was Stephanie, but did not say so.

In any case, they were mollified and decided that Kenneth was not in any immediate danger, so normal (?) life was resumed.

Kenneth thought that having his father around all the time was going to be a bit of a bummer, but hoped that his father might decide to spend a lot of that time with Stephanie.

Linda, on the other hand, had not reappeared; not when Kenneth was there, anyway.

After his fourth exam, he came home from school to find his father sitting in the sitting room looking as if he’d been crying.

“What’s up, Dad?”

It would be fair to say that communication between father and son had been minimal since the confrontation prior to his father having the crash. As the breath-test had been as a result of the crash, and not due to Kenneth’s information, Kenneth decided not to rub salt into the wound. However, Graham was still cautious in dealing with Kenneth, as the boy was far worldlier than he ever gave him credit for.

“You’re mother’s been with her lover and stripped the place,” Graham said.

Apparently, Linda had come round with Yvonne and removed all clothes and ‘her stuff’. The house did look a lot emptier, and most of it was the rather ornate and ‘arty’ stuff with which Linda had filled the house to impress business clients.

“I think the place looks better without that crap,” Kenneth said, which drew a thin smile from his father.

“Yvonne has left her husband and it seems that they’re both suing for divorce. They said they are planning to set up home together in fashionable Fulham.”

“Good riddance; they deserve each other,” Kenneth said, and turned to go up to his room.

“Kenneth, wait, please.”

“Dad?”

“This is awkward, as, well, I have to admit to hardly have been a very good father, have I?”

“No, you haven’t, and Mum was pretty crap too.”

Graham smiled.

“You could be a little less certain.”

“It’s true, Dad, you’ve been a selfish sod who’s been so engrossed in yourself that you’ve hardly acknowledged my existence unless it’s to affirm that I do or become what you want. You’ve ridiculed me and my problems, so, yeah; you’re a crap Dad who basically showed me you don’t give a shit about me.”

Graham opened his mouth to argue, but closed it again.

“That’s not true; I actually care deeply about you. But when did I ridicule you?”

“When you told me that I couldn’t be transgendered.”

The man frowned.

“That was years ago,” he said.

“Oh, you remembered, I’m surprised.”

“You were just a child.”

“I’m still a child, legally. But I told you when I was five, when I was eight and when I was eleven. You pooh-poohed me then and so I’ve no reason to expect you not to pooh-pooh me now.”

Graham frowned some more.

“But, the girl; I saw her, and you, you and she, you..”

“Dad, that was me!”

“What?”

“That girl, Keira; that was me.”

Graham laughed then, a little and very nervous laugh.

“No, I know a girl when I see one, and that was not you. Besides, there is no way you could just appear like that, and disappear.”

“Doh, my bedroom window goes out onto the trellis for the wisteria, Dad. Look, I am a girl. I have to be a boy occasionally for school and shit, but I am a girl for the rest of the time.”

“No, that was a real girl.”

Graham looked sceptical, so Kenneth shook his head.

“We can argue this until we’re blue in the face. Stay there, I’ll prove it to you.”

Kenneth left his father staring after him. The boy knew that he had his father in a place that he could control. It was now or never. If he could convince his father, then he was half way there.

Twenty minutes later, Graham was still in the sitting room watching the news on the only TV that Linda hadn’t taken; mainly because it was too big, too heavy and wouldn’t fit in her car.

He looked up as the girl walked into the room.

Keira had taken the time to get her makeup right; wearing the pretty dress and high heel shoes. She still wore no jewellery as she didn’t actually have any; except the torc, that is.

“Good God!”

“No, sorry, I’m just Keira, your daughter.”

Graham stood up onto unsteady feet.

“But your voice, your body and, hell, even your face. You’re a girl!”

“Duh, what did I say, Dad?”

“No, I mean a real girl, with, those and, ....” Graham was staring at Keira’s ample bosom that was displaying a spectacular cleavage. His eyes moved south to a very smooth front at crotch level.

“Okay, so I have breasts and a vagina, that is what makes me a girl, Dad, or had you forgotten?”

“You can’t be Kenneth, he’s got a p.. a  p..”

“A penis? Yes, I know Kenneth had a penis, but then I’m not Kenneth any more, am I?”

Graham sat down abruptly.

“How?”

“You don’t want to know, because you wouldn’t understand, so just accept it’s happened and you have a daughter now. Now, for awhile I’m going to have to switch back and forth, just until I’ve finished with school and get my friendly doctor to sign me off as a real girl.”

“I don’t understand,” Graham said.

“I told you that; don’t you listen to a word I say?”

“This can’t be happening.”

“Well, it is, and you’d better get used to it. Now, my doctor’s name is Anne Dobson and I need you to understand that I am serious about this. In a few weeks, Kenneth is going to be gone and I will be Keira all the time. So, task number one, I need you to find me a decent sixth form college that I can start in September as a girl.”

“But, you can’t...”

“Dad; focus and listen to me, and listen carefully. Kenneth is going away permanently very soon, have you got that?”

“But..”

“Dad, have you got that?”

“I think so. Why?”

“Because I’m Keira and I am what Kenneth should have been from birth; okay?”

Graham nodded because he felt if he tried speaking it would get even more complicated.

“Good; and when he goes away, I will be here all the time. The doctor will have to sign papers to say I must have been inter-sexed all along and someone made a boo-boo when I was born. I need you to confirm that to the doctor and to anyone else who asks, okay?”

He nodded again, as it seemed to work the last time.

“Good, then that’s settled. Oh, and it might be best to say nothing to Mum for a bit. She’s freaking out enough without all this.”

Graham was happy with the last as the less contact he had with his estranged wife, the better. By all accounts, Linda was trying to take him to the proverbial cleaners.

Graham stated that he would fight, claiming infidelity, while Linda claimed she sought comfort after Graham ‘abandoned’ her for his secretary.

Keira had to remain out of sight for a couple of weeks, while Kenneth coped with all the exams and hassle with his parents. She was limited to the privacy of her room, so was there all night. Kenneth had never slept so well until Keira came along.

Connie was conspicuous by her absence. In truth, she was more than a little scared of Keira, so used the revision excuse to stay away. She was friendly to Kenneth in school, and gradually was coming to terms with having a weird friend who was more than a little bit different to everyone else. Kenneth had such a cluttered life; he was actually grateful for the space that Connie gave him. He went out of his way to be nice to her in school, and the strategy seemed to be working as she was losing some of her fear, if not her weight.

“So, you’ve been having a busy time, then?” Anne said when Kenneth eventually came to see her. It had been over four weeks since the last meeting

“Yeah, well, what with exams and fighting parents, you could say that.”

“How are you?”

“Okay; a bit tired. But I’ve finished the exams now.”

“So, is that you finished with school for the summer?”

“Yes, I suppose it is. They let us and the A level students go at half term. The sixth formers come back for a last farewell, but we don’t have to.”

“Will you go back in September?”

“That depends on a couple of things.”

“Being?”

“One; whether my grades are good enough for sixth form; and two, whether I’m a girl by then.”

Anne laughed, as the boy was so certain. It was as if he had no doubt at all that he would change gender without any help at all.

“I suppose we ought to talk about hormones,” she said.

“I’ve been thinking about that. Can I leave that for a bit?”

She was surprised, as she had thought the boy would be eager to start down the road.

“Care to tell me why?”

“Okay, but bear with me, as you probably won’t agree. One, I’m not sure that taking stuff to change my boy body will help in the long run, as my girl body won’t need any hormones. Two, as I have to live at least part of the time as a boy, even if it is just going to be for a very short time, I don’t want to be like in the middle somewhere.”

“Are you having second thoughts?” she asked.

“About what?”

“Changing your birth gender. It’s not unusual, as many patients suffer from doubts at some point.”

“No, not at all; why should I?”

“Well, without hormones, you won’t gain the physical characteristics that will help you do so.”

“No, I’m not saying I don’t want female hormones; I just know that I’ll make my own. Once I make my own, I won’t need artificial ones.”

Anne smiled sadly.

“Kenneth, this is ludicrous; you can’t change, I keep telling you this.”

“I know you do, but I know I can. I want that box of chocolates.”

She laughed.

“You do seem happier in yourself; why is that?”

“There are a few reasons. Now my parents have had their fight and split up, things are more settled at home. For ages I knew things were dying, but they were both in denial and tried to maintain the image they wanted everyone to see. They fooled no one but themselves. Mum’s moved in with her girlfriend and Dad is living and working from home. That’s a bit of a pain as I liked the peace of being by myself, but at least we’re talking now. I don’t have the stress of exams, and I know that within a little while I’ll be a girl all the time. I’ve told my Dad and although he’s confused, he’s okay with it.”

“That’s excellent news. What’s he confused about?”

“I don’t think he can come to terms with me as a girl. You know, I was his only son and great things were planned. He doesn’t quite understand that it’s my life and I will live it my way.”

“You’re not a girl yet,” Anne pointed out.

“An academic point.”

“How did he react when you told him?”

“Denial, in that I couldn’t be, followed by confusion.”

“Would you like me to talk to him?”

“Maybe after I’ve gone through the change.”

Anne was surprised again.

“It might be better that I talk to him before that, as the transition period might be as long as two years.”

“No, more like a couple of days. So, I think you’ll probably need to get your head round it first, before you try to sort him out.”

Anne shook her head and smiled.

“So, once you are a girl, what will you do with your life?” she asked, humouring him.

“That’s easy; I’ll be a super hero and uphold truth, justice and the British way,” he said with a smile.

“Oh yes, and what will your super-name be?” Anne asked, entering into the spirit of the game.

“Ah, good point, I haven’t actually thought of one yet.”

“Well, let me know. And what super-powers will you have?”

“Oh, just the usual: the ability to leap tall buildings with a single bound, impervious to bullets, to be able to fling bolts of kinetic energy with my mind, and to understand all languages instantly.”

“Not a lot then?” she asked, smiling.

“Nah, just same old, same old.”

“Seriously, Kenneth, have you given much thought to how you really want your life to unfold?”

“Seriously, no; I just want, no I just need to be a girl. Once that happens, I don’t actually care. I can look at things differently and go with the flow. I suppose it all comes down to how well I’ve done in my exams. If I get good grades in my GCSEs then I’ll look at sixth form. I’m not sure that staying on at my present school will be an option, as to transition there might be tougher on the school than on me.”

The answer surprised Anne.

“What do you mean by that?”

“Okay, for me, I’ll be a girl, so I’ll be fine. For the school, they have to manage the fact they will have a boy who is now a girl. They will have neurotic and bigoted parents who will want to create a stink; I’m not sure why, as I’m sure transitioning to being a girl doesn’t make me into a serial sex offender. Anyway, they’ll get their knickers in a twist and force me to use a neutral toilet, so as not to infect all the ‘normal’ kids, I suppose; and to forgo any sort of sporting activity in case their little precious has to touch me or see my partly naked body. So, it’s far more complex an issue for the school than for me.”

Anne was amazed at Kenneth’s maturity and sense of reality.

“So, what’s the answer?”

“Find a school at which I have no history, so I can attend as a girl. You could write a letter telling them that I’m a normal girl, and that’s it; job done.”

“You’ll still be transitioning until you have GRS,” Anne pointed out.

“If I was to do things your way, yes, but then I’m not going to, am I?”

Anne laughed.

“I think you’re in for a shock.”

“I could say the same to you.”

“Somehow I doubt it.”

“Well, let’s wait until the exam results come in, shall we?” Kenneth asked, not appearing the slightest bit concerned.

Connie was hanging about by the bus stop when Kenneth stepped off. His heart sank, but he greeted her warmly.

“What are you waiting for me for?”

“I needed to apologise,” Connie said.

“For what?”

“Avoiding you.”

“Okay, I accept your apology.”

“I wanted to explain.”

“You don’t have to, as I understand completely. I freaked you out and you were trying to get your head round me and what I was capable of.”

“You’re doing it again. Are you sure you can’t read minds as well?”

“Nope, it’s obvious. Had it been me, I’d have been freaked out as well. I did too much too fast, so perhaps I should apologise to you.”

Connie smiled.

“No, that’s okay. It must be so lonely for you. I heard about your parents. I’m sorry.”

“That’s okay, it was a long time coming, so now it’s actually happened, we can get on with our lives.”

“You’re not close, then?”

“I get on all right with my Dad now, but he’s never really been there while I was growing up. He’s a bit of a stranger, so it’s tough for him too. He’s finding it hard with me becoming Keira full time.”

“He knows?” Connie asked, surprised.

“Yeah, I had to tell him. When he was always away, it didn’t really matter, but now he’s back, I suppose it’s only fair to keep him in the picture. Actually, he’s been okay with it so far. Mind you, I’ve been at school every day, so he only sees Keira occasionally in the evenings. He seems to spend most of his time with his girlfriend,” Kenneth said, grinning. “Like you, I think I freak him out.”

Connie shook her head.

“You seem to have a complicated life. Does he know you’re from somewhere else?”

“God no!  I couldn’t do that to him, as he’s psychologically fragile enough after my mother left him for another woman. No, you’re the only one who knows and I’m keeping it that way.”

“You know you said you’d help me lose weight and stuff?” Connie asked.

“Yeah; I thought you’d chickened out. Are you still up for it?”

“If you are.”

“Great, come on in; I’ve been a boy long enough today.”

Thirteen

Graham was working in his study when he saw Kenneth and the girl walk down the drive. This was the first time he’d seen Kenneth with anyone his own age. He was feeling a little less unsettled about things now, as they’d fallen into a routine that gave the illusion of stability if not actual stability. Kenneth always came home from school, went to his room and then came down as Keira. She’d do her revision or whatever in the dining room and then she’d help him make an evening meal. Graham found that she was a better cook than Linda had been, so she took on that role more and more.

To start with, he found it disconcerting, bordering on the surreal having a beautiful daughter instead of a son. He tried to ascertain some hint as to how this impossibility had happened, but the girl just smiled and told him that he wouldn’t understand.

He wanted to understand, so she told him that one day she would explain, but it was vitally important that he never told anyone, at least until she made the change permanent. She hinted that that time was not in the far future. For that he was grateful, as he didn’t know if he could cope with having Kenneth and Keira around.

It was definitely like having two children. The strange thing was, he actually liked Keira better. He wasn’t sure why that was, but suspected it was because she was more at peace than Kenneth. Indeed, it dawned on him that he actually thought of them as two distinct and separate individuals, and while he did so, he was able to deal with them far better. If he consciously thought of them as one person, his mind objected.

He went out to the kitchen as they came in. He remembered seeing this girl before, but couldn’t remember her name.

“Hi Dad.”

“Kenneth; how did you get on with the doctor?”

“Okay, I have to go back next week. I think I’ll make that the last one.”

Graham frowned, as he’d been doing research on the internet.

“I thought it takes longer than that?”

“This is me, remember?”

Graham nodded, and then looked at the girl.

She was a nice-looking girl, but perhaps was a little overweight to be classed as pretty. He then cursed himself for stereotyping and categorising as per the cultural imprinting.

“Dad, you remember Connie, don’t you?”

“Yes, of course,” he lied. “How are you Connie?”

“Fine thanks, Mr Frost. I’m sorry about, um, well, you know, er, everything.”

“Yes, well, shit happens, Connie.”

There was a pregnant silence that was broken by Kenneth.

“I’m going to change; can you give Connie a coffee, or something, Dad?”

“Yes, I was going to put the kettle on anyway. Tea or coffee, Connie?”

Kenneth left them to it, and went up to his room. Fifteen minutes later, Keira appeared in a skirt and short sleeved top.

“That’s better, my God, I hate being a boy!”

Graham felt uncomfortable, so glanced at Connie to gauge her reaction. To his surprise, there wasn’t one.

“That top looks nice; was that one we got the other day?” Connie asked.

“Yes, it’s okay, but it shows every mark. I have to be careful not to dribble when eating or drinking.”

Graham shook his head. Was he the only one to find this situation too weird for words?

“Connie, I’m sorry to ask you this, but don’t you find this a little odd?”

“What’s odd, Mr Frost?”

“Um, well, Connie, Kenneth is now Keira. Some would say that it’s impossible, and yet you don’t seem bothered by it; why is that?”

Connie looked at her friend, who was now refilling the kettle.

“That’s because I understand, Mr Frost.”

“You understand?”

Connie nodded.

“Yes.”

“What do you understand?”

“Why she couldn’t be a girl before this. She was growing up and needed the protection of anonymity to develop into who she is now becoming.”

Graham blinked a few times as he processed the information. He looked at his daughter.

“What am I missing here?”

“Everything, Dad,” she said, with her eyes laughing at him.

He regarded Connie who was finishing her coffee; as Keira sat down to start hers.

“Connie, who exactly is Keira?”

Connie looked to Keira for help. Keira just smiled.

“She’s your daughter who used to be your son.”

“That’s it?”

“As far as I know, yes.”

“Why aren’t you bothered by her ability to change from one to the other?”

Connie shrugged.

“I used to be, but understand why.”

“We’re going round in circles, aren’t we?”

Connie shrugged again.

“I think we might be.”

“Look, Dad, just trust me when I tell you that I will explain things when you’re ready, okay?”

“Will you; just when will that be?”

“That’s up to you, but I don’t think it’ll be that long.”

“Okay, I give up. Just tell me how long this switching back and forth is going to go on for?”

“There’s no reason that it shouldn’t stop today. The school is finished, so I’m not going back there, only they don’t know it yet. I’m to see Anne next week, so I can go like this, which will probably blow her mind, but at least I get my chocolates.”

“What?”

“Nothing, Dad; it’s a private joke. Have you done anything about schools yet?”

“Keira, give me a chance. Your mother is divorcing me, so we’ve solicitor’s letters flashing about and all the dirt is coming out about what a terrible father I’ve been, and how career-minded she’s been and how unfaithful we’ve both been. The last letter seemed to imply that they are going to take everything that’s in both our names, split it straight down the middle and put a quarter aside for you and split the rest down the middle for each of us.”

“Yes, that’s what seemed to be fair,” Keira said.

Graham frowned.

“What?”

“Well, I wrote to both sets of solicitors, giving dates and times when you’d both been flying here there and everywhere. I noted when the affair started with Stephanie, and when Mum started sleeping with Yvonne. I think I’ve sort of destroyed both of your defences, which leaves them with no option but to see me as the real victim and make you two share everything else equally. It’s just such a pity that the solicitors are the only winners in all this tragedy.”

Graham was, once again left speechless by his daughter.

“Are you sure you’re my child?” he asked.

Connie spluttered the dregs of coffee across the worktop, apologised and caught the cloth that Keira threw at her.

“The truth is in the genes, Dad,” she said, laughing at him again.

Anne went to the cupboard and fetched another box of tissues. Her last client had used half a box, and his father seemed to use the other half.

She spent a minute gathering her thoughts and then completed the notes for Roddy Myers.

The poor lad was desperately confused over so much, but it was compounded by his father, who probably needed as much counselling as his son. She’d referred Richard to a counsellor for the parents, families and partners of people who were dealing with emerging sexually related problems, in particular homosexuality and gender dysphoria. She felt it would be impossible for her to deal with Roddy and his father.

Often, all they all needed was to talk over how they were feeling and to have someone tell them that it was fine to feel that way. Guilt brought about by social and family expectations had a lot to answer for.

Her secretary brought in a strong black coffee.

“I think your next patient is here,” she announced, somewhat uncertainly.

“Think?”

“Well, I thought it was young Kenneth Frost.”

“Yes, it should be.”

“Okay, well, you might be surprised,” was all she said before leaving.

Anne shook her head and went back to the file she was completing. They were making progress, but it was slow going. The guilt and strong desire to meet his father’s exacting expectations was proving a tough nut to crack.

She glanced at the clock and sighed. She never had enough time.

She finished the notes and placed the file in the drawer, pulling out Kenneth’s file. She opened it and smiled as she saw the plain piece of paper with the rather smudged fingerprint that lay on the top.

She liked Kenneth, as he was so unlike any of her other patients. His optimistic and unquenchable certainty as to how things would happen was entertaining, or would be if they weren’t quite so impossible. She knew she had her work cut out to get him to see the gritty reality of his situation.

She pressed the buzzer and asked him to come in.

Keira walked into the Doctor’s room wearing the largest smile and a very pretty summer dress. The dress hid very little. What it managed to hide successfully alluded to by shape and form. There was absolutely no way that this person was male.

Anne regarded her for a moment.

“I’m sorry, has there been a mix-up?” she asked, frowning.

The girl didn’t stop, but walked up to the chair by the desk and sat down, crossing her long and very shapely legs. She pulled the hem of her skirt down as it rose up a bit when she sat down.

“I’m here for my chocolates, Doctor,” she said.

Anne smiled a weary smile.

“Ah, very funny. Oh, Kenneth is a wag, and you are remarkably alike, but I don’t think so,” she said, entering into the joke with good humour.

Instead of laughing or admitting being part of an attempted gag, the girl simply held out her right index finger.

Anne stared at it stupidly for a moment.

Keira sighed and reached over, lifted the felt pen off the desk and painted her finger carefully.

“May I?” she asked, mimicking what Kenneth had said when he had first taken that same piece of paper.

She rolled her finger on the paper, looked at the result, smiled and handed it back to the bemused doctor after signing it in her presence.

“You check that while I go wash my finger, okay?”

The girl got up and left the room, leaving the door open. Anne sat there, slightly stunned, but watched the girl cross the corridor and go into the ladies room. Sylvia popped her head round the door.

“You okay?” she asked.

“Who the hell is that?” she asked her secretary.

“She said she used to be Kenneth Frost, only she told me she’s now Keira Frost.”

“This has gone too far!” Anne said, getting cross. However, she looked at the piece of paper in annoyance. How dare this girl waste her time like this?

She looked at the paper a little more closely. Then, she opened her top drawer of her desk and took out her magnifying glass. Sylvia watched from the doorway. The frown of annoyance gave way to an expression of wonder and shock.

“What?” she asked.

“Come here and compare these two, will you?”

Sylvia walked over and looked at the two fingerprints under the magnifying glass.

“Okay, they’re the same, what of it?”

She pointed to the one with Kenneth’s signature.

“Kenneth did that one and signed it in my presence a few weeks ago. It has been sitting in my drawer ever since, locked away.”

“So?”

“That girl has just done this one in my presence too.”

The two women looked at each other and then at the fingerprints.

“You can’t have two people with the same fingerprint, can you?” asked Sylvia, whose husband was a police inspector.

“No.”

“So, that means that the girl is the same person as Kenneth Frost?” she asked, very uncertainly.

They both looked up as Keira returned. The girl closed the door and walked over to the same chair and sat down, saying nothing.

Anne looked at Sylvia, who shrugged and left the room quickly, closing the door behind her.

Anne tried to get her thoughts in order; and failed.

“Sorry, doctor, but I cheated a bit,” Keira said. Anne was amazed, for as much as the voice was Kenneth’s. It wasn’t. It was a girl’s voice; not a little girl’s voice, or a boy’s voice being forced to sound like a girl, but warm and rich, quite a sexy voice.

“How so?” Anne managed to ask.

“I knew I could do it before I came to see you.”

Anne nodded but without knowing why.

“You are Kenneth?” she asked.

“No, I’m Keira; Kenneth was my old name; the name that belonged to the male me.”

“What I’m trying to ask is - how?”

“Ah, there’s a thing; to be honest, I haven’t a clue. I just changed.”

Anne played for time to gather whatever wits were left. She flicked through Kenneth’s file, hoping for some revelation that might help her in a situation she never imagined she would find herself.

There, on the first page; the notes of her first examination after the assault.

“Keira?”

“Yes.”

“Tell me about the first time we met.”

Keira smiled gently, knowing that the doctor was hoping to be able to establish the truth of her identity.

“You came to the school, and we met in the sick bay with Nurse Verity. We talked about the attack and how I was feeling. You examined me, specifically my head, for any lasting injury or potentially worrying signs.”

“Did I examine anything else?”

“Yes, you checked my heart and lungs, and had a quick look at my torso, as I fell badly and bruised my ribs at the back.”

“Would you mind if I examined you now?”

“I expected it,” she said, standing up, and unzipping her dress in a practiced movement.

Anne was a little shocked, as the girl before her had a full and very definite female figure. Her breasts were held in place by a delightful pink bra, and she wore matching pants.

“Now, before we do this, is there anything I remarked upon about your back?”

“Just that I have a large mole in the small of my back, which I keep catching with my fingernails when I tuck my shirts in. You told me it would be easy to remove.”

Keira turned round and there, in exactly the same position, was a large mole with obvious signs of old scarring from inadvertent nail strikes.

Anne saw it and sat down again.

“Put your dress back on; I’m convinced. I don’t understand how, but I’m convinced.”

Smiling broadly, Keira slipped her dress back on, and zipped it up. She then sat down again, crossing those legs. Anne looked closely at her face.

It was Kenneth’s face, but softer and definitely more feminine. The rather prominent nose and Adam’s Apple were gone, as was the slightly sharp chin and long forehead. This was a very pretty girl, wearing a modicum of makeup, sensibly applied.

“Who did your makeup?”

“Me.”

“Who taught you?”

“My friend Connie.”

“Care to tell me how long this has been going on?”

“What?”

“I’m not sure, to be frank; I just get the impression you’ve been doing this longer than just today.”

“Does it really matter?”

“Not really; I am out of my depth here, so I am struggling to comprehend how best to proceed.”

“Proceed? Sorry doctor, but this is it; the end. I’m a girl, so all I need is a letter confirming that from a medical perspective so I can get everything changed and get on with my life.”

“I suppose you’re right. I’d like to get a colleague to look...”

“No! Absolutely not! The problem with being unique is that everyone wants a slice. Well, that is just not going to happen. By all means examine me, and get another medical practitioner who knows nothing about me to confirm your findings, but there is no way I’m going to become a circus freak.”

“I understand that. But you must understand that from my perspective, you could hold some key to aid us in dealing with other patients.”

“No, I don’t. You will have to trust me on that one.”

“How long have you been like this?”

“Three days, so far, this time.”

“This time?”

“I’ve been having an evening here and there over the last few months.”

Anne shook her head.

“I’m sorry; I’m still at a loss. Well, let’s do a thorough examination. If you don’t mind I will call in a colleague, and I promise I will not tell them anything about you.”

Unfortunately, Dr. Howlett was with a patient, so they waited fifteen minutes for him to finish. In that time, Anne took a sample of blood from Keira, so as to determine whether her chromosomes would confirm her new gender. She then asked the girl questions to try to obtain some degree of understanding of this event. She held short of calling it a miracle, but that’s clearly what it was.

Eventually, Dr Howlett arrived and so Keira stripped off, unselfconsciously, Anne noted, and allowed them to give her a full examination, including a gynaecological exam.

Anne was amused to note that the girl did not remove a rather plain circlet of grey metal from around her neck.

“Family heirloom?” she asked.

“Something like that.”

Anne allowed Dr. Howlett to take the lead, as he was trained in that field.

While Keira dressed, again, the two doctors conferred, with Anne asking her colleague to state what he discovered.

“I’m at a bit of a loss as to what we’re looking for, unless it’s to say we’ve just seen one of the most perfect specimens of a young adult female it’s been my pleasure to see for a long time.”

“So, Keira is a normal young woman?”

“Anne, do me a favour; tell me what this is all about; what am I missing?”

“Not right now, John, all will become clear in time, I hope. All right, she’s female, and an adult; can you tell me anything about her cycle?”

“She’s probably just had it, as I think she’s got another three or four weeks to go. But from what I saw, a perfect example of a young, healthy and fertile female.”

Keira heard that and grinned. She came back and sat down. Dr Howlett looked mystified and obviously a little miffed that Anne was not telling him more.

“I’ll speak to you later, John; I promise. Thanks for your help.”

John was obviously not going to get his explanation yet, so he grinned good-naturedly and left.

“Now, about that letter,” said Keira.

Fourteen

Graham felt uncomfortable, but he was reluctant to fidget in such august company.

Mrs Doreen Lambert was Headmistress of the very selective Drinkwater Hall Sixth Form College for Girls. They sat in her study overlooking the very fine grounds on the edge of the Chiltern Hills. She was reading the report by Mr Pettifer, Keira’s last headmaster.

After trying to nonchalantly regard his hostess; a middle-aged and conservatively dressed matron, he transferred his gaze and looked at the austere paintings of some equally formidable-looking women that looked down their noses at him from their canvasses. He correctly assumed they were her predecessors.

“I’m sorry if this might take a few minutes; I do like to read what’s been written, and this is all a little sudden,” she said with a smile.

“I understand, I wouldn’t have it any other way,” he replied.

“Keira is in good hands, as Shannon simply adores showing new girls around the school. She’s Irish, and one of our Upper Sixth-boarders. She comes from a rather dysfunctional family in the Republic, so has spent the holidays with a relative in Kent. Unfortunately, the relative had to return to Eire for a family crisis, so Shannon asked if she could stay here for the week or so before term began.”

“Poor girl, one never imagines that wealthier people suffer from problems, but it’s come home to me all too recently.”

“Quite, problems are endemic across the board. Would you like a cup of tea?”

“No, thanks, I’m fine.”

Doreen resumed reading and the clock ticking.

He was actually feeling rather better than he expected to be, all things considered. As he sat there, listening to the elderly grandfather clock tick away the seconds, he thought back over the last few, very hectic weeks.

The summer had been an amazing time for the family, particularly for Keira. She and Connie had spent a lot of the time together. They swam often and went for long walks, during which they discussed everything that Keira had missed by not growing up a girl. Three times a week, they went for a four mile run along the river, across a farmer’s field and back along the road. To start with, Connie had to walk most of it, but after a few weeks was managing the whole thing in a good time.

Under Keira’s supervision, Connie had cut out the comfort food. She still snacked, but usually on oranges or apples. Chocolates, crisps and biscuits were banned, and so she was on track to drop from fourteen stone to nine by the end of the holidays.

Graham was surprised. Firstly by the fact that his daughter had the patience to help a friend in such a way, and secondly that Connie had the strength of character to stick to the strict regime that Keira appeared to have imposed on her. He was also pleasantly surprised in the change in Keira’s friend. She had blossomed as she lost weight. Graham put her change down to a gradual improvement of her self-confidence and self-esteem. The combination of the weight-loss and the psychological stimulation had created an attractive girl with a lot of charm.

Graham knew that Connie was not looking forward to the end of the holidays, as he and Keira were going to France for a week (possibly with Stephanie) after the GCSE results, and then it was almost definite that Keira was not returning to the same school.

As he sat in Doreen’s presence, he hoped that this school might take her. The Head of the last school to which they’d applied had read the letter from Anne and decided it was one complication too many. They hadn’t even bothered to arrange an interview.

Unbeknown to Graham, Keira, although sorely tempted, decided that crime-fighting and superhero stuff should wait, just until she got some stability in her life. She would often go out during the warm nights to practice her gifts, but felt the local constabulary could manage perfectly well without her help for the time being.

Actually, she discovered that being a girl was such fun on its own, that there wasn’t any need for extra excitement. To be honest, she liked her sleep, and so found getting up in the middle of the night was adversely affecting her.

Then, in July, Keira had a surprise visitor as predicted by Dr Howelett. To her, although faintly unpleasant, it was confirmation that she’d made it. She still had not removed her torc ever since that day after the exams. As a result, and out of courtesy, she made an appointment with Dr. Anne to keep her updated with progress.

Anne was flabbergasted enough with the revelation of Keira in the first place, so was not so surprised when the girl sat in her room and casually, and not without some pride, announced that she was experiencing her first period.

“I suppose I should be surprised, but I learned that with you, the impossible happens. How are you?”

“Brilliant,” was the one-word answer that was reflected in the girl’s smile.

Anne asked if she could exam her again, to which she assented.

After which, Anne told Keira that she thought that the girl had filled out a little, but otherwise there was little change.

Graham worked hard from his home, making occasional flights abroad with Stephanie, who appeared more and more at the family home. Graham toyed with the possibility of selling it, but as he could afford not to, he decided to keep it as an investment against inflation. Had Linda remained in the area, he might well have moved, but she and Yvonne were now in London.

He was amused to observe that George Marchant had been seen recently at the Tennis Club with a very attractive girlfriend. He had rung up George, as an old friend, and they had got together for a drink as a foursome with Stephanie. They had met Jenny, the new girlfriend and all came to the conclusion that they should have got divorced years ago.

Initially Graham was rather apprehensive about Keira’s reaction to Stephanie, so took things very gently.

Actually, in Stephanie, Keira found an ally. Although almost ten years younger than Graham, Stephanie was a mature, intelligent and an attractive woman. Keira discovered that she was interested in almost the same things as Keira and was obviously deeply in love with Graham. In response, Graham became more animated and human than Keira could ever remember. Gone was the taciturn and miserable man who seemed grumpy all the time. Keira found her easy to like, and so she got on far better with her than with her birth mother.

Having been somewhat close to being terrified of Keira at the start, Graham had actually come to know and love his daughter. He did not admit to being able to understand anything about her, particularly her ability to be two entirely different people without seemingly finding it anything strange. There was still something distinctly different about her, which made him wary. It was like having a pet kitten that one believed was a wild tiger in disguise.

He was also at a loss to understand how anyone could prefer being a girl to being male, but if that’s what made her content, he was okay with it.

He felt a heavy sadness that he had failed Kenneth so completely, so worked especially hard to make it up to his new daughter. Somehow the absence of Linda seemed to make everything lighter and perhaps happier. Although none were aware of it at the time, the slowly degrading relationship soured everything within the small family. Graham was convinced that Linda’s uncompromising attitudes about just about everything pushed him towards Stephanie so as to find someone with whom he could find solace.

Life seemed to become sunnier within the Frost household on the day at the beginning of July when Keira had returned from the doctor with a certain piece of paper. Unlike the paper that Neville Chamberlain waved in September 1938, after returning from a meeting with a certain Mr Hitler, this piece of paper was of great significance. Anne’s letter paved the way for Keira to have her birth certificate altered, her national records, school records, medical records and every other record changed from male to read female.

On the back of that, Graham was better able to plan for the future. Not being able to drive started as a real pain, but he tried to alter his working life-style accordingly. The company, Frobisher & Booth, did not make it desperately easy for him to work from home, although conscious of his unfortunate circumstances. In actual fact, it made very little difference to either the work or the clients. Graham thought that they simply didn’t like not having him at their beck and call. Although Graham knew he was good at his job, what the partners hadn’t told him was he was their best, and they needed him to bring in the clients as he had done for the last decade or so.

They started making things harder and harder; demanding that he go to this meeting, that conference, and yet another meeting, knowing full well that without a car, he was stuffed. Stephanie was able to only do so much, and the stress began to tell on them both. After much soul searching, he asked for a meeting with James Booth, one of the partners, and made his situation plain. In the end, the company was very nice about it, but was not really able to give him the flexibility he needed. Reluctantly, Graham gave notice and launched out on his own as an Independent Financial Services Consultant.

Stephanie quit too, and joined him.  Frobisher and Booth then regretted their uncompromising stance, as all Graham’s clients ditched them to stay with the man who had served them so well. That surprised Graham who had expected one or two, but not them all.

James Booth called him at home and all but begged him to come back on his own terms. Graham politely refused and hung up.

In August, all across the British Isles, envelopes were plopping into people’s homes, or were delivered to schools to distribute. The results were in!

“I don’t think I want to know,” said Connie, staring at her envelope.

Keira grinned and ripped hers open.

“Bloody hell!” she said.

“What?”

“All A grades with one A star in English.”

“No?  Even in French?”

“Even in French.”

“There has got to have been a mistake; you are so crap at French.”

“I did a lot of revision,” said Keira, knowing that somehow her torc helped her learn what she had believed was un-learnable.

“But you failed the French mock!” Connie pointed out.

“So, I got better.”

“They’ll think you cheated.”

“They can think what they like, I didn’t.”

Connie opened her envelope.

“Well?”

“Three ‘A’s, and the rest ‘B’s. Better than I thought.”

“Enough for sixth form, anyway.”

“I’m not sure I want to go back, not if you’re not going to be there.”

“Hey, live with it, it’s just for two years.”

“Why don’t you want to go back; Mr Pettifer says it’ll be okay?”

“He’s just the Head. I’ve a history there, and even though people can see who and what I am now, there will always be those who will have a problem of some sort.”

“I think most of it is in your imagination. I think people will be fine with it. It’s not like you look like Kenneth in a dress.”

“Thanks for that. Maybe you’re right, and it is in my mind, but if I start afresh somewhere new, it’ll make it easier for me.”

“I suppose,” said her friend, morosely.

“Anyway, look at you, the new, slim-line and drop-dead gorgeous version. The guys will be queuing up, and so you won’t have time for me.”

Connie smiled half-heartedly; pleased on the one hand, as she was already noticing that boys were seeing her, as if for the first time, but she valued Keira’s friendship above nearly everything else.

As a result of those results, Graham was in a better position to seek a place for his daughter at a reputable sixth form college.

Whether it was guilt over not being around for Kenneth’s early schooling, or for some other reason, he investigated the possibilities of getting her into a private school for her last two years.

There were two reasons for this (apart from the fact there was the money available set aside by the divorce settlement), the first was there was less chance of her meeting anyone who remembered her as Kenneth. The second reason was the quality of the education. Keira was clearly a bright student, so he decided that she ought to get the best on offer so to help her get a place at a better university.

Which was why he now watched the indomitable Doreen turn the pages of the report in front of her.

“She’s managed to acquire some impressive grades at GCSE, even if this seems to have surprised some of her teachers,” she said.

“She was struggling with her gender disorder in the early part of the syllabus, so when she took the mock exams she was rather distracted,” Graham said, following the agreed spiel.

“Well, if these grades were achieved when she was going through a significant difficulty, what would she achieve without such problems?”

“Quite,” agreed Graham.

“I see she did particularly well in French, which confounded her French teacher.”

“Indeed,” said Graham. “We actually had a week in Brittany last week. She appears to have mastered the language. I was surprised at her fluency with the spoken word.”

“Really, where did you go?”

“Port Crouesty, at the mouth of the Gulf of Morbihan. We have an apartment there, opposite the Marina.”

“Lovely; I know it well. I used to sail in the Gulf quite often when I was younger and fitter.”

“We have a catamaran; a Hobiecat. Keira loves sailing.”

“Does she? Well, she sounds like a good all-rounder. Her Headmaster is of the opinion that she will do well now things are more settled. I notice he refers to her as a boy?”

“The gender confusion was only resolved since she took her exams. He is not fully aware of the current situation. He was made aware of the possibility that my son might become my daughter, but the speed of the transition took us all by surprise. I think the doctor classed it as a unique inter-sex case. It’s all a bit bamboozling, really.”

“I take it you have informed the school you are considering taking her out?”

“It’s not that simple. The school is a state school with a separate sixth form that one has to apply to join. It is over subscribed, so there is stiff competition to get in. Existing pupils have an advantage, as they do have pride of place, but it is never a foregone conclusion. Mr Pettifer has said that a place will remain open for Keira, but we need to make the decision by the end of this week.”

“How interesting. So, he’s willing to take her despite knowing the history?”

“Yes, he’s been very supportive.”

“And yet you are still looking elsewhere?”

“Two main reasons; one, Keira wants to start afresh somewhere there is little chance of anyone knowing her. This is for her piece of mind. Second, I am satisfied that her current school is a good one, as her grades display, but to be honest, I feel her chances of getting better grades in subjects she will really appreciate are better in a school like this that offers a wider range of subjects. Academic subject are great, but the more life-skills and artistic orientated subjects might give her an advantage in further development.”

Doreen smiled at Graham.

“I might ask you to write our prospectus. I wholeheartedly agree. I hated some of the core subjects at school, as the teachers were mediocre and the subjects did not enthral me in the slightest. I was blessed by a place here for sixth form, and can honestly say it opened my eyes to the real world.”

Graham breathed a sigh of relief, pleased that his Internet browsing paid off.

Meanwhile, Shannon o’Hanrahan was showing Keira the gymnasium. Keira was dressed in a summer dress; in fact one that she and Connie had acquired that first day out. Shannon was in shorts and a tee shirt. As the school was still on holiday, she was allowed to wear her own clothes all the time.

“It’s relatively new. I think it was built about four years ago. The Lambster keeps harping on about what things were like in her day, and we don’t know how lucky we are. I hate PE, and they make us go for runs when the hockey pitches are too muddy or frosty,” she said, with her soft Irish accent very obvious.

“The Lambster?”

“Oh, that’s the nickname for the Head. She’s all right, I suppose; a bit too Jolly Hockey Sticks for me.”

“She seemed pretty switched on to me,” Keira observed.

“Oh, that’s for sure,” agreed Shannon. “You can’t put much past her.”

“Do you board?” Keira asked.

“I certainly do; you won’t get me going back to Dublin every weekend. I’ve been here for a week already.”

“How come?”

“Family problems at home, so I was staying with an aunty near Maidstone. She had to go home to Dublin for some family problem, so I asked the Lambster if I could come here. She’s been very good about it.

“What’s it like?”

“Boarding or Dublin?”

“Boarding.”

“It’s okay. Because we’re all seventeen or eighteen, we’re treated like young adults. We each have our own room, which we can decorate more or less how we like. There are rules, but they’re mostly for our safety and to make life easier. I was in a good school in Dublin, but me Dad decided that I needed to get away from the distractions so I could get to Oxford or Cambridge.”

“Did he attend one of them?”

Shannon laughed heartily. She was a pretty girl with red hair and green eyes that twinkled mischievously.

“Me Dad? You have to be kiddin’ me. He’s what they call an entrepreneur, but I call him a wheeler-dealer. He made a fortune in scrap metal and dealing in dodgy property deals back in the eighties. To be honest, I don’t get on with him, and he doesn’t know how to take me. The main reason I’m here is to try to get some English culture to rub off so I might attract some better class of men than them that usually sniff around. It’s the fellas that he calls my distractions.”

“I was under the impression that the Irish don’t exactly love the English,” Keira said cautiously.

“You’re thinking of them up north. To be honest, most of the south don’t give a shit either way. That’s all in the past. We’ve shown that we can fuck up all by ourselves and so we can’t blame it on the English, can we?” she said, referring to the recent financial crisis in Eire.

“I find it all rather confusing,” Keira admitted.

“So do I, to be sure, but all the troubles are because they just can’t live with each other in the north. It’s like me dad and me. We’re fine when we’re apart, but when we’re together, we fight because we’re too alike.”

“Like my parents,” Keira said.

“Divorced, are they?”

“Heading that way.”

“Mine too. My Mum pissed off years ago, and I don’t blame her, as me Dad is a right shit.”

Keira had never met anyone quite like Shannon before. When they were first introduced, outside Mrs Lambert’s study, the Irish girl had been sweetness and light, appearing almost so butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth. Now, she swore like a trooper and was as down to earth as one could want.

“So, no boys here?” she asked, somewhat wistfully.

“There’s a boys’ school up the road a way, eight or nine miles; just too far to walk. Anyway, we get together for the dramatic and arty-farty stuff, and things like the Christmas Disco. Are you into all that shit?”

“Not really. I’m into computers, and I like sports.”

“Do ye?” Shannon asked, looking at Keira as if she said she liked biting the heads off puppies.

“Yes, I like to keep fit, so I run and swim and stuff. I have played a bit of tennis, but never seriously. My Mum met her lover at the local tennis club.”

“Juicy, was he?” Shannon asked with a grin.

“No, she was the wife of a friend of my Dad.”

Shannon looked a little shocked, and then grinned.

“Cool!”

“Anyway, I’ve never played hockey or that other one with the butterfly nets.”

“Lacrosse; it’s a fucking lethal game. Makes psychopaths out of anyone that plays the damn game; I tried it once and got sent off for trying to kill someone.”

Keira laughed, feeling like she belonged here.

Doreen stood up and announced that she would give Graham a short tour of the main school.

“I’m sure a man of the world like yourself already knows what a gymnasium and a hockey pitch looks like, so perhaps if I show you the conditions in which the girls live might give you a good idea as to how Keira will be living while she is here.”

Graham took that as a positive sign.

They left the study and she showed him the main dining hall and library. Judging by the amount of hi-tech PCs around the place, Keira would be in seventh heaven. He said something like that to his hostess.

“Ah, a bit of a wiz on the old computer, is she?” Doreen asked as they started up the stairs.

“Just a bit. Put it this way, when I have a problem, I go to her. She’s built at least three systems, to my knowledge, and they always seem better than the shop deals.”

On the landing, they walked past a large bay window that overlooked the beautiful grounds. Two girls were walking past the window and they were laughing. It was Keira and the girl who was showing her round the school, Shannon.

Doreen watched Keira for a moment. She was a very pretty girl, displaying no hint whatsoever of any gender confusion. Tall and with an athletic figure, rather than what one would call voluptuous. She was, however, well endowed in the chest department, without being too big, and had the height to carry it.

The two girls walked over to where a car was parked and spoke to an attractive older woman who was sitting on a bench reading a book.

Doreen turned to Graham with a quizzical expression.

“Ah, that’s Stephanie, my, ah, new partner. We thought it better if just Keira and I came in.”

They watched and there did not seem to be any reservation on behalf of Keira in relating to Stephanie.

“They get on well?”

“Very well; in fact, Keira gets on better with her than with her mother. We all went on holiday together.”

“May I ask about your own relationship with her; you mentioned an ex-wife?”

“Indeed; to be brutally honest, it’s amazing that Keira is as well adjusted as she is. I’m a consultant in the financial services industry, and up until recently have been employed by one of the biggest, most prestigious companies in London. Linda was, or probably still is an interior designer with one of the most exclusive design companies. Neither of us was aware of it, but I don’t think we were there for Kenneth, as Keira used to be called.  I suppose one gets so drawn into the cycle of success and achievement that one loses sight of what is important. That’s why I’ve left my old company and now work from home with a handful of clients.  Keira has gone through a tough time, so I want to be there for her.”

“And her mother?”

“Isn’t. Sorry, that must sound quite harsh, but Linda has formed a relationship with another woman and does not want anything to do with Keira or me. I’ve not heard from her for a couple of months; letters from the solicitors, yes, but not from her.”

“What does Keira feel about that?”

“You’d have to ask her. However, I don’t think they were close.”

“The school she has been in is co-ed, yes?” Doreen asked.

“Yes.”

“Am I to understand from Mr Pettifer that she has not attended there as a girl?

“No.”

“How awkward for her; I can understand why she is seeking a fresh start. I hesitate to ask a personal and rather sensitive question, but...”

“With the exception perhaps of a brief holiday romance with a young French lad, Keira has had no girl or boyfriends to date. If you asked her, she would say the confusion was sufficient to make it all a non-starter.”

Doreen smiled. They reached the landing, so Doreen walked.

“Thank you; I have to ask, because all the girls are aged between sixteen and eighteen, so are very much post puberty and active sexually, if given enough rope!”

“To be frank, I always suspected that my son was gay, so when Keira emerged, it was an enormous relief. However, being the father of a normal girl, who is becoming more and more aware of boys, is giving me some sleepless nights. She’s been fine so far, except as I said, for the young man she met in France. I think he was sufficiently in awe of her to do anything dangerous, but I was rather taken aback as to how sexually mature and aware she is. She was the one in control and seemed to twist poor Charles around her little finger. It wasn’t as if she was all over him, but she certainly seemed to have gained a lot of confidence and had fallen well and truly on the side of being a heterosexual girl.

“Stephanie was brilliant, and gave Keira the little chat that her mother would have had to give had she been around. However Stephanie said that Keira didn’t need the advice and might even have been able to tell poor Steph a couple of things.”

“This young man, Charles; is he British or a local?”

“Charles is a French boy, a year or so older than Keira. They met on the beach when we were sailing. He was in the local sailing club, and we were having a problem with our mast. He came over and helped. That’s when I realised Keira’s French was far better than I had imagined.”

“Has he been in contact since?”

“We’ve only been back a few days, so I have no idea. If he has, it’ll be via text or email, so unlike the old days of the letters in the post, I will never know.”

“Oh, I know what you mean. This technological age is just so difficult to police. The internet here is controlled by us, so they can’t stray onto any dubious websites, but anyone with a little bit of knowledge can easily bypass the system I mean, a girl with a mobile phone that is used as a mobile modem, can get her laptop onto the web onto any site she wants. It’s a nightmare. They’re all technically adults, so apparently it’s an infringement of their human rights to prevent them from accessing whatever sites they want.”

Doreen was very much up with current law and trends.

“We try to encourage a voluntary acceptance of our code of conduct, and by and large are successful. It’s a harsh world out there, so we find ourselves in a cleft stick. If we shut them away and prevent them gaining experience and knowledge about how harsh a world it is, when they leave here, it will be a bigger shock than if we allow them controlled exposure.”

They had reached one of the corridors off which the girls’ rooms were. None were occupied, so Doreen opened the first one she came to.

It was a small, but comfortable room. The bed, desk, wardrobe and chair were all utilitarian but very serviceable.

“They are permitted their own comfy chair and a computer/office chair if they want. There is enough electricity for their music devices and computers. One girl tried to get a fridge in her room, but we don’t allow that. Televisions are another problem area. There’s a TV lounge on each landing, and there is a fridge in the small kitchen area on each landing, so they learn to share facilities. We find this sets them up well for university.”

“With most personal computers also used as TVs, I can’t see no TV as a problem. Keira doesn’t watch much anyway. Do they not have meals in the dining room?” Graham asked, confused.

“You’re not experienced with girls, so you don’t know that they are constantly nibbling, even if they eat the school food. You will always get the girls who won’t eat in the dining room, but will stuff their faces with biscuits and other junk as soon as they leave the hall. These are young adults, not primary school children. We can guide and advise, but never force them to eat the food.”

“Is the food good? I remember my old school food, and it wasn’t that brilliant.”

“We have just sixty girls here, so our chef doesn’t have the large numbers to cater for that most modern schools do. We are able to cater for a variety of dietary requirements; from those with allergies, through vegetarians or religious specialities, to plain old likes and dislikes.”

“Keira eats like a young horse,” Graham said with a smile.

“Then oats will be no problem,” Doreen said, displaying that she did have a sense of humour.

“So, did you like France?” Shannon asked, after Keira told her where she got her suntan.

“I always like it there; but this year was the best ever.”

“Have you got a place there or what?”

“Dad bought a three-bedroom, luxury apartment back, oh, about seven or eight years ago. He had a particularly good year, so he put his bonus to best use. He was going to sell it, so as to maximise the profit, but when the divorce reared its ugly head, he put it in my name so Mum couldn’t get her mitts on it.”

“Have you got a boat, then?”

“Not a boat; we keep the Hobiecat in the underground garage through the winter and take it out when we’re there. We keep it on the beach, by the sailing club.”

“What’s a Hobbie-thingy?”

“A catamaran; it has two hulls with a fabric deck stretched between the two. It’s got a big mast, so you can sail it pretty fast.”

“So, no cabins you can sleep in?”

“It’s not that kind of a boat.”

“I don’t like water, me.”

“Can’t you swim?”

“I can swim, but I just don’t like getting water in my eyes and ears. I don’t like getting my head wet, really.”

“Do you like it here?” Keira suddenly asked.

“Would I ask to come here rather than go home if I didn’t?” the Irish girl asked.

“No, I suppose not. Still, it is rather, I don’t know, removed from reality?”

“That’s a good word. I guess you could be right, as it is rather posh and all that, but the Lambster does surprise us with how much she trusts us to do. It’s not like the rules are here to tie us down, more like they teach us to discipline ourselves. Do you know what I mean?”

“Have you just the one year left?” Keira asked.

“Yeah, but I haven’t a clue what to do. I’d like to go into acting, which is why I’m doing the Drama set.”

“Set?”

“A lot of the ‘A’ levels we do here are job orientated. Like, we have the Sports and Leisure set; it’s a double vocational A level in sports science and leisure management. The drama set includes English, drama and theatre management.”

“Oh, do they do any IT system stuff?”

“You mean computers and that shit?”

“Yes.”

“Cool!” Keira said, already planning her chosen path.

“You have to get accepted first,” Shannon reminded her.

“Oh, I suppose you’re right. I’d forgotten.”

“Do you like the place?”

Keira looked at the beautiful buildings and well-kept grounds.

“I’ll tell you after the first term."

Fifteen

“Miss Frost, that is the rule; all jewellery comes off, and that’s final!” Miss Trehearn said.

“But, Miss...”

“Either you play, or you go. If you play, then that thing round your neck comes off. It’s a health and safety issue; for if someone gets their clothing snagged, or it is bent into your neck, someone might get hurt or clothing could be damaged; that’s the rules!”

“You can’t bend it, it’s very strong.”

“Your choice; do you want to play?” the coach asked, ignoring Keira’s pleas.

“Yes, Miss.”

“Then take it off.”

Keira desperately wanted to play, as she had been selected for the short list for a trial to play for the school first eleven against another school at hockey. It was the first time she had a chance to be selected to represent any school in anything. This game was the final trial before the match on Saturday, and out of twenty-two possible players, she just had to shine.

She was in a justifiable quandary, for the torc had been round her neck consistently since that day she had placed it there.  It was loose enough to shower and wash without difficulty, and it never seemed to get grubby or sweaty.

A couple of girls had teased her about it, but she claimed it was an old family good-luck charm and she never took it off.

She knew that if she took it off, then there was only one possible result, and that would be disastrous.

“Can I put it in my locker, please?” she asked, as sweetly as she could. She thought she might be able to place it round her thigh under her skirt, or something.

“You have three minutes!”

She raced to the changing room and grabbed both ends of the torc. It came free as always, and she waited for the tingles.

They never came

She waited, and waited, and still nothing happened.

She lifted her skirt just to make sure, to discover that she was still Keira.

She opened her locker and pushed the torc in, locking it with the combination lock provided.

She ran back towards the pitch, waiting for the tingles and having her world end.

Perhaps because she had worn it for a longer period, then the change took longer to happen. Perhaps she might last until the end of the game.

Perhaps.

Miss Trehearn watched her join the others.

“There; that wasn’t so hard, was it?”

“No, Miss.”

She was not able to concentrate to begin with, as she kept expecting the tingles to mark the beginning of the end.

They still never came, so she entered into the game with increasing enthusiasm. She had so far avoided using the power of the torc, as she needed to prove to herself that she was capable of competing on an even playing field with her contemporaries.

Just before the second half, she scored the first goal of the game.

By the end of the game, the other side had drawn, but that wasn’t the point. Two goals had been scored and she had scored one of them. She had also been responsible for defending against at least three concerted attacks, and managed to win the ball from the opposition each time.

After the whistle blew, Miss Trehearn called them all around her into a circle.

“Good game, girls. That was quite impressive. I’ve chosen the eleven for Saturday, with two reserves. I will read your names out, and if you are not called, then please head off for a shower. Otherwise, those I name please remain here and we’ll settle your positions for the match.”

Keira was the second name called, after the better of the two goalies, Brittany Phillips.

After the coach had finished, there were thirteen girls left. Keira felt excited, as she was now going to play against another team. This was a first for her.

“Right, Deidre, as you were on the team last year, you will captain the team this season. Keira, I want you as vice-captain, as you show the most promise and you seem to have an excellent idea as to how to get the defence to best cover the opposition forwards.”

She said more, but Keira was only half-listening. Vice Captain! How good was that?

After the short team talk concluded, they made their way back to the showers. As she approached her locker, she saw it was open. Her heart sank, and she immediately checked.

The torc was gone!

She looked at the girls who had preceded them to the showers, and two were missing. There was an altercation in the toilets, so she ran to find Sally Dixon and Fiona Bullinger fighting.

Sally held the torc in her hand and obviously Fiona wanted it.

“That’s my property,” said Keira firmly and very loudly.

She hadn’t meant to, but it was loud enough for Miss Trehearn to pop her head around the door. The three girls were unaware of her presence.

“You want to fight me for it?” said Sally. Fiona decided that she no longer wished to be part of this and tried to leave. Shannon managed to prevent her from doing so by tripping her up with her leg and then sitting on top of her on the damp floor.

“I don’t have to fight you for it,” Keira said, quietly and firmly. “That is my property and you broke into my locker and stole it. Everyone can see that, so unless you want more trouble than you can handle, I suggest you hand it back, right now!”

“I never took it, so you can’t prove that. She took it!” she said, pointing to the pinned-down Fiona.

Keira didn’t even look at Fiona.

“You have it, so you know it was stolen, so that makes you guilty of handling stolen goods. I believe that carries the same sentence at crown court, of ten years in prison!”

A sudden silence came over those assembled. As there was a possibility of a fight, the girls had been noisy in their support, mainly for Keira. However, as Miss Trehearn walked into their midst, they all fell silent and returned to minding their own business.

“Miss Frost is absolutely correct. Now, Miss Dixon, you have two choices, and both involve you returning Miss Frost’s property to her first. One of them does not involve any pain. Your choice.”

Sally passed the torc back to Keira, with little grace.

“It’s broken anyway; it doesn’t bend.”

“Now apologise.”

“Why; I never did anything?”

Miss Trehearn just looked at her as some teachers could.

“Sorry,” Sally mumbled.

“Now, you and Miss Bullinger can get changed and get over to Mrs Lambert’s study. I will have a talk with Miss Frost and ascertain whether she wants the police involved. Clearly that lock has been tampered with, so the case for involving the police is a compelling one.”

There was a corporate sharp intake of breath as all those present realised that a possible prank had just been upgraded. These two girls were looking at suspension if not expulsion for dishonesty.

Keira gratefully opened the torc and replaced it around her neck. Only then did she relax.

“Is it valuable?” Miss Trehearn asked.

“Only to me.”

“If it is, might I suggest you have it placed in the school safe?”

“I’d rather keep it on me, thanks.”

“Then I would get a decent lock for your locker, if I were you.”

“I will.”

“Now, the decision to involve any external authority lies with you. The miscreants will be dealt with by Mrs Lambert, and it may be she feels this is serious enough to call the police. However, on face value, I’m not sure it is, but that decision is up to you.”

“I have no desire to have some police officer taken off some important job to take statements from me and other witnesses over a petty matter that is relatively irrelevant as I have my property back. I will be happy to leave it in the hands of Mrs Lambert, as long as any further dishonesty is discouraged.”

Miss Trehearn smiled. She was a large (not fat), mannish lady of around thirty. She played Rugby for the England women’s team, and was not the sort of woman that anyone would want to start an argument with, no matter how much alcohol one had consumed first.

“Well said, Keira,” she said, and then walked out.

The two girls were gone by tea time. After tea, the fifty-six remaining girls were called to the main hall for an address by the Principal.

They sat on the reasonably comfortable chairs in the large auditorium that doubled as a theatre and cinema, as well as many other functions.

Mrs Lambert and Miss Trehearn walked in and stood in front of the assembled girls.

“As you are no doubt aware by now, an act of petty theft and damage resulted in one of our number almost losing her personal property. Up to now, this is unheard of here, and so I had absolutely no qualms in calling the parents of the two young women responsible and asking them to come and collect errant offspring. They will not be returning.

“This college is proud of our reputation for developing young women of the highest possible calibre so as to be well prepared for their next phase of life. Dishonesty and a lack of integrity are two of many aspects of life that we neither encourage nor condone. I considered informing the police, but as the victim of this heinous crime was the first to acknowledge, our hard-pressed constabulary are busy enough without taking the time to deal with our little crises. The girls concerned will find it hard to locate an alternative place of education, as I have made it quite plain in their records that they have been expelled for dishonesty.

“Your personal property is your responsibility, and we remind you of this as often as we can. On this occasion an item of jewellery was locked in a locker and those concerned broke in and removed it. They claim it was a prank, but neither I, nor Miss Trehearn, nor indeed the victim appreciated it as such. A sense of humour is a valued asset in this day and age, but so is wisdom. One must learn what is funny and when it is funny. To undertake such an activity is neither funny, nor frivolous. I need not say any more than if you respect each other, and each other’s property, then you will be respected in turn. The next time an act of dishonesty occurs, the police will be called. Do I make myself clear?”

She waited for all the girls to stand and reply that they understood. She then walked out.

Miss Trehearn walked over to where Keira stood.

“Here; hopefully you won’t need it, but I thought I’d give it to you anyway,” she said, passing the girl a heavy-duty combination padlock.

Later, Keira was in her room, working on her laptop. She left her door open, as was the custom. If you didn’t want to be disturbed, then you closed your door. It was a simple system, so other girls knew when to go visit a friend, and when their friend didn’t want a visitor.

Shannon appeared.

Hi, Kay, you all right?” Shannon liked Men in Black, so tended to use people’s initials as nicknames. No one else bothered.

“Fine. Thanks for helping earlier,” Keira said.

Shannon eased her bum onto Keira’s bed.

“No problem, that Fiona was a right twat. Her daddy is even richer than mine. See, proved a point, you can’t buy class.”

“I still don’t know why they did it,” Keira said.

“Jealousy, pure and simple. You see, you’re too bloody nice and everyone likes you. You look good, you do well in everything and, shit, girl, some people hate people like you.”

“I thought you said everybody likes me?” Keira teased.

“You know what I mean,” Shannon grumbled. “What are you doing?”

“I’m trying to design a computer program that will make studying languages like French easier.”

“Are you serious?”

“French is a different language to English. We have far more words in English, because we rob all other cultures and languages with impunity. We then use those words as English, without a second thought. French, obeys far more strict rules, with only a few exceptions, while English break all the rules all the time.”

“You’re not even studying French,” Shannon observed.

“I know; I’m doing IT, so this is why I’m working on this. I speak French, so I can use the language to assist my IT course.”

“How many languages can you speak?” Shannon asked, guardedly.

“Why?” asked Keira.

“I thought I heard you speaking to that Korean girl yesterday, in her language.”

Keira cursed herself for being careless.

“A couple,” she said, casually.”

“I speak two; English and bad English,” Shannon said, laughing at her own joke.

Keira smiled to acknowledge she identified it as an attempt at humour.

“So, what’s so special about that thing round your neck?” Shannon asked.

Keira’s hand automatically went to her torc.

“I have no idea. It’s not that valuable, I think.”

“You value it. You looked terrified when you found it was missing.”

“It’s been in the family a long time. I would hate to lose it.”

“I’ve never seen you take it off before; may I see it?”

Keira didn’t want to get a reputation of being churlish; neither did she want anyone to think the torc was more special than she wanted it to appear.

She reached up and undid it, passing it to her friend in its ‘C’ shape.

“It’s lighter than it looks; what’s it made of?”

“My granddad found it during the war. I think it was part of a plane that was shot down.”

Shannon nodded, turning it over in her hands.

“There’s nothing on it,” she remarked.

“I know. I think it’s some form of alloy, but it’s quite a bit stronger than aluminium.”

“It could be very old; say from a lost civilisation; like Atlantis or something like that,” Shannon suggested, having seen the TV series on the previous evening.

“That’d be cool. I think it might be rather more old-looking if it was from way back then.”

“It might have magical powers; like from a wizard or witch.”

“Didn’t you know? I’m a superhero in my days off!” Keira joked.

Shannon laughed and tried to open it. She failed, but went red in the face with the effort.

“It’s fucked!” she announced.

“No, it’s fine. There’s a knack to it,” Keira said, taking it from her friend and placing it back around her neck.

“How did you do that?” the Irish girl asked, frowning.

“Ah, that’s a secret,” Keira said.

“Oh, come on; you can tell me!”

Keira took the torc off and showed Shannon, but no matter how hard she tried, the girl couldn’t make the torc become pliable.

“It’s jinxed!” she said.

“No, it’s special. It’s like it belongs to me and me alone. No one else can open it or wear it.”

“That’s daft.”

“It might be, but like the sword in the stone, it could be a sign of something.”

“Like?”

Keira shrugged.

“I don’t know.”

“Your granddad found it, where?”

“I have no idea, it was in a box of old war stuff; you know, bayonets and old bullet cases, stuff like that.”

“Didn’t you ask him?”

“He was dead before I found the box.”

“Oh. Still, you ought to take it to the British Museum or somewhere like that. It could be worth a fortune.”

“Then they’d take it off me and I’d never see it again. Sorry, but it’s staying right here. I’ll give it to my daughter when she’s old enough.”

“You might just have sons.”

Keira just smiled.

Sixteen

“Okay, where the hell have you been?” Shannon said as Keira clambered in her bedroom window. The time was a little after three in the morning.

Shannon sat in the dark, actually in Keira’s armchair.

Keira cursed under hear breath, but hoped that Shannon had not actually seen much.

“What you don’t know, you can’t tell,” Keira said, enigmatically.

“That’s the third time this week!” her friend said accusingly, as she watched Keira undress out of her dark clothing. There was a thud of something heavy as it fell onto the floor.

It was Sid the Snake’s gravity knife. Keira had forgotten all about it. She had meant to hand it to the police, but with all the excitement, it had slipped from her mind.

Shannon picked it up and stared at it for a moment, frowning.

“I thought you were out seeing a boy, but, this; what the fuck is going on?”

Keira folded her clothes neatly and put them away, unselfconsciously naked. Then, she slipped her nightdress on.

“Believe me, you don’t want to know,” she said.

“What’s this, then?” Shannon asked, holding up the knife.

“It’s not mine. I took it off someone earlier.”

“Huh?”

“Look, okay, I do stuff at night, but I’m not breaking any laws, okay?”

“What stuff?”

“You don’t want to know,” Keira repeated.

“I bloody do!” she said, standing up.

Keira was tempted to invent a boyfriend, but that would simply encourage Shannon to want to come with her, just in case he had a friend.

“Look, Shannon, I’m not like most people.”

“I know, we’re all fucking unique. But somehow, I’m not sure I remember my mother telling me I could fly. What about it?”

Keira simply rose from where she stood in the middle of the room, so the top of her head touched the ceiling.

Shannon gaped at her.

“You see; I really am not like other people.”

“How the fuck....?”

Keira came back down and stood next to her friend.

“This has to go no further, understand?” she said in a voice that did not encourage disagreement.

“Look, ...”

“No Shannon; if I tell you, nobody else gets to know. I mean it.”

“Nobody?”

“Absolutely nobody. If you do, I’m dead. But then, I won’t  be going alone.”

The threat was implicit, so Shannon made the sign of the cross.

“I swear.”

“As I said, I’m not like most people. I have powers.”

“Are you an alien?”

Keira was tempted to run the same story as she had to Connie, but it was rather too silly.

“I’m as human as you, but then I’m a little bit more.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

Keira shrugged.

“I have powers that most people don’t have. If the authorities discovered about me, then I’d be locked away, and, well, you’ve seen the movie, Paul, haven’t you?”

“If you have powers, then surely you could escape?”

“Everyone has a weakness, and if there were too many of them, or they found my weakness, then I’d be helpless.”

“It’s that thing, isn’t it?” Shannon asked, pointing to the torc.

“Partially.”

“What’s that mean?”

“I have powers; all it does is amplify them so as to be even more powerful.”

“If I had it, could I fly?”

“No,” said Keira. “It’s locked into my DNA and so it would probably kill you.”

“How did you get it?”

“It found me.”

“Huh?”

“That’s all I know; it found me.”

“You mean like the Green Lantern?”

Keira looked blank.

“Only in that movie, it was a ring and a lantern. Did some alien superhero seek you out?”

“No, it was nothing like that. It was just in a pile of junk, and before I knew what was happening, I had it around my neck.”

“You mean that it got there by itself?”

“No, I put it on, but you tried to open it, and you couldn’t, right?”

“Right.”

“Well, others have tried and I’m the only one who can open it.”

Shannon regarded her friend for a moment, and then was aware that she still held the knife.

“So, what’s the story with this?”

“A burglar had it and tried to kill me.”

“What happened?”

“He was stealing memory chips from a factory; now these babies are worth serious money, and he’d pinched over a million quid’s worth. I simply assisted him to the police station with a full confession and all the evidence. I forgot about the knife.”

“Did he try to stab you, or what?”

“He threw it at me.”

“And you ducked?”

“I don’t have to duck.”

“What?”

“Try it; throw it at me.”

“Don’t be daft.”

“Go on; nothing will happen.”

Shannon wasn’t happy, but she did. Just as when Sid threw it, the knife stopped just short of Keira’s skin and was held as if in a power beam. Keira picked it out of mid-air and folded it away again.

“See!”

Shannon sat down.

“Jeeeze,” she said, regarding her friend with different eyes. “My best friend’s a fucking superhero!”

“Look, Shannon, I’m knackered, do you think we could do this another time?”

“Can you read minds and stuff?”

“Some stuff, but not minds, no.”

“What stuff?”

“How about I show you, say tomorrow night?”

“Can I come with you?”

“What?”

“On your next jaunt, can I come too?”

“Uh, how exactly?”

“Oh; can’t you carry me?”

“Not for any great distance; not if I’ve got other stuff to do.”

“I’ll work something out,” she said, leaving her friend’s room somewhat reluctantly. At the door she paused and looked back.

“Can you disintegrate people with your eyes?”

“If you don’t bugger off and let me get some sleep, I’ll try!”

Grinning, Shannon went.

On the following morning, the two girls went down for breakfast together. Shannon wanted to ask Keira so many questions, but knew that she wasn’t likely to get any answers with everyone around.

“Do you ever use your powers, you know, in a normal day?”

Keira just gave her a look, and so Shannon raised both hands in the air in surrender.

Breakfast with almost sixty girls, between sixteen and eighteen could be a noisy place, but normally it wasn’t. The food, as Keira had discovered, was by far better than any food she had eaten in a school in her life. It was much better than her mother’s cooking if it came to it.

Over the last few months, she had grown a couple of inches in height, and certainly her figure had developed and matured, more than perhaps it should have in such a short time. The sudden development had been accelerated over a short space of time, as she had not started at a normal time for puberty.

She was a good five foot nine now, and a statuesque girl with a proportionate figure. She still ate, as her father said, like a small horse, and she clearly loved her food. Mrs Lambert always took breakfast with the girls, and on this particular morning had her eye on Keira.

She had no regrets at all over the decision to accept the girl at the college. Keira had shown that she was an intelligent girl, capable of getting on with her contemporaries and more than proficient on the sports field. Judging by what her teachers said, she should get exceptional grades at ‘A’ level, and might even go on and do her Oxbridge entrance exam.

However, there was something rather unsettling about the girl, and Doreen couldn’t quite put her finger on what it was. On those rare occasions when she had to sit in on a class, or was in a position to observe the girl, Keira was distinctly calculating. That was it; she was always assessing everything that went on around her. It was almost as if she was an undercover spy watching and logging everything she saw.

The other thing that interested Doreen was that she wasn’t like a lot of the girls, who rarely shut up. Keira spoke sparely, but whenever she did, it was always worth listening to. She was friends with Shannon, which was odd, because the Irish girl as a year ahead of Keira. They shared no classes, so it was not what anyone would have expected. They were like chalk and cheese. Keira was cool, calm and sophisticated compared to the volatile Irish girl, who, by her own admission was rather a rough diamond.

Doreen felt they complimented each other very well. Shannon had sailed very close to the wind during her first year. Boys were a major problem, and it took extreme measures to keep her away from straying down the road to the boys’ school.

She had, however, grown up a lot in her first year, and Doreen felt that this friendship further stabilised Shannon.

As she watched the pair, Shannon was oblivious, while Keira was acutely aware of the Head’s scrutiny. She was, Doreen felt, much older and wiser than her years suggested. As she met Keira’s glance, she felt a bolt of power that frightened her a little. She had to look away, as nonchalantly as she could.

What was that? Keira thought, as she watched the Lambster physically wince as the Head-mistress made eye contact with her, and then looked away hurriedly.

Was this another hidden power of the torc?

She looked at the others; all were oblivious to her and her power. There was Marcia Valentine; a rather arrogant girl who believed she was better than most here. She was deputy head-girl, and told anyone who listened that she should have been head-girl.e

Keira watched her until the snotty brunette glanced her way and made eye contact.

Wham!

It happened again.

Marcia jerked slightly, as if suddenly shocked by electricity. Then she frowned and looked away, appearing slightly dazed and confused.

Keira looked down.

Okay, she told herself, this could be awkward. What was happening?

The bolt directed towards Marcia was greater than towards the Head. Why was that?

Could it be that the mildly curious got a little jolt to dissuade their curiosity, while the antagonistic received a bolt level with their negative feelings towards her?

She glanced sideways at Shannon, who grinned conspiratorially and met her eyes.

Nothing.

There was no animosity, nor was there any mental searching going on. That must be the answer. It was a defence mechanism to deter any curiosity towards the wearer, or more importantly, any negative or aggressive feelings. She would have to watch that, carefully.

As the day progressed, Keira felt as if she was outgrowing this place. She had been here just a few weeks, and yet it was as if she was destined for greater things.  She had to shake that feeling away, as it was a dangerous thought. One of the most important things she learned from being Kenneth was the importance of belonging and fitting in. As Kenneth had never felt he belonged, now Keira did, she didn’t want to start believing she was so different to want to isolate herself from the world. Her strength was from being in the world and not standing out. She had to learn patience alongside her academic lessons.

She found that without the constant thoughts of being female nagging at her, she was able to give so much more to her classes. The Torc definitely helped her learn and particularly remember. In fact, she was enjoying learning more than she could ever imagine.

“Shit, you weren’t bloody kidding, were you?” Shannon said when she finally recovered the power of speech. Having been carried from the roof of the school, across the playing fields to land in the woodland some two miles away reduced the normally effervescent Shannon to a gibbering wreck.

“You pushed, and this is what you got. Do you want to go back?” Keira asked.

“No bloody way; this is so cool. I just need to get used to it, that’s all,” she said, looking at Keira’s dark form in the gloom. “Why do you wear black?”

“It’s harder for people to see me.”

“You can fly, why do you worry whether they can see you or not?”

“One, I can’t fly, not as such. And, two, I care because if they see me, they talk and that brings the press and probably the authorities. I want to stay under the radar, that’s why.”

“If you can’t fly, what the hell do you call what you just did?” Shannon asked, looking back across the valley at the school. They’d covered a couple of miles in just a couple of minutes.

“It’s more like a jump. I can turn gravity off and jump a really long way.”

“Like on the moon?”

“More like in zero gravity, as the moon still has gravity, it’s just less than here.”

“You’ve been there?” Shannon asked.

“Don’t be daft, of course I haven’t been to the moon. But people have and we all know that there’s less gravity there.”

“Oh; could you go there, if you wanted to?” Keira turned and looked at the sliver of moon that sat low in the night sky.

“Possibly, in theory, if I had a suit and sufficient air. Neither of which I could get, so it’s pretty academic really. To be honest, why would I want to go there?”

“Hey, why not? It’s there isn’t it?”

“There’s bugger all up there,” Keira said, losing patience.

“You could check the conspiracy theories that say the yanks never went there.”

“And then what? I couldn’t exactly go public, could I?”

“Oh, I never thought of that.”

“Clearly. Look, I’ve probably thought of all these things, and discounted most of them. I’m still learning my powers and abilities, so just keep your silly ideas to yourself. The most important thing for me is not to shine out and be seen. Can you understand that?”

“With all those mobile phones with cameras out there, you’ll find it hard.”

“I know, so that’s why I go out at night and dress in black.”

“You should have a mask.”

“One of the burglars said that.”

“How many have you grabbed?”

“Two, so far. It’s not as easy as I thought. They don’t advertise what they’re doing and when.”

“Stuff the burglars; I’d go after the terrorists.”

Keira frowned.

“Why?”

“They’re like you, trying to keep under the radar. It stands to reason that they’ll work hard to keep out of the sight of the authorities, so that would be perfect for you.”

Keira had not thought of that.

“How fast can you fly, or jump?”

“I reckon I can move at around seventy miles an hour, probably more if pushed. With you dragging us down, it was about forty.”

“So, what else can you do?”

Keira showed her some; not all.

“This is awesome! Okay, now I know why you don’t want anyone to know,” said Shannon. “Why did you tell me; I’d have accepted a story about visiting a boy?”

“Lies are harder to keep up than the truth. Besides, have you any idea how lonely it is not being able to share it?”

“Does anyone else know?”

“One other; a girl from my last school; she was my only friend, I suppose.”

“That is really sad.”

“Oh, Connie is okay; she’s a bit gullible. I told her I was an alien, and I think she still believes it.”

“That is so awesome.”

“I’d just become aware of my powers and, well, it was a bit of fun.”

“May I see it again?”

“The torc?”

“Yes.”

Keira took it off and handed it to Shannon.

“I still can’t move it,” she said.

“I didn’t think you would. I think it’s sort of keyed into me and my DNA or my brainwaves.”

“If you left it off for a while, would it have to reboot or something?”

“I have no idea, and I don’t intend to find out.”

Shannon turned it over and over.

“It’s too light and slender to have any technical junk inside; so it must be magic or something like that.”

“It could be alien, and they were far more technically advanced than us.”

“How did it get here?”

Keira shrugged. She didn’t like being without it. Shannon sensed her unease and passed it back, surprised at the ease with which Keira opened it and placed it back where it belonged.

“I’m jealous,” Shannon said with a grin.

“Sorry, but as far as I know, this is the only one.”

“Are we going to nab a burglar tonight?” Shannon asked.

“No, I’m knackered from last night. We’ll go back and get some sleep.”

Shannon wasn’t heavy, as the device managed to nullify weight, but not mass. By using the power of the torc to keep Shannon close to her, she was able to jump with her wrapping her arms around Keira’s waist. It was cumbersome, but stable.

“What the hell?” Shannon said, as they were in the middle of the first jump.

This surprised Keira, who was already looking for the next landing point to change direction to keep on course for getting them to the school. The problem with this means of travel, was once you had the velocity, one could not stop or accelerate. One could only turn the gravity up and so head down to the ground, or lose it to attain greater height.

“What?” she asked, simply staying on the same bearing.

“There’s a van moving down there with no lights on.”

Keira couldn’t see it, as they’d passed it by the time this information was passed. She started losing height, and landed heavily at the edge of a field.

“Where?” she asked.

“Back there, in the trees. There was a track or something through the woods.”

“How far?”

“Hell, I don’t know; perhaps about a quarter of the way back the way we’ve just come.”

“Stay here!” she said, and took a smaller jump.

“Shit!” said Shannon, disappointed.

She found Shannon’s judgement of distance quite accurate, as there was a track in the woods. It was the sort of track that forestry vehicles use once a year and for the rest of the time dog-walkers and horses keep the weeds at bay.

She could not see a vehicle, but she could smell the exhaust fumes. She jumped back to where Shannon waited.

“Come on, I can’t see the van, but it was there.”

Grasping her friend, Keira jumped back to the last place she had been and the two girls proceeded on foot.

“Stay behind me.”

“Why?”

“I’m bullet proof, you’re not!”

Shannon ducked behind her friend without a delay.

“Who owns these woods?”

Keira shrugged, as she didn’t know.

“What do you reckon? Poachers?”

“Shannon, shut the fuck up!”

They walked for a few hundred metres, and then they saw a brief flash of a light; it was a flashlight or a lantern. Keira stopped and motioned for Shannon to get behind a tree.

“Wait her while I have a look. Don’t come out, as it could be dangerous.”

“But....”

“Shannon, this isn’t a game, so stay there. Oh, and silence your damn mobile, as I know you’ve brought it and knowing our luck, one of your daft boyfriends will ring you up just at the wrong moment.”

“I’ll switch it off.”

“No, just silence it. We may have to call the police and if it’s off, we will have extra wait while it warms up.”

“Oh, okay,” Shannon said, fiddling with the phone in question.

“Done!”

Keira relaxed slightly, as Shannon’s phone was well known for going off at all the wrong moments.

“Now, stay here!”

“Yes boss.”

“No, I know you, and your curiosity is going to get us killed, so stay here, I mean it.”

“Okay already!”

Keira left her friend, not trusting her to do as she was told for a moment, and moved towards where they’d seen the flash of light.

As she got closer to the spot, she made out some shapes in the gloom. There was a hut here; a rough, forestry hut, with one door and no windows. The side facing her was around twenty feet long. The dark-coloured van was parked next to it. Everything was in darkness.

She could hear muffled voices, and they weren’t that far away. She heard the breaking twigs first, so she knew that someone was moving close to the hut.

Someone stumbled, probably tripped by a fallen branch or similar.

“Bloody hell!” said a female voice, an Indian or Pakistan intonation with a marked London accent.

“What?” said a male voice of a similar pedigree, but lacking the London bit.

“These damn sticks; why don’t they come and tidy the place up?” said the woman.

The man just laughed.

“It’s not funny, I’ve grazed my leg.”

Two figures came round the side of the hut. They went to the back of the van and one of them opened it. Next came the sounds of them sliding something heavy along the metal floor of the van, and she could hear their grunts as they lifted it from the back of the van.

Suddenly Keira was aware of a good deal of noise and wheezing behind her, as Shannon plonked herself down beside her.

“What part of ‘stay there’ didn’t you understand?” Keira hissed at her.

“Fuck me; it was bloody frightening back there. Something hooted at me!”

Keira groaned.

“That was an owl, dummy!”

“What’s happening?” Shannon asked.

“Two people and they’re taking something heavy from the van.”

“Where?”

“I don’t know, because some lumbering git came and distracted me!”

The girls watched as one of the figures returned and stood, looking vaguely their way. The other figure returned.

“What is it, Shamin?” said the male.

“I thought I heard something,” the woman, Shamin, said.

“What?”

“I don’t know. I hate these woods; they give me the creeps.”

“You’re a city girl, there’s nothing out there except for foxes and stuff.”

“Do foxes bite?”

“Probably, but they’ll be more scared of us than we are of them.”

“I wouldn’t be too sure.”

“Seriously, there’s nobody there.”

They stood, waiting and listening, while the two girls stayed still. Keira maintained a vice-like grip of her friend’s wrist, just in case.

“Come on,” said the man. “One more and we can get the hell out of here. I have to get the van back before seven this morning.”

The couple dragged something else from the van and lugged it out of sight round behind the hut.

A few minutes later, they returned, got into the van, and left with the man driving. Keira just managed to get the registration number.

“What were they up to?” Shannon asked.

“No good, that’s for sure.”

“Do you think they’re bank robbers hiding their loot?”

“No, I think these might be the people you spoke to me about; terrorists.”

“But one was a girl.”

Keira smiled in the darkness.

“So?”

“Oh, I see what you mean.”

“Come on, let’s see what they were hiding,” Keira said.

“Don’t you want to chase the van?”

“Why, even if I could find them by now, what good would that do me? Okay, I might find where they end up, but that doesn’t help us any. We need to see what they’ve been hiding.”

The girls picked their way to where the hut sat and then looked round the back. There was nothing apparent. The hut turned out to have strange openings at various places, the like of which she had never seen before.

The door was locked.

There was a plain sign carrying the letters; COS, No.6 Private.

“What’s that mean?”

“I don’t know, it could be something to do with the forestry commission or something. But they didn’t come in here, we’d have seen.”

“There’s fuck all else here!” said Shannon.

“It’s here, and we know it can’t be that well hidden because they were too quick.”

Twelve yards from the hut, amongst some trees, was a fresh pile comprising mostly of sticks, branches, evergreen needles and leaves.

Beneath the pile was a large rectangular piece of one inch thick plywood, which in turn covered a small pit, four foot by two foot by three foot deep. Shannon struggled to try to lift the plywood.

Keira pulled her out of the way, and used the torc to mentally shift it as it was. In the pit beneath it were two large, yellow, plastic containers.

The girls looked down at them. Keira lifted one out and Shannon took out her mobile phone to illuminate the label.

“What the fuck is NH4NO3?” asked the Irish girl.

Making no attempt to open the container, Keira replaced the container to where it had been, then she returned the ply, covering it over with the debris once more.

“Well?”

“It’s ammonium nitrate.”

“What’s that?”

“If you’d paid attention to what was going on up in the North over the last fifty years or so, you’d know. It was a favourite of the provisional IRA,” said Keira

“It’s a bomb?

“No, ammonium nitrate is a common fertiliser, but when mixed with fuel oil and sugar, it is a bomb. It needs some form of charge, like a detonator to go off. Compacted inside a vehicle or enclosed space, it can do a lot of damage.”

“How the hell do you know all this stuff?”

“I wasn’t always like this. I had a misspent youth; too many silly interests. I was a geek.”

“Some geek. So, can you just walk in and buy this stuff?”

“I don’t think so; as there must be some form of restrictions or a licence to buy it. We’ll have to check. Whether they’ve come by it legally or not, this is not a usual means of storing it.”

“So what do we do?”

“Now? Nothing; well, that’s not quite true, as I wouldn’t mind getting some sleep.”

Seventeen

Ben managed to get the van back before seven, after dropping off Shamin at their flat in Hayes, in the West London borough of Hillingdon. She had just enough time to shower and change before going to work. He was on the late shift, so he could come back and sleep before having to head off at one o’clock.

It was an area where their ethnicity would not stand out, as there was a multi-cultural population mixing very successfully. Just down the road was Southall, with a huge Asian community, of Hindus, Sikhs and Moslems.

Shamin worked as a psychologist with the Mental Health Team at Hillingdon Hospital. Everything was going to plan. The first of the ‘helpers’ was due to arrive by ferry at one of the channel ports within the next week or so, and the others by different routes from then on. There were six coming, each with a different specialism that would meld together into a good little team that would be capable of undertaking a variety of different tasks.

Ben found Britain was nothing like he imagined. Yes, the government seemed to spout the anti-anybody in the Middle-East (except the Israelis) rhetoric that bolstered his resolve, but the ordinary people were much the same as people everywhere. They weren’t the evil leeches he had expected them to be. There was a corruption within the society that he expected, but it was more a level of selfishness than anything else.

These people did not know the real meaning of want or need. The poor had cars and televisions and a roof over their heads. They had access to free medical care that most people he had grown up around could only dream. The poor squandered what funds they had on alcohol, cigarettes, drugs and gambling. Even those who received benefits wasted most of it. He failed to understand their mentality.

It was also far more expensive than he had expected. No wonder the people were so miserable, as they had to work really hard just to put food on the table. With the money they earned, they could live like royalty in some of the places he had lived.

He was also more than a little afraid of the police. On first glance, with their silly hats and absence of weapons, they seemed more like tourist attractions. But he had seen how they operated, and he was impressed by the speed with which they responded, and also the variety of specialists, including firearms, that appeared if required. It would not be good to underestimate them!

The one big fly in the ointment was Shamin’s father.

He had met him once, and there was a mutual dislike, almost to the point of hatred. Omar thought himself a traditionalist, with extreme western leanings and a capitalist’s heart. He even voted conservative in the last election!

Ben thought him almost more English than the English. He was more interested in status and success than anything else, not unlike many from Pakistan, if the truth be told.

However, he was not a devout Moslem, but followed the form for appearance’s sake. As a family, they did not have prayers, or follow the festivals. He was everything that was wrong with a British Moslem, but Ben could see that if they all went this way, radical Islam might die in Britain.

Not that Ben was a good Moslem, either. He could play-at with the best, but he knew that that is all it was. If Allah really existed, then the Moslems would not be relegated to the worst parts of the world and the state of Israel would never have been allowed to be formed.

Omar still wanted Shamin to make a ‘good’ marriage. In his eyes, that was to one specific man, but her mother wasn’t so picky. Oh, she didn’t want it to be Ben; that was for sure. She kept reminding Shamin that there were so many good doctors working at the hospital, so any one of them would do.

As Ben worked stacking shelves in Tescos, they could barely look down their noses at him. At least Shamin’s mother spoke to him, which is more than her father could bring himself to do. This simply had the effect of pushing Shamin closer to him, but it did not make for an easy and stress-free life.

Their flat was a two bedroom apartment above a parade of shops on the main Uxbridge Road. Hayes Police station was almost within sight on the opposite side further towards Southall. There were some useful shops in the parade, and room to park cars behind in the alley to the rear.

It was noisy and expensive, for what it was. Neither was a problem. Ben had been given sufficient funds to rent somewhere for six months at least. Now they were both working, most of that money was still available for other parts of their plan. The most crucial positive feature was the lock-up garage behind the shops. It was important for them to have somewhere to store purchases for a brief time, before moving them somewhere safer.

Neither of them was a chemist or bomb-maker. There was a man due to arrive soon who was both.  They had to acquire the necessary components, and then locate a safe location in which this man could go to work.

Shamin worked to identify a suitable target, while Ben sought the necessary components. He found that there were strict regulations on buying what was on the list. However, such was the corruption that there was always someone willing to supply whatever you wanted, for a price, and forget about the restrictions.  He managed to buy two large, forty kilo containers of Ammonium Nitrate from an agricultural suppliers near Milton Keynes. The other components were less problematic; sugar and fuel oil. However, the detonators would be a real problem, which was why they were coming in with man number four from Belgium in a week’s time; hopefully in a crate of machine parts.

Their time was both amazingly dull and exciting.  On balance, it was dull. Ben found his work dull in the extreme, but he needed to work not only to keep up an appearance of being normal, but also for the money. He still needed to eat, and although Shamin was paid a lot more, he couldn’t let her be the main breadwinner; his pride wouldn’t let him.

The exciting moments were fleeting and occasional. They realised that they couldn’t keep the fertiliser in the garage, so they looked for somewhere to hide it where it would be safe.

The hut in the woods miles away from London came to their knowledge by accident. Ben had few hobbies or interests outside of what drove him. However, he had one interest that he had possessed since he was a child. He recalled his mother telling him about birds, and showing him some marvellous birds that existed in places that man couldn’t, such as the sand grouse and others. He was an amateur twitcher; although he rarely admitted it. In all his travels, he even kept a diary listing the birds he saw, when and where. It was a cheap hobby, as it had so far only cost him the price of a pencil and a notebook.

On a break one day, he stood outside the Tescos, at the rear, while a couple of the other employees smoked their cigarettes. He watched some birds fly overhead. They were starlings, but a couple of collar doves stopped and rested on the top of the roof. He watched them, marvelling at their ability to adapt to whatever surroundings they happened to be in.

“Nice pair!” said another man. Ben turned and regarded him for a moment. He wore a name badge with ‘Barry’ on it.

“Yes,” he agreed.

“There’s a colony of parakeets that lives just the other side of the M25, in Buckinghamshire. Last winter they came this far east. I had them in my garden. They raided the bird table.”

“They’re not native, surely?”

“No; a pair was probably set free a few years ago and have bred in the wild.”

“Ah.”

“You’ve travelled a bit, what’s the most unusual bird you’ve seen?” Barry asked.

“I’ve seen lots. I think that I like the Abyssinian Roller best.”

“What’s that like?”

“Sort of like your Magpie in size and shape, but with blue and turquoise colouring. The male has a long tail.”

“Where did you see that?”

“West Africa; Ghana.”

“I didn’t think we got them this far north.”

So began a conversation pertaining to birds. Barry turned out to be a real twitcher, belonging to no less than three clubs in the area. His favourite one was the Chiltern Ornithological Society (COS) that operated out of Chesham Bois in Buckinghamshire.  He told Ben about the various hides they had dotted around the region, plus shelters and other facilities for the members.

One weekend, while Shamin was committed to a family function, to which Ben was neither invited nor welcome, Ben accompanied Barry on a day out.  This time it was to watch the Red Kites in the Chiltern Hills.

The red kites were a success story verging on a disaster. Back in the 1970s, it was discovered that the red kites were vanishing from the UK.

A few breeding pairs were introduced to the fringes of Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire, along the ridge that marked the western fringe of the Chiltern Hills.

Forty years later, the numbers had grown phenomenally to the point that the local farmers were threatening to shoot them, despite them being protected.

They were spectacular birds, looking like large birds of prey. In fact they were scavengers, normally after carrion rather than live prey. However, they were not adverse to taking young rabbits or the young of other birds straight from the nest.

One of the hide/shelters they visited was in the middle of woodland in which the kites were known to nest and breed.

Ben remembered the route and that there were no houses or farms anywhere near the shelter. The land was owned by the Forestry Commission, managed by Forest Enterprise, and given over to the local people for their restricted usage by bird watchers, a few horse trails and some public footpaths upon which dog-walkers and ramblers would walk. The actual woods in which the COS birdwatchers had access, were not given over to other groups, as the breeding pairs of Red Kites were protected and therefore public access was restricted.

It was a simple matter of opening an unmarked gate and driving down a passable track through the woods to get to an isolated shelter that was rarely visited by anyone other than a few bird-watchers. The Forestry Commission were not going to get round to harvest these woods for another ten years at least.

This was an ideal location to store stuff until they needed them. If found, then there was no way of linking them to the evidence, so it was safer than any garage in London where there was always a possibility of being watched from some building. Here there were no witnesses.

He visited the spot three times, on random days at random times. He never saw a soul. On the third time, he brought a spade and dug a pit, using a piece of plywood he found in the garage as a lid. He covered it over and left it.

A week later, he borrowed a van from a friend who ran a small grocers shop, promising to have it back before work on the next day. He and Shamin moved the fertiliser and drove out in the middle of the night to hide the containers in the pit. He noted that nothing had been disturbed, so he felt this was a foolproof location.

He arrived back at the flat, feeling very tired. To his dismay he saw a familiar Mercedes parked in the road outside the shops.

Omar, Shamin’s father, had a personalised number plate, so it was an easy car to recognise.

Sure enough, as he went up the stairs at the back, he saw Omar standing at the top waiting for him. He was a tall man, wearing a smart grey suit and silk tie. He was also overweight, and wore tinted spectacles. He wanted to look like a mafia boss, but looked like the fat shop owner that he was.

“Omar,” he said, not certain what to expect from the man

“I need to speak with you.”

This was the longest speech Omar had ever had with Ben.

“Come in then,” he said, opening the door to the flat.

The flat was neat and tidy; Shamin saw to that.

“Tea?”

“No.”

Ah, it’s going to be like that.

“What do you want?” he said, playing the same game.

“I want you to leave my daughter.”

“Why should I do that?”

“While you are with her, she will never reach her full potential.”

“Why don’t you allow her to judge that?”

Omar ignored him.

“How much will it take to persuade you to leave?”

“More than you’ve got, or ever likely to get. I’m not interested.”

“You must understand that I am serious. I do not want you around my daughter.”

“She’s an adult, and in this country as well as most other countries, what you want or don’t want is irrelevant.”

“I am prepared to give you fifty thousand pounds to leave her today. What do you say?”

“Go away.”

“Sixty.”

“If you went up to a million, I’d still tell you to fuck off. This is not up for negotiation.”

“You will find that you might regret saying that to me. I have friends.”

Ben went very still.

“What do you mean by that?” he asked, a dangerous edge crept into his words.

“I have friends who can make things very difficult for you.”

“Are you threatening me, old man?”

Omar looked uncertain for the first time in the exchange.

“Not at all, but if the word gets out that you are, how shall we say? A person who is not honourable? Then accidents happen.”

Ben looked away for a moment. The anger inside of him grew. He knew the feeling, and tried to control it. He watched as his hand began to shake.

He stayed silent, not daring to move. He could easily kill this man, but that could be disastrous.

“Well?”

When Ben replied, his voice was that of someone different. It was a cold voice, devoid of humanity.

“For every friend you have, I have a legion. Only my friends are not fat shop keepers, or business men in fancy cars and silk ties. My friends are warriors, fighting for the cause. Mark me well, old man, if you see me coming, you would be advised to walk in the opposite direction. The last man who threatened me was found in a well in Syria with his genitals in his mouth.

“For me, there is no such thing as an accident. They do not just happen. If I want someone to die, then I make it happen. I do not threaten, I make promises. There is a difference. Do you understand old man?”

“You can’t speak to me like that!”

“I will not speak to you again. Shamin is my woman. That is the end of the matter. I seek no blessing from you, but know that if you move to try to take her from me, you and all your family will die. That is my promise, not a threat. Now, go to your fancy car and don’t come back here again.”

Ben turned his back on Omar. He did not watch as the man left, but turned and closed the door quietly.

Omar sat in his car for many minutes, feeling his heart rate racing. He waited for it to slow, and for himself to calm down.

Omar had not been as frightened as that, ever. Finally, he started the car and slowly drove away. He did not see Ben watching him go. He drove past the police station, heading into London. Ben smiled and went to bed.

The constable was bored, but was trying not to show it.

“What makes you think your daughter’s boyfriend is a terrorist, sir?”

Omar had gone into his local police station in Ealing, as he was passing. He stated that he wanted to report someone as being a suspected Al-qaeda terrorist.

PC Ronald Fisher took all the details, including contact details and told the man he would pass it to those who dealt with such things.

He was not paid to make decisions, just pass on what information was submitted and let others make those decisions. He was, however, able to submit his thoughts on the informant and the value of the information:

Omar Khan (54) an Asian male of Pakistani origins attended Ealing Police station to report he suspected his daughter’s boyfriend – Ben Gomez 24, as being an Al-qaeda subversive. He was unsure as to the actual origins of Mr Gomez. He believes he might well be from somewhere in the Middle East. His daughter, Shamin Khan, aged 24, is a psychologist working at Hillingdon Hospital. Mr Gomez works for Tescos. The couple reside in the premises listed in the Uxbridge Road, Hayes. PNC reveals no trace of convictions for Mr Gomez; he has not had contact with police. Mr Khan admits he wanted his daughter to submit to an arranged marriage, and sent her to Pakistan to receive an education and in the hope she would come round to his way of thinking. It appears she met Mr Gomez since returning to the UK. He stated that Mr Gomez claimed to be an Islamic activist and threatened him. When asked why he should threaten him, Mr Khan admitted he offered a considerable sum of money to Mr Gomez to leave his daughter. Suspected domestic disagreement.

The details were passed through the intelligence system, and were marked ‘not urgent’ and were subsequently buried under a mountain of similar reports on the desk of a team at MI5.

A young clerk called Rachel, whose job it was to log all reports, sat at her computer and entered the details into the system and filed the report in a cardboard box that was taken to the basement archives.

A few days later, the computer spat out the name – Ben Gomez. Michael Lawrence, one of the team looking at Islamic terror suspects, picked up the name, and started making routine enquiries with the Border Agency and immigration intelligence officers. He certainly didn’t expect to find anything, but was surprised to find nothing at all. This might sound odd, but Ben Gomez didn’t exist.

Although Border Agency had his passport on file entering the country, coincidentally on the same day and time as one Shamin Khan, checks with the Portuguese passport office revealed that this passport was not one they issued.

Alarm bells rang, only perhaps not as loudly or as soon as they should have done.

Eighteen

Shannon’s behaviour was very unusual. For a start, she was quiet, so that drew attention to her straight away. Secondly, she barely allowed Keira out of her sight, so, as the two girls were neither in the same year, nor sharing any classes, this was proving a problem for her.

Keira believed that she was the only one to notice, but she had not taken the experience and observation skills of Mrs Doreen Lambert into consideration. Friendship was one thing, but Mrs Lambert was beginning to wonder whether these girls were on the verge of forming an unnatural relationship. It wouldn’t be the first time, and she was sure it wouldn’t be the last. However, from what she had seen in the past, these two did not display the tell-tale signs that she normally observed.

However, the girls had work to do, lessons to go to and sports to play. They did not get that many chances to discuss what they had seen, or what they could do about it. Keira slightly regretted telling Shannon, but was the first to admit that being alone in situations like these wasn’t helpful. She needed someone else to bounce ideas off, and, hopefully, have someone watching her back. The problem was that Shannon was not liable to do as she was told; which she proved only so well on the previous night.

Keira became aware that Mrs Lambert was watching her a little more closely than before, so she was able to warn Shannon to cool things and to back off.

It was three nights later that Shannon crept along the corridor at three in the morning to knock on Keira’s door.

“What are you doing?” Keira hissed at her friend.

“Look, we have to do something; they could be blowing up big shit with that stuff.”

“No, I’ll do something, what you can do is call it in to the police.”

“Me, the police? You have to be kidding?”

“We have to get the information to someone. This is too big for just us.”

“Just what is too big for you?” asked a frighteningly familiar voice. “And just what is so serious as to warrant the police to be notified?”

Keira’s heart sank, as she realised that the Lambster was far more astute than anyone gave her credit. Shannon gave a little shriek.

“Mrs Lambert, I can explain,” Keira said, trying to work out what she could say.

Mrs Lambert looked at her.

“I’m sure you can, Keira, but try to make it the truth, there’s a good girl.”

“The truth?” Keira said, smiling slightly. “Are you sure?”

That response was not what Mrs Lambert expected.

“Of course.”

Keira took a deep breath and quietly considered exactly what she should and should not say, while Shannon was making very strange gesticulations behind the head-teacher’s back.

“We think we’ve discovered a possible terrorist bomb-making plot,” she said.

Shannon groaned and whacked her forehead with the palm of her hand before she realised exactly what her friend had said.

Mrs Lambert looked non-judgemental, but possessed a definite ‘I’m listening, but I want more’ expression.

To be fair, Keira held back, as she did not want to mention her abilities. When she finished, she didn’t feel that Mrs Lambert was convinced she had just had the truth.

“You leave me with more questions than answers, Keira. For a start, how did you get to these woods?”

“We walked.”

“In just a few minutes?”

“Okay, it might have taken us longer than I mentioned. We were talking so didn’t really take any notice of the time.”

“How do you know about Ammonium Nitrate?”

“At my last school, I did a project of chemicals that had perfectly normal industrial uses as well as potentially dangerous uses by terrorist or criminal organisations. I was that kind of geek.”

Mrs Lambert regarded her sternly for a moment or two. Keira didn’t flinch or break eye contact.

“What were you going to do?”

“I did some checking and that confirmed my suspicions. We were going to contact the police, but didn’t want the school involved.”

“And just how were you going to do that?”

“We were going to go to the village and use the phone box there,” Shannon said, grinning conspiratorially at her friend.

Mrs Lambert looked from one to the other several times.

“Your story is certainly not what I expected, that is for sure. However, I am afraid that some aspects of your story just do not hold water. The woods you are talking about are over five miles away. For you to take ‘just a few minutes’ to get there and back is, quite honestly, ridiculous. Secondly, how could you see a van from all the way over here?”

Keira looked down and said something that Mrs Lambert didn’t hear.

“Speak up girl!”

“I’m not like other girls!” Keira said, quite a bit louder than she meant to.

It wasn’t as if she was bragging, but it was a simple statement of fact that alarmed Mrs Lambert. Had Keira been bragging, then she might not have been alarmed at all, but it was the clinical manner in which she said it.

“Would you care to expand?”

“Not really.”

That surprised Mrs Lambert.

“And why not, pray?”

“Once you realise how different I am, then everything about me is in jeopardy.”

Mrs Lambert’s eyebrows rose at that one.

“Child, I think you do me an injustice. I am hardly likely to be that surprised at anything you can claim.”

Mrs Lambert couldn’t have said anything less truthful, as she discovered when Keira claimed nothing. She simply floated from the floor and rose to the ceiling.

She looked down at her head-teacher with a calm and rather solemn expression. Shannon closed her eyes and was praying to anyone and anything that might happen to be listening.

Mrs Lambert could remember three occasions in her life when she lost the right words and one of them involved sexual intercourse. This made the fourth.

“Keira, please come down from there,” she finally managed to utter. Keira gracefully rejoined the rest of the human race on Terra Firma.

“I’m sorry, I was wrong. I am about as surprised as one could ever be.”

“I thought you might be.”

Mrs Lambert glanced in some annoyance at Shannon, who was still praying.

“Shannon, dear, please belt up, you’re not helping!”

Shannon stopped abruptly and reopened her eyes appearing surprised that Keira was back on the ground.

“Both of you; my study, now, and with as little noise as possible; that applies to you particularly, Shannon!”

A few minutes later, both girls were feeling uncomfortable, sitting in the comfy chairs in Mrs Lambert’s study. The door was closed, and the curtains drawn; a small haven of light in an otherwise dark night.

The lady herself was standing behind the desk, holding the curtain open a crack so she could stare out of the window with her back to the girls. If she was honest, Mrs Lambert was at a loss. It was rare, but she was genuinely unsure as to how best to proceed.

She turned and looked at the girls.

“I have to be honest and to tell you that I am not sure how to play this. You have me stumped!”

“May I make a suggestion?” Keira asked.

“Of course.”

“Well, I do not wish my abilities to become general knowledge, and I certainly do not feel that we should attract any adverse publicity to the college, so perhaps we ought to simply sort this little mystery out and ensure the appropriate authorities do what they are paid to do and are none the wiser after the event.”

“I think that sounds like an excellent idea. I think we need to flesh it out before it becomes a proper plan, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“May I ask a question?” she asked the girl.

“Yes.”

“This is all a little surreal for me. I mean, I’ve read about superheroes in comics and in films, so it’s a little difficult to comprehend that they are not pure fiction. Just what are your abilities?”

“I’m not like a real superhero, as I’m still sort of learning my way. There’s no one to teach me.”

“That’s as may be, you can still do things that most of us can’t. What can you do?”

“She can fly!” said Shannon.

“No, that’s not really true. I can adjust gravity and make really long jumps. It’s not flying, as such.”

“Is this how you travelled all that way?” Mrs Lambert asked.

“And she carried me!” added Shannon.

Keira looked at her crossly.

“Shannon, shut up, please!”

“Thanks. Now, I can jump, and I think that I’m bulletproof. I can also move very heavy stuff with the power of my own mind.”

“Like?”

“She can move cars!”

Shannon subsided as both regarded her with unforgiving expressions.

“I really don’t know my limitations. As I said, I’m still feeling my way here.”

“May I ask how you come to be graced with such abilities; are they inherited from your parents?”

“No.”

“Well?”

“I’m not sure, but I think they come from my torc.”

Mrs Lambert regarded the torc from afar.

“Why?”

“They don’t work when I’m not wearing it.”

“Fair enough. Best you keep it on then. We don’t want it going missing, now, do we?”

Keira looked surprised.

“Why do you look so surprised? Don’t you know how many girls have dreamed of possessing the very powers that you now possess, and yet in this boring old world, what is the most likely thing to happen?  I’ll tell you; the bloody government, who have displayed an innate ability to get everything wrong, will steal it and try to work out how it works, and probably break it in the process, rending it completely bloody useless, just like themselves! What we have to do is to divert all attention away from the true power, and allow you the freedom to grow and develop and to be able to do all those wonderful things that most of us can only dream about.”

Both girls stared at Mrs Lambert in complete surprise.

She smiled.

“I was young once and was able to dream with the best of them. Now, let’s make a plan!”

*   *   *

Omar made the mistake in telling Laila, his wife, that he suspected that the boy called Ben was a terrorist.

“I know that we don’t like him, but that doesn’t make the man a terrorist,” she said, not unreasonably under the circumstances.

“I don’t believe that that is his real name either!” he persisted.

His wife was long-suffering and patient, so she smiled gently and let him have his rant.

“I told the police he was a terrorist,” he finally admitted.

That was enough, and his wife turned on him.

“You what?”

Feeling the abrupt change in the tone of her voice, he felt immediately defensive.

“Well, he threatened me,” he said.

“You stupid, bloody, idiot. That is the sort of thing that will lose any hope we have for Shamin to make a decent marriage. Oh, I hope to God she never gets wind of this, or you can wave goodbye to all our hopes and dreams. What did the police say?”

“I don’t think they believed me.”

“Why not?”

It was then that Omar admitted to offering Ben a substantial amount of money to leave his daughter.

Liala went ballistic, accusing him of utter stupidity and a complete lack of thought.

“Did you tell the police about this offer?”

“I might have mentioned it in passing; I can’t really remember,” he said.

“Of course you did, which is why they didn’t believe you.”

“But he threatened me!” Omar wailed.

“Oh yes, and I don’t suppose you threatened him at all?”

Omar was silent.

“Oh, tell me you didn’t?”

“I might have suggested that I had friends who might make his life difficult.”

“I don’t wonder the boy doesn’t go to the police and report you for being a terrorist!”

Omar was shocked.

“But he said things, about killings he’s done before. He was quite graphically unpleasant.”

“You just pray that Shamin doesn’t hear about this.”

Shamin did, because Ben decided to tell her.

“Your father offered me a lot of money to leave you,” he told her after a few days.

It was Saturday morning and they were waiting at Waterloo rail station for the ‘technician’ who was supposed to be arriving on the 11.32.

“When?”

“After I took the van back, he was waiting for me at the flat.”

“He must have waited for me to go to work. How much am I worth, then?”

“His first offer was fifty grand, but I sensed he would double it if I was interested. I told him he could offer me a million and I still wouldn’t take it.”

Shamin tried to work out how she felt. On the one hand, her parents had struggled to give her and her brothers everything they could, but on the other hand, they had failed to maintain what she considered an honourable lifestyle. They had succumbed to a quasi-Western/Asian culture that encompassed the lesser qualities of each, notoriously pride and greed. They also paid lip-service to their Islamic heritage, for which she felt betrayed by them.

“I shouldn’t be surprised, but in a way I am. What did he say when you turned him down?”

“He told me that he had friends and that he could make my life difficult if I didn’t cooperate.”

That made her feel slightly sick.

“So, you threatened him back?”

“I told him what I would do.”

She covered her ears.

“Enough! I don’t want to hear any more. I wash my hands of them; you are my family now!” she said.

Ben smiled. A small triumph tasted well in his mouth.

The man, when he arrived was a nondescript fellow, of average height and owning a weasel-like face, with a sharp nose and prominent teeth. He also had bad-breath. He carried a brief case and a small suitcase. He handed the suitcase to Ben.

He said his name was Ali, but no one cared. He was Lebanese, but had not been home for many years. He had left as a young man when the fighting had been very bad with Syria and Israel and all the various factions fighting for supremacy in the eighties.

He had gone to Libya, trained at one of the many Islamic training camps, and learned all about bomb-making from an Irishman who was hiding over there for a few years after a large bomb had killed many people in England.

Ali had learned English from this man, so still spoke with a pronounced Belfast accent.

“I have arranged a bedsit for you in Uxbridge. There will be no worries, as the landlord has been paid up front for a month,” said Ben.

They travelled in Shamin’s car; a Ford Fiesta. Ali had never been to England before, so was like a tourist while they drove out of London. It was all so ordered and very much cleaner than the places he had stayed in. The cars were all in good condition, and the traffic moved well, despite being so much of it. He couldn’t understand what was missing for ages, and then he realised that no horns were sounding. The drivers were all behaving so much better than those in Pakistan.

“You have the chemicals?”

“Yes. At a safe place.”

“In a town?”

“No, as per the instructions, I have found an isolated, rural place to keep them.”

“Good. I will need a van. We can take the van, collect the fuel oil and sugar and then go to the chemicals and I will build it there.”

“You have the detonator?”

He smiled and patted his briefcase.

“You have a target?”

Ben looked at Shamin, who smiled and nodded.

“Oh, yes, I have found a target.”

The assembly room was full, so as Mrs Lambert took to the stage, the noise level dropped. The girls looked at the rather portly, sweaty man with Mrs Lambert.

“Girls, this is Mr Porter, from the Chiltern Ornithological Society. At very short notice, he has very kindly agreed to deliver today’s illustrated lecture on the Red Kite and its remarkable come-back in these isles. He has agreed for a select few to accompany him to one of their hides in some nearby woods to watch the pairs as they come in for the evening to roost.”

The lecture was, as could have been predicted; despairingly dull, if you didn’t happen to be an aficionado of the Red Kite. For the fifty-six girls seated listening and watching the movie, precisely nil were interested. Two, however, at least made an effort to look interested, as Keira and Shannon were angling to be on the bus trip to the woods.

The lecture ran on for an hour, after which questions were encouraged from the semi-comatose girls. The lucky Mr Porter was allowed to take tea in the staff room, with the jolly enthusiastic members of staff, who had (some of them) actually enjoyed the lecture. After tea, those girls who wanted to go were asked to congregate by the school bus in casual walking gear.

Five members of staff (including Mrs Lambert) rolled up to be met by twelve girls and the stalwart Mr Porter.

“Is this all?” asked Mrs Lambert, hardly surprised to see just ten other girls with Keira and Shannon.

“Far better a few who are enthusiastic than many who aren’t,” said Mr Porter jovially.

The plan, or rather, Mrs Lambert’s plan was for them to accidentally find the terrorist’s stash of chemicals. This would initiate a call to the authorities, who would probably want to start a surveillance operation to catch those responsible, and so leave the college free from all connection other than just the accidental discovery.

The problem with finely made plans, as they were to discover, is that things happen to completely screw them up.

Mr Porter took them to the right woods, and indeed, to the exact spot where they’d found the stash of chemicals just the previous night.

Only instead of a hidden pit was an empty hole in the ground. The chemicals had been moved.

Keira recalled that just as the bus approached the gateway, a scruffy van had passed them on the road. She hadn’t thought about it, but now put two and two together.

“Oh dear!” said Mrs Lambert. Despite arranging things as quickly as she could, it hadn’t been fast enough.

“Distract them!” Keira said, and set off down the lane at a run.

“How?” bleated Mrs Lambert, finally stumped.

Shannon shrugged and managed to fall into the pit, thereby distracting everyone for the time that Keira needed.

Dressed in trainers, a pair of jeans and a tee shirt, she did not feel ready for this.

She started bounding as soon as she left the woods, but the van could be anywhere now. Taking a risk, she jumped high, and tried to use altitude to see where the van was.

She had a reasonable sense of location and direction, so only guessed that terrorists might well make for a centre of civilisation, like London, rather than some fields and woods. There was only one way to London from here, and that was the busy A road that ran close to the college.

Sure enough, there was the van, in a queue of traffic at the roundabout waiting to get onto the A413.

But what the hell was she going to do now?

She landed in a field close to the road, and saw only that two people were in the front of the van. It was the same van as the other night, so she could not see if anyone was in the back. It was slow, so she imagined that it was full.

The van entered the main road and headed towards London. Taking a risk, Keira bounded ahead of the van, so that she was able to reach where the A413 met the A40 close to where her uncle and aunt lived at Denham. The problem was that there were loads of people about, and she really did not want to be seen flying by anyone.

Superman and all the others never had this problem. There was a van with a big lump of explosive stuff on board. She had no way of knowing whether it was already a bomb, or they were moving it so they could make it into a bomb. She didn’t even know who was in the van. She heard two people the other night, but she would never be able to identify them from their voices. The woman was called Shamin; that was all she could remember.

Then she remembered the number plate.

Taking out her mobile, she dialled 999.

“Emergency, which service do you require?”

“Police please,” she said, amazingly calm.

She heard the operator contact the police control and then tell the police operator her mobile number.

“Police, what’s the nature of your call?”

“Hello, yes, this might seem a bit odd, but I’ve just seen a van with two huge containers of ammonium nitrate in the back. It was weird because for some reason this stuff was being stored in a pit in the woods near my college.”

The operator suddenly took her seriously.

“What’s your name?”

“Keira Frost.”

“Where are you, Keira?”

“I’m following the van,” she lied. “A friend gave me a lift.”

“Where is the van now?”

“On the A413 approaching the A40 at Gerrards Cross, heading towards London. There are at least two people in the van that I can see. I think they’re Asian or Middle Eastern.”

“Tell me about the chemicals?”

“They were in two big yellow drums. They had ammonium nitrate on the labels. I remember that from science. It’s fertiliser that the IRA used to make bombs with, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Where was it?”

“They had hidden them under a plywood cover in a pit in the woods near our college. We went bird watching a few nights ago and found them there. We took our teacher back today and were going to show her when we saw the van leaving the woods.”

“Do you still have sight of the van?”

“Yes,” she lied.

“What’s the number?”

She told him.

“Where is the van now?”

Keira looked up the road, and along came the van.

“It’s on the dual carriageway of the A40 heading down the hill towards the A412 and Denham. The M40 is not that far away.”

“How close are you?”

Keira watched as it drove past where she sat on the fence of a big field.

“A few cars back. There are definitely two people in it; a man and a woman. I think there might have been someone in the back. I didn’t get a good look.”

“We’ve got a helicopter on way. What vehicle are you in?”

Keira hesitated. What could she say?

She gave the Lambster’s car details, but pretended that they couldn’t remember the number.

“That’s fine. Keep the commentary going until we tell you that you can leave it.”

“Shit!” Keira said to herself. Taking a quick bound, she jumped ahead of the van and watched as it turned onto the M40, but instead of heading towards central London, it pulled over and let a man out of the back. Then it shot under the M40 and headed west, towards Oxford.

“Where the hell are you going now?” she asked.

“A man has just jumped out. He’s a scruffy little man with a backpack. He’s wearing grey trousers and a black anorak. He’s Asian or an Arab, I think. The backpack is blue. He’s walked under the motorway and is heading towards Uxbridge on foot.”

“Where’s the car going?”

“West along the M40 motorway.”

“Keep going.”

“It’s in the left lane, so it’s going to join the M25.”

Keira was about to jump when she heard the sound of a helicopter above her.

“It’s too far ahead,” she said, watching as the car indicated and joined the traffic onto the M25 heading south.

“We have it now, both on CCTV and the helicopter. Can you see the other man?”

She turned and saw the solitary figure walk past an Indian restaurant on the left hand side of the road towards Uxbridge.

“Yes, he’s still walking. I can follow on foot, if you like?”

“Good, we’ve got the van, so follow the man but don’t get too close. A car is heading from Uxbridge. What are you wearing, Keira?”

“Jeans and a tee shirt.

“Okay, just stay behind the man, don’t get too close.”

She was now walking, about a hundred and fifty yards behind the man. A silver police car with Metropolitan Police on the side came out from Uxbridge and drove past the man. It then did a U turn and pulled alongside her.

“Are you Keira Frost?” asked the female officer in the passenger seat.

“Yes.”

“Is that the man from the van?” she asked, pointing at the man a couple of hundred yards ahead of her.

“Yes.”

“Stay here, we’ll go and speak to him,” she said, and the police car started driving off.

The next few moments happened as if in slow motion for Keira. Relaxed and leaving it up to the police, she watched as the police car drove alongside the man and the roof lights came on.

Obviously the female officer must have said something to the man, for he stopped in his tracks.

As the officers prepared to exit their car, the man looked around, and Keira watched as he dropped the backpack, as his right hand started going towards his belt.

“He’s got a gun!” she said, aloud.

The female officer was now half out of the car, but was looking worried as the man was grasping at something at his belt. Her colleague was on the other side of the car, so had a look of impotent horror on his face as the girl must have shouted that he had a gun.

Keira never remembered jumping, but she must have. For the man was looking at the female officer as he drew something black from his pocket and started pointing it at the girl.

Keira hit him from the side, knocking him sprawling, and she just sat on him, so he could not reach the gun that now lay under the car.

The officer got out and was staring down at her with shock on her face.

“He had a gun,” Keira said, still sitting on the squirming man and pointing at the weapon that lay on the ground beneath the police car.

The woman gaped at her, glancing back to where they had left her. Her colleague was faster to react and came around and put the man in handcuffs; none to gently either.

“He had a gun, Sue!” he repeated, sounding slightly silly.

“How the hell did you do that?” the woman, Sue, asked, now that she had her powers of speech back.

“I started running just after you left me. There was something funny about him. I was right,” Keira said.

The male officer pointed to the backpack.

“Grab his pack and let’s see if anything else is in there,” he said.

“I wouldn’t. He could be the bomb maker, so he could have a detonator in there,” Keira said.

“She’s right, Cliff, don’t touch it,” Sue said, nodding in agreement, and got on the radio to call for a van and a firearms officer to deal with the gun.

Keira walked a little distance away and called Shannon.

“Where the fuck are you?” Shannon asked.

“They’ve just arrested a man from the van. He had a gun and tried to shoot the police. The helicopter is following the van onto the M25.”

“That doesn’t tell me where you are.”

“Oh, uh, Denham.”

“Shit. I’ll get the Lambster.”

Mrs Lambert was clued up enough to have returned to the college with her charges, and so was prepared to set off to claim her errant student. She called her on the mobile once Shannon had told her the number.

“I’ll be with you as soon as possible. Will they take you to the police station too?” she asked Keira.

“Probably; I sort of got involved when he produced a gun and tried to shoot the police.”

“Say as little as possible. If anyone asks, I was following the van with you, but you got out to follow the man on foot and I went after the car towards the M25, got that?”

“I had already planned that.”

“Good girl. I’ll bring Shannon, as I can’t trust her to be good when I’m gone.”

“Who was that?” the female officer asked.

“My teacher, the one in whose car I was. She’s coming back for me, but is stuck in traffic.”

“You can come to the station with us. Once the van gets here, they can take the prisoner while we wait for the ARV.”

“ARV?”

“Armed response vehicle. As there’s a firearm involved, we have to call one. They have to prove the weapon and make everything safe.”

“Oh. What about the pack?”

“They’ll check that too. Just how the hell did you cover that distance so quickly?” the girl asked again.

“I’m a fast runner.”

The girl shook her head, unable to discount her claim, as her focus had been on the man with the gun.

“You were bloody stupid, as he could have shot you.”

“Actually, he didn’t know I was there as he was going to shoot you, so I think I’d be a bit careful who I call stupid,” Keira said. Cliff, the male officer holding the prisoner, laughed.

“She’s got you there, Sue. Just thank the girl, as we owe her, big time.”

Keira smiled as if it was of no consequence.

The ARV arrived and two armed officers approached. One of them took the weapon, after photographing it where it lay first. He expertly unloaded it.

“It’s a nine millimetre, and its real,” he said, placing it in a special firearm evidence container.

They pointed out the backpack. The other officer gingerly opened it and then placed it gently on the ground, some way from the carriageway.

“Sod that, there’s stuff in there I’m not bloody touching. I’m calling the bomb squad.”

Another police car arrived, along with a van. The prisoner was placed in the van, where he was searched again before being driven away. A supervising officer came over and spoke to the first pair of officers. Keira watched as Sue kept pointing to her and where she had been when the officers first spoke to her. She smiled, as the distance she had covered was shortened by the officer to a distance her mind could accept.

The sergeant came over to her.

“That was a brave thing you did. You may have saved my officers’ lives, so thanks.”

“That’s okay.”

“What made you think he was going to do something like that?”

Keira shrugged.

“His body language was very defensive when the officers pulled alongside him. I saw him look around as if to see which way to run, so I knew he was going to try something. I never imagined he’d have a gun.”

“How far away were you?”

“Not that far, fifty yards, or so.”

“You did well to cover that distance as quickly as you did,”

“I can run fast when I have to.”

“It’s just as well you can. If you come with me, I’ll take you to the station and we’ll get a statement from you.”

“Can I ask what’s happened to the van?”

“It’s on the M25.  It’s been stopped by two police cars and there’s a standoff. It appears they wanted to park it under the M4/M25 flyover junction. If it went boom there, London and the South East would come to a standstill for days.”

“What kind of standoff?”

“There’s a man holding a female hostage.”

“If the female is Shamin, I heard her talking with the man earlier, and she’s as much a part of it as he is.”

“Where was that?”

“In the woods a few nights ago, a little way from the college. My friend and I were up there; well, we’d sneaked out of college, but we saw them hiding the stuff in this pit. I don’t know what his name is, but he called her Shamin, and she was in it as deep as he was.”

“I’ll call that in. Were they armed?”

“I have no idea. We hid. I was taking the teacher to show her what we’d seen when we saw them leaving in the van.”

As Keira was driven the short distance to Uxbridge Police station, she learned that the incident was still running.

“So, what’s happening on the motorway?” she asked the sergeant, whose name was Mike Gardener.

“Just what I told you. They have two traffic units there, with an ARV and an armoured Land Rover from the airport firearms unit. The traffic cars forced it off the motorway onto the hard shoulder when it refused to stop. It’s sitting there with two people inside. As the information is that there could be a large amount of explosive inside, they’ve shut the motorway in both directions. The man has threatened to shoot the woman if anyone approaches.”

“That’s rubbish, as she’s in it as much as she is. They just don’t want you to see what’s in the van. If it blows up there, people could get hurt. Why not move the car to a safe place; like the middle of a field, or something?”

He smiled.

“It’s not that easy.”

Keira realised that she would have to get there to help, but how?

They arrived at the police station, so Keira was asked to wait in an interview room while an officer was sent for to take a statement from her.

“Do you have a loo I can use?” she asked.

The sergeant told her to hang on so he could find a female officer.

“Do I really have to wait; I’m not going anywhere?”

“I suppose not. The ladies loo is on the first floor. When you’re done, come right back here, okay?”

“Thanks.”

Fortunately, the toilet had a window, and within seconds, she was bounding out of Uxbridge and aiming for the M25 between the M40 and the M4. She wasn’t sure where about it was, but looking at the traffic, she could follow the tail-backs to the cause.

Mrs Lambert would be arriving at the police station soon, and so she knew that she had to get back really quickly.

She saw the police helicopter and the eight lanes of stationary traffic, so knew she was getting close. There was the dirty van, on the southbound carriageway hard shoulder, with police cars parked close to, but far enough to hopefully not get caught in a blast.

The motorway snaked through Buckinghamshire countryside at this point, with fields to the east and woodland to the west. She hovered above the police helicopter for a moment, hoping that their attention was on what was going on below them.

How can I communicate with the police without drawing attention to myself? She asked herself.

There was a very large articulated truck below them, at the front of the queue. She had a brain wave.

Hovering above the scene was the Metropolitan Police’s helicopter, call-sign India 99. Lee Holder was an experience police helicopter operator. He had been working in India 99 for the last eight years, so when he looked down and saw something strange, his actions were automatic as he focussed his camera onto the top of the truck’s trailer unit.

Letters suddenly appeared on the roof of the trailer below. The truck was a dirty white articulated lorry, and one that needed a good clean.

The message was simple and easy to understand;

POLICE – THERE IS LITTLE TIME TO ARGUE. THE VAN WILL BE MOVED IN FIVE MINUTES TO A NEW LOCATION IN THE CENTRE OF THE FIELD THREE HUNDRED METRES TO THE EAST.  YOU MUST BE READY TO FOLLOW, OR PLACE VEHICLES INTO THE FIELD IN PREPARATION.

IF YOU UNDERSTAND THIS, HAVE ONE OFFICER LEAVE THE LAND ROVER AND WAVE UP TO THE HELICOPTER.

PC Holder called down to the men on the ground, and then put a call to the superintendent who was Gold Commander in the Major Incident room.

“What do we do, sir?” the Chief Inspector in charge of the firearms officers asked.

The Superintendent was stumped.

“From whom has this message originated?” he asked.

“Sir, this message has just appeared as if by magic on the roof of the truck below. No one was on the truck, so someone is watching and seems to think they can do this.”

“Can we communicate back?”

“We can try, sir. We could get someone to write in the dirt on the truck roof as well.”

PC Terrry Watts was a traffic officer on scene and so when he was asked to clamber onto the roof of the truck and draw in the dirt, he thought someone was pulling his plonker.

“Someone’s pulling my plonker,” he said, with a mouthful of sandwich.

“Get up there and follow the directions of Gold Commander,” his sergeant said.

Grumbling, he did as he was told.

“Ask; who are you?” the radio squawked at him.

WHO ARE YOU? He wrote in the dirt.

Moments later a new set of words appeared.

YOU DON’T NEED TO KNOW. JUST KNOW I CAN AND WILL DO THIS. IF YOU NEED PROOF, WATCH THE BLUE MAZDA IN THE FOURTH LANE.

Suddenly, the Mazda sports car left the ground and was moved fifty yards forward, into the empty cordoned area. Then, it was moved straight back to where it started from.

YOU HAVE FOUR MINUTES LEFT. GET YOUR OFFICERS INTO THE FIELD.

All the officers in the Incident Room looked at the Superintendent.

“Show me the film again,” he said.

They replayed the video link from the helicopter. It was clear. The Mazda moved and not under power.

The Superintendent made a decision, one he was never going to regret.

“We need to get that damn van off the motorway. If there is no other way, then we might as well trust whoever it is. Get the firearms teams into the field, now!” he said.

Keira watched with some relief as the police moved rapidly. The Land Rover drove at the fence and easily destroyed it. Then, all the police vehicles followed it, taking up a position somewhere in the middle of the field. There were no livestock in the field. Keira had checked.

The Helicopter Video link showed numbers as they appeared on the roof of the truck.

10 - 9 – 8 – 7 – 6 – 5 – 4 – 3 – 2 – 1….

The van suddenly left the ground, rising to about fifty feet off the ground, and then it flew sideways to land in the field, in the middle of the new police-cordoned area. It was rocking gently on its springs when, moments later, one of the members of the firearm team shot something through the side window of the van. Clouds of smoke came from the broken window, and the firearms teams approached with ballistic shields raised, opened the doors and dragged the two occupants out. Then they all moved very quickly away from the van.

The traffic officers on the Motorway stared in disbelief at the van, and then scratched their heads. One moment it had been sitting there, and then, almost as fast as they could think, it was in the middle of a field where if it exploded, no one would get hurt, except the two people on board. There was no reason to close the motorway any more. Moments later, the snarled up traffic started moving again.

“I’m done here!” Keira said, and bounded back to the police station.

After scrambling through the loo window, she arrived back at the interview room as a different female officer was walking down the same corridor.

“Keira Frost?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Here to make a statement?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“I’m PC Karen Mills; do you want a cup of tea?”

Keira grinned.

“That sounds marvellous; one sugar, please.”

Nineteen

The Prime Minister sat at his oval cabinet table when the three men were shown into the room. They sat without being invited and glanced nervously at each other.

The Prime Minister sat with his hands clasped together, he did not look happy.

“You three are supposed to be my security experts. Does any one of you have the slightest idea as to what happened earlier today?”

None could answer.

“How about the identity of the person who undoubtedly saved our asses?”

None of them had a clue.

“You have seen the film?” he asked.

The men nodded.

“Have you been fully briefed?”

They nodded again.

“You will be pleased to know that I’ve just heard from the Bomb-disposal people that there was enough explosive in that damn van to take out the junction. It was timed to go off at 5pm, so in the middle of the rush-hour. I do not need to tell you of the mayhem that would have caused.”

One of the men cleared his throat. He was Sir Giles Famshawe, head of MI5.

“Sir Giles?”

“We’ve managed to identify the occupants of the van. The male suspect possessed a false Portuguese passport in the name of Benjamin Gomez, but his real name is believed to be Mohammed Mehmet Khan. He has known links to several different terrorist groups in the Middle East and in Pakistan. He was last logged recruiting fighters in Pakistan. The woman is his girlfriend, one Shamin Khan – no relation, and is a British subject. We understand she was recruited by Khan while she studied in Pakistan. Her father actually reported him as being a suspected terrorist several days ago.”

“Why was he not picked up?”

“We understand that her father went to a London police station after having offered the man a considerable sum of money to leave his daughter. Threats were made, and the officer taking the report noted that he suspected it was a domestic disagreement.”

“Which it was, but we could have actioned the intelligence?”

“Indeed.”

“How about the other man; the one they dropped off and the girl reported?”

“He’s saying nothing. He sits in his cell and prays all day. He refuses to answer any questions and we have no idea of his real identity. He had some false papers and we have no idea as to how he entered the country. We assume it was either illegally or on a passport in a false name. The genuine holder of the documentation is actually in prison in Pakistan.”

“Robin?”

The Prime Minister looked at the next man. Robin Reece-Flynn, the head of MI6.

“Nothing for any sources. We can confirm that we know about Mohammed Khan, but have nothing on the other two.”

“Archie?”

The commanding officer in charge of the SAS did not expect to have to find answers, as his role was to send the chaps in to deal with the terrorists. He was here as a courtesy more than anything else.

“Nothing to report, sir.”

The door opened and a tall, elegant woman strode into the room clutching a slim briefcase. She was in a dark skirt and jacket, and although she could be anything from thirty-five to forty-five, all the men knew that she was older than she looked.

Her hair was neatly bobbed, but it was her eyes that were her most outstanding feature. They were brown, but of an unusual colour. They were almost amber. They also had the disconcerting effect of making anyone who made eye contact with her feel incredibly vulnerable and uncomfortable.

“Sorry I’m late, sir,” she said, sitting next to the Prime Minister.

“Thank you for coming at such short notice, Amber. You know the chaps, don’t you?” he said.

She smiled, nodding at the three men.

“I know them, but they’ve probably forgotten me.”

There was a little embarrassment over this comment. Archie Macrae, the soldier, had a vague memory of an incident on a Caribbean island back in the seventies, but couldn’t quite remember the details. The others just felt uncomfortable, but didn’t know why.

“I’d be interested to hear your views?” the Prime Minister said.

“I’ve gone through the course of events on my way over here, and I think I can actually help. We’re dealing with a highly sophisticated and skilled individual who has displayed remarkable resourcefulness and initiative, as well as shown a mature level of social awareness. The fact that we have no real idea as to her identity is testimony to her intelligence and ability to cover her tracks.”

“Her?”

“I have no doubt that the person responsible is a female, and probably quite young.”

“Young?”

“Under twenty.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“She reminds me of me rather a long time ago. Had it been a male, then I think the whole issue would have been dealt with far less carefully and probably involved a great deal more drama. I’ve read through the officers reports, and believe I have a suspicion that I know who she is.”

“Who is she?”

“No, with respect, Prime Minister, this has to be handled very carefully. I need a cast-iron assurance that I am to be the only one to make contact and to recruit her. This is not some fly-by-night vigilante, as she has displayed a level of power quite awesome in one so young and inexperienced. I am the only one who can help her reach her full potential, and although I trust my colleagues implicitly, I don’t think they’d have a clue how to deal with her.”

The men muttered in an almost-offended sort of way, but actually all were grateful not to have landed the difficult task of locating and dealing with anyone who has the powers that she appeared to possess.

“What do you propose?” the Prime Minister asked.

“Nothing, immediately; we’ll let this all settle down and allow everyone to believe that our police are still the best in the world. Those who witnessed the paranormal activity will have to be spoken to, and I suggest that I be the person to do that.”

“Agreed, what next? As we don’t want this person to just disappear, do we?”

“She won’t, I promise.”

“I’m still not convinced she’s a girl,” said the MI5 man.

“Trust me, I know what I know,” said Amber with a smile.

“What about the terrorists; they’re not talking?” the SAS commander asked.

“Where are they being held?”

“They’re all at different police stations in West London. The press are being a bit of a pain in the arse, as usual, but it’s still early days. The press release has been brief and to the point; a terrorist act was nipped in the bud by effective police work. No one was hurt and no property seriously damaged. A quantity of homemade explosive material has been recovered. We are not seeking other persons at this time,” said the MI5 man.

“Let me know where they are each being held, and I’ll go and see if we can free up some cooperation. I might just bring along a companion, as a sort of initiation rite, if you know what I mean?”

The Prime Minister was surprised.

“That soon?  I thought you wanted things to settle down a bit?”

“I do, but she’ll be feeling frustrated at not being able to see what happens next.”

“How can you possibly know this?”

“Because it’s what I’d be feeling if I were she.”

“Can you be certain that she’s one of the good guys?” asked the MI6 director.

Amber smiled.

“Oh yes, she is definitely one of us. Now, if you don’t mind, I have to go and see a girl.”

Mrs Lambert had been quiet all the way back to the college. Not that Keira was interested in saying much either. They had the car radio on and listened to Radio Four news, as it was more comprehensive than any of the others.

Needless to say, Shannon was full of questions as soon as they got back.

The others were aware only that Keira went missing for a couple of hours and that Mrs Lambert had to go and collect her. There was curiosity, but nothing out of the ordinary.

After tea, Mrs Lambert banged her spoon for silence.

“Girls; as you are by now aware, there was an incident this afternoon where one of our number witnessed part of what is being called a failed terrorist plot. Keira behaved most correctly in identifying some chemicals that were possibly to be used in the manufacture of explosives, and assisted the police to locate and arrest those involved. It is vital that we do not speak of this matter to anyone outside the school, and that includes boyfriends and family. I do not want the press to come to the college, and to twist the facts for their own version of events. Is this clear?”

It was, abundantly clear. The girls looked at Keira with renewed respect. She was grateful to retire to her room for a study period and obtain some peace and quiet.

Mrs Lambert was in her study when she glanced out of the window to see the sleek, black car pull up outside the front. It was a Jaguar sports car, not that she was any sort of expert, but even she could see that it was new and had darkened windows.

A tall, well-dressed woman got out of the driver’s seat and glanced at the window through which Mrs Lambert watched. She made eye-contact with the older woman, which sent shivers of ice run down her spine. She immediately knew that this woman was here to see Keira.

Doreen heard the front bell being pulled, and listened as someone went to answer the door. She stood in preparation to meet the newcomer.

“Mrs Lambert, there’s a lady here. She says she’s from the Home Office,” said the secretary.

“Please, ask her to come in,” she said.

As soon as Amber walked into the Head-teacher’s study, she was aware that this woman not only knew about the girl, but had actively assisted her.

“Thank you for seeing me, Mrs Lambert. Can I just say how fortunate Keira is to have such an understanding and intelligent woman as a mentor?”

Doreen was blown away by the use of her own name and that of Keira’s. She felt confused and back-footed. Her visitor was an attractive woman of indeterminate age. Doreen noticed that she wore a wedding ring on her left ring finger.

“Let me be perfectly frank with you. My name is Amber Robbins and I work for a select department within the security service at the Home Office. I am a specialist, and as such it is my task to locate and recruit similarly gifted individuals to join a very select group. Just so you know, I can read minds and possess other skills that most people would find disconcerting at best and downright terrifying at worst.  When I was at school, I was blessed by a wonderful woman who was my teacher. She was to become my mother, as my own mother passed away when I was very young, but if it hadn’t been for Jenny, then who knows what sort of muck-up I would have made of things.

“Now in you I identify another, just like Jenny, who can see past the usual prejudices that our society breeds. You’ve done just the right thing for Keira, but I have to tell you that it’s now my turn to help her develop and grow to understand those gifts with which she has been endowed.”

Doreen Lambert stood, unsure how to reply.

“You don’t have to reply, as I am not going to take her away from here. You have shown me that this is the best possible place for her to finish her education, so she will complete her A-levels here, and then look to her next goals in life, whatever they may be.”

While she was talking, Amber sought with her mind the girl in question. Keira wasn’t hard to find.

<Is it me you’re after?>

<Yes. I’m Amber.>

<You’re like me, in a way?>

<In a way.>

<Do I come down, or what?>

<Do you want to help me finish what you started?>

Keira grinned and stood up, putting her books away.

<Yes please.>

Doreen was startled when someone knocked on the study door.

She opened it to find Keira standing there.

Doreen said nothing, but opened the door for the girl to walk in.

“Hello, Keira. It’s good to finally meet you. I was very impressed with how to managed things today. You were very resourceful.”

“Thank you; I tried to be as neat as I could,” she said, frowning. “How did you find me?”

“I read the statement you made to the police and then I spoke to the female officer that you saved from being shot. She wondered how you managed to run two hundred metres in less than five seconds. You tried to make her believe it wasn’t as far, and she believed you. I didn’t.”

“I was worried about that, but I couldn’t let him just shoot her, could I?”

Amber smiled and turned to Mrs Lambert.

“What time would you like her back?”

“In time to get a good night’s sleep,” the older woman said, with a smile.

“Excellent, can I suggest you change into something a little smarter?” Amber said to the jeans-clad Keira.

“Like?”

“A dark skirt and blouse, perhaps with a jacket. You are going to be part of the WIB now, aren’t you?”

“WIB?”

“Women in black.”

“How many are there?”

“That would be telling, but your addition will significantly add to those already serving.”

In the end, a conservatively dressed Keira joined Amber in the Jaguar and hurtled along the country roads towards London.

“How do you know nothing was coming?” she asked.

“I can see more with my mind than anyone can see with their eyes.”

“I can’t do that,” Keira admitted.

“Maybe you haven’t tried,” Amber said, glancing at the girl. She noted the torc for the first time, immediately understanding that here was the source of the girl’s power. She drove, while seeking answers with that amazing mind of hers.

“It’s an alien artefact,” Amber said at last.

Keira immediately touched her torc.

“How do you know?”

“I can ‘see’ into it. It’s highly technical, belonging to a race far superior to us in so many ways. Even with all our scientific brilliance, we could still never come close to what you have around your neck.”

“Is it old?”

“Very. I can’t tell exactly, but it was made long before man started thinking himself as civilised,” she said, pausing. “It’s what changed you from being a boy, isn’t it?”

Keira was surprised that she wasn’t surprised that Amber knew.

“Yes, how did you know?”

“You and I are more alike than either of us could ever imagine. We managed to get to a good place in very different ways. I did the same thing when I was about eight, or so. Only I didn’t need a torc. My parents were part of a scientific programme to try to engineer special people. They died without knowing if it worked. It didn’t; not to their generation, at any rate. Unbeknown to the authorities, I was born with powers, though. One of them was to become the person I should always have been - a girl. I don’t understand much about the inner workings of that thing, but I sense that it was created to give the wearer the appearance of being female. What happens when you take it off?”

“Nothing. No, that’s not true. I lose all my powers, but I stay a girl, now.”

“That wasn’t always the case?”

“No, to start with, I was a boy when I went to school, and the rest of the time I’d be a girl as long as I wore the torc.”

“When did that change?”

“After I started at this college. I’d been a girl permanently for a few weeks and my games mistress made me take it off to play hockey. I didn’t have a choice, so I took it off. I waited for the change to happen, but it never came.”

Amber nodded.

“I’d say that was the default if you left it on for longer than a couple of weeks. It wasn’t designed for humans, but for another race that needed to look human. I think it was one of a pair. This was the one to allow them to look female, while the other one was to make them look male.”

“How do you know?”

“Part of my power is to feel inanimate objects and understand their history. It’s not clear, but that’s the impression I sense.”

“Why would they want to look male or female?”

“They probably didn’t look anything like us, so needed to appear normal. Humans come in two genders, so they probably felt it right to have one of each, at least.”

“You mean there are more of these things?”

“I don’t know. Possibly.”

“Why did it change me if I’m not the same race as they were?”

“I can sense that it is tuned into female human DNA. It gives the wearer the image of being human female, regardless of whatever they happened to be originally.”

Keira thought for a moment, gently touching the torc with her fingers.

“Are there many people, like us, I mean?”

“No, very few.”

“I suppose I’m not really like you. I use an artificial means to obtain my power.”

“No; actually, I sense in you latent power that is simply amplified by the torc. Some of its powers are definitely unique to the torc, but others are most definitely of you.”

“I’m not sure I understand,” Keira admitted.

Amber sighed.

“I have a daughter; she’s grown up now, and lives and works in America. Her father David was an American serviceman who was gifted and never knew it. He had some amazing latent powers, which made him an exceptional policeman. Jenny is probably more powerful than me, but we were careful no ensure that the security and intelligence services never found her.”

Keira frowned.

“What happened?”

“I went to work in America during the Cold War. The Soviets had a cunning plan to operate a sleeper programme and cause mayhem in the 1970’s and 80’s. We managed to stop them, but grew so close that we could not ignore things any more. We had to be careful, as we both knew how the official mind works. Our daughter Jenny was born just after David and I got married. As far as my people and his were concerned, we just happened to be enjoying some well-earned leave.

“We settled in the States, as I managed to get a job as a liaison consultant to the American intelligence people. David was still in their military, but they were good enough to keep us working in relatively close proximity to start with.

“We had fifteen wonderful years, and then he was diagnosed with cancer. Jenny took his death hard, as she couldn’t understand how neither of us could use our powers to save him. Jenny went into medicine and is now a wonderful physician on the West Coast. She has some amazing gifts, but she refuses to use any of them for anything other than medical practicalities. I actually respect her for it, but can’t help but think that in a way it’s a waste of some amazing gifts.”

“Do you see much of her?”

“Yes, I do. She has a wonderful husband who is a doctor as well. They have three children, and I see them as often as I can. One of them, little Chloe, is showing great promise; if you know what I mean?”

“Where are we going?”

“I have to finish what you started, so I thought you’d appreciate a ring-side seat. Am I right?”

“Oh yes,” said Keira with a smile.

Ali was afraid, but he was never going to show that he was afraid, nor that all his training and preparation was insufficient for his current predicament. He pretended to pray whenever he thought someone was watching him and said nothing to the infidels whenever they spoke to him. The truth was that he actually was suffering from extreme doubt as to the existence of Allah, and specifically that he was on the path of righteousness. Nevertheless, he refused to be drawn to say anything, despite their use of several different interpreters.

They fed him regularly, and quite well too. But because he refused to speak, they had yet to attempt to interrogate him.

He was pretending to pray when he heard them open the wicket on the cell door. Then he heard the keys in the lock and the door opened. He still refused to look, even though he knew that someone was looking down at where he knelt.

He became more than a little disconcerted as that person made no attempt to speak to him or to try to get him to move. He looked up.

Keira stood a little behind Amber in the doorway of the cell. The policeman stood just behind her, twirling the keys on his finger. Amber simply stood there, looking at the prostrate man.

When she finally spoke, she said the nine words in Arabic that the man least wanted to hear. Then they simply left the man quietly sobbing.

“What did you say to him?” Keira asked, as they left the custody suite. Keira didn’t see the identity card that Amber showed the police officers, but it seemed that she could go anywhere she wanted. Keira felt important to be with the older woman.

“I said, ‘Usman Khalid, your mother will be disappointed in you.’ That’s all.”

“I thought you wanted to interrogate him?” the younger girl asked.

Amber smiled.

“Oh, I did, but just not how he expected. I now know everything he knows, but now I have to remember it all, so hush for a bit, there’s a love.”

Keira followed her upstairs, to the CID office. Amber seemed to know her way around, and no one challenged them.

They walked through the general office. A few detectives looked up in mild curiosity as they passed and seemed to remember important stuff they ought to be doing.

“Are you doing that?” Keira asked.

“Clever girl, now just say nothing for a bit.”

They walked into a detective chief Inspector’s office. A female DCI sat at her desk. She looked up as Amber breezed in. She opened her mouth to say something and then closed it again, abruptly, and stood up, allowing Amber to sit down.

Amber reached down to the third drawer down and removed several lined A4 pieces of paper. The woman handed her a pen without being asked. Amber started to write in a very neat and precise hand. Keira and the DCI simply watched as Amber filled three sides of A4 paper. She then signed a name at the bottom and stood up, handing the paper to the police officer.

“That is a complete run down of the terrorist you have in custody. His real name is Usman Khalid and he is a Pakistani national. He is a seasoned bomb-maker and is responsible for several atrocities across Pakistan and the Middle East. I have listed all those on page three.”

The woman was reading the paper and she nodded vacantly without looking up.

“Ready?” Amber asked Keira.

“Yes; for what?”

“The other two, of course.”

“Oh, right, super,” the girl said, making Amber smile.

They returned to the car, and Amber drove quickly and well across London.

“Do you have any questions of me?”

“So many that I don’t know where to start. Did you just read that man’s mind and then make the police do what you wanted?”

“Yes, well, actually, no. What I did was to encourage the man to think of everything I thought we ought to know, and then I read what he was thinking. With the police, they need very little encouragement to be helpful. They do, however, have an unfortunate tendency to be rather bureaucratic and pedantic about certain protocols. All I do is by-pass the silliness and actually, they’re normally very happy with the way things pan out.”

“Could I learn to do what you do?”

“We’ve got a way to go before you get to learn things that others do. For a start, do you actually know what you can do?”

“I think so. At least, I’m learning stuff every day.”

“Well, I know you can defy gravity and move amazing weights with mental power. What else is there?”

“I’m bullet proof; or at least, I think I am.”

Amber just raised an eyebrow.

“A burglar threw a knife at me, and I discovered that I have a force field around me. It didn’t matter whether it was a knife or a punch, as neither landed on me. I think it would be the same with a bullet or bit of shrapnel.”

Amber smiled.

“Useful; go on.”

“I can learn languages very easily. I used to be crap at French, but with the torc, I learned to be almost fluent. We have a Korean girl at school, and when she spoke in her language, it’s like the torc translates and helps me talk back in her language.”

“You see, these are skills that the aliens needed to fit in among humans. They needed to be safe, and to be able to move quickly. Perhaps they were not used to Earth’s gravity, or perhaps they were terrified of humans so much that they needed the ability to escape rapidly. The chances are their own language was nothing like our early speech patterns, so they needed artificial help to get their voice boxes to attempt human sounds and to tune into the minds of the humans so as to provide an instantaneous translation.”

“Oh.”

“Oh, indeed, Keira; you’ve stumbled onto something very powerful and very precious. If you keep it, you need to learn exactly of what it is capable; indeed, of what you are capable.”

“If I keep it?” Keira sounded quite worried.

Amber smiled again.

“Okay, now I know that’s not an option. I am not going to force you to do anything you don’t want to do.”

“You could, though, very easily, by what I’ve seen.”

“Yes, I could, but I won’t, I promise. You see, I was like you once, and it’s tough when you feel that you are the only one. I sense in you all the frustration of having this power and not having anywhere to go or anything to do; am I right?”

“You know you are.”

“Well, I’m here to tell you to forget about looking for trouble, as trouble will find you when you’re ready for it. Now I know you exist, it’s my job to keep you safe while you learn what you can do. There are many people who would stop at nothing to have what you have, and if they can’t have it, they’ll try to make you to do things by threatening to hurt those close to you. What you should be doing is enjoying being at school, because you will never be as free as you are now.”

“School is so dull!”

“It seems that way, but it’s not forever and if you try, you can actually have fun. If you don’t want to have fun, then it’s as easy to be a miserable cow and end up being miserable for the rest of your life.”

Keira was quiet.

“Are you okay?” Amber asked.

“I’m confused; are you telling me you want me to come and work for you?”

“Not for me, dear, I want you to come and work with me. I want you to develop as normally as possible, with due regard to the odd circumstances, and to let me help you in that development.”

Keira felt very humble, as clearly Amber was an important figure within the security services, and yet she was taking an inordinate amount of trouble to single Keira out for special treatment.

“I’m flattered, but how do you know I’d be good enough.”

Amber laughed heartily.

“My dear girl; if you take a moment and look at what you managed today, and all without any help or special training, you will understand that you are more than good enough.”

“Then, what do I have to do?”

“Are you seventeen yet”

“Soon.”

“Then you have to do nothing for a couple of years. I will get you and your father to sign a form, and the rest is up to us. Your secondary education is a private school, yes?”

“Yes.”

“And your father is paying full whack?”

“As far as I know, yes.”

“Then we will inform him that HMG will pick up any further education. In other words, once you agree to join us, we will pay for your degree course at university.”

“I’m not sure I want to go to university. Can’t I just come and do cool stuff with you?”

“You will have enough time to do cool stuff, as you call it. You only get to be a free student for a limited period, and believe me; you want to take what you can get. The main thing to remember is that you might have some amazing gifts, but you don’t know it all. Take my advice; work hard, get your A-levels, go to university and get a useful degree in something that will help you and in which you are interested. Then come and do cool stuff. How about it?”

“I suppose you’re right. Can I get some work experience in the holidays?”

Amber just laughed as she pulled the car over to the rear yard of another police station.

“We’re here; now let’s see what little Miss Shamin tells us.”

Keira grinned.

“They all tell you everything without knowing it; right?”

“Right!” said Amber, leading the way.

Twenty

France 2012

Adelise Fortier had never hated anyone quite as much as she hated the English girl. It had all started a couple of years ago, in the summer holidays.

She and her family, which comprised her parents, her older brother Armand and her younger sister Claudette, hailed from northern France. They had a holiday home in the Brittany Port du Crouesty. Her parents were keen sailors and they owned their own five berth yacht that was moored in the marina. When they weren’t here, the boat was stored in one of the boat yards. Her father would call the yard and arrange for the yacht to be in the water and ready for him when they arrived.

They spent every summer here, as her father was able to work from the cottage, which had internet connections and all he needed to keep up with his clients. He was an accountant. In fact, their little cottage had around the same amount of space as did the boat.

They also belonged to the sailing club, which gave them all a degree of social interaction with other people. Six weeks with just one’s parents and siblings was enough to drive anyone bonkers. The children had all grown up together, so Armand and Charles, being the same age, had become firm friends as little boys and were still good buddies.

Strangely, she remembered Keira’s father and mother, but not the girl herself. She had a vague memory of a skinny and shy boy who didn’t make any effort to mingle with the French children.  It took her a while to remember where she had seen Graham before, because he now had a much younger and more attractive woman, and a different child. Adelise assumed that Keira was not his, but Stephanie’s child, and the boy had remained with the rather intense mother, who was no longer with her husband.

Charles Royer was her dream-boat. Only the young man was unaware of her interest. Charles and his younger sister Bernice were, just like Adelise and her family, migrant holiday-makers; brought by their parents to spend summer by the sea.

Many French holiday-makers would head south, to the warmer Mediterranean coast. However, not everyone could afford the exorbitant prices for accommodation and nearly everything else in the south, so some headed west instead. The Atlantic coast was cooler and definitely less settled than the Mediterranean, but when it was nice, it was a lovely place to be.

The Gulf of Morbihan was a sheltered inland sea, protected from the Atlantic by the narrow mouth of the inlet at Port Navalo. In the Gulf were many islands, some inhabited, and a wonderful area in which to sail and explore. There were many ports with cafes and restaurants in which the sailor could stop and refresh oneself. Port du Crouesty was to the southeast of Port Navalo by a few kilometres, on the Atlantic side of the straights.

Both families had been visiting the area for many years, having bought property here in the eighties. The children had found many others of their own age, of which the Fortiers and Royers were but two families among many.

That first year that Keira had appeared, Charles was a University student, studying to become an architect. Just like Keira, Adelise was still at school, but thought the older boy was the best thing on two legs. She had thought that he might find her equally as attractive, but out of nowhere came the English girl and her Hobiecat.

To be fair, although Charles had obviously found the English girl attractive and spent far too much time with her, the girl herself did not appear to be that interested in Charles. On those occasions when the young people had all congregated together, the English girl had been very much side-lined as her French wasn’t very fluent. However, she picked up the language so quickly that Adelise suspected that Keira had been pretending to not understand so as to get Charles to pay her more attention.

Adelise was not to know that Keira had only been a girl for a matter of a few weeks, so was still fumbling her way through life. She was only just beginning to appreciate what her torc could do for her, so was experiencing a steep learning curve with both her new gender and what resided around her neck. To have a very good-looking boy interested in her was flattering, but also somewhat frightening. She liked the attentive Charles, but was a little wary of what signals she was sending him. As a result, she tried to play it cool, which was taken by the French boy as playing hard to get, and made him all the more interested.

Nothing very much occurred that first year, but the following year saw Keira return with two friends; an Irish girl called Shannon, who chased every boy capable of walking and stringing a sentence together; and a very shy but pretty English girl called Connie.

Adelise noticed that something had happened to Keira in the intervening period. Gone was the rather shy and uncertain girl who spoke the language poorly. Instead, she returned looking like a million dollars and full of confidence. It was as if she had grown up three years in the intervening twelve months. She was now totally fluent in French and appeared to know exactly how to wrap poor Charles around her little finger, or any male, if it came to it.

Adelise’s brother Armand was now a student in Lyons with a girlfriend. This fact did not deter the irrepressible Shannon, who targeted the poor boy and almost traumatised him in the process.

As far as Charles was concerned, his smile arrived on the day he first saw Keira, and he was with her as much as was humanly possible. To Adelise’s disgust, Keira was no longer reluctant to accept his advances, and gave him sufficient encouragement to make sure that he was entirely blind to any other girls specifically Adelise.

It was a relief to all, perhaps with the exception of Charles, when the English girls went home at the end of their two weeks. Adelise hoped that Charles would lose interest in Keira before the next holiday, but she feared that he wouldn’t. Her other hope would be for the English girl to meet someone in England and therefore not be interested in Charles.

Neither happened.

For a start, when the English girls returned, it was a week earlier in the season, as Connie and Keira had now left school, and Shannon was on the break after her first year at university. They also arrived without Keira’s father and new step-mother. Stephanie and Graham were in the Caribbean on their honeymoon.  They had handed over the keys to the Crouesty apartment without hesitation and the instructions to ‘leave the place standing.’

Adelise did not arrive until a week after the others. As she walked through the port on that first evening to return to the old haunts and favourite cafe from the previous years, she was dismayed to see Charles sitting next to Keira with his arm draped in a proprietary fashion across her shoulders.

Keira looked even more attractive, having already acquired a gorgeous tan from the hours spent sailing and basking on the beach. She was dressed in a stunning sundress that made her look more like a catwalk model than ever.

Armand was pleased to see that Shannon was draped over a large young man wearing a Welsh Rugby shirt.

He actually turned out to be a New Zealander called Matthew who was doing Europe and had been working in a bar in Crouesty when he happened to fall for Shannon, mainly because of what she could do with an empty bottle of beer. (Actually, the empty bit was optional, but nobody wanted to drink it afterwards).

The girls were as friendly as ever, which made Adelise even more cross. The problem was that Keira was a nice girl and it wasn’t as if the French girl had managed to stake a claim on Charles in the first place.

Everything changed on that day.

It was a lovely sunny day, very much like all the days of this particular summer. The marina was busier than usual, as there was a competition running over the weekend, so there were many guest boats fighting the regulars for the already crowded berths.

They were pulling their hair out at the Capitainerie, as was usual in the summer weeks. There were far more boats than there were berths, so many owners were frustrated at the lack of somewhere to keep their boat. Many would stock up their boat and sail into the Gulf to find a berth in one of the many inlets or moorings that were scattered around the islands and mainland towns.

Adelise and her family would often spend several days (and nights) on their boat, depending on the weather. Her parents discovered that teenage girls are not always the best crew, particularly when sailing interferes with their social lives. Armand was a clone of their father, so adored sailing, and, as long as Shannon was otherwise engaged, he could take or leave social interaction for the most part.

However, due to the crowds, her father decided to undertake an ‘expedition’. On this occasion, he decided to head out for a day’s sailing to return up the Rivière d’Auray to a berth he had pre-booked at the picturesque village of Auray for the weekend. That way, they’d avoid the crowds in Port du Crouesty, and be certain of a berth when they returned on Monday.

This estuary was tidal, so he had to time it right. Too late and he’d never get up to estuary, so they’d have to stay where they found themselves, and if they were stuck in the mud, they could incur a fine by the river authorities, or even sustain damage to the hull.

Because they left quite early, Adelise did not witness the near disaster, but only heard of it later, on her return.

The weather was unpredictable in this region. Even if the sun was shining, the sea could be rough, and the wind treacherous. The coastline was notoriously rocky and there were hidden reefs to catch the lazy or unwary. One could not venture too close to the shore, so it was always a good idea to follow the buoys and charts, no matter how familiar one thought one was of these waters.

When Adelise returned, she found all her friends talking about it. She also discovered a morose Charles sitting in a sulk by himself.

“What’s up with Charles?” she asked one of the others.

“Oh, the English girl told him his fortune, I think.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think he was a little over-protective towards Keira, so she told him that holiday romances were all right, but not for him to get too steamy and serious, as she wasn’t that interested. He’s been sitting there ever since.”

“How was he over protective?”

“I’m not sure, but it was something to do with the rescue.”

“What rescue?”

“Of course, you’ve been away, haven’t you?”

Adelise was getting frantic by this stage.

“What the hell happened?” she asked.

“It was yesterday morning, Sunday. You probably were up at Auray waiting for the tide, but it was blowing a gale here. Some kids went out in a dingy; you remember the Montpelliers?”

“Yes, what about them?”

“Stephan and Paul took the dingy out. Their parents were at that fancy lunch at the Marina, and had told them not to go out if it was windy.  We were all at the beach; no one went out because of the wind. The waves were getting bigger by the minute. No one saw them until it was too late. They keep the boat at the other end of the beach, so no one was close enough to see them go out.

“I can’t remember who saw them first; it might have been the Irish girl. Anyway, we could see the dingy was in trouble, as it capsized in a very rough sea. Charles said he’d go and ring the coastguard from the direct line at the club. We were all watching as a couple of the lads decided to take out the rib with the outboard, but they had to turn back before they got swamped.  We could see the hull of the dingy in the water and the two boys sitting, hanging onto the keel board.”

“What happened?”

“Charles came back and watched the guys bring the rib ashore. He then realised that Keira was missing. He went mental, searching and shouting. Shannon told him not to be an arse as she had probably gone to the toilet.”

“Anyway, we were all distracted by him, so we just noticed the dingy being pulled out of the water by the two boys, with Keira helping them. She said a freak wave pushed them towards the beach, so she had gone to help them. The mast had snapped, so they were going to have a lot of explaining to their parents.”

“Keira went out to them?” Adelise asked, surprised.

“I don’t know, no one was watching the dingy, as it all happened when the rib was coming back in. The guys got soaked and damn near overturned in the breakers.”

“What did they say?”

Not a lot; they were exhausted. They just said what Keira said; the wind and waves blew them toward the shore and she went out to them.”

“So, why did Keira dump Charles?”

“Well, after we got the dingy in and the two guys were checked over, Charles had to go ring the coast guard again to cancel them. When he got back, he delivered a stern lecture to Keira about being foolish.”

Adelise smiled.

“That would have gone down well,” she said, sarcastically.

Her friend grinned.

“Like a lead balloon. She told Charles that she was a big girl and to back off. He was stupid enough to think he could then tell her off some more. That was when she told him that she was not his property and that if that was what he felt then he could just forget any thoughts of being close to her. Judging how close they got the other night, I think that shocked him a little.”

“Then what happened?”

“Nothing; she walked off and hasn’t spoken to him again, while he’s sat in the corner of the cafe being miserable fool.”

Adelise smiled gently. This was her chance.

“Were the boys all right?” she asked.

“Tired and scared, but otherwise okay. Their parents were furious and are making them pay for the new mast.”

Making an excuse, Adleise left her friend and made her way to the cafe. Charles was still sitting there looking miserable. She went in and sat down next to him.

“Hi,” she said.

Charles vaguely looked her way without saying anything.

“I hear Keira was a stroppy cow?” she said.

“I was only looking after her welfare,” he said, petulantly.

Adelise felt bold, so she reached out and took his hand.

“I know, she’s so ungrateful,” she said. “I’d never be that nasty to you.”

“That was a bloody stupid risk!” Shannon said.

“Calculated,” said Keira.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“Amber said that people see what they want to see and what they expect to see. When something doesn’t fit their expectations, they change what their memory tells them so that it does.”

Shannon couldn’t argue, as nobody actually saw Keira go out to the dingy and help the boys and the boat to shore. Fortunately the boys in the rib were being so entertaining that everyone was distracted for several crucial seconds. The two in the dingy were so grateful that they were quite happy to keep to Keira’s story.

“I still think you should have let the coastguard or lifeboat do their job,” Connie said.

“They weren’t going to get there in time. Charles had only called them, so they would be at least twenty minutes, or half an hour. These boys had less than three minutes before hitting the reef.”

“You didn’t have to snap Charles’ head off, he was just worried about you,” Shannon said.

“Maybe, but I needed to do something. He was beginning to piss me off. He was settling into a nice little domestic arrangement and talking about me coming over to live with him at his university. Amber said that relationships might be difficult.”

“You need to find Mr Incredible, or some other superhero,” Connie said with a smile.

“Like that’s ever going to happen. At least I know I like guys,” said Keira wearily.

Adelise didn’t hate Keira anymore. Indeed, she was a little grateful to her, but was never going to tell her so. Charles was hers on the rebound, and she was able to manipulate events so as he could see how much better she was compared to the feisty English girl. She had high hopes of something developing further.

Keira had outgrown the French holiday, and so when they returned to England, she felt it unlikely that she would return. Still, it had been fun while it lasted.

Twenty-one

London 2014

Shannon was late, so she grabbed a couple of bits of bread from the bread-bin, whopped a piece of yesterday’s pizza between then, and left her flat, just remembering her bag as she rushed out.

Fortunately, a bus was just pulling up at the stop across the road, so she just managed to get there before it started off again. After showing her pass to the driver, she collapsed onto the only available seat.

She sat back and gnawed her sandwich, much to the amusement of the oriental gentleman sitting across the aisle from her. He was obviously a tourist, as he wore the standard Japanese tourist’s garb, including digital camera and umbrella.

A mobile phone rang. Shannon groped in her bag for her phone, as it was hers. The theme tune to Star Wars was a little lame, but at least she knew it was hers.

It was Connie, as she suspected it might be.

“Hi, Connie, what’s up?”

“You’re late!” her friend said.

“Yeah, well, sue me. Is Keira already there?”

“I don’t know, we agreed that I’d wait for you outside; remember?”

“Sorry, but Matt didn’t leave until gone two.”

Connie rolled her eyes.

“It’s your first day, so you could have made a fucking effort!”

“I’m on the bus; I’ll be there in about ten.”

“I’ll tell Keira.”

“Ta. Look, I’m sorry, but you know what I’m like!”

“See you,” Connie said, unwilling to say something that might make Shannon cross.

In fact, the bus took twelve and a half minutes. Connie, a slimmer and very well-dressed Connie waited outside the imposing building.

“What have you got all over your face?” she asked the Irish girl.

Shannon wiped the tomato paste from around her mouth.

“Pizza, probably,” she said, her Irish brogue still evident.

“Come on; I called Keira and told her that the traffic was holding you up.”

The building they entered was neither the MI5 or MI6 buildings that the girls were expecting. This was an old building. One amongst many other imposing but very anonymous grey buildings that housed various departments of the Home Office.

A uniformed guard on reception was polite but possessed a no-nonsense manner.

“Yes, ladies, may I help you?” he asked.

Connie took a letter from her bag.

“Good morning, we’re here to see Miss Frost,” she said, almost forgetting Keira’s surname.

“Ah, you’ll be Miss Rogers and Miss O’Hanrahan, yes?”

The girls nodded.

“Sign in, please, and don’t bother smiling for the camera,” he said, as they signed the book and stared at the impersonal lens of the security camera as they did so.

He handed them two ID cards with plastic clips to attach to themselves. They were impressed as their photographs were already on the cards, even though they were temporary, visitor passes.

“Fifth floor, she’ll be waiting for you when the lift stops. Have a good morning.”

They were the only people in the lift.

“Can you believe we’re actually here?” Connie said.

“Not really. I know I told her that she should give us both a job when she made it, but I never thought she would.”

“Do you realise that we’re the only people who know her secret?”

“Apart from her Dad, that is; oh, and the Lambster.”

“They don’t count.”

“At least I didn’t believe she was a fucking alien!”

Connie smiled.

“I was young and gullible. Besides, it wasn’t that far from the truth, was it?”

“My Dad would die if he could see me now!” Shannon said, regarding her reflection in the large mirror that was the back wall of the elevator.

A slim and very sophisticated young woman, dressed like a city businesswoman stared back at her. She and Connie could be colleagues in the same office.

“I even had me fucking hair cut!” she complained.

“Mind your language, Shannon,” she said, automatically.

Connie smiled, agreeing with her friend’s assessment. This was a million miles from where she thought she’d end up.

“I still need my back-up, and that’s you two!” Keira had said just three months ago.

They’d all gone their separate ways after school. Connie and Keira having split up when Keira left their first school close to the Thames.  Keira had brought Shannon home in the Christmas holidays after that first term, as she was unwilling to go home to Ireland. Shannon and Connie had got on well, and the girls had promised to keep the friendship going no matter what.

Connie was a little jealous of Shannon at first, but she realised that Shannon was now a kind of irreverent, older-sister figure for Keira. In fact, Shannon made everyone look better than they really were. The girls made a pact to spend the summer holidays together, starting with a trip for them all to France.

Keira’s father finally married Stephanie and they planned to move abroad as soon as Keira had flown the nest. Not that they were in any rush, so when Keira announced that she had been offered a scholarship to any university, her father rubbed his hands together in undisguised glee.

The girls had headed off to France when Graham and Stephanie were on their Honeymoon. The apartment in France was still there when they went the following year, and Graham was a little sad that his daughter no longer wanted to join them. Keira had told them that she had grown out of the place, and wanted to do other stuff with her friends. Graham decided to sell the apartment as he and his new bride were looking at somewhere different to settle down.

After getting straight A’s in her A-levels, Keira had gone to Cambridge to study Russian and IT, while Shannon had got into Reading to study criminal psychology a year earlier. Connie had done a design course at Brunel University in Hillingdon.

The girls had tried to keep in touch with each other, but it had been quite difficult because they were in three different places doing very different courses. However, Shannon became almost a permanent feature at the Frost household during the Christmas breaks in particular; Mr Frost wondered if he might have two chicks to leave the nest rather than just one.

Qualifying a year earlier than Keira, Shannon had been unable to find a job immediately. She acknowledged that her interview techniques might let her down a bit, which her two friends had to admit was probably the case.

“I’ll get you both a decent job when I go and work for the spooks!” Keira had said.

Both girls had thought she’d been joking. Now they knew that she had been perfectly serious.

The lift stopped and the door opened.

“Look what the cat dragged in” said a familiar voice.

The girls smiled at their friend, who looked almost like a different person. Clad in a dark suit, she looked like the epitome of a civil servant of executive. With a new hairstyle, shorter and gleaming, she looked stunning. Judging by the amount of male heads that turned as the trio made their way along the corridor, she wasn’t the only one.

“What is it we’re meant to be doing here?” Shannon asked; for which Connie was grateful.

“I’m putting together my own team; and you’re it.”

“Just us?”

“To start with. I’m not operational yet, so we’re in the early stages of development.”

“I’m not with you,” Shannon admitted.

“The department is very hush-hush. The director answers to the Prime Minister only. It’s a small department and one that gets some of the trickiest jobs. Now the director has done nearly all the work up to now, so she is grateful that there are a few of us to take on the workload. Even I don’t know any of the other specialists. I met a girl called Kezzy [1] the other day, but I have no idea what she does. She’s a little older than me, but seems friendly enough. We’re not allowed to talk about what we can do; that was one of the first rules that the boss told me about.”

“I thought you’d all work together, like the Avengers,” said Shannon.

“It’s all too secret. We aren’t allowed to know how many of us there are, or what we do. That way, if one of us is taken, we can’t reveal anything. Anyway, I’m still in training, but apparently it is essential to have my own team as backup. You will be that team. You’re my interface with everyone else, as you will be the only people who know the truth.”

“Who is this director, your boss?” Connie asked.

Keira paused, unsure what to say.

“Her name is Amber and I think she can do a lot of what I can do, but she doesn’t need a torc. All I know is that she started back in the seventies and took over this department a little while ago.”

“So she’s old?” Connie asked.

“Not that you’d notice,” Keira said.

“So, when do we get guns and stuff?”

“You don’t, Miss O’Hanrahan,” said a new voice. “At least not until you’ve convinced me that you know how to use them without maiming your own side.”

Amber was standing outside her office watching the three young women approach. It was at that point they appreciated what Keira had said, for Amber might be older than their parents, but she looked very much younger than her years.

“My God,” Amber said, smiling and shaking her head. “What the hell are you going to call yourselves; Charlie’s Angels?”

“Huh?” said Shannon.

“Look at yourselves, and then look at all those men in their offices dribbling down their nice new suits. Get in my office before you cause one of them to cease functioning altogether.”

They sat in the spacious and remarkably modern office, despite it being in a rather elderly building.

“Welcome to my domain,” said Amber. “Now, despite your enthusiastic start, I will remind you that we have the formality of a job interview to undergo before anyone is employed.  Just because Keira wants you does not necessarily mean you get the job.  Have you both brought the relevant documentation?”

After handing over their various diplomas and degree certificates, so began a gruelling morning. Neither girl actually had any idea what they were to face. Whatever they had thought was nothing like the reality. They did not realise it, but Amber had ‘interviewed’ them both without their knowledge within the first fifteen minutes.

Despite Shannon’s rough edges and somewhat questionable language, Amber discerned that the girl was loyal and dependable. Deep down, she craved to be needed and important to others, as both these elements were conspicuously absent in her family life. She had discovered a friend in Keira, and to a lesser degree in Connie, that had given her friendship for the first time in her life.

Connie, on the other hand, was sadly lacking in self-esteem, regardless of the fact that she now looked slim and very attractive. Her formative years had been tough, and once again, Keira had given her a boost when she so desperately needed one.

Both were intelligent and intuitive young women, but they were also lacking the level of discipline that Amber believed necessary for working in the intelligence game.

While Keira was otherwise occupied researching various organisations that potentially could be enemies of the United Kingdom and her allies, Amber had the pair working on a scenario assessment, while she contemplated whether or not to take them on. Keira needed a support team, and from her own experience she knew that the fewer that knew her secret the better. She could recruit experts who could assist and Connie and Shannon could act as mediators so as to keep the true powers hidden even from those they worked with, as well as those who had a nefarious agenda.

The girls finished and sat back, regarding each other warily.

“Jeez, that was fuckin’ nasty,” said Shannon.

“Did you get the one where you had to decide who should live and who should die?”

“Yup.”

“What did you do?”

“I cheated; I wrote that I called Keira on my mobile and got her to come and help.”

“I never thought of that. I saved all those under forty.”

“I don’t see how we could answer that one right. It was bloody tricky.”

Amber came into the small office in which the girls had been sat for the last couple of hours. She took their sheets of paper and sat in one of the vacant chairs as she read through the list of actions with reasons.

Finally, with a smile, she put down Shannon’s paper and started on Connie’s answer sheet.  The girls felt inordinately nervous, but sat in silence. Finally, Amber put down the papers.

“Why don’t you want to be a psychologist?” she asked Shannon.

“It’s boring, and I hate boring.”

“So is intelligence work. Most of the work is routine and positively brain-numbing.”

“Yeah, but it’s the moments of sheer bloody panic that I’d be looking forward to. I mean, that time when Keira took out them terrorists, I just wanted to be part of it all and not sitting on me arse hearing it all second hand.”

Amber failed to control her smile, so she turned to Connie.

“How about you, Connie; is being a designer not as glamorous as you thought?”

“My friend wants me to help, and that’s far more important.”

Amber smiled and nodded.

“Right, then you’d better come with me,” she said, standing and leaving the room. The girls grabbed their bags and followed.

They returned to Amber’s office, to find Keira waiting for them.

Once all were seated, with Amber behind her desk, they all looked at her expectantly.

Amber regarded Keira for a moment.

“Are you sure that you want to screw up these two friends’ lives?”

“If they’re willing, yes.”

She turned to the girls.

“Are you sure you want to forget what a normal life is?”

“What’s so good about a normal life anyway?” Shannon asked with a grin. Connie just smiled and nodded.

“Okay, then on your own head be it.  Welcome to the smallest and most secret department in the United Kingdom. In a moment, you will sign the Official Secrets Act.  Once signed, then you become faceless. As far as your family and friends are concerned, you are now civil servants within the Home Office. We will work on exactly what you can tell them, because on Monday, you will all be heading to a small farm in Hertfordshire where you will stay for six weeks to be trained in areas that you never knew existed. There will be some other members of the team joining you, but you are the only people who know what Keira is able to do, and no one, and I mean no one is ever to even get a whiff of her potential, is that clear?”

The girls nodded. For once, Shannon didn’t have a funny word to say.

“Keira wanted you to be her mentors, to help her deal with all manner of things, both in the social arena and while at work. You are her running backs – there to watch her back and to come up with imaginative and realistic explanations for surprising things that might just happen. Your job, ladies, is to keep a tight lid on anything she does, and to ensure that the press are never able to get anything printable to use.”

“So, do we get to go where she goes?” Shannon asked, with her eyes gleaming.

“Yes. One of the areas in which we will train you is communications. You will be her eyes and ears, using the technology to maintain communication channels while she undertakes whatever it is she has to do. You are not the field agents; you are her support, which is a vital role. I hope you appreciate how important it is. But, if she tells you to ‘Stay there’, then you do as she says. Is that clear?”

The girls nodded. Shannon felt guilty as she recalled not doing exactly that in the woods that fateful night.

“This training; is it likely to be physical?” Connie asked.

“Why?” Amber asked, bluntly.

“I’m just curious. Keira and I used to go running and stuff, so I’d like to get fit again.”

Amber regarded the slender young woman for a moment.

“Connie, you lost a substantial amount of weight over a year and a half, and despite living a typical student’s life, you have kept it off. Getting fit is the understatement for what we are going to expect of you.”

Shannon looked slightly worried.

Amber sighed.

“Look, girls, this is not just a career; it’s a lifestyle. Believe me, and I learned the hard way, this is your chance to say no, walk away and live an ordinary life. What do you say?”

“A boring ordinary life,” muttered Shannon.

“It depends on what you consider to be boring. As I said, much of our work is exceedingly boring.”

“Yeah, but we get to save the world. How many people can say that?” the Irish girl said with a grin.

Keira grinned at them both.

“Then welcome to my world!” said Amber, producing some documents for them to sign.

As the three friends walked away together for lunch, Amber wondered just what kind of world she had welcomed them to.

Time would tell.

.......................End of Book 1.

Books by Tanya Allan

Her AMAZON.COM PAGE: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B004VTB5OQ

A Chance would be a Fine Thing (Knox Journals Book 1)

A Fairy's Tale

A Girl can but Dream

Amber Alert

A Tale of Two T’s*

A Wedding and Two Wars (Knox Journal Book 2)

Beginning's End

Behind The Enemy

Dead End (Candy Cane 2)

Dragons & Stuff!

Emma*

Every Little Girl's Dream #

Extra Special Agent

Flight or Fight

Fortune's Soldier

Gruesome Tuesday*

In Plain Sight*

In The Shadows

It Couldn't Happen, Could it?

Killing Me Slowly*

Marine I: Agent of Time*

Modern Masquerade

Monique*#

Queen of Hearts*

Ring the Change

Shit Happens - so do Miracles*

Skin*

Tango Golf: Cop with A Difference

The Candy Cane Club

The Hard Way*

The Other Side of Dreams

There's No Such Thing as a Super Hero

The Summer Job & Other Stories

The Torc (Book 1 – The Emerging)

To Fight For a Dream*

Twisted Dreams*

TWOC - A Comedy of Errors

Weird Wednesday*

When Fortune Smiles

When I Count to Three #

Whispers in the Mind*

Whispers in the Soul*

*Paperbacks can be found here: http://www.feedaread.com/profiles/368/

[1] See - There’s No Such Thing as a Superhero; by Tanya Allan