Martha Eadie, aged 13 years

They were still there when I came back from taking Fred for a walk in the dunes.   Two huddled figures on the beach, wearing a school uniform that I did not recognise.  They were watching the breakers pound the shore – they weren’t running around or talking or eating, they were just staring at the green-brown sea.  And it was weird, I thought, because all the schools around here had broken up a couple of weeks ago. Fred trotted over to say hello and to sniff around. The girl ignored him and turned around to glare at me with dark, accusing eyes, while the boy, who was much bigger, continued to observe the murky waves. Suddenly Fred got spooked and started to growl.  I trudged across the sand and grabbed him by the collar but even as I pulled him away he just kept on growling. It was then, in a flash of recognition, that I saw the boy’s face.  I should have obeyed my first instinct and run, run like there was no tomorrow, but I didn’t.

“What you staring at?” snapped the girl. …

I paid no heed to the girl’s rudeness – by now, I was more than used to it. I ignored her, and turned to the other, the boy. He gave a wry smile, as if to say: fancy seeing you here. “Hey, Jane,” he said; the words were soft, but they carried across the sand spread between us, at least two metres.

There was a lump the size of a golf-ball wedged in my throat, somewhere just below my tongue. I swallowed, hard, to get past it, and then croaked, “What are you doing here?” To my own embarrassment, my voice came out far less confident and nonchalant that I’d originally intended.

Again, he smiled, a slightly sinister, all-knowing smile that didn’t ease my anxiety. “Why don’t you ask the real question?”

As he always had been for the past two years I’d known him, he was right. “How did you find me?” I whispered. The dalmation at my heels whined and tried to back away from the two inhuman strangers – he’d been present when I met them, and our meeting was anything but ordinary - but I held him steady.

Tom, tall and dark-haired, stuck his hands in his pockets and looked down at me. “The government’s relocation standards are slacking,” he said flippantly. “It wasn’t difficult.”

The girl beside him, the beautiful, snarky, and generally rude Emilie, cleared her throat. “People coming,” she muttered, and both Tom and I fell instantly silent. You couldn’t trust anyone. Admittedly, a family with two small children would prove dubious spies, but you could never tell.

As soon as they’d passed, I glared up at Tom. “Cut to the chase, Superman,” I said sardonically. “What d’you want from me?”

The smirk dissolved on his features and his dark eyes were, as per norm, deadly serious. “We need you,” he said simply, not the slightest trace of irony in his slightly Irish-lilted tones.

“Why?” I said defiantly, folding my arms.

Emilie stepped forwards, a challenging sneer on her pretty face. “Look around, Jane,” she told me coldly. “Notice something missing?”

I didn’t have to obey to realize what was out of place. My brown eyes widened. “Where’s Art?”

It had always been the four of us. Tom, the ‘strong and silent’ type, the leader; Arthur, his brother, humorous despite whatever we were up against; Emilie, the beauty, sarcastic bordering insolent; and me. Plain Jane. The mortal. More often than not the one who had to be rescued. However, now, one of our group was missing.

“Where’s Art?” I repeated, unfolding my arms to a silent look from Tom, and a barbed twitter of if we knew, we wouldn’t be here from Emilie. My expression changed to one of disbelief. “What, so you can track me across the country, but you can’t find your own brother?”

Tom stepped up to me – a good head taller than me, and intimidating – and said, his quiet voice clearly annoyed, “Jane, shut up.”

I did as advised.

“They’re back,” he said solemnly.

I stared. And then I blinked. And then I stared a bit more. “What?” I said stupidly. “But I thought they were dead!”

Emilie scowled. “So did we.”

I looked between them. Emilie looked bored, but there was a strange feature in her eyes – something like worry reflected in those round blue orbs. Tom… well, Tom just looked like Tom, but I knew that he was anxious too.

I sighed. “Let me guess,” I said wearily, “cue insane death-defying rescue mission?”

Tom’s lips twisted back into their ominous-yet-friendly smile. “Did you doubt we’d even come here without one in mind?”

“Whatever, I guess,” I grumbled, reluctant as ever. I can’t say I enjoy hanging around with non-humans and generally having people try to kill me, but I suppose it was necessary.

And then, without a superhero-style ‘ka-boom!’ or even a dramatic flash of light, we were gone.

Martha Eadie