“So what happened?” Rish asked me as we drove on through the late morning. “I mean, why do you look like a bloody model?”

I blushed at the compliment and smirked, turning my eyes from the road ahead to look at him, “Muse fixed me. Or, she’s still fixing me. I’m not finished yet.”

His eyes widened, though he was still watching ahead of us, “Wow. Yeah. You definitely seem happier than the guy I was playing badminton with.” He glanced at me now, giving me a quick flash of a smile.

“Yeah. That guy was pretty depressed… a real downer,” I intoned, barely loud enough for him to hear.

He glanced at me, lifting an eyebrow, “I didn’t know it was that bad. Shit, I’m sorry.”

I gave him an appreciative smile, “Thanks. Like you said, things are better now.”

“You know,” he started after another pause, “I actually thought you were gay.”

My eyebrow shot up at that, “Oh?”

“Yeah, that was until I realised that you weren’t interested in blokes. The way that a gay man would be,” he clarified.

Ah right. The old confusing someone trans for being gay. The funny thing is…

“I am gay, though. Like, lesbian kind of gay,” I said.

He laughed at that, cracking his trademark grin. There it is.

The miles passed by as we continued along. The traffic wasn’t too bad – it was only Friday morning, approaching mid-day.

“So what about you? How’re you finding being back at home? I know you weren’t looking forward to it,” I asked.

He sighed. I didn’t think he was going to answer me, but after a little while he did, “It’s got worse. Now my Dad’s asking what I plan to do after university. I have to keep telling him that I don’t know...”

I could understand. That was the best life that I could have imagined for myself before all of this craziness started happening. With my gender dysphoria and depression on top, I dreaded to think where it would have led me.

“You’re doing fine, Rish. Your parents are just scared, that’s all. Deep down, they just want you to do well.”

He gave me an appreciative smile.

My nerves were starting to spike a little as we drew closer. I hate country lane driving, but Rish seemed to have a handle on it. Nothing about his driving told me that he was incompetent or inexperienced behind the wheel.

We pulled off the motorway at the same moment I saw the field on top of a distant field. Squinting, I couldn’t see any difference between what I could see and what was in my memory. Was this the right place?

‘It is the correct place,’ Muse confirmed.

“Well, Muse thinks that’s the right place,” I said, pointing towards the hill.

We pulled off into a roundabout, and then we were into the country lanes. All of Rish’s attention was focussed on the road and the car, and I didn’t want to distract him. Instead, I kept an eye on the sat-nav to make sure we took the correct turns. I also turned the music off, for good measure.

About twenty hair-raising minutes later, we arrived. Rish found a small path that led up to a gate that some farmer used to access their field, and parked next to it. We hopefully wouldn’t be too long – irate farmers are scary people.

I checked the direction that we needed to head, then looked to Rish. I arched my eyebrows at him, “Coming?”

He looked doubtful at me, then at the field, “Er. Are you sure this is a good idea?”

I waved a hand dismissively, “You can stay here if you want, but I’m going.” I began to walk towards the fence where the oak tree was, without looking behind.

For a moment, I thought he really was going to stay behind as he folded his arms and leaned against the car. Though as I climbed over the fence, he rolled his eyes and jogged after me.

The field was full of what looked like wheat. The ears were still green, but the plants themselves were pretty tall. It wasn’t high enough for me to completely hide inside, but it came up to my shoulders when I stooped. Rish kept close behind.

I led him through the wheat stalks, towards our target – using the oak tree as a landmark.

---

Once we’d crested a rise, I was finally able to see the whole field for what it was. A lot of the wheat had been churned up near the oak tree, the cracked mud now caked into furrows of dried dirt. The tree actually stood alone, separated from any other large foliage by at least twenty meters of what had once been farmland. Around the perimeter of the open ground someone had put up some blue and white police tape. It fluttered in the breeze, rocking back and forth.

The crater was actually on the opposite side of the tree from where we were – I could only just make out the edge of it protruding from behind the oak.

I had to grab Rishaan’s shirt to get him to stop, and we took a moment to assess the situation. At first glance, the area actually looked mostly devoid of any human life. The presence of the tape told me that it likely wouldn’t be completely unwatched, though.

During a second scan of the area, I spotted movement in the shadows of the thick treeline that edged the field. I saw what seemed to be darkly dressed figures. The darkness of the woods, plus their clothing was likely why none of the amateur drones had spotted them. Oh, how I wished I had some binoculars right now.

“I think there are people watching the site,” I whispered to Rishaan, gesturing towards the wooded area.

He stared in that direction for several seconds, then nodded. He dipped himself down below the height of the wheat the moment he spotted them.

“Shit. Who do you think it is?” he asked me.

“If word got around that this might be an alien landing site, it could be anyone,” I replied.

I was just about to take a step forward when I felt something hit me in the leg. What the actual…?

Panic momentarily overcame me and I quickly looked down, expecting the worst. A squirrel had dug its claws into the leg of Sarah’s combats, and was staring up at me. I blinked.

“Uh…” I began to say, but it started to climb up my body. I wasn’t sure what to do. What should I do?

‘This appears to be the same squirrel, Erin. The one that transferred me to you,’ she said. ‘I can see why you wanted to pet it.’

Rish hadn’t noticed my predicament until I tried to speak, and he turned to look at me.

I saw him start to move towards me to help, but then stopped. “What the hell is that?” he asked, doing his best not to break into a laugh.

“It’s a squirrel,” I said, and it hopped even further up my body until it was gripping my hoodie.

“Fucking hell, I’ve never seen one do that before,” he observed, amazed.

I didn’t want to risk hurting it or scaring it away, so I just stood there and waited to see what it wanted.

With one last burst of speed, it darted up to my shoulder, underneath my hair and then I lost track of it. It felt like something small was pulling me backwards, shifting my centre of gravity ever-so-slightly.

“Where’d it go? Is it in my clothes?!” I asked Rish, the worry sneaking into my voice.

“It’s in your hood,” he answered, still trying to stifle the laugh. Oh great.

‘The squirrel would like to stay here for now, Erin,’ Muse added, with a giggle in her voice.

I grumbled, toying with the idea of trying to dig it out anyway, but then gave up. It’d leave me alone eventually.

Our attention back from the distraction of the squirrel, I returned my focus to the oak tree. Okay, then. Now what? There was probably cover – if we ducked down – to get about fifteen metres away from the tree without being seen. That would leave us just on the edge of the fluttering police cordon.

I was certain that I’d be noticed once I tried to cross behind it. There was also the fact that I had no idea what I was looking for once I got there. That was a problem.

‘The tree,’ Muse answered. ‘You are looking for the tree.’

“Well, the tree’s right there. I found it. Now what?” I said out loud, earning me a look of confusion from Rish.

I tapped my head, and he nodded in understanding.

‘Now touch it,’ she answered.

“Touch it, okay…” I mumbled, looking at the ground between where we stood and the goal. I just had to touch a tree. How hard could that be?

“Stay here, Rish. If something happens, get back to the car, and get out of here,” I instructed him, beginning to edge a little closer to the clearing.

He looked uncertain to begin with, but my glare at him made him give up any notion of disagreeing.

“Alright. Be careful.”

“Careful’s my middle name,” I replied with a grin.

“No it’s not. It’s Felicity,” he answered, laughing.

I wondered for an idle second how he’d known that, then I remembered that he’d seen my name change documents. Duh. He’d signed them, too.

Ducking low to use as much cover from the wheat as I could, I rushed my way to the edge of the clearing. The position left me without much view of where I was going, but I’d remembered the general direction I needed to head in.

It turns out I was right.

At the edge of the clearing, a meter or two from the cordon, I paused to consider. I could just make out the shapes moving in the trees, but nothing too specific. They were definitely people, though.

The only real way across would be for me to run. There wasn’t any cover at all to hide my approach. Damnit.

I psyched myself up for the fifteen meter dash. I took a deep breath, but just as I was about to launch myself into a sprint, I spotted one of the figures step out into daylight. My heart froze for just a second as I recognised the shape of a gun slung over their chest.

It was a shape that I’d never seen before in person, only ever in films. Why did this have to be so complicated?

With teeth gritted, I prepared myself again, and leapt forward. By the time I’d darted underneath the cordon tape, my legs had carried me about five meters.

I heard shouting coming from the figure with the gun, “Oi! Stop!”

A quick glance in that direction showed me that the dark clothing was actually black tactical Police uniforms. And there were five of them, each armed with a submachine gun, advancing towards me. The first one I’d seen was pointing their firearm directly at me. At me!

Oh shit. Oh shit.

My legs carried me to a stumbling stop a few meters closed the centre of the clearing, and I angled my face away from them. I was trying my best to at least attempt to conceal my identity. Thoughts were hard right now, my mind felt like it was running through treacle as it fought against every instinct to run.

“Hands up! Don’t move!” someone shouted. I think it was the one aiming at me. While I was held at gunpoint by him, the others released their weapons, allowing them to hang from their harnesses. They reached for their bright yellow tasers strapped to their chests. It all looked very well practised.

My hands slowly moved above my head without even thinking about it.

I was beginning to panic, anxiety and terror overcoming my ability to think while they drew closer. There was no way I could do this. This was insane. What am I doing?

Then, in the blink of an eye, it was gone. Muse’s voice in my mind was insistent, ‘Touch the tree, Erin.’

“Don’t move!” the lethally armed one repeated again. They had probably covered about half of the ground between us, by which point they seem to have decided that I wasn’t too much of a threat. The firearm was lowered and the officer reached for a pair of cuffs from their waist.

I still had four tasers pointed at me, though.

Screw it.

I moved.

Giving them little warning, I turned and darted towards the tree again.

The snap of taser after taser firing was all I could hear behind me, combined with profane exclamations of disbelief as the barbs failed to connect. I had lifted an arm to shield my head out of reflex, but something had redirected the projectiles away from me. Somehow.

They were still shouting at me to stop, even as my fingertips brushed the rough bark of the oak tree.

A surge ran up my arm, and it felt incredible.

I could feel something spreading throughout my entire body, infusing me with… something – a sense of power or potential. For the briefest moment, my vision swam – shapes appearing to clash and shatter against each other. Then there was another shape – this time more organic. It was pulling the other shapes together, forming them into something whole.

My awareness seemed to shift, and I began to notice currents of something around me. Some kind of energy. I could just make them out, like a breeze tracing across my skin.

Voices were starting to percolate back into my sense of the now, and the vision of the shapes faded as quickly as it had appeared. I was staring at the advancing Police officers, my hand still lightly touching the tree. They were definitely a bit more wary than before – they’d all switched back to their submachine guns and were aiming them at my chest.

“Get on the ground, now!” a couple of them shouted at me. I could hear a slight warble of fear in their voices. What had them so worried?

Since I hadn’t moved in a while, one of them decided to lunge for me. The moment that his gloved hand touched my arm, an arc of electricity – no, a bolt of lightning – lanced between us. There was a crack, and he fell to the floor.

The air around us grew colder, my breath condensing into puffs of steam.

The other officers looked confused, their eyes wide behind their clear goggles. I don’t think their training told them what to do in this situation.

They adjusted their guns after the briefest hesitation – and I panicked. I could feel something slipping from my control as my mind went blank.

A crackling wave of electricity unfurled from me in that moment. I was surrounded by arcs of bluish lightning that went racing outwards in all directions. The officers stood no chance as the lightning laced across their bodies, bathing them in its glow. Ice began to form wherever the energy vaulted, covering their uniforms in crystalline fractal patterns.

The currents of energy that had been a gentle draught on my skin had become a raging torrent, whirling around and through me. Even though two of them had managed to get shots off at me, their rounds were caught in the maelstrom that was Erin Reid.

The wave passed and dissipated before it reached the edge of the clearing, ending in one final snap of superheated air. There was a moment of silence, then they all clattered into heaps on the ground, joining their comrade. The two bullets dropped as well, as if gravity suddenly remembered them.

A cascade of fatigue rolled over me and I was discovering that standing is actually quite a hard thing to do. I staggered away from the tree, holding a hand to my forehead to fight the crushing headache that was tearing at my temples.

Through the bleariness of my half-closed eyes, I saw Rishaan catch me just as everything turned to black.

---

My head hurt and everything ached when I opened my eyes. It took me a few moments for my memory to come back and tell me where I was. This was the back seat of Rish’s car.

I groaned and pulled myself upright.

“Oh shit, Erin, you’re awake,” he exclaimed, calling to me over his shoulder. We were driving on the motorway again.

“Yeah,” I answered, rubbing at my eyes. “Goddess, I’m hungry. What happened?”

‘You lost control, which is understandable,’ a voice said in my head – it took me a moment to remember that it was Muse.

“I dunno to be honest, but you fucking exploded,” Rish replied, his eyes wide. “Wanna get some lunch?”

I couldn’t help but laugh at the sudden segue, but yes. I was most definitely up for some lunch.

There was a rustle of movement from the passenger seat, and a very squirrel-like face appeared over the top of the seat, peering into my eyes. I reached out to give it a little scritch with my finger.