It took way longer than it should have for Casey and I to stop making out. I’m not saying that there’s an appropriate length of time for it…

Oh, never mind. We did eventually remember what we were going to be doing for the rest of the day.

We took water and snacks with us, and found our way to the secluded training spot. I think we’d just about started to feel like this was our space away from all the other worries of the world, where no one ever disturbed us. This was all just in time for us to lose it again when we left in the evening.

I started my ritual by popping my headphones in, and tried to find my zone. There was an edge of worry and anxiety about this evening that was making it a little harder to focus than usual. My internal psychiatrist helped with that just enough to take the edge off, although she seemed to be reluctant to do more.

Most likely our link would be affected if she had to push down on my emotions too much.

‘Correct,’ Muse added, her voice in my mind easily cutting through the music.

I’d also noticed that she never seemed to be able to create emotions out of nothing. It was always reducing them, never inciting.

‘Correct again. We are unable to force you to feel things, only help to dull them once you do.’

That was what I’d thought, based on what I’d experienced so far. I just wanted to make sure.

Clearing my head of that line of thought, I turned my attention back to the woodland space around us and took a deep breath.

We trained some more but on this occasion I decided to work on my reactions and the speed with which I could direct the powers. The first time I’d used them in any kind of controlled way it had taken several seconds to go from the arcing finger lightning to the glowing ball.

I also needed to try overcoming some of my hang-ups I’d developed after my explosive loss of control that had injured those Police officers. It had made me reluctant to push myself or test the edges of my own abilities. Being safe was all well and good, but it also meant that I wouldn’t improve anywhere near as quickly.

The first order of business was learning to have finer control. If I didn’t then it would be like having a volume dial that only has settings for 0 and 10, with nothing else in between. Lacking any kind of finesse was only going to get me in way too much trouble.

Over the course of half an hour, I tried to get a feel for how I could adjust the energy transfer rate from Muse to the outside world. I was starting to feel more confident by the end, but I still needed to test myself to find where my limits actually were.

I made sure not to be too close to Casey – she was still throwing around tiny plasma pellets – then began the process of forming a miniscule ball of electrical potential in my outstretched hand.

Something I’d learned pretty quickly about the manifesting business is that – unless you’re happy to shoot bolts of electricity like some crazed evil wizard – it requires you to do two things at the same time.

The first: regulate how much energy is being channelled outwards.

It takes effort to start the energy flowing, but once started it feeds itself. After that, the effort comes from trying to stop it. ‘Losing control’ is what happens when you open yourself too far, and don’t have the strength to bring yourself back again. There is a mental cascade and it all just slips out of your grasp – like what happened at the oak tree.

A giant explosion of energy, and at least one wrecked human-being were the end result.

Therefore, keeping things under control was my desired outcome, but that also acted as a limiter on how quickly I could do anything.

The second: ensure your manifested energy is contained and doing what you want it to do.

Right now I wanted it to stay concentrated into a tight ball. That exerted a pressure back on me because it didn’t want to be held that way. The more densely packed it all was, the harder it became to hold.

I thought I knew where my first limit might be – for channelling – so I pushed further towards it. The next problem was that I had no idea what my second limit was, i.e. my ability to contain the energy.

The small orb grew slightly and dimmed, my grasp over it started to fail. I knew that I was reaching my maximum ability to contain it – I felt like I was a dam trying to hold back an ocean.

After another few painful moments, the sphere was shining brightly again and small crackles of static were brushing over my fingertips. However, it still continued to grow.

Uh. What do I do now?

Forcing the flow of energy to stop now that I was so close to my red line was much harder than I’d anticipated. Then it all began to slip.

The energy that had been contained within the expanding sphere exploded into a blinding flash, then condensed into a cascade of huge bolts of electricity. They forked their way into the ground, searing the grass, leaves and plants that they touched. Even from behind my earbuds I’d heard the whip-cracks of the air being torn apart around me.

Oops.

‘Oh, he would have been so proud,’ Muse laughed amongst the miniature storm.

Casey cowered down low, shielding her eyes from the garish light at first – then her ears from the deafening roar. Sheepish, I pulled out my earbuds and waited for her to recover from the unexpected shock.

“Sorry!” I cringed, once she had started to rise.

“What the actual fuck, Erin?!” she shouted at me, her eyes alight with amazement rather than anger.

I scanned her up and down for any sign of injury, biting at my lower lip in trepidation. Thankfully, she seemed to be unhurt.

“Hey, it’s not as easy as it looks, okay?” I called out to her, pouting.

She rolled her eyes at me and shook her head.

Cheeks solidly red from embarrassment, I angled myself away from her a little more. At least this time, if I were to mess up again, I wouldn’t risk frying the woman I so very much loved.

I wondered if it would ever get easier to do all of these things, and Muse assured me that it would come in time. Patience and dedicated training were all that I’d need.

The rest of my practice time, approximately two and a half hours of it, went towards just generally getting to understand myself and my symbiote partner a little more.

Casey, on the other hand, was finding more applications for her little plasma ball trick. She tried to see how quickly she could form and throw them through the same log she’d used last time. By the end of the session it had all but ceased to exist except for small piles of splinters and fragments of bark from where it had collapsed on itself.

We had our small lunch before we headed back home, an arm wrapped around each other’s waist.

---

We acquired a few more things on our way home. Casey wanted me to have all the basics that I’d need and never had the opportunity to buy – this included more underwear and extra sets of clothes. She also helped me with a handbag and purse.

It was similar to a satchel and I preferred to wear it across my chest rather than over one shoulder. Everything felt more secure that way. The purse was fairly cheap and made of synthetic leather, nothing special. I’d still given her so many kisses in thanks that the cashier had looked pretty awkward.

Before we headed home, she insisted that she needed to stop by a supermarket for a few small things, but forced me to wait outside. She hadn’t taken too long, although she was being all mysterious and refused to tell me what she had in her carrier bag.

Okay then. Fine.

We linked arms on the lazy walk home, chatting, flirting and giggling in the balmy afternoon sun.

The rest of the afternoon was spent fretting that we’d forgotten to pack everything we’d need, or discussing what we’d do if no one turned up. As soon as Sarah arrived home she joined in with the worrying, adding her own fears into the mix. She was concerned that Martin might flatly refuse to allow her to come with us – a point we insisted wouldn’t happen.

To get us out of the spiral of anxiety, we decided to cook our parents a farewell meal. Actually, it was Casey that had suggested it. She said that she felt bad for staying with us for a few days without helping out somehow, or giving them any kind of payment. I told her that was silly, but she’d insisted.

The two of us did the majority of the actual cooking, following a recipe we’d found somewhere on the internet, with some added tasting assistance from my little sister. By the time Mum and Dad arrived home, we had a more than passable approximation at a spaghetti bolognese ready and waiting to be served.

Dinner itself was fairly subdued.

I don’t think our parents had been expecting to have an empty nest so suddenly. Even Dad was starting to show a little emotion, that’s how much it had gotten to him.

“Lots of thieves over there, make sure you keep an eye on your belongings,” he was telling us both, much to Casey’s amusement. She hid the smile behind her hand, but the creasing around her eyes gave her away.

Sarah and I shared a roll of our eyes, breaking into joint laughter afterwards. This was just Dad showing concern the only way he knew how. Casual xenophobia was how the Empire was built, after all. I think there was also some genocide and slavery in there too, but they don’t tend to teach that in schools.

We cleaned up after dinner as well, cautiously checking out the window every so often to see if someone had shown up in the meantime. They hadn’t given us an exact time, but…

My phone buzzed on the coffee table and I dashed over to snatch it up.

“Hello?” I asked, leaving the sitting room to bounce upstairs to my bedroom. It would be quieter there without everyone watching me.

“Hello, Ms Reid,” came Martin’s voice on the other end of the connection. I knew he’d be one of those people that actually enjoyed making phone calls. “I was wondering whether you’d given any thought to our offer, eh?”

I smiled at the question. I was very touched that he’d decided to call ahead of time.

“We have, and we had a couple of things we wanted to ask from you before we said yes,” I replied back, biting at my lower lip. I hoped my lack of confidence didn’t come across in my voice.

There was a noticeable pause before he answered, “Oh? What would they be?”

Deep breath, Erin.

“I want my sister and a close friend to come with us, too.”

Another pause, this one longer. I took that to mean that he’d muted his end and was discussing the details with someone else in private.

After what felt like around a minute he came back to me.

“Sorry, Ms Reid. Uh, could you explain to me why you want them mixed up in all this?” he asked, his voice uncertain. “Neither of them have alien symbiotes, correct?”

I saw Casey by the doorway, leaning against the frame with her arms folded.

“No, they don’t but I want them close by so we can protect them,” I said. “Besides, I think my friend could be useful.”

Rishaan had been the one to figure out the alien before we had, plus he was the person that was getting in contact with all of the other human-symbiote pairs. When the proverbial chips were down, I didn’t want to be sitting there texting him for help.

There was another pause, and I gave Casey a smile. She returned it, though she remained watching me.

“You’re not going to let me say no, are you?” Martin said on the other end of the line, breaking into a laugh.

“Nope.”

“Alright, but we only have space for three of you in the car,” he chuckled, and I let out a breath I hadn’t realised I’d been holding.

“That’s fine. He can come separately.”

The look of relief washing over my face must have said it all, as I felt arms wrap themselves around my waist and pull me in. I squealed in delight, and switched to speaker phone mode so Casey could join in.

“See y’all soon,” Casey said, her chin resting on my shoulder so she could easily speak into my phone.

“We’ll be arriving in about a half hour,” he replied. “See you then.”

---

We told Sarah the news, and instructed her to make sure she had her passport ready, just in case. We spent more time saying our last farewells to Mum and Dad and my sister promised to call them as often as she could.

I was actually wondering what had happened to Sabina. Any attempts to locate her in my room or outside in that short time hadn’t paid dividends. We’d been in too much of a rush to do much in the way of in-depth searches, though. I had a sneaking suspicion that I hadn’t seen the last of the floof ball, but we didn’t have time to find her, or to make sure she was okay.

Almost exactly thirty minutes after the end of our phone call, a new car pulled up outside the house. Martin pulled himself out of the passenger seat, and walked his way towards the front door. He was dressed more casually today, with a casual pair of jeans and a t-shirt.

Whoever was driving wasn’t Christine, though. It was another man, and he looked like he doubled as a bodyguard of some kind.

Sarah and I gave our parents one last batch of hugs, while Casey went to answer the door and help with moving our bags into the boot of the vehicle outside.

The fact that Dad let us both give him a hug and a kiss on the cheek without too many qualms showed just how much his view of me had altered since I started changing.

Mum was tearing up, and she couldn’t help but look at me with wonder and amazement. She didn’t say anything, but I think she’d mostly been keeping herself blind to the changes that had been happening. That sounds dumb, but the things people ignore when they want to can be pretty extensive.

She’d been grieving for her lost son, but had found a much more wonderful daughter in the process. And I most certainly looked like her daughter – that much was certain.

Once outside, I introduced Sarah to Martin.

“Well. She’s definitely your sister,” he commented, opening a door for the three of us to get in the car.

Sarah and I looked at each other, with amused knowing smirks.

We bundled into the back with me sitting in the middle. Martin settled into his place in the passenger seat, and we set off for wherever it was that they were taking us. My sister and I waved to our parents until they were out of sight – then I took her hand in mine and gave her a reassuring smile.

“So where are we going?” Sarah asked me with a playful smile. She knew, she just wanted to tease Martin.

“Austria!” he replied, looking back at her. “They didn’t tell you?”

“We did,” I answered quickly, instead, “she’s just being a brat.”

“I can’t wait to see the kangaroos,” she added, with feigned wistfulness.

The stoic driver nearly smiled at her awful, terrible joke, I swear.

 

About twenty minutes into the journey, Martin pulled out a couple of sheets of paper from a briefcase and handed them to Casey and I.

“So, since you’re with us, let’s do some work,” he said, pulling out a laptop from the same briefcase.

I blinked, looking down at the sheet. It showed a map of the Earth with lines running around it.

“In the last few hours we’ve detected something new,” he was saying.

‘Advanced scouts,’ Muse said in my head. ‘They don’t always send them, but they have this time it seems.’

Martin continued to speak, glancing behind us every-so-often, “It looks like there’s smaller parts of the larger object that have broken free. They’re on a collision vector with the Earth as well, but they’re accelerating much faster than the larger object.”

“Muse says they’re advanced scouts,” I answered preemptively.

He nodded his head a couple of times, “We were afraid that might be the case, especially after our previous conversation. The bods back home were both excited and terrified when I presented what we’d discussed.”

Casey and I looked at each other, eyebrows raising. I wasn’t sure about her, but everything felt like it was going a little bit faster than I’d expected.

“So, when do they arrive?” Casey asked this time, her eyes not leaving mine.

In answer, he turned the laptop around so we could see the screen.

It displayed a quick animation of our solar system – with the major bodies present. Next, the camera zoomed into an object still entering the space occupied by the inner planets. From there, two smaller spheres are shown accelerating their way down the sun's gravity well, spiralling into a collision with Earth.

“Three days.”

“Oh shit. Where are they going to hit?” I asked, swallowing a lump that was forming in my throat.

Martin turned the laptop back around, grimacing, “We’re fairly sure it's the northern hemisphere. Our best guesses right now place one in northern Europe and the other in North America.”

I looked back down at the sheet of paper, noticing the small crosses placed on the lines. Fuck.