Part 21. Escape Plan

This chapter is dedicated to twilight, who helped me edit this story as well as supporting me on Patreon. Thanks :D




"You two need to wake up as quickly as possible," Alex said firmly. "If you rendezvous before anyone else from your school gets there, it might be convenient for us."


"Do you know the paths round there?" Mel asked, "Is there a way to get to where you are before the police do? Last I saw they were just arriving at the school, looking terrified, but I bet there'll be some unlucky constables out searching for you. I'm on a hilltop next to an old church, looks abandoned."


Amber gave him directions as quickly as she could, and then opened her eyes. Inside the tree was a tight fit, in almost complete darkness, and the smell was surprisingly strong when it hit her all at once. It took her a little time to wriggle down and slip out through the hole at the base of the tree, and then she was hurrying towards the gate where she'd suggested Mel wait.


Somehow, she was more nervous now than she had been running out to get a monster's attention. Maybe it was just that when it came to the monster, she'd had no time to even think. But walking out to meet Mel, that would mean admitting that this wasn't all a dream. It would be bringing the Rainbow into her real life, and she had no idea how Mom was going to react to that, or any of her friends.


"Amber?" Mel was there as soon as she came back to the little car park, leaning against a scooter. He didn't look quite the same as he did in the dream world, and that made her wonder if she looked different too. Here, he was wearing a loose black T-shirt with pictures of characters from a video game, and jeans that were worn through at the knees. "You look different without the pink glow. I guess I do too, it's just I've not met any of the others in the real world before, if that makes sense."


"I thought you knew Violet when she was still alive."


"Yeah, that's different. She could always meet the dead ones in her dreams, but she recruited me in the real world, when we were both kids. I could never get into the dream world until ..." He hesitated, theatrically clearing his throat. Amber could guess the next part of that sentence; Violet had died young, and she could easily imagine that her mental powers had increased when she was a ghost.


"Oh, right. So this is the first time you've met somebody in the dream first. I bet it's weirder than going the other way. And I... I've got a pink light? I kind of thought it would be red. To finish the rainbow."


"No, pink. Don't ask me why, those are the colours fate gave us, I guess. When it started showing through properly, then we really knew you were Claude. Well, the ones who'd been around long enough to know him said it's the same colour. Anyway, get up on the scooter, I'm going to–" he stopped suddenly as a flashing blue light became visible against the sign. "Sorry."


Mel swooped down and grabbed Amber, picking her up like she was a bride being carried into the house, or like he was a fireman or something. Amber's first instinct was to yell, but she forced herself to be quiet. She trusted him beyond doubt, and she knew he must have some kind of plan. She didn't have to wait long to find out what it was, because just a couple of seconds later there was a police car stopping by the gate, all decked out in blue and yellow paint, and a couple of cops.


"Thank God," Mel called out, "I found this girl in the woods, she might be injured."


"Did you see what happened, Sir?" one of the policemen asked, while the other one took Amber out of Mel's arms and carried her over to set her down on a picnic table next to the 'woodland park' sign.


"There was a monster, I couldn't believe my eyes, and then it just disappeared into thin air!" Mel gasped, acting just like a real terrified normal might have done. "You're not going to believe me, but there was this... this thing, with like snake heads, chasing after her. Like there's been on the news lately, I thought they were just drunks and weirdos, but I saw it with my own eyes! It was chasing this kid, and she ran into the woods. Then it disappeared, but I didn't know if it had caught her or what, I couldn't just leave it so I ran around like a headless chicken until I found her. She was out cold, I think she might have hit her head or something, so I was going to take her straight to the hospital. She'd just woken up when you arrived."


"We can do that, Sir," the cop seemed to be glad after Mel's high-speed babble finally ended. "We'll have to ask you to come down to the station to make a statement about what you saw, it's proper procedure of course."


Having heard Mel's speech, Amber figured it would be easy enough to give a story that kind of agreed. She could tell the police that she'd seen a monster attacking the school, and run away. It had been right behind her, and then she didn't remember anything more until Mel was carrying her. She had actually hit her head climbing into the tree, so there was a bruise if they checked for one, but she didn't know if it would be the right kind of bruise to knock someone out. But at least this way, it was an injury that wasn't anything to do with the monster, so they probably wouldn't think it was that important.


She wasn't quite sure why Mel had wanted to rescue her, rather than just walking back to school. But it was good that they knew each other now. And she could just act confused if they asked any questions, and blame it on a head injury. She fully expected that she'd be meeting with the others again tonight, and have time to properly think about what she was going to say to the police. Keeping a secret identity might be harder than she'd ever thought.

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