Aphrodite picked at one of her fake eyelashes. "I think I would know if I had your *dirty powers', not everybody who was there can turn into a freak like you."

Ca.s.sandra wasn't convinced. "What does Sabrina think of this? Where is she?"

Aphrodite shook her head nonchalantly. "She's not here, I haven't seen her...I have no idea where she is."

She quickly changed the subject, still keeping her arms covered. "Well you look absolutely ghetto fabulous, Babe, even for a crime of nature."

Ca.s.sandra's stomach turned and twisted, but she stood her ground.

"If I threw you a stick would you leave?"

A few of the guards chuckled and Aphrodite wriggled her nose and turned to leave.

"Cute, real cute, but listen b.i.t.c.h, who would really want to be you, a deadbeat loser, I'm stunned you weren't put down at birth, you're a freak and the only person who likes you is another freak, do us all a favour and drop dead, how does it feel to be a freak?"

Ca.s.sandra wiped away a solitary tear from her eye and walked over to Aphrodite who had a slightly mocking smile on her face, she was still smiling as Ca.s.sandra hit her with a solid punch to the jaw.

"How does it feel? Ok pretty much."

Aphrodite sprawled on her back, and stopped the guards from interfering by way of a wave from her hand, the same hand she used to stem the bleeding from her mouth.

"Big Man wants you alive, we all know what you are and what you can do so they will rough you up before you're taken to prison, have a nice life."

As Aphrodite held her mouth and headed for the door, Ca.s.sandra called out to her.

"Aphrodite, how did you become the world's biggest b.i.t.c.h?"

"Breeding darling, immaculate breeding." She motioned to the guards and then exited the way she came in.

Ca.s.sandra made the effort of banging her hands repeatedly on the door after it had closed which caught Aphrodite's attention. She started filing her nails and gave a smile to Ca.s.sandra and waved to her.

Ca.s.sandra banged on the gla.s.s to be released but Aphrodite stood up, slipped off her very high heels and turned and ran up the staircase and now Ca.s.sandra was alone, more alone than she could possibly imagine.

"Oh I do not need this s.h.i.t right now." She turned and stared at the arrows, growing impatient in their bows. Ca.s.sandra concentrated hard again, but there was no transformation into the *Dragon head'. Her little blond head shook hard, but there was no change.

Apollo noticed her frustration. "Big Man wants you alive, but I'm not Big Man, what if we were to tell him that the *subject grew hostile and resisted arrest, or the subject became violent."

In a heartbeat, Apollo grabbed the gun in his holster and shot dead the guard standing nearest to him, the other guards held their arrows to Ca.s.sandra in the *aim' position, barely flinching.

"Subject shot whilst trying to escape," Apollo finished.

Fear slowly started to grip Ca.s.sandra and she finally found the strength to simply sink to her knees and cried out in frustration for her impeding death and at Aphrodite's betrayal, but it seemed that tears weren't going to save her, there was no sympathy coming from these guards, the only thing they forced themselves not to do was to look into the trembling girl's eyes, her heart leapt to her throat as the last thing she saw as she closed her eyes was the sight of the archers growing tired with their achy hands.

Still knelt on the floor, she stopped trying to transform and finally relaxed, welcoming her fate, she whispered to Apollo. "Ok then, let's get this over with."

They drew back their bows a little further and on Apollo's command...fired. Ca.s.sandra instinctively raised her hands to protect her face as thirty arrows flew through the air but failed to hit her head, Ca.s.sandra carried on screaming as her arms were still raised protected her face, but the arrows weren't striking them, they were falling against something else, oblivious to the fact it wasn't her arms that had protected her from the arrows' fury, it was the loud sounds of men gasping and shouting that made her slowly lower her arms.

She looked out from behind the gap between her small forearms and saw a huge dark shape in front of her eyes. Brown bat-like wings, she reached out and touched them they felt smooth and leathery and were translucent in the middle, they were folded neatly behind her head and Ca.s.sandra turned to see that they were growing out from her back, she arched her back and it felt so lovely.

They were beautiful and strong enough to deflect the arrows from her head. Her heart continued pounding, the archers on Apollo's orders fired again, Ca.s.sandra shrieked and shielded her face again with the same result, the wings opened from her back and shielded her from harm and as soon as she dropped her hands to her side the wings folded behind her.

Apollo stared at Ca.s.sandra and scratched at his dirty chin. "Well, well, well, what a surprise." There was a slight hint of urgency in his voice. "I hate surprises." He took a long intake of breath and turned the flamethrower on at Ca.s.sandra; the powerful flame shot out and enveloped Ca.s.sandra until the door behind her turned a healthy orange.

The heat was even too much for the guards who stepped back whilst wiping their brows and wondered about the mouthy teenager's fate; they shouldn't have had worried. As Apollo hit the *off' switch and the flames came to an end, Ca.s.sandra remained with her hands to her face and wing shield intact, still trembling and unsure about her new addition. Apollo threw his hands in the air, exasperated. "This day just gets better and better."

The girl dropped her shield and waited for the guard's next move, breathing heavily and wide-eyed, but a small calm was beginning to show from her, and Apollo wasn't impressed.

"What's your next move, missy? The door's locked and I've got the key. So what are you going to do? Take us all down by your pretty little self?"

Ca.s.sandra managed a little smile. "Bingo!"

She dropped to the floor in agony as she felt a burning sensation in her back, pounding the ground with her fists; the pain was unimaginable, one fist at a time and then the other until they were in tandem until Ca.s.sandra collapsed forward and laid still spread eagled on the floor.

"What do we do, boss?" the archers asked as they surrounded her figure.

"Kill her," was the quick reply from Apollo.

"Ok on three...one, two..."

Then all the men stopped and watched in amazement as she lay face down on the ground, something was rising from beneath Ca.s.sandra dress, something big was trying to ease its way through, the trained guards took a few steps back in fear more than antic.i.p.ation as her dress finally split to reveal that the huge bat-like wings had grown and now hung down her bare back and then began to flap, slowly at first, as everybody in the room looked on in amazement, until Ca.s.sandra was awake and airborne, screaming with surprise as she climbed higher to the ceiling she flew with concentrated urgency to find a way out. Ca.s.sandra had no idea where these new bigger wings came from but they were definitely keeping her alive, like a caged bird she fluttered at the top of the room unsure of her next move, her eyesight was greater then it had ever been and it felt as if there was an a.s.sault on her senses, she could see and hear what the guards were going to next and she would not allow it.

She had only been flying for less than a minute but already it felt like she had been born with this gift of flight, swooping down she aimed for the already scattering guards and let her wings crash in to the ones foolish enough to stand in her path, neither her or the wings were hurt and she sailed high to take another dive, getting herself in position she hesitated and an idea came to her. Looking at the little men with their arrows aimed high Ca.s.sandra threw her hands behind her back and bought them forward in a huge clap, her wings mimicked the action resulting in a huge gust of wind that knocked some of the guards over. Before Apollo had a chance to use his flame thrower on the flying girl creature, she had flown a little lower and repeated the process, this time not even Apollo had the strength to remain on his feet from the powerful force from the wings, somehow Ca.s.sandra felt safer when she was flapping around the ceiling and the remaining archers that stood on their feet aimed high again, Apollo scratched his chin again as he was in full concentration mode. He yelled, "Aim for the split ends!"

Ca.s.sandra put her hands to her face as the wings stopped flapping and swung to protect her face, she fell into a dive and swooped, causing the men to scatter, twisting and turning the giant wings on her back; surprisingly no-one from the party above heard the din, except Aphrodite who turned around after hearing some sort of noise and commotion a few corridors back.

It wasn't just the sight of the tremendous winged beast that had the archers staring; it was the fact that the bat-like creature was blond and was wearing knee high boots and the remnants of a high street dress; it was definitely Ca.s.sandra only now with the power of flight in her.

Apollo thought, bad things usually come in threes, the destruction of the arena, Ca.s.sandra flying a about two down and one to go...what could possibly come next?

Ca.s.sandra whipped her wings around and sent the security men behind her sprawling before taking to the air, Apollo let fly with another flame burst but this time Ca.s.sandra, in her new flight form, let rip with a black flame from her own mouth to counteract his, letting out a cry of defiance.

Aphrodite edged closer outside intrigued by the battle sounds. Ca.s.sandra released her flame onto the men who tried to kill her earlier with not an ounce of regret. Apollo recoiled from the intensity of Ca.s.sandra's fire and decided enough was enough. Running up behind her, he made a scything motion of flame down on the young girl's back, she reared up high with the pain, turned and charged towards him, but it was hard for a girl to run wearing knee-high black boots let alone with huge wings sprouting from her back, and as she went for Apollo, unsteady on her feet, she was greeted by a wall of flame from the twisted jailer, making Ca.s.sandra spin and crash through a wall, as she rolled in the rubble a new form emerged.

Ca.s.sandra stood on all fours with stumpy legs and chicken-like claws and her skin had turned from it's pale white to a shiny tough copper colour, the shine even appeared on her armour plated back. Her body was longer and serpentine, and on her shoulders were the bat wings, which were now a reddish colour.

Ca.s.sandra's eyes were reptilian and were hardly blinking, just scanning the rest of the room, a forked tongue flickered out her mouth to taste the air, her neck was short and muscular to support a huge head a a head filled with razor sharp teeth.

She stood taller with a belly overhanging her waist, still the remains of her dress clung to the fat stomach but the knee high boots had finally split and desperately clung onto her hind legs. This was Ca.s.sandra's full transformation into a dragon.

As Ca.s.sandra began licking the rubble off and brushed herself down in her new dragon form, something caught her eye. Far ahead of her stood Aphrodite who had now found the cause of the noise which she a.s.sumed was ruining her party, she didn't scream or panic, but her breathing grew more heavy as she watched this probable fierce beast eye her up too.

Aphrodite remained calm and slowly took off her heels and held them tight in her left hand, her glittery purse in the other, she was fascinated by this giant gate crasher, as were the guards who were climbing through the hole in the wall.

One guard brandished a spear which came at Aphrodite from behind and it was in that exact moment when the spear pieced Ca.s.sandra's boot that the penny dropped for Aphrodite, she recognised the shredded boots, she recognised the remains of the dress and even the cry of annoyance from the beast sounded feminine. Without saying a word, she turned and ran.

The dragon turned around and picked up the spears man whirling him twice above her head before hurtling him back into the crowd of others and then she ran after Aphrodite.

Running as a giant dragon wasn't easy for Ca.s.sandra and even though she was the larger of the two, she was losing ground on Aphrodite who was tearing through the corridor doors whilst Ca.s.sandra just charged through them and now the party above was aware of maybe not her appearance...but at least the noise she was causing in her wake.

Aphrodite pushed hard through each fire exit door and sprinted to the next one ahead, Ca.s.sandra wasn't too far behind and rammed herself through each wall, carefully protecting her eyes with the crest on top of her head with each strike and tottering unsteadily on her clawed feet with each step, if the heels took some time to grow into as a eighteen-year old teenager, then the claws were killing her as a giant dragon.

Nevertheless she was closing in on the' so-so' friend who had betrayed her and Ca.s.sandra didn't know what she was going to do to her when she grabbed her by her scrawny little neck...should she wring it?

The guard's arrows and the occasional spear were having no effect, Ca.s.sandra stood and knocked them away and then resumed her chase, but led by Apollo the guards gave chase anyway.

Aphrodite didn't look back at Ca.s.sandra; she just kept on running. She was right behind the scheming b.i.t.c.h girl and reached out to grab her.

Aphrodite threw herself through yet another door and as Ca.s.sandra bashed her way in, so driven by anger that she was so close to claiming the little wretch, as she outstretched her hand to s.n.a.t.c.h up Aphrodite, her novice use of running on all fours was to be her un-doing and she tripped over her front leg and came crashing down on her soft underbelly knocking herself out.

By the time the chasing archers had caught up with Ca.s.sandra, she was out cold as Aphrodite stood over the dragon, watching the huge stomach rise and lower slowly, and then revert back to Ca.s.sandra, still not moving.

Unfazed, Aphrodite put her high heels back on. Apollo sidled up to the socialite queen.

"I guess you're not going to tell me how you did that, are you?" Aphrodite walked around a bit to get the feel of her shoes back again. "You guessed right, darling," she said, and started walking away.

He turned to his archers for some support.

"So what shall we do with her then? Same as before?"

Shifting to a more comfortable position on her right foot Aphrodite gave a look which Apollo picked up to be glaringly obvious on what to do next.

"I don't care what you do, just do it quietly...I've got a party to go back to and to get my money." She waved to Apollo as she left through the one undamaged doors out of the maze of corridors. "Tootles."

The remaining archers gathered around the unconscious Ca.s.sandra in a circle, most of them thought she was beautiful but knew they had a job to do, one man rubbed his eyes and looked away from the beauty for a second and at Apollo. There was an ounce of hope that Apollo would save her after that terrific display of fighting for her life and so the young guard, called Meakins, asked, "We're not still going to kill her are we, Boss?"

The smile Apollo gave back was one the archer had seen all but too many times, if a smile could be repugnant then this was it.

"Of course we are! Now where were we?"

Meakins wasn't too sure. "Is it fair to shoot her while she's down, Boss?"

"We could always trade places and pick her up and have you lying down there, young Mr Meakins." Meakins froze.

"No, its fine, I'm fine."

"Good, then I can continue," said Apollo. The archers pointed their bows down on Ca.s.sandra and drew back the arrows.

"Oh yeah on three. One. Twoa"

Ca.s.sandra's eyes opened on *three'.

Quick-stepping back to the main hall Aphrodite heard a girl's voice scream out, "COME ON THEN YOU b.a.s.t.a.r.dS," followed by silence.

Aphrodite still had her phone on her and entered a number and waited for a reply.

"h.e.l.lO?...YEAH IT'S ME...IT'S DONE, YEAH...I DON'T KNOW IF SHE'S STILL ALIVE...I KNOW YOU DID...WELL WE HAVE STILL HAVE SABRINA, KIMBERLEY AND THAT LITTLE NERD BOY TO TAKE...YES....YES, I WILL...APOLLO IS GOING TOO?...OK. I WILL YES...THANK YOU *BIG MAN'...WHAT?...CALL YOU BY YOUR PROPER NAME?...OK...THANK YOU...I WILL...LOVE YOU TOO...BYE, DADDY."

She turned around and gave a huge exasperated sigh and felt her ears. "d.a.m.n! She's still got my earrings."

CHAPTER TWELVE.

Shadowlands "GEMMA!!" Elias opened his eyes and they started to sting straight away. He wiped at the left one which had started to weep and looked around through one eye at yet another new cell, this one was much cleaner than the cells beneath Big Man's studios, the bed may have been divine to anyone else but to Elias it was just somewhere slightly more comfortable to being dragged behind a horse.

Now beneath, the covers were wet with sweat and there was more light available too, raising himself from the bed, a sharp pain coming from his back made Elias rethink as he eased back down on the mattress and remembered where he was a a prison hospital. He looked up and down the beige wall and focused on a window without any bars.

Most of the wounds he sustained whilst being dragged across the courtyard had healed but Elias was not to have known this as the pain seemed to be still there, some of his right earlobe was missing and was probably still laying in the sands of the Theatre of Screams, the skin on his back and sides had been sc.r.a.ped red raw and the crimson glow of dried blood peeked through the bandages; his mouth was very dry.

The right cheekbone wasn't as filled out as usual and scarred deeply for ever, he touched it and it made him wince forward, his mind tried to wander back to those moments, laying in the sand behind the horse.

He sank back down on the bed, holding his sore cheek. He could barely remember the destruction of the arena at the hands of Kimberley, until a voice, slightly familiar, stopped his train of thought. "I'm scared to dream too."

Elias turned from the window and looked at the tragic face of Felcey, it was completely pale now, his hair was dirty and joining the bland pathetic dull colouring in his cheeks bloodshot eyes sat deep into their sockets as he watched Elias in the next bed, eager to speak to someone who didn't offer so much sympathy every time they opened their mouths to speak to him.

The young comic collector offered a smile before one of the many Hustle beetles in his body pressed from inside his stomach. Elias saw the skinny lad's gut rise and then decrease, causing Felcey to wince once more.

"The boys are restless today," joked Felcey.

Elias was finding it hard to see the funny side of anything at the moment, attempting to raise himself from his bed again struggling to hold the base of his back without crying out too loud, failing to do either and again it was a return to lying flat on his back.

Felcey found it hard to look Elias in the eye without his eyes being drawn to the nasty scars on his face so he was glad Elias was on his back so he didn't have to avert his eyes any longer. Reaching for a wooden cup filled with water on his bedside table, he drank long from it, letting the remnants trickle down his mouth, turning his head he dried the rest on his pillow and tried conversation again.

"That should do it; I'll try and drown the little sods."

He had Elias's attention now.

"How are you feeling, Felcey?"

Felcey's red eyes widened as he went through the well-rehea.r.s.ed routine of explaining how his condition was worsening and that any time the beetles would depart from their safe hold from within and kill him in the process and how the only way he survived an attack from Beak-nip lions was his newfound ability to produce milk from his hands and then how he witnessed the terrifying Chimera....and then there was Kimberley, he let her down, he ran away...he was a coward. Felcey didn't want to think about her and tried to end his conversation upbeat.

"Could be worse though, I could be a United supporter."

Elias supported that same football team and chuckled, which, due to his injuries, turned in to a mini coughing fit, he reached for his wooden cup, similar to Felcey's and took a sip.

"Where am I? Where are we?"

Felcey gasped as a crushing pain hit his chest but no sooner had he held his hands to his front, the pain had gone, breathing heavily, he answered the question, although Elias would have forgiven him if he was unable to continue.

"We are in Gommerstall Prison, obviously in the hospital section; you've been out for ages, asleep through the journey on the prison transport plane."

"Transport plane, we flew?"