Losing the Plot (2 page)

Chapter Two

L
et me explain that Michael is not, repeat NOT, your typical headmaster.

As well as running our school, he’s a v. big cheese at the Agency. He’s also an archangel. Plus he
totally
doesn’t take care of himself. On this particular night, he wore a beautiful suit which already looked as if he’d slept in it. Rather surprisingly, he didn’t mention the balloons or the takeaway. He just said, “Here again, Melanie? That’s three times this week.” Michael has this terrifying ability to see into your soul, which, at that moment, I completely didn’t need.

“I LIKE doing Angel Watch,” I said. “Is that so hard to believe?”

“Not at all! “Michael dragged a chair into my overcrowded little booth, which was starting to smell suspiciously like a tiny Chinese restaurant. “Oh, Jordan’s looking much better,” he said, beaming. “I’ll just check his light levels.” He touched a key with a fancy L on it (which I’d totally never noticed until this moment) and the incubator filled with golden sparkles.

“Wow!” I breathed. “How did you do that?”

Michael laughed. “I didn’t!
You
did.”

But I couldn’t really focus. I could feel Lola and Reuben silently panicking behind me. Should they whisk our Chinese goodies out from under Michael’s nose? Or act like it was nothing to do with them and hope he didn’t ask awkward questions?

To my amazement, Michael solved the problem by helping himself to a spring roll. “Did you get these from The Silver Lychee?” he asked.

Lola gave a cautious nod.

“Thought so,” he mumbled happily. “The chef’s a genius.”

Sitting next to an archangel is an experience. Seeing one sploshing on the soy sauce is something else. Suddenly Lola cracked and reached for a spring roll. Soon we were all tucking in.

Michael took off his gorgeous jacket and hung it over his chair. “Who’s next on your list, Melanie?”

Light levels really soar when there’s an archangel in the vicinity, so we whizzed through my list with no effort whatsoever.

“That about wraps it up,” I said at last. “Thanks for your help.”

I was expecting Michael to put on his jacket and go back to his office. But he said, “Um, how’s the time-travel going, Melanie?”

“It’s OK,” I sighed. But it’s impossible to lie to an archangel, so after a few seconds I came clean. “I can’t really see the point,” I admitted, “all that hanging around, being immortal and invisible. I thought we’d at least get to materialise. But Mr Allbright said very few angels develop the ability.” I’d felt unbelievably depressed when Mr A told us this. I was like, “Then why bother?”

“Your teacher’s right.” Michael’s eyes twinkled. “Of course, some agents
have
been known to make a fluke appearance in an emergency!”

“Oh ha ha, very funny,” I said. You see, on my first ever time-trip, I got a teensy bit carried away. I materialised without Agency permission, and almost got myself expelled.

By this time I was starting to wonder what was going on. We’d finished the takeaway ages ago, but Michael still showed no sign of wanting to break up the party. Plus he kept doing that church steeple thing with his fingers, as if he was working up to asking us something.

“I’m sorry you’re having doubts, Mel,” he said at last. “You see, we’ve got this um,
situation
on Earth. I’d been hoping you three could help out.”

Something inside me instantly sprang to attention. When an archangel asks for help, it’s got to be major.

“What kind of situation?” Reuben asked at once.

Michael frowned. “It’s actually more of a glitch. But if it isn’t caught—” Our headmaster corrected himself hastily. “I mean,
monitored
, it could be dangerous, possibly even catastrophic.”

Words like these are music to Lola’s twenty-second-century ears. “You said the three of us,” she said eagerly. “You mean we’d be going by ourselves?”

“You do work exceptionally well as a team. But if Melanie’s lost interest—”

“She hasn’t. Have you, Boo?” Lola interrupted.

“I haven’t?” I said.

“No way,” said Reuben firmly.

Michael cleared his throat. “I should warn you this is one of the more volatile eras in Earth’s history. A time of love, hate, treachery…”

“Sounds like fun,” grinned Lola.

“So when is this glitch exactly?” asked Reuben.

“It’s not an actual glitch yet,” said Michael confusingly. “It’s more of a
potential
glitch. If it does appear, it will probably show up in Elizabethan London, around 1579, say.”

“So this is like, a research trip, not an actual mission, right?” I was pretty sure the Agency didn’t send new trainees on solo missions.

“That’s right,” Michael agreed, just a shade too quickly. “Technically speaking, it’s not a mission as such. As I said, it’s a delicate situation.”

I was puzzled. Usually Michael is the most straightforward being in the universe. But tonight, it was like everything he said had this weird double meaning.

“I don’t get it,” I said. “Are you saying we can do stuff, so long as we do it like,
unofficially
?”

Our headmaster began to construct a new steeple with his fingers. “Just remember that you didn’t hear it from me,” he said very quietly.

I stared at him in bewilderment. What kind of an answer was that?

“Um,” said Lola, “What if we don’t find your glitch?”

Michael suddenly looked weary. “I can’t really go into details at this stage.”

“Can’t or won’t?” I said cheekily.

Michael’s expression was cagey. “All you need to know is that if it isn’t checked, it will leave the way wide open to the Opposition.”

I still feel queasy when I hear that word. I was totally shocked when I found out there were evil forces which wage war on angels for like,
fun
. The Agency refers to these forces as the Opposition. My mates and I call them PODS, our shorthand for the Powers of Darkness.

Unlike us, PODS have no actual shape of the own. But over the centuries they’ve developed a scary ability to take on any shape they like.

On my first time-trip to Earth, I tangled with a PODS agent who was the spitting image of a boy I fancied at my old school. This boy (the human one) was gorgeous, but really bad news, so for obvious reasons, I’d kept this humiliating crush to myself. Yet somehow the PODS Agency had all this deep personal info about me. It made me hot and bothered just thinking about it.

I realised Lola was talking to me. “Mel, are you OK?”

“I’m fine,” I said. “When do we go?”

“As I was saying, now would be best,” said Michael.

“Can’t we at least go home and change?” I protested. I have these perfect trouble-shooting outfits in my wardrobe, but nine times out of ten I have to charge off in whatever I happen to be wearing at the time, which is usually something v. short and sparkly. Just what you need, when you’re off to do battle with the Powers of Darkness.

“All right,” Michael sighed. To my surprise, he affectionately ruffled my hair and I felt about a zillion angel volts sizzle through me. “But be quick,” he added with a smile.

With archangel fingerprints tingling all over my scalp, I said hoarsely, “I will.”

“Do you guys get the feeling this mission could be really big?” Reuben said, as we hurried back to school.

“Really vague, more like,” I grumbled. “I mean, first it’s a situation. Then it’s a glitch. Ooh, then it’s only a potential glitch. And we’re not on a mission. We’re just taking a look. No, scrub that! I should have said ‘Unofficially taking a look’!”

“It has to be vague, Mel, you know that,” said Reuben. “Humans have free will. You can’t say what’s actually going to happen. You can only say what
might
happen.”

“Reuben Bird, will you just listen to yourself?” I exploded.

“Hey, what’s your problem, girl?” Lola’s tone was sharp.

I took a deep breath. “We’re supposed to be divine messengers, or whatever. Only we never actually materialise, so most humans never get the message! Duh! So can someone please tell me what we’re even FOR!”

My friends were both staring at me in surprise. I was quite surprised myself. Michael was right. I did have doubts, loads of them. Now they’d all come bursting out at once.

“I just want to know what we’re for,” I repeated in a quieter voice. “Like, if humans have this free will everyone goes on about, how come we’re allowed to influence them, anyway?”

“You said it,” said Reuben. “We influence them. Beam vibes. Help them remember who they are. We don’t
make
them do stuff.”

“Totally,” agreed Lola. “The PODS put on enough pressure as it is.”

Reuben grinned. “If it helps, just think of us as alarm clocks.”

I couldn’t help laughing. “You what?”

His eyes glinted. “We wake humans up!”

Lola put her arm round me. “Come on, Boo. You’ve got to be just a tiny bit excited! Can you
believe
they’re letting us do a solo trip this early in our training?”

“Yeah, this sounds much more up Orlando’s street,” Reuben agreed.

Orlando is one of our seniors. Not only is he an angel genius, he’s heart-meltingly gorgeous. But he’s so into his studies, he genuinely doesn’t notice the effect he has on girls.

Lola gave me a sly nudge. “Melanie wishes Orlando was coming too.”

“I do not,” I said huffily.

“He’s probably off on some hush-hush Agency project,” said Reuben.

“They didn’t pick us because Orlando’s unavailable, you know,” I objected. “They picked us because we’re good.”

“Oooh!” teased Lola. “Someone’s feeling better!”

I was, actually. “Hey,” I said suddenly. “Do you think angels are wired so they like,
need
to do angel work?”

My friends exchanged weary glances, zipped their lips and threw away invisible keys.

“OK, OK, I’ll
read
the boring cosmic manual, all right!” I sighed. “Now can we just
drop
it?”

Back at the school dorm, I put on my new T-shirt, a pair of skinny jeans and big funky boots. I swapped a couple of hoop earrings for business-like little studs. Then I threw a few girly necessities into my rucksack, grabbed my jacket and I was ready to go.

I checked out of the window and saw an Agency limo already waiting, its lights blinking in the dark. Lola tapped on my door. I’m not exaggerating, we’re such close friends we’re practically twins. And our taste in clothes is so similar, it’s spooky. Except that being from the future, my soul-mate always looks that bit more outrageous! Tonight, she had on the coolest sunglasses, with misty blue lenses. One lens had a tiny diamante star in the corner.

“You look great!” I told her.

The limo dropped us back at HQ then we hurtled down to Departures. Michael looked pointedly at his watch.

“We aren’t that late,” I panted.

Lola grinned. “Plus, like you always say, Michael, Time doesn’t actually exist!”

Michael hustled us along corridors, giving us a last minute briefing as we went. “You’ll be splitting up, I’m afraid. Each of you has been allocated—” he coughed “I mean, will be monitoring a different human.”

“So much for the’ research trip’,” I mouthed at Lola.

I heard Michael say casually, “I think I’m right in saying it’s not a plague year.”

Workers in white fluorescent suits were giving our portal a last-minute service. The chief maintenance guy gave us a bashful grin. On Earth, Al would be an ideal heavy, like a doorman at a nightclub.. But he’s actually incredibly shy. He makes these agonizing little jokes but he totally can’t look you in the eye.

Michael dished out our angel tags while we waited. We always wear them when we’re on official business. They help us stay in contact with other angels through the Link. Plus they’re v. useful if we want to get somewhere in a hurry. Since we were going to Earth without a supervising adult, we also got issued with these really hi-tech Agency watches.

“Ready when you are, kids,” said Al, and we stepped into the portal.

Reuben was singing under his breath. I recognised the lyrics of a tune he’d been working on. “You’re not alone,” it went, “You’re not alone,” over and over.

“That’s a cool tune, Sweetpea,” Lola said. “Let’s put a little harmony in there.” Lola has a beautiful voice. She literally sings like an angel.

I sing like a frog, basically, but I joined in just the same.

When Michael heard us singing in the time portal, he got this really weird look on his face. At first I thought it was because regular agents don’t tend to sing on take-off. But he didn’t actually look like,
annoyed
. He looked sort of touched and upset. He actually made a move towards us, as if he was going to say something, then at the last minute, he checked himself and gave Al the thumbs-up.

“Remember,” he called, “stay alert.”

The door slid shut.

“Yeah, the Agency needs Lerts,” Lola quipped under her breath.

I waved at Michael through the glass, trying not to laugh.

“What’s plague, Mel?” Reuben hissed into my ear.

I explained that the plague was one of the most terrifyingly contagious human diseases ever. I’d just reached the part about those disgusting purple boils when our portal lit up like a fairground and we were blasted out of Heaven and into the slipstream of history.

Time-travel, Agency-style, is unbelievably speedy. Entire centuries flash past your eyes in a multi coloured blur. Shortly after take-off, we passed a major Opposition outpost. They’re quite easy to spot showing up as whirlpools of dark icky energy. The Agency only sends really top-flight trouble-shooters there. Personally, just whizzing past one gave me the chills.

Then I remembered something that Mr Allbright said. He said nothing in the cosmos ever stays the same. Like, a golden era can collapse in ruins and a dark one can suddenly have a major change of heart.

I remembered something else too. He said it only takes
one
wide-awake human to make a difference.

But as we hurtled towards our destination, we started getting a weird strobing effect. Dark light dark light dark light. Like a cosmic zebra crossing.