Ade unwinds her hair from a spongy doughnut thing that was on top of her head. ‘I expect so.’ She puts the doughnut on the ground next to the pile of clips and rubs the part of her head where her hair dollop was a moment ago. ‘God, that’s such a relief – it was giving me the worst headache.’ 240

‘I have a spare scrunchie if you want one?’ Kat says, taking a band off her wrist and passing it to Ade.

‘Thanks, Kat,’ Ade smiles, and I know she’s not just saying thank you for the hairband.

‘I’m gonna kill Trent.’ Mak is fuming. ‘What a snake.’

‘Yeah,’ I sigh. ‘It’s not the best. What’s Chets doing, Kat?’

‘He’s put his pincers and stinger away. He’s back in his original position and it looks like he’s trying to clean his face. That was a good idea, with the hairspray.’

‘Never leave home without it,’ Karim grins.

‘So my plan was a disaster,’ I say. ‘And now we’re stuck and it’s my fault. Sorry, guys – this is the worst.’

‘It wasn’t your fault,’ Ade says. ‘We had no way of knowing that Chets had evolved new weaponry.’

‘I’m gonna kill him,’ Mak says again. ‘We should never have let him in.’

‘If we hadn’t let him in, we wouldn’t have found out about Chets,’ I say. ‘And we’d be sitting here not knowing that the swarm is about to attack us.’ 241

‘This might sound weird,’ Kat says. ‘But I actually found it quite reassuring when Trent jumped down the hatch. Everything has changed so much the last few months – it’s kind of nice that some things are the same. Chets is an alien wasp, and Trent left us all in the poop to save himself. It’s like old times.’

‘You know, most people’s old times are like rounders in the park, or eating marshmallows round a campfire.’ Karim puts his hairspray back in his pouch.

‘How long till it gets dark?’ I say, just as the first chimes ring out from St Anthony’s. My heart sinks. ‘We’re running out of time. What are we going to do?’

‘We’ll think of something,’ Kat says. ‘Don’t lose hope, Lance. We’re all here together, and that’s something I would have said was impossible if you’d asked me yesterday.’

‘Same,’ says Ade.

‘Yeah,’ Mak nods. ‘How did we let things get so bad between us?’

‘Well, from what I can tell, it started when you met Georgia-Rae and totally disappeared up her Huaraches,’ Karim says. ‘And that seems to have 242 snapped something that was already pulled too tight in Adrianne, possibly from the transition to high school.’

We all look at Karim.

‘Just saying,’ he says. ‘No offence.’

‘The new boy is right,’ Chets calls over. ‘And the situation was exacerbated by the falling out between Adrianne and Katja.’