The Power of Five Oblivion

brief seconds, the five of them had been together. That was all that mattered. All they had to do was form a circle and a gate would open up and swallow the Old Ones. Wasn’t that how it was meant to work? But before it could happen, someone had fired a shot. One of the guards must have been alive, hiding in a corner of the temple. Why had he chosen her? She had felt the explosion of pain in her head and had thought that this must be what it was like to die. And even as she fell, she knew her power had switched itself off and the typhoon would fall on the temple and demolish it. That was her last memory. She wasn’t sorry she had been killed. She was just sad that she had let the others down.
    But she wasn’t dead. She had woken up here. One of them must have carried her. Maybe the others were waiting for her outside in the corridor: Matt, Pedro, Jamie and Scott. If only she could believe that, then the pain wouldn’t be so bad and she would feel less alone.
    That was world number one.
    The real world. The here and now.
    But sometimes she would slip back into the life she had left behind when she flew to Hong Kong and she would see herself almost as if she were watching herself in a film. There she was … a confident, carefree girl moving across the screen in the uniform of a smart, south London private school (mauve dress, yellow jersey, ridiculous straw hat). On her way home, surrounded by her friends. She had to remind herself that this was her, how she had been, and not some stranger she would never see again.
    She had lived in a comfortable house in Dulwich with a front garden and a gate and dustbins that were emptied once a week. Everything was ordered. School Monday to Friday and, annoyingly, Saturday mornings. Even weekends had their own routine, meeting up with Aidan, who was, she supposed, her first boyfriend, not that either of them would have ever used that word. They would hang out in the park, go shopping, see films, go to parties (home by eleven o’clock or else…). Looking back, she saw that she had been pinned down all her life like a butterfly in a glass case, but that was the way she wanted it. Didn’t everybody?
    Of course there had been upsets. She remembered the day her parents had told her she was adopted – which was hardly a great surprise as she was nothing like them with her Indonesian looks, her long, very black hair and green eyes. But the telling of it, the explaining made it real and somehow took her away from them. It was official now. You don’t belong to us . What if they got fed up with her and sent her away again? They didn’t owe her anything. What would happen if her real parents turned up and demanded her back? She had been nine years old at the time and those had been the thoughts that went through her head.
    And then, when she was fifteen, Paul and Vanessa Adams had got divorced. They had kept everything very civilized. There had been no plate-throwing or heavy-handed lawyers. But once again Scarlett had felt threatened. Everything she had taken for granted was being dismantled around her and there was nothing she could do. Her mother was moving to another country. Her father wanted her to go with him to Hong Kong. As her family life disintegrated, Scarlett had been struck by how little control she had over her own future – and it made her angry and afraid. Sitting on her own in her room, she had actually cried. How pathetic those tears seemed now.
    Lying in bed with a bullet wound in her head, Scarlett felt she had plenty to cry about. One thing was certain. Her old life – Aidan, Dulwich, all the rest of it – was gone for good. She would never be able to return. At the same time, none of it mattered any more. She might die. She might never see Matt again. The Old Ones might have won.
    She was determined it wasn’t going to happen. Somehow she was going to get out of this hospital bed and back onto her feet. It wasn’t over yet. She was going to fight back.
    “Scarlett? Scarlett – can you hear me? I’m right here with you. You’re going to be OK.”
    Someone was holding her hand. It was Lohan. She was sure of it. He had followed her through the door and across the world and he was with her now, as he had been when she was escaping from the Old Ones in Hong Kong. She tried to speak but her mouth was too dry, and anyway, she was exhausted. She needed to sleep.
    Because sleep took her to the dreamworld – the third world – that she knew so well and that