by Alesha Dixon
“Haven’t you listened to anything I’ve said?” he spat back. “I’ve grown stronger with the precious stones in my presence! They are connected to me now! Enough talk. Aurora.” He straightened and began to walk back across the room towards me. “I’m going to need the Light of the World now. I’m guessing it’s in one of your pockets. Silicon, if you could do the honours.”
I tried backing away as Mr Mercury loomed towards me, his eyes glinting in the darkness. As I moved, something caught my eye, floating in the pool of light just by the door, which hadn’t been shut properly after the guards had brought us into this room.
It was a feather. An ostrich feather.
I turned my attention back to Mr Mercury, who was standing just in front of me, ready to start searching my pockets.
“You’ll never win against your great nemesis, Mr Mercury,” I declared.
“You’re not my great nemesis,” he snorted. “My great nemesis is—”
He was cut off by a loud thud as one of the guards standing nearest the door of the tunnel went crashing through the air. Everyone spun round to try and see what was going on as a beam of light appeared, cutting through the darkness. Nolan shrieked, cowering away from the light as it darted about the room.
Mr Mercury fumbled with his torch, managing to turn it on and direct it to the doorway to see the source of the light beam.
An ostrich was standing in the doorway wearing a head torch.
He spat what looked like a raspberry hardboiled sweet across the room, which hit Mr Mercury in the middle of his forehead with a sharp THWACK!
The sweet bounced off his head and skittered across the floor.
“Lovely shot, darling!” Aunt Lucinda cried. “And look! It’s your nemesis, Mr Mercury! He was just talking about you.”
A wave of hope washed over me. It was time to fight back.
18
“I HATE THAT OSTRICH!”
Mr Mercury’s cry echoed off the walls as Alfred bolted through the room, making a bee line for his enemy and knocking several of Nolan’s guards off-balance as he bulldozed his way through.
At Alfred’s magnificent entrance, all of us sprang into action.
Several of the men in charge of JJ had either become distracted by the grumpy ostrich lumbering past them at immense speed or been shoved out the way by him, so none were quite prepared for what JJ did next, which was to bellow a war cry before launching into an incredible swing-kick. Owing to his super-strength, the one kick sent two of the men next to him flying away towards the walls. Realizing what was going on, another guard jumped on JJ’s back, but JJ just grabbed him by the arms and hurled him forward over his head, tumbling to the ground.
“Get the light from him! The light!” Nolan was yelling at Mr Mercury, as he cowered into the corners of the room, desperately trying to avoid the beam of light from Alfred’s head-torch.
As Alfred came pelting towards him, Mr Mercury looked torn between facing his nemesis head-on or running away from him screaming. He suddenly put up his fists in what I imagine he thought was a threatening stance, but Alfred didn’t flinch and he didn’t even slow down when he reached his target. He just ran full force at Mr Mercury and they collided with a loud THUD!
I had closed my eyes at the moment of impact and opened them to find Mr Mercury on the floor, splayed out like a starfish, while Alfred stood over him, the beam of his torch shining on Mr Mercury’s big bald head. With a theatrical flourish, Alfred pinched Mr Mercury’s trousers in his beak and tore them in two to reveal Mr Mercury’s boxer shorts which had sparkly unicorns all over them.
“GERROFF ME, YOU OVERSIZED DUCK!” Mr Mercury screamed at the top of his lungs.
Alfred froze. Aunt Lucinda gasped dramatically.
“Oversized duck? You’ve really done it now, Mr Mercury,” she tutted.
Steam seemed to be coming out of Alfred’s beak. With his large foot square on Mr Mercury’s chest, pinning him to the floor and causing him to flail his arms and legs around in a panic, Alfred slowly lowered his neck so that the end of his beak was touching Mr Mercury’s nose.
“I … I didn’t mean it?” Mr Mercury attempted in a high-pitched squeak as he stared into the eyes of a VERY cross ostrich.
Alfred ignored him. He pulled his neck back and then launched into such fast pecking on Mr Mercury’s head, the bird’s neck and head became a blur.
“Aurora!” Mum yelled. “Get out of here!”
During the commotion, Mum had been busy dealing with the other guards, taking the opportunity of Alfred’s entrance to get the upper hand, despite her hands being tied behind her back and locked in the special gloves, so she didn’t have any powers.
If I thought my mum was pretty cool before, now I thought she was awesome.
I knew that, growing up with Nanny Beam, she probably had some good martial arts skills, and of course being a superhero and everything, I assumed she’d picked up some tips on how to handle herself, but what I did not realize was that she had clearly been inspired or taught by NINJAS.
I’ve never seen anyone move so fast. I’d barely blinked and she’d whipped the guy behind her right off his feet with a smooth kick to his ankles as she spun round with perfect balance. As another came at her, she sprang into a double roundhouse kick and he fell stumbling backwards straight into another guard behind him so they both went down like dominos.
In the meantime, the guard in charge of Aunt Lucinda was yowling in pain and hopping on one leg after she’d stomped on his foot as hard as possible with her stiletto heel.
“That will teach you for being a bad guy!” Aunt Lucinda huffed, sticking her nose in the air.
“Aurora! Go!” Mum called out again.
I made a run for it, darting towards the door that was now fully open, thanks to Alfred’s entrance, but I felt a strong grip on my arm and I was pulled backwards.
“Not so fast, Lightning Girl!” Darek growled. “Give me the stone!”
A blur came rushing past me and rugby-tackled Darek to the ground, leaving me free to go. I glanced back to see Darek winded and writhing on the floor, while JJ stood over him, giving me a thumbs up.
“Go, Lightning Girl! Get that stone to safety. We’ll handle everything here!”
My hands still tied behind my back, I dodged the chaos surrounding me and slid through the door back into the underground tunnel. Running through the dark was much harder than walking through it and this time I didn’t have anyone with a torch in front of me or Darek holding me up as I went. I hurtled forward blindly, hoping that the tunnel was shorter than I thought.
I collided with the wall painfully, knocking me to my knees, remembering too late that the tunnel had curved to the left on the way down. On the ground, I heard footsteps and the heavy breathing of someone running after me.
“Come back here, Aurora Beam!”
The threatening voice echoed down the tunnel and my heart leapt into my mouth as I realized it was Nolan. He must have slipped out without the others noticing.
I had to get to the entrance of the tunnel, out into the light. With all the energy I could muster, I pulled myself to my feet using the wall to leverage me up and then raced on as quickly as possible, tripping over my feet, my arm grazing one side of the wall as I used it for guidance.
Nolan was getting closer, his eyes so used to the dark that the pitch black of the tunnel didn’t matter to him. My heart was thudding hard against my chest and the adrenaline was making my ears ring.
I saw the entrance to the tunnel up ahead and desperately ran towards it. Suddenly, something went swooshing past my ear, like a strong gust of wind. A moment later, it happened again, swishing past me and nearly sending me off-balance.
I felt sick as I realized it was Nolan shooting his dark energy beams from his palms at me. I didn’t have much room to dodge them in the tunnel and if hit, they were definitely strong enough to knock me to the ground. The only good thing was that Nolan slowed a little, as shooting each dark beam wiped hi
s energy.
All I could do was aim for that opening and ran faster than I’ve ever run before. pushed through the entrance to the tunnel and stumbled outside.
Ducking as a ball of darkness shot over my head and cracked against the rocks above me, I Any hope I’d had for daylight putting off Nolan from emerging after me fizzled away. It was dark outside, the skies murky and shadowed. The Aurora Borealis flickered dimly, fading away with every minute.
My shock at the sky cost me. Pausing to look up, I was sent flying forward by a blow of dark energy that grazed my left side. Without my hands to stop my fall, I was lucky that the force toppled me slightly sideways so that my left arm took most of the impact, rather than me landing flat on my face.
Nolan cackled triumphantly as he approached, out of breath from the chase. I tried wriggling along the ground, but he laughed maniacally at my attempt, catching up with me easily and pinning me to the ground with his foot.
“It’s over, Lightning Girl. It’s finally over.”
19
Standing over me, Nolan slowly lifted his hood and revealed his face which, like his arms and hands, was horrifically scarred with lines of darkness that looked etched into his skin.
I’d been expecting that.
What I hadn’t been expecting was Nanny Beam’s eyes and nose. I’d seen an old photograph of Nolan, so I knew they looked alike, but for some reason his horrible, evil plans and actions had led me to think that any Beam characteristics would have been long gone, even the physical ones. That his face was so familiar made everything he was doing feel even more painful.
“Look where we are,” he continued, towering over me and oblivious to my scrutinizing his features as I blinked up at him. “Right underneath the Aurora Borealis.”
He pointed up at the sky. He grinned, showing crooked yellow teeth.
“I have the guardian and you have the Light of the World, which means that I can transfer the powers.” He shook his head at me pityingly. “You should have stayed indoors, Aurora. Yet again, you’ve run straight into a situation that works best for me and now you’re stuck in the middle of nowhere with no one to help you. Tell me, what are the Beam women without their light-beam powers?”
“What do you mean?” I croaked, my brain running through ideas and not coming up with anything. All I could think to do was keep him talking and bide my time.
“The answer to my question is: nothing. You’re nothing without your powers.”
“That’s what you think of Patricia, right? Nanny Beam,” I said, his face wincing at her name. “Everyone admired her powers but, other than that, she was nothing special in your eyes.”
“Precisely,” he said, lifting his hands up to examine his palms. “I was a prodigy. I built an empire. I moved technology forward at a faster pace than anyone else. I achieved more than anyone could imagine and yet next to her I was ignored by our parents. Still, after today, that will be all in the past. We had better start; the darkness is growing. I need the power of all four of the precious stones.”
He showed me his palms and I saw another faint black line appear, swirling beneath his skin, growing darker and bolder. He then reached into my coat pocket and I wriggled under his grip, but it was no use. He pulled out the box and gave me a thin-lipped smile.
“I trust Nanny Beam had this box specially made for the Light of the World,” he said.
“You won’t be able to get in. Only my mum knows the codes.”
He looked down at me, tilting his head to one side. “You have so much to learn, Aurora. I’ve already told you that when it comes to superheroes, they’re exceptionally predictable.”
He tapped the side of the box and a keypad appeared, along with a series of small blinking lights across the top of the box. He delicately entered some codes and, one by one, each light turned green.
“And the final hurdle,” he said, examining the bottom of the box, which had a tiny red light embedded into it that I hadn’t noticed.
I was staring at him in disbelief, too shocked at how easily he’d got past the security measures to realize what he was doing as he suddenly held the right light close to my face.
Lifting it away, it was now blinking green.
“Eye retina scanner,” he explained. “Only for Beam women. Really, Patricia, couldn’t you have been more imaginative?”
The box clicked open. He gently lifted the lid and his eyes lit up as he saw the stone. Being so close to the source of my powers sent a strange rush of warmth from my toes all the way up my body and down my arms, making my fingers tingle. Near the Light of the World, my powers were almost uncontrollable and my gloves began to shake from the light energy building up in my hands.
“How do you think you are going to transfer the powers?” I asked. “You have to take off my gloves for that and as soon as you do, I’m just going to summon my powers and—”
“One moment of pain for a lifetime of power,” he said, lifting the stone from the box and clasping his fingers round it. “It will be worth it. Years of hiding away in the darkness and now it is finally time.”
As he clutched the Light of the World, I looked beyond him up at the sky and saw that the Aurora Borealis seemed … a little brighter?
I squinted at it to work out whether I was seeing things. Maybe the fall to the ground had made my vision a bit hazy? No, I could see clearly and the Northern Lights were definitely brighter.
It didn’t make any sense. And yet…
My powers were bubbling up inside without me having to concentrate on summoning them. I should have been feeling terrible, distraught at what was about to happen, but I didn’t feel bad. I felt brilliant. I could feel the sparks shooting from my fingertips and the swirled scar on my left palm burning within the gloves. Light within me was trying to find a way of shining out.
I looked back at Nolan with the stone in his hands, and I couldn’t help but smile.
He opened his mouth to say something but then he saw my expression and his face fell.
“What? Why are you smiling?” he asked, his eyes darting about, worried that someone was coming to help. “I shut and locked that door to the tunnel behind me as I came after you; no one is coming to your rescue.”
“I know,” I replied calmly. “I don’t need anyone to rescue me.”
His brow furrowed in confusion. “What’s going on? Are you … glowing?”
“Don’t you know how powerful the Beam women really are, especially when we’re around the source of all our powers?” I asked breezily from the ground. “Did you really think that a pair of gloves designed by some guy in an underground lair was going to stop us?”
His expression turned to panic as he looked at the precious stone resting in his palm. When he’d picked it up earlier, he’d dropped the box to the ground and he quickly went to retrieve it. But he was too late.
A surge came rushing through me with a force more powerful than it had ever been before. Warm and tingling, the energy shot down my arms, my fingers growing even more fiery than they already were, and suddenly…
WHOOOOOOSH!
The gloves disintegrated into nothing as light beams exploded from my palms like immense lightning bolts. It was my powers but like they’d never been before: a force of dazzling, pure bright light bursting out of my hands. It was so powerful it knocked Nolan clean off me and on to his back. He cried in pain and covered his face as waves of glittering light flooded across the land surrounding us.
The Light of the World fell to the ground, rolling across the grass.
As the energy force slowly waned and my hands were still sparking, I stood up and picked up the stone with my left hand, letting its pattern sit on my matching swirled scar.
Nolan scrambled to his feet, turning to look at me, his eyes wide with fear, and then his expression clouded over with anger. He began to determinedly shoot out dark energy bolts from his hands.
I quickly dodged them and, careful not to drop the precious stone, held up my hands to let t
he powers rush down my arm without any effort.
The beams blasted from my palms, the pure radiant light hitting the dark energy head on.
Nolan’s dark powers were no match for the Light of the World.
The light engulfed the darkness and he dropped to the floor, crying out as he was bathed in the glowing beams.
There was suddenly a roaring sound from the sky as secret service helicopters appeared, hovering above us.
“Finally. Well done, Cherry!” I grinned, waving up at them before turning to Nolan, who was cowering on the ground and had shielded himself from the helicopter spotlights with his hood. “I think it’s about time you saw your sister again. Don’t you?”
20
“This is it. This is the place.”
Standing at the top of Mount Kirkjufell, everything seemed so small. After a two-hour trek to get there, the view was incredible and I could see for miles. There was no question that this was where I was supposed to be. As Mum and I had followed our guide up the winding mountain path to the top, the swirled scar on my hand had begun to glow.
The guide, who was from the local town of Grundarfjörõur (and had laughed at me for a full five minutes as I tried to pronounce that), pointed up to the sky.
“There you have it. The Aurora Borealis,” he said, beaming at me. “This is the best view you can get, in my opinion.”
“It’s beautiful,” Mum agreed.
He hesitated and then held up his phone apologetically. “I’m sorry to ask this, but could I have a photo with you, Lightning Girl? I’m a big fan.”
“Of course!”
Mum took a few photos of us and then handed him back his phone. He scrolled excitedly through the many pictures.
“Thank you so much,” he gushed, before nodding back to the path. “I’ll give you a moment to enjoy the Northern Lights. I’ll be over there.”
We thanked him and then waited until he was out of earshot as he headed back down the path and out of sight, busy sending the photo to all his friends.
