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of my mind. Something wasn’t right.
    I brought my left leg to my chest and gingerly explored my shin. The dent in the bone was quite noticeable and even now, it still throbbed with pain. Associated with the injury were memories of the Skel who had caused it, sending shudders of revulsion through me.
    Looking to the Japanese car in front of us, I was surprised to see the girl turn and glance at us – well, not at us but at me. Her brown eyes locked with mine for an instant. An expression I could not decipher fled quickly across her round face before she turned away.
    Suddenly a crystal-clear image flashed in my mind. An image of several pairs of slippers, shoes and high-heeled black boots, arranged neatly in rows across a polished wooden floor. I was hit by an overwhelming feeling that this exact situation, right down to its smallest detail, had occurred previously. I instantly rebelled against this – for I knew that was not impossible. As I tried to wade through the implications of what I had just experienced, a sharp metallic taste filled my mouth, followed immediately by a sensation of falling from a great height.
    I grabbed the truck's dashboard to steady myself, but almost as soon as it began, the sensation ceased. Intense pain exploded through my stomach, and then vanished. As if that wasn't enough, the unnerving episode concluded with every nerve ending in my body spiking with adrenaline. It felt like thousands of ants had bitten me.
    The entire occurrence, from image to adrenaline spike, had taken perhaps a few seconds, but the after effect was weird. I felt as if I’d woken from a very deep and exhausting sleep.
    "You okay, Ethan?"
    I looked at Michal, who was glancing at me as he drove.
    "I...uh, I'm just tired, I guess," I replied. I mean, what else could I say – I had absolutely no idea what just happened. It defied all logic. The vision made no sense, for I had never seen that polished floor, shoes, boots or slippers. Was my mind reacting to the most stressful day of my life? Or, and I shuddered to consider this disturbing possibility, was it a premonition of some sort?
    Whatever it was, I never, ever wanted to experience it again.
     
     

Chapter Five
     
    "Hey, check it out, that girl keeps glancing at us," said Leigh as our three-vehicle convoy reached the end of Victoria Street and turned right to head north up Dryburgh Street.
    "Did you see her clothes? She looks like a doll!" Shorty exclaimed.
    "And her hair? What's with the pink?" Leigh laughed.
    "Hey, don't knock her, mate. I wish Newhome girls were permitted to dress like that," David said.
    "Can you imagine the Custodians reaction? They'd go psycho," Leigh agreed.
    "Hey! You reckon all the girls are like her where she comes from? What's the place called?" Shorty asked.
    "Hamamachi," I replied.
    "Right – 'cause if they are, next chance I get I'm going AWOL and heading straight there. And I ain't never coming back!" Shorty vowed.
    "She's not looking at us," Michal said after a moment. "She’s looking at Jones."
    That brought a chorus of ribbing and jokes from the three in the back seat. I looked at Michal and sighed, but truth be told, the corners of my mouth had turned up ever so slightly. My life would be rather dull without those three clowns to liven it up. The 'Dour Duo,' that's what they called Michal and me. I guess that summed us up pretty well. I hadn’t always been so glum, though.
    I’m pretty sure I had a more positive outlook on life before that ceiling fell on my head just after I turned eighteen. I have no memory of the event, just a gaping hole in my mind that covers pretty much my whole eighteenth year. My father told me the injury caused shocking epileptic seizures as well as chronic amnesia. All I remember is how I felt when I woke from the operation that healed me of those afflictions – disorientated, confused, and empty. It was like my life was only a shell of what it had been before.
    I glanced at the 4WD in front of us