The Unnatural Disasters

1,p1. All the reasons not to trust strange women: Newton

Newton

Room G26, stuck deep in the bowels of Hearters School, is about the best place to rehearse on the ceiling.
It's dank: rarely touched by cleaners, who have far better places to do their work in a school that's the size and shape of your average stately home and grounds. It's cold- one of the places that hasn't been shifted by the sandstorm of modern day- ergo meaning you have to turn the elderly system of cast iron and boiled water on manually. And, most importantly, it's quiet.
It's pretty obvious why Rose Fakoor, the wonderfully unassuming, does not want to be outed as the girl who can walk on walls.

Anyway, nobody really knows I'm here. I'd be willing to bet that nobody cares, either. I'm a loner by nature- and if that sounds overly dumb or edgy to you, then please remember that I am a 13 year old girl wearing a hijab who cries whenever someone tries to yell at me. (Arguably the hijab is enough for some people to believe I'm threatening, yes, but those people are idiots and I'm discounting them.)
Really, I just have a tendency to be standoffish around new people.
What can I say! I have trust issues!
But as I continue with my routine, I also continue to brood. I'm not actually meant to be down here. However, nobody's going to check. You need a contract signed in blood to use the actual school rehearsal rooms, which are uncomfortably close to the PE office, anyway. Classrooms are really meant to be forbidden to go into after school hours. It's in the rules, somewhere. Pretty sure it's meant to be there to stop the school gangs of uppers from wrecking the geography classroom in a fit of hormonal rage, which'd be insulting if it hadn't happened twice in the time I've been here. But considering the fact that I'm not actually planning on destroying G26, I give myself a moral pass. Besides, I have a good reason.
I do not want to go back to my dorm.

The music dives headfirst into the chorus. I grin. The song's one of my favourites: Gonna have to kill you, by Beetlejunk. Part of the wondrous and bizarre music sub genre of 'songs about murder, set to very catchy tunes sung in a major key'. I get a sudden jolt of memory, from one of my first days being introduced to the people I am forced to share a room with, Ella Stanley and Eliza Birchwood. I had asked them whether or not they had heard of Beetlejunk- then subsequently tried to get them to listen to it.
It did not go well.
In case you haven't twigged it yet, Ella Stanley and Eliza Birchwood are why I'm not going back to my room.
It's not like they're bad people. It's not like that. It's just- Ella and Eliza are the two most popular girls in my year group, and I am socially a ghost. Funny how that works, isn't it? But the dorms were assigned at the very start of the first year, and never changed. When I got assigned to share a room with Ellaiza, they became best friends, rose up the catty girl school hierarchy, and left me to become their skeleton in the closet. The single ugly stepsister to their two Cinderellas. They're not bad people; they just believe that anybody like me should come with a warning label. But today they happen to be hosting their daily ring show of gossip to their equally beautiful-rich-and-popular friends. Ergo? They wanted me out the way.
So that explains why I'm here, where here is, and-
"Hello, Rose," an unrecognised voice says.
And this is the point in which I fall off the ceiling.
I glance down at myself, then up at the person in question, then back down to myself. Crap. I must have craned my neck to look at her, a habit I really need to stop doing.

It takes me a second to remember that most people don't tend to do things on the ceiling.
scramble to make myself an alibi.
"I'm wearing a harness!" I yell at the woman.
Considering the complete lack of rigging in what's meant to be the spare maths room, it's unlikely. I need something more solid.
"Or-" I continue, "this is my Dad's technology!"
More, likely, yes, but why would the CEO of a transport company give his teen daughter probably very expensive prototype ceiling-walking software? Dad's software's what got me into this mess from the start. It doesn't have a long history of helping me out of trouble.
Wait, Rose, think for a second. She's probably school staff, even if I don't recognise her...
"I have permission to be here!"
I look up at the woman. The woman looks up at me. We give each other unnecessarily long eye contact. I suddenly doubt she's school staff: unless today happens to be Dress Up Like A Government Agent Day. I think I know why she's here, and it's probably not got anything to do with the charity bake sale. Or the Hippocratic oath, for that matter.
"You don't believe any of that for a second, do you."
"Suffice to say I... don't?"
She's kindly, maternal-looking. Grey eyes and pale skin. Hell, maybe she isn't planning to experiment on me in some unmarked island?
I sink to the floor.
My phone's still playing Beetlejunk in the background. Still stuck to the ceiling. I reel it in, letting it fall as I let the gravity bubble break then grabbing it into orbit by the one created in my hand. The woman looks on, smiling faintly. I should have known. Should have known it wouldn't last, should have known that I'd be carted away someday like the complete freak I am. Didn't think it'd be like this, though.
"Well? Where's the armoured guard? Where's the cage?"
I look into her eyes.
There's pity there.
Annoying.
She mutters to herself. "Why is everybody suspecting me of murder today? I promise to you. I'm not going to harm you, okay?"
And the words feel true- I've had enough practice to tell.
"Then why are you here? Who are you? What gain are you trying to get?"
"My name's Luda. If you want to know? I'm planning to save the world."