Out of the blue

As much as every teenager might daydream out the classroom window about running away, never coming back, and starting a new life selling iced buns, Alyssa Symmonds never thought she'd be _that_ girl. Much less with coursework deadlines looming like the hangman's noose and flash-cards littering every surface, nevertheless, that girl was she, and she that girl - if you would still even call her a girl.

Raised by her Aunt and Uncle from the age of 7, despite an outgoing and adventurous spirit, Alyssa has never been part of what you might call the 'in crowd'. Following a turn of less-than-human events, Alyssa may find this was not solely the result of her overbearing uncle, her surreptitious older brother or through any fault of her own character. She was simply a girl who surrounded herself by the wrong _species_.