62 The Top of the Spire

Chapter 62 The Top of the Spire Peanut charged up the stairs, leading the group straight into the pencil-drawn storm cloud. The inside was illuminated by flashing pockets of bright, crackling electricity, but the group managed to dodge the lightning and, to everyone's relief, arrive at the top unscathed. Peanut looked at the door at the end of the staircase. It was just a few steps away now and it was wide open. 'Nerys must have gone through already,' she said to her ink-covered, wind blown family. 'I just hope we're not too late.' Peanut started to walk towards the door. 'Wait for me,' said Dade 'I am Conté's heir, so I really

should be there with you. It's me who needs to get hold of Little Tail, after all, if the prophecy is to be fulfilled.' Peanut grabbed her dad's hand, and then they stepped through the door together. It led to an open-air walkway no more than a metre wide, with a barrier that came up to Peanut's chest. The path completely circled the outside of the Spire a few metres below its tip. Sitting on top of that tip was a thin, white, pylon-like structure, reminiscent of the Eiffel Tower, that reached a further ten metres into the bright Chroma sky.

'Is that the mooring mast?' asked Peanut. 'I think so,' replied Dad. 'What is a mooring mast?' said Rockwell, as he came through the door onto the walkway with the others. 'It must be where they park the Giant X,' said Dad, as he continued to walk around. An airship like that would have to be tied to something when it was refuelled so that it didn't float away. Maybe that's why they added this mast to the Spire.

Little-Bit stood on her tiptoes and looked down over the edge of the barrier. 'LB!' shouted Mum. 'Get away from the edge!' 'Look!' Little-Bit shouted. 'Superheroes! They're everywhere!' Peanut looked over the barrier. Her sister was right! The sky below them was full of cloaked figures, criss-crossing and zig-zagging through the air.

'Wow!' she exclaimed. 'They must have escaped from the lake!' And if they've escaped, then maybe they're helping everybody else to escape too,' said Rockwell, excitedly. ' Yes! The lake looks like it's emptying of people,' said Mum. And that's not all,' added Leo. 'Look over there. In the snow!' On the white expanse of the North Draw's snowfields, a dark shape was sprawled across the ground. Even from a great height, it looked huge. 'It's the Giant X!' shouted Rockwell. And it looks like it's been deflated! Josephine must have brought it down, just like she said she would. I bet she found a way to override 67's protocol! I mean, of course she did! If she can build something that disables RAZERs with the click of a button, she can definitely figure out how to do the same with Giant Xs! Gosh, she's brilliant.

'Never mind that now, said Dad, urgently. 'Let's stay focused. It's Nerys we're after, remember. I've just done a full circuit of the walkway and all I could find was this.' He held up the Mona Lisa. 'She must have dropped it. But Nerys herself is nowhere to be seen. It's like she's vanished into thin air. I've got a terrible feeling that she's already drawn a portal and left...' 'Er, Dad,' said Peanut. 'She hasn't left. 'Where is she, then?' he asked. Peanut pointed to the mast. 'She's up there.'