They weren't planning on having to trade me back.

They had other plans for me.

Things Shan just barely managed to stop from happening.

It meant I survived.

It also meant I got to see some things, things I wasn't supposed to see, or things I wasn't

supposed to see and live to tell about it. Here's what I know.

The mosaics have been created.

They've bred.

And the trumpet is on its way.

This is Spines.

This is Spines. I'm You've already heard from Shan how I was taken.

One minute I was walking across the street.

The next, I was suspended in the middle of a clear, shiny bubble, like Glinda the goddamn witch.

That bubble didn't respond to anything I tried, not slowing time, not matter manipulation, teleporting, nothing worked.

I could still do all of those things inside the bubble, but I couldn't make contact

with the walls. They just flexed and shied away from me as I rose into the air, as it took me away.

I fought, but at a certain point I just stopped and I watched Shan's face until they disappeared.

For a long time, I was up in the clouds.

I couldn't tell how fast I was moving, how far I was going. Turns out it was several thousand miles,

which means I must have been moving faster than a jet. It got cold up there, but the bubble must have insulated me somehow. I would have

frozen to death otherwise. After a while, the bubble started to descend. I could make out a city

beneath me, something hot and sun-baked and unfamiliar. Later, I found out it was Madrid, but I

...