Zayn's POV

"Niall, can you scratch my back please?" Kayleigh asks, pulling her top up and looking at him. I struggle not to snicker at Niall's half bemused, half delighted face. This is just like Kayleigh, we're in the middle of this thing and she asks him to scratch her back? That girl is insane. Niall reaches a hand out, unsure, but then halts, furrowing his brow in confusion.

""You never told me you had a tattoo, Kay." He looks at her questioningly.

"That's because I've not got one. You know that - what's up with you Ni? You sound like you're only just getting to know me!" Kayleigh looks at Niall like he's gone mad.

I shake my head as I look closely at Kayleigh's back. There, on the left hand side of the small of her back, sits a small tattoo in the form of a crescent moon. There is a word also inscribed, following the formation of the curve. I can just about make it out from where I stand and then I notice the letters following it.

Matched. XX, XY, XY

"He's not being stupid Kayleigh. There really is one there. Do you want to see it?" I ask her.

"What!" She yells, jumping and twisting so that she can see herself in the mirror.

"What the hell has happened to me?" Kayleigh exclaims. "This is, this is ridiculous. I've never gotten a tattoo in my life! Why the heck is there one on me?" She starts hopping around the room like she's gone crazy, placing her head in her hands and pacing everywhere.

"Calm down." Louis says to her, snatching her hands. Kind of ironic, really. I seem to remember that he was the one running about everywhere, panicking, and calling Niall and Kayleigh hybrids and nonhuman. I say as much and receive a poisonous glare from Louis. So much for that then.

"Louis, I've just discovered Niall can stop me feeling pain, can read my mind, I can fly and, oh yeah! That I've got a tattoo when I've never set foot in a tattoo parlour in my whole entire life! So don't you dare tell me to calm the fuck down!" Kayleigh screams, utterly losing it. I can tell she's about to break.

I try to think about what Perrie would do as she and Kayleigh are quite close and she asks about her a lot. Perrie's pretty much my rock and I'm not sure where I'd be without her. Definitely not here, that's for sure. Every time Kayleigh or El is stressed, Perrie seems to know exactly what to do; I assume that's one of the benefits of living your life with girls all the time.

I walk over to Kayleigh and grab her arms, forcing her to face me. I give her a steely glare like I've seen Perrie do and keep her gaze on me.

"Snap out of it. If you don't keep calm, we're not going to be able to figure this out, okay? And we need to work out what's happening or else things are going to go wrong fast." I tell her. She looks at me
quizzically for a moment before dissolving into giggles, her previous, strained expression melting away. While not the reaction I was expecting, at least it brought her out of her funk.

"So....sorry." She spluttered, all but doubling over. "You looked so much like Perrie does when she calms me down!"

I cracked a half smile and glanced around at the other boys who seemed astounded by her outburst. Niall's panicked face had disappeared completely but I could tell he was still worried and Harry had stopped looking like a skittish rabbit ready to run at any opportunity he was presented with. I think I did quite well there.

"That's all well and good, Zayn." Liam began, running his hands over his face. "But there's still the question of why that tattoo is even there in the first place and why Kayleigh and Niall have suddenly become......what should we refer to you as?"

Niall and Kayleigh both looked slightly taken aback but it was Louis who got in first. "Human, Liam. They're still human they've just developed abilities that we've never experienced before." He shook his head.

"I didn't mean it like that. I meant it like 'What should we refer to your abilities as?'. Sorry, I didn't mean to offend you." Liam says, apologetically.

"How about we just call them abilities? I think it sums up what's happened to us and it doesn't make us sound like experiments gone wrong. Besides, for all we know, this could pass in a matter of hours." Kayleigh suggested.

"Good idea. But Liam's right. How did that tattoo get there in the first place?" I question. "Can I have a look?"

"Be my guest." Kayleigh shrugs, lifting her top up a little to show me.

I crouch down so that my eye is level with the tattoo and gently start prodding and looking at it.

"It looks like it's actually part of the body." I conclude. "It's not just ink drawn on the body, it's actually growing out of the body. Which, I may add, is exceptionally creepy."

"Part of my body?" Kayleigh asks, surprised.

"Yep. And these words don't make any sense at all. I mean, Matched? XX, XY, XY? It sounds like a date but I'm not sure." I look at her ruefully.

Kayleigh pinches the bridge of her nose and sighs. "Roman numerals?"

"Possibly, but is there a number represented by Y?"

"No."

"Then that's not it. Hang on." I furrow my brow as I catch sight of something suddenly appearing. Kayleigh moans in pain and starts to wriggle as it grows into the skin and she reaches a hand out for Niall. She stops when he touches her and I'm able to get a proper look at what's appeared.

"Anni." I read aloud what the it says. The new word sits at the base of the moon and joins up with the word Matched.

"Anni?" Niall questions. "Didn't Tessa mention somebody called that?"

"That's what Jessica said when we questioned her. And Sewani." Harry says quickly. "I wanted to ask you about that before, you know, everything happened."

"Think it could all be the same person?" Louis frowned.

Kayleigh looked thoughtful as she let go of Niall's hand. "Possibly. Tessa said that Anni was much more powerful than we would ever be. I didn't really pay much attention to it at first but I see how it could all be connected."

"So we're looking for a women named Anni?" Liam asks. "Well that narrows the search right down. We'll totally figure this out!"

"Don't be sarcastic Liam." Harry narrows his eyes. "We will work this out because it's a challenge and you should never not complete a challenge."

"Life motto number 32." Kayleigh claps her hands. "Thank you for that inspiring speech!" Harry plays along and bows but looks thoroughly troubled.

"Did anybody give any more clues as to who this Anni person may be?" Niall fell back onto the bed a little less than gracefully.

"No. All that was said was simply Anni. No more information was given." Louis shrugs in response. "And we spent the whole day chasing up leads."

"Well where do we start then?" I ask aloud, rubbing my face in my palms. This has been one flipping confusing day and I think I'm about ready to pass out. All that's keeping me awake is my stupid curiosity and knowledge that, if I don't do this for Kayleigh, Perrie will likely kill me. If only she were here right now, she'd know exactly what to do.

Oh god. What am I going to tell Perrie? She's bound to find out at some point, I mean, Niall can read minds and Kayleigh can fly! But we don't know what's going on, and by the way that they were both shot at earlier, telling Perrie could put her in danger. On the other hand, if I keep it a secret and she finds out, she's going to be as pissed as Harry when he's woken up before ten o'clock in the morning.

"Maybe we can do a search for Anni + Matched?" Liam suggests, jerking me from my thoughts. "Something's got to come up at some point, it might just take a while."

"But we don't have a while. We've got an hour until we're 'woken up' and none of us have had any proper kip. On top of that, I think Niall and Kayleigh have just had the shock of their lives. They're not going to want to sleep after all of this." I speak, trying to be fair.

"Maybe we should discuss what we found out from the leads while Liam surfs the net. That way, we can kill two birds with one stone. Besides, Zayn's right, none of us are going to get a decent night's sleep on empty stomachs and worry. It doesn't look like this thing on my back's going anywhere any time soon so we can figure that out later." Kayleigh sensibly formulates a plan.

"Well, Harry and I started with Sewani, Jessica, CeCe and Kyle." Louis tells us. "Sewani and Jessica both mentioned Anni and told us to keep our noses out of it but CeCe and Kyle didn't say anything about it."

Sewani Devereux is the new head of security and Jessica Ferrell is our lighting and sounds manager. I've never liked her because she was rude to Perrie on one of her rare days off and upset her quite badly. Plus her last name is Ferrell- I mean, come on, take one 'L' away and it's just begging to be made fun of!

"So Anni's known by a lot of people then." Liam states, loading up his laptop and logging into Google.

"Yes. I mean, if lots of people have had experiences with her then she must be widely known or, at the very least, talked about." Niall clarifies, his hand slowly inching it's way to rest on Kayleigh"s knee.

"So. Let's see. I've searched for Anni + Matched + Tattoo and I've got something quite interesting." Liam murmurs. "Take a look at that."

He twists the silver laptop around so that the screen is facing towards us and we all take a look at what he's trying to show us. Liam's pulled up some blog talking about the weird and wonderful things in life but he's zeroed in on one specific post. Titled 'The Self-Inking Tattoo?' the article was posted two months ago and showed a stray cat's back that appeared to have been tattooed. The poor thing looked exceptionally malnourished and scared and he was trying to jump into a bin when the photographer caught his back. Clumsily inked into the skin was a crescent moon and words around it. Except this time, there were nine pairs of XXs and XYs.

"What the hell?" Kayleigh's brow creases as she looks intently at the screen. "Who tattooed a cat?"

"That's the thing, the author doesn't know. Here, listen to the article." Harry begins to read out what's written on the laptop.

"Following my encounter of the purple duck just last weekend, today I happened to chance upon this scrawny little thing on my way home from work. Sitting in a side alley, the cat was trying to crawl into the bin when I caught sight of this marking on his back. It appeared to take the form of a crescent moon and had an odd series of Xs and Ys following the curve of the inside edge. As I watched, I noticed the cat began to cry out in pain and I caught sight of new words being etched into the skin."

"I tried to help it but it hissed at me so I kept well back. The word 'Anni' appeared. How's that for weird, folks? And that's not all. I went home and did some research into it and it turns out other animals have been spotted with the same 'tattoo'! It appears that animals unlikely to be missed (such as wild dogs or squirrels) have been found with the exact same markings! I kid you not, my fellow friends. Scientists have been investigating the cause and are trying to piece together why such a strange phenomenon has occurred! Stay tuned and subscribe to the feed for regular updates." Harry finished, drawing in a deep breath at the end.

"So it's not uncommon then?" Louis looked on, disbelievingly.

"It's not uncommon in animals." I quickly correct him. "There's nothing to suggest a human has ever had one appear."

"Well that makes me feel ten times better guys, thanks!" Kayleigh laughs. "I don't suppose the cat was able to fly or read minds either?"

We dissolve into laughter as soon as the words leave Kayleigh's mouth and it's then that I start to question something- a simple thing (as heartbreaking as it is to be talking so detachedly about the whole situation) such as a murder has turned into this. Something out of a sci fi movie. And the only thing linking them is a word. A person. Anni.

Suddenly, a pounding on the door shakes us all from our different stages of laughter. "Boys!" Nevie, from management, yells through the door. "Up! You've got a plane to catch in two hours and a meeting with Abby Ingrid almost as soon as you touch down in the UK! Hurry up!"

We all begin to pick ourselves up from the floor and look at each other. Nevie clearly didn't realise we were all in here together because we heard her travelling the corridor and shouting through the other room doors. I felt exceptionally sorry for the people above and below us. It was five o'clock in the morning and I was fairly certain they did not want to be woken up by an extremely angry Chinese lady at this ungodly hour. It would be complaints galore in Simon's office.

"There's another thing we forgot to mention." Kayleigh suddenly revealed. "While we were hidden in the room, an officer requested that somebody should get Simon Cowell on the phone. I don't know why though."

"You're kidding? So Simon's got something to do with this? He's linked to Anni?" Harry rubbed his forehead in exasperation.

"No. He's got something to do with the officers- he's probably been asking them to keep him updated on Paul's case since he won't be back in Paris for quite some time, at least, until his next business meeting anyway." Niall replied.

"Right. Right." Louis nodded thoughtfully. "But don't you find it a little odd the way the officer just casually asked for Simon to be called? It's like they'd done it time and time before, the way you were describing it anyway."

"That's true." Niall scratched his chin. "But-" he was cut off by Nevie yelling again.

"I know you're all in there. Kayleigh, you are in so much trouble when you get out of there. Hurry up and move your arses." She yelled. If looks could kill and we were standing where she could make eye contact, I was willing to bet we'd be six feet under right now.

---

When we'd finally gotten dressed, Kayleigh said goodbye and stepped out from the room. She was barely out of the door before Nevie started to harass her. I moved closer to the door so that I could listen in and intervene if I had to but it sounded like Kayleigh had rehearsed this is her mind.

"Kayleigh, how do you think that looks to me?" Nevie spat, obviously making reference to the fact that she'd caught Kayleigh with us at five in the morning. "You're a member of their team. Just because you're good friends does not give you the right to have midnight chats with them, especially given your current position. I can tell you now, some of the team members want you fired and I've got a good mind to do just that."

I bit my lip, praying that wouldn't happen. I already knew Kayleigh was getting some pretty nasty tweets on Twitter but she hadn't been on there in days. I hated to think about the looks she was going to receive from her friends and colleagues.

"I'm sorry, Nevie, I truly am. It's just, the boys invited me to their rooms to find out how I was and work out how best to deal with everything. Niall and I had been texting and he got it out of me that I was feeling pretty low so he asked me over." Kayleigh lied through her teeth, making me struggle not to laugh. Kayleigh was crap at lying, surely she wasn't going to get away with it?

"I'm sorry, Kayleigh. I can't quite imagine what you must be going through right now, what you must be experiencing. I truly am sorry. I can see the boys have been a real help to you so I'll keep this between us for now. But I'm warning you, if this isn't cleared up by On The Road Again, you're not going to be hired as the One Direction stylist ever again, agreed?" Nevie's voice softened slightly.

"Thank you Nevie." Kayleigh gushed, trying to sound enthusiastic. I let out a small laugh. She had gotten away with lying to somebody- perhaps those new found abilities extended further than just flying.

"Tell you what, love. As I know you're close to the boys and that I suspect it wouldn't be very easy on you if you were to fly back home with the rest of the crew, shall I ask and see if you'd be allowed to fly back with them?

"Please, that would be great. I owe you one."

"Consider it a favour. Next time I need bailing out of something, just back me up?"
"Done!"

I prised my ear away from the thin door and slowly sank back, sliding downwards. I was struggling badly to get my head around the fact that Kayleigh and Niall seemed to have these new abilities. It wasn't normal and I was worried that something bad was going to come of it.

Mind reading was genetically possible and the only way to make it possible would be to alter somebody's genetic makeup, same as flying. But to do that, you'd.....well it was scientifically impossible. With the technology of the twenty-first century anyway,

Then it struck me. Perhaps what had changed them both was some sort of alien compound? As ridiculous as it sounded, this Anni person could be an alien or, at the very least, somebody who could acquire alien technology. I sat and pondered it for several minutes. If all these people knew about Anni, she must have a lot of power. She had to be respected as well and that meant she was ruthless and possibly tough talking; it was also a possibility she wasn't somebody prone to giving mercy.

I picked up Liam's laptop from where it lay discarded on the carpet and looked at the picture on the webpage. It really was an odd spectacle that, a cat with a tattoo? It was like something Dr Seuss would write about! Or Roald Dahl.

I scanned the picture thoroughly, looking at every detail possible. It was quite grainy but I was able to make out most of the important features. And then something caught my eye.

In the background of the picture sat nine kittens.

And suddenly everything fell into place.

"Three." I chuckled. "She will be pleased." I moved the laptop to one side and stood up to go and find Kayleigh and to let her know the excellent news.

The question was now, who would be the father?


YOU

They crippled us. The forces Repose sent killed the majority of the team I was on, leaving two survivors because we were cowards.

Luna and I stumbled on. She'd been shot but, since she'd been ill on the day KJ-56 was administered, she couldn't heal herself like I could.

Repose knew what they were doing. They must have had an inside source. But never mind that. They knew about KJ-56 and its effects; they knew the only way to counteract it was to shoot straight through the heart with silver bullets. They'd seen past the 'only wolves can be killed with silver' story and worked it out. They knew Amalgamations could not heal themselves while silver was present.

I had to find the mole, I had to.

Luna coughed violently, spitting blood as she did so.

"Leave me." She whispered hoarsely. "Find them. Find out what KJ-57 does. My life's work has been to develop that-don't let me down."

I nod and, in a last act of honouring Luna's name, I take two fingers and place them horizontally on my forehead.

Luna takes one last shaky breath as I lay her down on the soft grass before I leave, sprinting through the trees and never looking back.

Notes

Hi!

I'm off on a crazily long car journey tomorrow so I will have loads of time to write!

There should be updates on both Thursday and Friday and maybe one at something like midnight (UK time because that's where I live) tomorrow!

Have a lovely Tuesday!

Xoxoxoxo

P.S Please don't forget to comment if you enjoyed the chapter or have a thought on the killer etc.....I always try and reply if I have a chance :)