Astrid was smart. She would be assertive not aggressive but not sound too businessy. That would cause a hang up.

"Hello?" the man on the other line said.

"Hello? Uh, hi i don't know if you know this but--"

"You're Astrid Ellison aren't you?"

"Yeah how did you..."

"I created you. Wow, so it is true." the man spoke in complete awe. He sounded crazy.

"Uh..."

"Um..."

"Listen, we're trapped here--"

"In the FAYZ. Yeah."

"--and we need your help. Please, please come." She felt tears come. "Please." there was a lasting silence on the other line.

"Ok. I'll come."

He hung up.

Michael Grant hadn't belived it. His characters, his creations, were actually alive and--well he couldn't say healthy. And the one he killed off? They were prablaby dead. If the people who he thought would be fitting if they were alive, then if he killed one main person off...he would be a murderer.

He edged away from his computer. No, he couldn't. He couldn't just write someones death, that's horrible! Barberic! But why did he care?

Because he now knows that they are alive. And he has to save them.

Oh great, Sam Temple mode, he thought. He wondered at the thought that there is a Sam and a Caine, and an Astrid, and a Diana, and a Quinn, and a Edilio, and a Orc, and a Gaiaphage, and a Pack Leader, and a Lana, and Computer Jack, and a Drake, and a Little Pete, and a Mary, and a Brianna, and a Howard, and many others, and all the rest of the kids trapped in there. He grabbed his coat and went to his car.

"Honey?" His wife, awoken by the phone was standing in his way. "Where are you going?"

"Somewhere no adult has gone before."

"Where's that?"

"The FAYZ."


Uglieness in this chapter sorry.

brain groggy...