Sorry the last chapter was so short, but I really didn't know what to do without it seeming random, broken, and…irksome.

Here's my apology, in the form of Chapter 20:

"Something's coming."

Those words really shouldn't have come from Bianca Moretti's mouth as she was bidding her daughters goodbye. As it were, the sentence had started as: "Bye, girls! Remember to bundle up! And be careful!"

She had meant, of course, to be careful of the icy layer over the sidewalks. It was winter, and with winter came slipping, sliding, and broken bones. She hadn't meant those last two words to slip out. She didn't want her daughters to know about the nagging fear in the back of her mind, which had started the moment she woke up.

Francesca didn't notice, though she didn't seem to notice much these days. She was in a haze of excitement, because her college application came back accepted.

Silvana, on the other hand, paused from where she was getting out the box of cereal. Her free hand, grasped the necklace she wore so often. Bianca still couldn't understand where she'd gotten it. "It found me," was all she'd say.

"Yeah…finally," her younger daughter muttered eventually. "Sure take their time…."

Maybe she'd imagined it, because as soon as it came, Silvana was pulling the cereal out as she bid her goodbye.

Bianca left feeling as though there was something she had missed.

~*~

Kenna tilted her head, much like a dog might, as though listening for something.

"Kenna!" Eira and Silvana cried. "We've got to get to school!"

Shaking her head, she muttered, "Something's coming…."

Even the somewhat thick Scot felt it.

"I just had the urge to do the creepy little girl thing and go 'They're HE-ere'," Silvana told her.

"Oh, shut it."

Eira almost laughed, but stepped on a patch of ice and would have landed down hard if she hadn't remembered just in time that her element was ice. Instead, she ended up encasing her legs in ice until she could regain her balance.

"Cool trick," Kenna said.

"Thanks. Now melt it." She motioned to the icy patches that covered the remaining block to the school, and the redhead sighed. Steam rose from the cement as the patches melted.

"It feels good to use these powers without having to be in Mew form," she said as she twitched her fingers, heating the next stretch of walk. "Feels right, almost."

"Feels better not falling."

As they walked into the school, waiting in the main hallway for the bell to ring, joviality was forgotten. It was obvious others felt the shift in the air.

"Something's coming," Evadne said as they met up with her. "I can feel it."

"Everyone can," Angelique's voice came whispery, as though she was much too tired. "I was up all night because of the feeling in the back of my brain. It was a new moon."

"Isn't it full moons that are supposed to drive people crazy?"

Angelique shrugged.

~*~

The teacher twitched all through homeroom, and as the day went on the five became tenser and tenser.

"I wish they'd just do something already," they would mutter to themselves in anger.

It was the waiting game.

And they hated it.

"Finally, finally, it feels like they're ready to do something, and nothing!" Kenna shrieked.

For once Evadne had nothing to say in contradiction.

"Wait, okay? Just wait," Eira soothed her bristling friend, whose words were slowly becoming thicker with a Scottish brogue.

"I'm done with waiting! I hate it! I'm fire! I burn and burn and keep going until I've fizzled out completely! I don't wait for things to happen! I make things happen!" She clenched her hands to keep flames from bursting forth. Her eyes averted in anger. "I hate this."

Silvana placed a hand on her shoulder. "S'all right. We'll live. We've survived everything else. A little waiting never killed anybody." She offered a smile. "Except when they waited so long they keeled over and died from starvation, lack of sleep, and old age." Kenna almost cracked a smile, but couldn't find it in her.

"Something's coming. For sanity's sake, it had better come soon."

Four heads turned to whispery-voiced Angelique, who managed to look wise despite the knots in her hair and bags under her eyes.

"What sanity?"

~*~

"Are you sure about this?"

"…Yes."

"You don't sound sure."

Silence passed. The second speaker did not answer the first.

"Fine. Don't answer me."

Yet again there was no answer but for an aggravated glance thrown his way by the silent companion.

"This is one of the moment in which I feel as though I hate you extremely."

"…Is that so?"

The speaker looked at his hands, and sighed, nodding almost imperceptibly. And then he began shaking his head, saying, "No, not you. I don't hate you. I just…I really hate this fighting. Why are we fighting?"

"To save our home." Emotion, wry humor, passed briefly over his face as he then said, "Ironic, isn't it, that that is the same reason for which the Mews are fighting?"

"Yeah…cruel irony."

~*~

Evening had come and yet the "something" still hadn't. Frigid chill permeated the air, and the café had been more packed than ever, full with people escaping the cold winter air.

Something was blowing in like a summer storm, or like the blizzards that followed the wind and struck the people unawares. Unfortunately, though, everyone in the city was aware that something was coming on that day, and yet nothing had come.

"Closing time," Eira stated as she walked into the kitchen where Silvana was washing dishes and Angelique was cleaning off the countertops. The door was standing wide open so that they had contact with the other two, who were throwing insults back and forth as they cleaned the tables and put up the chairs.

"Why haven't they struck?" Angelique, whisper-voiced still though it had been a full day, asked. She gazed out the window onto the busy street.

"The moon won't be full for a while yet," Silvana said flippantly as she washed the dishes, and the others stopped their work to look at her, wondering why she was mentioning this. "The plants have all died. It's so very cold, everything is frozen. Do you know what this means?" She turned around to face them with her green eyes calm and face emotionless.

Shaken heads and a chorus of four variants of "No" met her. She leaned back into the counter, arms crossed, eyes gazing above their heads and out the window, looking for all the world as though she didn't have a single care in it.

"It means that the only one of us with much power is Eira. Without a full or even partially full moon, Angelique is practically powerless, as we've seen today." She motioned to whisper-voiced, haggard Angelique, who didn't look putout, but did look vaguely accepting. "The plants are dead or hibernating because of the winter, but for the evergreens, but we don't have many of those around here. My power comes from the plants, so where's my power when they're all dead? And Kenna's power comes from the heat, the sun, warmth. That trick she did this morning with melting the ice was cute, but not powerful or stupendous or anything. And Evadne needs water, but the water is frozen into ice. Therefore Eira, who thrives in ice and snow, is the only one with power."

"Yeah, and…?" Kenna goaded, trying to get her to continue on and get to the point.

"When night comes, it'll be colder. Kenna, you might not even have power enough to melt ice. They're waiting for night to fall. The perfect night. The night when all of us will be powerless. One alone isn't enough to stop whatever they've planned. We're done for."

"What about Amatista and Azul?" Evadne asked. "They don't get their power from any outside sources."

"Yeah, but Amatista still can't remember half of her life, and Azul doesn't want to get caught up in the fight again, remember?" Eira reminded them. "I doubt they'll be much help."

"So we're on our own?"

"Looks that way."

They turned to Silvana: Fearless Leader, the Silvana she was in times of crisis. At the moment, there was a crisis.

Silvana was silent staring out the window. And then suddenly she was animated. "We need a plan."

So work was finished and plans were made, and just as they locked up the café, the summer storm or winter blizzard blew in.

"Hello, Mews."

The Cyniclons had arrived.

And they brought the devil's army with them.