The nightmares had started a few days after returning home, the knowledge that Elinor wouldn't be able to travel, that she'd be stuck at home for five whole months suddenly crashing down hard around her ears. They would still see Elinor's mother, keeping an eye on her was important now more than ever, but she wouldn't see them. She would look straight through them as though they weren't there, as though they were ghosts from her memory. It had been hard, initially, so hard. Watching as she found her place in her new school, hiding in the crowd of animals when she went out for a coffee, walking carefully behind her when she and Mr. Rabbit went food shopping on Sunday's. She'd started off doing all of these things alone but recently one of the other teachers had started joining her. Elinor, always bright and happy and shining, tossing her perfect black hair over her shoulder, finding any excuse to touch Oliv -Ranger Rabbit's arm. Gazing adoringly up at her, laughing at all of her jokes as though Elinor was the most wonderful person in the universe.

Her parents were oblivious but Ari knew the truth. Elinor was falling for her, and she was worried that she was going the same way.

'It's nothing,' Ari said to Elinor, washing her hands free of the chilli residue on them and tucking an apron around her waist. 'Just bad dreams.'

'You never used to get bad dreams,' Elinor said softly.

Ari shrugged, not able to meet her eyes, worried her face would betray her emotions.

'I've not seen Mars around for a while,' Elinor continued, cautiously, and Ari felt the tears well up as he stirred the pan, keeping her back to her aunt, trying to keep her breathing controlled.

'Oh she's about,' he replied, his voice thick with emotion. 'She's got a lot on at the moment. You know, work and stuff.'

'Funny,' Elinor said, easily seeing through the lie. 'She didn't strike me as the type to have a full-time job.'

'Can we drop it, please?' Ari asked quietly, unsure he'd be able to keep Elinor's emotions in check for much longer. 'She's fine, I'm fine. We're all fine.'

There was silence for moment, broken only by the sizzling of the pan and the steady chop chop chop of Ari's aunt's knife on the chopping board.

'You can talk to me about this stuff, you know,' Ari's aunt said after a moment, a hand on Elinor's shoulder. 'Because I just want you to be happy, Ari. That's all I want. And Ranger Rabbit, mad as she was, made you happy.'

'I will be happy, aunt,' Ari said, allowing himself to be folded into Elinor's embrace. 'It's all a bit confusing at the moment, but it's going to get better.'

'Happiness shouldn't have a start date, Ari,' his aunt whispered gently to him. 'If there's something in your life that's stopping you from being happy now, remove it.'

A cheery hello called from the corridor, Olive back from picking up her cousins, and Ari's aunt squeezed Elinor's hand, carefully wiping away the tears that were dripping silently down Ari's face.

'I'm here for you,' she said, kissing Ari's cheek. 'Always.'

Standing in front of her mirror, Elinor didn't have the first idea what to wear.

She'd never felt comfortable in a dress, she'd always viewed them as being impractical and so many of the damn things didn't have pockets. Her hair was wavy from a shower and she decided to leave it like that rather than trying to style it straight, rummaging through her wardrobe with the water dripping down her neck. She pulled on a pair of skinny jeans and a dark jacket, matching it with a grey top embroidered with stars and scrutinised her reflection.

She hadn't been sure about this date. Sure, her mother was nice and all and they got on really well, but there was a feeling deep inside her telling her that this was wrong. That she shouldn't be doing this, that going on a date was a stupid thing to do.

She almost, although she knew it was impossible given the fact that she was painfully single, felt as though she was cheating on the nameless and faceless lover from her dreams, the one that held in the night and kissed her and made her feel so safe and so loved.

'I deserve to be happy,' Elinor told herself, firmly, fixing her rabbit ears and checking she had her purse and keys in her handbag.

She bent to pick up a scarf from the floor and that ridiculous fob watch she'd found in a box under her bed tipped out of her bag, landing on the carpeted floor.

'How did you get in there?' she mumbled, picking it up and holding it in her hands. It was warm and the shape of it was reassuring, although she had no idea where she'd picked it up from or even if it was hers. She made to toss it back onto the bed but found herself putting it back in her handbag instead, forgetting it was there almost immediately.

As she closed and locked her front door, making her way down the steps to the main road, she couldn't shake the feeling that the campout tonight would only end in heartbreak.

'Did they see you?'

She was anxious, frightened and terrified, more so than they'd ever seen her, practically throwing her friends back into Ari's house as the ship spun widely into the time vortex, her fingers gripping the controls so tightly her hands turned white.

'I don't think so, mom,' Elinor said, sharing a concerned look with the others. 'Why? Who are they?'

'Bad news,' Ranger Rabbit replied, her hands trembling, her eyes wide. 'They're bad news. But you're sure? You have to be sure they didn't see you.'

'They didn't,' Olive said. 'They couldn't have done, we weren't close enough. I don't even know who you're on about.'

'I didn't see them either,' Ari said, his heart pounding as Ranger Rabbit started rummaging through the storage boxes at the bottom of Ari's PS5 console, flinging things out until the floor was littered in bits of electrical equipment and an assortment of random, jumbled objects.

When she came back up again, there was a piece of twisted metal in her hands, almost like a crown, and she looked up at them with eyes so full of sorrow that Ari just knew that whatever was coming next wasn't going to be good.

'I need your help with something,' Ranger Rabbit said. 'Something big. Because I'm in trouble, big trouble. And whatever happens next, whatever happens to me, I need you to promise me something. I know I say it all the time and completely contradict myself almost immediately but in this instance I mean it, I really do.'

'What?' Elinor asked, panic on her face.

Ranger Rabbit looked at the three of them individually, taking in the expression on their faces before finally settling on Yaz.

'You do not interfere.'