It's not worth doing something unless someone, somewhere, would much rather you weren't doing it. -- Terry Pratchett

Caledon, Northern Ireland, 20--

It crouched in the corner, staring up at her with its many eyes. Her hand shook as she held the container over it. Slowly she lowered the container, trying to catch it safely. It scurried away, its many legs carrying it to the corner immediately beside her.

Dani O'Shannon screamed and leapt back. The spider crawled to another part of the shower base. If she didn't know better she would have sworn it was shaking with laughter.

She sat back, staring at the spider. The spider stared back. Dani slowly raised the plastic container she was using as an improvised spider trap. (It had previously been a yoghurt carton, and some yoghurt still remained in it.) The spider sped away. Apparently it didn't care for the leftovers of strawberry shortcake-flavoured desserts.

"Damn it!" Dani shouted. She immediately clapped her hand over her mouth and looked around guiltily. If the children had heard that... "Listen, spider. I want you out of my shower. I'm sure you want out of the shower too. So cooperate, please!"

She reached out, holding the yoghurt carton over the spider. It remained in place, gazing at her through more eyes than any living creature should ever have. Dani clapped the carton down on top of it before it could run away again.

"Finally!"

~~~~

When Dani came in from setting the spider free in the garden, she heard a series of shuffling thumps overhead. They began in the room above the kitchen, thudded down the landing, and went into the bathroom.

She knew what that meant.

The children were waking up.

~~~~

How did Dani -- Dani who was barely over twenty, Dani who could scarcely make ends meet, Dani whose only goal in life was to be an author -- end up taking care of twelve children almost all piled into one six bedroom house? A house she could barely afford, no less?

Good question.

Dani would dearly love to know the answer.

It began just over three years ago. Dani had been living in Omagh, attending tech and working in a café. An old friend had dropped by one day with a small, shivering child clinging to her hand.

"Hello, Dani!" Celeste Morgan had said cheerfully. "Would you mind taking care of my son Kevin for me? I've some important business to attend to and I can't bring him with me."

Dani had stared blankly. This was the first she'd heard of her former schoolmate having a child. But she said yes. It was only for a few days, after all.

Or so she thought. Celeste might as well have walked off the face of the earth when she walked out Dani's door that morning. No one had been able to find any trace of her. No one had been able to find any of her relatives. And so Dani had found herself taking care of Kevin ever since.

Child number two arrived only months later. Again, an old acquaintance was responsible.

"Excuse me, Dani," Dr. Akiko Tsukiyama had said. At her side was a girl of maybe eight, looking around Dani's living room with interest. Dani took one look at the child and thought, Oh no. Here we go again. "Could you watch my niece for a few days? Her parents are divorcing and they sent Hotaru to stay with me. But I have so many important cases that I haven't enough time to look after a child. Especially one as... unique as Hotaru."

And that was how Hotaru Asumi became a part-time resident. At least she didn't live in Dani's house; she stayed with her aunt or with her mother, and Dani had only to look after her when neither of them could.

By far the most mysterious child was little Máximo Córtes. Dani opened the door one morning to find a toddler wailing on her doorstep and babbling in Spanish. His name was the only information anyone could get from him.

When he arrived, Dani began to have a niggling feeling that someone was playing a joke on her. Why else would Dani -- asexual, aromantic Dani, who had realised years ago she would never have children unless she adopted them or paid a small fortune for IVF -- why else would she find herself looking after an ever-increasing number of children?

She was hardly surprised when the next two children arrived together. She was surprised by the way they arrived. Amy Marbeth and Jack Hawdon literally appeared in her living room one evening while Dani, Kevin and Máximo watched a film.

"We need somewhere to stay," Amy said, her arm around her... friend? Cousin? Brother? "We heard you take in people who are... odd."

Dani noticed the unnaturally-sharp teeth visible in both of their mouths. She thought of Kevin, who was at the very least half-werewolf, and Máximo, who could walk through walls, and Hotaru, who literally glowed when happy. She thought of herself, who as a teenager had looked a Vampire in the eyes and survived.

"I suppose you'll fit right in," she said.

Rosie Crogan was the next child to arrive. She was also the most obviously inhuman. It was hard to see anyone as human when they were glowing white and semi-transparent. Dani didn't know where the ghost had come from. She wasn't sure she wanted to know.

At least this one won't need a bed, she told herself when she was tempted to shout obscenities at whoever was responsible for this. There's barely room for another bed in any of the rooms, unless I buy bunk-beds. And I haven't the money for any more furniture.

Almost a year passed between Rosie's appearance and the next child's arrival. Dani had begun to hope that Rosie was the last one. Then Amy came home one day with not one, not two, not even three, but four small children following her like ducklings.

Dani gave them juice and cookies, then went out to the garage and shouted every swear-word she knew.

Cathy McKee, Harriett Maynard, Imogene Turner and Noah Bartley were all polite, well-mannered children. The fact that Harriett could fly, Cathy could set things on fire by touching them, Imogene could become invisible and Noah could turn into a cat was entirely beside the point.

The last two children arrived weeks later and a minute apart. First Elias Patton crashed through the dining room window, covered in flames. Then his sister Julie jumped through the hole in the window, surrounded by a ball of water.

Dani stared at them over the charred and soaked remains of the pizza she had ordered for dinner. Her gaze turned to the window, which was beyond hope of repair, and the carpet, which was burnt and covered with puddles. The children sitting around the table stared at the new arrivals with wide eyes.

"I hope you have a good reason for destroying my home," Dani said wearily.

"We're being hunted," the boy said, wrapping his arms around himself and staring up at her through wide eyes. "The lady said you'd keep us safe?"

Lady? Dani thought. What lady? Is this lady the person who's sent all these children to me?

"Who's hunting you?" she asked.

"Our stepfather," the girl said. "He hates us."

This sounded suspiciously like something out of a fairy-tale. Dani was inclined to be sceptical. But then she remembered these children's powers, and it no longer sounded implausible.

And that was how Dani became a sort of aunt and older sister combined to twelve children. All her attempts to find their parents or relatives had failed. With the exceptions of Hotaru and Kevin, she hadn't a clue who their relatives were. The children themselves never answered her questions on the subject. There was no way to deny it: eleven children had taken up permanent residence in her house, and she hadn't a clue how or why.

"You could always give them up for adoption," her friend Sophie said one day.

"I've thought of that," Dani said. "But more than half of them aren't human at all. How could adoptive parents cope with them?"

Months passed. No more children appeared. No one came to claim the children already staying with her. Dani got used to the constant noise and chaos of a large and rowdy "family". Some days she didn't mind this strange state of affairs at all.

And then there were the days when living with eleven children was like living in an insane asylum.

This was shaping up to be one of those days.

~~~~

No sooner had the bathroom door closed than an almighty wail rose to the heavens. Dani had begun to pour out a bowl of cereal. Upon hearing this, she dropped the cereal box and raced up the stairs. It wasn't as bad as she feared. Máximo sat on the floor outside the bathroom door, screaming at the top of his lungs and beating his fists against the door.

"Be quiet, Max!" Amy's voice came from inside the bathroom. "You can go downstairs!"

"Need to go now!" Max shouted at the high, distressed pitch that could be reached only by unhappy small children.

It was impossible to tell exactly how old Max was, but Dani guessed he was around five or six. His behaviour at times made her wonder if she'd overestimated his age. She seemed to remember having grown out of the "scream when things don't go my way" stage when she was four. But then maybe she was unusual. And besides, Max was only half-human at most. 

Speaking of which...

Max stopped wailing and leant against the door. His body began to slip through it as if the door was made of mist.

"Oh no, you don't," Dani said, scooping him up and carrying him downstairs before he could get through it. "How many times do I have to tell you? Never walk through a closed bathroom door! Especially when someone's in the bathroom!"

Max sulked all the way to the downstairs bathroom.

"Go in there, then go up and get changed," Dani said, pushing him through the doorway. "Your cereal will be ready by then."

She went back into the kitchen and picked up the cereal box. It had fallen on its side, and corn flakes spilled out onto the floor. Dani sighed and went to fetch the dustpan.

When she returned, Cathy had appeared. The girl sat at the table and pored over her Maths homework, gloves firmly in place.

"Morning," she mumbled, not looking up from her sums.

"Good morning," Dani said, kneeling down to brush up the cereal.

A thud-thud-thud noise on the stairs heralded the arrival of another child. Two of them, actually. Elias and Julie staggered into the kitchen looking like the living dead.

"Morning," they said in unison.

From then on there was a constant stream of children wandering in. Peace and quiet disappeared. Dani tried to hand out bowls of cereal, stop anyone spilling the milk, prepare packed lunches, and generally try not to lose her mind in the chaos of preparing eleven children for school -- high school, primary school or nursery; whichever the case may be.

Finally everyone had their breakfast, everyone had their uniforms on and their schoolbags and lunchboxes in hand, and everyone climbed into Sennacherib.

Sennacherib was an old van that had once belonged to Dani's uncle. For reasons known only to himself he had left it to her in his will. She had been all of fourteen when he died, so for three years she had loaned Sennacherib to her friends, Colonel and Mrs. Brown. They were the ones who had named it. The reason for its name was still a mystery to Dani. But now she had so many children to ferry to and from school, Sennacherib was a blessing no matter how odd its name.

As soon as the children were safely at school, Dani drove home and sat down at her typewriter. Her friends wondered why she didn't write on a computer. The answer was simply that there were far fewer distractions when she used a typewriter.

It was widely believed until the eighteenth century that ghosts were incapable of magic and no longer remembered who they once were, Dani typed. However, a case involving a murdered witch who returned to get revenge on her murderer proved this theory wrong. Note that this applies only to ghosts of witches. There is considerably less information on whether the ghosts of humans are in a similar situation. And there is no information whatsoever on whether the same applies to ghosts of Vampires or Werewolves. Indeed, there is presently no evidence to suggest Vampires or Werewolves can become ghosts. Some might say that this is proof these species do not have souls. This theory is flawed because--

The phone rang, cutting Dani off in the middle of her sentence.

"Damn it!" she muttered aloud. "Couldn't whoever is it have called later?"

She got up and went to answer the phone.

"Good morning," said an official-sounding voice on the other end of the line. "Is this the residence of Danielle O'Shannon?"

Dani's eyebrows flew up. Very few people used her full name, and she was sure that none of them were phoning her. "Yes, I'm Danielle."

"This is Inspector Sharpe from Enniskillen Police Station."

Dani's eyebrows tried to crawl into her hairline. Why would the police be calling her? Especially the police in Enniskillen? Had they found information on one of the children's relatives?

"Will you please come to your local police station? We would like a few words with you."

A cold sense of dread formed in Dani's chest. Why did the police want to speak to her? Did they think she'd kidnapped some of the children? She looked at the clock. The children would still be in school for another four hours. "I'll be there in ten minutes."

~~~~

Caledon Police Station was a small building, with only two officers. There was no need for any more; there wasn't enough crime in the village to require a larger police force. Dani parked Sennacherib on the pavement outside and went in, wondering what this was all about.

"Miss O'Shannon?" the reception said. "The Inspector is waiting for you. Follow me, please."

Curiouser and curiouser, Dani thought, feeling rather like she'd fallen down a rabbit-hole. What is this all about?

~~~~

Inspector Sharpe was a tall, middle-aged woman with dark hair and sharp grey eyes. She sat behind a table in the room Dani was shown into.

"Miss O'Shannon," she said pleasantly. "Nice to meet you. Do sit down."

Dani sat down, and tried to shake the feeling of being accused of a crime she hadn't committed. She didn't even know why she was here yet!

"Do you know Miss Courtney Brooks?" the Inspector asked.

That name rang a bell. Dani searched her memory for where she might have heard it before. "I think a girl at my school had that name."

The Inspector nodded as if she'd already known this. "Were you and Miss Brooks close?"

Dani shook her head. "She's several years older than me. I don't think I ever spoke to her."

"Hmm." The Inspector pursed her lips. "Miss O'Shannon, we've called you here today because Miss Brooks was murdered yesterday. Her body was found in her house. She held a piece of paper with your name and phone number. Can you explain why?"

The room seemed to spin around her.