Lanie, Rachel, and Melody stood there in horror. Now that Angelina and Ruth had caught them red-handed, their plan seemed a lot more stupid in hindsight.

"You want to tell us why you went poking around down here?" Angelina asked.

Rachel and Melody looked at Lanie, since she was the one who'd instigated the whole thing. Lanie looked Angelina right in the eye and said "We wanted to know."

"Wanted to know what?"

"We wanted to know why. Why you turned all of us boys into girls and put us in your foster home."

Angelina looked between the four girls. "So you disobeyed us," she said. "You told each other that you used to be boys!"

"We weren't going to," said Lanie. "But when Jenny got to our dorm, she was acting really strange. She seemed really insecure and uncomfortable. It reminded me of how I felt when Ruth turned me into a girl and sent me here, and I got suspicious. So me, Rachel, and Melody took Jenny out to Subway and got her to break down."

"And then we broke down, too," Rachel admitted. "Me and Melody-we hadn't suspected there was anyone else at the foster home besides us that used to be a boy. But then Lanie opened our eyes to the truth."

Ruth slapped her thigh. "Now do you see why I've been trying to convince you to make our foster home coed?" she asked. "It was to prevent something like THIS from happening!"

"Silence, Ruth!" Angelina barked. She shook her head at the girls and said "Well, it seems I made a mistake in assigning Jenny to a dorm with someone whose gender transition was still fresh in her mind. But, for your actions, you will still face consequences." She drew a knife and held it to Jenny's throat.

"Wait!" Lanie exclaimed. "Why are you even doing this? Why are you turning boys into girls? And why are you doing that..." She gestured at the notebook Rachel had found, "Potion...thing?"

"Because it is my life's goal to purge the world of its disgusting males," Angelina answered. "All my life, I've hated men and boys. They burp and fart in public, they constantly get in fights, and they disrespect women."

"Girls get in fights too!" said Rachel. "Don't you remember last year, when Amber got in a fight with that girl at school?"

"Males still get in many more fights than females," said Angelina. "And that's not the end of it. They abuse their wives, they cheat on them, and they still expect us to love them. Well, us women will not stand for it any longer. We will turn every male in this world into a female and make them see how bad they really were. Once they do, they'll all realize how much better it is to be female."

"You're crazy!" said Lanie. "There's no way you can go around and turn all three billion men in the world into women!" As she spoke, she slowly edged toward a thick metal spoon sitting on the table.

"I know it will take a long time," said Angelina. "That is why my fellow witches and I are working on more ways to turn unsuspecting men into women. We have several divisions of our Pretty And Pink organization, all of which we use to take in homeless boys and turn them into girls to start new lives. Our next plan is to create a gender-changing potion that looks just like regular water, then start distributing it to people via food, tap water, and other beverages."

"That's a stupid plan!" said Rachel. "What if the police end up figuring out that people's food and drinks were spiked with the potion and trace it back to you?"

"That's why we plan on devising on even more strategies," said Angelina. "But none of you will be there to see them." She started to draw her knife back, ready to stab Jenny.

"Yes we will!" Lanie grabbed the metal spoon, threw it at Angelina, and bull's-eye! The spoon hit Angelina square in the face, making her drop the knife and lose her grip on Jenny. Jenny broke out of Angelina's arms and ran over to Melody.

"Stop right there!" Ruth shouted. She dashed past Angelina and ran at Lanie, Rachel, Melody, and Jenny with her hands ablaze with magic sparkles. She hurled a blue fireball at the girls, forcing them to scatter. When Ruth rounded on Lanie, Lanie made a fist and punched at Ruth. Ruth dodged her strike and waved her hand. Lanie was suddenly frozen in place, unable to move a muscle.

"I almost didn't want to go after you," Ruth said as she readied another fireball. "But Angelina insisted on it. You were her most important target."

What are you talking about? Lanie wanted to scream. But Ruth's freezing spell didn't even let her talk.

"Ruth, no!" Angelina ordered. "Don't kill her!"

Ruth had been getting ready to throw her fireball, but Angelina's order made her falter. Neither of them noticed that Rachel had picked up a knife from the table and was coming up behind Ruth. Right as Ruth was turning to regard Angelina, Rachel thrust the knife forward and stabbed Ruth through the back. Ruth's eyes widened in shock, then rolled up inside her head. Ruth's spell broke as she fell dead onto the floor. Lanie gasped as she found herself able to move again.

"No!" Angelina gasped. "My servant...you miserable girl..."

Rachel looked down at her bloodied knife, like she was only just realizing what she'd done. "I...I..."

"You will die!" Angelina summoned a fireball even bigger than the one Ruth had created and hurled it at Rachel. Rachel stood rooted to the spot, too stunned to react. But Melody saw what was going on and jumped in front of Rachel. Melody's body took the brunt of the fireball, and she burned into a pile of ashes on the floor.

Jenny screamed. "Melody!"

"We've gotta get out of here," said Lanie.

"No," said Angelina. "Your pathetic friends will die, but you, Miss Lanie..." Her expression softened ever so slightly. "You and I have some special business to take care of."

"No, we don't," said Lanie. She, Rachel, and Jenny dashed past Angelina and ran for the stairs.

Angelina grabbed Lanie by the arm as she went by. "You can run," she warned, "But you can't escape me."

"We'll just see about that," said Lanie. She balled her fist and punched Angelina harder than even she would've thought possible. Angelina let go of Lanie's arm and flew backwards into the wall. Angelina crumpled onto the floor like a rag doll.

Lanie didn't know how badly she'd hurt Angelina, but she wasn't gonna stick around and find out. She, Rachel, and Jenny ran up the stairs and back into the office. They burst through the door and ran off down the hall. Right when they were nearing the foster home's front doors, they ran right into Taylor.

"Lanie? Rachel? Jenny?" Taylor asked. "What are you doing?"

Lanie stopped and looked Taylor dead in the eyes. "Trust me, Taylor," she said. "The less you know, the better." Then she turned and ran out the door with Rachel and Jenny.

Taylor stared, bewildered, at her roommates ran down the street. "I am so confused right now," she said to herself.

***

Lanie, Rachel, and Jenny ran through the streets. They ran across crosswalks, avoided pedestrians and honking cars, but they didn't have any particular destination in mind-only away from the Pretty And Pink foster home.

The trio didn't stop to catch their breaths until they'd reached the edge of Nashville. All three of them panted heavily for almost a minute. When she'd regained her breath, Lanie asked "Is...is Angelina following us?"

"No," said Jenny. "I can't believe she's a witch!"

"We can't stop here," said Rachel. "We've got to find somewhere to hide!"

"But where are we gonna go?" Jenny asked.

"I don't know," Lanie answered. "I know we can't go to any of my old friends' houses, and-"

"We should call the police," said Jenny.

"No!" Lanie and Rachel said at the same time.

"Why not?"

"They wouldn't believe us," said Rachel. "Imagine a bunch of teenage girls coming in and telling them that there's a witch hunting them."

"We have to get out of Nashville," said Lanie.

"How? We can't keep walking and running forever!" said Jenny.

Lanie thought for a moment, then had a lightbulb go on over her head. "I have an idea," she said. "There's a train yard just a few blocks away from here. If we can stow away on a freight train, then we can ride somewhere far away from Nashville."

Rachel and Jenny exchanged glances. "Are you sure that's safe?" Jenny asked.

"Of course it is," said Lanie. "I've seen lots of homeless people hitch rides on freight trains. It's how they travel from city to city."

"I guess it's better than taking our chances with Angelina," Rachel mumbled. "Show us where to go, Lanie."

***

The train yard wasn't far from where the girls had stopped-just a ten-minute walk away. The metal wire fence didn't have any rings of barbed wire lining the top, for it was easy for Lanie, Rachel, and Jenny to climb over and start looking around. Much to their relief, there was a freight train just starting to depart the yard. The train was pulled by two locomotives and consisted of three tanker cars and about a dozen boxcars. Toward the back of the train was an empty boxcar with its side doors open.

"Wow, that's convenient," Rachel said when she saw this empty boxcar.

"I know," said Lanie. "Come on!"

The girls all ran after the train as it continued to chug along and pick up speed. Lanie was the first to reach the boxcar's open door and jump up onto the edge. She pulled herself into the boxcar and turned to see Rachel and Jenny coming. "Come on, guys!" Lanie urged.

Rachel put on an extra burst of speed and jumped up into the boxcar. Lanie helped pull Rachel into the boxcar.

"Come on, Jenny!" said Lanie. "You're almost there!"

"I can't do it!" said Jenny. She was running as fast as she could, but the train was picking up speed.

"Yes you can!" Lanie said as she and Rachel reached out their arms for Jenny to grab. Jenny put on an extra burst of speed and reached out for them, too. Soon, Jenny had managed to grab Lanie's and Rachel's hands. The two older girls pulled with all their might and heaved Jenny onto the boxcar's bed.

Now that all three of the girls were safely inside the boxcar, they shared a sigh of relief. "That could've been dangerous," said Rachel.

"I know," said Lanie. "But at least we made it."

"I can't believe we just did that," said Rachel. "I can't believe we just had to escape Pretty And Pink Foster Care."

"Me either," said Lanie.

"And..." Rachel hesitated. "And I can't believe I killed Ruth."

"You killed Ruth?" Jenny asked.

"Yes," Rachel said miserably. "She was threatening Lanie, and I stabbed her in the back."

"You saved my life," said Lanie. "I owe you for that."

"I know," said Rachel. "But still, the fact that I killed someone..."

"I know how you feel," said Lanie. She was hesitant about saying what she was thinking, but it felt like the right time to admit to what she'd been hiding. "Remember how my dad died right before Ruth found me?"

"Yes."

"It was me who killed him."

Rachel looked over at Lanie with shock. "You did?"

"It was in self-defense," Lanie explained. "He was threatening me, and then I kicked him and knocked him off the balcony. I knew my dad was kind of a bad person, but I still felt really horrible that I'd taken away a human being's life."

"But Angelina killed Melody," said Jenny. Her eyes were starting to well up with tears as she remembered the horrible scene in that underground bunker.

"I know," Lanie said, hugging Jenny. "Melody was a great person."

"Yes, she was," Rachel agreed. "She didn't deserve to die."

Lanie looked between Rachel and Jenny. "Guys, I'm very sorry," she said. "I didn't mean to drag you into this."

"You shouldn't be," said Rachel. "It's Angelina who should be sorry."

"Should we go back?" Jenny asked. "Tell the other girls what's really going on?"

"No," Lanie answered. "Showing our faces at that foster home again would be suicide."

"But what Angelina's doing to everyone is terrible!"

"I agree," said Lanie. "But I don't think there's anything we can do about it."

"Not right now, anyway," said Rachel. "I think all we can do is just..."

"What?"

Rachel hesitated, trying to put her thoughts into words. "Keep going," she finally said. "Get away from Nashville. Hope Angelina doesn't find us."

Neither Lanie nor Jenny argued with that. All they could really do now was ride the train and wonder where it would take them.

To be continued...