'That's an outrage! A travesty!' said Nicola. She thought for a few seconds. 'Although, I guess we are guilty of all those things.'
'But we should have a chance to defend ourselves!' said Greta. 'How can they have a trial without us even being there?'
'The judge was a hairity,' said Topaz. 'We've all been sentenced to a lifetime in jail. The Security Thugs are under orders to capture us, dead or alive. They're on their way here with Enrico. We've got twenty-four hours at the most. And the worst part is, they'll all be armed with Despair Gas.'
'What's Despair Gas?' asked Katie.
'It's terrible, terrible stuff,' said Topaz, which wasn't exactly helpful.
Serena said, 'You know how in the Valley of High Hopes you felt filled with hope? Like you could do anything in the world?'
They all nodded.
>
'Well, Despair Gas has the opposite effect. One whiff of Despair Gas and you feel so miserable you want to lie down and give up. It's like how Topaz felt with her cold but far, far worse.'
'Can't you just wear masks,' asked Sean, 'so you don't breathe it in?'
'It's strong enough to get through any material,' said Joshua.
'Well, we'll just have to be stronger than the Despair Gas,' said Nicola. 'We'll have to be prepared not to give up, no matter how bad we feel!'
'Yes,' said Topaz doubtfully. 'Although -' She stopped herself and smiled with difficulty. 'No, you're absolutely right.'
'Instead of running and hiding from Enrico and the Security Thugs, we should go ahead with our original plan of the protest march,' said Nicola. She could feel determination filling her chest. 'We should meet them head-on! We've got to make use of Enrico's phobias like we said. Let's get back to planning. So we agreed we should all be carrying buttons and wearing yellow -'
'Well, yes, okay, we did say that, but we weren't being practical!' said Topaz irritably. 'There are no buttons or yellow clothes on the whole planet of Shobble.'
There was a moment of tense silence.
'We could dye our clothes yellow,' offered Shimlara.
'Oh, yes, because yellow dye is so readily available here on Shobble,' said Topaz.
'No need to be sarcastic,' said Nicola, surprised.
'Sorry.' Topaz looked guilty. She blew her nose hard and said again, 'Sorry. I'm just frightened this isn't going to work.'
'Well I guess we can't all wear yellow,' said Nicola. 'But we can -'
'Chilli,' Greta interrupted her.
'I beg your pardon?' said Nicola.
'Remember how you meant to pick up a jar of chilli powder from your dad's spice rack and instead you brought turmeric?'
'Yes,' said Nicola, wondering why Greta was choosing now to bring up Nicola's past mistakes.
'Well, just the other day my mother rang up the Stain Brains -'
'Stain Brains?' interrupted Nicola. Was Greta going a bit mad?
'It's a radio show where a panel of experts tell you how to get stains out of your clothes. It's my mother's favourite show. I find it quite interesting too. Anyway, my mother rang up to see how she could get a bright yellow turmeric stain out of her favourite apron. Turmeric is a yellow spice.'
Nicola still didn't get it, until Katie said excitedly, 'So we could add your jar of turmeric to a big vat of boiling water and easily dye all our clothes yellow!'
'Of course!' said Nicola, pretending she'd understood all along. 'Excellent. Well done, Greta. Okay, why don't you and Katie be in charge of dyeing all the clothes yellow.'