9.4 It ain’t over til it’s over

While the Kyoti household was busy dealing with Donnie’s death, Nicola was busy getting what she wanted (as usual).  Several residents of Sunset Valley were already in fear of the serial heartbreaker, and now they would tremble in the presence of Nicola Kyoti, their new Emperor of Evil.

She got home and celebrated with the beverage of choice for all Emperors of Evil, a chai latte with extra sprinkles.  She sat and thought about how wonderful it would be when her little brother Jono became a master thief, and together they could keep the town in their thrall.

In honour of her sister’s achievement, Joanna Kyoti painted a celebratory picture.  Their sister Gemma had long suspected Nicola was an evil alien replicant, and Joanna thought that maybe there really was something in that theory, after all.

As for Gemma, she took some time away from the rest of the family to think about her life and where she was going.  She had always wanted to marry a rich man and live off his money for ever, but now she had her wish… and her husband was gone.  What she was about to discover, though, was that Donnie hadn’t left her on her own…

…for she was going to have a baby.

Discovering she was going to have Donnie’s child made Gemma sad – she had grown fond of her late husband, and although they weren’t the world’s most pasisonate couple, they’d been beginning to find they had more in common than they’d first thought… and now he was gone, and he would never know his child.

Rae was determined to help her daughter get through this pregnancy successfully.  She was sad Michael wasn’t here to witness his grandchild being born, but she was determined she would be.  She might have been over 100, but she had no desire to give up on life.  She spent lots of time cooking for Gemma and advising her on the best medical care.  She told Gemma the sex of the baby so she could prepare by buying clothes.

Gemma took her mother’s medical advice on board – after all the woman was a top surgeon who’d given birth to six children, so she knew her stuff – and made good use of the spa.  She read the Valley’s premier maternity tome, Totally Preggers…

…and she ate lots of fresh fruit.

To celebrate, Rae made some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for Gemma when she came back from the spa, and she invited her youngest son, Alfie Win, over to share them.

Joanna greeted her little brother and warned him to expect to see a change in Nicola when he got in…

… for Nicola had that familiar glow… and not from eating her Ready Brek.

When Alfie Win saw his big sister, he ran screaming away from her across to the other side of the house.  It was true!  She really was an evil alien replicant, and she was out to get him!

Trembling, he broke down in front of his mother, telling her how scared he was.

Rae gave him a big comforting hug and she smiled wryly.  She was used to the eccentricities of her six children by now, although she didn’t really understand them.

No matter how old the ninth generation got, some things never changed, and despite there being a range of easels to paint on, Joanna and Nicola decided to get into an argument about the one near the window.

Whilst all the commotion was going on in the art room, Gemma tucked into some sandwiches and smiled.  She wouldn’t be alone in raising her child – as crazy and messed up as they were, she’d have a big family around her.

One member of the household was missing all the antics, and that was Jono – who finally achieved his heart’s desire of becoming a Master Thief.

Despite not being an heir himself, he demanded his fox statue was given pride of place in the heirs’ bedroom to go with the one earned by his ancestor Joseph.  The new head of the household reluctantly obliged…

…because no evil plot was going to detract her from her true purpose in life: to look after the child growing inside her.  She knew her labour would run smoothly…

…after all, she’d washed her hands three times that morning to make sure.

Full of a sense of purpose she’d never known before, the ninth generation heir, Gemma Kyoti strode into the hospital…

…and left with her head held high, carrying the tenth generation and the realisation of Lianndra Kyoti’s dream.

9.3 Garden State

The Kyoti family were spending a lot of time in their garden of late.  Joanna had taken on the role of caring of the money trees.

Rae was enjoying working shorter hours, and spent a lot of time playing chess or chatting to her many friends on the computer.

Nicola was celebrating getting to level nine of the Criminal career by cooking up a big pile of hot dogs.

And Jono was taking a new approach to the idea of sucking up to the boss… by asking her to become his girlfriend.  It clearly worked, though, as on that evening’s shift, he was also promoted to level nine.

Love was clearly in the air.  Gemma and Donnie were engaging in some bathroom romancing at long last.  They had begun to start to spend more time together and were discovering that they genuinely did like one another.  Neither would day theirs was a grand passion, but it was beginning to feel more like a loving companionship.

Eventually, Gemma was able to lure him back into the heirs’ bedroom to finally consumate their union…

…and this time she succeeded.

Buoyed up by love and inspired by the rest of the family’s enjoyment of the garden, Donnie decided to go for a swim.  He wasn’t a strong swimmer, and was feeling a bit peckish, but he’d heard you should never swim on a full stomach.

He got so carried away that he swam for hours, finding that the cool water helped him organise his thoughts.  He now understood why his brother-in-law, Jono, spent so much time swimming.  Donnie swam and swam, well into the night.

By now, it had been a long time since Donnie had eaten anything, and he was feeling faint.  He started to try to get out of the pool, but he was in very deep, and found himself weakened from hunger and trapped by his heavy clothes.

Donnie Kyoti reached out for help… but instead, the water took him under.

Joanna heard a splash and came out to see what was going on – only to find an old familiar figure by the poolside.

Donnie pleaded with the Grim Reaper to spare him, but Grimmy was having none of it.  Joanna screamed for her sister to come, quickly.

Gemma stopped still in her tracks at the sight of her husband’s ghost.  What had happened?  She felt a weird mix of  emotions: a sense of freedom mixed with shock, a sense of fulfilment mixed with sadness.  But most of all, Gemma Kyoti just felt sick.

The Grim Reaper looked at the young widow.  He’d taken her husband and that had satisfied him greatly, but as he watched her, for a split second he was almost moved, especially as he could see what she had to face now.  Just for her, for the time being, he decided to leave this family in peace.

9.2 Just an inbetweener

All Alfie Win Kyoti wanted for his birthday was a party that didn’t go wrong.

Unfortunately the influence of his big sister Gemma and big brother Seth had rubbed off on him, and he grew up with the same neuroses they had about Nicola and Jono…

He was ready to leave home and escape from his evil siblings, but before he did that he needed Joanna to paint his portrait.  He made very sure they weren’t lurking, waiting to scare him… and then he did what he needed to before striking out and moving on.

Joanna felt honoured to be painting her little brother’s portait.  She knew her dad would have wanted to do it and she felt she was carrying on a little piece of his legacy by making sure Alfie Win’s face joined the rest of the family portraits in the heirs’ bedroom.

Alfie Win probably got out at a good moment, as both Nicola and Jono were continuing to rise fast up the ranks of the criminal underclass…

…although Nicola found the animal ear disguise more ‘disturbing’ than ‘evil’.

She also took up art as a hobby.  Most of her paintings had the familiar red glow the family’s other evil painters had used, but occasionally she painted things that harked back to her heartbreaker days.

Joanna was still plugging away at the police work, and her cunning chef disguise finally fooled someone into agreeing to be interviewed by her.

As for newlywed Gemma and Donnie, they slept in the same bed… but beyond that they didn’t communicate a great deal.  Gemma was simply secure in the knowledge she was now comfortably off for life.

Rae was so pleased that one of her six children had finally married, and she told Gemma so.  Gemma received her mother’s affection, but her mind was firmly fixed on one thing… and it wasn’t how attractive she found her new husband.

She thought she really ought to make more of an effort with her marriage, though, and so she took Donnie into the heirs’ bedroom to finally consummate their marriage.  She hoped the luck of the room would rub off on both of them and that maybe she could conceive the child she needed to become the new heir.

But tonight wasn’t to be their night.  Maybe Gemma’s theory about their marriage being doomed had some substance to it…

9.1 (S)He’s just not that into you

After taking Michael Kyoti, the Grim Reaper wandered upstairs and started chatting to Joanna and Nicola about his relationship with the family and how much he was going to enjoy reaping souls at their parties, and he looked forward to seeeing a lot more of whichever Kyoti triplet became the heir in the future.  It was the first time the girls had ever really considered the whole heirdom issue.  They’d known for a while that one of the three of them would have that responsibility in the end, but none of them had ever really thought much about whom it might end up being.

Joanna decided to take her responsibility to the family seriously and went out looking for potential mates.  She didn’t have a great deal of success.  The neighbour across the road threatened to punch her…

…and her friend-seeking mission to the park was hindered by her unique choice of spot to play in.

Nicola, meanwhile, had had her fair share of loving, and whilst the idea of being head of the household was tantalising, there was one small problem – she couldn’t imagine the Emperor of Evil (which she was hoping to become) walking around covered in baby sick.

Their sister Gemma seemed a more likely target, but since her last boyfriend had died, she hadn’t had much chance of romance either.  The girls’ mother, Rae, decided to do something to help Gemma.  Now she had reached the top of the medical  profession she would have more time on her hands and she needed something to do to take away the pain of losing her beloved Michael.  She had met a guy a while ago whom she thought might be Gemma’s type.  He was rich, single, and, um, “quirky”.

Donnie Sawyer had a strange habit of talking to himself when he thought no-one was looking (and sometimes even when he knew they were).  He was somewhat unconventional, but he was harmless enough.

Rae invited Donnie round and made herself scarce whilst he and Gemma tried to bond over juice.  They talked about their interests and their fears.  Donnie was obsessed with the evil bunnies that lurked in the bushes waiting to eat you.  Gemma wasn’t impressed.  She  may have had her neuroses, but this guy was a total fruitloop.

Whenever Donnie came to visit, he would inevitably end up playing the guitar and dreaming of becoming a rock star…

…whilst Gemma was getting into novel writing.  Her latest work, ‘Gemma Quest’ was going very well indeed.

Eventually they found themselves in the bathroom-home of all flirting and romance-at the same time as each other, but Donnie spoiled the mood by having a little accident.

Fed up of their inability to connect, Rae asked Donnie to move in with the family, hoping that eventually he and Gemma would pair off.  Donnie began working towards his dream of being a rock star by getting a job in the music industry.  It was the first job he’d ever had – he was rich and a bit of a couch potato and hadn’t really ever motivated himself before.

Learning that Donnie was a couch potato like her intrigued Gemma and she wondered if maybe they had more in common than she’d first thought.  And of course, he was rich, which was a good thing – all she had wanted was to live off a rich man rather than getting a job, and that was becoming a pressing need.  Since Michael passed on, things were a little troubled in terms of the Kyoti household finances.

They’d been so busy grieving that they missed a bill payment and had their lamp repossessed.

And young Alfie Win became the first Kyoti teenager in a long time to take on a part-time job to help out, although he didn’t exactly enjoy working at the spa too much.

He did like Donnie, though, as did Joanna.  Gemma looked at the way Donnie got on with her siblings (and was hated by the evil alien replicants Jono and Nicola) and she started to think more about whether he was a serious marriage prospect.

Some more bathroom flirting ensued…

…and eventually they shared their first kiss.

Seizing the moment, Gemma decided to propose to Donnie.

Donnie refused.

Gemma stormed off, unimpressed.  This guy was behaving like a bit of a jerk.  She had been beginning to find him somewhat attractive, and the feeling was reciprocated, but there was something holding him back – and if she was honest, something was holding her back, too.

Over breakfast the next morning she contemplated what to do – should she really marry a man where there was no particular ‘spark’ between them?  But as Alfie Win chatted about longing for another new car, she realised having ‘the spark’ wasn’t what really mattered.  Donnie was a bit annoying, but he wasn’t a bad man, and there were even some things about him she liked – he could watch TV with her, and he was pretty good on a guitar.  They could be friends, they may even become really close over time.  And he was rich, which was the most important thing.

She proposed yet again, and this time he accepted.  They set the wedding for the next day and booked the park across the street.

The day didn’t get off to a flying start when the family got word that Harry Kyoti had died, but hey, death becomes a Kyoti party, so the show must go on.

Gemma carrying a half mixed bowl of waffle batter to the ceremony wasn’t a fabulous omen, mind you.

When the lovebirds arrived, they discovered their guests dispersed all over the large park.  The guests seemed more interested in chatting to each other than in celebrating the marriage.  Some guy calling himself “The Ninth Doctor” kept hanging around and shouting randomly in the background.  It all felt rather less than romantic.

Still, the couple started to hold hands and as they looked into each other’s eyes, they prepared to make their vows (even if Gemma’s brother Seth was looking away from them).

But, of course, Gemma’s mobile phone went off at the opportune moment with a fabulous opportunity to mend a friend’s stereo which she couldn’t resist.

They were ready to start again, but Gemma got hungry and demanded Jono whip the batter for the waffles for her before she proceeded.

Jono then had to go to work, and Rae was left holding the waffle pan ready to take home to cook.  In the meantime, all the guests left, bemused that they hadn’t actually witnessed any nuptials.

Gemma and Donnie decided to use their his’n’hers moodlet managers to get themselves back in the mood whilst Rae went home to cook the celebratory waffles.

As night fell, Gemma and Donnie had their own private wedding under the stars… and came home to the news that Gemma’s aunt Emma Mabel had died just after leaving the ‘ceremony’.  Gemma started to panic… were the fates against this marriage?

8.12 Song for my Father

Joanna Kyoti was panicking.  What was her father doing, just leaping into the fire like that?  He was an old man, surely he couldn’t withstand that kind of danger.  She screamed at Michael to be careful.

Michael reached for the fire extinguisher and set it off.  It produced a huge burst of water, much more substantial than anything the firefighters had been able to get from their own extinguishers.

Michael Kyoti was not going to let anything get in the way of his family’s happiness, and he was so angry at the fire for ruining his little boy’s birthday.  The fire would not win.

Unsinged, unscathed, Micahel stood triumphant – one elderly man had been able to do much, much more than Sunset Valley’s “finest”.

He celebrated by trying on that weird mask toy thing Nicola was always going on about.

And he and wife Rae slept soundly that night, holding on to each other, so grateful they had more time together.  Either would be heartbroken without the other, they’d been a pair for so long, and had been through so much together.

The next day his good luck carried on, and he was finally promoted to the top of the business career, meaning that a member of the family had now gotten to the top level of every full-time career in the Valley.  It was a proud, proud time to be Michael Kyoti.

He was even prouder to be able to finally celebrate his youngest child’s birthday.  Alfie Win was terrified of the cake but his daddy promised it would be OK, and the little boy, trembling, blew out the candles.

He grew up to be rather cute…

…but the birthday party fire had terrified him so much he’d developed a cowardly streak.

Downstairs, his Uncle Wesley celebrated.  He had had a blast seeing his little nephew grow up.  Little did the family know this would be the last time they ever saw him.

Jono Kyoti was promoted to being a ‘Bagman’ in the criminal career.  Slowly, but surely, he was working his way up the ranks of the underworld.

However, his attempts weren’t helped by the fact that when he went across the road to talk to his boss CeCe, she was at a very busy party – it was clearly the place to be seen, as his aunt Emma Mabel was there, and she was always at the popular places.

He gave up on the party and came home to perfect his ‘Roland’ sprinkler dance.

Nicola wasn’t having her brother behaving in such a manner, though, and soon hauled him up to the cops’n’robbers room for some athletic training and evil scheming.

She was already getting promoted much faster than Jono, and was now rising up the Evil branch of the Criminal career.  She wasn’t keen on her little brother and partner in evil being left behind when they had a city to take over.

Despite living with two wanted criminals, Joanna was loving being in the police force.  Rae couldn’t believe how relaxed her daughter was these days – a far cry from the Joanna of old.

However, there was one of the Kyotis who wasn’t enjoying life much at the moment.

Gemma’s boyfriend Joel had died of old age before she was able to marry him.  They hadn’t been as close in recent days, with him often not being able to come over and visit, or else coming for a party and rushing off.  Rae tried her best to comfort her daughter.

Gemma had a lot of thinking to do.  She still didn’t want to have to find a job – but where would she find a nice rich man to marry and live off now?  What if her having no money meant her whole family suffered?  What if they couldn’t pay the bills anymore?

Rae pondered Gemma’s situation.  It wasn’t good for the girl to be alone, and seeing as she was set on marrying a rich man, the least Rae could do was help her out.  She thought about all the Valley residents she knew and tried to remember which ones were rich, were single, and most importantly, were good enough for her girl.  Someone sprang to mind, and she was about to call him, when she heard a strange noise from downstairs.

Michael Kyoti was midway through a painting when he felt woozy and he heard an old, familiar, tingling sound.

He was sad to be leaving his children, particularly his youngest boy, whom he hadn’t seen grow up to be an adult yet.  He was sad to be leaving his family’s legacy unsure, with none of his daughters yet having a child.  But most of all, he was sad to be leaving his beloved wife Rae.

At 93 years old, Michael Kyoti, loving husband and brother, father-of-six and the eighth generation heir, was taken, without knowing which, if any, of his children would bring Lianndra Kyoti’s ten generation dream to fulfillment…

8.11 Take it like a man

Michael Kyoti loved his six children.  Although they were often challenging and sometimes difficult to understand, he did have a real affection for them all.  He was really excited because all three of his sons were about to grow up.  He cradled baby Alfie Win, wondering if he would ever cradle a newborn again, and grateful he’d got to experience childrearing so many times.

Jono Kyoti was the first to age up.

He made a big show of deliberating over what he wanted to become in life… but really he’d known for some time…

…he wanted to be a Master Thief.

Seth Kyoti was next, and although he pretended to be holding things together, as he blew the candles out, he couldn’t do it.

He had a massive freak-out at the thought of staying in this madhouse any longer.  He wanted to be Swimming in Cash, but the family were already doing that.  He didn’t want anything else from them.

He was ready to leave  – but there was one person he was afraid of leaving.

Before he left, Seth cleaned his teeth three times, washed his hands twice and tucked his big sister Gemma in.  He was so afraid that she would be destroyed by the government and their alien conspiracy.  He really hoped their parents would look out for her.  He was ready to go but he would miss his big sister more than he could say.

Gemma was devastated to say goodbye to Seth, but she was also glad that he was going to get himself out, and get himself to safety.  She decided it would be her duty to protect their little brother and teach him all the valuable life skills he needed, such as to check for bugs, both the biological and electronic kind, wherever he went.

Alfie Win was such a little charmer that he helped Gemma feel a lot happier.

Joanna was also enjoying having another little brother to play with and she loved spending time with Alfie Win.

Of course, once or twice, Nicola managed to swipe some candy from him and stay true to form.  However, she didn’t get to do it as often as she’d like, because she had other priorities.

She and Jono had made a pact to both rise to the top of the criminal career together – he would become a Master Thief, like their ancestor Joseph, and she would become the Emperor of Evil like their ancestor Cinderella.  Together they would rule the Valley.

All this meant that the Kyotis’ legendary cops’n’robbers room was getting a lot of use…

Of course, policewoman Joanna tried to use the room at different times to her evil criminal siblings.  In the past she’d have been far too good to share her home with her enemy, but since her ‘mid-life crisis’ as the family called it, she’d become much more laid back.

All three began rising up their respective career tracks…

…with Joanna adding another police car to the family’s fleet…

…and Nicola raiding Cinderella’s old wardrobe.

The evil duo were happy to conspire regularly over games of chess.

Joanna’s suspicion of her family members had perhaps gone a little far when she tried to interrogagte her bemused uncle Harry in the town library when he was doing a book signing.

Gemma was still Gemma.  She was still determined not to work, determined to marry a rich man – maybe her boyfriend Joel, if he could ever stick around longer than five minutes.  She was determined not to let THEM get to her.  Since Seth left, she was on her own fighting the enemy threat.  Her teeth-cleaning and tap checking reached new heights of obsessiveness.

On the eve of Alfie Win’s birthday, Michael put the finishing touches to Jono’s portrait.  He had now painted portraits of all five of his older children.  He dearly longed to paint Alfie Win’s as well though he knew that wasn’t likely.

Alfie Win was a strange child.  Not in the way his brothers and sisters were strange, but he seemed to have huge mood swings – he’d be grumpy one minute…

…and the next he’d be easily impressed with what he was doing.  He spent most of his time playing with blocks and occasionally playing chess or doing is homework.  The family never knew whether he’d jump at an idea or resent it, so they mostly left him to his own devices.

Rae, meanwhile, was still making steady progress in the medical field, and was also getting to know everyone in town – finally achieving her lifetime wish of Golden Tongue, Golden Fingers.

Rae encouraged Gemma to go out and meet some of the neighbours too.  she was secretly concerned about her daughter’s desire to marry a rich man and simply live off him, not least because Gemma had seemed to fall for Joel, the first rich man she met, despite there being a large age gap beteeen them.  Rae would never stop Gemma doing what she wanted, but she did want Gemma to be informed about the choices she was making and not spend her days in a marriage she would one day regret.  Their next door neighbour was bemused by Gemma’s assertion that evil aliens were wearing masks to make them look like real people.  Perhaps he wouldn’t be the next Mr Kyoti.

It seemed no time at all until it was Alfie Win’s next birthday.  He was having an excited day – it was time for a party, and cake!  His big brother Seth was home as were his uncles Harry and Wesley and his aunt Emma Mabel, plus lots of the family’s friends and neighbours.  He was going to be a big boy!  However, when he blew the candles out, it wasn’t him that was covered in sparks…

His birthday cake and the table went up in flames!  The family had heard stories about this kind of thing but never experienced it themselves.  There was an old family story about Carmel Kyoti setting a barbecue on fire several generations back, but she was renowned for being the batty old lady that lived in the attic so no-one was surprised by that kind of story.  However, they never expected to experience a fire themselves.

They called the Fire Brigade and four firefighters came… but the blaze was getting out of control and the firefighters told the family they couldn’t hold the flames back, the fire would have to just blow itself out.

Michael was shocked.  He couldn’t let that happen – he couldn’t let there be a risk of fire engulfing those he loved: his children, his wife, his brothers and sister, his friends, his home, his family’s legacy.

Reaching for a fire extinguisher, brave, protective Michael Kyoti walked into the fire.

8.10 Why do you have to be a heartbreaker?

Michael Kyoti became an old man with little fanfare, because he was far more excited about something else to make a fuss of his birthday…

Yes, he and Rae were expecting their sixth child.  Rae wasn’t entirely impressed with this chain of events; she had assumed she was too old to have any more children, but Michael was thrilled, as he’d been wanting another child for a long time.

Seth was the first of their five children to discover a new baby brother or sister was on the way, and he started panicking.  Babies smell and mess things up, don’t they?  He was extra-fastidious in cleaning and tidying the house that day.

He was also very keen to talk to his friends online to find out signs of how he could tell if the new baby was part of the government’s evil alien agenda.

Jono, Seth’s twin, had other things on his mind and didn’t really care one way or the other about the baby news.  He was getting very interested in swimming.  He loved the outdoors, and loved the feeling he got from working out, so he made more use of the pool than any other Kyoti had done throughout the family’s history.

He also liked to sit at the outside desk and chat, troll on forums or play chess.  Jono was thinking about the future and he had a strong idea what he might like to do when he left school – he just needed to make sure he was ready for it.

Michael and his elder friends were chatting about how being grey didn’t mean life was over.  Michael was about to become a dad again; Joel was dating Michael’s daughter Gemma, and Sarah had a new love as well…

…she was seventh in the line of Nicola Kyoti’s conquests.  Gemma looked on in bewilderment – how could all these crazy people be falling for the evil alien replicant plot?  Didn’t they know the truth about Nicola?

With Sarah romanced and ditched, Nicola was running out of friends that she hadn’t yet destroyed, so she went to the park to play the guitar.  She played all through the night, and once the sun came up, she’d found more new friends whose hearts she could relish breaking.

One Jabe Garcia, the brother of Gemma’s boyfriend Joel, was the next to fall into Nicola Kyoti’s trap.

As she walked away from him, he was incredibly angry and became very concerned for his brother.  Was it really a good thing for Joel to be involved with a family that could produce someone as callous as Nicola?

As she walked away from Jabe, she didn’t feel the pang of regret most people would feel after letting down a loved one – she simply picked up her phone and invited over her next conquest.

Den Jupitus became the ninth Valley resident to succumb to Nicola’s charms.

Only one more conquest and she would have achieved her dream to tear apart the town by breaking the hearts of its citizens.

Although Nicola was on a mission, she still made sure she found time to tell her mother just how disgusting it was that she and Nicola’s father were having a new baby when they were practically pensioners.

Joanna Kyoti had always been the good one, the calm in the storm, but she had become increasingly isolated, withdrawn and depressed.  Since teenhood she’d been comfort eating and hiding in her room.  When she’d announced her desire to become a policewoman, no-one in the family had supported her.

She was becoming increasingly angry and frustrated.  How come Nicola could just decide she wanted to destroy so many people’s lives?  How come Gemma’s sole ambition was to marry a rich man?  How come her parents were even thinking of having another baby at their age?

Joanna couldn’t take it any more.  She felt like she was cracking up, like everything she once thought she was – good, sweet, clever Joanna – was changing.  She didn’t know who she was any more.  Eventually she snapped.  Maybe all she should want from life was to be Swimming in Cash.  So she sold some of the old family paintings that had been in the family for years, and she sold one of the old sports cars to replace it with a Margaret Vaguester.  It felt good to be reckless for once, and in a weird way, it was fulfilling.  She got a strange glow from the experience.  Something in her personality had shifted in a real way.

She kept on pursuing a career in the police, but suddenly she didn’t feel as much of an urgency to get to the top of that career anymore.

Joanna wasn’t the only one fulfilling wishes.  Nicola had invited her friend Jon over for a bit of romancing.

…followed by a bit of heartbreaking.

Ten broken hearts ought to be enough to make her mark on the Valley once and for all.  Nicola Kyoti was incredibly satisfied with herself.

Whilst the younger adult Kyotis were having these milestones, their parents were having another, as their sixth and final child was on his way.

Alfie Win Kyoti arrived safe and sound, with no idea of the craziness of the family he’d just been born into.

8.9 Why do fools fall in love?

Love was in the air for the Kyoti family.  No sooner had Nicola broken up with boyfriend Timothy than she rushed off to the park to meet her next victim true love.

Spencer Funke couldn’t resist her charms, expecially when she gave him an amazing massage.

It wasn’t long before they were a couple, but then Spencer had to suddenly dash off and use the toilet before things could go any further.

Nicola made the most of Spencer being inconvenienced by popping across the road to the Plaza to flirt with Ani Jone;  mooching a good meal from her at the same time.  Nicola had an ‘interesting’ approach to romancing, to say the least.

When Spencer returned, she asked him to join her at the theatre, and promplty dumped him in front of the large crowd leaving the show.

Her aunt Emma Mabel was one of those leaving the show and was somewhat ashamed to see her niece behaving so badly, especially towards one of her many friends.

The next day, Nicola invited Ani over, romanced her, and promptly broke up with her.

Michael looked at his daughter with despair.  Wasn’t this the third relationship she’d had in as many days?  He would never understand that girl – how could he have failed so badly as a parent that she was the result?

Love was also in the air for Wesley, who was hoping to soon top his career.  His relationship with colleague and close friend Jinny Bloomwood was eventually becoming something more.

He invited his boss, Joel Garcia, around that evening to talk about work.  When Gemma heard that Joel was rich, she got chatting to him, and the next day she invited him round to talk some more.

Joanna Kyoti came back from work at the Police Station to find both of her sisters flirting with some guys.  This was yet another of Nicola’s many conquests, and she couldn’t keep up with her, but she was worried about what Gemma was getting herself into: flirting with their uncle’s boss, and whilst Nicola was around to be a bad influence on her.  Joanna despaired.  It was getting harder and harder to be around her sisters.

Sure enough, Nicola got the next boy, Andrew, to agree to be her boyfriend, and them promptly dumped him as well.  Rae went out to see the boy and help pick up the pieces – she couldn’t help but wonder if she’d be spending the rest of her life trying to mop up the mistakes Nicola was making.

Wesley saw Joanna was becoming quite distressed and he implored her not to give in, to stay strong, to be the person she was and not be swayed by everyone else, but Joanna wasn’t sure she could be strong much longer.  She felt as though her sanity was hanging by a thread.

When Rae decided to go and read up on her charisma skilling after work, Nicola decided she’d accompany her mum to the library.  She was delighted to get there and find James, the boy that had rejected her first kiss, was there.  Duping him into becoming her boyfriend and then breaking his heart was the most delicious pleasure she’d experienced yet…

…closely followed by doing the same to her former friend Carey, who’d rejected both her and Jono’s advances not so long ago.

Whilst Nicola was busy dumping her sixth partner…

…Joel became Gemma’s first boyfriend.  He couldn’t resist her cute, kooky charms.

He didn’t quite understand her family though, other than his favourite chef, Wesley.  Gemma’s little brother Seth was especially strange, insisting on asking Joel if he was part of some sort of government conspiracy.

Being loved up clearly agreed with Joel, as he soon promoted Wesley to a Five-Star Chef.  Having achieved his dream, he left Michael and the family with an amazing fridge and went to live with Jinny and set up a restaurant together.

Love wasn’t just in the air for new couples, though.  Amidst all the chaos of their children’s lives, Rae and Michael Kyoti remained just as much in love as they ever were.

…and despite both being on the brink of elderhood, there was still as much passion in their marriage as ever.

8.8 Wishing and hoping

Gemma Kyoti was panicking.  What had she just seen?  She needed to check the taps, check the mirrors, wash her hands, do all of her safety checks, because she was really worried.  Her father was returning items she’d never seen before.  Where had he got them from?  Why was he sending them back?  She stood staring at him, mouth agape.  Michael saw his daughter watching him and knew he needed to tell her something.

Michael hoped he’d done the right thing in admitting to Gemma that he was returning stolen items.  When she asked him why, he told her that the family had been struggling to pay the bills on such a large house and he had wanted new things to sell… but that his conscience hadn’t let him do it.  He promised her he’d never steal again.  However, something had switched in Gemma’s mind.  They needed money?  What could she do to get them some?  She’d never wanted a job, she still didn’t want one.  She didn’t want her name on any records with any employers.  She knew better than to become a pawn in the system.  But she couldn’t help but worry.  Surely there must be something she could do to contribute to the family’s wealth?

It was time for the younger Kyoti children to become teens.  Seth was still afraid of the government conspiracies and demanded they only invited family to the party.

Wesley persuaded them to let his best friend Jinny join them, too.  Other than that, the only guests were Rae’s father and Harry and Emma Mabel.

Jono aged up to be a rather striking young man, and immediately went back to whispering with his big sister Nicola.  Michael eyed his children with suspicion.  It wasn’t nice to feel that way about your kids, and he wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt, but there was something very unnerving about them.

As the boys sat and watched the family’s favourite channel, Cookin’ Cable, Nicola looked at them both and wondered what Jono could become… and what kind of mischief they could get up to that would freak Seth out…

Nicola had a boyfriend, Timothy, but she was a natural flirt and couldn’t help trying her luck with other locals.  Her best friend, Carey Hart, spurned her advances, though.

Jono thought he’d also try his look with Carey, but she wasn’t impressed.  Rae looked at her children in horror.  What were they doing?  She was good friends with Nicola’s boyfriend Timothy, and she felt cut up on his behalf.  She tried her best to calm Carey down whilst Jono and Nicola ran off, giggling and whispering to one another.

The relationship between Jono and Nicola wasn’t the only one troubling their family.  Seth and Gemma were also thick as thieves and seemed to enjoy babbling nonsense at one another.  Seth’s latest obsession, alongside being afraid of the government, was to be scared of the lakes and sea around Sunset Valley.  There were monsters there.  And they were equipped with sonar.  Everywhere you fished, you were being watched.

Gemma had to go fishing the next day for a science project, but she was terrified.  She felt she was being watched all the time she did it.  She wondered if her little brother was right.

No sooner had the boys become teens than it was the girls’ turn to become adults and decide what to do with the rest of their lives.

Joanna really wanted to be a police officer, and she couldn’t understand why nobody else in the family seemed too keen on her pursuing this career.

Of course, not approving of Joanna entering the force didn’t mean the family disapproved of their fleet of police cars, such as the one Gemma used to drive into town.

Gemma was on a mission.  She had realised that there was a way she could contribute to the family funds but not work.  She would simply marry someone rich and live off their wealth for ever.  It would be simple.

As for Nicola…. well, she didn’t even wait until she’d eaten a piece of birthday cake before taking Timothy aside and breaking up with him.  He would be the first of many.  She’d befriended a lot of residents of the Valley… now she was going to make them fall totally in love with her… and then relish tearing their lives apart.

8.7 The heat is on

Michael Kyoti’s guilty secret was beginning to take over his life.  When he thought no-one was watching, he would sneak out of the house and take something from a friend’s home or public venue, and then he’d sneak back in.  It was becoming an obsession.  He hated what he was doing but he felt compelled to steal and he didn’t know what to do about it.

One of the reasons he’d been so stressed lately, and had thus turned to stealing, was the growing tension between his three teenage daughters.  Joanna, always so good, always so clever, was becoming very quiet and subdued.  She and Nicola had spent their early teens arguing and now Joanna preferred to stay out of her sister’s way.  Instead, Nicola was fighting with her other sister, Gemma.  Michael found the girls’ behaviour trying and he thought Nicola was probably the catalyst for a lot of the trouble.  There was something seriously wrong with his daughter, even though it pained him to admit it.  He tried to confront her a number of times, but she would always put the blame on the others, saying Gemma was just a neurotic freak who was overreacting, and Joanna was just a miserable so-and-so.

Nicola now had a boyfriend, a young man named Timothy, one of Rae’s many good friends.  He seemed a nice kid and Michael hoped he’d be a good influence on her.  He was at a loss as to what he and Rae could do to get through to her.  Maybe love would be the thing that saved her.

The younger Kyoti children, Seth and Jono, were as antagonistic as their sisters had been.  Jono always had a malevolent glint in his eye, and Seth always looked slightly panicky.  Occasionally Seth got the edge over Jono in a game of chess, but most of the time, Jono seemed to have the upper hand in their relationship.  They didn’t have the loud rows and crying their sisters had, but there was a quiet rivalry between them.

Jono was often talking with his big sister Nicola, and the family were always suspicious they might be plotting something, but they didn’t want to say anything – anything that got Nicola being nice to someone else couldn’t be discouraged, could it?  When he wasn’t spending time with Nicola, he often had his head buried in a book – but closer observation would reveal that often his eyes weren’t fixed on the text but darting about the room, revelling in other people’s misery and thinking about what he might do to them or get from them in the future.

Seth, on the other hand, was very close to Gemma.  She taught him all the tricks to stay safe in life, such as cleaning his teeth three times in a row and checking for alien spaceships every night before going to bed.  Gemma had taught him to use the internet because the people on there knew the truth, the truth that other people were keeping from them.  She was convinced Jono and Nicola were part of a sinister alien plot to take over the world – and her online friends had helped her become sure of this.

But as Seth started to investigate the alien threat, he discovered something even more sinister.  The government were in on it.  The government were against them all.  And his granny had worked for the government.  What if they’d been probing her house?  The house he now lived in?  Seth knew he needed to check every plughole, every socket and every tap to make sure there were no devices hiding.

Rae, in the meantime, maxed out her guitar skill and was rising through the medical ranks.  She continued to chat to local residents and was becoming very popular and loved in the Valley.  Many residents told her how much they liked her daughter Nicola, who had also taken up busking and was becoming a firm favourite with the locals.

Wesley Kyoti was making good progress in the culinary career and he couldn’t wait until the day he got to be a five-star chef.

He was also becoming best friends with Jinny Bloomwood, one of his colleagues, and he was starting to really fall for her… but he didn’t know if she felt the same, and he was too shy to find out.

Michael finally broke down one night and confessed his secret to Rae.  She shocked him with the revelation that she, too, got tempted to steal sometimes, but she channelled that anxiety into other things – her job, her work, her friendships.  She knew there were some bad tendencies within her, but for the sake of her family and for the good of the community, she had learned to manage them.  She knew Michael better than anyone, she loved him with all her heart and she knew he was a good, kind, family man.  She told him she knew he would do the right thing and that he could overcome his problems.

Michael knew she was right.  Rae encouraged him to channel his energies into other things like she did, so he decided to spend time with Wesley, helping with the cooking and gardening, and to paint more.  He’d always loved painting and now his aunt Daisy was no longer alive, the family would need a resident portrait painter soon.

Michael Kyoti slept soundly that night.

The next morning, he woke up very early and began the process of returning the things he’d stolen to their rightful owners.  He was relieved he had managed to put things right.

What Michael didn’t know was that one of his children was also awake, and was glued to the window trying to work out just what their father was up to…