Cynthia and the gang thought they were in for a proper holiday at last, but it’s turned out to be all work and no play for those poor lasses. Check out their latest postcard update:

Ohayo Ginger,

The girls and I popped over to Kagoshima, Japan. We were all geared up for some lush hot springs and stunning views, but instead ended up at a bonkers magic club—nothing but endless scarves, fans, and those daft tricks with cups and balls. Turned out one of the magicians was a 200-year-old shapeshifting fox on the run from a nasty crew of witches. Hyacinth smuggled him out under her coat, and Sydna only had to sort out a few dodgy characters on our dash back to the jet.

Mata ne!

Cynthia

I do so miss my mates, gallivanting around the globe on their grand tour. Making friends wherever they go I am sure, and no stranger to a spot of wetwork when required. Imagine my delight when I received another one of their postcards through the mail. Fancy a gander? Here it is:

Privet Ginger!

Greetings from frosty Kamchatka. Had a wonderful time exploring a warren of secret bunkers (near Avachinsky, another wonderful old soul) filled with relics of psychic experiments older than your mum. The Dean had given us a shopping list but then the lads from FSB Psychotronics turned up looking for receipts! Not to worry - the girls and I are right as rain, though we had to leave a tad earlier than planned. Sending you some scrummy smoked fish!

Stay warm,

Cynthia

Postcard from my chums:

Aloha Ginger!

Touched down in Kona - but no beach time for us! Straight onto a boat to dive Kamaʻehuakanaloa. Imagine, 3,200 ft below sea level! The Dean's mission is top secret, but let's just say we chatted with a rather ancient spirit. Wish you were here to see Hyacinth's underwater ballet. It's a sight! And predictably, Synda got into a bit of a scuffle with a shark. Missing our Psyhigh escapades but embracing the deep blue with the girls.

Cheerio!

Cynthia

Cynthia had an appointment with the Dean.

"Oh, all's well," she said upon her return. "I think."

The rest of us had been eagerly awaiting news of the meeting. It was all very official and hush hush and quite frankly we didn't know what to think, and had gathered in the commons room in the dorm to commiserate over a cup of tea.

"Dean Hammer, Dean of Psychic High School, would like us to form a special group."

"Not the Christmas Pageant!" Syndony exclaimed.

"He must have seen our yearbook from the Cadet Corps," Cindy said.

"I SWORE I'd never do THAT again," Synda said.

"No, not the Christmas Pageant my dears. We all know how that turned out."

This sent all the Synthies into a titter.

Cynthia continued. "It seems he'd like us to form a sort of... 'Ambassador Corps' he called it."

"Would we need to sing and dance?" Hyacinth asked, apparently hopeful. The rest of the girls rolled their eyes.

"No, no, nothing like that. Quite a bit more... clandestine. We'd all keep our manufactured identities. Or occasionally have new ones. There's a fair bit of travel, but it seems the price of remaining here at Psyhigh with the anonymous protection it affords us."

The girls looked a bit troubled at that.

"I've become a bit suspicious of anything with Corps in its name," Synda said.

All the girls nodded in agreement.

The girls and I had been having a splendid autumn. Cynthia, Hyacinth, Syndony, Synda, and Cindy had taken on the new identities they had prepared and were fitting into school life magnificently. Syndony and Cindy even had dates for the Halloween dance! Sydna got into a little scrape with the giant isopod, but all's well that ends well, as they say.

It was after Halloween when they first got a bit spooked. Cynthia had seen something in town that made her rather nervous, and soon the girls were sneaking out clandestinely at all hours of the night, breaking curfew.

"All sorted," Cynthia told me after arriving back at the dorms early one morning. "There was a scout from an SYG disposal unit lurking about in town."

"I was ready to dispose of HIM," Hyacinth said.

"Yes and it took great discipline to follow orders, dear," Cynthia said. "But a missing scout is as good as a lead, isn't it?"

"It took a bit of work to create a trail for him in another direction," Cindy said. "Needed to lead him a number of hops away."

"I'll be heading to Jakarta in a few weeks," Sydna said.

All the girls sipped their tea solemnly.

Later, Cynthia and I settled down for a cozy chat around a warm cup of tea and I asked her to enlighten me about this "Synthie Business."

"If you mean 'are we robots,' then the answer is no," she said. "We're the same bunch of mischievous girls you've grown to cherish and adore."

My dear old Cynthia.

"It's just that on the inside," she continued, "we've got super-strong bones and replaceable synthetic organs. And field effect generators."

"Oh."

"And it turns out they can deactivate us by flashing certain high-speed frequencies through our 1000-megapixel retinas and take us apart for components."

"Oh my goodness, that's terrible," I exclaimed.

I didn't know what else to say. But I couldn't help but wonder about her parents.

"Turns out they were involved," she said, rather gravely.

I stared at her, a bit confused.

"And we can read minds."

Oh, the last days of summer with my dear chums have been an absolute hoot! First of all, they're getting on like a house on fire with the rest of my classmates. In our spare time, we adore visiting lower campus with its charming gardens and tranquil reflecting pools, not to mention our jaunts into the fields and the woods.

We found ourselves on one of the disused sports fields, and Cynthia, Hyacinth, Syndony, Synda, and Cindy started to get a tad rowdy. Sydna stumbled upon a football and gave it a good boot, sending it flying clear across the field, while Hyacinth darted after it quicker than a flash, leaping quite high into the air to make a spectacular catch.

"There does appear to be something to this 'Synthies' business," remarked Cynthia. "We possess all sorts of talents we'd never been aware of before."

Once Hyacinth snatched the ball mid-flight, she hurled it back over the field with astonishing velocity, and Syndony, using her heat vision, made it go up in flames. When its smoldering remnants hit the ground, Cindy opened her mouth and made some eerie tones at it until it reformed into its original shape, albeit a tad scorched. Sydna ran up and kicked it over the horizon.

"Well, you ladies are a real bunch of surprises!" I declared.

My fondness for my cherished best friends knows no bounds.

My dearest chums from back home have graced our presence! Cynthia, Hyacinth, Syndony, Synda, and Cindy. It's been an age since our last rendezvous, yet we've seamlessly resumed our camaraderie as though no time has passed at all.

It turns out that they were all informed that they were "Synthies," a moniker that the MI6 Junior Cadet Corps term uses for artificially created cadets (officially called Synthetic Young Girls, or SYGs), and they were slated for termination and summoned to some ominous decommissioning establishment. Understandably, all this news was quite a lot to take. Synda, in particular, engaged in a rather spirited altercation with the elite strike force dispatched for their retrieval, resulting in a few unintended casualties. This prompted the collective decision to embark on an international sojourn.

And I'm happy to say they're getting along splendidly! Since they'd be quite a lot to squeeze into my own tiny dorm room, the RA was able to find spare rooms and cobble together a plethora of dining hall vouchers.

So for now, everyone's just settling in, and I'm eagerly anticipating these waning days of summer, during which I shall introduce them to the wonders of our locale.

I've just received word from a few of my old chums back in the MI6 Junior Cadet Corps. Appears there's been a bit of a commotion, and several of them are “are on the lam” as they say. Looks like I'll be playing host to some summer guests on holiday! Cheerio for now.

The grasshoppers here are absolutely splendid. They possess knowledge and share secrets with you, unlike the ones back home. Those enjoy challenging you with riddles, and if you happen to answer them incorrectly, you're in for a spot of trouble. They will give you a good boxing!