This fic is set at the beginning of Ptolemy's Gate. The details of Kitty's life are different than the book, and will be explained in this chapter.
I really, really hope you enjoy this story!

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Kitty could not believe the scene that was enfolding before her. Night police swarmed the old factory floor like angry wasps. Werewolves, men and spirits in the guises of men charged into every corner, sniffing out rebels to imprison or, more likely, to kill without trial.

A friend was struck down by one of the vicious wolves as she tried to escape through the back window. It gripped her thigh with the force of a bear trap, pulling her to the ground where it sank its teeth into her throat. Twelve or so new resistance members were in the room, hurtling silver disks and cheap inferno sticks whilst scanning desperately for escape routes.

The screams, howls and explosions of silver and fire went past Kitty; all she hear was the crying of an infant. She saw the child, curled up and sobbing in-between two mouldering cardboard boxes in the far corner of the room.

Before Kitty had a chance to rescue him, a detonation was fired at his hiding spot.

Holding her breath and praying that his resilience would hold out, she watched from the shadows of the building next-door. A crack in the brickwork allowed her to survey the hideout without detection. Kitty had come back late from her part-time job with Mr Button, and as soon as she heard the commotion, she had hidden herself away. Many of the members who usually congregated here were absent as well, Kitty hoped they had heard the noises and fled to safety.

The green vapours dispersed, leaving the child exactly as before. Kitty sagged in relief. If she could just get round the back of the building to the ventilation tunnel, she could crawl through it, sprint in, grab the toddler and be off.

Seven of her comrades had been killed; the remaining five were being led from the building with handcuffs and knives to their backs, their faces were blank with shock and disbelief. Kitty could be sure that she would never see any of them again. Swallowing hard, she looked back to the infant.

The spirit who had fired the detonation cocked his head to the side in confusion, before firing a more powerful blast at the child. Several of the policemen and werewolves to turned to watch. Three other spirits added to the detonation, causing the building to shake at its foundations. As the smoke cleared, the child was exactly as before. Crying and hugging its knees, looking up at the foes that surrounded it in fear.
The demons exchanged uncertain glances.

"'Ere chief, you might wanna take a look at this." One of the demons called, looking over his shoulder.

A massive werewolf who had been by the door, surveying the prisoners' procession to the vans turned its shaggy grey, blood stained head.

"What?" It snapped.

"This here kid's got some proper resilience goin' on. We can't kill it."

The wolf padded over, causing the small semi-circle to part. Kitty's heart raced as the beast approached the child, she knew he couldn't he harmed by magic or lesser physical injuries – but he was defenceless against the glistening fangs that shone from the wolf's mouth. It snarled as it stood in front of the small boy, who cowered beneath his hateful glare.

"Take it to internal affairs; no doubt they'll be interested in its resilience. Besides, what fun is there in mauling something so pathetic?"

Again Kitty sagged with relief. For now, the boy was safe from death at least. She could get him back from the ministry, but she doubted her ability to retrieve the child from the depths of the police chief's stomach. Shuddering, she continued to watch the scene, straining her ears for any details on where the boy would be taken.

The large wolf stalked off towards the exit, barking further commands at the policemen outside. The demon who'd first fired the detonation picked up the crying boy with obvious disgust. Unsure of how to hold him, he first held him by the feet, but the wailing was too much. A human policeman took the toddler with a roll of his eyes and put him on his hip in the appropriate manner. Conversing about the awful noise, they departed, leaving the destroyed hideout in their wake.

Creeping to the nearest window, she watched with a vice around her heart as the vans departed into the night. Already planning her rescue mission, Kitty exited the building to find her allies.

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Three years ago, Kitty's life changed forever when she had found out she was pregnant.

Knowing that her baby was conceived without her consent, with a mother who was wanted by the government and with the prospect of a miserable life ahead of it, filled with nothing but danger and oppression under the magicians hand had almost been enough for Kitty to end the baby's life before it had even begun.

But she didn't.

Why?

To this day Kitty doesn't know why she went through with it. She had been living alone in a miserable little flat, with a measly amount of money and a scraping of rebellious friends that she didn't thoroughly trust. She was sixteen and a single mother with a criminal record and more enemies than she could count. It was hardly a stable environment to raise a child in.

Nonetheless, she had somehow, against all the odds stacked against her, raised her child to the grand age of two and a half. It had been the most difficult time of her life, but she didn't regret her decision.

She had found out that her little boy was resilient when he was only a year old. She had left him with a resistance equivalent of a 'babysitter' in a shabby hideout in the east end. Whilst she was out working at the Frog Inn, there had been an attack. When Kitty returned, the building was empty of life, but, digging through the rubble with the franticness only a mother would know, she found her baby was there, completely unharmed and gazing up at her.

Blessed with the strongest magical and physical resilience on record, she had a feeling in her gut that her baby boy had a destiny to fulfil.

The conversation with Bartimaeus three years previous on the night of the Golem attacks had got her thinking. With the next generation growing up more resistant to magic attack, perhaps children like her son would be the ones to topple the government when they themselves turned into adolescents. She prayed that this was the case. With unrest in the streets and across the empire – it was only a matter of time.

The last few months of her pregnancy had been the hardest, living off all her reserves and even resorting to stealing. When the boy was about a month old, she joined an underground resistance group, claiming she'd found the child abandoned, Kitty integrated the baby into the new underground resistance easily. Women cooed over him, the men were jealous of his unheard of resilience and children peered down their dirty noses at him, seeing nothing special about a chubby baby who couldn't stop gurgling.

Working part time for Mr Button, she learned great deals about magic, which she then relayed onto fellow rebels, acting as a teacher and an expert on resilience. Many people knew of her previous experience involving the raiding of Gladstone's tomb, and let her off any truly dangerous activities. Leaving her baby with resistance members on a frequent basis hadn't been ideal for Kitty, but she had no choice if she was to earn any money. She had made a few true friends, and since then, she had started to feel a little more optimistic about the demise of the magicians again.

Fear was rife in London, but so was hope – something that could never truly be squashed out of the people.

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Wow, apologies for all that information! I just didn't want any confusion in the later parts of the fic :)
The next chapter will set the story in motion!
Please please follow this story or drop a quick review, it keeps me motivated.