MOTHER 3

just the prolouge so far. im lazy :/

I awoke one otherwise peaceful morning to the sound of my brother banging on the door to our bedroom. Recently, he had created the habit of doing this on a regular basis, but never with such enthusiasm.
"Lucas! How long are you going to sleep? Come on, get up and play! Hurry up! Drago brought his kid with him. He's so cute... Hurry up!!!"
I frowned to myself. I was in no mood to get out of bed, much less stomp around in the mus outside (it had rained the previous night, so the flowers were lively and the ground was quite unpleasant.) But, despite my silent expression of dislike, my brother continued his shouting and banging.
"Come on Lucas, wake up!" Claus, as we called him, ceased is irritating knocking and ran down the flight of stairs, supposedly because our mother had called him. So I sighed, rolled myself out of bed and languidly lagged myself down the stairs. To my surprise, Claus wasn't eagerly awaiting my there-- in fact, he had seemingly vanished. Mother, however, was seated at the table humming a delightful tune while writing a letter to our father. I had no interest in her or her letter at the moment and walked past her to the door.
"Where do you going, young man?" She said. "Do you really want to go outside in your pajamas?"
I nodded. "Yeah,"
"Well, you're not going to. Go get dressed, please."
"But mom..." I moaned, slumping over and sticking my tongue out.
"Or you could stay here and live in your pajamas forever. Your choice, Luke."
"Okay, okay, I will." I said, running back up the stairs, shuffling through my dresser and picking my usual outfit; a red and yellow striped shirt, blue shorts that had been cargo pants in a previous life, and of course, my sneakers and socks. It was a simple outfit, yet a comfortable one (as well as my most worn). After I had gotten dressed I headed downstairs once more and that time, out the door. It was a beautiful day, as it always was in the Nowhere Islands. The sky was a rich blue with clouds scattered across it, the grass was just as rich in color as well as nutrients, all of the animals Grandfather owned appeared to be in a decent mood, and you looked hard enough, you could see a small portion of Tazmilly, as well as it's residents. But, as I said, such a day was a typical day in the Nowhere Islands and was nothing too spectacular, so I just ran off to the field left of Grandfather's house where I assumed Claus would be playing. My suspicions proved to be correct, and he was playing with the dragos that lived there, just like he said he was going to.
"Oh, hey Lucas!" he smiled brightly. "Man, I'm beat. I've been play-fighting with the dragos and their friends all morning. Lucas, you should play too. Try to hurl yourself at a drago."
I shrugged. To be honest, I never found play-fighting with animals all that entertaining. But Claus insisted on it, so I did. He, for some unknown reason, bothered to show me how to do it "the right way", which was the way I planned on doing it in the first place. "Now it's your turn, Lucas," he said, pointing to the drago that he =had been playing with. "Give it a shot. But you'll never be able to do it with such a scared look on your face. Let yourself go limp. Release the tension in your shoulders. Relax, relax!" And I did so, charging forth. The drago played along, falling over in a dramatic fashion.
"The harder you bump into a drago, the happier it gets." Claus smirked as the drago returned to it's feet.
"No thanks," I muttered flatly, hiding my hands in the pockets of my shorts. "I just don't think it's very fun. But I guess that's just me."
Claus dawned a shocked look. "What are you talking about?! This is the very definition of fun, Lucas! What's gotten into you? You used to love doing this when we were little,"
"I guess I did..." I said, remembering a few years ago. We used to play that game all day every day, even after our parents said it was time for supper. I would have continued that thought, had a curious looking insect not approached us and began yelling at the two of us. How exactly we could understand him is beyond me, but we could. We could since we were little, since the very moment we arrived in that world.
"Move it, move it, move it, move it. Mole cricket coming through! I heard you all fighting. You got to let me in, you gotta. I'll knock you all to the ground. Try and stop me and I'll make you eat it, punk!" he said, pawing at Claus's leg.
"Why? You're just a bug. I could squish you before you could say... anything, really." Claus said, crossing his arms and tapping his foot. "Want proof?"
"I doubt you could. I'm the one and only mole cricket, after all!"
"Really?"
"Absolutely!"
"Really." he said, raising his foot above the insect.
"I already said-- whoa whoa whoa, what are you doing, kid?"
"I'm gonna squish you!" Claus said, grinning manically. "Wanna see?"
"No! Absolutely not! I'll be off now, if you don't mind..." the mole cricket laughed hesitantly, taking a few steps to the opposite side of the field.
"Oh, no you don't..." Claus said, chasing after it. And so the full-fledged chase scene, one that looked like it had been taken straight out of a movie, began. They ran around the field about ten times at the least. They jumped, leaped, did somersaults, figure eights, and almost anything else you could imagine a nine-year-old boy and a mole cricket doing. They would have gone on for hours, had our mother not walked into the field. Both of them froze in their places, glancing nervously at each other. "You had more bones than I thought," the cricket began. "You can be my sparring partner any time. However, the next time be in the big stadium, the Cricket Hole. I look forward to it...brother."
"I stepped on a cricket. I wonder if he'll be okay... Everyone, time to eat. We're having omelets today, kids--" she said, before being cut off by the two of us jumping around, signing of praise and love for omelets. We really do love them that much. Anyways, we ran off towards home where our grandfather, Alec, was sitting alone at the end of the dinner table with an empty plate accompanying him. Claus sat next to him, and I sat across from Claus. When Mother returned, she placed two or three omelets on each plate except her own-- apparently, she wasn't all that hungry and only wanted one.
"Hey, mom, what's your favorite food?" Claus blurted out at random, almost spitting chewed-up pieces of cooked egg all over the table. Fortunately, he didn't.
"Omelets, I suppose." Mother murmured before cutting up her omelet into practically perfect squares (aside from the round edges, of course.)
"Whoa, that's the same as us! Wow!" my brother said, bouncing up and down excitedly.
"After we eat we're going back home. We have to go through the woods, so I'd like to leave a little early." she said with a flat tone, completely ignoring Claus.
"Maybe sometimes the kids can come visit by themselves. You too, Lucas." Grandfather laughed, amused by his own joke-- though no one else found it funny. Mother just rolled her eyes and stepped outside, I assume to deliver her letter to Father. I managed to catch a glimpse of it before I left, and as far as I could tell, it went something like this:
"The kids have been running wild around the fields and mountains since we've been here, just like you said they would. They never get tired.
"Claus is still as risky and energetic as always, but Lucas is still a little withdrawn. But, it seems like both of them are having a great time playing. I think my father's going to be lonely when we leave. He hadn't seen the boys for a long time. But, we'll be coming home this evening.
"I hadn't breathed in this clean mountain air for a while. I forgot how good it makes you feel. You're always in Tazmilly Village enveloped in the smell of goats, so I want you to smell this clean air as well.
"Next time we come we'll have someone baby sit the goats and we'll come here as a family. Claus, Lucas and I have you always in our minds. Tonight when we get home I'll whip up a batch of my special omelets.
"Yours and the boys forever, Hinawa."

flat tacos

D Gray Man crack fiiiic

It was around noon. Road was seated on the couch doing homework. David had recently joined her after getting bored of his book. Jasdero was sitting at the table in the kitchen all alone, fumbling around with his four day old taco.
"My taco won't stand up!" He whined, watching it once again fall flat on it's side.
"Well...why?" Road asked, not bothering to look up from her homework.
"I...I don't know..."
"Well," David said, getting up off the couch and strolling towards the kitchen. "We should do something about that."
"Yesssss yes yes." Jasdero smiled.
"But...what exactly should we do about it?" Road muttered.
"...What if it had a flat bottom...?"

So, about an hour later, Tyki came home from his four hour long trip to the library to see his three younger siblings perched around the oven, eyeing it carefully.
"W-What are you doing...?" He asked, throwing his longcoat on the table.
David looked up at him with a bored expression. "Making flat tacos."
"Um...why?"
"BECAUSE MY TACO WOULDN'T STAND UUUUUP!" Jasdero screamed. Tyki covered his ears to block out the shrill sound.
"Oh...okay." Tyki muttered, walking out of the room.
"So...um..." Road glanced at Jasdevi, who were watching the oven carefully. "How are y--"
"THEY'RE DONE!" David shouted, leaping towards the oven and recklessly slamming the door shut after he threw the tray on the counter.
"I...um...I wanna see..." Road muttered, almost afraid of the purple haired boy and his blonde brother. Jasdero was smiling wildly, holding one of the tacos up in the air.
"It's beautiful! Heehee!" He said, looking up at it as if it were a god.
"I proclaim it...the Flat Taco."

Untitled

(Soul Eater fanfic)

A fairly tall black-haired boy walked silently down the halls of his new school. He, being the son of Shinigami, didn't even have to go to school-- but he insisted on it. He wanted to and he felt obligated to. The only thing that was stopping him from a perfect first day was the fact that his two friends serving as weapons didn't wait for him to prepare himself and left without him. So, as he entered the classroom and took a seat next to said friends, whose names were Liz and Patty, he rested his head on his hand and looked patiently at the eldest sister.
"What the hell are you staring at me for?"
"I'm waiting for an apology."
"Yeah? We'll you're not gonna get one no matter how long you sit there. You look like a moron, by the way."
"I'm willing to wait. Even if it was wrong of me to have taken so long just to get out of the shower, it was just as wrong for you two to have left without me."
"That's bullshit."
"Oh, sis!" Patty said, smacking her across the face. "Don't swear!"
"I'll swear when I feel like it, Patty... besides, don't you think Kid is being a filthy liar? We had every right to leave without him!"
"It will always be immoral, no matter how many excuses you come up with." Kid sighed as their teacher walked in.
"Will not..." Liz whispered.
"Okay, class! How many of you actually took the time to study for this test?" The gray-haired man smiled, making fun of his more careless students. About half of the raised their hands well the other half just grumbled.
"Yeah, that's exactly what I expected. Maka, will you pass these out?"
The girl nodded, rose from her seat and made her way to the front of the class.
"Um, Lizzy, how come professor Stein always asks Maka to help him?"
"I have no idea. But I bet Kid would know. I mean, he is supposed to be a genius and all..." Liz sneered.
"He has is reasons." Kid mumbled as Maka set a considerably large pile of papers that were supposedly the test in front of him.
"Whoa, this is huge! This is what we were supposed to study for?! That's insane!" Black Star cried as he flipped through it.
When each and every student had received a copy of the test, doctor Stein went over the rules before he set the time.
"I want to make this clear, okay? There will be no cheating whatsoever, and if you get caught you'll get a zero on the test no matter how many answers you got right on your own. That means no looking at other papers, no asking someone else for the answer, no cheat sheets or whatever tricks you kids have up your sleeves. hYou have an hour and a half and I expect to hear absolutely no talking among you guys. And..begin."
"Dammit, dammit, dammit!" Liz murmured to herself. "Why the hell didn't I study for this?! I knew it was gonna be important..."
"What's that, miss straight A's didn't study? Oh, that's a shame..." Kid snickered, turning the page and filling it out in less than a minute.
"Shut the hell up!" Liz frowned. "Whoa whoa whoa..."
"Hmm?" Kid smiled, looking at her and still managing to somehow fill out the answers.
"Dude! There's no way you're not cheating! No one can do anything that fast!"
"I beg to differ."
"Doctor Stein!" Liz shouted. "I think Kid's cheeeaaating!"
Everyone in class turned around to look at the striped boy.
"I-I'm not, I swear!" He said. "Liz is just pissed at me!"
"Nuh-uh!" Liz said, grabbing his arm and taking a piece of paper out of his sleeve. "See? He has a cheat sheet and everything!"
Stein shook his head and made his way to the two. "Kid, I never expected this from you. Quite frankly, I am...ashamed."
"Look, I'm sorry! Can't you just confiscate it and let me start over or something?!"
"Rules are rules, Kid. Come with me."
So, for the hour and twenty minutes after that, Death the Kid, son of lord Shinigami, was forced to sit at the teacher's desk and watch Stein read a book.
"And...time!" Stein said as the timer went off. "Raise your hand if you knew what the hell any of those questions meant.
A boy and a girl in the very back were the only ones to raise their hands.
"Yeah, figures." Stein smiled. "Bring your tests up here, kids..."

"Do I really have to help you grade every single one of these?" Kid mumbled impatiently, sorting through the five-foot-tall stack of tests.
"It's your own damn fault. Here, take students J through L..." Stein said, handing him the tests for students whose first names started with either J or L. Kid looked through them as fast as he possibly could, his eyes darting from the answer key to the sheet and back...
"Jonathan Doss, Judith Kerr..."
"Hunh...I always thought we had more J's in our class than that."
Kid sighed. "Kasey December, Kelly Luna, Kelly Wilburn, Kimberly Lee, Kina Wolfe, and some other people..."
Stein put those tests upside down on top of the rest and realigned it.
"Lacey Hack, Lenna Wolfe, Lina Alexandria, Lily Lang, Lolo Jackson..."
"There's more than that. I'm sure of it..." The older man muttered, shuffling through the ungraded pile. "Oh, there's a ton of Lizes! how did that happen?"
"Liz?" Kid murmured.
"Yeah, do these ones real quick. I have to go get some coffee."
Kid looked down at the tests for a moment before grading them a little bit more carefully than the others.
"Liz Jones, Liz Rule, Liz...Thompson..."
Kid frowned when he scanned over her test.
"'No way I'm not cheating?' I thought you hardly even studied for this test!"
He reluctantly wrote 98% next to her name and placed it with the rest of the tests. He sat patiently and waited for Stein to come back from retrieving his coffee, ignoring every urge he had to continue grading the tests and get the hell out of there. He didn't want to end up being the student who told horror stories about Stein at lunch and had them be true.
"'Kay, there's only like twenty tests left, right?" Stein said as he entered the room with two cups in his hand. "Show me how fast you can finish those and I'll give you this hot chocolate, okay?"
Kid nodded and filled out the remaining tests in almost record time. And by record time, I mean about fifteen minutes-- he was the first student to ever have to help doctor Stein grade a test.
"Pretty damn good, Kid. You can go home now." Stein smiled, pointing to the door and taking a seat.
"Thanks," kid murmured. "Oh, wait... I have to get my stuff. Is that okay?"
Stein nodded. "Take your time, I don't have to be out of here 'til seven..."
Kid ran to the seat he had sat in that day, bent over and crawled to the seat next to that, which was Liz's. True, he lied to Stein and already had his belongings on his person, but when someone who doesn't study for a test and gets an almost perfect score is the kind of person to leave things behind, especially if she's your teammate, you investigate.
If your name happens to be Death the Kid, at least.
If she and her sister had been paired with anyone else she would've simply gotten an A and moved on. But no, this sort of thing had to be investigated. In depth. For days.
"I knew it!" he whispered to himself, closing her purple flower-laced binder and stuffing a photocopy of the answer key in his pockets-- one sheet on the left, the other on the right. "That twit..."

"Hey Lizzy," Patty said as she arranged her stuffed animals in order of height. "Why did you tattle-tale on Kid today?"
Liz looked at her sister, then returned her eyes to following a yellowish crack in the pristine, high-rise ceiling of Shinigami's house. "Do you really wanna know?"
"Yup!" Patty smiled.
"Well, mostly 'cause he never fucking listens to me. Like, remember last time we went to the market with Black Star and Tsubaki?"
"Oooh,you mean when he bought me mister Elephant?" Patty muttered, pointing to said elephant.
"Yeah. And how I said we couldn't afford to get you any toys 'cause Shinigami-sama was having a really expensive dinner party soon?"
"Mhmm..."
"And he bought it anyway?" Liz sighed. "Or when we were training, and I said I was reaaaaaally tired but he insisted we keep training? Or--"
The doorbell rang.
"Oh, fuck-- don't tell him I was complaining, okay, sis?" Liz said, running over to the door. She opened the creaky old maroon door and faked a smile at her meister.
"Oh, you're finally home!"
"Yeah, Stein was being really strict..." Kid sighed, dusting off his pants and taking off his shoes.
"Hey, Kiddo!" Patty said, skipping over to him. "You know what we're having for dinner tonight?"
"No. What?"
"We're having blue cake. Have you ever hear anything as crazy as that?" She giggled, turning around to look at her sister, who nodded when she realized that Patty was trying to distract Kid from his troubling day at school.
"Mhmm, go on..." the black haired boy mumbled, taking a seat on the couch and grabbing a nearby magazine.
"I mean, we had to go to the store with Shinigami and he spent like fifty bucks just on the icing! That thing's gonna be huuuuuuge."
"I bet it is."
"Hey Kid," Patti said, bouncing over to the couch and sitting next to him. "You wanna go play video games?"
"No."
"Draw?"
"No."
"Read me a story?"
"No."
"But I wanted you to read me a story!" The blonde pouted.
"Just how badly did you want me to read you a story?"
"Really badly. Like, I'll go buy a rope and hang myself if you don't read me Cinderella!"
Liz laughed nervously, knowing that her sister probably would, even if it was just as a threat. "I think you should do it, Kid..."
He rolled his eyes and languidly dragged himself over to a massive bookshelf in the corner off the room. "Cinderella, huh?"
Patty nodded as Kid took a rather thick picture book off of the middle shelf. "You do know this book is horribly overrated, right?"
Patty frowned. "Is not! Just read it to me!"
Kid sighed, tossed his head to one side and opened the book to the first page. "Copyright 1956 Hans Christen Anderson, all rights reserved..."
"You're an asshole, Kid." Patty muttered, storming off to her room.

PA4K (WIP)

¹p s y · c h i c

Pronunciation: \ˈsī-kik\
1 : of or relating to the psyche : psychogenic
2 : lying outside the sphere of physical science or knowledge : immaterial, moral, or spiritual in origin or force
3 : sensitive to nonphysical or supernatural forces and influences : marked by extraordinary or mysterious sensitivity, perception, or u n d e r s t a n d i n g . . .

A fourteen year old boy, whose name was Valyrie Thompson (though his friends, family and everyone else he ever met referred to him as Val) walked as fast as he could to the bus stop, seeing that the twenty-six foot construction yellow machine had already arrived and was preparing to leave. He considered running, but this early in the morning? That would make his morning cramps worse than they already were.

“Wait! Driver, waaaaait...!” He yelled over the engine, reaching out his hand and he walked just a little bit faster and jumped onto the bus just before the doors closed. He let out a sigh of relief and headed towards the back of the bus, avoiding eye contact with everyone who was staring at him—most likely for his odd taste in fashion. His gray hair, which was a result of his mother smoking around him far to often as an infant, his gray hoodie and dark gray pants, and most likely the oddest gray thing about him, his left eye. He couldn’t help that it was that way and had been since he was only two years of age. He would wear a blue contact in that eye if he could, but his father only said “No son, they’re too expensive.” and proceeded to finish his paperwork when Val had asked if he could buy a pair a few months ago.

“Val! Over here,” a familiar voice said. Val looked up to see his blonde counterpart, DJ, sitting in the very corner on the right side of the bus all alone with his sideways hat and sloppy posture. The gray-haired boy smiled at his general presence and sat down next to him.

“It really cold outside,” said Val, examining DJ’s choice in clothes, which was a plain black t-shirt, Adidas shorts and his usual sneakers. “How on earth are you not cold?”

DJ shrugged. “I just never get cold. Except that one time…”

Val laughed, recalling the winter that the boy was referencing. They were eight and nine years old and their mothers had insisted that they wear as many layers of thick winter coats as possible, but DJ—or Daniel, as he was called then—had refused. Three hours later he came back inside and had come down with pneumonia. The gray haired boy shook his head and laughed.

“How ‘bout you? You always wear that damn hoodie. Even when it’s more than a hundred degrees outside! How long have you even had that thing?”

“Three years. And those sneakers?”

“Five…”

“My point proven.” Val smirked, crossing his arms in a way that said ‘I’m right, you’re wrong’, because he had always been a show-off like that. Always. Not a day had gone by since the first time he could speak that he hadn’t smirked and folded his arms in that manner, or at the very least pointed out that he had been correct and the opponent not. Perhaps it was his personality, or how he was raised, or a combination of both—we’ll never know, and we’ll most likely never care either.

Half an hour later the yellow bus stopped at the entrance of an enormous high school. It was made almost entirely out of sandy colored bricks, with a sign positioned just outside of the door that read in big, bold, confident letters: “Fourside High School.” Just like most schools in the state of Oregon, it was named after what street it was on, or at least which street it was closest to that had the catchiest name. Val stood up, not taking his eyes off of the flood of students competing against each other just for entrance into such a building.

“Val, move!” DJ said, pushing his out of the seat and into the isle. “Don’t stare off into space the whole time like you did last year!”

“I won’t, I promise.” Val muttered, following the stream of children to the front door. A clear, glass front door, just like most high schools had. And a tastefully chosen tile pattern on the floor as well, just like most high schools. And frighteningly enthusiastic ads and signs and posters covered the doors of the classrooms, just like most high schools. So, if you wanted so say, this was a completely ordinary high school. I’m not going to say that you can’t call it that, but I don’t suggest it either. After all, you haven’t even read a mere chapter of this book, so you have to right to be jumping to conclusions—not that you are.

I’m not even going to bother writing about Val and DJ’s first day of high school. Basically, it was awful. It made Val phsycically sick to his stomach and DJ couldn’t believe how awful the curriculum they had provide the teachers with was. And not to mention the atrocious attitudes of about…say, ninety-five percent of the student? That sounds right. The entire school was rotten. They’d been washed over with some belief that it was cool to be that way. But, despite the fact that everyone there was like that, there was a popular clique. Just like it elementary and middle school. Even preschool, at least it was that way for those two. For the entirety of their educational lives, there had always been a popular clique of corrupted children (and I use the term ‘corrupted’ as lightly as possible, because just being a stuck up brat isn’t quite as awful as some other things that children were doing in 2008.) and neither Val nor DJ had even been a part of it, and they didn’t want to. Those two’s motto was ‘popularity sucks’. Because if you narrow it down, popularity really does suck. And it does awful things to perfectly fine children. At least those two were resisting it. Because if not them, then who? Your mother, perhaps. Or no one... could you image a world where no one rebelled, ever, even if they had a good cause? Well, thankfully, we live in a world full or rebellion, as well as awful high schools. And so far, Fourside gets the award for being the worst school anyone has ever seen.

On the walk home, Val and DJ strolled down the street in silence. At least…they would have, had a perky blonde girl, who had half of her hair covering half of her face and the other half in a ponytail that went down to her waist, hadn’t interrupted their silence.

“Hey kid, I noticed you have a gray eye.” She said, looking at Val. And he shrugged.

“Yeah. What of it?”

“Well…I can’t explain it all right now. At all. I have a bus to catch in…say… two minutes? Basically, if you have a gray eye, actually… never mind. You go to Fourside, right? Meet me at lunch tomorrow. I’ll explain it then.”

“Wow…she seems pretty ADD, huh?” DJ laughed as she ran off.

“Yeah, seems like it…” Val smiled, taking a silver key out of the pocket on his hoodie and jamming it into the deadbolt. "See you tomorrow!"

So.

Next day, at lunch.

Val and DJ had managed to make their way through the cafeteria with two plates, both of which had a minimal amount of disgusting food. Finding the girl, whose name was Kelly, took a while, but not as long as they had expected.

"Okay, so..." DJ said, tossing his food around with a plastic fork. "What about his gray eye?"

Kelly took a deep breath. "You really want me to explain this?"

Both of the boys nodded.

"Okay, so if you have a gray eye, it means you're psychic. Basically. Depending on how old you were when it lost color pretty much tells you what specific type of psychic you have. There's only three kinds, telepathy, telekinesis, and speaking to the dead. Telepathy is when you're two, telekinesis is three and speaking to the undead is eight."

"...Go on..."

"Okay... if you're a girl, your left eye goes gray and it's the opposite if you're a boy. Anyways, I go to this after-school program called PA4K..."

"PA4K?" Val raised an eyebrow. "What does that stand for?"

"I..um...eheh. Nothing. Really." Kelly winced. "Anyways, PA4K basically trains you, and this is gonna sound really lame, to learn to use your powers so you can better the community."

DJ burst out laughing.

"I said it was gonna be lame!" Kelly insisted. "Anyways, it's really expensive for my family, so I need to get at least two people to go so we'll get a fifty percent discount. I bet you're gonna say no, but I'm dead serious, this place rocks. It's one of the best-- no, the best programs or organizations or anything I've ever gone to and it'll totally be worth your money."

"I dunno..." the gray haired boy murmured.

"Oh, please please please?" Kelly whined.

"How much does it cost? Is it really that expensive?"

Kelly shook her head. "Nah, my family just ends up with minimum wage jobs. It's really only like a hundred bucks for the term and fifty for the summer camp..."

"That is expensive though."

"Dude! There a private schools that cost three hundred and fifty dollars just for a month."

"I...huh. That's true."

So Val went home that day, unsure of whether or not to go to the after-school program he found out about not even three hours ago.

He did.

Val took a step inside the lobby of PA4K, and just by glancing at the general appearance of it gave off the sudden feeling that it was not your average after-school program. There were literally hundreds of photos and posters of psychic mediums, over half of which were signed by said psychic medium. Two couches faced each other on the left and right sides of the room. The left one was a mellow floral pattern and had been sewn together and patched up to the point that the very fact you could tell it was a floral pattern was a miracle. The other one was a black leather sofa, the kind you would expect to see at a fancy dinner party (though one thing set it apart from a couch at a dinner party. Namely, the sunflower that had been embroidered on either arm of it.) The carpeting was a blueish gray, a particular shade that matched not only Val but the grayish-blue wall.

"Oh, new kids!" A cheery, somewhat high pitched voice said from behind the gray-haired boy and the blond girl. They turned around to see a girl who was presumably in her early twenties, had pink highlights in her brunette hair, thick-rimmed glasses, a plain black t shirt, one hand in the back pocket of her skinny jeans and the other holding a cup of hot chocolate from a nearby Starbuck's. "New kids are always so exciting... you're Valyrie, right? The telekinetic kid?"

Val nodded. "And you would be..."

"Kivi Jones. I will defiantly not be your teacher though... you'll probably get Aidan and Nadia. Anyways, school starts in fourty-five minutes, so just do whatever. But pick a good seat, 'cause this place is gonna get friggin' packed soon."

"Oh god," Kelly smirked. "Can I show him around? Please?"
Kivi thought about whether she should let the two children run around an expensive wearhouse that had lots and lots of easily breakable machines in it. "...sounds good. Just get your asses back in room seven when school starts!"
"I will, I promise," Kelly smiled, grabbing Val's hand a leading him into the first and only hall of the entire building. the walls were a very, very light sky blue and had been written all over in marker by past students, and well as teachers and volunteers. The wall opposite of the signed one had three doors, which Kelly described as "two spare rooms and the janitor's closet."
"But...those look like pretty big rooms." Val muttered. "Are you sure it can really be called a closet?"
"Yes I'm sure...oh oh oh, did I ever tell you about our janitor?"
Val shook his head.
"Okay, well, she's pretty cool... her name is Marissa Lee Emerson but everyone here calls her by her initials 'cause it sounds like Emily. Last term she had this awesome neon green Chelsea hawk... I mean, she might still have it, but I dunno. Anyway, she always uses this brand of cleaning stuff that smells really fruity."
"Sounds cool."
"Oh, she is." said Kelly, who, at that point in time, was seemingly abandoning Val in the hallway and moving on to what Kivi had referred to as room seven. It was a much more open room than the lobby or the hallway, and not just in floorspace... somehow the walls seemed higher up as well. Beanbags were strewn about the floor in an orderly fashion, the left corner was occupied by a platform on which a drum set, two microphones and a few amplifiers sat, and probably the most curious part of the entire room, a rack of guitars on to the right that covered the entire bottom half of the wall.
"Er...um... why are there so many...?"
"Oh, guitars? Some of those are basses too, genius. Anyways, you want the long story or the short one?"
Val shrugged. "Long one...?
"Okay, so the girl who founded this place, her name is Alexandria but we all call her Alex. Her brother's name is Alexander, but everyone he knows calls him Alex too... so that's pretty confusing sometimes. Anyways, Alexander had to move to Europe so he could go to college and get a job, but he had this collection of guitars and basses. He gave them to Alexandria and told her to do whatever she wants with them, so she just kept them. But then, when she got guardianship over her cousin Xander, whose name is also Alexander, she had to turn the room she was keeping them in into his room. So she decided to keep them here and let everyone play them if we wanted too. Eventually, a group of friends who went to the summer camp together started a band and played at lunch every day, so it just kind of became tradition to do that... of course, we don't have lunch except for during the summer camp, but still, it's pretty damn fun."
"Sure sounds fun..." Val muttered. "You talk a lot, also."
"Oh, but I just can't help it!" Kelly squealed, "there's just so much to talk about in this world! I mean, really. And it doesn't help that you talk so little..."
"That's only because I have nothing to talk about."
"Yeah, well..." Kelly glanced at the clock hanging above the doorway. "Shit. All the kids are gonna be here soon, and that lobby's tiny. I think we should go back now..."
"Whatever you say, crazy woman."
"I'm not crazy!" Kelly shouted as they walked back to the lobby and sat on the coffee table in between the two couches. Just as they sat down, they heard the bells on the door jingle as two girls walked in. The slightly taller one had dark brown hair, almost black, that was perfectly straight on her right side but messy, uncared for and spiky on the other. She was wearing a black hoodie and cargo pants that she cut off just below the knees and had turned into an odd variation of capris. The other girl had short blue hair that she kept in a small ponytail and was wearing a cut up tank top over a one-armed shirt, an armwarmer on the side without a sleeve, a miniskirt that apparently used to be a pair of jeans and striped leggings.
"Name please," Kivi said, whipping out a pen and hovering over the check list for who had arrived that day.
"Eliza and Madi."
"Oh, you're back!" the brunette laughed. "I thought your parents couldn't afford it?"
"Well, yeah..." Madi, the one who was wearing the tank top and one armed shirt, frowned. "At least, my parents. But Eliza's mom got a second job and paid for me."
"Well, that's a fine example of good sportsmanship." Kivi said, checking Elizabeth Kerr and Madison Score off of the list as the made their way to the lobby and sat on the black leather couch.
"Oh, Madi, your eyeliner looks awful!" Kelly wailed. "Do you need to borrow a mirror?"
Eliza and Madi exchanged glances. "Yeah, no thanks. I have catoptrophobia."
"Catoptrophobia...?" Val said to himself. "What's that?"
"Fear or mirrors." Madi sighed.
"And...exactly why are you afraid of mirrors?"
"Bloody Mary! That shit is scary, okay?"
Val gave her a strange look. "You don't actually believe in that stuff, do you?"
"Of course not. I'm not stupid. But still..."
"Um, Madi," Eliza muttered. "You do realize you have to do that willingly, right?"
"But Eliza, it's just so weird and creepy..."
The girl with half-combed hair sighed, crossed her arms, and closed her eyes. "Kelly, can I see that mirror?"
Kelly nodded, digging inside of her pockets and pulling out a flimsy plastic makeup mirror. Eliza held it up to her face, glanced at Madi, then back at the mirror.
"Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary..."
Silence.
"See?" Eliza tossed the mirror back to it's owner. "Nothing happened."
"Yeah, well...fine."
"So, anyways..." Kelly muttered, trying to start a conversation. "Anyone here like seashells? I totally love seashells. I mean, they look cool and they're easy to find! You just go to the beach and pick 'em up. So easy!"

"Kelly." Val said, tossing his head to the side and staring right into her colored eye. "You talk. So. Much."
"That's why we like her!" Eliza giggled, jumping off of the sofa and tackling the eldest girl.
"Whoa whoa whoa, Lizzy..." Kelly said slowly, shrugging her off and putting her hands in the air as a shield. "...what did I say about glomping me?"
"To not too..." Eliza raised an eyebrow. "What did I say about calling me Elizabeth, Lizzy, Elli or Beth?
"Not too!" Madi shouted, pointing her index finger towards the ceiling.
"Biiiingo." Eliza smiled, offering a high-five to her accomplice. And just as those two rested their hands either in their laps or their pockets, the bells on the back of the door jingled and and a young blond girl--no older than eight-- walked in the door as her mother waved goodbye.
"Name please," Kivi said, digging through her recently made pile of garbage for the sign-in sheet.
"Amelia," The girl said, hardly even muttering her name as she leaped into the lobby. "Who wants a lollipop?"
Eliza violently flailed her hand in the air and Amelia tossed her a strawberry flavored lollipop.
"Wait, so you just...like, give out free candy?" Val said, a bewildered tone in his voice.
"Yup!" Amelia giggled, sitting on the empty couch across from the others. "I have lollipops, Starburst, gumdrops, M&Ms, KitKats, Pocky, chocolate, saltwater taffy and--"
Kelly raised an eyebrow. "Since when were you allowed to have chocolate? I though you were allergic to that stuff. and you don't just get over allergies, you know?"
Amelia shrugged. "Mom lets me have it! And she's super-worried about allergies and stuff..."
The elder blond sighed, reaching a hand out towards the pink backpack that was now lying on the floor. "Give me a few M&Ms. Like, the green ones... twenty of 'em. No-- twenty five, you got that? And if you mix a blue on in there or something, I'm not gonna give you that dollar I owe you! Actually...um... never mind. I want a lollipop. A raspberry one. And it has to have a clear wrapper, I don't like the other brand. And don't give me a chewed up one, either!"
"Okay okay okay!" Amelia laughed, digging for the clear-wrapped raspberry lollipop without a chewed stick. "Jesus Christ, could you talk any more?"
"I have ADD, dammit!" Kelly whined, unwrapping her lollipop and tossing the wrapper on Val's head.
Eliza laughed. "Nice hat."
"What?"
"Nice hat."
"...What...?"
"Nice. Hat."
And with that, Madi burst out laughing and so did Kelly, while Val only stared and the girl with half-combed hair in utter confusion.
About half and hour later the laughing died down and the lobby filled up, and every child was anxious about the first day of the after-school program. Everyone (aside from Eliza and Madi, they were having a conversation) watched the clock tick time away as the Aidan, Nadia, Jami and Kivi all examined a clipboard in great detail to make sure everything went perfectly. As the air filled itself with a nervous feeling, Val sat by himself in a room full of people, wishing that he had never agreed to go to PA4K.
"Okay," Kivi said, placing the clipboard in Aidan's hands. "Telepathic kids follow Jami, mediums follow me and telekinetics follow Aidan and Nadia."
So all forty-three children marched down the hall and took a seat in their assigned rooms-- Eliza in the telepathic, Kelly in the "speaking to the undead"--simply because they had no better name for it than medium, Val and Madi in the telekinetic and Amelia mysteriously gone.
"Okay then," the taller of the two, presumably Nadia, said, leaning against a massive as well as blindingly bright whiteboard. "Um... first we have to organize groups because everything will be a million times easier that way."
"Yeah yeah yeah. How many kids do we have this time....?" Aidan muttered, standing on her toes and counting every student individually. "Huh... i think we should put them in groups of three. What do you think, Nadia?"
She nodded. "Okay guys, you know what to do. Right?"
So Val scanned the room, looking for at least one vaguely normal person to be on a team with. But, of course, the closest he got was Madi. He walked over to her, scratched his head, and said:
"Everyone here is weird."
"Yeah?" She smirked, crossing her arms. "Deal with it. Or get used to it. Something like that."
"It smells funny, too." Val muttered, leaning on the wall.
"That's MLE's fault. Complain to her. And didn't Aidan and Nadia say the teams were supposed to be three people...?"
The boy shrugged. "I guess. But don't look at me, okay? I just came over here because everyone else is weird."
Midway through that sentence an auburn-haired girl with one green eye and one gray one sat down next to him. As soon as Val finished his sentence, she said "I'm Belleanthrea Silvarious McLaughlin the Third."
"I'm Madi." Madi said with a bored tone.
"I'm... Val." Val said, with an even more bored tone. "And...yeah. I'll just be calling you Bell."
"Oh, fantastic! So... how old are you guys?"
"Fourteen." They both said in unison.
"Oh! I'm Twelve."
Val and Madi exchanged glances and sighed. "You can be quiet now," Madi said.
"Oh no, am I to loud or something? I hope not! What is it? Am I talking to fast? I'll slow down if you need me too--"
"Just. Be. Quiet."
"Okay kids..." Nadia said, seeing that they had all seated themselves in groups. "For the new ones, let's get one thing clear. You are psychokinetic. And that's Greek. and it literally means mind movement. So, basically, you can move anything just by looking at it. Obviously weight still applies and all that, so you can't lift anything twice as heavy that you could normally. I say twice as heavy because it doesn't put a strain on you physically, so it's easier to move."
"Any questions?" Aidan asked. Of course, everyone shook their heads.
"Okay then!" Nadia smiled, rising from her seat and pointing to it. "Anyone care to try it out?"

Hansel and Gretel (prolouge)

If you've ever been to Oregon, an under appreciated state on the west coast of the Unites States of America, you would know that the vastly overpopulated section of it is the top left corner, and the rest of the state is essentially a vast wasteland with a few small (or large) towns scattered about.
This story just happens to take place in one of those small towns. It's population is a mere eighty people. As one might suspect this is the kind of town where everyone knows everyone, and lots of love, respect and support go around so there is no reason for it not to be a big thriving city-- except, of course, that everyone liked it to be small and cozy. All of the hand-built houses to the adorable little stores and markets, plus the fact that the largest chain there was a Mexican restaurant that had such fantastic success that they saved enough money to buy an old warehouse at the edge of town and turn it into an even better version of the first one. If you wanted to, you could say the only downside of that town was the dark, ominous forest that restaurant was perched outside...
Oh, that forest.
It used to be loved and cared for and treated more as a park that a forest, until the Mayor went there on an innocent walk to relieve the stress of having such responsibility. Her walk went perfectly fine, until she never came back out...
And this is where I introduce the main characters of this story: Hansel and Gretel.
Their parents conceived them on accident and were simply too poor to raise any children (though today, they have several) and abandoned them in the woods as apposed to putting them up for adoption like any sane person would (neither of them were very sane). Unlike most children who were abandoned in the forest, a part where no one in particular went at that, they did not die. They survived. They learned to feed off the land and, after a while, even put a flimsy roof over their heads made of stick and mud. They learned English around the age of five when they found a cardboard box filled with raggedy clothes and books, mostly fairy tales-- one of the town's couples also had twins around their age who had outgrown both the clothes and the silly little stories. The husband was an English professor and had been offered a job at the local collage, so he threw out his grammar books and dictionaries.
Hansel and Gretel, if you wanted to say, were the luckiest children to ever walk the face of the earth.
Being abandoned in the woods and surviving it one thing, but teaching yourself English is another.
Not only are they the luckiest children in the world, but they are completely self-sufficient.
And, if you really wanted to say, there was only one thing wrong with them:
Murder.
Living your entire life away from society and never speaking to any person other than your own sibling has it's consequences. You would have absolutely no idea what human morals are, you would have no idea that killing a woman, poking her eyes out, pounding nails into her spine, and then eating her were wrong. You would think it was perfectly fine, that you were supposed to do that because it was a game. You would be just like Hansel and Gretel.

Two

I breath in.
I've lived in this tank all my life. Just...stuck. Stuck in my own little world, my little world of green liquid... I can't even remember how long I've been alive, if you really want to call this living. But I do know that in that time, I've never been touched by another human being. Ever. Can you even comprehend that, not being touched, ever?
Of course not.
Ever since the very moment you came out of your mother's womb, you've been surround by people. even if you think you're alone, I guarantee you, there's someone nearby. But me? I'm not so lucky. I mean, father stops by sometimes, but he never speaks. He just checks the meters and leaves. He's always been like that, as far as I know... ever since the government asked him to create me--no, us--it's like he doesn't even know I'm here, that I could speak to him. I've seen him talk to brother and sister, but never me. Sometimes I can't help but wonder if he doesn't like me.
I close my eyes, because I can feel him enter the room and I think I'm supposed to be asleep now.
"Two," he says, because that's my name... Two. "I'm so sorry that I have to do this..."
I nod. I try to say "it's okay," but I can't. Because I live in a tank.
So father draws near and empties out the green liquid. I spit out the tube he has be breath from and step onto the floor. It's colder that I expected it to be. And as far as I can tell, it's concrete. Father guides me to the table where I lay down as he goes through some drawers. He walks over with a mask on his face and a knife in his hand. I try as hard as I can not to flinch or anything while he positions the knife to the socket of my arm. He brings it down and I can't help but scream.
Father sighs as he says "Well... that didn't work." And he tries what I assume is his backup plan. Again, I try as hard as I possibly can not to move while he brings his shaking hands to my neck, and then slams the knife into my chest.
All I feel is panic.
I'm panicking because there's now blood all over myself, the table, and father's lab coat. My blood. Gallons of it, too. I shut my eyes tightly as father carelessly walks back to the tank. I can feel my heart stop beating. The last words I hear is father saying "oh well." So I, the girl who doesn't even know how old she is, the girl who lives in a tank, the girl who had never spoken, the girl who had never touched another human being until only moments ago, draws to a close.
It's a happy ending though, because I'm no longer alone.

Nikki Star

Nikki took a deep breath as she glanced at the crowd of around two thousand people from behind the black and pink curtain. At heart, she would always be Nichole Dana Pelling, and she would always do the dishes when her mom asked and she would always clean her room, she would always say "I love you" before her dad left for work, she would always go to bed on time and she would always get to school no matter what. But right then, in that moment, she was Nikki Star. She was that one sixteen-year-old girl who played bass and singed in a band. She was that one girl who did whatever she wanted, whenever she wanted. She was the girl who met everyone she knew at the scene. She was the one girl with the sideways hat and the pink stripes in her hair who always ordered orange soda when her friends ordered cocktails. She reminded herself as hard as she could-- she wasn't Nichole anymore. She was a girl in one of the biggest local bands anyone had ever seen. She wasn't just the law-abiding little girl she was raised to be, she was the person who got her songs played on the radio. She was the girl who would step onto that stage as the curtains were dragged apart, put one hand in the air, announce her presence and have an enourmus room full of people applaud.
"Nikki!"
"Ah--huh?" She said, turning around quickly and accidentally whacking her bandmate in the face with the bill of her hat.
"Dude," He--no, Bryan said, pointing to the drum set. and for some reason, his fingers were covered with rainbow colored rings... "Do you have any idea where that replacement drummer is? We can't find him anywhere?"
Oh, yes, the replacement drummer. What was his name? Something usual and boring...like Paul. He was a little older than all of them, around twenty-three, and had a knack for getting free food (as well as disappearing).
"Dunno." Nikki said, staring at Bryan, who had apparently dyed (or at least hair-sprayed) his hair while she was thinking to herself, as it was now dark purple. Though, as it always, it went up in the back and almost-- and I repeat, almost covered his left eye.
"Damn...look, can you help me find him? 'Cause seriously, we can't start this whole thing if we don't have a drummer..."
Nikki shrugged. "I don't see why we had to ditch Shiloh. She was fine."
"Because she had to go to college! Dammit, just go ask if everyone has seen him, okay? Me and Michael will go look for him..."
Nikki stuck out her tongue in disgust. Really? Open the biggest show of her life with "has anyone seen Paul?" Not a chance in hell.
"Actually, you know what--" She began, taking her purple zebra-striped phone out of her pocket. "I have his number. I'll call him." So she went through her contacts as fast as she could until she came across a certain Paul DeAundre.
"Oh my god, could your phone be any slower?" Bryan shouted.
"Dude, just calm down, we still have ten minutes. Where the hell is your guitar? Did you tune it? Is it the red one or the green one? And what about a strap, do you have one? Cables? Picks?"
"Chill, Nikki, it's cool." Bryan laughed, putting both hands in front of him as a shield. "How about you?"
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine... but I left my bass in the RV. You should go get it. How about Michael? What's up with her keyboard?"
"It's on the stage, and it has an amp..."
"Hello? Who the fuck is this?" A slurred voice shouted from Nikki's phone. Both of the musicians jumped.
"Paul? It's Nikki... dude, get up here. The show starts really freakin' soon."
"I'm on the fucking stage, man!"
"You are...?" Nikki muttered, peering onto said stage. The one where no one was. "Dude, where are you? Seriously..."
"I'm right here," Paul said, suddenly not a static-y monotone voice over a purple phone.
"Whoa shit dude! Don't sneak up on people like that!" Nikki said, stuffing her phone in the pocket of her black skinny jeans. "Okay...you have, like, sticks or anything...?
Paul pointed to the floor tom, where two sets of thin sticks were waiting for him.
"Oh, thank god..." The blond girl said, kneeling over. "You seen Michael?"
Bryan nodded. "She's in the bathroom right now. She'll be back soon..."
"Shit, man! My bass is in the van!"
All three of them glanced at each other before taking off to the back door as fast as they could. They got to the RV in less than thirty seconds, but they were on in three minutes and Bryan couldn't find his keys.
"Nikki, don't you have a pair?" Bryan said frantically, turning all of his pockets inside-out and getting nothing but an old stick of raspberry gum.
"I--um--yeah!" Nikki said, her eyes lighting up as she took a key chain out of the pocket on her hoodie and tossed it to Bryan.
After retrieving Nikki's bass, the three of them rushed back inside and were nearly out of breath when they saw the brown-haired Michael, who was completely ready, staring at them with her hands on her hips and one eyebrow raised.
"Where were you guys?" She asked.
"We had to get Nikki's bass!" Bryan said frantically, trying to plug it in but failing. Michael sighed and plugged it in for him, as well as his own guitar-- the shiny purple one that nobody knew he owned.
"Okay okay okay," Nikki said, "The sound guy's gonna turn on the mics, right?"
Paul, Michael and Bryan nodded.
"And you guys are okay?"
They nodded.
"...Okay."
The curtains drew back, the lights above the audience turned off and the lights on stage went on. And in the very very very back of the room, Nikki saw someone with headphones on nod-- presumably the "sound guy."
"Hey there, guys," Nikki smiled, her voice amplified through the PA speakers. "I don't suppose your here to see us, are you?"
The crowd cheered.
"Well," Bryan said, leaning towards Nikki's microphone. "That's good. Because we need money to go buy five packs of hot dogs at the supermarket,"
"Oh yeah," Michael giggled. "Love them hot dogs."
Nikki laughed along with them, trying to bring attention back to her so they could start the show. "Anyways, we have this song... and... it's called Another Note."
With that, Bryan, the lead guitar, played some riff followed by Michael, who played a more subtle one, followed by Nikki, who played a few notes over and over again that went along with Michael's, and finally Paul, who played a beat that went with Nikki's. After a few minutes of that, Nikki and Bryan both leaned towards the microphone and sang the following (very slowly):
"This time you've gone too far
We will burn your corrupt world
We will start it all again
These diamond eyes will not forget
your trembling bloody hands;
we will raze all you ever owned
for our own new lands.
This is the end of all your felonies,
This is the end of all murders,
this is the end of all my suffering...
this is justice,
I am justice."
And with the last line everyone stopped aside from Bryan, who played the first riff as an outro. The crowed cheered, Paul set down his sticks for a moment and Nikki took her hand off of the neck of her bass.
"Wow, I forgot how intense that song was." She smiled, "Who wants to hear The Reaper? It's alchapella..."
The crowd cheered again. Because that's all they were good at, cheering.
"Okay then. Anything for the hot dog fund, ya know?" Michael said, taking her place next to Nikki.
"Sleep my darling sleep
Sleep yourself awake
And if when you hear the footsteps on the stairs
You'll know the reaper's there

"Sleep my darling sleep
Sit in the dark all alone
Just remember when the reaper comes
To take your soul to hell

"Sleep my darling sleep
Close your eyes for good
I want you to know that when you're gone
I won't cry a single tear"
"Okay okay okay," Michael said, taking a step back. "Do we have any songs that don't make you wanna kill yourself or what, Nik?"
Nikki laughed. "No. Because our lives are awful and we take out all our teenage angst through deep emotional songs with music written by a twat."
"I am not a twat!" Bryan shouted.
"Oh yes you are," Nikki smiled, adjusting her hat. "Anyways, here's a really angst-y song. And it's called August Twenty-Second, 2002. And... Bryan's a twat."
"Am not!" He said as he returned to his place on the stage.
"Oh, and just as a warning, this song's a rap. And it's got a lot of words. You know why? 'Cause we're teenage angst-y gangsters." And she said "gangster" the way you were supposedly supposed to say it-- "gangsta."
"I am a creature far beyond
That which you call a social bond
A creature who is not afraid to murder
Just to get beyond the border
Right about now the creeping suspicion
That this is more than just ambition
In probably going through your mind
That feeling will have to be left behind
For my plan to unwind
In the way I had under command
So just about now I'm going to demand
that you leave the room, only for a moment
But I ensure you this mistake was no accident
And that everything is going just as planned

Right about now you're probably wondering why
I would excuse you in such a way
But it's okay my dear,
It will all be over in the blink of an eye
So just about now I have the fuel
And about to leave a world so cruel
When you come knocking down the door
Because you finally realized what I meant before
but right about then the flames were eating me away
An option I hadn't thought of until this moment, just today

So now I'm barely breathing,
And my ruby eyes are sheathing
You're about to call an ambulance
And tell them this was a series of accidents
And I can't help but laugh at your ignorance
So, just about now the curtains would be closing
And you'd be hearing claps from the audience
But you're on the phone and you're composing
Some ridiculous lie you think is fact
And I'm laughing to myself because you think you have it cracked
When you and that man are so far from the truth
The truth is that I'm still in my youth
And I gave it up for you,
So as I lay here dying I'm making a quick review
One of your performance, how talented you really are
And what I thought you to be is nothing short of who you really are
And just about now, as the curtain is closing
And I can see a red and blue light far beyond that's faintly glowing,
I feel you drawing near
And despite you're surroundings, you're mellow
And as my soul and I disappear
The last thing I see are your eyes, still canary yellow.
And just about now, you're wondering if I'm really dying
The fact is, I'm not. It's faux-- I'm lying
But as long as I keep you convinced
As long as it's the truth you're up against
Then I've done my deed, I've served my purpose
And you can follow my lead."
"Okay," Nikki muttered, sweat dripping down her face. "That's officially fucking epic."
Michael nodded. "Holy flying spaghetti monster, Nikki, you look really worn out. You do know we're only on the third song, right...?"
A smiled wormed it's way across the blond-and-pink haired girl's face. "Anything for the hot dogs, Michael, anything for those damned delicious hot dogs."
And they played the rest of the night, just like that. They got kicked out around midnight, but that didn't bother them one bit. Because in the end, it doesn't matter if you're breaking the rules or not, what matters is that if you just entered high school and all of a sudden you find yourself playing music with your friends in front of thousands of people, or you turn on the radio and hear the song you wrote at three in the morning, you're going to make the best of it. It doesn't matter who you are or what you want to do in life, you just do it. And that's exactly what those three did-- they played. They played for hours and hours on end, and they didn't stop, even when they felt the audience was loosing interest.
Because in life, you just keep going on.
And that was their life-- playing. Playing music.