Hey every one! This is a preview of the currently very long story I'm righting being since I haven't posted anything up about it and all I had was the summary in my profile. Please note that I will not be putting up this story in chapters, because then I'll be putting an obligation on myself to finish it and I'm not good with pressure! .

Not to fear though! I will hopefully be putting up two new stories very soon. ^_^

The few reviews I've gotten have all been complements so I'm pretty hyped up right now. :D

So if I get any more reviews then I'll probably blow up from ecstasy inflation and mind you I've only gotten two reviews for two different stories! :D

I started writing this story because I hate how they ended Static Shock! Honestly! Blowing up Francis and Ebon was a horrible thing to do! Especially after showing the two episodes Wet 'n Wild and No Mans an Island…I mean they showed that Francis had real heart, a past, and insecurities and then BOOM! Bye, Bye, mister pyro! .

DISCLAIMER: If I owned HotStreak then I'd of started a series of Romance novels upon this fanfiction.

Out of the Fire into the River

Preface

His past always caught up with him…

His old problems never seemed to really be solved…

He couldn't help but feel like the cards life had dealt him were almost unrealistically bad. He had finally started a new life and yet his old one had come back from the grave he'd dug for it like a vengeful spirit. So many memories he'd made in a just a year that completely consumed his other more bitter ones.

He had cheated death many times before…maybe God had given him a second chance? Well, he guessed that luck was on his side, but it had worn off apparently as he lay here waiting to be…he honestly didn't know what Ebon had planned for him. He held in his heart many regrets, but he really couldn't dwell on those thoughts for long, what with her smiling face a constant image ingrained inside his head. The people of his town…his home…his surrogate family really are what they had become to him now. Sure, he had been a stranger inside their small town, but they had welcomed him with open arms without knowing a thing about him.

He was cold right now…he felt the humidity in the basement air all around him seep into his bones. How he felt such warmth and cold right now, as his small reverie into his head had left him with a small fulfilled feeling inside his stomach. His inner warmth contrasted greatly with his outer cold, as he thought of the girl that had helped him so much this past year and had become the most important person in his life. She'd made his life change into something worth living and he could honestly say that if he hadn't found her he might still be wondering the streets looking for a job.

Hell, he'd of been back to his old life of crime in no time flat if he hadn't be able to find work. She was like an angel…he felt drawn to her when they'd first met. Whenever he had managed to depress himself with thoughts of his past crimes, she'd always be there to pick up his broken pieces and mold them into something beautiful. She didn't even know when she'd cheered him up most of the time being since he always lied about what he had been thinking about all the time.

She never needed to know that he was known in Dakota as a wanted gang member/freak named Hotstreak that had been presumed dead after having merged with another gang member/freak and been taken down by local heroes Static Shock and Gear. She didn't need to be informed that he was dangerous or wanted or anything that might cause her to hate him.

She could never hate him.

He couldn't bear the thought of her never wanting to see him again, but he knew that it was going to happen eventually when she found out why Ebon had captured him…when he found that out as well. He was in chains that had cut off his ability to create fire and it annoyed him. He wanted to get out of here before she discovered the truth and despised him.

She'd been so kind to him…so trusting and alive. She was such a dreamer…she never thought realistically about anything really and he loved that about her. He himself hadn't had the luxury of having dreams while he was on the city streets out in the night with a gun and a plan to rob someone, just to get by after his parents had died. Leaving him all alone in the hospital he had been in for a consecutive two years because of leukemia without any living relatives. Why did they have to leave him all alone?

He didn't know…after all these years he still couldn't answer that. He had remembered running away from the hospital after the night they'd told him he would be in foster care after he was well enough, but he had never been well enough. He had pushed all of his strength into running out of there and escaping the doctors. He had almost died after he'd hidden himself under a bridge by the docks and shortly after he had been found that morning by the police. His whole life after that he been hopping from foster home to foster home, always spending most of his nights in jail after he'd gotten into a stabbing or had committed a petty robbery or some other type of small time criminal activity. He had manage to survive his cancer, but at what cost?

He had gotten noticed by the wrong people for it too and that's how he got into the big time or really just a well-known gang.

He'd been so young and yet already had been through so much, but never had the time to wallow in self-pity so he didn't. He didn't want to think about his parents or his traumatizing child hood so he brought his thoughts back to his little guardian angel.

She helped him get through these tough times and he knew that he could never repay her for all the kindness she'd given him after he was so used to being treated like garbage or being looked upon with fear. Her musical laugh echoed in his ears after he started to feel the warmth again.

He smiled, as he thought of when she'd asked him what he wanted to become in the future. He'd told her he didn't care where he ended up as long as she'd be a few miles away from his home. He really felt like that…that he could be a millionaire and he'd still feel empty if she wasn't near him. He never felt like that before and he had surprised himself even. She was such a good person.

The whole town of Falcon Wood thought this about her…she was just that kind of girl. The kind of girl that would help you with your groceries to the car even if she didn't know you, she was the kind of girl that always smiled. She was the only girl that had made him blush and turned him into some one kind. She had called him a sweetheart on more than one occasion, but honestly he couldn't believe her no matter how much he'd like to. It was typical to him that he'd be thinking of her right now.

He was always thinking of her. Every day he thought of her, even if it was only a small inclination that she was still there, he always had a thought of her in his day. It was his favorite past time/obsession and he could day dream about her for hours on end now that it had progressed this far. 'How unhealthy' he had always thought to himself when he had come to his senses. He knew it was wrong to think about one person so much, but he had already broken so many rules one more wasn't going to hurt. She had fixed him…now that he thought about it she honestly had always been so good at making him happy. It was a feat that few people he knew could accomplish, if none at all.

He was so happy…even just thinking about her he was happy.

Slowly when he'd first met her she'd gained his trust and gotten him a job at a local bar alongside her. He went to school with her too, but he really didn't see himself going to college even though he was going to aim high and go for it. Now that it'd crossed his mind he had spent almost every waking hour with her…'Lexami.'

He almost got chills from thinking her name. He thought it once more… 'Lexami'.

He started to doze off on top of his cot with her face now replaying over and over in his head as he looked for an escape from his stone underground cell. Her smiling lips revealing pure white teeth, small nose, beautifully wide insanely violet eyes, her silken smooth ghostly white hair, and her ears…her wonderfully strange pointed kitty ears…how they drew his attention to her. They made her unique and made him feel like less of an outcast knowing that there was someone close to him that was also a bang-baby, at least that's what he assumed she was.

She had a matching tail too and it always made him want to laugh when he saw her occasionally leaning on nearby object in front of him, it always flicked and moved funnily while she was daydreaming or thinking. Sometimes she would even wear a ribbon on it as if it were just a normal every day thing to do. She was such an exotic specimen really…always catching his eye. Her smiling face was replaced by her laughter, a disembodied echo inside his head. The sound of water dripping found his ears, his thoughts now slowed in his head as sleep over took him.

He wasn't going to get out of here in time to stop her from finding him and learn from Ebon about his criminal record. Static, Gear, and her were coming for him and there was nothing he could do, but feel helpless and wait for them to come. He was such a fool…how could he of let Ebon capture him so easily? He wanted to see Lexy…he wanted to tell her that he was okay. He didn't know what was going to happen to him and he was scared. Not for his life or his wellbeing, but he was afraid of leaving her alone without saying good bye. It was a somewhat idiotic thing to be scared of… well, at least in his own opinion.

He had to get out of here…he had to stop Ebon's plans…but most of all he had to get back the life he'd built anew. He didn't know how or if he could escape, but he was going to try at least when he'd rested enough. He wasn't going to leave her like this…not like a sniveling coward waiting to be rescued. If she was going to learn about his past and who he had been, then he was going to make sure she'd remember him for who he was and not the things he'd done all that time ago. He wouldn't be known for his crimes and rage, or his bullying and thuggish swagger. No way was he going to let her think of him with contempt…if he was going to die and leave her he'd do it after stopping Ebon, saving Falcon Wood, telling her he loved her, and then promptly leaving her his journal so she could hear his inner most thoughts.

He would go out in style, with a big bang. 'Ha…' he laughed inside his head about his ironic little pun. How had he gotten by without her? Surely he was dead before…ever since he'd met her it was like he was living for the first time. What with her crazy ideas and impossible dreams she always gave him the one thing he had gone without with since his parents died and that was hope.

She'd made him hope about more things than he liked to admit, he hoped that he could have a normal peaceful life, he hoped to have a small family someday, and most of all right now he hoped to get out of here and complete his to-do list. He started to fall into unconsciousness, with her face and his thoughts of aspiration swirling around in his head like a dust devil.

He'd make it through this…that girl had made him feel things that he hadn't felt in a long time…before her all the emotion he had felt could be summed up in one word…numb. She was a gem! She was such a wonderful prize…he couldn't help it, but he saw her as his. She belonged to him as far as he was concerned. His…no other man would get to touch her.

He was possessive and he had no shame in admitting that. He was going to claim his prize, protect what was his! She had captivated him inside her lively spirit and her capability to see the beauty in everything. Really any man would have claimed her if they were smart enough to see what a vivid creature she was. Some just saw her outer beauty and others only looked at her inner beauty, but the few that saw her inner beauty only saw her as a friend and a good conversation, excluding him of course. He saw both with a burning intensity that would knock a lesser man to his knees.

'What a strange girl I love…' his last conclusion before he lost consciousness.