Chapter 1:

Halie and Alexis

I snuck into Alexis Key's room. Her black hair was bearly visable between the rise and fall of the blanket covering her sleeping form. I smiled, she was my best friend and roommate,and the sad truth was, we were both orphans. Alexis's mom was killed when she was two, in a fire accident, and her dad was so torn apart, he jumped in front of a moving train. I never knew my parents, all I know is my mom was like and angel and died hours after my birth. So we lived in a little house built in the 1930's, it looked horrible on the outside, that way no one would come inside and take us to an orphanage. But inside, it was pretty nice. We had a flatscreen t.v, a computer, every thing was working, and we had food.

We lived together outside of Tranquility, about 7 miles out. I worked playing electric guitar on the streets every day, while Alexis stayed home and did all the chores, cooking, cleaning, and when she had the time, worked at a pet shelter. We were always there for each other, cause that's the only person we had to rely on, each other.

I crawled on the floor over to her bed, and then yanked the sheets off her. " Alexis, Alexis, Alexis!" I yelled, jumping on top of her.

Alexis shot up and smacked me. " Um, first of all, OUCH!" I growled, then I wiped the sweat off my face. " Alexis, I'm leaving soon, I made waffles!"

I trotted out of her room and set the table. Three waffles for Alexis, three waffles for me. I waited for around three minutes, and Alexis still didn't come out. I growled and went to find my eletric guitar. I plugged it in and walked into Alexis's room.

I then very loudly strummed Eye of the Tiger. Alexis shot up faster then a bullet. " Halie, I'm awake, stop playing!" Alexis moaned.

" Breakfest is served," I said, then walked out of the room. I put my eletric guitar in it's case and went to eat. Alexis was dressed and sitting at the table, shoving waffles down her throat.

" Easy there tiger," I chuckled grinning, then sat down at the table and cut up my waffles. Alexis shoved the last piece of the golden waffle into her mouth.

" Yum..." she purred, sitting back in her chair. I chuckled and finished my last waffle.

" Alright, so we have a choice today. We contuine our little routine, me working on the streets and you doing whatever,That's option one," I said, flicking an invisable piece of a crumb off my shirt, " or I talked with the school today on the phone, and they said they would be glad to have us, we wouldn't have to pay for lunches or our schooling. The only problem is if one or both of us get in trouble, we have to have an adult be there for us. That's option two," I concluded grinning.

Alexis just stared at me. " Option two all the way! How'd you manage to pull it off?"

I just grinned and shook my head. " School starts on September first. So in..."

" Three weeks!" Alexis shouted out. I chuckled.

" Yes, in three weeks. The only problem is I'm not exactly sure what grade we will start in.." I pondered.

" We should be in 6th. Considering your birthday is October 18th, and mine is July 21rst," Alexis stated.

" I guess your right, well, I'm going. Any requests?" I asked, standing up and going to find my gear.

" Hmm... we're out of chocolate..."

I laughed and walked out the door. " Chocolate, got it!"

Alexis giggled and dissapeared from my view. I closed the door and breathed in the warm, crisp summer air. I looked around the woods surrounding our home, a chipmunk squealed and leaped into it's hole, a birds chirped and fluttered out of it's tree. Everywhere around me the forest was moving, I smiled. Then I started out for Tranquility, a lovely seven mile walk from our little cabin in the middle of nowhere. What I didn't notice was that the forest was alerting me to an unseen danger to both me and Alexis.