Chapter One

We begin our adventure in the grimy, yet lavish city of Las Vegas. With no rain to wash away the dust of life, all sorts of unpleasentness washes over the good, choking it, preventing the beauty from ever blooming, and turning that which was a alive, dead.

This is Rosaria. A small, beautiful teenage girl who never fit in with her large, loud family. She was incredibly intelligent, but that knowledge was stifled beneath the hot desert sun, and beneath her older brothers taunts. After they had dropped out of school and gone to work, one in a restaurant, and another for some hotel contractor, Rosaria thought she could finally bring home a report card in peace, but her mother didn't understand the grades, and her father never even bothered to look. So Rosaria continued in her silence, and her achievements continued to go unnoticed, even by those who handed her the grades.

Her actual adventure began as she was walking home from school. The air was dark and heavy, just like monsoon season. But Rosaria knew it was not a monsoon, those came in August, not April. As she walked slowly home, although a bit quicker after remembering she was hungry, she felt an odd feeling.

I didn't think I was this hungry. Gosh! she thought, Is this what it feels like to pass out?

And pass out she did.

Out in an alley of Baltimore, Ian was hiding. His friend Ricky had made a bad move with a Bird that night and blamed it on Ian. Ian just figured that it would be easier for him to hide from the dumb bird, than have Fat Ricky try to pull a stunt. Again.

And then this feeling washed over him. Almost like that horrible fatigue of sixth period, but harder.

And it came again and again, bringing Ian to the ground.

Man Ricky, I shoulda just let you learn your lesson.

He tried to bring his legs back to their proper place under his body, but they slowly felt like puddles, incapable of doing anything other than running down a drain. He heard yelling and assumed that he'd been spotted. That was his last thought before he joined Rosaria.

Spencer was just sitting in his room in a small suburb of Portland, playing on his DS. Man was 8th grade rough. A plate of pizza rolls sat beside him. He didn't even notice himself drifting off and disappearing. Neither did the pizza rolls, but they were thankful to have survived the afternoon snack. At least until the family cat came in.

Tessa was at track practice. Her tight, frizzy curls were pulled back the best she could as she ran around the locker room getting ready for practice. It was mostly empty when Tessa locked herself in the stall. She waited until Emily had left to do what she went in to do. She finished up and headed out to the field. She had almost made it to the door before she collapsed.

This is the price you have to pay, the voices in her head said.

Then she blacked out.

Kyle wasn't in the mood to watch mom and dad go at it again. He walked out to the woods across the road. He wasn't sure who owned the property, but he knew it wasn't his dad, so it would be quiet there. There were a few trees he really liked to climb, but today he just didn't have the energy.

He sat on a huge root and cursed to the wind. He thought maybe if he vented all the hate that his dad put in him that he could finally be normal, but when he stood, the urge to break the branches in his way was still there. He looked down at his worthless hands.

I'll only ever be his son. I'll always be this angry.