Chapter 1:

My Name is Stephanie

The rain fell, hard and heavy, but the blood fell even harder...

Her rain soaked hair glistened in the moonlight. Her sword reflected the glare from a nearby orange streetlamp, the stream of light bending up and down the long, narrow sword in rythem with her chest which moved slowly up and down, her breasts slightly trembling. Her right leg shifted in its stance, squaring her off with the monster in front of her. His breath was rapid and his breath stale, she could smell it from the one hundred sum odd feet they had between them. She waited for it to make a move. She used to call it "him" but that all changed when "he" discovered that drug.

The human monster thrusted itself forward, letting out a low grunt. She pounded ahead, right foot then left, calculating the perfect moment to strike. He lunged. She dodged, leaping above his head and bringing the sword down into his neck, severing his head. She landed, squatting with her back to the beast. Her sword, in her right hand, was held out straight behind her while her left hand held her steady in the low stance. Blood spouted into the air like a fountain, a macabre, grotesque fountain. She barely moved as the blood poured down on top of her.

She was soaked, a mixture of rain and the blood of a creature. Her eyes glistened. She was crying. Or maybe it was just a trick from the rain.

8 Months Prior

"Shit, I am gonna be late for school AGAIN!" Her feet hit the ground as she lunged off her bed. Hitting the ground running when she noticed the time on the clock: 7:46. She left for school at about 7:30 on most days as she had a nearly 15 minute walk to school. "I'll never make it!" She passed the bathroom, skidding to a halt and turning back, thrusting her body inside and slamming the door shut. Her left hand groped around on the sink for her brush while her right hand moved back and fourth against her teeth. She gargled and spit into the sink, accidently getting some leftover toothpaste on the brush, which she continued brushing with anyway.

My name is Stephanie VonHannum. Im 17 years old and a junior in high school. I have long, medium brown hair and light blue eyes. Anyway, enough about my superior looks. Mornings at my apartment werent always like this. At least, they werent back when I had a mother and a father, and not to mention two restless siblings.

Its been a whole year since the accident and things have gotten much better. My grades used to be below expectations and I often skipped school. I started hanging out with a "not-so-average" crowd as the teachers call it. The days when I was at school, I got sucked into after school meetings with the teachers. They told me things like "Its alright to be upset, if you need anyone to talk to, I am always here for you." Or they attempt to give me advice on my life: "Stephanie, I think you need to stop hanging out with that, lets say...not-so-average crowd. You used to an A student. But now? You skip classes and your other teachers and I are worried that you might be involved with drugs." That wasnt true, never touched the stuff in my life, my world was already turned into something unreal, I didnt need to take drugs and make it worse.

I know they were just trying to help me, like all my friends. But it doesnt last. There are four stages of mourning. First: You are upset (obviously) your world crashes down upon you and nothing makes sense. This is the stage where after about the third person who brings you homecooked meals and offers to stay with you, you just want everyone to forget you exist and to stop caring so much. Second stage: You become more confused about why this had to happen to you and you begin pushing people away, you lose your friends and become a hermit. Third stage: After the confusion has passed, you become angry, so angry that you keep telling yourself not to buy a gun and shoot that old lady across the street who gives you sympathetic glares everyday after school. And finally the fourth stage: You seem to come to terms with things, you find a new life (if going back to your old one doesnt suit you anymore) and you adjust. People think your fine now and that you arent upset, but deep down there is a gash which was ripped in you the day you lost whoever you lost that while just never heal and will never go away.

Take all that, which normally occurs for one person, and multiply it by four. I was destroyed for the first month. I didnt eat or sleep or even bathe. And when I did bathe, I was scared of myself due to the voices which told me things could be much better if I just slipped beneath the glassy surface of the water and never came back up.

After that first month, stage 2 and 3 flew by. They only lasted about another two weeks. Then I moved to an apartment three towns over, attempting to leave my old life behind and start a new one, with a new school, new friends, a job, and a new house. Things would change. I just didnt know how much they would change in the upcomming year.

I rushed through the front door, locking it as I ran out. I was sooooooo late. My left hand flew out in front of my face as I came up on an intersection. There was little to no traffic in my neighborhood so I crossed to the other side, checking the time...8:04...with ease, there was not a car in sight.

"DAMNIT! Again! My homeroom teacher is gonna kill me!" Since I came to this new school 8 months ago (4 months after my familie's death) I had been doing much better in school. I was an A student again. I didnt skip school, unless I was sick. And I was frequently late for homeroom. But the teachers were used to it and let it slide since I worked till three in the morning and had to sustain a house on my own.

I burst into my homeroom class, no one bothered to even look up from Mr. Johnson who was telling the other students about a night fair that was comming up soon. They were all used to my lateness and knew it would be me bursting through the door. I took a seat next to my best friend Meagan Sainte who I had only know for the eight months that I had been at school. I no longer saw my old friends. My old life, was just that, old news, everything and everyone in it.

"Meg..." I whispered to her from across the void between our rows of individual desks. We sat in the second to last row, out of eight rows that put us in the way back, so far that Mr.Johnson either never heard them...or didnt care they were talking.

"Your late again." She joked "What is it?" She faced forward the whole time as not to make a scene, her upper torso merely leaning towards Steph just enough to hear her clearly.

"Whats this fair about?"

"Its a long story, Ill tell you at lunch okay?"

"Yeah, alright." They smiled at eachother and turned back to their desks, Meagan taking notes and Stephanie scrambling to pull out her notebook as they began learning functions of Y and the degree and coefficiant of the afore mentioned.

Later that day Steph wandered into the lunch hall, nearly walking into a beam whcih held the building up due to having been mostly put to sleep by her Chemistry teacher Mrs. White. Steph dragged herself towards the lunchline, grabbed a slice of cold, cheese pizza, a salad with brown leaves, and a can of diet pepsi. She paid and turned to face the crowd of high school students all scrambling to find seats at tables where their friends sat. Steph felt a finger poke her back causing her soda to tip off her tray, hit the ground, and explode. It spun in maddening circles on the ground, spraying all its contents onto nearby students including Steph and Meg who had just come up at her side.

They bottle stopped, Meg bent to pick it up as Steph squeezed the sticky soda out of her jeans, but another hand got to the bottle first, picking it up, the owner turning to Steph who looked up at this patron.

"Thanks- Oh...its you."

"Your such a clutz. Seriously, work on your walking skills, one poke and I sent you flying." Jake Green had never been very nice to Steph. He turned and walked away, hands in the pockets of his over sized jeans, looking as cool as ever as he left the lunch hall.

"Seriously? WHO THE HELL DOES HE THINK HE IS!? PUSHING ME AROUND LIKE THAT?" Steph stepped as much as she could over the giant puddle of soda in front of her. People who were cuaght in the spray turned to glare at her and she walked past. She ignored them.

"I think he means well..." Meagan started but decided not to finish.

"You think he means well? Why is your brother such an asshole?" Everytime Steph and Meagan had a sleepover at Meagan's house, Jake would be there, often inviting friends over the same night since their parents were always traveling. Jake was only a year older but acted like he was two. They would be in Meagan's room when the power would suddenly go out. Then a scratch at the door. The door would fly open and either one or several guys in gory looking masks would step in grabbing up the two girls and dragging them outside. Often they would be thrown, fully clothed, into the in-ground swimming pool, or possibly held down while one of the guys drew on their faces with permenant marker, causing the girls to spend the rest of their weekend scrubbing off the ink.

"I swear Meagan, if your brother tries any stupid stunts tonight Im gonna kill him!!"

"He isnt having any friends over I dont think, but then again, he never tells me when he is, probly cause he knows we would just go to your house."

"Why dont we?"

"What?

"Spend the night at my house tonight?"

"Steph, you have a one room apartment, your bedroom is your livingroom."

"Good point. Fine, your house it is." The two girls dumped their soggy meals into a trash can and began walking towards their next class which they had together, English 11.

"Hey!" This sudden outburst nearly caused Meagan to fall into a nearby freshman boy.

"Uh, yeah?"

"How about tonight, we get the drop on Jake?"

"What do you mean? Like, plan some kind of trap for him, a practical joke of sorts?"

"Yeah, only its got to be ten times better than anything he has EVER done to us." Both girls nodded, turning into their english classroom, neither talking, only thinking about what they could do.

Steph was on her way home to get her bag and walk to Meagan's house which was only eight blocks away. Meagan usually drove to pick Steph up and make a quick pit stop at Dunkin Donuts on the way back to Meagan's house for some french vanilla Coffee Coollattas. But today Meagan had a swim meet and wouldnt be home till 5 but told Steph to be waiting for her when she got there. Steph loved the smell of Meagan's house, it always smelled of rosemary candles and chocolate chip cookies. Probably because thats all Jake could make himself.

Steph came up on the same intersection she had crossed this morning when she remembered something in her backpack she needed to check. She was only a block from her house but decided to check it now since if she didnt have the book in her bag, she would have to turn back to school and get it.

Her right foot hit the pavement first, then her left, she took slow, small strides across the crosswalk as she pulled her bag off one shoulder and up to her chest. Unzipping it, she looked inside and saw the book, sighed in releif and turned to put the strap back over her shoulder when she saw the car, but it was already too late.