Chapter 1

That Scream

Roderich woke up to the sound of a high-pitched scream that echoed in his large house. Roderich's eyes were fixed on the dark ceiling of his room. He swallowed hard. Roderich begged that the scream was from a nightmare instead of from reality. But another scream soon followed. Roderich sat up in bed and choked back his own yell of terror as a gunshot echoed through the night. Then he heard his fathers voice.

"Rod, run! The window!"

Roderich snapped his head over to the window and stared.

"The wind-" His father's voice was cut off by a gunshot which was followed by silence. An unfamiliar man's voice soon followed.

"Oh, Rod! Roddy, Roddy, Rod!"

Roderich ran to his desk and pushed his chair beneath his door handle; he picked up the heaviest book he found and chucked it at the window, shattering the glass. He ran. He jumped. Roderich landed on the top of the car sitting in the driveway, snow falling on of his dark brown hair. Roderich screamed as he felt horrible pain move up and down his leg, then he looked at his ankle. My ankle isn't supposed to bend that way… Roderich thought. He shook his head. He looked up into his window right as a figure appeared. Dad? Roderich thought. In response, he saw a small handgun glow just enough in the moonlight to tell that it was pointed at him. Roderich threw himself off the car and onto the snowy ground as the handgun shot another bullet into the night.

Roderich's young purple eyes were filled with fear as he called out "HELP!" then he went sprinting.

Adrenaline must have taken over, for he could no longer feel the pain in his twisted ankle. The young Austrian boy

pounded on the neighbor's door.

The neighbor swung the door open, and also held a gun in his hand. "Roderich, get in here!" The older Italian man ordered.

"W-what?"

"If you want to live, then get in here!" The Italian screamed. "Lovino!" he added, "You and Feliciano get yourselves and Roderich to safety!"

"Sì Grampa Ruggero!" both young Italian boys called out.

Roderich heard the sounds of a small shootout between the murderer and Grampa Ruggero, then he heard sirens. He heard the sounds of police, and angry ones at that. Ruggero finally walked downstairs, calmly, no longer a gun in his hand. Ruggero explained that the police found both Roderich's mother and father dead. Roderich uncontrollably sobbed into Ruggero's shirt. "T-thank you, though, f-for saving my life" Roderich managed to say. But another gunshot split the night, and a scream came from Lovino, who was upstairs. Policemen were yelling at another attacker. When Roderich and Ruggero reached the upstairs, one policeman was dead, and Lovino was crawling on his hands and knees, blood trailing from his right hip. The second murderer turned his gun towards Roderich, and aimed directly at his face. The attacker pulled the trigger.

Roderich sat up in bed with a scream. He was panting, shaking and sweating. This happened ten years ago. Why couldn't he forget it? Why did this nightmare of a memory seem to haunt him every night? Roderich rubbed the scar on the left side of his face. The attacker had missed his face by only millimeters, but still left a scar. Roderich heard a quiet knock at his door.

"Yes?" He replied, but his voice was barely audible.

His uncle opened the door slowly. "Same dream?" Roderich could only nod his head. "I'm sorry," his uncle whispered then closed the door, for uncle Geron knew that he couldn't help. Roderich laid back down and tried to fall back asleep.