Chapter One.

Day of the Noise.

"Reina, he's late."

"Well isn't he always late?"

"Yeah but that isn't the point! Today is kinda a big day isn't it? I mean I think this is a pretty serious discussion we have to have."

"Casey will be here."

"And how do you know that?"

"Because that's just how he is isn't he? You know, never there when you want him, but never there when you actually need him."

"You make him sound like a superhero. Although I'm sure that's exactly how he sees himself in that whacky brain of his. Pretty sure his mom dropped when he was a baby, and I'm pretty sure that's because he asked her to."

"Erik!"

"Ow!"

"He'll be here, okay?"

Erik shot his faithful little sister an incredulous look before turning away and muttering under his breath, "Starting to wonder if that'll be such a great thing…"

"Hey guys!"

Reina shoved her fist into her brother's rib again sharply as they turned toward the voice that had called out to them.

It had been a fairly normal Friday afternoon in the suburbs of Stone Canyon, or what the teenage populace referred to it 'coolly' as the S.C. Upon first glance the day was no more or less different for these particular three teens either; it was tradition to not only spend time together after school, but to practice in their little garage band for hours on end. Upon second glance however one could see the slight tension that perpetrated the air within their little music space as their final member quite appropriately finally arrived.

This tension did disperse, albeit for a brief moment, when the pair looked at their classmate with tilted heads. "Uh, Casey, what are you wearing?" Erik questioned though not sounding the least bit curious.

"Oh this?" The long haired teen lifted up a yellow hockey mask revealing his wide grin, "Yeah, this is kinda why I was late," he explains as he tosses it passed them, the mask itself banging loudly against his drum set. "I was playing hockey with Tommy, my second-cousin twice-removed on my step-step father's side. He was feeling a bit down because his girl broke up with him through a Dear John letter, she had gone off to become a gymnast. Sucks, she was really cute. I forget her name though. Kim? Kimberly? Kat? Katie? Kira? Kathryn? Bah, I'll never remember," he laughs as he makes his way to his drum set, plopping himself down on the stool before exclaiming triumphantly, "Oh snap! I remember! It was Amy. Dunno why the hell I kept thinking it started with a "k'. Sorry guys, been feeling a bit scattered-brained lately.

"Oh, just lately you say?" Erik mutters under his breath with a smirk. It isn't low enough to escape his sister's apparent acute sense of sound however and her fist finds her way to his rib as though it were magnetic.

"So, Casey!" Reina says loudly to mask the sound of Erik's yelp of pain. "We have to talk."

"Yes Reina, I'll marry you, but you could have shown more class and not ask in front of your brother," he replies very absentmindedly as he searches for his pair of drumsticks.

Erik turns menacingly toward his extremely scattered-brained friend but Reina cuts him off swiftly. "Duly noted so I'll withdraw the question," she tries to hold back a smile as she sees out of the corner of her eye her brother rolling her eyes at the mere thought of them walking down the isle. "We do have another question. Well to be specific I have an idea I want shoot at you."

"Load the chamber and blow me away," he grins as he twirls a stick oddly impressively in his hand, eyes thoroughly fixed on her.

"Well, we've been practicing as a band for awhile now right?"

"Eight month's thirteen day's and roughly eighty-eight seconds from now, yeah," he nods as the spinning drum stick dances even faster between his trained fingers.

"Yeah, right… well, I have an idea. You know about Holly's Haven right?"

"Yeah! Great music store down on Cherry Hill road. Great store. Terrible road. Needs more cherries."

"Agreed," she presses on, "I was down there just last weekend and I found out that they hold an open mic there. It's for comedians, performers, and most importantly musicians. I was thinking maybe we could perform there, the three of us as our first real gig."

"Yeah, and I'm not so keen on it," Erik comments, "I mean, we've gotten a lot better, there's no question. I feel more than comfortable singing and playing rhythm guitar now more than ever, and Reina here has been getting her bass lines down pat," his sister looks up innocently at him, "and you Casey with your drums, you, you…"

"Yeah buddy?" Casey says eagerly.

"You… bought a drum set! Good job!"

"Yeah, it's a talent," he nods knowingly.

"Agreed." Erik says in that same no nonsense tone his sister had used and also presses onward. "As great as we may have become over all this time, I'm just not quite sure we're ready yet-"

"We are ready!" she exclaims.

"No we aren't. We haven't even come up with a name yet."

"We don't really need one. The songs we do know we can nail perfectly."

"They are also all songs we cover Reina, from other bands much more well known to say the least. I mean I know they're fun to do and all but don't you want to wait till we get good enough to create our own songs and then perform them?"

"What's wrong with doing covers? It's just our first gig anyway!"

"There's nothing wrong with it but I seriously doubt a crowd will be willing to sit through a set list that's half Weezer songs and the other half indie crap!"

"Hey! Those are the songs that I chose and they are not indie crap, plus it's just an open mic so we don't have to do a full set list, just one song!"

"Hey!" Casey interjects as he springs to his feet. "You guys are asking for my opinion right? Well are you gonna let me give it or you guys just gonna keep yelling at each other? Sheesh," he exhales as he sits back down, "you guys fight like your brother and sister."

In unison they slap a hand to their foreheads. "We are brother and sister, remember?"

"Oh yeah, weird coincidence huh?" he remarks. Before the duo could slap their foreheads again he continues, "If you want to know my opinion then I'm with Rei-rei on this."

"Did you just call her ray-ray? Never mind," he sighs, "are you serious Casey?"

"Yes I am. We've been together for awhile now, so what's the point of making all this noise if we're the only ones who get to hear it? I always imagined us playing for people, not for garages."

This stirs something deep within Erik as his friend's words working their wisdom through his mind. Reina raises her eyebrow at the sudden burst of advice their friend had produced, thoroughly shocked and awed. If there was one thing she loved about the boy it was his ability to be unpredictable and to say what you meant to say in very interesting ways, albeit better for worse.

"Okay." Erik says after a long pause, rubbing his chin. "We'll do it. But, before you get all happy Reina, I have some conditions.

"First, we'll practice two months in advance,"

"That's too far," she complains, "two weeks."

"Too soon, compromise, let's say one month then."

"Two weeks."

"Three weeks."

"…Two weeks and a day?"

"Two. Weeks."

"Deal, two weeks," he submits as he rolls his eyes, "but we practice every other day till we do and when practice we practice hard alright? We can get our songs down better and tighter that way, and then we'll have time to decide which song we think sounds best to perform onstage."

"Yeah!" Casey shouts in enthusiasm, "Now that's what I'm talking about! Good thinking there, just tell us what to do 'ol fearless leader!"

"Fearless leader, yeah right," he laughs off as he motions towards a resting crimson red guitar leaning against the garage wall.

"Seriously Erik I think it's a good plan," Reina nods, "let's make it three weeks then, okay?"

He doesn't quite smile, but Erik knows it's an accomplishment to make his sister bend away from her, albeit usually right, stubborn way of thinking. "Deal. But for now your fearless leader wants to know if we can actually get to practicing now?"

"Yeah!" Reina reaches for her bass guitar and throw it on happily. "What do you guys want to start with first?"

"Anything but Greenday, I'm getting sick of-"

"Brainstew by Greenday on three!" Casey yells, "One, two, three and four, let's drop!"

But before any of them get the chance to 'drop', the garage door careens wide open.

"The hell?" Erik walks toward the door and begins to try to pull the door manually back down. "Reina did you hit the garage door opener by accident?"

"No, I'm pretty sure I didn't. Weird, but then again it's not like it's the first time right?"

"Yeah, well, how's about this for a first time," he drops his hands to his waist, "I can't get it to go back down."

"No?"

"No, it won't budge at all."

Before Reina could give it a try however Erik notices Casey's finger outstretched. "Uh, guys?"

"Yeah?"

"That woman is watering her lawn."

"Yeah so? It's just our neighbor."

"The water isn't moving."

The duo glance their neighbor. Although it may ironically have been the oddest thing that had came out of Casey's mouth that afternoon, it was also the truest.

Unfortunately.

"Well, would you look at that," Erik breathed.

Hypnotically they walked out pass the driveway and onto the woman's lawn, dumbfounded at the frozen liquid that had once been flowing freely through the air, and looked almost as equally dumbfounded at the woman who appeared to be robbed of all motion.

"Uhm, Tori?" Reina tapped her shoulder, but no response. Carefully she removes the blue headphones she had been wearing whilst watering her grass. "Tori? Tori? Tori!"

"It's no use, and it isn't just her guys," Erik slowly began to realize as he walked out onto the street. "It's, it's everyone. Everything."

"Nothing is even playing on these things," she notes, "nothing at all… no noise…"

A dog frozen it time as it chased after the postman, a little girl stuck in mid air as a pair of jump ropes sat suspended in mid-air both above and below her. It was as if the trio had magically been whisked away into a Norman Rockwell painting.

"This can't be a prank, this is physically impossible. Like, literally, physically, impossible." Erik shook his head.

"What is going on?" Reina clasped her hands over her mouth. Her knees begin to buckle, the sudden weight of their impossible situation clutching her heart. "Erik, Erik? Erik, I c-can't breathe…"

"Rei-!"

A bolt of lighting strikes the area near his feet even before he could take one step toward her falling sister.

"Guys… what the hell is that?!" Casey shrieks as he points at something creep its way towards them.

Something not quite human… but not quite a monster either. Its skin was metallic, bolts of electricity dancing madly around its tall frame. Its eyes were devoid of pupils and as round and large as footballs, dark circles surrounding them. However it barely stood a head taller than either of them and initially appeared to be the same height as them as well. It was hunched forward, arms dangling in front of itself in a terrible posture, its fingers crackling with bolts of energy, torching the pavement it moved under.

"Well, at least it moves slow right?" Casey noted.

And, as if on cue, it manifested itself as a streak of lighting and appeared almost instantaneously in front of himself and Reina, smacking the incorrect teen with a swiftness they could not hope to outclass. Casey reeled through motionless air and up the driveway into his garage landing terribly on his bass drum.

Before either of them could scream his name aloud however the monster takes its hand and digs it fingers teasingly into Reina's ankle.

Only blood and screams exit her innocent body.

"REINA!"

Without thinking, without even think he had screamed her sister's name, he knew only one thing.

Either attack this monster or have a dead sister.

This decision didn't require time to think.

Bringing his hands up over his head he prepared to deliver a haymaker, but as if it sensed his attack a bolt of lighting struck him around his navel, leaving him a crumpled heap on the ground. "Ahh, ah… you gotta be kidding me…"

"You gotta be kidding me," Casey moaned as he made his way out of his own bass drum. Blood was trickling over his forehead, but he was still in one piece and on his feet.

Slowly but surely adrenaline began coarse through Erik's veins. Although it was nothing compared to the bolts of lighting that seemed to be what this monster was composed of, it did allow the teenager the chance to get back onto his feet as well. "Yo Casey! You alright?"

"Y-Yeah but I think its coming back to me for round two!" he screams in panic.

"Damn!"

"I know right?" deliriously Casey points to the sky as if he were having an Eureka moment, "If only we could teleport…"

"Dammit Casey snap out of it or you're gonna die!"

"I'm just saying it would be cool if we could teleport!"

And once more as if on cue Casey stares in amazement as the monster travels literally at the speed of lighting in front of the unique teenager. The lighting it produces crackles itself loudly, almost as it the energy itself was laughing at the boy.

"Yeah, teleport… like that…" Casey laughs hopelessly. He lowers his finger gradually. "I gotta learn not to point at things. Bad stuff happens when I point at things."

"Well, that doesn't happen everyday…"

"Reina!" Erik kneels down to his sister. "You okay?"

"I think I'm fine but my leg, I-I can't move my leg!"

"Just hold on okay? Just hold on for me," Erik pleads, but he doesn't know what's next to come, and what he could guess, judging from the sheer speed and strength from this alien being, he dared not say aloud. He begins to watch in terrors at the monster raises a deadly hand to his drummer friend.

"Well guys, I guess this is it!" he shouts towards them, gripping the remains of his destroyed bass drum. "Thanks for giving me a chance!"

A chance to be what, they both wonder deliriously. A chance to be in their band? Admittedly they weren't his first choice but still.

"A chance to be what?" Reina yells to their doomed friend.

"No, a chance," he smiles as he raises his drum above the monster's head in a vein attempt, "a chance to be your friend!"

Erik dashes back up the length of his driveway, but it's pointless. "CASEY!"

"Well, as I used to say," he smiles as he thrusts the drum down onto his attacker, "LET'S DROP!"

A bright light.

A bright, yellow light.

It's a charming, slicing, dazzling light, outshining all from view.

And for a moment.

Nothing.

And as for the next moment.

Power.