Fara Smith, a girl with brilliant blue eyes and golden hair with white streaks. At a glance, Fara
was like any other girl growing up in London in the twenty first century, until she turned thirteen
that is.
She'd always been smarter than the other kids. She learned to read at four, basic math at five,
French and Latin at six, and she was writing short stories by seven. Fara had a thirst for
knowledge. By the time she was ten she was fluent in twelve languages (English, French, Latin,
Chinese, Italian, German, Dutch, Spanish, Greek, Navaho, Portuguese, and Vietnamese). This
alone set her apart from the others, but when she turned thirteen, the dreams started. They
were vivid and abnormally realistic. She dreamed of the stars, of other planets and species, of
impossible things.
Nobody else cared. Nobody thought they were even remotely interesting. Nobody except
Amicitia. She was her only friend. She first met Amicitia when she was five and some of the
boys, that usually only focused their mocking on Fara, were pushing her around. So, Fara went
over and began babbling about things none of the other kindergarteners cared about. Her plan
worked. They stopped messing with the girl. Of course that meant they had begun tormenting
Fara again, but in reality, she didn't mind.
After the boys became bored with Fara, the girl came over. She said, "Thanks for that. They
think I'm a freak cause of my skin..." That was when Fara actually noticed the girl's skin. It
shimmered. "That's," she paused, "that's really cool!"
"You really mean that?"
"Yes! You're skin is like a penny that sparkles."
The girl smiles and says, "What's your name?"
"Fara. Fara Smith."
"My name's Amicitia. Amicitia Smith." She giggled, "We got the same last name!"
"Have."
"Huh?"
"We have the same last name."
"Oh. You're smart. I like you. We should be friends."
"You- you wanna be friends with me?!"
"Yup." She popped the p.
"Okay," she said slowly, "but can I call you Ami?"
"Yup!" Again popping the p.
From then on, Fara and Ami were best friends. They stood up for each other. They were each
other's only friends.
Fara told Ami about the strange dreams her second week of having them. She had drawn some
of the different things she had seen. There was the tunnel made of clouds and colors, fields of
red grass, potatoes in armor, giant moving pepper shakers, metal men, and angel statues.
A few months after the dreams started, something very strange happened. Fara was at the park
with Ami when Ami suddenly shouted, "Fara! What was that?!" Fara spun around, alarmed,
"What?"
"You were fading!"
"What?"
"You were! I swear!"
"Ami..."
"No! You were!"
Fara saw the tunnel from her dreams flash around her for a second, but then it vanished.
"Fara!"
Her face was pale when she answered, "You- you were right."
"Are you okay?"
"I saw the cloud tunnel."
"From your dreams?" She nodded. "Like, in your head?"
"No. It it was all around me. It was- it had to be real."
"Fara, are you sure?"
"Yes, I-"
"Fara!" She was gone. "Fara?"