Chapter 1

Zelda sighed as she looked out the window of the car, watching the hundreds of trees skip over the setting sun like a set of ballet dancers. She had her chin rested up against her fist; she solemnly looked out the window with a look of longing and depression in her eyes. With another sigh, she looked back to the seat in front of her.

It was the end of the summer, meaning the beginning of her junior year. Though she normally would have been very happy about this, she was actually rather depressed and aggravated. Her father had gotten a great job offer in San Demas California, meaning her moving from Florida to the unfamiliar area known as the Concrete Jungle.

She had been in Florida most of her life, growing up there, making friends there. It was nothing but pure irritation that she had to spend her final years of high school, her supposed best years, in a totally new world. Her dad told her to look on the bright side, but that was just a tad bit difficult when her enter life had been torn from her suddenly.

Just she, her father, and her older brother, Serj, left to California. Serj was a senior, and equally disappointed with the situation. It did give Zelda some comfort knowing that her brother would be with her through the whole thing as well. They could help each other, yes… then it wouldn't be nearly as bad.

Zelda was 17, and Serj 18. Their mother had passed away when Zelda was only 6 years of age. It devastated the family, needless to say; yet somehow, they still managed to limp on through the hard times. Their father had to work two very stressful jobs just to put Mac and cheese on the table every night, the occasional Ramen noodles or a casserole.

The car they owned was merely an old 1987 Honda Civic. They didn't have the money to pay for Zelda to get her license, and Serj had to bust his butt at his dead end job just to be able to scrape up enough money for the course, though it was nice having two drivers in the family.

It's rather obvious that the two children had to grow up very fast at a very early age. Zelda did not find this irritating however; she was more responsible and mature that most people ten years older than her. She had always just shrugged it off and taken it as part of life.

They had been traveling for five days now and still had another day to go until they met their destination. They were much too poor to afford plane tickets, so they rented a trailer and transported all their things like that. To their utter dismay, the trailer cost so much money that they had to sleep in the car in a parking lot or something of the sort, hoping that no cops were to come by.

Zelda continued to glare out the car window; her beautiful features had turned to desperate and grieved lines. Night had fallen now, and her eye lids became heavy. Growing more wearisome of the long ride, she drifted to sleep in an awkward state of mind.

Link sat on his bed in the small apartment that he and two of his high school buddies inhabited, his blazing guitar chops running away. He spent most of his time nowadays screeching away at his Ibanez S Series guitar with metallic copper finish. He smiled as he finally got down the last final notes for a personal favorite of his, a very difficult song from guitar god, Steve Vai; For the Love of God.

It had taken him a year of working on it to finally pick out each and every little riff and subtlety, but with a great smile of pride on his face, he realized he had accomplished what most people could never do.

Link was a senior at San Demas high now, well, after the next week he would be starting back in his new year. He didn't have the great reputation of star football jock that all the ladies wanted, but he had his share of the girls drooling at him as he passed them through the halls.

He undoubtedly had the BEST band in town, and there was no question about it. They were known as Prototype, and had very consistent gigs just about every weekend, and often about three shows within those last three days! With blazing guitar chops, booming bass licks, and thunderous drumbeats, they were able to cover great bands like: Avenged Sevenfold, Rush, Dreamtheater, Pantera, and many, many other bands that most people would never even attempt to try. This single fact earned Link all the popularity that he needed as lead guitar and backing vocalist.

He smirked at his own success as he set the guitar on its stand and tossed his white medium pick onto the dresser with its assortment of other picks and several Allen wrenches for tuning. Taking a quick glance at his clock, he now realized that 11 o clock had already crept up on him. He had started playing at just 4 in the afternoon!

"Damn I'm good," he thought to himself sarcastically, though in a way, truthfully.

He hadn't even realized he had played a straight 7 hours and hadn't even left his room to go to the bathroom. Link was rarely disturbed throughout the whole summer, since his buddies were always out partying and getting drunk and high; the usual stupid high school shit basically.

Link just spent most of his time playing, whether he was jamming at the warehouse his band rented out, or just sitting on the couch with the TV on blazing away. Seeing no point in staying awake any longer, he shrugged his shoulders and turned out the light before sliding under the covers in his bed.

His apartment was very small. Though it had two bedrooms in it, that still didn't change the fact at how poor the place was. Link took one of the rooms, while the other two roommates hogged the other room and the living room. The rooms were not much bigger than a decent sized walk in closet, and the carpets an old musty brown. Clothes, guitar magazines, and other assorted teenage guy crap was strew lazily across his room. Pots and pans with caked on crud littered the kitchen, and the living room didn't look much better with its many Doritos's bags and beer cans lying around. The couch in the living room was an awful dark orange and yellow color, but it was rather comfortable.

Link made his money for rent off of the gigs he did all the time. He made roughly three hundred bucks a weekend that he could keep for himself, so he was not at all struggling, while the other two had to work cruddy jobs to bring in a couple hundred dollars a month. Link felt bad, but hey! He couldn't help that he was just that good!

As you see, this is really nothing more than just an intro chapter. Please read and review, I'll have many more writings to come. Thanx guys

Geddy