Standard disclaimers apply. Kori is my character :3

A/N:I've never written before so be sweet to me please! TTTT

Chapter One: Prelude to the Commencement of a Very Grand Adventure

Korban Gibson made her way up the crowded street. She could hear the voices and footsteps coming from her fellow passengers of the sidewalk. She tapped her walking stick back and forth, making sure there was no trash to trip over or patches of ice to slip on. Kori knew she had arrived at her destination when the sweet scent of freshly baked bread and pastries met her nostrils, and sat down in front of the bakery. The scents coming from it would be her meal today; she hadn't been able to obtain any money, so she breathed the sweet smell and pretended she could taste it. She leaned her head against the wall and began to daydream while she enjoyed her "meal."

She had been blind since the day she was born, and homeless for the past five of her sixteen years of existence. Her parents had been very well known members of the topmost tier of the "middle class." Although they were in fact multi-millionaires, they still claimed middle class status so their equally rich friends would complement their humility. Korban Emilia Gibson was their second daughter; the first was perfect in the eyes of her parents, though Kori knew otherwise. When Kori was born, her parents had been mortified by their daughter's blindness. They feared that their neighbors would frown upon them and gossip that perhaps the Gibson genes were not as high-quality as they had been led to believe. Kori's parents took her to many expensive doctors in several states; each said that there was nothing that could be done for their daughter's eyesight. When the Gibsons finally realized that the doctors were right, they devised a plan in which they would forsake their unfashionable disaster of a child. They set up a tent for her in the back yard of their downtown mansion, telling her that no child's life would be complete without a camping experience. While eleven year old Korban slept in her tent, her family packed their things and moved away. It did not take Kori very long to discover that she had been abandoned, but it never bothered her much. She got a few of her things that her family had left in the house and decided to be a real life street camper. After living on the street for five years, she had gotten to know her little area of downtown very well, even if she couldn't see it. Being deprived of sight, her other senses compensated by being extra sensitive. She could tell where she was by the smells of different building materials, and she could tell how many people were around her by the shuffling of clothes, cracking of joints, and sometimes even heartbeats. She had no use for reading, but music did for her what reading did for everyone else and more. It also happened to be that as she had never seen, she did not think in picture but sound and sense. If others dreamed of lying in a meadow of flowers, she dreamed of the feel and smell of the flowers, and any given melody that meant what she believed flowers would mean if they were a song...

Kori's reflection was interrupted by the prissy clip-clop of high heels on pavement. A young child near her cried, "Mama! That girl doesn't have a house, can I give her my candy bar? Please?"

"Elwin, don't stand so close to her! She might have fleas or something," answered a slightly older female voice. Kori did well to hide her agitation at being interrupted and insulted by the same people. She didn't know what facial expressions were since she had never seen one, so her face remained blank while she informed her audience that she did not have fleas or anything of the sort, and that she sometimes bathed as often as three times a week whether she needed it or not.

"Humph, well you ought to bathe three times a day considering that you probably live in a dumpster," snapped the woman that must have been the children's mother. "Come dears, we must get Claire to her violin recital. Elwin you should keep your candy bar! There might be a golden ticket inside it, remember? What would your friends say if you gave up that magnificent prize? Now let's go." Kori heard the heels walk down the street, but a soft thud in her lap told her that the Elwin had tossed his candy bar to her behind his mother's back. She silently wished upon everything she could think of that that child's greatest dreams would come true someday.

She turned her attention to the candy bar, which she began to open. She unwrapped a corner of it and took a small bite, enjoying how smooth and rich the chocolate was. As she allowed her morsel to melt in her mouth, she became aware of something smooth and stiff that would not melt. She pulled it out of her mouth, and upon determining that the material was too think to be part of the wrapper, proceeded to open the candy bar the rest of the way. She discovered that there was a card of sorts made out of the same material as what she had bitten, and separated it from the chocolate so she could continue her feast.

She was again interrupted by a woman shouting, "Look there! That little blind girl has found a golden ticket!" Kori was soon surrounded by a mob of people wanting to look at her ticket, or maybe even snatch it from her. It became a very stressful situation indeed when she heard her walking stick being kicked away from her amid the chaos.

The stick was placed into her hand by a pair of warm, gloved ones. An old man's voice called to her, "Don't give that ticket to anyone!" Kori clutched the ticket to her chest and shoved her way through the crowd, which dissipated as suddenly as it had formed. The same old man stayed with her, however, and offered to read the ticket to her. He informed her that in precisely two hours, she was to report to the front gate of the chocolate factory, the big one on the other side of town, where she should be given a tour and then escorted home by a truck full of chocolate. He then offered to lead her there, providing that she allowed him to tour the factory with her. He thought his grandchildren might enjoy eating and sharing a lifetime supply of chocolate.

"Two hours! That's short notice, will everyone else get there on time?"

"My dear, the other children found their tickets weeks ago. There is no doubt in my mind that they have already been waiting outside the factory for a couple of hours. And by the way, you may call me Mr. Shinley." And with that, Korban's new friends led her towards the chocolate factory and the commencement of a very grand adventure.

A/N: PLEASE R&R!!! Let me know whether I should continue writing, and make some suggestions on what should happen next…