AN: Well, here's the next chapter. I hope that it wasn't too long before an update, I thought that this was actually pretty good for me :P. Thanks so much to all who have already reviewed and added the first chapter to their favorites. It's very encouraging, and inspiring to get so much feedback already. I take any review, criticism, advice, or compliments, all of them are important. Anyways, onto Chapter two.

Chapter 2 - Master of the Myth

"Alright, littlies, pipe down!" Tad, a fellow senior ugly, raised his voice while standing to his full, tall height. He grunted when he bumped his head against the low area in the roof of the cave, earning a burst of giggles from the younger uglies.

He smirked sheepishly while rubbing his head, but looked at them seriously. "Really, if you want to hear a story from one of the masters tonight, you'd better quiet down." The teen insisted, earning sudden silence.

Jazzy smiled. "That's your cue", she nudged Zac in the ribs with her elbow. "O great master." She grinned.

Zac smirked. "Are you sure you don't want to take this one?" He asked casually, though his eyes burned in anticipation with his tale.

Jazzy shook her head. "No, you had better be the one to awe them tonight." She smiled again when his eyes lit up and he got up quickly to take his place in the seat before the fire. She knew him too well.

The young man settled himself on the designated seat, which was really just an old beanbag chair that had been chosen as the Storyteller's Seat. He looked around at the ugly faces before him, taking each of them in with a mysterious look, his eyes shadowed by the dancing flames. "This is a new story; one that I guarantee will send shivers up your spines." He murmured.

"You always say that", a little boy chirped up while looking at the older teen with his face set in a defiant look, but his eyes were as wide as saucers.

Zac grinned faintly. "I do, don't I? Well, this story isn't about haunted hovercars, or rise of the undead rusties…no, this story is about pretties."

The little boy wrinkled his nose along with the rest of his littlie peers. "Pretties? What sort of scary story could you make about pretties?"

The teen's eyes gleamed brighter in the firelight. "You'll just have to listen, won't you?"

Jazzy shifted and leaned back against a rock, shuffling over slightly to make the hard surface more comfortable against her back. "Alright guys, quiet down so he can start." She commanded lightly.

Zac waited until the littlies had settled before he leaned forward slightly. He reached down and picked up a stick, poking it into the flames. The smoldering kindling sparked and popped, sending sparks spraying up. He looked through these sparks to the anticipating littlies. "This story is about a new type of pretties…ones that were not human, but were something else…something animal-like…they were called Creatures…" He started lowly.

Jazzy watched for a moment before closing her eyes, allowing her mind to drift into seeing the images that Zac described slowly, dramatically…


"Sir, the new pretty has been completed and is awaiting your analysis." A short, stocky Scientist in a lab coat commented as he approached a taller man sporting a black suit.

The suited-man turned from looking at the large wall-monitor he had been studying. "Bring it to me."

"Uh, Sir…it may be better if you came to the lab to see it. We are keeping it sedated until it is entirely stable." The Scientist shifted to his other foot subtly, while stuffing his hands into the deep pockets.

The man raised a steel-grey eyebrow but nodded in consent. The two men left the room and walked down stark white hallways, the walls were only broken by dark steel doors. They reached a door at the end of the long corridor, which they stopped before and the Scientist tapped in a security code to the keypad waiting in the wall.

The door opened and both entered a dark room. The Scientist stopped and turned to look at the other man. "I must warn you, Sir, the Creature's intelligence is still in the making…though we've completed the physical development, there is still much to complete in the mental and emotional stage. The instincts are still very dominant."

The man chuckled. "Show me the pretty, I'm getting impatient." He demanded coolly.

"Sir…yes, Sir." With a deep breath the Scientist turned and started walking through the room, flipping on several lights to expose the laboratory. Finally, he reached a large, heavier steel door at the end of the room. The windows were made of iron bars with the glass missing, similar to that of a jail cell.

"Careful Sir, you don't want to get too close." He murmured while tapping on the keypad. The door made a loud clicking noise as the lock unbolted. The Scientist pulled it open and stepped into the room beyond, flicking a switch.

His boss stepped in behind him silently and looked into the small room as low light filled its shadows. Near the far side of the room there was a large cage, and in that cage a huddled form. He stepped closer; ignoring the chirping warnings from the Scientist while he peered into the dark shadows of the cage. He leaned in closer to see…Golden green eyes stared out at him. A low growl echoed from the shadows…

"Raaaawr!", Zac suddenly yelled, lunging up to his feet.

The tense and silent littlies screamed, throwing themselves away and clinging to each other.

Jazzy gasped sharply and winced at the higher pitched scream from beside her as Shasta clung to her tightly.

"Oh my gosh! Zac you idiot!" Shasta shouted indignantly while she let go of Jazzy. "That was so mean!" She got to her feet in a huff and stomped over to the grinning Zac, raising her hand to slap him.

Zac shielded his face with his arms while snickering. "Come on, Shasta, it wasn't that bad…You should have seen your face."

Shasta glared at him dangerously while crossing her arms and looking away, "Hmph. That was not funny, at all."

Jazzy grinned while watching. She looked around at the huddling littlies. "Aw, c'mon guys, it was just a story." She smiled while crawling over to coax them out. Well, he did manage to give them a scare, never challenge the story master.

The littlie who had challenged Zac earlier stared at the older boy with wide eyes, and then he turned his gaze to Jazzy. "Jazzy..."

Jazzy looked at the little boy and raised an eyebrow. "What's wrong?"

He blushed deeply. "…I wet my pants."

The girl stared at him for a moment before looking over at the two older teens. "Zac, this one gets to ride with you." She grinned faintly while getting to her feet.

Zac looked at her while Tad grinned widely. "What? Why?" He glanced at the littlie. "What…oh…oh come on!"

Jazzy grinned wider at his expression. "You brought it on yourself, Master storyteller." She purred smoothly while walking up to him and patting his chest. "Enjoy the ride." She glanced back at the other waiting littlies. "C'mon kiddos, let's head home."

The early morning sunlight poured in through the window, filling the plain dorm with its growing glow. Jazzy opened her eyes slowly and blinked against the bright, warm light. She sighed softly and sat up, running a hand through her tousled, tangled hair. She hadn't brushed it after the flying last night, she was going to pay for that.

Her gaze wandered around the sunny room, from the clothes on the floor to the smaller monitor on the wall. She hadn't used it for awhile, but no doubt Shasta had judging by the absence of any dust. Finally her gaze landed on the calendar pinned to the wall close to her bed. Jazzy reached over to tug it off and settled back to look at it. The bright red marker immediately caught her eye. It circled the day, her birthday, that was the day that she'd be receiving the transformation…that was the day that she'd become a pretty. That was the day she had been waiting sixteen years for; finally she could get rid of this ugly face, this ugly body…and this ugly personality. She had to wait only a few more weeks.

Shasta mumbled in her sleep across the room and rolled over in the tangled mess of blankets. Jazzy glanced over before she put the calendar back and got to her feet. With a yawn she stretched her arms up, stretching her whole body upwards before she wandered over to the closet. Hm, Saturday, which means no ugly uniform…but usual ugly clothes instead. She wrinkled her nose while looking at the selection she had left out the night before after stuffing the black clothes far into the shadows in the back, far from any sight of a possible room-inspection.

Jazzy sighed while shuffling through the clothing. Boring…bland…stupid…ugly…just plain ugly. She couldn't help but growl in irritation before grabbing a pair of jeans and a tee-shirt. Chucking off her shorts and tank top she pulled on the clothes with a defiant, annoyed air. This was another thing she wasn't going to be missing, stupid, irritating clothing. The pretties always had nice clothing…pretty clothing.

The next order of business was to tame the unruly beast that sat waiting on her head. Jazzy walked over to her bed and sat down on it while grabbing a brush from her nightstand. While setting her teeth against the oncoming battle, she ran the bristles through the tangled, mid-back length mess. The brush caught once…twice…three times before letting go. Ow! Ow, ow!

It took several more moments of angry mutterings and tugging until the task was complete. Jazzy sighed and put the brush down, picking up her little mirror instead for the usual inspection. She wrinkled her nose while staring at her reflection. The familiar dark blue eyes stared back at her, large and shielded by long, but thin lashes. There was the familiar pale complexion, broken by light pink, small lips and a spattering of freckles over a pert nose. There was the same small chin, which rounded the end of a soft jawline and face-shape. Straight, dirty-blonde hair framed her face, and covered part of it with bangs and matching eyebrows that covered the worst part of all: the terrible forehead. How she hated her forehead, the large, high forehead, her worst foe when it came to her face. I will be only too happy to see you gone, you…ugly forehead.

Jazzy snorted and paused to brush her fingers over some small bumps breaking her usually smooth complexion (her only blessing) around her mouth. "You've got to be kidding", she muttered while scratching at them with her nail. Nope, they were still there, blemishes to only mock her already ugly face. Wonderful.

A knock on the door broke her from the irritated inspection. She looked up and blinked for a moment. "Hello? Come in." She called in a hushed tone.

The door opened quietly and a familiar face peered around it. "What's taking you so long? Did you sleep in?" Zac asked while looking at her. He raised a dark eyebrow then smirked. "Oh, you're staring at yourself again."

Jazzy gave him a look. "Shut up. No, I didn't sleep in, and I am just making sure I look somewhat presentable." She got to her feet and shoved the mirror back into a drawer. I forgot we were going boarding this morning. She grabbed a simple black sweater and pulled it on before heading towards the door, hopping on one foot while pulling on her grippy shoes.

Zac leaned against the wall across from the door. He looked at her once she had closed the door. "You shouldn't spend so much time looking in a mirror. Nothing's going to change until the operation." He shrugged. "Besides, it's just me."

Jazzy looked at him. "I know, but I like to look at my face and try to imagine…what it'll be like when it's different." She grinned faintly while looking at him. "Maybe you should do the same and you'll have a better chance with life." She stepped up in front of him and reached up to tousle his already tousled dark hair. "Did you even brush it?"

He swatted her hand away and ran his hand through it. He shrugged again. "Nope", with a smirk he stood up straight and started walking down the hallway. The grippy soles of his shoes squeaked quietly on the hard flooring.

"Of course you didn't. Honestly, even though we're uglies we should still care somewhat about how we look, or else they may not even want to operate on us out of fear." Jazzy joked while following after him, keeping her voice and steps quiet enough to avoid waking any curious littlies or other uglies in the early morning.

"Mm", he murmured without looking at her. He kept quiet until they reached the safety of the outdoors before turning to look at her with his characteristic smile. "Ready for boarding?"

Jazzy studied him for a moment before she smiled. "Always, did you disinfect your board after the ride home last night?" Her smile widened to a grin.

Zac's expression fell into a scowl. "Yeah, I spent an extra hour on that last night. Did you have to give me the kid that not only wet his pants, but also gets motion-sickness when going too fast? You know how I ride." He muttered.

Jazzy's grin widened. "You shouldn't ride like such a maniac with a littlie, anyways." She watched as his scowl only deepened before her grin shrank to an apologetic smile. "Alright, I'm sorry that you had to put up with him last night, and that your board paid for it…he didn't enjoy it too well either." She murmured while putting her arms around her friend, pulling him into a hug.

Zac sighed after a moment and put his arms around her, returning the embrace. "Its fine", he muttered, before smirking widely. He shoved her into a bush casually and took off at a run towards another group of thicker bushes, the hiding spot of the two boards.

"Zac! Get back here!" Jazzy yelled at him while struggling to sit up in the clingy vegetation. Oh, he's so getting it. She watched as the boy snapped his fingers and leapt onto the board as soon as it rose from the bushes. "Zac! You better run!" Jazzy crawled out of the bushes and sprinted towards the bushes just as he easily veered away.

"Yeah, right. Come and get me, bush-butt." Zac taunted while coasting away backwards. He smirked at her when she shot him a glare and jumped onto her waiting board. He turned and zipped away just as she was within a few feet of him.

Jazzy muttered to herself but couldn't help the grin on her face as she watched him zig- zag lazily away. He glanced back once and made a face at her before turning and speeding away towards the forested park. It's going to be like that, is it?

"Fine, then that's how it's going to be." Jazzy said to herself while shifting her right foot forward sharply, sending the board speeding ahead. She relaxed into a comfortable riding position, keeping her knees bent slightly and rested on the balls of her feet for stability and guidance, with her arms out to the side for balance. She loved boarding, and loved racing and these games of chase all the more.

Zac glanced back again when hearing the faint whirr of the following board. His smoky eyes gleamed with adrenaline before he looked forward and shifted his foot just slightly. He shot ahead and flew into the forest, weaving through the trees and soon disappearing.

Jazzy shifted slightly and rode after him, entering into the park. She weaved around the trees with increasing speed until they were a blur. The branches smacked against her and the grey bark seemed to just narrowly brush against her at other times, but the feeling was hardly noticeable. Jazzy could feel her eyes burning with the thrill of the chase while she looked ahead, trying to spy her target. She smiled. There he was.