A/N-so, you think this is a time travel fic, do you? I guess in a way it's a time travel fic. In a bizarre, strange, and twisted way it could be. You'll see what I'm talking about. I was glad to get such positive responses, and sympathy for my shoulder. It really does suck. Anywho, we just had our entire lower floor re-carpeted and re-floored, and we're gonna do the upstairs soon, along with re-painting and re-furnishing my room. Yay!!! And, we'll be re-furnishing the computer room soon, so my comp will go down in some time. I just got back from Atlanta, I know, I'm such a busy girl! Then it's back to band camp, dunno if I'll be marching or if I'll be able to play, and after two lovely weeks of that it's back to school. So hopefully I'll have time to update. Meh, I dunno if I will. Just a side note, I know it says the general themes of the story are fantasy and romance but they only gave me two choices!! It's also humor, supernatural, and action/adventure. Fun stuff! Now, on with the story!

August 20, 2004-I'm free! No more sling! Well actually, I can't really move my arm, just the lower half. I can type, write, and eat but I can't play my flute or piccolo for 4 weeks. So much for band camp. But this should take faster typing now that I have to hands.

September 1, 2004-SOOOO sorry that it's taking me this long. I've got a big AP US packet to do so I've been working on that, and band camp is making me hella exhausted so I'm doing the best I can. I can't promise any quick updating cause I don't have much time, but I'll do my best to update ASAP.

September 18, 2004-alright, so...yeah. Why have I started typing this thing four times and not finished? And why has it taken me so long? Well it's a long story, and a little crazy, but it's all true. First, my computer broke. Like really broke. We worked and worked on it, and finally it sort of worked again but then...nope! Luckily we had backed up all my files because when we took it to the computer store, they had to wipe the hard drive. Fun stuff. Then, school started and I had work to do and what not. A week after school had started, this pinched nerve I have in my right hand started to act up until I couldn't write anymore with out immense amount of pain. And it started to develop in my left too, but not as severe as in the right. I think I have carpal tunnel...because I write too much! So that means I can't do anymore rough writing drafts, cause I can't write that much. Sure, it hurts to type, but not as much as it does to write. I know, you're thinking what's wrong with me? Why am I always broken? Well, actually my mom and doctor are wondering the same thing, and I'm going to get blood work done soon to check for a systematic problem, such as arthritis. Yeah, fun. So, I'm trying my hardest to write my stories, but now things are really difficult for me, so please bear with me!

CHAPTER 1-STOP THE WORLD!!!

The day was March 17, 2004. As usual, Rane and I walked to school together. We don't really talk on the way cause I know I can't hold a serious conversation with Rane for a very long time. And we're also too tired to discuss anything. If this were last year, we'd be chattering on but no, we're so worked up that the silence is actually the best communicator of our mood. We're both too busy being lost in our minds, in our dread of the coming day. I myself didn't want to face another day of English, my first period class. The teacher doesn't pay attention to the class and of course I'm the butt of all their jokes and pranks. I took a glance at Rane whose green eyes were already tearing up in anticipation of going to algebra, her first class. As it is, Rane's not very good with math, but when you're in a class with a bunch of ninth graders who have less maturity then we do, it's not an easy ride.

The doors to the large brick building in front of us loomed closer, like the mouth of a monster, which in a way is what it was. A monster just waiting to swallow us up, digest us, and then spit us out for another day. As I do every morning, I took Rane's hand in mine and gave it a squeeze. She looked at me through her tears and managed to give me a small smile. I returned the smile and together, hand in hand, we walked through the jaws of the monster.

Immediately I felt myself get swallowed up. Of course we got stares, I mean two girls walking into the school holding hands was a big target for harassment. Within seconds we dropped hands, but since we'd been doing this since the beginning of the year, it didn't matter if our hands were linked or not, we got harassed anyway. As we pushed our way through the crowded hall calls of "freak" "dyke" "carpet muncher" and other names of the type penetrated our ears. I looked at Rane, who now had tears running down her face. I can't recall a day that didn't start for her without crying. I wish I could have said "ignore them", but I can't even ignore them. It was the perfect start to a perfect morning.

Rane and I share a locker, which we've decorated with pictures of our favorite actors, and from our favorite movies. The top half of the locker door is Rane's and is covered in pictures of Christian Bale, and as him playing Jack Kelly in Newsies. The bottom half, my half, had pictures of Ivan Dudynsky, and him being Dutchy in Newsies. If you haven't guessed by now, we're big newsies fans. The inside of the locker has pictures from scenes in Newsies, and also from Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and the Princess Diaries. Those are our favorites. There were a few others but those ones dominated the locker. After grabbing our books, and my giving Rane an encouraging hug, we went our separate ways, onto our own personal hells.

English 10, room D113, teacher: Mrs. Newton. Mrs. Newton is newly married, and new to teaching. Which almost explains why she doesn't pay attention to the class. She spends most of her time on the computer, doing who knows what. So I took my seat in the front of the room, that's where they put me because of my "disabilities". Did I mention I'm ADD along with LD. I mean I'm not as ADD as Rane, cause she's ADHD but I also have my trouble paying attention. As expected, I'm on tons of drugs, like Ritalin and others of the sort. But it doesn't matter where I sit really. I'm still teased, and relentlessly at that.

"So freak" the jock behind me hissed as I sat down. "Talked to your imaginary friends lately?" I focused on a stain on the wall that over the past months had become my only friend in this class. Ignore them I told myself. There's no one there, just ignore them. "Ohh, are you talking to them now? What are they saying?" the kids around us laughed at this, though I frankly thought it was immature. Couldn't he think of anything better? Well, of course I had to ask, cause I sure got my answer. "So, what trick are you and your blonde friend gonna do today freak? Stop the world with your "powers"?" he burst into cold laughter, echoed by the rest of the class. I drew my eyes from the stain and focused on the floor, an acquaintance of mine. The reason why they knew was the charming guy behind me had intercepted a note I had been writing to Rane. And then it was read aloud when Mrs. Newton stepped out of the classroom. This was a month ago, and I knew I had yet to hear the end of it. I clenched the side of my chair tightly, knowing that my knuckles were turning white but I didn't care. I couldn't say anything, I just couldn't. I mean, of course they didn't understand, and it only added to me being a freak. I knew, that whatever I said, they would just twist my words and make seem even more stupid then I already am. So, I said nothing. I know it's a stupid tactic, but it's the one that works.

"Look at her" one of those blonde girls said, her voice filled with cold laughter. She was one of THOSE girls. You know, the ones who dress the way magazines say, have multiple boyfriends, always look good, and can be fakely sweet one minute, and naturally bitchy the next. The kind that Rane often gets mistaken for. Well, I mean Rane doesn't dress that way cause she always dresses a little funky, but from the head up she looks like she belongs in that clique. "She won't talk to us. What, miss "I have mystical powers"? Are you too good to talk to us? Too good to lower yourself to our level. Or maybe you're so stupid; you don't understand what I'm saying. Do...you...under...stand...me?" She said the last part slowly, as if I didn't understand. I willed the tears away from my eyes. Class hadn't even started and I was already close to tears. That was never a good sign. But, I still didn't talk. It was like a torture chamber, and they were trying to get important information out of me. But I was steadfast, I wouldn't talk. They could try all their little tricks, but they wouldn't get one bit of information out of me. Nope, none at all. In a way, it was fun to pretend that I was some important spy, and that the information I knew was so top secret it was essential that I didn't say anything. It was like a game, for them, and for me. They could spend all class making fun of me, but I'm not going to say anything. Not to Mrs. Newton, not to jock-head behind me, not to anyone.

My charade was interrupted by the morning announcements, done by our SGA president, some stuck up, cocky, "popular", senior who thinks he's the shit. Well, let me tell you. He's not. He always tried to be funny during the announcements, and he tried so hard, he wasn't. Everyone knew he wasn't funny, but all the "popular" kids laughed anyway, cause he was one of them. And he was so cool, that whatever he said had to be funny to them or they'd be considered a freak, like me. It was a sad experience, knowing that everyone around me was just being fake, and people liked them for that. But me? I'm myself, and I'm hated. It's a bunch of crap, high school is. Once the announcements were finished(thank goodness), Mrs. Newton, who had finally decided to grace the class with her presence, collected last nights homework, gave us an assignment to do, and left the room again. Seriously, what's up with that?

"Soooo..." I heard that girl say from behind me. "What are you doing tonight Josh?" without turning around, I knew that she had slinked her way over to the desk behind me, and was probably leaning on it in a seductive manner, making sure her chest was at Josh's eye level.

"Well, I don't have any plans at the current moment" he said smoothly. "Why?"

"Funny you should mention" the girl giggled. "But a few of my friends and me are having a little get together. See, Jenna's parents are out of town for the weekend, and she's got the house to herself. So, whadda ya say? Wanna go with me" at this point, I'm sure she was doing something flirtatious, like batting her eyelashes, and stroking his arm, and all that other good stuff. Whatever it is she was doing, because I frankly did not want to turn around and see that disgusting display, it must have worked because Josh, in all his jock intelligence, said yes. Little miss blondeness flounced back to her desk and I let out a sigh. Why, oh why, did I have to be cursed with the power to slow down time, not speed it up? I looked up at the clock, which was laughing at me. I'm not even kidding. It was cracking up at the fact that it was only eight, and that I had another hour trapped in hell with these superficial, idiots.

"Shut up you" I muttered under my breath at the clock mocking me, but not soft enough because Josh heard me.

"Are you imaginary friends bothering you freak?" he hissed in my ear, so no one else would hear him. It was like he wanted private tease the Nixie time. "Want me to beat them up for you? Tell them to stop?" he chuckled at his own remarks, which is honestly quite pathetic, but hey, whatever floats his boat. I bit my lip, because as much as I wished I could whip around and say something witty, I'm not exactly that bright, and I don't usually say very witty things. Just think them. It's like I can think of this incredibly powerful thing to say, and then either butcher it as soon as I stick the words in my mouth, or forget it cause I'm focusing on something else. After a couple minutes of my silence, Josh got bored and let me return to my thoughts. Which were of course, how can I get out of this hellhole? I finally resorted to my usual technique, setting my head down on my desk, and sleeping. It's a fail-proof system.

My nap was interrupted by the schools' mechanical bell, which doesn't exactly ring, it more...well I don't know what it does, but it doesn't ring. It just...does. I slipped pass my classmates, and into the crowded hall, where I was lost in the throng, and for those ten minutes, I was a normal, high school student. That, however, didn't stay the case for long once I reached the gym, for another fun day of P.E. I guess P.E. is quite possibly my favorite class, because your mental capability isn't put to the test, only your physical. And though I may not be some sports super jock, I'm decent enough that I don't get teased...too badly. I mean, there are still those popular people who feel it's their life's duty to tease me relentlessly. I did, however, have people in this class who would sort of associate with me. Y'know, make friendly small talk. People I could kind of hang out with. It was better then nothing I suppose. Today, after the usual warm ups, we played a game of softball. I did alright, hitting one single, and making three decent plays. And no one really made fun of me; except for of course, you guessed it, the popular people. But I've already figured, the best thing to do is ignore, which I did, so that didn't really bother me.

After P.E., I met Rane, and we went to lunch. We were lucky to have lunch together; the only time of the day we could spend a good chunk of time together. After buying our "lunch", if you could even call the school food that, Rane and I went to our usual corner of the cafeteria, and sat down, to tell each other our horror tales of the morning. Rane went first, as she normally does.

"So Algebra was horrible" she started, before sticking one of the push-up pops in her mouth. Rane always eats desert first, even at home. Her blonde hair was pulled back in a messy bun, her green eyes lined lightly with metallic green eye shadow, the shade of green matching her tube top, which she wore on top of a bright pink three quarter sleeve shirt, along with a pair of flared, green plaid pants, held up by a blue leopard print belt.. As I said, she dresses funky. "First, I come in, and Justin Lee asks me if I have a video of you and me together. Then, the class launched into a discussion about my sex life. Our teacher came in when I was yelling at Natalie because she said something really mean, and because she doesn't listen to me, or my side of the story, I didn't get any credit for the homework I spent three and a half hours on last night..." Rane suddenly got a blank look on her face, and looked up at the tiles on the ceiling. "How many tiles do you think there are total in this cafeteria?" she asked me. I let out a sigh. How typical Rane that was.

"Well my day wasn't any better then yours."

"What does your day have to do with the number of ceiling tiles?"

"Nothing, but before that you were talking about your day in Algebra."

"Oh my gosh! Did I tell you? I got yelled at in art? I can't remember why..." Rane bit her lip, trying hard to remember. "But I did go back in time, and then didn't get yelled at" she smiled. I laughed.

"Great!" the smile drifted off my face. "Rane, I can't stand it anymore!"

"Not knowing how many ceiling tiles there are? I know, neither can I."

"NO, not that" I rolled my eyes. "I can't stand the abuse we have to put up with, the shit we get dealt day, after day, just because we're different, just because we're not like them, just because we're not that smart."

"What's the quadratic formula?"

"I don't know. Does it really matter? Aren't you sick of it?"

"I am so totally sick of the quadratic formula. Especially since I don't even know what it is. But it's like all we talk about in math. And everyone else understands it. I don't. It's because I'm stupid."

"RANE!" I shouted in exasperation.

"Hmmm?" she said innocently, turning those big eyes on me.

"Listen" I grabbed her face, so she couldn't break eye contact with me. That's the only way I can get her to pay attention, for a longer period of time then she normally does. "One, you're not stupid. Two, we need to do something about what we have to deal with. Don't you think there's something more we can do with our powers? We must have them for a reason. There must be some catch or something. I guess it wouldn't make sense if we just had them. It's like just having a tail. There's no point. It's just there. Though it would be cool to have a tail wouldn't it? You could like hit people with it, and wag it when you're happy and..."

"Nixie..." Rane said patiently through squished cheeks. "You're getting off topic."

"Oh, right" I laughed sheepishly. "But don't you think there's some sort of point to us having these powers? Something more we can do?"

"What if we pooled them together?"

"Nah, then we'd probably like spontaneously combust."

"REALLY?!?" Rane squealed. "That would be SO cool. It'd be like, one minute, you're there and then BOOM! You've burst into a bunch of tiny pieces!"

"RANE!" I shouted. "We're not going to spontaneously combust, and it wouldn't be cool. What if, what if I stopped the world?"

"Stopped the world?" Rane repeated. "How would you do that?"

"With a lot of concentration."

"You can't concentrate."

"I can try."

"You'll spontaneously combust" she giggled. "Wouldn't that be funny? You'd get attention."

"I'D DIE!"

"Oh...right..."

"I could try..."

"Now? If it worked, if something happened, when the world resumed people would notice we were suddenly missing, or different."

"Then when? The sooner, the better."

"How about ten minutes ago...?" Rane schemed. "When we were in the bathroom. There was no one in there, and we had just come from our locker. No one will notice we're missing until fifth period, and by then, we'll be long gone."

"True" I nodded. "That's actually a great idea."

"Let's go." Rane said, determinedly. I let go of her face so she could concentrate. I watched her close her eyes, and felt her grab tightly onto my wrist. I knew it was time to close my eyes, because rushing backwards in time, even just ten minutes, can damage your eyes if they're open. I felt the ground leave me, as if it had suddenly dropped away, and the sound of rushing wind filled my ears. I held on as tightly as I could to Rane, and before I knew it, our wild ride was over, and Rane and I tumbled to the floor of the second story girl's bathroom.

"Ow." I heard Rane mutter. I wrenched my eyes open, and looked at my watch. Yup, ten minutes in the past.

"Alright, are you ready?" I asked her, standing up. Rane nodded cautiously, also standing up. I grabbed her hand and began to concentrate, but this time, harder. Stop the world, stop the world, stop the world, I thought over and over again. I could feel the world slowing down around us, I watched as the whirlpool in the toilet gradually slowed down, but it kept going, it didn't stop. STOP! STOP!! I willed the world to stop, but it just went slow, very slow, not stopped. Finally, with all the strength I had I screamed. "STOP THE WORLD, I WANT TO GET OFF!!!" Then, with the same feeling you feel when a train comes to a jerky halt, or when your mom slams on the brakes to avoid hitting the idiot driver in front of you, Rane and a I fell forward on the ground, and I looked up the best I could, to see the toilet, stopped mid-flush.

"Did it work...?" Rane asked in disbelief. I could only nod in shock. I had actually stopped the world... I shook my head, that couldn't be possible. I stood up, helped Rane to her feet, and the two of us stepped into the hall. Now, we were used to seeing, when I slowed the world down, things look like they were stopped, but actually moving at a very slow pace. Like a person walking? Though it would take four minutes to put their foot down, they were still moving. This time, however, Rane and I stared for ten minutes, and no one moved. Nope, they were frozen in place.

"I can't believe it," I said breathlessly.

"Now what?"

"I dunno" I shrugged. "Let's go outside." So making our way through our frozen classmates, and of course pushing over some of the people who bothered us the most, Rane and I exited our prison.

"Nixie..." Rane said softly. "Look" I followed her gaze to a door in the middle of the school parking lot. It was just a door, sitting there. And we both knew it hadn't been there before.

"Do you think...?" I asked, not bothering to finish my sentence, because I think Rane knew what I meant.

"Probably..." she replied, still awe-struck, as was I. This was impossible.

"Should we...?"

"Couldn't hurt." I looked at Rane, and she shrugged. "Well, like you were saying. We must have our powers for a reason, so that door must be there for a reason. And I think we're supposed to go through it."

"Alright then." I nodded hesitantly. Surprisingly, for one of the first times in her life, Rane actually made sense. We looked at each other encouragingly, took each other's hands, and with smiles on our faces, we made our way towards the lone door. We reached the door and Rane reached out, putting her hand on the doorknob, but looking at me for confirmation.

"Good bye world" I said softly, with an almost sad smile. "We're getting off." I then gave Rane a nod, and watched as she turned the silver knob, and pushed the door open. The last thing I remember was being consumed by white light...