Chapter Two

Now, as the immature young adult that the author is, with a disappointing lack of creativity that is genuinely uncharacteristic of them, we are going to skip through the boring school day that no one is actually that interested to hear about because the current American education system is absolutely ridiculous, considering that the only person I know who actually uses the skills they have learned in high school (the various unnecessary maths and sciences and whatnot) is my sister, whom, being the giant nerd she is, is currently attending college for engineering and biochemistry, a concerning combination. The previous sentence just further proves how inadequate the American education system is. That was an incredibly long run on sentence, I can't even say that in a single breath, which is saying something because I have an impressive lung capacity and I generally talk really fast.

It is time that we return to the story, where we see Cassidy Becke climbing into the house through the bathroom window because she has a superstition involving the front door, something about how the population expects you to use the front door and since that is considered the "normal" thing to do, she thusly cannot do it. She would prefer to try to escape the sempiternal panopticon, despite knowing how futile any and all attempts at escape would be, and therefore must climb in through the bathroom window.

She thuds to the bright orange bathroom floor, thinking to herself, "Why the fuck haven't I put a stepladder there."

"Cassidy? Is that you?" calls Cassidy's mom.

"Mom, who else enters the house through the bathroom window? You've known me for 18 years, you should be used to this by now," she groans as she lifts herself from the bathroom floor.

"Oh, well, one of your friends from your old school called asking for you, about 20 minutes ago. She said her name was Petra Vives? She sounded really nice, said she was in town. Told me to tell you to meet her at that park here in town, by that restaurant. I can give you a ride?" Cassidy's mom explained, as Cassidy was already halfway out of the bathroom window again.

"No, mom, it's okay, love you, bye!"

Petra Vives was a very boring girl. Her name makes her sound interesting, but all in all, Petra Vives was an incredibly average person. Her grades were good, but not great. She had medium length hair that could either be described as a really light brown or a really dirty blonde. Dirty blonde is an odd way to describe a color, as it implies that there is another shade of blonde called clean blonde, but nobody has ever mentioned it, so it would seem that clean blonde does not exist. Also, dirty blonde to me has always sounded like an insult, along with dishwater blonde. I prefer to say dark blonde, as that is a bit of an oxymoron and it sounds quite edgy. So, Petra could be described as having either light brown hair or dark blonde hair. She generally can be seen wearing jeans, graphic tees, a grey hoodie, and old Chuck Taylors. She has hazel eyes and fairly light skin, and is about 5'6" and about 120 pounds. Her favorite musician is Taylor Swift and her favorite movie is Sixteen Candles. She has two cats and a small dog and has moved twice, once when she was 11, shortly before she met Cassidy, and again just a couple weeks ago, when she moved to Cassidy's town.

Today, she was was sitting on a bench at the park Cassidy had agreed to meet her at, sporting a T-Shirt emblazoned with "Nice manners, babe" and her typical grey hoodie. She jumped to her feet at the sight of Cassidy walking down the road towards her.

"Cassidy! Come here! I need to show you something!" Petra called loudly, startling a murder of crows pecking at a patch of grass a few yards away. One of my friends once asked me, "If a group of crows is called a murder, then what is a single crow called?" and I just looked at them for a good three minutes before they realized that what they said was absolutely stupid.

Cassidy started jogging, completely out of breath by the time she reached Petra.

"I'm sorry for bugging you, but I found this weird thing and I'm new in town and I don't know anybody except for you so I'm asking you for help because you're smart and know things and stuff…" Petra trailed off, gesturing toward the object in her hand. It was a blue cylinder of sorts, with a rounded button at the top and a flat bottom, similar to what a sonic screwdriver would look like if you took an image of it and stretched it so that it was very wide.

"It's… okay…. Petra… Let me… see the…. Thing….." Cassidy panted.

Petra handed it over and Cassidy flopped onto the bench, inspecting it.

"Are you really that out of shape? You weren't even that far away."

"I chose… not to do sports… for a reason…."

"Oh, I guess that's fair. Anyway, would you happen to know what this is or what it does?"

"Only… one way… to… find out…" said Cassidy as she smacked the little button at the top of the contraption. Upon contact with the button, Cassidy was paralyzed. She couldn't move her arms or legs and could hardly breathe. She just held on tightly to the object, feeling as if a very strong wind was blowing at her much unlike the way that a summer breeze makes a windchime gently jingle. Her hair was flying every which way, until she came to a jarring stop, laying on the ground of what seemed like an open field. The wind was knocked out of her and she took a moment to assess what might have happened.

She was sitting on a park bench with Petra and now she's laying in some long grass. She opened her eyes and looked around. Petra was nowhere to be found. Cassidy sat up slowly, still trying to catch her breath from both the jogging and her smashing her lungs with the full force of her body into the ground. She noticed some incredibly bright lights in the distance and stood and started to walk toward them, like a moth getting trapped in the light by fixation, truly free, love it, baby, I'm talking no inflation. Cassidy shook the almost incoherent lyrics to the popular 2015 Fall Out Boy song, "Irresistible" out of her head and continued onward.

((A/N: Review! I know the story is kind of slow right now, and boring or whatever, but it should pick up soon. This is about the point where it gets really fun ;). Anyway, I hope you've enjoyed it thus far or something, I'm not good at this))