Here's the next chapter! Thanks for your review, rollingbell and Xx Rebel Writer xX!

Oh, and before I forget, some people called Cleo "cat girl" due to a book. The book "Cleo: How a Small Black Cat Helped Heal A Family" is owned by Helen Brown, not me, and it is a truly wonderful true story, as is the sequel, "Cats and Daughters".

The first thing I noticed was the heat. It was too warm. The second thing was the fact that I was most definitely outdoors, since there was a light breeze. I opened my eyes, groaning.

"What the-" I shot to my feet, staring around. I didn't know anything about where I was. The sky was clear and blue, unlike the often cloudy city I lived in. On looking around, I seemed to be in a dark alleyway, with tall crumbling clay buildings, peach coloured. There were no cars, but there was a marketplace, full of stalls with pushy traders yelling out to passers-by. Much further up, there was a huge bronze palace.

I instinctively looked down when I realized that I was barefoot, and got the shock of my life. I was wearing patched hareem pants in a plain creamy colour, although it was grey with dust. My (also patched) navy top had loose sleeves and was a bit floaty, and in these circumstances, was only lucky that it didn't show anything. I found that in the pocket of my pants, there was a knife.

"OK," I muttered under my breath, "Anything else weird that happens can be explained by the star freak-out. I did not ask to be sent to a new world. Do I have anything to fight for here? I still have no life and no friends."

I scanned the marketplace again. Everything seemed kind of Asian-European, like Turkey or something, except everything was spoken in English. I also noticed the customers in the market, all dressed with turbans, veils. One or two men wore a fez. The clothes were all plain.

"Hmmm...not modern day." I mused. "Too traditional. It looks like Arabia before the middle ages."

I searched my brain for the very little I knew about the time period or place. I remembered that crimes were punished very severely – they cut off your hand if you were caught stealing. And considering, there did seem to be a few people who were wearing patched or beggar-type clothing. They all seemed to be street kids, sometimes older. Although, I wasn't sure how I knew some of this. It seemed to be instinctual, as if I'd been here before, or something along those lines.

I knew that this would be a hard life. I was on my own, with no money, no knowledge, nothing. And as an orphan, that made me homeless. I was a street girl.

I wondered what to do, watching from inside the alley. Stealing and scavenging was the only thing I could do to survive, and right now, the former was looking more and more appealing. But what if I got caught? I wasn't interested in losing a hand. So what could I -

"Stop, thief!" I was broken from my thoughts as men with swords ran past.

"Guards instead of the police." I theorized. That was scary. I peeked out to see who they were chasing.

Just as I thought this, a boy with black hair nearly to his shoulders, a red fez, a purple vest, and patched boys' hareem pants jumped down further in the alley from a low building. He had a monkey on his shoulder in a vest and fez, and some kind of fruit in his hands.

Suddenly, I heard one of the guards' voices nearer. "He must've gone into the alley!"

The guards were soon at the end of the alley, but the boy had already disappeared back onto the top of the building he'd come from.

"Did you see a street rat?" one of the guards addressed me rudely.

My eyes flickered upwards. I knew he was talking about the boy, who was hovering. "So the boy must've stolen that fruit to survive. That makes me a street mouse, I guess. And if I'm going to get any friends, turning people in is not the way to do it."

I shook my head. "No, sir, I haven't seen anyone." I said respectfully. At the Home, I wouldn't have answered so nicely, but I was not planning on being on the receiving end of one of those swords.

The guards ran off in the opposite direction with absolutely no logic, and I called "All clear. Are you going to run some more, or stop here?"

The boy and monkey leapt down gracefully. I looked at the boy again, noticing that he was maybe one or two years older than me. "Thanks for that." he said with a quick smile.

"Um." I looked down for a moment, trying to work out what to say.

I was saved by the boy, who gave me an interested look. "Am I right when I say you're not from around here?"

I looked back at him, wondering how he guessed. "Well, I'm not exactly." I admitted. "I don't even know how I got here. I've had so much trouble just surviving by myself, that I figured it wouldn't be any harder here." I smiled slightly. "But if those guards are on the tail of everyone suspicious, I'm screwed."

The boy laughed at my bluntness. "That sounds like my life." he said. The monkey smiled too and chirped something.

I nodded. "You seem to know what you're doing, though. Up until two months ago, I still had a home." I was not going to tell the truth and sound insane, but I felt a bit less tense with this boy, so I still got the point across. Even if he was from the streets, he was definitely not the stereotypical homeless guy you see on some streets. He was friendly and natural. And the monkey – well, he was kind of cute.

The boy shrugged. "After a couple years, you get used to it. It's not easy, though."

I looked up and noticed the sky was getting darker. "Um.." I began again. "I was just wondering, do you know anywhere I could stay which is safe? Anywhere at all?"

"Well," the boy began, sounding unsure. "You could stayi where I live. I mean, it's not much, but it's better than some random alleyway."

I was a little surprised at this generosity, and a bit suspicious (hey, he was a teenage boy, what was I meant to think?) but I didn't have any other options, so I said "Are you sure? If it's no trouble?" Besides, I still had the knife on me.

"No, it's OK." the boy said.

"I do have one other request." I said shyly. "I was saying before, you seem to know what you're doing and how to survive. Would it be OK if you taught me how to do all that?"

"Well," the boy smiled, "If you'll help me with survival, then sure I will."

I smiled too. "Thanks. I'm Cleo, by the way."

He must've been the first person who didn't find my name amusing, because he simply replied, "Well, hi, Cleo. I'm Aladdin." without betraying any amusement at my name. He gestured to the monkey. "And this is Abu."

Abu raised his fez said something in a squeaky voice that sounded like "Hello."

And as I followed Aladdin and Abu through the streets, I wondered if that wishing star had actually tried to make my wish come true.

Wow. That chapter was hard to write. Now we've got all the hard stuff over with, we'll get into some movie stuff in the next chapter. Let's go!