• Chapter One
    The Vanishings

    tab A tall and slightly round 17-year old boy with light skin, blond hair, and blue eyes was just waking up as sun slowly started to appear over the eastern hills and to another person shouting from another room, “It’s morning time, William!”
    tab “Yeah, Mom, I’ll be down in just a second!” the boy shouted taking off his pajamas for a white T-shirt, blue vest, white shorts, and light blue shoes, “Today’s Saturday, right?”
    tab “Yes, but don’t forget you promised to help with your father’s shop!”
    tab William gave an annoyed groan as he jogged down the set of stairs inside the house, snatched an apple off the kitchen table, and waved bye to his mother before dashing outside because he knew this man was not his real, biological father, instead he was just somebody who married his mom about a month ago, but his mother insisted he call this man, who was still new to his life, his dad. Once outside, his eyes seemed to have automatically adjusted to the bright sun, without even a slightest hint of trouble, “That’s strange, I usually have to squint for a bit…” he thought as he got on a red and black bike to pedal up and down the series of hills to where his “dad’s” shop was, but when he was about a third of the way up a hill a sudden pain hit his right arm. “Ugh!” he exclaimed, almost falling off the bike, but when he was able to kept going, he climbed up the hill again. However, the same pain returned this time it caused him to yell out even louder and fall off the bike, roll down the hill, hitting one of the bike’s handle bars, knocking him out. Nearby, a few people heard the shouting, but all they saw was the red and black bike and a crystal-like flying beast off in the distance.
    tab Meanwhile in another part of the world, a six-foot tall nineteen-year old boy wearing clown make-up, which was neither happy nor sad, with a brown ponytail-style hair and eyes to match wearing a blue cape, yellow shirt, red pants, along with white and black boots was exiting a house when he went back inside to make sure everything was okay. Once finished he went outside where the wind was gusting, causing his cape to flap behind him as he whispered to himself, “My dear, you know I’ll be fighting for you—no matter what!” as if he was talking to a memory. After taking a few steps to get used to the wind on his cape, he went into a small town where nobody seemed to care about his clown-like appearance as he smiled to everyone. Just then, a strange pain occurred in his right arm, but he was able to ignore it as he kept going as somebody shouted out, “Hey! Bizarro!” However, the pain in the clown’s arm came once again this time it was as he fell down a flight of stairs, knocking himself out upon hitting the last step, but before anyone could react his body vanished in a flash of colors, and some of the people noticed a light green, three-headed, creature flying off in the distance.
    tab Inside of a rain-flooded city a 17-year old boy about 6 feet tall, wearing sunglasses, a golden blazer, an amulet, as well as white shorts and light blue shirts, looked around and noticed that his light blue shoes started to soak up some of the water, causing his feet to turn into prunes. However, he that as he helped with the cleanup by using some of the wires which snapped into rope-like cables on both ends to move large clumps of fallen trees and power line poles. Although many of the people suggested he take a break, he insisted that he could keep helping as he consistently replied with, “I told you I’d help out after this storm, and I will!” sounding a little tired, but he didn’t want to stop even when a small pain hit his right arm as he kept working. However, the pain multiplied as he tripped on a pole, falling over and hitting his head on another. Many of the people notice this happening, but before they had time to react, his body was gone in a flash of colors and many of them were confused as to what occurred.
    tab “Where’d Michel go?” asked one of the people, “I though I saw him fall down here, but now…”
    tab “I don’t kn…What’s that?” asked another, pointing to a barely noticeable emerald-colored beast flying in the sky.
    tab Around the world the moon’s white glow was shinning on a 17-year old boy with silver hair, eyes as black as a moonless, starless night sky, tan skin, and an average 6-foot-5-inch body. He was wearing a black muscle shirt, overcoat, jeans, and combat gloves with only the only off-colored item in comparison to the rest of his attire being a pair of gray-colored shoes. As he jumped down from the tree he was in, he thought to himself, “Another night, another time by myself…” and “At least I’ve got a house to go to…” He walked, almost invisible and with near perfect accuracy, to a series of apartment building until he got to a door with the name, “Skyllar Kage” next to it, “I guess it’s time to head to bed.”
    tab An adult’s voice rang out as he started to open the door, “Sorry, Mr. Kage, but you’ve got a problem involving some money.”
    tab “I gave you some!” Skyllar answered, looking somewhat annoyed.
    tab “Not enough.”
    tab “What do you mean ‘not enough’?! Do you know what I had to do?!”
    tab “What?” the head asked, sarcastically.
    tab “I couldn’t even STOP MOVING while at the restaurant YOU signed me up at! Without getting a single bit of money in MY pocket!”
    tab “Sorry, but this is now…” the adult removed the nameplate and replaced with one the read, “Vacant,” as he spat the word at Skyllar
    tab “Why don’t you go to [censor]?!” he shouted, storming back to the tree he was at earlier, “And I didn’t WANT that [censor] place any [censor] ways!” When he shouted the last part, he was already in the leafy part of the tree, where he laid down as a bug buzzed by him. Soon after adult vanished from his sight, a sudden pain in his left arm, which he ignored as he took taking his overcoat off and used it like a sheet. A few moments later the pain returned, even worse than before, but as he reached over to fell his arm, he rolled over and fell to the ground. However, he did not land on the ground, for many people inside the building swore that they saw a flash of colors and then a red and black shadow of a creature flying.
    tab Elsewhere, just as dusk was hitting another area, a rockslide had ruined a small community that a 18-year old boy wearing a red T-shirt, blue jeans, and black shoes lived at helped clear the rocks, figure out what damages occurred and the resulting cost, somebody called out, “Max! Max!”
    tab Max turned to see who the person calling his name was as he asked, “What is it?” seeing the look of panicked worry on the elderly female’s face.
    tab “Get some help!” she exclaimed, “SOMEBODY IS UNDER HERE!”
    tab Max nodded as he ran, but a pain in his left arm slowed him, without stopping him until the increased in level as he tripped over a rock while shouting, “We need some help here!” tab However, once everyone was there, Max’s body was nowhere and one of the others noticed a brown creature flying in the distance.
    tab Finally, as the sun started to kiss the ground goodnight a group of girls were setting fire to a large, wooden dragon while cheering, “We are the Dragons! See our flame!”
    The crowd of spectators in the bleachers watched as the ‘dragon’ burned and set fire to the knight placed after it. Even though the Dragon was lit before the knight was, the knight burned down faster as the cheerleader shouted out, “We are the Dragons, and we burn down the competition!”
    tab In the group of cheerleaders, each one wearing the full suit, one of them stood out a little bit, with her violet hair, but everything else was the same in comparison: tan skin, blue eyes, and about 5-foot-9-inches with the traditional cheerleader-style body. Although her left arm was annoying her a little bit, she knew she had to keep going, and when it came to the pyramid, she really had to ignore it as she was stuck on the bottom of the pile, “Please hurry,” she thought to herself, “I really need to see a nurse.” However, no sooner than she made her wish, the large wooden dragon came down and lit the field, causing everyone to panic, even with the staff telling everyone to stay calm.
    tab “Alright everyone,” a female couch stated, “Stay calm, we’ll handle the flame, you just get out of those cheerleader clothing and get safe! Come on, Alexis!”
    tab Alexis hurried out off the field as she exclaimed, “I’m coming, I’m coming!” until she was finally safe and head inside of the bathroom that was some distance away from the field where she rushed to get out of her cheerleader costume and into a red tube top, orange vest, orange-and-red heels, and matching fingerless gloves. While she was changing she noticed her left arm’s pain becoming worse until she was safely off the field and tripped over a parking lot stopper, hitting her head on a nearby car. However, in the rush nobody seemed to have noticed where she was or that there was red shadow in the sky.