Kara lay still in her bed, the inky blackness of her room pressing in and suffocating her. It seemed to leap out at and grab at her. She closed her eyes, hoping for sleep to come for her, but it didn’t come. Rolling over and opening her eyes, Kara grabbed her phone and earbuds off of the nightstand. The moon came out from behind the clouds and cast dancing shadows across the walls. She put in her earbuds, hoping that some music would help her sleep. She started one of her favorite albums after nearly being blinded by the bright light of the screen and let the beginning guitar riff wash over her. She closed her eyes and listened to the music, letting it lull her off to sleep.

The next morning in homeroom, Kara had her head down on her desk, eyes heavy despite having actually slept last night. The several cups of coffee that she had drank at home and the nearly empty one sitting beside her atop the desk weren’t enough to get her going.  She was half-listening as the teacher called role, speaking loudly over the chattering students.

“Kara Reginald?” Mrs. Peterson asked, looking up. She saw the girl’s head down on the desk and sighed, checking beside her name. She didn’t really care that Kara wasn’t exactly participating, as the girl got decent grades and didn’t disrupt class like the other hooligans.

Kara didn’t bother to look up, just sat up long enough to take a sip of her coffee before putting her head back down as the teacher continued role. It was a short period, but it gave Kara the start of a raging headache that began to feel like someone was hitting her head with a sledgehammer as soon as she entered the hallway. Students shouted and laughed, pushing each other into lockers and into other people. Kara stumbled as someone was violently pushed into her.

“Hey watch it!” He shouted, and shouldered past her, his friends coming close behind. ‘Stupid jerk Dave.’ Kara grumbled to herself and began to fight her way through the halls, head pounding with each passing moment. She paused for a moment to clutch her head, cursing this school. Her vision swam and on the steps, she saw a man with an unfamiliar face and strange eyes staring at her. She blinked rapidly and looked down, trying not to lose her balance. Once she looked back up, he was gone and her vision had returned to normal.

‘Maybe it was just my imagination.’ She thought to herself before noticing that the hallways were much emptier than before. On cue, the warning bell rang. She took off, darting through the dregs that still remained in the hallway. She barely managed to slide into her seat in math when the late bell rang and the teacher shut the door. Kara’s head hurt much worse now, giving things an almost cloudy look. Bending down as if she dropped something, Kara took two ibuprofen while retrieving her binder. She knew that she absolutely should not have the medicine on her, but if she had to leave class everytime she got headaches like this, she would miss alot of class. Kara sat back up and pulled out a sheet of paper from the binder, trying to block out the chatter that stabbed at her.

“Quiet down class!” The teacher squawked, making Kara’s head feel as if her brain was expanding in retaliation and was going to burst through her skull. “Today we will be learning about imaginary numbers.” Kara heard the boys behind her discussing what one of them had been doing the other night and she made an inaudible noise of disgust.

“Ricky, Tim, Eric, do you have something you would like to share with the class?” The teacher asked, eyeing them with an irritated look.

“No Mrs. Richards.” Eric replied, elbowing the other two into silence. They copied his words and the teacher nodded, turning back to the board. Surprisingly, the three boys shut up, something for which Kara was grateful for.

“Imaginary numbers are the opposite of real numbers-” Mrs. Richards started the day’s tedious lesson with an example on the board and a sigh.

After several class periods, Kara was more awake than she was that morning, but worn to the bone. The ibuprofen had kicked in shortly after math began, so her headache had subsided to a dull ache. The true horror was about to start though, as gym class was about to begin. Kara sighed as she put things in her locker for safekeeping, while her headache threatened to come back at the overpowering smell of lotion and perfume wafting its way through the rows of lockers and benches. The fluorescent lighting reflecting off of the hot pink walls of the locker room was not much help either, the stabbing pain hurting just as bad as all the talking, laughter, and screaming.

“Oh it’s coming back.” Kara groaned quietly, clutching her head as she tried to get through all the girls to reach the bathrooms. She gave up and instead settled on the mirror mounted on the wall near her gym locker. As she was putting her raven black hair up into a ponytail, all of the girls near the bathroom fell silent. Kara turned and saw Jessica and her posse of friends enter the locker room, late as usual. She turned to the mirror and continued to brush her hair back, ignoring the girls that constantly bullied and harassed her. She kept an eye out for them in the mirror though, as she didn’t want to be caught by surprise. Shockingly, they left her alone, not even coming near her.

Once her hair was successfully pulled back and and smoothed out, Kara stood for a moment and breathed deeply. That action was quickly regretted as she could now taste the perfume that had been in the air. She coughed and flinched as her pain spiked.

“Let’s go ladies!” The gym teacher shouted, clapping her hands and shooing girls out of the locker room. Kara winced again and rubbed her head.

“Out, out, out.” The teacher shooed the last few girls, including Kara, out of the locker room and into the gymnasium. “Okay everyone,” The teacher called out loudly as she too entered the gym, “Dodgeball is the game of the day. Have fun.”

 Kara was irritated as she trudged out onto the gym floor and over to the far end. She could practically feel the excitement on the other side of the gym as Jessica, her posse, and several other people gathered. The shrill whistle blew and the pounding of feet filled the gym as everyone ran for the dodgeballs sitting on the half-court line. Like Kara, many stayed back. As balls began flying, she ducked and kept moving, trying not to get hit. Her efforts were in vain though, as one of the boys on the other side threw the ball at her when her back was turned to him. It hit her in the back and sent her reeling, going down to the floor to catch her breath.

From the other side of the gym, she could hear the hysterical laughter of Jessica and her friends, along with the deeper laughter of the boy that had hit her. She picked herself back up, dusted herself off and went to sit in the bleachers, glad to not have to participate.

“Go get in the trashcan Reginald, it’s where you belong!” Jessica shouted much to the amusement of her and her friends. She decided to ignore her, despising being called by her last name. She was the first one sitting in the ugly blue and red bleachers, so she pulled out her phone and scrolled through some fanart, for once glad that the gym teacher was to busy scrolling on her own phone to notice that Kara had her phone out.

Towards the end of gym, Kara slid her phone into her pocket and opted to rest her head in her hands, as it was beginning to hurt again, but she couldn’t take more ibuprofen yet.

“Alright everyone, go get changed!” The teacher shouted, and she was suddenly glad the school day was close to being over. Her vision was getting funny again and she was going to end up hurting herself. As she walked to the locker room, the crowd around her jostled back and forth. A pair of hands reached out and pushed her hard onto the ground. Kara put out her hands to break her fall and tears pricked in her eyes. Her hands were scraped up, but she got up and pushed through the laughing crowd, ignoring the snide remarks dropped by Jessica.

Once Kara got home that night, she went straight to her room and dropped her stuff on the floor. Of course her dad wasn’t home, he never was anyway. Always working or out on the town. And it wasn’t like her mom was home either. That was impossible since her mom had died giving birth to her. Kara sighed and went to the kitchen to get a bag of chips, trailing her hand along the wall as she walked back to her room. The worn carpet, the off-white walls, it was all as familiar as the back of her hand. Upon reentering her room, Kara flung herself onto her bed and opened the bag of chips while fishing her phone out of her pocket. She popped one of the crunchy, salty crisps into her mouth as she pulled up her music. Putting in her earbuds, she continued to eat the chips. She wasn’t hungry, but she knew she needed to eat something. Crumpling up the bag and throwing it into her trash can, she laid down on her bed to watch how her little desktop lamp threw shadows onto the walls and ceiling. She cranked up the music despite her headache that was severely paining her, and crawled under her red and black plaid duvet and curled up, growing relaxed in the warm cocoon.

The music soothed her emotions, which were a swirling mess of darkness, billowing around like smoke. Kara was being lulled off into sleep, the beat of the music giving her a sense of peace. The last lyric she remembered hearing before falling asleep was, ‘Remember me for centuries.’

Kara awoke on the floor of a long, wood-paneled hallway. She sat up quickly, looking around wildly and trying to figure out where she was. Scrambling to her feet, she tried to see down the hallway. It just seemed to continue on forever. Cool air blew through the hallway, as if someone had forgotten to turn off the A/C. Kara shivered and felt panic seeping into her. She was in an unfamiliar place alone and the last thing she remembered was falling asleep in her own bed.

She wondered if she should walk down the hallway, and just happened to glance down to look at her clothes. She was still wearing the clothes she had gone to school in: a long sleeved blue t-shirt, black leggings, but she was barefoot. ‘Wow and no shoes.’ She thought sarcastically. ‘Might as well walk down the hallway, I am not exactly doing anything standing here.’

Kara started padding down the hallway, the soft carpet making her feet slightly uncomfortable due to the fact she had never felt something as soft as it under her feet. The chilly air made her shiver. Lights reflected off of the polished walls and it was at that moment that she realized that her head did not hurt. She stopped walking out of shock. No pain thrummed through her head and looking down at her hands, there were no marks on them from earlier.

“Must be a dream.” Kara muttered, shaking her head and began walking again. The hallway was monotonous, as it looked to her like she was walking in a circle. She soon came across a closed door that just looked like an average door you would find in an office building setting. Solid wood, metal handle, and no window. She reached for the door, but hesitated. The door could be hiding something.

‘But it’s just a dream Kara, open the door and stop being a wimp.’ She chided herself and wrapped her hand around the handle. Twisting the handle, she opened the door. It swung open silently, revealing a long boardroom of sorts, but with the table shoved against the wall and all the chairs missing. The room was lit with a soft light from an unknown source. Along one side of the room, there were stone columns lining the wall. Kara shrugged and went in, looking around as she went. She shivered as her feet touched the freezing hardwood floor. This place was colder than the hallway.

“Hey, hey you,” someone hissed. Kara whirled around, knowing the voice had come from behind her and saw someone crouched on the ground in the shadow of one of the pillars. Even though she knew it was a dream, she still found herself wary of them.

“Please come help me.” They pleaded and she found herself compelled to at least go over and help. She made her way over to them, approaching slowly. Her vision sharpened and saw that it was a guy with auburn hair. He looked up at her as she approached and she saw with a start that he had the same bottle green eyes that were streaked through with small fleck of brown and gold that she did. He his pale skin made the sprinkling of light freckles across his nose more prominent. The longer she looked at him, the more familiar he seemed.

“You were the guy on the steps at school!” She exclaimed, finally grasping where she knew him from.

“Shhhhhhhh.” He hissed putting a finger to his lips. It was then that Kara noticed that his hands were bound with glowing, golden rope and that his wrists had dried blood around them. The blood looked oddly colored, but Kara just brushed it off as an issue of the lighting. Kneeling so that she was on eye level with him, she looked him in the eye.

“But you’re the guy from school, correct?” Kara asked, frowning.

“Yes, yes I am.” He replied, sounding almost annoyed as he looked her over. Even with the slight tinge of annoyance in it, his low, melodic voice was  pleasant to listen to.“Look if you could-”

“Who are you?” She interrupted, tilting her head to the side. She was finding that he looked familiar, and it wasn’t just from school. Despite her curiosity, the cold made her shiver and pull her sleeves over her hands.

“Your best dream or your worst nightmare. Who are you?” He shot back.

“Give me a straight answer and maybe I’ll tell you.” She retorted

“I am Lucien. I know your name too. I merely wanted to keep up formalities. You are Kara.” Kara was staggered. He already knew her name and that surprised her. “You wonder how I know your name, that is understandable. You were stolen from your home race, my race, when you were a child and raised in the human world. I attempted to retrieve you today, but Gideon, my captor, captured me before I could fully reach you. This isn’t a dream Kara, you got here by yourself. There’s no telling how.” He said getting quieter. The last part hit Kara like a ton of bricks. His words echoed in her head. ‘This isn’t a dream.’

“Hold up-” She began, needing to know more. She hadn’t been paying much attention to this Lucien guy, but when she looked back to him, his face was contorted in pain, as he hissed under his breath. In answer to her unasked question, he held up his bound hands to reveal the glowing red bonds that pulsed and seemed to constrict on his wrists. Navy blood trickled down his pale arm and dripped onto his darkly coloured trousers. She raised her eyebrows. So it hadn’t been a trick of the light, his blood was indeed an odd color.

“What are you?” Kara couldn’t stop herself from asking the question. Taking in a deep breath to steady himself, he replied,

“That will all be explained in time Kara. The bonds are connected to Gideon’s life force and emotions. That’s why they’re doing this.” He bit his lip to prevent from crying out. Seeing him in pain like this, Kara couldn’t help but feel a twinge of pity for him.

“He’s angry Kara, very angry. It would be in you best interest to leave.” He muttered, hunching over and hiding his hands, which she had managed to get a look at. The bleeding was worsening, making a steady drip.

She looked at him and tried to decide what to do when she was hit by a memory that wasn’t her own. Someone was watching a slightly younger Lucien playing with a child close to a reflecting pool. Not much else was in sight. The little girl looked a lot like a younger her. Lucien was waving a light up stick that the child watched with an enraptured expression. She laughed and clapped, reaching for it.

“No Kara, you can’t have the palo de luz.” He laughed and put it behind his back. The older Kara watched as a soft grey smoke wrapped around the light stick and transformed it into a green teddy bear with huge black eyes. “But you can have this, an oso de peluche!” He pulled it out from behind his back and gave it to the child, who was delighted.

“Thank you brother!” She laughed and hugged the bear tightly. The memory ended and Kara was pulled back into reality. Lucien looked up at her with a sad smile as another door at the end of the room was thrown open. The resounding noise startled her to her feet. Almost immediately, Kara was spotted and analyzed by this giant man. He was at the least 6’3 with shaved blonde hair and squinty eyes. He wore a loose, white shirt and denim jeans, while his feet were bare like her own. Over his shoulder, she could see the hilt of a sword. It may have been something else, but it being a sword was the only thing that came to mind when she looked at it.

“Who are you?” Both Gideon and her asked at the same time. Kara narrowed her eyes at him as he puffed his chest up and bellowed,

“I am Gideon, mighty destroyer of planets and captor of Lucien.”

“Well I am Kara, mighty destroyer of,” She paused and thought for a moment, “Food.” Gideon laughed, a frightening sound. She edged over to the table, his eyes watching her every move. Lucien let out a whimper and she looked at him, seeing that his hands were still bleeding and his bonds were getting tighter. Gideon looked from her to Lucien.

“You were trying to free him, silly girl?” He ran at her, the ground seeming to shake as he came closer. She threw herself across the shiny, wood table trying to get away, and slid along it, nearly slamming into the wall.

“Ow.” She muttered and then yelped as she saw Gideon reaching across the table to grab her by the arm. Scrambling away, she went to jump off the table, but he caught her by the arm and yanked her to him. The pain and her sudden fear caused her to  panic and thrash around, biting and kicking his arm until he let her go and she was able to jump off the table. He stood for a moment, staring down at the blood welling up from a bite, before running after her. Kara’s bare feet slapped against the cold floor as she ran from him, doing her best to avoid him. She hadn’t missed the sword concealed on his back, and was concerned for when he might pull it out.

“Come. Back.” He growled, diving at her legs. She danced out of his reach and glanced over her shoulder. In the corner, there was some sort of desk with office supplies spread on top of it. She could see a letter opener on top, laying there. While Gideon was still on the ground, Kara made a mad dash for the desk and reached it as he was getting up. She grabbed it and held it like a sword, not knowing how to use it, but ready to try

“Okay, okay, you want to play dirty little girl, I’ll play dirty.” He smirked and unsheathed his sword, which had a long blade that gleamed unnaturally under the light. It was tinged green and she groaned internally. If that blade was poisoned, she was done for.

Of course, Gideon made the first move, slashing out at her once he was close enough. She hit the ground, trying to avoid it. Rolling to the side, she got up and ran behind him. He didn’t seem to quite understand what was going on yet, so she leapt up onto his back and started stabbing him with the letter opener. Desperation had taken over her. She knew that Gideon would kill her, but she didn’t want to die. Gideon screamed in agony and threw her off. She flew through the air until she slammed into a column and collapsed like a ragdoll. The last thing she remembered was heavy footsteps and a shadow blocking out the light.

The first thing Kara saw when she woke up were the brilliant colors of a sunset filtering through the trees. The orange hue of the sunset made everything look warm, despite it being cold. She stared up and saw trees soaring upwards to form a canopy with their deep green leaves. Becoming aware that the ground was soft beneath her, Kara assumed she must have been laying on moss. The chirping of birds and the soft humming of someone nearby were what she heard as she listened.

“Lucien?” She asked, not sure if he had managed to escape. She had no clue that she had killed Gideon and that Lucien had been able to get free and save her.

“Kara?” Lucien asked, his face filling her field of vision with a slightly concerned expression.

“How long was I out?” She asked, attempting to sit up. Lucien pushed her back down and and her head began hurting as a result of trying to sit up.

“If you want to sit up, do it slowly. You were out three days Kara. I was worried.” He replied quietly.

“Oh.” She mumbled. The sun had set now and a full, bright moon rose to take its place in the sky. “You saved me?” She suddenly asked, having sat up slowly.

“I couldn’t just leave you, now could I?” He replied with a small smile. “Also, you killed Gideon. Kara, that’s impressive.”

“Thanks for saving me,” Kara paused and looked surprised, “I killed Gideon?” She felt a flash of guilt and tamped it down, using the thought that he deserved it to rationalize her way through it.

“You did indeed.” He answered with an almost proud expression.

She spotted a swirling sphere of grey smoke a few feet away and pointed at it wordlessly, partly trying to distract herself, partly wanting to know what it was. Lucien glanced over his shoulder and looked a bit surprised, like he hadn’t meant to leave it there.

“I’ve been watching the world of those that took you from our race.” He replied, waving a hand. A scene of the street she used to live on appeared. There was a tattered and water-damaged Have You Seen This Girl? poster stapled to a light pole.

“I’m missing?!” She exclaimed, startled and trying to stand up. When she lost her balance, Lucien caught her with ease and set her back down on the ground.

“Yes time passes differently between the two realms.” He replied, sitting back down beside her. “3 or 4 days here is equal to close to 20 years in your world.”

“What about my dad?” Was the first question out of her mouth. Lucien had a sad expression as he waved a hand and showed her a series of scenes.

“These aren’t recent Kara. They’re pretty old.” He said as he showed her a series of scenes. The first was her room. Or it was supposed to be her room. Stripped of all her possessions, the room had no personality. A bed stripped down to the mattress. A dresser with open empty drawers. Books and drawings gone. No curtains on the windows. The next showed her dad sitting with a dark haired woman in a restaurant. They were laughing at some unknown joke. Her father reached out and took the woman’s hand. Kara turned away, slightly hurt. She had known her father didn’t particularly care for her, especially since he blamed her for his wife’s death, but this hurt.

Lucien explained in a quiet voice what had happened after Kara left and she just sat, feeling numb. Her eyes had a far off look, as if she wasn’t quite there with him.

“Do you want to go back Kara?” He asked softly. She just wordlessly shook her head, not trusting her voice. Lucien recognized that she was upset and reached up. He caught a forest green blanket in his hand. Wrapping it around Kara’s shoulders, he patted her shoulder and she pulled it around herself. She eventually fell asleep, wrapped up in the blanket. Lucien made the sphere and looked down at his little sister. She looked peaceful in sleep, for once looking like the 17 year old that she was. The night was getting later and the air was growing colder. The moon filtered through the leaves, making the forest glow softly with its soft light. An owl hooted in the distance.

Lucien thought about taking her back. If she didn’t want to go home, he would take her back to their homeland. He held out a hand and a swirling vortex formed, showing a place of sunshine and happiness. Picking up Kara as gently as possible, Lucien shifted her weight so he could carry her easier. The motion woke Kara and she looked up at him.

“Where are we going Lucien?” She asked, looking at him with a curious expression.

“Somewhere where you’ll be happy.” He muttered and then put a hand on her forehead. “Now sleep Kara, you need it.” She fell asleep quickly with a little help from Lucien’s magic. He gave her an almost father-like kiss in the forehead, took in a deep breath, and walked through the portal, the smoke dissipating once he walked through, leaving nothing behind.

The forest was left as it was before. The moon shone brightly down on it, illuminating the centuries old trees that it was comprised of. The wind blew through the trees, rustling the leaves. A lone nightingale sung its nightly song and far in the distance, a wolf howled to the moon.