Chapter 1

The morning of July 15th started the same as any day for James Salihas, at 2 pm when his door was flung open by his mother, shouting “It’s two in the afternoon, get up before I slap you in the face with a wet towel!”

Groaning to signal his awaken status and surrender, James’ eyelids regretfully fluttered open only to be greeted by the same grey ceiling, the first thing he saw every morning upon his return from his freshman year at an out of state college. His parents had redecorated his room, apparently as soon as he left, into the future site of his father’s apparently planned future model train layout. The signs of the future plans could be seen in every corner: two-by-fours, plywood, boxes of miscellaneous wiring and track. In almost any other circumstance, James would have been thrilled by the prospect. He and his father had spent much of James’ childhood going to hobby stores and looking at trains. The only real complaint that James had was it was going in his room. However, since the decision had now been moved out of his hands, he was going to remain in his room until he was evicted by force.

As the sound of his mother moving down the stairs faded, James rolled over and out of his bed. Fortunately, since his bed was a mattress on the floor, he didn’t have far to fall, and was no worse for it. Groping for his cell phone, he pressed buttons on it until it dialed the first number in the phone’s address book. Bringing the cell phone to his left ear he rubbed his eyes with his right hand. After four rings, a voice answered.
“Hello?”
“It’s me,” James cryptically stated, then after about two seconds pause, adds “Mario.”
“You’re still a jerk, I see,” the voice on the phone noted, followed by a hearty laugh.
“Shut up Becky, call Peter. Lets go to a movie or something that will kill brain cells.”
“Sure. Thank you for at least calling me before showing up at my house, much appreciated, see you soon.”

Closing his phone, James lifted himself to a sitting position, cracking his neck once before standing and heading to the bathroom. Standing in front of a floor-to-wall mirror, he inspected himself. At five foot eleven, he was by no means, a small person, and at one hundred and fifty-three pounds, not a thin one either. Nor was he fat however, and thanks to broad shoulders, his build was almost large. As he described himself online, his build was “annoyingly average.” Removing something from his right eye, he checks his face. Also “annoyingly average,” his green eyes and curly brown hair allowed him to pull off the “I’m well-off-but-don’t-really-look-it” style which was his preference. Further, his face, thin for his build, allowed him to wear a wider variety of clothing styles. After removing something from his teeth and rinsing his mouth in the sink next to mirror, James exited the bathroom, pulling on a pair of jeans to accent the shirt and boxers he had slept in.

Sliding on some sandals, James exited his room, trying to ignore the sign that had been nailed to it, stating “dad’s train room” on it. Going down the stairs two at a time, and grabbing onto the end of the banister, he power slid into the kitchen, grabbing an apple as his mother looked up from her book.
“Welcome back to the world of the living,” she noted as she takes a drink from her glass of water.
“Thanks,” James replied dryly as he takes a bite from his apple. “Glad to be, I’m going over to B’s to we can meet with P and go somewhere.”

The use of only the first letters of their first names was a habit James, Peter and Becky had picked up as friends since middle school. Always together, they were dubbed by P, B and J by some great wit in seventh grade. The name had stuck, and instead of fighting it, the three used it even now that they had gone to different colleges in different states.

“Be back by eleven,” his mother demanded. “Spend some time with your family, for once, James, your father and Margaret don’t see enough of you.”
“That’s because dad never takes a break from his firm and Margaret is at some program so she can skip a grade in high school, it’s not me who’s not available. If you want to talk in those terms, bring up Steve. He’s the one in Germany working in a pottery studio because he’s trying to ‘find himself.’”
“Your brother is having a hard time at medical school, he deserves a break,”
James’ mother stated, giving James a hard look and opened her mouth to launch
into another speech about how James needed to apply himself. James, however, knowing the signs, intervened.

“Right, right, I’ll be off then, see you tonight.” With that statement, fired off like a machine gun, James made a break for the door, managing to escape before his mother started in on him. Jumping down the steps, James stretched to prepare himself for his trek to Becky’s. It really was a trek, too. His father had designed and built the house his family lived in on the top of a very tall, rocky and almost inaccessible hill. After a few years though, a community had sprung up at the base of the hill, and in it lived Peter and Becky.

After finishing his stretches, James began the ten-minute jog down the hill to his friends. As the trees and rocks on the side of the road flew past him, a bit of a feeling of peace came over him. He liked the outdoors in small quantities, and a jog like this was perfect for him, since Peter would drive him back home. However, rounding a corner, he skidded to a halt. “Well crap,” he stated, looking before him. When he’d been picked up from college, his father had mentioned that some people were planning on building a house below theirs on the road, but James hadn’t seen it; he was asleep for the rest of the ride home. Now, in front of him were several large machines resting on one side of the road, ready to break up the rocks and clear a path so a new house could be built. The machines were all powered down, the crews apparently still out to lunch. There was room for him to pass by, but he had to slow to a walk. Passing and inspecting, James noticed a pile of broken up rocks at the side of the road, their size ranging from those the size of a pebble to those the size of him.

Knowing he could afford the time, James walked towards it, and began to sift through the base of the pile, looking for anything interesting. Moving up the pile a few feet, one of the rocks caught his attention. Strangely round, it looked like a geode or something. The size of a golf ball, he picked it up and blew off some of the dirt and dust, scrutinizing it carefully. It was, for all accounts, just a rock, albeit a very round one. So, in order to see if it was in fact a geode, he banged it against a diagonal slab next to him to see if it would open. It didn’t. He then tried a little harder. Still nothing. Taking in a deep breath, he slammed the rock down with enough force for some of the smaller pebbles at his feet to give way. This time, it did break open, and from one side, a little semi-translucent orb appeared out of the stone. James looked at it closely. It looked almost like a pearl or something to him.

Looking around him, James half expected something evil to appear, since this reminded him of some of the horror movies he had seen, and a firm believer that if the person was dumb enough to get in the situation where a homicidal maniac or monster was after him or her, it was just evolution weeding out the week, and nothing to be upset about. He’d written a paper on the subject as an essay in English, and gotten a grudging ‘A’ out of his teacher for it. So, cautious to any trans-dimensional demons or whatever, he began to pry the little orb, about the size of a marble, out of the rock. Like his attempts to break the rock around it, he ended up having to use a lot of force to remove it, destabilizing his footing even more in the process. Tossing away the rock case, he fiddled with his little orb. It was quite cool; Becky and Peter would probably get a kick out of it.

“Oh crap,” James exclaimed, Becky and Peter! Checking his watch, he groaned. He was going to be late, he liked to show up before Peter and pretend to flirt with Becky a bit until he arrived. Twisting around to take a step, he remembered a moment afterwards that he was on a pile or rocks, which helped to remind him by partially giving way beneith his grounded foot. Trying to correct his balance, he over leaned forward, and with an “Oh Fu-“ fell forward, and out of his universe.