Chapter 3:

	“Chief! We have found something!” one of the tribesmen called out. Lionhawk
turned from his business to see two men running towards him, one with a small
bundle tucked under his arm. “What is it?” the young lion asked, turning to the
bundle-carrying man. Pulling the cloth from it, Lionhawk looked down upon a
largish egg of a color and shape he had never seen. “What is it?” he asked.
	“We don’t know, chief, we found it out on the prairie.” Lionhawk took the egg
and examined it for a long time. Focusing his thoughts around the object,
Lionhawk could sense something wrong with it, a monster yearning to be free.
“Hmm, something like this must be kept safe,” he said, taking the egg into his
and his mother’s hut, placing it in a hard-to-reach place. After taking several
steps back, he ponders its placement for a moment, and then shakes his head as
he takes it down. “Unsafe there,” he mumbles as exits the hut and takes off,
heading towards the wilderness. Several miles later, he arrives at a natural
clearing in the deep woods, perfectly square, and filled with strange rock
formations. His people quickly deemed the area as a sacred ground, and not even
the chief of the tribe could venture in without receiving a sign from their
gods. “It should be safe here,” Lionhawk says as he pulls back and casts the
bundle into the sacred grounds.

	“Hope, sweetie, are you in here?” Kayin’s voice pierced into the cool workshop
of their residence.
	“Yes, daddy, I’m here, just finishing up some work.” Hope replied as she
emerged from underneath something covered by a tarp in the center of the room.
Her face was dusty and streaked with a few drips of oil on her face. Despite her
dirty appearance, Hope was still all smiles. Kayin smiled as his daughter
quickly closed the gap between them, “what is it?”  She asked him. “Just telling
you that you might want to start getting ready for school. Hope nodded as she
pulled her hair from a tight braid and restoring the normal ponytail, “alright,
did you…?” she asked, and her question was quickly answered by Kayin handing her
a piece of paper. “Of course,” he said as he handed it to her, “you have my
consent to have a room in the Center, as long as you occasionally come home for
a visit.” Hope made a high, happy sound and threw her arms around her father’s
neck, “thank you daddy!” she said, and “going along with the Center will be so
FUN!”
	“No problem,” Kayin said, returning the hug, “but if you don’t get cleaned up
now, you’ll be too dirty to get let in there.” Hope grinned and quickly set off
towards the bathroom, turning her head to shout, “have fun at work today.” Kayin
nodded and headed out the door towards the docks of the local town. The small
town the Ravenhurst family lived in was of a cozy smallness where every family
knew each other. Kayin was captain of a small fishing boat, the Heart, which
made daily excursions from the shore to reap a small bounty of ocean fish.  The
small family was quickly accepted into the town after they took up residence,
with some financial aid from Ambar, which was quickly paid back by Kayin. Grace
too found a nice fit in the town, keeping busy helping the local children with
school or any other problems that arose in the town. Hope was also popular in
the town, a combination of her natural charm and residual powers of the Love
Crest. She was among the first children to leave the town for the Prime Center,
on a musical scholarship. As Kayin prepared his nets and lines for his fishing
trip today, he spotted a small, pink trail coming from his house as Hope took
off, headed for Prism, and her school.

	Several hours later, Hope was walking down the halls of the Center, with a
growing group of friends in tow. Even in her first year, Hope had made a great
deal of friends, and no enemies, save the owner of the pair of eyes following
her. “Look at her,” a voice hissed, “thinking she can just waltz in here and
become everyone’s favorite. Humph, I’m much better than she is,” concluded the
owner of a voice, an older and quite irate Vixy. “We’ll see how long her little
stint lasts,” she says to herself, watching the crowd she is with, “not even the
usual popular crowd, why would she be with them?” Hope continues to walk,
unaware of the resentful stares of the other large, popular group. As Hope
passed Vixy, she smiled and waved, drawing a slight nod as she passed. When Hope
was out of sight, Vixy glared and grumbled again, “keep smiling missy, you’ll
fall soon enough and recognize me…everyone does.” With the quiet threat made,
Vixy’s mood seemed to brighten as she got back to her daily routine. “Oh yeah!”
she said, digging in her bag for two slips of paper, permission slips for her
and Shin for the Prime Center Excursion. Prism’s Prime Center was not only a
marvel of education on Neo Earth, but also a technological wonder as well. The
main building, all the accessory facilities (such as musical halls, stadium and
medical building) and even a few of the adjacent apartments were located on a
massive plate in Prism. This plate was the development of Ambar Industries, and
was the first large-scale anti-gravity platform. With it, the Prime Center was
able to lift off of the ground and travel. As Neo Earth grew and redeveloped,
the Excursion was created for students of the Prime Center to tour the world
over the course of several months, landing in specific locations across the
globe. Vixy reread the note again, rather redundant that she signs her own
permission slip, but it was a timeless formality that all students went through,
despite age. “Oh well,” she said as she took off, heading for the offices to
turn in the slips of herself, and her new roommate.

	Nearie was silent as usual as she took her place in the large commons, a tray
with a light lunch, the same as the day before, in front of her. The meal was as
quiet as the eater, very little flavor spiced it. Nearie seemed content with the
situation, a book opened next to her as she ate and took occasional glances at
the book. A sudden burst of high voices and fast-moving feet temporarily broke
Nearie form her trance, as a group of first grade students at the center flooded
into the commons, pining for their food. She only watched the group for a brief
second before returning to her studies, until a particularly high voice
shattered her concentration. “Hi!” the voice chirped, very close to Nearie’s
ear, “whatcha doing?” The polar bear girl turned her head slowly to look down at
a first grade panda girl, smiling happily as she plopped down next to Nearie.
She said nothing in reply to the question and tried to get back to her work, “my
name’s Penny. What’s yours?” Nearie nodded a tiny bit before again trying to go
back to her work. “Oh yeah! I drew a picture, wanna see?” Penny practically
threw an open sketchbook into her face. The drawing was actually very good, even
for students much older than Penny. “That’s nice,” Nearie said calmly, still not
really caring about the small panda. “Want me to do another?” Nearie still
stayed quiet. “Well? Do you want me to draw a picture of you?” After another
long silence, Nearie finally said, “you aren’t going to leave me alone, are
you?”
	“Hmm, nope! We can be friends!”
	“………Alright, you can draw a picture of me, but be quiet.” Penny squealed in
happiness, and then quickly got intent on her work, silently sketching the
studying polar bear. The panda hummed in delight as she worked, “I’ll see you
here tomorrow then?” Nearie sighed, “I suppose,” thinking that it will at least
keep the panda quiet.

	Meyshsiam hummed to himself as she sorted through books in an old bookstore
near the Center. He never really expected to find anything too interesting in
the stacks of old books, especially those that would strike his interest. As
looked over the stacks, one book in particular caught his eye. He thought it was
somebody’s journal for a second, but when nobody else in the store even glanced
at it, Meyshsiam picked it up and began to thumb through the pages. “Well now,
this is interesting,” he thought to himself as he read, “yeah, this is just what
I need. And if might actually work too.” He slowly closed the cover and looked
around the shop. Meyshsiam grinned as he turned his back, starting to walk out
of the door, onto the street. “Hey!” A voice called behind him, “you forgot
something!” Meyshsiam slowly turned his head to find another clerk jogging over
to him, “you forgot your coat.”
	“Oh…” he said, embarrassed, “thanks…”
	“No problem, have a good day,” the clerk said as Meyshsiam stepped out to the
street, immediately caught up in the crowds on it. “Yeah,” he thought to himself
again, “this will really impress her!” as he slowly climbed into a bus, taking
him back to the Prime Center.

	“Damn Vixy…” grumbled a voice as the sounds of running water filled the room,
“You’d think you could clean up once in awhile.” The voice belonged to Shin, who
was trying to restore order to the apartment’s kitchen, and fighting an uphill
battle. Pots and pans were scattered liberally throughout the kitchen, and
showed various states of dirtiness. Shin sighed a bit, but attended to his
duties. As he worked, Vixy arrived, left and came back again just in time for
Shin to prepare and serve dinner. “Wow, you really cleaned this place up,” Vixy
commented as Shin served. Even though she still wasn’t warm to the idea of Shin
as a roommate, Vixy admitted he did have some good points. Later, tensions were
back to a peak as the two watched television. “Look Vixy,” Shin grumbled, “we’ve
watched this show for three hours already…can we watch something different now?”
	“Shh!” Vixy scolded as she watched the romantic movie with starry eyes. Shin
sighed and crossed his arms, watching the movie unfold slowly, too slowly in his
opinion, but he didn’t have the remote. An hour passed, then two, soon it was
midnight and the movie was finally ending, with Vixy asleep. Shin turned his
head slightly to see the vixen finally asleep, with a slight smile on her face.
“Finally,” he whispered, as he reached over to grab the remote. “Easy now…don’t
wake her…” he said as his fingers touched the black plastic. Suddenly, Shin
found himself in a tight hug from a sleeping Vixy, “oh….” she cooed romantically
in her sleep, her voice imitating that of the woman in the movie. “Ah, ugh, err,
Vixy? Vixy? Vixy wake up.” Shin said as he tried to pull away, but failed to
escape the sleeping vixen, already in her own dreams. With a sudden surge, Vixy
lashed out, wrapping Shin up and pulling him strongly down. Shin quickly found
his face buried on one of the vixen’s breasts, almost suffocating him. He had
never had this kind of experience before. Vixy’s breasts were soft, like
well-made pillows, and as he cleared his face from them, Shin tried to struggle
away, a furious blush on his face. “Don’t leave me, my love,” Vixy murmured in
her sleep, pulling him back down onto her chest. Shin tried to struggle again,
but soon he could feel a little pleasure in the back of his mind, “what are the
chances this will happen again?” he thought as he began to settle somewhat. “She
is attractive after all,” he thought again, settling his cheek on the soft
breast, “might as well enjoy it while I can, as long as I can get away before
she wakes up.” He was tired too, and as he relaxed more, he soon felt sleepy,
and within minutes was asleep on the couch, with Vixy arm’s still wrapped around
him.

	“HEY!!!!” Like a bomb, Vixy’s voice, and fist exploded into Shin’s reality.
“JUST WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU WERE DOING?” she demanded as Shin rubbed his punched
face. “Look Vixy…it was you who…”
	“What? Like I would do THAT, with YOU.” Vixy let out a long, irritated sound as
she got up and left, leaving Shin confused, and with a growing bruise.