"It's easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled."
-Mark Twain

Prologue: Disarm You With a Smile

A young Cody lies in his bed, his room pitch black save for the small amounts of sunlight peaking in from the blinds. His hair is disheveled and he buries his face in his hands.

"Jesus CHRIST, would you just SHUT THE FUCK up already!?"

Outside his room, his parents were engaged in another one of their epic arguments. Shouting was heard, and mixed in between the shouting was the sound of glass breaking and things being smashed up, and he began to lightly sob. He looked up at the window through his tired, teary eyes, his face flushed and gleaming with tears. How he wished he could get up and just run straight to that window, release the hatches, and dive out into the freedom of the world.

No one would even know he was gone - his parents barely acknowledge his existence, and the people at school would not care, he was unwanted, and he desperately wanted to be free. He could do that right now if he would only garner up the will.

But he knew, oh yes he knew, that he would never be able to do that.

For one, his room was on the top floor of his house, the third story to be precise. Yes, Cody's house was big. Fancy. He was apart of a rich family. How true the saying "Money doesn't buy happiness" really is. He heard another crash behind his door, and more yelling.

Secondly, where would he go? He was only 11 years old. There is no where for him to go out there in the world other than to sit in this prison, scared and alone and dying on the inside from all the neglect he had receieved over the years, the abuse taken both by his peers and by his parents piling up on the inside and collapsing in on his confidence and what little character he had on the inside, leaving behind only a broken young child.

The shouting outside his room got louder, as it usually did during these kinds of arguments his parents had, and he covered his ears with his hands and began to sob uncontrollably, squeezing his head tightly.

He began to shake violently as his sobs soon turned to horrible wails as he succumbed to the feelings of dread and hopelsesness, and it is in this state of hopelessness and dread that three facts suddenly registered deep in his psyche.

Number 1 - his parents are arguing in the den.
Number 2 - next to the den was his father's study, which he knew contained a safe with the combination "3244".
Number 3 - in this safe was a loaded Remington 1911, which his father told him about in the event that a robber was to enter their home while he was alone as a result of his parents going out on one of their many prolonged business trips.

Immediately upon realizing number 3, he ceased crying and felt a strange feeling wash over him, his sadness and despair quickly becoming replaced with this... Strange, dark, morbid feeling. It was like he was in a hyper state of awareness.

His parents were still yelling, and it seemed to be heating up as he heard more crashes and booms, and he began to think...

They were distracted - distracted with their battle in their own little Hell. It would not take much effort to sneak into his father's study, go over to that safe, grab the weapon inside of it... Go into the den... Take aim... And...

He violently shook his head, as if trying to shake his head of these morbid, horrible thoughts.

What was he thinking? He couldn't do that... He couldn't KILL his parents. No matter how horrible they were or anyone was to him, he could never willingly kill them. That'd be just... Horrible. He couldn't do it...

Even with this truth in his head, the thought still stuck to him, and it slowly receded into the back of his mind, as he began sobbing again.

This couldn't go on... he could not stay in this state forever.

When his parents weren't home - he was completely alone, left to his own devices, unless he was at school, and even there he was alone. He was the weird kid there. The quiet kid. The kid who everyone liked to whale on because he lacked the strength to fight back.

And when his parents WERE home...

He heard the yelling reached its breaking point as they finally rose to levels of horrible loudness, levels so loud that had he lived close to neighbors, they would have undoubtedly heard and called the police.

God... How tired of this he was. How tired he was of sitting alone in his room locked away, stuck in his own lonely miserable state of constant sadness.

He wanted to fight back against those who made his life Hell - wanted to fight back like you wouldn't believe, but he couldn't. Everything he had tried had failed and exploded in his face, and all his ideas seemed to explode in his face as well. It seemed he was destined to constantly be alone and trapped.

He had tried it all: physically fighting the bullies at school, meeting them head on, staying quiet in the back of the classroom, and that was only school. Here? At home? He had no options like that. He was only able to submit to his loneliness while his parents were away, or submit to total despair as he listened to the war between his parents wage while he stayed locked in his room.

But then... He thought of something...

He was not just fighting against bullies, or his parents, he was fighting against the WORLD itself. The world wanted to beat him down into the ground. But what if instead of submitting to the world, he fought it in another way?

What if instead of folding or caving in on himself, he fought back against the world not with sadness or despair, but the opposite? What if he fought back... With a smile? And with a guise of optimism?

Yeah... The more he thought about it, the more it seemed to ring true and make sense. Fight the world which wanted to make him submit, and do it not with weapons or with words, but with a simple smile and optimism.

Maybe with time - he would even begin to believe his mask of optimism.

He stopped sobbing, and he began to wipe his face of tears, as he rose out of his bed and shakingly walked over to his door, his heart feeling as if it had dropped into the pits of his stomach.

The yelling outside continued, and he stepped out of his room into the hall - where he heard the yelling increase in volume, only he did not recoil and go back inside, or scream or cry...

He stepped forward.

A smile plastered on his face.

And there we go - first chapter of "A Fall From Grace", and unfortunately it's a prologue...

So there's no way to say this, and if you haven't figured out by now, then I guess I'll just break it to you straight and save myself from writing a large Author's Note: this story is going to be very dark.

This story is pretty much going to be about Cody, the REAL Cody, the Cody which has been buried under a guise of confidence and optimism breaking free to tackle the world. It's going to be dark. It involves Cody turning into something dark. Becoming a bad guy pretty much. Although I'll leave alot of room for you all to interpret his character as bad or justified.

I hope you all enjoy this story - as I've had this idea for some time.

I think that's all I have to say for this story, but a real quick thing I wanted to touch upon:

this chapter's name is taken from the song "Disarm", by Smashing Pumpkins. If you haven't heard of that song yet, I highly recommend you go take a look, as it pretty much perfectly describes the Cody I want to portray in this story.

That's all, see you next chapter, where things really begin!

-Twisted