Surviving the Fall

Chapter 1

The Board

Warren grunted as he slipped off the skate board and landed on his back. He cringed slightly as some of the more experienced boarders and bladders laughed as they passed him.

Shooting Marissa a glare that said not to help him, Warren got off the ground.

He took off the red helmet and shook his short black hair out. He looked to be about twelve, but in reality he was only ten.

Suddenly an older boy whizzed past Warren and pushed him down so that he landed face first. Marissa threw her magazine aside and rushed to her younger brother. Another girl, who was in a pair of in-lines stopped next to the pair of siblings.

"Yo, King of the Jerks, pick on someone your own age," the girl yelled. "Don't let him get you down; he's all bark and almost no bite."

"I think I've seen you around school," Marissa said. She was about to say Sky High, but what if it wasn't the junior who had supposedly dropped out a couple of weeks ago.

"Yeah, you probably did before I dropped out last week," the girl said.

"You were a junior, Clarice Faith."

"Yeah and you're a freshman, Marissa Peace," Clarice said. "Who is this?"

"My brother Warren."

A small girl screamed and Clarice took off again, yelling at the King of the Jerks to leave her sister alone.

Laugher could be heard as a boy, who had been hanging with Clarice, stole the King of Jerks' skate board. A small group continued to play keep away with the board for awhile. Clarice was the conductor of the whole bunch. A small girl with dark brown, who looked like she was the group's personal cheerleader, laughed the hardest of all.

Warren rushed up to the King of the Jerks and pushed him as hard as he could. Being surprised of being pushed, the King of Jerks fell face first. Several of Clarice's friends proceeded to do jumps over him before they tired of torturing him.

"Okay time to teach the runts how to actually skate board," one teenage boy said as he stopped his board next to Warren.

"Start Rick," Clarice said. "I'm going to talk to Warren's sister."

"Warren is way too formal, we're calling you War," Rick said.

Clarice approached Marissa. "You can go. Rick was the one who taught Maria how to skate board."

"Maria is your little sister?" Marissa asked as she pointed to the young girl who was with Rick.

"Yeah."

Marissa looked away. "Why did you leave the school?"

"Why stay at a place that has no clue how to handle me or my powers?" Clarice asked. "I'm getting training from someone who knows how to help me. She has very similar powers, and I like going to school that people want to make friends with me and haven't labeled me as a loser or a sidekick."

"I guess that makes sense," Marissa. "No that does make sense, if I could I leave Sky High, where my dad's past mistakes haunt me, I would be thrilled."

"Don't worry so much, you and Warren will always have us to come to when things get to bad," Clarice said with a warm smile. Marissa smiled and went back to reading her magazine.

Without anyone noticing, Marissa brushed the future, a nice side effect that came with telepathic powers. She saw an older version of her younger brother hugging a girl with dark hair that was died blonde at the bangs.

Marissa gasped when Warren fell again. Rick laughed as he helped up the young boy. "Lets teach you how to fall properly before we do anything else. First thing you do is make sure you have a friend that can help you back up."

"That goes for whenever you fall down in life," Clarice mentioned.

"Aint it the truth," Marissa said.

"Okay time to burn this thing," Matt Peace said. A big red bird sat on his shoulder. It trilled happily as Peace's old villain uniform.

Suddenly the Commander came up behind the pyrokinetic. The bird flew off Peace's shoulder as the Commander grabbed the former villain. "You are going to pay."

"I'm trying to," Peace said as he tried to pry the hand that was around his neck.

The next thing that Mathew Peace completely understood was that he was thrown into a cell. He had no way of reaching anyone, and no clue where his phoenix was.

Embers solved that problem when he flew to the barred window the Peace had.

"Stay with Truth," Peace whispered. "I'll be out as soon as I can."

Embers took flight to a tamer's house. The one where he had gotten Embers from.

Michael Truth looked up as a phoenix entered his house.

Truth was very used to unusual creatures; he was after all a tamer. A tamer was a person with super powers that let him control animals of all sorts, even a creature of myth.

"Dad, what's wrong," Truth's oldest daughter, Viviana, asked.

"This phoenix belongs to a friend of mine," Truth replied.

"Would you like me to send a spirit out to find him?"

"No, I'm sure Embers can tell me everything," Truth said before going to the basement with the large red bird.