A small town, far outside the city of New York, called Cheks. The home town of not many, probably the small population of 200 people.
Cheks was also home to a small group of friends, about 4 kids, middle school. The kids were Cloe Rubia, Mathew Garderner, Indigo Chileeum, and Jackson Patar.
It was November 8th 1993, Maxon Scar’s, or Max, as his friends called him, one year anniversary of his disappearance. No one knows just…. how….. he disappeared, nobody ever found him.
Everyone assumed he ran off to another state or even country. But after about 5 months of nearly GLOBAL investigating, everyone soon caught onto the impression he was dead.
After Max’s disappearance, his cautious mother, Joana, went into a depression. I mean, you can’t blame her… what would you do if your kid went missing and was never found?!
Her daughter, Karee, had recently graduated from high school and went off to college the summer before the disappearance. She came home after two months of being in school to help her mother. She, to this day, hasn’t returned to school.
But… little did anyone of the small town of Cheks know, Max was ok.
Or as ok as one can be in a hidden, dangerous dimension.
It was called ‘Flipped.’ Everything was dark and scary, it always appeared to be night. It looked exactly like Cheks, except for the fact that NO ONE was there and it was gross, rusted, and covered in cob webs. It was cold and seemed to be snowing ash, the sky remained a low shade of purple.
Max had been living in this terrifying world for a year after being… kidnapped…? By a creature he had a dream about when he was younger. It was a short monster, shorter than 4 feet, it didn’t have much of a face, a long pointy nose, long arms and shorter legs. It was a swift creature, and had the ability to open up a gateway between these dimensions.
This gateway was in the ground, hidden, and only one with this special mental power can open it. However, the portal back to the regular world was through the sky, dropping from almost as high as outer space! It’s not so simple to get out though, if it was Max would be back in Cheks riding his bike to school right about now.
Anyway, Max was waking up in his ratty bean bag chair he had found. He had a small, underground base that was his hiding spot. He always had to run for his life, it was a flight instead of fight thing, considering the fact that he wasn’t very athletic.
Despite his un-athletic abilities, he managed to survive a whole year, though he still thinks he’ll have to spend the rest of his life there.
He doesn’t know that he won’t.
The year before, 1992, the group of five would ride there bikes all around Cheks.
Indigo, AKA Indi, a 7th grade girl with medium length brown hair, peachy skin, and an athletic build, was very close with Max. They would hang out together everyday after school, where as the group only hung out every other day.
Before Indi met the group, she always had trouble making friends. No one is really sure why, she was everything a friend could want, feisty, smart, a little shy, and very kind. But then she started 5th grade and became friends with Cloe, who introduced her to Mathew, Jacksen, and Max.
She felt better because she finally had real friends. Great, right? Well, after Max disappeared and everyone believed he was dead, she got sad and lonely again. But, she was the only person to believe and know… that he wasn’t dead. Except, Joana Scar. Everyone thought they were both crazy and said that they just missed him.
Everyone would soon find out that they were very much not crazy.
Cloe, Jacksen, and Mathew were pretty ok after the end of 6th grade. They continued on with their lives; school, and attending their club meetings at Jacksen’s house.
Indigo always attended these meetings, but wasn’t the same as before.
Back to present day, Jack (Jacksen), Matty (Mathew), and Cloe just arrived at school with no sign of Indigo.
“She really is having a tough time today…” Jack piped up after looking around for a minute.
“Yeah well… it’s the first anniversary so I can’t exactly blame her,” Cloe chimed in.
Matty nods being his usual, quieter self. They were all close with Max, and so “losing” him was hard.
The bell rings, the kids depart, and the halls grow silent.
For now…
I can’t wait to see what comes next!