Static chapter 1

This is Static, in progress. I never write in chapters, so just note future ones might be a tad short.

"We were once strong. We were, weren't we?"

The voices. They were back again, quiet as ever. They were never quite speaking to Ezra. They were all talking to them selves. He wasn't sure what they were. They would come to him sometimes, speaking quietly in their sad little voices. There were a few, but not many. Perhaps there were five voices. Now that he thought of it, there defiantly were five or six. They suddenly tuned in, one at a time, when he thought of this.

"We were once. Once, yet maybe twice, weren't we?"

That one was a woman. Or a girl. She sounded quite down-trodden. Like she was a dog that had done something bad. They always spoke to Ezra about the same thing: their downfall. Each voice spoke of it differently, but they all were wondering what had gone wrong. They had been powerful once, right? Thinking of this, Ezra climbed out of his bed and looked at the bookshelf for a copy of Important People of this time. Suddenly feeling like he was some sort of detective, he flipped through the pages for any important groups. There was only one, which he knew about anyways. The Cascade was a four person group that held power in The Hub where Ezra lived. They had been in power for maybe twenty years, more then Ezra had been alive.

"We lost... I promised we would never lose. I have failed us."

This one was a man. He had steady voice, and sounded like he had seen much. But seen much of what? The book having served it's purpose, Ezra put it back in the bookshelf. It was too early in the morning to head downstairs, so he looked for another book. This one, simply titled Wars, didn't have anything recent at all. The most recent war was apparently over a thousand years ago. Disappointed, Ezra leafed through it's pages as he thought of where to look next. Then he caught sight of a small column. What caught his eye was the date. ????-EY3420. EY3420! 20 years ago! And they didn't even know when this war started. Intrigued, he read on.

This struggle is quite unknown. It is unknown exactly when it began, and even the end date is speculative. What is known is that this brought down the ever so mighty yet

carefree gaze of the IG. The Cascade is believed to be involved in this, but they refused to respond. It is known that the battlefield was The Hub itself. However, it is to be

noted that there is not a single veteran of this war. No one seems to remember it clearly. It is probably one of the greatest mysteries ever, the question "What happened to

the IG?"

"It is always her. She is also hurting us, and thus me. She should have respect, but ever try over yields the same result. How could we have failed?"

And that was another woman. She sounded lighthearted and young, but stressed. She spoke quietly, and Ezra remembered that she said this every time. The other voices changed, but she always spoke of Her. Whoever she was. Ezra decided it was late enough that he could head downstairs. Unsurprisingly, they were already up reading the paper and eating. Ezra's father seemed very focused on his paper, so much that Ezra was afraid he was going to be yelled at for disturbing him.

"Father, what is the IG? Do you know?" He asked.

"The IG? Why do you want to know?" Replied his father, not lifting an eye from his paper.

"I read about it in a book," Said Ezra.

"I don't know." Said his father, "Now go eat breakfast."

Ezra played with the thought that his father was lying and really knew about this great secret, but decided against it. He wasn't in a book, after all!

"I have let us down."

This was a man. He had the sweet voice of an businessman pretending to be upset, but this certainly wasn't the case. He was the most straight forward of the voices. Ezra gulped down his cereal quickly and ran to the computer. He opened the online search and searched for IG, but nothing that seemed relevant showed up. Ezra was not really expecting anything anyways.

Ezra left to school at eight, as he did every day. The wait for the bus was monotone as always. As he sat in his seat, he slumped down against the window and watched the familiar sights pass. There was the Aireterium, the strange blue box of a establishment where the guards were trained. And then the Labs, a giant complex of perfectly white buildings where The Cascade did research. And then the so called 'Emerald City' itself, the great green palace where The cascade's members lived. You couldn't even see past the great gates, high walls and large fountains.

"How could we lose? We have me. I am the fight, how can I lose myself? They have trapped us..."

This voice was hard to identify. It was more of an echo, of many voices at once. It was high and yet malicious and low. It sounded bitter. The school bus passed by a marching procession of guards. The guards themselves were all invisible to anyone who looked in the visors of their bulky medieval looking armor. Perhaps they too were another one of the mysteries of The Hub.

The bus pulled into school. The building would only be Ezra's second home for only two more years, but that still seemed like forever. Classes were a bore and most of the people were too. He had a few friends of course, but they weren't that close. They just hung out in school.

Only one person stood out to him, and that was Katherine. Of course, Katherine stood out to everyone else as well. She was easily the most popular girl in school, with her lovely accent and long dark hair. It should have been pretty easy to get closer to her, but she had a body-guard of sorts, a bouncy loud-mouth girl named Tori. Tori was Katherine's best friend, though they seemed to be complete opposites. Tori was more boyish then feminine, and was always full of energy. Her curly red hair bounced as she walked and she often spoke so loud you could hear her through a closed window twenty feet above her. Katherine was very attractive and usually spoke softly. She was very intelligent and would often speak her mind with such well-thought out points that the opposing side would be impressed. She was russian and came from a rich family who took her back every summer. Tori was very protective of Katherine. If anyone tried to get too close to Katherine, Tori would bad-mouth them and do anything to keep them away. Most of the guys hated Tori for this.

"Perhaps I should take my duty more seriously, rather then make light of it and do my best to avoid it. I am a failure to us."

Ezra had heard this voice before. He could have sworn it was the same businessman voice from before. But then when he thought of it, it was actually slightly different. More young, maybe. When lunch rolled around, Ezra was surprised to see Katherine sitting by herself. Tori seemed to be gone, but maybe she was just using the bathroom. Still, he couldn't let this chance slip by him. He headed to her usually empty table, not surprised to see a few other people sitting there conversing with her.

"Hey," He said, as he took a seat at the table, "Where's Tori?"

"She is sick today. Quite unfortunate. This is probably the first time she's been sick since I've known her!" Replied Katherine with a kind smile.

Feeling more confident, Ezra decided to jump ahead to territory no one really wanted to muddle in: Why Katherine stayed with Tori. If she just ditched her, she would be able to go to parties and make many more friends. "I was wondering..." He said, "I mean, no offense, but why do you hang with Tori? I mean, she's rather pushy and protective of you, right?"

"Well..." Ezra didn't like the troubled look on Katherine's face, "We've always been friends. I know she's a but overprotective, but she's really a great person. I mean, I sorta feel like I'm the protective one. If I left her, she would have trouble making friends. It's just her personality."

"I should have known they would count me as one of them. We, or actually them, have all failed. I may have escaped, but they have focused minds."

A new voice, light and full of pride, brought Ezra out of his conversation. This voice was the coward. It had left and had still fallen with it's comrades.

"Hey. You okay?" It was Katherine, "You looked kinda out there for a second."

"Sorry about that. I was just... thinking." And indeed he had. The voice had sounded extremely close, and loud. Like it was nearby. It was different from the other quiet voices. This kind of mystery, though he reminded himself he wasn't in some book, had to be solved.