Megan's Bout with Deminity - Chapter One

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Novel Snippet:2

Megan has nearly lost her mind. Although intelligent and satirical, her demand for fantasy makes her appear delusion. Unfortunately, there is still a part of her deep inside that can't break free of reality. When she meets a mysterious Hooded Man in need of help, he tempts her into entering Deminity, an infinite, chaotic dimension that is home to a variety of eccentric beings. Once there, she struggles to throw down the barriers of her own common sense and finds herself in one perplexing bind after another, whether it's watching the world flip upside down before her eyes, battling a monstrous grape juice addiction or being hurled across the universe in the crater of a moon golf ball.3

What she doesn't realize is that there's a power struggle going on more ghastly than she can imagine. Either she must walk the line between the rational and irrational in order to navigate the chaos , or find her path blocked by a treacherous tyrant and a prejudice Queen.4

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Chapter 1: Falling from the Apple Tree 6


Megan was not what you would call an ordinary girl. On the surface, she looked like a typical sixteen year old girl with beautiful blue eyes, a round face, two blond pigtails, and the usual outfit of t-shirts and jeans. She was the smartest student in her classes, and she rather enjoyed a large glass of grape juice. However, it was underneath the physical appearance of her clothes and stellar exam scores that made her so bizarre.7

She would often lie on her bed and fantasize about exotic worlds and strange adventures, wishing that her life was something more than gravity and homework. Now one may think that was perfectly normal behavior for someone in her middle teenage years, and that having an imagination was a healthy affair for the mind of a growing girl. Her obsession lay in the depths to which she demanded the existence of fantasy worlds. She became so insistent that they were real, that she would look for them everywhere. While other girls were out dancing or getting their nails done, she was peering in shoes, looking in the bottom of cereal boxes and even gazing in the tiny hole of an opened padlock, hoping that someone would invite her into their secret society. Always her searches came up empty, but she did discover a rather large spider in the nook of her dusty closet once. Unfortunately, she was disappointed when the spider refused to talk with her, wondering if the mothballs in her hair made her look too hideous for the hairy creature.8

Some would say that attempting to talk to animals was nothing to be perturbed about, and that they have in fact talked to their own dogs as if the mangy little buggers were living secret lives and could understand everything they said, but her desires went much deeper than a giant mutt conspiracy. Over the course of the past few years, her outward behavior began to reflect her inner cravings. Sometimes she would get so involved in a book or a movie, that she started to take on the traits of the heroes of the stories. She would steal their mannerisms, use their trademark expressions, dress up like them and even solve pretend scenarios with imaginary bad guys. One time, she even used a broom to break a lamp, which she thought was the mastermind behind a drug scandal. Generally she only did this around the house when her mother wasn't around, who didn't pay much attention to her anyway, but lately her urges for fantasy were overcoming the battle with her common sense. She started to become less aware of the real world and how her actions would be perceived, and began to openly broadcast her obsessions to the publics eye.9

Most recently, she was reading a comic book about a fabulous squirrel named Squirrelly. He would bolt up the branches of a tree at super speed and then traverse the tree tops as if they were nothing more than common stepping stones. He was the superhero of rodents, defeating crime in the magical forest. She read the comic with such passion and vigor, and she wanted it to be real so bad, that she started believing that she was Squirrelly. It was one thing to pretend she was a rodent in the confines of her bedroom, but another when she walked around thinking that she could do the things that a crime fighting squirrel could do. It was this strange behavior that set into motion a series of events that would forever change her life.10

Her adventure began on an ordinary day of school. She was sitting in her physics class, a bland room of regurgitated yellow and stained windows, surrounded by twenty of her fellow students who didn't think themselves squirrels. However, just like Megan, many of them were pretending to be something they weren't, whether wearing jeans that cut off the circulation to their legs, gawking and chatting in ridiculous slang, or otherwise doing whatever it took to fit in. Since Megan had always chosen to avoid this course of action, there wasn't anyone in the room making an effort to acknowledge her, save one. That was Mr. Wilty, the teacher. 11

In fact, he was communicating with all the students, taking down the daily attendance at the start of the class. He was a tall and wrinkled man, much younger than his appearance showed. He was quite prone to stress, which was reflected in his grave expression, slumped shoulders and spotty gray hair. Every time he spoke, his protruding nose hairs seemed to wiggle, adding a slight wheezing into his voice. 12

When he called out Megan's name to the hyper class, she sat there quiet as a mouse. Her eyes were focused on the open comic book in her lap, eagerly battling a sarcastic raccoon with a slingshot and acorns.13

"Megan? I called your name, and you didn't answer," said Mr Wilty, gazing at the part in the top of Megan's blond head. "Are you paying attention?"14

The rest of the students snickered. When Megan looked up to see what all the commotion was about, she met the eyes of the entire classroom.15

"Megan?"16

She sat there with an air of innocence, looking left and right as if she too was looking for Megan in the class room. When Mr. Wilty sighed and walked over to her desk, much to the enjoyment of the class, she offered him only an empty stare.17

"Explain yourself," grumbled Mr. Wilty.18

The class silenced in anticipation.19

"Yourself: I believe it's a reflective form of you, is it not?" said Megan, pondering the answer by playing with one of her blond pigtails. "But what does that have to do with Physics?"20

She may have been out of her mind, but she was most certainly intelligent. The class agreed with that assessment and erupted in laughter. Mr. Wilty, however, was not amused.21

"Megan, go to the office," he snapped.22

No teacher liked to be made a fool by one of their students, even if she had nearly aced his last test (Megan had said nearsightedness arose from bitter demons lingering in the back of people's eyes, tinkering with incoming light waves out of spite). 23

Despite being yelled at, Megan continued to sit in her seat, glancing around at her fellow students as if she couldn't understand why this silly Megan was not listening to her teacher.24

"This is your last warning, I suggest you do as I say," said Mr. Wilty, steam pouring out of his shriveled ears.25

"Me?" said Megan, pointing to herself for emphasis. "You didn't give me a first warning."26

"I just told you to go to the office," said Wilty, his tone teetering on insanity.27

"You sent Megan to the office. That's not my name."28

The class was acting as if laughing gas was seeping through the heating vents. 29

"Oh no?" said Mr. Wilty, a bitter calmness coming over him like the eye of a hurricane. "Please enlighten me of who I'm speaking with, then."30

"My name is Squirrelly, the fabulous squirrel hero," said Megan, and half of the students fell out of their seats.31

Later that day, Megan was sitting under the cool shade of an apple tree next to the football field, deeply involved in her comic book and smiling as she was was thwarting an acorn robbery.32

Her principal, a short and stern looking woman with thick glasses and a face reminiscent of a bulldog, had been distraught to learn of Megan's odd behavior in the classroom. She had already excused Mr Wilty for the day for having an ulcer attack, and when she had tried to summon Megan the girl through her harsh authoritative tone, she had met resistance from the four-legged rodent with two legs. She then had attempted to reach Megan's mother, but after several attempts had failed, she had no choice but order Megan to wait outside her office for the time being.33

When Megan had taken her seat, she couldn't help notice how wonderful the weather had been as the bright, luring rays of sunlight had poured against the bleak windows right across the hallway from her. It had been enough to conquer her will power, so soon the fizzling light panels in the ceiling had been replaced by clear skies, rays of vitamin D and wandering bumble bees. She then had made her way across the football field armed only with her comic book under the arm of her yellow t-shirt, had found the soothing shade of the tall apple tree, and had plumped down under it. 34

The stark aroma of rotting fruit in the crisp aroma of grass was waltzing in Megan's nostrils. There was a stiff breeze in the air, which was currently disrupting her concentration as it blew the paper thin pages in her lap. As she was trying to compensate for this annoyance by pinning the pages with her elbows, a group of jocks loitering next to the walls of the school spotted her. They were wearing their school colors of red and white, and had decided that fourth period would be better spent hanging outside. 35

These jocks were considered some of the most popular students in the entire school, which earned them the right to belittle anyone they wanted too. With Megan in their crosshairs, they decided that she would make a worthy target to have fun with. Of course, what that meant was they were going to have fun at her expense, because the rumor of her actions in her physics class had circled the popular veins of the school. With a hearty group laugh, the jocks set off in her direction.36

Megan was certainly not a member of the gossip circle, having no real friends of her own. Her behavior in general was not the cup of tea that her peers enjoyed, finding her taste rather peculiar. This didn't bother her, however, since all the companionship she needed was in other worlds. Right now, there were several porcupines and rabbits in the magical forest who needed her abilities, so there simply wasn't time to make ordinary human friends.37

Also, the strengths she had learned from her hero worshiping would at least help her against the group of egotists approaching. Her counter in any situation, whether she felt fear, annoyed or otherwise displaced, was sarcasm. To her, conceited jocks were nothing but hollow frames of confidence that protected their fragile inner children, so sarcasm was especially effective.38

The jocks walked towards her, their chins above parallel to the ground as if to say that everyone was breathing an inferior air to them. One of the boys even had his peck cupped with his hand, because that's where the school letter was and he had to make sure that everybody knew he was a big part of it at all times. A finger on his free hand was also pointing to the letter for further emphasis.39

"Hello Squirrelly, eat any nuts lately?" said a sturdy boy with bleached blond hair.40

The rest of the group broke into laughter except the boy with his peck cupped. He was too busy brushing off the invisible dirt on his school letter.41

"Leave me alone," said Megan.42

"This girl must swim in nutella," said another boy with locks of curly brown hair, but nobody laughed.43

"Man, that was stupid," said the boy with bleached blond hair, turning to his friend.44

"Oh, and asking her if she ate any nuts is funny? That's so clichéd," replied the curly haired boy.45

"You laughed, didn't you?" said the blond haired boy.46

"Ya, but that's when I thought we were supporting each other," he replied, hanging his head and frowning.47

"Boys, do you mind?" said Megan, who had read over the same line three or four times already as the jocks had argued.48

The boy with bleached blond hair hit the curly haired boy on the shoulder and offered a grin as if to say that all was forgotten, and that it was time join forces once more. The curly haired boy perked up in attention and grinned back. The boy cupping his peck was more interested in a couple ladies who were passing by, so he took off to tell him about his winning touchdown from the other day. The rest of the boys were the followers, ready to laugh on command at whatever their leader said.49

"So... Megan... Squirrelly, whatever you prefer. I was wondering if you could give us a demonstration of your powers," said the blond haired boy with as much phony kindness as he could muster. The rest of the group put their hands to their mouth to suppress their grins.50

"No superhero uses their power pretentiously," said Megan without taking her eyes off her booklet.51

The boys shot each other sideways glances. They were used to words such as run and fetch, like on the football field. Never were they faced with such daunting words.52

"No no no, I don't want you to pretend, I want to see you use them for real," responded the blond haired boy.53

The rest of the boys nodded along like loyal puppies.54

"That's not what that means," said Megan.55

"Oh?" said the blond haired boy.56

"Shouldn't you be off stuffing some kid in a locker?" said Megan in frustration.57

"Listen," said the blond haired boy in his sweetest voice, kneeling down and putting his hand on Megan's shoulder.58

Megan shot him a devilish stare.59

"I respect... no admire your incredible talents. I wish I could bolt up a tree as easily as you, but I can't. It would really make my day if you could just give me a little demonstration, nothing major. You wouldn't do this for your number one fan?"60

"Yeah, we're all big fans," said the curly haired boy, figuring this was the perfect time to establish himself as one of the leaders of the group again.61

The loyal followers were all looking the other way, their faces red and their heads shaking from silent laughter.62

"I'm sure you are," said Megan, swatting the blond haired boys hand off her shoulder like it was some intrusive insect while staring the curly haired boy directly in the eyes. "After all, I must smell like a mixture of hazelnut and cocoa from all that swimming I do,"63

The curly haired boy gulped and hung his head, while the rest of the followers exploded like a balloon with too much air, unable to hold back any longer. Half of them were laughing at Megan, because she really was the biggest loony they had ever met, and the other half were mocking the curly haired boy for being put in his place by the biggest loony they had ever met.64

The blond haired boy wasn't laughing with them, and was instead furious that he wasn't able to ruffle Megan's feathers. He wasn't used to being outsmarted, because anyone who had ever attempted such a foolish stunt had met the cusps of his knuckles. Unfortunately for his ego, he couldn't hit a defenseless girl. Instead, he barked out an order in a vicious tone.65

"Common gang, let's leave this loser to her freakish thoughts."66

"Yah, what a freak," said a chubby boy follower with hair as red as oozing lava. 67

The jocks took off back towards the football field, but the incident still burned a hole of shame in the blond haired boy's pride. To redeem himself, he thought of a plan to reestablish his bolstering testosterone. He couldn't let Megan get the best of him, even if she had won the battle. The war would be his.68

For the most part, the football field was empty except for a wiry freshman and his pimple-faced friend, who were throwing a Frisbee around after getting out of class early. They were just minding their own business, laughing as innocent youth tend to do in a windy game of Frisbee, when the captain of the jocks approached them. Without even a proper greeting, he threatened the insignificant freshmen to do his bidding. He ordered them to toss their Frisbee into the branches of the apple tree, the very same one that Megan was sitting under. The freshmen, intimidated by the size and power of the upper-year jock, agreed to do it. They weren't particularly keen on spending the rest of their high school careers in the jock's locker with all his smelly equipment.69

In addition to the strange request, the jock gave the freshman a couple of lines that he was to feed Megan, once the Frisbee was in the tree. Naturally, the freshman didn't understand the point the lines, because he hadn't heard the rumors that were going around the school. He wasn't a prominent member of 'the loop' yet, so he figured he must be on the butt end of a joke as he prepared to execute the plan. 70

Once the seeds were planted, the blond haired boy returned to his loyal gang and commanded them like usual.71

"Common, everybody huddle in and pretend we're talking."72

They formed a semi-circle in the middle of the football field with a perfect view to the show. The only thing they lacked was a bucket of buttered popcorn.73

"This is so hilarious," said the curly haired boy.74

"Do you think she'll do it?" asked the chubby boy and his fire hair.75

"Of course she will, she actually thinks she's a friggen squirrel," said the blond haired boy, looking smug.76

"I heard that last week, she thought she was a dwarf with a magic ring," said the curly haired boy.77

"What an absolute weirdo," said one of the other followers who had a head shaped like a watermelon. There was just a smidgen of white fuzz on the top of his head and chin.78

"It's sad really, that she acts so pathetic at her age. My six year old sister is more mature," said the blond haired boy. Then, only a moment later, he started jumping up and down, squealing like a pig with a new pile of mud to play in. "Oooh look, they're about to do it."79

The freshman thought it stupid that he just simply walk up and toss the Frisbee into the tree, so he enlisted the help of his friend to make it look like he was going for a long catch. "I'm open," he said, attempting to sell his act as he bolted towards Megan. When his friend tossed the Frisbee over his head and into the highest branches of the apple tree, the freshman yelled back, "That was the worst throw I've ever seen."80

Startled, Megan peaked up from her booklet adventure with curious eyes and saw the skinny frame of the freshman standing there, staring up into the tree with a saddened expression on his face. When the freshman noticed Megan looking his way, he spoke the lines that he was forced to say. It certainly wasn't oscar worthy.81

"Oh my, what ever am I to do?" said the freshman, sounding almost sarcastic. "My Frisbee is in the tree, and I'm too weak to climb up there and get it myself."82

Megan put her book down onto the grass and got up. She brushed off the dirt from the rear of her jeans and emerged into the sunlight, failing to to notice the group of jocks staring at her from the distance. The golden rays bounced off her pale skin as she glanced into the swaying branches, searching for the saucer amongst a barrage of rotten apples. It really wasn't any different than looking for UFOs in the milky way, which she had been obsessed about for at least a fortnight after watching E.T.83

"I can get that for you, sport," said Megan with a smile, once she had made first contact with the saucer.84

"Thanks," said the freshman.85

"Anytime."86

The freshman, who almost blew away in a blustering wind gust, was more than nervous. The Frisbee was really high up there, right where the branches were thin and far between. He didn't understand the motive behind having a girl climb a tree, and he most certainly didn't want her to get hurt because of it. However, he expected her to give up after a few feet and come down, so he wouldn't intervene just yet. The jock's had big muscles, after all. 87

"Be careful," whispered the freshman quietly, glancing over his shoulder to make sure the jocks didn't hear.88

"This won't be a problem for a squirrel like me," said Megan with confidence.89

"Yeah..." said the freshman.90

He wasn't sure if she used the rodent as an analogy or if she actually thought she was a squirrel.91

Megan climbed onto the first branch, but it was hardly at super speed. She grunted and wheezed, sweat trickling down her round cheeks, determination etched in the contours of her forehead. 92

The freshman gulped, she was going higher than he expected.93

By the time Megan was a quarter of the way up the tree, she was out of breath entirely. The freshman couldn't take it anymore.94

"Come down, you'll never make it."95

"No... reality is a prison," said Megan, gasping. "I must break free."96

The freshman was more confused than ever. When he looked over to where the jocks were standing, he noticed that half of them were rolling around on the grass in laughter, while the others were giving each other high fives. The blond haired boy was standing there, his arms crossed, with a look of utter satisfaction. 97

"Listen, I think that those jocks set..." the freshman began to say, but he stopped mid sentence in horror.98

Megan had reached for a thin branch, and it had snapped in two.99

Squirrelly Squirrel climbed for the ball.
Squirrelly Squirrel had a great fall.
The apple tree was just too tall.
Since Megan wasn't a squirrel at all.100

Megan fell ten feet to the ground, hitting the grass with a mighty thump. The jocks - once again led by the blond haired boy - darted away like a group of cowards, leaving the freshman to deal with the situation on his own. Even his pimple-faced friend scurried away.101

He leaned down and felt Megan's cold face, feeling an incredible surge of guilt for being a pawn in their terrible ploy. The girl wasn't moving, and he thought he had heard a faint crack when she had landed.102

"I'm going to get help," he whispered, just in case she could hear his quivering voice.103

Without further hesitation, he sped off towards the school. The gusting winds seemingly lifting him into the air as he ran, leaving poor Megan to play the role of tragic fruit in Newton's apple tree.104


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