Prologue - Homeward

September 23rd, 2023

It was a crisp fall morning in the small northern neighborhood of Newcrest, a township in the pacific northwest. The sky was slightly cloudy as a mailman carried packages and envelopes from house to house, stopping just short of a large manor at the corner of the street. The mailman had heard of weird things happening at the house on the corner, particularly how strange the occupants were, but he decided to go ahead and deliver the mail anyway. After all he stuck to his motto whenever possible: "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor weirdness abound stays these couriers from their appointed rounds".

The mailman quickly ran up the sloped walkway and placed the mail in the mailbox, turning around and power walking away from the manor as the cool fall air chilled his spine. He had just made it to the sidewalk when the front door flew open and a teenage girl wearing what appeared to be green costume makeup, a robe, and a facial mask stormed out of the house and ran to the mailbox.

"PAKIGE!!!" the girl exclaimed as she opened the box, only to have her face fall disappointed when all she saw were two envelopes, both addressed to "Maria L. Kethrin."

"No pakige? BOO!!" The girl turned around and walked

back into the house, yelling out-loud to anyone in earshot saying "Maria doesn't even live here anymore!! I've been staying by myself here for the past few days waiting for my family and friends to show up! And yes that DOES sound like exposition but who asked you??"

The mailman ran away just as the doors finished closing.

Inside the house, the girl changed into her day clothes and wiped the facial mask off, leaving the skin on her face just as green as the rest of her. Bored and disappointed by the mail delivery, the green girl walked over to the couch and sat down, turning on the television. The local news started playing, the chyron below the anchors mentioning the upcoming anniversary of "Arrival Day", with the news anchor himself reading along to what was obviously a teleprompter.

"Our top story this morning: Governor Davis has recently announced his plans for the twenty-one year anniversary of Arrival Day, a day in history where an unidentified flying object arrived and hovered over the city of San Myshuno back in 2002." A file photo appeared on the screen showing the massive UFO as it hovered over the arts district. "A memorial to the few lives lost in the riotous incidents following the arrival is planned to be unveiled during the anniversary. Local Anti-Alien protestors who believe aliens walk among us have stated the anniversary should not be celebrated because of those lives lost."

As she sat on the couch watching the news, the girl pulled her phone from her pocket and texted her sister. She began with the usual "Hey" and "WYA" teenagers have been known to use, before sending an actual message longer than three letters.

"Arrival day on Wednesday, you have any plans?"

A few moments later her phone chimed with a text message alert.

Well I'm trying to do my own arrival first. At the house. Be there soon, Keera.

The girl, Keera, texted back saying "Okee!" and put her phone back to watch more television. The news went on to talk about the local weather, sports, and stocks as well, saying the company ToomesInc. was at a low point due to the actions of one of their higher ups causing trouble for them. As one would expect from the actions of a sixteen year-old girl watching television, the channel quickly changed from the news to a romantic comedy movie before anyone could say "boring".

A few minutes into the movie, Keera took her phone back out to read up on the actors in it, trying to figure out exactly who the main actress was and why she looked familiar. A quick search on a local SocialNet page revealed she was in a play performance with Keera's friend Scarlett back when the latter was an actress on stage at high school. Scarlett was a burgeoning actress herself in recent years, even going so far as to take a major in acting at college, but she and the rest of her lifelong friends left their studies early. When Keera asked why they did so, all they said was something involving Keera's older sister and nothing else.

Scarlett told Keera through texts about how she would go online, from home rather than stay across the country on campus to continue her studies. This process was made easier by Scarlett's boyfriend, Keera's older brother John, having graduated from college himself when he was only seventeen years old. John was incredibly intelligent from a young age. He breezed through homework, won numerous science fairs, and spent his life working on robots to make life easier for everyone. Scarlett grew attracted to his intelligence when she was younger, and the two eventually made it official right before he headed off to college at fifteen.

Keera had always thought Scarlett's cousin, Kelly, would be more of a match for John because she too was incredibly intelligent. However, she never seemed too interested in John, or anyone for that matter, and if she was she certainly hid it well. Kelly had an eye for detail and a photographic memory, able to figure out things even adults could not, which led her to become a "private investigator" of sorts when she was a teenager. She figured out a lot of things in her town, but even didn't even need a magnifying glass to figure out her other cousin Tom's attraction to Keera's older sister.

Tom grew up with his cousins, as well as Keera's family, due to extenuating circumstances involving Tom and Scarlett's respective parents. When they were children, Tom's crush on Keera's sister became obvious, and vice versa, to the point of everyone in their corner pocket of the world asking when the two would just finally get together already. Keera wouldn't be surprised if there were fanfics of the two already out there on the internet, but would not dare to type that into a search engine. Still, "Tom and Annabelle" was the name of the ship from the get go.

Keera looked up to Annabelle growing up, as did everyone else. Annie was a pillar of the community. Cheerleader, valedictorian, eco-friendly, nice to everyone, and incredibly pretty to boot. To everyone, Annabelle was a practically perfect person in every way. To everyone who knew her and Keera, however, there was another thing of an interesting nature: Annabelle and Keera were not born on Earth.

Keera's thoughts ran away from her as she sat on the couch, to the point of her not even realizing the living room door behind her was opening. She stood up and turned around, watching as everyone she was just thinking about walked into the house, Annabelle herself smiling at her younger sister after taking a look around the house.

"Well things look a bit different here, but it is good to be back!"