Chapter One: The Beginning

   Kai always knew who was trustworthy when it came to people. His friends would always say it was just a 'feeling in his gut' or 'his conscience' but Kai liked to call it a sixth sense.

It was their last day of school; the day they graduated. Kai took a seat next to his best friend, Cole Brookstone. Cole was probably the most trustworthy out of their entire group of friends. He was also the only one accompanying Kai to the city after today. "We're finally leaving this hellhole!" Cole exclaimed.

"Yeah. You excited?"

"Excited?! I'm ecstatic! It's been four long years..."

"It would've gone faster had you paid attention in class," Kai remarked leaning back in his chair.

"Hey, it's not my fault that these classes are boring..."

"Well, at least you had that computer class. That seemed to be the only class you could actually get a good grade in..."

"Coding? My coding class was at least interesting..."

Cole was in the computer class because he had to have another elective class but there was nothing that he had wanted to do; so the school stuck him in the computer class. After the first few days, Cole wouldn't shut up about how he could hack into drones and stuff like they did in the movies.

"Yeah. Might come in handy someday..."

And it did come in handy, because not even a week after they had moved into the city, Kai was proposing that they do something to stop the gangs in the city.

"Why don't you get a job at the police station?" Cole asked looking through the fridge for something to eat.

"The police aren't going to do anything unless a gang kills someone or something..."

"And this is our problem because?"

"Don't you want to be able to walk on the street without your wallet being stolen?"

"My wallet wasn't stolen. It was almost stolen..." Cole corrected, pulling out a water bottle. Kai rolled his eyes.

"Come on, aren't you always telling me that you want to help people?" Cole crossed his arms.

"I want to help people in a way that doesn't get me killed..."

"Please? Come on, you don't have to come with if you don't want to. You can stay inside and be my eyes and ears..."

"Fine."

"Perfect! The first step is recruiting...I'll try and get my sister to join and-"

"Our other friends?" Cole put the water bottle away.

"Yeah."

"I doubt they're just going to drop everything and just come out here to join your gang..."

"What makes you say that?"

"Half of our friends are trying to find jobs and/or trying to get into college." He explained heading towards the living room.

"So I'm assuming we're going to have to find other people?"

"Yep."

********

It had been a year since they first decided to form a gang and now Kai's sister had finally graduated out of high school. Kai was currently on his way over to her new house. After she had graduated she had told Kai and Cole that she would be moving to the city since she wanted to be closer to all the 'action'. It was perfect considering now Kai didn't have to drive two hours just to see if she would join the gang.

Kai parked his truck in front of a pale yellow house. The house was fairly nice considering it was in the suburbs of the city. It had a white picket fence lining the outside of the yard and behind that Kai could see his sister had planted some flowers. Past that was the white door that leads to the inside of the house and the welcome home mat. He knocked on the door and waited for a minute until the door opened.

"Hey, Sis!" He greeted with a wave.

"Hello, Kai. What do you want?" She asked leaning on the door. Kai faked a gasp.

"You think I want something?!" He placed his hand on his chest. "What kind of brother would I be if I did that to my favorite sister?!" Nya rolled her eyes.

"I'm your only sister bro. Now seriously, what do you want? I was in the middle of something.."

Kai sighed. "Fine. I was wondering if you wanted to join my gang.." Nya raised a brow.

"Gang?" Kai nodded as Nya sighed. "Is that all you wanted?" She made a move to shut the door.

"Wait!" Kai exclaimed rushing forward shoving his foot in between the door. "Promise me you at least think about it..."

"I promise..."

"I mean it!"

"Fine! I promise to think about joining your gang."

"Thank you." With that Nya shut the door and Kai walked back to his car. He got in, shoved the key into the ignition, and drove off heading towards the apartment.

After a year of living in the apartment, Kai was finally beginning to think it felt like home. The apartment was meager compared to Nya's house. To the left was the living room sporting an old couch, a used coffee table, their 39'' tv and their Xbox. To the right was the kitchen where Cole was sitting munching on an apple. The kitchen had a sort of black and white look going for it and was fairly large compared to the rest of the apartment. The stove, counters, and fridge lined up against the wall while the island sat across from that sporting a fruit bowl that they had lazily put there to add some color. Past the kitchen was the hallway that leads to the bathroom and bedrooms.

Kai slipped out of his shoes and set his keys in the bowl they kept by the door so they wouldn't lose the keys. "Took you long enough. The kids mistake you as a pinata again?"Cole asked from the kitchen island. Kai huffed a laugh.

Kai worked as a party entertainer for kids. It was an easy job when the kids weren't being spoiled brats...Or when the parents weren't being complete jerks. Kai once had to leave a party earlier because he had gotten a call saying that his apartment was on fire because Cole had tried to cook lunch and failed miserably. He went to leave and the mother of the birthday kid stopped him and asked: "Where do you think you're going?" When Kai had explained the situation she simply rolled her eyes and said that he had to stay for the whole party or else he wasn't getting paid. He didn't get paid that day.

"Thankfully no. Work was fine, and I went and talked to Nya," He explained sitting down in the kitchen.

"What'd she say?"

"She said she'd think about it..."

"Well, that's good."

"Yep. What have you been up to?"

"Nothing much. Just looking for people to recruit." Cole admitted turning his head to the laptop in front of him.

"And that's why I recruited you first! Find anyone?" Cole rolled his eyes.

"Not cause I'm your best friend or anything. And yes I think I did find people.."

"Show me!!!" Cole turned the laptop so Kai could see it. He scrolled down across a few names and stopped when he came across one in particular.

"This is Zane Julien. Former Medic in The Night Stalkers gang. Went to med school for two years before moving here and joining them."

"Reason for leaving?" Kai asked studying the picture shown along with the information Cole had found.

"One of the members threatened to hurt his family if he didn't hurry up with the healing. So he refused to treat him any further and left after overdosing the guy on pain medication."

"This guy has style..."

"Not as much style as this next guy." Cole pressed the back button then continued scrolling through the page until he came up to another person. "Jay Walker. Criminal recording for 'blowing up anything and everything'"

"Member of any gangs?"

"None that are recorded. It was stated that he preferred to work alone..."

"Interesting..."

"Yep." With that Cole shut the computer and picked up his phone. "I'm ordering pizza for dinner. I don't want to cook..." He explained dialing the number.

"Not like you can!" Kai joked heading to the living room and turning on the Xbox. "Wanna play while we wait?" Cole gave a nod then started to order their food.

Thirty minutes later, the two of them were snacking on pizza while trying to snipe each other on the Xbox. By the time eleven thirty rolled around, Kai was exhausted.

"I'm going to hit the hay..." Kai told Cole standing up.

"Suit yourself..." Cole remarked not looking back at him. Kai headed to his bedroom and shut the door. Before he could flop on the bed and let the sweet lull of sleep take him, his phone rang an ever so familiar ringtone. He checked the caller ID. It was Nya.

"Hello?"

"I'm in."