PROLOGUE

Annalia's hands shook. One step held life and death together. One step held the future. Her future. She gathered up all the courage she could muster and took one cautious step forward. Then the darkness swallowed her whole.

CHAPTER 1

It all started like this..

    "Ouch! Stop! That Hurts!" rang through the halls of the crammed waiting room Annalia sat in. She was in the dentists office, waiting to be treated.  Next to her sat her mom, clearly as worried as her.  All except her little brother Jamie had a gloomy expression on their face. 

    Not too long ago her family had suffered a mighty loss as their service dog, Joa, had died. The kids in her class always said that it didn't sound that bad, but it really was. Annalia's mom had a rare disease called Philotongs, or Phil. for short. It would make her uneasy, and she would go blank for seconds without thinking. Joa had helped prevent it from happening. 

    Now, life was not the same. One time Annalia asked her mom for a snack, her mom just sat there and stared at the 

wall for a total of thirty-six seconds. (Annalia counted.)   As Annalia sat, lost in thought, she barely noticed a cute boy wink at her, if she did say so herself. Annalia's mind was scattered at the moment, between the (cute) boy and the thoughts of her mom and the future so she let her heart take control and gave an odd wink back.

    The boy stopped, looked in her direction, gave a sly smile, and left the dentist without another word.

    "Huh," she thought, her thoughts back in order now. "He's cute!" her heart added. 

    "Stop it, you stinking thing," she thought back to her heart.

    All of a sudden she heard her name being called.

"Annalia Nobody, " the woman at the front desk called out. 

"Please come to the front desk."

    Annalia took a deep breath to try and steady her nerves, then gave her mom a hopeful look. Her mom gave her a hug, and pushed her towards the lady at the desk.

    "Why is Annalia so scared?" she heard her brother ask.

    She didn't hear her mom's reply, but she hoped it was something snappy.

    As she approached the desk, she realized the woman at the front desk looked like she was missing some features.  As she stared intently at the lady's face, Annalia almost missed the question she was asking.

    "Annalia Nobody?" the woman asked. "Is that you?"

    "Um...I...err...yes," Annalia sputtered.

"Wonderful," the woman replied. "Please follow me."

    Annalia nodded and followed behind the strange woman, watching at  her back so she didn't have to deal with people staring at her.    

    It was just so much easier, acting like you weren't always the odd one in the group. Ever since her dad had disappeared when she was little, Annalia found it easier to be ignored than the one with only one parent who acted weird.

    "Here we are, the woman said, almost to her self. Under her breath, she added, "Finally got it."

Finally got it? What on earth did that mean? Annalia shook her head disapprovingly. 

"Please have a seat at the chair in here," The woman said with great enthusiasm. "The doctor will be right in."

CHAPTER 2

Slick sticks it

    Slick stood as still as he could in the bushes outside the dentist's office. If he could just get closer to the girl, maybe he'd find out if it was really her, the chosen one. If it really was her, he'd have to make a good impression on her, and so would Miley, his friend. He smiled thinking about her, a princess who hated being a princess meeting a girl who really was a princess and had no idea. But then his face fell. What if she really didn't know it was her? Would he be spoiling her story? No, it couldn't be. This had to be it. It just had to.

    ...Right?

    Slick shook his head. It wouldn't do just to leave such an opportunity, as his mom always said. "If you're out to have an adventure, make the most of it!"

"Okay," Slick thought "Here goes nothing."

And with that, he strode off towards the  Back door of the dentist's office, the secret door for Magicals.  

CHAPTER 3

Well, well, well...

"Okay," Annalia thought. "Just be calm, just be calm just be calm..."

    The thing was, almost everyone who came to this dentist didn't come out for at least 3 hours. "But," Annalia whispered to herself. "I'm only here to get a cleaning, because I don't have any cavities, right? So it'll only be about 1 hour?" 

    "Right," Annalia assured herself. "Totally, completely right."

    The door opened and a long, thin man with almost no hair strode into the room, a goofy grin on his face.

    "Why hello there, young lad," the man said, taking a chair next to Annalia. "Is that okay if I ask you some questions?"

She nodded, completely unaware of what to do.

    "Great then, I'll just start with your favorite color and your if you have any experience coming here before?" the man asked, taking out a pen and a piece of paper. 

    Annalia had no idea how any of this was supposed relate to her teeth but she decided it to answer him anyway.

    "Um... green, and, um, no?" she said.

        Little did she know that the doctor wasn't really a doctor at all, but he was a magical stalling for Slick.

    "Okay, uh-huh, uh-huh...let's see here...yes...favorite food?"

    Now Annalia was confused. "Um, what?"

    "I said favorite food?"

    "Oh yes, sorry. Pizza?"

    "What kind?"

This "Doctor" was getting on Annalia's nerves. "Does any of this have to do with my teeth?" she asked.

"Oh yes, yes....very important stuff..." the man trailed off, seemingly lost is thought. "Well, you caught me, the real doctor will be in here in about five minutes. Have a nice day!" 

He dropped the paper, witch Annalia noticed was blank, and left the room without another word.

    Almost immediately after the strange doctor left, the boy who had winked at Annalia earlier popped out of the shadows.

    "So, what's up?" he asked.

               CHAPTER 4

                   WAIT, WHAT?!?

    Annalia was frozen. Her poor head was torn between figuring out what to do and how to do it that she couldn't take control of her body, forcing Slick to grab her arms and tell her, "Annalia? Is that you? Hello? Snap out of it!" 

    After two or three minutes of this Annalia had gotten control of herself and couldn't resist the urge to ask, "How? What? Why? What?..."

    Slick smiled. This was going to be fun. 

"I know," he said. "I'll explain it all later. But let's start with names, shall we? I'm Slick."

    Annalia nodded. "I'm Annalia Nobody, but you can call me Ann."

    Slick waved it away. "I know. Let's get moving, before the real dentist comes and catches us."

    "I'm so confused," Annalia said. "Are you...rescuing me?"

    Slick stopped moving, looked at her, and groaned. "Look, if you're really Annalia Nobody, then I'm your twin. Please Don't freak out."

    Annalia bit her lip to keep from screaming. What was he doing here? What did he want? Why on earth did he call her his twin? The boy did look exactly like her, both having the same dirty -blonde hair with remnants of whatever hair-do they had last, and it looked like neither of them cared to tie their four year old sneakers-which coincidentally were the same pair. They both had the type of sing-song voice that would draw little kids to them like a magnet. Thankfully, the boy had on a different shirt on then her.

    "Look," Slick said. "I know you're confused, but I really am your twin. Fifty-nine seconds older, to be exact. The Dark, the bad guy, separated us and attacked Mom. He gave her a disease called Philotongs, and ever since I've been trying to get back to you. Mom can travel between the fictional and nonfictional worlds, but when she comes back, she forgets all about it. That's why she's never mentioned it to you, and why you don't know about it. Also, the dark is our dad, and that's why you don't know where he is. His name is Peter. Now come on, we have to get out of here before the real dentist comes back. Sorry about that guy, by the way. He's a 

  fictional and nonfictional worlds, but every time she goes there, she forgets all about it. That's why she's never told you about t before, and why you don't know about it. The Dark is our dad, by the way. And his name is Peter. And sorry about that dentist dude. He's a Terrible actor, but the only one I could afford."  

    She jerked her arm out of his grasp. "Wait! I'm supposed to be getting a cleaning, remember?"

    Slick sighed. "I was hoping you weren't one of those rule followers, but I guess I'll just have to tell you the same thing I told Miley. What's life without a little adventure?"

    Annalia scooted away from him on the chair. "Who's Miley? What does she want? What do you want?"

    "Here we go again with the questions. Listen, if I don't get us back to our real world, in Jupiter City, it will fall apart! You want to see a photo of 

Miley, well here you are!" He snapped his finger and a hologram showing a picture of Miley appeared. He shoved it in her face. "Well, come on already! Are you going or not?" Annalia hesitated, but she still said, "Fine. I'm in."

CHAPTER 5

And......We're off!

    Annalia followed Slick through the door of the Magicals room. "Wow," she breathed at the sight of all the Magicals striding into rooms, talking to each other and dancing with each other.

    "Come on, we need to get into Miley's room, and fast."

        "Fine," she said less than happily. "But we are coming back."

    "Yah, yah, I know, I know," Slick replied. "But if I'm not back by 4:30, Miley is going to kill me. So can we please hurry?"

    "Fine" she grumbled.

    Slick opened one of the thousands of doors in the room and crept in.  "Okay, all clear. Come on in."

    Annalia followed him in and gaped open-mouthed at the sight of it all.  

    Strewn across the floors of the small room they were in was all types of gadgets, every kind you could imagine.