Suneater {TPN/Norman}

{1} Grace Field House

A gasp came from Alex, "I never even thought of that!" It was a good idea. She wasn't exactly sure if it was possible though. It would be kind of hard to ride a giraffe, wouldn't it? She didn't really know since she hadn't seen one in person before.

"Good luck with that," Ray told them.

Norman spoke up for the first time, "These gates don't open from this side?" He was holding on to the bars and looking up at them, "I wonder what it's protecting us from."

That's what Alex had been wondering. Behind the barred gate was a dark, and kind of creepy, tunnel. There was no sign of the outside world in the darkness so she didn't even have a hint of what might be out there. Could there be killer animals like from one of the books? Could there be towers and castles with princesses and queens residing in them? Alex wanted to know so desperately just what was out there.

Ray started quoting their mother's words, "'Listen. You can never go to the gate or beyond the fence... Because it's dangerous,' eh? We all know that's a lie."

"You think?" Norman asked.

"Why's that?" Alex also inquired. Mom would never lie to them about something like that. She loved them and always told the truth. Why would she lie and say something was dangerous when it isn't? Sure, it was definitely a possibility that she lied, but it just didn't seem likely. There was no way that Mom would lie about something like that.

"Bleh," Emma cut in before Ray could answer, "This wasn't as interesting as I hoped. Let's go back before they find us."

Alex broke herself out of the memory with a shake of her head. She focused back on the book and started reading again. A little while later, the girl closed the book with a sigh. She had finally finished it. The book was a lot longer than most of the ones that she's read and she had been determined to finish it for a while now. Her goal was to read every single fantasy book in this library before she was adopted. Ray told Alex that it was too unrealistic of a goal seeing as there were many fantasy books in this library. Norman on the other hand was very supportive of her goal no matter how unrealistic it sounded.

Speaking of the platinum blonde boy, he had just walked into the library looking for Alex. Alex listened to the footsteps get closer and closer until he stood right in front of her. Norman smiled down at the redhead, "I knew you would be here."

Alex stood up and placed the book back in its rightful place. She turned her head to look at him with a smile of her own, "Well, obviously. When am I not?" When she wasn't doing chores or hanging out with the others then she was in the library. If one of the kids couldn't find her, all they had to do was to come to this room and she would be sitting here reading a book. Alex faced her body toward Norman so she could ask, "Now, what do you need?"

"It's time for breakfast and Mom wants our help setting up the food," Norman told her. The girl nodded and followed after him to where the food was. Ray was helping them out this time so she greeted him when she saw him.

As the three started to set the food down on one of the tables in the dining room, the sound of multiple feet could be heard. The footsteps were coming straight for where they were. Alex smiled as she realized who was on their way here. Not even a second later, Emma burst into the room. She had Phil on her back, who was pulling one side of her mouth, and other kids following her behind her.