The place people call HAVEN was quite large. The structure itself appeared more like a mideval castle on the inside, with grand stone corridors, spiral staircases, and rooms upon rooms with more rooms leading into bigger rooms. The keymaster Gheed Shask reckoned no one knew for sure how many rooms there were in Haven because counting them all would be next to impossible. In fact, even though Gheed was a fourth generation keymaster, he had never even seen the king with his own eyes, or been to the royal quarters.

As ordered by representitives of the King, Gheed was to stay in his apartments, and keep track of all of the castle keys. In fact he was locked inside and treated more like a prisoner than part of the castle. The guards brought meals, exchanged buckets, but he was hardly ever allowed to leave the sight of the keys, just like his ancestors. Being Keymaster was certainly a respected castle position of great importance. Even though he wasnt sure where half of the keys even went to, if anyone NEEDED a key, they would have to pay Gheed a visit.

Even the King himself. . .

And so it seemed like fate when one stormy evening, the King did come knocking on Gheed's door. And when Gheed opened the door, the King and five others piled through it. Two servants, two guards and Gheed reckoned a military general of some sort, made up the King's entourage.

"Keymaster!" The King exclaimed in a thundering commanding voice. His white beard hiding all emotions on his face. The King's posture however, made him seem quite angry.

"Y-yes, your highness?" Gheed shook nervously, slowly backing towards the far wall.

"I require your assistance!"

"M-My assistance!?"

"I require the key to door 318."

"318?" Gheed questioned, running his head through all the castle keys in his mind. Most of them were labeled into catagories like numbers, colors, shapes, etc... The numbered keys were always the older ones. This meant that it went to an older section of Haven.

"318. Right." Gheed repeated aloud, regaining his thoughts. He went over to a board full of keys that occupied an entire wall. Then he took them to the 300s section. To everyone's surprise, the numbers went frim 317 to 319 without a space for 318. Completely skipped over on the wall.

The others saw this, and confusion set in. The general immediatly began throwing accusations at Gheed. "The keymaster has hidden the key to 318! How can he be trusted!?"

The king turned and gripped Gheed in the shoulder hard, so he couldn't run. "WHAT TRICKERY IS THIS!?"

"I-I don't know! I swear I don't know! I have never noticed. . ." Gheed pleaded.

"He's Lying! Only the keymaster has access to the keys!" The general interjected.

The king shot his general a death stare and then returned his attention to Gheed. "Where is the key?"

Gheed felt ill with adreniline, like a rabbit running for its life. The king of Haven was now in his own apartments, and very upset. Forget the threat of Gheeds own life, it was the sheer embarassment of shaming a proud line of keymasters that came before him. He never thought he would be lucky enough to catch a glimpse of the man who now stood before him, demanding answers that Gheed did not have.

Gheed's mind still swirled around it being a numbered key. Not only numbered but what he would call a 'Low Number' ... The numbered keys went into the 10s of Thousands. It was no doubt the oldest section of Haven; the original structure before all of the additions started. Gheed remembered something his father had told him about that part of Haven.

'Those older doors were built differently. Well crafted to last thousands of years. Some of them even came with tricks for opening. Sometimes a key wasnt all you needed. . ."

"The door!" Gheed exclaimed.

The King let his vice grip loose and took a step backwards, pondering the keymaster. "What about the door?"

"The door to 318! It might not have a key!"

"What do you mean?" The King asked.

The General butted in. "He's a liar! Every door in this place has a key! He gave the key to our enemies and that is how they are sneaking inside! He's a traitor and he's covering for them!"

For the first time, Gheed was beginning to pick up on what was happening between the King and the General. There was trouble, and it involved the door. The general, perhaps desperate for his own position, was looking to pin it on Gheed. Except Gheed KNEW he was not a traitor. He was a keymaster.

Gheed looked over at the general, who was starting to look guilty. Guilty of what, Gheed wondered. He was touching a triangle pendant around his neck...

"Take me to the door. I must see the lock." Gheed demanded. "Then I can tell you what type of key is meant for it."

The King hesitantly nodded approval. "Alright. We are getting to the bottom of this right now."

Gheed riddled around a large desk and produced another ring of keys. There must have been over 100 keys on the ring. He explained, "Generic blanks. They are not master keys but they might be able to force an older door open. There's a size for every type of lock... I think."

The group then left the keymaster's apartments. Gheed carefully locked the door and the King led them down the large corridor. Gheed felt like he walked for hours. They went up staircases, through large banquit halls, and even a busy kitchen. Everywhere the king walked the people stopped to solute him.

Finally they began to head downwards on a long staircase. Gheed could tell they were entering an older part of Haven. It was dimly lit all around with torches. the stone walls had become crude, rocks jutting out from them. Down another long but clousterphobic hallway the group finally reached its intended door.

Gheed took the lead and examined the door. It was an ancient heavy wood. It was almost black from years of stain and grime. The handle was a golden knob, and a keyhole in the shape of a triangle. Above it read '318' in a very tiny inscription.

"Now open it." The King ordered.

First Gheed jiggled the handle. It hardly turned. Then he tried pulling the handle, again nothing. He pushed, he slammed his shoulder into the door, but the door itself remained completely unphased. Even the seams on the edges fit so neatly against the wall that gheed couldnt get a fingernail inbetween the crack. Then Gheed produced his ring of Generic keys. He flipped through them until he found a real tiny one with a triangle shaped shaft. He put it in the lock and jiggled it, attempting to turn the handle.

"Mhm. Thats what I thought." Gheed said aloud, after his generic key did not work.

"Execute this man!" The general declared. "Right now, for wasting the king's time!"

"Hold!" The King ordered, his voice echoing down the corridor. "I will be the one to make that order, general."

"I am sorry your highness, but I cannot open this door." Gheed said, calmly.

"I told you he's a-"

"But your general here CAN open it." Gheed explained, cutting the general off.

The general turned red. He was already drawing his own sword halfway out of its shieth. "Mark my words you little worm, I am going to cut you down where you stand!"

Surprisingly, the King drew his own sword and stood between Gheed and the general. "You will do no such thing!"

Then after a moment of compliance the King carefully turned his attention back to Gheed. "Keep talking."

Gheed took a deep breath. Exhaled. "Okay. This is one of the oldest doors in Haven. I can tell by its craftsmanship, specifically the lock. There are only a handful of triangle shaped locks in the entire Haven. One of them happens to be the Drawbridge Gate. Another one of them apparently is this door. Triangle shaped rooms require a special kind of key."

"Like what?" The King asked.

"Like that thing your general is wearing around his neck." Gheed said. "I wasnt positive back in my apartments but I am sure of it now. His pendant is a key to this door. All of the triangle doors share those pendant keys. I dont know how many pendants were made, and thats the one key I dont have a copy of. As far as my father had told me, they had all been lost or destroyed."

The king turned back to the general. "So. You have the key."

Then out of nowhere the general lashed out trying to strike the king. The king blocked it, and then the two guards attacked the general and killed him right there.

The king bent over and snatched the pendant from around the general's neck. He then handed it over to Gheed. "Well done, keymaster. Here, now you have the lost key. I trust you'll keep track of it."

"Oh yes your highness, of course! You're not mad at me for not having it? The key I mean?"

The king laughed. "Im glad you didn't. I knew he was a traitor, but I needed a way to coax it out of him. I would never have killed my precious keymaster. There are not too many that I can trust, but you are loyal Gheed. And Loyalty gets rewarded. Ill see to it that we have a celebration in your honor, and of course you will attend."

"Oh your highness, thats very generous!"

"Nonsense. You just helped me save this kingdom. You're a hero, Gheed. Now come walk with me back to your apartments, I wish to discuss the possability of you making a catalouge of every room in this place. . ."

There was a shrieking of tires and a sudden unmistakable sound of a crash and glass smashing. Three thugs, wearing balaclava masks to hide their identity scrambled out of their wrecked sedan. They were waving machine guns into the air and began to take off down the city street.

A second later a black sedan skidded to a hult right at the collision site. The road was now successfully blocked by the thug's car and a semi truck that it had collided with. The man in the semi truck was already on his cellphone pointing at the wreckage and using obsenities at whoever he was speaking to.

Out of the black sedan stepped two men, although they were no ordinarily dressed men, nor were they dressed as police. This was something much different, and they stood out like a sore thumb on the dirty streets of New York.

One of them was dressed in a black suit, with a black shirt, black tie, slick back black hair, black shades, black perfectly straight pants, black polished shoes and complete with a black wrist watch. He seemed to be surveying the damage for a moment. His name was Agent Black.

The other was dressed in a white suit, red tinted shades, White shirt, white tie, White polished shoes, white pants, and a white wrist watch. He was pulling out a white plated pistol from his side. His name was Agent White.

"Which way did they go?" Agent Black asked the truck driver.

The man didnt say anything to the two Agents but instead pointed in the direction that the thugs had taken off in.

The two agents gave chase. It wasnt hard to spot the thugs, they hadnt made it very far, a duffel bag they were carrying was slowing them down. The thugs cut off down an alleyway, and the agents gave chase. The thugs had made a terrible error, however. The Alleyway was a dead end, and when they hit a brick wall of a building, and a locked door, there was nowhere to run.

The thugs turned their machine guns towards the agents. The Agents turned their pistols onto the thugs.

"Alright, drop your weapons and-" Agent White had started to say. He was cut off by his partner who shot one of the men in the leg, instantly crippling them.

The man cried out in pain and dropped his machine gun. The other two thugs held their guns in position but neither opened fire. Instead one of them cried out "They shot Danny!"

Agent White gave Agent Black a mean look. "Dammit Black, why did you do that!?"

"Its us or them now." Agent Black said.

Then without hesitation he opened fire again, downing the other two thugs. Only they didnt get shot in the leg... They got shot somewhere a lot more vital. Agent White figured they must have been dead by the time they collapsed onto the ground.

"What the HELL is the matter with you!?" Agent White broke out, furious. "Since when do we just gun people down!?"

Agent Black ignored the question for a moment and walked over to the dead thugs. He kicked their machine guns out of reach of the third injured thug, who was still wallowing in pain clutching his leg.

Then Agent Black turned to face Agent White. "We don't take risks." He explained. "We do the job, we get the assets and the criminals are expendable. We do whatever it takes."

"No!" Agent White protested. "Not whatever it takes! Just because we have lisences to kill dosnt mean we are allowed to just make that decision!"

Agent Black sighed impatiently. "Look. They had machine guns trained on us, give them that extra second and its those three walking out of here with the assets. A decision was made. The right one. I pray you figure that out quick."

"They were going to surrender." Agent White said.

"You don't know that."

The injured thug stopped howling and interrupted the conversation. "I swear I give up! I give up, Im not going to try anything I swear! We would never use our guns! They were just for scare! I swear!"

Agent Black turned to the man and shot him dead. Again without any hesitation.

Agent White raised his pistol at Agent Black. "You just murdered-"

Agent black raised his pistol at Agent White. "I did what I had to. To protect us."

"I'm not going to let you get away with this!" Agent White exclaimed.

"You think you have the guts to stop me!?" Agent Black hissed. He picked up the duffel bag the thugs had been carrying. "The only thing that stands in my way of finishing this job now is you."

"Don't do it." Agent White said.

Agent black squeezed the trigger.

. . .

It clicked. No shot. His sinister grin melted away quickly as he realized he was out of ammo.

Agent White pulled the trigger to his own pistol and shot.

Agent Black flew backwords onto the ground, grabbing his shoulder. "You shot me! Dammit you shot me!" He kept repeating over and over.

"It was me or you." Agent White said coldly. Then he grabbed the duffel bag. As he turned to leave he looked down at Agent Black. "Its not fatal. You'll survive. You wont die today. But for what you did here... Your time is gonna come."

Never thought you needed form, To make words Tell or say, I myself am the rhyming sort, Twos and Fours all day,

Go about what you know, Make your words speak clear, Or write a little cryptic thought, And bury it with fear,

Dosnt matter how you say it, Dosnt matter how its read, As long as when you look back, Its something that you like you've said,

The soul. The last bastion of human mystery. The be all and end all of philosophy. Either it is everything we stand for, or it is nothing but a false idea. Black is too bold, White is too pure, instead I would like to think it shifts and bends into a plate of glass... A window of who we are.

As cold as it gets, As dark as the nights, As lonely we are, There's warmth in the ice,

As bad as you think, As it repeats twice, As hopeless this sounds, There's warmth in the ice,

As forgotten I am, As Ive payed the price, As little I'm owed, There's warmth in the ice,

So here they are now, They used to be nice, All they got left, Is a blanket of ice,

Let me try again, Let me make it right, Let me hold this thought, Let me screw it tight, Let me solve the case, Let me find a way, Let me make more sense, Let me decide to stay, Let me spill the blood, Let me light the flame, Let me swear to god, Let me take the blame, Let me inside your head, Let me have your soul, Let me give you mine, Let me end control,

It gets darker now in the days of snow, Hiding and huddled life ceases to grow, The streets are all empty and everyone gone, Yet fresh tracks appear on the sidewalks by dawn,

Wind sometimes howls through the branches of trees, They look so defeated without any leaves, The creatures have all fled back to their holes, To wait until warmth returns to their souls,

It gets darker now till the Solstice Sun, Frigid and stiff and Ice overrun, Just hoping that things might turn out okay, And spring will reappear someday,

Today was the day. Albert Mitchel had finally had enough. His stupid job and the stupid people who worked there had drove him up one too many walls in the last five years. He was sick of the same topical conversations, and pretending to be interested in the same bullshit. He was especially sick of his boss, Mr. Dresdin. The man was evil incarnate as far as Albert was concerned. The worst sort of callous and concieted traits any human being could posess. He somehow managed to turn "Knowing everything" into an artform and punishment for everyone around him. He was just simply insufferable... a lost cause. The sort of person Albert realized there was no reasoning with, because Mr. Dresdin did not want to be reasoned with. Simple as that. So today, Albert Mitchel was going to quit.

Albert had been psyching himself up all weekend now. Over the night he could not sleep a wink. He rehearsed exactly the sort of verbal beatdown he could not wait to bestow. He let his thoughts run through all the victorious conclusions in his mind. Of this he was sure... No matter how it went down, he would walk away a free and happy man.

By the time he had arrived at the offices, rain was coming down in a torrent. A wicked morning line of severe storms was pushing through the area. The electricity in the air matched the electricity in Albert's eyes. Appropriate... he thought to himself.

There came one last deep breath as Albert accepted what he had to do. Get wet and make a mad dash for the entrance. There was no way to avoid it... He knew that 3 seconds in the rain would have him soaking from head to toe. But he couldnt wait any longer. Now was the time.

Albert kicked the car door open with his foot and then hopped out into the storm. As he slammed the dripping door shut, a crack of thunder erupted from the sky. He made a mad dash towards the entrance, splashing through puddles, getting soaked. Then he saw a figure up ahead holding an umbrella. The figure was gesturing towards him... gesturing to take refuge under it.

By the time he had made it under the umbrella, he realized who the person was... much to his dismay. It was Mr. Dresdin, his boss.

"There ya go! Walk with me!" Mr. Dresdin ordered and the two of them walked side by side through the storm.

Albert felt more than uncomfortable having to brush shoulders with this vile man. He decided to say nothing.

"Its raining cats and dogs!" Mr. Dresdin exclaimed as they walked.

"Y-yeah." Albert tried to play along, but cringing to himself on that overused phrase.

_Cats and dogs? Really? What a moron... _ __

"Anyways Al, glad I caught up with you. Ive been meaning to talk to you." Mr. Dresdin said.

"Well, actually..." Albert tried to get his words out, but Mr. Dresdin cut him off.

"You see, we here at the company are a team. And as a team we need our best to step up, and our worst to step down or get better. Everyone has a role to play here, you understand?" Mr. Dresdin explained. Then he continued on before Albert could even answer. "Now I know things here havnt been as good as I hoped this year. I think we are going to take another loss this quarter. So what I am trying to say is..."

Then albert found his voice. He felt what was coming and he would be damned if he let this pompus man get ahead on him. Not today. Not ever.

"NO YOU LISTEN!" Albert exploded, pointing his finger directly into Mr. Dresdin's chest. "You are the most dispicable man I have ever met! You want to know WHY this company is failing!? Just look in a damn mirror! You bring absolutely NO motivation to the team, you sit there in your king sized office and play solitare all day long and the only time you stick your head out is to yell at someone for absolutely no reason! You THINK you know everything, but you dont know shit! You don't even know how to turn on your own damn computer!!! How you ever got to be manager, or even managed to get a degree, is totally beyond me. I wouldnt even let you walk my dog! And if you didnt have this job mister... if you were not the slave driver that you are, Id be stepping over you in an alleyway, wiping my shoes on your face!"

Albert then took in an exaggerated huge breath and yelled out with all his might, spitting into Mr. Dresdin's face. "I QUIT!"

Mr. Dresdin came to a complete stop and stared at Albert, dumbfounded. His eyes turned wide and his mouth dropped open. This was something he was clearly not expecting.

"What I was going to say was," Mr. Dresdin replied, now with a skeptic dissapproving glance. "Is that the company has not been recognizing your talents and that we wanted to give you a promotion and pay raise."

"Oh." was all Albert could say.

"Yes. Oh." Mr. Dresdin repeated. Then without warning, the boss stormed off with his umbrella towards the building... Leaving Albert in the rain.

She didnt look up from the cracks in the sidewalk, nor did she turn down her street to go home. Instead, she just kept walking. Rain thundered down from gray heavens above in the mid afternoon. She splashed her sneakers against the soaked concrete, trying not to concintrate on anyone else. Cars whizzed by, spewing water from the wheels. Everyone was in a hurry now. Even mother Earth.

In her head, The voices from earlyer began to claw back through her mind. . .

"What did you do!?"

"Now you'll regret it!"

"You should be expelled!"

"We are calling your parents! We will discuss it with them!"

"How could you!?"

"What kind of monster are you!?"

"Im sure they are going to press charges!"

Each phrase hit her like a bullet to the chest. She just wanted to sink deeper and deeper into the ground until no one could see her. The feeling of shame was unbearable. How could she go from genuinely liked to genuinely loathed in the mattwr of minutes!? She hadn't felt deceptive, or vindictive... she was just... just...

Defending herself. And if Holly, a scummy popular girl who loved to walk all over her peers, hadnt have punched her square in the face, then maybe she wouldnt have pushed Holly down the stairs. Maybe Holly wouldnt have been rushed to the hospital today. Maybe Holly shares some of this blame...

Of course, No one else saw it that way. No one at all, since there was no one else in the stairway to see it happen. What they saw was a girl with twisted broken limbs screaming her death scream while another girl stood at the top of the steps looking down in shock.

'It was instinctive.' She thought to herself as she walked further on away from her home. 'I didnt think, temporary insanity... It was just a reaction.'

The flicker of red abd blue lights against the sidewalk came into her view and she lifted her eyes up to see. A police car had a man pulled over, and the officer was leaning into the window of the offender's vehicle. She stopped dead in her tracks, frozen with sudden fear. Maybe the police were looking for her! The officer pulled back from the window and looked down the street directly at her.

For a moment both of them just stared at eachother. Then the officer turned back to the car and held up his index finger to indicate the universal sign of 'Hang on a minute'. At this She turned and started to run back down the street.

She heard the officer shout out "Hey! Hold Up!" But she was not going to stop. She broke into a full sprint now. She rounded the corner and started down that street when she heard the chirp of the siren behind her. Then came the megaphone: "STOP RIGHT NOW!"

Her feet could no longer move on command. She tried to escape, anyway she could, but another side of her crumbed to acceptance at the officer's command. After all, she was never a rule breaker. She turned, bursting into hysterics. "Im sorry! I didnt mean to! It was an accident!"

The officer stopped his car, and flew out of it qhickly approaching her. He had his gun drawn. "Hands on your head NOW!"

She obeyed, sobbing all the while. This was it... This was how her life would turn downhill forever.

Just a little bit left of the world we know, All of the greens that we planted to grow, Birds in the trees sing their chimes down below, Come winter there will be a blanket of snow, No footprints or tiretracks to disturb its glow, The oceans still tide and the rivers still flow, When we all died off the Earth stopped its row, Now its just a tranquil space of indigo,