Dorothy woke up to black.

She panicked and immediately sat up. Where was she? It was cold, and she found herself breaking into goosebumps and shivering, with her teeth chattering as well.

Suddenly, there was a rustling next to her feet. She quickly drew them to her chest. She frightfully looked into the dank shadows.

"Quince, is that you?" she asked in a quivering voice.

No one answered, but more rustling was heard.

She looked around her again, and began to feel wet tears stream down her face. She was scared, very scared. More rustling ensued, and Dorothy noticed something particularly odd about the rustles. They sounded like minute chuckles.

She wiped off her tears and picked up the basket next to her. Wait-! Basket? She looked down again and saw that it was indeed the same basket that she had thrown at Quince. And now, there was a hand on it.

Dorothy shrieked and hurriedly removed the basket's handle from the wrist, letting the hand fall onto the cold hard ground. She then heard a groan. As she squinted through the smog, she could see the hand was connected to an arm, which was connected to- Quince!

She rushed over to him, and knelt beside him. His eyes were closed, and he seemed to be sleeping. She lifted his head, and placed it on her lap.

"Quince! Quince!" she yelled as she began to shake him. When he did not move, she began to shake him even more, becoming panicked. Tears fell down her face, once again. She held her head down in despair, after a few minutes. She then felt something touching her hair.

Before she could look back to see what it was, she felt herself pushed onto Quince, and her lips meeting his. She began to blush, and wanted to get away, but two arms wrapped around her. The kiss seemed to last for eternity, and she soon began to sink into it, until she was ripped away.

She looked to see Quince's smiling and mischievous face.

"So, did you like that?" he chuckled.

Dorothy began whacking Quince with her basket.

"That was the cruelest thing anybody has ever done to me! I thought you were a goner! And then you kiss me?! That's not my ideal image for my first kiss!"

Quince sat up and gave Dorothy a confused look.

"That was your first kiss?"

Dorothy lowered her hands, and thought for a moment.

"Yeah... it was... Why do you ask?"

"Well," said Quince, brushing himself off, and standing up peering into the darkness, "I thought you were used to kissing. I mean with all those boys drooling around you."

Dorothy sat thinking, and stood up.

"'Drooling'? No, they're just good friends. Are you insinuating something?"

Quince chuckled and shook his head.

"Well then," began Dorothy. "Where are we?"

Quince looked back and smiled.

"We, my dear, are in the Emerald Tower. And in the midst of several thousand living beings."

Dorothy paled. "We... we are?"

Quince nodded.

"And now, to dispel of them."

He clasped his hands together, and began chanting some words. His hair then began to stand on end, and the air became electric. A weird inhuman shriek erupted, and the darkness around Dorothy shifted. Soon it began to rise, going higher and higher, up and up, until it was gone, and light was replaced.

Quince lowered his hands and looked around him.

"Ah, there they are!"

Dorothy followed his gaze and found a pair of rickety stairs. He began to walk up them, and Dorothy quickly followed.

"Where are we going?" she asked.

"To follow them."

"And what exactly were those... things."

Quince grimaced. "They called themselves: 'Guardians'."

Dorothy shuddered. The name sounded a little creepy.

"Oh, thanks anyway."

Dorothy was confused.

"Thanks for what?"

"The kiss. That was my first too. I'm glad I could share it with you."

Dorothy stopped walking, and her heart pounded.

Me too...