A/N: Here's a new story of mine. I've been working on it for a while, and I have a pretty good idea of where I want this story to go, so I hope that you all enjoy it.

Humphrey woke up to the pain of yet another migraine. As he slowly lifted his head up, he had to squint his eyes to the bright light of his desk lamp. Looking down he saw his chemistry book. He was confused at first, due to the grogginess of an early morning mixed with the blaring sound of his alarm clock. After a few seconds of trying to regain his wits, he realized that he fell asleep studying again. Now that he was out of his post-sleep stupor, he became more aware of the alarm going off on the edge of his desk. Reaching over to turn it off, he realized how stiff he was from sleeping in his old wooden chair. Once the annoying sound of the alarm was finally gone, he put his arms over his head and arched his back against the edge of the chair, which resulted in the resounding crack of his spine being pushed back into place. He grunted in enjoyment at the feeling, and it helped to wake him up a little bit more. After enjoying the pleasure of his back being pushed back into proper order, he looked over at his clock to see what time it was. It was 6 in the morning.

Humphrey turned off his desk lamp and got up out of his chair with a grunt, then turned and walked across his room to turn on the light. After he got over the initial shock of the brightness, he went over to the desk and picked up his chemistry book to put it in his backpack. Then he walked out of his room into the hallway, turning off his bedroom light on the way. He walked through the dark hallway toward the only bathroom in the house. When he reached the bathroom, he turned on the light and shut the door, then he looked at himself in the mirror.

His usually stark grey fur was faded, and his extra-long head fur was matted horribly. He could see dark circles around his eyes, which showed clearly through the thin layer of fur around the eyes. His dark hazel eyes were tired and somber looking, giving him the appearance of an older wolf. Looking at his body, he could see what remained of his once lean muscles. His arms were like sticks, and his ribs were showing too. His appearance was so sickly that Humphrey was surprised that he even had the strength to stand up. Thinking about this, he realized just how hard he had been studying these past few weeks. He had become so obsessed with getting good grades in school that he was destroying his health. But he knew it was important, he needed to become a great scientist like his father. Humphrey had always had more trouble learning than other wolves in his grade, in fact the doctors believed him to have a mental handicap that prevented him from learning. Due to this, he had always pushed himself to learn to prove not only to others, but to himself, that he was just as capable of being great as everyone else.

As he was pondering this, Humphrey turned the water on in the shower to get it to the right temperature before getting in. Once the water was the perfect temperature, he stripped down to his birthday suit and got in. As soon as the soothing water touched his body, he let out a peaceful growl. The water quickly brought his mind to maximum awareness, and Humphrey had to thank himself for the decision to shower in the mornings. After he finished rinsing off all of the soap from his fur, he turned off the water and, moving the shower curtains out of the way, grabbed the big blue towel he had put on the towel rack the night before. He vigorously dried his fur, making sure not to leave any spots wet, and then, grabbing his dirty laundry, he left the bathroom and went back to his room.

Back in his room, Humphrey put his dirty clothes in his laundry basket, grabbed a pair of worn-out jeans, a plain black T-shirt, some boxer briefs, and a pair of fresh socks, and then he got dressed. Once he was fully clothed, he grabbed his gray and white sneakers, slipped them on, and then headed downstairs to fix up some breakfast. After eating, he went back upstairs to his room and grabbed his school bag. Heading back down the stairs, he checked how much time he had until he had to leave for school. Looking at his phone, he saw the time was now 7:00. Going around the whole house, Humphrey proceeded to make sure everything was locked and secure, then he went to his garage. He got on his bike, went out of the garage, and then closed it with a side panel, which he secured with his password. Now that his house was secure, Humphrey grabbed his phone from his pocket to check the time. It was 7:10, so he started to school. He turned down a winding road that would take him to his school. It was a fairly short ride, only a few minutes, but the road cut through the forest on the edge of town, so it seemed to take a lot longer to ride through it. About halfway through this road there was a power transformer that fed electricity to this side of town. It was the only structure on the road, and about a half mile down past the transformer the road ended and a city road took its place.

When Humphrey got to the school, he put his bike in the bike rack and locked it with a key lock. After his bike was secured, he walked into school and headed to his first class. While he was walking through the halls, he heard a loud slam come from down a side hall. Looking down the hall, he saw a very large grey wolf pinning a smaller wolf with brown fur to the lockers. From what Humphrey could see, the large wolf was Seth Peters, captain of the boxing team. He wasn't sure who the brown wolf was, but he could tell that the brown one had pissed off Seth. Humphrey stood at the entrance to the hall, wondering if he should do something. He wanted to do something. But he didn't, instead he turned back to the main hall and continued on. It's not worth it, I can't possibly stand up to Seth, he'll kill me, he thought to himself. He turned into the next side hall and moved down to the end of it, where he stopped and opened up his locker. He stood in front of the open locker, staring into it while lost in thought. He kept telling himself that getting involved would just make things worse for the brown wolf, that Seth would beat him even more just because someone tried to help him. He convinced himself that he was more helpful by staying out of it, by lying low and just focusing on his work. A movement at the other end of the hall caught his eye, pulling him from his thoughts.

Humphrey turned his head towards the movement, and he saw a girl walking towards his end of the hall. She was a medium height, golden furred wolf with sharp amber eyes and a loose, flowing mane on her head. Humphrey looked at her for maybe a second before turning back to his locker to get his books organized. While he looked indifferent to the appearance of the marvelous female, on the inside he was furiously fighting his feelings. I don't have time for girls, I have to focus on my work! Nothing is more important than finishing school with good grades, not girls, not heroics, NOTHING! I can't be distracted. However, even as he was telling himself all this, he knew deep down that he had feeling for the girl. Her name is Kate Whitmore, and she had been in his classes ever since he moved to the city in the second grade. Humphrey had told himself for years that he could afford no distractions, yet his feelings for her kept growing. When he finished preparing his book bag, Humphrey closed his locker and started heading to his first class, glancing at Kate as he passed her. He might not let himself get distracted very often, but he couldn't help but admire her beauty when he had the chance. As he got to the main hall, the bell rang for school to begin, and he hurried off to his class.

Time skip - After School

The bell rang, signaling the end of the school day, and a flood of students spewed forth from the entrance to the building. Among the horde, Humphrey walked over to the side of the steps up to the school and sat on the ground, waiting for the school grounds to begin clearing out. The only part of school he hated was the chaos of large crowds of students, and no crowd was worse than the one to leave the school. Once the majority of the students were gone, Humphrey got up and walked over to his bike. After unlocking it and pocketing the key, he got on and began the ride home. As he got onto the winding road through the woods, he realized just how exhausted he was. He had quite the workload at school today, two worksheets in his college-level statistics class and a quiz in honors history. He also had received a great deal of homework, including a three page essay for English that was due tomorrow. The thought of doing the homework made Humphrey feel even more tired, all he wanted to do was take a three hour nap once he got home. The thought of rest distracted him, and he was startled when a car honked its horn. The car was coming straight towards him, and Humphrey realized he was in the middle of the road! He turned quickly to avoid the car, but he hit a rock on the edge of the road and went flying over the handlebars of his bike. In mid flight, he realized that he was clearing a fence. Why is there a fence here? he thought in confusion. His question was answered a second later when he hit a solid object, and a feeling of pure agony ran through his body. He could hear the sound of sizzling as waves of agony continued to assault his feeble body. He hit the ground and laid there, the pain of the impact too much for him to move. He opened his eyes and looked up at what he hit, and to his surprise, and horror, he saw that he was lying right next to a transformer. He tried to get up, but the pain of his movements hit him hard, and he fell back to the ground unconscious.

A/N: I hope you all enjoyed the first chapter of this story. If you want to give me any tips or pointers don't hesitate to tell me in a review or PM. I plan on making this a pretty long story, so it would help to get feedback so I can make it as best as I can. Thank you for reading, and I hope that you all have a wonderful day!