Hello, everybody! This is my first fanfic. This was a little something I started in March 2017, and I honestly didn't expect it to get as long as it did, and for me to get as into it as I did. I've already written about 84 000 words of this story at the time of posting it, so yippee. I've actually left this fanfic alone for a while and started work on another Legend of Spyro fanfic, which I started work on in May 2017. I've focused on that one a lot more nowadays because it'll be much longer than this one, and I prefer the other one, but I still think this one's quite alright.

This fanfic will probably be a single story, but I might make some sequels of this in the future depending on how popular this one is. I have most of the story planned out and I'm actually almost finished writing it, and there are a few ways the story could continue, but like most things, I'm not sure whether it should.

[EDIT] So it's January 14, 2019, which marks one year since this Prologue was posted. I just want to thank everybody for the support this story has gotten. It just hit 54K views a few days ago and it's got 90 favourites. These numbers are absolutely insane, especially since it's only been one year, so thank you everyone! For anyone new coming to Broken Perceptions, I really do hope you guys all enjoy it, and I hope you stick around for any future projects.

Anyway, that's enough of my rambling. Enjoy the story!

Aaron ran as fast as he could, trying to shut out the shouting voices from behind him. His left leg was filled with pain as dark bruises covered the pale skin on the twenty-year-old's leg. His right leg was bruised as well, but not nearly as bad as his left. Aaron's breath was hard and the sweat rolled down his forehead and down into his mouth, causing him to taste the salty liquid running down his face. Aaron's heart raced as he tried to outrun the angry people running behind him, catching up to the tired and pained young man.

As his conscience gave out, the angry, hateful words from the angry group of four men, all a year older than him, filled his head. Screams came from people as Aaron raced down the sidewalk, almost tripping over his shoelaces, which had been untied as someone stepped on them, accidentally causing him to stumble over and his shoelaces to untie. On a normal day, Aaron would have stopped to tie up his shoelaces, but this wasn't a situation where he was almost late to get to work or his university, which was only two blocks down from his house. He was being chased by bullies. The same bullies he'd had to deal with since ninth grade. The four bullies had all gone to the university Aaron was at only five months after he had enrolled there, and it was too late to back out as no other university in the city offered the coding courses he was interested in.

Aaron had noticed that the bullies had gotten more violent over the years. Back in ninth grade, the bullies would only ever give anyone a few bruises, but by the time Aaron hit eleventh grade, the bullies had broken his right arm. They had almost broken his left leg, and he was just lucky that he managed to get out of their grasp. Aaron had no idea how he did it, but he did, and now he was running, trying to ignore the pain shooting up through the nerves in his left leg as he manoeuvred between random people walking down the sidewalk. A few orange cones came up in front of him, as he had only noticed it just before it was too late. Aaron took a swift turn to the right, only to run onto the road. Picking up the pace so he wouldn't be run over, Aaron felt his feet hit the ground even lighter as his breath went even harder as a result, his mind focusing on not getting run over.

He made it across the road, and he looked back and frowned as he saw the bullies running after him, several cars screeching to a stop as they just missed colliding with the four twenty-one-year-old boys chasing Aaron. The boys made it to the other side, chasing Aaron with everything they had. They hurled insults and rude comments at Aaron, and Aaron tried his hardest to block them out but he couldn't. He was trying too hard to outrun the angry group without getting an injury. It was too hard to do that and blot out the hurtful comments, and so Aaron let the comments hit him like a hammer.

Aaron took a sharp turn to his right, running into a lush green park. He looked behind him briefly to see the angry men following him. Aaron groaned as he turned his gaze forward, letting out a scream as he dodged a woman walking her dog. Aaron wiped the sweat off his forehead as he heard the bullies laughing and shouting, as well as the dog barking savagely as the woman tried to calm it down. That was too close. Aaron thought, continuing to wipe sweat off his face.

Aaron made sharp turns in and out around the large park, causing people to stop in shock as the fear-induced man almost ran into them. He watched as parents blocked the ears of their children as the bullies followed Aaron, hurling curse words and horrible insults at him. He only wished he could have the freedom of having his ears covered to block out the hurtful words, but he didn't have anything that could do that.

Suddenly, Aaron let out a high-pitched yelp as his foot slid over a large lump of dog crap, causing him to slip around as he ran, the sticky, stinky substance sticking onto his shoe. Aaron let out one last shout as he lost his balance, falling over into a large lake that was in the park. The sounds of the park ceased, and so did the shocked shouts of strangers and the hurtful comments thrown at Aaron by the bullies. He stopped, hoping the bullies would lose sight of him and leave. Aaron let himself sink to the bottom of the lake for a few seconds. He figured thirty was enough, and he began to swim back to the surface. But it was then that Aaron noticed something was wrong. The water was crystal blue. It wasn't murky and dark, like the lakes in all the parks Aaron had been in. Crystal clear water was almost unnatural in a park. But still, Aaron swam up to the surface, taking in a massive breath of air as he reached it.

But it was then that Aaron knew that something was completely wrong. His surroundings were still lush and bright green, but he was now in some sort of dense rainforest. Not a park filled with hundreds, possibly thousands of people. And it was way too quiet for him. He hated overloads of noise and the rowdiness that came off the bullies, but he didn't mind the noise most of the time. It sort of made the world seem more human to him. It made it seem more gentle, and more like home. But this forest was way too quiet. He knew that often, quiet was good, such as at night when people are trying to sleep, or when trying to calm down from a hard experience, or when trying to show suspense in a movie, video game or audio book even, but the silence was too overwhelming for Aaron.

Aaron pulled himself out of the lake, hauling his sore, painful bulk over the faded bricks that surrounded the lake. Hold on a minute… lake… bricks? Aaron thought, scrunching up his face as he realised that something wasn't adding up. Is this some sort of well or something?

Still confused, Aaron stood up, wiping his dung-padded shoes in the grass, wiping of the sticky brown substance into the ground. He stopped and tied up his shoelaces, figuring that now he was in a forest, which he had no idea how he got into, that he could trip over rocks or stumps or… anything if his shoelaces got caught. He straightened his body after tying up his shoelaces, looking around and wondering where to go. He rolled his shoulders, feeling his bag jolting around on his back.

And that's when Aaron's eyes widened. He got to the ground, whipped off his bag and dug through it, pulling out books and small sheets of paper, followed by his phone and a Nintendo 3DS (Aaron was a pretty big gamer). He turned on his phone, surprised at the fact that it worked perfectly, despite his bag being submerged in water. Then he opened his Nintendo 3DS and turned it on, breathing a sigh of relief as the screens turned on, revealing the game card that he had inside, which was an old DS game: The Legend of Spyro: Dawn of the Dragon. He was a huge fan of Spyro since it came out on the original PlayStation, and he had gotten both the PlayStation 2 editions as well as the DS editions of The Legend of Spyro trilogy, so he could enjoy great, detailed gameplay on the PS2 at home, while enjoying the game on the DS while the move. He had been replaying the trilogy recently, and he was loving it as much as he had at the age of thirteen. He was glad that both his phone and 3DS worked, and, returning his breathing to normal, turned off his 3DS, closed it, put it back in the case it came with, and put it back in his bag, as well as his phone.

Whirling his bag around his shoulder, Aaron stood up, walking forward. He looked around, staring at the large trees that towered high above him, much taller than the ones he was used to seeing. And Aaron had seen very tall trees no more than ten months ago, but these trees gave a new meaning to the word 'tall'. These trees dwarfed the 'tall trees' that he had seen back then. As he walked, he listened closely for any bird or insect calls, but heard nothing except his own footsteps and the wind whooshing around softly.

Aaron walked for who knows how long. His phone had run out of battery ages ago, and it was a pain to keep taking out his 3DS to check the time, so Aaron had given up on that. After what felt like three hours of walking, he came to an end in the rainforest as he saw lush green grass that ran along flat ground, with no endless maze of trees to be seen in sight. Aaron let out a weary, but triumphant groan as he fell to the ground, his bruised left leg giving way. He ran his hand through his dark, sweaty hair, and smiled. I'm finally out of that maze of trees! Aaron thought, too tired to speak out loud to himself. When I regain my strength, I need to figure out where I am.

Aaron figured it was the perfect time for a nap as he saw the sun setting in the horizon, oblivious to the large stone structures off in the distance. He closed his eyes and fell asleep, lying in the grass. Tomorrow… he told himself. Tomorrow I'll find out where the heck I am. I need to get back home.

And with that, Aaron's eyes clamped shut, and he lost all consciousness as he fell into a deep sleep.