That world was shattered forever at a New Year's bash turned bloodbath. The dark Seattle club, that had opened just days before, closed in the wake of the disaster; its owners vanishing under the police department's careful scrutiny.

Liberty and a handful of other girls were found amidst the carnage; babbling about fanged monsters and demonic beasts.

Alex Haley's body was never found.

Liberty withdrew. Her comic book illustrations turned dark and filled with the creatures that she had watched commit the slaughter in the club. The monsters she kept being told didn't exist.

Victor Haley, the twins' father, needed someone to blame for the loss of his son. His own grief lead him to take Liberty's depression as a sign of guilt. He took every possible opportunity to remind her that the only reason Alex had gone to that party in the first place was because she had wanted to go.

Within a week, he had made arrangements for the family to move to the desert-bound California town of Rio Hevrir.

When Serenity and Liberty arrived, they found a letter from Victor detailing his new found hatred of his daughter. It was resting on the mantel of their new house... right on top of the divorce papers.

Serenity Haley, still in a very fragile state emotionally, fell into a bottle from which she could not escape.

Liberty, like her mother, hit bottom. She attended school, but basically squeaked through her classes. Her father's money went straight to the bank, so she was able to keep herself, and her mother, taken care of... after tricking her mother into signing the forms that added her name to the checking account.

All her free time was spent with her nose in a sketchbook - nearly always drawing pictures of one of the monsters she remembered from the club.

The wrestler who vanished from school was no concern to her. He was just one more drop-out... or else lucky enough to escape this town... But when he came back to school just recently, he was changed. She didn't know what it was at first, but something was different.

With school nearly over for the summer, she finally found out what it was.

His name was J.J. Dawson. He'd been in the hospital for most of the last four months recovering from the attack that had destroyed his family. He watched their slaughter and was left for dead by the beasts that killed them.

The same type of monsters that had orchestrated the bloodbath in Seattle and taken her brother away from her.

The ones she had actually started to believe were all a figment of her imagination.