The Hunter.

Chapter 1

Darkness. She was sure she'd opened her eyes, but all she registered was a black haze. Suddenly the small box-like room she was in jostled and she flew against a wall, promptly landing on her right wrist. She gritted her teeth and stood up, holding the walls for support. She could hear metal grinding against metal, the room seemed to be going up. She didn't dare utter a sound, for fear of calling attention to anything that might be dangerous. Where was she? Why was she here? She couldn't remember ANYTHING, it was like her mind had been wiped. Like some guy had taken a magical eraser and rubbed her mind, leaving nothing behind. She felt along the ground and found nothing, she felt all the walls for latches or anything at all. After searching eighteen times over she sat in a corner and pulled her legs up to her chest. She would wait, she somehow knew she wasn't very patient, just cautious. She felt something spark in her mind, a single memory, she desperately tried to grasp it but came out empty handed, or rather, empty minded. After what felt like two hours the box began to speed up its movement and the smell of burning metal filled the room, then it stopped altogether. She was just about to call out when she noticed a slither of light across the roof, either side was a door..the doors were suddenly open. She scrunched her eyes shut and raised her arm up to shield her eyes from the blinding light, she could hear voices. She removed her arm, opened her eyes and furrowed her brows at the silhouette leaning over the opening, it looked like a boy... A handsome one, at that... she thought and shook her head to clear her thoughts. Said boy leaned back and disappeared from her view. "Holy..." someone whispered. Another boy peeked in, handsome, as well, she could see properly now that he had dark chocolate skin and angular cheekbones with short black hair. Then they were noises, people talking over each other, the dark skinned boy yelled "Hold on! Everyone SHUT UP!" That seemed to stop the noise pretty nicely. "Why don't you just tell us what the shuck is down there, Alby?" someone called out. The dark skinned boy, presumably Alby, yelled "You shanks shut up!" he then nodded to where boy number one had been standing, "Tell 'em, Newt." She searched her vocabulary for words like shuck and shank, but couldn't find anything remotely close. What strange language where these strange boys speaking? Why did they have her? Who were they? Perhaps they had something to do with it all, they might have something to do with her memory loss. She kept her mouth shut and vowed to observe before speaking. She truly was terrified, what were they going to do with her? She could feel her eyes watering, she blinked rapidly and furrowed her brows, allowing her curiosity to reign over her fear, she would not show weakness, she might need to prove her strength, whatever this place was, it was unfamiliar ground, and she needed to survive. "It's a girl" boy number one, Newt, said. The voices started up again.

"A girl?"

"I call dibs!"

"What's she look like?"

"How old is she?"

Her eyebrows furrowed even deeper at one of the comments. 'dibs'?! She was not a freaking object. Boy number one looked in again, she could see now that he had long blonde hair which had grown below his ears, sun kissed skin and deep, dark, brown eyes. She could see that he was tall and very muscular, strong. He looked troubled as he tilted his head and called out to the others "Bring the ropes!". He took a rope from some boys and lowered it into the box. She backed away from it and looked intently at him. Did he really expect her to come up? For all she knew this box was the safest place for her right now. "I'm not going to hurt ya" she noted his strange accent... British, somehow, she knew that. She raised a brow at him skeptically. He rolled his eyes and chuckled "I'm Newt. Do you remember your name?" Aha! So they know about my memory loss! And just what kind of a name is Newt? She thought, while she shook her head no. "Come with me, I'm usually an honest shank, we won't hurt you you're safe" Safe! Safe was she? The nerve! And there was that strange language again. Well what choice do you have? Her conscious whispered to her, Have you SEEN the muscles on these guys? Chances are, he's just being polite asking you. He could MAKE you. "Hello? You alright there?" She realized she'd been staring into space. She made her way over to him and began to climb the rope, "That's a smart girl" Newt said, she stopped to glower at him. "Oookay, not a good word choice" he said, clearing his throat. She tilted her head and gave him a look as if to say 'Ya think?' then rolled her eyes and proceeded with the climbing. When she reached the top she was pulled onto the grass by many hands, when she was finally there, the one called Alby told them all to stop touching her before they freaked her out. She got up and looked at her surroundings. They stood in a vast courtyard several times the size of a football field, surrounded by gigantic old looking walls, covered and draped with ivy. The walls had to bee hundreds of feet high and were all split down the middle creating a huge gap in each wall, which, she could see led to passages and corridors beyond. She looked around at the people surrounding her and noted that they were all boys, around fifty or sixty of them, not a single female could be spotted. "Hey!" said the buff one, Alby. She snapped her head in his direction and furrowed her brows in confusion. "I'm Alby. Do you remember your name?" She scoffed and shook her head curtly. As if he really cared. "Already asked her the same bloody question, she's a feisty one this one, you just gotta check her expressions to know that." She narrowed her eyes at Newt, who in turn, raised arms up in surrender and shrugged at Alby as if to say 'What'd I tell ya?'. "Does the Greenie speak?" Someone called from the crowd. "Shut up, Gally!" Alby yelled back. Alby looked at her and asked in an impossibly hard tone "Can you speak?" She set her jaw stubbornly and just stared back at him. Alby looked at Newt who shrugged and said "Maybe she's mute?" which caused her to glare daggers at him. "Does she even understand English?" The one called Gally asked. "Gally, quit being a slinthead and shut up!" Alby said, "She seemed to understand when I was talking to her." Newt said, running his hand though his blonde locks. English? ENGLISH? Oh, please. As if they were ones to tell her about English. She might not have her memory, but for some reasons she knew that the words shuck and slinthead were not part of the proper English language. It was weird, actually, how she could remember these things, words, objects, how she just knew what they were. But she couldn't recall learning them, or who had taught her. Obviously, she must have parents, but where were they? Who were they? Were they missing her? Did they know where she was? Alby took a step towards her and she took three steps backwards, bumping into a group of boys who steadied her before she fell, she hastily stepped away from them. "Look, Greenie, I know you're scared, If you ain't scared, you ain't human" Alby said, "Act any different and I'd throw you off the cliff 'cause it'd mean you're a psycho."