• Ella opened her eyes a scream peirced the night air. She was imediately alert, but then stopped. There was nothing she could do anyway and here it was survival of the fittest. She made sure at that the scream was far enough away that whatever was by now devouring the unknown victim wouldn't be disturbing her anytime soon. She nodded, satisfied.

    Ella under normal circumstances would've felt some sort of horror at her uncaring thoughts, but she had spent such a long time in this disparing forest to know that emotions only got in the way. She couldn't remember how she had gotten here, but she had given up on leaving. Ella could barely remember what her preivious life had been like. She vagualy remembered her parents and maybe an older brother, but she couldn't picture any of them or what they might've been like.

    Everyday it seemed, a memory would fade, that is ,of course, if you lived long enough to see the next day. There were things in ths place that were beyond anyone's nightmares. Ella usually managed to avoid them, but there had been several occaisions were she passed the corpse of an unknown victim. She was completely unfeeling towards it, having seen it so much that she couldn't even feel pity.

    She did wonder, however, why there seemed to be enough people to keep the beasts in here well-fed. She heard enough screaming to guess that at the very least. Looking around her now at the looming trees, the lack of actual edible plants, and basic dark that seemed to be present all the time. It was a pretty dreary place, she thought. Not really where anyone would want to spend their vaction.

    Ella hadn't actually seen anyone else alive ever since she had gotten here. She wasn't sure how long ago that was, but she wondered briefly how many people were here if they hadn't already died out. It would be nice to talk to someone else again.

    Her stomach growled, taking her out of her thoughts. She bit her lip. In this place the only way to get food was to hunt, but there were very few animals that wouldn't kill you. Grabbing her hunting knives, Ella covered her hidey hole and walked through the trees lightly, feet making no sound whatsoever. She would check her traps first, then if those had failed, she would go.

    Going towards her first snare, she heard something that made her blood run cold. Something was by her snare, trying to get at the prey that had been trapped and died. Whatever it was, it was definetly not something that was a usual animal she would see. She reached her hand for her knife, but the thing noticed her. She couldn't make out its form in this gloom, but she could tell it was going to charge.

    She grabbed at the knife and pulled it out as the thing lunged at her. She screamed, remembering ironically that she had paid little attention to the scream she had heard earlier. She twisted and pushed even as it tackled her to the ground. Suddenly, a hand went over her mouth as she tried to scream again. "Be quiet, will you!" A voice spoke into her ear. Dark blue eyes glared down at her. Ella was shocked to see another human, but the boy continued, "Just relax. I would rather not alert every other monstousity in this entire damned forest to hear you." He got up and pulled Ella up beside him.

    Ella eyed him warily. He had just attacked her and it had been for no reason that she could see. She looked at his hand and saw that he had her knife. He seemed to realize this too, but it looked like he wasn't about to give it back. She stepped back from him, wanting to have time to react should he attack again. He seemed to be studying her, or maybe waiting for her to speak. She recalled a phrase from her past she had used on people who stared at her and spoke slowly, the slowness that came from not speaking for years, "T..ake a...pi..cture..It.l...ast..lo..ng...er." She started at the sound of her own voice. It was light and surprisingly beautiful. She wondered if she could've sung at one point in her life.

    The boy looked at her confused and then realized what she had said. He laughed, a deep humorless laugh. "Well I'm afraid I don't have a camera so I think staring will have to do. Who are you anyway? What are you doing here?" Ella wasn't used to beng asked questions, much less talking to other people in general, but she could definetly feel her anger rising as she heard a slightly accussing tone in his voice, as if she had no right to be here by her snare with the food he had been stealing.

    "Wh..at...are...y..ou...ta'king...'bou..t? T-t..ha..t...is...me....s..na..re...You w-were..stealing me f...ood." Her tounge stumbled through the words with less difculty, but nevertheless felt embarassed by her lack of speech.

    The boy shook his head. "Well I was hungry, but it seems to me that instead of food, I've found you. Interesting. Especially since I have not seen another person in quite some time. You do know what this means don't you?" Ella simply shoock her head. The boy sighed, "It means that we need to find a way to get out of here.."