Chapter 1

Memories Never Forgotten

He walked into the kitchen to find it empty. He had just gotten out of bed and was wandering around the house trying to find everyone.

Must have gone out already, he mumbled to himself. Might as well go for a run, he thought to himself. He walked to the door to find past it was darkness. He tried to stop walking but his legs kept moving.

When he walked into the darkness the door slammed behind him and he had the feeling he was falling. All around him he saw dead rats. Some were splattered against the walls, others had cuts in their chest's, clearly from a sword.

Then he felt the ground beneath him. He looked around to find he was in a cave. He had a sword in his hand. Then he saw it an army of rats marching at him. He tried to fight only to have his hands tied to his back. He tried to yell and found he was gagged. Then everything went dark. He tried to echolocate but found nothing around him.

After a few minutes he tried again and registered a heap of bodies next to him. He saw Tick, Hamnet, Frill, Twitchtip, and Talia's dead bodies. Then Henry was behind him laughing in an unhuman way, holding Luxa while she was bound and Ripred bound next to him with a knife at his neck.

Henry stopped laughing."Oh, have these ones been the ones you had feared to see." He yelled." Well then watch them die!" Henry ran the knife into Ripred's throat and jammed it into her eye, over and over and over again.

Gregor couldn't do anything. His body refused to move. He could only sit there and watch the blade keep being thrusted into her already mushy eye.

He sat up in distress. His muscles were stiff and he was covered in sweat. He looked around his room. He was in his bed. His room was quite small but not as small as his old room in New York. He had moved to Pennsylvania instead of the farm in Verginia.

He looked at the clock to find it was five thirty, he had an hour and a half before school started. He got up and went into the kitchen. It was empty as he had expected. No one else would bother being up this early other than his Mom who went to work at five o' clock. He let out a sigh. The dream was a common one but he still couldn't shack the memories away, even after five years.

He opened the door and went off at a thoughts shifted to the underland as he ran. His mom would dispise him if she could read his thoughts. Why can't I forget them, he thought.

He kept running for half an hour not even stopping. He went back into the house and was greeted by his sister, Lizzie." Morning Gregor." She said tiredly. She was almost as tall as him when he was twelve but was not tall compared to Gregor.

He nodded at the comment. He hardly spoke anymore and had only two friends, Holly and Issac. He would not hang out with them often but at school he would eat with them. He was the center of bully by the school bully but only got into a fight once when he was in a diffrent school on the other side of the town before they moved here.

Margaret(Boots) walked into the room and got some breakfast. He poured himself some cereal and ate. When he was done it was six fifteen. He went to his room and grabbed his backpack. He was out the door with Lizzie and Margaret going the other way towards their schools.

When he got to school he was greeted by Jeff, the school bully. He was always going after Gregor, Insulting him and threatening him. Gregor never had been afraid of the over weight kid. No one liked him except for a hand full of his gang.

"Gregor you loser what you doing here. Where's my money? I told you to bring me my money so you better hand it over." He talked slowly like he needed to think of the words he said before he could say them.

Gregor only shook his head.

"Whats that mute? Don't have my money." He Yelled. A group of other kids were gathering around them hoping for a fight."I'll show you what happens when you don't have my money!"

He threw a side punch aimed for Gregor's hip. Gregor spun around the punch and came right up to the side of Jeff's arm, the one he had used to punch at him. Gregor used his utter suprise to headbutt Jeff square in the fore head, knocking the kid out.

The crowd let out a loud gasp. Gregor began to walk away when two members of Jeff's gang came up behind him, one with a knife another without. They rushed him at the same time and Gregor ducked under them both and stepped back grabbing both their heads and slamming them together.

Following them was a base ball bat that Gregor did not notice in time to dodge. It rammed into the side of his head knocking him to the ground. Three more gang members had come up, one with a baseball bat. Gregor rolled away from another swing from the baseball bat and grabbed the bat. He pulled it from the kids hands and swung it into the kids arm with a loud crack. The kid clutched his arm as Gregor's fist went into his temple.

The other two kids looked at Gregor in pure horror and ran. Began walking towards the entrance, a teacher yelling at him to come back.

But he wouldn't go back. He was heading home knowing that if he stayed he would only be in more trouble. The school would not believe his side of the story but would believe others. His only choice was put his fate in other kids hands.

As he walked from the building and turned a corner where he ran into Issac."Hey, where are you going?"

Gregor didn't have to say when the teacher yelled again. He started off at a jog, running past all the people giving him questioning looks. When he got home he went into the basement with the lights off and landed on the couch down there.

The room was hardly used by the rest of his family. It was used as a small wreck room. He came down here to think most of the time. He just sat there staring into the dark. He didn't need the light anymore. He could spend his life in the darkness if he wanted to.

He sat like that for many hours until his dad got back from work, he was a science teacher for middle school and would know that Gregor got into a fight.

"Gregor come up here please." His dad boomed through the house.

Gregor got up and walked into the kitchen. His dad sat on a stool next to the small island. Gregor took a seat as far away as possible.

"Why did you get into a fight at school? Was it for money, as the school said the kid ,Jeff I believe, said you got into a fight with him to get money from him and his friends tried to help when you pulled out weapons?"

Gregor only shook his head.

"Then why did you get into a fight." At that moment the door bell rang. Wait here. He went and opened it to see that it was Holly.

"Hello Jimmy I am here about the fight Gregor had today." She said sadly.

"What is it."

"Jeff had been threatening Gregor to give him money and when Gregor began to walk away Jeff tried to attack him and after him his gang members followed suit." She said causully.

Jimmy, Gregor's father had a look of pure suprise on his face. "Thank you for telling me that. I was just talking to Gregor about that."

Gregor got up and walked back into the basement not caring about the conversation knowing that his father would no longer press this apon him.

When his mother got home she slammed the door and marched down stairs turning the lights on. " You are grounded for a week you are not to leave your roo..."She steamed, but Gregor didn't care.

His father came down stairs."Grace it was not his fault. He was being bullied and stood up for himself." His father got his mother up stairs and turned off the lights. He knew Gregor prefered to use echolocation. His mother dispised him using it.

He sat there for a few more minutes until he drifted off. He tried to shack it off, but he was too tired to resist.