"Let go of me! Release me!" The man held me in the air by my backpack as I swung at him with my fists. I kicked at him, but I could not touch him.

"Who are you and where did you come from." It didn't even sound like a question, more like a demand.

"My name Joshua and I'm looking for my sister!"

"Joshua huh?" He dropped me on the ground and I landed on my butt. "Follow me, boy, and I'll bring you to your sister."

I stood, excited, and began following after the man. Deeper into the trees. I gripped my knife tightly within the sleeves that fell over my hands. I continued following him deeper into the woods, afraid that he was luring me to my death, but then we came to a small building no bigger than a garage. Then I was only afraid he was going to kill me in there, but I followed him inside.

"Watch your fingers and don't touch the walls."

I walked into the room and stood in the center, becoming completely blind as he closed the door behind him.
"What are you doin'. Turn on a light so I can see you."

He said nothing, but I heard him rustling through something. The floor seemed to move, like an earthquake, and I fell to my knees. An earthquake...no...the floor seemed to lower and I realized it was an elevator. I stayed still and silent until lights came from the walls we moved past. It made me sick watching, so I squeezed my eyes shut. Suddenly we stopped and I hit my forehead on the ground.

"Haha, watch your head at the end there."

"Yeah, thanks." I glared at him as I stood.

"You're pretty gutsy for a kid, tell me, how old are you?"

"I turned eleven a couple days ago." I began following him out of the elevator thing and into a bright hallway. Everything was white, just like those old hospitals and stuff in the movies. There were doors on either side, steel and white with no windows. They did have numbers or sometimes letters though.

"How long you been out in the woods by yourself?"

"A month? I don't really know the day I ran away…"

"Alright, kiddo. One more question. You said you were looking for your sister, right?" I nodded. "Do you know that she's dead and why?"

"That's two questions."

"Answer them both and I'll get you a lollipop."

"I'm not a freakin' baby ya know."

"You've got a strange accent. Sandra didn't."

"So what?"

"In here." He grabbed my arm and pulled me into a room we were about to pass. I struggled against his strong hold but he didn't budge as he pulled out his key chain and shifted through the numerous keys and keycards on it. It didn't take long for him to find the right keycard and swipe it. "Wait in here, kid."

He pushed me in, causing me to trip and fall. Inside was white as well. There was a camera in a corner nearest to the door. In the far corner was a bunk bed with white sheets and a latter. The top bunk was messy and a few pictures and posters hung on the wall. There was a bookshelf filled with what looked like chapter books and some stuff about fossils.

"Morning already?" Somebody mumbled from the top bunk. They had an accent I think might've been british but I'm not sure. The sheets shifted and a boy with greasy black hair sat up. He was wearing white clothes and gloves.

I kept my knife hidden. "Who are you?"

"They call me Solitaire."

"Why?"

"You ever played Spider Solitaire?"

"No."

"Well, it's confusing and is completely strategical, plus I can do this." He took off his gloves and put them again the wall. He began climbing up.

"Like spiderman?"

"Yeah, exactly. Anyways, what's your power?"

"um...I don't have any."

"You don't come down here unless you've got powers or are training others to control theirs."

"I-I."

"Since your in my room, my trainer must've claimed you as his subject. Tell me, which lab are you from. Red, orange, yellow, blue, or green?"

"You're talking nonsense, I swear."

"What was the first thing you remember?"

"I remember staring up at my sister while our parents argued."

"Oh...well then, you must be a natural born. So, your sister, did she have powers too?"

"She might've, she was incredibly talented when it came to fighting."

"Enhanced senses and reflexes? Such as when somebody was going to attack her it was almost like she knew before it happened?"
"Well yeah, but-"

"You know, my trainer had another student like that once. I used to train with her. I wonder what happened to her…"

"What was her name?" I stepped toward him, excited to now if it was my sister.
"I don't know, it was awhile ago. She called herself the "Defender" for some reason. Fought with this wicked sword though."

Defender? I felt my heart drop at the disappointment. I mean, perhaps it was her...but Defender? Even she could've done better than that.

"So, what's your name?"

"It's Josh-"

"No! Never tell anyone your real name! That's why we have nicknames. Only our trainers and the higher ups are allowed to know the name of the subjects."

"You make it sound like a king's court with the name "subjects"."

"I mean subjects as in test subjects, dumbo. We all have a number given to us when we arrive here, then we either come up with a name based on our abilities or they do. Me, I couldn't think of anything besides spiderman because my powers are based of the comic book dude. Besides the webs of course, they weren't able to mimic that."

"Are there a lot of others?"

"Yeah, actually, there's a ton. I think there's about fifty in this area. There's another on the other side of the country though. I heard that one's for the weaker subjects so they fit a bunch more there."

"Who's the most powerful here?"

"That would've been Defense, but she hasn't been heard from for a little less than a month so...I don't know. At the end of every month they hold this battle, you see, and it's to see who ranks the strongest. Every two months at least five or six people come here. The people who rank the last three or four are booted and sent to that other place. I'm usually at the bottom, but always better than the worst. I don't know, every time it gets harder every month because only the strongest stay."

"Oh. How close is the next one of these battle things?"

"About a week? I'm not sure, just take a look at my calendar."

It was hanging on one of the sides of the book shelves. I walked over and checked the date. He had a date circled for monday, five days from then.

"So what, do you guys just train down here?"

"No, we have a schedule. We get up at eight, get ready, go breakfast when the doors open and return here to brush our teeth-"

"I don't see a bathroom."

"Press that button by you."

I pressed it and a door whooshed open. Now that I look closely I can see the outline of the door when it was closed, but everything was white so I didn't notice it. Inside was a toilet and a sink scrubbed clean. There was a bathroom mirror above the sink. A smiley face was drawn on it in what looked like black paint. It had dried while dripping, making it look like it'd melted.

"Then we go to class for two hours to learn about science and math. Lunch. Then we have to learn about grammar and history for another two hours. Then we train for an hour, rest half an hour, then we group into study groups depending on our trainers and work on the homework or any group projects for two hours. That's about it. We also have to learn about survival in the wilderness. There's a large room with fake plants and such that groups go into separately. My group goes in three fridays. We practice out there for an hour every other day though because we've barely passed every time."

"Your school is strange. In my school we had a bunch of other classes like art and my sister always complained about how the school made her take classes she didn't care about like Wood shop or Band."

"Music and art? Wow, you must be so lucky. We aren't allowed to take art or music classes unless it corresponds with our powers or if we happen to be super smart and can memorize everything..." He looked to the the door with a scowl as he sort of trailed off. "For extra classes, those are pretty interesting sounding. We have seven choices of classes to take but we eventually have to take everything."

He stared up at the ceiling as he thought. I began to sit on the floor.
"Whatcha doing? Come on up here and sit."

I began hesitantly walked to the beds and began climbing the latter.

"Most of the less important classes include lockpicking, master climbing such as as trees or walls (needless to say I passed that). Oh, and that class about using your surroundings to your advantage. I found out how to use playing cards to cut people, even if it doesn't kill them. Um...there are classes that take about two months, but those mostly correspond with one another. Like the sword fighting, archery, and gun shooting, aiming and cleaning class. The purpose of the weapons fighting class was to find weapons for people who's power was mostly offensive."

"What's your weapon?"

"My weapon is this." He held his hand out like he wanted a handshake and pulled up his sleeve. Around his arm were dozens of quarter sized holes. He made a fist and white spikes shot out. The spikes were long enough to cover his hand. They were so sharp and long that he'd only need one punch to kill somebody.

"Wh-what...how...i don't…"

"When they attempted to give me webs it didn't work and the webs worked like acid and burned holes in my arms. In order to stopped the acid effect to travel above my elbows, they changed the stuff. I don't think this is what they wanted but it's what they got. It seemed to have worked out really well though."

I was about to say something as his spikes drew back and he pulled his sleeves down, but the door opened. The man from earlier walked in, along with a woman and who looked similar. They both had glasses, though her's were rectangular and his were a little more roundish. They both wore doctor's coats and their hair was black, but her's was long and put back in a pony tail and his was short (but not that short). Even their faces were similar.

"You boy, come here. You haven't told him your name have you?"

"No, not really."

"Good. Until we find you a good name, you'll be Ingrata while here. Understood?"

"What's that even mean?"

"If you must know, it means Offensive in Latin. Now, come, we have much to discus."

I made this chapter super long to make up for not writing a chapter for so long. I hope you like it...or, at least, you don't hate it. have a good day!