Forks: a closed community - idyllic on the surface, underneath bubbling with discontent. Bella is determined to rebel against her non-negotiable future already laid out for her by others. Added to this, when you go to bed at night in Forks, there are no guarantees that when you wake in the morning your family will still be intact, or maybe it is you that has been taken by 'The Catchers.'

Disclaimer: The majority of the characters in this story belong to Stephenie Meyer. I've borrowed them once more to have enormous fun with.

THE CATCHERS

Prologue

Storms and Monsters, without question, are the foremost terrors of childhood. While the elements raged around our isolated farmhouse I would cover my head with pillows. Hands clamped over ears. Eyes tightly shut. The compelling need to scream would overwhelm me, but not even a squeak would escape. Rose-scented washing soap Mom uses on the laundry still triggers disturbing memories.

Two nights after my seventh birthday and more importantly the night after Gran disappeared, I sensed a presence in my room. Infantile imaginings gave life to a sinister monster that had chosen my room to inhabit. Mom and Dad didn't believe me of course. By the time they checked under the bed or in my closet, the monster had gone to whichever cave it inhabited during the day.

Childhood years flew followed by an even fleeter adolescence. The monster continued to visit for short periods before disappearing for months; either that or I slept more soundly. When Jupiter entered our lives on my sixteenth birthday he would alert me to its presence. Whatever the monster is it still loiters, but not as often lately.

My room, the same room, remains a place of unease, and not just because of the monster. My friends in Forks also suffer from sleepless nights. Resentment because of how we are obliged to live, Anger about the rules we have to live by. Destructive feelings fester in the dark hours. My friends are rarely vocal like me though. It's a wonder any of us are sane. That last statement's way off sadly … only two of my friends are completely sane. I wonder whether the others think I'm sane. Very few, probably.

No storms or monsters trouble me tonight but sleep lingers a long way off. I'm seriously distracted. Eighteen tomorrow; a birthday loaded with obligations. My now adult imaginings cannot foresee a future that delights me. Mom's mutterings about duty remind me constantly of what lies ahead for girls of my age. Night terrors take on a different form now. Fears that are impossible to dismiss linger annoyingly. To have no alternative option hurts. Sleep eventually wins over exhaustion.

Jupiter's growls wake me. Instinctively, I'm super alert. September nights in Lympi should be warm. Outside my thin cotton quilt, my exposed arm is icy cold.

Black night. Still air. Silence … apart from frustrated snuffles from the other side of the door. Jupiter knows when I have company.

Allegedly I snore, which means the monster will know when I'm awake. Limbs rigid, face-down on the pillow, eyes tightly closed, I concentrate on rose scents while yearning for confrontation. Like every previous visitation I'm too scared to take the initiative.

Time passes. Dawn rustles the drapes. Our elderly cockerel crows.

Movement.

This has never happened before. Blood pounds painfully in my ears. My fingertips dig into the mattress. Mentally I'm preparing to defend myself when a male voice, terrifyingly close to my ear, whispers …

"Happy birthday, Isabella."

CHAPTER ONE

The exact moment I realized all was not well in my relatively sheltered world occurred on the morning after my seventh birthday and remains a vivid memory even now.

Gran had tucked me into bed the night before where she had lovingly calmed me before leaving me to sleep. Understandably I was over-excited and suffering from sugar overload after my birthday celebrations. As usual, Gran kissed me on the forehead and stroked my hair before dousing the candle on the nightstand. She whispered, 'Goodnight, precious Isabella,' and blew me another kiss from the door. I never saw her again.

The smell of burning woke me. I rushed out of bed and then to the kitchen to investigate. At the washing bowl Mom had her back to me, head bowed. I noticed her shoulders shaking as she scrubbed the pan she used to cook eggs. At the table, Dad stared unblinking out the window where an unusually intense sun for a September morning warmed the newly harvested fields. Naturally, I presumed they'd had a row, which wasn't unusual. I noticed Dad's knuckles. They were white where he gripped the table edge. His other hand bunched in a fist. I'd seen Dad angry before but never violently. This situation felt different. Even at seven, I recognized Dad's fury was on another level.

"Where's Gran?" I asked in total innocence.

Gran's high-backed chair with the brightly knitted cushion remained tucked under the table. A place had not been laid. Dad banged his fist so hard that my spoon jumped in the air.

"This cannot be borne," he growled and got to his feet sending his chair crashing onto the stone floor. Mom wailed, dropped the pan, and covered her face with her apron. Dad turned on his heel, snatched his coat from the back of the chair and cap from the hook. The windows shook as he left the house.

"Where's Gran," I asked again. I was seven, remember, and Gran was my refuge when the atmosphere in the house wasn't great.

Mom drew a breath and turned to face me. She'd aged overnight, looking more like Gran than Mom, which even at that age I thought strange because they weren't blood-related.

"Gran's gone, Isabella. She won't be coming back. You must never ask for her again. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

Reflecting on that moment, I genuinely cannot recall my immediate reaction. Can a seven-year-old be shocked? Could she truly know grief? Would she have the capacity to understand that twelve hours previously she had a loving grandmother who doted on her, and then told to forget her? What I do remember is crying during the half-mile walk to school where I told my cousin and best friend, Mike, what had happened.

And that was when I first heard anyone, young or old, speak of 'The Catchers.'

Eleven years have passed since Gran's disappearance, each year melding into the other. Nothing much has changed in my hometown, Forks, one of four populated areas on the Lympi Peninsula.

A strange name for a town I know, Forks is a coastal settlement of about two thousand people. To the North, South, and West lies the Northern Ocean, which allegedly contains numerous uninhabited islands. To the east behind the border fence lies a range of craggy, sometimes snow-capped mountains. Beyond them are the Wastelands where no one, not even the border guards, is allowed to set foot. The feeling that my community is trapped in a box where the walls are gradually closing in has accelerated rapidly lately.

Forks has one school, a huge lumber yard, a pottery and metal furnace, a blacksmith and farrier, paper, cotton, and flour mills, a charcoal burner, myriad individual home-based industries such as dairies, bakeries, tailoring and carpentry, and farms of varying sizes. Only by the coast is the terrain flat, after which the land gradually becomes rolling the further inland you travel. To the north and east, the hills and base of the mountains are covered in young pine which stretches as far as the sea. Around Forks fertile and semi-fertile fields are used for crops and grazing. The ancient road system that connects Forks to the other town-size settlements gets patched up when necessary, as do the houses and other communal buildings, all of which are constructed in locally grown timber.

There are so few children in Forks that school classes are populated by ability rather than age. When my cousin Mike and I started school aged four, there were kids aged seven who still hadn't passed the first grade out of five. By the time we reached twelve, I was studying with kids ranging from eleven to sixteen. I left school at fifteen when the Principal decided I knew enough to enter the world of work or to continue helping Dad on our farm which is what I ended up doing.

When I say 'our farm', my family, the Swans, don't own the land. Every house, mill, and business is jointly owned by the community, which is governed by the Elders. They are Civil Law Enforcers who live and work from a group of buildings called the Compound which is situated in the forest by the border fence. A separate tall fence surrounds the Compound, over which flies a flag of two horizontal stripes, green on top of blue, with a silver knife placed diagonally across the center. When they ride out from the Compound, both male and female Elders wear blue sashes displaying the knife emblem over black wool or cotton clothing. They visit regularly to ensure the population adheres to a set of rules laid down in years gone by to keep us safe. When I first asked my dad, who I now call Charlie most of the time, 'safe from what,' he said I would find out when I'd matured enough to understand.

Maturity is considered reached when kids make the fifth grade. Mike and I along with six other kids were taken to the office of the School Principal who is always an Elder. There we were told about the Old World and the Catchers. Mike and I had heard stories about both before but neither had been told the official line. Discussing either is taboo in our community - like talking about sex or death.

We'd already been warned about the Wastelands which run the length of our only land border. From an early age, we were told never to think of going near, or out in a boat further than the rock shaped like an owl, or so far that you're unable to see the shore. In the mountains, the sea, and across the Wastelands, are where monsters from the Old World hang out. Descriptions of misshapen people and animals riddled with disease and dangerous behaviors are fed to us from an early age. If you have the misfortune to encounter either and survive, you would be forced to stay in isolation for months to prevent infection from spreading to the rest of the community. Nobody I know has ever seen or been attacked by Wasteland-type people or animals. Maybe they're all dead by now.

Rumors about the Old World being a wonderous place where people lived in glass cities that touched the sky had already reached my ears before our talk with the Elder. Some said that food was plentiful and life was fast and good but only for some. The privileged could fly like birds and dive deep into the oceans. Sickness was rare and folks could live for a hundred years. In contrast, there were desolate communities where people were malnourished and poor; in other words an unfair world for many. Those stories were spread by friends or neighbors who'd either found or heard of books and artifacts from the Old World either washed up on the shore or discovered in the forest. All such items have to be surrendered to the Elders immediately and not talked about with anyone. The penalties for doing otherwise would be that your family could lose land or provisions. As a child, I never believed any of the outlandish stories. I mean, people wouldn't have been able to fly, or live inside glass? Now I'm not so sure.

The Elder told us that many hundreds of years ago the great majority of the Old World's population was wiped out by war. The three strongest nations fought one another using tactics and weapons that caused catastrophic damage to the earth's weather patterns. Seas rose, the temperature became too hot and then too cold. Vegetation was decimated and most of the people and animals died. Of the few that survived, many became diseased and feral. Small, isolated communities eventually sprang from the devastation of which Lympi is one.

To prevent another catastrophe from happening again, the Elder impressed on us that the way the people of the Old World lived must never be revived. That is why they insist it is imperative to destroy anything connected with that time to stop history from repeating itself.

I remember being desperate to ask the Elder questions. I had just turned thirteen and like Mike was intensely curious. Mike correctly sensed my frustration and had hold of my hand under the table throughout the lecture. He squeezed my fingers so tight when he thought I was about to interrupt the Elder I almost cried out. Keeping your mouth shut in the presence of an Elder is an unwritten law observed by anybody with a functioning brain. Mike was determined I wouldn't break it.

The Elder spoke then about The Catchers. He admitted his explanation was speculation because no one living had spoken to or seen one. How they were able to enter and leave our community without being witnessed remained a mystery. Traps had been set to catch one with no success. To the best of his knowledge, they were human-like creatures who snatched people and animals either for food or their gratification. The majority of those they took were old, but all ages were at risk, including young children. The Elder looked directly at me when he reminded us all of what happened to Gran.

I came away in a state of shock. Mike on the other hand declared he hadn't learned anything he didn't already know and taunted me that he knew more. After persistent pestering on the walk home, he agreed to tell me the other stuff as he described his knowledge. I had to promise on my life not to say anything to anyone. After making that solemn promise, we stole some snacks from Aunt Carol's kitchen and headed for my hill.

My hill lies on the border of our farm and is the place I go to escape tension at home. The slopes are easy to climb but only when dry. During the winter months I'm obliged to find an alternative refuge, usually the barn or the stable, or on warmer days, the beach. That day though had been hot and sunny. I'll remember what Mike told me to my dying day.

After we'd demolished every last crumb we'd stolen, Mike lay back in the long grass and closed his eyes for a while before starting his story. I remember noticing for the first time the changes in his face. He'd always had a plump, boyish look about him, but in the last few months, I could see he was becoming a man, and a handsome one at that. Thick fair hair flopping over green-brown eyes and a face that seldom wasn't smiling. Mike's demeanor was something I envied.

He told me about a book he'd found under his parent's bed. He'd been searching for their new kitten so wasn't snooping he wanted to assure me. The book had colorful pictures of buildings with many floors and huge windows. Also, 'carts with wheels but no horses, Bella, and tall poles that shone with light.' 'Do you mean drawings,' I interrupted. 'No,' he responded excitedly. 'I don't know how, but these pictures were as real as though what I could see with my eyes had been transferred onto paper.'

'What did the words say,' I asked, hardly able to contain my excitement.

'I don't know. I can read well, but the words didn't mean anything to me. The letters were mixed up but there was a definite pattern. One word I do remember was part of the book's title.' Mike spelled out BRAZIL. I have no idea what that means.

'They were pictures of the Old World then?'

'I guess so.'

'Carts without horses?'

'Yes, and they were shiny so possibly made of some sort of metal with glass windows.'

'Wow! Anything else?'

'Only a huge statue of a man on a hill with his arms outstretched, and also the people. They were … I don't know … different I suppose.'

'In what way?'

'Clothes, shoes, hair … just about everything. And some of them had very dark skin.'

'Any flying people?'

Mike laughed then. 'No, I'm sure that's a silly story. Wouldn't it be great though, being able to fly?'

'Where would you go first if you could?'

'I don't know, probably north. The air seems more wholesome up there. Where would you go?'

'Hmmm. Across the ocean I suppose. Is the book still under the bed? I'd love to look at it.'

'No, I presume Dad gave it up, probably after he'd checked it out himself.'

'Shame, I would love to have seen it, especially the dark-skinned people.'

I've dreamed about that book and the Old World countless times. What's beyond the Wastelands fascinates me even though I presume it's a dangerous place to be. When I'm on the beach pulling the crab pots in, I hope something as interesting as Mike's book will wash up on the shore. Most mornings the Elders' people search the beach themselves, which means the chance of me finding anything like Uncle Michael's book is close to zero. Once in a while, a rusty can or a glass bottle gets caught in a pot, but that's the pinnacle of my excitement.

When I got home after my afternoon spent with Mike, Mom decided that would be the right time to talk about being a grown-up. Marriage, sex, kids, and everything else; which includes the obligation for girls to start dating at age eighteen and be married before they are twenty-one. Boys could wait until twenty-two but only if there was a shortage of available girls. In most cases, the girl would live with the husband's family immediately after the wedding. I knew all this of course.

What I didn't know was that if I hadn't found a husband by the deadline, one would be allocated to me. They were either older men who couldn't find anyone to marry them, or a man whose wife had died, or, more worrying, any previous wives hadn't got pregnant within three years of marriage. If that happened divorce was automatic with both partners allowed to re-marry as there was no way of finding out who was at fault.

The Elders encourage newlyweds to have as many pregnancies as possible but strangely few families in Forks have more than two children. Uniquely, the Ulley's have four. The poor woman had to keep going until she produced a son. I'm an only child, so when I learned about the mechanics of how babies are conceived, I wondered why Mom hadn't produced more offspring. That was too personal a question to ask though. I would have loved a brother or sister.

In my room that night, the seven years that remained before the obligation to begin searching for Mr Perfect seemed a long way off. However, I remember mentally ticking off all the boys in Forks who were in the right age group and dismissing each one in turn. Mike, who would be an admirably suitable husband, was unfortunately too closely related to be considered. Marriage with a first or second cousin is not allowed unless both parties prove to be infertile. Only Mike fell into the unavailable category on Lympi, which meant I had a clear field to choose from.

So here I am, now aged eighteen, with the obligation hanging over me to find someone to marry and be married before my twenty-first birthday. My 'newly available' party will be held on Saturday where eligible males desperate to seek my hand in marriage will no doubt fight among themselves for the privilege. When I say 'my' party, this is not exactly true. I'm sharing the Gathering Hall with two other girls, Jessica and Angela, both of whom turned eighteen in the last month. Angela is gorgeous and will have the pick of the guys who put beauty above personality. She's a nice person too so it will be interesting to see who she chooses. Jessica has already declared she wants to marry Mike. Unfortunately, he doesn't seem too keen. This is going to be a fun watch.

Even though it's my birthday, farm chores need to be completed. After breakfast, I clean out the coops, feed the pigs, and complete all the other tasks Charlie set me before he left for his day job patrolling the eastern border. My afternoon will be taken up by driving the cart to the part of the beach where our crab pots are situated. Believe me, my arm muscles are impressive for a girl my size. Turning the wheel is hard work especially lately when I've had bumper catches. I have no idea how much I weigh but I'm still wearing clothes Mom had made when I was twelve.

The journey to the beach takes approximately an hour, depending on the mood Star is in. She's a young, nervous pony therefore difficult to control, especially if she gets distracted by anything happening away from the road. No doubt she picks up the scents of wolves and bears but they are rarely seen this far south at this time of year and not before nightfall. By then she's secure in her stable with Charlie's horse, Ranger. Sadly, Star and Jupiter don't get on, so much to Jupiter's disgust I have to leave my amazing hairy wolfhound behind which is a shame. He would so love the beach. I've looked forward to the drive all morning and set off straight after lunch.

Lemony scents from tunnels of young pine are saturating the breeze as we pass through. The warm wind cleanses my airways and ruffles my waist-length when wet curls. ridding both of the less-pleasant farmyard odors that linger more than I'd like. Even better, on the deserted road with no noise other than the gentle voice of nature and the clippety-clop of my pony, thinking is so easy.

On sparkling days like today, I try to imagine what this part of Lympi would have looked like before the catastrophe. Lympi is so beautiful at this time of year which makes me wonder whether it was as beautiful before the wars. I remember Gran telling me that her grandpa's grandpa's grandpa said that Forks was situated nowhere near the coast before the catastrophe, which confirms what the Elder told us about the seas rising. This could mean there are lost towns under the water which is a weird thought. Mike told me that one day during a storm he was on a high point looking out to sea when he saw a shiny cross attached to a pointy roof sticking up above the waves. He mentioned the cross to his dad and the Principal. He's never seen the cross again. Weird that.

Unsurprisingly, my whispering night-time visitor has been playing on my mind all day. I should feel unsettled because of how close he came to my face, however, I am more curious because his words came out of nowhere. What I mean by that is I felt no sense of presence. No warm breath on my cheek. No scent from his body. After he said, 'Happy Birthday, Isabella,' I shrieked before spinning onto my back. I'd had enough this time. Maybe becoming an official adult during the nighttime hours had given me the confidence to be brave for the first time and face whoever had been haunting my room for the past eleven years. The only evidence of a presence alas was my drapes falling back into place across the open window. Now he's made the first move, the newly feisty Bella Swan has decided to face the monster next time he sneaks into my room.

After Star is hitched to the post close to the wheel, I wander down to the shoreline to take a few minutes before starting work. Boots kicked off and cotton pants rolled up, I step somewhat warily into the soothing foam. After an unusually hot summer, the water feels warm around my ankles which encourages me to walk out further than I've risked before. I've never learned to swim adequately enough for the sea, but right now I just want to dive in and keep going past the owl rock to check what's out there. And there is something out there I'm sure. Today I'm more positive than ever, or maybe it's because I'm eighteen now and I'm counting on someone or something to save me from what I'm obliged to accept is an unhappy future.

Heavy waves break against my knees. I feel unsteady and unsafe. Wiping tears from my eyes the idea of escape is shelved once more. I turn my back on the tempting horizon and get on with the job I'm here for.

While I'm tipping the contents of the final crab pot into an almost-full second basket, Star, who up until then had been patiently waiting for me to finish up, stamps on the sand and snorts loudly.

"What's the matter, Star?" I call out and walk over to her dragging the heavy baskets behind me.

Star responds to my inane question with more snorts. Something's wrong. Animals sense it. There's tension in her neck which quivers under my touch. She strains against the tether which is the only thing that's stopping her from bolting.

Star's fear instantly transfers to me. Alone on an isolated beach with only a young pony for company, I'm old enough and wise enough to be wary. My heart thumps in my ears as I scan our surroundings for the human or animal that's spooked her. Bears rarely come onto the beach if they spot a human. Wolves won't appear until nightfall. At first glance, the wide expanse of shingle and sand between the path and the water's edge looks deserted. The cart bed though will give me a better view.

I have to shade my eyes against the sun which is still at least two hours away from setting. Not a soul or anything unusual is in sight. Star's agitation increases. She shuffles backward away from the water which indicates the direction where she senses danger. Common sense tells me to unhitch and get away fast. Curiosity compels me to stay.

Starting from the northernmost promontory on the right, I scan the waves for anything that shouldn't be there. Star has never had a problem with the permanent seal colony that basks on the rocks to our left, or the even more rowdy walruses that come on shore occasionally. We've watched Orcas breach and crash far from shore, but never at this time of year. No, something else is out there. Even I can sense a presence now. It's time to go. I jump off the cart and grab the heaviest basket first. Using more strength than I thought I had in me, I sling it onto the flatbed in one heave. The second is much easier.

Before unhitching, I give the ocean one last glance over my shoulder which is when I spot the anomaly; a flash of colour moving with the silvery blue waves. I fix on the object and make a rough attempt to calculate its speed and course. Again, curiosity compels me to keep watching, even when the object accelerates towards the shore. Approximately twenty yards from the water's edge, broad shoulders appear in the foam before the rest of a male body slowly unfolds to stand before me.

Knee-deep in sunlit waves, a tall, long-haired youth raises his head to purposely lock eyes with mine. The backdrop of water around him sparkles as though light is peeling off his body. I have to shade my eyes to look at him.

More than fifty yards separate us, yet even from this distance I instinctively know what I'm looking at. There in full view is the subject of a thousand disturbing nightmares and many scary stories. The monster. The terror of my people. A Catcher.

Strangely calm, I accept death is seconds away. From what I've learned from the Elders there is no escape from these beings, and there's no one around to help me or to witness my end. As the Catcher takes a step towards me, of all things to think about at the end of my life, I wonder why I'd been told that these creatures are misshapen and feral, when in fact they are so extraordinarily beautiful.

Hello, and welcome to my new story. Apologies for the long delay between The Vampire on East 46 Street and this one but real life bit me hard on the ass last year so I had to walk away from writing for a while. I hope this story is worth the wait.

As always, the story is complete on my elderly computer, except for TLC and a tweak here and there. I will upload twice weekly on Tuesday and Friday for the next fifteen weeks (30 chapters). If real life heads for my ass again, I will either warn you in plenty of time or upload the rest of the story in one hit.

Best wishes and happy reading,

Joan x