The Unknowns (Book 1)

The Unknowns Chapter 3

The Unknowns

Chapter 3

I meet Anna at a deserted field that goes for miles. She’s already there, stretching and taking her sweatshirt off. I walk over to her and stretch as well. She told me was could ask each other questions as the days goes on, but for now she said we need to focus on our powers and how I’d react to a fight.

“I don’t want to fight you, Anna,” I refuse.

“You’re going to be fighting men and women out there, Austin. If you can’t even smack me, you’ll die before we even get a mile from your house.”

“It’s not that I won’t fight women, I just don’t want to fight you, so if you don’t mind, maybe we could try something else-“

She grabs me by the arm and twists it. I look at her, and grab her left hand that’s turning my right arm. Right when I touch it, she kicks me in the leg, causing pain to shoot up my leg. I fall to the ground, grunting angrily. So she wants to play it like that, does she?

I wait until she’s leaning down toward me, and then I kick her in the side with my left foot, sending her a good few feet across the field. Now I’m realizing why she picked this spot. She falls to the ground, but quickly gets back up, a hint of a smile forming on her face.

She starts running, and before I knew it, I feel her slam her fist into my stomach. I fly backwards, but land on my feet shakily. I grab a nearby tree and pull it out of the earth. I throw it toward her, hurling it as if it were a Frisbee for her to catch. She jumps away, barely missing the tree.

She grabs the tree herself, and hurls it back at me. I look away from her, and try to grab the tree again and throw it back, but by the time I grab it, I lose sight of her. Tree in hand, I look around the field to see if I can get a glimpse of her, but she must’ve taken off into the trees to our left.

I put the tree down, and take off into the semi-forest. I look up every so often to see if she’s hanging around in a tree, but there are no movements or noise except me. Maybe I went too far? I start heading back, but I hear a twig crack behind me. I turn around and see nothing but the usual scenery of the woods.

I hear a branch move above, but it’s too late, Anna’s already landed on my back, sprawling me on the forest floor in defeat.  She rolls off me, laughing hysterically, as if this is all a game. Her laughter builds my anger up, until I can’t take it any longer. I jump up in a standing position and swing my leg back, knocking it into her side, causing her to actually fly two feet above the ground, and slam her into a tree trunk. Her laughter has stopped, and instead, she’s coughing, and breathing in as much air as possible.

She looks up at me, and shakes her head. She stands up, and takes a twig out of her hair. She walks over to me, and I thought she was going to slap me, but instead she gives me a high-five. “That was awesome. I thought you were going to be a wimp and give up, but you retaliated wonderfully. You’re fighting is still choppy, but with enough practice you’ll be fine.”

I smile. “Have you been training yourself?”

We make our way back to the field and she nods. “I had to go to an orphanage after my parents died. I was adopted when I turned eight by a married couple in their early twenties. When I got my first attacking power at eleven, I trained every day until I heard the Hunters were back from a two year hiatus. I went home, packed my bags, and left without saying good-bye.”

“Where’d you go after?”

“After the whole Hunter situation ended, I went back home, and they both found all the papers about the supernatural and the abductions, yours and mine included. They put two and two together and figured I went after people who kidnapped my parents. I let them believe it, but when I turned sixteen, I told them I had to go see you since I knew you’d be going after your parents soon.”