The sounds of passing cars and footsteps of people walking by were the first things the young girl heard as she opened her eyes. The first thing she saw was a figure crouching above her. Her vision was still too blurry to make out any details about the person, and her mind felt so fuzzy that she wasn’t sure if she was dreaming or not. Where am I? What's going on? Who… am I? She tried digging deep into her memory but she couldn’t find anything there. The person who was standing above her noticed that she had opened her eyes and tried speaking to her, but her mind was still too distraught to understand the words. She tried looking around and saw that she was lying in what could only be described as some sort of an alley. A dark, abandoned one, lit only by the stars that shone in the black night sky. Where am I? What's going on? Who am I? The questions burned again in her head, only, this time, panic and anxiety started taking over. She tried focusing on the person above her. It took her a few more seconds to realize that the figure was a girl, and it took her several more to understand her question.
"Are you okay?" the girl who stood above her asked. As she lay there on the cold floor, the girl with no memory started making out facial details of the one in front of her. She had long brown hair with bangs covering her forehead, deep brown eyes, thin lips and a small pug nose. She looked somewhere between 16 and 18 years old. "Are you okay?" she asked again.
"Y-Yes," the girl on the ground finally answered her, with a faint, hesitant voice.
"Oh, good, so you can talk," the girl with the pug nose said. "What happened? What's your name?"
"I… I don’t remember." She got to her feet, rubbing her head as if that could trigger some of her memory back into action.
"What do you mean, you don’t remember?"
"I… don’t remember who I am or how I got here."
"Alright, relax. My name is Kelia. You're in St. Cyprian, Brontspil." The girl looked at Kelia with blank eyes, not sure what to say. "I guess you also don’t remember where you live, right?" the girl shook her head. "Okay, how about I take you to my home, and we can call the police or something?" The girl nodded.
She looked at herself, noticing she was wearing a white shirt and blue jeans, with black sneakers. Despite some dirt that had rubbed onto her shirt from the alley's dirty floor, her clothes and shoes looked clean, perhaps even new.
"Wow, those shoes…" said Kelia. "I can tell they are of high quality. Those jeans too. They look really expensive. You don’t get to see a lot of that quality in Brontspil." The girl remained speechless, not sure how to respond. "Well, I guess there's no point in asking where you got them, right?" Kelia asked. "If you don’t even know your name, I doubt you'll know that."
She looked at Kelia's clothes and saw that the jeans she wore were tattered in place, with small hole and rips appearing all over them. It was apparent that they've been in use for a long time. Kelia's shoes looked old and worn as well. They had stains of mud on them, and one of her soles seemed to be torn. Her clothes… no wonder she admires mine. Is she not able to afford ones that are more decent?
The girl with no name looked once again at her own clothes, and noticed how lavish they looked in comparison. Seeing the pockets in her jeans, she went through them, hoping to find something that might help her remember who she was, but the only thing she found was a folded piece of paper in her right pocket. She opened the folded page and saw a long list. The list was presented in two columns, with the left one having names written in it, and the right one having some sort of emotional effects written there.
#1: Theylon Summers – Shivering, tears, having trouble falling asleep.
#2: Jelion Rake – Tears, less shivering then previous, refusing to react to anything or anyone, trouble falling asleep.
#3: Lunarey Sykes – Vomiting, loss of appetite, nightmares
"What is that?" Kelia asked when she glimpsed at the list.
"I don’t know."
"Did you make that list?"
"I don’t know. I don’t remember."
"Alright, since you don’t know anything about yourself, or even you name, how about we give you a temporary one until you start regaining your memory?"
"W-What name?"
"I don’t know. Umm… how about this one, right here, number 3?" she pointed at the third name in the list, Lunarey Sykes.
"Lunarey Sykes?"
"Well, I don’t think we should take that last name as well. Lunarey should be enough."
"O-Okay."
"Everything's going to be okay, Lunarey. Let's go." She presented her a hand to hold, and the girl, now known as Lunarey, took it and walked with her.
Something caught Lunarey's attention once she saw Kelia's hand presented to her. It was a black bracelet that Kelia wore on her arm. It was made of some hard material and had a matte texture. It looked about half an inch thick and was almost as wide as a fist, wrapping neatly around her arm. What is that? Some kind of a fashion accessory? She wondered, but she dared not ask.
"How old are you?" Kelia asked. Lunarey remained silent, stooping her head in embarrassment. "Right, you don’t remember," Kelia answered for her. "Well, I'd say you look 17 years old, but maybe I'm wrong."
"H-How old are you?" Lunarey asked.
"I'm 18. I'm a senior student at a local high school not far from here."
As the two walked down the streets of what she only knew as St. Cyprian, Lunarey found herself appalled by the gloomy sight of her surroundings. All kinds of litter and trash filled the streets, the buildings looked old and dilapidated, with either missing tiles or just a plain dirty appearance, and they were all colored either gray or brown.
Several people passed by them, and they look gave off a disturbing feeling. Some of them, Lunarey thought, were looking at the young girls with lustful eyes. What is this place? she wondered. She fastened herself to Kelia's arm and held it like a shield. Kelia looked at her and showed a reassuring smile on her face. "Don’t worry. Nothing's going to happen, and if something does, I have a can of pepper spray in my pocket." She pulled a black sprayer from the pocket of her jacket. "I know that people around here may look intimidating. Actually, I think that’s not really exclusive to the Brontspil district, but to every district in Alataria."
"Alataria?" Lunarey wondered.
"Man, you really don’t remember anything, do you?" Kelia let out a sigh. "Alataria is the name of the country we're in. It's got 11 districts and you in one of the southern ones, Brontspil."
"Oh…" Lunarey said sheepishly. She rubbed her right hand, feeling awkward for not even knowing the name of the country they were in when suddenly a sharp pain came from where she was rubbing, right behind her right elbow. She pulled up her sleeve and revealed a tiny, pointy bump behind her elbow joint, right where a large vein was popping out. "What's that?" Kelia asked her. "Did you inject something into yourself?"
"I don’t know." So many questions ran through Lunarey's mind, and no one could give her any answers. It angered her, yet she kept her cool and didn’t show it.
"Alright, look, this is starting to get very weird. I mean, that list, this injection mark…" said Kelia. "I'm starting to think calling the police might get you in prison or something. I mean, what the fuck did you even do before you lost your memory?" Obviously she wasn’t expecting an answer to that question.
"So… what do you want to do?" asked Lunarey, almost afraid to hear her answer.
"Well, if you ARE a criminal or something, the wise thing would be to tell you to fuck off, but… my good nature prevents me from sending you off in your current state, so how about we don’t call the police in the meantime, until you regain some of your memory?" Lunarey's eyes lit up. "I know what it's like to live in this god-forsaken country, and I don’t blame anyone who has to turn to crime to make a living. It's just the way things work now, so—" Lunarey cut her words off with a sudden, almost instinctive hug. She squeezed hard around her new-found friend and whispered in her ear, "Thank you, Kelia." I'm so glad that of all people, she was the one who found me. Others who might have suspected me to be a criminal might have cast me away on these streets. After letting go of her, Lunarey smiled and continued the walk to Kelia's house.
After 10 minutes of walking, the two reached an old apartment building, which was about 5 floors high. Once they entered it, they climbed a stench-filled stairwell up to the 2nd floor and made it to a wooden door that had a sign on it that said: "Hopewell."
"I'm going to have to tell my mom some story about you, so I need you to back me up on everything I tell her, understood?" asked Kelia.
"U-Understood," Lunarey replied.
Kelia knocked on the wooden door three times, and a few seconds later the door was opened by a woman with short brown hair and large almond-colored eyes. She wore an apron over a white shirt and blue pants. The woman invited the two inside with a cheerful smile and a begging question. "And who's this new friend of yours, Kelia?"
"Oh, Mom, this is Lunarey. She's a friend of mine."
"Nice to meet you, Lunarey. What a lovely name you have. I'm Cynthia." She presented a hand.
"N-Nice to meet you, too. Y-You have a lovely name, too," said Lunarey as she shook her hand.
"Well, it's an OldGen name, but still…" the woman chuckled. OldGen? What's that? Never mind, asking wouldn’t be wise. "Oh, you… don’t have a SmartWrist?" Cynthia asked as she looked at Lunarey's hand. A SmartWrist? Lunarey looked down and noticed the same matte black bracelet that Kelia had wrapped around Cynthia's wrist. Is that what she's talking about?
"H-Her SmartWrist's in repair. It broke down," Kelia hurried to answer for Lunarey.
"Exactly," Lunarey confirmed it.
Entering the apartment, Lunarey immediately noticed how small and dense it was. She started wondering if Kelia had any brothers or sisters, as she couldn’t see how any more than two people could live in such a small apartment. She also noticed how dimly lit it was. Only one light bulb hanged from the ceiling, barely giving enough light to the living room.
"Hey, Lunarey, want to see my room?" Kelia asked.
"Uh, yeah, sure." She followed Kelia into her room through another wooden door. Kelia's room was just as small as Lunarey had expected by now. A single bed stood against the wall and a table and a small closet stood next to it.
"Well, unfortunately, I don’t have a spare bed to give you, so you might have to sleep on a mattress on the floor," Kelia said. Lunarey didn’t mind. She was happy enough to have a roof over her head.
"Do you think your mom will allow me to stay here for a while? W-What if she doesn’t really that idea?" Lunarey sounded worried.
"Let me deal with her. I'll take care of it." Kelia sighed.
"Thank you, Kelia, really," Lunarey felt as if she owed Kelia a debt she could never repay.
"It's okay," Kelia said. "I don’t think I could ever leave a person to the vicious streets of the Brontspil district."
"This place… it frightens me," Lunarey confessed. "The people who passed by us on our way here…"
"Yeah, I know, everyone gets that feeling." Kelia didn’t seem to be bothered by it. She must be used to it by now. "In Alataria, where you live can change every aspect of your life, for better or worse, but THIS district is probably one of those that have nothing to offer for the better. Brontspil and Flintwood, Alataria's two southern-most districts, suffer from the largest rates of unemployment, poverty and homelessness. It's very hard to live here."
"I-Is it like this everywhere?"
"Well, Alataria's general economic state is… horrible. Some districts fare better than others and make living in them a bit easier, but almost all of them are affected by our government's poor care of finances." Perhaps I'm not as lucky as I thought…
"I see." Lunarey said. "Alataria… Brontspil… Flintwood… these names mean nothing to me. I don’t remember any of them. I don’t know anything, Kelia. I mean, I don’t recognize half of the words you say," she looked frustrated. "I don’t even know what that SmartWrist thing is." She pointed at the Kelia's bracelet.
"Alright, relax, you'll get the hang of it, don’t worry," She calmed her down. "A SmartWrist is like a phone, only much more capable."
"W-What do you mean, more capable?"
Kelia pressed her finger against her SmartWrist bracelet. The matte surface suddenly lit up, showing the time, date and Kelia Hopewell's full name in a digital display.
"Wow," Lunarey looked amazed.
"I can talk with everyone I want with this thing, take pictures, play games…" she stopped herself upon noticing Lunarey's awe-filled face. "Oh, sweet Luni, you still have a lot to learn about the world."
