The snow crunched under my feet as I marched forward, gripping my jacket tightly around me. It seemed that the snow storm Derek and I had encountered while coming here was the kind of thing that lingered, waxing and waning in intensity at times and yet never completely fading away.

It had been several tens of minutes since we'd begun our march into the forest, though we had yet to encounter our "prey" (or, perhaps, our "predators" if things were to go poorly). With the distance we'd covered, it was clear that some of the weaker ones in the group would be a bit fatigued.

Though Hannah, Derek, and James were moving along smoothly, William, Samantha, and I were beginning to trail behind. I, specifically, was breathing heavily with sweat trailing down my face. My trudging was interrupted by a voice that caused my head to turn off-course.

"You okay, kid?"

Though I'm mildly ashamed to admit I'd hoped that if anybody were to approach me, it'd be Hannah, in the end it was Derek who approached me. Looking ahead, I could see Hannah standing a few feet behind James, her hair bobbing up and down as she went.

"Yeah... fine."

Looking back at Derek, Hannah's words from last night rang out in my head.

Amnesia, huh?

Yawning, I thought back to the conversation Hannah and I had had last night. It turns out that Hannah lacked memory of anything before the crash. She'd woken up, covered in a layer of snow, with a miraculous lack of injuries and her past alike. Apparently, the group of survivors had found her after exiting the plane, and had assumed she'd gotten thrown somehow.

From how she explained it, though she couldn't really remember much of anything, every so often a word or sentence would dredge up some sort of instinctive response from her. It could be happiness, sadness, or even rage. It was for that reason that she'd said it was best for me to back off.

After all, even knowing this now, it was basically impossible for me to avoid doing something wrong. Even she didn't know what might set her off.

However, in truth it wasn't just her backstory that drew my attention. It was thinking about whether any of the others knew about it like I did. She seemed pretty secretive, but what if that was just towards me?

I turned to look at Derek.

She seems to trust him, at least more than the other. Did she-?

"Yes, I know." Derek earnestly smiled as he spoke, though I recoiled in surprise.

"If you don't want the world knowing what you're thinking about, you might want to get better at hiding it. You were staring at the poor girl so long that I thought you might burn a hole in her back."

Returning my face to its serious state, I frowned at Derek while furrowing my brows.

"Relax, kid. You don't have to take my advice if you don't want to, just thought I'd put it out there. You might not believe this, but I only want to help you out a bit."

"...Why would you want that?" My frown deepened as I raised my question.

"Hm.. that'd have to be because you remind me of myself when I was your age."

Derek maintained his smile and winked, causing me to tighten my fists as I wiped some sweat from my brow.

I scoffed.

"You must've been a pretty miserable person if I remind you of yourself."

"Perhaps I was. Though wouldn't that only further justify my wanting to help you out?"

I simply sighed at Derek.

"In any case, do any of the others know?"

"Nope, just me. And now you, I suppose." Derek laughed lightly as he began to stretch, taking his arm and laying it across his torso.

"Why you, then? Why nobody else but you?"

"Let's just say it... came up in conversation."

Derek's cryptic words only served to confuse me and make me more suspicious of him. It felt like more like his smile was a mask. As opposed to Hannah, who made me feel comfortable with her hones sincerity, it felt like Derek simply couldn't be telling the truth.

Did she really trust this guy? And enough to tell him everything, at that?

Maybe I was being crazy, thinking that her sharing with me was something meaningful. She'd definitely made attempts to hide her amnesia, but she'd told me without knowing me very long anyway.

No good, I'm only getting in my own head at this point.

Snapping out of my daze, I registered the state of Derek, who was now swinging his arms and legs as though to get ready for the sprint.

"What's with the warmup, Morpheus?"

"Haha, you'll see soon enough."

Just as Derek was finishing his words, a guttural battlecry came from in front of us.

"Oi, oi! Hey there, Wolfie!"

I barely had time to register James' words before he leapt forward with inhuman speed and strength, flying forward and quite literally causing a tree to explode.

Splinters of wood flew out in every direction as James charged in a straight line towards what appeared to be the large gray wolf I'd encountered earlier.

It was limping, but still managed to bear its fangs as it braced itself fro a confrontation.

Hannah turned away and covered her eyes while Derek simply walked forward, following soon after James.

He called out to me after taking a few steps forward.

"Watch closely, knowledge on hunting monsters might be useful someday!"