HIDDEN

~CHAPTER ONE~

"To everyone making the choosing today, be in the main room for 10:15."

Elle's eyelids fluttered open. She rubbed her clear blue eyes and glanced at the clock. 10:05.

Jumping out of bed, Elle brushed through her chestnut hair with her fingers and clipped a yellow bow to the side. She slipped on her favourite white dress with red roses littering the front and her red wedged heels. She brushed her teeth, packed her things and at 10:15 on the dot she was in the main room, and actually one of the first there.

"Hi Elle, are you excited?" Asked Lydia, the girl who had rescued Elle all those years ago.

"Were you, Lydia?" She asked.

"Gosh no! I was afraid of being sick on stage!"

Lydia had originally been Erudite.

"Lydia, what was Erudite like?" Elle asked.

"Hard. Competitive. They're about the only words I can think of to describe it. I'm glad I picked Amity."

Elle and Lydia sat in silence as more and more sixteen year olds filed into the room.

They were briefed on what to expect. Where to cut yourself, which bowl represented which faction, how long it would be, and what would happen afterwards.

"Okay? Remember, you haven't had an aptitude test, so just go with it. Choose wherever is right for you. Not where your friends are going. This your future we're talking about. There's no going back." Said Steven, the man who ran the building.

Steven led them into the lift. They all had different first memories of the lift.

Twelve years before, Elle had lived with her deluded father and alcoholic mother in the darkest corner of Chicago, amongst other faction less families.

When Elle was four, Lydia arrived. She said she was a 'dauntless dropout' and had no where else to come when she escaped the wrath of the leaders.

A couple of weeks later, Lydia woke Elle, Robyn and Aliyah up in the middle of the stormiest night of the year.

She led them for miles through wet fields until they came to a wooden gate. They were each hauled over the gate and into the orchard below.

Robyn and Aliyah were the same age as Elle. They had all grown up together.

Lydia led them to the lift and told them not to be scared.

Before they knew it, the doors were opening into the warehouse.

Robyn and Aliyah stepped into the lift first. Steven had given them a choice to go up alone or in groups to avoid suspicion from the other Amity families making their way to the choosing ceremony.

One by one, two by two, three by three, each stepped in and were whisked away from the building forever.

Before Elle knew it, it was her turn.

She stepped into the lift and turned her back on the dim warehouse.

And then the doors re-opened. Elle opened her eyes, stepped into the blazing, sunlit orchard and walked towards the gate.