Chapter 2

Chapter 2, Awakening

Alina awoke. She blinked lazily for a few moments before slowly looking around her. Her room was so familiar, it was almost as if she had lived there her whole life, although it was only the start of her second year. Her bed was pushed against the stone wall. Really, there wasn't much to distinguish the wall from the floor, every surface of the room was made from the same polished stone. The chamber was lit from a single window cut into the far wall. It was narrow, just wide enough to fit one's head, if it could open. Alina slowly sat up and gingerly placed one foot, and then another, onto the cool surface. She wrapped her warm blanket around her bare shoulders, and slowly walked to the window. Out of it she could see far into the distance.

Below her were the University gardens. It was still early in the day, but there were already a few students tending to the flower and vegetable plots which extended out for a hundred meters from the foot of the stone edifice. It was early spring, and so most of them were just weeding and tilling the soil to prepare it. Every student was expected to tend to their own section. Vitalus taught that every person, no matter how wealthy or studious, needed to understand how to tend the land. Some of the students, especially those with rich parents who hadn't had to contend with the rigors of barracks life, disliked this manual labor, but Alina found it peaceful. There was nothing quite so rewarding as seeing living things thriving under one's care.

Beyond the gardens was the school wall, delineating it from the city which surrounded it on all sides. Beacon had an air of newness. It was one of the few cities on the continent which was not just an empty echo, a shoddily repaired reminder of what the Cataclysm had done to a once wealthy land. The houses and apartments were humble, most being made of wood, and none standing taller than five stories, but they had a quiet dignity.

The young woman slowly pulled herself away from the view, reminding herself that she had a full day of activities and responsibilities. She shed her night shift and pulled on her uniform. Composed of blue-gray tunic over gray pants, it was not particularly flattering. The uniform was deliberately unisex, although the enforcement of dress code was lax enough to allow the female students to differentiate themselves somewhat. Alina, like many of her peers, had sown a fabric belt into the inside of her tunic, and she cinched it up, allowing the smooth linen garment to subtly accentuate her waist. A small embroidery of a golden rose on her left side, a hand span below her shoulder was the only other adornment which she allowed herself.

Other students got away with much worse, some deliberately flouted the rules by substituting silk for the somewhat uncomfortable standard wear, but Alina was used to the feel of her uniform. It was a significant step up from the wool clothes she had worn while in the children's home.

Once dressed, and her notebooks thrown in a small bag, she rushed out the door. The chiming of the great bell indicated that she had no time for breakfast, she only had about five minutes to make her way to the first class of the day on the opposite side of campus. She rushed out of the room, closing the door behind her a little more sharply than she had intended. Alina jogged quickly down the dormitory hall, then down three flights of stairs. She was already halfway across the grounds when she remembered what her first class was. Natural Philosophy & Logic, she had no reason to be in such a rush. Professor Emanuel hardly ever got to class less than five minutes late, and she had already read five chapters ahead in the coursework. She meant no offense to Natural Philosophers, their work was deeply valuable for the moral fabric of the nation, and she really enjoyed thinking about the subject, but sometimes she felt like Professor E. made his lessons intentionally over complicated in order to make himself seem smarter. After all, if you can't explain something simply, do you really understand it? She could probably teach it better, at least she would be a little more engaging.

Alina quietly snuck into a seat near the back of the auditorium. For once it seemed that the professor had actually been on time. He was already droning on about something or other related to the interplay of evolutionary psychology, Nietzschean motivations, and the influence of organized religion. Or something like that. Some of the students around her were clearly less interested than she was, laying their heads on their crossed arms or letting their heads droop, trying to get back the sleep they had lost the previous night from studying, or partying as the case may be. Alina contented herself with reviewing her homework for the next class.

After her fourth class of the day, B level calculus, Alina made her way through the cafeteria to pick up lunch. After pointing out the items she wanted from the options of the day; a scoop of potato mash, a fresh roll, some eggs, and a glass of cider, she made her way out to the orchard. She sat down with her small circle of friends. John and Lidia were already there, leisurely enjoying their meal as they soaked in the fresh air and sun of the grove. It was too early in the season for them to be able to enjoy a peach or apple, but it was certainly something to look forward to.

As she sat down the two friends turned their attention from their private conversation to her. "Hey Ali, how was your morning? It looks like you just got up." John said, chuckling a bit and gesturing to  Alina's somewhat unkempt curly brown hair. She hadn't had time to do more than give it a few strokes with a brush, and she instantly reddened at the reminder. She looked away and self-consciously ran her hand through her curls to get them to behave. Lidia lightly punched John in the arm and glared, before turning to Alina and placing her hand lightly on the other young woman's arm. "Don't listen to him Ali, he's just jealous he'll never have someone as pretty as you in his house". She said, her voice conciliatory. "Here, let me" she said, motioning for Alina to turn around so Lidia could fix up her hair. Alina looked down in continued embarrassment, but acquiesced, a private smile touching the corner of her mouth. Lidia produced a small white comb from her bag and ran it through Alina's hair a few times, expertly consolidating it at the nape of her neck. She braided the hair, somewhere between the brown of freshly turned earth and auburn of the last moments of sunset. After a minute or two, her fingers working deftly, the work was done. A french braid artistically swept from the back of Alina's head and rested on her shoulder. The sun shone on the skin of her neck, her hair contrasting with the lighter tone of her skin.

"I woke up a bit late, but I still made it in time to Professor E's lecture on power and organized faith." Alina answered, somewhat in answer to John's earlier question, and partially just to break the silence. "I've heard of his class" responded John, "My older brother let me read his term paper…" he paused, stroking his stubbly chin in something approximating, or perhaps parodying, deep thought. "If I remember correctly, he basically just paraphrased the Professor's paper on the contribution of democracy to the Cataclysm. Dashed it off in a night but still got a B+ since E's so full himself, he loved his words parroted back to him" At that John cracked a wide grin.

Alina inwardly relaxed. She couldn't stay mad at this dope, he meant well. John didn't have a face to earn him a place in any propaganda poster or fashion store window, but he had a simple handsomeness, which when combined with his easygoing charm, made it easy for him to make friends. Some part of her wished that she had the same social skill, but she had grown used to being on the outside looking in.

Even though the children's home was theoretically an equal and egalitarian place, there were still the clear distinctions which any group of children will draw between each other. Most of the children spent weekends with their parents. Her own father had died shortly after her birth, his life one of the last to be lost at the tail end of the war of Succession, when Sperovia had at last driven the Remnant forces out of Columbia. Alina had visited his brick in the wall of heroes with her mother many years ago, shortly before she too abandoned the young girl to pursue a career in service to Vitalus in the temple. The woman had meant well, but years of neglecting to form a maternal bond had left little connection between them.

Alina had persevered despite her challenges, the first and so far only child of the Ninth legion children's home to gain entry into Sperovia's Leadership Academy. Each class consisted of only a couple hundred, picked from the cream of the expanding Republic's millions of citizens and inhabitants. The entrance exam and selection committee were tasked with keeping entry purely meritocratic, but it was to be expected that the children of Sperovia's small elite, those with access to tutors and coaches, would do the best on these exams. Alina was still waiting for someone to knock on her door one night, finally announcing that her entry had been a mistake, but over the last year she had pushed this thought to the back of her mind. After all, just getting into the school virtually guaranteed one a low level government post, and every additional year one was able to survive the brutal academic coursework meant more career possibilities upon flunking out. Of the couple hundred accepted each year, only one tenth graduated. This was by design. By law the candidates for the next supreme leader of the Sperovian Republic could only be chosen from among the graduates of the Academy, graduating between the fifteenth and twentieth years of the current supreme leader's reign. This was the twelfth year of the third supreme leader; Reinard. This meant that if Alina managed to graduate she would be in the running, but she didn't give much thought to that possibility, she'd be just fine in some Temple laboratory or library.

Lidia was a third year, and John a first. Lidia and Alina had met while studying in the great library, while Lidia and John had met when Lidia served as the Resident Advisor for his dormitory wing. Alina wasn't sure what had happened between them exactly, but she had her suspicions.

The three friends chatted about various classes and projects for the better part of the two hour break between morning and evening classes. As the bell tolled two in the afternoon, they parted ways with smiles and a hug or two, refreshed and ready to face another few hours of lecture followed by a night of feverishly completing essays, reading, and the ponderously long math problem sets.