Chapter 2

I'm minding in my own business in the cafe when I hear about Seven and Three.

"Have you guys noticed Seven's been gone today?" 

That's Twelve, nickname Chat. He's the main spreader of information around the kids, 'cause he's friends with most anybody who talks to anybody. He's loud, and only right forty percent of the time.

He's still useful, because anyone with half a brain can sort out the obvious mistruths, which are most of them. It's just the remaining ten percent of lies that are troublesome.

And Chat will regurgitate pretty much anything anyone tells him, so he's a pretty good gauge of the general mood in Delta and Epsilon. Everything in Gamma's top secret and most of Beta and all of Alpha is dead ('cause the doctors are just starting to figure things out).

"And Three," someone pipes up. People start paying attention. It's only been three days and they've already harmonized? There's no other reason why both of them would be gone at once.

Everyone knows about Seven and Three. They're the only popular kids without nicknames 'cause their numbers are so legendary to us their names would be less meaningful if they had names with, well, meaning. They're two of the most powerful subjects in Epsilon, holding fire manipulation and telekinesis respectively. It's no wonder the doctors paired them. And they may or may not hate me.

Probably 'cause I hated them first, but that's irrelevant. I wasn't always as sharp as I am now at eleven. I was just some kid, scared and wanting to make friends. And everyone wanted to be friends with Seven and Three, the royals.

I know it's silly now, but I've never been free from jealousy crawling its way up my spine, boring holes into my bone marrow. An ever-present green that edges my vision. So I hated Seven and Three. I didn't even know them.

I still don't really know them.

And I was bad at hiding my feelings too, back then. I wasn't old enough to know that the looks I was giving them… couldn't just be passed over. Longing. Fury. Oh man, I was passionate.

Just about the wrong things.

Now that I think about it, what happened next never should have started a years-long cold war between us.

Seven and Three were always friends. It was as natural as breathing in the highly hierarchical society we and the doctors had constructed for ourselves. They were the King and the Queen, holding power over a feudal court.

I was a peasant. Which was fine at the time. Not the greatest for my future power struggles over Epsilon, but fine. I was weak. I cared. 

I would have been eaten alive. 

But some of the doctors liked me. They saw a weak young girl, small and pitiful. Fresh from losing Michelle.

I suppose they must have fancied themselves angels for helping out the young kid who was falling behind. And they did help me. I probably would have died without them in those days, just like Sixteen.

Sometimes they gave me extra toys.

Let me mention—these "toys" were small, handheld machines. Designed to test intelligence, kind of like a Rubik's Cube, except Rubik's Cubes would have bored us by age five. We'd probably spent countless hours staring at them at three or four, when we were still too young for any of the older toys. 

So toys helped make you faster and smarter and quicker at recognizing patterns. Not much of an advantage, but still an advantage.

The toys the doctors gave me were new ones. Ones that the others hadn't got yet.

And the royals wanted them.

I mean, we probably could've worked something out. If I had been an astute bargainer, I could've used them to make my way into the court, let it be my stepping stone. I could've shared them, letting myself have a piece of the pie while still gaining the favor of Seven and Three.

But, like I said, I hated them.

Long story short, it didn't work out. It may have come to a scuffle. And I may have done some damage. It wasn't as hard as it should have been, back in those days. Seven and Three had barely gotten their Abilities, and I had had mine for as long as I could remember.

I confused them during our fight, full of lightning-fast impulses that were ripe to be exploited. It's the only reason I barely won, limping out with less bruises than my counterparts.

I got a little harder, then.

Being the prideful young children we were, we never forget, and we never forgave. Even despite our Everest-high power gap, we considered each other equals.

I guess my younger self did manage something, after all.

So, long story short, I guess it's not a surprise how fast Seven and Three Harmonized. It is unusually quick, but they've been friends for years. Not like me and Thirty-One.

And now they're ahead of me. Don't get me wrong, they were before they ever Harmonized, but now, it's dangerous for me.

Me and Thirty-One better get our act together quick or we'll be crushed by the royals, who will be twice as strong as they were before. 

Lost in thought, I barely hear the bell ring to end our mealtime.

It's pretty random, the bell. Makes us adaptable. Also means most of us scarfed down our entire meal in the first few minutes of cafe time. The doctors are known to have given less than three minutes of mealtime once. Then the docs made us go to PE.

Physical Education & Examination. That technically doesn't make the acronym "PE" but uh, well. You can probably tell why they wouldn't shorten it. I think the doctors call it PE2, actually.

Most of the time it's brutal. Running till we hack a lung and climbing over obstacles yards taller and inflicting brutal harm on each other without worry of retaliation.

What happens in PE, stays in PE. That's one of the rules made by the doctors, so the test subjects would stop trying to gang up on each other during free times. What if they lose a powerful ability to a group of five weak kids?

They watch us all the time, of course. We can say whatever we want to each other, though. They don't want to listen to children. But if they ever see a group of kids surrounding another, they'll step in.

It's not foolproof though. Two, called Volcano, used to be the most powerful of us all. But he had the nastiest personality of anybody. Pushing people, stealing, screaming during bedtime. That's why he was below Seven and Three, who had combined their powers. He was alone.

One day, he ended up almost killing Seven in PE. It wasn't the first time he had almost killed someone. Heck, I think he might've actually killed someone. But he had finally hurt someone who had the power to stop him.

Seven, Three, and a bunch of others killed him that day, in full view of the doctors. There were enough kids that the doctors couldn't stop them, and could barely see who did it.

They sent everyone to isolation that day, including me. I don't think anybody was too upset about it though. We were young enough that we were still put in baby isolation, where it's just that you're alone in a room. We were just relieved that Volcano was gone.

Anyways, today it's just regular classes for our smarts. I've never had trouble with those.

They separate us into three classes. A, the highest, B, and C, the lowest. When we're older we might be able to go to class S, which is mainly private mentorship or self-study. That's what I'm aiming for.

But right now, I'm in class A.

Today it's Politics in their Native Languages, or Poli-Lang.

The classrooms are structured like theaters, with a great big desk in front. Each row of desks rises above the one before it, setting the front as a center stage. Each desk can seat about three people.

Of course, I only sit with one other in a class of seventeen.

"¿Quién puede hablarme de la relación entre España y Francia en los últimos años, mencionando en concreto el acontecimiento ocurrido en 2003? Responda en Francés." The teacher's voice is loud and booming inside the small classroom. I raise my hand.

I contribute the minimum amount required in class. However, there are only seventeen students, so I end up volunteering quite often.

"Plain girl." This doctor's been teaching us languages for years, ever since her colleagues found out she studied in multiple countries. We all know she complains about it. Even after knowing us ever since we were practically toddlers, she never bothered to learn our names.

She just calls us by our most notable physical attribute. There's "Platinum Blond," "Ear Scar," "Freckles."

I'm not really notable anywhere. I've got wavy-straight brown hair, cut in the chin-length Institute-style. Brown eyes and fair skin.

A medium sized nose, a small mouth, and big eyes.

There's not really more than that you can use to describe me, and there must be dozens of kids at this Institute who have all of these. So Ms. Poli-Lang calls me "Plain Girl."

Speaking of, the only kid who's willing (or forced) to sit next to me is "Boring Girl." Ha. Isn't that funny, Ms. Poli-Lang?

Everyone calls her Ms. Poli-Lang 'cause we're not supposed to know the doctors' names for whatever reason. Maybe it's mental, lets them think of us as sub-humans who don't have names, who can't call them by their names. Maybe they don't want us to spill any info when eventually we're released on missions. But it's not important.

"L'Espagne et la France entretenaient d'excellentes relations jusqu'en 2003, lorsque la Corée du Nord a bombardé les deux pays et détruit les richesses de leurs citoyens. L'Espagne et la France se sont mutuellement envahies pour voler du matériel, ce qui a finalement conduit à l'affaiblissement des deux nations."

"Bien." Ms. Poli-Sci turns away.

It's not that classes are easy. I'm at the Institute; of course they're not. I hear we're grades and grades ahead of our "normal" counterparts living in society.

It's just that I don't have to work so hard in them. I attend, I study the day before the test, and I pass. With varying scores—it's not foolproof, depending on the topic, but I'm not struggling like some of the other kids are.

That's why I write messages to "Boring Girl," or Forty.

It's kinda my fault she's called that. She's not plain at all. She's got startling purple eyes, inherited directly from her Shifted grandparent. She's a second-gen, which is pretty impressive stuff.

Her Ability's pretty minor, though, so she's basically an outcast like me. 

Back when she was naming us, three, me and Forty were basically "inseparable," at least in Poli-Lang, so she called Forty "Boring Girl" for hanging with the boring, "Plain Girl." I don't remember this though, nor do I think Forty does.

Forty's got selective mutism, so I'm not entirely sure based on the messages we send in class.

Anyways, I think it must've been self-defence, though. It's safer to travel in packs. Now Forty knows better than to think being in a pack with me is better than being alone, but it's fine just sitting next to each other in Poli-Lang. She doesn't talk to me out of class, for obvious reasons. 

She has a best friend anyways, Thirty-Five, in class C. "Firecracker," Thirty-Five's called. I think Forty's doing just fine, even if she prefers the company of a buffoon in the lowest class.

She's my second source of news.

"Did u hear about the royals?" I write.

"Yea," She writes back. "Nineteen and I r nowhere close to Hrmzing."

It's a shame Forty didn't get paired with Firecracker, but it might be for the best. I've seen firsthand that being Linked can really mess up a friendship.

I pick up my pen after she passes me the note to write back, but she shakes her head. She starts writing on another scrap of paper, so I turn away and watch Ms. Poli-Lang.

She looks as if she wishes she were anywhere else.

Wish I could relate, but there's not much to do outside of class, other than meet with wolf or listen to Chat. Here, I can imagine she's an entertainer, a monkey dancing to our tune. Forced to perform and shackled for us, babbling in Spanish and French and Chinese. 

It's a bit funny, speaking only English outside of class and being limited to about ten percent of the vocabulary they're teaching us, but the doctors would get mad if they couldn't understand us.

I hope Forty hurries. Looks like Ms. Poli-Lang's wrapping up.

Forty finally passes me the note. "I don't think we should talk anymore," it says.

My mouth tenses and I crumple my fists under the desk. I know what this means.

She thinks I'm going to die. I'll never harmonize, and if I do, even the combined power of me and my Link will never keep us useful to the Institute. She's so sure of it, she's not even willing to keep my company in a class where we're forced to sit alone together. 

She is sure she, Firecracker, and their Links are all better by themselves, discarding me as a potential ally.

I ignore the dimly heard voice of Ms. Poli-Lang.

Fine then.

Forty never factored into my plans anyways, so it's fine.

It just hurts maybe a little that she thinks so low of me. I mean, maybe I haven't been broadcasting my abilities and skills, but she knows how I do in class A. 

Do I seem so pathetic?

Sometimes I wonder if I live my entire life in my mind. If I spent so much time in isolation as a child, it became my normal. 

I wonder if the person I am in reality is really the same as the one that lives in my head.

I wonder if the person I am is enough.

I shake my head to drag myself out of this spiral. There's no point in these thoughts. All I need is ambition and the will to carry it through. It's not time yet to take action. There's no need to rush, for Forty or the royals or anyone else.

Eventually, I'll flip the coin and we'll see. It's all or nothing. 

Let's watch it spin.

"Class dismissed." I leave class without looking back at Forty.