In a white flash, I fall from the platform and crash into something and fall to the ground. At first I thought it was a stone wall, but the fabric on my face tells me otherwise. I open my eyes to see that I landed on a girl with short, light-brown hair, light tan skin, blue eyes, a narrow face, and a uniform just like mine. She seems to be my age, but as I lay there, I notice something very… wrong. She is buff as fuck. I thought I was pretty well toned, but this girl probably has twice as much muscle as I do!

“You can get off me any time now,” she says to me with an irritated look. Her voice is pretty tomboyish, but still distinctly feminine.

“Sorry,” I say with a light blush. As we both stand up I begin to fix my uniform, only to be stopped when the girl shoves me. “What the fuck was that for!?” I demand.

“That’s for feeling me up, you creep,” she replies coldly. My heart stops as my eyes widen and a knot begins to form in my stomach. ‘Feel her up?’ What does that even mean?

“I didn’t-”

“What, just ‘cause I’m a girl, you think I’m weak?”

“What? No, I-”

“I bet I could knock a little guy like you out in ten seconds flat!” she says while getting in my face, setting her fists on her hips.

“I’m not little!” I yell back as I get in her face.

“You’re pretty short for a guy,” she replies with a smirk.

“I’m a few centimeters taller than you,” I reply evenly.

We continue our little stare down for what feels like an eternity. I really don't want to fight her. Not because she’s a girl, but because she’s a girl, and I don’t think I’d win. Thankfully, after a few more seconds of intense staring she breaks out into laughter.

“BWAAAA-hahaha! Why are you so serious, man!? Gosh, if I didn’t know any better, I'd think you actually wanted to fight me!" Yeah... cause I want to be pulverized by a girl. "Bwahaha! You’re a laugh-riot man. What’s your name?”

“Umm, I’m Miles Eremita,” I reply, relaxing a little knowing that I’m not about to lose a fight to a girl.

“Oh, so formal, heh heh. I’m Fidus Cor. We should hang out some more! Where’re ya heading?”

“Uh, I’m heading to orientation-”

“OH! I am too; let’s go together! But it won’t start for, like, an hour, so let’s go get my sister!”

Oh sweet Barbra. She has a sister. I don’t even want to imagine what her sister is going to be like, but I get the feeling that it involves an unnatural amount of muscle. I don’t know what possesses me to do so, but as she takes off into the crowd, I promptly follow her.

As we make our way through, I take a moment to take in my surroundings. The room we’re in is very large. The walls extend up for two stories and are painted in a vertical-striped fashion, going from a light cream color to gold. The ceiling is a solid cream color, with a massive crystal chandelier in the middle. The chandelier has two tiers, each with an assortment of gems hanging from them. The gems are glowing white and are providing the majority of the light in the room, along with some wall lights spaced evenly along the walls. The floor is covered in a red carpet that has some sort of flower pattern throughout it. The wall behind me is covered in platform stations, while the walls to the left and right have various chairs, couches, and small tables. On the far end of the room, there are two sets of stairs that meet in the middle on our floor and curve up towards the second floor. On the top floor are rows of large stone doors with small signs posted on them. Most of the people in the room are kids roughly my age in uniform, but there are a few adults in the area as well. Most seem to be parents, but a few are in grey business suits with red or black ties.

“Who’re the stiffs?” I ask while pointing out one of them.

“Hmm? Oh, those are the professors. Most of them are okay, but watch for the one with the long blonde ponytail. He’s the dean of the school, so try not to get on his bad side.” Of course he is.

We come up to a lone couch in the corner of the room, with a single person occupying it. She has long dirty-blonde hair that has gentle curls which cover half of her face. She looks fairly similar to Fidus, but is nowhere near as buff, and her eyes are a lighter blue. She doesn’t notice us as we approach because she’s reading a fairly large book. Fidus motions for me to stay put as she brings herself right up to the unsuspecting person’s face.

“HEY TENERA!”

“EEEEEP!” she screams as she falls off the couch and lands on the floor, with the book now on top of her head. “Oh, Fidus, you startled me,” she says timidly. After some giggles from the three of us, Fidus helps her to her feet and gives her a small hug before turning to me.

“Hey, I want you to meet my new friend, Miles. Miles, this is my sister, Tenera.” Tenera doesn’t look at me during the introduction. Instead, she just looks down and away, trying to keep her face hidden behind her hair. She lightly taps her foot against the carpet as we stand there quietly. After a few more moments of awkward silence, I look to Fidus for answers, only to get a shrug and a small grin.

“Soo… this is my first year here. Is it yours?” I ask. She glances up at me for a brief moment, before hiding behind her hair and mumbling an answer.

“Uh, sorry, didn’t catch that. What did you say?” I ask, but only get quieter mumbles. I look back to Fidus for help, but she only puts her arm around Tenera and motions to the book in her hands. “So I see you have a pretty big book there. Those are hard to come by... Seems pretty interesting. What’s it about?”

“It… it’s about the first space travelers,” she replies quietly. “Would you like to borrow it? I’ve read it a hundred times already.”

“Uh, I would, but I can’t read, so-”

“You can’t read!?” both Tenera and Fidus exclaim at the same time. Tenera seemed worried about this, while Fidus looked like she’s about to burst out laughing... again.

“Uh, no, the orphanage never taught me-”

“You’re from the orphanage?” Tenera asks. She seems unusually interested in my response, while Fidus just gives her some odd looks.

“Well, yeah-” Before I can get anything else out, she rushes forward and wraps me up in a very tight hug.

“Oh you poor, poor thing! It must have been horrible there! But don’t worry about that mean old place anymore; you’re in good hands here. If you want, I could help teach you to read and write and-”

“Whoa! Slow down there, Tenera,” says Fidus as she pulls her off me. “I’m sure the school will do all that for him. Sheesh. Oh, and you,” she says while pointing to me. “Don’t get any funny ideas about my sister. One wrong move and I'll lay you out. Got it?” Both Tenera and I immediately blush and step away from each other.

“I wasn’t going to-”

“Oh, so what, she isn’t good enough for you?” she replies while shifting her stance and crossing her arms. All the while, Tenera is locked in a frozen state of embarrassment. Where the fuck is all this coming from?

“I didn’t say that! I was just going to say-”

“Oh, so she’s just not your type. What, you don’t like girls that you don’t get to feel up?”

“Wh-diJ-wuh NO! THAT’S NOT IT EITHER! AND THAT WAS AN ACCIDENT!” I yell as I take another step away from Tenera. A few people start to look over at us, making me blush even more.

“Pretty convenient accident if ya ask me,” she says evenly with an evil grin.

I’m about to go off on her, when my thought process is interrupted by the sound of bells going off. I’ve heard these bells before from the orphanage; they’re made to go off every hour, and always play the same little tune. The only difference this time is that they’re a lot louder here. I think they’re held up in the building somewhere. At the sound of the bells, Fidus immediately looks at her watch, and then back to us.

“Well, it’s time for orientation. Let’s get going so we can get some good seats.” And with that, she grabs both me and Tenera, and starts heading up the stairs to the auditorium. I give Tenera a questioning look - which she only shrugs to - and walk along with her. I guess it’s normal for Fidus to act this way.

We walk through the double doors into the auditorium, and my jaw drops to the floor. This place is way bigger than I thought it would be! The ceiling goes up for what looks like three stories and curves inward in four spots. In the center of these domes are large chandeliers, each adorned with white glowing lights and gold trim. The walls are painted in a rich dark red, with gold finish on the edges, and have hanging lights at regular intervals. There are hundreds of rows of red cushioned seats filling the floor around us, leaving room for only three aisles; the one we’re in is in the center, and the other two are by the walls. All the seats face towards a stage that’s set higher than the ground we’re on. It has black flooring, with red curtains covering the back wall. To the left of the stage is a single black podium with a small microphone on it.

As we continue walking forward, I turn my head to look behind me… and then my jaw finds itself on the floor again. Covering half of the seats on our floor is a balcony with its own seats. Halfway above that one is another balcony with seats. Just how many seats do they need here?

“So, what… architecture gets you off?” Fidus asks with a playful smile.

“Is she always like this?” I ask Tenera.

“*sigh* Sadly, yes,” she responds. Fidus gives her a playful nudge on the arm as we all giggle a little.

We take our seats in the center of a row that’s about halfway to the stage. When I look at the seat, I get a little confused; the part I should sit on is pointing upwards. I’m about to ask how the seats work, when I see Fidus and Tenera sit down. Oh, duh, they fold down. I take my seat and do a double-take.

“What’s the matter?” asks Tenera.

“This is the most comfy thing I’ve ever sat on,” I reply in astonishment. How could anything be more comfy than the seat in that car? This to be some kind of magical spell thing.

“Eh, I’ve had better,” replies Fidus. I look at her in disbelief. There is no way there is anything in all of Terra more comfy than this seat right here.

As I get cozy in my seat, the auditorium quickly begins to fill with more and more students. I notice that the upper levels are filling with what looks like a combination of parents and staff, while the lower level only has students. As I continue to look around, all of the lights suddenly begin to dim, except for one that is shining down on the podium. Once the lights are practically off, a man comes out from behind the curtains and stands behind the podium. He seems pretty short, and really fat. He has short brown hair that’s on the sides of his head, but some of it is combed to the side; a sad attempt to cover his balding problem. He’s wearing the same grey suit as the others, a red tie, and big thick glasses on his face.

“Ahem. M-may I have your attention please?” he asks in a nasally voice. “Welcome to this year at Stella Ficor. I am the Dean of Admissions, Professor Scolaris. I will be leading orientation, but before we continue with that, let me introduce the other deans.” As he says this, a line of seven people walk onto the stage and face the crowd. They all wear similar clothing: grey business suits with red ties. I didn’t really pay much attention to most of them; the only one that caught my attention was the tall blonde one on the end. “Finally, Dean of Administration, Professor Altum Stans.” Once introduced, the deans did a slight bow and exited the stage to the right with the others.

“Uggh. If it keeps up like this, I’m going to pass out from boredom,” whines Fidus.

“You may to need to know some of this, sis. Try to stay awake. If you can, that is,” Tenera replies weakly.

The Dean of Admissions spends the next hour talking about different requirements for classes and what’s to be expected from all the students and blah bah blah. Fidus passes out ten minutes into it, and I only last around twenty... I think.

I wake up to Tenera lightly poking my shoulder. I rub my eyes for a second, but then realize that Fidus and I are using each other for support, and quickly stand up. This makes her fall onto my seat and jolt awake.

“Huh? What’s going on? *yawn* What’d I miss?” she asks while getting up and stretching.

“Oh, um, well, it’s time for our group orientation,” answers Tenera.

“Didn’t we just do orientation?” I ask while rubbing my eyes and stretching as well.

“Well, yes, but that was mainly for the parents. This orientation is meant to get us acquainted with the school and to assign classes," she tells me,making me nod. I don't completely understand, but that's what I get for falling asleep.

“Okay then,” I reply sleepily. “Where do we go?”

“You just go to the Mico platform that’s assigned to your group.”

“Hmmm… Okay, you wouldn’t happen to know what group I’m in, would you?”

“They’re divided by last name, so you just need to go to the group that has this symbol on its sign,” she says as she pulls a piece of paper out from her book and writes a symbol.

“Thanks,” I say as I take the paper and put it into my pocket. I wonder why she’s so kind to me; we only met an hour ago and now she's ripping pages from her book fro me. Whatever, better this than being alone.

As we make our way out to the lobby, I see that many small groups have already begun to form. At the center of each group is a large white sign with a black symbol on it. I pull out my piece of paper and quickly match it to one of the groups in the center. I turn back to the girls and say, “Well, that’s my group. Guess I’ll see you around, then.”

Tenera gives me a small hug and says, “We’ll see you around. You be sure to come by the library so we can work on your reading. If you want to, that is…”

Fidus comes to my side and gives me a hard slap on the back. “Yeah, yeah, yeah, reading, shmeading. If you ever want to find me, I’ll probably be at the gym. So be sure to swing by so we can hang some time, alright?”

I give them a quick nod and head towards my group. It has around forty or fifty people in it already. After a few minutes of just standing there alone, I finally work up the courage to go talk to someone. I look around for a few seconds, trying to find the best candidate to fix my loneliness, but most of the people in my group have already formed their own circles.

I continue to walk around until I see two guys standing next to each other, not talking to anyone. The one on the left is roughly my height, with pale white skin, brown eyes, and neck-long dark brown hair that’s brushed back. He’s of average build and wears the same uniform as the rest of the students. The other one is a little shorter than me, with light brown skin, blue eyes, and a shaved head like mine. He’s pretty skinny, but still looks like he weighs more than I do. I walk up beside them and am about to introduce myself, when the one on the right begins to speak.

“Look, I’ll ask him just to prove you wrong,” he says in a rather booming voice while gesturing towards me. The other person just shrugs in response, not really caring about whatever it is they're talking about. “Hey! Come here real quick; I need you to help with something,” he says while motioning for me to come closer. I’m a little hesitant at first, but this is sort of what I was after, so I approach the two of them.

“What do you need help with?” I ask as I stand there.

“Before I ask, you must promise that you’ll help, no matter what. Do you promise?” he asks with a very serious look.

“I-”

“And once you make a promise, you must never ever in all of forever break that promise, or else.”

“Or else what?”

“EXACTLY!” I’m not sure what horrible things would happen if I were to break this promise, but the look on his face gives me a pretty good idea. So I decide it would be best to just humor him.

“I promise,” I reply, which sends him into a much brighter mood.

“Knock, knock,” he says, making the other person shake his head. I stare at him, trying to see if he's serious, before finally replying.

“Uh, who’s there?” I ask.

“Interrupting applause,” he replies, with a massive smile on his face. I can see where this is going, but I decide a bad joke is better than finding out what ‘or else’ meant.

“Interr-” before I can answer, he begins clapping and whistling as loud as he can. He quickly draws the attention of every person in the room. As I look around, I begin to realize that everybody is staring at me instead of him! I can feel the blood rush to my cheeks as I try to get this kid to calm down.

“Okay, okay, funny, ha ha, you got me, can you stop now?” He finally stops his applauding, only to fall on the floor in a fit of laughter. With his counterpart down, the other person begins to speak.

“Sorry about that. My friend here has a reputation for being… strange. Most people around here know not to fall for his jokes.” His voice is quiet yet understandable. He seems to hold himself in a dignified manner. Not quite posh, but pretty close.

“And you couldn’t warn me because…”

“He made me promise not to.” He sounds so sad to tell me that. Oddly enough, I somehow understand.

“AND YOU CAN NEVER EVER BREAK YOUR PROMISE, OR ELSE!” the first guy screams while jumping out from behind me, scaring the crap out of me.

“My name is Eximius,” the other one says rather calmly, “and the joker there is Inficiunt Gaudium, but most people call him ‘Cunt’ for short.”

“Hey, no they don’t! Only you do that,” replies Inficiunt, his face pouting.

“Why do they - or you - call him cunt?” I ask.

Inficiunt gives me a skeptical look before asking, “Do you know what a cunt is?”

I give it some thought before shaking my head. This makes both of them fall on the floor in a laughing frenzy. I’m a little confused, but soon realize that people are still looking at me, so I try to get them to stop.

“So anyway, my name is Miles Eremita.” Inficiunt continues to laugh, but Eximius is able to get himself under control enough to respond.

“N-nice to - haha - meet you, *chuckle* Miles.” Well… at least he’s trying. Inficiunt, on the other hand…

“Oh man… ha ha, ho ho…” After a few more chuckles and wiping the tear away, he finally gets up. “That was too funny! Oh man, I haven’t laughed that hard since… yesterday! You’re a funny little guy Miles. We’ve got to hang out some more.”

“Oh sweet Barbra, I’m not little!”

Inficiunt and Eximius look at each other before Eximius asks, “Who’s Barbra?”

DING DING DING

Before I can answer, a man in one of the grey suits begins to ring a bell he’s holding. “Alright, students with last names starting with the letters ‘E’, ‘F’, ‘G’, and ‘H’, follow me,” he says as he walks towards one of the platforms.

“That’s us,” says Eximius as he begins to walk with the group.

I catch up with him and ask, “Wait, what is your last name, anyway?”

“I don’t have one,” he replies.

“Really? Huh… Okay, I guess.” I don’t know why, but I find it really odd that he doesn’t have a last name. Whatever, if he doesn’t want to tell me, he doesn’t have to. Our group is led to a platform that is three times the size of the one that brought me here.

“Okay,” says the man in grey, “groups of ten. Once you’re on the other side, just take a seat and wait for me.” With that, the first group steps onto the platform and vanishes with a flash.

“By the way, what did you need help with, Inficiunt?” I ask while the next group gets onto the platform and vanishes.

“Huh? Oh, right! Well I had tried to tell the same joke to Eximius, but he ruined it by giving away the ending; then he said that it wasn’t a very good joke, but I said it would have been better if he didn’t ruin it by jumping to the punch line - like he always does,” he says -in one breath- while giving a dirty look to Eximius, “so I decided to try it on another person, and then you came up, and BAM! Hilarity.”

OK… I’m not sure how he said all of that in one breath, but it’s our turn to take the platform, so I ignore it for now and take my place. In a blinding flash, we’re sent to the next room.

We appear in a white square room with dark grey carpet. Along the walls are pictures of different smiling people, along with captions. There are three rows of seats, all facing away from me towards a hallway. Throughout the hallway are open doorways that I can’t see into. Most of the seats are filled, but the three of us manage to find some that are together. Once we sit down, another flash appears and more people begin taking seats while the man in grey walks to the front of the room.

“Alright, I'm going to call your name and then tell you who your counselor is,” he says while he looks over a tablet, wiping his finger from side to side. He lifts an eyebrow then looks up. “First up: Miles Eremita, you are going to see Counselor Charta Operari.” I get up and begin to walk down to the hall. As I go, all the other kids are whispering and watching me. Inficiunt and Eximius have a confused look, but don’t say anything as I leave.

I approach the man in grey and ask, “Which one is he?”

“He’s the fourth one to the right,” he tells me quickly.

At least I know some numbers. I walk down the hall, counting the doors. As I turn the corner to the fourth room, I stop dead in my tracks.

“Hello Miles.”

“C-captain?”

Next Chapter: Chapter 4 Power Estimated time remaining: 87 Hours, 47 Minutes