There is a 4th book in the Goddess over World series, but I don't think I'm going to finish it anytime soon, so I'm not putting it here.
The Cenchen are almost a secret. Almost. You might have heardthem in hallways, the back of buses, soft conversations not meant for you. You may have seen them in dark places: in dreams you can't quite remember, their dark shadows tracing a soft edge in the dark walls, the confusion so thick that everything seems darker and darker until it spirals over you, covering your mouth and nose and ears and eyes until you return to the light, the warmth, and everything has returned. You may not have heard of them. Any who know them would envy you. The Cenchen are a dark place in the world. They are a place where no one knows who or what they are, and yet they know exactly who they are because it is all they have ever known. All their parents have ever known. All their parents and their parents and their parents have ever known, a lineage so far that the need for truth and knowledge has died a slow and painful death. The worst a Cenchen can do is make you one of them. The best a Cenchen can do is tell you what they know. They will put everything in perspective so clearly that you will know exactly who you are, and no matter how miserable it seems it will be the greatest gift you have ever received. You will never meet a Cenchen, but you have met this book. I will tell you what I know, and what my parents have known and their parents and their parents, and our lineage is so far and so old that our need for truth and knowledge has died. But yours has not. I am Camielle Cenchen. "It's dark, dark, dark," Camielle hummed to herself as she changed into her clothing for the day. "The dark, dark, dark, and the light, light, light. I don't know what it means but it feels so right." She paused and tilted her head. It sounded funny, the way the words had the same ending. She'd never heard words like that. "Never heard words like that," she said in a half singsong, then paused and smiled. "Heard words! Ha! It did it again!" She smiled in delight at the small triumph. She'd figured out something. "Something, crumbthing, lumpthing," she muttered, putting her clothes away and making her bed. "Lumpthing? Ha! I need to find a lumpthing today.' She smiled. "I bet Jayne will find one." She slid her small feet into a pair of slip-on sandals and pivoted in them. The walls sailed past her, their black and gray patterns spinning in different and unpredictable ways, the colors running together so she couldn't distinguish wall from door. She walked down the black and gray hall quickly, trying to remember the images from the night before. Images, images, images…. There was a black corridor, she knew, and she walked down it purposefully. There was this whole sense of purpose, like she knew exactly what she was going to do if not what it meant. There was a door. It was light. There was a monster. It was dark. There were other images: teeth that caught her and held her, red splashed on the wall… But there was no story, no sound, only images. She found the large lunchroom and sat down next to Jayne and Alex, her two friends. The black ceiling and tables were punctuated only by bright white sitting complacently in the ceiling, spinning streams of color down to the world below. "Hey Jayne. Hey Alex.'' 'Hey Camielle,' they both said. ''Something weird happened last night.' She frowned, trying to remember. The hallways and doors seemed ages away now, twisting and refracting and dimming. She had to drag them unwillingly by teeth and throat and hair, a struggle. "I don't really remember, but there were images and words." "Images? Words?" "Something about dark and light. Are those words?" Jayne shook her head. "Dark? Light? Never heard of them.' "Good,'' Camielle said. ''The images were scary. If the dark doesn’t exist, maybe the images don’t either.'' ''How could you see something that doesn't exist?'' Alex asked, sounding confused. ''If it doesn't exist, how is it visible?'' ''The images were strange,'' Camielle answered. ''They didn't seem…'' Camielle shook her hands a little, trying to remember. ''They didn't seem like they belonged. They didn’t fit.'' "Let's talk about something else, then,'' Jayne said. ''Like breakfast. The adults can handle your weird images.'' ''The adults know everything,'' Camielle affirmed. ''They'll know what the images are. Why didn’t I think of that?'' ''So, what should we eat this morning?'' Alex asked. ''Who cares? It's all the same anyway.'' Camielle smiled. ''Maybe that's what dark means. It means all the same, and the light means different, each thing is different.'' ''Our lives are dark,'' Jayne said, trying it out, before vigorously shaking her black braids. ''Nah. Don't like that.'' ''I do,'' Camielle said. ''It sounds cool. Light.'' ''You sound like a little kid,'' Jayne said. ''Besides, what do we need new words for, anyway? We have plenty already.'' Camielle looked down. ''I like my name. A way to separate me from everyone. To make me…light.'' Jayne shook her head. ''Don't you ever listen to anything, Camielle? We can't really be part of the cenchen when we have names. We're just people that live here, not cenchen.'' Camielle gave a one-shoulder shrug. When you put it that way, it didn't sound so bad. It sounded important, like it was her job or something. “It is your job”, she thought, “It's your responsibility to be the Cenchen, not a person within them.” And yet it still seemed sinister to her, some black monster curling up in distance with large white teeth waiting to devour, to depart its own darkness upon her. Like the images she'd seen. Don't be such a child, she criticized herself. Grow up. They finished breakfast in silence still without a resolution for the day's activities. It was the same as always, a bland cereal-type thing with tart, unidentifiable fruit. No one really knew how big the Cenchen was. Various small children had walked away from the classes and small factories where their parents worked to the halls beyond. Their reports were always the same; long, boring black halls that went on forever with dozens of boring black locked doors. Even more children had gone far far far and never returned. The halls were so long long long and dark dark dark that it was hard to go far and return, the adults said. Their emotionless eyes showed no sympathy, only dark understanding, like the world behind theirs was mirrored behind their eyes. They walked past the dining area into unknown halls beyond. They were truly all the same, and she wondered why the small children ever continued far enough to get lost. ''Why are the hallways all black?' Camielle complained. "Why not blue or white or something?" ''I like black,'' Jayne said, sounding vaguely offended. ''There's nothing wrong with black,'' Camielle said. ''It's just so…dark, remember? All the same.'' ''It's better all the same,'' Jayne said. ''That's the way the adults want it.'' Camielle gave a half-shrug and stopped arguing. ''What's that?'' Alex asked, pointing to one of the doors. It didn't look like all the other doors in the Cenchen, plain black with a white doorknob. It was still black but there was color, too, silvers twists and colored adornments, glimmering and shimmering and swirling and twirling. ''It's cool," Camielle said. ''Let's go in!'' Jayne shook her head. ''I don't know. It looks screwed-up to me. What's with all the silver and white? It's so…so…" "Light,'' Camielle said. ''It's light, it's different, it's not the same as everything else.'' ''Stop using made-up words,'' Jayne said, sounding exasperated. ''They don't exist.'' "Fine, fine." Camielle said, sounding irritated herself. "But come on. What are we waiting for?'' ''I don't like the look of it,'' Alex said. ''Let's go back. Maybe that one room is open. Everyone will be there." ''But-'' "I like that idea,'' Jayne said. ''This was stupid, anyway. There's nothing here.'' ''But that door-'' Camielle tried. ''Come on,'' Jayne said, pulling on her arm. "It's probably locked anyway.'' Camielle shot one last longing glance at the light door, but didn't open it. She linked arms with her friends and walked to the large room. confusing "Catch, Camielle!' Camielle's hands shot up to protect her face and she somehow managed to catch the ball, then promptly drop it. Sports were not her thing. "Where are you today, Camielle?" Alex joked. "That ball was right at you." Where are you today? The question echoed. Where was she? She was in the Cenchen. Her feet rested on the Cenchen floor, her hands grasped a Cenchen ball, she was contained under a Cenchen ceiling. Where are you today? But her mind was not underneath the ceiling or around the ball or on the flooor. Her mind had seen everything before, so many times. It was so dark, so soul-suckingly dark. The darkness seemed everywhere, to permeate her fingers and wrists and hair and legs and feet…everything seemed dark. She did not want darkness. She wanted light. She wanted the light door. Where are you today? Her mind had not wandered back into the sports room. Her mind was still sitting outside the door, patiently waiting for the rest of Camielle to join it. She couldn't focus. No one had ever seen the light door before, she was sure. They would have mentioned it. Amid rows and rows of dark black hallways and endless dark white doorknobs, someone would have mentioned it. They would remember lone light amongst deathless dark. What was it? She wanted it. "Hello? Hell-o? Earth to Cam-ee-eel?" Alex asked, chucking the ball at her so that it lightly hit her on the head. Camielle protected her head with her hands and just managed not to get a concussion. "Ow, Alex. That hurts. And stop pronouncing my name wrong. It's Cam-ee-elle, not cam-eel." "Well, your name is about to be RIP if you don't pay attention." "Your name's about to be…um…death if you don't stop chucking random stuff at me." "Sorr-y. I just can't help it, you're such an easy target staring off into space like that." "It always takes an elephant jumping around on one leg to get Camielle attentive," Jayne said, giving a half smile. Camielle scowled. "Why do all of you always pick on me, anyway? Jayne's just sitting there. Why dontcha chuck something at her?" "Because I'll chuck it back, and I can actually hit what I want to hit within a five mile radius." "I can hit it within a ten foot radius." "You and the rest of the world." Camielle looked down and sighed. "Anyway. How long has it been since breakfast?" "You can't possibly be hungry already," Alex said. "If I was hungry," Camielle said," I would be waiting for Roshen, when the food is actually edible. No, it just feels like it's been days since this morning, for some reason, and I wanna know how much time has really passed." "It's been like three hours," Alex said, "so I think you'll survive. Or if you die, it'll be from concussion rather than starvation." Camielle nodded. Three hours… she thought to herself. Three hours of freedom gone. I need those hours back. I need to find that door. I need to open it. I need to know what's inside. She pushed her loose red hair back, trying to think. Unlike almost all of the girls in the Cenchen, she left her hair loose rather than in braids or ponytails. She always pulled on it separated it whenever she tried to think and so braiding it was more of an exercise in pointlessness than anything else. She needed to get away from Jayne and Alex, that was for sure. They felt like prison guards rather than friends, guarding, hovering, scouring. They stood impassive, watching, pulling her away from the light. They were dark, everything was dark, and they wanted her to stay dark. They hid from the light, hid from her weak light, wanting to destroy it. They ran from the door, the light door, for the light threatened their darkness. Camielle wanted the light. She did not want to be dark. She couldn't stand the darkness, and she was as frightened of it as Jayne and Alex were frightened of the light. Frightened of darkness? Her mind said. You are afraid of your friends? Don't be afraid, Camielle. There is nothing you can do. Embrace the darkness. Embrace it. Ignore the light, it will never get you anywhere to be different. "You're so spacey today," Jayne said, pulling Camielle from her thoughts. "I don't think you heard a word I just said." Camielle smiled. "No, sorry. I'm so tired, ugh." "We should enjoy the day while it lasts," Alex said, sounding irritated. "I hate classes. I hate writing. I hate reading. I hate all of our stupid machinery and spells. I want to just skip over school and go right to being an adult." "School is important, and it's not that bad. If you would just do what the adults tell you to, it would be much easier." Camielle shrugged. She was largely ambivalent toward school: not loving it, not hating it, not excelling like Jayne, not failing like Alex. She would be like the dozens of other children at graduation: never singled out for praise for disdain, losing her name quickly and painlessly and working with the other adults at mediocre jobs. "What about you, Camielle?" Jayne asked. "Don't you think the classes are getting easier?" Camielle shrugged. "They're okay, I guess." Jayne sighed. "That's what everyone says. I like the classes. Why does no one else like them?" "Because it's work, and no one likes work," Camielle said. "We all just wanna play all the time." "I wouldn't worry about it too much I were you," Alex added with a snort. "The adults all love you." Camielle rolled her eyes. "The adults don't love anything. I mean, look at them. They're all so…blank-eyed'know?" "You're going to be one soon," Jayne pointed out. "Maybe you shouldn’t be so angry at them, eh?" "I'm not angry, I just think they look sort of…creepy, the way they all look the same and say the same thing. Like they words written into them and they can't work around them, they're stuck there. Don't you think they sound like that?" "Oh come on," Alex said. "They don't look like that. They say different things. But they need to teach us the same things, so they teach it the same way." Camielle tilted her head the side, considering it. "That makes sense, I guess." "Everything makes sense, Camielle," Jayne said in her know-it-all way, "so maybe you should stop questioning it. The adults know what they're doing. I mean, they're the adults. They know everything." "I guess they've never been wrong before," Camielle said slowly. It was true. The adults with their dark eyes, dark smiles, dark frowns, and dark understanding were the epitome of darkness. If she truly feared and hated the darkness, she should have hated and feared the adults. She did not fear them. She did not hate them. They were always right. They loved the darkness, but perhaps it was because the darkness was to be loved. They were the ultimate example… Their darkness was understandable, for if they were all right they had to say all the same things. But Camielle and Jayne and Alex were not right all the time. They should be light, different. They would not be light for long. When they lost their names, they would lose their light and become adults, dark adults. The epitome of darkness. Don't be so afraid, she told herself. You are Cenchen. It is what you are meant to be. She twisted two strands of her hair together uncertainly. It would be so easy to be dark. You had to fight for light, but darkness would come without thought, without desire. She did not go after the door. She called her mind back from the threshold and melded back into society. The Cenchen were meant to be dark. The Cenchen were meant to avoid light and seek the dark, to pull society around them so completely that they were not real. The images came that night. She was walking down dark hallways. She did not know what she was looking for, but she knew it was here somewhere and she wanted it. She wanted it so much. The desire to find it drove her to wander and wander.t was all she could think about; she did not know where she was going, where she was, or where she had been: only that she was close to what she was looking for and she wanted it. It did not matter where she was, anyway. It was impossible to orient herself; the hallways were dark, far too dark. After many dark hallways, she found what she wanted. The light door. She stood and stared at it for a while, unsure whether to open it or not. The intense wanting was fading and almost gone; she was uncertain now. Uncertain about the door, uncertain about the place; uncertain about the wanting. It faded. Her desire for light faded. She gave a small half-smile at the door. It was so ridiculous. She suddenly saw the situation as Jayne and Alex. It was just another door, one of a million lining the hallway. It was lockedboring. Dark. She started walking back toward the main rooms. She would not leave them again. She would stay in the main rooms, learn her lessons, lose her name, and and become an adult. It would happen so fast she would not even notice. Soon enough she would be another dark, nameless adult, no longer light Camielle. She was already dark, so dark. She had always been dark, so dark. Camielle woke up simply enough and went through her morning routine without much frivolity. The images were so much more complete now. It wasn't just a hallway and doors. It wasn't just seeing things, hearing vague words. It was emotions, powerful emotions. She had felt the wanting, the uncertainty, and the silliness. It had transcribed to her now. She could feel a disinterested disdain for the door and a detached desire to be dark. But was it right? Were the images right? Was the door silly? Should she ignore her desire to be light; stay dark instead? Should she lose her name as casually as everyone else? Should she be light Camielle? Or a dark Cenchen girl? She walked down the hall determined not to think about. She came into the monotonous mess hall and ate her monotonous breakfast without discussion. There was little to discuss as an older child, only training and more training and more training. She and Jayne and Alex walked down the monotonous halls to a clean, monotonous classroom. There was silence in the room as the students waited for a teacher. Today's teacher was a pretty young girl who looked like she'd lost her name only recently. She had large blue eyes and golden hair and skin, very different from most of the Cenchen girls. Most people in the Cenchen had dark hair, small dark eyes, and pale skin, like the black and white of the complex had imprinted itself on the people. Camielle was one of the few who stood out, with glittering red hair, blue-green eyes, and small brown dots across her nose and forehead. "Good morning, children," She announced. "Good morning, teacher," the class answered back, every voice the same. "I assume you are all slightly nervous about losing your names in the next few months?" she tilted her head to the right s her honey hair swung down. "Everyone is always slightly nervous. It seems so unnatural to lose your name. I thought that for today we could have a short discussion about what it really means to lose your name." She gave a bland smile. "You see, the Cenchen is meant to operate as a single entity, not as a group of individuals. Everything we do we do for the entity, not for ourselves. When we lose our names, we do not lose our lives, but we do lose our selfishness, our need to do everything for ourselves and those we love. We do everything for the Cenchen: we teach for the Cenchen, we grow food for the Cenchen, we process items for the Cenchen, we have children for the Cenchen. When we lose our name, we lose our connection to our self. Our own lives mean little, as do the lives of others. What matters is that the Cenchen lives on, not the individuals within it." She paused to breathe and looked at the faces of the children. None of them seemed more at ease: If anything, they looked more worried about the impending day. But that was all right. The teacher was just getting started. "This might seem scary to you losing yourself your desire to live. But you must realize that it is the right thing to do. Your name and your sense of self is really nothing more than selfishness- living your life for yourself, learning for yourself. That is all right you are a child- you need to learn as an individual, grow as an individual, know as an individual. But when it comes time to work then you must live and work as the entity. When I work as an individual, I work for myself. But my work does not benefit myself, it benefits you, it benefits your knowledge, it benefits the Cenchen. If I was an individual, I would want to do things only for myself. "But I am not an individual, I am the Cenchen. I work to benefit the Cenchen. It works much easier. "There is a practical side to it as well. This morning, I woke up knowing I was going to come and teach you children. I did not have to go and ask. I did not have to trust another individual to give me the correct work. I, as the Cenchen, knew the best thing for the Cenchen when I woke up. "I realize that it seems quite scary now. That is why we do not make everyone lose their name at the same time. You can only benefit the Cenchen if you go willingly, if you truly realize your place. "Your place as an adult is to be the Cenchen. Right now it might seem terrible to be the Cenchen rather than yourself. But the Cenchen is what matters, not your identity. Names make you one person, but there is no room for people, only the Cenchen." Her speech finished, the teacher stood up in front of the class, waiting for some sort of response. Camielle raised her hand. "So it's not really you standing and talking to us, it's 'The Cenchen'?" The teacher nodded, "So when we lose our names, we become, like, this vessel for the Cenchen? What is 'The Cenchen,' anyway?" "Well, you might be getting the wrong impression," the teacher said. "There is no Cenchen that fills us. Our priorities change, that is all. We do what we do for the Cenchen, and thus we are the Cenchen; we are of the Cenchen." Camielle herself accepted it, but her mouth did not. She couldn't relax like all the nice little Cenchen girls and boys. She had to respond. "Why can't they just make work benefit each person?" she asked almost desperately. "Why do they have to make each person the same? Why so drastic?" The teacher sighed. "You don't understand, Camielle. Once you start working for yourself, society crumbles. There's no sharing, no giving. Cleverer people end up with everything and others with nothing. The cleverer control everything and make slaves of the others. Everyone fights for their share and alienates themselves from others. Isn't it a fair trade? You lose your name, but you win security, fairness, and closeness from others rather than competition. Which would you rather have?" "There are only two options?" "Two options, which would you pick?" It was a hard decision. Camielle swallowed. "I guess order is better. Order and security is better than just…just a name." The teacher smiled her blank smile. "Do you understand now?" The class smiled back, their expressions as blank as hers. "Yes," they answered. "Do you want to lose your names? Are you ready?" "Yes," the class answered . "Will you focus on training, will you train, will you join the Cenchen when the time comes?" "Yes," the class answered. They finished the morning reading a long piece of text about various processes within the Cenchen and answering questions, a fairly typical morning in the Cenchen. Once they were adults, reading and remembering what they read would be the most important thing they could do. Camielle, like the other children, did not have to think to read and answer questions. They'd been taught as children to create a slate in their mind, put details on it, then extract details from the slate as needed. There was no need to think. The Cenchen did not think. Camielle walked out to lunch still undecided about losing her name. The practical side was undeniable, but she still didn't understand why they had to completely erase people to keep things running smoothly. There had to be another way to run things. "Hey Camielle," Jayne greeted when she reached the table. Camielle managed a weak smile, not understanding how Jayne could be so happy after the deluge of doom and gloom they'd received that morning. "What did you think of that teacher today?" Alex asked. "I wished they'd have someone come in and talk every day. Class is so boring." "It was certainly…interesting," Camielle said carefully. "They've never been so open about it before," Jayne aid interestedly. "It's good. They trust us." "Or they know if we resist, we'll be blanked in a month anyway," Camielle said with a hint of anger. Jayne shook her head. "That's ridiculous. Why would anyone resist?" "Well," Camielle said, trying to explain the importance to Jayne. "I mean, isn't it at least a little like…you know…I mean, you lose yourself. You're just a blank slate. Isn't that…you know….bad at all?" Jayne shrugged. "Even if it's bad, what else should we do? We're Cenchen. We belong here. This is what being Cenchen means." Camielle did not seem as enthused. "I want to see the door," she said before she could stop herself. "What?" Jayne asked. "You know…" Camielle said weakly. The light door. The white and colored one." Alex rolled his eyes. "A white and colored door? Fairy tales. All the doors are the same, black with a white doorknob." "But…but…" "But what?" Jayne asked. "Didn't you see it? See the light door-" "Light?" Jayne asked. "What's light?" Camielle tried to explain it, but she couldn't quite put it into words. Light, light, what was light? How could you put light into words? How could you explain light to a person who had known only dark? How could you explain difference, uniqueness, infinite variety to someone who saw the same thing repeated over and over? Black and white rooms, black and white text, black and white people, adults with eyes as dark as their souls. "It's...It's..." Camielle said. The words were leaving her. She had the barest glimpse of the idea, but she could not articulate it. "it's...the children...it's the books...each one has it's own..." "Give it up, Camielle," Jayne said. "We're old enough to not believe everything say." Camielle looked down and ate her food. They filed back into the classroom a few minutes later and finished their questions from the morning. When they'd completed that they were given another packet, as dull as the first. The black and white classroom was pure qui They ate dinner a few monotonous hours later and had an hour or so of free time. They all walked to the large room and sat down and talked or threw balls around. Each child sat the same way, talked the same way, tilted their head to the right the same way. I thought we were light, Camielle thought. I thought our names made us light. I thought our names made us think differently. They were the same. Every child did the same thing. They ate, went to class, went to the large room, went to sleep. They lost their names and did the same. Always the same, always dark. The darkness was simple, the darkness was easy, the darkness was Cenchen and the darkness would come. The next day was the same, and so was the day after that. Camielle's days of light were disappearing quickly, but she did not care. "Camielle" got less and less real. She couldn't describe light anymore. It did not mean anything to her. She was no differentiated light. She was Cenchen. She did not mind. Her days of light were insignificant, near-torturous. Training was tedious and soon it would be over. She could not wait. She wanted to lose her name. She wanted to lose everything that set her apart from the Cenchen. The days passed by, each the same. She could not count the days, could not know if they had been more numerous yesterday. Perhaps they had. Perhaps they had not. She wanted them to end. Camielle meant nothing to her. The Cenchen meant everything. "Good morning, Jayne," Camielle said. Jayne nodded and continued eating. "Are you tired of training yet?" "I am so sick of training I can't take it any longer," Jayne said. "we were supposed to lose our names weeks ago. I can't believe we're still training." "Maybe we'll just train forever," Alex said with his usual pessimism. "It sure feels like it." "Do you think they do this to every unfortunate class, or are we just super lucky?" Jayne said. "I don't know," Camielle said. "But we'll be done soon. That's good, isn't it?" "We were supposed to be done soon weeks ago," Jayne pointed out. "If this is soon, far off things will never come." Camielle shrugged. "Being an adult is probably the same thing. Reading, operating stuff, watching kids." "But when you're an adult, you're actually helping the Cenchen," Jayne argued. "Right now we're just killing our brains. That doesn’t help anyone." "I hate talking about training," Alex said. "What else can we talk about?" "Someone got past the corridors yesterday," Jayne said. "Is that interesting?" "Someone got out?" Alex asked, sounding shocked. "What? Is that even possible?" "Apparently it is," Jayne said. Camielle's eyes were wide, but she didn't say anything. "Who was it?" Alex asked. "It wasn't a kid," Jayne said. "It was an adult. The teacher who talked about our names that one time, remember? The girl with yellow hair?" "An adult?" Alex said. "Okay, now I know you're making this up. Adults are the Cenchen. They don't have names. Why would they leave?" Jayne shrugged. "It's true. One of the adults told me." "How did she get out?" Alex asked. "They found her outside the main complex," Jayne said authoritavely. "I don't know where, really. She was rambling on about some kind of door she found that lead her to anothersociety thing. Like another Cenchen, but different. She got scared and came back, she said." Alex raised an eyebrow. "So she walked through a door, one of the millions of doors outside the complex, and found another society, then came back? What was she doing outside the complex anyway?" "The adults probably walk around the complex at night making sure no one gets lost," Camielle said. "Maybe she took a wrong turn or something. Kids say those corridors go on forever." "I swear it's true," Jayne said. "The adults wouldn't lie, would they?" "You would," Alex pointed out. "One of the adults told me," Jayne repeated. "I asked them if it was possible to leave the complex. At first they said no, but they changed their answer midsentence and told methat someone just had." "Why did you want to know if it was possible to leave the complex or not?" Alex said. "I was curious" "Maybe they'll mention it to the class," Camielle said. "Would you be happy then?" "Yes," Alex said, "I would be the happiest person alive." Camielle shrugged. "I don't think it's such a big deal. Kids get stuck in those corridors all the times. Ones that don't make it back." "Yeah, but they're kids," Alex argued. "Adults can't get lost. I mean...they're adults. It doesn't make sense." Jayne shrugged. "Well, sensical or not, class is about to start. And regardless of their navigational skills, I would really prefer to not make the adults mad by being late." "Let's go," Alex said. They were late of course, and had to half-run, half-walk to the classroom. They slid and scrambled into the classroom a few minutes behind everyone else, and the other children had the opportunity to laugh and snicker at them. There was an adult standing at the front of the class, unusual. Once kids were this age they usually received packets rather than instruction. Being the intelligent and well-trained children they were, they took the opportunity to stare and gawk at the adult standing there rather than immediately take their seats. There were several moments of silence. "Would you like to sit down?" the adult asked, gesturing to the desks. "We are all waiting for you." "Uh...right," Jayne said, and the three sat down as unawkwardly as they could, but not managing it very well. When the entire class was seated, the teacher once again looked up. "I imagine you would like me to explain what I am doing here." They nodded. "We are having...problems with the corridors. How many of you went exploring out there as small children?" Most of the class raised their hands. Small children loved to run around the corridors and dare each other to go further further further, always further. Jayne and Camielle had always been especially good at this, winning most of the contests . "Small children leaving and getting lost is...regrettable. Older children leaving and getting lost," he looked especially prominently at Jayne, Camielle, and Alex, "is...even more so. But when an adult shows a...deficiency in their navigational ability, that is when we see it as truly wrong. Action must be taken." The class was silent and unquestioning, as if they already knew everything he was saying, everything he was building up to. Perhaps they did. "An adult was found outside the complex last night. That alone would not be a cause for alarm- the corridors are occasionally.. watched in case a child has gone too far and is missing- but she alluded that she had wandered down the corridors deliberately and found another society. We do not know if this is true or not." "Another society?" Camielle asked, "There are other societies?" "Most likely not," the adult answered. "We know what is behind every door, and there is no other society, no other Cenchen. Something is very wrong. And that is what I have to tell you today. Something...dangerous is outside. Something that makes us see things we do not truly see. And thus we must, absolutely must make sure that each class stays outside the corridors. You must remain inside the complex.” “This is especially important for you, this class," he looked conspicuously at Jayne, Camielle, and Alex again, "as our almost-trained class must not be lost to us. Do you understand?" "Yes," the class answered. "Will you stay inside the complex?" "Yes," the class answered in chorus. "Will you focus on training, will you train, will you join the Cenchen when the time comes?" It was the customary way for an adult to finish an announcement. And the answer was always yes. They finished the morning with another endlessly dull packet and escaped to lunch a few hours later. "So you were right Jayne," Alex said. "Sorry I thought you lied." "Yeah, Jayne," Camielle said. "It's cool how you always know things before everyone else. Weird, but cool." "Is it just me," Alex said, "or did the adult turn and glare at us every five seconds?" "Not every five seconds," Jayne said. "Just every time he mentioned older kids leaving the main complex." She put her head in her hands. "Between that and the lateness, that has to be the most embarrassing thing in a long time." "There, there," Alex said sarcastically, patting her on the shoulder, "There's always tomorrow." Camielle laughed. "This will probably amaze you," Jayne said, her face still in her hands, "but that is definitely not making me feel better." "Who said I was trying to make you feel better?" Alex said. Jayne sighed, then turned and glared at Camielle. "And as for you..." she said, trailing off in a way that could be interpreted as threatening or as indifference to finishing her sentence. "Me?" Camielle said, "I'm not the one that shot question after question at you and made us late!" "It sort of was your idea to go out to the corridors, though," Alex pointed out. "It was not," Camielle said, "It was boredom and a lack of navigational ability that lead us to go out the corridors." Jayne snickered at that and said, "Did you notice that's exactly what he said? A deficiency in navigational ability? Ha." "See? See?" Alex said. "Not so weird after all. They have flaws." "Who, the adults?" Jayne asked. "The adults aren't weird," Camielle said. "The adults are always right," Jayne affirmed. "Which makes it even weirder one of them got lost," Alex said. "I mean, if they're always right, how come they didn't know exactly where to go and all that? They're part of the Cenchen, they carry a piece of it in their souls...shouldn't they at least know how big it is?" "They said she went deliberately," Camielle said, "Maybe she was looking for something." "That's even more ridiculous," Jayne said. "There's nothing there but doors. What could she possibly be looking for?" "Well, the doors have to serve some sort of purpose," Camielle said, "They're probably rooms for the adults or factories or something. Maybe she opened the wrong one." "How could an adult open the wrong one?" Alex asked. "That's what I'm saying. They know everything, and especially around here. They can't possibly just wander into the wrong door." There was a pause. Jayne suddenly slapped a hand to her forehead. "God we're such idiots. We didn't even listen to what he said. There's something out there. Something that makes us see things that aren't real. It doesn't matter why she was opening doors and getting lost, because she didn't. She was patrolling the corridors and hit an illusion or something." "There's something out there that makes illusions?" Alex asked, "Cool. We should go and get it." Camielle rolled her eyes. "Go and get it? Why on earth would we want to do that? Besides, didn't the adults tell us to stay in the main complex? Whatever it was would probably hit us, too. It's dangerous." "Do you ever listen?" Jayne asked Alex. "No," he admitted. "It's boring. Training is boring, stupid endless packets and adults that never shut up." "I wholeheartedly agree," Camielle said. "I thought you liked training," Jayne said, sounding sarcastically betrayed. "No one likes training," Alex said. "Even you don't like training." "Some of it is interesting," Jayne said. "I just wish I could become Cenchen already." "Don't we all," Alex said. Images came that night. She could not say what they were. She knew they were not truly in her bedroom, but they existed somewhere else. It was showing her a depiction, a diagram, but no directions. It was a door, a door with colors like red and blue and green, colors she could name but rarely saw. A door with white and silver, a door that was beautiful. A door that stood out among many, a door you would remember. It was real. It was a secret, but it was an answer. It was forbidden, but it was a need, a want. She wanted it, she wanted it desperately. She wanted the answers. She woke up and grabbed her black Cenchen dress off the floor. She changed quickly and silently and walked quietly to the door of her room. It was a door as formidable as the door in the images. She'd never awoken at night, never left for the empty hallways alone, and had certainly never broken a Cenchen rule. It's dangerous, the adults had said. No one can go and look for it. No one can enter the hallways. You must remain in the complex. The adults were always right. If they said it was dangerous, then it was dangerous. She could not walk outside if the adults forbade her to. Whether or not the adults were right about the danger was entirely rhetorical. But whether or not she actually cared was another thing altogether. She stood at the door for several long minutes. She wanted the door, and knew now would be the best time to go. But the adults said it was dangerous...said she could not go....said she must remain inside and sheltered... She stood there for a long time deciding. But it was rhetorical decision, and in the end she went back to bed, back to sleep, back to darkness. "Hey Jayne. Hey Alex." "Hey Camielle," they both answered back. "Do you guys ever...see images at night?" Camielle asked them somewhat hesitantly. "No," Jayne said. "No," Alex said. "Maybe it's that illusion thing." Camielle shook her head. "Not like that. It wasn't an illusion. I mean, it wasn't real and I could...you know...see it and everything, but it wasn't like...like...there in there....and I mean...you know..." she trailed off, still fumbling for the right words to describe her images. Alex shrugged. "All right then...what did you see?" "A door." She frowned. "It was...special. I wanted it." She snorted and shook her red hair back. "I almost got out of my bed to go and look for it. Ridiculous, isn't it?" "That sounds...scary almost," Alex said, in a disbelieving, almost sarcastic, and entirely unsympathetic voice. "But, I mean, I thought you said the images don't exist." Camielle rolled her eyes like this should have been understood. "I know. That's why it's so ridiculous." Jayne rolled her eyes. "Obviously. Do you need a road map?" she asked Alex. "Don't be so mean," Camielle said, patting Alex on the arm. "Just because someone is a little slow doesn't mean we should mock them, should we?" Alex glared at her half-sarcastically. "Class time," Jayne announced, standing up and clapping her hands together in a very orderly way. "I'm not done yet," Camielle said, frantically shoveling the bland food into her mouth. "Yeah, me neither!" Alex agreed. "Well, you must go regardless," Jayne said. "We all know the consequences of spending too much time talking and eating by now, do we not?" "You can go early, miss perfection," Alex said. "Or are you too terrified to cross the hallways from here to the classroom?" Camielle stood up. "Oh well,” she said, “ the food is not very good, anyway. See you later Alex." Class was as dull as always. Camielle tried not to let her mind wander back to the forbidden door, but it was not easy. She wanted it and this want was not easily dispelled. They finished class and went to lunch. Camielle's mind was still on the door and it was hard to focus on her friends. As her friends talked, she ate silently, thinking of doors and white rather than training and training and more training. Dark and light, she thought to herself. They sound like nonsense but I know they mean something. What do they mean, what could they mean? She knew it had something to do with that door, a sea of dark and one light door. If she found the door she would know what they meant. She tapped her fingers on the table. She had to know, she simply had to. She needed answers, and she needed them now. Whether the adults wanted her to or not, she would go tonight. She would find the door and open it. She would go through. It was driving her crazy, insane. She could not take it any longer. Her worry for rules and structure and dark was fading and her desire for the door was increasing, every minute, every second. Night. She fell asleep against her will, and the images came again, same as always. A door, the same door, She sat outside it, watched it, watched the light. It is different, she thought. The other doors are black, like a sea of black and dark. And the door stands alone, white and silver and light. Difference is light, sameness is dark. She woke up with the words echoing in her head. Uniqueness is light, sameness is dark. The Cenchen was dark, very dark. She stood up and walked to the door, still uncertain. Perhaps the door was not as important as she thought it would be. Perhaps it was better to simply go back to sleep and ignore the door, to stay dark. The adults wanted her dark, and the adults were always right. They wanted her to stay away from the corridors, and they were always right. She took a step back hesitantly, considering. I don't care, she decided. They can't make me do anything. I'm going to the corridors, and I'm finding that door, and I'm doing it now. She opened the door, pushed it open, and walked out into the hallway. She walked past the dining hall and into the corridors. The corridors were eternal, a neverending stream of dark black that never seemed to end. She'd never gone through the empty corridors alone, just her and the black and white, her and the dark. It was lonely, it was scary and terrifying, yet she could not stop. There were no adults guarding the corridors to catch her, stop her, tell her to go back. There was no need. No Cenchen child would go out to the corridors after strictly being told not to. Camielle was the only one that wanted something out there, wanted it enough to disobey: to question the adults' authority. The corridors, she eventually learned, were very long. It was worse than that: she had no idea where the door was, where she was, or where she had been. She did not really care. Her life in the Cenchen was insignificant compared to the importance of the door. She kept walking, passing an endless amount of the dark hallways. They seemed painted with fear rather than paint, and Camielle began to wish she had waited until morning-tomorrow-Jayne and Alex-when she lost her name-this was forbidden-dangerous-why had she come-she should have stayed asleep-walking more and more frantically- The door. The light door. It was there. It was real, all white and silver and bright, just as she had seen it before. She reached out to touch it hesitantly, unsure of what would happen. It opened easily. The sight inside was more than she ever would have thought possible. The world inside burst with color, and it was light- so light- so much lighter than the eternal Cenchen dark. White covered the walls, and long rows of books covered them. The floor was red and had fabric on it for some reason. She took a step forward and the door shut behind her. She did not care. The world she was in now was so light it shone, and the Cenchen dark was unimaginably horrible in comparison. She reached for one of the books. Books were nothing special, nothing exciting, just deathlessly boring descriptions of deathlessly boring Cenchen things, the kind of thing that only Jayne found interesting. But the room was so light and colorful she could not imagine the books as boring. She pulled off a purple one, flipped to a random page, and started reading. "The Cenchen was not always dark." Camielle almost dropped the book in surprise from just that one line. Dark? It was real? It meant something? "The Cenchen used to be the strongest group in the world- small, but so powerful that no one dared attack them.” "Those days are gone." Camielle frowned at the text. She didn't understand. How could anyone attack the Cenchen? There was no one else but the Cenchen, nothing outside the corridors. Who was there to attack? She almost put the book away, but decided to keep reading no matter how confusing it was. If this was what the door had to give her, she must not stop. She sat down on the floor to continue. There were always those similar to the Cenchen- F.B. Bridges, Heleron, and most notably the Tertiminaries. But they were insignificant compared to the Cenchen. The Cenchen controlled everything, everyone. You cannot imagine what it was like to be Cenchen in those days. We never worked: we learned magic as dutifully as our parents and their parents and their parents, all to keep the Cenchen strong. We took whatever we wanted or needed from the others without thought or worry, safe and secure in our superiority. For we had been granted the greatest gift of all: The Stone, the Cenchen Agate. The Stone was not the only one of its kind, but it was the only one worth mentioning. Its power was unimaginable. Any individual who stood in its way held not a chance. Anything we wanted was given to us. But rather than share this wealth, this power, this presence, we stole it all for ourselves. The purpose of this book is not to make you hate the others. It is not to make you yearn for the Stone. It is not even to make you understand that you deserve this fate. Such reactions are understandable, but all emotions are insignificant and weak compared to knowledge, and all knowledge is insignificant and weak compared to the simple knowledge of who and what you are. You are Cenchen, and you must understand that. You must understand who and what the Cenchen are. But even more than that, you must know yourself, your individual. You must know your name. I do not think you know your name. The Cenchen you know now is not the way it always was. People used to always have names, to stay individuals forever. Knowledge was shared more freely between members of the Cenchen. But most importantly, it was not a place of shadows and darkness and black. Each room was different, each room was bright. Whoever is reading this will surely never understand what it is like to have a name, a true name. Only small children know what it is like to have a name, and they will like each other, hate each other, annoy each other, and so on based on their names and their personalities. They will form friendships with people they like, and avoid them with people they don't like. But once children get older, they stop talking. When they get close to getting their names, they are as close to being adults, and they will start to know things before they are told. But their names mean little, their personalities mean little, and they do not need a knife to separate from their name. It will come apart on its own. Adults never talk to each other. Why should they? They are all the same. It would be as good as talking to yourself. Our day was not like this. The adults instructed, they did not simply pass out pointless work. They smiled and frowned, and they did it genuinely, they did not simply do whatever they were instructed to. Older children talked and laughed and complained and destroyed things, they did not simply sit in stone. People's names make them who they are. But you are surely not seven any longer, and will not remember it as well as you should. You will never have a name again. Never have a name again? Older children have names, Camielle thought to herself frantically. I am Camielle, Camielle, Camielle. It is my name. It is who I am. The other children have names, too, and they know… But she had seen the empty smiles of the other children, the quiet tables. Most days she and Jayne and Alex talked while the others sat, blankly, staring into space. She looked at the book. Was it the truth? Were there older days in the Cenchen, with names and thought and emotion? Or was someone mocking her, laughing at her, writing a book to scare and confuse her? She was too tired to decide. She decided to keep the book, read it tonight or whenever she had free time. She slid it in a pocket in her dress and crept out the door and down the corridors. She knew which way her room was in and she followed it. She found her room without trouble and went to sleep. "Hey Jayne. Hey Alex." Camielle sat down at the table and eyed the food without much interest. "Hey Camielle," they both said back to her. "They're going to give us a date today," Jayne said. "What's that supposed to mean?" Camielle asked, still disinterested. "We'll know when we're going to lose our names. Finally. Are you ready or what?" Camielle did not look particularly excited. Instead, she sat and stared with her mouth half open like she'd just gotten hit in the face with a raw fish. "Camielle? Are you okay?" Alex asked. "It's not that big of a deal." "When is it?" Camielle asked. "When will we lose our names?" Jayne rolled her eyes and sighed. "We don't know when we'll lose our names yet, Camielle. That's why we're getting a date, so we will." "How long is it?" Alex asked. Jayne sighed and put a hand to her forehead in frustration. "I knew telling you two this was a bad idea. Look, the date will just tell us when we can expect to lose our names. I do not know what the date is. We will get a date today." "Ohhhhh," Alex said. "I get it." "Why do you look so upset, Camielle?" Jayne asked. "You should at least be somewhat happy. We will know when training will finally end!" Camielle shrugged pathetically with only her right shoulder. She did not want to lose her name anymore. She did not even care about being Cenchen anymore. She wanted to stay Camielle, now and for as long of a time as she could. Alex did not look very happy either. "I guess…I guess I'm just sort of shocked. In a good way, sort of. But I'm just surprised, I guess." Jayne rolled her eyes. "Well I am very happy that training is almost over, even if you freakazoids could care less." "I'm happy," Alex insisted. "I'm just surprised. I was beginning to think we would never go to training. This is good." Jayne sighed. "My great news and this is the response I get? A comatose Camielle and a stuttering Alex? Ugh." Alex rolled his eyes. "What do you want, a celebration party? Yay for Jayne, she told us we'll know when our training ends! Hooray!" Jayne narrowed her eyes at him sarcastically. "I asked for happiness, not sarcasm! Be happy, Alex! Happy!" She demanded in her own sarcastic way. Camielle broke in suddenly. "Have you ever noticed we're the only ones who talk?" she burst out. "We are?" Jayne asked, looking around. "Hey. We are. That's weird. I wonder why." Camielle sighed and started twirling a strand of hair around her finger. "It's like they don't need to lose their names. The other children are all…all the same. Losing their names is a formality, not a change." Jayne looked at her like she was crazy. "Camielle, are you okay?" "Every child is different," Alex said. "We don't become adults until we lose our names. They have names. We have names." Camielle shrugged. "I'm just saying." Jayne stood up. "Well, my two excitable friends, we should probably get to class. I still mustn’t be late." "All right," Camielle said. Alex nodded. There was an instructor there that day, as Jayne had predicted. "Good morning, class," he said "Good morning," they said back. "We have good news for you," he said. "You are very close to finishing your training." The other children smiled faintly, but Jayne was the only one that looked genuinely happy. "We have decided- temporarily, of course- that we will make you adults in four weeks time, twenty eight days. Be ready." Camielle's mouth dried. It was so soon… Jayne raised her hand. "Will we lose our names as a class?" The adult nodded. "If all goes well, you will become adults together." "What if things don't go well?" Alex asked. The adult gave a simpering, dark smile. "Let's just hope that doesn't happen." He handed them books and told them to read. The children did not even consider avoiding it, and the room was as silent as ever. Camielle thought about the purple book in her pocket. She could care less about whatever nonsense the book was about. But the purple book was interesting, the first book she'd seen and wanted to read. She slid it underneath the book she was supposed to be reading. She'd finished the first chapter and was on the second, which was about the other societies. You do not truly need to know about most of the societies to understand my point. The only truly important ones are F.B. Bridges and the Tertiminaries. They were strong, but more importantly they were crafty. Very crafty. F.B. Bridges was the scary one, a rigorous curriculum, a rigorous life. Parents were handpicked by the leader of each of their two major clans so that the children would be as perfect as possible. The child started school at six and learned exactly what F.B. Bridges was about. By the time they were fourteen, their classes are entirely based on magic and weapons. They learn how to be as dangerous as possible, using a kind of power they call Kins which in low levels can move things and at high levels can do all kinds of things. They get scars across their wrist- some to identify the school and clan of each member, some to identify their power. It would take only a few of the most powerful F.B. Bridges students to take down the Cenchen individuals. They dared not to, however. We could eradicate their entire society with the Stone. F.B. Bridges was new compared to other societies, but they were incredibly strong and dangerous. They built headquarters all over the world and took over many normal schools, making normal children not affiliated with any one society forced to do whatever F.B. Bridges wanted them to do in normal society. They were like a virus- infecting society after society, child after child, making each one exactly like Bridges. They always turned into fighters, completely willing to follow Bridges. This was partly what made them strong- their ability to conquer, their ability to control. Camielle reread the small section several times. It was a world she had never known, never even thought about. Some small children liked to make up other societies, but the idea that there was something else out there was whimsical, crazy, definitely not taken seriously. It felt strange to read about these people. Even the Cenchen was unrecognizable. She'd never heard stories about a stone or being super powerful or anything else the book said. It seemed to have no connection to her life or anything she knew. She recognized only the language. But she could not stop reading. She kept reading about F.B. Bridges. It went into a little bit of their history- their slightly psycho founder, F.B. Bridges, had apparently started the school in the hopes of killing this even more psycho and powerful villain. Eventually, though, it evolved into a large group simply trying to take over- take over the other societies, take over the normal people, take over everything. Most of it made very little sense to her. The idea of other societies existing was strange enough, but the idea of these societies going and trying to kill each other ? That was even stranger. She didn't understand what they had to gain. She didn't understand any of it. But she could not stop reading. She barely noticed when the class put the books to the side and walked out of the class. They did it simultaneously with no announcement, as they all simply knew when the class was over and it was time to leave. Camielle almost missed it today, although she'd never before been unable to sense the time to leave. She surreptitiously slid the purple book back into her pocket, left the other one on the desk, and quietly walked out the door behind everyone else. "Boring," Alex said as he shoved the bland, unidentifiable food served into his mouth. "Four weeks of this? I'll go insane." Jayne sighed. "At least we know when it'll be over. Finally. They can't just make us wait forever. They're done with being vague." "It's very soon," Camielle said. "Are you crazy?" Jayne said. "Four weeks will never end." "It'll end," Alex said. "Trust me, it'll end." Camielle did the same thing in the afternoon that she'd done in the morning, and thus started reading about the Tertiminaries. The Tertiminaries were not as strong as F.B. Bridges, but they were resilient to conquest and thus were never controlled by Bridges. Their society was much the way ours used to be- small, unlike Bridges, one unit, unlike Bridges, with classes and knowledge similar to ours rather than the fighting-based one of Bridges. They had been around as long as us, and they were our total and complete enemies. Like us, the Tertiminaries demanded complete and total allegiance to the idea of being a Tertiminar. The idea of becoming like Bridges never managed to stick, and the one time Bridges tried to conquer them the people rebelled, preferring death and torture to becoming a Bridges host. Like the Cenchen, the Tertiminaries had a Stone, the Tertiminar Quartz. It was insignificant and had little power, but it was enough to convince F.B. Bridges to stay away after the first time they tried to take over. All in all, they were much like us. Like us, they had to worry little about obtaining goods, unlike many of the smaller societies, and they worried little about conquest, unlike F.B. Bridges. They were primarily concerned with carrying on the knowledge they'd received at their start. To understand the Tertiminaries, or even the Cenchen, you must understand why we were both created. The story goes that a person- it was so long ago no one quite knows who- needed to hide from Sahbrihna, the same villain F.B. Bridges destroyed. Long before F.B. Bridges. those who knew anything important about magic or weapons, were quickly tracked down by her so she could use whatever they knew. It was difficult to avoid being caught. No one quite knows how, but the founder created a small group of people to protect the magic and weapons before killing himself. We still aren't sure how the people managed to hide against Sahbrihna, what made them different enough to survive. The two sections eventually split over unimportant issues, and are now known as the Cenchen and the Tertiminaries. The Cenchen weapons, the Tertiminar magic, the Cenchen Agate, the Tertiminar Quartz, all are essentially what the founder wanted to hide so many years ago. The book went on a little longer about the Tertiminaries, and Camielle read and reread it until the afternoon was over. She was less confused now, and she'd begun to get used to the idea of there being other societies, the societies hating or fearing each other. She wondered where they were, if they still existed. If she opened the other doors in the hallway, would she see them? Would she walk into an F.B. Bridges school? Would she walk into the Tertiminaries? What if she went beyond the corridors? Did they exist there? If she walked long enough would the corridors end, the darkness end, and she'd see F.B. Bridges and the Tertiminaries? Where were all these people? Were they in the sky above her? But what changed us? She thought to herself. What made us from being like the Tertiminaries? What made us dark? She put the book back underneath her coat and walked out with all of the other dark Cenchen children as quietly and complacently as ever. Was it the founder's idea to make people lose our names? Camielle thought. If it's a Cenchen thing, it must have started with him. Does F.B. Bridges make people lose their name? Does the Tertiminaries? Is it something only Cenchen can do? What makes us different?" "Cam-ee-elle," Jayne said loudly. "Hell-o? Are you even awake?" "You've barely talked today," Alex said. "Or yesterday," Jayne said. Camielle shrugged. "I guess I just don't really feel like talking." "Why?" Jayne asked. "I don't know," Camielle said quietly. "How can you not know?" Jayne asked. "Let's talk about something else," Alex suggested. "Like what?" Jayne said. "There's never anything to talk about except training. And Camielle being depressed or something." "That book we read was weird today," Alex said. "It never really seemed to have a point, did you notice that?" "No," Jayne said. "I did," Alex said. "It would start off talking about all these different stone things, then it would talk about spells, then it would talk about random people. It never seemed to come together and make sense." "So it was about a lot of different things," Jayne said. "Who cares? You don't have to understand it, you just have to read it and remember it." "Still, though," Alex said. "It was very strange." "They just want to make sure we know everything we need to know," Jayne said. "If they have to have it be random, I really don't care." "Do you two always have to grandstand?" Camielle complained. "You're giving me a headache." "What's grandstanding?" Alex asked. "It's when you talk really loud for the express purpose of making sure everyone can hear you," Jayne informed him, "and you would know that if you ever pay attention when you read. And we're not grandstanding, Camielle. We're talking at normal volumes." "Everyone can hear you," Camielle said. "Everyone can hear us because no one is talking," Alex pointed out, "not because we're talking loudly." Jayne looked at the other children briefly. "I still don't understand why they never talk. Why do they have to stare at us like that?" "I wonder what they would say if you walked up to them and started talking to them," Camielle said. "Would they answer you, or would they just stare at you?" "Stare at you," Alex said. "Answer you," Jayne said at the same time. "It's interesting to think about," Camielle said. "Not really," Jayne said. "I'd rather talk about that book I saw you reading in class today." Internally, Camielle was fairly sure her entire body shut down instantly as Jayne said that. Externally, she pretended like she thought Jayne was referring to the blue one they'd passed out. "The one they handed out?" Camielle said. "Please don't bring that up. It was confusing as hell." I really hope it actually was confusing as hell, Alex, Camielle thought. Because if it isn't I think I am going to go and kill you. "I think I saw you reading a different one," Jayne said. "Were you?" "No," Camielle said. "Books are boring. Why would I bother reading a different one?" Jayne shrugged. "I thought they gave you a different one. Did they?" "No," Camielle said. "Your mind wanders off way too much when you read, Jayne. You sound crazy." "Jayne is crazy," Alex said. "Well, let's talk about something else then," Jayne said, pointedly ignoring Alex. "Do you ever wonder if maybe there are other people besides us?" Camielle asked. "No, I don't wonder," Jayne said. "They're right there behind us." "No, I mean, people besides the Cenchen," Camielle said. "Don't you think it's possible?" Jayne raised an eyebrow. "Other people? Where?" Camielle shrugged. "Like…behind the doors or something." "The doors just hold boring magic stuff," Jayne said. "Stones and swords and whatnot." "Oh," Alex said. "So that's what the book was about. The stuff behind the doors." Jayne rolled her eyes. "Do you have the capability to remember anything?" Jayne said. "That's elementary. We learned it years ago." "Well, maybe some of the doors hold that kind of thing," Camielle said. "But maybe others have, you know, other people. Don't you think it's at least possible?" "No," Jayne said. "No," Alex affirmed. "Why not?" Camielle asked. "Why don't you think it's at least possible that there's someone besides us?" "Because the adults said we're the only ones," Jayne said. "And the adults are always right." "But what if-" "You think the adults are wrong?" Alex asked, one eyebrow raised. "That's not possible, Camielle," Jayne said. "Why do you keep bringing up these strange things today?" "Maybe they're not wrong, just-" "Just what?" Jayne asked tauntingly. "They lied to us? They told us we're all alone, just for fun?" It did not seem plausible. Neither option seemed plausible. How could the adults be wrong? How could the adults lie? How could either possibility be true? But she knew it was true. Her dark faith in the adults had switched around. She did not think the adults always had to be right. They could lie. Maybe they don't know, Camielle thought to herself. Maybe the adults before the adults told them that there was no one else…they're not lying…they're just wrong… Maybe the other societies were gone by now. She'd heard little about the past, only information about the present. Maybe the adults said there were no other societies not because the Cenchen had always been alone but because they were alone now. She did not know what was true. Maybe the book is just a story, she thought to herself. Maybe they made things up. She did not know what was true. There was too much conflicting information, too many possibilities, too many things she wanted to be true that simply could not be true. She did not want to think about such things. It did not help that she was tired from being awake most of the night before. When you are going to try and think, it is best to think after a lot of sleeping. Thinking without sleeping does not make people happy campers. The three got up. Camielle started to walk with them, but stopped after a little bit, suddenly facing a massive weakness attack. "Camielle?" Alex asked, turning to watch her. "What are you doing?" Camielle shook her head slightly. Her head hurt like hell and she was not in the mood to go into the large room and try to talk and get things thrown at her. "I have a headache.” “Oh,” Jayne said. She paused slightly. “Are you going to go back to your room, then?” “Yeah, I think I will.” She walked back to her room and laid down on her bed, trying to decide whether it would be more satisfying to sleep or to continue reading the purple book. She decided on the book. You have read about the Cenchen, Bridges, and the Tertiminaries. When you look around you, it is quite obvious that the world around you is quite different from any of these. You must understand why. Bridges had long been angling to gain control of the Tertiminaries and us, the Cenchen. The only thing that would allow them to do so was the Stone, the Cenchen Agate. They wanted it. One of the Bridges fighters, Lucy Jones-Lear, easily made it into the Cenchen by pretending to be on of us. It was not hard to believe. She had disguised her blonde Bridges hair so it was distinctive Cenchen black and the person who she claimed was her mother had once had a daughter named Lucy. She killed the guards watching the Stone, the strongest fighters the Cenchen had. She easily controlled the Stone after that. Once the Stone was hers, we were lost. Every Cenchen person carries power inside them from the Stone, and when it became Lucy’s, the power vanished, killing many of the weaker Cenchen people, especially the children. Bridges moved in soon after to try and take over. Despite our loss of people and power, we defended the Cenchen as strongly as we could, and Bridges lost many of their strongest fighters. We survived attack after attack, determined to save the Cenchen, recover the stone, and reassert our dominance over the others. We were demolished eventually, again by the tricks Lucy Jones-Lear. She made it into the Tertiminaries complex by again disguising herself. Once in she stole the Tertiminar Quartz, threatened vtheir leader, and eventually forced the Tertiminaries to join the fight against us. We could have fought off F.B. Bridges forever but the combined forces of the Tertiminaries and Bridges was impossible. Bridges had huge numbers and incredible strength, and the Tertiminaries understood the technology we’d been left almost as well as we did. We surrendered quickly. Camielle put the book down and stared at it for a little bit. We surrendered. Surrendered. It was the Cenchen. The Cenchen had surrendered. Is it real? Camille thought to herself frantically. Surely someone should have mentioned this at some point! We can't be a part of Bridges. I would know. We would know. Surely we would know. The adults would know. The adults would tell us. She stared at the book, noticing dimly how much sense the book made to her now. She could read it with a dull edge of understanding, even though she'd rarely heard many of these words and some of the concepts were foreign to her. She continued reading. With control of the Cenchen, the Tertiminaries basically gave up. Although Lucy and F.B. Bridges failed to use the Stone, they were still the most powerful group around. Thy controlled everything. It would not be exceedingly difficult for them to demolish the Tertiminaries. They were the only society left standing, and it is so hard to stand alone. Furthermore, the destruction of the Cenchen was massive, and they likely wanted to avoid this. Only thirty or forty people remained. The complex was in pieces. All of the weapons and many of the books were taken to F.B. Bridges. The people were as broken as the complex, their identity crushed. They called themselves Cenchen, but they were not truly Cenchen. They were weak and frightened, and they accepted Bridge's control with little argument. They did not care about throwing off Bridges and remaining free. All they wanted was to survive. It is difficult to describe those days, even though I lived through them. I do not remember much, as I was quite young. It was chaotic but subdued at the same time, unorganized and depressed. F.B. Bridges built us a new complex within a few days. Bridges provided food and other such necessary things, but no one was very talkative and only the children ate. It was during this depression that a new leader would emerge, and he- not F.B. Bridges- was the true cause of the Cenchen's problems today. His name was Matthew Herjika-Cenchen. He was the only adult who ate and talked and stayed energetic. As time went on he gained more and more power- he parceled out the supplies, he restarted classes, he tried to keep everyone together. It is possible that he is the main reason we stayed alive during that time. Throughout it all he continued to insist our time as part of Bridges was temporary and that we would be Cenchen soon, as long as we all stayed together and worked together and worked to make the Cenchen stronger until we would throw off Bridges. I don't know how we fell for it, how we possibly could have believed him, but we did. We listened to him and we did everything he said. The book went into more detail about Matthew and the time he controlled. She understood the idea of control much more now and wondered why it had been so important then but did not seem to exist any more. Why did people want to control others so desperately? Why couldn't they simply leave each other alone? She read more and more about Matthew, finding him quite interesting. The people were desperate for him, desperate for order, desperate for leadership, and did everything he asked. Even the children obeyed everything he said, working hard in their classes, learning how to fight. The Cenchen started building, too, expanding on the knowledge their founder had used years earlier. For thousands of years the Cenchen and the Tertiminaries had stored the knowledge of their founder, but they had never tried to understand it, never tried to use it to make something new, something more powerful. Matthew knew how to do it. He knew everything the Cenchen had ever been given and he understood it, too. He could make the connections between all of the information, and he made their weapons faster, stronger, and more powerful. He made their small factories faster and more efficient, and within a few months the Cenchen was as strong as ever even without the Stone. Things were happier. Some parents missed their children, some children missed their parents, and almost everyone had lost a sibling, but the Cenchen grew closer together, like one large family. Matthew was not satisfied. He insisted that the Cenchen would never be restored without more people, more fighters, and they couldn't wait decades to be back to a normal population. He wanted a new program. Camielle shut the book after that last line and went to sleep. She was so tired she could barely think, let alone read, but was still desperate to finish the book. She'd read it in class tomorrow. She woke up in the morning feeling better and slid the purple book back into her coat. The book was still somewhat confusing and most of it contradicted what the Cenchen had always taught her, but she had decided to continue reading it and believing it. The book was light and the adults dark, and she trusted the light to make her light. Following the adults would darken her. "Hey Jayne, Alex," she said, once she reached the table. "Hey," they both said. "You shouldn't have gone back to bed last night," Jayne said. "Yeah, something actually interesting happened," Alex added whilst shoveling food in his mouth at an impressive pace. "That weirdo kid with the blue eyes-you know, the one that broke the books and desks as a little kid- threw another temper tantrum last night." "It was awesome," Alex commented. "He threw the benches at the wall with this spell we aren't supposed to learn. He broke the benches and almost smashed the wall." "You only think it was awesome because you weren't the one that almost got smashed with a heavy bench," Jayne pointed out, flipping her black hair back. "I'm just lucky I didn't get hit front-on. I bet they could kill you if you aren't careful." Alex scoffed. "You're just a big baby, Jayne. You're fine now, aren't you?" "Well, yeah, but that doesn't mean it was fun or painless, hello." "Well, yeah, it wasn't fun, but that doesn't mean it's the biggest act of suffering the Cenchen has ever known, hello." Alex said, pretending to flip his hair back in a mocking way. Jayne rolled her eyes. "You can be so ridiculous, Alex." "You're the ridiculous one, Jayne, not me." "Blue eyes?" Camielle said, finally cluing in to the conversation. Jayne and Alex would always get lost in these long and pointless insulting-sessions, and Camielle usually fell asleep halfway through them. "Like a Tertiminar," she trailed off mumbling under her breath. "Tertiminar?" Alex said. "What's a Tertiminar?" "I remember reading about them once," Jayne said, frowning. "They were in the back of our history textbook. They were part of the Cenchen once or something." "Okay, now I know you're making stuff up," Alex said. "We've never read to the back of the history textbook. We usually only read two or three chapters." "I read the whole textbook," Jayne said. "It's cool. Interesting. And they give us a lot of time so that idiots like you can finish, and thus people with any measure of intelligence can finish the whole text." "They don't give us that much time," Alex said. "And they want you to memorize it, so you have to read it over and over again." "I don't have to read it over and over again." "We're not all geniuses, Jayne." "I'm not a genius. I just memorize things easily." "I don't think anyone has ever memorized as easily-" "Shut it for a second, Alex," Camielle said, in a very rude and un-Camielle way. "They have something about the Tertiminaries in the textbook?" "Uh, yeah," Jayne said. "Isn't that where you heard of them?" "I heard it in the images I saw last night," Camielle lied. "I don't know what it means." "How can you hear words in images?" Alex asked. "I don't know," Camielle said. "The images are very strange. But seriously, Jayne, what are they?" Jayne looked upward for a second trying to remember. "The Tertiminaries were the original version of the Cenchen. Like the Cenchen today, they had standardized education, a small workforce, and they had similar occupations. Their main distinguishing feature was that all adults have names. As is to be expected, their society was eventually taken over by some guy and dissolved into chaos. We must learn a lesson from the Tertiminaries: it is necessary to erase names and identities, both to prevent strong leaders from taking over and to prevent society from dissolving into chaos." Alex gave her an incredulous and slightly sarcastic look. "Did you memorize that?" "I remember what I read," Jayne said. "Great," Camielle said. "What book was it?" Jayne gave her a blank face. "I think it was blue." "That doesn't really help me," Camielle said. “Seriously, Jayne, what was it called?" Jayne shrugged. "Beats me. But we better go, we're going to be late." Camielle shook her head and sighed in irritation. "How come you can memorize every piece of information about the Tertiminaries but you can't remember to save your life what the stupid book was about?" "It's the way my memory works," Jayne said. "But come on, we're going to have to run." The morning passed in a very boring way; they had shorter packets today and an adult to coordinate the process, and thus Camielle couldn't find a good opportunity to start reading the purple book. They were going to work on the same thing in the afternoon, the adult said, and Camielle almost screamed with irritation. Rather than submit to such childish impulses, she glared at the table through lunch and pouted, wishing she ran the stupid Cenchen. "You do not look very happy today," Alex observed about Camielle, halfway through an insult-fest with Jayne. "You've been very quiet lately," Jayne observed. "It's like you and Alex switched personalities." "It is?" Alex asked. "Yeah," Jayne said. "You used to be the one that stared at the table while Camielle talked, and now it's the opposite." "That's because you and Camielle sort of dominate conversations," Alex said. "Honestly, Jayne, I think if I locked you in a room by yourself for a week, you would still talk about even within it." "So I like to talk," Jayne said. "What's wrong with that?" "It gets on my nerves," Alex said. "It does not," Jayne said. "If you wanted silence, you would go and sit at one of the other tables with the quiet Cenchen children. I hardly tied you to the chair." "You don't understand the concept of a happy medium, do you Jayne?" "There's no happiness in the medium, Alex, only in the extremes." "Do you two ever shut up?" Camielle asked, her irritation over the morning, her confusion over the book and her deep-seated fear and dream of losing her name finally exploding. "You're giving me a headache. And I don't want to lose my name and it's upsetting me, how can you not figure it out? They say Cenchen children with names really only live within themselves, but I can't imagine how they ever guessed that without meeting you two!" Alex and Jayne sort of stared at her for a second. "I live within myself?" Alex asked, sounding more confused than Camielle had ever heard him. "You don't want to lose your name?" Jayne asked, sounding just as clueless. Camielle put her hands to her forehead and looked down at the table, like she was shielding her eyes. She wished she could whack her head on the wall and then vanish. Unfortunately, the world did not seem so hot on granting wishes. "No," Camielle said. "I don't." "Why?" Jayne asked. "Because," Camielle said, refusing to look up. "Because…because I'm…because I don't want…" Unable to intellectualize her dissent with losing her name, she instead sat there in angry, frustrated silence. “Because what?” Jayne asked, “What don’t you want? Being Cenchen? That’s what it means, Camielle! How can you not see that?” “I don’t live within myself,” Alex said, apparently still on that part of the conversation. “What does that mean, anyway? And why don’t you want to lose your name?” “If you were going any slower, Alex you’d be going backwards,” Jayne said. “I don’t know why I don’t want to lose my name,” Camielle said in a low voice, forcing Jayne to close her mouth and listen. “But it feels wrong to me. I don’t know why, but I want to be myself. I want to be Camielle. I don’t want to be another nameless face of the Cenchen.” “You are Cenchen,” Jayne said, totally confused. “How can you not want to be part of the Cenchen? It’s what you are.” “But it’s not all I am!” Camielle said, frustrated with her inability to put her feelings into words. "What else do you want to be?" Jayne asked forcefully. Camielle sighed and put a hand to her forehead again. "I don't know. I don’t even know." "Then what are you screaming about?" Jayne asked. "What do you want?" "Nothing," Camielle said, regretting her stupid impulse all the more. "Just forget I said anything." They were all quiet this time. "Well? Camielle asked. "Are you going to go back to your stupid bickering or what?" "It's not like we just turn on a switch and start bickering," Alex sad. "Yeah, it always just sort of happens. But I don't see how you can really complain! I mean, if you ever talked then we wouldn't go off on these long conversations." Camielle shrugged. "We should probably get moving," Jayne continued. "People are starting to leave." "Why do they always have to leave so quickly?" Alex complained. "I'm never finished." "Less bickering, more eating," Jayne suggested. "It's a brilliant formula." The afternoon passed the same as the morning. Camielle did not do particularly brilliantly, as her mind was still on the purple book. When class was finally over she went out the back way and slipped into her room unseen. Going to bed early one night wouldn't bother Jayne and Alex too much, but there was no way Jayne would quietly let her go to her room a second night in a row. And she could hardly bring the purple book to the large room- the Cenchen children and Alex could care less, but Jayne would want to read it. And there was no way that Jayne and the book held would fit together smoothly. She made it back to her room and opened her book to the fourth chapter, "Matthew's New Programs." Matthew is best known for only two "contributions" to the Cenchen. The first was a dangerously simple solution to the Cenchen's population problem. He wanted new adults and new children desperately. F.B. Bridges was full of powerful children. Essentially, Matthew wanted to take small children from F.B. Bridges and assimilate them into the Cenchen. There would be easy and difficult things about this. On one hand, F.B. Bridges had a very loose idea of "family", and many children over three or four were raised by the school rather than their parents meaning that they would be missed minimally and recovered even less energetically (Bridges, unlike the Cenchen, didn't have even the smallest problem with a low population). On the other hand, just getting into F.B. Bridges would be a monstrous difficulty. While schools for very small children were guarded the most lackadaisically of any Bridges settlement, any Bridges fighter was still a force to be reckoned with on their own territory. There was the added problem that stealing children would not be well received by Bridges, and a war with Bridges was the last thing the Cenchen needed. Matthew's solution, therefore, involved a remarkable lack of fighting. Rather than simply force his way into Bridges and pray that no one would get killed, he requested at Bridges that some of the more skilled Cenchen children train there. They were reluctant at first, but Bridges had a long history of letting the most talented of other societies train in their schools, and eventually the ten strongest Cenchen children left for Bridges. Matthew's plan not only got some of the Cenchen into the F.B. Bridges settlement, it also allowed for the strongest of them to grow even stronger, as Bridges was a top-notch school. After a few weeks of Bridges, Matthew's first program finally started, and ten blonde four-to-six-year-old kids had joined the Cenchen. Besides bringing in younger children who would remember little of Bridges, they openly told older children what the Cenchen was like. After sixteen or seventeen years of constant work, constant exhaustion, constant competitiveness from classmates and discouragement from teachers, many older kids still in classes joined the Cenchen voluntarily. Within a year the Bridges fighters, at the top of their talent, outnumbered the Cenchen within the complex. While two hundred or so people was hardly going to bring down all of Bridges, Matthew did know that isolating and controlling the one nearby Bridges settlement was not impossible. He made new and stronger weapons and taught the Bridge kids how to use them. Cenchen technology grew stronger by the day, and Matthew was confident that he would be able to take control of Bridges, piece by piece. Once he got his hands on one Bridges school, it would be possible to take control of the school, teach them to be Cenchen. If he did it just right, just the way he planned, he could control their relations with the other Bridges schools, tell them nothing was wrong, the Cenchen were normal. He had enough fighters. He had enough weapons. He had enough power, enough control over everything and everyone within the Cenchen. What I wish to tell you now does not require knowledge of the outcome of the battle or the next. What you must know, what you may have guessed already, is that you are not part of the Cenchen. You are not a blind, black-haired devotee. You look different. You are different. You were part of F.B. Bridges or the Tertiminaries at birth, and that is what has brought you to the door, to this book, to the truth. The Cenchen children will never search for the truth. But you will not simply accept what the adults tell you as true. You are a part of the Cenchen, but you are not Cenchen. You look different. You are different. You are different. Different. Dark. You are not Cenchen. She was not part of the Cenchen? She was one of the children Matthew had stolen? She was born in a school she'd never heard of, a society that everyone insisted did not exist? She was not Cenchen? How was any of this possible? She'd been here since she could remember! She'd been friends with Jayne since she was five, in classes since she was four, watching the adults since she was three. How on earth could she have been born somewhere else? When? Why would they take a two-year old from another society? For that matter, when had Matthew come about? He wasn't here now, she was sure. How long had he been in power? She wasn't even fifteen yet. How could he have been around and strong ten or eleven years ago years ago to steal her, but hadn't shown since she was four or so? How could someone disappear, how could someone totally evaporate in one or two years? "The book is lies," she said venomously. "Lies! It's not true! I am Cenchen! I am Camielle Cenchen, it is my name! I am not Lere or Cusa! I am Cenchen!" Reasons poured into her head for it not to be true- she talked, the other children did not- she made up words, the other children did not- she'd chased after a stupid light door, the other children did not- she'd read another book- she'd believed it, the other children would never believe there were other societies, other powers, other times- You are not Cenchen, Camielle, her mind concluded. You are not Cenchen at all. "Small abnormalities-" she whispered. "Everyone has small abnormalities- the adult that ran away- the kid with the temper tantrum- I'm still Cenchen-" They had looked different, too. The adult had yellow hair. The kid had blue eyes. Camielle had red hair and blue eyes, and neither of them were going to go away. She was not Cenchen. "So that's what it comes down to, huh?" she hissed acidly, speaking to the book. "The color of my stupid hair?" She picked up the book and threw it at the wall, which was actually rather satisfying. It fell down to the floor and slowly slid underneath her bed. She'd never been able to successfully retrieve anything underneath her bed, and she sure as hell wasn't going to try now. "I won't listen," she told the room defiantly. "I am Cenchen. The adults say so. I'm not going to believe any more of your stupid lies. There's no such thing as F.B. Bridges or the Tertiminaries. There's no such person as Matthew Herjika-Cenchen. I am who I am, and that is that." Satisfied with this, she promptly went to sleep. Camielle woke up in the morning, considerably more sedate and logical. She considered what the book said. You look different. You are different. She considered the truth of that as she got ready for the day, thinking about the smaller aspects. She was fairly sure that whenever they'd gathered to go into the corridors, almost all of the children were blond. Maybe. She'd never really looked at anyone, so it was hard to be sure. And the children that always excelled at classes or couldn't figure out classes at all were usually blond, though again she couldn't be sure. She knew that as they progressed through classes, there were always less and less children, and most of the ones that vanished were blonde. Blonde, she thought to herself. Okay, so most of the kids are from Bridges and maybe a few from the Tertiminaries. But where am I from? I'm not blond. I know I'm not Cenchen. She made it down to breakfast finally resigned and joined Jayne and Alex at breakfast. "Hey Jayne. Hey Alex." "Hey Camielle." Jayne's hair was black as death, and her eyes were even blacker. She was definitely Cenchen. Camielle had never really doubted that. Alex had black hair as well, but she couldn't tell what color his eyes were; his bangs were too long. "You vanished on us again, Camielle," Jayne said. "Were you sleeping again? How tired can you possibly be?" "Very tired." "It's not like it's the most exciting thing the world has ever known, Jayne" Alex said. "We do the same thing every day." "Except Camielle," Jayne said. "She's got her own little schedule." "I'm special," Camielle said brightly, wondering if they knew just how special. "Very special," Jayne said, rolling her eyes. "So. Anyway. I looked up the Tertiminaries yesterday- as I was going to tell you, but you were most unfortunately not here-" "Are you planning to tell me something or are you planning to complain about something?" Camielle asked. "Because it sounds a lot like the latter." "They are mutually inclusive aims, Camielle," Jayne said. "Now shut up for a second. So, I was wrong about the Tertiminaries-" "Jayne the Perfect was wrong about something?" Alex said, eyebrows raised. "I think the roof just flew away in shock." "Shut up, both of you," Jayne said. "Let me talk. Anyway, the Tertiminaries were not some old version of us. They were, like, another us. They-" "Another us?" Alex said. "Jayne, that doesn't even make sense." "There was another society?" Camielle asked. "Where did you read this, some kind of children's fairytale?" "Do you want to hear what I'm telling you or not?" "Not really," Alex said. "I'd rather interrupt you and make fun of you." "I noticed," Jayne said sourly. "Shut up, Alex," Camielle said. "Okay, okay, I'll listen." "Okay, so, as I was going to clarify, before you so callously interrupted me-" "You're complaining again," Camielle pointed out. "Yeah, can we skip the editorializing?" Alex asked. "Fine, whatever. So anyway, originally there were two societies: the Tertiminaries and the Cenchen. The Tertiminaries and the Cenchen hated each other for a while even though they were really similar. Then the Tertiminaries went from being sort of anarchist to having this one leader, and he kind of drove them into the ground, I guess. That was about when the Cenchen figured out how to take away people’s names. That's partly what the corridors are, though. The ones far out lead to the Tertiminaries and all their stuff, I guess." "Where did you read this again?" Alex asked. "Because that can’t be true. I mean, come on. There's no one but us." "It wasn't a textbook we were reading in class like I thought. It was a dfferent one we haven’t used before. I found it in the classroom and started reading it when I was bored." "Then it's not real," Alex said. "Some idiot started writing up crap for fun. Either that or it's a children's book." "How would a children's book get into our classroom?" Jayne asked. "Come on, Alex, think a little." "There are no other societies." "None now, but maybe in the past there were. I mean, hey, it's not like you were there! Maybe there were." "The adults would know, and they say there are no other societies.” “Yeah, there aren’t any now. Doesn’t mean that we’re the only ones that have ever existed.” “Wouldn’t they tell us if there were ever other people?” “We don’t know very much of our history. Maybe they just didn’t think it was important.” “Wouldn’t they tell us-” “Alexxxx,” Jayne said. “Why are you getting so defensive? I didn’t say that there were definitely other societies. I just said that the book was probably right. Maybe you’re right, maybe I’m right, honestly, what does it matter? We’re the only ones that are here now, are we not?” “Maybe there are others now,” Camielle suggested. “Maybe there were others besides the Tertiminaries and we just don’t know about them. If others existed in the past, maybe some of them live there now.” “That’s definitely not possible,” Jayne said authoritatively. “I mean, the adults would know if there were others now for certain.” Camielle shrugged. “But you think there really is something beyond all those corridors? I think that’s crazy. No one’s ever said there’s anything past those corridors.” Alex. “Maybe they haven’t gone far enough,” Jayne said. “The ones that go really far always get lost.” “Well, yes, but at least one-” “It’s time to go,” Jayne said, standing up. “Just forget it, Alex. Let’s not argue over stupid things.” “All you guys ever do is argue over stupid things,” Camielle pointed out. “Stupider things than this.” Jayne shrugged. “Still.” The rest of the day passed much the same as any other day- boring packets and school and Jayne and Alex arguing endlessly and redundantly. They didn't bother her when she went to her room instead of the gathering area everyone else attended. Of course, Jayne was also preoccupied grandstanding with Alex, so that was probably a significant factor. She reached her room in record time and surveyed her room, quickly looking for the purple cover before remembering she'd thrown it behind the bed. That is not going to be fun to retrieve. She wanted to read the book now, no matter how many crazy things it told her. She was not Cenchen, that much was clear. It helped that Jayne believed other societies could conceivably exist, that intelligent, forceful Jayne could consider something as fanciful as that to be true. Unfortunately, she'd dropped several things behind her bed in the past, and had learned the hard way that trying to retrieve items from behind it was not going to be fun, painless, or remotely possible. She could not decide whether or not it was worth it to go and search for the book. I could just leave it, she thought to herself. Who cares? It's just a stupid book. It's not like it says anything important, anyway. I bet everything it says is a lie. And honestly, it's not like I'm going to be able to retrieve it anyway. But maybe it is true. Jayne said it could be true. And if it's possible…I need to know, I need to know who I am. You already know who you are. This is a waste of time. It could tell me how to avoid losing my name. You are Cenchen. Losing your name is what we do. It's not what I want to do. After a little over an hour of arduous pain to obtain the book, Camielle finally managed to extract the little monster from the back of her bed, the ordeal being just as torturous as she remembered it. She looked it over, remembering what it had told her. Did she want to know everything it told her? Was it right? Was it necessary? Would it hurt her or help her? She decided she didn't care, she had to know, she had to find the information. Now. Whether she needed to know or not, she still wanted the information desperately. She turned to the page she had left it at. Matthew did manage to take over the Bridges settlement. The most important thing he did was make sure that the fighters already within Bridges went directly to the inside, most guarded section of the settlement and took over the communications section. This made it so that the settlement could not call in reinforcements. As you can guess, Matthew was successful. He took over settlement and after settlement, being as careful as the first time. It took several years for the Bridges headquarters to figure out that the Cenchen were taking over. They issued a warning to the settlements and took precautions around their own site. While the Cenchen was heavily guarded, things had become more lax in recent years as their enemies diminished in power; the fact was that Bridges was fairly sure no one would really be stupid enough to attack Bridges. Matthew was. The fact was, he had a new weapon no one could withstand. Every Bridges settlement fell completely and easily under his power with little effort, and even Bridges headquarters would eventually fall to him if he could get in and use it. Matthew had found out how to make people lose their names. No one could avoid submitting to him. Making people lose their names was a weapon? A way to kill people? A way to conquer, to take over, to control? It was not part of the Cenchen the way she had always thought. It was not a way to make sure the Cenchen was free, strong and bound together. It was not anything she had ever been taught. It was not something smiled upon, something respected. It was a weapon. She'd heard little of weapons before reading this book, but even the Cenchen school had taught her a little about them. They were something evil, something bad. That was what weapons were. That was losing her name. She had not been prepared for some of the truths of this book but she was prepared for this one. It was not hard to believe that losing her name was bad or evil. It is not good, and it is not Cenchen. I must find a way to stop it, avoid it. Somehow, I will avoid it. She went to bed without finishing the book. "Hey guys," Camielle said, sitting down at lunch the next day. "Do you guys know what a weapon is?" she asked quickly before she could stop herself. "No," Alex said. "Yeah," Jayne said. "It's something to hurt people with. Why?" "Because-" Camielle said, trying to decide whether or not to spill out the story of the purple book or not. "Because I found it in a book. I wanted to know if you guys know what it is." "Why were you reading a book about weapons?" Jayne asked. "The Cenchen doesn't use any weapons." Camielle shrugged. "I don't remember where I read it." Alex shook his head. "You guys are crazy. You can remember all this random crazy stuff but not where you found it." I'm crazier than that, Camielle thought, the past few days' events flashing across her mind quickly. She shook her head, like she could make her doubts disappear that way. They were quiet for a second. "So, what should we talk about?" Jayne asked. Camielle was quiet, watching the table, still remembering the days past. This is so crazy, she thought to herself. How can I possibly believe any of this? There are other societies, I'm not Cenchen, losing your name is a weapon…how can any of this be possible? How can I believe it? But it seems so correct….it feels right….I know it's right! …How could I have believed the Cenchen? How could I have believed all those falsehoods? How can I avoid losing my name? "I don't know," Alex said. "There's never anything to talk about." "There is so," Jayne argued. "Soon there really won't be anything to talk about," Camielle said in a brooding voice. "Once we lose our names, we won't talk. We'll all be the same. There'll be-" "Really, Camielle, are you still upset over losing your name? Are you ever going to stop freaking out over that?" Jayne asked. "No," Camielle said. "How did I know?" Jayne grumbled with a hint of amusion. I'll look in the corridors tonight, Camielle thought to herself. I'll find the door! I'll walk until I find the Tertiminaries, but wherever I go I'll find something that will help me to avoid losing my name. The corridors are so much less scary than losing my name. Camielle did not hesitate walking out of her room that night. She walked down the hall and out to the corridors without looking or stopping, trying to not look at or think about the walls. The corridors. The black, the white, the dark…it was inescapably dark… She entered the corridors and kept walking at the same steady pace. She knew where to go, which corridors to turn at, which corridors to walk through. She did not know how she knew this- surely she had not been paying such close attention last time- but she did. She reached the door much more quickly this time. She did not stop, she did not turn back for short times, she did not get lost. The corridors did not scare her anymore. There were worse things to be frightened of than the dark. The door, as light and recognizable as ever, stood before her with unwavering strength. She hesitated for the first time that night. You are not Cenchen, the voice in the back of her head whispered. But did she want to be Cenchen? Did she want to defy the voice, the book, her own reasoning? Did she want to listen to Jayne and Alex and the adults- they were always right- she was Cenchen- Was a person Cenchen because of where they were born or what they thought and did? A Cenchen girl would go back. She did not go back. She opened the door and walked in. The room was almost as overwhelming as the time before, and Camielle had to blink a few times before she could get used to the overwhelming color and brightness and light. She walked amiably over to one of the bookshelves and scanned its selection. Most of them were black or blue, not bright like the purple one she held. She pulled down a random black one and opened it to the first page. Blank. She flipped past a few more pages. The whole book was blank. She shrugged and pulled down another book, flipping past the pages quickly. It was blank as well. Why would they had so many blank books? She puzzled to herself. What is the purpose of a blank book? She looked through a few more books. None of them had any words. Had she imagined something? She opened the purple book she still carried with her and glanced through it. Everything was there. No blank pages. How come this book had words in it but the others didn't? She walked around the room, pulling a few books down from each shelf. They were all blank. Every single one. Is the purple book the only one with words? Why? Something fell off one of the bookshelves on the other side of the room rather loudly, catching her attention. She walked over to pick it up. It was a map, she knew. It showed the Cenchen- the dining hall in the center, the large room, just bellow it, rooms off to the sides, classrooms at the top and bottom. The corridors went all around with factories near center and the storage rooms further out, the door and the namelosing room surprisingly close to each other off to the right. None of it was surprising. But there was one door marked quite far away from anything, at the left edge, something she hadn’t ever seen before. C.M. Office. What's an office? She puzzled to herself. "Hey Alex. Hey Jayne." "Hey Camielle," Alex greeted. Jayne was silent. "I am so extremely tired," Camielle announced. "I could not sleep last night, and when I did the stupid images came back and bothered me again. Ugh." Alex shook his head. "What is it with you and the images? I've never seen any of them myself." "She's just special," Jayne said in a low voice. "We can all be dark. Different." Camielle cocked her head to the side and stared at Jayne for a second. "Dark? I thought you said it was made-up." Jayne shrugged. "She hasn't started talking about inanity this morning," Alex said curiously. "I don't think she's talked at all." "There's nothing to talk about," Jayne said. "It's all the same." "You sound like Camielle when she got all depressed," Alex said. "Why?" "I told you, I don't know!" Jayne snapped. "Leave me alone, okay? Stop bothering me!" She put her head down angrily. Alex seemed rather startled. "Well," Camielle said. "Someone's cranky this morning." "What did you see last night?" Alex said conversationally. "A door again?" Camielle shook her head. "Just these blank books. And this map of the Cenchen. But it was messed up somehow." She really had seen the images briefly after she came back from the door. Blank books chased her across this multidimensional map. It had been very strange. They both looked at Jayne, expecting her to say something. Suddenly, Camielle had an idea. "I think I know what's wrong. Jayne," she said, "you know that book you found?" "Yeah?" Jayne acknowledged uninterestedly. "Did you- did you read all of it?" Jayne rolled her eyes. "No. I read the first chapter, if that. Why? How is this important?" "Are you sure?" "Yes, I am quite sure. Somehow I imagine I have the authority to declare whether or not I am sure about this." Alex tilted his head puzzlingly. "What are you two talking about?" "Nothing," Camielle said. But she could not stop thinking about it. Was it possible? A few days ago, Jayne had insisted that there was no way that other societies could exist. And yet yesterday she believed that maybe-just maybe- other societies could have existed. And now she was sitting here, depressed, proclaiming everything was dark and everyone was the same? This was too strange for comfort. Actually, a Jayne that wasn't constantly running her mouth at every available opportunity was enough of a cause for alarm. "What does a book have to do with anything?" Alex. "I don't know. I just thought…I don't know." Alex looked from Camielle to Jayne and back to Camielle. "Girls are weird," he observed at low volume. "I heard that," Camielle informed him. "What do books have to do with anything?" Alex exclaimed. "You aren't making any sense." "Not everything has to make sense, Alex," Camielle said. "Relax." Alex looked out at all the other Cenchen children briefly. "You know, I wonder what would happen if we tried to sit and talk to them." "This conversation is giving me an overwhelming sense of déjà vu," Camielle said sarcastically. "What could it be?" Alex looked down at Jayne for a second. "Would they act like her?" "I wonder," Camielle said, her sarcasm evaporating. "It's interesting to think about." Jayne did not respond. She wished everyone would just shut up and leave her alone. She couldn't think straight, couldn't understand the words they said. Everything seemed to be spinning around her in crazy ways. Normally she would say a hundred things, take over, determine what was said and what was not. But the words seemed too far away now and it was impossible to focus. She wished she could focus. She wished it would stop and go back to the way it always had been. But it was too late for that now. You cannot forget things when they are burned into your skull. Camielle and Alex did not understand. They would never understand. The three went to class as mindlessly as ever. The teacher went up to the front of the room and talked about things, something, but Jayne did not listen. She could not hear him. She could not understand him. Most of all, she did not care. Nothing mattered. Camielle carefully eased the purple book out of her pocket in class. She was fairly sure that she had heard whatever the teacher was saying many times before, and thus was not feeling particularly depressed about missing the teacher's words. The book went on for a very long time about Matthew. She was beginning to lose patience with the book and the way they would go on and on about things she did not care about. She still had no idea why the Cenchen was the way it was, and the book seemed to be taking the long way of telling her. She neared the end eventually. But no matter how powerful Matthew was, his conceit and arrogance easily and universally outweighed it. He challenged Bridges openly, daring them to attack him. Daring them to try to take over the Cenchen. People who wish to keep their lives intact do not openly attack Bridges. Bridges is the ruler of the world. He strengthened the Cenchen and watched everyone in the Bridges settlements he controlled to make sure they were all nameless. Not one had an ounce of will left. They obeyed him without question. He told them to destroy Bridges, to kill their friends and family, and they did it without pausing. He was always right. He took over settlement after settlement, becoming less careful each time. He wanted only one thing now. The Cenchen Agate. Bridges became more and more desperate to prevent Matthew from finding it. While the Cenchen before had always been passive and restrained, it was quite obvious that a Matthew-headed Cenchen would not be quiet and still. With the Agate and the name-losing power, the Cenchen would be unstoppable. They could take over every Bridges school. Bridges was not in a happy situation. They did not want to fight Matthew, as it seemed like the more he fought them the more fighters he got as he made them lose their names. He insisted that all he wanted was the Agate and he would leave Bridges alone. They did not believe him. It was hard to believe that Matthew, with his passionate and conquerable personality would ever be content with the small, one-unit Cenchen. However, he warned them that if he found, the Agate rather than have it be given to him, then he would destroy Bridges. He would kill as many members as he could, and he would make all of the rest lose their names. It was inevitable, Bridges believed, that he would eventually find the Agate if they did not stop him as soon as possible. They did not want to fight him. They did not want to give in. But they could not just sit there and watch. Eventually, they had to take action. They chose to fight. Bridges was huge, you see, with hundreds of settlements and hundreds, sometimes over a thousand people in each settlement. They would not fall. The Cenchen had not dealt with war for hundreds of year, not since Sahbrihna was killed. We would rather compromise without war, even when we had the Agate, than risk losing people. Most of the Cenchen upon hearing Bridge's decision to go to war frightfully begged Matthew to back down, relinquish his demands, let Bridges decide what would happen to them. Matthew would not allow this to happen. He wanted the Cenchen to be free and powerful, and he was willing to risk war to make it happen. He was the first in hundreds of years to be so determined. Matthew was not the typical Cenchen person. He was extremely charismatic; everyone liked him and he held extreme power over many. He would be warm and kind one minute, passionately and almost frighteningly nationalistic the next, and cold and unemotional the third. We did not know what his true personality was. No one did. The only one who came close to his capacity for leadership was his brother Jakob Herjika-Cenchen. While Jakob was almost as passionate and charismatic as Matthew, there were notable differences. He was less two-faced, showing one side consistently. But he also opposed war, opposed annexing Bridges settlements, opposed making people lose their names, opposed stealing children from Bridges. In essence, he opposed Cenchen. He wanted things to be the way they had always been. People were increasingly uncomfortable with the idea of war, fighting, and name-losing. Many felt it was like killing- their heart kept beating, yes, their mind kept thinking, of course, but they were still not the same. They were not the people they had always been. They were all the same. As dislike of Matthew's actions began to grow, Jakob's popularity, formerly almost nonexistent, soon began to rival Matthew's. This would not do. Matthew killed Jakob in cold blood after a particularly enthusiastic demand session by the people. He stabbed him in the back and used magic to make the body disappear. He did not tell us this: he said that Jakob had gone back to Bridges to tell them about our plans and rebellions and that Matthew had stabbed him to keep the Cenchen free. The people believed this completely and Matthew remained unrivaled as a ruler. Only later did I know the truth. Eventually Bridges came in and started their war. It was violent, with more and more people coming in day after day. Matthew and others would watch every border and made many of them lose their names. The army increased every day. We grew stronger and stronger as time went on, and Matthew became more and more arrogant with each day. But the people did not become more arrogant with each day; we became more and more frightened and shocked as time went on. We saw the look on people's faces as they lost their names, the saw the sheer volume of people we near-killed. And people just kept coming. That was the real problem, the sheer amount of people Bridges had. No matter how many people we took names away from, more showed up every day. We were fairly sure the war would never end; we were almost certain that no matter how long we fought Bridges would continue to send more and more people. Eventually, though, Bridges turned to the only person who had any hope of bringing down the Cenchen. Lucy Jones-Lear. Lucy was older now and known across the world in many different settlements. She was powerful, she was charismatic, she was near-invincible. Wee heard news of her plan before she came. Supposedly, her friend had invented a way to make people impervious to losing their names. She entered the Cenchen to test this out. She and her friends were not completely impervious to losing their names, but they had new weapons we had not encountered before that made defeat almost certain. Death-tipped boomerangs and cold controlled fusion allowed them to kill dozens of people before we were ready to make them lose their names. And she just kept coming. Only one person could have led us through such a time. None of us were ready for this war, none of us were willing to go all the way through with it. But we continued anyway, all because of him. He promised us Cenchen dominance and the Agate. He promised that Bridges would bow to us someday. Somehow, we believed him. Lucy and her allies made it into our settlements after many tries and many battles. They took over the Cenchen, killing some, intimidating even more. The Cenchen was on lockdown for several days. But the truth was that she did not need to go quite so far. Matthew had fled. Camielle finished it there. The book was getting more and more interesting, and she was sure that the end would be soon. Then she would know, she would finally know. We were not always like this, she thought to herself sadly. We were once free. I wish we could be free once again. She wished a new Matthew would come, resist losing his name. She wished a new Matthew would take charge of the Cenchen, make them keep their names, and change whatever was wrong that made them so dark. She wondered who it could be. Alex? Jayne? Her? She woke up in the morning as bored as ever and continued on the book, finally finishing the long thing. Without Matthew, the Cenchen completely fell apart. Bridges moved in again, more completely than the time before but probably not as totalitarian as we probably deserved. They searched for Matthew all across the world. By that time we regretted the war, our actions, and our aggression, and we hoped he would not come back. Bridges was nicer to us than Matthew had been, leaving us alone much more than he had. We did not want him to come back. We did not want him to be found. They found him eventually however, and we learned then that Bridges was not being nice and leaving us alone to know the knowledge we had always known and stay one small unit the way we had for centuries. They were simply waiting to find Matthew, to make him sit there and watch us fall. They went through people one by one, making each one lose their name until there was only one Cenchen person left. Matthew. He lost his name after everyone else, watching the Cenchen be transformed from the strongest power in the world to a mere shell of dark Cenchen people who could not think for themselves. For someone who believed the Cenchen should be free, strong, and powerful as passionately as Matthew did, there could be nothing worse. Eventually he, too, lost his name. There are no free Cenchen left. You may wonder who I am. I was the first child to be born outside the Cenchen, long before Matthew's child-stealing program. Bridges did not kill me as they did every other Cenchen child. I had blue eyes. I was a Tertiminar. I have never seen the Tertiminaries, but I spent my life in Bridges from eight onward. It is a hellish place- they make you learn as a child until you are near to drop, and then they keep going. No one likes you, few children form friendships, one person usually dominates and makes every other child into a toy, an amusement. But I continued to learn and work as hard as I could. I wanted to make the Cenchen free. But I know now there is no chance of that. Is not what it used to be, not what it should be. No one has a name; it hardly deserves to be called the Cenchen. A society of the nameless does not deserve a name. It is a trophy for Bridges. A monument. "Look what we can do," they say. "Look how strong our fighters are. Look how innovative our weapons-makers are. Look. We can destroy anyone, anything that stands in our way. If the Cenchen ever rose again, Bridges would destroy it. It is that simple. If there is any chance for you, if there is any way you could leave, lead, in even the wildest of possibilities, all I have to tell you is to find the door. Find the door, a white door. Find the books. Read them all, and you will know anything you want to know. The book ended. Camielle looked down at it in frustration. "Read the books?" she said, irritated. "But they are all blank. Blank books are not going to solve my problems." She was determined to do whatever the book told her, however, and she resolved to find the door that night. She went through the day as mindlessly as ever. Jayne was still quiet, though not as much as before. Alex bothered Jayne even more directly, demanding she tell him what was wrong, demanding she talk. It bordered on amusement, but Camielle had little amusement on her mind. She was surprised at how little the book affected her. It talked about war- war, a place where weapons were used- dozens of people losing their names, Matthew taking power, losing it Bridges forcing people to lose their name rather than them simply accepting it as being the "Cenchen" thing to do. But she did not reel back in shock anymore. She did not pause every few second to try and decipher some of the words. Every term, every concept, made perfect, cold sense to her. She understood it. The only question she had left was more on what was happening now. Was Bridges still here? Where were they? Outside? Did they live here? Or was the Cenchen so without personality and passion they did not fear another Matthew? She walked out to the corridors the next night. She did not worry about the darkness or the endlessness of the corridors at all. She did not stop and hesitate when she reached a dead end, a turn, or finally the white, light door. Losing your name was not the Cenchen thing to do. She was not being a "good little Cenchen girl" by hesitating or going back to sleep, she was dooming her world to despair and controlling overlords forever. She walked in and continued to look in the books. She was halfway through flipping a green one full of black pictures that she almost did not notice a second person entering the room until he was all the way in. He dropped a book in surprise first. "Camielle?" he said in shock. "What are you doing here?" Camielle whirled around. Alex. "Alex!" she said, her voice considerably louder and more incredulous than Alex's. "You know about this place? The door? Bridges and the Tertiminaries?" Alex finally slammed the door shut before turning to face her. He did not look happy. He did not look happy at all. "Yes, Camielle, I know." His voice was quiet and sad and shameful. "I know all about it." Camielle stared at him. "Well? Why didn't you tell us? How come you sat there and insisted there were no other societies, no way out of the Cenchen? Why didn';t you say that you knew there were?" Alex sighed. "Because I did not want you to know." Camielle glared at him. "So you wanted to keep the truth all to yourself, huh? That’s how it is?" She was still holding the book in her hand and looked about ready to throw it at him. Alex grabbed her wrist. "I did not! It is for your own good, Camielle. You cannot know- you should not know-" "You have to know the truth!" Camielle exclaimed. "You don't think that we should always know what the truth is? How can you think that?" "It is better to not know," Alex insisted. "Why?" Camielle said, yanking her wrist away and crossing her arms. "What do you have to say about it, huh?" Alex closed his eyes and looked down. "When I was- younger," he said, in a broken, halting way, "I found- a book. A red book. In the back of a classroom." He paused for several seconds. Camielle, starting to regret the amount of yelling she had done, did not say anything. "I was reading it in the corner one day- I was proud, you see, that I wanted to read outside of class, the way Jayne and Danyel and Alis did, like the smart kids- an adult came up to me. She dragged me into an empty classroom. "She told me that she was my- mother. I did not know what it meant at the time, but she quickly explained. She said that she had been born outside the complex- like the people in the book and that she'd been forced to come- here." He paused again. Camielle could not tell if he was trying to remember what happened or if he just really did not want to tell her. "She said that she had resisted losing her name and becoming an adult all her life, and when she lost her name she truly began to pay for it. Rather than simply becoming a blank slate with memories like all the other adults, she was trapped inside her mind for long periods of time. She was a dual personality- blank on the outside, but fighting and trapped within. "She tore the book I was reading into pieces. 'Don't fight it,' she insisted. 'Don't fight losing your name. Become a Cenchen, blend into the Cenchen. Lose your name easily and painlessly,. Watch the others, make sure they do as well.'" Camielle started to nod. "You were eight, right?" "How did you know?" ":Because I remember you were eight when you came up to Alis, Danyel, Jayne and I and wanted to hang out with us." She raised an eyebrow infinitesimally. "Trying to protect us, eh?" "You don't get it, Camielle! You don't get-"? "I understand perfectly fine," she said, her voice quiet and strained rather than an angry, sarcastic hissing the way Jayne would make it. She sounded like usual submissive Camielle. "But what I get even more is that is that I would rather be a trapped personality than a blank slate. I would rather exist in some form than not exist at all." "No, you don't," Alex said. "Please, Camielle. You must stop fighting. Throw away the book- rip t to shreds! Stop coming here. Do your classes, talk to us at lunch. Be the way you have always been. Please, Camielle." "No!" she shrieked, throwing the book down at the floor. She wished she could throw it at his face. "I will not, Alex." Alex sighed. "I knew it was too late. I knew it." He shook his head. "I wish you had simply told me what you knew the way Alis and Danyel did. It would have been so much easier. Camielle's anger evaporated instantly. "Alis and Danyel? You know what happened to them?" "They both told me they found a book about a secret society,": he said calmly. "They wanted to ask Jayne, our little leader but she was too…unapproachable. I told them it was ridiculous." "That's it?" Camielle asked, confused. Alex shook his head sadly. "I told one of the adults. They lost their names the next day, before rebellion could become too entrenched in them." Camielle stared at him in shock. Alex gave a half smile. "You did not recognize the blond teacher who stressed the virtues of losing our names?" "That was Alis?" Camielle could not believe this. "But she looked so much older!" "She is an adult," Alex said calmly. "She looks the same as all the others." Camielle did not say anything. "But do you see now?" Alex asked. "Do you see how we must make sure that no one knows about the truth?" "Except you?" Camielle muttered. "To make sure that someone can spy on us and make sure we don't rebel?" Alex grabbed her wrist again. "Camielle," he said softly. "I'm not evil." Camielle started to shove him away, but stopped suddenly. "So if someone who is rebellious and does not want to lose their name- even if they're Cenchen- can they still be- trapped?" "Yes," Alex said. "That is exactly what I am saying." "Do you think we could free Matthew?" Camielle said. "He could lead us again. We would be free of Bridges." Alex shook his head. "We do not know how to free people, Camielle. And besides, what would you want to make the Cenchen free of Bridges for? You are part of Bridges." "I am not!" "You were not born here," Alex said carelessly. "Even I and the rest of our group were born in the Cenchen. You were born in a Bridges settlement. You are an alien." An alien. It was the worst insult you could give someone in the Cenchen, to say that they were born elsewhere. Jayne had called many others aliens without really meaning it, but Alex meant it. Camielle was an alien. "But I am not part of Bridges," Camielle said. "I have lived here for most of my life. I do not know what Bridges is like-" "Hell." "I know, I know I know," Camielle said crossly. "But I have never experienced hell there. I can only remember the Cenchen. I am not an alien." "Yes, you are." "I am not!" Alex sighed. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry." Camielle glared at him. "Do you think Jayne has found a book?" Alex asked, changing the subject. "Is it possible?" "Jayne never met a book she didn't like," Camielle admitted. "It is definitely possible." "I can't imagine Jayne believing something like that, though. She is so insistent on believing what the adults say." "It's hard not to believe the book," Camielle said. "Even when you don't understand most of the words, it all just makes so much sense." "But she is Cenchen," Alex said. "There's no doubt about that," Camielle admitted. "Alis and Danyel were from Bridges as well, weren't they? She was the only Cenchen one?" "Yes." Alex laughed without humor. "Making it all the more ironic that she became the leader in our little group." "Leader?" Camielle asked, tilting her head to the side. "Leader in what?" "She dominates," Alex said. "Some people are just leaders. Danyel was. Jayne is, especially. You are not." Camielle, despite not totally understanding what he meant, still felt rather insulted by this. "I hope I can find Jayne's book soon," Alex said. "Jayne should know the truth," Camielle insisted. "Everyone should know nthe truth." "Not everyone," Alex said. "I wish I didn't know. You and Jayne will too. Soon." "You shouldn't hide the truth." "The Cenchen should continue the way it always has. Adults without names, kids without rebellion, and a population without leaders." Camielle glared at him. "That's not the Cenchen. The Cenchen means a society of people who are free and powerful." "No one can be free and powerful. Not with Bridges the way it is. It is so powerful- so incredible. No one could hope to defy them." "Matthew did." "Matthew lost, and he would lose again." "How do you know what Bridges is like, anyway?" Camielle asked him. "You've never been there." "I have. When I was young." "You're lying." "I refuse to lie." For the first time in what had to be a couple of years, Camielle got to the table before Jayne did and spent several minutes in a staring contest with Alex. She could not believe some of the things he had done. He'd sentenced Alis and Danyel to losing their names early, wiping their personalities out forever. He'd tried to stealthily dissuade her from seeing the door. He'd probably been the ones to blank out all the books! His whole job, his whole mission, was to hide the truth, obscure the truth, keep everyone happy and in line. He'd called her an alien. He'd accused her of being an alien. Even if it was true, she could not stop her head from reeling in anger. Alien, alien, alien… "Camielle," he said after a few minutes of total silence, "Maybe you're right." Camielle did not answer. Jayne walked out then before he could say anything else. "Hey guys," she said, sounding happier than she had a couple of days before. "Hey Jayne," Alex and Camielle said together. "I have to tell you something," Jayne said conversationally. "It's sort of weird." "All right," Alex said. Camielle stayed silent. "I've seen some images the past couple of nights. Not like Camielle's, where they're all, like, abstract and stuff." She leaned forward. "They were very distinct. It was almost real." Camielle wondered if they were real. "It was a society full of these other people," Jayne continued. "They were like Camielle or-" she paused, like she was going to say Alis or Danyel, but mentioning disappeared children was a serious taboo in the Cenchen, "or, you know, where they have the different-colored hair and eyes. They were all staring at me, and they talked funny. And they all used magic. But they didn't use it just in the classroom, it was all the time. Just for fun." "That's very strange," Alex said. "Really off the wall." "Jayne," Camielle said quietly. "It's real. It's called F.B. Bridges- it's a real place- they've enslaved us-" Jayne's reaction was not what she expected. She stood up very quickly and ngrily. "Are you making fun of me?" she asked in a near-yell. "Well?" "Sit down," Alex said casually. "Stop grandstanding." Jayne sat down but continued to glare at the two of them. "Why are you making fun of me?" "I'm not making fun of you," Camielle said. "I'm telling the truth. It's a book. I can show you!" She slid Jayne the purple book. Jayne looked down at the book. "What are you, crazy?" She turned toward Alex. "Has she lost her mind?" Alex looked down and was very quiet for several seconds. "No. She's right." Jayne rolled her eyes. "You're both crazy, then." "We're not crazy," Alex said. "It's true!" Camielle exclaimed. "Read the book." Jayne flipped it open and scanned it. "Hm." "Do you believe us?" Camielle asked anxiously. It was important that Jayne believed them they were right. Jayne was the voice of reason. It sounded ridiculous as she said it now, but if Jayne believed them it was so much less so. Jayne flipped the book again. "Maybe. I'll read it." Alex and Camielle were silent. Jayne read the book all through the afternoon. She did not need to pause every few seconds the way Camielle did. She read it straight through, understanding every sentence of the Cenchen's history. She read it for several hours all through class. It had to be the first time Jayne ever did not pay attention in class. Jayne was not sure what she thought of the book by the time she was finished. It contradicted every belief the Cenchen ever gave her, and she was just not sure what she thought. Camielle and Alex had to be crazy. The writer of the book had to be crazy. She just did not understand how it could possibly be true! The Cenchen and the adults were always right! But she resolved to believe it anyway, for now at least. Tentatively. At dinner, Alex and Camielle were obviously waiting for her to explain what she thought of the book. "I'm not sure," Jayne admitted. "It is a very strange book, and I don't see how it can be right. The Cenchen has always said that there were no other societies at the current time." "But maybe the Cenchen lied-" "The Cenchen does not lie" Jayne argued vehemently. "It does not." Camielle shut her mouth and looked down. But there's just something about it," Jayne said, her voice much les matter-of-fact. "I don't know why, but it seems true. I don't know why." "Because it is!" Camielle said. "It is!" "Stop shouting," Jayne said, annoyed. "Seriously. It's not necessary." "Fine, fine," Camielle said. "But do you get what I'm saying?" "Yes, I guess. And I think we should do what the book says." "What does it say?" Alex asked. "To go and look at all of the books," Jayne says. "They'll be helpful. We need to go and read them." "Helpful?" Alex asked. "Helpful in what?" "Helpful in making it so we can't lose our names," Jayne says. "It's a weapon. We can't just let it happen." "What are we going to do about it?" Alex demanded. "There is nothing we can do. The Cenchen wants us to lose our names. We can't do anything about it>" "Yes we can," Jayne argued. " Camielle found Jayne after their afternoon classes and pulled her aside before Alex could find them. "Hey, Camielle. Is something wrong?" "I- we can't trust Alex." "Why not?" "Because he doesn't want us to know the truth. He doesn't want anyone to know the truth. He says if we know, then when we lose our names, we'll be trapped inside ourselves. He says it's awful. Horrible." "Why didn't he say anything earlier, then, huh?" "I think he's working with the adults to get rid of rebellious children. To make them lose their names before they become a problem." "Camielle! Are you serious? Why would you think that about Alex?" "Because," Camielle said slowly and unhappily. She did not want to talk about Alis and Danyel. No one ever talked about Alis and Danyel, or Mirabellah and Jaik, or Tinq and Cristina, or any of the other children that had disappeared. You were not allowed to. "Because," Camielle said slowly. "He…turned in Alis and Danyel-" "Alis and Danyel? Turned in? What are you….I mean…" "He told the adults there was something wrong with them. They couldn't take that. Alis and Danyel lost their names years ago." Jayne did not say anything for quite some time. "But- but-" she whispered, sounding confused. "The adults are…they're always… there must have been a…a reason or something…" she trailed off. "There was a reason," Camielle said bitterly. "They wanted to do exactly what we're planning to." "Shit," Jayne said. "This is just wonderful." "I know. But maybe he's changed his mind. I mean…he was really quiet this morning. And he didn't try to discredit me, even though he could have. So maybe he's changed his mind." "We'll see." Jayne gave a half smile. "I should go and ask him." "And this is a brilliant solution because…?" Camielle asked. "Because any solution I have is brilliant, of course," Jayne said sarcastically. "Seriously. I can tell when people are lying. Plus, there's the fact that Alex is scared of everything. Especially me." "He's scared of you? Then why isn't he scared of oxygen?" "You know what, he probably is." They found him sitting on a bench in the large room, probably waiting for them. The scene was the same it had always been- small children talking, older children sitting nearly silent, but it seemed different, more sinister. "Hey Alex," Jayne greeted Alex edged away. Jayne. Shit. He'd really hoped Camielle would not talk about what he'd done in the past for this exact reason. "Why are you telling the adults to make us lose our names? Why do you not want us to know the truth?" Jayne asked in a quiet, but still dangerous voice. Alex sighed. "It's too late for that anyway. And maybe…maybe your right. Sometimes people have to know the truth." "And you have a good track record of believing this is important, right?" Jayne. Alex moved away again. Jayne's black eyes were doing that angry thing they did sometimes. Scary. "Maybe not. But you know why- I mean-" "How do you even know that adult was right?" Camielle asked, sounding much less angry and intimidating than Jayne. "Maybe she was lying or just- just wrong!" "The adults are always right," Jayne and Alex said together. "Ugh!" Camielle protested. "Why do you two always say that? They can-" "Because it's true," Jayne said calmly. "They are always right." "How can you believe the adults and the book at the same time?" Camielle argued. "Bridges exists. The Tertiminaries exist. The door exists. Children go missing for stupid reasons, the corridors show what's real. The fact that we say there's a truth to learn just shows that the adults don't always tell the truth! How can you think both at the same time? They are totally contradictory!" Jayne and Alex looked at each other uneasily. "I don't know," Jayne said. "But…I mean…the adults…" "Are not infallible!" Camielle near-shouted. "Calm down," Jayne said, sounding irritated. 'There's really no need to shout." Camielle sighed. "I just wish you would see that the adults can be wrong. They can. I know they can." "But the adults are-" Jayne started before she could stop herself. She closed her mouth halfway through her sentence. It was harder than she thought it would be. The idea that the adults were always right was drilled into her as completely as it could be. Alex tried to surreptitiously sneak away while Camielle and Jayne had this conversation, but he was not as successful as he probably could have been. Jayne, he knew, was near-psychic about when people were lying or being evasive, even if she didn't always pursue it. You could not trick her. "All right then," Jayne said. "So you aren't planning on telling the adults to stamp the rebelliousness out of us? You want to know the truth?" "Yes," Alex said. Jayne raised an eyebrow at him. "Wait. I mean that yes, I agree with you that no, I don't plan on doing that. So yes. I mean…yeah." Camielle started to snicker. "Are you sure?" Jayne asked. "Yes. Now please stop glaring at me." Jayne shrugged. "I guess. I think you're telling the truth." She looked at him more angrily. "You better hope you're telling the truth." Camielle was in awe. Jayne could really be scary when she wanted to be. "All right, Jayne," Camielle said. "You don't need to kill him." "I don't?" Jayne asked jokingly. "Come on. It's so much fun" "Oh yeah," Alex said. "I bet you think so." They talked for a little while longer, their lighter chit chat disguising their unease about the mission they'd start in an hour or so. They made it through the corridors quite slowly that night. Camielle did not mind the dark or the endless black. She was used to it now. Jayne seemed a little uneasy, but it didn't bother her too much. Alex was the one that seemed really upset, glancing up at the walls and doors every few seconds and anxiously stopping. “Alex, are you okay?” Camielle asked him. “You are so nervous. I mean, havent you been here before? Why does it bother you so much?” “I haven’t been here that often,” Alex said. “And it’s just...freaky. Dark.” “Get used to it,” Jayne said, as abrupt as ever. They made it to the door eventually. Alex and Camielle both hesitated, unsure, but Jayne easily opened the door and wlaked inside. She busily walked to the bookshelf and puleld off a couple books. She flipped through them, found them blank, and then angrily threw them on the ground, becoming very frustrated in a very short amount of time. “Why are all these books blank?” she near-shouted angrily. “Why on earth would some idiot put a bunch of blank books in here?” “I blanked them out, Jayne,” Alex informed her l. “Leave them alone for 5 seconds and I’ll fix them, all right?” Jayne rolled her eyes and stepped away. Alex paused for a second before walking towards the stack, picking one up, and tossing it at Jayne. “There. Happy now?” Jayne threw the book at him. “Yes. But there’s no need to throw things.” “Hypocrite,” Camielle said. “Whatever,” Jayne said, proceeding to open up many of the books on the shelf and glance through them. “Ugh. None of these are about the present” she said, sounding frustrated. “Most of them are about the Tertiminaries or Bridges and their history. I mean, it’s like, I don’t care. Ugh.” “How can you even tell what they’re about?” Camielle asked. “You’re not reading them, just glancing at the top.” “It’s called a title, master of brilliance. It tells what the book is about.” “What exactly are you looking for, anyway?” Alex asked. “I want to know where the Agate is, how we can get at it, and what we would need to do with it to get rid of Bridges. Obviously.” “You really think you can do that?” Alex “I think we should focus on getting out. We’ll never find the Agate.” “Yes, we can. And even if we make it out, the Cenchen is still enslaved.” “There is no way that we are going to be able to free the Cenchen. Were too young and we don’t ahve any power. Bridges is huge and powerful.” “They wont expect an attack from us at this point. We’ve lost our names and they dont teach us dangerous spells. In their minds, we’re powerless.” “In real life, we’re powerless too! There’s no way we can sneak the Agate past them.” “Yes, there is.” “No, there isn’t.” “Yes, we can.” “You’re going to-” “Both of you, be quiet for a second!” Camielle interrupted loudly, “ I mean...well...I think I know where the Agate might be.” “Where?” Jayne demanded. Camielle retrieved the map from the bookshelf and showed it to Jayne. She scanned it uninterestedly until she saw the C.M. Office. “What’s that?” Jayne asked. “I don’t know,” Camielle said. “Do you think it could be important though?” “Well,” Jayne considered, “If the Agate is anywhere in the Cenchen, then it’ll be there.” “Why would the Agate be in the Cenchen?” Alex asked. “How dumb do you think Bridges is?” “Because they do so much work here,” Jayne said. “Think about it. Those factories run all day, all night. The Cenchen isn’t big enough to need to run all those factories all the time. We have way more than we actually need. Maybe all the extra stuff we make goes to Bridges, so they can focus on fighting and training and whatnot instead of manufacturing. But all the stuff we make needs some source of power...like the Cenchen Agate. “So they run all the factories off the Agate?” Alex asked. “Why would they use it for that?” “Because they can’t use it for fighting,” Jayne said. “Only the Cenchen can use it. So I bet they connect all the societies they’ve taken over and then use the Agate to power them.” “We’re going to get ourselves killed,” Alex said in his usual cynical way. “It’s crawling with just-out-of school Bridge kids. Do you know how dangerous those kids are?” “No,” Jayne said. “But I don’t really see how you would either. Have you ever been to Bridges.” “Yes, I have. And I know the C.M. Office has something to do with them, too.” “What?” Camielle asked. “How?” “Because the C stands for communicating. And if it's communicating, then it's probably communicating with Bridges, not some other randoms. And that means that someone from Bridges is there, and anyone from Bridges is not only going to really want to kill us, they're going to be really good at it, too.” “Well then we’ll have to make it so they can’t see us,” Jayne said. “Do you know any spells that could help us do that?” “There’s one similar to blanking that will-” Alex started, stopping halfway through his sentence as he realized that a spell to make them invisible would only make Jayne want to go that much more. “ "It does what?" Jayne asked. "Come on. Finish your sentence." Alex sighed unhappily. "It'll make it so that people can't see or hear you. I think they won't be able to touch you either, but you have to stay really still." "All right then," Jayne said. "What are we freaking out about, then? We can use your little spell to stay invisible. Then we won't have to worry about hiding or anything. We'll be safe." "But what if-" "Alex." Jayne's tone was not happy "We have to do it. I have to do it, and I have to have you help, so you better just shut up and make me happy, al right?" "But-" "Alex." "Fine. Just stop glaring at me." "Tomorrow we'll meet at my room, all right? And tomorrow night we'll investigate the C.M. Office." Camielle was nervous. She did not like the way Alex talked about Bridges and all the training they did. It was frightening, and she was truly afraid now of getting killed. But she had to follow Jayne. She hoped- she trusted- that even if Camielle was weak and shy and would make all the wrong choices, Jayne would make sure they were okay. Jayne would lead. And so she was less nervous. She would be okay. Jayne would make absolute sure that they were all okay. "Remember," Alex said as they waited outside the Office. Keep still. They won't be able to see you at all if you keep absolute still. After a while it'll feel weird and you'll want to move, but don't even flinch. Keep focused on being still." "Okay, okay," Jayne said. "You don't need to go on and on about it." He did the spell and they walked in. The room was startling, much different from the Cenchen or even the room behind the white door. The walls were an even blue instead of black like the Cenchen or light like the book-room. It wasn't too big, about the size of any classroom, but it looked bigger than it really was because it's only contents were a small white table. The bright white in the ceiling was very dim, like someone felt that they needed the light on but that it wasn't of paramount importance. Most importantly, there were four doors in the back all line up next to each other. "Weird," Jayne said. "But cool." "There's nothing here," Alex said. "Can we go now?" Jayne was probably about to make some sarcastic statement about the doors in the back, but she was abruptly cut off by three people entering from one of the doors, two girls and two boys. They were obviously Bridges- the two girls blond, the boy with light brown hair. "Oh- my-gawd," the taller of the two girls was saying. "De Ruysscher and the class work is getting so ah-noy-ing." "Totally," the shorter one affirmed. "I mean, watching the Cenchen? Puh-lease. Nameless kids don't even, like, do anything, hello!" "Duh," the other girl said. "It's totally ridiculous." "I get you, Camille. Like Bridges training isn't enough to deal with? And what are we supposed to do here, anyway? Just do nothing? Lame." The boy rolled his eyes. "Ugh." "It's, like, so boring. Just walking around and akg sure they don't, like, run around or do whatever other crazy shit Cenchen six-year-olds try to pull. But god. It's not like they do anything except, like, class anyway." "I know. And does anyone pay even an ounce of attention?" The boy laughed. "I mean, come on. It's such a waste of time." "I know. So lame. The Cenchen could be, like, surrounding the office right now and no one would notice." "OMG, you are so right." They kept talking, but Camielle couldn't focus. Keeping still when blanked was difficult, next to impossible. A weird feeling crawled from her right wrist to her body, like an army of ants was slowly making its way across her arm. She wanted to shake it badly, terribly, but she couldn't move- she could feel her arm beginning to twitch- Finally, the three stupid teenagers made their way out of the room. Jayne and Alex all shook themselves out, clearly feeling the insect-feeling as much as Camielle did. "That was weird," Jayne felt the need to declare. "Did you hear one of the girls?" Camielle said. "She said my name. Or something that sounded like my name. Cam-eel." "They said a lot of stuff I think was important," Jayne said. "First of all, I don't think they're putting a lot of worth into security for this place. I mean, they've got kids who haven't even finished training here." "Those kids looked way too old to still be in training," Alex said. "They are much older than us." "Bridges kids train until they're eighteen, nineteen, or even twenty," Camielle said. "Not fifteen." "Still," Jayne says. "They aren't paying a lot of attention to us. I bet you anything they aren't paying a lot of attention to the Agate either." "They're going to guard the Agate a lot more intensely than some random corridor in the Office," Alex pointed. "Of course they guard the Agate more closely," Jayne said. "I don't doubt that. But if they're guarding one section more lackadaisically they'll probably guard everything lackadaisically. They don't expect us to be able to do anything." "Yes, and there's probably a reason for that," Alex said. "Alex, just shut up," Jayne near-yelled. "Why do you keep saying the same thing over and over again? No one cares any more now than we did the first thousand times. Either say something I care about or just shut the hell up." Alex looked very surprised to be yelled at like this. "Let's go through the door on the left," Jayne ordered in a calmer voice. "We should probably try to avoid whatever room the Bridge kids are walking through." "Oh, but aren't the Bridges kids so not dangerous-" "Alex, shut up!" Alex shut up. They went through the door on the far left, facing another empty room. They walked through this one much more carefully. There were at least a dozen doors, and someone from Bridges could walk in through any at any time. The room looked like it was for some kind of storage. Weapons piled up on the walls, stacked up neatly. The parts of the room near the walls looked like inventory in a store, but the middle was completely empty. "Weapons," Alex noted. "Cool." He looked mildly interested for the first time. "Don't touch them," Jayne warned. "You need a Bridges-scar or else you'll set off an alarm." "Oh." Alex paused for a moment. "What's a Bridges-scar?" "It's this scar they get across their wrist when they join Bridges," Jayne explained. "Okay," Camielle said. "Where should we go next?" Jayne pulled the map out of her pocket. "Ugh. I wish this map would-" The map now showed the complete floor plan of the C.M. Office. "That's cool," Jayne declared. "All right. Wow, this is confusing. It seems like half the rooms don't exist most of the time. And how can they fit so many doors-" "Can we just figure out where the Agate is?" Alex asked. "Hurry up." "Shut up, Alex," Jayne said "So I think we should head to where the storage rooms are." "Isn't half the Cenchen storage?" Camielle asked. "Why do they need storage here, too?" "So that we don't get into it, obviously," Jayne said dismissively. "Anyway, it also shows where all the guards and locks are- or where they should be, at least- and they seem to be toward the left of the storage rooms. Let's go there." "So we're going to walk into a stack of Bridges guards with our point- and-shoot weapons and expect not to get killed? There is no way that is going to happen. And we're hardly going to be able to consistently sneak past them, either. Blanking is not always perfect, you know." "Hm, Jayne considered. "You know, you might be right about that." "Let's just go back," Alex said. "No thanks," Jayne answered. "We have to do it. Let's just go carefully, and if we see or hear guards we'll try to, I don't know, go slower or something. But we can't stop now." "I think we can stop now," Alex muttered. "But no, I have to be friends with a bunch of crazy people with a suicide wish." Jayne lead them into room after room, most of them filled with supplies lined up like inventory. Most of them were Bridges-style weapons, the kind that required years of training and skill to master. I bet we make all these weapons, Jayne thought bitterly. We make all of their weapons and food and everything else and they put half of it here until they need it. I can't believe they enslaved us with their weaponry and numbers, and now we work constantly so they can increase their weaponry and numbers. She hated it, hated the idea of not being free, hated the idea of imprisonment by people she'd hardly ever seen. But despite her anger and sense of injustice, every time she heard about Bridges she still felt amazed, awed. They must have so much power to be able to control the world like that, to crush and control everyone and anyone who stood in their way. Their leader must be the most powerful person in the world. Jayne would love to be that person. But more than that, she wanted to free the Cenchen. If she found the Agate, she could do that, make them free...lead the Cenchen, she would make a good leader- and a formidable one, with the Agate in her hands…it was so powerful, she might be able to control Bridges, even….she would have so much power… But now was not the time to dream. She had to focus on finding the Agate now. She would love to lead, to have all that power, but freeing the Cenchen was definitely more important…well…maybe. Eventually, they finished walking through unguarded and unlocked rooms and stood outside one with guards. "I can hear them talking," Camielle said. "God, I wish I knew what they're saying." Jayne pulled a cup out of the pockets of her jacket. She placed the hollow part against the door and listened through the other end. "I've always wondered," Alex said. "Does that really work?" "Yeah, it's super clear." They paused for a few minutes, letting Jayne listen. "Are they saying anything important?" Camielle asked. "I think they're playing some kind of game. They're talking a lot about spoons and cards. Wait, they stopped talking. Now they're actually playing, I think. I can hear cards sliding around." "They probably won't pay any attention to us," Camielle pointed out. "Come on, let's go." "I don't-" "Think to yourself, Alex," Jayne said in an icy voice. "Is what you're going to say new or important? Is it going to make me happy?" Apparently deciding whatever he wanted to say was not going to make Jayne a happy camper, Alex shut his trap. He then tried the door. "It's locked," he informed the others. "I know how to pick locks," Jayne said. "It's easy." She pulled a wire out of her pocket and leaned forward to pick the dock. Alex grabbed her wrist. "Bridges locks are different. If you do it the wrong way, you'll set off an alarm." Jayne did not look happy to hear this. "Great. How do you propose opening the stupid door then?" "There's a computer chip inside it. If you hit the computer when you pick it, we're toast. If you manage to avoid it then you're okay. It's not hard, but you have to know what you're doing." "Can't we just kill the stupid computer?" "You mean smash it? No way. That'll set off an alarm too." "Can't you just blank out the door?" Camielle asked. "Then we could go right through it, couldn't we?" "They'll see the door go missing," Alex said. "If we just pick the lock they won't care, because Bridges kids like to force doors and kids outside of training are probably wandering around playing with their magic and screwing everything up anyway. But they don't know how to blank things or cast illusions or anything. They'll see the door go missing and then they'll start looking for Cenchen. A door flying open won't prompt them to ring an alarm, but a door just vanishing will." "So, basically, we have to pick the lock," Jayne said. "Great." "Yep." "Do you know how to do this?" "Well…um…" "Are you going to do it?" "No." "Okay, let me rephrase that. Alex, open the damn door. Now." "But-" "Do it!" Alex, apparently finding Jayne scarier than Bridges, picked the lock. The kids playing their game barely noticed, continuing to play their game. Jayne Camielle, and Alex moved in slowly, praying that the Bridge kids would not notice the odd glimmers and movements in the back of the room. The kids finished the game with a mad scramble for spoons on top of their table. They finally looked up. Jayne, Camielle, and Alex froze. "Oh look," one of the girls said. It was the same one they'd seen earlier: the tall blonde girl. "Some idiot opened the door." "Maybe it was a Cenchen kid," the same boy said in a dry, scary voice. "Coming for the Agate and to eat us." "Ha. As if," a different Bridges girl said, flipping her hair over her shoulder. She had brown-black hair and eyes but did not look like the typical Cenchen girl, either. She obviously belonged to Bridges. "Those blank-eyed freakazoids wouldn't leave the complex if it was on fire." "It's probably, like, an instructor," a brown-haired girl pointed out. "Maybe it's Dobrescu. I think he's the one patrolling today." "Awe-some. That's all I need- to get caught by Dobrescu and lose my Certificate. That would totally make my day." The tall blond girl rolled her eyes. A new girl started packing up the cards. "Maybe we should stop playing Spoons and, like, actually walk around and make sure no one tries to go anywhere." The others looked down to pick up the cards and spoons and Jayne, Camielle, and Alex took a few careful steps toward the one other door about ten feet away from them. "But I don't really wanna do that," another girl said. "It's boring. I wanna play Spoons." "Only because you always win." The group of kids walked out of the room through the door Jayne, Camielle, and Alex had just been through. They made it to the next door, checked for guards on the other side with Jayne's little spying-cup and Alex picked the lock on it. The room was empty. There were three doors on the sides of the walls. "Which way do we go?" Camielle asked. "That one," Jayne said, pointing to the door in front of them. "I don't know why but it just seems like the right one." Camielle frowned. She was not so sure. While the door was undoubtedly appealing, there was something sinister about it. Something bad. She did not know which feeling was more important. Whichever one Jayne agreed with, she supposed. The two girls started walking to the door. Alex ran in front of them and stopped them. "Don't go in there," he warned. "Alex," Jayne said angrily. "Get out of my way." "Seriously. Don't. I'm not saying this because I don't want to. The Agate isn't in there, a trap is." "And you know this how?" "Because I've been here before. Don't go through that door." "Where should we go then?" Camielle asked. "Where is the Agate? We need to find it." "I have no idea. But I know it's not there." "I don't care," Jayne said. "I'm going through." She tried to shove Alex aside but was not successful. "Get out of my way!" "No." "I think there's something important in there,' Camielle said hesitantly. "Can't we at least just see it? We don't have to stay for a long time." Alex sighed. "Bridges doesn't know you're here. They aren't looking for us. But someone else does, and they're through the door. Look for another one." Jayne definitely was not happy about this. She shoved past Alex and reached for the doorknob. It did not turn. "It's locked," she said in an angry, tight voice. "Unlock it." "No." "Alex-" "I'm not going to unlock it." "Alex, you are going to listen to me and unlock this door, I swear-" "Let's just go through another door," Camielle shouted. "Please. Just stop fighting. This isn't helping us at all." “I want to go through the door,” Jayne demanded. “Open it, Alex.” “No.” “The Agate probably isn’t there, Jayne,” Camielle said, trying to resolve the argument. “Let’s go through a different one, okay? One that will actually help us.” “That one will help us,” Jayne said. “I want it.” “Yes, we’ve figured that out by now,” Camielle said. “However, Alex seems quite sure that you’re not going to get-” “Shut up, Camielle.” “Jayne-” “Shut up!” Camielle shut up. “Give it up, Jayne,” Alex said. I’m not going to unlock the door. Jayne glared at Camielle and Alex but shut her mouth. I'll come back, she thought to herself. I'll wrench the doorknob off the goddamn door if I have to. But not here, not when Camielle and Alex could get in trouble too. Jayne led them through the only other door. Each room they walked in seemed to have successively less rooms. As they kept walking they saw more completely empty rooms as well, like they had long since grown purposeless. Camielle had a vague feeling that the rooms had once held something, maybe supplies, maybe people, maybe knowledge or power but someone had removed it. She did not know why. She would ask Jayne when she was in a better mood, less likely to yell or get snappy. Jayne never cared to analyze things when she was angry. Finally, finally, there was one door left. Camielle could not say how she knew it, but she did. There were no more doors and empty rooms in between them and the Agate. "This is the last one," Camielle said in a low voice. "How do you know?" Jayne asked. "I just know. But there's something on the other side of the door, too. Something else." Jayne shrugged. Camielle could get very strange sometimes. It was best just to ignore it and not let it get in her way. "All right, Alex. Open it." "This is a different lock. We need someone from Bridges to open it." "I'm from Bridges," Camielle pointed out. "I'm an alien." "You don't have a Bridges-scar," he said. "Or a draccal knife." "What's a draccal knife?" Jayne asked. "It cuts the scars and marks them from Bridges, usually across their wrist. The wounds from it usually don't heal." Camielle was hit with a sudden memory of a tall blond woman holding a short knife. She had a bracelet with a clear, red stone in it. Camielle shook her head, wondering where on earth that had come from. "I don't think I have one of those." She pulled the sleeve down on her wrist to check. No scar. Nothing. "I guess we can't go forward then," Alex said happily. "We need to turn back." Jayne looked at it, considering. "Blank out the door." "What?" "Blank it out. We can walk through it then and get through." "But they'll see!" "They'll see anyway if we're really going to take it." "Jayne, we can't just-" “Alex, blank out the door.” Jayne's voice was forceful. “But the guards-” “If we take them by surprise, I have a spell that’ll take them out no problem." "You're crazy, you know that?" "Alex. Blank. Out. The door. Now." He blanked out the door. Jayne's spell sliced through the room, but failed to hit anything. No one was in the room to get hit. "No guards," Jayne said, sounding pleased. "Excellent." The room wasn't that big, slightly smaller than a bedroom. It was totally empty except for a small table in the center. The table had a dome of glass on it, filled with an unidentifiable Bridges-liquid, and floating in the center, the Agate. A small book laid next to it. "Read the book first," Camielle requested. Jayne, of course, would rather just grab the Agate and run, but she reluctantly reached for the book instead. She wanted the Agate's power, it's possibilities. She did not want to wait. The book was short, only 10 or so pages. Jayne did not see the purpose of a ten-page book, but she opened it to the first page anyway and quickly read it to herself. Tu vas un stade. Non, je vais dammit The Cenchen Agate. Named for the largest society under it's reach, the Cenchen Agate powers the main underground factory matrix. Made up of the Cenchen, Heleron, Collinska, and several offshoots of these societies, this group manufactures 70-80% of Bridge's supplies, as well as supplies it's own. This is the biggest and most important piece of Agate. The Cenchen, Heleron, and their offshoots are subject to name-losing. Security is low. The Cenchen are the only ones who could steal, but none of them have names. Death is not common, as the Cenchen are fairly treated considering past actions. Most die from old age. The Bridges Agate The Bridges Agate powers a much smaller complex made up of the former prisons from the Saushale, Bridges, and Tertiminaries. Security is high. Few survive long enough to be a danger. Causes of death include "What is it?" Camielle interrupted. "You aren't saying anything." "I don't know," Jayne said slowly. "I think they broke the Agate or something. It describes all these different ones. The Cenchen Agate, Bridges Agate, Bridges' Storage Agate, Tertiminaries' Storage Agate, and then 'Personal Agate'. Weird." Camielle was hit with even stronger memories... A classroom of people...a teacher at the front...magic...they were trying to knock people down but Camielle knocked them out...she was the best...she could do whatever they told her to do...everyone struggled but Camielle... A redheaded woman...an Agate....she would have to remember....no matter what she would have to remember....remember...Someone had it...the Agate....she had to take it from them....they were dangerous.. Someone hit the redheaded woman from behind...she never saw...they were taking her away to a camp... "So…even if we stole this one…Bridges would still be able to take us over," Camielle said slowly. "Wonderful." "It's completely wonderful," Jayne said sarcastically. "Completely. I wish it would at least explain what a Personal Agate is." "Some people just carry Agates around with them. There's a redhead in Bridges with one. And a man in the Cenchen who has one, too." "How do you know?" Jayne asked. "I'm not sure, but I know it's true." "The way Jayne always knew what was up with the Cenchen?" Alex asked. "Like that?" "No. Someone told me about a lot of things a long time ago, and I think I just forgot until now. They taught me things, too, but I don't remember. They told me about the Agate, too, but I didn't remember until now. Just now. It just sort of hit me. They said where the Agate is in Bridges, but I don't know where it is now." "Well, you're going to have to remember," Jayne said. "We're going to find those pieces and we're going to find the people wearing them. We're doing to track down everything. We will control the Agate." "Someday, Camielle, you'll find all of the hidden spots I don't know. You'll track down everything. You will control the Agate." Camielle shook her head. She did not know where the memories were coming from, and she did not know whether she wanted to keep remembering. She was so confused. Who was the redheaded woman? Why did she teach Camielle so much about the Agate? What was all of this, anyway? Were these her memories? Could they be those illusions the Cenchen had warned them about so many days ago, a warning none of them had paid any attention to? She did not know at all. Jayne turned to Alex then. "So, Mr. Know-it-All, is there some special way of opening this?" "I only recognize locks, Ms. Sarcastic-and-Bossy. This just looks like to glass to me." "Well, I don't know about the glass but I seriously doubt we want to be seriously upsetting that liquid," Camielle stated, apparently enjoying the feeling of pointing out the obvious. "It does not look like a happy camper to me." "I think I can deal with that," Jayne said. "I just hope an alarm doesn't go off." "Lucky for us, they can only have one dangerous thing," Alex said. "Either the liquid is corrosive and hard to dodge, even for Bridge-kids, or else it'll set off an alarm. I think they figure if you made it this far you aren't scared of an alarm." Jayne decided to try and ignore that. She had a good way to deal with the liquid. She'd learned the Kins, Bridges magic, years ago, as some idiot had put instructions for it in the back of one of the spellbooks for some odd reason. Combined with an old Cenchen spell she'd found in the room behind the door, it became a terrifyingly powerful concoction. "Stand back," she announced in a loud voice. Alex and Camielle stood back. Jayne watched the dome for a second, hoping she wouldn't accidentally kill anyone, but then shot off the spell. It was as huge as when she'd practiced. The glass shattered instantly, and the liquid was obviously designed to go all around the room. Camielle and Alex threw up their hands (like that was going to accomplish anything), and as they did so a blue light shot out, collided with the dangerous liquid, and suddenly hit the ground. Everything was silent for a second. "Jayne, why are you throwing blue light at us?" Alex asked. "The blue was Camielle," Jayne said in a low voice. "Not me." More memories hit her, coming out of nowhere. A boy sneaking up on her…he was going to scare her…a knife he'd stolen…he was behind her…poking her…surprised her…blue light shot out… hit him… hurt him…almost killed him…it just came…she hadn't meant to…she was too powerful… "Okay, whatever,'' Alex said. "Let's just grab the Agate and go, alright? I really don’t think standing around here dawdling is in our best interests." "Okay," Jayne said. "Now we need to go and get the others." "Later," Alex demanded. "We've done plenty tonight. Plenty." "We have a time limit, though," Jayne said worriedly. "We don't have that much time left until we lose our names." "How many days is it now?" Camielle asked. "I don't remember," Jayne said. "But it's probably been too many." "Look, we can't even get to Bridges, let alone fight them," Alex pointed out. "We don't know how to get there. We're sort of stuck in the Cenchen." "There's no way to get from here to Bridges?" Jayne asked. "How do the Bridge kids do it, then?" Alex and Camielle were silent. "One of you knows the answer to this," Jayne said angrily. "Tell me. Now." They were silent again, but neither Camielle nor looked completely comfortable underneath Jayne's angry glare. "There's probably a transporter here or something," Alex finally said in a very unwilling tone. Jayne smiled. "Excellent. Where is it?" "Check the map," Camielle pointed out. "It's probably on there." Jayne rolled her eyes, laughing at herself. "Duh. I'm slow today." "So we are going to Bridges?" "Yes. Or, at least I think we should." "Of course you do," Alex shot at her, taking an angry step forward. "I think it's the worst idea you've ever had. Like tromping into this Bridges-infested place isn't bad enough, you want to just waltz into the actual Bridges settlement? Are you out of your mind? There's only one Bridges settlement with the Agate, and it is the most dangerous, deadly, inhospitable place you can think of anywhere! The likelihood of us even making it in is absolutely nothing. Zero. Three stupid little Cenchen kids? There is no way we're going to be able to trip up their security! That school is extremely dangerous! The only way you can even just go and learn at SoCal Bridges is to be just about the most brilliant person alive, and the instructors are even more brilliant and deadly. None of us have had any training whatsoever. Bridge kids have so much training it's unbelievable. Jayne, you may think you're invincible, but no one stands a chance against Bridges. No one." "Thank you for that extremely redundant rant," Jayne told him sarcastically. "Redundant or not, you have to admit I'm right!" Alex exclaimed. "Only the dumbest person alive would think that Bridges is in any way even remotely possible to penetrate!" "Well, I guess we are the dumbest people alive," Jayne said. "Because it is possible to penetrate it, and we are going to penetrate it, and that's that!" "Do you two always have to fight?" Camielle asked. "Yes, it's dangerous. Yes, we need those other Agate pieces. But we don't even know where any of this is! Can't we please just discuss this when we actually know what we're doing!" "Well, you said you would know how to find it if you were there. So all we really need to do is find the transporter and then we're in." "We're not going in," Alex said. "You're not going anywhere unless you can blank yourself out, and I'm not coming. You're not going to blank yourself out ithout me." Jayne glared at him. She was not happy about this. She wanted the power, the power of the Agate, the power of leadership. She did not want Alex in her way. He was too cautious, too worried, too afraid of taking risks. Jayne was not afraid of taking risks. Without Alex, she was not going to go very far. She could not go to Bridges with only Camielle, weak Camielle, who was afraid to force or order. She needed Alex's power. But suppose she did not go far from here. Suppose she went nearby, to a place that was only a dozen yards away… The door outside of this room. The door that had called for her. She wanted power. She wanted the door. And she wanted it now. "We need to get the door," Jayne said in a low voice. "Now." Camielle, holding the Agate, considered this. "I bet I could trick the door with this." "You know how to use the Agate?" Jayne asked. The same redheaded woman, this time holding a stone…giving it to Camielle…she needed the stone… "Use it," the woman says. "You must learn how to use it." Using it was easy…like doing any other kind of magic…get inside it…tap into it…find the magic…power yourself…your spells… The image was clear. She remembered the Agate she had used: different, redder, locked on a chain. She remembered secretly practicing with it. Camielle tried to remember, tried to get more memories…but it was too evasive, too far away. She couldn't latch onto it. "How do you use it?" Jayne asked urgently. "We need to know." Camielle shook her head. She did not know how to do most maic. Jayne always had this special way of remembering and executing spells that no one else could copy. Camielle was alright at most of the basic Cenchen-level spells, but the one she remembered was far too complex. "I'm not sure," she said in her usual wisp of a voice, gently moving the Agate from hand to hand. "I can't realy remember it." Jayne sighed impatiently. Camielle could be the most frustrating person alive sometimes. She spoke weakly, just waiting for someone to go after her cruelly. Her rare outbursts were always followed by intense regret and shyness. She was afraid of everyone, even her friends, afraid of speaking, afraid of ridicule, but inviting it anyway. Jayne didn't understand her at all. She didn't understand shyness, the fear of talking or leading at all. Camielle would rather think in silence, but Jayne always had to talk. She didn't understand Camielle's silence. And now this? She couldn't remember it? She said there was something familiar abot it a second ago, did she not? What bought that on? Why couldn't she remember it now? Camielle would never answer these questions out loud, she would only say them in her head while Jayne sat here and seethed. She was afraid of Jayne's anger, she could tell, fearfully gazing down. She wanted Jayne to be calm, and hoped that silence would make it happen. Jayne never wanted silence. She always wanted words. She wanted Camielle to explain. This is ridiculous, she thought to herself. No one is listening to you at all. It must stop, and it should stop soon. Camielle needs to speak and Alex needs to help and I need to make both things happen. Now. She angrily turned on both of them. "Alright, look. We need to do something, we can't jusdt stand here! Alex, you are going to help, and that is-" "I'm not going to go into Bridges." "I want you to open the door outside here. I will help. I know it will." "I'm not doing that either," Alex said just as defiantly. Jayne shoved him and started glaring in an angry, forceful way. "I know you don't want to. I know you think it's some sort of trap. You've said so very clearly. But I also know that the door will help, and I need you to open the door, and so you are going to help me, alright?" Alex took a step back. It was sort of hard to defy Jayne when she glared like that, and Alex decided that a wise decision might be to just help her. "You will regret it," he warned her, certainty thick in his voice. "No, I won't," Jayne said just as certainly. She started walking out of the room, Camielle not too far behind. She turned back around just before reaching the door. "Well, Alex?" she asked, one eyebrow raised. He picked the lock, turned the doorknob, and the three walked in. The room was big, definitely bigger than the room that housed the Agate, though hardly the biggest room they’d ever seen. It had only a few pieces of furniture inside- a large desk shoved against the opposite side, a small table near the side, and most notable, a large chair right in the center facing away from them. “There’s nothing here,” Camielle felt the need to point out. The chair spun around and a man stood up. Jayne, Camielle, and Alex froze. He did not look any different from the other Cenchen adults; black hair, near-white skin, black eyes. But there was still something different about his eyes. They were alive. Jayne’s eyes. “Hello, children.” His mouth twisted around in a strange smile. The look shot an odd feeling of deja vu through her.. The red-headed woman was near the door...opening the door...four students...they smiled the same way...they were getting their way...winning...they were going to do something evil...something evil to the red headed woman... Something was wrong. Alex was right, this was wrong, it was a trap. They needed to leave now. He was looking right at them. He could see them despite the blanking. “Don’t bother blanking yourself out,” he said in a bored tone. “The Cenchen can see right through it.” “Who are you?” Jayne asked, her voice strong. “Why have you not lost your name?” “I am Matthew Herjika-Cenchen.” The next sentence is inadequate. But excellent scene so far. All three of the children expressed some shock at this, but Jayne was the least jarred. She kept staring at Matthew with the same cool expression. I don’t know what to say! Well, I know WHAT to say, but not how to say it. He always says too much or too little. I don’t know what to say. “I know who you are, too,” he said in a casual tone of voice, sitting back down in the chair. “Alex, the informant, the spy. Camielle, the one with all the power. And Jayne, the leader.” Matthew smiled, though less forcefully than before. Forceful smiles? Really? “Why are you here?” Jayne asked, her expression guarded and her voice not kind. “I want to lead the Cenchen,” he said simply. “I want to make sure no one loses their name again. But I need the Agate if I’m going to do anything.” Camielle still had the Agate in her hand. No, she thought to herself. I can’t give him the Agate. I don’t know why, but it would be bad. Jayne did not tell Matthew that they had the Agate. She wanted the Agate for herself, and she was determined to keep it. She was determined to keep the power it offered her. “I already have some... control over the Cenchen,” Matthew continued, his voice gaining emotion and anger as he went on. “But Bridges still gives me certain...limits. Too many...parameters. I am tired of Bridges controlling me and the Cenchen. I am tired of watching the Cenchen losing their names. Bridges is the one that deserves to suffer, not us. They are the one acting abominably.” Jayne looked more interested. “What does this have to do with us, then?” "You know where the Agate pieces are. You can reach them." His eyes turned toward Jayne. "You can help me use them. To lead." "Why do you know who we are?" Camielle asked hesitantly. "Do you- do you watch us?" Matthew shrugged, his casual manner in no way affected by her question. "I know who you are. I know where you've been." Jayne did not seem to find this as alarming as Camielle. She seemed as cool, calm, and casual as Matthew. "You say we know where the Agate pieces are? What makes you think that?" "Camielle knows," Matthew said. "She helped hide them. She was taught their location." An elevator...a secret elevator....the back of a secret room...walking quickly...Bridges was filled with cameras...the red headed woman did not want the cameras to see this... “We must protect it, Camielle,” she said, hiding it in the wall. “We can’t let Bridges have all this power. We must protect it.” Camielle took a step back. "I- I- I don't know where any pieces are," she said fretfully. "I don’t remember anything before the Cenchen. I didn't even know the Agate existed until a little bit ago." "But you remember now," Matthew said with a touch of anger. There was no doubt in his voice. He knew it was true. He was certain. "The closer you got to the Agate, the more you remember." Walking across a large expanse...black everywhere...she needed to take it to the Tertiminaries prince...the Agate would be safe there... Camielle was scared. She did not know why, but there was something bad about this. About him. She didn't want him to know so much about her. She wanted him to doubt this information. She didn't like his certainty. He was certain about this, and about something else, too. He was certain something bad was going to happen. Something to do with her. Something bad. She did not acknowledge his statement. She did not say anything at all. "Why does it concern you what we remember?" Jayne asked. "How do you know she will follow you? That she will help." "Oh, I don't know anything for certain," he said, his voice as careless as ever. But there was still something underneath- that same edge of certainty. He did know for sure. He had a plan, and he knew it would work. He knew that Camielle and Jayne and Alex would help. Jayne seemed to pick up on this as strongly as Camielle. "Yes, you do. You are certain. You know we will help you. Why?" Her voice was forceful, not out of fear but out of determination. She was going to get her way. "You don't like it when people are cryptic, do you, Jayne?" Matthew asked, smiling lightly. "A...forceful person. You don't always have to force people to do things, Jayne. Sometimes, you can trick them. Make them think that they want to help you." "You're going to have to force us if you want us to help you," Jayne said. "Why?" Matthew asked her. "You want the Agate as much as do. Every time you think about it the desire...shocks through you. You must have it, you must have the power." Jayne kept her mouth closed. "I want the Agate as much as you do. We both want to lead. We both want to control the Cenchen." "You want to control the Cenchen," Jayne said. "I want to free the Cenchen." "An...admirable goal," Matthew assured her. "Something you can only accomplish with the Agate and my help." Jayne could not deny this. He held control over the Cenchen already. He had a piece of the Agate as well; she could see it wrapped around his wrist. And he had controlled the Cenchen before. Bridges was weaker this time. They were unused to opposition. The Cenchen had a chance, more of a chance than last time. Jayne wanted to help. Jayne wanted to lead. Leading with Matthew...it was an interesting idea. "You would ask me to lead? To help you lead?" Jayne asked, desiring clarification. "That is exactly what I am asking you. I know you could do it," Matthew smiled in his usual way. "I know you want to." It was exactly what Jayne wanted. She was older than the other children in the Cenchen; she'd started school a year and a half later than the others. The others were fifteen, she was almost seventeen. Perhaps she was still somewhat oung now…but in the future…leading the Cenchen… It was definitely a pleasant thought. Camielle, however, did not like the way this conversation was going at all. The sense that something was wrong was strong within her, and she didn't like the idea of Jayne helping him. She definitely did not like the idea of following him herself. But still…maybe Jayne was right. Jayne was always the one that knew things ahead of time anyway, Camielle was notoriously "tuned out". She was probably being ridiculos now. Jayne was right. Jayne knew what to do. Jayne- I'm being just as stupid as the others are about the adults, Camielle realized. "The adults are always right." "The adults cannot be wrong." People can be wrong, people cabn be misguided. I can't trust everyone else to make my decisions for me. I have to believe that I am right sometimes to. "Well," Jayne said carefully. "Don't hesitate," Matthew said in a low voice. "I now what to do with the Agate more than anyone live. We would win. We would control Bridges. We would control Bridges. You know you envy the head of Bridges, you know you desperately wish you could hold that much power." He was right. He was completely right. Jayne didn't doubt or hesitate any longer. "I'll help you," she said, certainty and forceful. "You knew I would say it, of course." "I was certain." "And you are right." "And Camielle, you do realize what helping me find the Agate would mean, do you not?" His black eyes sharpened. "You would never have to lose your name. No one would have to lose their name." Camielle liked that idea. She did not want to lose her name, of course. But she didn't like the way he thought. She didn't like how much he knew about them. About what they wanted. How could he guess that Jayne would want to lead so much? She thought to herself. I never would have guessed. I've known her since I was four! He met her twenty minutes ago! She didn't like the way he thought. She didn't like t at all. "I- I-" She turned around, smashed the door into small pieces with the Agate's magic, and ran down the hall. Alex followed her. Matthew watched the two run away without much concern. "They won't make it far," he said indifferently. "They'll listen to me eventually," Jane said in the same cool way. "They always do." "Of course they do," Matthew said. "You are a leader. People will always follow you and they will always do what you demand." He knew who Jayne was; he always had. He knew why she was a leader. He knew why she was different from the other Cenchen kids. He knew why she had started school latr than the other children. He knew things about her that even she didn't know. "Do you have enough power to send the Cenchen after them?" Jayne asked. He nodded. "Everyone over eleven. By that point they wil have almost lost their names." "Some kids are scared of the corridors," Jayne pointed out. "They will all do as I say. Do you know where they might have gone?" "The white door," Jayne said instantly. Matthew seemed somewhat confused. "A white door?" "It's in the corridors, Jayne said. "Filled with books." "I don't know what that is," Matthew said. "But I suppose you do?" "I could find it," Jayne assured him. "But are you sure it will help? How do you know that Camielle could find the Agate pieces? She's never been outside the Cenchen." "She was born outside of the Cenchen," he said shortly. "She was trained outside the Cenchen. She does not know it, but it is still true." Matthew turned away from Jayne. Do not worry, he assured himself. They will not be able to hide from the Cenchen easily. And they definitely wont be able to hide from Bridges. I will find them. They will help me. And I know Jayne will be able to make them do what she wants. Jayne is forceful, a forceful person. It will all play out in the end. The Agate will be mine. I will control the Cenchen and Bridges. I know it will happen. Running. Camielle was never a fan of running. When it came to problems, Jayne wuld face them head on. She was not afraid of anything. Alex would hid or ran from problems, afraid of everything. Camielle wld not run or hide or face anything head on. She would always simply endure, succumb, fight back only in her head. She did not like running. But she was running anyway. She ran past the C.M. Office as quickly as she could make it. The blanking spell Alex had put on them earlier seemed to be in full force now, strengthened by Camielle or the Agate or perhaps something else entirely. But no matter what it was, it seemed to work quite well. The Bridge kids lethargically walking past seemed to notice only the doors slamming, never Camielle or Alex running past. But soon- so soon- they would see, they would notice- Running…the red headed woman had been hurt…she was not coming back…Camielle needed to run…they always told her to run… Camielle did not like running. But still she ran, eventually making it to the corridors. At first they were as dark and silent as ever, but before long Cenchen seemed to spring out everywhere. They were not fooled by Camielle's spell. They reached for her and Alex, stood in their way, tried to block them any way they could. Camielle was scared, scared of their darkness, their unseeing black eyes, the blankness of their actions. They did what Matthew or Bridges told them to do, and they would never think to do otherwise. She was scared of becoming like that, and the Agate seemed to react. Blue light streamed from her hand, hitting most of the Cenchen and forcing them back. They could not impede Camielle and Alex's progress. And so Camielle continued to run. They were following her…they knew who she was…they would find her…she was scared…she did not like the fear… She did not like running. She was not entirely sure where she was heading at first, her only intention was to get away, away fro Matthew, away from the sense something was wrong, away from black eyes that could see and plan. But now she knew. She knew where to hide. Mathew would never find it. Bridges would never find it. The Cenchen would never find it. She had hidden there before. The Cenchen was so small…nowhere to go…Camielle liked to roam…to run…she would not be able to leave…she wanted to leave…would the Cenchen ever let her…she had to hide where they would never find her… She wandered into the corridors…a purple door….she opened it…the room was boring, she did not care about its contents…but in the back there as another door…no one would be able to find her there… A hiding spot. She was running towards the door before she even realized it, Alex behind her. She didn’t know where it was or how to get to it, but some instinct, some memory in her head did. Something in her knew how to get there. She reached it soon enough, sooner than she had expected. It was harder to notice thann she had expected; it was purple, yes, but a very dark purple. The white on the ceiling was dim now, and the purple was hard to discern. It was almost black. It would certainly never attract the attention of anyone looking for her, noticeable only to those who knew what it was and was looking for it. Camielle knew what it was and she was definitely looking for it. She swung open the door as soon as she reached it and skidded inside. A;lex skidded in soon after her and closed the door quickly but relatively quietly. He stood here, almost still, desperately trying not to breathe hard and heavily. Camielle immediately went to the back of the small room. There was an indentation towards the edge of the back wall, about an inch wide, a centimeter deep, and going from the ceiling to the floor. She remembered it from the last time she’d ran here, unpursued, curious, bored, and she knew what it held. She laid a finger on it and the back wall seemed to open up, revealing a slightly smaller room. She and Alex immediately hurried inside and the door closed up behind them. The door slid open and she walked in, looking all around her. The room was smaller and less exciting but still different, still hidden from the boring, monotonous Cenchen. She would stay here for a while. They came for her soon after. No other missing children were ever looked for, and only a few returned. But it seemed like half the Cenchen was out now, looking into every door, whispering her name. It felt like every inch of the Cenchen was searching, looking: the walls, the ceiling, the doors, the knobs. All of it wanted her, wanted her to return, wanted her to learn, wanted her to become Cenchen. She tried- Alex lightly touched her on the shoulder and hissed, “Camielle, can you hear me?” She jumped up slightly, startled out of the vivid memory. All of the other memories here hazy, faded, difficult to remember, floating through her head. But this one was sharp and distinct. She could remember the angles of the room, the hiss of the Cenchen, the rough floor, the cold air. But mostly she could remember that feeling: the feeling of being hunted, of being watched, the fear, the whole Cenchen pressing in on her, wanting her, wanting her back. The feeling was intense and she did not like t. But she wanted to know. She had to know. Desperately. “Do you have the Agate or does Jayne?” he said, his voice low and hard to hear. Camielle opened up her hand. “Yeah, I thought I-” Once she started tuning into her surroundings, she realized she was clutching nothing in her hand. The Agate wasn’t there. It had wrapped around her wrist, and once she pulled back the black Cenchen sleeve she could see it was glowing brightly. “Whoa,” Alex said, shocked into audibility. “That’s cool.” She pushed her sleeve back and covered the stone again. The thick black Cenchen cloth extinguished all the light. “Why is it doing that?” Alex shrugged. “I don’t know, but it’s good. The Agate will only bond to certain people. Once it does you can’t take it from them by force, they have to give it to you. Plus it makes you harder to kill because the Agate will protect you. And trust me, no one is gong to be dumb enough to get in the way of that thing.” “Why did it bond to me?” she asked. “No idea. The smaller ones will bond with a lot of different people- I saw Matthew wearing one. But that’s the biggest. You’re- you’re special.” “Yay,” Camielle said sarcastically. “That just made my life that much better.” “What’s so bad about that?” “The more special you are, the more people you have trying to kill you,” Camielle said in an angry voice. “I don’t want it.” “You don’t want to have power? You don’t want to help?” Alex shook his head. “Then why did you go into the CM Office and everything? Why did you go into the door?” Camielle sighed. “The door? The white one? I don’t know. I just- I wanted it. It was something different. It didn’t seem dangerous. It didn’t seem bad.” “I’m fairly sure the C.M. Office seemed dangerous.” “Jayne,” Camielle said. “That was all Jayne. I had to follow her. I had to do what she said. I don’t know why, but everything seems right when she says it. She’s convincing. She’s-” “She’s a leader,” Alex said. “She’s Matthew’s daughter. It’s in her genes.” “She’s- what? She’s Matthew’s daughter? Are-” She was abruptly cut off as the purple door opened up loudly and several people came loudly tromping in. Camielle was fairly sure they were from Bridges just from the noise they were making, and she became even more sure once they started talking. “OMG, I can-not be-lieve that this happened!” one girl said. “The Cenchen do nuh-awt run away. Jesus Christ, we are going to be in so much trouble. We could, like, lose our Certificates!” “I hear this girl, is, like, special though,” a boy said in a low voice. “Don’t be ridiculous, John,” another girl said, her voice as irritating as ever. “She’s not special. She’s just some little bitch trying to create trouble.” “And trouble she’s created,” the first girl said. “She’s got half of SoCal Bridges after her. I don’t think Saddam Hussein had this many people trailing him.” “Do you think we’ll find her?” “No one evades SoCal Bridges for long,” she said in a supercilious voice, clearly proud of her society. “Come on, they’re not here. Let’s go.” They filed out and shut the door behind them. Camielle finally allowed herself to breathe. “That was not fun,” she said, enjoying her usual hobby of pointing out the excruciatingly obvious. “They have half of SoCal Bridges after you?” Alex said in a strangled voice. “Are you kidding me?” “What does SoCal mean?” Camielle asked. “Is it a Bridges word for the best?” Yes, because SoCal is in California and California is the best “No,” Alex said, shaking his head. “It’s short for Southern California. That’s where they’re located, in Southern California.” “What’s Southern California?” Camielle asked. “Is it a society or something?” Alex shook his head. “Ack, just forget it. It’s hard to understand if you’ve never been outside the Cenchen.” “I’ve been outside the Cenchen,” Camielle reminded him. “Remember?” “Yes, but clearly you don’t remember it as well as you could.” “Alright, fine,” Camielle said, sounding slightly unhappy. “But what were you saying before the Bridge kids? Something about Jayne being Matthew’s...daughter?” Alex shrugged. “Yeah. He and her mother kept her a secret from the Cenchen until she was five or six. I bet they used the same forgetting-spell on her that they used on you. Maybe that’s why you two got to be friends so fast.” Camielle glared at him. “We weren’t friends because of some stupid spell, Alex. And how do you know all this, anyway? Just going to Bridges wouldn’t help you know everything the world has ever known about me or Jayne, now would it?” Alex sighed. “It’s because of my parents. They used to be very important people in the Tertiminaries. They aren’t anymore, but it’s enough for me to...know things.” “Why are you here then?” Camielle demanded. “Why aren’t you in the Tertiminaries?” “Because we were banished,” Alex said. “And we were not allowed to return.” He was silent for a while and so Camielle stayed quiet as well. The Cenchen complex had a voice: a strong voice, a loud voice, an insistent voice. It wanted her to return. She closed her eyes and covered her ears, trying to block out the voice. It demanded her return, demanded that she assimilate, the she become Cenchen, that she darken, that was all she was. She was dark.... She stood up. She couldn’t take it any longer. “I am from Bridges!” she yelled. “My name is Camielle White-Cusa! I am Camielle White-Cusa! I am not Cenchen! I WILL NEVER BE CENCHEN!” The Cenchen adults did not seem to agree. They filed into the room before hers, having heard her voice. Camielle stayed silent. You are Cenchen...you will be Cenchen....Cenchen....the room whispered. Camielle tried not to move, tried not to speak. She would not let the Cenchen find her. She would find out how to get away, to leave, to go back to Bridges. That was who she was. She had to go back to Bridges. “Where is she?” the adults whispered. Camielle stayed silent. But the room just kept going and going. She couldn’t take it anymore, couldn’t take the voice, couldn’t take the relentless demand to assimilate, darken, become Cenchen...lose her name...even now they wanted her to lose her name... She screamed. The Cenchen adults heard her, crowding around the indentation. They knew she was there. The message of the Cenchen was strong, erasing everything she used to know. She forgot it all. She tried to remember, forcing herself to think about Bridges and the Agate and her mother. But she began to remember less and less. The voice of the Cenchen pounded in her head, its demands loud and insistent. The more she forgot, the quieter it became. She wanted the voice to stop. And so she forgot. She could not remember Bridges. The storylike memory ended and Camielle shook her head. I used to be strong and defiant, she thought, barely able to believe it. I was like Jayne. But the Cenchen changed me. It made me hate rebellion. It made me prefer giving in to fighting. “Alex,” she asked in a rather quiet voice, startling him. “Do you...do you know anything else about me? Me and the Agate?” Alex sighed. “Well, it’s sort of a long story.” “Please tell me.” “Well, your...mother was the head of the Cusa line.” Seeing the confusion on her face, he tried to explain. “There are two clans in Bridges, the Lears and the Cusas. Clans are, um, they’re these big groups of people loosely related to each other that share resources and such. The clans used to be separate societies but joined together, and they don’t fight each other anymore. Anyway, the Cusa clan is much more powerful- less people, but the people have much more power and talent. Anyway, your mother was part of the best, the White-Cusas-” My mother. That must be the red-headed woman. She still wasn’t completely clear on the concept of parents. The Cenchen adults were always vague on it. Most Cenchen children did not have parents. “I was a White-Cusa. Is the title hereditary or something?” “No, it’s based on how much power you have. Anyway, your mother had a lot of power in Bridges as head of the line. But she wasn’t the traditional Bridges leader,the way they always want to take over and control others. She focused on making the lives of the societies Bridges had conquered better instead of conquering more. People thought she was weak and she’s wasn’t hugely popular, but she was powerful enough to fight off most of the other contenders. She had the Agate and no one was really going to be able to get in her way. So they decided to, well, cheat, I guess.” “What does any of this have to do with the Agate?” Camielle broke in. “That’s always what I remember, all this crazy stuff about the Agate.” “I’m getting to that,” Alex said, sounding mildly annoyed that his story was interrupted. “So anyway, she was not an idiot, of course, and realized that something like this was possible. So she decided to hide the Agate in Bridges and send you to the Cenchen-” “Hold it,” Camielle said, cutting him off. “She what? She sent me to the Cenchen?” “Yep.” “Not Bridges? Not Matthew? Not anything like that? My mother sent me here?” Camielle still did not completely understand the concept of parents, but she was still reasonably sure they were not supposed to do that. Parents were supposed to be nice. they helped you. They didn’t send you to the Cenchen and damn you to misery. “Yes, it was her. She knew that you were powerful. She assumed that you would resist losing your names- you are an alien, after all-” “Stop calling me that.” “Well, it is true.” “I don’t care. You say it like an insult. Being an alien is not a bad thing.” “It’s an unnatural thing. You belong in Bridges.” Camielle sighed, sounding very annoyed. “Fine. Whatever. Can we please just get along with what you were talking about?” “Sure, if you’ll stop interrupting.” “Sure, if you’ll stop editorializing.” “Alright. Anyway, she assumed that you would be safe from Bridges in the Cenchen. Once you’re in the Cenchen, people stop messing with you. Anyway, she broke the Agate- well, half the Agate, the other half powered the labor camps. She and you hid pieces all over SoCal Bridges, and she drilled into you how to use it and what it meant and where all the pieces were. I think she hoped that even if you did lose your name that somehow your alien-ness-” “I said to stop calling me that!” “Okay, your Bridges-ness and the Agate would allow you to remember. Somehow. She wanted you to find the Agate and free the Cenchen, to do what she couldn’t.” Camielle was quiet, I find it amusing that you read through the boring part of the story and now that it’s finally mildly interesting you stopped. "I don't know what to do," she said finally. "Ugh, I never know what to do. Jayne does, but not me." "Jayne's not going to help us anymore," Alex said. "We have no plan." Matthew, however, definitely did. "The Bridge kids finally located hem," he said. "You were right, Jayne. The Cenchen can't enter Camielle's little hiding spots." "I remember waiting outside that door," Jayne said. "I knew it was there and that Camielle was in it, but I couldn't see it. I had no way of getting in." "Well, now we do." "But Matthew," Jayne asked. "Why aren't you going to tell the Bridge kids to simply bring them here?" "Because Camielle doesn't remember where the Agate is," Matthew said. "She won't ever remember where the Agate is unless she truly wants to. It's hidden too far. She's going to have to go to Bridges and find it on her own." "And once she finds them? She'll be very powerful then, wont she? And if she learns more the closer she gets to the Agate, the wont she know how to use it well enough to decimate us and Bridges?" "She will hardly hurt you with the Agate, Jayne." "But she doesn't want to work with you, and she knows I am working with you," Jayne said. "Although…I suppose if I come back….say I ran away…I barely escaped…" "You can pull it off, Jayne," Matthew said. "Be convincing." "I can be convincing," Jayne said. "But I don't know if she will ever go to Bridges without me. She wasn't sure about going, and Alex definitely didn't want to try. Camielle isn't determined enough to try and oppose him. They won't go." "They have to go somewhere," Matthew pointed out. "Unless they're gong to go back to the Cenchen- which I find extremely unlikely- they will have to either come back here or to Bridges." "Camielle won't go anywhere. She will simply stay there." "Then you will have to go now," Matthew said, sounding mildly irritated but trying not to show it. "Carmen can help you get in and around Bridges. I know she will help you." "Are you sure?" "I am surer than sure." "I am quite certain," Jayne said. "So I will say that Carmen helped me escape, that she was born in Bridges but wants to help us?" "Camielle's mother was active in trying to help-" "I know who she was." "Then you should know your story quite well." "Does Camielle?" "If she doesn't, you can almost certainly tell her." "I can certainly tell her." They sat in silence for a few minutes. Camielle did not want to give up. She wanted to go to Bridges, desperately wanted to go to Bridges and fight for the Cenchen. But she still did not know what to do. She did not think someone as young as her could make a difference, especially against something as terrible and powerful as Bridges. Camielle was scared. I have to do it, she thought to herself desperately. I have to find the Agate. It is essential. She was startled out of thinking of this by Alex suddenly touching her and hissing for her to be quiet. It took a second for her to realize why, but she quickly figured out that someone was in the room outside their again. No! she thought to herself desperately. They can't find us. They can't- The door to their small hiding place gave way. Camielle and Alex scrambled back, Camielle raising her wrist in some sort of effort to use the Agate to somehow get rid of the attackers. As usual, she was not entirely sure what she was doing. Any resolve she had completely vanished the second she saw Jayne. She did not care that there was an unknown girl next to her- a Bridges girl. "Camielle! Don't!" Jayne half-shrieked, reflexively ducking and taking a step back. "Why are you here?" Alex asked, his voice quite clearly angry. "What happened with Matthew." "You were right, Camielle. Both of you. It was a trap." "That's somewhat vague," Camielle pointed out, once again pointing out the obvious. "What happened? Who's she?" She looked again at the Bridges girl. She was tall ad rather pretty, though she looked decidedly different from the Cenchen, large, wide-set eyes, heart-shaped face, not to mention ice blue eyes, gold-tinges kin and blonde hair with some purple in it. How she had acquired purple hair Camielle couldn't even begin to imagine, but apparently it had happened. Altogether she looked quite odd. "He was ot happy when you left," Jayne started, trying to come up with a story that would convince Camielle and Alex without sounding ridiculous. "At fist it didn't bother me. But then I realized he was calling in for help with Bridges. He's in league with Bridges-" "And you were so horrified y this idea that you dragged along some random Bridges girl?" Alex raised an eyebrow. Decidedly odd." "My name is Carmen," "I don't know what to do," she said finally. "Ugh, I never know what to do. Jayne does, but not me." "Jayne's not going to help us anymore," Alex said. "We have no plan." Matthew, however, definitely did. "The Bridge kids finally located them," he said. "You were right, Jayne. The Cenchen can't enter Camielle's little hiding spots." "I remember waiting outside that door," Jayne said. "I knew it was there and that Camielle was in it, but I couldn't see it. I had no way of getting in." "Well, now we do." "But Matthew," Jayne asked. "Why aren't you going to tell the Bridge kids to simply bring them here?" "Because Camielle doesn't remember where the Agate is," Matthew said. "She won't ever remember where the Agate is unless she truly wants to. It's hidden too far. She's going to have to go to Bridges and find the pieces on her own." "And once she finds them? She'll be very powerful then, wont she? And if she learns more the loser she gets to the Agate, the wont she know how to use it well enough to decimate us and Bridges?" "She will hardly hurt you with the Agate, Jayne." "But she doesn't want to work with you, and she knows I am working with you," Jayne said. "Although…I suppose if I come back….say I ran away…I barely escaped…" "You can pull it off, Jayne," Matthew said. "Be convincing." "I can be convincing," Jayne said. "But I don't know if she will ever go to Bridges without me. She wasn't sure about going, and Alex definitely didn't want to try. Camielle isn't determined enough to try and oppose him. They won't go." "They have to go somewhere," Matthew pointed out. "Unless they're gong to go back to the Cenchen- which I find extremely unlikely- they will have to either come back here or to Bridges." "Camielle won't go anywhere. She will simply stay there." "Then you will have to go now," Matthew said, sounding mildly irritated but trying not to show it. "Carmen can help you get in and around Bridges. I know she will help you." "Are you sure?" "I am surer than sure." "I am quite certain," Jayne said. "So I will say that Carmen helped me escape, that she was born in Bridges but wants to help us?" "Camielle's mother was active in trying to help-" "I know who she was." "Then you should know your story quite well." "Does Camielle?" "If she doesn't, you can almost certainly tell her." "I can certainly tell her." They sat in silence for a few minutes. Camielle did not want to give up. She wanted to go to Bridges, desperately wanted to go to Bridges and fight for the Cenchen. But she still did not know what to do. She did not think someone as young as her could make a difference, especially against something as terrible and powerful as Bridges. Camielle was scared. I have to do it, she thought to herself desperately. I have to find the Agate. It is essential. She was startled out of thinking of this by Alex suddenly touching her and hissing for her to be quiet. It took a second for her to realize why, but she quickly figured out that someone was in the room outside their again. No! she thought to herself desperately. They can't find us. They can't- The door to their small hiding place gave way. Camielle and Alex scrambled back, Camielle raising her wrist in some sort of effort to use the Agate to somehow get rid of the attackers. As usual, she was not entirely sure what she was doing. Any resolve she had completely vanished the second she saw Jayne. She did not care that there was an unknown girl next to her- a Bridges girl. "Camielle! Don't!" Jayne half-shrieked, reflexively ducking and taking a step back. "Why are you here?" Alex asked, his voice quite clearly angry. "What happened with Matthew." "You were right, Camielle. Both of you. It was a trap." "That's somewhat vague," Camielle pointed out, once again pointing out the obvious. "What happened? Who's she?" She looked again at the Bridges girl. She was tall and rather pretty, though she looked decidedly different from the Cenchen, large, wide-set eyes, heart-shaped face, not to mention ice blue eyes, gold-tinged skin and blond hair with some purple and silver in it. How she had acquired purple and silver hair Camielle couldn't even begin to imagine, but apparently it had happened. Altogether she looked quite odd. "He was not happy when you left," Jayne started, trying to come up with a story that would convince Camielle and Alex without sounding ridiculous. "At fist it didn't bother me. But then I realized he was calling in for help with Bridges. He's in league with Bridges-" "And you were so horrified by this idea that you dragged along some random Bridges girl?" Alex raised an eyebrow. “Decidedly odd." "My name is Carmen. And I am nuh-ot random. I’m a Haze-Lear, hello.” I am reviving the characters from Goddess Over World. Yash, meet Carmen Lear, the Queen of Sarcasm. She was so sarcastic she made her friends cry once. Also, she is a major valley girl. “What’s a Haze-Lear?” Camielle asked. “It means I’m, like, totally awesome. Yeah. That’s right. Highest status, yay.” Camielle seemed utterly stymied by so much sarcasm coming at once. “So, anyway, I hear you guys have some kind of, like, brilliant plan to get into Bridges?” Carmen rolled her eyes. “No offense, but your chances of getting in without anyone from Bridges to help is about zero.” “We don’t care,” Alex said, eyes narrowed. “Who are you and why are you here?” Carmen sighed. “I told you. My name is Carmen Haze-Lear. I don’t know what else you wnat me to tell you there, the number of teeth I have? And I want to help because, like, A) Bridges is fucking crazy, and B) my family has rebelled against Bridges for a long time.” “The signs of your success are overwhelming,” Alex remarked dryly. “Well, there’s only one way that a society could ever hope to take down Bridges,” Carmen said. “How?” Camielle asked. “Purple frogs,” Carmen said sarcastically. Camielle seemed genuinely confused. “The Agate, of course. It’s got an incredible amount of power.” “So, are you planning to help us get the Agate or are you planning to sit here and annoy us?” Jayne asked, sounding irritated. “I plan to sit here and do both,” Carmen informed them. “Because that's just the way I roll. Alright, so is there any way in particular you plan on getting the Agate? I mean, I’m getting this weird feeling that the Agate is not really going to walk out and greet us. We’re going to need some more information about where it is and how to get it.” “I helped hide it,” Camielle informed her. “When I was younger. I’m not totally sure where everything is but I think I would if I could actually see it. Like it would help trigger the memories. Don’t you think it’s possible?” Carmen shrugged. “They’re your memories, not mine. I haven’t the slightest clue what screwy things are going on in your head.” “Yeah,” Camielle said in her quiet, slightly shy way. “Screwy.” Carmen sighed. “Sorry. you’re not screwy. I’m just being stupid.” Camielle did not seem much reassured. “So, anyway, do you have any idea where the Agate is located inside Bridges? Like a general location?” Camielle frowned, remembering an elevator going down, down, far down below the light. The ground. “It’s underground,” she said slowly. “It’s beneath the surface.” “Really?” Carmen said sarcastically. “A brilliant analysis. I can’t believe I didn't think of it before!” Then she caught sight of Camielle’s sad, hurt face. “Oh. You were being serious.” “Why wouldn’t I be?” “Well,” Carmen said, sighing. “Most of SoCal Bridges is underground. So it sounded like you were just pointing out the obvious.” “It was really far down,” Camielle said. “Almost to the bottom. Does that help?” “Near the bottom? How exact. So is your plan to just sort of wander around Bridges praying that you see something vaguely familiar?” “I sort of half-remember it,” Camielle said, not responding to the criticism very well. “I’m sorry. I just don’t know any specifics.” “Still,” Carmen said. “Specifics would definitely be nice.” “We realize that,” Jayne interjected. “But we can’t always have everything we want, can we? Look, I don’t need you to criticize our plan. I need you to help us get into Bridges. Do you think you can do that?” “Easy,” Carmen said. “Bridge kids will switch between schools pretty often. If you guys come with me I’m fairly sure I can get you in the door, and my friend Lynn can deal with the security. They always make her do security because she doesn’t play tricks.” “Alright,” Jayne said. “Excellent.” “But seriously, I think we should have a pretty good idea what we’re doing,” Carmen said. “They don’t like people to just wander around Bridges. We’ll get in trouble.” “I’ll know it when I see it,” Camielle assured them. “Once I see the elevator.” "Hey-y-y-y, Jovial Jake!" Carmen greeted the one guard outside the Bridges transporter. He looked at her unhappily. "How's the cheeriest person in the world doing today, eh?" He glanced over Camielle, Jayne, and Alex disdainfully. They looked quite different from usual, and he did not appear to recognize them as the Cenchen runaways. "Who are they?" "My friends," Carmen said. "They're from Alaska. Isn't that cool?" "No," Jake said, being a very straightforward person. "We have Cenchen trying to escape, you realize that-" "I never realize anything" Carmen said. "I'm just a big dumb blond." "I know," Jake said, in his angry, flat voice. "You're an annoying, idiotic girl." "Yep," Carmen agreed. "And you're a depressed man with no happiness in life. I would kill to see you smile." "I’d kill to see you have your mouth stitched.” "Ah, well," Carmen said. "So, are you planning on letting me through or not?" "I'm not." "Please?" "No." "I'll love you forever!" Camielle seriously doubted that this would convince Jake, who very clearly did not want Carmen’s love. "Definitely not." Carmen sighed. "I am going to be here for a very long time, then. Until you let me through." "No. You're going to go and leave me alone." "I'm not a threat," Carmen said, in a very perky tone of voice. "You should let me through. There's no reason for you not to!" Jake sighed and looked at her angrily. "I'm not doing you any favors." "Jaaaaaake….You must do your job! It is of utmost importance!" "Carmen, I swear to god, if you will not fucking-" "Excuse me," Jayne said in a sharp voice. "I believe you have a job here, do you not? A job to let us through? Will you kindly do that now as opposed to sitting here arguing with my friend here?" Her bossy tone and angry eyes seemed to convince Jake that they were not to be messed with, and he unhappily let them through. They entered a small door like area, dim, clearly some kind of transporting room that would get them to Bridges. "Ugh," Alex asked. "What was the deal with that guy?" "Jovial Jake," Carmen said, laughing. "He's just this unhappy guy my friends like to torture." "Why do you have to be so mean to him?" Camielle asked. "He would hav let us through faster if you'd been nicer." "Psh," Jayne argued. "Being nice doesn't get you anywhere." The four of them walked into Bridges then. The room was like nothing Camielle had ever seen before- the walls a white-purple color instead of black, the hall wide, people streaming everywhere. The people did not all look the same, black hair, black eyes, siilar features. Camielle was amazed by the differences between people. And so many! The Cenchen was virtually unpopulated by comparison. "People from all over the world come to SoCal Bridges," Carmen explained. "It's the center of activity. That's why everyone looks different." "Different parts of the world make people look different?" Camielle asked. "That's why the Cenchen all look the same, because we're all in the same place?" "Eh….sot of," Carmen said. "Anyway. There's Jake's twin and Lynn. They're the security crew for this transporter. Don't worry, she alwsy lets people in. And Jake's twin has a huge crush on her, so he never doubts what she says." Lynn walked up. She looked sort of Cenchen; she had similar coloring at least, but there was still something different about her, her heiht, her face, everything. She was definitely not Cenchen. "Hey Carmen. Who are tehse people?" Lynn asked, as bizarrely perky as Carmen. "Kids from Alaska," Carmen lied easily. "They came to check out the Cenchen and now they're coing here." "Cool," Lynn said. "From the Cenchen Complex?" Jake's twin asked warily. "They have runaways in the Cenchen, you know." "Runaways in the Cenchen!" Carmen said. "Oh, my god! How could this happen! Woe will befall us! The Cenchen are so dangerous! They could wipe us out forever, oh my god!" "Exactly," Jake's twin said. "We need to watch them pretty carefully." Carmen rolled her eyes. "I was being sarcastic. The Cenchen will never rebel. They're too stupid and nameless." "Still." Lynn had some kind of door set up. She pressed a button, most likely to turn it on. "Walk," she demanded. They walked through, were cleared, and continued into the complex. Camielle was still amazed. Bridges was just so huge. The main room area alone was the size of half the Cenchen. It separated off into dozens of hallways, each with tons of rooms and elevators. "How can they have so much stuff here?" Camielle asked, amazed. How could anything be so big? "Magic," Carmen explained carelessly. "Most of the doors just hold empty rooms that don’t exist until you actually open the door. Means less digging. Anyway, there are tons of hiding places in this school. If we go to the back we’ll be cool." This is so fucking cool. It’s almost like quantum physics. I just can’t get over it. Wait until you get to the 38th floor.... They started walking through hallways. The school seemed to never end: every hallway had another branching off it, and another off that, and another off that. Camielle could never imagine something so huge. They said Bridges was huge...but this place was even beyond huge. It was endless. She could walk forever and never find an end. As time went on the hallways got smaller and less populated, but it still seemed completely different from Cenchen Camielle had never seen so much color in one place. "So," Carmen said. "I imagine you know exactly which button we want, right?" "Umm…Camielle sad, still completely awestruck by the elevator. "No." "What do all the buttons do?" Jayne asked Carmen. Wow, I cannot type. “I haven’t the slightest clue,” Carmen said. “I would recommend not touching them. When it comes to Bridges, you never know whether you’re about to plunge the world into an Ice Age or enter a storage room.” Jayne scoffed. “Come on. It can’t be that unstable.” Carmen shrugged. “Have you lived in SoCal Bridges for thirteen years?” “No,” Jayne admitted. She paused. “You’re thirteen?” Carmen rolled her eyes. “I came here for schooling. So, are we going to pick a floor or are we going to stand here and see if a tsunami hits us? Which floor are we looking for?” Camielle reached out to touch the buttons, hoping, wishing, some obscure memory would resurface and she would be able to remember which floor to search. As she reached out to touch the side the Agate suddenly glowed violently, red and orangle, like a scarlet band of fire rapping around her wrist. The elevator seemed to recognize the bracelet, and the wall started glowing the same fashion as the bracelet. Then all of the lights winked out and the elevator dropped rapidly, jerking from side to side. Then, just as suddenly, the elevator stopped. The four of them just stood there for a moment, breathing hard. The sudden movement had caught them all by surprise, and they'd been jerked around the elevator in various ways. "Pleas tell me you wanted that to happen," Carmen said. "No," Camielle said. "It just sort of….happen." "What was it doing, anyway?" Alex asked, speaking for the first time all day. "Why?" "Who knows," Jayne said. "I just want to be able to see. Where are we going, anyway?" Camielle shook her wrist slightly and it started to glow, white and soft. They found the door to the elevator and trekked outside of it. Camielle lanced around, wondering if she would be able to remember the settings she wanted or if it would completely confuse her again. The setting was a very large room, mostly black, with large objects protruding from random places. Camielle knew immediately that the floor went on forever- each point in the place could open a new door, a new room- and a new room out of that- another room out of that- more. You could lose yourself forever if you did not know where you were going. Camielle knew where she was going. The first tie she'd seen this room she had been amazed…reaching out to play…she wanted to climb and explore… She touched one of the objects…was somewhere else…somewhere new…someplace else to explore. Another room. Another room to play in. She ran around aimlessly, hitting new rooms every second…her other always just a step behind. Camielle wanted to lose herself in the rooms….wander so far she would never be found…just keep going going going going until she was gone But she could not keep going forever. She stopped after many rooms and her mother caught up with her. Now it was time to return, to find the Bridges settlement again. To return to their original task. "But I do not want to go," she told her mother. I want to stay here. Bridges is boring and cruel.This place is new, and there is always more to see." "There is more to Bridges than meets the eye," her mother pointed out. "Do not discount it immediately." Camielle nodded. Bridges was full of hiding spots. Camielle liked to hide, to trick others into believing she was gone. "Now you must try to bring us back," her mother instructed. "I know you can find out ho to do it. This whole place is a Helliner illusion, but it is a strong one. Navigate the illusion." Camielle frowned. Navigate the illusion? Make her tell her where to go? Could she do that? She looked around her. A Helliner illusion. Helliner illusions worked differently from the Cenchen ones she was used to. They were an illusion, not to trick someone's mind, but to trick the place. To trick the place into believing something was there. She lightly touched the wall next to her. It seemed real. It seemed quite real. But she could faintly hear the place beneath, tricked, wanting to be free. Camielle slid Kins between the layers of illusion, carefully, an the original, real setting greeted them almost immediately. Camielle's mother placed the Agate pieces on one of the unidentifiable black objects. "The land will take them and hide them in illusions," her other said. "But how will we ever ind them? Make the illusions disappear?" Her mother shook her head. "They will become part of the illusion. In order to find them, you must track the illusion and convince it to let you in." Camielle tilted her head to the side, thoroughly confused. "Ho do you convince an illusion of something? Do illusions have minds?" "No, but illusions do have purposes. You must find the purpose and make it match yours." "What is the purpose of these illusions?" Camielle asked, still very confused. "You will know when you see them." The Agate slid away from the object, slid into the wold of illusions. "Illusions,' her mother concluded, "are very tricky things." Camielle opened her eyes, the odd memory finally over. She was surprised by how detailed the memory had been- more reality than anything she'd seen before. "Well?" Carmen asked. "Do you remember how to find the Agate?" "Um," Camielle started, trying to decide the best way to put this. "You st track the illusion and convince it to let you in." "What?" Carmen asked. "What illusions?" "This whole place is like a neverending illusion," Camielle tried to explain. "If you touch anything you'll be drawn into another illusion, and an illusion past that and so on. But the illusions are sort of real, too- the sort of exist even though they don't really." Carmen looked at her in a very sarcastic way. "So, we have to find illusions that are 'sort of' rel, then convince them to let us in? How exactly did these illusions become sentient?" "They're created with a purpose," Camielle tried to explain, realizing that her message was very unlikely to get across. "So…these illusions have a purpose? And we convince them to let us in? How exactly do we accomplish that, a television ad? How would an illusion hear us, anyway?" "I don't know," Camielle said. “How wonderful,” Carmen said sarcastically. “Wonderful. We came here for absolutely nothing.” “Not nothing,” Jayne said sharply. “Look, this is serious. There’s got to be some way we can figure-” “The Agate,” Camielle said suddenly. “It knew which floor the Agate was in. Maybe it knows where the other pieces are. That’s how we can track them down.” “And finding them?” Carmen asked. “Have you thought about that at all?” Camielle took a few steps forward, Alex following sort of close behind, and reached out for one of the objects. The Agate started to glow in response, and when she finally touched the object the whole world shot black, white, and then into a whole new world. A new hiding place. Every inch of the floor was a door with a hiding spot behind it. “Camielle,” Alex said from behind her. “Camielle!” She turned around. “Yeah?” He glanced from side to side and took a couple steps forward. “Look, I don’t think we should trust Jayne and Carmen.” Camielle frowned. “Why not?” Alex sighed. “Well, for one thing, Carmen is a Bridge kid, and they generally aren’t the best people to trsut when you want to take down-” “But Jayne trusts her. If Jayne trusts her, I trust her.” “Camielle.” Alex sighed. “Look, maybe we shouldn’t trust Jayne either.” “What?! She and Carmen have helped us so far, haven’t they? We would have been caught ages ago and never would have reached Bridges.” “Look,” Alex said. “Think about it from Matthew’s point of view. If he ignores you, you’re never going to go and get the Agate and he’ll never be able to access it. You could get caught in Bridges. And even if you somehow manage to make it in and get the Agate, he’d never be able to get it that way. But if Jayne and Carmen come, make sure you get the Agate, and then take it somehow, Matthew comes out on top.” “But-” “Make sure they don’t touch it. All of the pieces will bond to you if your touch them first.” “What do-” She was cut off as Jayne and Carmen finally appeared out of nowhere. She and Alex both turned to face them. Could Jayne be working with Matthew? Carmen looked around at the place they’d been transported. “Whoa. This is majorly cool.” The room was fairly large, though not nearly as wide as it was long. The walls were mirrored with yellow at the top, making everything dim. The ceiling was a mirror as well but was almost black; so black it was difficult to see. “Where are we?” Carmen asked. “It’s an illusion,” Camielle said. “There’s a spell on the floor we were at that makes it create new places if you touch it.” “It creates new places?” Carmen asked, taking a few steps forward. There was some kind of table thing draped in black cloth. She reached out and picked it up, but the cloth disintegrated in her fingers, black dust piled on the floor. “It’s hard to explain,” Camielle said cryptically. “This place is some kind of combination of places we’ve seen and places the land has seen.” “How can land see?” Carmen asked, reaching out to touch the mirror. It turned odd and gelatinous when she touched it. She pressed harder, creating an odd handprint. “Stop touching everything,” Camielle said. “It’s possible to get dragged into other worlds if you aren’t careful.” “So the land creates this place for us and creates it with a purpose,” Jayne mused. “How can you use something like that.” “If I were trying to hide something I wouldn’t hide it someplace like this,” Carmen said. “I’d hide it in...in...in something like those balloons on the ceiling,” she said, pointing upwards. “They could pop them every second and they’d never find it.” “What the,” Alex exclaimed, jumping backwards and almost knocking over Camielle. “Where did those come from?” “I was just thinking about them,” Carmen said. “And how great they would be to hide something in.” “If I were going to hide something,” Alex said, “I wouldn’t hide it in something so easy to access. I’d hide it in something you could never open, something-” He stopped talking as a medium-sized box, a little bigger than a textbook, suddenly pulled out of the ground. It was clearly made out of a very durable metal. “Convince the room that it’s purposes are yours,” Camielle said very quietly, so only she could hear. “Convince...” “What?” Alex asked, turning to her. “The purpose of the room is to hide something,” Camielle said slowly, thinking out loud. “To hide the Agate. So if we create something where the goal is to hide the Agate, then it will convince the room that our purposes are its. The Agate will be wherever we hide it. “If I were going to hide the Agate,” Jayne said. “I would hide it behind a wall.” She closed her eyes and pictured the wall behind her. She turned around and reached out to touch the glass. It was hard instead of gooey the way Carmen had seen it. She clawed the hard part away from the gooeyness, revealing a small cabinet-esque space. It was empty. “Let me try,” Camielle said. “I have a piece of the Agate, after all.” She closed her eyes, feeling the hot band of fiery Agate around her wrist. If I was going to hide something, she thought to herself where would I hide it? Where would it be safe? “If I were going to hide the Agate,” she said slowly. “I would hide it behind a door. Because behind a door there are always a million possibilities.” The Agate around her wrist burned like fire. She spun around, instantly facing a rather short door. She took a deep breath and slowly opened it. Was she right? The door held only a small shelf, but on the shelf sat the Agate. Jayne immediately came and stood next to her. “Is that the Agate?” she asked, reaching for it. Camielle touched it first, the rock spinning around her wrist and adding to the already-thick band she had. “I found it,” she said unneccesarily. “You have to create a hiding place for it to fill.” Remember in Inception, when one way to extract information from someone was by creating a safe they will automatically fill? Imma idea thief, heh heh... “Wonderful,” Carmen said. “Where do we go next?” “Back to the Bridges floor,” Camielle said, touching the mirror-wall and sliding Kinds underneath it. It felt automatic to her, easy. They returned to the original floor. They made it back to the ground floor fairly quickly. Carmen looked around, cocking her head to the side, and turned to Camielle. "So…is this room real? Or is it just one of those freaky imagination dream like thingies we were just in?" Camielle nodded. "It's real. Or at least, I think so." "Cool," Carmen said, nodding a little. "So…where are we going next?" "Well," Jayne said. "If the Agate pieces are behind doors that Camielle creates, maybe we should create a whole…illusion-place-thing full of doors. That way we could go to one place instead of a million." "This place is a Helliner illusion, I imagine?" Alex asked Camielle, breaking his long silence. "Yeah," Camielle answered. "I don't really know that much about them, though." "I do," Alex said. "Look, are you sure there's no other way to get the Agate pieces than to walk into all of these crazy illusions?" "I'm almost completely sure this is the only way," Camielle answered. Alex sighed. "Helliner illusions are extremely dangerous and difficult to manipulate. If the place thinks you're controlling it then it could try to…get back at you." "We have to find the Agate," Jayne interrupted. "No matter how scary or difficult or dangerous it is." "Okay, okay," Alex said. "Come on, we might as wlel get going." "A room with a lot of doors," Camielle murmured to herself. "Everyone focus on a room or a hallway with lots of doors," Jayne said. "Endless doors." Camielle, still focusing, reached out to touch the side of the room again. And immediately they were swept into a whole other world. The room was surprisingly small compared to the last one, colored a light purple on two walls and dark purple on the other two. Some kid had clearly gone to work with a box full of crayons as well, as there were streaks of color everywhere along with random pictures. There were four doors in the back and one door directly in front of Camielle, about two or three feet away. The doors were all plain white, except for the one in front, which had a large black 'X' marked on it. The room wasn't completely empty; there was a purple bed shoved off to one side and two desks near it, but most of it was just a plain hardwood floor. Here is how I found the inspiration for this room: I stood up. I looked around. I sat down. I described everything I saw. Carmen looked around. "It's a bedroom for one of the higher-level Bridge execs," she observed. "That's why it's so big." The room was several times bigger than one of the Cenchen bedrooms, maybe a little smaller than one of the classrooms. "Well?" Jayne said, poking Camielle. "Are you going to open one of the doors or what?" Camielle glanced around. "I recognize this room," she said softly. "It's good." Jayne sighed in irritation. "Just open one of the doors, okay? We don't have a ton of time to waste here." She reached for the door with a black 'X'. She'd seen this room before but was never allowed to touch that door, maybe this was where her mother had hid the Agate pieces before, maybe she could end her search here and now… She opened the door and screamed. The door led to a whole new room. There were dozens of ghosts within, their black eyes all the same, their black hair all the same, they were all the same, dark, same same same… Her mother had put the door in her room days after the warning…Camielle always wanted to open it and see inside but was never allowed to. "Please?" she asked. "I like doors. I want to see what's behind." "No." But her mother was not always able to watch Camielle and her room, and eventually she snuck in. She went straight for the door, that X-marked door, a door of mystery. She wondered what secrets her mother had put behind it. Some kind of magic? Magic and doors, Camielle's two favorite things… She opened it and screamed. There were ghosts inside, dozens of them, maybe hundreds. Ghosts wouldn't scare her, nothing scared her, but there was something different about tehse, something sinsietr, something completely and utterly wrong. They were all alike, they looked alike, they had the same voice. Help us…they whispered, on the edge of speech… Camielle slammed the door and ran. She could not imagine anything worse than that door, that possibility, becoming all the same and melding in, indistinct, the same, the same, the nsame same same… Her mother was putting a lock on the door and Camielle was crying. "Mommy, why are they in there?" she asked tearfully. "Why are they all the same?" Her mother sighed and sat down. "Camielle, they are the souls of the Agate. If I was to break the Agate and hide it in the illusions, I had to remove the souls first." "Why are they all the same?" "They have lost their names," her mother said sadly. "When you lose your name, you lose everything distinct about you. Everything." "The Cenchen is horrible," Camielle said, hitting the wall. "Horrible, doing that to people." "It's not the Cenchen, it's Bridges," her mother corrected. "We make them do that." "Why don't you stop them?" "Because I can't. I can't control the Agate. But you are a quarter-Cenchen, you will be able to control it. When you are old enough you will be able to make them change." "It's so bad," she said quietly. "Losing your name is a nightmare." "There's no such thing as a nightmare," her mother said. "There's only fear. You open that door and you run away, you call it bad and horrible and nightmarish because you are afraid. You see the sameness and you fear becoming the same." "That will never be good," Camielle said. "Everyone fears that." Her mother shook her head. "Some people prefer it. It makes things easier when you are all the same- you don't have to worry about being disliked or inadequate. Everything is easier." "I don't care if I was disliked or inadequate," Camielle spat out. "I would never do that. I would fight it. I would run if I could. I would get away." "Just remember, Camielle," her mother said. "Be careful which doors you open. Some hold happiness. Some hold fear. When you stand above the door there is an eternal risk, but once it is opened you can never close it again." Camielle opened her eyes, saw the souls again, and started to scream. She slammed the door and instinctively jumped back, landing on the bed behind her. "Camielle?" Alex asked, following her in a much calmer manner. "Are you okay?" Camielle nodded. "Yeah. I guess." She started shaking. "Did you see the souls?" she asked. "Did you see the ghosts?" Carmen shrugged. "Those white things? Yeah. What's the big deal?" "It's okay, Camielle," Alex said, touching her arm lightly. "They won't hurt you." "But they're so…so scary," she said, tryingt o explain it. "Did you see their eyes? Didn't you see how they were dark, dark, all the same?" "Yeah," Alex said. "Reminded me of the Cenchen. You didn't think they were so scary, did you?" Camielle shrugged. Her life between leaving Bridges and finding the white door was hard to remember now. She could not remember thinking about losing her name and not being scared, even residually scared of the thought. "I don't know," she said. "I think I always feared it at least a little bit." "So," Jayne said, breaking into the conversation. "Should we get going? We still have an Agate to find, you know." Camielle nodded. "Yeah. Agate. Yeah." "What should we do with the Agate when we find it?" Alex asked Jayne as they walked to one of the other doors. "I mean, we can't give it to Matthew. How are we going to free the Cenchen?" Jayne shrugged. "We'll make Matthew leave and control the Cenchen ourselves. If Bridges tries to stop us we'll crush them with the Agate." Camielle walked over to some of the other doors. "Do they have Agate pieces behind them, I wonder?" she mused aloud, opening some of the other doors. Each one had several pieces behind it. Camielle touched all of them quickly, before Jayne had come close to her, and whirled around. "Ready," she announced. "How many pieces are there?" Alex asked as they lined up again, ready to go back to the oriinal floor. "I don't know. Forty-ish maybe? Between forty and fifty, I think." "Cool," Jayne said. "Maybe we should split up." "No," Camielle said. "Won't help. Only I can get at the Agate. I mean, you can go back if you want, but we can't split up." Jayne sighed. "Alright, whatever." They went to a couple more places. Most of them were fairly simple- one floor, one door. Nothing too complicated or demanding for the room to set up. As a result, there were no more completely frightenin plces. They all focused on finding as many Agate pieces behind the door as they could, and within an hour or so they had all but one. "Are we done yet?" Carmen whined. "All of these stupid rooms are beginning to freak me out. They're so dark and weird-looking." "Dark?" Camielle asked sharply, turning to Carmen. "The rooms are dark?" "Yeah," Carmen said. "Dark. Like, not well-lit. Dim. Shadows. You know." "I thought dark meant all the same," Camielle said, sounding somewhat confused. "Not all black and everything." "Well, now you know how wrong you were," Carmen said in a sarcastic sing-song voice. "So. Are we going to get going, or just hang out and see if the rest of the Agate pieces just walk over and say hi?" "There's one last piece," Camielle said carefully. "It was mine. I was supposed to keep it in the Cenchen and it would help me remember." She sighed. "I left it in the illusion-world. But my mother put a spell on it before I left it so that only I would be able to find it." "So…you want us to stay here?" Carmen asked. "Yes. Leave the floor. The room could get…angry." "Sure," Carmen said. "We'll trek on up to my room. Third floor, room H-C, alright? You can ask someone for directions." "Alright." They turned around, walked up to the elevator, and vanished out of sight. Camielle turned to face the room. Camielle Crystal White-Cusa, the room hissed. It's been too long, dear…and no Jade or Alex to protect you… "I'm not scared," Camielle announced. "You're not bad. You're not scary." You may not find us scary, but we know all your fears…we know ever bad moment…the horror of the Cenchen, the memories of Bridges…things you may not even know yourself… "Fear will not stop me from getting the Agate." Fear will stop anyone… Camielle walked up to the object that had caught her eye so many years ago, touched it lightly, and was transported to another place. She was in a place she'd never seen before. The room had a huge, high ceiling, a gray ceiling. Gray was everywhere. The floor- sand, the floor was made of gray sand- seemed to go on in front of her forever. She turned to her left and saw the room go on and on, green and red spiky plants, tall yellow-ish grass. She'd never seen so many plants before. What were they there for? She turned to her right and froze. Water. She had never known so much water existed in the world. The gray sand met gray water, and the water went on and on and on- and on- and on- pas the horizon. The entire world was made of water, water water. She had never seen so much water. She stood around for a few seconds, then suddenly something clicked in her head. Outside. She was outside. This was not a room at all, this was a whole other place, a whole other concept, that land that existed outside of the Cenchen and Bridges and ceilings and floors and walls. She started to walk across the sand. The air seemed to change as time went on, it became heavier, wetter, and harder to see through. She could not see far in front of her, and the air came in, gray air, coming closer. She could not see anything except the gray sand, the gray water, the gray sky, the gray air, the gray and gray and gray. Gray was a horrible color. "Where am I?" she challenged the illusion around her. "This isn't scary. I've never been here before. There's nothing to be scared of." She kept walking. She eventually came to what appeared to be a large version of a box. It's what inside looks like from the outside, she realized. She immediately reached for the door it held, opened it, and walked in. The room was small, somewhat dark (Carmen's dark) and almost empty. It had a dilapidated feel to it- the wood almost cracking in places, the paint chipping, the floorboards covered in spliters. The only thing inside, however, had none of this: it was a red table, perfectly circular, sleek, shiny, plastic. There was one person sitting at the table. She looked as sleek as the table: short, shiny black hair and bangs, bright red lips and nails, heavily shadowed eyes. She smiled when she saw Camielle. "You are looking for the Agate, I imagine?" She had a very rounded way of speaking, every word as shiny as her appearance. "Who are you?" Camielle asked, her voice more forceful than it had ever been. "Why are you here?" The woman shrugged one shoulder and waved the question away with her long nails. "I am the representative of the illusion world, I suppose you could put it. But it is not terribly important. What I want to know is- do you want to find the last piece of Agate?" "Yes." "Are you sure?" "Entirely sure." The woman shrugged. "Then you must go through that door.” Camielle reached for it. "Wait, dear, don't you want to know what is behind it?" Camielle turned back around somewhat unhappily. "The Agate?" she asked, her shy and uncertain voice back. "Wrong," the woman answered before smiling. She seemed to be enjoying this. "There are three trials. The first one tests your determination to be…Camielle, you could say. The second one tests your determination to continue your…quest." She laughed a little bit at the word, as though using it to mock Camielle';s action. And the last tests your determination to understand." "I will succeed," Camielle said in a sure voice. "I will." "We'll see about that," the woman answered dismissively. "There is one rule though." "What?" "You've noticed that the illusion world is like a dream, I imagine?" "Yes,' Camielle said, unsure. "Well, we will further those parallels. You will not be able to remember your objective or any of the previous trials while you undergo them. You will be able to remember everything that happened before you entered Bridges." Camielle swallowed. "But…how will I know to…to keep going?" "If you're lucky, you'll find out." The circular dungeon. The stand. The knife. The emotionless Cenchen man. She was going to lose her name. She walked up to the stand. There was no way to leave, no way to avoid it, no way to run away. She was going to lose her name. The man smiled in the same robotic way all Cenchen adults smiled. "Your name?" She took a step back. "C-C-" Once he knows, there's no way to stop it. Irritation flashed in his eyes. "I said, your name?" Cenchen adults did not get irritated. "My name is…Camielle," she said in her usual quiet, soft voice. "And it always will be." The man frowned. "There's no way to keep your name in the Cenchen. Cenchen kids do not keep their names." Camielle took a large step back. "I am not Cenchen," she said in a loud voice. "I am a White-Cusa. My name is Camielle White-Cusa, and that is who I am." "You are Cenchen." "I am Camielle!" she screamed, taking another step back. "I am Camielle. You can't take it from me. My name is who I am!You can't take kit away! You can't take me away! It's horrible!" "You may be Camielle White-Cusa," the man intoned. "But you are in the Cenchen now. In the Cenchen, we lose our names." "I am not Cenchen! I'm from Bridges. I was born there. I'm an alien! I am not Cenchen!" "There's no place but the Cenchen. If you are alive, you are from here. Aliens are a myth, they do not exist." "I am an alien!" "You are a Cenchen girl. You will always be Cenchen. You will lose your name and you will become a Cenchen adults, and that is all that you can ever do." Camielle started to scream again, but the adult reached forward with the knife and slashed her wrist. Camielle covered the knife's surface in blood before slowly dripping to the floor. My name, she thought dully. That's how they take your name. She took one last step back and crashed into the wall, her head knocking into the surface. She slowly slid down to the ground, eyes closed, the world pounding uncertainly around her. Her wrist hurt. My name, a small voice in her head screamed frantically. I must remember my name. She did not care about the voice. She simply did not care. Nothing seemed real- losing her name- the knife- the blood- she was still bleeding- her wrist hurt- The Cenchen adult was gone and it was just her alone. My name, she thought. I know I have a name. She sat up and shook her head. Focus. I must remember my name. Her hair fell into her face and she pushed it away with her good hand. Red. Her hair was red, red like blood. Red like the blood on the floor, her dress, her wrist. Cenchen kids don't have red hair. "My name…" she looked around angrily."I know I have a name." She stood up and examined her wrist. It had already stopped bleeding. Draccal knife, she remembered. It heals fast. "Draccal knife," she said aloud. "They come- they come from Bridges. They are used in Bridges. Bridges. F. B. Bridges." Bridges. Bridges. She had to remember. "I know I have a name," she repeated, walking up to the stand. The room seemed bigger than before; she turned around to face the rest of it. "My name is who I am. You can't take away who I am." The room was silent. She bent down and picked up the knife. There was red on it. Blood. The blood traced out a 'C'. C. "My name has a 'C' she said quietly, spinning it around in her fingers before calmly throwing it into the wall. Her throw was straight; the knife was stuck all the way to the hilt. "I learned how to do that," she told the room, walking over to retrieve it. "That's some of what they taught us, how to throw knives and swords and Kins. The other kids were terrible. But I was the best, better than kids older than me." She frowned. "They said I was a- a- White-Cusa." She started to smile. "That was part of my name, White-Cusa. My first name was…" She closed her eyes, trying to remember. She couldn't remember. She angrily ripped the knife out of the wall and jammed it into the wall opposite. The throw was much worse; the knife went in diagonally instead of straight. "Great job," Camielle," she muttered to herself, walking over to retrieve the stupid knife. She suddenly froze. "Camielle," she repeated. The room did not answer. "My name is Camielle White-Cusa," she announced to the room. "That is my name. You can't take it away from me. You can try and try but you will never take my name." A door opened in front of her. Camielle walked through it. It was simply the Camielle thing to do. The room was very boring, gray, medium-sized. The only thing inside was a boring, gray metal table. There was a woman sitting at it. She had black hair and black eyes, though, like Lynn, there was something very not-Cenchen about her. She seemed to be in her mid twenties. Camielle jumped back against the wall as soon as she saw her, but there was no way out. No doors. No windows. Just gray, gray, gray walls. "Hello, Camielle," the woman said in a very monotone voice. "My name is Regina. Would you like to sit?" Camielle did not sit. She leaned against the wall, not nervously, but not exactly casually. "No." The woman raised an eyebrow. "You seem very hostile. Is there any particular reason why?" Camielle did not answer. It was hard to explain why exactly, but she did not trust the woman. There was a pause. "I see," Clarissa said, leaning back. "So, you are looking for the Agate, I imagine?" Camielle glared at her and did not answer. "Well?" Camielle sighed, sounding unhappy. "Yes. I am." "Why? What do you plan to do with it once you get it?" she asked, sounding as gentle and overly polite as ever. "What do you think I plan to do with it?" Camielle rolled her eyes. "I want to free the Cenchen." "Really," the woman said. "Why?" Camielle glared at her. "Because. I have to." "Because you believe Bridges is evil?" "Yes. It's horrible to do that to people. It's evil! Bridges is evil!" "Really. Has it ever occurred to you why Bridges makes the Cenchen lose their names? That it was a Cenchen weapon? Did it ever occur to you that perhaps it wasn't the worst punishment after all? That it fit the Cenchen-" "It is the worst punishment! You took away their names, made them all the same, and then brainwashed them to make them think they liked it! Do you seriously think that's not a bad thing?" "So? They don't care. They're Cenchen. The Cenchen don't mind being all the same. They're-" "They don't mind? Are you crazy? Would you like it if someone tried to take away your name?" "You can't grade us on the same scale. We-" "Oh, you are the worst-" "Listen to me. I am Bridges. I was born in Bridges. You were born in Bridges. I was raised in Bridges. You were raised in Bridges, at least for some time. We think differently. We-" "So, because they're Cenchen, they're a completely different species?" "Camielle, listen to me. You don't know what you're doing. You know very little. Many people have attempted to "free" the Cenchen. Some of them have succeeded for short periods of time. But nameless people are difficult to control-" "Hardly. They're easy to control, that's why you do it!" "Have any Cenchen kids ever wanted to avoid losing their names? Have you ever met any as desperate to lose their names as you, a Bridges girl, or Alex, the former Tertiminaries prince?" "Jayne. She's Cenchen." "Jayne is half-Cenchen. Besides, any daughter of Matthew's is not going to lose her name quietly, that I can assure you." Camielle tried to ignore that. "So? She's still half." "Any real Cenchen kid does not mind losing their name She was back in the first room, with the red table and the shiny woman. Camielle wondered nervously what she was going to do. The woman didn't say anything for several minutes. She just sat there and stared at Camielle. Unfortunately, this did not do much to alleviate Camielle's anxiety. "Well, well, Camielle," the woman said slowly and somewhat ironically. "You finally cracked the third test." "I- what?" Camielle asked. "I won? I get the Agate? But- I died! The monster got me!" "We call it a spider," the woman said, picking up on the most trivial detail to explain. "And surviving doesn't make you pass. We've had many Bridge kids come through here that compromise the spider in seconds even without Kins. But they still don't make it." "Then…how did I make it?" "You said we would always win and that you were stupid to try," the woman said, sounding somewhat amused. "That usually makes the illusions happy." "But- but- you said in the beginning that the trial would test how well I could survive or something-" "Your determination to survive, yes." "That sounds like testing my determination to surrender to me." "We know." "And I'm the only one that ever managed to surrender. Wow." She looked up at the woman. "Do you always do the same tests?" "Similar. Something to erase the person's personality- most people get tripped up on that one, especially humans that aren't in any kind of society- then one to make them give up- no one's lost there yet- and then the spider." "Always the spider?" "Yes." "So…if I went back to the Cenchen and lost my name…I would still be able to remember it later?" "Not that easily- this is all illusions, remember- but maybe." Camielle nodded. "So I am different. Everyone got tripped up except me. Me." "Well…" the woman said, stretching out the 'L' and smiling slightly. "Not everyone." Camielle's mouth went dry. She did not like the way the woman was looking at her. "What do you mean…not everyone?" "Someone else came here and wanted the Agate. All of it. He made it through all three trials. He wants the Agate…the Agate you have." "Who is he?' Camielle asked, but she already knew the name. "Matthew Herjika-Cenchen." Wonderful, Camielle thought sarcastically. This is exactly what I wanted. I made it past all the trials, and look at my special prize! I get to have Matthew here…in the illusion world…where all the illusions sort of want to kill me… "Well?" Camielle asked. "I finished first, right? I get the Agate?" "You finished at the same time," the woman said, walking to the door. "You get a new trial- to face Matthew. Whichever one of you survives gets the Agate." "Survives?" Camielle asked, jumping out of her chair. "No. Please no. I can't do this. I'm going to get killed." "Too bad," the woman said, her voice entirely unsympathetic. "Sometimes in life we have to do things like this!" "Things like what?" Camielle shrieked. "Things like getting killed?" "You're going to die eventually," the woman pointed out. She seemed to be really enjoying this. "What if I don't want to fight him?" Camielle asked. "Then you're screwed," the woman said cheerfully. "Do I get to use this Agate in the fight?" Camielle asked, holding up her wrist. "Or are you going to take it?" The woman cocked her head to the side. "Hm. Yes, you can. That would definitely make this fight more fun to watch." "Fun to watch?" Camielle squawked. "You're dong this because it's fun to watch?" The woman shrugged, her expression suddenly serious. "Perhaps. Now listen, Camielle, you must be careful. Matthew does not have as much power as you or even as much skill, but he is clever. He will figure out how you fight and he will play on your tendency to hesitate and overthink things. You cannot give him that advantage. If he's down, finish him off. Don't sit there and wonder what to do." Camielle gave the woman an expression of despair. "Not hesitate? But…I mean…I've never fought anyone before. I don't know what to do!" "Figure it out," the woman said in a sharp voice. She stepped to the side and gestured to the wall. "The door is there. When you walk in, be ready to fight." "Camielle, Camielle, Cami-elle," Matthew said, leaning against the wall. "I knew it would be you that made it past all the trials." He paused to grin. "Only you would be weak enough to surrender." Camielle did not say anything. The room was very large and quite gray. Most of the center of the room was very well lit, but the edges, where Matthew was, were dark and hard to see. It reminded Camielle very clearly of the expanded room in the second trial, where she'd suffered her first defeat. He got up off the wall and started walking. "So they let you keep the Agate, did they? I guess I'm not hugely surprised. The illusions love fights. It would hardly be a fight if you didn't have the Agate." Camielle still didn't say anything. "Well?" he asked walking toward her. "Aren't you going to say anything?" She continued to be quiet. To be honest, she was very scared, and fear never made her want to talk. She was also watching Matthew. Why is he talking? Camielle asked herself. We're here to kill each other. What is the point of talking? "Well, Camielle, I suppose you're really somewhat lucky. If there was no trial step and you were simply to walk into the Cenchen and expect to get rid of me, you'd be in for a surprise, that's for sure. You'd lose your name-" He cut himself off to attack her, his Kins slamming into her, but Camielle could see the attack quite clearly. She slid a shield up, absorbing the power, and took a step back. Calling on her days at Bridges, she employed a move known as the Arc that she only half remembered but could implement quite well, something along the lines of sucking away at his power and life at the same time. He fell to his knees, trying to breathe. Camielle froze, unsure. What now? What would a real Bridge kid do? She couldn't remember any moves, couldn't remember anything. Finish him of, the woman had said, but how? She didn't know what to do. Camielle never knew what to do. While she sat there and fretted about this, Matthew knocked some kind of Cenchen spell at her, and she hit the wall. She tried to react, but Matthew's spell made it impossible. That's not possible! She yelled to herself. When you Arc, they can't suddenly hit you with a counterattack like that. There's no way. Unless…oh, I'm so stupid. He was faking so I would hesitate. He knew that would screw me up. It's so obvious. "You always react, don't you, Camielle?" Matthew said. "You're very good at reacting." He went on, but Camielle wasn't listening. I remember this spell! She thought anxiously. We would play Tag with this! You need an outside Kins to undo it…that's why Bridges always fight in packs…oh, I am so screwed- But I have the Agate! She realized. Does that count? She keyed in to the Agate, the band around her wrist, that power. It was somewhat more difficult to use than she'd expected, but she figured it out without an excessive amount of trouble. The Agate's power quickly undid the spell, rushing away and almost burning her wrist. She moved quickly, not hesitating the way Matthew expected. She Arced him for real, then followed up with a strong Agate-intensified spell that crashed him against the wall. "These are not the kinds of spells they teach a six year old," he snarled. "These are the kinds of spells they teach me," she answered. Her last spell smashed into him, and the scene finally changed. The room was small, with one door at the side. The only thing it was a tall stool and a piece of the Agate on it. She lightly touched the piece, and the already-considerable bracelet grew even larger and stronger. An orange line etched around the center. This was the entire Agate. It was all hers. All completely hers. She walked through the last dor in the illusion world. Bridges again. That illusion floor. Camielle carefully hurried out of it, not wanting to spend a second more time in it. She went up the elevator and walked into Carmen's room. They urned to look at her. "You're here already?" Carmen said, sounding surprised. "It's been five minutes! Why couldn't we come? I mean, nothing dangerous lasts five minutes, does it?" "It was dangerous!" Camielle insisted. 'It was very scary. And I could have sworn it was longer than five minutes." "Well?" Jayne asked. "What happened? Did you get the Agate?" "Yeah." Camielle said. It was hard to remember the rest. The whole thing was indistinct and she could only remember flashes. "I…I was in a room with a big monster. And…and I fought Matthew. And before that…there was a woman..and I lost my name…and…uh…it was sort of dark…uh…" "You saw a woman, lost your name, met a monster, and fought Matthew?" Carmen asked, raising an eyebrow. "In five minutes?" "I told you, it wasn't five minutes," Camielle repeated. "And there was more, I just can't remember. It's all fuzzy." "Dude, all of this is hella bizarre," Carmen said. "Sounds more like a dream than real life." "What's a dream?" Camielle asked. "You're asking me what a dream is? Are you kidding me?" Carmen said. "A dream is, I don't know, you go to sleep and see images and you wake up and can't really remember it. You guys seriously never dream?" "I may have…once," Jayne said. "I know Camielle has. She saw a onster or something." "Oh come on," Carmen said, rolling her eyes. "Everyone dreams. You guys just don't remember them." "Well, Camielle has the Agate now," Jayne said. "So maybe we should get going to the Cenchen?" Carmen nodded slowly. "Okay. Cenchen. Yeah. How exactly do you plan on taking control once you get there, though?" "By force," Jayne said casually. "With the Agate it should be fairly easy to take control of everyone. And when Bridges comes, we'll knock them out, no problem." "And no one will lose their names," Camielle said. "And no one will lose their names," Jayne confirmed. Taking control of the Cenchen was not hard. Within days Jayne had convinced all of the nameless Cenchen adults that she was to be the new leader, and they followed her. She had total control. There was, of course, no way to really undo the names of the adults that had already lost them. But she made it very clear that no children were to lose their names in the future. She made it a rule. But the Cenchen were still…reserved. Their messages of "the adults are always right" and "the Cenchen above everything else" were hard to erase. The Cenchen childen, even with their names, were still largely the same. Things went on. The Cenchen went on. Bridges came and they fought them back easily with the Agate. Their attack halted fairly quickly once they saw that the Cenchen had the Agate. There wasn't really a point to fighting the Cenchen once they had the Agate. Camielle was somewhat worried about this and went to Jayne to ask why. "Jayne, why do they still act the same? Is there any way to…you know, change that?" "It worries you?" Jayne asked, tilting her head to the side. "Hm. How tragic." "Well…I don't know if it's tragic…" Camielle said, struggling to explain it. It's just…why do they still act so-" "So Cenchen?" Jayne asked. "Camielle, that's just the way they are. We can't change that." Camielle pursed her lips and took a step back, not completely believing Jayne. "Here, I have something to show you," Jayne said after a moment of silence. She went in the back and got some kind of silver tube. "What's that?" Camielle asked, tilting her head to the right. "I'll show you," Jayne said. "No, give me your right wrist. I need the Agate." Camielle showed Jayne her wrist, somewhat hesitantly. Jayne touched the silver tube to it ever-so-lightly. The Agate on her wrist shattered, the pieces littering the floor. They flew up to Jayne and joined together a little big. There was one long piece, a shiny piece, and then another section. The final section was dotted and jagged, like it had been made from a million tiny pieces. Jayne picked the pendant up. There was a hole near the top and a ribbon appeared. She slid onto her neck. "Jayne?" Camielle sad hesitantly. "Why…why did you do that?" "I have the Agate now," Jayne said. "I control the Cenchen. I control everything. I don't need you." "Jayne!" Camielle said. "But we're friends, we're best friends! Why do you want to get rid of me?" "Because," Jayne said. "I don't want to depend on you to control the Cenchen. I want to control it myself. I want to run it the way I want to run it, and I don't want you and your compassion to screw it up." "But…Jayne…" "But Jayne!" Jayne mocked. "I won. I won, Camielle." "Won what?" Camielle asked. "We weren't playing a game or racing or anything. What could you win?" "Everything," Jayne answered with a snarl. "Jayne," Camielle said. "What are you talking about? What have you been talking about? Why are you acting so weird?" "I'm not acting weird, Camielle," Jayne said with a smile. "I'm acting the way I intended to." "You- what?" Camielle said. "Since when?" Jayne shrugged. "Since Matthew explained to me how you work. I can't lead the way I want to with you in charge." Camielle took a step back. "But- Jayne-" "Don't worry about it," Jayne said. "You'll forget all about this soon enough." "Forget all about…what? What are you talking about?" "You'll forget about the Agate. You'll forget about me. You'll forget about the past year. Everyone will." "But- how- I mean-" "It's a spell," Jayne said. "You're going back to F.B. Bridges. To learn. To train. You will remember the Cenchen. You won't remember leaving." Camielle was quiet for a second. "But Jayne…" Camielle said slowly, dragging out the word. "Why are you doing this to me?" "Because you're in my way," Jayne said. "And when things are in my way, I usually try to make them leave." |
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