Lately, things had been happening too quickly for Myla to keep up with. One day, she’d been at home playing in her backyard, flipping stones down by the frog pond. That’s when they came for her: adults she didn’t know.
They’d been yelling, her parents had been crying, yet no one tried to stop them as she was dragged away from her home. Many children were. She’d been confused.
They’d been taken to a space ship, landed out there on the Silka fields, that was bigger than their entire town — one of those you read about in books or hear of in stories but they sound reeeally impossible because you have never seen one yourself — and then, she was soaring among the stars.
She’d made a new friend aboard that ship, but then they’d crashed. There’d been crying children, but then there wasn’t. Her friend had been gone, too.
Myla cried a lot after that.
Nyamien tried to comfort her, saying a lot of strange words – he’d been saying a lot of strange words lately – but just as they’d promised to get stronger together, he was gone as well.
Now, it was alongside that tall, scary alien that she waited to be taken away from that planet where the rain fell like tears. Yesterday, Nyamien had left, and her hands were still shaking where she clutched at that stuffed rabbit.
But she wasn’t afraid. She wasn’t allowed to be. She had to be strong, or she’d never get to see him again.
𐫰 𐫰 𐫰
Just like Nyamien had promised, Myla ended up meeting a lot of children her age. Already on that pretty ship that took them away from the crying planet, she did.
Although it wasn’t quite as big as the one that’d taken them away from home – only holding some forty children – it looked nicer. And to someone who’d been feeling as alone as Myla had, forty was a lot, too. Especially as they spoke some language she didn’t understand.
Now, she was left sitting on a chair in the corner, swinging her legs back and forth as the other children talked to each other. The hall was large and shiny, and there were plenty of toys present as well. As none of the other children had even looked at them, however, neither had Myla. Which was a shame. Some of them looked like they’d would’ve been really fun to play with…
No, Myla was satisfied with just holding onto Happy, legs swinging back and forth as she watched the other children.
They didn’t play, they merely talked with strange gestures, like children trying to be adults. They wore frilly clothes as well and, at most, they’d send Myla a short glance, see how dirty Happy had become, and scoff before looking away.
They were really strange, the children you met up here among the stars. Myla missed her friends.
She missed Leyi and Nyamien.
Squeezing the stuffed rabbit tighter, she shook her head.
You need to be strong, Myla. You need to spread your name for Nyamien to find you.
𐫰 𐫰 𐫰
“Hi, my name is Myla. What is yours?”
The girl just blinked at her. Myla had approached the girl because she seemed lonely as well, but now she wasn’t so sure anymore. Still, she didn’t give up.
“Do you want to be my friend?”
Some of the other children had paused to look their way as well now. Why, Myla wasn’t sure. So, she just held out her hand towards the girl she’d tried to befriend.
There was a pause, and then a sigh, and the other girl tapped the thing strapped to her wrist with a meaningful look. Nyamien had called it a UI, though, the one the girl had looked much nicer than Myla’s.
“I have one, too.” Myla nodded, holding up her own arm to show at it.
Another pause, and that girl — short cut, raven black hair and eyes that were darker still; lips that held an almost purplish hue and an aura that was like that of a prince — tiredly rose from her satin cushions.
The other children nervously stepped back as she did, but Myla still held her hand outstretched as the other girl took hold of it.
She touched her UI to Myla’s, and a moment later, she spoke, “Terra-Ibdis? Where even is that from?”
“Terra who?” Myla asked, only for the raven-haired girl to roll her eyes.
“The language you speak. I’ve never heard of it before. Where are you from?”
“Sector M94?” a boy behind them gasped. Ever since the raven haired girl had switched over her UI, the other children had begun frantically fiddling with theirs. “You’re a commoner?”
“No, I’m Myla,” Myla said, causing a murmur to run through the room.
A lanky girl with silver glasses said she’d never met someone born that close to the Void. A chubby twin pair of boys spoke over each other, asking why she was there. All of them were looking at her now, half with open curiosity, the rest with that same adult act from earlier.
It reminded Myla of that one aunt she had, the one who’d gone to a different moon to study. She, too, had looked at Myla with the same kind of distaste as she eagerly showed her the mud-fish she’d made.
“Have you received any modifications yet?” that first boy asked. His eyes were filled with burning curiosity. “We were just talking about what our parents gave us before coming here.”
“Of course, she doesn’t,” the sliver-glassed girl scoffed. “Commoners don’t get any before they arrive at the Academy. Their genetics are not suited for it anyway.”
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
“Really? Then how…”
“What about…”
“But she…”
“Why…”
A storm of questions came Myla’s way at once, and the raven haired girl sank down on her cushions with a deep sigh, seeming to wish she could get away from there. Myla’s ears were beginning to hurt as well, and she squeezed Happy tighter in her arms.
“But I do have a mod,” she quietly objected.
Nyamien had given it to her, and she wasn’t sure why they thought he wouldn’t have. She hadn’t spoken loudly at all, yet they all fell silent.
“You do?” one of the twins asked, his eyes sparking. “What kind of modifications is it? Me and my brother received B-grade fortification mods, with a sub spec of bruising. The same our father has.”
A hint of jealousy passed through the room at those words, though Silver-glasses quickly spoke up, “She’s lying. Or she’s got some low-grade modification for sure. It was a mere miracle my brother managed to get hold of a Synthetic, C-grade parallel-thoughts augmentation for me. There’s no way she has anything even half that good.”
They all stared at Myla now, though she had no clue what they were expecting. Even squeezing Happy didn’t help.
“They want you to tell them about whatever modifications or augments you have. Though, you don’t have to tell them if you don’t want to,” the raven-haired girl quietly explained, busy playing with her own UI now. She hadn’t even looked up from it, but her words still caused a wave of uncertainty to pass through the other children.
Now, their stares weren’t even half as intense as Myla looked down at her new friend, “I…erm, I received it form a friend?” she tried, not knowing a whole lot about grades, bruisers, or what’s-its-name-thoughts.
“You can look it up on your UI. It’s…” although the raven haired girl had seemed completely indifferent to the rest of the children, she did pause as she looked over at the bulky thing attached to Myla’s arm. “Ah, I guess you can’t. Too bad.”
“They still give those out to new recruits?” Silver-glasses asked with bafflement. “Just…just give me a second. CHARLES, BRING ME MY OLD ACCESS DEVICE,” she loudly yelled, causing a man — whom Myla hadn’t even noticed where he stood perfectly still on the balcony above — to come hurrying down. There were more adults present up there as well, quietly observing.
“She could’ve used her UI for that had she wanted to…” the raven haired girl murmured behind Myla, and the words seemed meant for her.
It was a strange comment. Myla would’ve probably yelled, too, if she wanted some help. Was that a bad thing?
“Here,” Silver-glasses soon said, proudly holding out a tablet-looking thing towards Myla. The towering Charles, who only looked vaguely human now that he was close, had just handed it to her. The other children were keeping some nervous distance. “Use this to access your UI.”
Myla hesitantly took the device.
“How do I…?”
“You just—”
“Let me show you.” Before Silver-glasses could step over, Raven — it probably wasn’t her name, but it fit the dark-haired girl — had gotten to her feet. “You just have to…”
𐫰 𐫰 𐫰
“Unknown?” Myla said to the quiet room. “It says that I have ‘Unknown’?”
At first, there’d only been silence, then came the mockery.
“What is that even supposed to mean?”
“She really doesn’t have a mod…”
“I told you she was just lying, trying to fit in…”
“Typical commoner…”
“Garbage…”
“Nothing…”
Laughter, scoffs, and looks of dismay had chased Myla into a corner, and not even Happy could shield her from their scorn. She was confused. She’d only told them what it said, and now, they seemed mad at her.
Then, a voice finally came to her salvation, “Myla Pheon? Come with me.”
It was one of the adults from the balcony above, and the only one that wasn’t laughing as she was led away by her hand was Raven. The dark haired girl followed her with a look of concern — the same look she’d held ever since Myla had spoken those words out loud.
It seemed to tell her that she should really, really not have done that.
𐫰 𐫰 𐫰
It was a cozy room. The seats were cushioned, potted plants lined windows that would occasionally switch between showing the star outside, or sceneries from distant planets. There were books, toys, fun illustrations, yet the girl inside of the room just sat on her chair, slowly swinging her legs back and forth as she clutched her stuffed rabbit to her chest.
She was alone, and she had no clue that she was being observed.
“This is the child in question?” a corpulent man with twirly mustache asked inside that far dimmer space. His single monocle had automatically pulled away from his left eye as he turned away from the screen.
No one else in the room had spoken so far, and there was reason for that.
“So, what are we waiting—” Before the corpulent man could finish his sentence, said reason chose to arrive.
Although no one inside of the room was particularly short — save a lone woman who was sucking on a smoke-less pipe in the corner — Celian still dwarfed them with his presence. Calmly, he strode into the room, looking each of them over in turn as if curious over his own summons. Not that anyone had summoned him. He’d arrived on his own accord.
“Mister Il Suen, I presume?” The corpulent man’s question was redundant. Aboard that ship, only a single passenger was not human.
“My greetings to you, too, Admiral Brow,” Celian said, his eyes having at last fallen upon the screen which showed Myla inside that room. She was still swinging her legs, quietly humming to herself. The colors on Celian’s face subtly shifted, and only a single pair of eyes seemed to notice as much.
“There is currently a single, acceptable reason for why you’ve brought this girl here,” Celian continued, his voice still the same, “and I’d ask that you confirm it for me. You brought her away from that room because it was getting too hectic over an innocent slip of the tongue, isn’t that right?”
“No, we brought her here because we’ve been denied access to her UI,” Admiral Brow huffed, pulling himself up to his full height. Although he was far wider than the Luminesari, he still remained half a head shorter, and no part of Celian seemed intimidated by the fact. “She might be a danger to this ship, and we demand access to her files.”
The dwarfish woman drew a final breath from her pipe, only to let it out in a manner that sounded an awful lot like a sigh. Even as she tiredly put it aside, however, now watching Celian with a cautious gaze, she didn’t say anything.
Celian gave her a faint smile, causing the woman to shudder.
“From my observations, none of the other children aboard this ship has been requested to concede such information,” the Luminesari said. Another shift of his tattoos, and the short woman grew tenser.
“By the Empress’ name, they are not the same,” Admiral Brow pressed on. “She’s a mere conscript from the rim-worlds, they are the children of our most loyal benefactors.”
“And in the eyes of her benefactor, it seems he hopes you’ll view her the same,” Celian simply said. “Else, he wouldn’t have shielded her uplink like he did.”
“She’s still one of ours, and aboard this ship—”
“Stop it, Cornelius, you fool!” Just as Admiral Brow had puffed up his chest even further to take a step towards Celian, the dwarfish woman finally spoke up.
In a tongue that touched only minds, she even sent out a swift apology before reinforcing it out loud, “My deepest apologies, Master Vilcalori, but we were merely curious about whatever modifications the girl might have integrated with. If she is to receive training at our Academy, such information is vital, is it not? Perhaps, you would care to enlighten us?”
“I certainly could.” Celian nodded. His eyes were now fully at the woman, as if Admiral Brow had ceased to exist. “As happenstance would have it, I was the one who oversaw her integration, after all fusing the mod directly to her genome.
“Although I realize this information will be highly unnecessary, I might as well mention that, in the off chance that someone had unsavory thoughts, harvesting the mod from the girl is currently impossible. It wouldn’t just kill her, but it would also destroy the mod as well. I made sure of that. At best, any such attempts would only anger her benefactor.”
Although his voice had never been anything but calm and polite, it still left a meaningful silence in its wake.
“And this benefactor,” Admiral Brow began, “he’s the same one who gave her the mod? Could you tell us something about it.”
“If the girl allows it, and only if she allows it, you can look it up yourself,” Celian said. “Not that you’ll be able to understand much of it.”
“You know what it does?” the dwarfish woman hurriedly asked as Celian set to leave.
“For now? Barely anything. In time,” Celian gave her another smile, “who knows? You’d best nurture her well, Miss Beux.”