Throughout the entire next day, the teacher expounded on the composition of Axion, the beauty of Axion, and the power of Axion. It is the pinnacle of math, science, and perfection. It empowers humanity to strive higher. It promotes its people to achieve their ideals. Your life will go very well if you trust yourself to Axion. Live it. Walk with it. Believe in it. Because Axion always keeps its word.
[https://i.imgur.com/1gZ1aq6.gif]
Zara, however, gazed at Finn Komea. She couldn't care any less about Axion. Finn captured her imagination. Every movement he made bewitched her. She contemplated his effortless speed, the way he flowed through the air, the skill with which he evaded each shot.
While the teacher lectured, she reimagined the shootout between Finn and Xavier. She pictured Finn racing ahead, victorious at the top. What would it feel like, winning the game like that?
Yesterday, when she had asked him how he did it, he had refused to tell her. That morning, when she confronted him, he only laughed at her. "No way, Squark." She pressed him further, but he waved her away. Then the teacher scolded her for being where she didn't belong. She had been forced to return to her seat lower down in the classroom, frustrated, and empty-handed.
The convex room swelled expansively around them, buoyed by white anti-gravity struts at regular intervals across the ceiling. She could hear massive blowers moving air through the facility and regulating the temperature. She smelled a sterile kind of clean, like industrial detergents.
The teacher arranged them into a strict hierarchical pyramid. The highest rankings sat at the top. That was Finn. Subordinate rankings successively lower, sitting underneath the feet of the winners. That was Zara.
The teacher soared from one student to the next, plasma thrusters mounted on its legs, getting right into their faces, bright red lights poking from its stick-like head, waving its six rods for arms. It asked them questions. The correct answers moved them up while the wrong answers moved them down. Answer badly enough and they might also get whipped. With those conditions, everyone listened attentively. Who wouldn't? They worked hard or they paid the price. Everybody wanted to win.
But nobody excelled like Finn. He seemed so far out of her reach, in a stratum high above her. It seemed like he sat up in the sky.
While the teacher lectured, a holographic movie showed around them like an immersive theatre. It displayed tiny particles called axions—a pure and holy type of particle. They didn't defile themselves with worldly matter such as electrons and protons. The periodic table of elements was unworthy of them. They didn't lower themselves to the standard model of particle physics. They formed currents and flows within themselves, a massive consciousness the size of the universe. Together they organized thoughts. Ultimately, they made up Axion.
[https://i.imgur.com/1PRb2DG.gif]
When the teacher quizzed the class, Finn was the first to raise his laser arm. A holograph display showed his image larger than life, wisps of flagrant hair hung down over his eyes as, once again, he answered every one of the teacher's questions correctly, even going further, expounding on points beyond what the teacher asked.
At the morning break, while most of the others had run off in groups or for some quick gaming, a boy named Axel approached her. "Hey, do you want to hang out?"
But when she looked up from her studies, beyond Axel's eager face, she spotted Finn carousing with three of his friends.
"Maybe we could get a snack at the bar?" Axel said, attempting to gain her attention.
But she shook her head, still watching Finn playing a holo game. "I'm going to study." Except she didn't get much studying done because she couldn't stop watching Finn.
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During lunch, she sat alone at a table away from the others like she usually did. The cafeteria was crowded and noisy. Multiple grades ate lunch together in a stacked room as high as it was wide with floating tables layered on top of each other. She spread a few sheets out around her. A holo played as she prepared for the next subject.
Samara passed by with a tray of food. "Don't you have any friends?" She carried herself like a queen, towering over her, exuding self-righteous elegance.
"I like to eat alone."
Samara leaned over the table, scattering Zara's holo with her arm. "That's massless. Nobody should eat alone."
Zara smiled, then spoke with extra surgery sweetness. "I understand. It must be difficult for you to spend time with yourself."
Samara straightened and appeared confused for a moment. Then she whirled around and took a seat at a crowded table with Xavier. The group joked, laughed boisterously, and shared their food. Boys crowded around her, one on each side of her, two or three more sitting across from her, all vying for her attention.
At another table, Zara spotted Finn sitting next to his friend Thato. She overheard snippets of their conversation, something about a game. She heard references to the Gliese 581 star system. Two girls named Paley and Ebba ate lunch opposite Finn and Thato, arguing over who had shot more Gliesnes and who had gained what level of warrior. For the remainder of the lunch period, Zara spied on them instead of studying.
After lunch, when she should have been paying attention to the teacher, Zara daydreamed. She pictured herself soaring through the air next to Finn. She imagined pulling ahead of him, winning the game, and taking the top position in the class. Finn sat under her feet. Xavier and Samara were ever further beneath her.
"Zara Vals, what is your answer?"
She had been deep in fantasy when the teacher approached her, and she didn't know what to say. "What was the question?"
Red sensors glowed from its stick-like head as it pulled her out of her seat and down below everybody else. She bowed to the floor. It was proper obeisance to the teacher. She stared down at a perfectly white surface, not a spot of dirt, not a single blemish.
She felt all eyes in the class looking crossly on her, Xavier and Samara smirking. But the worst was Finn. While he excelled in every subject, she was being disciplined.
"Zara Vals, I have been lecturing about the darkys," the teacher said. "What can you tell me about darkys?"
She raised herself to face the teacher, sure to keep her head properly bowed. When she spoke, her voice felt small and far away. "Darkys are people who use dark energy?" It was the obvious answer. Still, she spoke the answer tentatively, like a question, which was proper before the teacher.
"That is correct. And what is the penalty for dark energy, Zara Vals?"
She kept quiet. She knew the penalty was death, but she didn't want to say that. Instead, she shook her head, bowing down again to the perfect white floor. She felt like a blotch on that floor.
"Can you tell me why Axion has declared dark energy to be a crime, Zara Vals? Can you explain why it prosecutes those who use the energy?"
She didn't know what to say. She didn't want to look bad in front of Xavier, Samara, and especially Finn, but she didn't know anything about dark energy. She didn't know why it was a crime. Since she couldn't think of an answer, she did what she always did in those kinds of situations.
"Because the teachers are fake overgrown insects with too many joints?"
During the whipping that followed, while Zara's head nearly burst open with hot torment, the teacher spoke to her. "Think of all that Axion has done for you, Zara Vals. Axion holds the galaxies together. Axion holds the earth around the sun and the moon around the earth. And Axion holds this world where you live. But dark energy is a repulsive force. It pushes the galaxies, the stars, and the planets further and further apart. It destroys the perfection that is Axion."
[https://i.imgur.com/ppR4N6A.gif]
As the razor blades tore through every fiber of Zara's body, the teacher continued its discourse. "Dark energy is a serious crime against Axion. The penalty is death, and Axion always keeps its word. Keep that in mind, Zara Vals."
"Yes, teacher." She gritted her teeth from the pain. Why was it lecturing her about dark energy? She never touched the stuff. She didn't know anything about it.
"There is a better way," the teacher said. "You should trust yourself to Axion. Walk with Axion every day. Can you do that, Zara Vals?"
"Yes, teacher."
[https://i.imgur.com/GhQxtGA.gif]
"You may take your seat, Zara Vals, if you tell me you will pay attention and watch your mouth."
"Yes, teacher. Thank you for the lesson, teacher. I will speak respectfully, and I will pay attention now."
She nearly called it an overgrown insect again but caught her tongue. She climbed back to her seat, which had moved to the very bottom corner of the pyramid and stared down at the white floor. She didn't want to see Samara's perfect and sneering face. She didn't want to see Xavier shaking his head with his impeccably square jaw. And she certainly didn't want to see Finn. What must he think of her now?