The Gifted

Chapter Seven

  I woke up to the sound of a trumpet blaring in my ears.  "Time to get up!  Five minutes until everyone needs to be outside their cabin!" a voice announced through the speaker I didn't even know was in our cabin.  I groaned and rolled over, shoving my pillow against my ear.

"C'mon, James," Charlie said, "It's time to get up.  First day of training--kind of exciting, isn't it?"

I rolled back to see Charlie's grinning face and glared in response.  "Not when you have to get up at the crack of dawn."  I honestly didn't even know what that expression meant.  It was something I heard people say or read in books when someone didn't want to get out of bed when it was early in the morning.

"James," Charlie persisted, "we have four minutes now-"

"That means three more minutes for me to sleep," I said smugly, closing my eyes and pulling the covers over my head.  I thought I had won the argument when I heard Charlie walking away, but next thing I knew, I was on the ground, my matress (A/N:  I'm having a blank-out...that's how you spell matress, right?) having been flipped from the other side of the bed.

"Fine.  I'm up, I'm up!" I surrendered.  Charlie walked over to our closet and pulled open the doors. 

"There's uniforms set out for us already--they even have our name on them," Charlie explained.  "Here-" he chucked my uniform over to me, but I caught before it hit my face.

Suddenly the speaker on our wall spoke again, "Two minutes!"

Charlie and I looked at each other.  "Let's go," I said.

We pulled on our uniforms and quickly combed our hair.  Then, I made Charlie help me put my bed back together.  We both made our beds neatly, not wanting to cross whoever was the voice on the speaker in any way--the voice didn't sound very friendly.

We ran outside our cabin and saw the line of cabins down the camp, two people in uniforms waiting outside each small dorm.  Excited and nervous whispers littered the air, but besides that, it was mostly quiet, each student anticipating what would happen next. 

Suddenly I looked up at the sky and my breath was caught in my throat.  The sky was so different than it always was back home.  Back in the Community, the sky was always the same--blue, a few clouds scattered here and there but always in the same place, the sun always stationed in its same nook in the sky--but right now, I saw the sky at a deep pink, oranges blended in, the sun brightly rising in the sky.  It was amazing, breath-taking.  This must be the crack of dawn.

I was just about to point it out to Charlie when a tall woman with a bullhorn, who I'm guessing was the instructor, Rodger, and a few other people I didn't recognize walked down the line of people.

"This is going to be the routine every morning," the tall woman bellowed into the bullhorn.  "I'll wake you up every morning, you'll get ready in five minutes or less, and you'll wait out here for your instructions for the day.  All of you are divided into groups of eight-"  The woman looked at the clipboard she held in her other hand and read the list off into the bullhorn:

"Group A: Karly, Valerie, Ryan, Melody, Fiona, Charlie, David, and James," the woman announced.  I looked at Charlie when my name was called, relieved we were in the same group.  "Group B: Carol, Evan, Troy, Lizzi, Dylan, Lori, Anthony, and Beth."  There were more excited whispers.  "Hush!  Like I said, you'll get you instructions each morning, the two groups will do one thing in the morning, then switch after lunch-er, I mean Noon Meal.  Group A, you'll be doing your physical training first; Group B, you'll be doing training in acting.  Now all of you guys head out to Meal House for your Morning Meal--you have 30 minutes to eat.  Then your group leaders will lead you to your training.  I am your instructor here, but I mainly lead physical training.  My name is Willow, but you'll address me as Instructor Willow.  Everything clear?"

"Yes, Instructor Willow," everyone chorused.

"All right, then let's move out," instructed Willow.

Everyone herded over to the Meal House for the Morning Meal.  The blob we had all assembled in was molded into a single file line leading to the morning buffet.  As the line inched its way along, I decided to bring up the morning sky I had seen before to Charlie.

"Hey, did you notice the sky this morning?" I asked.

"No, should I have?" Charlie replied.  We walked forward as the line in front of disappeared.

"Well, actually yes.  It was amazing!  The sky was different it was-" I was cut off by the lady serving the morning buffet.

"What would you like, dears?" she asked.

Charlie's face lit up.  "We can have anything at all?"

"Actually, you need to have at least one serving of grains, one of protein, one of dairy, and one of fruit, but you can choose what each is!" the lady explained cheerfully.  She showed us the selection in each category, and we each picked our meals.  Then we walked over to the tables, searching for one to sit at when we saw Karly and Valerie flagging us down to sit by them.

We made our way over to their table and sat down in the empty chairs.

"Hey!" Karly greeted.  We mirrored her greeting.

"How do you guys like the training camp so far?" Valerie asked.  Valerie was shy at first, but she has been gaining more confidence the more she hung out with us.

"I love it!" Charlie exclaimed.

"I wouldn't decide quite yet--we still have training with Willow...Oh, excuse me, Instructor Willow," Karly said in a voice mocking our new instructor.

"Yeah, I think it's too early to tell," I agreed.  There was a silence as we started to gulp down our food, but I broke it after a while.  "Did any of you see the sky this morning?" I asked.

Karly shook her head, but Valerie's eyes lit up.  She nodded rapidly.  "Yes!  I saw the sky!  It was amazing!  It was so much more different than at home.  It-it was pink and orange and just these amazing colors!"

I nodded along as she spoke.  "Yeah, I know--it was incredible!"

Charlie and Karly glanced at each other and shrugged.  "Just look tomorrow," I instructed.  They nodded in response. 

Suddenly the speaker had another announcement: "Please finish your meals within the next five minutes, students, and gather in your groups for the beginning of the training."

We each scarfed down the rest of our meal and met the rest of our group by the door.  Turns out Group A's leader is Rodger, which was fine by me--he seems nice enough.

Once everyone from Group A was gathered, we headed out to start pur physical training.  I got nervous all of a sudden.  I haven't really found anything in great at yet; this has to be it.  I need something I can lean back on--know for sure I'm good at.

We came across a big obstacle course and Rodger stopped us there.  Soon Willow came into sight and took over.  Rodger left and Willow started explaining the course: "Okay, since today is your first day, we'll start easy.  All you have to do is climb that ladder," she gestured to a ladder that seemed to be about five yards tall, "make your way across those monkey bars, climb down the rope, cross the balance beam, climb over that wall, crawl under that wire, and run to the finish--Oh and you're being timed.  Form a line," Willow instructed.

"Yes, Insturctor Willow," everyone groaned.

"Okay, let's go!" she exclaimed.  I watched as the people struggled to finish the course quickly.  Then before I knew it, it was my turn.  "All right, James, you ready?"  I nodded, and my stomach churned.  "Okay, ready, set, go!"  And I was off.

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A/N: Hey, meh pretty purbles!  Soooo I really suck at updating...Just bare with me.  Hope you enjoyed the update!  Happy Easter!  Keep Reading!  Love y'all! Xx

~gleek_geek