The Kataya Legacy

One: Letters

The Kataya debut had surpassed expectations. The last few debuts had been flops with the exception of Warrior (which had made a strong initial presentation but ultimately blew up due to scandals involving past rank abuse). Kataya's strong presence and favorability in the public eye over the past 7 months had been a huge relief to The Corps, to say the least. Voluntary recruitment had never been higher and the smudges on public image were slowly being erased and overwritten with each of Kataya's clean missions. With the increased positive publicity came more Academy applications than the recruitment team had ever seen. There was obviously no guarantee that an Academy recruit would gain any more notoriety than a voluntary recruit. In fact, Kataya's own Chris Tiller had shown that voluntary recruits could be just as capable in the right circumstances (and with a healthy amount of natural talent and bravery). Despite the few dazzling careers of lucky cadets on A-level teams that The Corps loved to display to the public, the reality was that most academy cadets were destined to spend their days after graduation in a Corps corporate office or in a C-level local debut team. Nonetheless, the possibility of greatness drew people in regardless of dismal statistics.

Cecilia was not susceptible to The Academy's smokescreen promise of grandeur. She had been a fan of the Corps since the debut of 3Y when she'd been barely 6 years old. Now, she had applied to the Academy because it was the only thing she could imagine herself doing. Serving her community in a steady environment was her driving force. Any grandeur would only be a secondary bonus.

All Academy correspondence came in the same gainsboro envelopes. Everyone knew that, including Cecilia's parents. She had made great pains to ensure they wouldn't see the damning envelope by leaving her last class a few minutes early each day for the past week on the premise of family medical emergencies and then running from the metro to the apartment building so she could beat her father home. It was Thursday that her efforts paid off. She was grabbing the offending article from the P.O. box right as her father walked through the apartment complex's lobby doors. She'd had to shove the envelope in her backpack before walking back into the lobby as nonchalantly as possible. Her dad had asked her if there was any mail. She'd said no. All she could think of was the contraband in her bag. It felt like the envelope was pulsing to the beat of her own heart. Betrayal and opportunity all in one folded piece of paper. The elevator ride up with her father had never felt so long or uncomfortable. When they'd reached the apartment Cecilia had rushed to her room.

Once she had shut and locked the door behind her, she pulled the Academy envelope from her bag. She looked at it for a moment, standing in the middle of her room, before sitting gently on her bed. There was no way to tell definitively the decision based on envelope size alone. The Academy crafted all acceptances and denial letters from the same one-page template and sent them out at the same time.

Cecilia ripped open the top seam of the envelope, her heart tight in her chest. She didn't want to open it suddenly, the weight of the contents feeling heavier and heavier by the second. She held the folded letter up to the light and tried to see any indication of the contents but the printed ink overlapped and was illegible. She unfolded it.

She had meant to read the entire document from start to finish but her eyes were drawn first and foremost to the one word she had been eager to see: Congratulations! Cecilia's heart swelled.

--

Ellis had no disillusions about where she would end up in life. Her grades were terrible (with the exception of her history classes and the odd personal accounting class she had taken junior year) and her extracurriculars were basically non-existent. The only thing besides school she could put in her applications were the hours she spent helping her mom at her pet grooming business. She sat at the front desk and talked to customers on weekends and some days after school. She was a natural people-person, a charmer. But that hardly was something you could put down as a tangible unique skill. Suffice it to say, she wasn't putting any hope in her Academy application. Voluntary recruitment was ultimately her plan. Serve for a few years, use the time to figure out what she wanted to do with her life besides customer service (if anything), and go from there.