Innocence be gone

chapter 6 the result

~one week later~

"So! What's happening?" I ask walking to the main hall, it's five in the morning, on a Monday as if it could be worse. "Well, your results are ready!" Dylan says pulling a piece of paper out of his pocket. Poor Dylan, the guy can barely see straight and stares at a computer all day! His face, permanently contorted into a squint for vision, has a wad of fluffy red hair on top and a speckle of a beard around the outer rim of his chin. Too bad an optometrist never made it here, I think under the scrunched up face he must be pretty handsome. "You ready to seal your fate?" Briaana asks, her curly hair creates a frizzy halo around her head. "As ready as I'll ever be." I hold thumbs I'll get something in the tech department. Or maybe food? Nah, I'll eat everything I make! "Drum roll please!" Freddie says sarcastically, ripping the paper from Dylans' hands. Dylan falters and I see flames in his eyes, like he's ready to pounce, but the flames die as he pulls himself back. "No drum roll? Okay anyway!" Freddie continues after a moment of silence. He opens the page and winks at me. I roll my eyes, actually that's an understatement, I roll my head. "You'll have to learn to love me darling, seeing as you're going to need some ACTUAL training!" "Oh god." I mutter. A soldier? I'm doomed to be a soldier? How the hell did that happen? I have the athletic ability of a pumpkin and I'm going to be on the front line? Is this maybe Syrelins way of saying she liked being an only child? Maybe. "Training picks up at noon, you can go now." Syrelin says from her throne. Looking down at everyone. I never knew her to be one of those people, she's changed, she's still changing. Why? Shrugging my shoulders I spin on my heels and head back to my room. not caring to be silent, these people might as well be dying before they wake up.

"L-leave me ALONE! GO away! Please! Get out of MY HEAD!" I wake with a start and sit up to see only Syrelin in the room. She doubles over and tugs at her hair. "Please!" she begs no one. Her voice is so shaky I know she's crying. "S-Syrelin?" I stutter, not sure if I should intervene or if I should let her play it out like a sleepwalker. "Oh!" she looks up in surprise. "You, um, you're awake!" she says acting normally, she's never been much off an actress. Tear stains dribble over her checks, eyes puffy and red. "What happened? Why were you crying? Who were you screaming at?" I ask scrambling out of bed. I run to her and she collapses in my arms, heavier than I remember. I crumble to the floor and end up sitting with Syrelin laying across my lap. "Sweety!" I whisper stroking her hair. She's still crying. "what happened?" I ask again. She shudders but stays silent. "They-they're in my head! All of them! And they're yelling in a language I don't understand and it's scaring me!" she rambles. "Who are they? Who's yelling at you?" I ask trying to comprehend the insanity that is my sister. "THEM!" she yells. I have a million questions to ask but I have a feeling that if I ask any of them she'll just go into hysterics. Slowly her breathing slows and evens out. The peace in the room may as well be in separate universes to the yelling five minutes ago. "Syrelin?" I ask when I've completely lost feeling in my leg. No answer. "Syrelin?" I ask in a voice gentle enough to not belong to me. I realize she's asleep when a snore comes that almost breaks me into tears! I laugh as silently as possible and probably look like a retarded seal! Slowly I shift out from under sleeping beauty and make my way to the cafeteria, I'm starving!

"Well, have you gotten you're results?" Angela asks. Her tubby frame is due to her job; being a cook also means getting first dibs on everything. "Yep, unfortunately you won't be seeing much of me." I say grimly, plonking down across from her. "What did you get?" she asks more excitedly than I've ever seen her. "Soldier." I grumble stabbing my mash potato wishing it was Freddie's face. "That's great!" "No it's not! That means I have to spend all day with 'Freddie the perv'!" I retort. "Don't hate me cause you ain't me!" I hear Freddie's voice behind me and it makes my hair stand on end. "You'll love me eventually, they always do." He says plodding his food next to mine. "Who's they? Your mother?" I mumble and a not so discreet 'tss burn!' is ushered by Angela. "No, actually it was yours." He retorts and I can't help but smile, we're all orphans and we all know it. "Not bad for a sack of muscles." I say before shovelling in another bite of tasteless mash. "Ah so you did notice 'the boys'? Probably cause secretly you want them to hold you and kiss you and," " And get away from me." I finish his sentence. "Alright lovebirds settle down!" Angela breaks up a soon to begin war. "See you at training babe." Freddie says after shovelling down his food. "Okay well my life's over, what's happening in yours?" I turn back to Angela. "Nothing much, do you have your result paper?" I slide the yellowed page over to her. "Ah attack squadron, lots of action there! You'll never get bored, maybe dead but never bored!" she says handing it back "Thanks" I say sarcastically. "But you know who else got into the soldier squad?" she asks as though it's not rhetorical, I shrug my shoulders "Damian." She says raising her eyebrows "The guy who was found cowering inside a broken down car?" I ask and she nods "How the hell is this thing set up?" I say realizing that neither one of us is fit for our job. Heck Angela could kick my ass if she wanted to and she's a cook for heaven sake! "Well shit I'm going to be late for training on my first day." I say listening to the twelve o'clock bell ring and I'm sure Angela is still hearing the last part of my goodbye when I'm out the door, down the hall and into the gym.

"Glad you could join us miss Alnordwend." Freddie says, I hate how he gets my last name correct. "Sorry." I grumble and head to an open desk. Why the hell are there desks in the gym? "Let me recap for this late comer and you lot can take some notes; what you'll all need to learn in order to become good attackers, well actually just good soldiers, is to know your enemy. Learn what species they are, know that species weakness and exploit it. for example; as we all know you can easily kill a Terachi with metal, using metal against a Benig would be rather stupid as that is their main energy source and would wind up with you going against a hyper-active and well-nourished demon." Freddie says marching back and forth. I recognize a few people around me from the hallways but some look completely out of place in this world. "Now, as I was about to say, for the next few weeks we will be studying the demons that lurk above. In exactly two months' time there will be a test, exam, final, call it what you will but pass and you go on to learn combat." He pauses for dramatic effect "Fail and you'll have to resort to whatever job came second for you. So before we get started any questions?" He finally finishes. I raise my hand. "Yes Alice." "I wasn't told to bring a notebook or pen." A few 'neither was I' spring up around the desks until Freddie puts his hand up and silence grips the room. "First rule of anything you do as a soldier, observe the world you go into before you're in it." He says gesturing to a stack of notebooks piled against the back wall behind us.

"Thanks to the generations of brilliant soldiers before you there are only six species of demon left." Freddie continues once the mad scramble for notebooks and stationary has dwindled. "They include the Edeg, Dasta, Reca, Benig, Enarik and Terachi. And five of the six are endangered with a rough estimate of three hundred of each spotted by our scouts. One of the easiest ways of killing a species; the food supply. Limit the food supply you limit their chances of survival. We cut off their food supply and once there numbers are dwindling under one hundred then, and only then, do we go in and finish them off. The first demon we'll be focusing on is the Terachi, the only one not endangered." "Excuse me sir but why is that? If any of them have a chance of survival against us wouldn't it be the Dasta as they have no known food supply." Someone from behind me piped up. "Very well done Doygon. The only reason that the Terachi have survived for so long is because there is still innocents out there." And in here I think to myself. "to add to that taking out the food source isn't the only way to kill, the Dasta is very sensitive to many visual and audio things making it easy to distract and kill but we'll get to that in time..."

For two more hours Freddie dragged on about the Terachi. After a brief outline about what we'll be learning tomorrow he dismissed us and I was nothing but a blur. Hated school. Always have, always will. Once alone in my room I tear out a page and draw the best Terachi I'm possible of drawing (which isn't very good) and transfer information from one page to another. In ten minutes I have a cheat sheet of everything I need to know about the only certain threat to my existence. Maybe this whole soldier thing is better suited to me than I thought!