First year of Skill School

Chapter 1: It's Skill School, dear. Not the military.

Chapter 1: It's Skill school, dear. Not the military.

Mandy swallowed. There were just too many people...

Her older sister gave her hand a reassuring squeeze.

"It'll be fine, Mandy." Merilyn's soothing voice spoke, somewhat calming her nerves.

Mandy smiled up at her.

Together they entered the huge auditorium. It was air conditioned and packed with students. It was, naturally, noisy.

Mandy and Merilyn made their way through an aisle and up some carpeted steps.

A board read First years. It was placed above several rows of seats.

Merilyn let go of her fifteen year old sister's hand. "Here we are!"

Mandy gave Merilyn a brave smile. Her red hair sprayed across her face and her sister's hand moved over it, setting her hair back in place.

Mandy looked back at the seats under the card. A few other girls sat there and they all looked just as scared and nervous as she felt. Mandy turned to her sister again and spoke softly.

"Thanks, Mer. I'll be fine. I'm overreacting. It's just the first day of Skill School."

First day of Skill School where she'd have to spend the next five years and she didn't know anyone and didn't have the slightest clue what a 'skill' was either and it was an all-girls boarding school at that.

Merilyn frowned. "Are you sure?"

"MERYL!!" A few girls shouted from across the hall.

"Positive." Mandy answered "Go. Your friends are calling you over."

Merilyn smiled and gave her little sister a peck on the cheek before making her way over to  the seats under the sign third years.

Mandy sighed and turned to face the first-year seats. She straightened her backpack strap and marched over to grab herself a seat.

Settling down, Mandy looked around herself for the first time. The auditorium was a huge, closed seating hall airconditioned and with a large stage down in the centre. The seats ascended in a semicircle around it. It was dimly lit and every girl in the building seemed to be talking at once.

Mandy couldn't believe that about two hours ago, she'd been so excited that even jumping up and down didn't free all her energy. Torturing her poor parents with questions seemed her way of calming down.

"What if I don't have a Skill, daddy?"

"Honey, everyone has-"

"Mom! Do we have to wear uniforms?"

"It's Skill School, dear, not the mili-"

"What's your Skill, daddy?"

"It's-"

"Oh no! We're gonna be late."

"No, Mandy. We have-"

Mandy smiled to herself. She could be really annoying when she wanted to.

Skills. Mandy sighed. The air that they breathed could affect the body and fifteen years of breathing could give them special powers or as the people in her planet called it - Skills.

Her mother could become invisible to the eye. Her father...

"HI!"

Mandy jumped, startled by the sound of the person next to her.