Chapter One
I walk in, another year starting, a new life beginning. It's not often you find someone like me here. But I am, and I am not happy here. I'm was born a Pawn, but all of a sudden I'm now a Tycoon. Not because I married into it, no. Because my father did.
Mom was murdered two years ago, and no one cared because she was just another Pawn. No one ever cares when a Pawn dies, but when a Tycoon dies, it's a big deal. Everyone cries, whether they knew the Tycoon, or not. We are all forced to go pay our "respects" at their big, fancy, and unnecessary funerals. It's not fair, then again, nothing is.
Like I said, I don't belong in the Tycoon schools. It's strange. It's not just a new year, or new life, but new clothes. And that's strange to me. New fabrics, designer made, perfectly stitched. Only the rich Pawns can afford the "fancy" clothes. The clothes I'm used to are old, worn out clothes. Usually meaning the clothes no Tycoon wants anymore. But sometimes, we get the from other pawns, who can no longer use them.
At our schools, all schools and all other places, there is a check in. When you are born, you are tattooed with a barcode on your neck. That is how the government sees you. As numbers across your neck. We're given them so we never get lost. At least that's what they tell us. They use them when you check in to make sure everyone is where they are supposed to be. The ink they use is also special. Two different types, both with trackers in them. Depending on your status, you get one ink or the other.
Very rarely, a one in a million chance, people can be given new barcodes. Erasing your old one, and giving you a new one. This happens when a Tycoon breaks serious laws, only murder counts for them, or when a Pawn is somehow lucky to marry into it. Families are brought to both. If you break a serious law, your whole immediate family is taken down with you. And if you marry into it, your immediate family is taken up with you. That's how I'm here.
I got a new barcode last week. I can still feel the needles and ink burning my skin. That's why we get them as babies, so we don't feel the pain.
I walk up to the check in. Get my barcode scanned. The guard looks up at me, then looks down at his scanner.
"Ma'am. You need to report to the Post. Go in, turn left, walk past the first right turn, then when the second one comes up, turn and it will be at the end of the hall." Typical. I need to talk to instructors and dictators because I'm rare. New here.
I go to the Post. I've been to the Post before, only not in a Tycoon school. In my old Pawn school. It is completely different than what I've seen. It's all glass and mirrors. Everywhere I look, I am forced to look at my reflection. And I don't recognize what I see.
This break, the breaks between finishing one year and starting a new one, when my Dad got married, his new wife took me out and changed me. Dad insisted I do it. I needed to fit in. And it looks like I do. Evie, my step-mother, took me to get my new clothes, makeup, which is really weird stuff to change how your face naturally looks, and get tattooed. I look like a Tycoon, and I don't like it.
I am called in to talk to the Head Dictator, Vaughn. He is tall, and rather menacing. But he is gorgeous. He looks young to be the Head Dictator, and I wonder how he got the position. His eyes are a perfect blue, with gold specks in-between the iris and the pupils.
"Now I understand that you are new to being a Tycoon, and that you don't know what to do. I don't want to bother with you getting taunted and bullied, so let's keep the fact that you are really a Pawn between us." He says, getting strait to his point. "Please sit." I didn't realize I am still standing. I walk over to a chair and sit down.
"How are we going to do that?" I ask.
"Simple. You tell people you are from a different Quad, and tell them that the Quad you are from is completely different than ours, and they will help you."
"Why would they help me?"
"Because you are beautiful, despite the fact of where you were born. Unlike the Pawns, who value heart and character, the Tycoons value beauty and status. And your father somehow married into one of the richest families there are. So you have beauty and status. You'll do fine. But just tell them you are from a different Quad. You are free to go." And I leave.
♥ ♦ ♣ ♠
It's weird walking up to my locker. It's freshly painted, shiny, and personalized. Whereas the Pawns have old, rusty, brown-painted lockers, which most of are broken. Even the floors are shiny, showing off your reflection.
I get caught staring at my reflection. All of a sudden, I am being pushed down. I look up from the ground and see the person who made me fall. Tall and gorgeous. He looks down at me, smiling, and offering to help me up. I am mesmerized. Could someone this gorgeous, still be this nice?
"I'm sorry. I didn't see where I was going." He says, his voice booming loud, and yet, beautifully.
I am stunned that he talked to me. "No, it was my fault, I was standing here, in the middle of the walk." I reply, taking all of the blame.
"Oh, well alright then." He says, leaving me standing there, still staring at his beauty.
"Wow," a voice from behind me says.
I turn around in shock. "What do you mean?" I finally managed to reply.
"Evan never talks to people outside of his little circle." The girl says. A look of confusion comes over her perfectly shaped face.
"Oh, is that bad? I mean, that he talked to me?" I ask in reply, scared that something may happen.
"No! Not at all! You're new here, right?"
"Yeah, I just moved," I think about what Vaughn said, and how to answer the question, "from Quad 3. Life's a lot different here."
"I bet it is. I've been to Quad 3. It's beautiful there. Nothing like this waist-land of Quad 1."
I find her remark odd. In Quad 3, all there is, is buildings after buildings, tall and big. Whereas in Quad 1 has all this beautiful natural, or used to be natural, plants, and greenery. Maybe I find it odd, because being a Pawn you are forced to live in the green, called the Stretch, and the Tycoons get to live in the big town, called the Manors. Where all the buildings are.
She looks at me like it is my turn to talk. "Oh, sorry! I just got lost in a train of," I pause, Tycoons never have to think, explains a lot, "of memory."
"What were you remembering?"
"Life back in 3."
"Oh. So, I never caught your name. I'm Arie."
"I'm Emrie." I say, smiling and feeling excepted.
Even back as a Pawn, I was never excepted. I was always different. Always reading, thinking, and analyzing. I would read books on how the world was years ago. Like 2000 years ago. I like it. I imagine life like that. Everyone living life according to how they chose to live it. It was amazing. You didn't have to be rich, or famous, or even remarkably beautiful, to be someone important.
"Well, Emrie, I'll find you after the school day is over, and I'll show you around! All the cool places to go, and I'll tell you who is who." And like that, she is gone.
