Exceptional

The Message

        "Er, excuse me?" A voice said indignantly, as I flopped onto my bed. "Who do you think you are?" I quick glanced up. A guy about my age sat cross-legged on the other bed in the room. He was tall, bespectacled, and he had wild, curly, brown hair that made him look like some kind of feral animal. He slammed shut the book he had been reading, and stood up, glaring, like I had interrupted some sacred ritual. Kira had told me I would be sharing a room with someone... but she didn't say I would be sharing it with a monster!

        "Imbicile! I lost my place!" he shouted, drawing closer to where I was. I sat up fast, freaking out a little. The guy was frightening, okay. I'm not a wimp. I'm smart.

        What do I say to make him not kill me?! I thought. I decided to improvise.

        "Listen, it's not a big deal, okay? It's just a book!" I said. Er, shouted. I may have shouted that bit.

        That... bear of a person backed away slightly, probably assuming I was sick or insane, not fit to be eaten alive. He either laughed or snorted, and then sat back down on his bed.

        "Arthur Wells." He said, flipping through the pages of the book, trying to find the one he had misplaced. He checked his watch, then set the book aside. "I guess it was a good thing you interrupted me... I need to get ready for a lunch date."

        Now, I'm not the smartest person in the world. Some may even call me a space cadet or a ditz. But I can put two and two together just fine. It's just sometimes my mouth starts before my brain finishes.

        "You're that guy!!" I shouted. He looked back at me with a gaze that told me just how crazy he thought I was. My brain scrambled to remember the details. "Er, Kira! Girl... cute hair... short, really, really tiny... she said, er, she said she was looking forward to lunch! You're the lunch guy, you're Arthur!" I panted, slightly out of breath.

        "You're not exactly articulate, are you?" he asked, chuckling. "But yeah, I am. What, you surprised?"

        "Yes." I said, blurting out exactly what I had been thinking. I clapped a hand over my mouth. Great. Way to be transparent. Time to fix this. "Er, I mean, I, er, I thought you would be, um, different?" I said, muffled by the hand I had forgotten to remove from my mouth.

        "...You are a weird one, aren't you?" Arthur sighed. "And I don't even know your name yet."

        "It's Sean! Sean Roscoe," I said, relieved he didn't pursue the matter more. He walked over to where I was.

        "Well," he said, pausing a bit. "Well, Sean," he continued, and then paused again. He suddenly grabbed my shoulder in a gesture that was either meant to be friendly or homicidal. "Let's... try to have an incident-free lunch, eh?" Then he grinned, and shoved me out the door, steering me toward what was probably the dining hall. When we reached the door, he let go, and started to walk away.

        "Where are you going?" I called after him.

        "I need to... clear my head," he said, and then was lost in the crowd of people. I tried to follow him with my eyes, but he was definitely gone.

        "He doesn't like you," a voice from behind me said. I jumped, startled. it was Kira, standing next to a tall guy I hadn't seen yet. He was about my height, with dark skin, and short black hair that was slightly streaked with purple. He was eating something that had bones, but it was so wholly devoured, I couldn't even tell what kind of creature it once was. The most striking thing about him, though, was his eyes. He had sharp, amber-coloured eyes, that focused on you like some kind of bird of prey. Strike that, the dude WAS a freaking bird of prey.

        "This is Marvin," Kira said, gesturing to the person beside her. "He's a senior, and he promised to show me around later!"

        "Sup," he said through a mouthful. Man of few words, this one.

        Kira giggled. "Come on, our table's this way!" She darted through people and tables so quickly, it was almost hard to keep up with her. "Hurry up! You get a demerit if you're late for the first speech!" Kira yelled back at me. They do those cheesy demerit things here? I thought to myself. Lame.

        "Here we are!" Kira said, gesturing to Safirah, who waved calmly.

        "Just in time for the speech, but still so late for lunch. It's rude to keep a lady waiting. And where's Arthur? I swear, he has even worse manners than you," Safirah said snarkily.

        "He's coming," said Kira. "He just went to... clear his head."

        "Ah," Safirah said, like it was some sort of code. She looked over at me. "Made a bad impression, eh?"

        I stuttered for a bit, then Arthur suddenly slid in next to me, shushed me, and pointed at the stage. Then I realised there was a stage. Was that there the whole time? Someone on the stage stood up, cleared his throat and started talking.

        "Attention! Attention, everyone," he called. The room fell unsettlingly silent, as if everyone was afraid of the man onstage. He didn't look particularly frightening. He was tall, I guess, with an average build; short, straght, mousy brown hair; and huge brown-rimmed glasses that took up a lot of his face.

        The man looked around the silent room, and declared, "That's better. Hello, students, and welcome to my School for the Exceptionally Gifted, or SEG, for short! I'm sure it will be a fantastic year for everyone," the man said, making Safirah scoff.

        It was almost like he heard her, because then he glanced in her direction, just for a split second, before moving on. But the way he glanced at her was so odd, so malicious, like anger was bubbling beneath the surface of his skin, but all he could do to act on that anger was stare. ...I was probably reading too much into it, though! I've always been a bit of a perciever more than a thinker.

        The man on the stage announced himself as Richmond Bones. Bones fit him, in a way, as a name. There were many other teachers on the stage too, I noticed, as Bones rambled on. There was a woman with bright purple hair and red glasses next to a man with long blond hair and a scruffy beard. He kept gazing at the woman in a way that made me a bit uncomfortable. There was a man with shaggy dark brown hair, and scars all over his face, scars kind of like mine. Next to him was a man with jet-black hair, all spiked up into different directions, like little icicles. There were many other people there as well, like a woman with rainbow-coloured glasses, and a man who looked young, but had pure white hair. Bones said we would learn their names in class.

        Safirah elbowed me accidentally, snapping me out of my daydreaming. Bones had moved on to a different topic, and this one was particularly odd. "Every week," Bones said, "The student with over twenty demerits, or the lowest grades in the school is transferred to B school. I can't give you all the details," he laughed, "But it's nothing you need to be too worried about!" I looked around at my tablemates. Was this supposed to me normal? It sounded rather sinister to me. Everyone had a similar, serious expression, except for Kira, who had one lone tear streaming down her face.

        I touched her hand, which was outstretched on the table. "You okay?" I mouthed to her across the table. She took out a pen, scribbled a message on a napkin, and slid it back to me.

        "That's what happened to my brother," the napkin read. "Except he never came back."