Exceptional

The Story

        Truman leaned forward, staring directly at the shocked Kira.

        "Well, obviously, I'm not." he said, after a pause. "Do you not believe me? Do you think I would really come up with such an elaborate scheme if it wasn't real? Of course not, Kira! You know me! The laziest brother ever, remember?"

        "But... you were taken... to B School, and you never came back! What happened there, why didn't you come back? And those scars... What happened to you...?" Kira trailed off, silently crying.

        A concerned look crossed Truman's face, the first real emotion I'd seen from him. He stood up, crashing into a few office items as he crossed over to where Kira sat, face buried in her hands.

        "Hey," he said, kneeling down to look her in the eyes. "Hey. It's okay. I'm okay. See?" He ruffled her hair, which I noticed, was nearly the same colour as his. Maybe what he said really was true.

        "Wait, wait, wait," I said, still skeptical about all these goings-on. "So... you're her missing brother? You... what... I..." I bagan stammering, trying to put together questions that hadn't already been asked and ignored.

        Truman sighed. "I can see I have some questions to answer. First off, I'm not dead." He did an awkward little wave. "Hi. I, um, only disappeared for a bit... four years, in the grand scheme of things, is not that much. I couldn't come back, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. You know I would have if I could. But they would have found me if I came back, and I didn't want you to get hurt. And I-"

        "Whoa," interrupted Arthur. " 'They?' Who's 'They?' "

        "That requires quite an explanation," said Truman.

        "You're getting us out of English class. We're all ears." Safirah said, leaning back, and crossing her arms, in the typical Safirah listening pose.

        Truman sighed, and stood up slowly, wincing a little while limping back to his desk. "Okay. Okay, okay, okay. Here goes the abridged version- I was a normal kid here at school, well, as normal as you can get when you're Exceptional-"

        "Yeah, that's right!" I shouted spontaneously, remembering the question I had earlier forgotten. "If you were once a student here, then what's your exception?"

        "It's hard to explain. Listen, do you want to hear the story or not?" he growled. I nodded sheepishly as he started his story up again.

        "So I was a normal kid, right? Well, my grades started slipping, and I got sent to B School, which wasn't so bad, in the beginning. It was just the same as what I was used to, except there were extra study halls and even a special time to practise your exception. Then one day, something just snapped. It was like I woke up into a nightmare! B School became more of a laboratory than a school. I tried to escape a couple times, but they just did more experiments on me, and broke my leg when I tried to run. That's the limp and the cough. The scars I gave myself so I could blend in as Jonason. And here I've been ever since. So far, I've been lucky never to have an outbreak in front of a class. You two are the lucky ones.

        "So," he said, clapping his hands together in front of him, grinning. "Any questions, class?"

        "Er, yeah!" Safirah said, defiantly. "We're supposed to believe that there's some secret conspiracy happening somewhere in the school right under our noses? That's ridiculous! Who the hell would even let that happen?"

        "Oh, come on. Even you can't be that unobservant," laughed Truman. "Who do you think it would be?"

        The answer, to me, was obvious.

        "Bones." I chimed.

        Truman clicked his tongue (which is something I cannot do, so it drives me crazy). "We have a winner."

        "So all the other teachers... they have no idea?" Arthur asked quietly. I could tell he was trying to make sense of everything he'd heard, but he just couldn't. I couldn't either, but not knowing things really gets to Arthur sometimes.

        "I thought you were supposed to be the smartest of the group. If they don't know anything, who do you think helps with the experiments?"

        There was silence for a moment. The bell sounded, but we could barely hear it over our own thoughts. Eventually, Truman reminded us that it was time to leave, and we all filed out, without speaking to him or anyone. Our little minds had just been blown.

        I couldn't sleep that night. Neither could Arthur, even though we didn't speak until morning. Classes were boring, as usual, but with the faint flicker of thoughts like your teachers are murderers passing through my head every now and again. You know. Normal.

        Lunch rolled around, and it seems that we made up for our silence yesterday with endless talk today. We had theories, questions, doubts. Poor Marvin had no idea what was going on, so we had to fill him in as best we could. To this day, the guy's probably still just a bit clueless.

        I felt significantly better after talking this out with my friends. The day slowed toward its end. I hummed one of my favourite songs and stared at my shoes as I walked back to the dorm. Apparantly, I was not watching where I was going, because I ran right into someone I had forgotten about until just then.

        "Hey, Sean! Just the man I wanted to see! How about having a quick word with me in my office?" asked Bones.