Twisted Utopia

Chapter One - Exhaustion

It's always been this way. Day in, day out.

Night in, night out.

I just wish that this damn world wasn't so . . . so perfect.

*****

I wince as the high pitched whine pierces my fuzzy brain, relentlessly pushing me into a sitting position. My back aches through the worn material of my pyjama top, and I absentmindedly wonder if my bed would be comfier if it actually had a matress, instead of a painfully empty wooden frame.

Okay, so that was a stupid question...

"IT'S TOO EARLY!" Whines a voice to my left. Snorting with barely supressed laughter, I rake my eyes around the plain gray concrete, over the other three beds that are somehow stuffed into my miniscule excuse of a dormitory, searching for the oh-so familiar flash of red light that's firmly branded into my memory, the agonisingly familiar crimson, robotic letters that take the shape of numbers: 4:00.

Every morning, for the last eight years, I've been on autopilot. Wake up. Get washed. Get dressed. Lesson, revise, test. Lesson, revise, test.

On, and on, and on, an-

My bright, uplifting thoughts are thankfully interrupted by an even sunnier drone.

Oh, joy.

"It's only been half an hour since you three fell asleep," mumbles a pale haired boy from the corner as he somehow manages to twist his skinny body into an even tighter ball. "So I suggest that you all go back to bed."

He's got a point.

"I, like, totally agree!" Squeals my self proclaimed 'best friend', Macei. Despite her protests earlier, she has somehow ended up hanging off the iron light fitting, fully clothed.

I don't even know, so please don't ask.

"Honestly, Macei, you are much too relaxed for your own good," scolds the most boring human being in existance; Dropi. Personally, I think that she should've been named Mary Sue, but that isn't how names work around here.

Basically, the unlucky member of staff in this hellhole who is given the extra shitload of work of naming a dozen children chooses a theme to label them all quicker.

My year's theme was four letter word/I.

In my opinion, I ended up with a good name. Calci.

As far as I can figure, the poor bastard who was weighed down with the exhausting task of naming me (note my sarcasm) glanced down for a second, searching for a four letter word to scribble on my birth certificate. He was greeted with his latest project - a pile of maths papers just begging to be marked. On the front cover of each paper, the words 'non-calc' were emblazoned in massive letters.

The teacher proceeded to grin, whip out his weapon of choice - the wicked pen - mess up my birth certificate with his atrocious handwriting, pat himself on the back,  and reward himself by jacking of-

Well, you get my drift...

Meanwhile, Macei crouches upon the light fitting, waggling her tongue at Dropi. The latter might as well be lecturing the cracked wall; her long-winded speech falls on deaf ears.

"If you keep sitting on the lights, you'll get electrocuted," notes the only male in the dorm, Birdi. "Or somebody will come in and put us in... The Room." His teeth snag on his scarred lower lip.

The bone white cuts, some freshly healed, others torn and leaking blood, are all there because of Birdi's disgusting habit.

You'll never catch us admitting it out loud, but Mace and I worry about Birdi. Actually, you'll probably hear Mace declaring it to the whole school at least twice a day, but I keep my mouth shut.

"We'll be fine, Bird! I mean, what are the chances that anybody's gonna come in ri-"

She's cut off by an earsplitting crash.

"MACEI TSUGI! REMOVE YOURSELF FROM THE LIGHT FITTING INSTANTLY!"

I untangle myself from my bedsheets enough so that I can bury my face in my hand.

Three shadows loom across the room. I glance up, letting the back of my hand hit my bedframe with a painful crack, and promply turn my head away to avoid being blinded by the bright light coming from the doorway.

I've already been deafened today.

I mean, my other senses still work fine, but what's the point of smell if sweat is the only odour here?

Why have taste if I only eat half-rotted cereal once a day?

All I feel is pain, pain and exhaustion. I don't even understand why I have a sense of touch.