A Gray Mask

Gray

           When you are a Gold, the highest pillar of the society, people notice. They care. They care about who your parents are, what your family name is, what weight it carries, if you have a scar, what your value is. When you are a gray, no one gives a gorydamn.
           As a gray, I am expected to be a soldier. To follow my Gold leaders into battle without question, without hesitation. They expect me to give my life in honor of their petty feuds. They don't know my name, where I came from, who my parents were. They don't care how I got here. As long as I keep quiet and do what they expect of me, no one will pay me any attention. And that is precisely what I want.
          Being a gray is so easy. You train most of the day, and you take orders for the rest of it. Simple enough. I wake earlier than everyone in my barrack, and spend hours at the gymnasium. I must be strong. Must not allow the Gold to take my gray life before my real job here is done.
          I eat my rations alone, in silence. I do not speak with anyone beyond acknowledging orders given to me by my betters. I keep my head low and steer clear of trouble.
         This is my second year at the academy. Getting in was a breeze, since the academy is not really designed to test the lower colors. The academy is designed for the best of the Gold to show off, prove themselves, earn a name for themselves. We are just the worker bees. That's why no one cared to ask why a gray soldier has a yellowish tint to her hair. No one bothered to check if my eyes were truly gray, or if it were contacts I bought in a violet shop on Mars. No one cared to test my blood or spit or check the authenticity of my sigils.
         Darrow au Andromedus is in charge here, the Dominus. I've seen him a few times from a distance, and he just seems like a pompous ass to me. Walking through the ranks like he is some kind of god. All the lower colors bowing to him. All the Golds looking up to him. He waltzes through the ship with his posse, completely untouchable. Roque au Fabii on his right, Victra au Julii on his left, Tactus au Vali Rath trailing behind. How I hate the lot of them. But none more than the Reaper.
          Where did he come from? Of course the news outlets keep playing the story of the son of the tragically departed Andromedus family. His mother and father perishing somewhere in deep space. People speak of his parents, of how they went to the institute together, how they were such dear friends and how they mourn their passing. What none of them seem to know is that I never had a brother. I, Luscinia au Andromedus, was not there when my parents perished, but I was there when Darrow au Andromedus rose from their ashes and claimed my family name for himself. And I will be there when the truth pours out of him, just as his blood will once I am finished with him.