Aenoxis and the Bridge Between Worlds

Chapter 2

The toes of his boots dragged along the floor, as he brought his feet forward, before his heels took over. One ankle landed on top of the other as his shoulders sagged into the back of the chair. Landing on the table with an uncaring thump, his school bag blocked his view of the door to the canteen, which was exactly why he didn't see the teacher's pet and her personal bodyguard enter until he'd put his lunch-less bag back beneath the table.

Even when he saw them, he barely paid them any attention. His lunch was much more interesting: Homemade noodles with vegetarian black bean. Besides, he wasn't one for idle conversation or polite greeting - he was much more comfortable glaring a challenge at the students that dared look his way.

Perhaps that wasn't fair of him, but life wasn't fair. It made people different from each other just to single them out. He would never be the same as anyone else. He'd always be different and miserable and that was how it had always been and would continue to be because he put no effort into changing it. He didn't much see the point when it all seemed so obvious to him. He was Black. Almost no one else in the Nation was. How much clearer a line could be drawn between them?

Sat beside him was the only person he cared to talk to inside the concrete building of silent judgement: Kailani Blackburn, his sister. He looked to her now, sliding his fork back into his noodles. She was looking at him with those innocent, sparkling eyes she always wore. It made him sick. Sick to his stomach at the thought that, despite the covering of her hijab, she was so open, so raw. So easily broken. He would forever do what it took to save the light inside her from being snuffed out, but when she refused to close her doors to anybody and left herself an easy target, he often wondered how easy it would be for him to fail.

Taking his focus away from his thoughts and bringing it back to the present, he quickly realised she was looking at him expectantly - waiting. She seemed to notice that he'd come back and chose that moment to give a subtle flick of her eyes to her right. When she was certain he'd noticed, she turned back to her own lunch.

With a sigh, he turned round in his seat, seeing the awkwardly shuffling whizkid sat opposite him and her knight in shining ice staring at him from behind. "What?" he snapped, perhaps too aggressive but it was too late to take it back, so he just let his eyes match his tone and hoped they'd walk away.

"If I'm right, you're the key to entering a different world," the short one said. No names and cute little introductions first? Oh no, it looked like he was missing out today. He rolled his eyes and opted for naming her Minion. In honour of her uncanny ability to blend into the background as an irrelevant extra and her need to follow all the rules. He assumed it went without saying that it also included her height. Although, he did have to hand it to her: She wasn't one for messing about.

"Reality check, Minion," he said, eyes hard and unwilling. Conversations took effort that he'd rather feed into something more productive. "Other dimensions don't exist." Or at least, it was easier if they didn't. Physics was by far his second favourite subject and so far, he'd done extraordinarily well in it. But that relied on a few things; the first and foremost being that the laws of physics did actually apply to everything. As soon as other universes or dimensions came into play, things got messy. And apart from which, there was no real proof they even existed, so how Minion thought she could travel between them was beyond him.

She seemed a little taken aback by his nickname for her, only throwing petrol onto the fire that was the wicked gleam he forced into his eyes and the crafted smirk that played along his lips. If people knew even for one moment the motivation beneath his hard shell, they'd give him that awfully annoying look Kailani had mastered over the years.