Ingenious

Chapter Three

Sitting out in the common room, waiting for the scores and my placement to be released is torture. So many thoughts are going through my head, and not just the ones I had expected. Instead of focusing on what will happen if I'm not placed in pre-gov, or even what would happen if I am... I can't stop thinking about what happened in there. The weird feeling as I watched myself do things without controlling it. The fact it felt like I was moving through things when in fact I didn't even leave the chair. The fact that I remember each and every second of what happened, despite no one else ever remembering. Everyone sits in silence, wondering about what happened in there and if it'll get them to the place they want to go. I watch as the final room is emptied and all the low level government officials go into one meeting room in the middle. The meeting room where they will discuss each of our futures. Decide each of our futures. They stay in there for almost an hour, which isn't surprising given the amount of people they have to place.

When they finally walk out of the meeting room, they call everyone up one by one, and hand out a sheet with your scores and placement. They go in a random order though I think it's based on your scores and placement category. I hope they are going lowest to highest, because slowly the room empties out. Until I'm the last one there. I fiddle with my fingers wondering if something is wrong.

"Raegen Fanning?" a voice calls. I'm brought into a room with 1 person at the main desk and 2 standing at the side. It's the older woman from earlier. My breath is catching and the nerves in me spiking. "Ms. Fanning," she starts "I have to say your case is quite peculiar."

"How so?" I ask, attempting to keep the shaking out of my voice. Did I fail or something? Can you even fail this?

"Let me get you a drink," she says motioning behind her as someone hands her a mug. "Do you drink coffee?" I nod and she hands me the mug. I take a sip from it right away to show a spirit of thankfulness, but the nerves flowing through me make it hard to swallow. "In both rounds of testing you accumulated the same score. What is interesting about these scores is that they were perfect." I freeze and try to calculate what she is saying, drinking from the mug to buy myself some time to answer. I start to feel a bit dizzy and unaware.

"100?" I question, "I aced both areas of the quiz?" I was aiming high, but acing this testing is unheard of. That would put me above everyone else.

"Yes," she answers blankly, studying me, "we do not control the scoring, our devices are made to do it for us. So when they found you at 100, we found it... interesting." Something in her voice, it makes me feel like she's hiding something. Something she knows but can't tell me.

"Has this happened before?" I ask. I have one other particular question looming in my mind, but I feel like it's rude to ask. My head swarms with things. Ideas, thoughts, theories. All of it is making my vision blur, and my body numb. Like it did with the machine. The lady doesn't answer, or if she does, I can't hear it. I feel my body slump from the perfect postured position it was in before.

"How are you feeling Ms. Fanning?" she asks, and I can't tell whether or not I'm imagining the sly smile creeping onto her face.

"Not too well," I answer, though my words are slurring and it comes out as nowl. My eyes feel heavy. Really heavy.

"Ms. Fanning?" she says, but I can't bring myself to respond. Something in me doesn't feel right. "Ms. Fanning we would appreciate your cooperation in the next few minutes." Cooperation? With what? Before I know what's happening one of the men on the side, the strong one who couldn't be much older than me is holding my arms down. Pinning me to the ground. Keeping me from moving. But I got 100. I got the highest score possible. Shouldn't I be in pre-gov? Where are they taking me? What are they going to do to me? Why is this happening to me?