Pristine

"I'm an aberrant. It's just a fancy way of saying outcast. Supposedly no-one is ever cast out anymore. There are no tribes left to be cast out of, and we don't physically throw anyone out of anywhere. In a sense that is true, but that doesn't mean that everyone is welcome everywhere either, and when you are unwelcome in all the places good people go, then you are classified as an aberrant, and there is almost no way back. Almost.

I started out 'Pristine.' I don't mean just when I was born and hadn't done anything wrong yet. Everyone has that rating up until they are sixteen, but I kept it up until I was twenty-one. They say that's the most valuable age to have kept that rating by. Every door is open if you can get that far untarnished, without even a point against you. I achieved that through a combination of keeping out of trouble and hard work, at least that's what I thought it took, but now I see it was just as much down to luck."

(Only the first 3 Chapters are included here)