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Chapter 2 - A Rozbury Roommate

  Dowyr laid on the top of a bunkbed staring at the gray slate ceiling of his room at the Academy of Emogic, the view from a small frosted window letting him know it was early morning. The only thing that kept the room from being indistinguishable from a prison cell was how nicely furnished it was, with a dresser, padded bench, and padded chair. The room even had a surprisingly clean private bathroom with running water, a luxury the orphanage never had. There was also the fact he could leave the room. Just not the building. It was expected that those who went through an Apex of Emotion needed to be educated on everything concerning Emogic, so he was confined to the Academy until he was ‘properly trained’. Might as well have been a prison for that. He already knew everything books had to say on the subject, and he understood how to channel. What then was the point of being a mandatory student?

  He sat up with a groan. His torso was sore like someone had carried him too roughly, but he had no recollection of the event. Everything was a blur beyond getting back to the orphanage after testing his Emogic. That bothered him. He remembered everything. The Sisters said he had a perfect memory, and some clergymen tried to convince him it was a divine gift from Heaven. He retorted with asking if Heaven gave him his ugliness and inability to speak too. Some of them even had the gall to say yes.

  More unnerving than the lack of memory was that he couldn’t channel. There was something blocking his attempts to bring the Emogic out, which meant there was an Indifference Emogician channeling at him somewhere, or some kind of Indifference emitting device. Dowyr remembered reading some years ago about the Academy’s discovery of being able to take an inanimate object and inject it full of Emogic, but he had never seen such an object in person, at least to his knowledge. They must have used something filled with Indifference to keep the newer Emogicians from harming themselves or others, but for Dowyr, it only made the possibility of communication all the more difficult.

  On a related note, there was the matter of the snoring coming from below to attend to. There was another kid on the bottom bunk. Snoring didn’t usually bother Dowyr, but at the moment he found it annoying to the point he couldn’t think straight.

  Shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, Dowyr signed. He looked over the edge of his bunk and blew at the sleeping boy’s face. The boy didn’t stir, so Dowyr jumped down and pinched his nose shut, jerking back when the boy awoke with a gasp.

  “What was that for?” the boy asked.

  Dowyr blinked, unsure what to do. You know signs? he signed.

  The boy stared at him, face blank.

  Dowyr pointed at himself. D-O-W-Y-R.

  “Are you deaf?”

  With a roll of the eyes, Dowyr pointed to his mouth and shook his head, then to his ears and nodded.

  “Oh, you just can’t speak?”

  This sucks, Dowyr thought, but he nodded, then pointed at the boy and tried to imitate his snoring.

  “Ohh. Sorry, I didn’t know I had a new roommate. I must have been asleep when you got here. My name’s Weynon Rozbury.”

  Weynon looked about Dowyr’s age, maybe even a year older. His short hair was sandy blonde, which nicely complimented his amber eyes. He might even be considered handsome if his ears weren’t so lopsided.

  Dowyr moved back as Weynon got out of bed and went to the dresser. From the top of it he grabbed one of two journals and a thick paper-wrapped charcoal and held them towards Dowyr.

  “Can you write?” Weynon asked.

  Finally, I have a voice, Dowyr thought, gladly taking the journal and opening to a blank page to write his name and age on. He wondered for a moment whether he should omit his fake last name, but it had always proved to be an effective test of someone’s character to him due to being a religious slur, and he wanted to see what Weynon’s reaction would be.

  Weynon took a single look and smiled. “Nice to meet you, Dowyr. I’m only twelve, but I hope we can get along. Did they tell you your Emogic yet?”

  Dowyr blinked, mildly surprised by such a friendly reaction and also that he was two years younger than he looked. The question wasn’t out of the ordinary though, as people who went through an Apex of Emotion often didn’t know what emotion they were going through at the time. Dowyr shook his head and wrote, No, but I’ve already figured it out anyway. Boredom, Class 2.2.

  “Really? I didn’t know Boredom was an Emogic. Cool. I’m a Class 3 Peace Emogician, a Druid.”

  Dowyr took an involuntary step back, nearly stumbling. This kid’s a powerhouse. And a surprisingly ignorant one at that if he didn’t know Boredom was an Emogic. But Peace Emogicians—'Druids’ being their nickname, and there was one for every Emogic—had the widest range of capabilities. When channeling, they could calm an angry mob, could listen to the land and communicate with animals and plants—plants!—and lastly could use the emotion that nature gave off, if in great enough amount. Out of the 32 Emogics, only six had been proven to exist in nature so far: Anger, Depression, Fear, Happiness, Sadness, and Love. Of those, only Happiness wasn’t terrifying at Class 3 or higher. Unless flying counted as terrifying too. Perhaps it did, for some.

  “Don’t be scared,” Weynon said, “Even though I still need to learn how to use my Emogic, we can’t channel in here. I don’t know how, I’ve only been here since yesterday afternoon and was told I’d have my orientation today. But can you tell me what Boredom Emogicians do? And what are they called?”

  Dowyr wrote, Mind Intruders. If we get to channel eventually, I’ll show you.

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  Weynon blinked. “Mind Intruders? I don’t know if I want you to show me.”

  Dowyr grinned, but before he could write a reply, the door opened.

  A slender middle-aged woman stepped into the room and smiled at them both. “Good morning, students,” she said in a soft, smooth voice; the sort of voice that sounded directed at children who needed to be put to sleep. It reminded Dowyr of the way clergywomen would talk to congregations and made his ears want to burrow into his skull. “I am Aelyss, an instructor here at the Academy. We’re so happy to have you. Breakfast is being served in the mess hall, and afterwards will be your orientation. If you would please follow me.”

  Dowyr shared a look with Weynon, but quickly followed after Aelyss. He was starving, and whatever they had here must be better than the slop at the orphanage. Weynon was right behind him, and they walked down a wide, white-marbled hallway. Lightstones embedded in the ceiling and walls glowed a little brighter as they passed. The doors of other student rooms were spaced evenly across the way on both sides. Many such students were walking the hall too, hurrying along to breakfast or classes. They all looked older, mainly young adults, but even a few that looked well into their thirties. Apexes of Emotion were rare among children to early teens, so Dowyr doubted he’d meet many students around his age.

  He tried to reach within and channel, but still found himself blocked off from his Emogic and grunted in annoyance.

  Heaven is stupid, he signed. Hell is stupid, the Sentinels are stupid, the Snakes are stupid, they’re all just stupid, stupid, stupid.

  He chuckled to himself as people gave him odd passing stares. They probably had no idea he was blaspheming in front of them. Nothing about their ridiculous religion mattered to him. If Heaven and Hell were real, or any of the Sentinels and Snakes for that matter, they never showed it. As far as he was concerned, this life was demanding enough as it was without the need to worry about pleasing gods or whatever came after. Perhaps that was because the local clergy were so demanding to be pleased. Not that he obliged. Sure, the pastors and teachers at the mandatory church services and classes he was forced to attend tried to make him change his ways, but they so flagrantly flaunted hypocritical teachings and ideas not even found in The Five Sentinels that it was child’s play to dismiss nearly everything they said. If they wanted to use a book to rationalize their actions or moral foundation, they at least ought to know the book inside and out. So many clergymen who tried to teach him only seemed to know half of what he did, if not less.

  They turned down another hall where a faint mass of voices could be heard. The noise grew until Aelyss brought them to a large series of arches that opened to the mess hall, where a myriad of men and women, ranging from teenagers to middle-aged, sat at tables eating and chatting with one another or waiting in line to get food. A number of long counters stood at the far end of the room where the people lined up, and beyond them was the largest kitchen Dowyr had ever seen. Cooks and kitchen servants darted around to replace empty platters on the counters. Each new platter looked like a work of art, with all the colors of a rainbow in fruits and vegetables purposefully placed to draw the eyes towards the center. The art pieces were quickly ruined once hungry hands got a hold of them, and despite Dowyr’s own grumbling stomach, he shed an invisible tear for them.

  Other platters were far plainer. There were a couple with large bowls of various stews, one purely for mashed potatoes, another for steamed vegetables, and the last Dowyr could make out held a variety of breads and cheeses. There was no meat to be seen, which was well and good in his mind. He had never tasted meat, and did not intend to. The closest to it he had tried was salmon, which he quickly decided was not for him.

  “Go ahead and get in line,” Aelyss said. “An orientation leader will be here soon to show the new students around and give you your schedules.”

  Aelyss disappeared back into the hall, leaving the two boys gawking at the scene.

  Weynon turned to Dowyr, looking a bit pensive. “You can go first.”

  Dowyr could barely make out his voice, but he nodded and moved towards the line, stepping lightly. He never liked loud crowds of people, and usually felt like he was getting in someone’s way when trying to navigate through them. The line moved slow, allowing him to grab a little of everything, not even worrying if he would be able to eat it all. Recovering from channeling too much the evening before had taken its toll on his stomach. His hands were starting to tingle from hunger.

  They sat in the emptiest corner of the room and ate in silence, though the rate at which Dowyr stuffed himself was anything but silent. Weynon looked as if he wanted to ask a question, but Dowyr hadn’t brought the journal to respond and still couldn’t channel. That hardly mattered to him right now, as this food was so much better than what was served at the orphanage. Satisfied hums were the only thing worth being communicated at a time like this.

  Though once his mouth acclimatized to the tastes, he did think about teaching Weynon how to sign, wondering if he could channel the knowledge straight into his mind. The books he read said Mind Intruders could do things like that, and it would make the process much faster, but he hadn’t the slightest idea of how it was done. Perhaps there was another Mind Intruder that could teach him, or an Empath that had experience with Boredom.

  When Dowyr finished eating, Weynon stared at his empty plate in disbelief.

  “My mom always said I ate too fast,” he said. “I think she was wrong now.”

  Dowyr gave him a toothy grin, but it was short-lived as a call went out to all the new students to come to the front of the mess hall for orientation. Weynon did his best to stuff whatever was left on his platter into his mouth before getting up after Dowyr.

  The orientation leader was a short, stocky man who looked to be in his thirties. When all the new students had gathered to him, he led them into the hall to speak.

  “Alright everyone,” he said, “let’s start with names, Emogics, and Classes if you know them. I’m Dane, Class 1.9 Puffer and proud.”

  Dowyr rolled his eyes at the lame joke, but a few students chuckled, and then everyone began giving their names. There were just over a dozen students, most of them young but all of them older than Dowyr. Some didn’t know their Class level, but they gave their Emogics, most of them the more common types such as Anger, Fear, Shame, and Worry. The negative Emogics were always overrepresented. When it got to Dowyr’s turn, Weynon spoke up for him.

  “This is Dowyr. He can’t speak, but he’s a Class 2.2 Boredom Emogician.”

  “A mute?” Dane asked. “Can he sign?”

  Dowyr nodded vigorously and signed, yes, and for the love of Hell get me an interpreter!

  Dane looked surprised and took on a stern tone. “You better be careful with what you let those hands of yours say. You can never tell who understands them. I’ll let you off the hook this time, but I better not see language like that again.”

  Dowyr pursed his lips and sullenly signed, yes sir, then put his hands behind his back to make a rude comment.

  “Good. Alright students, if you’ll follow me. You may have heard that the Academy doesn’t work like regular schools. There are no semesters, grades, or tests. It’s purely lessons and training from the start. Every day new Emogicians arrive needing to be trained to understand what it means to be one and how not to hurt themselves or others with their power. You’re here for three months for that purpose alone. I’ll walk you through the process of how your first month will go, starting with the classrooms and lecture halls you’ll be going to. First up, of course, is the chapel…”

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