by Jason Letts
Mira looked at everyone around her. The crowd was supportive, but their cheering seemed half-hearted. Parents began to look for their children. The young students headed out in small groups. Soon, Corey and his assistant, Natalie, retired.
Mira’s classmates surrounded her.
“Wow, I can’t believe you did it,” Mary said.
“Congratulations,” Will said. “You outsmarted the lot of us.”
A handful of them crowded around, hugging her and patting her on the back. Mira wore a big smile. The payoff for her hard work delighted her. She turned her head to see Chucky standing there with the silver helmet in his hand. He looked as happy as if he had won.
“You were amazing,” she said. “I didn’t see you for so long. I didn’t know what happened.”
“I kept an eye on your egg for you. Couldn’t let anybody mess up your plans.”
She put her arm around him and gave him a hug.
“Can’t say I’ve ever seen anything like that,” he said, impressed. “You put on quite a show. I don’t think there’s anybody who could say you didn’t earn it.”
“Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Anything could happen from here, but I think we’ll be OK as long as we stick together.”
Mira looked at the group before her, and she noticed that some of her classmates were not listening to her. A few were talking to their parents or sitting on the grass. She wondered if they were bitter about their loss or if they were unhappy she had won. But even Vern and Aoi gave her their attention.
After she finished speaking, she heard somebody mention how hungry they were, and it reminded Mira of how tired and hungry she felt. Somehow the morning had passed and the afternoon was well underway. Though most of the people had left, Jeana and Kevin remained. They waited patiently for Mira to finish speaking with her classmates, stopping themselves from digging into the sandwiches they’d brought.
When Mira finally reached her parents, she felt the flush of joy and excitement all over again. Her parents greeted her with a warm embrace, and Kevin brushed her hair back and cupped his hand around his daughter’s cheek.
“We’re very proud of you,” he said.
They sat down to a picnic lunch along with some of the other students and their parents. Mira told Jeana and Kevin about everything they didn’t see, but she was careful not to insult or demean anyone with her story. Those around her listened and chimed in at various parts. Most of her classmates were able to laugh about what happened, even if they wished they had done better.
“I actually slipped on a root and almost put myself out within the first minute,” Vern laughed before sneezing again. He was taking the loss surprisingly well, much better than he might have at the beginning of the year.
After she had finished her sandwich, Mira turned to her parents with a satisfied look.
“I’m ready to go home now,” she said.
“Oh, no. You won’t be going home at all tonight,” Jeana said.
Chapter 14: The Synthesis
“What? Why not?” Mira asked.
“Because you’ve got your graduation ceremony tonight. You can’t miss it. It’s very important, especially for you since you won, and it’s for the students only. We’ll see you tomorrow though.”
“You can just fly home whenever the sun comes up,” Kevin said.
Even though she knew he was joking, Mira was disappointed and couldn’t respond in kind. “No, I can’t. The batteries are dead.”
Kevin and Jeana, along with the other parents, started to leave. Mira saw that this didn’t bother her classmates at all, but Mira wanted her parents to be a part of her celebration. Seeing them go was going to be heart-wrenching.
“Thank you for being here today. I love you,” she said when they hugged her.
She watched them take to the path back home and disappear in the trees. Soon, all of the parents had gone, and only the fifteen students and their teacher remained on the grassy glade.
“So what is this ceremony,” Mira asked.
“I’m not exactly sure,” Rowland said. “No one who goes through it is supposed to talk about it. Only thing I know for sure is its name, The Synthesis.”
“What are we supposed to do now?” she asked.
“Sit tight and wait for Corey to return,” Fortst said.
“All my life I’ve only ever seen Corey on Final Trial day, so it must be a big deal,” Aoi said.
“And what do we do tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow the Shadowing will begin. We each go our separate ways in search of a mentor to guide us, and we become their shadow,” Will said.
“Wait, “synthesis” means coming together, so we come together only to separate right after? That doesn’t make sense,” Mira said.
“If it doesn’t make sense then at least it fits in with everything else we do,” Will said, shrugging.
“How does it work, finding a mentor? Who will be my mentor?” Mira asked.
“You find someone who has a similar power as yours. For example, Roselyn is going to be Corey’s shadow, because he controls sound and her power comes through her voice.”
“It’s going to be awesome!” Roselyn interjected.
“Some of us have had these arrangements for years. You are a special case, so I have no idea what you’re going to do,” Will said.
Mira didn’t know either, and this seemed like just one more thing she would have trouble figuring out because she was different. She didn’t want to let her friends down, so she would have to be good at it, whatever it was.
The sun hung low over the horizon. The sound of crickets and chirping birds came from the forest. The temperature cooled, and the students started a small fire. A few of her peers snoozed on the grass, others played games and talked to pass the time. Mira surveyed them from a nearby tree. She tried to think about what it meant to be a leader, and what she was supposed to do. It seemed difficult and tricky. None of the answers she thought of seemed exactly right.
A few of Corey’s men appeared with heavy logs in their arms. They dumped them in an open space on the ground, and then asked Mira for help before going back for more.
“Me? Sure,” she said, catching up with them. They walked to a small lumberyard, where an imposing stack waited to be carried. Thinking it would take forever, Mira hefted a log and wrestled with it all the way back. She dropped it on the ground and went back for more, but this time Vern and a few others followed her. They each deposited a log on the pile, and this time the rest of the students got up to help.
They all grabbed logs from the pile, and it only took a few trips for the stack to be completely moved to the pile in the glade. Corey’s men adjusted it a little, building the logs up into a spire. By the time they finished, no light from the sun remained. Instead, fifteen torches formed a semi-circle around the center, but only the one on the end had been lit.
“I think it’s going to begin. Each of you get to a torch,” Fortst whispered, pointing Mira to the one on the end. She stood by the pole under the light of the flame. Everyone could see her, but she couldn’t see anything. Hushed voices murmured around her, and Mira felt as nervous as she did before the Final Trial.
The voices stopped suddenly. Mira looked into the darkness, thinking she saw something. The night seemed darker, and she guessed that Corey had come. Knowing that the only light shone on her, she maintained her poise and kept silent.
A bass sound, low but deep, rang in the air. The students looked to that spot in the darkness, where low rumbling grew louder and transformed into a hymn. A meditative sound of hope and faith rose up to the web, and each of the fifteen students was compelled to join in. The sound echoed and amplified until a single note, solemn and true, washed over them all.
They held the note as long as they could. Silence resumed, but it felt less lonely and less fearful. When Corey spoke, they all felt in their hearts that they could see him. Though no light shone on him, they could see the cloak, the bandage, and the prickly, grizzled face
in their minds.
“The end of the beginning. You’ve made it this far despite pain, fatigue, stress, and sorrow. And this road has not been easy. At times, your bodies have been injured, your minds have been confused, and your spirits have been dampened. What’s more, you have long inflicted these miseries on each other. Ruthlessly, selfishly, and heartlessly, you have subjected each other to the greatest torments at your disposal. And it’s only natural that grudges and grievances developed as a result.
“This ceremony is The Synthesis, when we look upon those experiences and the feelings they spawned with mature eyes. We will come to a new understanding of their purpose, and it will allow forgiveness to take root. Only then can you go out into a world that knows nothing of justice and offers little sympathy for the weak.
“I invite you to think about your greatest failure. Bring up that memory, that moment when everything collapsed around you and everything you wanted had slipped away. Who stood over you triumphantly? Who conquered you, even if just for that instant? No doubt that person is here tonight. Whoever it was, he or she was the best teacher of the world that you could ever imagine. To face a loss, to know defeat, and to feel the stinging anguish of regret, these are what await you beyond. Without knowing it, you have all worked tirelessly for each other’s benefit.”
Under the flame, Mira thought back to her helpless and pitiful loss to Vern. She couldn’t see him, but she wondered if he thought about her too.
“You should thank that person for the service they did you. Though you were not the winner, that lesson will prove to be a much greater prize. Search that person out and thank them now.”
Surprised by the command, Mira started to venture into the darkness. The sound of feet shuffling through the grass and nervous chatter came nearer. Mira stayed near the flame. The students sought each other out in the crowd.
“Thank you,” one voice said, and then another, and then it came from everywhere.
“Remember that time when we were seven? Thank you.”
Mira saw Aoi thank Chucky, and then Roselyn popped into view.
“Thank you,” she said. “You taught me that I can’t just rely on my gift.”
Mira smiled and nodded, then she saw Vern in the distance. They caught eyes and walked toward each other.
“Thank you,” they said at the same time.
When the chatter died down, Mira heard Corey’s voice.
“Remember this and realize you have always had each other’s best interest at heart, even if your mind carried something else entirely. The bonds between you must be unshakeable, because someday they may be the only thing you have left. Now, your time as a student of this academy has come to an end, and I release you to find a mentor for personal study before joining with the great forces of our land to defend our freedom. Take up your torches.”
Corey instructed them to circle around the tower and light their torches from Mira’s. As each student approached her, they said the same words, “By my burning spirit, I exist in light.”
The glowing embers fanned out and formed a ring. Holding their torches out in front, they felt the heat on their skin. Each face carried depth and promise with the yellow and orange tones.
“Fire is just like water; if you put two drops of water together, they join in a way that makes it impossible to tell they had ever been separate. And fire is no different. On my command, move inward and lose your flame to the indistinguishing blaze, and in so doing cast off your selfishness and your pride!”
Each student took a step forward at the same time. After every step, they chanted, “When my light is gone, all that remains is shadow.”
Suddenly, Corey released an unexpected, alarmed gasp and looked over his shoulder into the night.
“Quickly now, throw your torches in!” he ordered.
Confused, the students did as he bid them. Without chanting or emotion, they tossed their torches on the spire. They expected Corey to say something, and an ill feeling sank into their stomachs when he did not. An anxious tension replaced the warm, communal feeling.
“What is it? What’s wrong?” Mira asked.
Corey’s frozen pose gave way to a terrifying roar, straining the veins in his neck. “We are not alone,” he said, and then discharged another ear-splitting growl.
While his roar seemed like a warning, it was apparently a signal, because soon the sound of cracking branches and panting shattered their solitude. Something erupted from the dense brush and spilled out onto the ground. Its legs and arms thrashed voraciously to rebound it onto its feet.
The group shied away from the rapid intruder. Only when it came closer to the light did Mira recognize Yannick, who had been stripped of his metal and looked like a deranged lunatic. Breathless and mutilated, his legs gave out in front of Corey, leaving him to clutch the robes with his filthy hands and sputter between breaths, hyperventilating.
“Followed them…after Mira…had to warn…Cloud Cottage.” He coughed and spat, whimpering and shaking.
“What are you trying to say?” Corey asked. “I can’t understand you.”
“I understood well enough,” Fortst said, reaching into his trench coat and removing a thick, rusty tube.
“My parents!” Mira said. “I have to help them!”
But before she could take a single step, she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned to see Vern.
“We have to help them,” he said.
“Come along now. I’ve saved my best lesson for last!” Fortst said, measuring his dark tone with an unmistakable pleasure.
The students, led by Fortst, ran back to town.
Corey’s words raced ahead, “Natalie, sound the alarm. Get everybody into the outpost, and I’m going to need some help out here. It’s finally happening.”
Yannick had passed out at Corey’s feet, and the logs in the bonfire burned thin like raw bones.
Mira pushed herself forward along the moonlit forest paths, with the web glowing overhead. The others struggled to keep up with her. But she had learned every rock and root on those trails in the woods behind her house. She couldn’t feel anything but the wish to find her parents.
She cleared the hill and all of a sudden she was there, behind the garden. She could see the back of the house. Putting her hands on her knees to catch her breath, Mira stalled because she hadn’t thought about what to do next. Though the lights in the house were off, the sound of heavy banging, crashing, and yelling rippled through the air.
The group had finally caught up with her and waited for her direction. Fortst made it up the hill, but he did not stop like the others. He charged at the house as if an army of millions followed behind.
“Did you bring your notebooks?” he hollered, then he cocked back his weapon and charged through the glass doors. The glass shattered.
“What do we do?” Will asked Mira.
“What do you mean?”
“You’re in charge now. You have to tell us,” he said.
“I don’t know. Um, let me think. OK, Mary, how many of them are there, where are they, and where are my parents?”
Mary shook her hands as if they were wet and sucked her teeth.
“Your parents are in their room. I think they’ve walled themselves in. There are a couple of others upstairs and a few downstairs. I can also sense several of them around the house, on top of it, and out in front by the road. Probably a dozen total.”
“Do you have any idea what their gifts are? I think we’ll have to split into two groups, one going in through the back and the other going around the side of the house to the front door,” Mira said.
“There is someone in the forest, on this side of the house. He can do something…it’s like geometry. I feel shapes. There are too many to tell clearly, and I need more time. There is one inside the house who changes his skin,” Mary said.
“Math?” Aoi chuckled. “I’ll go let him know he’s in the wrong line of work.”
“Will, Rowland, Dot, and Jeremy, go
with her on this near side. Vern, Roselyn, Mary, Chucky, and I will approach from the back of the house. The rest of you, go around on the far side. Stick together, be careful, and don’t wait to find out what they’ll do to you,” Mira said.
Everyone nodded and split up into their groups. A few struggled to catch up with Aoi who raced along the tree line and jumped into the brush as soon as she heard a noise.
Mira and her group left the safety of the trees to approach the gaping hole in the door Fortst had left.
Something hit Chucky in the shoulder, knocking him to the side. Another plop hit the ground just near them.
“There’s someone on the roof,” Mary said.
“I think it was a shingle,” Chucky said, holding his shoulder.
“I got him,” Vern said. Stepping forward, he motioned to the person standing on the roof. Sidestepping the shingles flung at him, Vern tried to pull the man down. The stranger jerked forward, slid down the side of the roof in an avalanche of shingles, and dropped onto the ground. He crawled through the shattered glass door and disappeared inside the house.
Aoi saw a man hiding behind a tree. He saw her too, but he didn’t run.
“You should’ve stayed in school,” she taunted. He stepped out from behind the tree, and Aoi could see a yellow insignia that looked like a sun over a cloud on his black uniform. Not wanting to waste too much time on this weakling, Aoi charged at him and took a swing at his face. He leaned back about two inches and Aoi’s punch missed him completely. She threw another punch at his stomach, but he slapped it away. Growling, she grabbed a large branch that lay on the ground and swung it at him. He hopped in between the fork in the branches.
Aoi spun and kicked at him, but he sent the heel of his foot behind her other knee, knocking her to the ground. She felt his hands twist her ankle and his foot press into her throat.
She tried to yell for help, but little came out. She struggled to breathe through her nose with her head pressed into the ground. She felt something crawl on her hip and cringed. A hairy wood spider crawled over her onto the man’s side, skittered up to his shoulder, and took a big bite out of his neck. The man yelped and Aoi broke free. She kicked him while he writhed on the ground, then sent him rolling down the hill.