Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Leeyia Stroods

   I wasn’t always this way.  Maybe I inherited it, but I don’t know because my real parents aren’t around to ask.  I can’t say it exactly feels normal.  I remember not having it.

   I didn’t realize I was an orphan until I was four; when I started to remember what had happened like the week before.  Persephani and I were never separate.  It was normal then; at least it felt normal.  That changed for me when I found I had a supernatural “power” when I was tweleve.

   First it began in small ways.  A chair would collapse underneath me when I sat down angrily; a hair band would snap when it wouldn’t go into my hair nicely; I once beat a wannabe bodybuilder who was seventeen years old in an arm wrestling match three times in a row; I would jump on a trampoline and find myself really high over the net; when the call came for dinner it felt like I rushed down the hallway, stairs, and reached the table at lightning speed.  But nobody noticed…or so I thought.

   By that time Persephani was different too, but in another way.  

   One day I was outside swinging when I heard the orphanage owner talking with a raised voice coming through the office window which was open.  Curious, I jumped off the swing and crouched down below the window.  I didn’t like what I heard.

   “No…you definitely need to send someone down here.” – There was a pause as the person the other end talked – “Are you kidding me?  You call a girl seeing pictures move and another karate chopping a standing palm tree down with her foot not a scratch on it, out of the ordinary?”

   “Finally, thank you!  My next call was going to be to the President himself!….Alright….Thanks, okay….Goodbye……..Oh! Goodness!! Leeyia?!”

   Because I had bumped my head on the window ledge, “Mrs. Hannigan” knew I had heard the whole thing.

   I wasn’t surprised when men showed up at the orphanage the very next day.  They went to the palm tree scene and asked me if I did that.  I told them the truth and they made me destroy another just to show I could.  They were terrified.  Soon enough Persephani and I were whisked away by the men.  We were taken to what they said was a “boarding school”.

   Apparently because a certain hurricane Cally had hit, several kids with special “powers” had escaped.  A few years later, more escaped.  Therefore, instead of being scattered across the area all Fairlies were put in the same area but not allowed to discuss with each other.  Like that stopped anyone.  Anyways that is when I met Brady.  He was tall, blond, blue eyed, and, yeah, I thought he was handsome; he still looks the same now at the cafeteria.

   When we weren’t all crammed together, a few of us at a time would go into the test rooms.  Barracks 41, the men, put us through different tests according to our “abilities”.  AKA the experimental rooms which looked a lot like the test rooms from Portal 2.

    For Ginger, a Fairlie who could read anything quick as a flash, it was easy.  All she’d have to do was flip a page one after another as fast as she could and be done for the day as long as she could tell the “blue coats” everything about the book.

   The same couldn’t be said for me.  I would do things like catch a car as it was dropped to kill me; tear a block of iron apart with my bear hands; or beat up the toughies of Barracks 41.  However, I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of showing them everything I could do.

   And because of that they forced me to live basically one of my worst fears.  As I walked into what would soon be my last test, I heard my sister scream – loud and in high pitch.  I ran to the source of the screaming and watched for a split second as my best friend was tortured by at least twenty well built men.  Those men didn’t know what hit them, but they didn’t come out of that test room the same way they went in; some couldn’t even walk out.

   Angry, I had helped Persephani out and brought her to rest of the Fairlies who loved my sis.  And that was the beginning of the uprising, and we didn’t just leave…we made sure to leave with a spark.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Brady Landers 

My knees gave away so I slid into the seat next to Leeyia. “What? What happened to you guys? The last time I saw you was when-“

“When we were,” Leeyia indicated Persephani and herself, “recaptured when we made a run for it. We were rescued by someone.”

She paused like she was waiting for something, “But whoever it was, this said person left us plane tickets to Orlando. Which is where you obvisiously went to.”

“Weird. You sure you didn’t see this person?”

Persephani answered, “We didn’t have the time to.”

I nodded and was about to lift a slice of pizza when I asked them, “But why Florida?”
“I don’t know,” Persephani said, “I guess because we knew you were heading there.”

“No, I mean why did this person want you to go to Orlando?”

“Well, we don’t exactly know why.”

“But you think…,” I encouraged her.

Leeyia spoke up not looking up from her lunch, “We thought that it might lead us to our birth parents.”

Her sister nodded, “But instead we were taken in by an orphanage and eventually adopted.”

“What about you, Brady. Why Florida?” Leeyia asked with her arms crossed. She wasn’t all happy to see me.

“Warm weather.”

Persephani laughed, but Leeyia stared at me. Her serious look implied, I’m not joking here.

I looked at her, “Remember the file room at the Barracks?”

She slowly nodded. Persephani looked at us both with her eyes squeezed like she was listening her hardest.

“We went in to see what everyone’s files said… that’s all,” Leeyia told her.

“I know, Leeyia. Don’t act so guilty.”

“Anyway,” I continued, “Mine was there. So I read it and saw I was taken from a family in Florida….My family.”

They stared at me in amazment and like they were waiting for more.
“And no luck so far,” I added. There as a long silent pause. Until the bell rang signaling the end of lunch. I shoved the whole pizza down my throat as we stood up, threw away our trash, or in the girls’ case their whole meal, and walked off to the next class.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Persephani Stroods

Chemistry was one word: boring! But when I looked over at my sister who sat in the usual and completely uncomfortable seat in the right row next me, I saw her taking notes! I mean how in the world does any person take notes on photons? Well the only person who doesn’t know if she wants to go to college or not but wants to keep the option open.
As I continued to watch her, she would sometimes stop writing and stare at the teacher. I know she was understanding everything he was saying but she was also thinking about something different.

She caught my eye and struggled to keep a smile that she hadn’t shown in forever down. I leaned back as I tried to remember when was the last time I really saw her smile.

~*~
I wasn’t always this way. Maybe I inherited it, but I don’t know because my real parents aren’t around to ask. I can’t say it exactly feels normal. I remember not having it.

Of course when it first happened, it felt awkward but I didn’t really notice it. I was eleven years old, helping a young boy learn how to become as good an artist as I was. I would let him draw whatever he liked and give him tips on how to improve it.

During one “lesson” Damen drew a simple squared based and triangle topped house like of those you see on refrigerators at little kid’s homes. Except that’s not what I saw.
His large red square with a white rectangle and two blue smaller squares, and a grayish-blue triangle on top of the red square weren’t at all what a person would expect to be the first story, the door, windows, and the roof coming from a five-year-old boy. In fact a two year old could have done better. However in my mind his house looked perfect; better than an architect’s edition.

The red square was a brick wall; the blue little squares that rested in the red one were curtained in windows with the sun shining in; the white rectangle a door with a stained glass window; his top triangle an attic with blue-grey shingles on the top.

That’s when I realized I was different. When I knew I had a “power”: I could see the artist’s imagination just by looking at his drawings or art.

It continued and would pop up in the least expected moments. It felt creepy but ther was also this feeling of that it had always been a part of me. Like I had always had it.

It wasn’t long until they took us. They being the 41ers. My tests were nothing as hard as Leeyia’s or even Brady’s. All I did was wait for a piece of art to come to life, but after I mastered that they made me do it from different ways. Ways like standing on your head, running around, standing on one foot, ect.

It seemed easy. That all changed as days turned to weeks and weeks changed to months and months changed to years….I began seeing the world through the Barracks 41ers. That really made my skin flake off my bones. I mean you try looking at the imagination of a power hungry evil man and tell me if you don’t come out of the experimental room with goosebumps and a stomache. But I was powerful to them. They all craved it. I was useful. You know that painting with the boy coming out? Well I see him move completely out.
Leeyia, a curious sort of human being, asked me one time what is like. I told her it was like one of those Blue’s Clues episodes where Blue and Steve jump into a painting or when Mary Poppins and the others jump into a chalk drawing. But I didn’t tell her it’s more like the picture jumps into me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Riley Hinderton

I could not stop smiling during chemistry. But as I walked out I smiled even brighter. Pulling out the blue paper I pulled off the notice board earlier, I peeked at it on my way to gym, feeling like Donnica Perfecto.

Disney wants you!
Ever dreamed about being a Disney Host Interactive?
Well, now is your chance to have that dream come true: be the second generation of the most amazing thing ever in Disney history!

Then it went on to say something about contacting a certain Joe Garlington. I hoped that I could really be a model for a DHI at Disney. A hologram of five different kids who were really long now in their early twenties would guide Disney guests around the park, tell them about each rides’ history, ect., during the day. Hence the meaning of DHI: Daylight Hologram Imaging and Disney Host Interactive.

I bumped into one of the newbies and watched all my stuff go flying. “Really? Watch where you are going!” I said irritaded.

“Uh, hey, look, that was both of our faults; I stopped in front of you and I guess you weren’t looking. So, sorry,” explained the girl with the ankle length black hair as she picked up the Disney paper.

I was stuned. No one in this school had talked to me like that. Let alone say sorry. Everyone here made me feel small and insignificant; they called me names and laughed at every flaw in my life.

“Oh, I guess. Sorry.”

“It’s okay. We all fail at some point each day,” she said reading the paper and picking up the rest of my things. “I’m Leeyia….No way!”

She had finished. “Hey, that’s what I said! You like the Kingdom Keepers?”

“The DHIs yes. I read the first part of book one of the KKs, ya know. The ‘story’ of five kids sleeping in their beds, but really running around Disney as their holograms. I know it’s for fun, but it’s not my thing,” Leeyia shook her head as we walked to our lockers.

“I’m Rylie, and you are officially the first ever person to take real notice of me this year.”
“Seriously?” she asked, stuffing her school books into her totally empty locker.

I nodded.

“Ouch. So are you going to try out?”

It took me awhile to realize she was talking about the DHI modeling. “Oh, I am.”
“Cool. See you then then,” she smiled and shut her locker and headed off to gym.
“See ya then!” I yelled back. Maybe this new girl would turn out to a great friend, I thought.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Leeyia

It didn’t take much to persuade my foster parents to allow us kids to audition for being a DHI model. Hang up an ad, add a few things like the winners getting enough money to buy something like say half of Fun Spot Orlando, free lifetime passes for the family and you have parents that suddenly won’t have the word “no” in their vocabuary.

They contacted Joe Garlington in a heart beat, got our spots, our being Adam, Ben, Philip, Erik, Persephani, and me, and were all set to be at Disney’s Hollywood Studios tomorrow. We were overexcited in my opinion but Mom and Dad needed to be straightjacketed. A few lamps didn’t make it that night thanks to Dad.

It was going to be late night of thinking of what all had happened. Finding Brady, possibly becoming a DHI model, and well first day of school. It wasn’t until 2 am that I actually fell asleep.