SWNOVELS Chapter 13: Jay
I stared at the girl. The one who was supposedly my new roommate. Jakki. She had brown hair. Sea green eyes, almost like mine. She was tiny. It looked like she had no meat on her bones, and I could see little yellow splotches on her arms that looked like healing bruises.
She didn’t look Supernatural. But, then again, none of us did. Except for Ryan and Rain. There was something about them. Something not… Human.
The twins had a... way about them. Ryan seemed nice and down-to-earth; his sister, Rain, on the other hand, seemed… Arrogant. Like she was superior. She was better than us, and she knew it too.
Sage decided that she wanted to catch up with some people, so she and Corey decided to leave. The blue-haired girl who was with Jakki said she’d take the youngest girl to meet her host family, so they left. So that left me with the girl who I’m supposedly supposed to be rooming with and the silver-haired twins.
The twins led us out of the apartment building and to what they said was the actual facility building. That was where my dad, or whom I thought was my dad, said was the place everyone worked at.
The facility was nice enough. It was roomy and modern. Ryan said the first floor was the lobby and hospital, and the second and third floors were schoolrooms and offices. Could there really be that many Supernatural children here that they needed their own school?
“The top floor is the training room.” Ryan said. “It’s where we help Supernaturals who are trying to control their powers, and where people learn how to develop their skills with weapons.” He said the basement was off limits.
“That’s where the Rogues are.” His sister jumped in to explain, before either of us could ask questions. “It’s a bunch of jail cells and an interrogation room. And there’s also an execution hall.”
“It’s pretty empty right now.” Ryan told us, probably trying to reassure us. “Only a couple of Vampires and an Alpha Wolf.”
They took us to the fourth floor and we saw two guys who said they were on their way to the training rooms. One had black hair and a piercing on the left side of his lip. The other one looked like he was from Japan, and he had glasses. I could see a faint purple marking, maybe a tattoo, peeking out from under the sleeve of his t-shirt, though he looked a little too young to have a tattoo.
Rain hugged them both before Ryan introduced us. “Tadashi, Andrew, this is Jakki and Jay.” He motioned to us individually. “They’re new here so we’re showing them around a little. Andrew,” the black haired boy waved, “is a fire Elemental. Tadashi is training to be a Master Wizard.” Jakki stared at Andrew for a few moments, a seemingly bewildered look on her face. Andrew was obviously getting a little uncomfortable, but before he could say anything Jakki decided to snap out of her stupor.
“You… You’re a fire Elemental?” She asked. Andrew nodded and made a small flame in the palm of his hand. It disappeared and he smiled. Her eyes widened. “I am, too...” she said, seemingly shocked to find someone like her.
“Maybe I can teach you a few tricks some time.” He winked at her and her awed look faltered. She backed away from him and looked down, embarrassed and more than a little uncomfortable.
Tadashi rolled his eyes at Andrew and lightly shoved him. “Don’t worry about this idiot. He’s not going to do anything. You’re not his type.” He had a British accent, something I wasn’t expecting. Jakki bit her lip and blushed slightly, mumbling a little “oh.” I shook my head and looked around. While they talked, I backed away slowly from the group.
I found a place with a window and some couches. I strolled over before I realized a young kid was sitting there, looking out the window. He only looked about 12 years old and he had blue, almost white, hair, with diamond stud earrings reflecting the light from the window. I watched him for a moment before hearing someone walk up next to me. It was Rain.
“That’s Vincent. He’s lived in the neighborhood for… three years, if I remember correctly. He just turned 14 recently.” I turned to look at her. “He’s an Ice Elemental, and he just became a full-blown Researcher last month, a few days after his birthday, actually. Passed his test with flying colors.”
I looked over at her. “So young?” I asked. Surely 14 was too young to start working- there were child labor laws after all. Unless they don’t follow normal American society laws.
She looked at me. “My brother and I are only 15.” She looked back at Vincent. “We train kids young. It makes them better suited for the job when they’re older. Researchers are the youngest- you can start working as a Researcher when you’re as young as, well, 14. Everything else you have to be older than 16.” She looked at Vincent, a sad look in her eyes.
“Why is he all alone? I saw a few other people his age around earlier.” She shook her head and sighed.
“They don’t like him. They’re afraid of him. When he first came here, when he was 11 years old with his father, no mother, everyone loved him. Vincent was really popular.” I looked back at him, wondering how someone so popular could look so alone. “He started growing apart as he got older. He wondered if he could start training young. He even asked the Leaders if he could watch people train in the training area. He never fought, not until he was older, but he learned by watching.”
I bit my lip. “He knows how to fight? How to use weapons?”
She nodded. “He started to actually fight when he turned 13, the same time he started training as a Researcher. He was almost better than the 16 year olds. He’s a natural born fighter. We have a few people like that around the facility. They usually train to be Hunters. They asked him if he wanted to train to be a Hunter instead, but he refused. He wanted to help people, not hurt them. He’s normally a gentle person.”
I looked over at Vincent again. “If he’s so kind, why doesn’t anyone like him? Why are they afraid of him?” She sighed and looked away.
“One day, he came into the training room, and he was seething. There was a cold steam coming off of him, like the way you can see your breath in cold weather, and he was trailing ice where he walked. He grabbed a sword and waited to join in a fight.
“He managed to get into the arena with an older guy. The man just laughed and told him to fight someone his own size and skill level. Vincent blew it off and got into stance to fight anyway. The man gave up and decided to fight him, though I knew he was planning on going easy on him.” She bit her lip. “The man had to go to the infirmary. He was in bad shape. Vincent finally warmed up enough to realize what he did, and when he looked around everyone was staring at him, scared looks in their eyes. He ran away.” Rain sighed. “Ever since then people have been afraid of him. And ever since then he hasn’t touched a single weapon.” I watched him for a few moments, wondering what backstories other people had here, if they were as bad as Vincent’s, if there were some that were worse, before looking away and walking back to the group, leaving Rain to follow behind me.