Disclaimer: If I said that I owned Uglies, would anyone believe me? No. So what's the point of this disclaimer? XD (For those lacking in sarcasm, no, I do not own Uglies, and I never will claim that I have.)
Rejects
Chapter 1: 7 Days
Only one more week, Leia thought to herself. Seven more days. She stood in her dormitory in front of the wallscreen, which was currently showing Leia a reflection of herself.
She tried in vain to cover up the acne on her cheek with the large powder puff her best friend Kelly had given her. In seven days, I'll never be called 'Pizzaface' again.
How does it feel, Leia?
Leia smiled in the wallscreen.
It feels good.
She adjusted her loose bun self-consciously, trying futilely to straighten the plastic sticks that Kelly had found for her. Somehow, during the five minutes she had had them on, they had managed to fall out.
A sudden phonealert sounded, and a mechanical voice spoke out.
"Call from Kelly Jobeson. Accept or decline?"
Leia jumped about a foot in the air and clapped her hand to her heart in surprise. "Omigosh…. A-accept."
After a moment, a hologram of a tall, slender girl appeared on the wallscreen.
"Leeeiiiia! I told you to get that high speed adapter, that took ages!" The girl paused, and let out a long, dramatic gasp. "Oh. My. Goodness. You look gorgeous! I told you that hairstyle works for you, and that top we found last weekend…it's adorable!"
Leia grinned and involuntarily crossed her arms over her chest, embarrassed. "Thanks, Kelly," she replied.
"So, Leia, this is what we're doing today. I want to go shop-surfing again, we didn't get enough last time. We still have to find a dress for the party!" Kelly's voice fluttered as swiftly as a bird, without ever missing a syllable.
"Um, okay. But Kelly, I told my crumblies I'd spend the afternoon with them." Leia told her tentatively.
"No worries. Just ditch them, they won't care," Kelly smiled dazzlingly, flipping her golden hair.
Leia opened her mouth, about to protest, but fell silent.
Kelly grinned again. "Good. It's settled."
In no time at all, someone pounded on the dormroom door.
Kelly, Leia groaned mentally, and opened the door.
Kelly bounced in, crashing into Leia and knocking her down. She looked down at her on the gray carpet in surprise. "What're you doing down there?"
Oh, I wonder, Leia thought to herself.
"Okay, okay, okay. Let me show you this morpho. It's amazing."
Another morpho?
But Kelly had already seated herself on Leia's unmade bed and pulled up the wallscreen.
"Kelly, I didn't get the new software upgrade-"
"It's fine, I did this on my ancient version just so I could show you!"
Perfect.
Kelly twisted her interface ring to bring up the morpho program and opened up a file from her ring.
"Look at it, Leia!"
It's your face. Amazing. Leia couldn't actually see anything different about the morpho from Kelly's real face, but she kept quiet.
"I don't know. The eyes are nice," she managed feebly.
"Leia!" Kelly cried indignantly. "I didn't change the eyes!"
Whatever.
"I want to see your morphos."
"Again?"
"Yes.'
Leia touched her interface ring to bring up her latest morpho. She had spent ages on it, smoothing the skin, paling it, thinning out her cheeks and sculpting her cheekbones. This Leia had a perfectly symmetrical face, angled brows, a full, pale-colored lip, and perfectly straight, black hair. But the eyes were the part she was most proud of. They were narrowed and angled up, seeming to tell everyone, I'll say anything and do anything.
"It's okay," Kelly dismissed. "You need to do something about the eyes, though. They're a bit too much. You should keep them closer to the way they are."
Leia nodded, but was rejecting the idea completely. There was something about the eyes she liked. Something that said, I love who I am. I'm free to be whatever I want to be. There's nothing you can do to stop me.
The night was flawless, and the city lights sparkled over the broad river entrenching New Prettytown from the ugly side of the city.
"The Pretty City," Kelly had called it, painting a picture in Leia's mind of a town where everything, everything was pretty.
"Streets paved with gold…" Leia thought with a smile, stretching out on the flat roof of the ugly dormitory. She remembered one of her teachers at the littlie preschool- the one with the long ponytail who read them a Rusty poem every day.
Leia pulled out her green notepad and flicked her eyescreen to "Journal". How did that poem go? She thought.
Gaily bedight,
A gallant knight,
In sunshine and in shadow,
Had journeyed long,
Singing a song,
In search of Eldorado.
But he grew old-
This knight so bold-
And o'er his heart a shadow
Fell as he found
No spot of ground
That looked like Eldorado.
And, as his strength
Failed him at length,
He met a pilgrim shadow-
"Shadow," said he,
"Where can it be-
This land of Eldorado?"
"Over the Mountains
Of the Moon,
Down the Valley of the Shadow,
Ride, boldly ride,"
The shade replied-
"If you seek for Eldorado!"
The poem had captivated Leia even at a young age. She remembered many a recess spent lying on the perfect green grass, chanting the words over and over again and trailing a pale finger in the azure sky while the other kids played and laughed.
"If you seek for Eldorado!" Leia whispered, tracing the skyline with a still-pale finger.
The language isn't all that special, she thought. No big words, no special images or anything.
But there's something about it.
Definitely something.