Book One: Chapter 2: SATs – Standardized Avatar Testing
"Really? You've never heard of the SAT? The Standardized Avatar Test… My older brother told me about it… you take it when you enter high school… Apparently it's like… a super intense, intrusive health examination. They're like checking everything from whether you have head lice to your mental state… probably why my brother failed. He's dumber than a box ah rocks! Apparently only a handful of people have ever passed it every year in the whole nation to become eligible candidates for some tester thing with the government. If you pass, you're apparently some kind of perfect human. Yep… I personally think it's a shitload of crap! The Secretariats just trying to make everyone into mindless zombies and tag everyone's DNA and hair samples! Fight the man!"
He stood there for a few moments with his fist balled up, stretched out into the air with his head hung low...until a head boy came and smacked the top of his head with a rolled up piece of paper and told him to move along to the gymnasium. As we walked towards the gym, signs along the walk directed everyone to the SATs as if the school was just that big that people might get lost.
"Psst… I'm ditching this whoohah… They aint gonna probe me, man. You down…?"
I looked around and then back towards the entrance of the gym where head students were guiding the others in through a single file format… "Uh… sure I guess." With that, Corey yanked my armed and pulled me down another hall and through an unmarked door…
"I know a short cut so that we can bypass the back gate security. Its actually above the gymnasium… so be quiet!"
We sleeked up the staircase and on to the track of the gym. It was on the second floor and surrounded the main floor just below. We ducked our heads low and assumed a crawling position, scurrying along the floor to get the opposite side of the track. Corey seemed a bit better at this kind of thing than I was. He was probably much more athletic than I was but hell who wasn't. He was taller, too. Not by much, but a noticeable difference. He had light brown skin, also; almost yellow. He was definitely biracial as I've never seen a guy with his complexion and blue-grey eyes. He was about ten feet in front of me when he crashed into a tall, rather large male.
"Well where the hell are we going today?" Corey just kind of chuckled, looked back to me and suddenly he launched his feet into the air, impacting the man's swollen chest. It was just enough to knock the man off balance but not fully knock him down.
"Run, Sai!" I scurried over to him and took off running, with him hot on my trail. I was still in shock at what he'd just done, or more importantly how he'd done it. It was like kung fu or something. Good thing I was a great autopiloter or I have ended up running square into a wall. Suddenly, my body impacted stone and I knew I'd spoken too soon. I was knocked to the floor, my head spinning form the suddenly jolt. I looked up and saw another freakishly large head boy standing over me.
They must breed these guys or something! I thought. I was immediately scooped up the man. An almost doppelganger of the man appeared suddenly behind Corey and did the same. They were immediately escorted down to the gymnasium floor where they were placed at the back of formation they'd put all the students into… Corey cowered behind the curious, almost excited Sai.
"What are you doing man… its just a physical, right?"
"Yeah, but… I don't know. I just have a bad feeling about it. Besides, who wants to find out that they fail at being a human…"
"Dude, you just went kung fu panda on that guy's ass… if I had to guess which one of us is going to epic fail this human test my bets would go on myself." Corey continued to cower and shake nervously in his place in the line….
"Good afternoon, students." "Good afternoon, head master!"
"Welcome to this year's SATs. I have very high hopes for this year's batch of fresh, young minds." The head master's gaze fell to the front of the formation. I tried to look around the guy in front of me to get a better look at who he was looking at. I managed to catch a glimpse of a girl standing at the front end of the formation to the right of ours….
"Is that the pretty girl from class…" I whispered to himself.
"It's Amiamara," answered Corey. "She's Headmaster Mizen's daughter and, well, a shoe-in to pass this year's test. Everyone knows it! Nepotism at it's best if you asked me. There's no way she won't pass it. With the headmaster's influence, hell he could get my pet tortoise, Lion Turtle, to pass the thing."
"Really?"
"Well, I mean Lion Turtle is pretty advanced for a tortoise and…"
"No! I mean, you think that'll really happen? She seemed pretty…capable of passing any kind of test in class today."
"Oh, well, I mean she is a genius. And she's already the valedictorian of your class. And she's been ranked this year along with the upperclassmen in martial arts this year."
"So why was it that you thought she wouldn't pass the test on her own?"
"Eh. It's just the conspiracy theorist in me." I sighed in exhaustion at Corey's rather imaginative outlook on life.
"And well…there is the thing about her older brother, Azazel. He was truly a legend at this school. He was declared a prodigy before he was even admitted. He's ultra cool and super smart! He was the first person to ever pass the SATs. They were planning to scrap the testing before he came along. Azazel is the coolest, most mysterious, most awesome guy ever to walk these halls!" Corey was doing that thing where he lost control of his vocal range. A few irritated students were whispering to us to shut up before the headmaster noticed the commotion.
"You seem really…um…knowledgeable about him." He nodded in total agreement!
"Mhm! Azazel is one of my idols. He's like a rock star of martial arts and cooletry." It was kinda clear that he'd just made up the word, but I decided to divert my attention back to the headmaster's speech.
"You will all be tested today. Most of you wont make it through the preliminaries, not even a handful will probably get to the final phase of testing. But please, don't be discouraged, young ones. Don't consider yourselves imperfect, but rather necessarily flawed." He managed to say this with the most convincingly charming smile you could ever hope to manage. The students all bowed and replied in unison. "Yes, headmaster."
A woman then replaced him at the microphone on the stage and began shouting into the mic at what seemed a highly unnecessary octave but no one seemed to mind.
"Now! There are three phases! Health Examination! Mental Evaluation! And Physical Aptitude!"
EXAMINATION ROOM #6 Osian Walker
Only a few minutes later, I found myself staring a doctor's eye scope thingy head-on, its almost blinding light threatening to have me seeing stars for days. Saying that the examination was thorough would have been the understatement of the century. They checked everything that I could have imagined they check and even more things that I had no idea could be checked. They logged everything about me that was recordable, including taking ample DNA samples.
"Now I only have a few more questions and we can wrap things up. Tell me, Mr. Walker, how far can you trace your family lineage back?" He looked intently through his large, bifocal lens at me. Why was it that everyone was so pushy about where people came from around here? Its like it was all they cared about.
"Um. Well…my grandpa and grandma were accountants born and raised in Ba Sing Se. And so is my mom, just like them. But we moved here when she received a job in the Secretariat."
"These grandparents, maternal, are they?"
"Yeah."
"And your father's parents? What did they do and where are they from?"
"Well, I don't know. My dad never talked about his parents or where they were from. He's dead now. He met my mom when he moved to Ba Sing Se."
"Curious… And he, too, was an accountant?"
"No. He was an Archaeologist. He was dig old stuff up and…"
"Yes, yes. I am aware of what archaeology is."
"And, how did your father die? Are there any rare, unusual illnesses that run in your family? Maybe IHB or something similar…?"
"Um.. IHB?"
"Yes. Intensive Heart Burn. It has been one of the leading causes of death in the UNF for a few decades now. Fire Nationers seem prone to the illness. It causes the heart to practically work itself into, well, something similar to combustion. The heart seems to run just a little warmer and faster than normal. So much until it simply bursts…"
"Oh…well, no. My dad died from falling off a cliff in the Southern Mountains of Ba Sing Se. Besides, we aren't from the United Nations of Fire."
"Really? Are you sure? From a medical standpoint, you do have genetic markers that suggest a northern lineage. Hm. Curious."
EXAMINATION ROOM #4 Corintin Helms
"Please, Mr. Helms… Stop squirming!"
"Noo! Noooo! Please, don't probe me!"
"Mr. Helms, I am not going to probe you! This is just a thermometer!"
"…Oh… Okay. Ahhhh"
"Um… No. Mr. Helms, not that kind of thermometer."
… "NOOOOO!"
EXAMINATION ROOM #1 Amiamara Mizen
"And how far back can you trace your…"
"My family can trace its lineage back to even before the Romance Era to Shujo Mizen, head advisor to Fire Lord Maizuko. Our lineage is well-known and public record, Doctor. You have but to search any of the official Secretariat catacombs to find it. My family has been a staple noble family of the current and past forms of the United Nations…"
"Uh, of course, Miss Mizen."
"And a few final questions… Are their any outstanding or uncommon illnesses that run in your…"
"No." She cut him off again. "We have always had PERFECT health. Is that all, Doctor."
"Uh, uhm, yes, yes that just about wraps it up. Thank…" She stood up and exited the examination room.
EXAMINATION ROOM #4 Corintin Helms
"Please, Mr. Helms, quit that whimpering and try your best to focus on the questions at hand, thank you."
Corintin sat in the corner of the room, moaning and rocking slowly in the fetal position.
"Now, tell me again your family's lineage…this time without the sobbing."
"Well…m-m-my mother and f-f-father are f-f-from the Southern Ocean T-t-tribes, Yue and Fiji."
"Um…my gramgram died of liver cirrhosis…"
The man sighed… "Thank you, Mr. Helms. That'll be all."
Phase II: THE MENTAL EVALUATION
EXAMINATION ROOM #1
"Can you please tell me what you see when you look at this?"
"An upside down, inverted kanji of the symbol for UNF…" The psychiatrist looked somehow shocked. It was exactly what the ink blog was created from but he'd never expected anyone to actually discern the actual image.
"Um…maybe we should try something different."
EXAMINATION ROOM # 4
"How was your relationship with your gramgram"?
"Please, don't make me think about it…"
"What do you mean? Is it hard for you to think about your experiences with your gram gram?"
"She would…she would… fart all the time! And when she'd get drunk….she used to make me watch soap operas with her! The horror! The Horrorrr!
EXAMINATION ROOM # 6 Osian Walker
"Now… Close your eyes for me. Listen only to the sound of my voice. With every syllable you hear, its making you sleepier and sleepier. You eyelids seem to weigh pounds and you can't imagine not taking this opportunity to take a nap. The sound of my voice is getting softer, and softer. The room is disappearing, the weight falling away. When I count to three you will enter into a deep trance, wholly removed from this place, this moment. Nothing will be tangible but my voice.
1 ….. 2 ….. 3….. Sleep.
I opened my eyes and the world was gone. But it was still there. It was as if the world had darkened and shaded itself into a calmer, sullen place. I sat up and scanned the room. The psychiatrist was gone and I was alone. The room had expanded and changed somehow, although I couldn't quite describe how. I stood up and I suddenly felt lighter, less tied to the Earth. I felt as if I could rise with the breeze, like suddenly, it wasn't gravity that held him to the world anymore… what was though?
"Hello. Where did everyone go? And who turned out the lights?"
I looked around, unsure of what to do now. I looked down at myself, at the skin on my arms and was suddenly aware of their luminescence. I wasn't glowing, exactly. But it was like the blood under my skin had been replaced with something brighter, something bluer and it just barely shown through the outer layers of my flesh. And it wasn't just me. Everything seemed to be bad of this brighter, more florescent material.
Then I heard a thump behind the door.
"Is there anybody there?" I ran to the door and tried to turn the handle but something was wrong. I lifted my hand to see that the metal knob was now rusted and falling apart. I suddenly noticed that the door was barely standing, internally corrupted and diseased. I quickly spun around to see that the entire room was now decrepit and dead. The wallpaper had pealed and faded into rotted paper, the floorboards were rotted and holed and structurally unsound.
"W-w-what has happened? Why is everything like this?"
I was getting scared. It was like I went to sleep and awoke in some dead zone. Whatever was happening, I realized it was the hypnosis or trance thingy that the doctor was putting me under. I had to wake up from this dream before it turned into a nightmare. And then there was another thump. I started panicking. What was it and where was it coming from? And then there was another sound. I placed my hands over my eyes as if I was a child, trying to make a bad monster in my closet go away.
"Wake up. Wake up. Wake up…. Wake up!"
"STAYYYYYYYYYY!"
I suddenly jumped up and everything was back to normal. I was back in the room I had been in, with the normal wallpaper and normal floorboards. The psychiatrist sat across from me, startled by my sudden movement. I was just standing there, not glowing or anything. And what was that sound, that voice... Something spoke to him.
"Mr. Walker... are you… alright?" I didn't know what to say, but I know I didn't want to tell him what just happened. He leaned up and squinted his eyes as if trying to notice something that he hadn't noticed before. Only he didn't know what that thing was.
"Uh, yeah, yeah. I'm good. I just got nervous." I tried to laugh it off so he wouldn't become suspicious.
"Right… very well. Either way, please have your seat so we can resume.
I didn't want to do. I didn't want to risk going back to that place. Apparently, I'd gone and he hadn't even realized. I was about to say something about it when his little timer went off on the coffee table across from us.
"Oh, well. That's all the time. You may rejoin the rest of the students, Mr. Walker."
I exited the room and reentered the main gymnasium to find Corey already released, standing among the rest of the students. As I walked closer, I noticed he was kinda slumped over, his head hanging.
"Corey…dude, you…alright?"
He didn't respond but I could see he was kind of whispering something below his breath, seemingly to himself.
"Please…please….please, don't. Please, don't…"
"Dude…" I rested my hand on his shoulder and he jumped up suddenly. "PLEASE DON'T PROBE ME!"
Half the students turned to look at us as I lowed my own head a bit, royally embarrassed.
"Oh…Sai. It's just you. So how'd it go? You perfect or what?"
"I don't know. I guess we'll all see after the third phase."
After a few minutes the microphone clicked on and the woman from early walked back on to the stage.
"Attention, students! The preliminary tests have concluded. All but the following students may
leave the gymnasium and resume your class schedules:
Yin Cho, Amiamara Mizen, Corintin Helms, Kairi Mazumira and Osian Walker. Everyone else you have failed. Please return to your normal class schedule."
Everything imaginable began to run through my head. What was going to happen? How is it that we passed and they didn't? What about me would cause me to pass tests like that? I could barely answer any of the questions, let alone give the right answers.
When I regained visual on what was going on around me. I turned to look to my side for some odd reason and there I saw her, staring him directly in my eyes. The look on her face was stern and unyielding. It was like she was asking herself the very same questions about me rather than asking them of herself. She knew why she was there, but why was I?
Corintin looked just as shocked about the results as I was…and maybe a little more scared about them as well.
"Sai… I've got a bad feeling about this."
The last bit of students finally made their way out of the gym, the sound of the double doors slamming shut giving the fact away.
"Students. Prepare yourselves... This is the part of the test that will truly weed out those of you who should not be here. Get ready for the physical aptitude test… Get ready for Agni Kai!"
So... Comment and let me know how you're liking it so far. My chapters are kind of big, sorry.
