Chapter iii
It's been 10 years since then, and Crescent has grown into a young, beautiful girl. When the guard sent her away to Sybil, she cried and screamed. She didn't like the guard. He held her to tightly and didn't loosen his steel grip. He screamed at her and people looked at the two Lunars, concerned. Though they only saw her, they figured that she was a shell and just returned to their work. Sybil, snarled with disgust when she saw the young shell but took her into her arms with soft gentleness you would never imagine a woman as cruel as Mistress Sybil, would be so gentle. Especially with something that she despised. But the Lunar Law said that someone had to take care of the shell until 10 years and when that day comes, was to be sent to be accounted a job. Sybil's hand shoved Crescent forward, making her walk faster. Crescent stumbled and let out a startled gasp and Sybil glared at the child.
"Don't be weak. You'll get a hard job, like mining, or carrieing giant sacks of flour." Crescent almost thought that the mistress was helping her, until she said,"Then, they would send you back to me and I would have to send you someplace else and I would have to leave Luna just to visit you, the disgusting shell. If you fail at the job you're chosen for." Sybil spat.
Crescent flinched."I'm sorry. I won't fail-"
"Of course you will, and I will have to take care of you! Don't say or promise things you cannot ever keep! You are a failure already, you were born a shell. So, hush. Keep moving." Sybil started shoving her with more force than before. She had nearly turned as red as a cherry, Sybil had gotten in her face, her lips curling into a snarl and smoke puffing out of her ears. She scared Crescent. Crescent realized she was shaking and took a deep breath a tried moving more swiftly and counted down from 10, calming her nerves. They arrived to an office with a plump old man with hair circling his head in a horseshoe. He wore khakis and tenishoes, with an ugly sweater his grandmother probably had made for him. He stood up when he noticed their presence.
"Hello, hello." He greeted them, shaking their hands."What might be your name, little one?" He said, looking at Crescent with a flushed face. Or might that be his natural completion, Crescent thought.
"Crescent, shell." Crescent laced her fingers behind her back and rocked on her feet. Heel, toe, heel, toe. The man sat down behind his desk and pulled out a port screen and tapped at the bright screen and heaved out a exasperate breath and shoved the port into his desk and pulled out a much larger port. Tap, tap, tap.
He smiled."My dear, you can sit here." He gestured toward a cousioned chair, placed in front of his desk, her feet didn't quite touch the ground."You are such a pretty girl. What do you like to do?" The man had brown eyes. He was looking at her like she was a cute puppy in a pet store window and he was a little boy outside excited to see the cute puppies but sad he couldn't bring one home.
"I like to play on my port." Crescent said quietly, shyly. She shrunck in her chair, trying to disapear and the cushiony fabric."I like to play Babble." The man smiled. Babble was a game where you are a spy and you have to hack into personal and important accounts to save the world. Crescent enjoyed the game. She played it since she was 5 and hs gotten very good at it, she could hack into actual accounts and she would often and change the screenname to silly names. (Creepy Pete, Poopy Lou, Smelly Shelly, etc.) Sybil would get furious and take her port away. The game has never gotten boaring for Crescent, it's all she would play.
"Ah, that is a fun game. My daughter, Linnie, loves it. Do you often play it?" The man looked at her questioningly, his thick eyebrows raised.
Crescent nodded, swinging her feet under the chair.
"Mmm." The man replied. "Ah! Crescent. Your blood type is O. You are 5'1 and you are under the guardianship of Thaumaturg Sybil. You are very good with computers I see. And is scheduled to be a royal hacker for, Her Highness. You will go in orbit around Earth on a satellite Today." He set the port screen down gently onto his desk and folded his hands in his lap. "Are you all ready and packed up? You will be provided port screens of all kinds and Mistress Sybil here will come and stock up your supplies every week and when there has been upgrades avalible, she'll bring a royal engineer with her and have his give you and upgrade." His mouth quirked up at the corner. "Are you excited?"
Crescent didn't know what to say. Couldn't say anything, she would try and the words fell dead once past her lips. All she could do was nod.