Cured (10 page)

Finally, only Felix was left. He moved
towards the ladder, and climbed it swiftly, almost as gracefully as
the Primes had. He stepped out onto the platform and looked down at
me. I shot him a quizzical look that I hoped said, ‘What are you
thinking you total moron? Get down from there!’

I saw his
mouth twitch in a little smile. Then he began swaying, his eyelids
drooping, and he started to take deep, heaving breaths. He was
obviously putting on a show, but none of the other Primes were
watching. They were all standing in a group chatting excitedly. I
had to do something. 


“Um,” I said. Everyone went quiet and looked
over at me. “I don’t think he is okay!” I said, pointing up at
Felix who was still swaying on the platform. 
Theo cursed and ran
over to the ladder. 


“
You alright
up there, man?” he yelled up at Felix. Felix did one last violent
sway to the left. Then he toppled off the platform and fell from
the ceiling, flailing like a ragdoll. I screamed, unable to keep my
composure, and leapt off my seat. Theo snatched Felix out of the
air without hesitation and lowered him to the ground, before
kneeling next to him. Felix kept his eyes shut. I sat back down,
hoping that no one had noticed my out-of-character outburst in the
commotion.

The instructor motioned for everyone to calm
down,

“Not to worry, not to worry,” she said,
“Often if a Prime had a crippling fear of something, such as
heights, in their Norm life, they still experience panic attacks in
their Newbie days.”

I exhaled the breath I had been holding since
Felix climbed the ladder. Another near miss. The instructor shook
Felix awake and gave him directions to the nurse. Felix made a
convincing show of getting to his feet shakily and leaving the room
with an embarrassed grimace.

As soon as he left, the instructor announced
that breakfast was served in the dining room, so I stood and
followed the Primes out of the arena. No one dropped back to walk
with me, no one even turned to check if I was coming.

I was last to reach the dining room. There
were two chairs left empty, one for me and one for Felix. I walked
towards the chair beside Ellina and she made no effort to hide her
groan of disproval. I sat down and stared straight ahead in silence
whilst the Primes talked animatedly amongst themselves about their
newfound balance.

The same serving children from the day before
came out carrying plates and placed them in front of us. Eva gave
my hand a discrete pat and smiled at me shyly. I smiled back and
tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear. Then I froze. That
was way out of character. I looked around the table, but the only
person who seemed to have noticed was Theo. He looked perplexed but
avoided my gaze, quickly looking down at his meal.

We had been served a towering stack of
pancakes drizzled in syrup and topped with a little swirl of cream.
On the side were a variety of berries, which had been dusted in
icing sugar, and arranged in a flower shape. It was beautiful.

Just as the children were leaving the room,
Felix entered and sat next to me quietly. He slid a small tube from
his pocket and into my hand. I glanced down at the object, it was a
pill canister labelled ‘Anxiety’. I stuffed the tube of pills down
the front of my dress before anyone noticed, and hoped that it
wasn’t visible under the fabric. Then I couldn’t help grinning in
relief. I glanced at Felix out of the corner of my eye and he
winked. All was well, for now.

We finished
our meals and went back to training for the rest of the day. I
observed, trying to absorb everything I could, whilst attempting to
appear disinterested. Felix now sat beside me, after explaining he
needed to recover from the panic attack. We were silent; today had
been far too risky. 


After dinner Felix and I walked back to my
room, ready for a long night of planning our escape the next
day.

We sat
cross-legged on the floor in the living room section of my suite. I
had gathered a heap of books and paper from the library, along with
a range of stationery. I had also programmed the WallScreen to
delivery us piping hot coffee every hour, on the hour. I appointed
myself as the reader, because that was one of my very few talents.
Felix listened as I flicked through the books reading out any
helpful information about the tests that we were about to
face.

The only helpful books were those on Greek
mythology and classical studies, though there were a lot of these,
as everyone knew the Prime tests paralleled Hercules’ labours. I
dictated details of the tasks to Felix and he bullet pointed them
on the spare paper. After three hours we had an extensive list of
points that neither of us could see as very helpful. We needed a
way out of the tasks, not a way to complete them. All we knew was
that tomorrow we were going up against a mutant lion with an
impenetrable coat. No doubt it would be genetically engineered to
make it more of a challenge for the Newbies’ enhanced strength. To
complete the task we would need to battle and defeat the beast,
which we both knew would be impossible. Felix was trying to lighten
the situation by making jokes, but neither of us was laughing. We
both knew our chances of surviving the first task were slim. And
then we had to face another eleven.

Chapter 16

I woke with a start, and sat bolt upright. I
rubbed my eyes and looked around the study, disoriented. Felix was
snoring next to me, a book laid open on his face. We had fallen
asleep whilst we had been studying our action plan. I realized with
a jolt of excitement, that Felix had his hand laid over mine. Then
I shook my head. No time to think about such trivial matters when
we were meant to be fighting for our lives.

“Fe,” I patted his shoulder, “Wake up.”

Felix groaned and stretched his arms over his
head, releasing my hand, and unaware that he had ever been holding
it. “What the…” he groaned, “Ave? What time is it?”

I checked the WallScreen. Six. In the
morning. Our task was in three hours. Felix grimaced and then
jumped into action. He scooped the plans off the floor and flipped
through them.

He started to quiz me. “So what are we doing
to try and not get killed today?” he asked.

“Um,” I tried to recall the plan we had made
last night. “We are going to get flown to location, then we are
going to be given the criteria. We are going to try our best to go
first and second out of the group. Then we will run in opposite
directions for exactly two hundred average sized steps. By this
time, the next two Primes will have been released, so attention
will be on them. We will both stop running after the two hundred
steps, turn around 180 degrees and run back in our original
direction.”

“Right,” agreed Felix. “ By that time we will
hopefully be able to see each other. Then we can start looking
around for a place to hide. Once we get to a safe spot, we will
start on the next part of the plan.”

“People will suspect us Fe. We wont be
running fast enough.”

”They’ll just think we are jogging,” Felix
replied.

I shook my head. We were so going to die.

“What about the massive genetically
engineered lion that is meant to be on the loose?”

“Don’t get eaten,” said Felix with a grin
that more resembled a grimace.

I swallowed and took a deep breath. We had
come up with the most flawed plan I had ever heard.

We were still racing around my room getting
ready an hour later, when we were called for breakfast. I quickly
tore a brush through my hair while Felix splashed water over his
face. Eva came and knocked on the door. The others were waiting for
us at the dining table. I asked her to send our apologies and say
that we would be down in a minute.

Then I turned to Felix, “Let’s get out battle
gear on.”

He led me into the WallDrobe and chose my
outfit first. A pale pink summer dress.

“Absolutely not.” I swiped the Wall until a
more suitable outfit appeared and pressed the ‘accept outfit’
button. I got dressed into my black leggings and matching black
thermal, before throwing black hoody on over top.

“That’s not exactly keeping up the façade
Ave,” Felix said.

“The act is up, Fe. It doesn’t matter what
the others think of me. We just need to focus on surviving
now.”

He considered my logic for a second, before
nodding and dressing himself in cargo pants and a black pullover.
We both donned hiking boots and I scooped my unruly curls into a
high ponytail, ignoring the makeup station entirely. As we were
about to exit the room I remembered the stick of charcoal and the
pill canister from the day before. I rushed back to my bedroom and
managed to find the items amongst the heap that yesterday’s dress
was in. I retrieved them from the floor and tucked both the objects
into the pocket of my hoody. Then I followed Felix out of the
room.

When we arrived at breakfast everyone was
already seated. They turned to look at us, and I noticed that all
eyes fell on me. No wonder, since I wasn’t exactly looking the part
of the prima donna princess they remembered from yesterday. I
ignored their eyes and took a seat next to Theo. Felix went to the
other vacant seat beside Ellina on the other side of the table.
Theo continued to stare directly at me. With a surge of confidence
and pure irritation I fixed my eyes onto his.

“What are you staring at?”

Theo quickly looked away. “To be honest, I
have no idea,” he murmured. Without any time for me to consider his
words, Regina swooped into the room humming an annoyingly
high-pitched tune and swishing her poufy gold skirt. I rolled my
eyes involuntarily.

“Good morning kiddies! How are you all?”

Without waiting for an answer she continued,
“All ready for your first task? Don’t worry, it’ll be a
breeze!”

I scowled, knowing that it most certainly
would not be a breeze.

The children carried us our breakfasts,
removing the lids from an array of silver platters to reveal stacks
of French toast drenched in golden maple syrup, piles of hash
browns and freshly toasted ciabatta loaf, crisp bacon, and eggs
that oozed fluorescent yellow when the yolk was pierced. I couldn’t
help but morbidly think of the last supper.

As we ate, Regina spoke. “Alrighty dumplings.
Straight after breakfast we will head off to the HoverCopter in the
left wing. You will all board the same Copter and fly to the same
destination. From that point you will be driven away from the
landing area. Each of you will be dropped in a different location,
meaning you will start the tasks alone. You may make alliances and
work together, although this is highly discouraged, as only one
Prime can win the tasks overall, and only one Prime can have their
first choice of position on Olympia.”

I caught Felix’s eye and he winced. Our plan
was toast.

“As you all already know, your first task
will be facing a lion, based on the Nemean Lion that Hercules faced
in his first labour.”

Phew. I breathed a silent sigh of relief. At
least we got one part of the plan right.

“So you know that for your first task you
will be capturing said lion. There are seven lions, so you must
catch one each, and you must battle and defeat the beast.”

The Primes fidgeted restlessly, as though
they couldn’t wait to get started.

“And to prove that you have completed the
task, you’ll need to use the lion to create a cloak. You will be
able to carry this cloak as a keepsake, and I highly suggest you do
so.”

At the thought of skinning the animal, I
shuddered again and bile rose up my throat, I couldn’t do it. I
hesitantly raise my hand.

“Yes Avery-Rose?”

“What if we don’t create the cloak?”

“Ah, I see,” Regina smiled. “Don’t want to
get out hands dirty do we? Well, you get bonus points for making
the cloak of course, however if you would rather not, I do
understand, you’ll just lose out in the rankings.”

I nodded, and Regina continued,

“Oh and I almost forgot! There is a catch.
The lion is impenetrable by most materials. You can figure that one
out for yourself though.” Regina winked and smiled in an overly
cheerful way considering we were about to go into battle with
beasts.

By this time, everyone had finished eating.
My plate remained piled high with food. I had entirely lost my
appetite.

Regina made an exaggerated gesturing motion,
“Let’s hop aboard then Newbies!” She let out one of her irritating
giggles as we stood and followed her from the room.

After winding our way through the maze of
glass hallways and mostly empty rooms, we wound up at the boarding
room for the HoverCopter that would fly us to the task
location.

By this point my teeth were chattering
uncontrollably despite the carefully temperature-controlled air
conditioning in the building. Felix had to nudge me multiple times
when the chattering became especially vocal, as we sat waiting to
be boarded. After what seemed like hours, Regina received a
WallScreen call from the pilot.

“The Copter is ready when you are Ms
Quaint.”

The pilot gave the rest of us a formal nod,
“Good luck, Newbies.” He did not smile or laugh when he wished us
luck as Regina kept doing, and I loved him for that.

The WallScreen went black and Regina turned
to address us.

“This is it, team,” she giggled, “This is
where I leave you.” She lifted her perfectly manicured hand to her
lips and blew us an exaggerated kiss. I had to stop myself from
reaching out and slapping her smug face.

Theo led the way through the door with a
confident stride, and we all exited the boarding room after him,
making our way along an over-bridge and out onto a HoverCopter pad.
The aircraft was painted bright red, and was five times the size of
my family’s own HoverCopter. It was already floating a meter in the
air it had a pilot, who sat ready to take off, in the front of the
cabin. My legs stopped moving. Felix gave me a shove, but my feet
remained glued to the floor so I fell forwards. He caught me before
I fell and dragged me over to the Copter, before boosting me onto
the floating platform.