Chapter 1

Monday, 26^th of November, 2035

Mandy

After all the excitement of the kidnapping and rescue, things calmed down a bit. The wheels of bureaucracy turned slowly, but eventually Gwen was made my legal guardian. We stayed with D and Joyce till Gwen felt we should try and find a place of our own, so we wouldn't overstay our welcome.

It was a bit of a shock for both of us, to suddenly find we were poor. We had grown up in a relatively well off family, and while we weren't trust fund wasters who didn't know the value of money, we had never been in a situation where we had to worry about where our next meal was coming from. We got some help from the government, but not a lot. Gwen had to find a job to keep a roof over our heads, clothes on our backs, and food in our mouths. I felt a little guilty about this; Gwen had been saving to go to university, and now she was forced to work to support the two of us, giving up her dream to help me. I resolved to pull my weight somehow, maybe try and help pay the bills. For now, I would do my best to do the cleaning, washing, et cetera, so Gwen didn't have to do all that in addition to a hard day's work.

There wasn't a lot to do at our new place, since our means were so limited it was very small. With some assistance from the government and what Gwen earned, we rented a small one bedroom flat. It was in a reasonably nice part of town and was nicely furnished, if a little spartan. It had a sofa-bed in the living room, that I slept on, and then a small single bedroom that Gwen used. A little bathroom sat opposite Gwen's room with a bath with shower head. There was a tiny kitchen off the living room with a hob, fridge, sink, microwave, and a small oven, enough to cook meals for the two of us. It wasn't much but it was our place. With just me and Gwen there, it felt more like a home than our parents big farm house ever had, warm and cosy. In stark contrast to the big, cold, draughty, forbidding place I had grown up in. Often in the evenings me and Gwen would sit curled up on the sofa together watching some TV or reading, happy in each others' company.

One complication in helping out with the chores was my still-damaged hand. It had almost regenerated now, but there had been an annoying few times where I had difficulty. Even some simple things like opening jars, putting on my clothes, and tying shoelaces could prove problematic. Every day, my sprouting fingerlets gained more motion, but it was still very frustrating at times. I tried to count my blessings in that it wasn't permanent; some people had to live through worse problems than mine, problems that weren't going to self-repair like my hand.

Now that the issue of who would look after me was resolved, I would be going back to school fairly soon. Gwen had found us a small flat, not far from D's house, so I would be going to the same school as her.

I was dreading being around so many people, partly due to the emotional onslaught my empathic senses caused, and I was also sure that my new body would single me out as prime bullying material. The fact that D and Jane would both be there was something that calmed me a little.

I had been practising with my abilities. I had gained some control over my fire abilities, but I still ended up incinerating a few outfits calling the fire out of me. This didn't please Gwen, since we couldn't really afford to keep buying lots of new clothes. I kept practising my stealth ability, trying out the non-invisible option where I could vary the image I projected. I was beginning to get fairly good at it, able to hold a small alteration, something like a simple mask, for hours at a time. More complex stuff still wore me out pretty fast, but I was improving with practice.

My abilities weren't the only things I had been learning about, Gwen had been trying to teach me the fine art of being a lady. D and Jane had also been educating me along those lines, except their method seemed to involve more shopping and something called girl power. Gwen patiently taught me all sorts of disgusting things about my new anatomy. D and Jane focused on getting me to walk, talk, and think like a girl. They even, with Gwen approval, tried to get my ears pierced, unfortunately they failed to factor in my body's regenerative capabilities. If it can regrow a hand two small holes were hardly a challenge.

I missed seeing D every day, now we had moved out on our own I didn't see her or Jane as much. It was the one good thing about me having to go back to school.

Sooner than I had hoped, it was my first day at Wilynsford secondary school. Gwen and I had walked over bright and early to register. It was a cold day, being late November, so I had my coat on with the hood up. This was only partly due to the cold; I was a bit nervous of people seeing me. Even after nearly a month getting used to the new me I still wasn't all that comfortable being around people I didn't know. I had always been a little shy, but my change had only accentuated this.

The school itself was a fairly modern building of glass and brick. It had a playing field out in back for sports, and a series of interlinked buildings separated with small paved areas. It was a lot larger than my old school in Little Greenvale. Back then, there had only been a few classes divided by year, with no more than twenty people in a class.

As Gwen and I negotiated the busy halls, the sheer number of people around me made the place oppressive. My empathic senses bombarded my emotions from every angle. The storm of a thousand different emotions screamed at me from all sides in the packed corridors, like a horrible, undying scream I couldn't block my ears from. I wanted to run away, find somewhere quiet and lay down for a while. I tried using some of the mental exercises Jane had been teaching me to block out the chatter. It helped slightly, the flaring sensations around me fading back a bit. The sensations reduced to a dull background noise with those closest to me still piercing through, but even then diminished.

It was very odd knowing how people were feeling all the time, some telepaths more or less blocked me out, but in most situations I knew what people around me felt. It had taken some time to realise that's what I was sensing and then some experience to tie up emotional states with their various indicators. It was very hard to describe to people what emotions felt like to me. It was a bit like trying to explain a colour to someone who had never seen it. People seemed to broadcast textures at me heat, or light, or colours, or physical sensations all seemed to combine with other indescribable stuff to tell me what a person was feeling. The textures were complex though like they were a single point in a huge continuum of emotions. It wasn't as simple as a big 'I am happy' sign. I had tried to explain this to D and Gwen, but neither really got it. Jane seemed to understand to a degree, mainly due to her telepathy allowing her similar senses, but even then it sounded different for her, maybe every empath or telepath perceived it differently. I guess in some way telepathy must be harder, I could sense when people were eyeing me up, which was bad enough, but at least I didn't have to hear what they were thinking of doing to me.

We arrived at the office, and went in. Gwen began talking to the secretary, and I pushed my hood back, sitting quietly in one of the seats. A few moments after I uncovered my face the secretary caught sight of me, and I felt bitter hate flare up.

"Not already," I thought to myself.

The secretary had stopped talking in mid sentence, about my timetable or some such, and was turning bright red. She just seemed about to explode, when a short grey haired lady with a kind smile walked out of the office behind her.

"Ah, you must be Mandy, the new student we were expecting. I'll take it from here, Mrs. Donnal." the lady said.

She ushered us into her office, and once we were seated, introduced herself. "I am Mrs. Thomas, the head teacher here. First of all, let me welcome you, Amanda, to Wilynsford secondary school. I hope you'll be very happy here. You'll start lessons in earnest tomorrow. For today I will have one of our staff give you a few tests, to work out what aptitude levels we need to place you in. Once we have that out of the way, we'll sort out your timetable and find you a house to join. We use the houses for administration, non ability tiered classes, things like Sports Day, and academic contests. We have a school cup that is awarded to the house with the highest number of commendations each year. Do you know anyone at the school already?"

"Yes. I know Dorothy Newman and Jane Collins," I replied.

"I know Dorothy, a larger than life character and a nice girl. She'll help you fit in, no doubt. I'll see if we can place you in the same house as her," she said. "I have some paperwork for your sister to sign. While she is doing that, let's get you started on your tests."

She handed Gwen a stack of forms, then led me out into the school. Turning to me, she said, "I'll give you a short tour on the way over. I'm sure your friends will fill in the rest. The school is divided into a series of blocks, each with a specific area of study. For example this is the Performing Arts block, and that over there," she said, gesturing down a corridor, "is the science block. I'll give you a map of the school to go with your timetable, so you can find your way around more easily."

By this point lessons, had started, and the corridors and other open spaces were quiet. There was the odd face looking at us out of a window, but for the most part, we were ignored. I was surprised by how huge the place was. It had seemed big on my initial trip to the office, but now I was in the main areas it seemed even bigger. It was quite intimidating and I found myself feeling a little afraid of what this place would be like. My old school was very small by comparison, everyone knew who you were and what you were about. Here I was just one girl among the masses. It gave me a cold feeling inside and yet there was also some comfort in that idea, I didn't want to stand out. We made our way through the school grounds, eventually coming to a two-story box-like building Mrs. Thomas led me into.

"This is our library. Downstairs we have books, and a small selection of educational magazines. Upstairs, we have an area with some teaching tablets, plus a few classrooms. They have access to the school networks, and a screened subset of the Internet. Outside of lesson times students can make use of these facilities, but it tends to get quite busy," she said.

She led me upstairs to a small class room overlooking the front of the building.

"Take a seat and I'll get you the tests so you can get started," Mrs Thomas said, indicating one of the moulded plastic chairs.

I sat down and took my coat off. Shortly thereafter, Mrs. Thomas returned with a battered-looking stand-alone tablet, which she plugged in and set in front of me.

"I'm afraid most of our portable units are rather old, but they do the job. I'll start you on your first test, which is in math, and I'll have Miss Gordon, our librarian, look in on you from time to time. It's fairly self-explanatory, but if you need help, just ask. You'll have half an hour to finish, and then we'll move you on to some other subjects. Don't worry too much if you have any difficulty; this is just so we have some idea of where to place you. We can always adjust things later as we get to know you. So any questions, or shall I start you off?" she asked.