Oroborous Academy

[Falcon2001]

I was dreaming last night and I dreamed the basis for this story, the Oroborous Academy. I remember clearly several scenes and even more clearly the overlying ideas of the story. As is the case with many writers, I have no choice on this, I must write o_O. Anyway here's the first bit.

 

Chapter One

 

The bus rumbled on endlessly as the children inside bantered and chattered. It was a big sickly orange bus, filled with pea-green seats – filled, in turn, by an assortment of teenage specimens. They were all excited to be going away to their destination. None of them had ever gone this far away from their homes before, and the nervous energy crackled through the bus almost audibly.

 

The bus seats were another source of excitement, though short-lived. Instead of the standard front-facing arrangement, the seats faced each other so as to almost encourage interaction between the teens. Near the back, a tall kid with close-cropped black hair joked and laughed with a group of friends. They were making crude jokes, and some of the girls were pretending to be shocked, passing mouths in front of faces and making flirtatious gestures. The flirting had been going on almost unabated, though disagreements between students were quickly shut down by the men in the uniforms near the front. The students had been suspicious of the passive, monolithic figures in the dark uniforms at first, but had quickly lost all fear of them, caught up in the unknown that continually flashed by them.

 

A brown haired boy sat near the middle of the bus, facing back towards the more adventurous types in the back. Every once in a while he looked up and scanned over the various groups, making assessments, choosing plans, creating words, and instantly trashing it all and resigning himself to his plight. When not watching everyone the music thrummed through his headphones hypnotically, lending the whole ride an otherworldly affair to him.

 

A girl bumped into him and he looked up, his eyes instantly taking in her form almost unknowingly. She was holding onto a rail above him, leaning over slightly with her hair falling in front of her face. The position drew attention to points of anatomy that he tried hard not to think about. She had a mischievous grin on her face, and she was saying something that drowned into the repetitive beat of his music. He pulled off the headphones and looked at her again.

 

“I said, could I listen to your headphones for a bit? Mine’s all packed away in my bag.” She grinned widely. “If I had known that the ride was going to be this long though, I probably would have brought mine.”

 

The boy shrugged and handed her the headphones, brushing hair out of his eyes. His hand momentarily strayed towards his ponytail, then jerked back down, conscious of a nervous habit. The girl put the headphones on and stuck the CD player in her pocket, swaying luxuriously to the music.

 

The boy tried not to become distracted by the display and tried to look past her but his gaze kept straying. Her eyes were closed as she moved to the music, and a voice in the boy’s head argued that she knew that effect that music had on him. He attempted to force the thoughts out of his mind by looking around the bus, but he was unsuccessful. He turned back and looked surreptitiously at her swaying form, then found himself trapped in two ice-blue eyes that were full of humor.

 

The girl leaned forward and grinned, showing bright white teeth. “So what were you looking at, boy?” she teased, leaning closer. The boy blushed and looked away just in time to see the bus take a wide turn. The girl tumbled into his lap, grabbing the back of his seat to catch herself with one arm and grabbing his arm with the other. Suddenly the boy found himself with a whole lapful of pleasantly soft female and wasn’t quite sure how to react.

 

She made no attempt to move, and giggled at his blushing. “My name’s Irene.” The boy managed a faint smile in response. “Jeral.” The girl smiled again. “That’s an interesting name, where’d you get it?” Jeral opened his mouth, and then closed it, looking faintly put off.

 

“I – I don’t remember. I suppose it’s not terribly important though. Probably something my mother came up with when she was pregnant. She always did enjoy fantasy, at least I think.” Irene laughed again and drew a little closer to him. Jeral tried to focus on the fleeting memory, but the present quickly overcame his past. He shifted a little, and his hand ended up resting on her hip. Her eyes were tinged with mystery, and he was entirely unprepared for the entire proceeding. She grinned again and set her head down on his shoulder.

 

“I’m glad we’re introduced – at least now I know someone on here.” Jeral nodded in agreement and relaxed, his sense of disbelief at least temporarily swallowed by the relaxing effect of physical contact. He drifted off soon after, with Irene curled up on his lap.

[Falcon2001]

Jeral jolted awake, momentarily disoriented by his surroundings. For a second he felt trapped and awkward, until he realized that everything was fine, and he was on a bus. He momentarily wondered who the girl was that was sleeping on him, but somehow he wasn’t worried. Soon enough he remembered that she was Irene, and the events that led to their meeting.

Around the bus, most of the kids were slumbering. The guy who had been chatting animatedly was now snoring away, surrounded by a group of similarly affected boys and girls. They were all paired off by now, and Jeral noticed that almost all of the people had been set up into pairs, a boy and a girl. A slip of a girl with fiery red hair was attached to the black-haired kid, sleeping peacefully.

Jeral quietly extricated himself from under Irene and stood up, stretching sore limbs. He cast a cursory glance towards the front of the cabin and found the huge men still standing there impassively, though they may have been different than before. He couldn’t tell – but his mind dismissed it without a second thought. His CD player had run out of batteries though, and he was set upon by a sudden boredom. He looked around and noticed for the first time cabinets above the seats. He opened one and looked inside to find that it was a sleeping compartment instead of just a storage area.

“Oh, look at that.” A sleepy voice murmured from behind him. He turned to find Irene standing wearily. He blushed. “I had hoped not to wake you.”

“Oh, don’t worry about it too much. I wasn’t that far asleep anyway. We drove through a security checkpoint about an hour ago, and I woke up to the bright lights.” She looked at the cabinet, appraising its volume. “Wonder if it’d hold both of us?”

He turned crimson as ideas raced through his head, but in the dim light of the cabin she seemed not to notice. “I suppose so…looks pretty roomy.”

She yawned. “Alright then, you climb in first – I’m a little claustrophobic at times.” Jeral scrambled up onto the seat and then hesitated. He looked over at the uniformed men at the end of the bus. Their faces could have been made of bronze or blood-stained iron in the reddish light of the cabin. He hung back a second longer, then hoisted himself up into the bed. It was lightly padded on all sides, and there was a single large pillow in the center. Irene poked her head in and grinned. “Wow, kind of cozy in here, don’t you think?” Not waiting for a response, she rolled in with a feminine grace and settled in next to him, snuggling close.

Once again he found himself inextricably drawn to Irene. Her hair smelled like lotus petals, and he found himself putting his arms around her and drawing her nearer to him. She squirmed a little, but didn’t fight him, smiling enigmatically.

They touched lips, but did not kiss. Sleep rolled in like the fog over a moonlit bay, claiming them both within minutes.

[Falcon2001]

Jeral woke up and wondered where he was. He blinked, trying to clear away the strands of sleep from his blurry vision. The sight of Irene lying next to him brought the whole trip back into focus, and he relaxed. Outside the sleeping compartment he could hear people talking excitedly. Fumbling around in the dark for the catch, he felt Irene stir awake.

 

"So where are we?" she mumbled, rubbing her eyes. Jeral shrugged, finding the catch. "I'm about to go find out." he replied. He pushed the door of the little cubicle open and swung down onto the bus floor. The sun shone in through the large windows, and Jeral guessed it to be a little before noon. All around him more of the kids were already up and moving - he appeared to have slept in.

 

Suddenly he realized that one of the large men in the black suits was standing right next to him and looking around impassively. He looked slightly startled, wondering how he had managed to get so close to him without him noticing. Before he could give the matter much more thought, the big man started to talk.

 

"Prospective students of Oroborous Academy, your attention please." All over the bus groups of kids looked up with the same mildly shocked expression on their faces as Jeral had had. The pockets of conversation slowly died, and the only sound was that of the bus rolling along the road.

 

"We will be entering the school grounds in less than one hour. Before we reach the Academy, you will each be placed into a group of fellow students. We will select the leaders of these groups and then the leaders will each select another two people to serve as sub-captains. After the selections are complete, you will be assigned names for each of your groups."

 

Jeral raised his hand. "Sir, what is the purpose -" The man turned to face him. "No questions - you learn through action at the Academy." He seemed to hesitate, as if listening to something far away. "You are the first captain." The man turned and walked back to where he had been standing for - as far as Jeral could guess - several hours.

 

The kid with the shock of black hair quickly named himself a captain, as did a quiet looking kid that wore way too much clothing for this time of year. Jeral was at a loss as for what to do, standing silently as the two other captains quickly chose co-captains and started filling up their ranks. Soon there were only scattered clumps of people and two large groups. Jeral looked to the men in black for some sort of advice and recieved only a stony stare.

 

He shrugged. "Everyone who doesn't have a group, you're in mine." Kids began filtering in from all over the place, and soon he was standing in front of a ragged clump of mildly confused-looking guys and girls. "I need two co-captains." he said, looking around. Two people stepped forward with upraised hands. "Okay then, good. You two'll be the co-captains. Any arguments?" He looked around at the silence, then nodded. "Good, let's wait for our name assignment."

[Falcon2001]

Jeral was startled again as suddenly the man in black seemed to materialize again from nowhere, speaking with a loud voice. Wait - was this one different...he sounds different -

 

"The different name assignments are as follows: Jack is the leader of Clan Chimera. Lehrit is the leader of Clan Lotus, and Clan Phoenix is led by Jeral. If you have any issues with the name assignments, you will write them out and give them to your educational co-ordinators at the Clan meetings." With that he turned around and just melted back into the crowd.

 

Jeral tried to follow the man - he was huge, how could it be so difficult - but he was yanked around by Irene, who looked at him shyly. "I didn't know you were signed up to be a leader, Jeral," she asked, twirling a piece of hair around her finger. "You don't seem like the sort to be in command."

 

Jeral shook his head. "I'm not sure either, it's a very strange choice nonetheless. Either way we'll have to get some order together." He turned to his co-captains, but they were both focused on something out the window of the bus. Jack was the first one to notice.

 

"Hey, it's the school!" He shouted, and suddenly everyone was crowded over to the right side of the bus. Jeral momentarily had a vision of the bus tipping from the sudden weight transfer until he saw the school and suddenly his attention was completely contained by the building.

 

The Oroborous Academy was built partially into the bottom of a sheer cliff that looked as if a mountain had been cleaved in half, leaving a large flat plateau at the bottom. The sheer majesty of the gigantic rock wall silenced the students, sending them into awed silence as they were suddenly in its shadow. The buildings that clustered at the foot of the cliff were all extremely beautiful, seeming to be made of blue crystal or glass that refracted light at crazy angles to a beautiful effect. What wasn't blue crystal was a white marble that shone brilliantly.

 

Irene drew close to him and Jeral idly put his arm around her. "It's beautiful, Jeral." she breathed, staring delightedly at the shining buildings. He smiled and kept his thoughts to himself. For a split second before they drove across the bridge leading to the academy, the crystal buildings looked like the teeth of a giant trap, waiting for the students - then they drove back into the sun and it was innocence and sparkle again.

 

Jeral shrugged.

[Thomas the Lost]

Nice buddy! But I wonder who Jeral is modeled after......

[Falcon2001]

"As explained by Sir Marvin in his eighteenth-century treatise on magicks and arcanum, the various pagan realms have merely been channeling residual energy from the earth's magnetic field - Jeral!" Professor Hayden's voice snapped across the room like a whipcrack, jarring Jeral out of his revery.

 

"Uh, oh. Sorry sir." He said, staring directly down at the textbook. The writing was clear and technical, but the images looked almost in stark contrast to the text. Symbols were scrawled across the pages, letters and phrases in a language that made Jeral's mind quiver oddly when he tried to read them. Deciding that the book wasn't much less uncomfortable than the teacher, he brought his gaze up.

 

Professor Hayden was an average individual by almost all accounts. His face was average, his height was just a little shorter than Jeral, his hair was of a mediocre cut and he was clean shaven. His body was of a medium build, his clothing neither stood out nor was sneaky, and his eyes were a smoky brown color. However, his hair stood out, a blindingly pure white even though he appeared to be in his mid-thirties. However mediocre his overall appearance was, though, it was difficult to keep his gaze for more a few seconds without feeling like electricity was trying to crawl up your spine.

 

"Mr. Jeral, perhaps you'd care to explain to the rest of the students what Marvin's Second Law states about the properties of alchemical reactions?" the teacher asked, a thin smile on his lips. Shaking his head slightly, Jeral cleared his throat and began to recite in a monotone.

 

"The second law restates the law of energy conservation in magic. What energy is used in the reaction has to be made up with a sacrifice of some sort or with energy from the earth itself."

 

"Looks like you've been reading your texts more. So how much energy would a simple reaction such as boiling water take?"

 

Jeral paused, numbers running through his head. "It should take about 63 joules. That amount of energy can be drawn from the c-caster's own energy without any ill effect, though repeated use of it can result in fatigue or other side effects."

 

"Straight from the texts. Alright, class, you're dismissed." Professor Hayden grinned and turned back to his messy desk as students streamed out chatting eagerly amongst themselves. Jeral breathed a sigh of relief and absent-mindedly dusted off his jacket, moving back to his room.

 

--should be more soon, I know this is a bad update.--