Bright lights.

Flashing.

Pain.

Hurting.

Shock.

Shaking.

Talk.

Screaming.

Death.

Clapping?

April roused from her daze as the noise of thunderous (or maybe not thunderous) applause brought her to her senses as she puzzled out when and where she was. She peered curiously at her surroundings, straining to see over the heads of the people who were sitting in front of her and eventually catching a glimpse of a procession of adults of various races, genders and builds all dressed in the different shades of the same ill-fitting shimmering silver robe. While some people were clothed in bright silver, the more mature-looking teens wore a duller, darker shade. As the adult teachers (who had shiny silver coloured robes, albeit more decorative ones with touches of murky grey) ascended the steps onto a raised stage, she noticed that the stage was also the same shimmering silver colour, so it looked like there were just a bunch of heads floating across the wall. April let out a small snort, and the person next to her gave her a funny look.

"What're you laughing at?" The girl had a friendly looking face, with smiling blue eyes that complemented the casual blue dress she wore. Her hair looked a bit mussed, but April wasn't really one to judge by appearances, especially since she herself hadn't cared about her own looks for the past few months. Remembering why, she sighed.

"Nothing, really," She should probably pay attention to the people on the stage, but it sounded like they were just giving some sort of welcome speech. "What's your name?"

"Lia. You?"

"April," Glancing around the big hall she appeared to have been brought to after dropping her stuff in her room, she noticed that the whole hall was actually made of the silver stuff. And the vast majority of people in the hall were wearing something silver. Twisting in her hard plastic seat she gaped at the vast number of people in the hall. There must have been at least 30,000 people! The other girl, Lia turned and surveyed the swathes of people with a tense grin.

"Cool. There are, like, a lot of them, aren't there?" Lia gulped, indicating the amassed crowd. "Where do they even get the funding for all this?!"

"I don't know- I hope not us!" Both girls chuckled nervously, both of them hoping that 'all this' meant a real-life Hogwarts, and not a mega-asylum.

"And would all the people who are having a chat with their buddies please quieten down because this is the important part of my welcome speech," Both girls covered their ears futilely as the person up the front of the hall turned up the volume of her microphone. "That's better.

"So today we have in this audience about 26 thousand people- so almost all the inhabitants of this Australian training course for people with, let's say, 'special' skills- teenagers who, at the age of thirteen or fourteen, discovered strange occurrences in their lives. I will be mainly aiming my address at the thirteen and fourteen year olds, but the older students of fifteen to eighteen may also find this reminder useful. To begin with, my name is Ms Whitbourne, and I am the supreme principal of this school.

"Many of you will have noted with some surprise the size of the crowd here, yet in a world of seven billion people, 30 million potential Benders is far less than one percent of the population. Considering we can only, or have only trained about 15 million Benders, the percentage becomes even smaller. So with these statistics in mind, you can see actually how little people are here- relatively. There are about seventy or so other institutions such as this spread around, to accommodate for different language groups and cultures.

"Yet the number of people here is still overwhelming, and many of our young students are in a state of confusion about what to do, where to go to, and if they are even, in fact, sane. So I appeal to our older students to take care around the younger students- and do not, I repeat, do not play pranks on them. Punishments will be severe. And for our new students, there is a panel on your wall that slides off to reveal a screen that will give you instructions when you get back to your room. You have two days of freedom before school begins, but there are rules, and if you break them there will be consequences.

"Now, this assembly is too big to be kept still and quiet for long, and undoubtably some of you have ignored everything I have said so far. So if your neighbour is talking, please poke them and tell them to listen. To summarise; there are lots of people. You are not mad. No rule breaking. You have two free days before school starts. No, there is no wifi. The panel on your wall slides off, and the screen underneath will tell you what to do. Do not just get up and walk out- the staff members you will notice stationed about the room will show you the fastest way out. Goodbye students, and to the new students, I wish you welcome,"