Shaun sits down between me and Melody, and is greeted by her friendly smile and four confused faces.

"So, Shaun needed a place to sit and I offered this extra seat beside us," I give them a warning look. "It was really nice of him to stick up for melody, wasn't it?"

"Mmhm."

"Yep."

"Sure was!"

"Oh yes."

"Well, uh, thanks Aria," Shaun says awkwardly.

"No probl-" My reply is cut off by the speaker.

"Chosen! Welcome! Things have been a bit slow lately I admit, but now it's time to get a move on! We have one test to administer before we announce how many of you are left in the 'competition,'" He does air quotes with the word competition. "Although I'm sure you're all able to figure that out from looking at the attendance," he laughs as if he had just told the funniest joke in the world, and an awkward, forced laugh ripples through the crowd.

"Now, you know that when you start fights you're forced to leave, but still that doesn't give us a definite that you're not prone to violence when angered. The abilities can be very sensitive, and you wouldn't want anyone to have a Hulk-like response," He grins.

"My sister isn't exactly prone to violence but still kinda Hulk-like when she's mad. Which is, you know, all the time," Shaun whispers to me.

I burst out laughing, gaining me strange looks from everyone around me. I sink lower in my seat and avert my attention away from Shaun and back towards the speaker.

"So if you'll make your way to your cylinders, we can begin!" He steps down from the podium and walks off the stage and out the door, beckoning for us to follow.

On the walk down the hall Nate runs up to me.

"So what's the deal with him?" He sends a quick nod in Shaun's direction.

"The deal with him? What do you mean?" I ask.

"He's never even spoken to us the whole time we've been here, and all the sudden he's like what? Your new best friend? Plus, look at his sister. People who are related are similar you know!"

"Woah, Nate, what're you talking about? I just asked him if he wanted to sit with us! It was the nice thing to do, and I wanted to thank him."

"Yeah? He didn't do much to deserve a thank you," Nate rolls his eyes.

"What? Nate, he was being nice to Melody after she started to cry."

"Siblings fight all the time, it's not that big of a deal, Aria."

"Yeah, but-"

"We're here, gotta go, bye," He stalks off into the big, white walled room.

"What is up with you today?" I mumble.

People fan out through the room in search of their cylinder. You can't just choose a random one, you need to use the same one every time. They work a little different for different people I guess. If you try using someone else's, it refuses to turn on and starts counting down from 100. One kid waited for the count down to finish before stepping out, and we found out that after those 100 seconds, it calls the guards; and let me tell you, they're not happy when they have to come all the way down here.

I step into my cylinder and look around. Three tiny, round black disks are attached to three wires coming down from the top of my cylinder. The walls light up and instructions are given as to what to do. I step forward and as it said, let the disks attach themselves to my forehead.

"Okay, think happy thoughts! Don't be mad at anyone, no matter how annoying! Don't think about whatever has Nate so upset!" I say to myself.

The walls then turn grey and black numbers appear. 5.. 4.. 3.. 2.. 1

*******

I'm in the middle of the sidewalk in a busy city. Taxis, cars, and buses drive by, and a few hover scooters fly by. I smile at a couple walking by. They look so familiar! I turn my attention to a group of teenagers on their hover scooters, again they look familiar. I try accessing my extra memories, but nothing comes to me.

"Hey you, move out of the way!" An angry voice yells.

I turn to see a man on a bike peddling as fast as possible towards me. I jump backwards, but I'm not fast enough. His front wheel slams into my side, sending him and me both sprawling to the ground, and his bike straight into a lamppost.

"Oh my leg!" I groan as I try to stand up but fail. My jeans are ripped and blood is soaking through.

"I can't believe this! My bike! I told you to get out of the way! Look what you've done!" The angry man stares at me in disgust.

I look at the all dents and scratches on the red and silver hybrid bike. It looks pretty messed up.

"I'm sorry, what?" I say in disbelief.

"You wrecked my bike you incompetent Idiot! You had better pay for a new one!"

"Excuse me? You rammed into me at a speed that could break the sound barrier, so I am very sorry if because of your actions you have a broken bike, but if anyone is going to pay someone, it should be you paying me for my hospital bills! I think you broke my leg!"

"How dare you accuse me of such preposterous things!" He stalks off leaving his mangled bike laying beside me.

I stare after him for a few minutes wondering what in the world that was about.
Suddenly the pain in my leg disappears and the sound of an eagle's screech comes from behind me. I turn around to see, not a busy city's street, but an open field bordered by a thick tree line on one side and a bubbling river on the other. The sky is blue and purple, and you can see the sun just beginning to set over the tops of the trees. I hear the eagle scream again and look overhead. It swoops down with a fish, probably just caught from the river, and lands in a nest on one of the highest trees. I walk closer to hear the barely noticeable chirps and squawks of three tiny eaglets cuddling under their mothers wingspan.

I hear the sound of a gunshot, and turn around to see two boys with shotguns aiming at the nest.

"Hey! Hey, cut it out!" I yell.

They rolls their eyes and go back to what they were doing.

"Stop it! I scream. "You're going to hurt them!"

"That's the point!" One of them sneers. The other takes one more shot and hits the mother.

"No!" I scream. "Look what you did!"

They aim again, and I look down to see a small black rock at my feet. I grab the rock and raise my arm to hurl it at his gun, hoping it will knock it out of his hands and not caring if it hits him instead, but then I stop.

"Relax, don't be angry, don't react," The voice in my head whispers.

"Why not?" I say out loud. "Why not!" I slowly put the rock back down on the ground and run towards the tree. I grab onto the lowest branch and hoist myself up onto it. I keep going as far up as I can, until I'm just a few feet from the distressed eaglets.

"What're you gonna do now?" I yell. "You can't shoot now, can you?"

"That's just a matter of opinion, isn't it?" He yells back.

My vision gradually goes black and all I can hear is the ringing in my ears. Suddenly I'm standing in a driveway next to my friends.

"I can't believe your parents bought you this!" Anna squeals pointing to a new yellow Lamborghini.

"Yeah, me either..." I say slowly. This doesn't make sense, my parents would never buy me a car like this! Such a waste of money...

"Can we drive it now?" Laura asks.

"I haven't seen you guys in so long..." I whisper.

"What're you talking about? We had a sleepover last night!" Anna laughs.

"Oh, yes of course," I say slowly as the memories come back. "We had a pillow fight and made chocolate chip cookies, right?"

"Yes, now let's go!" Laura exclaims.

"Okay!" I grin, feeling calm again.

I jump into the drivers seat and wait for Anna and Laura to get in.

"Where's Carrie?" I ask once they've both buckled their seat belts.

"She's on vacation," Laura replies with a funny look on her face. "Are you okay? She's been gone for like two weeks now!"

"I.. Yeah I knew that," I laugh. "Just messing with you!" I start the car and drive down the driveway. We sing to the radio as I drive. We stop at an intersection, and I slow down to stop and look to the side. An eighteen wheeler is barreling down the freeway with no sign of stopping.

"What are they doing?" Anna says in panic from the seat beside me. In the backseat Laura watches wide eyed. All of the sudden the truck turns on a dime and heads straight towards us.

"Out of the car!" Anna screams and throws off her seatbelt. The world seems to move in slow motion until I look up to see that I'm not in the car, I'm sitting on the ground beside it. The whole front of my car is smashed in.
I turn around to see Anna and Laura both screaming. When did I get out of the car? The truck driver jumps out and whips her blond hair out of her ponytail.

"Ah shoot, I missed you!" Comes the squeaky annoying voice.

"Clair? What? We could've died," I say. I look down to see a crowbar by my side. I stare at it for a while but then look back up at her.

"Why?" I ask.

"Aren't you mad?" She sneers. "I almost killed your friends! I bet you just want to kill me now, don't you?"

"No, no I'm sorry I don't," I say quietly. I know if she endangered my friends I'd normally be outraged, but It doesn't feel real. They're okay, nothing is going to hurt them.

The world starts to fade away again.

*******

"Welcome back," says a robotic voice.

I look around in confusion. I'm in my cylinder. Anna's not here, nor is Laura.

"What was that?" I ask.

"That," says the voice, "was a simulation. Aria Parker, you passed."

"Thanks," I smile slightly.

"You are welcome!" The voice say with robotic enthusiasm. "Please proceed back to Gymnasium three."

"Okay, see you later," I open the cylinder and walk away with a grin on my face. I passed, I'm not going anywhere.