The Lexington Imaging Center was a squat building that sat about a mile away from the Academy for Gifted Children. The trip was only two minutes by taxi, but the awkward silence in the car made it seem like ten. Kenny could barely keep her eyes open throughout the ride, despite having slept for almost fifteen hours. Had not Miss Kaylee promised that she would answer the young girl's questions today, Kenny probably would have refused to come that morning. But Miss Kaylee did promise, and there Kenny stood in front of that small, fat building before the sun itself was up.

Miss Kaylee opened the door and hurried Kenny inside. It was 6:10, which meant they were late for their appointment with Dr. Kane. A woman sitting at a desk looked up at the two as the bell in the door tinkled above their heads. Her eyes lit up and she gasped, "Dr. Anderson! You haven't come to visit in forever!"

Miss Kaylee responded with, "Hello, Meredith! I would love to stay and chat, but we're late for our appointment with Dr. Kane."

The woman called Meredith nodded. "Yes, we were expecting you ten minutes ago. Is this Kendall?"

Kenny looked up from the floor and nodded to answer the woman's question.

"Great! Just follow me...."

Meredith got up from her desk and opened the door beside her. She led Kenny and Miss Kaylee down a thin green hallway. Kenny peered into one of the rooms to find a CT scanner, and a mammography machine sat in another room across the hall. The building seemed to be empty except for Meredith and the aforementioned Dr. Kane.

Meredith paused at a small room and opened the door. Inside were hospital gowns piled one on top of another. She took one of the gowns out of the closet and handed it to Kenny.

"That's the smallest we have, sorry. We don't get too many children your age around here. You can change in the bathroom."

Meredith led Kenny to the bathroom and unlocked the door. The young girl quickly went inside, trying to hurry. She pulled off her clothes as fast as she could and put the gown on. Tying the strings at the back wasn't an easy job, especially because Kenny could barely keep her eyes open, but she managed to secure a knot.

Kenny came out of the bathroom, and Meredith took her clothes from her. "Now we just have to put your clothes into a locker and you're all set to go into the machine."

Kenny watched as Meredith did exactly as she said she would; she placed Kenny's clothes in a small metal compartment then locked it with a key. When she finished, the woman gave Kenny a small pouch with earbuds in it. The young girl stuffed the pieces of Styrofoam in her ears as Meredith led Miss Kaylee and the young girl into the room farthest down the hall.

"Here we are. The MRI Scanning Room," Meredith said as she opened the door.

The walls of the room were a pale orange, and pictures of flower meadows and puppies were hung all around. In the center of the space sat a large machine that looked like a donut. A long piece of plastic jutted out from the donut hole. Kenny realized that would be where she laid down as she was inserted into the machine.

"Will I be able to stay in the room with her?" Miss Kaylee asked.

"As she's being scanned? Of course!" Meredith replied. "We advise parents and guardians to stay with their children, especially when their kids are as small as Kendall here."

The woman turned to Kenny. "Kendall, you have to stay really still in the machine. If you move, the picture will come out blurry, and we might have to do the scan over again. The bed you'll be lying on will move throughout the scan, and the noises made by the machine can get a bit loud. However, it is important that you don't move no matter what. Dr. Anderson will be with you the whole time and I can speak with you through that intercom on the wall."

Meredith pointed to a small square box that hung in a corner. She smiled at Kenny and asked, "Now, are we ready to start?"

Kenny nodded, anxious to be done with the scan already. Meredith helped the young girl onto the bed and made sure she was comfortable.

Miss Kaylee stepped up beside the woman. "Bye, Kendall! See you soon."

The bed moved into the machine, and the MRI scan commenced.

****

"That wasn't too bad, was it?"

Meredith and Miss Kaylee were waiting for Kenny when she came out of the MRI scanner. She shook her head in response to the radiology technician's question. The scan had taken about forty minutes, and the young girl spent most of the time thinking up questions to ask Miss Kaylee when she was done. She was much more alert now and wanted nothing more than to get answers.

"You can change back into your clothes now," Meredith told Kenny. "Dr. Kane just has to analyze the MRI and tell you the results. It doesn't take long."

Kenny hopped down from the machine and stretched. Meredith left the room to talk to Dr. Kane and Miss Kaylee took the young girl to the bathroom. Kenny absentmindedly changed out of her gown, thinking over what Color had told her the day before. She knew the MRI had been on her brain but she wasn't sure what they were looking for.

What had Color called the fold on Gifted people's brains? The C-area? The E-area? The young girl racked her brain but she couldn't seem to remember.

Kenny came out of the bathroom and handed the johnny gown to Miss Kaylee. She pulled an index card out of her back pocket that read, Can you answer my questions now?

Miss Kaylee shook her head. "I won't be able to answer any questions until we get the results to your MRI scan. Here comes Dr. Kane now."

Kenny watched as Dr. Kane shook Miss Kaylee's hand. The man towered over her; he must have been at least six feet tall. "Dr. Anderson! We haven't seen you since you brought the little twins here."

Miss Kaylee smiled. "I'll try to visit more often, but right now, we have to stay on task. So what did the results look like? Is Kendall as Gifted as we thought?"

Dr. Kane looked down at the paper in his hand. "Yep. She's extraordinary. Her Z-area wasn't too hard to find."

Miss Kaylee let out a long sigh of relief which caused Kenny to frown slightly. What did Miss Kaylee have to be relieved about? Had she thought Kenny wasn't Gifted? If so, why was the young girl brought to the school?

I'll have to ask, Kenny told herself.

"Alright, I guess you guys have to go now," Dr. Kane said after a moment of chatting with Miss Kaylee. "Here's a copy of the MRI. I have to open the office soon."

Miss Kaylee said a quick goodbye to Dr. Kane and Meredith and led Kenny out of the imaging center. She called a taxi, and as the two waited, the woman asked Kenny if she had any questions. Kenny excitedly pulled out several of her cards. This was it! The time for answers had come.

The young girl pointed to the copy of her MRI then held up a card. What was that for?

Miss Kaylee thought for a moment before showing Kenny the MRI. She pointed to a small fold on the young girl's brain stem and said, "You see this? This line— fold— on your brain right here is something that most humans don't have. However, all Gifted people are born with this fold. It's called the Zhang's area, or the Z-area, named after the school's founder. Gifted people's abilities originate from this point in the brain."

"The larger your Z-area is, the more powerful you Gift is. For example, compare Color's Gift to the girl we saw yesterday, Flower's, Gift. Flower's Z-area is almost three times larger than Color's, which is why her Gift is slightly more prominent.

"Most children, however, don't need an MRI to know if they're Gifted. Gifts are passed down through families, but it's common for them to skip a generation or two. For example, the school's principal, Dr. Zhang, got his Gift from his grandfather. If your parents aren't Gifted, your grandparents or great-grandparents are. It rarely goes back any farther than that, which makes it easier to find most Gifted children."

Except for me, Kenny thought, frowning. I don't know who my parents or grandparents are. Kenny searched for an index card. She pointed to herself as she held up one that said, How did you find it?

Miss Kaylee analyzed the card then looked to Kenny. "How did we find your rib cage? Your lungs? Oh no, how did we find you? As I said before, Dr. Zhang inherited the Gift of something we call Gift Detection. He can sense when someone is Gifted, even if their Z-area is only nanometers long. He took a vacation to Snowcoast over the summer and, while he was there, he said he sensed that an incredibly Gifted person was there. That's why he sent me.

"I'm sure you've noticed by now that I'm not considered a teacher here. I never was a real teacher, and I'm not a doctor, either— I just have a Ph. D. I'm actually a school counselor and a Searcher, or someone who searches for Gifted children to bring to AGC. I wasn't the only Searcher sent to Snowcoast, of course, but I was the only one sent to Cute Cuddly Care. I was told to come back here after a month, with or without a Gifted child, but I refused to return to AGC. It was because of you, Kendall.

"I knew you were smart from the beginning of the school year. You would write down the right answers to all of the problems on the tests I'd give you, and then you would erase them as I watched. You did it with your homework, too; you would never fully erase the answer so I could see it plainly. I would've talked with you about it sooner, but I wasn't truly sure how intelligent you were until you solved those addition problems on the chalkboard about a week ago. Don't worry, there'll be no addition problems here. I promise you that you will get the education you need at AGC."

Kenny held up another card. Thank you. But if the woman had asked her to specify what she was thanking her for, she wouldn't have been able to say.

Thankfully, she didn't. Instead Miss Kaylee simply smiled at the young girl as their taxi pulled up to the curb. "It was my pleasure, Kendall. Now, we must hurry. Breakfast starts in less than an hour, and you still have to get your uniform, identification card, schedule, and dorm room assignment. You've been staying in a room we call the Not Determinable dorm, or the ND room, because we weren't sure if you were Gifted or not. Now that we have proof you are, in fact, Gifted, you can begin school today and start living like a regular student."

Miss Kaylee ushered Kenny into the taxi and the car drove off.