Going back to how works change draft to draft for those interested in the process, here is what our first "page" has become by my fourth draft:
In the illustrious one-hundred year history of the Institution
of Elements, Learning Academy and Nature Camp, there were few greater failures
than Isabel Soto.
Failure to stop her.
And, yes, failure to save her.
Not one single failure either.
Many failures rolled up into one human being.
Failures of such weight and magnitude that they
could not be excused as a simple mistake.
Nor could they be easily brushed aside or ignored. Nevertheless, they had tried that too,
placing her in the same lockbox where all the other misshapen and ill-fitting
broken toys from the many prominent societies of elemental civilization
resided.
It had a copacetic name that place: the Cleansing Sphere of Reform.
But Isabel Soto escaped.
And her misery congealed, still and dirty as
gutter water, unreformed and unrepentant.
It multiplied and festered, malignant.
Isabel Soto walked a twisted, gnarled path with blood splattered over
every curve and dead end. Her life and
choices grew darker and more desperate until…what could be done to rectify that
cemetery of wrongs? To heal those soul
deep wounds?
And what hope was there for ethos, pathos,
or logos to bridge a divide created by such frighteningly overpowering
magic?
Evelyn Strange, Head of the Infirmary, didn’t have
the answer. All she could do for now was
to maintain her always strained composure and carry on in her most unusual task. Even that was difficult. Frustrating too. Extra frustrating for a woman well familiar
with the emotion. Her mind was sharp and
her skills, both mundane and elemental, were honed and yet…it all eluded her.
She was not one to leave such answers to
others. One could easily claim her whole
life was about finding answers, specifically to questions teenagers
constantly asked of the world about how they could possibly make their lives
more difficult by inflicting injuries upon themselves and their peers. When Evelyn answered those questions,
the kids stayed safe. They healed. They grew.
They learned. They…turned into
slightly less idiotic adults.
An improvement, if a small one!
Evelyn had hardened her heart year after year for
her whole life preparing to answer those many questions, equally standing at
the ready for the next emergency crisis of blood and bone or a lazy malaise of
runny noses and sour stomachs. Few
situations at the Institution surprised her at this point—seven years keeping
King Henry Price in check will do that for a person—yet seeing one of her kids
in such a sad, deplorable state still somehow touched the empathy she’d tried
so hard to bury deep.
Empathy mixed with rage.
Rage built along the same dual line as those twin
failures.
Rage at what this child had done to her fellow
mancers.
Rage at Evelyn herself, for not pushing harder
when they might have prevented all that murder and mayhem.
Evelyn knew all the symptoms and signs, had seen
the signs of that great enemy many times in the nearly two decades she’d served
as Head of the Infirmary.
Anima Madness.
And all its recognized stages.
Dormant. Progressive. Dominant-Subverting. Converted.
She had recorded them dutifully into her student
medical database, forwarding all information to Administration just as the
school bylaws ordered, but nothing more.
Keep them healthy and happy, Evelyn dear, that’s the job I place at
your feet! the Lady had said upon Evelyn accepting her position those many years
ago.
Happy?
Me?
A cackle sounded.
Point made, point well made!
Can you at least restrain your natural inclinations and not make them
feel too guilty while you stitch them back together? For me?
And so I don’t have to deal with phone calls from angry parents?
Evelyn had…mostly.
For whole days. Maybe a week here
or there.
Okay, so she hadn’t strangled anyone yet…that
qualified as restraint, didn’t it?
Funnily enough, I did restrain a few of them,
but they brought it on themselves with all that whining!
Anima Madness might not have been in her purview,
but it was inescapable. Question
without an answer though it might be, worse than Isabel Soto’s dilemma. She’d petitioned for classes on the signs and
symptoms, for educational pamphlets, for a club where the students could freely
talk about how Anima Personalization affected their lives. We have therapists for just this reason,
Evelyn dear, and we wouldn’t want to unduly scare the children, would we?
Her hands balled up into fists at her side. Evelyn knew she was…grouchy. On her best days. Curmudgeonly on her worst. Winter War especially, when they let her kids
hurt each other just for tradition and entertainment, so parents could beam
over victories and crow during the Old Mancy party circuits. But this newborn rage waling inside of her…
Evelyn felt reversed.
Inverted.
Not with days and weeks of peace either, but
merely spare hours at best.
The why frustrated as much as the rest, but
she knew exactly when it happened.
That battlefield.
Eureka.
A victory, they all crowed, as loud as those
parents after Winter War.
