The Selected |Weekly Updates|

Chapter Eleven

"How long have you been standing by the door, Valerie?" He asks me calmly. And even the little me knows that he is not angry. "Did you hear everything?" The younger self nods the head. Dominic sighs loudly, agitation sipping in his bones and mind. "Sebastian... Even Victor..." He trails off. "They did not mean it." He whispers gently. "They are both blinded by the grief."

"But I did not kill them!" My younger self shouts loudly. I watch with sadness as power starts slipping out of my tender control. "I tried to stop Caroline. I told her! She would not listen!" I cry out once again, slight tremble going through the ground, gently shaking the entire building.

"I know." Dominic smiles at me. "I believe you, Valerie." He adds with another smile. "Despite what Camilla says, you have never hurt anyone before, only yourself." He states as the matter of fact. "And no matter what they say, you are not a monster."

"How can you be so sure?" The younger me asks with tiredness. She falls down on the bed, looking powerlessly at Dominic.

"Because I know you, Valerie." He smiles at me gently. "And I knew your parents." I look at Dominic alarmed. I do not remember this aspect of dialogue. "They could not have  a monster for a child." He smiles again.

"Can you tell me more about them?" My younger self whispers with hope. "Please..."

"In a time, Valerie." He smiles at me again, getting up and approaching me, kneeling in front of me. "When you are older, and when you are ready I will tell you everything you want to know." He makes me a promise. "But for now... They were good people, powerful and determined. They were amazing." He smiles again and plants a soft kiss on the top of my head, on my hair.

"Are they dead?" He looks at little me alarmed. "You keep saying that they were amazing..." Little me whispers in barely audible tone. "It must mean that they are dead."

"Yes." He answers after hesitation. I can see sadness in his eyes, something broken inside. "They died long ago..." He turns around walking towards the bedroom door. "Good night, Valerie."

Little me nods, saying nothing more as she watches Dominic leave the room, closing the door behind him gently.

When I open my eyes, I do not speak. None of them say anything about what we all have seen just now. I can feel someone putting their hand on my shoulder, squeezing it slightly.

"I know that you don't understand it now." I whisper in low voice, but I am sure that they all hear me. "But they are all part of the story. You won't be able to understand the whole story of The Competition without memories of the before."

"I know." Santi whispers with sad smile. "Some of the things now do add up." They state with small smirk. "Like Victor's sudden brutality and Sebastian's coldness. So many people died because of them..."

"I don't understand." Derek talks up for the first time since all these began. "Who is Caroline?"

"She was Victor's daughter." I whisper as I stand up, flexing slightly. "She died during one of the missions." I click my tongue. "I was with her. But we were not alone." I add after slight hesitation. "I was only six back then." I state carefully.

"Six?" Anne gasps out. "And they sent you out on the mission?!" She fumes out. I chuckle at her reaction.

"Yeah, it is a long story though." I whisper as I start walking around the room. "Anyways, she died because of a monster, it was S class monster. I told her that she would not survive it." I push my hair behind my back, tugging it slightly. "She would not listen. She wanted to prove them wrong, to show them that she was more powerful. She was only sixteen. She did not know better. But we were kids, too."

"We?" Beth asks confused. "Who we?"

"None of them are alive today." I shrug my shoulders. "We were five. Me, Marcos, Caroline, Isaac and Joseph." Santi smiles at the mention of the names. They know every one of them, but Caroline. "We were all the members of The Section Five." I state with tiredness. "originally Fifth Section was created for soldiers and it mattered not how old you were, you were sent out on the missions with the rest of them. We always were one big family that always worked together."

"Section five?" Ryle, Anne's Assistant asks bewildered. His flaming red hair is down on his face, covering his brown eye, while the green one is staring at me. "What were their powers? I will do the research later today on them, I feel like a lot of connected to them."

"Sure." I nod at him. Here people are rarely written down by their full names, but they chosen names and powers, sections and positions. No one here cares who you were before you came in School. The only thing that mattered was who you became after arriving. "Marcos power... He called it Nail Manipulation. He could create nails, any size of them and control them." He nods. "Um, Joseph, he could manipulate tachyons."

"I will do research on that one." Ryle comments as he motions for me to continue talking. He is writing everything down in small paper. "Do go on."

"Yeah, right." I mumble. "Caroline had the power of Illusions, though she could solidify them for certain amount of time and use them in battles. While Isaac..." I smile at the mention of his name. Isaac was closest to me in age, someone I could easily relate to. Someone, who was child himself. "Isaac had Radiation Manipulation."

"Alright." Ryle nods. "Did they participate in The competition?" He asks as he puts the paper in his pocket.

"Yeah." I smile fondly. "They were beasts. We were only five during the competition." I shrug my shoulders. "Me, Marcos, Isaac, Joseph and Santi." I click my tongue. "It was so long ago... Santi still went by he/him back then..." I smile at them. Santi chuckles back.

"What about Dishi?" Anne looks at me confused. "I thought he was here during competition."

"No, he came after that." Santi shakes their head. "The timeline of all the things happening is confusing." They chuckle humorlessly. "But luckily, he did not take part in the bloodbath that took place that year."

"It was brutal." Dante nods his head. "And your Section was the reason of many deaths that year." He states with pale face. "I remember it now. After the results were known..." He whispers in a lower tone. "Only your Section had no casualties."

"And our Section has the highest kill." I add with grim face. "I remember it, Dante." He shakes his head.

"No, Valerie." He whispers. "You did not just win. You won with thousand and two scores." His sentence silences everything around us. Thousand and two.

"You killed that many students?" Anne whispers in a low voice, eyes wide open.

"No." Santi shakes their head. "There were not only students, Anne." They state annoyed. "There were monsters, too." I can sense the calmness washing over the room. "But it still was a lot. The second place holder only had four hundred and ten."

"What did you guys do?" Derek asks and chuckles humorlessly.

"How many students died that day?" Genevieve mumbles out. I look at her and smile with pity. Her doe like eyes are filled with fear and tears. Her tender body is shaking like a leaf. She is not destined for the battlefields, none of the healers are. They usually barely know how to fight, as they whole attention is on healing and not harming.

"Around twenty." I avoid her eyes. "It would be more if Aileen did not arrive, when she did. She managed to save most of them, but for some it was too late."