The year 2500, Humanity as we know it ended many centuries ago.
"All marchents under age of 18 please report to the front" announced the robot. Robots took care of normal things like stores, restraunts, hospitals, buses and any other place where humans used to work. Humans are extinct, I refer to them as humans because that is not what we are.
We are called marchants we arrived to this planet several years ago after we made sure Humanity is gone because the seventh marches was collapsing and we didn't have enough time to test the global arena of this planet.
We landed not many kids were made merchants reproduce extremely slow. Any child that was born a full merchant on earth was close to a miracle. Something changed when we arrived to this atmosphere.
We could do things no merchants could but they say to every gift there is a sacrifice. A power source to keep everything in the Universe even. I, Nova, daughter of Allias and Drain of the seventh marsh am that sacrifice and this is my story....
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I walked in the line of marching kids towards the robot that was supposed to give us our mark. All Merchants had to be marked into their groups before age of 18. There were the Patriots (bronze) , Seekers and the( silver), and the Megas( gold). Megas were very rare, so that each 200 years one mega was born to take along this sacrifice. Megas weren't exactly treated like equals and not in the good way If you might ask. Megas were hated by all other groups because they were diffrent, more powerful.
No act of harm was ever made towards them not that they stuck around long enough. Megas were handed to nature to fuel the power source . Without the power source we would all collapse into nothing. It's a big tree that gets planted and each new merchant that is born is born inside the tree(no there is no pregnancy like humans) and each one of the merchants that die is also planted in the tree. Each 200 years it needs a new fuel where an mega would come and save us all. Why do we hate Megas this much well that's because no one is really willing to give up their life to a tree so that the rest can live. I mean once you ask them they'll say it's an honor to be a sacrifice but when it comes to it no ones really willing. Remember when I said something changed when we landed on earth well here it is the widow tree( the power source) was glowing gold diffrent from it's normal metallic color . Has that happened before? No, but many of our wisdom merchants (200 years old, merchants have a really long life span) say that it's a sign that a new Mega has been born. Do I believe that? I mean why wouldn't I? That's why we are being checked early this year. This year not only kids turning 18 are labelled but any kid older than 12 which includes myself being 15.
"Next Specimen" the robot ordered.
" Astra daughter of Octavias . blonde hair. blue eyes. 15 years old . Height 5'4." she stated. Astra was my bestfriend since we were 2 years old we grew up together and fled to earth together because our fathers were siblings so she is technically my cousin.
"Patriot - bronze" the robot stated and stamped her arm with a bronze flag and she left the line. now it was my turn. I took a deep breath and stepped forward towards the machine. I always get nervous when I'm in the spotlight considering every merchant above and under the age 18 was watching me getting labelled.
" Next speciman"
" Nova daughter of Drain. Brown hair, hazel gold eyes, 15 years old , height 5'6 " I stated.I had nothing to worry about both my parents were seekers ( silvers) and you inheriet your label from your parents. The robot stayed calm for a few seconds digesting the information I gave.
"Patriot( bronze)--ssseeker(silverr)-- gold gold.
error, error" the robot started malfunctioning and completly shut down infront of me. I could hear everyone's gasps erupt only to be interrupted by mother Alas.She was the mayor or president or whatever they called the person in charge of the continent. We called her mother because she gave all the orders and everyone followed her orders just like a child followed their mothers orders.
" We will see what the problom is but for now all labelled children follow robot ZA to be distributed into your labels. Seekers and Patriots you may go fulfil your duties tomorow at this same time we will continue labelling the remaining, for now those who are unlabeled please follow me" she ordered motioning her arms towards us.
I saw that the crowd slowly disappeared and I took a glance to see my father reasuringly nodding. I turned my head towards the labelled to see Astra but she was long gone. Why did the robot have to malfunction on me why couldnt I be labelled and then he could break, dissolve, melt for all I care. The gasps and murmuring slowly disappeared replaced with utter silence only the sound of our feet stomping on the floor. Everyone knew if mother was calm everything was going to be okey. That's how much we trusted her. If she told us to jump in an air hole trust me we would've.
I couldn"t make out where we were heading since planet earth is not our original home. only our greatest elders have traveled to the planet hundreds of years ago while humanity still existed that's how we knew about this planet until a deadly virus wiped out humanity completly. After 2 minutes of walking we arrived at a long stair case where mother motioned for us to go down. of course no questions were dared to be asked not like anybody would question mother but those who did were banished in the galaxies and never heard of again. So you wouldn't know if we obeyed her now because we were scared of get or that we truly trusted her. I didn't care to think about it. I did what mum and dad always told ms ' do as you're told, dont ask any questions, dont reveal anything about yourself unless asked' their voice was carved in my mind from the many times I heard that.
We headed down the stairs in a long file line until we arrived at double doors which we also crossed to find a long hall filled with beds rows and rows of beds with white sheets. Each bed had a panel on top of it with a number, our specimen order. I looked for number 102. After I found it I sat on the bed and waited for everyone to settle down so we could listen to our next instructions.
"Meals will be given to you in aproxamily 3 debors"( one hour in earth time) at least I think it's one hour. but that didn't matter I wasn't hungry anyway. I layed in the bed my face towards the white chipped ceiling. I thought about the jobs that Patriots and seekers do. No one ever tells the "underage' about our community we are taught simple course methods( math, science of planets and galaxies, communication, and how to control our powers that we were forbidden to use outside of the classroom until we become of age). Mother forbid us from knowing to reinforce discipline and yet again no one daired to question mother's decisions. So that's how it's been for as long as I can remember we go to school and our parents do their assignments and we meet at meals and special meetings with mother.
The meals soon started to get passed out. Everyone ate in silence as the robots passed out plates of food. I got up from my bed and sat like everyone else, as the robot approached me and set a table and organized the food on it.
These robots fascinated me I mean we had more advanced technology back in the matches but we couldn't get close to any of it. This is the closest I've ever got to smart technology. Humans really outdid themselves with this invention considering they don't have any special abilities to serve themselves so they use technology to serve them. Even our brain structure us diffrent from humans it works much faster and has more capacity so I remember things from when I was 1 years old. So you could say we are a lot smarter. Considering our ancestors used to travel to earth amongst humans to study their life style and planet to make ours better. We blended very easily between them infact you cant tell the diffrence between a human and merchant by just looking at them.
I ate my food in silence as the robots came back for round two to take the plates and tables back. I finished my food quickly because I knew that if one of the unlabeled didn't eat that would just drag attention which I dont need. I watched the robots carefully and how they moved from bed to bed cleaning and my expectations were correct they were checking if the plates were empty or not. As they came to the last beds and headed out of the long hall all the lights were shut which meant bed time. Merchants are very strict back in the seventh March we all had to wake up at the same time and sleep at the same time. It was a daily schedule which we were used to. I drifted off to sleep (which we really didn't need to function but mother always said those who are underaged need a lot of rest to fully grow.
I hoped for the best tomorow and prayed that I was in Patriots with Aster but that was highly unlikely since both my parents are seekers but you know labels are genes so I might just get lucky enough to get my uncles label. I crossed my fingers and everything went black.
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