《Swan Colony》


 1.1

    1894 Perth, Australia


    "Damn students couldn''t tell the difference between a grass stain and pile of shit."


    Akio''s broom skittered across the floors. It was a Sunday morning, so the hallways were mostly empty until class would begin again. From a distance, it seemed like he was angry at the floor.


    "Fuck''n Anarchy. I''d kick''em in the groins if I had the option."


    Akio didn''t have the highest respect for his fellow classmates. Despite him being a senior, many students still looked down on him for being asian. Swooping at the ground, a pamphlet swept up to his head.


    SALLY: LOST DEVIANT: IF FOUND PLEASE RETURN


    Akio raised an eyebrow. He crumpled the pamphlet and tossed it to the nearby trash bin.


    Before going missing, Sally was infamous for her promiscuity. She''d slept around with several boys, and even a few teachers. More likely than not, Sally ran away due to the constant bullying.


    Akio almost returned to cleaning before someone tapped him on the shoulder. When he turned his head back, and a finger pressed against his cheek. "Chieeeeeeeeffff."


    Akio groaned aloud. The girl''s name was Jade. She was among the newest body of students in the Akademia. With Akio being a year senior to her, she was always a nuisance whenever they met.


    "Go away," Akio turned his back to her. "And stop calling me chief, only club members call me that."


    Jade stepped in front of him and smiled, "you said that I could become a member when I cleaned the courtyard. Guess what, chief, I just cleaned it up. That means you have to initiate me!".


    She grinned at him. Jade looked down at him with a confident smile as he squinted at her. Akio said, "I gave you that task an hour ago, you couldn''t possibly-"


    Jade tapped her finger over his lips, "shhhhhhhhh...... Don''t ask questions, sensei. That''s irrelevant."


    Akio glanced up for a moment. "You used your powers, didn''t you?"


    "Well you didn''t tell me not to."


    "Jade, I gave you that job to test your discipline. Using your powers defeats the purpose."


    "Well you should''ve told me that before I burned the courtyard!"


    "You burned the courtyard?"


    Jade pointed towards his nose. "I did exactly as you said. You owe me a committee spot!"Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.


    "I don''t owe you anything. I said I''d think about recruiting you if you cleaned up the courtyard. You cleaned it, but you cheated. Now I have even less reason to initiate you."


    Jade lowered her arms and pouted her lips. She would''ve been cute if she wasn''t such a pest. Despite him being her senior, Jade was a few centimeters taller than him. While people commonly mistook them booth as blood relatives, they both actually originated from two different nation states.


    Akio had enrolled a few years earlier after leaving his home country, Ezo. Coming to the school with scraps, Akio had to work twice as hard to prove himself worthy as the only asian scholar in an Australian school.


    Jade originated from Taiwan. Her state was occupied by the Taiping dynasty, and she actually derived from an aboriginal tribe that didn''t even speak Chinese.


    The only thing they had in common was that they were immigrants in Australia, but their worldviews couldn''t be further apart.


    "How could you not accept a deviant?" Jade growled out to him. Her foot tapped fast as she continued speaking. "For the first time in history, the colony is accepting deviant students. And you won''t even have one in your club?"


    "That''s exactly why I won''t have you in our club. Deviants are dangerous. We uphold the peace against your kind. We can''t keep things stable if we have to watch behind our back to see if you''ll explode."


    "I will not explode!" Jade shouted.


    Even their attires were opposite. Akio''s hair was a natural black raven color. He went out of his way to never stick out, and made sure that his black school uniform was kept clean and simple to forcefully blend in with the other students.


    Jade''s eyes were pink tinted, and so was her hair. Whereas most people were desperate to conform, Jade seemed content with desperately trying to stick out in whatever way she could. Her uniform was taylor made with bright beads at the edges, shimmering extra colors that should''ve been against school policy.


    The school had relaxed its uniform policies ever since super powered children roamed the halls. Not only had Jade replaced her cuffs and buttons of panda-shaped pins and straps, she also marked her uniform with symbols. They were zodiac animals which were associated with China before the Taiping''s purges.


    "You just yelled at me," Akio said stopping in place. "I''ve had people throw trash at me and I still stayed calm. If some students you like garbage, how are you not going to want to kill them using your powers?"


    Jade cracked her knuckles, "I only need to kill one to get my point across." Akio gestured at her, proving his own point. Jade waved him off, "oh hush, you know I was kidding."


    Jade''s frame was tall and thin. She was well developed for her age, and was attractive to most boys in the school. Akio, however, was skinny to a sickly degree. People often belittled him for his size, bullying him and constantly implying that he was no better than a cripple.


    It was why he''d joined the Edict Enforcers. Being the only oriental student in Australia was difficult, but joining the club had earned him the foundation of friends who had all come to respect him. He was now president of said enforcers, and Jade was truly testing his patience.


    "All deviants are the same. You''re all dangerous. I can''t have one in my group."


    Akio returned to sweeping. Jade grabbed the broom and extruded green crystalline from her fists around the utensils. The broom entrenched into the floor, cementing the tool with bright emeralds encased around it.


    "I have complete control of my powers," Jade hissed. "I''ve arrested actual criminals in Taiwan. I''m experienced, you need me and you know it."


    Akio rolled his eyes. He pulled out a crystal from his pocket. He tapped the broom and disintegrated Jade''s crystalline into dust. "Look at what you did, your powers made dust, and now I have twice as much to clean as before. Which serves as a perfect example of how deviants only cause messes."


    Jade flung her hands back. A scream suddenly stretched across the hallways. Akio turned back and glared at Jade, to which she said, "that wasn''t me!"


    The scream sounded off again. This time Akio dropped his broom and sprinted towards it. Jade followed behind him.

 1.2

    "Don''t follow me," Akio ordered.


    "No."


    "I''ll let you join if you stop following me!"


    "That''s not going to work this time! I won''t follow orders until after you let me join the team."


    Akio grumbled at her, but stayed quiet as she followed his pace. Running through the hallways, Akio could barely recognize the place. The school was once falling apart. Paint withered off of the walls, ceramic tiles were broken. There was nothing to boast about the school except empty space and quietness.


    Now it seemed like an entirely different building. New paint and trims decorated the walls. The metal doors were decorated with bronze window frames, everything about the school had changed over the course of the summer.


    And with his help, it was kept clean too. Jade, without knowing the difference from last year, asked aloud, "who the heck cleans this stuff?"


    Akio only smirked proudly towards her. By the time they reached the source of the sound, Akio and Jade found themselves at the front of the girl''s shower room locker hall.


    "Shit," Akio said patting his head.


    Jade squinted at him, "you''re kidding, right? You can''t do your job because of a girl''s sign?"


    Akio hissed, "last year girls couldn''t enroll, this wasn''t a problem until now!"


    It was true. As well as this being the first year that deviants were allowed to enroll, it was also the first year that girls were allowed to enroll as well. With it previously being a non-deviant, all boys school, Akio''s stature as president of the Edict Committee became all the more important. With his reputation on the line, he could neither go inside nor do nothing as the victim cried for help.


    Jade pointed a thumb to herself, "don''t worry chief, I''ll handle this one."


    Akio bit his lip. He couldn''t protest. He didn''t even have other girls on the committee. Jade stepped inside the steam filled room. Closing the door behind her, her eyes widened at the sight of the shower room walls.


    Splashes of black liquid covered the wall and ceilings. A skank smell filled the room with hot gases and heat. The floor was covered in tar. Rather than the shower section being clean with soap and water, it felt like a swamp had rolled over the room, intoxicating the area with a disnausiating aura.


    Jade crouched down and tapped her finger tips against the black muck, "what is this?"


    "Help!" A girl yelled from behind. Jade looked over and her eyes widened in shock. It was a girl, stripped naked with nothing but a bathroom towel covering her waist. Envy overtook her as she compared her own chest to hers. She was gorgeous, and Jade wanted to flaunt over her pristine skin and robust physique.


    "Hi," Jade said blushing.


    The girl pointed behind Jade, "he''s behind you!"


    Jade turned around and a whip of black muck slapped across her face. She stepped back as she rubbed across her cheek. Looking forward, a boy covered in checkerboard patterned marks stood in front of her.


    "Out of the way bitch," he said to Jade. "The little cunt had this coming."


    The boy was wearing a school uniform. Identical to Akio, except his jacket wasn''t buttoned, which revealed portions of his muscular chest. He was wider than Akio, and a swirl of black tar circled around his finger tips.


    Jade entered a strong stance and glared down at him. "Under the authority of the Edict Committee, you''re under arrest!"


    The boy raised an eyebrow at her. The checkered ink across his skin dissipated. Beneath it all revealed his natural white skin. His chin was square, and he had bright amber eyes with green and black striped hair in his bowl cut haircut.This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    "Guess that makes you a dickless tracey then, don''t it?" His voice came out like venom. The teeth on his grin looked sharp, like they were finely cut to mimic a shark''s mouth.


    Jade didn''t falter. "I don''t know why you did this, but I''m ending it!"


    The boy dispersed into a puddle of tar. He dropped to the floor and joined with the rest of the tar on the shower room floors. The toxic like liquid morphed into a balck cloud, and it pushed itself onto Jade''s body.


    Jade raised her fists to cover her face. Jade held still as the liquid wrapped around her body in a whirlwind of tar. Frustrated, he morphed back to normal and glared at Jade, "you''re a fucking deviant?"


    Jade stood up tall. Her body had become encased in solid rock to resist the toxins. She was a crystalline blue color, with an outer shield of rock resilient against whatever he could shoot at her.


    The attacker yelled, "since when the fuck were deviants cops?"


    "Since deviants like you exist," Jade pounded her fists together and charged towards him.


    Rather than fight, the boy morphed into an ink cloud and escaped from the locker room. He also made sure to throw ink at the victim''s face before leaving. Turning solid once more, he sprinted outside and crashed into Akio.


    Akio tumbled back. He pulled a crystal in his pocket and pointed it towards the assilaint. Glancing at him, Akio said, "Lockhart?"


    In the aether Akademia, the established rules were; every scholar learning the art of crystal programming was required to ''tame'' a single deviant in the school. That meant being assigned a deviant powered partner, and having complete responsibility over their learning and success within the Akademia.


    Lockhart was Akio''s deviant. The pair typically left each other alone, rarely speaking with each other and never truly interacting. But a few days earlier, they had entered their first argument.


    Akio looked down at the poster of Sally, "this won''t help her."


    He glared at him, "why the fuck not?"


    "Because nobody cares about her. When nobody cares, nobody helps. I could tell all the enforcers to look for her, and they wouldn''t do anything. I''m sorry, but this is just the way things work."


    Lockhart grabbed him by the collar, " you''re the fucking president! Its your job to give a damn!"


    Akio tapped his crystal against his hip. Lightning coursed through Lockhart as he recoiled back in pain. Akio said, "don''t tell me what to do. You''re a deviant, you''re supposed to do what I say. I''m telling you right now, no one is going to find this girl."


    Lockhart''s eyes glared deep into Akio. Rather than say anything, he morphed back into tar and shifted through the halls and away from them. Droplets of black ooze were left in his wake.


    Akio shouted out, "I just cleaned that!"


    Inside the locker room, Jade crouched down to the victim to offer her hand in aid. "I''m Jade. What''s your name?"


    The girl took her hand and stood up, "I''m Maria."


    "Do you know why he attacked you?"


    Maria hissed, "because all deviants are the monsters."


    Jade frowned. "I''m a deviant too."


    "Yeah, but you''re one of the useful ones."


    Jade frowned at her. It was a backhanded compliment. Jade unbuttoned her outer jacket and rested it over the girl''s shoulders. Jade said to her, "we''re all students here, and that means we''re all stuck together too. So help me help you. Are you sure there wasn''t a reason he attacked you? Anything helps."


    Maria glanced over to the side with her face red in shame. Her mindset against deviants was strong, but in the presence of someone being kind, it was hard to hate against that. Maria answered, "my thrall, the deviant I''m supposed to own... Ran away."


    "Ran away?" Jade thought for a second. "You mean Sally?"


    Maria nodded. "That bastard thought it was my fault."


    Jade bit her lip, "was it?"


    Maria glared directly at Jade, "what do you think?"


    Jade raised her hands back in defense. Before she could answer, she marched out of the locker room on her own. "I don''t need a fucking thrall telling me what to do!"


    Maria stomped out of the locker room with only a jacket and towel covering her body. Akio noticed her passing him, and his eyes widened from the near-naked sight of her. Maria didn''t break stride as she walked passed him. "Prick," she called out.


    Jade appeared behind him, and yanked at his ear, "stop gawking you minuscule pervert."


    "Ow," Akio said tilting his head back. "I can''t help it!"


    Jade rolled her eyes. Looking back at the destroyed locker room, she sighed aloud, "he got away."


    Akio looked over to the side. Lockhart dropped a poster of Sally before disappearing. Akio let out a sigh, "yeah he did."


    Jade stepped back and bowed down towards Akio, "I''m sorry, please give me another chance! I''ll catch the next one I swear!"


    Akio shook his head, "no I''m not doing that."


    Jade just repeated herself, "I''m sorry I swear I''ll do better."


    Akio shook his head harder, "let me rephrase that. You don''t get another chance because I''m letting you join."


    Jade''s head shot up, "excuse me?"


    "You''re right. We need someone like you. I wouldn''t have been able to capture him even if that sign wasn''t a problem. Deviants have to fight deviants with scholars like me supporting them. I''ll let you be our first deviant recruit, then I can recruit more if this works out."


    Jade almost shrieked with joy, "I won''t let you down chief!"


    "Please don''t call me that. But there is one condition in letting you join." He raised Sally''s poster towards Jade, "I need your help finding Sally."

 1.3

    Raj reached for another sip. Rosa pulled back the bottle and yelled, "not on my watch!"


    Raj leaned forward for the drink he couldn''t sip. He let out a groan, "if you''re going to torture me, just kill me instead."


    Rosa sneered. "You''re my teacher, its your job to supervise me until the job is done."


    "But I focus better with a drink." Raj leaned forward to reach for it, Rosa turned around and walked towards the classroom window. It took her some effort to unhinge the locks, but she quickly stretched the bottle outside.


    "No you don''t. You literally pass out after the second drink, and then give me an mark for effort. I''m here to learn, not be some token student for you to ignore."


    Rosa turned the drink over to spill it on the grassland outside. Raj watched in misery as his bottle became empty. "My whisky..."


    Rosa let out a deep deep breathe. Setting the bottle aside, she looked over to catch Raj escaping from the door. She rushed over to pull him back by the arm, "you''re not leaving me!"


    Rosa pulled his hand back, "you''re not leaving me!"


    Raj looked back and said, "at least swoon me before smothering me!"


    Rosa pulled her hand back in disgust, "don''t belittle me! You are to stay here until I finish my school work!"


    She pointed over to the wooden table at the edge of the classroom. A clay pot sat at its center. It was shaped like a kettle with water inside, and a colorless gem laid dormant inside.


    Raj said, "I''m pretty sure students are supposed to do what teachers say, not the other way around."


    "You haven''t earned enough respect to be treated as such."


    "Oof."


    "It''s your own fault. You keep on treating me like a child, but you''re never teaching me like an actual student. Each time you give me an assignment, you get inebriated by cheap whiskey, and use it as an excuse to leave me. And then I''m left here twiddling my thumbs like a nitwitted child!"


    "My whisky is not cheap."


    She grabbed him by the shirt collar and dragged him back to the table. His hips swayed as she pulled. He was only slightly taller than her, and Rosa had enough strength to drag him easily. It was gestures like this why people often mistook them both as siblings.


    Raj was often mistaken as a student. Despite being a young adult, he was often mistaken as a teenage boy. He finished school earlier than most, so being a part of the school staff came off as unusual. It didn''t help that he still wore the standard school uniform. He kept on dress pants and a dress shirt. He enjoyed wearing the jacket tuxedo because it made him look taller and more broad shouldered than he naturally was.


    Rosa''s uniform consisted of a long black dress and white shirted attire. The silhouette drew the attention to her thin framed body, despite overemphasizing her waist. Her raven colored hair was tied back in a bun to keep it from looping over in front of her. Her front hairs were dyed blonde, bleached to the point that it could shine in the sun.


    She wore leather boots and long gloves for more practical reasons. But due to her filipina background, she was more often mistaken for cleaning staff than as an enrolled student.


    Raj said aloud, "It''s not my fault, I''m actually too busy. I have to-"


    Before Raj could turn around, she yanked him by the ear, "I torch the school''s rum supply if you tell me your too busy for me. I came to this school to study aether. If you''re not going to be my mentor, find someone else who will!"


    That wasn''t how it really worked. Raj was a teacher at the school, but he had no say over who he''d be mentoring. It was plainly obvious Raj wasn''t committed to his duties.


    Rosa pushed Raj onto a chair as she turned towards the table. She stretched her neck. "Watch," she spoke in a plainer tone.


    Rosa pulled out a crystal from her skirt pocket and pointed it to the kettle bowl. Upon tapping the bowl, the water began to boil. A light glow emitted from the gem while heat and electricity surged through the water puddle.If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    She whispered to herself, "holy mother, bless this aqua."


    The crystal sitting at the center of the pot slowly began to float. It levitated at a gradual pace before it reached the front of Rosa''s face. At the side of the kettle Rosa picked up two pairs of golden chopsticks and began plucking at the streams of water.


    "I don''t doubt your talent," Raj said resting a hand on his cheek. His back leaned forward while his elbow rested on his knee. "The assignments I''ve been giving you isn''t for amateurs. They might be below your level, but they''re not designed to be easy."


    "Then my mentor, and tell me what I''m missing." She pulled the streams of water away, morphing it into levitating shapes around the crystal. The water moved like clay. She caressed the water lines into shapes until they slowly formed distinguishable polygons and hexagons floating midair while encircling the crystal.


    "You need to understand me, sir. I came to this school to learn. If I can''t get that from you, then what''s the point of me being here?"


    By the time she finished pulling the water, asymmetrical shapes surrounded the crystal. They floated in a repeating pattern, swirling at consistent pace with perfect synchrony.


    "See?" She said confidently. "The reason I''m not learning is because this is too easy for me. It might take other students days to cipher, but for me, it''s only a matter of minutes. How can I expand my skills if you''re not around to actually teach me?"


    Raj frowned at her. She was right, she was clearly at a level above the other students. Her skills could stay stagnant if he didn''t take a more active role into her mentoring. He let out a sigh. Raj pulled out a pair of gold chopsticks from his own pocket, and began poking at the assembled shapes.


    "What are you doing?" Rosa asked.


    Raj quickly unraveled all of Rosa''s work. The polygons popped and disassembled as he used his sticks to break apart what Rosa created. "I''m not impressed. I gave you an assignment, and you made it happen. But why aren''t you try doing more than that? Why didn''t you build up off of what I gave you?"


    Raj assembled new patterns over the crystal. The hexagonal shapes soon began to swirl, and they expanded out of the crystal like massive wings. "I think I know why they assigned you as my student. Neither of us had formal education before coming here, but we both have natural talents for aether ciphering. They thought since you were talented and I was talented, we''d make a good student-teacher pair."


    The patterns in the water accelerated in size. They flowed reflectively to one another as new shapes formed from his own gestures. "But clearly, you don''t see me as your senior. I know I''m just a year older than you, but years don''t determine how skilled someone is. Mutual understanding does."


    The shapes expanded further. Instead of polygons forming, twisted ladder shapes extruded from the floating gem. They formed art. Fractal patterns in swirling shapes Rosa had never seen before, reflecting the gem''s light while twirling in a fluid dance. Raj said to her, "you''re good, but you lack creativity. I know you don''t want to be my student, but the only reason I''m not spending more time with you is because you''ve never shown me that you''re worth it."


    Rosa''s eyes glared. She cusped her own picks in her hands and began stabbing at the shapes of water. Raj stepped back while she broke everything apart.


    "I''m not worth it? You''re not worth it!" She yelled back. Rosa snipped across the water streams, breaking his shapes apart at a reckless speed.


    "Stop!" Raj ordered. Aether was dangerous, remorphing the ciphers in these gems could easily cause the deaths of any nearby user. "If it gets unstable you''ll-"


    "Blow up the school, burn off your face, melt away my legs or steal the oxygen from the room. If I''m being honest, any of that is better than hearing your smug mouth go off on tangents of things you know nothing about!"


    Raj raised his golden picks to fix the floating water patterns. As Raj tried fixing them, Rosa kept breaking it as she continued to destabilize his creation. She went on, "you think I don''t want to be your student? Of course I do! You were a prodigy before coming here. I was glad to be your disciple. But now I know that you''re nothing more than an alcoholic man child who doesn''t know the first thing about taking responsibility!"


    Panicked, Raj pushed Rosa away from the table. Rosa raised up her second crystal, and tapped Raj in the hands. The crystal shot out an electrical current across Raj''s body, forcing him to take painful steps back.


    The floating water streams became spikey. It beated intensely as the energy emitting from the crystal could soon overwhelm it. "Rosa, we need to go, now."


    Rosa snickered. Her picks continued poking at the spiked water.


    "There''s no time!"


    Rosa yelled back, "I grew up in an orphanage! It''s nothing short of a miracle that I was accepted into this school. I won''t let some imbecile squander my chances of becoming a true scholar!"


    At that moment, she jabbed at the water streams. She pulled them up and out nearly wrapping them around her body. Her arms swung in circular motions, dancing with the water flows as she pressed it down closer to the crystal.


    The streams began to stabilize, and she soon morphed the water into calmer shapes. "All I have is aether ciphering, if you can''t teach me, I''d rather die."


    And with that, the cipher was complete. The crystal glowed in alternating colors, like a rainbow with a heartbeat patterned glow. She tapped the kettle with her second crystal and let the gem hover gently onto the kettle. With the ciphering completed, she picked up the gem and pointed it at Raj.


    With a tap of her second crystal, she used the newly formed gem to draw a painting in the air. The jewel sketched a rainbow in the air as though it was a canvass. With it, she spelled the words ''fuck you'' towards him.


    "You''re a bad teacher, "she pouted.


    Raj wasn''t even angry, he was only impressed. When she disassembled his original work, he thought it was out of sheer recklessness from a temper tantrum. Now it was clear that she was in complete control of the situation. She knew she could fix the damage she''d done, and even displayed her abilities through it.


    Raj stood up and said, "Rosa, I want to show you something. You wanted to know why I wanted to leave? I think you to help me with my alkhemistry project."