Page 1 of The Commons

PROLOGUE

The Commons was not Ivy League. It was leagues above.

It was so well established that it did not need a drop, a penny, or endorsement from any private, business, or governmental institution, or so they claimed. It was so successful in creating world leaders that every president for the last fifty years in every country went to hell and back to enroll. It was powerful in its ability to control the government and every other institution in the entire world. The Commons was untouchable.

Well… until I stepped in.

CHAPTER 1

The Selection

Piercing silence screams in my ear, creeping all around me. I feel like a prisoner on death row. My skin shudders, just as a raucous cry of seagulls triggers my eyes to open and I breathe out the cold air vapors besieging me. My feelings are trapped in a sea of emptiness knowing there is no escape from this barricaded metal cell. The sound of the seagulls intensifies, echoing mournfully, coiling my heart in resounding sadness. The vibrations of the ocean waves jolt the ground beneath me, snapping me back to my senses.

If one of these Patrons doesn’t select me, I’m screwed.

It does not help that I have a zero percent chance of getting selected by them. Well actually, 0.00000142857% – as you can see, the odds are in my favor.

I’m so screwed.

Why would they select me? I don’t look like I can fight. I don’t look like I can fly. I don’t look like I can flirt.

It doesn’t help that to them I’m a nobody. My raindrop speckled sweater and sandy sneakers certainly don’t scream: look at me, my great grandparents have a billion dollars stashed in my bank account for such a time as this.

Shantavia Lerogaski! Snap out of yourself!

“No electronics in here. We take your phones and keep them safe. No cameras. No games. No devices!” an officer shouts.

Everyone takes out their phones and puts them inside a box. Just as the boxes are taken away, my eyes snap to the right to see six muscular beings in the distance dressed in white suits with a P sign and a cloud logo on their shirts. They all look like they are in their twenties or so.

A student behind me whispers, “Those are Air Patrons. They are like superheroes.”

“They are better than superheroes,” a boy responds.

“But superheroes aren’t as arrogant as Patrons.”

“That’s because Patrons are like gods.”

“Okay, even gods aren’t—” The student instantly stops speaking as the Air Patrons whisper among themselves, examining students in the distance whose heads are bowed to the floor. Yes, to the floor. We can’t look at them apparently. Our human eyes will disintegrate, or something, should it collide with a Patron’s. That’s a joke, but I don’t doubt it’s possible. Everyone around me now bows down in respect, and I follow them.

The aura of a Patron is unnerving, like when one is underwater and the pressure is crushing you, and you can’t breathe because if you breathe, you’ll die. That’s how I feel sensing their presence and they are not even close to us yet. Oh my…

“How did she make it in here?” a boy beside me says, swirling a dagger in his hands, staring at me with a haunting glare. I thought we weren’t allowed to have weapons in here? My sister forcing me to take martial arts could come in handy. But from the way he’s glaring at me, he certainly didn’t read my resume. He certainly doesn’t know that I crashed my fists down to the deteriorating fragments of my keyboard doing two years’ work in two months to even make it in here. There goes my gap year.

But perhaps I should have put more effort into my outfit? My dad would certainly be embarrassed. He never wears one outfit when seven would do.

Whispers now encroach around me from the elites that I have the privilege of sharing the same air with. Yes, the same air. The elites are on the other side of the gate, dressed in flamboyant attires. They have powerful recommenders who have paid millions to beg the honor of a Patron to claim their child on this selection day. If you get claimed, you have a higher percent chance of making it into The Commons… One percent. Very high, see… much better than zero point zero point zero point zero. Did I get all the zeros? There’s probably more zeros. The elites consider us too poor to be within ten feet of them. Yet I am now to face the gods to which they serve—Patrons.

Snapping to the right, a former classmate of mine, Xexi, begins shaking uncontrollably, reminding me of the visceral effect my body should… should be having. But I’m too bold for my own liking. I’m naïve, I think. Clueless at best.

“There are three upgrades in The Commons: Sachis, Lerods and the highest, Patrons,” she begins to rant to herself. Herself not to me. I already know these things. I read every last bit of trash I could find on these untouchables. “Patrons are higher than teachers and administrators and are divided by elements. Air Patrons, Fire Patrons, Water Patrons, and the highest—Earth Patrons.”

Xexi whispers to another unfortunate middle-class student next to me. Yes, middle class, that’s what we all are on this side of the gate. To The Commons, middle class might as well be scum of the earth. “I heard the top two Patrons are Patron Pesh and Patron Lenon. No one has ever seen them in a selection, let alone accept prizes from recommenders. One does not look upon their eyes and live.”

“How do you know?” she exclaims.

“I’ve heard rumors of them training the most CEOs and celebrities or something like that. Patron Pesh doesn’t like speaking to humans and Patron Lenon likes destroying them.”

“Ahh! I thought it was a myth, but they do exist!” she says with a slight grin.