Free Start by Odette C. Bell

again, only to fall asleep under a tree
rather than getting to class, she'd been knocked out in the
training centre.
    At
least that hadn't been her fault though.
    It had
been an accident. One that no one was able to explain to her.
Nobody had made that block go scooting across the training centre
to wallop her on the chest, so the prevailing theory was that the
block itself had malfunctioned.
    She'd
never heard of TI blocks malfunctioning, but she wasn't exactly the
most knowledgeable cadet out there.
    Pushing herself up, she let out a breath, being careful not to
extend her chest out too much as she did.
    Though
her muscles didn't ache, it felt weird to move them.
    Because every damn thing felt weird.
    Again,
for about the millionth time, she brought up her left hand and
stared at it.
    She
was still dimly aware of the terrible dream she'd had under the oak
tree that morning. But it was fading.
    She
could recall that writhing blue energy biting its way into her palm
and fingers though, and it made her shudder.
    “Come
on,” she told herself through gritted teeth, “you have to do your
assignments.”
    She
couldn't put them off any longer. She was getting further and
further behind. What was worse, she'd missed all afternoon due to
her injury.
    She
slowly slouched over to her desk, neatened what she could, then
stuck her tongue out as she considered the display on the hovering
holographic computer screen. It sat about several centimetres above
her desk, tipped at an angle so she could see it properly. Right
now it displayed an enormous list of stuff she had to catch up
on.
    She
tried closing her eyes, but when she opened them, the assignments
hadn't disappeared.
    The
last thing she wanted to do right now was work. She would prefer to
make herself an enormous bowl of ramen and fold up on the couch
watching holo movies. She couldn't though. She had to catch
up.
    So she
sucked in a breath, stiffened her back, forced her chin to jut out,
and got to work.
    She
did what she could, keeping the boring tasks until last.
    And
the boring tasks were always the same for her.
    TI
practice.
    Ah,
she hated it.
    No
matter how hard she tried, she never progressed. Everyone—including
Sharpe—believed that with just enough sweat and tears, anyone could
master their implant. Well she had sweated and she had cried, but
she was still at the bottom of the pile.
    She
stood up, marching over to her bedside table and picking up the
tiny, itty-bitty TI cube she was meant to use for
practice.
    Fresh
new cadets learnt to master the use of this itty-bitty cube in
their first week.
    She
still had trouble lifting it out of its case.
    Sitting roughly on her bed, she shot the cube a merciless
glare as it sat there, offending her by its mere
existence.
    Contrary to popular belief, Nida was not lazy. She tried her
hardest. It just so happened that her hardest was never good
enough.
    She
hadn't given up yet. And that was something. But it was still
seriously demoralising every time she had to face her utter
incompetence with the use of her TI.
    “Okay,” she breathed dramatically, tipping her head back and
rolling her eyes at the ceiling, as if it agreed with her that all
TI blocks were lame. “Come on,” she reached forward and pressed the
button that would disengage the TI block from its
pedestal.
    There
was a slight beep and a flash of yellow light.
    Yellow
light.
    She
knew it was yellow.
    Yet
for a heart pounding instant, she thought it was blue.
    She
blinked, even pressing her fingers into her closed eyelids. “What
the hell is wrong with you?” she muttered, winking one eye open to
confirm the light was most certainly yellow.
    “You're tired, you're stressed, and you spent the afternoon
being coaxed back from death,” she answered her own question. And
it was a pretty good answer. There was nothing wrong with her,
other than that which she had already stated.
    Feeling relieved at that conclusion, she leaned forward and
spread the fingers of her