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  • Majgen Ch. 001

Majgen Ch. 001

12

Copyright of Nanna Marker.

Warning: Work in progress, the full Majgen book-series is not yet completed (unless my bio states otherwise.)

----=(The meeting)=----

'Seven chairs on my right,' she thought while entering the classroom from the students' entrance, 'seven chairs on my left.'

Summoned by teachers, Majgen focused on unimportant details. Through trial and painful error, she had found this to be the wisest approach.

Adhering to proper etiquette for a low ranking student, she stood still there just inside the door. It automatically closed behind her. Perfect rows of empty seats started at the wall on both sides of her.

'Fourteen chairs total, in this row.'

The classroom was, unconventionally, designed and decorated solely in shades of white. Every surface was white, ranging through lily white, to egg shell white, to beige white. This colour choice was especially unusual for focused lecture style classrooms. The designs of these classrooms were intended to place focus on lecturers. Although white was efficient for this it usually became distracting in its own right. This school, however, the Mentariata, could afford the best and hired only exceedingly skilled designers.

Awaiting instructions, Majgen kept her head bowed. In order to make herself easily recognisable she had pushed her hood back, revealing her face and hair. Majgen's natural hair colour was a shiny pure black. In accordance with Mentarion Tradition she didn't dye it, but she made it boring by removing its shine with chemicals. Combined with her black uniform this made her less noticeable; the effect she aimed for.

When moving through the school hallways, she kept the hood up. Her shy childhood was not the basis for this evasive behaviour. Since being enrolled five years ago, experience had taught her that getting attention could easily lead to painful punishment.

For Majgen it was best to remain unnoticed.

In the opposite end of the room six Femaron ranked empaths were seated behind a curved table. The curve of the table, and their formal spacing, enabled each one to address another politely, without leaning forward. The Mentariata was a study facility for the stronger human empaths, the 'mentarions'. Any possible detail in design which could ease adherence to the Mentarion Ways was implemented in every part of the school.

Head still bowed, Majgen empathically recognised five of them as teachers, the sixth she had never sensed before. Engaged in a social conversation, they didn't immediately acknowledge her presence. She didn't attempt to listen in. Low ranked students at the Mentariata would never attempt to interfere with teachers talking amongst themselves, at least none who wanted to sleep on their backs in the near future.

Ordered to attend, Majgen made sure not to guess why. Being summoned usually meant bad news for her. Attempting to guess why she was here would cause her to feel fear. Being a strong emotion, fear would make them pay more attention to her, attention she did not want.

'Seven chairs to my left, seven chairs to my right, fourteen chairs total this row. This room is very bright, the architecture is simple,' thought Majgen.

If a person was thinking of trivial details most empaths within sensing range gained very little information of what went on in that person's mind. Or rather, very little went on in the conscious mind of a person thinking of trivial details. Nobody had taught Majgen such subtle techniques to hide her thoughts and feelings, but she had picked some up herself over time.

During her first couple of months at the Mentariata, Majgen had tried to evade punishments by hiding her offences. This had taught her that it was very difficult to hide fear amongst mentarions, and absolutely impossible to do so when subjected to a thorough mind read. Most importantly, Majgen had also realised the retaliation for trying to evade punishment was often far worse than the penalty for the original offence. Any attempt by a student to lie to, or fool, a teacher always resulted in direct, swift, and painful punishment. Students were not meant to hide thoughts from their teachers. Untrained mentarions had no rights for privacy of mind.

Nowadays, Majgen didn't try to conceal crimes against the school's rule sets. She only used thought-techniques to keep her emotions level and uninteresting to avoid extra attention. Some higher ranking mentarions at the Mentariata knew she used such thought tricks regularly. They had not forbidden her to do so. They too had been relieved when she had learned to attract less attention.

The teachers soon finished their talk.

"Approach us, Student," said Femaron Kradi.

It was the first verbal acknowledgement of Majgen's presence. Majgen had never had much interaction with Kradi. He primarily taught second and third ranked students. His speciality was precognitive analytical theory -- the basic techniques to foresee likely future changes of mind in subjects.

Counting rows as she passed them, Majgen walked to the open area in front of the table. There she bowed once, a formal show of respect towards mentarions of higher rank. She raised her head to look straight at Femaron Kradi, also a formal gesture, to show he had her full attention, if he should want it. Ignoring Majgen, Kradi turned to one his peers, her superiors, and Majgen lowered her face to stand in her usual humble pose. This spared her from the unnerving sight of six Femaron ranked mentarions gathered at one place.

Pale yellow with bright blood-red markings.

At Majgen's time the colouring of Femaron uniforms was considered hideous as well as unfashionable. Majgen, however, had no conscious thought of the Femaron uniforms as distasteful, to her they were simply intimidating.

"This is the student we told you about, Femaron Baglian, Majgen Rahan is her name."

Femaron Kradi's words were directed at the mentarion she had never met. The others knew who she was. All teachers at the Mentariata knew who she was. Out of more than two thousand she was probably the only student whom every single teacher could recognise by appearance as well as mental sense and name.

'Have I been summoned only to be seen by a new teacher?' she thought. That thought woke an emotion in her, a claustrophobic feeling of imprisonment, a yearn for freedom.

'I passed six rows of chairs. Each row had seven to my left and seven to my right. fourteen chairs total in each row. I passed six rows. Six rows of fourteen chairs is the same as six times ten chairs plus six times four chairs. That is sixty chairs plus six times four chairs. That is...'

By these calculations she drowned the inappropriate emotion. The trivial thoughts also helped her pay less attention to her superiors' conversation. She did not want more unwanted emotions to surface.

"At first sight she doesn't appear so unusual," commented Baglian, "apart from the fact that I have never seen anyone as old as her dressed in the tenth ranked student uniform. You said she was eighteen?"

"Yes," another of the teachers confirmed, "her birthday was about two weeks ago."

Majgen was a Tenth Ranked Mentarion Student, hence she wore a student rank ten mentarion uniform. A rank colouring normally worn by children. She had been spared the indignity of the usual cut of uniforms for the youngest mentarions, though. As was norm for adult mentarions, the outer layer of her uniform was a long, sleeved, hooded cloak. It stopped six inches from the floor when she was standing. In accordance with the adult design of mentarion uniforms Majgen's cloak had no opening in the front. In the children's version of mentarion uniforms the cloak part was shorter and open in front, like a house-coat, to be less of a hindrance to physical activities, such as running.

"Well her conduct so far seems appropriately humble for someone wearing a uniform that a thirteen year old would consider a disgrace." Baglian's tone of voice was humorous as his eyes traced the randomly placed silver-grey spots, of varying sizes, on her black cloak.

'It pleases him, to see me in disgrace,' realised Majgen. 'I wonder why. No don't think further on it, remember Femaron Braygen. Make sure not to find out too much. Think of something else.'

She dug into her mind to find more trivialities to think of.

'The Green sun in the New Contuna system is not actually green. It only appears green to ships approaching the Ventro mining spots because the light passes through...'

Four years earlier, a teacher named Femaron Braygen had caused Majgen direct suffering, when she had inadvertently invaded his privacy and seen memories he meant for none to see. Consciously Majgen was unaware of the name similarity. Braygen and Baglian. Subconsciously, however, her mind classified Baglian as a larger threat than a random Femaron ranked stranger.

"Don't let her humble appearance fool you, Femaron Baglian," said one of the teachers, Femaron Peterson. "She is a genuine pest." Femaron Peterson had been a close friend of Femaron Braygen. He still felt resentment towards Majgen for the incident leading to Braygen's shameful resignation.

"A genuine pest you say?" Femaron Baglian didn't really seem surprised at that statement, "and now you want me to take this pest off your hands. What have I done to deserve this?"

His tone and manner gave the impression of honest curiosity, in spite of the joke implied by the wording. All the Femarons had mind shields up for privacy, like graduated mentarions usually had amongst other mentarions. Majgen knew that none of them were at the moment able to feel mild emotional shifts in the others.

She could.

Majgen was the only one -- other than Baglian himself -- who could sense he was not the least bit curious about the answer. He expected them to praise his abilities as a mentarion, his self-discipline and his technique. He expected to be told that he was their best hope of shaping the hopeless girl into a useable mentarion. In his opinion he was doing the five teachers a favour by giving them this opportunity to salute him.

'He must be the most arrogant man I ever felt,' thought Majgen. 'But that is not important, 'cause the planet we are on has the biggest apple-farm complexes in the universe. The thirty botanic floors of fountain-blue variety true-breed trees alone gives in total a...'

"You have not been ordered to accept this task, by any of our superiors, Femaron Baglian. She will only be assigned to you if you give us permission to do so." Femaron Kradi said this to make sure Baglian would not feel pressured into accepting.

"Personally I will be happy to see her out of the Mentariata," added Femaron Peterson. "But my conscience tells me to say this to you, Femaron Baglian. Don't accept the job immediately. She is trouble. You can't tell it by looking at her for a few moments, you can't even tell it with one thorough scan of her mind."

'At least Femaron Peterson is being honest.' Majgen was familiar with his opinion of her already so thinking of this was not waking strong emotions in her. In spite of his feelings towards her, Peterson had never stalked her for extra opportunities to harass her.

In Majgen's experience most higher ranking mentarions were not as withholding as Femaron Peterson. Not when it came to turning feelings of resentment into acts of retribution. She considered it childish of him to still hold on to his dislike of her four years after losing close contact with his friend. Majgen knew that he, like herself, had long been aware that she was not to blame for what had happened. It was true she was the direct cause, but she had not known better back then, and that was not her fault. Yet, Peterson's decision not to act on his resentment placed him higher in Majgen's esteem than the majority of the teaching staff.

Student Majgen Rahan acted even more respectfully towards the people in the Mentariata than etiquette required. Her every sentence was carefully phrased to express her inferior status. Every movement she made carefully rehearsed to express humility.

It had taken her a lot of practice and thinking to master fine details in language, tone and posture that could be used to look and sound pleasingly respectful to the normal human senses. Two years ago she had finally mastered all those aspects.

She could not change her feelings however, could not make those just as pleasing to the minds of the mentarions around her. She could not help that the sight of different mentarion rank colours did not affect the amount of respect she would feel, or not feel, towards the person wearing them.

What rank a mentarion could achieve was not merely determined through hard work and skill. The highest rank a particular mentarion could possibly achieve was determined by what empathic strength he was born with.

Amongst humans mental power was very rare. Only one in a million had any kind of empathic abilities and it was estimated that only one in 80 million was born with a potential strong enough to become a mentarion. In a total human population of 3.6 million million people, 3,600,000,000,000. The total amount of known human empaths was well past three million, but there was only about 45,000 known mentarions.

"Stay with us here at the Mentariata a while, Femaron Baglian. Give her some private lessons. Watch her in the halls." Femaron Peterson consciously listed suggestions to Baglian. "We could even have her temporarily assigned to serving duty at the Visiting Lecturers' Centre. Just to give you a proper chance to see her obstructive nature."

Femaron Peterson's words startled several of the teachers. One of them, Femaron Nero, had to restrain herself to let Femaron Peterson finish talking before she spoke.

"We will under no circumstances assign Student Majgen Rahan to ANY duties ANYWHERE in the vicinity of the visiting lecturers' centre."

Femaron Nero slammed her mouth shut to stop at that. If not for the strict protocols, regarding teachers' interactions in front of students, she would have braved professional mentarion etiquette and have proceeded to direct insults of Peterson. She normally respected him professionally, but the thought of Majgen let loose on esteemed visiting mentarions made her stomach clench.

The Femarons all went quiet after Nero's outburst. Majgen sensed the five teachers gathering their composure. Baglian, however, did not feel uncomfortable about the scene he had just witnessed. Other Femarons indulging in quarrels unworthy of persons of their rank and status simply assured him that he was superior to them. A detail which Majgen couldn't help but notice.

After a while Femaron Kradi spoke, "Femaron Peterson, I must second Femaron Nero's opinion. Student Majgen may not be allowed near visiting lecturers."

Then Kradi turned to address Baglian again. "Ottearon Weissme specifically recommended that you, Femaron Baglian, were well equipped to handle Student Majgen." Femaron Kradi paused a moment, hesitating before revealing an extra detail in front of Majgen. "He implied that you might be our last hope before giving up and signing her over to the weaker empaths."

Majgen would not be able to dampen her emotional response to those words by focusing on trivia, and she knew that well. The subject of what would happen if the school gave up on her had come up on several occasions in her past. She instantly raised a mind shield to hide her emotions from the Femarons.

Raising a mind shield amongst superiors was a breach of etiquette for students, but letting the teachers know her feelings on this subject was very risky. She knew that from experience.

None of the five teachers present had had much direct contact with her. She had never been taught by any of them. Majgen perceived what emotional response Femaron Kradi expected her to get after his mention of the weaker empaths. It was evident he had no concept of her true feelings about that possibility.

The six Femarons all noticed her shielding, but none of them corrected her. Five of them assumed her shield was raised to hide feelings of dread at the threat of expulsion. Most of them could feel a shiver themselves at the concept of being discarded, of being unworthy of a mentarion's important role in society.

Femaron Baglian knew better.

Ottearon Antwoine Weissme, leader of the Mentariata, had contacted him personally the day after the Mentariata's official request for his presence had been delivered to the arrogant Femaron. Amongst other things he had also informed Femaron Baglian of Majgen's unusual feelings about her career as a mentarion.

"I would not like to see a mentarion go to waste," said Baglian, "there are not enough of us to discard the unworthy, not as long as there is any chance of salvation. If Ottearon Weissme has said that I am the best hope for that girl to become useful to society, then I will not turn my back on my duty."

Baglian reached for his wallet. Like most mentarions, he kept it in a wrist pocket on the underside of his arm. The skin-tight inner sleeve of mentarion uniforms was particularly suited for this use. The looser outer sleeve hid the undecorative lump formed by the wallet.

As Baglian placed his wallet on the table it was a small black rod, a bit thinner than his little finger and half as long as his hand from wrist to tip of index finger.

"Wallet five crimson unfold horizontal shape five."

The wallet unfolded itself, becoming a flat screen lying horizontally on the table -- what Baglian called 'shape five' in his personalised settings.

Using personalised voice commands for a wallet was quite common. It was easy to forget to turn voice command adherence off before talking to people, hence most people used a voice activation code in front of each command. Baglian had activated continuous voice adherence when saying 'wallet five crimson'. He trusted his own ability to remember to turn voice adherence off before talking to people.

"Open travelling. Open flight planner. Departure time after five hours."

The last was an unusual personalisation setting most people would for travelling programs speak a full standardised 'Departure time later than five hours from now'.

Majgen felt irritation rising in the other Femarons, caused by Femaron Baglian's continued use of voice commands. In screen-size he could have easily controlled the wallet with his fingertips. By using voice commands Baglian had put them in a position where talking would be discourteous of them.

The rhythm of the spoken commands interrupted Majgen's stream of trivial thoughts. After raising a mind shield, Majgen had intensified her efforts to dampen her emotions. She was aiming to make her emotions sufficiently level and appropriate to lower her mind shield. Preferably sooner than one of the Femarons should decide to order her to do so.

Majgen switched strategy and listened intently to Baglian's voice commands instead.

He filled in search fields for a travel between Ceasar, the planet they were on, and a place called Drom which she wasn't familiar with. By the time he was adding sort fields Majgen's emotions were steady and about as interesting as a storage inventory. She lowered her mind shield.

After a while, Baglian's wallet presented him a list of suitable travel plans, he stopped speaking commands and skimmed the top of the list. In the sudden quiet Majgen inadvertently gained the knowledge of why he had used voice, rather than touch, commands.

His primary reason had been to demonstrate a good voice personalisation system so the other Femarons could learn from his wisdom and benefit greatly. Majgen immediately grasped the irony of how much the other Femarons, who were unaware of his motives, did not appreciate his efforts. She could prevent her face from smiling, but couldn't stop the humorous feeling itself fast enough.

12
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