Awakening - The Last Science #1

Chapter 5 - Apathy - I

  Rachel wanted to call out to her, but Rika was already heading out the door with her new friend in tow. It would have been totally inappropriate in the middle of the Council discussion to shout across a room of people to the pariah of the group, but in spite of every bridge Rika had burned, Rachel wanted her old best friend back. The muttered relief from her right immediately dispelled that opportunity for the time being.

  She glanced at Joshua Miller, sitting to her side with a perpetual disinterested expression. It was Rachel's deepest desire at that moment to give him a strong look of disdain and somehow shame him into accepting Rika back into their world, but she couldn't justify it. Rika had thoroughly wrecked any chance of that relationship rekindling. Her own strained and neglected friendship with Rika made them look like soul mates compared to Josh. Rika cheated on his best friend with him, then deliberately maneuvered the two of them into getting her access to the Market, all the while manipulating the two of them to spill any magical knowledge they had. Once Rika had everything she wanted, she'd ditched the both of them, with only a quick thank you and a goodbye before leaving two dumbstruck boys with a rift never to be repaired.

  No, as much as Rachel wished she could rehabilitate Rika, she knew the wounds were too raw. More importantly, she had her own standing in their little community to think about. If she lost face, she'd lose the following she'd built up, and her goals would be that much more difficult to achieve.

  "You could have been a bit more helpful there," she murmured to Josh.

  "Hey, you're the one who insisted Will's secret weapons stay secret," he whispered back. "I'm just rolling with your game plan."

  "I appreciate that, but still, you didn't need to antagonize Ryan."

  "He'll be fine."

  "Rachel dear, before everyone starts getting fidgety, shouldn't we continue?" Mabel prompted. Rachel nodded, taking a deep breath before standing up again.

  "Now that the first order of business is out of the way, we have a few other matters to take care of, if everyone would please settle in for a little longer."

  The room quieted down once more. Rachel took a quick visual survey, and her hopes sunk even further. After the excitement of the Scrap and Rika's departure, the temperature of the room was once again relaxed and ultimately bored. Several had already stepped out. Without the community's primary troublemaker or the inherent drama of their latest discovery, commanding their attention on the less glamorous matters was her true challenge. Rachel knew it was the details that would make or break their growing society. They needed to build a stable system of governance, else once they emerged into the world they'd be helpless to protect themselves and their interests from the powers that be. As it stood, the only people who continually showed interested beyond the council were Kendra Laushire, Ryan Walker, and the man she was about to name.

  "We've had a new proposal for a research experiment from Julian Black, which would encompass a significant region of the east end of town." Rachel nodded to Josh, who unrolled a map of the town—with Julian's planned ritual site outlined—and stuck it to the chalkboard with a few magnets. "The Council cannot grant approval on this project, as Mr. Black declined to give the details of his experiment, but as it does not encroach on any existing territorial claims, we grant Mr. Black the floor pending a vote of audience."

  Rachel gestured toward the voting board, and threw her will into the movement as if it were a tangible presence sliding along her arm and into the air. The extension of her mind reached out and scraped away the chalk dust from the previous vote, slicing cleanly between the board and the fragments that were stuck on the surface. They fell away, leaving the board far more clean than any eraser would ever achieve.