Before I begin with this next chapter, I would like to thank you all for getting me to 2K votes and almost 15K reads. This is the best Christmas present ever! I also have the first chapter of The Ice Queen of Lessaenes up for anyone who's curious about Saralee.

And of course, happy holidays to all of you awesome people who are reading this book :D

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"Stop!" Yelled the reg who sat on a stool at the bottom of the staircase that led up to the 51st floor. "Only Jade and Amanda are allowed up there."

"Amanda asked me to meet her there at 2:00 today," I told her.

"Hm, I don't see you listed on here," she said, looking down at her phone. "Did you receive an official summons?"

"Um...no," I shrugged.

"Sorry," she shook her head. "No summons, no entry."

"But Amanda told me to-"

"Sorry, Claire."

Ugh! How could someone as smart as Amanda overlook something like this? As much as I hated having to see her, I wanted answers. Soon, a really stupid idea began to form in my head.

"Remember this morning?" I asked, trying to sound like the confident rebel WGO thought I was. "Yeah, that's never going to happen again if you don't let me go up there."

"I do remember this morning," she rolled her eyes. "Let's see, I woke up, got dressed, and came to work. I think that's going to keep happening for the rest of my life, thank you."

"What..." I looked around fearfully, and almost as if my silent accusation had summoned her, I heard Amanda's voice from behind me.

"Let the girl go, Angela," she snapped crossly.

"Oh, of course," her eyes widened and her face seemed to turn pale as she handed me an orange wristband. "Wear this...at all...times so we know you're...authorized," she managed to croak out.

As I nodded and put on the paper wristband, she turned to Amanda. "What's going on? This is the second time this week!"

"Your job is to guard my staircase, not to question who climbs it," she said coldly. "Come on, Claire," she gestured to the stairs and I began to follow her up.

I felt electricity spark in my body as we climbed higher and higher. The light turned blue and blue dust coated almost everything. Somehow, I loved this blue dust. I wanted to roll in it and stuff it in my mouth.

"Sorry about the dust, I was practicing this morning," Amanda shrugged. "And please try to refrain from eating it for now."

"Why do I even want it? It's powder!" I exclaimed.

"Relax, it's perfectly natural," Amanda chuckled. "Newly Awakened Lessaenites always crave Aura dust. The more powerful your Aura, the stronger the feeling. They say Queen Saralee devoured five barrels of the stuff in a single day when she Awoke!"

"Now," she said, motioning for me to sit down at a thick wooden desk. "I know you have a million questions for me, and I know if I answer those questions you will just have more. So I'm going to do something better than answering your questions myself. I'm going to give you back your memories."

"My...memories? You mean my memories were...erased?" I asked, completely in shock.

"You're not who you think you are, Claire," Amanda said gravely. "You have unbelievable power within you, but you are also in incredible danger. There are people who would do anything to have your power for themselves, and most of them are not so nice."

"But...why were my memories erased?"

"You were getting too powerful, so they sent you away," Amanda sighed. "They tried to destroy your memories forever, but I managed to snag a copy of the file before they did. Just wait, you'll understand everything soon," she smiled, opening a drawer of her desk and pulling out a blue helmet with a few weird nodes attached.

"Wait!" I yelled as she began untangling the cords. "I don't trust you. What if you're one of those people who wants to use me."

"What makes you think that?" Amanda asked, narrowing her eyes. "Listen, they hurt me more than you will ever know," she spat viciously, her happy demeanor instantly fading away.

"They destroyed my family's home and banished my mother from the planet, then they forced me to serve them for life. It's their fault I'm like this! They killed me on the inside, slowly and painfully!" Her voice faded to a whimper. "And the worst part is...my father is one of their leaders. My little sister joined them a month ago. I had every opportunity to be one of them, yet I chose not to. If that doesn't make you trust me, I don't know what will."

"I trust you," I nodded. I had never seen Amanda so tired and sad before, so vulnerable. Her eyes held so much pain that it took all of my willpower not to cry for her. Nobody can fake that.

"Good," she smiled weakly, placing the helmet on my head and attaching the nodes to my forehead and the back of my neck. "When I turn this on, you are going to go through a series of flashbacks, which will reflect the most important parts of your life before the memory wipe. Your less significant memories will be stored in your brain for you to access later."

"Wait, before you start," I asked. "Who are they?"

"They are the Icehearts," Amanda said the word quickly, as if the very term disgusted her. "They're the most power hungry, evil, wretched beings you could imagine. And they're all after you."

"But why?"

"You'll see," Amanda nodded and clicked a button on her desk and the world slowly faded into darkness.

..........................

I sat on a couch in a sumptuous room, next to an older girl who I somehow knew was my sister. We both wore stiff, expensive dresses and fur lined boots and vests. The room, though richly decorated, was frigid.

A woman in a stunning green dress and crystal shoes burst through the door, a wide smile on her face.

"Mother is back!" I called excitedly in my young, high pitched voice as I ran up to her. I couldn't have been more than six years old.

"Yes, I am," the Queen of Lessaenes smiled. "And I have great news for you!"

"What is it, mother? Did you get me a present?" My sister asked excitedly.

"No, Tara, she got ME a present!" I yelled.

"I'll get you as many presents as you want later, girls," she laughed. "But what I have to tell you is so much better."

"Oh, Uncle Airel's visiting, isn't he?" I piped up. "Yay! We get to play with our little cousins!"

"It isn't that either," the Queen shook her head. "We won the war!" She exclaimed with a smile.

"Really? Does that mean no more bombs and attacks in the palace?" Tara asked excitedly. "Did you kill the man who killed Father?"

"Oh, with what's happening to him right now, I'm sure that man wishes he were dead. And this means so much more than just the end of hostilities."

"What else?" I asked curiously.

"Now, all the land west of the Tri-planet colonies belongs to us, the Icehearts," my mother explained. "And so does all of Earth."

"So now we own all those humans who killed Grandma and Grandpa and Aunt Annalee and Father?"

"Yes, Vivi, we do," the Queen smiled. "And they will pay very dearly for what they did."

.........................

"Happy Birthday Princess Viviana!" Shouted the circle of Icehearts and their children all around me.

I ran excitedly to my colossal three layer cake, smiled and waved at the sea of clicking cameras that filled the hall, and sat down on the stool in front of it.

"Mother!" I wailed, noticing the lack of glow on top of my 5 candles. "Why aren't my candles lit? I want to blow out my candles!"

"Flames are vile things!" She announced, more to the crowd that had gathered to watch their princess's fifth birthday celebration than to me. "And never will I let one burn in my palace!"

The other Icehearts nodded in agreement and cheered as my mother skillfully allowed little bursts of Aura to appear on top of my candles, in an illusion of warmth."

"No mother, I want real fire!" I screamed and the Queen's gaze hardened.

...........................

"Wait," my mother called. "Don't put her in the ship just yet. Wipe her memories first."

"Where are you sending me?"

"Shut up," she snarled. "Armetorius, I want you to see that her memories are destroyed in such a way that she can never access them in the future."

"Yes, my Queen," the Keeper Chief bobbed his head obediently and two Ice Guards put a red helmet on my head.

"Extract everything," Queen Saralee ordered, and my vision blackened once again.

.............................

I gasped as my eyes fluttered open. My entire body was drenched in sweat and I was shaking uncontrollably. I looked around, confirming that I was still sitting in a chair across from Amanda on the 51st floor.

"Are you alright, Claire?" She asked.

"Yeah...just need a minute," I winced, wiping my sweaty palms on my shorts and taking a few long, deep breaths to compose myself.

"Claire?" Amanda called. It took a conscious effort to respond to my name now, it didn't resonate within me like a name should anymore. I really wanted her to address me by my real name.

"Please, call me Viviana."

"Not so fast," Amanda laughed. "I'm sorry, Princess, but you're still in the Program."

"That I am," I sighed. "But I won't be for long...will I?"

"No, you won't," Amanda shook her head. "A year tops, we'll be out even sooner if things work out well. I'm going to make an announcement to the rest of the organization as soon as the Glitchketball finals are over."

"I still can't believe this," I shook my head. I, Claire King, was an alien princess being hunted down by the most powerful, dangerous group of people in the galaxy.

"I know, it's a lot to take in," Amanda nodded. "Especially when it's stuffed into your brain by a machine in less than ten minutes."

"If it helps get your mind off things a little, Team Sloppie made the Glitchketball Championship."

"Seriously!?" I gasped, my smile instantly brightening.

"Yeah," said Amanda. "They tallied it up just this morning. You guys have the second highest cumulative score, and you're just three points behind Team Codie!"

"Yes!" I beamed. "Just wait until Kelly finds out!"

"But we know it isn't going to be a Glitching battle between two teams this year," Amanda added darkly. "It's going to be an Aura battle between the lost princess of Lessaenes and the future Warrior Chief. Excuse me for a minute," she quickly added when her phone rang. Picking it up, she walked to a corner to speak to whoever had called her.

"Hello?"

"What!?" She nearly dropped her phone with surprise. This couldn't be good.

"Are they sure it was him?" She asked, her voice trembling.

She listened to what the other person was saying for a few minutes while nodding, before slamming her phone down on her desk.

"Correction: You're going to be battling the Warrior Chief of Lessaenes," she said with a dry laugh. "Apparently my father was found dead yesterday, killed by rebels. Served him right."

"What?" I asked, surprised by her lack of emotion about this. "You're not...sad? Or anything?"

"Of course not," Amanda snorted. "He was Queen Saralee's number one lackey. I'm pretty sure that if she had told him to, he wouldn't have hesitated for a moment before killing me, my mom, and my little sister."

"He was still your father."

"That kind of thinking is going to get you nowhere in the Flame," Amanda narrowed her eyes. "If someone does you wrong, no matter who they are, you can forgive, but never, ever forget."