Let me set the record straight once and for all: I didn't dislike the de Silver, I just didn't feel like I belonged with them as much as I do with my own family.

I would be lying to say I hadn't regretted saying yes to visiting the de Silver every year. It was extremely tedious and boring. They didn't want to take me anywhere fun except bombard me with history lessons and made me sit with other young de Silvers in a room. They were boring, the conversation simply didn't flow.

The first few visits all passed like the worst maths class. The other de Silvers clearly wasn't thrilled to see me either. Frankly, they all looked too full of themselves to even be worth talking to. One of them, this guy called Gerald something, was the worst. He was like a robot, always listening to everything the adults said and giving me creepy looks. I would have slapped him silly if mother hadn't made me promise not to cause any trouble. Besides, I was supposed to network. So I tried.

"Margo, how are you doing?" Harold was waiting outside the classroom and rushed to greet me as I left yet another history lesson. I pursed my lips at him. He always showed up when I was feeling the least patience.

"It was good," I answered curtly and started towards the library. Harold won't follow me there and neither would my classmates; the whole silence in library thing was enforced rigorously here. I had made myself a nice little corner to read until it was time for bed. At least they had some books that the Balikova didn't. Two weeks here really was too long. I couldn't even go anywhere because this was a secret underground base.

"We're thinking of assigning you a buddy, so you can integrate more here." Harold didn't get the hint and sped up to walk alongside me. I wished my legs were longer so I could leave him behind. "What do you think?"

"I'm perfectly fine," I replied through gritted teeth. A buddy? A nark was more like it. I didn't need a living surveillance camera. "I don't need a buddy." Being polite and feigning to care en mass was bad enough, doing it one-on-one would kill me.

Harold paused and the silence was charged between us. I wished my telepathy would surface already so I can read people's minds. Then I didn't have to guess, I would know what to say to get out of these situations. I ignored the nagging worry in my head about my power's late emergence; supposedly the earlier it surfaces, the more powerful you were. I was eleven and some other Balikova and de Silver had got their powers.

"I'm going to the library," I told Harold; maybe that'd get him off my back. He nodded, his brow creased and a distant look in his eyes. I slowly walked away from him and then broke into a speed walk. Yes! A clean getaway.

Everything was state of the art in this secret headquarter of theirs. I had no idea of its exact location and apparently neither did most. Their founder, this guy named Akram, asked his descendants to build it with detailed instruction, in case something were to happen. And they all took that secret to the grave. Apparently. Unlike them, our headquarters weren't a secret because we had complete faith that we could defend ourselves.

I passed by a few of the other students in my class on my way and nodded in acknowledgment. I didn't come to make friends, but it paid to be on good terms with them. After all, I was here to show them how different I was. So that they'd know my face and name when I become the most powerful P.O.E. in the world.

The librarians nodded at me. They knew who I was and left me alone most of the time. Father always said that the key to the future is in the past, and no one can have enough knowledge. So I tried to find something new and different to read every time I visit.

Most of these books were original copies salvaged from before the Dark Ages. Most had e-copies but I like touching the books themselves. It's a slice of the past that only a fraction of us had the privilege to get up close with. But I must have taken a wrong turn because it didn't bring me there. Instead, I was in a section that I had never been to before.

I knew the de Silver library was large but I only spent time in the sections related to P.O.E. and world history. Perhaps I had wandered to the literature section? There was a weird smell in the air, like something was molding but less unpleasant. Still, it made my nose itched and I sneezed.My eyes gazed the shelves, taking in the leather spines and my curiousity got the better of me. I went through the titles of each book, noting down the words and phrases that I didn't recognised. A book advertised to be about Confucius, another on Angkor Wat. What were those things? I kept a list of those that I didn't know, which turned out to be a lot.Perhaps I should hire new tutors.

The smell was starting to get to me and I studied the junction in front of me. Normally, there would be a catalog computer in every section but I couldn't see any here. I was running my hands down the shelve, feeling the varying length of their spins when I felt something different. Was that wood?

I stopped, my hand groping for the none-book and pulled out a box. Honestly, if I hadn't been touching the spines, I wouldn't have given it a second glance. It was a nondescript wooden box and it wasn't locked. I opened the simple latch that kept it shut to reveal three thumb drives.My heart sped up when I spotted my name, though Margot wasn't an uncommon name in the de Silver. I grimaced, but then I spotted the year I was born underneath it. I was the only Margot born in 2395!

The other thumb drives had the name Andre and Abigail on respectively. The year under Andre's was about twenty years earlier than mine, but the one for Abigail was only four years after me. There was no one by the name in the de Silver. Yet. I wasn't added on until five years ago, who was to say that she wouldn't come along?

Closing the lid of the box, I tried to think about who Andre might be. I clutched the box close to my heart, wandering around the library, hoping to clear my head. Whoever the other two were, I'd decide what to do with the box once I had read the content in the drives.Eventually, I ended up in a section that I recognised and I found my way back to my room. My hands were shaking and I tucked the box behind my back, away from sight. My heart was pounding, my head was spinning with what this could possibly be. Could someone be pranking me?

It was unlikely though; how could they make sure I walked into that section of the library?With all these thoughts still swirling in my head, I swiped my identity watch to open my doors. The cleaning bots had come by, and my room was spotless. I had to dig around to locate the thumb drive port; who even use this anyway? We could just transfer the files wirelessly or via email.

There was only one file inside, labeled with my name. I double-clicked, feeling my heart in my throat as the video popped up. The face that stared back at me almost gave me a heart attack."Hello," Akram de Silver, the founder of the de Silver Family, said. He looked young in there, younger than the portraits I had seen of him. "My name is Akram de Silver, and I hope that you are Margot."

My stomach twisted when he said my name, and I pinched myself to make sure this wasn't a dream as he carried on. "Katerina told me you'd come one day, either you, Andre, or Abigail."Katerina! It had to be Katerina Falcon, one of the Originals. How did Akram know them? I knew they were from the same period, but they were miles apart. He used the word either, did that mean that since I was here, there was no Andre or Abigail? My eyes darted to the thumb drives. Guess I would find out later.

"You're the child of one of my descendants and one of Victoria's descendants," he said. Tell me something I didn't know. I shifted to get into a more comfortable position, trying to get a read on his background. It looked dark; was he underground or was it night time? "You inherited both of our mutations, which gives you more power than we have ever seen before in a single individual—surpassing even the Ganesh Family. However, the world that you have been born into is not at peace. There are dangers ahead. If the world is to survive, it's up to you to do something."

I perked up. That was exactly what I had been waiting for. I knew I was special, but to know that I would be the most powerful P.O.E. ever, that was better than I imagined.

"The future is not certain," Akram continued, staring intently into the camera. I didn't understand why he'd know that we weren't at peace. Everything had been the same since they established the Peace Treaty. What could possibly happen? "But if what Katerina saw came true, everything that we had worked so hard for will cease to exist. The P.O.E. community, the Citybases, even the Legres."

There was no mistaking the gravity in his voice, and if Katerina Falcon had seen it, there wasn't much chance that she was wrong. My entire body shook at the idea that I could save the world. A trickle of what my father would call "andrenoline" ran through me, and I was both terrified and excited.

"There is a long road ahead, but you need to prepare yourself. Find Katerina, she'll tell you what to do. I don't want to place such a great burden on you, but you are our only hope."He went quiet for a bit but didn't cut the video. I checked to see that he was probably going to say something more. "You might want to ask me what the danger is, the truth is, I don't know. All I know is that you have the power to make everything right. But not by yourself. So be prepared and I wish you all the best."

With that, the screen went black. He didn't give me much information, except that I would be a powerful P.O.E., that I could save the world and I had to find Katerina. Which was ridiculous, because she wasn't alive anymore. Or was she?

I pulled up the de Silver database tab, typing in Katerina's name. A bunch of results popped up, mostly related to books that mentioned her name. There were no photos of the Originals for the world to see, but I knew each Legacy Family must have some portrait or photo of them. We had one of Victoria in our headquarter.

A few entries on the Original Peace Agreement. I clicked in, but half of it was cut off, classified.I huffed, pulling up the video messaging tab and called father. He never hid anything from me, since I'd get to know everything one day anyway.

"Hello princess, what's the occasion?"

"Father, is Katerina Falcon still alive?" I asked, noticing that he was in his office. He paused, an unreadable look crossed his face.

"Why the sudden question? Did the de Silver said something?"

"No, I just read a reference and it worded like she's still around," I answered. That wasn't lying."She is," father answered, his face looking tensed and tired. "It isn't a secret, not really, but we don't know her exact location. She travels a lot."

I hid my grimace. It would take more to track her down then. A plan started hatching in my head and I looked around for a sheet of paper and wrote them down. No one could hack a piece of paper, and no one could stop me from saving the world.

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Seems like I'm updating monthly and not weekly - sorry about that. Writing has been weirdly hard for me since I finished Dark Ages. But the events of the last month has really triggered my post-apocalyptic imagination, so I'm back.

For those who are living in China and Hong Kong, and Asia, stay safe from the coronavirus! I'm HK based and things have been a bit manic. But it does mean I get more time at home to write.