"It's been 1,000 years since the Dark age has ended." I scramble to keep up with my teacher as she leads us through the museum, trying to fiddle with my air bubble to make it comfortable and look around the hallway at the same time. We landed on Earth this morning and Miss Holland told us that we only have the day to go around the castle, and that we need to be nice and obedient or else we won't get to see anything.

"Is the castle 1,000 years old then?" Jenny asks, walking alongside Miss Holland closely. I try not to roll my eyes at her, her perception of history is horrible.

"No Jenny, it's even older than that." Miss Holland answers in an excited tone, which cause a wave of chatters among the rest of us. I share a look with my best friend, Yvonne, and she grins back at me, face slightly distorted by the bubble. We might not be that into school, but we know everything we can find about the Originals.

"It's from the Old Ages!" One of the boys shouts behind us and Miss Holland nods, not bothering to reprimand whoever it is that spoke out of turns for once.

"It's the castle that Katerina Falcon, the Original with the power to see the future, lived for over three centuries." She recites, turning a corner and leading us into an exhibition room. I always find it weird that we don't have photos of the Originals, but the Time Guardians has always stresses on the importance of time-space continuum and all that and won't reveal the information. And since Mars was only repopulated two hundred years ago, any chance of an old record being kept in a dusty corner of the virtual library is zero.

"Lisabeth, are you paying attention?" Miss Holland's voice breaks me out of my daydream and I quickly nod, not wanting to get into trouble again.

"Good." She gives me a slight glare, but thankfully drops the issue. "Their rise to save the world from dying of radiation and the Peace Treaty with Legres are the only reason why we are able to survive and thrive to this day."

"Don't forget Abigail Beckett!" Ivanna shouts, her face almost press up against one section of the exhibition where photos of a girl with piercing blue eyes were shown. For some reasons, Abigail Beckett's photo is allowed to be on display, something about the time slice of her lifetime being blocked from entering since the incident about five hundred years ago that almost caused the timeline to rupture. I am not sure what that means, but it's obviously not a good thing. We don't get to study time until the grade 13, and even then it's mostly about the importance of keeping it intact. Boring.

"Yes." Miss Holland walks over to the display case where a photo of Abigail's family and some artefacts are also shown. "Abigail is the direct descendent of Akram de Silver, who has been amended to be the eleventh Original since the discovery of his involvement with the Originals by Abigail. She was instrumental in the eradication of the terrorist group the Apocalypse and renewing the Legre Peace Treaty."

"Hey Lisabeth, aren't you a direct descendent of Chungkit Wong." Cole suddenly turns to me and asks, and several other heads swivel around to look at me. I can feel the glances of everyone into the room focusing on me.

"She is, but that's none of your business." Yvonne answers for me, knowing that I am not good under this kind of situation. It's true that the Original bloodline runs through my family, but it's been almost nine hundred years, virtually half the people on Mars are related to him as a branch of the Wong family had been the first to migrate to Mars.

"Cool! Have your power surfaced yet?"

"Are you eligible to become a Time Guardian?"

"She is not from the Falcon or Graham line!"

A million questions bombard at me all of a sudden and I feel like my head might explode. A sense of dread spread through me as the fact that my powers, if I have any, still hasn't manifested yet. My father assured me that it will, and that Mars affect our mutation in a different way. My mother told me that it doesn't matter whether I am a POE or not, that I would still make her proud and can always work in the Peace Treaty Organisation. But nobody who is anybody is a norm nowadays.

"Class, settle down." Miss Holland shouts to get everyone into order. "Please don't pester Lisabeth, and we have a lot more to see before we finish today's tour."

Reluctantly, the class leave me alone and I breathe a sigh of relief. Yvonne put her arm around me comfortingly and I gave her a grateful smile, what would I do without her?

After a quick tour of the exhibits in the room, we are ushered out of the room as another group barges in. Miss Holland isn't kidding when she said we are on a tight schedule.

"Maybe you will find a hidden message for you here!" Yvonne nudges me excitedly and I grin back at her. I definitely hope to – in fact, I plan on making my own luck today.

"Lunch break, this room's atmosphere is especially calibrated for the current atmosphere so you can take off your air bubble. We will begin the tour in half an hour." Miss Holland's stern face is on, so we know that she means business. Exchanging a conspirational glance with Yvonne, we wait until Miss Holland rushes towards the toilet before making a big scene of pretending to need the toilet, too.

"We will get in so much trouble for this!" Yvonne winks at me, both of us trying to hold in our giggles as we slip past a no access rope. It's time for my adventure to begin...