"The biggest adventure you can take is to live the life of your dreams."
-Oprah Winfrey

Alexandra would love to say that her whole training went as good as the first day did. Because, it didn't.

She was right away accepted. Upon her performance in the first test, called "Overpowering the Stalker", which she had indeed done. She was accepted. But then, began the trouble.

'You need to be lithe. And fast. Physically and mentally. That being said, you can take a lot of example from a panther. The way it hunts.' Said Master George, to the new group of recruits who had gathered around him, the new first year batch.

'O-okay, but where is the Panther?' Alexandra asked, a bit giddy with triumph.

'Don't be purposefully dense, girl! There is no Panther here, unless you want one, which we could provide, certainly!' The Master boomed, fixing her with his stern gaze- terrible enough to make burly men pee in their pants.

'No, no. I guess I shall manage.' She managed, as the boys all looked at her, their eyebrows raised as if they were noticing her for the first time. That was a little counterproductive, because her very first impression had become of an impertinent lass.

Not that Alexandra cared, in any case.

'Very good! Now, you seven, are the top twenty percent of all the people we had shortlisted. Make sure you do good. This is your first year. Here, we will prepare you for the challenges ahead. However, just because it is a preparatory year, you must not take it lightly at all. Unless the base is strong, the building will be as weak as a house of cards. And you all MUST help each other in times of need, because here, you DO NOT compete. You all must be a chain and strengthen each other. Remember, boys - and girl: A chain is only as strong as its weakest link!' He said and waited, for the words to have their desired effect. Alexandra knew that was a famous quote - chain being strong as the weakest link. The boys, six of them, looked impolitely bored. She knew that feeling: everybody was waiting for some action.

'Go there now, in the Health Test, all of you!' He then said, dismissing them all.

There, they asked Alexandra a lot of things, about her general health, made her run twenty miles, and then do some other basic things - like sit-ups and hops and lunges and rolls. Fifteen medics in white uniforms rushed about. They raised their eyebrows at Alexandra, so she grinned at them. Perfect non-violence, she couldn't knock out everybody's teeth. With that, the first day was over.

They had to sleep in the dormitories. It was the housing center for all the students. There was a separate room for her, while two boys shared one room. According to that stalker-boy, whose name was Sander, this year, apart form her, there were Watson, Hans, Venly, Gergs, Paul and Owen.

All boys, without doubt. This year was particularly low joiners. But Master George said that it always happened once in a while.

Sundays were off. One task everyday, one bit of test, one bit of work to do. They were marked upon it, if the job was satisfactory, it was a pass. If it wasn't, a fail. Three fails in a row, would land them in Detention.

First they were taught to swim, because swimming was, as Master George put it, "an easy and indispensable thing to learn,". They would have get up in the mornings at three, a time Alexandra found torturously early, when even the sun had not woken up. Right in front of their Dormitory was the Mess, they had breakfast at four.

There was a huge training ground, spread over acres and acres of land, right in the middle of the campus. To the lower right corner of the Ground was the a lake. Deep, very deep and, at nights, scary. That was where, for six hours each day, they learned to swim - something which Alexandra found quite simple to do.

By twelve, they were free to have lunch. Following which, they assembled in the training grounds for a round of strenuous physical work. Alexandra could barely walk by the end of it, at five or six in the evening, when they had Dinner. By seven, everyone was free to either go to the library, or the Arena, or the Lake, or their dormitories. The private time for everyone. Alexandra usually stayed in the library, or sat down by the lake to think of Doveland (that she no longer bothered about) ... or what the people at the Shelter would be thinking of her ... Betty had said, You won't leave, right?

And she'd assured that she wouldn't. But she'd broken her word. She had left. Not that Alexandra wouldn't return. She surely would. One day, the first day she got the chance to, she would.

By nine, Master George's Office light went off. That was when the young people had the whole campus to themselves. They had fun, apparently. But Alexandra just dragged herself off to the dormitory and crashed asleep.

* * *

One Saturday, four months after a lot of exercising and fast moving, they had to rope walk.

Henry was supervising. He was a big, burly guy, four years older to all of them, in the fifth year. He was calling out their names one by one.

'You people will preferably not have to rope-walk, ever in your lifetime. But this is, more for testing your concentration. Now, come on when I call your name. WATSON!' He called, and the boy stood up instantly. He was freckled, had blonde hair and blue eyes. His most prominent feature were his pixie ears, which gave him a trouble maker's position in the year. He had to go first, evidently a bit unnerved, because below them was the lake: deep and scary.

He walked a bit, shaking horribly, then unbalanced, held on to the rope with his hands and crawled the rest of the way. Alexandra couldn't hold a laugh.

Henry noticed, 'Mabel. Isn't it?'

'Yes.' She said, stoutly.

'Go next.' He ordered, not asking any questions. She stood up.

It is not difficult, she told herself.

It's a wall, think it's a wall. 

And it was surprisingly easy. Her legs wobbled horribly - more than Watson's - but she was certainly doing better than the him. Only, when she was halfway, some devilry came to Watson's mind. He crawled back to the rope, and when Henry wasn't watching, gave it the slightest shake. Even that was enough to imbalance her already shaking legs.

'DON'T!' Alexandra cried. But it was too late, she tried to hold on to the rope, but it all happened really quick. Down she splashed.

'Poor!' Henry announced, looking down into the lake. 'Poor performance!'

'But Sir!' She protested, thrashing to keep herself afloat. 'He shook the rope! Watson did!'

'I didn't see that!' Henry replied.

Alexandra cursed and kicked the water in desperation. 'The others must have!'

'Well?' Asked Henry, to the other boys. They all suddenly looked really busy with themselves and shook their heads innocently.

'You people did!' Alexandra yelled.

'They didn't!' Henry yelled back.

Alexandra didn't say anything- mainly because she was trying to keep her head above the water. But she had a good dictionary of choice words for such situations - ones that would make Henry drop his dagger. Or maybe, put her in detention forever. That was why, perhaps, it was good she didn't use them. Watson just smiled innocently with a shrug and made a gesture that could have meant get out. 

Get out from the lake... or the Council? Alexandra had wondered, she had a suspicion that he had meant "get out of the Council".

That same week, they were given a race to compete. Apparently their speed had to be twenty six kilometers per hour. A pace that made Alexandra gawk and splutter. In that race, all the boys left her in the dust - by the standards of her sisters, Alexandra had been a cheetah. With these people, she was worse than a tortoise and it was for real: she was not a very fast runner. Her skills were more mental. So for the next time, she tried harder, a lot.

Improving speed was not too difficult. Since she had no way to time herself, she checked how blurred the things around her seemed. And only when her surroundings appeared nothing but a combined splatter of colors, was Alexandra satisfied.

Turned out, she should have been more than satisfied: because in the second race, Alexandra felt her feet were not even touching the ground at the speed she was going. All her year-mates were no where to be seen around or in front- which could only mean that they were somewhere behind. What she didn't realize was that, her year-mates didn't like to be left behind.

They found a way.

This time, Alexandra didn't even have time to yell "DON'T!". Just when the finishing line was in view, something round and hard came under her left sandal. It, at once, startled, scared and unbalanced her. Her leg twisted, with her whole body weight falling on the already twisted foot, increasing the pain to a hundred times worse. Alexandra found herself face to face with the dusty tracks, a second later. All around her, the rest of them completed the race.

She shot out a hand and extracted her foot from beneath herself. It was unusually swollen and tender. Then her eyes fell upon the hard and round thing under her foot, and she used such a bad word: the examiner, Mark Fannel, told her that he would throw her out if she repeated it.

'But Sir, someone threw this right under my foot! And don't tell me you didn't see that' She hollered at him, remembering Henry. He did look interested. 

'Show that to me,' He asked, holding a hand out for the wooden bottle. Alexandra did. He stared at the thing for a second, then offered Alexandra a hand up. She hesitated for a second but then: just for the second time in her life, she accepted a man's hand, standing up.

'Who did this?' Fannel demanded, turning towards the rest, whose smug smiles had been wiped out.

No reply.

'I asked, who did this?' He repeated.

No reply.

'So, I guess, you all are scared of a girl. You cannot do better fairly, so you use cheap tricks.'

Silence.

'I am not Henry.' He clarified, making everyone go even more silent if that was possible, 'I do know where you can get these bottles and who can get it.'

Silence.

'But since that one person will not own up...' He said, 'I guess it is a fail for all the boys. And a pass for-'

'It was Venly!' Paul shouted suddenly.

'Liar!' Venly snapped, 'Not me! It was Hans!'

'What? You rascal! I saw you getting that bottle, but I didn't know you would do that with it!' Hans said, almost grabbing his collar.

'It was not me! Really. Hans and Watson did it together. They told the rest of us to keep quiet!' Venly continued, now Hans really closed his hands upon his collar, fixing him with a vile look and muttering curses.

'We didn't!' Watson maintained, giving Venly a smack on the head- who did the same to him, snatching his collar away from Hans.

'Yes you did!' Owen and Gergs spoke up at the same time, backing up Venly, their speeches peppered with words three times worse than the one Alexandra had used.

Soon they were having a brawl over whose trick it was. Fannel and she, watched - Alexandra frowning, Fannel with a smirk - like he knew he ought to stop that, but it was only too enjoyable to do so.

'Sir...' Alexandra ventured.

'Go.' He told her, in an elder-brotherly way. 'No one failed. Let me get these boys apart - they are getting murderous.'