August 20th, 2484 - Frontier Space, a Nameless Planetoid - Training Room 3

The hallways of the church were cramped, the walls stone and overbearing. There was an enormous chapel, containing a great, silvery crystal, suspended above the pulpit by loops of chain. There was a kitchen, and an indoor garden, where herbs and vegetables were grown. It had a sunroof, with a beautiful view of the stars. There were vast, empty rooms for training, and cramped, empty rooms for sleeping, with beds fashioned from cold stone slabs. There were other rooms too, but they did not matter to Clerica. Clerica didn’t mind the cold; she awoke each morning with renewed vigour, her purpose laid out for her by the Holy Mother. Clerica trained in the Mystik Arts from dawn until very nearly dusk, dressed in her own, simple cyan robe, alongside her sisters. She did not speak to them, and they did not speak to her. Clerica had seen war before, and she knew all too well that they were preparing for one. There was no need for unnecessary attachments on the battlefield.

*

A group of girls watching Clerica at all times. One was clearly the ringleader, and she walked across the training room floor to bar Clerica from leaving.

‘Going somewhere?’ she asked.

Sunlight pierced the dark room through the windows above, hewn into the rock like the bars on a prison cell.

‘My room’, Clerica replied, bluntly.

‘You excelled in training today’, the girl scoffed. ‘It’s ridiculous, seeing the new girl reach first place on the fitness rankings with only a month of training ... pushing me down to second. You might even learn the name of your Mystik Art before we do. I bet that’d make you feel real important … the Holy Mother’s new favourite doll.’

‘It’s just … my purpose’, Clerica replied.

The girl untied her long brown hair and shook it out. One of her eyes was blue, the other green. She contorted her lips in a nasty, contemptuous smirk.

‘They call me Dei’, the girl said. ‘If you want to talk about lofty concepts like ‘purpose’, then my purpose is to be the best.’

‘Did the Holy Mother … order you to be the best?’ Clerica asked, raising an eyebrow quizzically. The group of girls giggled in a sinister fashion.

‘Hardly’, Dei scoffed, narrowing her eyes. ‘My orders are the same as yours … to train until I’m fighting fit, and to be prepared … but I decided my purpose by myself. Is there anything you want? Besides eating, sleeping and training like a machine?’

Clerica drew a blank. She thought for a moment, and replied, ‘Do I need anything else?’

‘We’re not going to get along’, Dei replied, and she stormed off to the other girls in a huff.

October 9th, 2484 – Frontier Space, a Nameless Planetoid - Garden

‘Ah! Dammit!’

There was a tremendous crash, and then a cry rang out. Clerica came to the garden every morning, before breakfast. She had come to love the sight and smell of the lavender from faraway Earth, the thorny daggerweed from Bungirba and the crimson heart flowers from Haaloja-2, the planet below. She didn’t move immediately. The cry of fear and astonishment stirred something in her, and panic set in. in her mind’s eye, she saw a girl, stumbling through the snow in nothing but rags, crying out for help until her voice was hoarse, clutching her freezing limbs…

‘Ooh, my leg!’ the cry came again. ‘Dammit!’

Clerica ignored the thought and stood. She was compelled, pulled through the rows of potted plants by some invisible force, filled with a sense of worry and urgency.

The girl lay shaking on the ground, her right leg twitching spasmodically. She looked up at Clerica, her pale grey eyes wide with fear, the dark skin of her face turning red with embarrassment. A large rack had fallen on her, and was covering her left leg entirely. All of the potted plants that had been on the rack had fallen, the pots shattering and the contents strewn in earthy mounds across the floor.

‘I—I was just watering the plants when it—it just—ooh, I told the Holy Mother I was too clumsy for this job’, the girl stammered, trying to lift the rack unsuccessfully. Clerica’s body moved on its own. She stooped, bending her knees, and grabbed hold of the rack with both hands.

‘I need you to push from underneath’, Clerica instructed. ‘We can’t get it upright by ourselves, but we can get it off you.’

The girl nodded, biting her lip and squeezing her eyes shut.

‘Hey, hey, Keep your eyes open’, Clerica snapped, and the girl obeyed, her curly, black hair bobbing as the leg twitched again. ‘What’s your name?’

‘I’m … Grace.’ The girl stammered. ‘T—thanks for coming over … some of the other girls wouldn’t. They’re used to my clumsiness by now.’

‘Just keep your eyes open Grace’, Clerica replied. ‘We’ll get through this, but you need to stay alert. On a count of three, we move together … one, two, three!’

*

‘I need a favour, Dei.’

Dei looked up from her food, and narrowed her eyes, her lips contorting with amusement.

‘What’s this Clerica?’ she inquired in a patronizing tone. ‘You need help from me? I thought you didn’t need anything.’

‘It’s not about me’, Clerica snapped.

The other girls seated around the stone table in the kitchen stared at her in surprise. Dei raised an eyebrow.

‘It’s about Grace’, Clerica whispered, sitting down beside Dei. ‘There’s been an accident in the garden. If the Holy Mother finds out, Grace could face up to six months confined to her room … cleaning it up is going to be a three-woman job.’

‘What’s in it for me?’ Dei chortled.

‘…Suppose I performed really poorly in training for a week, and my ranking dropped to twentieth place’, Clerica suggested.

Dei considered for a moment. Both her eyebrows were raised.

At last she replied, ‘Fine, it’s a deal.’

*

They began to sit together during breaks, and at breakfast. Grace and Clerica were fast friends; Grace could talk for hours without tiring, and Clerica enjoyed her company. Clerica’s ranking plummeted to exactly twentieth place for one whole week. Then, once that week was up, they rapidly improved, sitting at second place, but never exceeding it. Eventually, Dei joined them during breaks. First she chastised and mocked, and then she partook in conversation. Before long, the girls were inseparable.