The Practitioners Book 1 Chapter 3

Hello anyone who happens to stumble across this blog(or Dugglyn)! How are you? If you are just stumbling across this, hopefully the title of this post and the previous two would have given you the hint to either start at my hello post or the one tat says "Chapter 1" in it. If not, please start there! If you already have read the first two chapters, first of all, I would love your feedback on those. Second of all, you're in luck(if you liked them, which I don't know why you would still be here if you didn't)! I figured I have chapters 3 and 4 waiting to be posted, so why not now! So now...chapter 3!!! Lots of exclamation points!!! Yay!!!!! More!!!!! Yeah, I'll stop now...(!). So here it is, please leave you're feedback, any and all constructive criticism and opinions are welcome!
                                                                           
                                                                                 3
                                                            The History of Ash Daniels
            Ash was excited-ecstatic. All she had ever worked for was being recognized. She had trained and fought so hard for this. Now it was here. She was a member of the Base. No longer that trainee that everyone was wary of. Not many people liked her, but that was okay, because she didn’t like them all that much either. Now that she thought of it, the latter probably caused the former. Well that and their jealousy. 
            But now that didn’t matter. She was a member. A real member. 
After the meeting, Will and Cass gravitated towards the cafeteria. She and Avery had headed towards the quarters that Ash shared with another girl. They walked there enveloped by a comfortable silence. 
            Avery and Ash’s relationship was very complex, but their affection was quite simple. Avery filled the roles of parent, teacher, and mentor in Ash’s life. Avery had taken Ash in when she was a very young child. Avery had been eighty two at the time, and had just begun working at the British Base after having spent a few years working in the Irish Base. She hadn’t gotten along with many people. That was one of the reason’s Ash and Avery had become great friends along with the close bond they had already shared. They shared views on other people. Most of them just aren’t likable. Avery had needed a change of scenery and ended up in the British Base. 
            That was roughly nineteen years ago. Avery took Ash in when Ash was one year old, almost seventeen years ago. Ash was going to turn eighteen in two months, in January. Jane and Will both had birthdays in March, but Will’s birthday was a bit less than two weeks preceding Jane’s. Soon they would all be adults. All her life, Ash had longed to be an adult, but mostly because that is when she would become a member of the Base. Even though when she did become a member this was only a few months away from being an adult, she still felt a vague sense of being tricked. She had always thought the two went together, but somehow it ended up being a lie. Ash quickly brushed away those thoughts and let the giddiness silently conquer her once again. 
            They walked through bland hall after bland hall. Ash remembered the first time she had run through these halls. She had been no older than six at the time. Avery had started to lead her to her new quarters. Ash, having been in the Base for basically her entire life, began her training earlier than most. Avery had told her the number of her room and Ash had wasted no time. The halls seemed to fly by her, grey wall blending into grey corner blending into grey wall blending into brown door. Eventually Ash had doubled back to find a thoroughly amused Avery strolling up to Ash’s room. When the door had revealed a storm grey square barely big enough to serve its purpose containing two plain twin beds with crisp but dull white sheets tucked tightly to the beds, Ash had been surprisingly excited. It wasn’t anything eye-catching. It wasn’t special or unique, and Ash had known that. That didn’t stop her excitement though. It was still hers. She was still on a track she wanted to be on. 
            Now the halls didn’t hold the same wonder. Maybe some nostalgia, but definitely no awe. In recent years, the halls had started to bother Ash, actually, in that bothersome existence that
only a hall could possibly ever lead. Most people say, “if these walls could talk,” but Ash always preferred them to stay silent. Halls tended to be boring. All the action packed and dramatic scenes tended to take place in dank caves or elegant ballrooms, but never dull hallways.Maybe a dirty back alley.Even doorways were more exciting; they led into those places. Someone had once told Ash that they believed doorways were haunted. She couldn’t remember who it had been. 
            Now that she thought of it, Ash pitied these halls. She was sure if they were able to talk they would beg for conversation. Begging wasn’t becoming of walls, Ash decided. Walls with any shred of dignity would act like respectable people, only without the human body.
            They reached Ash’s room and she went to grab the knob. She paused.
            “I’m going to miss you, Avery.”
            “I’m going to miss you too, Small.” Avery said with a sad smile. Before Ash was called Ash no one knew what to call her. Most people called her Avery Jr., much to Avery’s dismay. Ash had followed Avery everywhere with as much admiration as a toddling three year old could muster. Avery took to calling her Small Person, which was later abbreviated to simply Small. “I’ve never been to America. You’ll have to tell me what it’s like over there.”
            “Avery, why are we being sent there?”
            “What do you mean?”
            “I mean, why us of all people. I mean, America has its own operatives.”
            Avery just shrugged. “They needed people who were young enough to be in high school. For some reason they couldn’t pinpoint just who in that school is the next target.”
            “Yeah, Governor Allen said that much. But why us? We aren’t anything special. We are pretty random. Doesn’t the entirety of America or anywhere else have young operatives?”
            Avery looked oddly confused. “When you say you aren’t special, whom are you referring to? Will, who shot through training coming off the streets, and is very possibly one of the most powerful pysch of your generation? What about Jane, who is not only extraordinary but carries with her Cassiopeia? Maybe yourself, the charmer that you are? All that unnatural magic making everyone like you?”
            Ash just smiled and closed her eyes. “Point taken.”
            “Someday you are going to accomplish great things, Ash. I am honored that I got to be a part of you.” 
            Avery’s hand raised into the space between them, but Ash wasn’t having it. She wrapped her arms around Avery’s strong shoulders. Ash felt a head shaking, but Avery quickly gave in and wrapped strong arms around Ash’s smaller frame.
            They separated and Ash could tell that this was the last that they would see of each other for a while. Ash took the opportunity to examine Avery-this random person who chose to take Ash in, who Ash had modeled herself after, had strived to become. Now, a childhood later, Avery appeared only a few years older than Ash to any passerby, but there was something about those scarlet eyes, a wisdom that set them apart, that marked Ash as the student and Avery as the teacher. For a moment Ash envisioned a wise old man on a remote hill spouting practically nonsensical lessons to a small child looking for wisdom. The picture made Ash chuckle.
            They pulled away, and just smiled at each other, a proud parent and a kid leaving the nest. Technically not true, and Ash knew that, but the sentiment seemed like it was the same. So Ash imagined, at least. She never had a family. Never had a biological parent. That was okay though, because Avery loved her and she Avery just as much as any family. They needed each other. Avery had been lonely, and Ash had been a baby with no family.
            But Ash did know a little about her family and about where she came from. Her parents had been pretty normal people. A young, newlywed couple who had just moved to the suburbs with their beautiful baby. Practitioners, probably around seventy, reaching that point in their lives when everything was new and happy and beautiful. Ash's father was a healer, with a job at a research center working on cures for various diseases. Practitioners could contract some of the same diseases as civilians, but there were also different ones that only those wielding magic could have. Often times they were much worse than the toughest cancer. It was those that Ash's father worked to cure. Her mother was a combatative, but had a distaste for fighting, and went into science. No one had ever bothered to tell Ash what power she possessed. When she was very young, Ash liked to fantasize that she flew like her, and someday her mom would return and they would fly away together. Ash's parents both took their professions very seriously, but often times they would have their own little mad scientist experiments going on. They were very good at them. They made a machine to freely power their entire house, infused nutrients into water, made their own sun cream that only needed to be applied every few weeks, a process of injecting someone with extra magic, a process for speeding up pregnancy. The test subject for artificial magic was Ash herself, as a baby. It had been a resounding success. They figured out a way to convert magic into matter and put it in a serum. As a baby, Ash's eyes were injected with magic. Pure magic. Her parents chose her eyes because the eyes are what link up the mind and soul and magic in a person. That's why practitioners had "unnaturally colored" eyes. That is why Ash had the magenta eyes of an influential, even though she was a combatative. The magic had taken shape inside her as charm. it reached out to the goodness in people, or brought out an unusual side of a person's personality.
            The sped up pregnancy worked as well on Ash's mother. But not for Ash. Ash had a brother. Her mother got pregnant with him only two months after having Ash, and her brother was born after three. It was a miracle. It was magic. His name was Daniel.
            Then one day her parents tried to beat the unbeatable. Death. The master of the universe as it is. There is an air of immortality that comes with constant success. Unfortunately, air eventually blows itself away to fill the lung of another. No one knows exactly what happened that day, or so everyone told Ash, as if it were some sort of campfire story, but Ash's mother, Ash's father, and Daniel were all killed. Ash was in another room, robbed from her mother's milk when she was no more than five months old.
            She was found by a civilian neighbor, and that quickly got complicated. Her magenta eyes captivated them, and they wanted this baby for themselves. But they could not support her,
and they just wanted what was best for this baby. This baby made them a better person. That was just the magic, of course, but that neighbor didn't-couldn't-know that. Ash was to be put into a foster system, but a practitioner in the operation got her out of there.
            All her life, from the time that Avery took responsibility for her, Ash wanted to be a part of the Base. It was what drove her. She was raised basically like any other child, only with magic. One day, when she was about two, Avery left for a day, leaving her in the care of another practitioner-they didn't work at the Base any more; they were one of the oldest on staff. Ash had asked where Avery had gone and had been met with the reply, "Why, Avery is saving people. Avery went to help people who can't help themselves. Avery might get hurt, but Avery helped people. I bet Avery would be so proud of you if you help people too, Jr."
            Ash turned towards the brown, inconsequential door leading to her quarters. Avery started to walk away, but paused before even reaching the corner. "Small, I just want you to know. I am so proud of you. I love you, Small."

(Sorry if the indents are sort of weird, I had to do it manually because the format didn't want to work :P)