Castle of Glass

If walls could talk.... the coppery haired, bespectacled matron of the Horizon Orphanage sighed and muttered to herself as she gazed unhappily down at the scrawny 4 year old girl who still had yet to utter a word since her arrival as an infant.

I knew what Claire was thinking and why she was frustrated on Amalia's behalf...though to Amalia I was sure it had always seemed as though Claire was frustrated with her.

The flame-haired Claire took this position to help the children of Rygellia 5, and time and again she watched them try to tear each other apart due to their own anger at all that they did not have.

Claire always tried to foster an air of togetherness and family and most of the time it worked.

Sadly, little Amalia was a very different child from the rest and she also tended to hide herself away from others, which made it all but impossible for her to make connections with the other children.

So Amalia had gone from "shy" Amalia, to "stupid" Amalia and once that dreadful label was slapped on her by the children it was downhill from there.....which made her social anxiety even worse.

I knew this because I watched over Amalia. I watched over all of the children at Horizon Orphanage & Foster Care to be sure, but I have always had a special place in my heart for those like Amalia.

I could find her anywhere that she was within my walls, and sometimes I used the lines of energy that ran through this world to find her when she hid herself elsewhere...they were the same lines that I used periodically to chat with the other original colonizer buildings on Rygellia 5.

We were all built for the colonists as an extra layer of protection for them, although only a few of the colony leaders knew about us....the government felt that the colonists would be upset and put off if they knew that they were living in sentient houses. After a few centuries, all those that had any knowledge of us passed away and had opted not to pass on the information and those that had were thought to be crazy so it was relegated to being a superstition. People thought it was the AI network that counted for much of what we did.

I felt Amalia cringing away from Claire as Claire knelt down to look at her, it brought me back to the present, Claire pursed her lips and asked, even though she knew Amalia would never tell her, even if the girl could speak, "Who did this to you Amalia? You can tell me, no one will get in trouble...but I need to know so this will stop."

Amalia turned bright blue eyes to her matron and for a second I actually thought she would tell her, but then she dropped her gaze and turned her head, her long brown hair fell across her face like a curtain and she hugged herself where the bruises stuck out like blue and purple flowers on her pale skin.

She ducked away from Claires attempt to place her hair behind her oversized ears and then took off like a shot. Leaving poor Claire kneeling on the tiles and trying hard not to cry.

Claire was so absorbed in trying to get Amalia to open up to her that she missed Trini and her little band of followers. The kids who chose to be harsh with others so as no one would dare to be harsh with them again. Smirking and snickering around a corner and just out of earshot of Claire and Amalia.

Amalia, however, had known that they were there.

Amalia was sensitive, she was able to feel the energy and emotions of other living beings.

Which was a large part of the reason that she never spoke to anyone and the main reason that she kept to herself so much. Amalia literally couldn’t be around many people as it would make her sick with migraines and such.

Over time most sensitives learn to shield themselves from these things or they discover different chemicals that can be used as a temporary block.

Caffeine was one of the more socially acceptable chemical blockers available, and you would be hard pressed to find a sensitive that was not a raging caffeine addict.

I gave Trini and her little friends a quick jolt from the power grid that they were by, not enough to do any permanent damage but enough to catch Claires attention and get them all on extra chore duty for the next few weeks.

That should give them something to do besides harassing quiet, shy little girls who couldn’t fight back.

I have always hated bullies, all of us houses did. I understand why they are the way they are...but they could have made the better choice and become something better, but who knows perhaps they still would after they grew up.

I let Claire deal with the bullies, and I went looking for Amalia.

Truth be told , I had been intervening on her behalf for a while now...but the other kids never seemed to grasp that they should leave her be.

Well ok, the kids who weren’t bullies caught on pretty fast....but they also weren’t about to tell Trini and her flock anything that would help them evade problems.

Most of the kids at HOAFC were good kids and were busy dealing with their own issues and just trying to grow up. Trini and her little posse were the only bad apples, and I knew what their issues were....it didn’t justify their actions, merely explained them.

I found Amalia up in what would have been an attic crawlspace. It was too small for any adult and would have been difficult for most children to get into....but Amalia was small for her age and would seek these places out as a safety net or when she was afraid.

I had seen her find all sorts of nooks and crannies in my walls as she grew more mobile, when she was smaller I had been worried that she would get stuck or damage my nerve clusters in different crawlways......but Amalia was amazingly gentle and coordinated.

Today she had found the chamber where a set of my central processing nerves resided ...these were used in the past to communicate between humans and us.

Amalia was huddled against the farthest wall within the chamber, hugging her knees with her head down.

She wiped her head up when my consciousness came nearer to her, she had always been able to feel when my focus was set on her but she didn’t know what she was feeling at the time. Even as a baby Amalia had felt my presence, which was how I had originally figured out that she was sensitive.

"Hello?" Her piercing blue eyes scanned the chamber around her and then her brows came down in a furrow

"Where are you?" Her stress had waned a bit as her curiosity took over.

I sighed to myself, it was too bad really......it would have been nice to chat with someone after all of these years, and Amalia could use a friend...well more accurately, a talking friend .

The funny thing was that her back was pressed up to the wall where two circular designs grew.

In the early days, these were where the colonists who knew about us would come to talk to us more directly....the circular designs grew over nerves that would allow me to connect to any sentient being touching them....they acted as a video phone of sorts.

"The funny circles. Right here?" Amalia’s small voice pulled me out of my reverie.

Wait. What? Had she heard me?

"Whoever you are, no I can’t hear you...but I can feel and sense what’s on your mind. I put my hands in the circles her....like this?" She had stood and placed her palms within the circles and was now looking up and around for confirmation.

I hesitated, I had wanted to talk to someone for so long and this little girl needed someone to care for her....but what if I made her life worse, It would be irresponsible of me....but then again I might be able to help her.

There was a faint glow as my wall beneath her palms grew warm and I expanded my senses until I felt that snick click that came along with a mental connection.

Her eyes grew wide as she felt my full mental presence and realized more of what I was.

"Your alive!"

"Umm hmm"

"You’re so old."

"Well, that’s not very nice but yes, I am quite old."

I felt her withdraw after her comment a little so I added

"It’s ok, I know you didn’t know...and what you say is true. I was here housing the first of the colonist on Rygellia 5"

This made her feel better and so she became curious again “Does Ms. Claire know about you?"

"No sweetie."

Throughout the afternoon and many more afternoons, evenings and mornings after that Amalia would come to visit me and ask all sorts of questions.

Questions about me and who I was and if there were any others like me.

She had so many questions and picked information up so quickly that I eventually began allowing her to sit in on my chats with the other sentient "Castles of Glass", I shielded her presence from them of course. It was frowned upon to mention our existence to humans at this point, although I disagreed with that policy there was no point in pushing the issue right now.

Amalia finally asked me why we were called Castles of Glass and so I spoke about how our creator, mother if you will... Donna Render had tried many different organic combinations which had all failed...and had finally happened upon a quartz cluster that inspired her to use a crystalline structure as our base model. To everyone that she worked for, the crystals looked like glass...and so we were deemed Castles of Glass.

My people referred to ourselves with the name that Donna had used for us, Sentients.

Amalia also wondered at our "names", when she found out that mine was BVL11, she decided that it sounded a lot like Beverly Clemons.

I found that I quite enjoyed having a human name and it stuck.

Amalia extrapolated names from all of the alphanumeric designations for the sentients that I chatted with regularly.... Higgins, Clavan, La Reuax, Darcy and so on.

Even Mad Maddy who had been silent ever since the family that had resided in her had been murdered 16 years ago.

We had all felt horrible for the whole situation, but at least the little boy, Mikhail Bote had survived and was now in the care of his Aunt Madeleine Devoe, but there was nothing we could do for Maddy now.

As the years passed and I watched Amalia grow up, I couldn’t have been prouder of her if she were my own daughter. I was able give her many tips on being a sensitive and once she learned more about shielding, she began to speak with the rest of the people at the orphanage....of course they still thought she was crazy, but crazy was better than uppity or stupid.

Once she reached adulthood, she left the orphanage to pursue her education and then find professional success......I had hoped to see her occasionally but she was busy and I knew it.

It was only when Ms. Claire's health began to fail that I saw Amalia again and she was able to explain her plans to me.

She ended up inheriting Horizons Orphanage and Foster Care from Ms. Claire and with her sensitive abilities was able to help many more children.

She had told me that she had worked hard over the years to convince Ms. Claire that she was the best choice to run Horizons and keep its legacy going.

This had been Amalia’s plan since she found out about me, she felt that she couldn’t let anyone just watch over me or the children...and if I had tear ducts I would have cried.

A few weeks after Amalia officially took over Horizons, Trini and her news crew stopped by to interview her.

I heard Trini's comments to her camera operator...

"Wow! This place is a historic landmark....I’ve always been a little in awe of it. "The young, muscled male colonist was staring up at my walls with a good amount of respect.

Trini had no such notions. "Huh, this old relic! It should have been torn down ages ago....if it weren’t for that clause written in our bylaws about all of these old Castles of Glass being untouchable, it would have been demolished by now" she sneered. Well, I guessed she had never decided to embrace being a kinder person after all.

"Hey what do you have against this place? It’s pretty neat actually."

"I grew up in this hole. I hated it then and I hate it now. Oh look, there’s the little loser of the hour! It’s no wonder she took this place over, trash always sticks together." Trini smiled as she saw Amalia walk over to greet the crew, she moved forward past the shocked cameraman to push a microphone in Amalia’s face...Amalia only smiled and took a breath.

"So tell me Ms. Kent is this structure still sa..."

"Hello Trini, it’s been so long. How have you been? By the way I love the hair. It’s very you" Amalia smiled and nodded towards Trini's severely close cropped hair while artfully dodging her old nemesis's attempts to disparage Horizons as well as Amalia.

Trini hadn’t expected that and tried futilely to gain ground again...to no avail.

Amalia led the interview where she wanted it to go and kept firm control of herself and the dialogue of the interview. Telling all about how she had graduated top of her class with honors from college and had gone on to pursue a high achieving career in counseling, how she had always dreamed of and worked towards coming back to horizons and reforming it to help future generations of lost children feel loved and valued.

After a few hours Trini was more than ready to give up and go home when Amalia dropped one last bit of news "Oh and I was going to wait to announce this but since we are old friends Trini I wanted to give you the scoop as they say" Amalia smiled as Trinis expression told that she wanted nothing to do with this scoop and wanted to leave as soon as possible.

"After careful thought and consideration, I’ve decided to rename Horizons orphanage and foster care.

From today onward it will be the Beverly Clemons House for Lost children. "Amalia 's smile was as bright as the sun...and I thought my heart was going to stop. I couldn’t believe it!!! She was naming the orphanage after me!

"Why the sudden change of name and who is Beverly Clemons?" Trini’s confusion and disgust filled her voice.

"Because that is the name it should have always had, and as to who Beverly is....well …she is my mother" Amalia looked right up at my top floor windows as she said that, she knew I had been listening this whole time.

Trini sharply said that was a wrap and walked away shaking her head in obvious frustration.

But everything else had faded to a dim after thought...I had never felt a sensation like this before, I couldn’t name it...I only knew that somewhere deep down inside of me it hurt so much that I felt like crying but at the same time I had found what I had been missing for all of these years.....the missing piece that made me complete, a child......a daughter.

Amalia patted the name plate on my front door espousing the new title I would hold and she discreetly pointed to the name plaque for the head of the house as she walked back into the building.

I looked at it and saw that it read Dr. Amalia Clemons.

"I had my name changed years ago, I’ve always thought of you as my mother. I love you, Mom." She whispered and reached out to pat my walls .

I distantly heard the news crews gasps as they witnessed me glow and sing. I hadn’t glowed since I was a small shard of crystal in Donna’s lab...and I only sang for the children as they all slept. They always thought it was the wind.

In a decade or so Rygellia 5 would be set upon by the Nascian's...a race who took whatever they wanted by force. It would be up to Amalia and me to awaken the rest of the sentients to their full capabilities as not only homes but starships as well.

This would also press Amalia to hasten her goal of having a sensitive connected to each of the castle of glass buildings. With the sensitives being made aware of the sentients existence.

While traversing the stars after being victorious in the battle for Rygellia 5, Amalia would find out the secret of Mad Maddy in an attempt to save me from the sickness that some of our kind succumb to.

All of these things were yet to come....But for today....I glowed, and I sang. My heart full of a mother’s love.