Emmerick Engel, Joey Lo [read an ebook week .txt] 📗

of meat, but I left my meat lunch alone. I turned towards the living room, where my mom was resting on the couch, her arm over my eyes.
“Mom, are you all right?” I asked, stepping in and standing beside her.
She didn’t answer me, but lifted her index finger and pointed it at the mantelpiece, where a single letter lay.
I sauntered over to the small fireplace. I was small for my age, but I could still reach the small shelf on top of the fireplace. I began to read it:
June 6th, 2011
Shirley Engel,
Your dear husband Carl Engel has just been promoted to work as a soldier in the Youclia-Canava war. Whether he, you, or your family likes it or not, we do not care. He will be training at the fortress and living there for the rest of his life.
Irina Kormel

I flung the paper onto the mantelpiece so roughly, that I didn’t even care if it floated down into the fireplace and burned.
“How can she be so cruel?” I muttered to my mom, clenching my teeth.
“Irina’s just like that. She’s the Old Lady, and whatever she wants, it happens,” was the reply from my tired mother.
“Doesn’t she understand how this world works?” I hissed.
“She only cares about her valley. She has no part in any of the other worldly on-goings.”
“What about the Youclia-Canava war? Shouldn’t she be caring about it, if she personally sent dad to go?”
“If it’s for the protection of her own city, she’ll do everything she can. That’s why there are rules and laws all over the city, Emmerick. It’s just something you have to understand and accept. Irina just wants everybody to be the same.”
“I don’t think so. This world is constantly changing, but what does she do? Stick a couple rules in, and she expects everyone to follow them!” I yelled hotly.
“Maybe you’re right. Maybe she doesn’t understand. After all, she hasn’t seen as much of the world as we have,” my mother replied, giving me a weak smile, and then changing it into a frown. “But you know when she has her mind stuck on something, there’s no changing it.”
“Don’t think like that,” I begged my mom, though I didn’t know why my voice was cracking.
“It’s the truth,” she said firmly. “And don’t beg. You know the Beg Rule.”
Those last words really set me over the top, so I yelled, “I DON’T CARE ABOUT SOME DUMB RULE THAT MATT’S MOM MADE!”
“Matt is a good boy. Now calm down. You know the anger rule.”
“I HATE MATT! SO I DON’T CARE IF I HURT HIS FEELINGS; I’LL STOP HER!” I growled, and bolted out the door.
I heard my mom try to call me back, but I also heard her say something along the lines of “the Leave Rule”. Her name-calling almost brought me back home, but her last words completely changed my recognition of her. I ran away from Crest Avenue, turning to Descent Street before I hit the center of Northvale Street. Irina’s fortress was in this direction.
As I ran, I couldn’t help but notice that tears were pouring out of my eyes. I struggled to keep them low, but I couldn’t. People stared as I went past. I tucked my collar up, hoping to hide my face, as crying wasn’t allowed on the streets until you were thirteen, and I was small enough to pass for a twelve year old unfortunate.
I finally saw a grand white castle-like building in front of me, with two twin silver towers. There was a guard up at the front doors, wearing white and black, which were the official colours of Youclia. I made to go past him, but he placed his spear against my chest, forcing the air out of my lungs, and stopped me from going on into the building.
“How old are you?” he asked me in a high voice.
“I’m fourteen,” I gasped out.
“Aren’t you a little short?”
“I am, but I don’t mind.”
“Well, if you’re fourteen, you don’t need me to go in with you. What’s your purpose for going in?”
“To see Old Lady,” I answered.
“Why?” he asked in his shrill voice.
“It’s none of your business.”
“As the guard, I have every right to know,” he said, pulling his spear up, and saluting to thin air, as he used to do when I was eleven.
I made a dash for it when he lifted his weapon. He didn’t seem to notice until I was halfway across the drawbridge. He gave a smart yell and chased after him. Being small, I was agile enough to run away from his grasp, which was always seconds too late.
Suddenly, the man jumped backwards and away from the drawbridge. I was curious, so I stopped to stare at him, which was one of the dumbest things I’d ever done in my life. He shouted something that I couldn’t make out, and instantly, the drawbridge began to move up!
I tried to run the rest of the length, but the drawbridge pulled up in a blur! I struggled to regain my balance, but suddenly, the drawbridge came to a stop at 90 degrees! I fell and rolled over into the fortress. Well, I was inside at least- but confronted by twelve guards.
“You’re not getting away, kid! No one enters without permission!” crowed one of the twelve shield-wearing men.
“No, no! You don’t get it! I just have to ask Old Lady something!” I shouted.
“Yeah, that’s what all three hundred and twenty of the people who came here last wanted to do. Well, they’re all dead now,” sneered the other men. “How would you like to be the next victim?”
“No thanks,’ I squawked, trying to find a gap through the men. No luck; they were like a brick wall-maybe even harder than one with that much metal on.
“You don’t have a choice, kid,” they snorted, and came even closer to me. Then everything turned black.
I regained consciousness inside a wet dungeon. There was a single light bulb at the top, but with its sore light, anybody could tell it was about to go out. There was a black metal door in front of me. I tentatively reached out towards it to see if it was locked.
“Are you trying to make yourself lose a finger?” snarled a voice behind me.
I recognized it in glee. “Dad, it’s you!”
His brown eyes went over my appearance. “Emmerick, you don’t look like you’ve changed a bit since I’ve seen you three years ago.”
I made sure the light was on my dad before I spoke. “And you’ve changed a lot too, Dad.”
His ran a finger down his long beard. “Not really. Anyway, why are you here?”
“I came to get you out of here!” I whispered.
He paused for a moment. “Why would you do that?”
“I want to show Irina how wrong she is about making these rules!” I answered.
“Are you crazy? Don’t do that.” Carl, my dad, ordered.
“Why?”
“The woman just started coming up with rules by herself two years ago. You can’t expect her to change so fast.”
“She has to. Her dumb rules change the valley- in a bad way,” I explained.
My father glanced at me with his sore brown eyes and muttered, “She’s not a bad person. She just has a different perspective on her people should live.”
“B-But we’ve seen the other parts of the world! We know it’s not like this!” I pushed on. “This place is twisted all because of her!”
“Emmerick, maybe you’re the one who’s twisted.”
Those words burnt me. “You don’t get it! If everyone’s the same, there’s no uniqueness!”
“Look, son. Everyone else loves the valley as it is now. Can’t you?”
“No. Besides, if you haven’t noticed already, everyone breaks the rules,” I charged on. “See how unstable this place is? If Canava wins the war, we’ll be crushed so easily.”
“That’s exactly why she makes the rules, so that no one is better than anyone else.”
“What does that have to do with the war?”
He looked straight into my eyes and boomed, “Are you an idiot? You should know this. Oh, right. You’re the