Eli and Era - Never apart

The First Doubt

All such sweet delicacies were provided by the System Delivery Agents whenever a resident came of age.

Chekerbee was a town of retired people. All the younglings had ventured to bigger villages for better opportunities. One or two had even made it to the Headquarters to do menial jobs. Eli always pinned this exodus of the young as the reason of his lack of friends.

Presently, Eli marvelled at the little red muffin. It was free of adornments. A simple red muffin. Quite symbolic of the principles of the present System. The System scorned upon worldly possessions and grandeur. Rather, it taught simple living and satisfaction to it's pupil.

That didn't stop the young of Chekerbee to flee to other places for more money, Eli thought sourly.

Eli checked himself again. The loneliness of the Roy Hill Castle rarely bothered him. However, today he found himself berating this loneliness. It may have to do something with the coming of age.

Eli could not longer resist the red delicacy he held in his left hand. The right hand rested on the empty brown bag. He shifted a little in his place and he did so his palm rubbed against something in the brown bag.

He took the little stick out. It was wrapped in a brown paper. As he opened the wrap, a small stick fell on the marble top.

Eli looked down at the floor. It was a weird stick with a sort of string sticking out one of its end and the other hand a small cylindrical stub. Eli picked it up puzzled. He turned it around and was amazed at this new piece.

After sometime if intently gazing at the stick, Eli started getting restless.

Thousands of questions seem to pop into his head as he held the stick in his head. The serene and quite mind of Eli had been jolted into a world of excitement and curiosity. He wondered how the stick landed in his bag. He questioned what to do with it.

May be someone dropped into his bag by mistake. Then he would have to return it to the shop. Or may be it came free with another item of grocery. Eli scoffed as his own childishness. As if the System would ever give anyone anything for free.

This time Eli fell back to the chair. He had never had once had a thought against the System in his existence. He was not a traitor.

Eli hurriedly kept the stick down on the black marble and attempted to roll it off the table. But so distorted was he with his thoughts that his palm roughly brushed against the stub of stick.