"Tuesday Five! Teacher says that you have to be faster, we won’t get dinner otherwise!"
A voice called to him from amid the bushes that towered around him, a cucumber hitting the back of his head. Most people would turn when they got hit like that, and he too was obviously no exception.
Standing behind him was a little girl with mud brown hair held together by a bit of straw. Freckles dotted her face, especially prominent beneath her green eyes. In one hand she held the cucumber she had hit him with and in the other she tightly clutched a bundle of smaller cucumbers.
She was the one who first called out to him as he inspected himself in the puddle of water. Sunday, another one of the children that lived in this orphanage.
Right, she was an orphan picked up on a sunday, so she was Sunday, or Sunday Two to the kids. And he too was an orphan, found here on a tuesday, so he became Tuesday, or Tuesday Five.
After he finished inspecting himself three days ago and got the chance to digest the situation a bit more calmly, the memories started to slowly come back. Not his own, but the memories of this body that he now found himself in.
Tuesday, left on the doorstep of this unmarked orphanage seven winters ago. He’s never heard anything about his parents or how he ended up here, all he has ever known is the work that needed to be done here.
Right, work. Calling this place an orphanage was probably a bit generous, especially if he compared it to the standards he was used to.
Firstly, it was completely unmarked so there was no way of telling that it was actually an orphanage. Secondly, it was extremely remote. If he climbed up to the edge of the wooden fence that surrounded this plot of land he could just barely spot a city in the distance, but it was simply too far away, who would come out here to pick up orphans?
Thirdly, the work that needed to be done. Farming vegetables, making compost for fertiliser, weaving baskets and rope, patching up clothes. There was always something to do, always too much to do, especially for kids as young as this. Worse yet, none of the kids here got to eat any of the vegetables they harvested. The food they got was mostly bread that carried the familiar taste of sawdust and watery soup.
It’d be strange if you managed to eat that and not ended up malnourished. That was why he originally felt that the face and hands he saw belonged to a five-year old kid, two years of growth had been cut away due to lack of nourishment.
And this, coincidentally, was the fourth odd thing he had noticed about this place in the now three days he had spent here. The people working here barely cared for the kids they took in. The food was horrible, they gave them names based on days so several ended up with the same name, and more than a few of the kids received some amount of abuse.
Strikes if you locked eyes with the caretakers. Beatings if you argued with them. Solitary confinement if you cursed at them. Denied food if they judged that you didn’t work hard enough. Forced to sleep outside next to the compost pile if you were a repeat offender.
"Really, there should be a limit to how despicable you can be to kids."
He couldn’t even call it spartan and try to laugh it off. He wouldn’t consider himself especially virtuous, but this was no way to raise kids. The world could be as it pleased, but the kids at the very least should be allowed to grow up healthily and happily.
"No, bad Tuesday Five! If teacher hears you say that then you’ll be locked up in the shed again!"
A cucumber hit the back of his head again as Sunday corrected him. The owner of this body had already been locked in the shed, solitary confinement, more than once in the past. Well, he’d gotten to experience all the possible punishments to be fair, he was quite a rebellious rascal.
That was probably why he thought the legs were incredibly sore when he first woke up in this body. He’d received a particularly vicious beating the day before, most of the focus had been on his legs because he dared to kick the so-called ‘teacher’.
"Okay, okay, I’m sorry, Sunday Two. Look, I’m already picking up the pace so we’ll definitely finish on time."
He could only stand up to appease Sunday, quickly plucking some of the slightly green tomatoes that hung around him. He was used to working, most of his past life had been nothing but hard work after all.
Besides, what would he gain from complaining? Would he return to his own world if he sat down and refused to work? Would he suddenly find his apartment if he snuck past the fence and ran into the forest? No, he would just go hungry and then he would die again. Right now, he was Tuesday, so he had to live as Tuesday while he figured out exactly what had happened to him and where he was.
"And then there’s that…"
His gaze rose slightly as a mutter escaped his lips. The numbers he saw last night weren’t just a hallucination, they still lingered in the sky, stretching across the blue expanse. He’d brought it up to Sunday, but she just asked him if he was still sleeping so it seemed like she couldn’t see it.
"It really is stupidly large."
"The tomato? No, that one actually looks a bit small."
He masterfully ignored Sunday’s retort to his comment, violet eyes sweeping over the ridiculously large number in the sky.
116,000,308,0. One billion one hundred million. The number rose or sank at random intervals, but it lingered around that general area at most times. When a number was that stupidly large it was hard to think of anything it could be related to, he couldn’t even think of it as seconds since it rose and sank as it pleased.
"Children! Everyone gather in front of the main entrance, NOW!"
A voice thundered across the grounds, Sunday dropping the vegetables she was holding because of how loud it was. Even Tuesday had to cover his ears, that damn overseer really had a voice that was way too loud.
"Come on, we have to go!"
Sunday ignored the cucumbers she had dropped and quickly grabbed hold of Tuesday’s hand. The overseer was the one in charge of this orphanage, her words trumped everything else so it was customary to drop whatever you were doing when she called for you.
The two scurried through the vegetable bushes, two other kids emerging a bit further down the bushes. The vegetable garden was located behind the orphanage itself, which quite frankly reminded Tuesday of a kindergarten.
One two-storied central building with a small clock tower on the top, and spreading out in a horseshoe shape at its side were rectangular buildings that reminded him of the ‘temporary’ classrooms that he so often saw getting set up at his school.
Vegetable garden directly behind the orphanage, compost pile at the northeastern corner that was furthest from the entrance, a wheat field at the northwestern edge, and a patch of straws at the southeastern edge. The entrance was at the southern tip so that left only the southwestern edge, but the kids were forbidden from going there so the owner of this body had no idea what could be found there.
"You’re all here, good. But you, your group was the slowest so your dinner will be reduced today. Engrave the importance of hasty obedience into your bones."
The overseer was an elegant woman approaching her fifties. Light brown hair that was slowly starting to get a few grey streaks, cut short and neat so that it hung just past the top of her ears. She had light green eyes with crow’s feet that were more than a bit noticeable, a stern scowl hanging on her face more often than not.
"Tch."
A quiet click of his tongue. The overseer reminded him of some of the superiors he had in the past. No matter how well you did, it would never be good enough, someone always had to get punished for them to establish their own position. It was one thing to do it to adults, it was almost expected in his line of business. But kids? Come on, that was just messed up.
Clap
"Line up, there’s important news."
She drew everyone’s attention with a simple clap, narrowed eyes sweeping over everyone present as she held an opened letter in one hand. The corners of her lips were turned up into a kind smile, but the kids here knew better than to trust that. So 21 kids stood there with straight backs, awaiting what could only be bad news.