“Let’s see. Your new assignment is,” She checked her handheld computer, “to serve for the Murson household as a servant. Their ranks range from 88,263 to 88,485. Your supervisor is Ellen Shaw. She is in charge of you from now on.  Her current rank is 999,943.  She will fill you out on all your duties tomorrow morning.”
    

Hearing that I relaxed a bit. Being a serving girl wasn’t the worst job I could get.
    

“Unfortunately your rank is below your current living situation. You will have to move out.”
  

 Which meant that I would no longer be allowed to live with my family. I would have felt worst if she had hit me. Taking deep breaths I had to remind myself that this wasn’t permanent. I could always get a better rank and move back in. Clearing my mind I tried to detach myself from the situation. I had to learn everything about my new rank. Later I could freak out.
    

“You now live in building 97 West Wall Street. You’re on the ninth floor. There should be a map in your folder. Some privileges that you have lost are; the right to ride a bike. You must now walk everywhere. The right two own more than three pairs of clothing. That is all. Here is your folder. Everything else you will need to know should be in here.” She handed me a large grey folder.

    The Inner Circle is surrounded by a gigantic wall that separates us from the Outer Circles. It is supposedly what keeps us civilized. Within the Circle there is no crime, starvation, metal illnesses, or deadly diseases. But that is because anyone who falls below the 100,000th rank is kicked out into the Outer Circles.
    

The building they sent me to was crammed right up against the wall. It was ten stories high yet even standing on the roof you couldn’t see over the wall. My room was on the ninth floor. There wasn’t an elevator.

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Author guidance for This story

NO MATURE CONTENT
NO VULGAR LANGUAGE
Constructive Criticism is welcome

Cora's parents were banished from the city when she was young for rebelling against the system. Since then Cora and her twin brother Fynnian have been trying to watch over their younger siblings Ian and Rose.
Cora and (Fynn) Fynnian are 17
Ian is 15 and Rose is 13.

updated Aug 13 '11 by Alex_Torres