Whill couldn’t hear. His best sense- gone. 

But he knew he was a Shaped.

The only reason he knew this was the banners that now hung on the walls with squares imprinted on them- the emblem of the Shaped.

He staggered off the platform, and ducked into a corner. 

Why? Why did I become deaf? A deaf Shaped- that’s a paradox. Shaped are supposed to gain enhanced senses, not lose them entirely! What happened to me?

His thoughts sped by, as he hid in the corner.

He sat down, his breathing turning quick and shallow. What is happening to me? Why me? I- he began to panic, curling up as the ever-present silence enveloped him, all sound gone. He couldn’t so much as remember what his own voice sounded like. All there was was silence. 

He began to cry, curling tighter. 

I wish I would have gotten something else. I don’t care that I got Shaped. I wish I was anything else. Dammit, I just want to hear again!

He cried in that eternal silence for a long time. 

It wasn’t until after he fell asleep in that corner when he stopped crying.

____________________________________________________________________________

Whill awoke in a soft, large bed. 

He shifted upright, and surveyed the room around him.

It was a luxury bedroom, the kind that only exceptionally rich Mused could afford. There were soft pillows, glass tables, bookshelves with limited edition books, and much more.

Was- was it all a dream? He wondered.

But the hope he had was short-lived. As he hopped out of the increasingly soft bed, he didn’t hear his feet hitting the hardwood floor. He didn’t hear his breathing. 

Whill was still shrouded in empty, complete silence.

He surveyed the room again. 

A finger tapped his right shoulder. He jumped, startled.

How did someone sneak up on me? That’s never- oh, yeah.

He swiveled around to see a tall, composed man standing in front of him. The man’s mouth was moving, and because Whill had no experience with lip-reading, it was complete nonsense to him.

“I… can’t.. hear you, sir.  I…. suddenly… went deaf… at the… shaping.. ceremony…” He mouthed the words carefully, unsure of what he was actually saying. He felt his face blush.

The man looked confused, and seemed to excuse himself, dashing out of the room.

Where am I?
 

The dreaded day came.

Whill, having stayed awake all night long, stumbled into the towering dome of the Bureau. Today would decide the rest of his life. 

Whill joined the line of jittering, nervous boys, his mind too nulled to panic. Staying awake all night had dulled his brain, which he would have wondered if that was good or bad.

No one knew how roles were assigned, let alone who assigned them. Whill didn’t care. He knew that there was nothing he could do to prevent his role, and he just hoped for something more than Burdened. 

The Shaping began.

______________________________________________________________________________

As the line of boys grew shorter and shorter, Whill watched some react ecstatically to getting Mused or Tried, and others sulk after receiving Burdened. Nobody got Shaped, and there were only two boys who were Snapped. Both fought but failed to escape.

After a long time, it was Whill’s turn. 

As he stepped onto the platform, he suddenly became hyperaware of all the sounds around him. Frantic conversations, hurried mumbling- he heard every word at the same time. He looked up, like Jax had done so long ago.

“Name?” some unseen voice probed.

“Whi- uh… Elias,” He stuttered, the voices of tens of people thundering in his ears.

A few minutes passed.

After the longest moment of his life, Whill heard the voice again. “You have received the role of-” Whill didn’t hear anything else. All the sounds around him stopped. He opened his mouth, and asked “What?” but he didn’t hear himself talk. 

There were no more sounds. People’s mouths moved, but there were no more sounds.

He couldn’t hear anything. His brilliant sense of hearing was gone.

Whill was deaf.

And he had done a damn good job.

Whill remembered Jax sneaking out to grab food every morning for the two of them, trying to make sure that he didn’t wake up. Jax had taught him everything he knew, and when the day came that he had turned 18, Whill desperately tried to keep Jax from going to the Bureau of Shaping. 

In Taring, all males, on the day they turned 18, were required to go to the Bureau of Shaping, to be assigned their roles. If one did not show up, they were assigned a death penalty. There were 5 roles.

The best role was Shaped- they were granted extrasensory abilities, and were of the highest social class.

After that, there was Mused- Mused became wealthy business owners and politicians.

Third was Tried- they were the middle class of Taring, having enough money to feed their families, with some spending money left over.

Then there was Burdened- the factory workers, always struggling to get by.

Finally there was Snapped. The mysterious role. Deemed the worst possible.

But Whill knew what had happened to Jax.

He saw it with his own eyes.

As soon as Jax had stepped onto the platform, Whill was forced to watch as his brother, his mentor, was subjected to the worst role that could be assigned.

Snapped.

Jax had been taken to a room, and while no one knew exactly what happened to Snapped, it was obvious. They went into the room, and they never came out.

Whill had been living alone ever since.

He had been given the name Elias at birth, but Jax had always nicknamed him Whill, and since that fateful day, he had refused to be called anything else.

Because that name was the last thing, besides the desk, that he had left of Jax.
 

SHAPER- 

Chapter 1

    Whill breathed in the sawdust-heavy air of the workshop. It was an early morning, but then again, wasn't it always an early morning? He picked up his gloves from the desk- the desk he had finished with- with---- He shook his head, trying to block out those thoughts. Dangerous thoughts. He put on the gloves, turning towards the back of the shop. 

    Whill had always been a scrawny boy, and even at 17, he was still shorter than most kids his age. That didn’t matter though, because he didn’t know them all too well. He yanked the sheet off of his creation. The thing he had worked on for the last year. It was a complex structure of wood planks, nails, and joints, made for the purpose of… well, Whill wasn’t sure what it was supposed to do yet. It just felt right. He grabbed the saw and got to work.

    The back door creaked open. The sound was so soft, so insignificant that anyone else would have just ignored it. But Whill wasn’t anyone else. 

    “Em, you could have knocked rather than sneaking in. It’s polite.” He rasped, turning towards the sound. 

    The girl, Em, stood in the doorway. She froze. “Again, Elias? How’d you hear me?” She had red hair, the color of burnt maple leaves, and had a lanky figure. She was in the rift below Whill, but she still was half a foot taller than him. “Why do you talk like that, anyways? It makes you sound old.”

    “This is my normal voice.” He said, glaring, “Also, don’t call me by my Luxe. My name is Whill.” He turned to go back to his carpentry, but she spoke again. 

“Oh, quit being so sour. You haven’t left the shop since Jax-” She stopped as Whill cut her off.

“This is not about my brother! I’m not here because he Snapped. I don’t care what it looks like!” Tears stung at Whill’s eyes, but Em couldn’t see them because he was turned away. 

It wasn’t about Jax. He wasn’t grieving. He looked back at the desk that they had made, all those years ago. Whill wanted to make another desk. He wanted to throw that piece-- that piece of garbage out.

It wasn’t about Jax’s Snap. 

"It's -n-not about- J-Jax" He stuttered, but the tears were already flowing.