Mercedes paced around the waiting room, speech in hand. She read through it several times to make sure she knew what to do. She knew she would not have to memorize her script, but she wanted to get the gist of it so she could know what to expect and be able to make some eye contact with the audience. Eye contact was important in getting the audience to humanize her. She needed them to like her. She needed this win.

When asking herself whether she _really _wanted to run for president, Mercedes always had one clear answer: she wanted to keep the realm peaceful yet proactive. This Magic World that she had just been exposed to was subject to frequent tensions between the realms. This always resulted in some type of war or conflict. This realm, in particular, was a bigger realm; it was at the center of everything, so there were bound to be many atrocities committed there. With a big realm like this, you would expect its military to be powerful and filled with lots of experience and training with magic. However, that was not the case. The citizens were in the middle of all of this, suffering from the violence and destruction. This was what drove Mercedes to want to do something about it, and the best way to do it seemed to be becoming president.

Mercedes was a natural observer. She was also a “fixer”, meaning she was determined to fix any and every problem that she could. So when she noticed what the problems in this Fantasy Realm were, she became set on solving them. Running for president seemed like a plausible idea, but there were many setbacks.

First of all, she was not even from this world of magic. Mercedes was born on earth and was raised there for most of her life. She had been interested in magic since she was very young. One day, as an adult, she came across a spell book, which turned out to be a _real_ one from the Magic World. She found the spell that could teleport anyone there, and she was immediately intrigued. Next thing she knew, she was in the Magic World. She was fascinated by all of the colorful lights, the blasting music, the futuristic architecture and transportation systems, the amount of people who could just open their bottle of soda with just a twist of the finger. She yearned to stay for just a little bit longer, just to experience this new, exciting place. But “a little bit longer” turned into several days of making friends, learning basic magic, riding in hover trains, trying the interesting fantasy food, and watching new shows and movies. Eventually, she decided that she wanted to stay forever and she found a place to stay, as well as a few colleges she considered applying for. So her last day and night on Earth was the day that she packed her things, said goodbye to her mom, and met up with her old friends. She promised everyone she knew that she would at least call them regularly and she kept that promise.

Mercedes never went back to Earth and she never planned on going back.

Her second setback was that she was only nineteen. She was only a year out of high school and was now a college student in the Fantasy Realm. On Earth, thirty-five was the age limit to be eligible for president. In the Magic World, the age requirement was only eighteen. Mercedes’ lack of experience in politics and the fact that most of her opponents were twice, if not, three or four times her age was scary and gave her a huge disadvantage. But Mercedes didn’t let this stop her. In fact, her young age only pushed her to work harder in all aspects: her campaign, her college studies in politics, and her leadership training, as well was her magical abilities. It got hard, and at times, she felt like quitting, but she never let that happen. Mercedes felt motivated because she knew that the people needed a younger president to relate to her generation and their needs. The younger generations had consistently called for the very things that Mercedes was aiming to tackle in her campaign, which is why she had hope that they would hear her out.

She had heard the phrase “for the people” in serveral campaigns and she wasn’t sure if any of the older men running for office actually meant what they said or knew what the phrase really intailed. To Mercedes, if someone is “for the people”, they stand for all people, not just one group of people. That is what she believed set her apart from the other candidates. She was able to better connect to people her age, who mostly had these same beliefs as her. Mercedes knew how diverse society was, especially in the Magic World, and was always passionate about calling attention to this, especially since she had an outside perspective moving there from Earth. She originally believed that the Magic World had done a better job of combatting these issues but she was wrong. It was just the same as on Earth: just as much bigotry, hate, and unfairness. Mercedes wanted to combat this issue and scale it down to help people in need. This is what she thought could convince the masses to give her their votes, especially the younger voters. _All of_ _this__ _was what she would call being “for the people”. She needed for this realm to be progressive in these regards.

_Progressive_. Peaceful, proactive, and… _progressive! _She was missing a P!

She suddenly knew that this needed to be added to her speech.

“Mercedes, you’re up!”

_Pen, pen! Write that down, quickly! _She thought to herself as she scrambled to write that last thought out on her script.

It was time. She was determined to show the audience what she was made of.