“Hello, roommate! You must be Jace? I’m Min!”

  Jace spun around, eyes wide, and found himself face-to-face with a boy about his age. A human, skinny as a twig, with messy black hair but unhealthily pale skin. His uniform was a mess. The collar wasn’t done up properly, and the tie hung haphazardly to the side, but given a few days here, Jace figured he’d probably match.

  “Uh, hi,” Jace said. “Yeah. I’m Jace. Jace Baldwin.”

  “Did you forget your keycard?” Min asked. He reached into his pocket and produced a small credit-card-sized chunk of clear plastic, then pressed it to the control panel beside the door. The door slid upward with a hiss, revealing the dorm room.

  It was plain, but Min had clearly been here before. He’d taken the left side of the room, where a cot waited. It had a hard mattress, like the bunks on the Luna Wrath, with segmented cushions and an unlit hololantern beside its headboard. On the other side, a desk waited. Already, Min had scattered clothes and his backpack across it.

  In contrast, Jace’s side was nearly empty. He tossed his backpack down on the pillows, then said, “Thanks for letting me in. Where…where do I get one of those cards?” It hit the sheets with a clunk.

  “Pick it up from student services,” Min said. “They’ll make you an identification slip, and you can use it to unlock anything that you’re supposed to have access to. Unless power goes down to the school, then we’ll be in trouble. All the doors seal shut without power.”

  Great, Jace thought. But it was good to know. He could seal a hallway or a door by cutting power to it.

  Jace spent a half hour getting himself settled. He opened his backpack, tucked his spare clothes into a drawer, tested out the bed and the chair at the desk, then finally, when he thought Min wasn’t looking, looked at LeeKay.

  Jace whispered, “Okay, bud, I’m going to go see if I can find some food. I’m starving. You hold on tight. We can go for a walk in the evening.”

  “You have a kyborg!” Min exclaimed, rushing over. “Oh, by the Split! That’s so cool. What’s its name?”

  “It’s…inactive,” Jace said. LeeKay took the hint and didn’t move. He still sat as a lump in the bottom of Jace’s backpack. “I don’t know if we’re supposed to have them here, so don’t tell anyone, please.”

  He wasn’t sure if he could trust Min, but he’d find out soon enough. At least if he got kicked out, it would kill the suspense of waiting.

  Before either of them could say anything else, a knock sounded on the door. Jace ran over and opened it, only to find Lessa standing outside. “Lessa!” he exclaimed. “You’re not supposed to be here!”

  “No one saw me,” she whispered.

  “Is something wrong?” he asked, looking hesitantly at Min.

  “Ah, you have a roommate! I’m all alone. For now.”

  “So nothing’s wrong.”

  “Yeah, everything’s fine. I just came to find you, ‘cause the dinner hall opens in a half hour, and I’m kinda hungry. You wanna come?”

  “Of course, I—” Jace sighed. Then, he rubbed his forehead. “You’re trying to get us expelled, are you? Ugh, this is not a good first few minutes.”

  “You’re too worried. I know Tillman made a big deal about it, but I already saw a bunch of girls hanging out around your dorm section. No one cared.”

  “Yeah,” Min replied. “No one really…uh, bats an eye if a couple needs to spend some time together.”

  Jace lowered his arms and sighed again. “Right.”

  “You’re friends with a candlefolk?” Min exclaimed. “I’ve never met one of you guys before? My name’s Min! What’s yours?”

  “Lessa?” she said.

  “Just give me a second,” Jace said. He turned back to the bunk and picked up his backpack with LeeKay inside it. For now, it probably wasn’t a good idea to let that out of his sight. “Alright. Now I’m ready.”

  They walked back the way they came, following the Academy’s hallways and tunnels, with Min close on their heels, until they arrived back at the main hall. Jace had a hard time telling what time it was with how gloomy it was outside. But, according to Min, it was ‘seventeen o’clock’. Jace set his new watch to match that.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “A watch implant?” Min asked. “Did it hurt?”

  “A little,” Jace replied. “But it’s fine now.” It would still take a little getting used to, and he wanted it out as soon as he didn’t need to mask his Aes anymore, but for now, he could bear the ache and sting it caused him.

  They picked up trays near the door of the meal hall. An attendant heckled Jace about not having his card, but since he was in uniform, she let it slide for the day. Then, they travelled down a cafeteria line, looking at the different options.

  There was an assortment of different foods from across the galaxy, no doubt catered to the refined tastes of the academy students. Breaded meat cutlets, vegetables grilled, fried, or battered in something that reminded him of tempura, tens of differently-shaped breads and pastries, and at the very end, a currently-empty tray labelled Daily Pills and Elixirs.

  No pills or elixirs to those who hadn’t passed the entrance exam, of course. Or, more likely, they were waiting for the semester to begin in earnest. Since there were a few second and third years here, Jace figured that was more likely the case.

  He took a few slices of breaded…poultry. He wanted to call it chicken, but it was slightly darker on the inside, slightly browner, and slightly richer. After that, a few heaps of fried vegetables. It looked like a carrot and bell-pepper stir-fry, but again, he couldn’t say for certain without knowing. Lastly, he picked up a knotted bun with seeds on its top.

  Once the three of them gathered their food, they took their seats at a table. Jace didn’t tell Min to sit with them, but he didn’t protest when the boy sat down with them, either. It would be incredibly helpful to have someone who knew their way around this society, assuming Min got himself into the academy at all.

  They boy had a rank badge that indicated Soul-Circle Blending as well. He was probably on track.

  “So, you’re a first year too, huh?” Lessa asked Min.

  “Yep! But I’ve been here plenty of times before. I could show you all the back routes if you wanted.”

  “H—how?” Jace tilted his head.

  “Oh, I’ve got three older brothers and an older sister, and they all attended! It was amazing, really. They passed, and in the process, they all got themselves to the peak of Nascent Heart! The core guilds scouted them, then, and they all have administrative positions within the core, now. Looking over provinces of lowly planets, managing the funds we send out to the Star-Empires, that sort of thing. Oh, one of my brothers is due for a promotion—they’re about to put him in charge of the elixir imports.”

  “You…have to import elixirs to the core? I thought this was like, the best, strongest place in the galaxy,” Lessa said.

  Jace wouldn’t have put it like that, but she was right.

  “Well, I should say materials for elixirs,” Min said. “You guys don’t know this?”

  “We’re from Thirmann,” Jace said. “From outside the core. It took a family fortune just to get ourselves in here.”

  “...Oh.” Min wrinkled his nose a bit, then shook his head. “Well, no matter. I’m sure you must have some potential if you made it here.” He picked up his fork and knife. “See, there are a lot of Wielders in the core, and most families want their children to grow up with a taste for elixirs and pills, no matter how difficult to get. There just aren’t enough alchemical ingredients in the core to sustain the industry. So we import them from the rest of the galaxy. Plus, it frees up our alchemists’ time. Instead of refining lower ingredients, they can focus on more powerful elixirs.”

  “I see,” Jace replied.

  “Where are you from?” Lessa asked.

  “I’m from the Porelli System,” Min said.

  “Yeah, I don’t know why I bothered asking. No idea where that is.”

  “We’re fabric makers,” Min continued. “Supplying the best coats and suits throughout the galactic core. But Dad wanted us to expand our influence, so here we are.”

  “So you’re not a top dog,” Jace said.

  “Sadly, not,” Min replied. “But I know my way around the system here. See, once you get in, they’ll sort you into different groups. The guilds have a say. For those that they want to be Administrators—basically, the people who oversee different branches of the guilds—they put in one section. For Warriors, they have another. Those guys are the defenders of the core, and usually the top fighters in the guilds. Some are former Watchmen, though these guys tend to be much better. Then you’ve got the Service—for the lower tier jobs. They’re lowest on the totem pole, and mainly just lower-level bureaucrats. Lastly, there’re the Intelligence candidates.”

  Min paused at that, probably for a little theatrical mystique, but he didn’t continue until Jace asked, “The Intelligence?”

  “No one really knows a ton about them, sadly. Once you get in, you’ve gotta swear a soul oath to secrecy. But generally, they’re the top of the top. The Warriors might be brutes, but the Intelligence are…well, they’re the spies in training. They’re the ones who gather information about the galaxy, about the outer empires’ rulers, they’re the ones who plot and create the designs to keep the empires subservient to us without them even knowing it.”

  Jace gave a short sigh, then looked into the distance a little. “How do I know which are which?”

  “When you get sorted,” Min said, “you’ll get a badge. See those second years”—he pointed out across the hall—“they’ve got a second badge beneath their rank. It’ll tell you what group they’re part of. But usually, you’ll know. The Servers are the flunks, the laziest, or the dumbest.”

  A little harsh, Jace thought, but he wasn’t about to interrupt.

  “The Administrators? They’re the guys who are always studying, always have their heads in a book, always taking notes,” Min continued. “The Warriors? If someone picks a fight with you, he’s probably a Warrior. And the Intelligence? Well, they’re harder to pin down. Lots of times, they pick fights, but they’ll be more subtle about it. They’re the outcasts, the outliers, those who are comfortable in their own minds.”

  “So I suppose those guys,” Jace said, tilting his chin up, and looking at the table over, “are Warriors?”

  He’d been trying to avoid eye contact, but there was a slowly building din as one boy began shaking down another, saying something about a family squabble.

  Then, there was a crash. Jace winced. Plates went flying, cutlery scattered across the ground.

  Min hung his head. “Yeeeahh. Warriors.”