He smiled and ran his fingers through his sandy hair boyishly instead of dealing any of them. “Sorry, man.”
“Should have been quicker,” Mile scolded Ives.
“Yeah,” Brennon, one of Rin’s closer friends, stepped in from the showers and added, “Don’t blame someone else for your own shortcomings.”
Calder, another friend, followed after him, towel cinched at his narrow waist. “For real, Ives. Nothing more unattractive than someone who doesn’t have enough confidence to look in a mirror.”
Pen grimaced and joined in. “I mean if I had a face like his…Yikes.”
“Hitting him where it hurts, boys,” Mile laughed.
With a huff, Ives bolted from the bench and exited the locker room, slamming the door behind him for good measure.
Which only made the rest of them laugh even harder.
“You are way too nice.” Calder clapped Rin on the back as he opened his locker.
“Right?” Brennon agreed, coming up on his left. “Don’t let dicks like that talk shit.”
If Rin wasn’t nice, he’d currently be holding Ives under the shower spray. Or bashing his skull into the tile. Or—
He chuckled and waved a hand at them. “Come on, guys. We’re all just trying to make it through training.”
“Don’t bother with that one,” Pen chucked his chin toward Rin as he spoke to the others. “Dude doesn’t have a mean bone in his body.”
“Seriously,” Mile clucked his tongue. “How do you plan on making it as a Detective with a personality like yours?”
Rin pretended to think it over and then shrugged, the smile never once slipping from his lips. “Make all the bad guys like me so they spill?”
More laughter.
Brennon was close to the same height as him, and a native to the planet Vitality, unlike Rin. When they weren’t in physical training classes, he typically had two lip piercings and an eye brow piercing in. His hair was a light chestnut color with red highlights in direct sun, a sharp contrast to their blond friend.
Calder’s hair was the shade of wheat, and thanks to their friendly natures, their friends had taken to referring to him and Rin as “the golden boys” whenever they did something that was deemed overly thoughtful or kind.
If only they knew how carefully concocted Rin’s personality was, they probably wouldn’t call him that ever again. There was little to no fear of that ever happening, however, not when he was so carefully in control of every aspect of his life, right down to the minute details.
Like when to make an exit without drawing too much notice.
Rin headed for the door. “See you guys out there.”
At least his mood was improving, that was something, Rin thought as he made his way down the wide hall toward the entrance to the main gym where they’d been instructed to meet. The challenge today had gone mostly all right if he didn’t count his blunder at the end there. Third place wasn’t that big of a deal. It wouldn’t draw too much attention his way, and he could easily slip back into mediocrity once the assignment was completed.
They were being paired with a senior trainer from the F-12 class based on their positioning in the challenge. Rin had been going for somewhere around fourth or fifth place, enough to keep his grades up, but not too high up the ladder for anyone to pay him much mind. F-12 was the highest placed class at the Academy, which meant whoever he was paired with, he could end up drawing a lot more attention from the rest of the school than he wanted.
The program would only last the semester though, so there was that, and Rin wasn’t too concerned about getting along with whatever senior he was attached to. He was known on campus as the guy who got along with everyone, even Ms. Sprig, the rude lunch lady who always burned the main dish when she was in charge of it.
He’d just keep up the friendly appearance, get whichever senior he was assigned to pass him, and that would be that.
Most of the class was already there when Rin arrived, his friends and the others who’d been changing still quickly catching up. Each class was given its own Active, a trainer in charge who acted a lot like a counselor and drill sergeant all in one. Theirs, Active Banks, wasn’t in the gym yet, so the class was at ease, goofing off, praising or teasing one another for their good or poor performance during the challenge.
Brennon tossed an arm around Rin’s shoulders and rolled his eyes at something Calder said.
The three of them had been friends since last year when they’d met during orientation. They had a fourth, Daylon, but he’d been placed in A-7, whereas the rest of them were in A-5. They still saw him frequently enough since he was Rin’s roommate though.
They were friends, because having friends was the best way to blend in, and Rin was fond of the lot of them, but he wouldn’t say any of them actually knew him. At least, not really.
To be fair though, more times than not, he wasn’t sure he even knew himself.
