She moves toward the door, and I realize she’s not coming with me. This is goodbye—or whatever passes for it when you’ve known someone for a day and one of you is a prisoner.
“Linda.”
She stops. Doesn’t turn around.
“Thanks. For explaining.”
“Don’t thank me yet.” She opens the door. “You haven’t seen where you’re going.”
Then she’s gone.
The system reasserts itself within minutes.
Two staff members I’ve never seen before appear in the doorway. Clipboards. Neutral expressions. The same flat institutional tone I’ve been hearing since the alley.
“Collect your belongings. You’ve been reassigned.”
My belongings. The jacket I was wearing when they picked me up, still smelling faintly of the alley. The gray clothes they gave me. That’s it.
I put on the jacket over the gray shirt. Slip Linda’s card into the inside pocket where it won’t fall out.
“Ready.”
They don’t respond. Just turn and walk, expecting me to follow.
I follow.
The transport is enclosed. No windows in the back, just a metal bench and a door that locks from the outside. I sit and count turns out of habit—left, right, straight for a long stretch, another left—but I’m not planning an escape route. There’s nowhere to escape to.
If they wanted to hide me, they’d do it quietly. Back rooms. Unmarked vehicles. The kind of processing that happens where no one can see.
This is different. This is transport in daylight. Official transfer. Paperwork and procedure.
That means I’m being moved somewhere the system is willing to acknowledge.
I don’t know if that’s better or worse.
The transport slows, stops. The door opens from outside, and the light that floods in is different—brighter, cleaner. I step out, and the Academy is bigger than I expected.
I’ve heard about it my whole life—everyone has—but hearing about something and seeing it are different. The buildings are old, stone and glass, sprawling across grounds that look like they’ve been here longer than the territory itself. People move between them in clusters and pairs, talking, laughing, existing like this is normal.
Because for them it is.
And everywhere I look, I see marks.
Wrists bare and casual. Sleeves rolled up. House colors woven into clothing, displayed like they’re supposed to be there. Because they are. Because that’s what normal looks like.
I pull my sleeves down without thinking.
The escort moves me toward a security checkpoint near the main entrance. Scanners, badges, a desk staffed by someone who doesn’t look up when I approach.
“Name?”
“Nova.”
“Status?”
The escort answers for me. “Transfer. Provisional intake. Cluster assignment pending confirmation.”
