It's been exactly a week since those DPOC agents dropped that bomb on me.
They told me they'd give me seven days to prepare. Get my things in order.
So here I am, sitting on the curb outside my house. Waiting. Thinking.
I haven't regenerated since that day. Not even a scratch heals on its own anymore. And while I haven't exactly tried to cut myself in half again… I have a feeling I wouldn't come back from it this time.
Maybe Mara decided to let me go.Maybe those DPOC agents told her to.
Who knows.
But regardless, life at Fortis is going to be rough if the only reason the government showed interest in me… is now gone.
The attack is still all over the news.
Or at least, it was.
Lately, it's been overshadowed by a massive prison break that took place during the same window of time, one orchestrated by an unknown terrorist group.
The government hasn't confirmed the two incidents are connected, but people are already drawing their own conclusions.
Luckily, most of the students involved in the attack, including me, were left out of the news cycle.
Mara, though? She wasn't as lucky.
Turns out unbeknownst to me, or seemingly anyone else at school her father is the CEO of Knightline, a company that produces power restrainers for prisons and unstable ability users.
In hindsight, it's pretty obvious.The name alone should've tipped me off.
So, although there were only a handful of blurry videos of her leaving the hospital, word spread fast.
It didn't take long for news stations to pick it up, running segment after segment, all asking the same thing.
Why was the daughter of Knightline's CEO attending a random suburban public school in Woodland Heights?
Nothing really came of it.
The public interest faded almost as quickly as it appeared .
But I doubt that drop off was natural.
It was probably someone making a few calls, just like that, the stations stopped talking about it.
It was surprising that no other student spoke out about what happened in the gym.
Not a word. Not even some, anonymous post on a message board.
And trust me, I checked. I probably refreshed more pages than I could count. But in the end? Nothing. Not a single post.
I even considered coming forward myself. Maybe out of spite. Maybe out of fear toward Mara.
But I didn't.
Nothing would come of it anyway.
I continued to daydream, lost in my own thoughts, until the sound of an approaching car pulled me back to reality.
It wasn't huge, but it was still clearly expensive. It was the kind of vehicle that looked more at home outside a government building than on a quiet suburban street. Its windows were tinted a deep black, the body polished like a mirror.
The car rolled to a stop beside me, the engine letting out a soft rumble. A moment later, the rear window closest to the front slid down revealing Agent Clint.
He was seated sideways, in the row of forward facing seats just behind the driver.
"Get in," he said, his tone as flat and unreadable as ever.
Despite his aloof demeanor, I'd grown to like Agent Clint.
We didn't exactly have deep conversations when we were around each other, but he was surprisingly pleasant to be around. Easy in a way most people weren't.
So without any more hesitation, I opened the door, grabbed my suitcase packed with clothes and whatever else I thought I might need, pushed it onto the floor of the car, and slid into the seat across from him.
"Agent Clint," I said with a nod.
"Arthur," he replied back, giving a slight nod of his own.
He then handed me a stack of papers, thick and neatly clipped together.
"This is all your registration information. The envelope underneath has your student ID chip and a wristband for it," he said. "Try not to lose it. It's a pain in the ass to replace."
I flipped through the papers. It was mostly rules, regulations, and copies of contracts I had already signed days ago. Just paperwork.
I sifted through it all, looking for my class schedule, but found nothing.
"Agent Clint, where's my class schedule? It's not in the packet," I asked.
"Oh, I forgot to tell you," he said, leaning back slightly. "Your classes get assigned once we arrive. They'll test you and place you where they think you fit best. Don't worry."
With that, we fell into silence.
I flipped through the papers out of boredom, occasionally glancing at my phone. Agent Clint seemed just as uninterested, doing the same.
About thirty minutes passed before I finally spoke again.
"Um, Agent Clint... where are we going?"
He didn't look up from his phone.
"First, we head to the main office in Salbrock," he said. "I'll take my leave there. After that, you'll take a fifteen hour trip down to Stocan. From there, a passenger liner will ferry you to the island where Fortis is. If you need anything along the way, just knock on the window behind me. Our driver will do his best to accommodate you."
"What's the driver's name?" I asked.
Agent Clint looked up from his phone briefly and said,"You don't need to know that. Please refrain from inquiring with him either."
I sighed and looked back down at my phone.
Before long, we arrived at the DPOC headquarters.
Agent Clint gathered his things and stepped out of the car with a simple,"Bye. Have fun at Fortis."
I replied with a wave of my hand as the door shut behind him, leaving me alone with my thoughts.
"Have fun at Fortis," he had said.
Somehow, I doubted I'd be having fun.
With a small fridge tucked into the car, stocked with drinks and a few snacks, it seemed we wouldn't need to stop much maybe only for gas.
As the car pulled away from the DPOC building and merged onto the highway, I unbuckled, stretched out across the seat, and pulled out my phone.
I doomscrolled for a while, flipping through random news articles, forums, and eventually settling into reading a few novels to kill the time.
Soon tiring of jade beauties and systems, I turned my attention toward the window, watching as the city slowly faded away, replaced by vast, endless stretches of trees and mountains towering over the horizon.
My eyes grew heavy as I stared out the window. I laid back down, closed my eyes, and let sleep fall over me.
I awoke to a knocking on the window. A bald man in a suit stood outside.
The driver, I thought to myself.
With a yawn and a deep stretch, I pushed myself up from the seat and opened the door. Outside, the early morning air was cold and windy.
"Take out your ID chip and head to the boarding zone," the driver said, pointing toward a large boat docked nearby.
I thanked him with a quick nod and made my way toward the boarding zone.
As I walked, I passed a surprising number of people, families crying as they dropped off their children, butlers escorting neatly dressed young masters.
It caught me off guard. I knew Fortis wasn't exactly a secret, but I hadn't expected so many people just outside the ship.
I was now in the boarding area, standing in line, waiting to enter the ship.
The closer I got to the front, the more it hit me, my life was about to change. The nerves built with every step, a rising pressure in my chest.
Finally, I stood before a man holding a scanner.
"ID chip, please," he said, not even looking up.
I quickly reached into the envelope Agent Clint had given me and pulled out the chip.
The man scanned it with a beep, then waved me through without any ceremony.
"Okay, next," he called out.
I took my first few steps onto the ship, greeted immediately by a full body scanner and a few uniformed workers.
"Put your suitcase on the rack, then walk through the scanner," one of them instructed.
gave a nod, lifted my suitcase onto the metal rack they pointed at, and stepped forward toward the scanner. My suitcase soon followed behind me. Luckily, there were no issues, and I continued onward, eventually ending up in a massive ballroom like area.
Hundreds upon hundreds of students gathered at the bottom of a wide staircase, all speaking amongst themselves.
Atop the stairs stood a woman with dark black hair, dressed in a sharp, regal black uniform. More and more students continued to pile into the room,
Eventually, the woman raised her hand, and the room gradually fell into silence.
"Thank you for your silence," she said, her voice cutting through the air. "I am Principal Kaitlynn Tovia. You will, of course, address me as Ms. Tovia. It's an honor to welcome you to our prestigious school," she continued, her tone formal.
"Soon, we will hand out room assignments," she said, . "And then tomorrow morning we will begin the class assignment exams. Prepare yourselves accordingly."
"Until then Enjoy the amenities that the ship has to offer "