David shouldn't have come to school. But missing days meant questions, meant counselors, meant forms that could trigger a Pathlight referral. So he sat in Mr. Samuels' class, the scratches on his wrist hidden under long sleeves, trying to look normal while the clock ticked toward whatever "help" Micah had promised.
"Let's return to ancient Greece," Mr. Samuels began, his fingers leafing through papers with the calm precision of ritual. Then he looked up and met each student's gaze in turn, his voice lowering just slightly. "The ship continues its journey, but over time, every part is replaced. Not suddenly. Not loudly. Quietly. Gradually."
He turned toward the chalkboard, though he didn't write anything—THESEUS still hovered faintly from earlier that week, its outline soft with erasure.
"We've already asked whether it's still the same ship. But today," he said, folding his hands behind his back, "I want us to go deeper."
"Now, let's apply this to something more personal," Mr. Samuels continued, leaning against his desk. "If a person changes their beliefs, their actions, their very nature... at what point do they lose their integrity? At what point are they no longer the same person?"
David sat in the back, arms crossed loosely over his blank notebook. The steady cadence of Mr. Samuels' voice slowed his pulse, like a familiar piece of music after too much static.
David could feel phones tucked under desks, probably still playing yesterday's footage.
He'd checked this morning on Abby's laptop—the video was tagged #PrayForDavid and linked to an automatic FaithCoin donation prompt.
"Show your support for spiritual intervention—every FC helps save a soul."
12,000 views.
3,400 donors.
His "rehabilitation fund" growing with each click.
They'd gamified his humiliation.
Turned his breakdown into a fundraiser for his own imprisonment.
And everyone participating probably felt righteous about it.
Mr. Samuels resumed his slow pacing. "Let's say you believe the ship stays the same. Then tell me—at what point does the ship realize it's changed? Does it mourn what it's lost? Or is there no awareness at all—just momentum?"
A few heads lifted at that. Chastity's pen was already moving briskly across her page. David watched her with vague resentment: crisp collar, folded hands, expression perfectly composed. She didn't write to explore. She wrote to affirm.
"Maybe it doesn't notice," she said aloud, not waiting to be called on. "Because what matters isn't the parts. It's the purpose. If it's still sailing in the right direction, the old parts were just... old. Things it didn't need anymore - Just rot. Things that would get in the way."
"But if you replace every part," Michelle's voice cut in, unexpectedly soft yet clear, "eventually something essential is lost. Something... human?""
Mr. Samuels offered no response—only a slight arch of the brow.
"Or maybe," said Michelle, voice quieter but more dangerous, "the ship thinks it's still sailing forward. But it's been turned around. Going in the wrong direction without knowing it."
Mr. Samuels moved to the center of the room again, hands loosely clasped. "Is it a matter of degrees?" he pressed, his eyes scanning the room, lingering for a moment on David. "A single act of betrayal, or a slow erosion of principles? And who decides? Who judges the point of no return?"
That drew some murmurs.
Chastity looked over, mouth drawn into a tight line. "I don't think obedience is the same as going in the wrong direction."
Michelle met her gaze steadily. "Who gets to decide?"
Then Chastity added, "I think it's selfish to cling to broken parts just because they're familiar." Michelle tilted her head slowly. And for the briefest second, her foot tapped beneath her desk.
David's pulse spiked. He glanced between them—Chastity, pristine and certain, and Michelle, still buttoned-up but burning at the edges.
A hand near the window went up hesitantly. "What if the ship is being watched?" a student asked. "If every plank replacement is logged and measured—like some running audit—does that change how it understands itself? Does it still have the right to say 'I am'?"
The class stilled.
Mr. Samuels let the silence breathe before he spoke again.
"Let's complicate it further," he said. "If all the original parts were saved, stored in a warehouse, and then rebuilt into a second ship—who gets to be called Theseus? The one with memory but no substance? Or the one with substance but no memory... No history?"
That stopped even Chastity's pen.
David didn't write. He was thinking of Johnny—of the boy he'd memorized piece by piece. Laughter, heat, sudden tenderness. Would there be enough left in the warehouse to rebuild him?
Or had they already burned the planks?
David stared down at his blank page, his pencil unmoving. But then he looked up and said quietly, "What if the ship still remembers how the sun hit its original mast? Or the ache in its hull from a storm it survived?"
He didn't raise his voice. He didn't need to.
"Even if every part's been replaced... doesn't that memory mean something?"
Silence.
Suddenly, a SoulWatch in the third row started flashing red, followed by another alert in the back row. The sharp electronic chirp made everyone freeze.
Two reds in one class meant an automatic report.
Three meant intervention.
Chastity blinked, but said nothing. Michelle lowered her gaze, thoughtful.
Mr. Samuels' eyes found David's across the room—a quick, deliberate look that said I see you. I know what's happening.
"Perhaps," he said, voice steady despite the electronic warnings, "we should remember that not all change is voluntary. Sometimes the ship finds itself in a storm not of its making."
He moved closer to David's row, not obviously, but with purpose. His hand briefly touched the back of an empty desk—an invitation, a shield. "The question then becomes: who stands with the ship through the storm?"
David felt the words land like a lifeline. For the first time since yesterday's humiliation, someone with authority was acknowledging what was happening to him.
Mr. Samuels turned back to the board. "And if someone chooses to replace their pieces? If they want to forget? Are they betraying the original ship—or rescuing it from rot?"
That was the question David didn't want to ask. Didn't want to answer. But it was already lodged behind his ribs like a splinter.
Mr. Samuels let the tension settle like dust. The blinking SoulWatches faded back to black, but their afterimage pulsed in the air.
He leaned one hand on the edge of his desk, thumb idly grazing a scratch in the wood. "Some of you are arguing purpose. Others, memory. Still others—consent." He glanced toward Michelle, then Chastity. "But maybe the real question isn't what gets replaced. Maybe it's why we let it happen."
He looked slowly around the room. "We don't always get to choose what gets swapped out. Especially when the rebuilding is slow. Sanctioned. Polite. Sometimes all it takes is silence."
David shifted in his seat. Something in his chest tightened, caught between guilt and recognition.
Mr. Samuels straightened. His voice dropped, not for emphasis, but intimacy.
"What if the ship doesn't notice because it's been taught not to?"
"And if it does... what responsibility does it have... to speak?"
The bell hadn't rung, but somehow the moment closed around the question like a seal.
David stared down at his notebook. It was still blank. But now it felt less like an absence, and more like a page waiting to be claimed.
As students filed out, Mr. Samuels called quietly, "David. A moment?"
The last stragglers shuffled out, leaving them alone.
David hung back, shoulders tense. He knew what was coming—concern, questions, maybe even a mandatory counselor referral.
But Mr. Samuels just handed him a book—worn, pages soft with age. "I thought you might appreciate this. Buddhist philosophy on identity and change. Nāgārjuna's writings."
David's breath caught. His mother had quoted Nāgārjuna. "Sometimes," Mr. Samuels said, adjusting his glasses, "when everything around us insists on one truth, we need reminders that other truths exist."
He paused. "The video from yesterday... I wanted to make sure you knew not everyone agrees with their methods."
"I can't—" David started, but Mr. Samuels raised a gentle hand. "Keep it as long as you need. My door is always open. Even if—especially if—certain wellness checks are being discussed."
The weight of the book in David's hands felt like armor. Like permission to remain himself. "Thank you," David managed.
Mr. Samuels nodded once. "Be careful, David. But also... be you."
"We're all just ships, David," he added.
"Some of us still feel the missing planks—the ones others decided didn't belong."
The bell rang late, like it, too, had been stunned into silence. Students filed out in uneven waves—some still arguing softly, others pointedly quiet. David hung back, collecting his things slowly, letting the crowd thin before leaving the sanctuary of Mr. Samuels' classroom.
He was halfway to the stairs when he heard her voice.
"Wait."
Michelle's tone wasn't loud, but it was direct—closer to an instrument than an echo. He turned. She walked beside him without asking, her pace matched to his.
They didn't speak for a few steps. The hallway was loud in that artificial, polished way—shoes squeaking, locker doors clanging, a recorded announcement droning about a schedule shift due to evening service.
The GFC posters had multiplied. One had Noel's face—younger, brighter, before. The words, New Beginnings, floated above his smile. Someone had drawn a halo around his head in gold Sharpie.
Then, softly, "You meant Johnny, didn't you?"
David stiffened. She didn't look at him when she said it.
"When you talked about the ship remembering. The sun, the storm. That was him."
He didn't answer right away. Just stared forward at the back of a senior boy's uniform jacket, seams too clean, posture too practiced.
"I meant what I said," David murmured. "That memory matters. Even if no one wants it to."
Michelle nodded once. "I figured you wouldn't lie about something like that."
They turned a corner. The crowd thinned. She glanced over her shoulder, then lowered her voice even more.
"I don't think you're.. wrong, you know."
A pause. "About what's happening to him. I've... noticed things too."
David looked at her fully now, startled by the hesitation under her polish. "What kind of things?"
Michelle gave a dry, humorless smile. "Things I shouldn't talk about. And definitely not here."
She glanced around the hallway, then stepped closer.
"My father expects me to report things. But I'm tired of being his eyes."
"You need to be careful," Michelle said, voice dropping. "After yesterday's video, they're talking about you in faculty meetings. I heard Eli Prophet mention a 'wellness check' for you. That's code for—" "Pathlight evaluation," David finished, cold spreading through his chest.
"Within 48 hours, usually. Maybe less after that cafeteria thing went viral." A silence stretched between them, taut but not unfriendly.
David's phone buzzed. Another FaithCoin donation notification. The countdown continued.
"It only takes three teachers and a guidance counselor to override parental consent," she added quietly.
Finally Michelle volunteered, "There's been bruises on Johnny's arms... other places, too. Not from baseball."
"He asked about you," she said quietly. "During one of his... episodes. When Father was correcting him. He shouted your name."
David's throat tightened. Johnny had thought of him even while— "He's my brother," Michelle said simply. "I won't let them erase him."
Then Michelle turned toward the library hall. Over her shoulder, she added quietly, "Just... be careful. People notice when ships start steering off course."
And then she was gone—collared and composed, disappearing into the crowd like a warning folded into a hymn.
David stood still, the echo of her words stirring something he hadn't allowed himself to feel in weeks.
Hope. Complicated. Dangerous.
But hope nonetheless.
David didn't plan to walk that way. His feet just moved, bypassing the front entrance, carrying him along the gravel loop past the gym, through the thin grove of trees, and down toward the ROTC field.
He told himself it was a shortcut.
It wasn't.
The book Mr. Samuels had given him—Buddhist philosophy on impermanence—weighed heavy in his backpack. Nāgārjuna's words offered both comfort and curse. Everything changes. But into what?
The field was sharp with geometry—white chalk lines so clean they might've been drawn by laser. Beyond them, the cadets stood in formation, their bodies forming a perfect grid of limbs and discipline. Sunlight hit the metal trim of their uniforms, casting sharp flares that made the whole unit shimmer like precision instruments.
Johnny stood at the front.
He didn't bark commands. He spoke them—precisely, coolly, with the confidence of someone who knew how far his voice would carry. His hand gestures were minimal, almost elegant, like a conductor guiding a silent orchestra.
And the cadets obeyed.
One-two. Turn.
One-two. March.
One-two. Forget.
The SoulWatches on their wrists flashed green in unison as each motion completed, a rhythm of light that mimicked approval, achievement.
David stood just beyond the chain-link fence. The metal grid left faint imprints in his fingers where he gripped it too tightly. He watched Johnny's body move—perfect posture, clean pivots, every gesture stripped of hesitation.
The others mimicked him, but none matched him.
Johnny wasn't just following the drill.
He was the drill.
It was beautiful, in a terrifying way. Like watching someone drown in perfect form.
David remembered how Johnny used to walk—shoulders loose, steps messy, like the world wasn't heavy on him yet. He remembered the crooked grin, the half-laughed insults, the music always in his hands.
That boy wasn't here
Instead, Johnny's uniform hung on him with flawless perfection, every pleat and fold aligned, every bit a statue - like a gilded Apollo frieze, torn down and replaced by a cold, glaring cross — divine in form, hollow in presence.
This boy didn't smile. He didn't blink. And when the sun caught his face—perfectly sculpted, sweatless, unmarred—David felt something awful claw up the back of his throat.
Admiration. Revulsion. Love.
David's heart recoiled. His body didn't.
This is what they made you into, he thought. And I can't stop looking.
"About-face!"
The unit spun as one. Another synchronized flash of green.
Johnny's face tilted slightly as he turned, scanning the edge of the field.
For half a second—maybe less—his eyes caught David's. Something flickered there.
Recognition?
A muscle in Johnny's jaw tightened—so slight the other cadets wouldn't notice. But David knew that tell. Johnny was fighting something.
Or just light on glass?
Then it was gone. Johnny shifted his focus, and the green light on his SoulWatch blinked again, bright as a seal.
David stepped back from the fence.
The imprint of the chain-link stung against his palms. He turned, slowly, the image of Johnny still seared into his mind.
Whatever this transformation was—it wasn't accidental. It wasn't complete. Not yet.
And that meant there was still time.
Time to interrupt it.
Time to fight.
David didn't know how. Or even where to start.
But watching the synchronized light—green, green, green, like a coded pulse—he understood now what the stakes really were.
They didn't just want to change Johnny.
They wanted to make him forget he had ever been different.
And David couldn't—wouldn't—let that happen.
Not quietly.
Not gradually.
Not at all.
David turned to leave, but froze.
Eli Prophet stood at the opposite end of the path, tablet in hand, watching him with that same calculating smile.
"David," he called out, voice carrying too well. "Just the student I was looking for. We need to discuss your wellness plan."
David's pulse hammered.
Eli's shadow stretched long across the path.
Forty-eight hours had become right now.
He wondered if Micah's 'help' would come before Eli's 'wellness check.'