Chapter 13

  Beginning of the First Act (II)

  The lights of the auditorium were already dimming when she walked in.

  She paused just inside the doorway, the sudden shift in atmosphere making her hesitate. Dim light flattened faces into silhouettes and turned the thousand-seat expanse into a shifting field of movement. Voices overlapped in bright, restless waves. The stage lights were up, washing the lower half of the hall in a harsh, artificial glow.

  ‘I hate being late,’ she thought, adjusting the strap of her bag as she moved forward.

  The aisles were still clogged with stragglers filtering in, murmured apologies traded in low voices as knees turned sideways to let them pass. Malika bypassed the crowded back sections, spotting a lone seat on the end of an aisle several rows down, closer to the stage.

  She made her way to it, dropping her bag at her feet as she sat. A bright voice immediately boomed from the platform—a young man in his thirties wearing jeans and a t-shirt with an open flannel over it. He was all charged up with an aggressive charisma.

  “Alright, Pioneer Class of 2030, how we doing this morning?!”

  A good chunk of the students around her whooped and clapped at the goading, the sound echoing off the high ceiling.

  Malika didn't clap. She had barely slept the past couple of nights, and the reality of the dorms was still setting in and her routine was all out of whack. Thankfully, she didn’t have a roommate... yet.

  Restless, she twisted in her seat, her eyes scanning the crowd around her, she began glancing back up the rake of the auditorium. It was habit, mostly—instinct telling her to map the room and take inventory; maybe see who else had made the cut that she knew. Her eyes scanned the rows of faces behind her, skimming over strangers until they snagged on a small group sitting near the center, a few rows back.

  Her gaze fixed on them, oddly enough she recognized them—or at least, their faces triggered a faint itch of familiarity. They had been at the Academy too, hadn’t they? The larger than life fellow definitely was, she remembered him at least. The others though, she felt like she had seen them in the halls a couple times.

  While trying to place where exactly she knew them from; she noticed the boy and girl on the edge of the group. The girl with dark hair and a boy sitting next to her, they sat next to one another, yet there was a rigid, uncomfortable distance in their posture. The girl was staring pointedly at the back of the seat in front of her, her expression clouded and distant.

  The boy on the other hand leaned forward slightly, glancing around the crowd. Seemingly looking for something. His shoulders pulled tight, radiating a nervous energy that seemed out of place.

  Then, as if feeling the weight of her gaze, the boy turned his head; and for a second their eyes locked across the rows.

  Malika felt a sudden, sharp jolt of awkwardness at being caught staring. She immediately snapped her head back toward the stage, her heart giving a small, embarrassed thump.

  ‘Great.’ She said to herself and then sighed and blinked hard a few times. That wasn’t awkward at all.

  Needing a distraction, she quickly opened the student folder she had received at check-in, burying her nose in the laminated program inside. She traced the detailed map of the campus with a finger, feigning intense interest in the breakout session schedule, determined not to look back again. He was probably staring at her now.

  On stage, the MC was still babbling. “Alright, I don’t wanna take up too much of your time here today. We have a lot in store for you and we need to get started, so without further ado let’s make our Institute President feel welcome! Justice Fields, everyone! Come on!”

  A ripple of applause rang out as he stepped off the platform. Justice Fields walked out, wearing a sharp, clean-cut navy suit, a practiced smile on her face as she approached the podium. Malika clapped with the rest of them, keeping her eyes strictly forward.

  “Students.” She began while taking a moment to look throughout the crowd of students before her, “I would like to formally welcome you all to a new beginning.” She smiled softly as she looked down at her notes. “Today, you are history makers. The first of many classes who will inevitably come through those doors you entered, and sit in the very chairs you find yourselves in right now.”

  “Humanity has been at war for a very long time. Longer than any of you have been alive—and believe it or not, even me.” A soft ripple of laughter spread from her joke. “You all are here to be transformed. Honed into fine instruments for one purpose, and one purpose only: To seek victory.” She flipped her page.

  “But victory,” Justice paused again, letting the word hang in the air, heavy and unadorned. She leaned forward slightly, her hands gripping the edges of the podium, the practiced smile vanishing to reveal something harder underneath. “Victory is not a parade. It is not a gleaming trophy or a line in a history book. Victory is simply our refusal to vanish.”

  The auditorium went dead silent. The shift in tone was abrupt, stripping away the excitement of the orientation and replacing it with a cold, sobering gravity.

  “Many of you are gifted individuals, talents who have the world at their feet. You should be proud of your progress and how far you’ve come, don’t get me wrong. Yet, there are those who look at the state of our world—at the constant pressure, the encroaching threats—and they see a losing battle. They get caught up in all the math, the statistics that print nothing but grim realities for us to get caught up in and they tell us that survival is impossible.”

  Malika felt a chill crawl up her spine.

  The words bypassed her ears and settled somewhere deep in her chest, vibrating against a memory she usually kept locked behind iron doors. The sudden ache was sharp enough to make her breath hitch.

  Statistically impossible.

  The words dissolved the clean, modern lines of the auditorium. For a heartbeat, she wasn’t sitting in the plush seat surrounded by well-fed students.

  No, she was back in the mud of the Lowlands, under a sky chock full of the ash of the burning dead. She could smell the iron-tang of blood and the sour reek of unwashed bodies huddled around a fire.

  Desperate.

  She remembered the look in her Captain’s eyes—not hope, but a grim, terrifying resolve. She remembered a kingdom broken. Walls long crumbled into ruins, allies that no longer exist as their banners still wave above deserted lands, their food stores rotted and useless. By all accounts, they should have laid down their arms and let the end take them. It would have been easier. It would have been logical.

  “I believe in the impossible,” Justice continued, her voice dropping an octave, resonating with a quiet ferocity that seemed to fill the room without the need for a microphone. “I have seen humanity pushed to the very edge of the cliff. I have seen the lights go out, one by one. And do you know what happens when the darkness is absolute?”

  Malika stared at the woman on stage, her fingers white-knuckled around the edges of her student folder.

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

  We lit torches, she thought, the memory so vivid it stung her eyes. We sharpened broken blades.

  “We do not cower,” Justice said, answering the thought as if she had plucked it straight from Malika’s mind. “When the odds are insurmountable, we do not calculate, hiding behind numbers and figures. No! We dig in! We stand shoulder to shoulder, and we become the wall that the tide must break against, because by God, we will not move!”

  Malika swallowed hard, the lump in her throat painful. She remembered the desperate, beautiful stubbornness of her people. They had fought not because they thought they would win, but because the act of fighting was the only dignity left to them. They had turned hopelessness into a weapon, sharpening their despair until it cut.

  “You are not here because you are the strongest,” Justice said, her gaze sweeping the room, landing on row after row of silent, wide-eyed teenagers. “You are here because you have the capacity to endure. But more than that, you need to get your eyes checked. I need each and everyone one of you to look at a future that promises you nothing but struggle, pain, agony beyond anything you could possibly think of and say, ‘I will stand up.’”

  Justice straightened up, the hardness in her face softening just enough to let a flicker of pride shine through.

  “That is the legacy you will leave here for the next generation to inherit. You will set the pace others will have to follow. Not as survivors, but as conquerors. You will be a people who look into the abyss and refuse to blink. That is what we will teach you here. Not just how to fight, but how to stand when everything else has fallen; because you will stand.”

  Malika exhaled a breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding. The tension in her chest loosened, replaced by a strange, sorrowful clarity. She looked down at her hands—clean, unscarred, holding a campus map instead of a sword—and felt a bizarre sense of continuity. A soft smile came across her lips as she closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

  Different world. Different war. Same fight.

  ‘I will stand.’

  “Welcome to the Institute,” Justice finished quietly. “Let’s get to work.”

  ~~~~

  The heavy velvet curtain swept shut behind her, cutting off the bright stage lights and muffling the applause into a distant, rhythmic thrum. The muffled boom of the MC’s voice vibrating through the air was the only reminder that the session was still going on.

  The moment she was out of sight, Justice Fields slumped. It was a fraction of a movement—a microscopic drop of the shoulders followed by a long, controlled exhale through her nose—but for her, it was a total collapse. She reached up, massaging the tension gathering at her temples. She could lead an institution, negotiate with politicians, and manage budgets that would bankrupt small nations, but five minutes of public speaking drained her faster than a twelve-hour board meeting. And a marathon. Combined.

  “Ah! President Fields!”

  The voice chirped from her left, bright and eager. Justice suppressed a wince before smoothing her expression back into something presidential.

  “That was incredible, ma’am! Truly!” Rupert appeared at her elbow, practically vibrating. He was clutching a clipboard to his chest like a shield, his lean frame struggling to contain his golden-retriever enthusiasm. “Your cadence? Perfect! The emotional resonance and delivery were better than anything I’d seen or heard to date! I was with the Board of Trustees in the balcony, and I really think that speech impressed them thoroughly! We might have just secured the funding—”

  “Rupert,” Justice said, her voice soft but firm, cutting through his stream of consciousness. She didn't stop walking, navigating the cables and equipment cases that cluttered the backstage wings.

  Rupert matched her stride, hopping slightly to keep up. “Yes, ma’am?”

  “I appreciate the play-by-play. But right now, I just need to decompress. The speech is done. I am thrilled that the Board is happy, but let’s take the win and just breathe for a second. Yeah?”

  She offered him a small, weary smile to take the sting out of the rebuke. Rupert blinked, then nodded vigorously.

  “Right. Breathing. Of course. Heh! Decompressing is so very vital.” He checked his watch, then his clipboard. “And, uh, well, we have exactly thirty minutes of decompression available if we are to stay on schedule. Your luncheon with Governor Reeves and Mayor Pascal is at one-thirty, and traffic being what it is, a head start won’t hurt us in the slightest.”

  “Then thirty minutes it is,” Justice said, patting him gently on the shoulder.

  Rupert beamed, but his pocket suddenly buzzed. He fumbled for his phone, his eyes widening. “Oh! It’s the Governor’s aide. I need to—uh, I’ll just—I’ll be right back!”

  He spun on his heel and scurried toward the exit, thumb flying across his phone screen. Justice watched him go, shaking her head with a mix of affection and exhaustion. He was scatterbrained, but his heart was in the right place. Did the man ever sleep?

  “You almost had me convinced out there.”

  The new voice was lower, rougher, and far more familiar. Justice didn't turn around immediately; she just let out a short, genuine laugh.

  “Hello, Alan,” she said, finally turning to see Alaric’s short frame leaning against a stack of unused lighting crates. He was dressed in one of his muted suits, arms crossed, watching her with a soft smile. “I take it I didn't look like I was about to vomit during the ‘victory’ line?”

  “You looked like Lady Liberty herself,” Alaric said, pushing himself off the crate and walking over. “All stoic and inspiring.”

  “Well, good. That was the goal.” Justice leaned back against a support beam, grateful for a conversation she didn’t have to manage. “First day seems to be a success so far. Can’t say I wasn’t worried, with the sheer weight of it all. We have the funding, the facility, all the staff we could ever need. But getting these kids to actually buy into the vision? That’s the one variable nobody can calculate.”

  “They’ll buy in,” Alaric said quietly. “They don’t have much of a choice. All the Guilds will be sniffing around soon enough looking to get them to sign pre-contracts. They’ll need to sharpen up if they want to make a good impression.”

  “Huh. I suppose so.” Justice lowered her voice, glancing around to ensure they were alone. “Speaking of buying in, how is our special case doing today? I think I saw Elias with him earlier.”

  Alaric nodded. “Xankoris is well. Elias has been meeting with him regularly. The boy is… skittish, but I don’t foresee any real trouble. He keeps his head down and has been hard at work already.”

  “Good. Based on his fitness scores, the boy is in remarkably good shape considering that respirator he needs to keep himself alive.”

  Alaric nodded. “Indeed. It’s quite clear he was exposed to some heavy doses of magic in his formative years, but the kid is strong. He is doing more than surviving.”

  “Mmm,” Justice hummed, then sighed. “Elias is sure he’s going to be a cornerstone for this class, but he’s not the only one I’ve been thinking about.” Justice began walking again, Alaric falling into step beside her. “The St. Claire twins.”

  Alaric gave a low whistle. “Naturally. Our two heavy hitters.”

  “Highest rated prospects in the state, top fifty of the country,” Justice confirmed. “Yet somehow, that boy Matthias has the fortitude of a wet paper bag, and Malika…” She paused and chuckled, “well, she has a psych profile that suggests she’s shown signs of PTSD. She’s a clenched fist with hair.” She stopped near the monitor bank, watching the feed of the students filing out of the auditorium.

  “It’s never easy, managing and mentoring talents.” Alaric murmured, his eyes also fixed on the screen. He paused, then smirked, muttering under his breath, “If anything, it’s a joy to shovel.”

  Justice glanced at him sideways, a small, knowing glint in her eye. “Come again?”

  Alaric didn't flinch. “I said it’s a joy to shovel. Something my father used to tell me when I was a young boy. He worked a field every day of his life for sixty years. Half of which he had to do by hand—and us children had to help him too.”

  Justice knit her brows. “Your father was a farmer?”

  “Indeed,” Alaric answered with a soft smile, his gaze distant. “I’ll never forget the day we finally built that stable, he had bought a pair of oxen for a great price at the time, and so when he came home with them in tow we immediately went to work and built a stable in just two days. The moment those oxen got in that stable, the work changed. I remember grumbling quite a bit because we now had to start shoveling manure.”

  Alaric glanced over at Justice, seeing the realization catch on her face. He chuckled softly. “I complained about the smell once when my father was there with me. And he paused and just stared at me and spoke with a bright smile plastered across his face: ‘It’s a joy to shovel, son. It means we have beasts to pull the plow.’”

  Justice let out a soft laugh, the tension in her shoulders finally loosening. “Quite the optimist… I hear what you're saying.”

  “I know you do,” Alaric said. “I just hope you won’t get caught up in all the mess, and miss out on recognizing the great talents sitting in those seats just a moment ago.”

  “Well, if I want to do that,” Justice answered, pushing off the support beam as Rupert came bursting back through the doors down the hall, waving his phone frantically. “I better get Rupert a shovel.”