Turns out we aren’t allowed to keep our new costumes. Bummer. By the time we all funnel back inside the locker room, bustling, whispering, excitedly talking and nervously chattering, our names have been peeled off the lockers and our clothes have all been thrown inside one massive hamper that literally vanishes into thin air the second any of us gets close to touching it. Our phones are in our lockers, sure, and thank God whoever raided my stuff decided to leave behind three stray cigarettes and my earphones. But that barely makes up for the fact that literally none of us have our own clothes left behind. Gym bags? Gone. Makeup kits? Vanished into thin air. Fun times? Old news.

  “What the fuck?” Jordan says, speaking for every single one of us inside the room right now.

  The mousy girl with the clipboard is waiting for us, scrolling through her phone. She holds up a finger, texts something, hits send, then, without looking at us, says, “So here’s how this is going to work. You’re all going to sign your costumes, preferably on your symbols, chests, gloves, boots, and masks—then you’re going to fold them and hand them back to us.” Before we all start very loudly complaining, she talks over us. “It was all in your university application forms. Did any of you read the fine print?” We all glance at one another. “No. I’m not that surprised, because nobody ever does. The university reserves the right to these costumes. Samantha?” I perk up, look around, point to my own chest. “We’ve also deleted the selfie you took with your gear. That’s strike one. If you want to post about certain things, there’s a freshmen social media handbook you’ll all find in your dorms, and if I were you, read it. Please. This school will sue your family into the alleys of Old-Port if you fuck up. Now, costumes, sign ‘em. There’s pens in each of the lockers. And please hurry up. Not everyone wants to spend their Saturday shepherding a bunch of kids around campus. Oh, before I forget—Sam, Jordan, you have Liberty Radio interviews.”

  “Liberty Radio?” I ask her. “Who the hell still listens to that ancient thing?”

  “Old people who probably think the Soviets are still scheming on dropping bombs on us,” Kory mutters.

  “Do radios even still work?” Jordan quietly asks me.

  Look, I might be a lot of things, but Liberty Radio? Jesus! I deserve better than that!

  “Oh, I didn’t realize you two were better than getting an audience of five-hundred thousand people to listen to what you’ve got to say about going to school. Riveting for the listeners, I’m sure.” She tilts her head. “Get changed and moving already. I’ve got a date in two hours and I cannot afford to screw this up again. Chup-chup!”

  Nobody moves. We stand there, dumbfounded, and quietly angry.

  A short girl with an explosion of pink hair shoots her hand above her head. “Um, excuse me?”

  Clipboard-Girl sighs. “Yes, Roxy?”

  “Oh, you know my name!” She grins, then drops the smile when Clipboard-Girl sighs again. She shifts on her feet, fidgets with her fingers. She smells like bubblegum. Like, a lot of bubblegum. “You said, um, that you deleted Sentry’s post, and it’s not my place to go snooping or whatever, but…do you have access to all of our—”

  “Yes, we do,” she says. A lot more talking, a surge of it from all of us. She just looks bored.

  Jason pushes his way to the front, then says, “Isn’t that, you know, a breach of—”

  “What? Trust?” She shakes her head slowly, then walks a little closer to all of us, until she’s almost right in my face. “Let me get something straight. Who you were before coming to university? Dead. Nobody gives a fuck if you saved the planet or got people blown up inside of a school. You’re freshmen. Seventy-six percent of you won’t even be here by the time you’re seniors, and considering how small of a class you already are…” She shrugs. The air stills, gets solid and silent in seconds. “In seven weeks, after you’ve had your first field exam, twelve percent of you either transfer, dropout, or…well, there’s suicide hotlines in your dorm room for a reason. Get used to your rights being breached, because in case you haven’t noticed, this isn’t high school anymore. You’re not popular. You’re not the kid everyone wants to hook up with or date or bully. You’re freshmen. You’re at the bottom of this food chain, so buckle up, suck it up, and shut the fuck up. Do those three things, and you’ll make it to the end, m’kay?”

  Roxy slowly puts her hand up. “Um—”

  “Golden rule of three, bubblegum. What did I just say?”

  Roxy slowly puts her hand down and looks at the floor.

  “Good,” she says. “I need these costumes in the next thirty minutes.”

  I put my hand out and grab her shoulder, stopping her. She stares at my fingers, and I see a flash of something in her eyes—not metaphorically, but something. Electric. Blue. It crackles quietly, then she glares at me.

  “Can we at least know where our costumes are gonna be, just in case we need them?” I ask her.

  “Need them?” she says quietly. “Why would you need them?”

  “Well…we’re superheroes,” I say, and for once, everyone is on my side, nodding and quietly agreeing.

  “Oh, no, honey, you won’t need costumes until you’re at least juniors.” I pull my hand off her shoulder, mostly in shock and horror, because that’s everyone’s expression right now, too. Juniors!? We haven’t even picked our first classes yet! That’s, like, three entire years away! Most of us have been saving people alongside our parents or uncles and aunts or the police department since we were in middle school, and now we’re just supposed to stop? “It looks like none of you did any research,” she sighs. “God, I hate explaining all of this. Look, you’re legally prohibited from leaving campus to get into superhuman-related altercations. There will be heavy sanctions if you do. Got a nemesis or a group of people that’s threatening someone back home? Go to your dean and file a report, or send an e-mail to campus security, and it’ll all get figured out. You’re all untrained, used to the fast life, loose and chaotic, just as long as you get the job done. Not anymore. You screw up, and it’s on the school for not training you good enough. Right now, you’re massive liabilities to us. Heck, you won’t be leaving school until Winter Break.”

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  “Winter Break?” I whisper. Then blink. “Like, Christmas? Like, almost four months from now?”

  “Yep,” she says. “Now, if you’ve got any more questions, find someone else and hope they’re nice. You’ll all find a number in your PU tracksuits. Your sophomore parents for the next couple of hours will also have the same number. Go to the Liberty Commons. You won’t miss it. You’ll find your group, get some lunch, walk around a little, and then you’re free for the rest of the weekend to reconsider your choice in program. Welcome to PU, kids.”

  With that, she briskly walks through the crowd, parting it like that one guy in those banned books.

  I turn around slowly and look at everyone, then say, “This…this is fucking nuts, isn’t it?”

  Jordan folds her arms. “My mom told me this place was a pain in the ass, just not like this.”

  Jason scratches the back of his head. “Man, I really should’ve just scrapped the invite letter.”

  “You got invited to join PU?” Summer asks him. “How! I applied, like, five times!”

  “Same,” “Yeah,” “Must be Vale’s kid—he even looks like him,” people say in a chorus.

  He lifts up his hands and says, “Guys, relax. I’m not the villain here.”

  “And neither is the school.” Red shoves her way past several people, then checks my arm before sitting on a bench and pulling off her golden boots. “You’re all so fussy because you’re all so used to getting things when you want them. Welcome to the real world.” She looks at all of us as she halfway unzips the front of her costume and exposes the scratchy tattoos near her collarbone. “It’s better than being in prison, I can tell you all that much. So quit whining and get naked. At least they’re giving us our own tracksuits. That’s more than a public hero program.”

  “We’re not in a public program,” a girl with…Holy shit, she’s hot. I shake my head. She’s wearing white boots that reach her thighs, a purple leotard that hugs her hips and stretches down toward her knuckles. She’s got a glitter-filled star on her chest, almost looking like she’s crushed diamonds and sprinkled them all over her costume. Long, black hair spills down her back, and her eyes are purple, too. I can’t help but stare. “We’re in PU. I don’t know what kind of backalley, pig-farm you were raised in, or which cows you’re used to saving, but some of us have standards, and some of us can’t just let some creepy intern surf through our social pages however they want. I like my privacy, and I’m sure as hell everyone in here likes it as well. I don’t give a fuck about their rules—this is crap.”

  “Great speech, sparkles, but what’re you gonna do about it?” Red asks her. “We signed their contracts.”

  “My daddy literally owns CapeCo, so yeah, I think I know what I’m gonna do about it.”

  With that, she spins on her heels, looks at the people standing in front of her, and motions them to move out of her way. Some do. The ones who don’t get hit with a burst of blinding light from her palms that leaves them dizzy and leaning on other people for support. I’ve got to blink the spots out of my eyes by the time she’s leaving.

  Well, marching down the corridor is a better word. Her boots echo against the concrete floor.

  “CapeCo?” Summer asks quietly, looking around.

  Most of us shrug. Jason says, “It’s a superhero movie thing.”

  “Production company,” Jordan says. “Super massive media empire. They run advertising for Ultra Force, the West Coast League, Texas Titans and about half of the Major Leaguers, including Liberty. That chick is a billionaire. At least, her parents are.” I look at her weirdly. “What?” she says. “I’ve modeled for them before.”

  “You’re a model?” Roxy squeals, eyes so wide they might fall out of her skull. “That’s so cool!”

  “How fucking old are you?” Red asks her.

  “Hey, be nice,” Summer says.

  “Twenty-two,” Roxy says with a grin.

  We stare at her, because…no fucking way she’s the oldest person in this room.

  Before anyone can start grilling her, the speakers embedded into the ceiling burst alive with static, then comes a voice loudly saying, “Freshmen! Costumes, now! Get to singing, get to changing, and get asses moving!”

  I work a finger into my ear, trying to get rid of the ringing. “Well,” I mutter. “This is fun so far.”

  Because who doesn’t love it when you’ve basically got no rights left?

  I slowly get to stripping myself down, longingly staring at my costume by the time I’m done scribbling my signature on the costume’s large golden S. Soon, I think, tracing my fingers along the spandex, before I make a knot out of the white t-shirt they threw inside my former locker, exposing my abs. I wrap the large red jacket around my waist and force my feet into a pair of white sneakers a size too big for my feet. The pants are baggy. The t-shirt is kinda loose. But hey, at least I’ve got my very own ID badge…unfortunaly, compared to Jordan’s, I was caught halfway through a sneezing fit when I took this picture a month ago, and these assholes actually decided to use it. Name: Samantha ‘Sentry’ Luck. Age: 17. Hero Grade: F. Power Class: Six-Star, Dual-Threat. Abilities: Classified. I raise an eyebrow at the classified part, but most of the other heroes have wandered out of the changing room, so I don’t have enough time to think about it. Jordan waits by the door, alongside Summer and Jason, waiting for me.

  “We don’t have all day,” Jordan sighs. “With how that chick explained it, we’ll be lucky to get food.”

  Summer rolls her eyes. “Oh, come on. They wouldn’t make us pay for food. We’re on full scholarships.”

  All of us stand in the doorway, because…

  “Does anyone have any cash?” I ask them.

  “My wallet was in my jeans,” Jason mutters, “which I’ll probably never see again.”

  Jordan says, “Don’t look at me, all my stuff was in my handbag. Luck, what about you? All those burger commercials must’ve meant you’ve got something in those pockets, right?” I suck air through my teeth. “What?”

  “They didn’t actually pay me for those,” I mutter, scratching the back of my head.

  Red, somewhere down the hallway, shouts, “What’re you dweebs gossiping about? Let’s go already!”

  “I thought she didn’t like us,” Summer whispers.

  “Hey, at the very least,” Jason says, leading us down the hallway, arms behind his head, “we might not get any rights, or eat today, or, you know, like having our entire lives in the hands of an intern somewhere, but we’re still in Pantheon U, right?” I give him an empty hurrah. He laughs. “Hey, I’ll take it. Beats being at home, right?”

  “Yep,” someone says beside me. I nearly jump halfway through the ceiling. It’s Kory, hands in his pockets, trying to light another cigarette with a lighter that won’t catch. “Damn thing. Just…work already…c’mon, cmo—”

  I shut one eye and light the end with a flash of laser beam. Pain. Immediately. But I can’t show that in front of these guys, so I shrug off his thin smile and quiet thanks, then spend the rest of the time massaging the back of my neck, reading the power dampening warning signs painted along the cold cement walls as we slowly reached the end of the hallway. We glance to our right, where the stadium’s trophy cases, large bronze superhero busts, and dozens upon dozens of retired superhero costumes line the walls. It’s a beat of silence, barely a second, but long enough for each one of us to feel it. Then Red, in all her elegance, sighs, swears, and tells us to get fucking going.

  So that’s what we do, because we’ll have four years to stare and at legends all we want.

  Well, if we make it that far, anyway.

  I know for a fact that I probably will. The humans on the other hand…

  I guess we’ll just have to see.