Emily had her hair up in curlers, and was about halfway done with her eyebrows, when Margot came into the otherwise empty dorm bathroom, wrapped in a bathrobe and looking like she had just woken, and wasn’t too pleased about it, a yellow plastic basket with her toiletries hanging from one hand. She walked over to the long faux-marble counter and set her stuff down on the sink and mirror combo next to Emily’s, giving her a nod. Emily smiled at her and then went back to tweezing her eyebrow. She waited until Margot had started taking the top off a bottle of facial cleanser before she snuck a look at her halo.
There were all sorts of ways, as Emily understood it, for empaths to realize their talent. Some of them saw emotions as colored auras surrounding people, others heard music associated with a specific emotional state, while some particularly unlucky empaths even experienced a mirror-image of the emotions that they sensed around them. Emily, being only moderately unlucky, saw what she called halos — a roughly circular hollow ring of colored smoke that floated above people’s heads. She couldn’t see them all the time; she’d had to learn how to look them, and the halos were even more difficult to see here at the Academy, where almost everyone had been taught to resist such things. But, if Emily tried hard, most the time, she could see it, at least a little bit.
Margot’s halo was thin and reedy, almost broken in places, but that was normal for her. Her halo was a uniform grey-blue, which in Emily’s own personal interpretation, indicated either apathy or a tremendous ability to control her emotions. For Margot, this too was normal.
Then Sarah came breezing in, greeting both of them cheerfully and then walking over to the sink on Emily’s opposite side, the tiled space echoing with the sound of her sandals. Emily didn’t even have to check Sarah’s halo; as always, it was a ring of pulsating rose-pink light, which for Emily indicated optimism, good will and excitement, which was Sarah’s default emotional state. But there was something a bit unusual about it, in that it was shot through with the silvery metallic tone that Emily associated with curiosity, curiosity she was certain was directed at her, when she noticed Sarah glancing over while she got her hairbrush out.
“So,” Sarah said, her eyes locked on the hair she was brushing as if it required her full attention, “when were you going to tell me about your little date with Alex?”
Emily did her best to look composed. She’d guessed at the source of her curiosity, of course, and she kind of did want to brag about it. Only kind of, though, because it hadn’t gone exactly how she’d hoped. Then she saw herself in the mirror and realized she was blushing, and that made it all worse.
“We didn’t go on a date. I made him dinner, that’s all.”
“At your house,” Sarah offered, smiling eagerly.
“At my parent’s house,” Emily corrected.
“But, they weren’t there, right?”
“How did you know that?”
Sarah waved her hairbrush dismissively.
“I didn’t think you’d invite Alex over to meet your mom on a first date. Come on, tell me, how was it?”
Emily put away her tweezers, and then started to carefully remove the curlers from her hair, one at a time. She hoped her hair came out looking alright, because sleeping with the curlers in had been a pain. The Raleigh Cartel’s precognitives had told her that Alex would like her hair better this way, so she’d been dutifully curling her hair since the session had started. She thought it looked good, but she was getting a little tired of all the work entailed.
“It was pretty good. I mean, Therese showed up, even though she wasn’t supposed to be there, and she made a scene, as usual. But, it could have been a lot worse.”
Sarah glanced over sympathetically.
“Therese still does that, huh? Doesn’t she ever get tired of scaring your boyfriends off?”
“Did she?”
Emily turned to Margot, who was filling the sink while watching her in the mirror, surprised that she asked anything at all. She thought that she and Margot got along fine, for two people who barely ever spoke to each other, but she didn’t think she’d ever actually shown any interest in her personal life before. Margot was looking at her expectantly, so Emily couldn’t risk peaking at her halo to try and figure out her motivation.
“Did she what?”
“Did she scare off Alex?” Margot asked, putting one hand in the water briefly to check the temperature. “Or is he your boyfriend now?”
The curler in Emily’s fingers at that moment slipped from her hand and clattered off the counter and onto the ground. Sarah picked it up for her, and then set it down next to the rest of Emily’s toiletries on the counter.
“Well,” Emily stalled, trying to reason out some kind of answer, “not exactly. She didn’t seem to scare Alex off, though it was a little bit weird after she left. And no, Alex isn’t my boyfriend. We don’t even know each other that well, yet. But,” Emily said slowly, enjoying saying it out loud, even if it wasn’t exactly the whole truth, “well, we are kind of seeing each other.”
And it wasn’t a lie, not completely. Alex had agreed, after all, to see her again, and to spend more time with her. It didn’t matter that she’d told him that it would help her convince the Hegemony that she was doing her job, and therefore make them leave both of them alone. That was a detail, and if it was an unpleasant detail, it was also a minor one. The important thing, she reminded herself, was that she had made progress.
“Really? That’s awesome,” Sarah enthused, grabbing Emily’s shoulder and squealing. “I was worried for you. He seems a little, uh, shy. Spacey, too.”
“He is,” Emily agreed cheerfully. “I mean, I don’t know that much about him, but given how he got here, and what it must be like, with everyone knowing who is and all, I don’t think it’s too surprising that he’s a little nervous. It’s okay. It’s even cute, sort of.”
Margot looked up from the towel she was using to dry her face.
“Do you like him?”
The vampire’s voice was flat and devoid of interest. Emily wanted badly to take a quick look at her halo, to look for the reassuring silver flash of curiosity, but she was a little intimidated by Margot, and decided not to, afraid that she might notice.
“Maybe. I think that I might,” Emily answered, being as upbeat as possible while still telling the truth.
“Did he spend the night?”
Sarah nudged Emily, her eyes sparkling.
Emily’s pride and pleasure at being the center of attention wavered.
“No,” she admitted reluctantly, trying very hard to put Alex’s confession of inexperience and the bizarre story about his family out of her mind, as thinking about it made her feel weirdly sweaty and nervous. “I was kind of upset. Therese and I got into a fight, and I didn’t want to be there when she came back, so we came back up to campus.”
Sarah looked puzzled.
“But, I thought that your plan was…”
“It was,” Emily acknowledged, freeing her hair from the last of the curlers, and then frowning at her reflection in the mirror like it had done something to her. “But, the mood was all wrong, and anyway, I don’t want him to think that I’m… oh, I don’t know. Desperate or something. I wanted it to be, you know, good.”
Sarah’s hair brushing became more agitated.
“Are you sure about that? Don’t get me wrong, but you need this to work, right?”
“Well, yes,” Emily said, feeling her cheeks burn, unable to look up from her lap. “But… well, I’m not… not like that.”
“Come on. I know perfectly well what you’re like,” Sarah said, sounding a bit exasperated. “Remember that boy at the start of last session, what was his name? Kurt something? He followed you around for like two months before he finally gave up on you because he thought you weren’t interested, and I know you liked him. You have a lot of good points, Emily, but being assertive isn’t exactly one of them. Did you even let Alex kiss you?”
“He didn’t, uh, he didn’t try,” Emily said, trying not to sound discouraged or pathetic. “Actually. I thought he would. I was standing right there. I would have let him.”
“He is shy,” Margot observed, carefully squeezing toothpaste onto her toothbrush.
“Look, don’t take this the wrong way,” Sarah said carefully. “I know that this is a weird situation. And I know that you like to take these things slow. But, you have factor the rest of the world into your thinking, Emily. This isn’t just some boy you’re crushing on; he’s a strategic asset for the cartels to fight over. Anastasia and the rest of them are serious about recruiting this kid, you know?”
“I know,” Emily acknowledged quietly.
“And just because you want to wait for the right time and make sure that you have feelings for each other and everything is special, that doesn’t mean that some other girl won’t hop right into bed with him, you know? It’s probably not going to be roses and candlelight dinners.”
Sarah looked at her with what Emily pretended wasn’t a trace of pity. Sarah was her friend, Emily reminded herself firmly, and she was trying to help.
“He’s a guy, Emily. You know how guys are.”
“I know,” Emily acknowledged, in a steadily meeker voice.
“I’m not saying you have to throw yourself at him, but if he thinks you're never going to put out, some bitch is going to steal him from you. I’m not trying to be hard on you,” Sarah said firmly. “That's how it is, hon. You do know that, right?”
“Yes,” Emily said, fighting off a looming wave of self-pity.
“There are a bunch of other Hegemony girls who are waiting for you to fail so they can take your place. And there is nothing that Anastasia will not do to get what she wants,” Sarah said urgently, putting one hand on Emily’s shoulder. “She will have no trouble whatsoever finding someone who will do whatever it takes to get Alex to join the Black Sun, if Anastasia decides that’s the way she wants to handle it.”
“Why do you think Anastasia hasn’t done that?” Margot asked, only somewhat intelligible through the toothpaste.
It was always weird to watch Margot brush her teeth, because it was the only time Emily could actually see her oversized, pointed canines. Not that she was scared of Margot or vampires in general; well, not very afraid. But her teeth were the starkest reminder of how very different Margot was.
“No idea,” Sarah admitted. “You’d know better than I would — you still work for her sometimes, right, Margot? I don’t try and out-think cousin Ana, I’m just glad my branch of the family stayed with the Hegemony. She probably has some other plan for Alex. But that doesn’t change what I’m saying. Even if Anastasia doesn’t interfere, somebody else will. You know how many power-hungry bitches there are here at the Academy? You do your usual good-girl routine, Emily, and you’re going to get lost in the shuffle.”
“I know. I know you’re right,” Emily said, doing her best not to sound miserable and failing. “But, I already screwed up my chance. I don’t know when I can get the house to myself again, and I don’t know if he’d even come over again…”
Sarah looked stricken, and patted her on the shoulder sympathetically. For a moment, she said nothing, and then she suddenly cried out excitedly.
“Of course!” She grabbed hold of Emily’s shoulders as if she was going to shake her. “I’ve got it. A perfect opportunity!”
“What?”
“Hey, Margot, when does Alex start that class with Mitsuru? You know, the bad one?” Sarah asked, nodding excitedly as she spoke. “Combat-whatever-it’s-called?”
Margot’s response was made unintelligible by toothpaste, and they had to wait until she had a chance to rinse out her mouth before they could hear the answer.
“You mean the Program,” she said curtly, looking, to Emily’s eyes, unhappy about something. “And he starts this week.”
“Perfect!” Sarah enthused. “So what you do is, on his first day, you get the proctor to let you into his room while he’s in class, right? So you are waiting for him when he gets out. Say you were worried about him, Alex will like that. His proctor is Li, so it won’t be any big deal getting him to let you in. Anyway, I hear that class is pretty fucked up, especially at first. Don’t you think he might want some company after, Margot?”
“Yes,” Margot admitted, speaking a little too loudly, her flat voice echoing throughout the tiled bathroom. “It would be a good idea for someone to be there for him. It is difficult for many people at first, emotionally.”
“But if it’s in the dorms,” Emily said slowly, “and we…”
“Right!” Sarah crowed. “So you can’t, so you don’t have to, but you don’t come off like a prude either. He’ll know about the dorm rules, so he won’t expect you to do anything. It’s perfect, right?”
“I guess so,” Emily said, thinking it through, and wondering if Sarah might be right. “I mean, it’s not like I’d get in trouble just for kissing him or something, right? And even Margot said he shouldn’t be left alone…”
“No, he shouldn’t,” Margot said, again speaking more loudly than was necessary, gathering her things and heading for the door. Emily was too occupied with Sarah’s scheme to wonder much why she didn’t shower, even though it seemed like she’d planned on it. “Someone should definitely be there.”
It was cold in the bathroom, and Eerie had started trembling long before Sarah and Emily finished chatting and gossiping and finally left. She’d been standing in one of the shower enclosures, naked except for the bath towel she was partially wrapped in, shivering in silence since Emily arrived, somehow unable to face the girl that Alex had gone home with. Eerie stayed completely motionless until they left, except for her chattering teeth. She didn’t even dare reach for her bathrobe, afraid that they would hear her open the shower door to reach for it. Eerie waited until she was certain that they were gone, and then she turned on the water as hot as she could stand. She was grateful for the warmth pouring down her back, but it was a while longer before she stopped trembling.
“I’m not trying to force you into making up your mind. I understand that this is a difficult decision.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I don’t want you to feel like we are talking you into anything.”
“You aren’t.”
“Good.” The kid composed himself and looked as if he was about to continue on, then the other kid, the quiet one nudged him. “Ah, right. Then, if it is alright with you, can I move on to the substance of our visit?”
Alex wanted to laugh, but he couldn’t. Alex toyed with idea of throwing a punch at the kid, what’s-his-name, Nathan something. But, he knew that even if he didn’t hurt him, that Michael would never let him get away with it.
“You mean you didn’t come down here to hold the bag for me?” Alex asked, gesturing with one gloved hand at the water-filled punching bag that Nathan was holding cautiously, almost fearfully.
“Err, no. Well, not wholly,” Nathan said seriously. Alex had thus far seen no evidence that Nathan had even a shred of a sense of humor. “I am here as a representative of the Drava Cartel, and Frederick is here as a representative of the Gehrig-Moore Cartel. Our cartels are members of an alliance known as the…”
Alex threw a left-right-left combination at the bag, making as much noise as possible when his gloves smacked the leather bag, startling Nathan and rocking him backward a bit as he struggled to hold it in place.
“The Hegemony, I know. That’s a stupid name, by the way.” Alex shuffled his feet, trying to change stances the way he’d seen Michael do it yesterday. It didn’t work. “I thought the cartels were forbidden to conduct business at the Academy?”
“We are here in an unofficial capacity, of course!” Frederick shrieked, his brow shining with perspiration. Alex was guessing, but he didn’t think the moderately rotund German saw the inside of a gym too often. Not that Alex had ever made a habit of it before he’d come to the Academy, himself. But Michael and the machines in his blood had conspired to make some serious changes in him over the last several weeks.
“Right, and?” Alex said, trying a couple more straight right hands, more for the way the noise made them jump than anything.
“Well, we wish to discuss,” Nathan said, and then frowned, and leaned close to whisper conspiratorially. “We wish to discuss your plans for your future.”
Alex laughed, and Nathan paused, looking indignant.
“I’m sorry,” Alex said cheerfully. “But, I have to know — what exactly is it you want me to do? I mean, which cartel do you want me to join? Yours,” he said, pointing at Nathan with his gloved hand, “or his?”
He nodded amiably in the direction of Frederick, who continued to watch in open-mouthed dismay.
“Well, that is to say that I — ”
“You brought him for moral support, right, Nathan? I get that. It’s always easier to face rejection if you’ve got more people to spread it around. That makes sense. But, if I understand all of this correctly,” Alex said, sitting down on the mat in a heap, dripping in sweat and not in the mood, “then your boss won’t be too happy with you unless I sign on with your outfit. I mean, it’s not like I can just join the Hegemony, you know? Did they even tell you anything about me at all?”
“What’s that?” Nathan looked panicked, but Frederick looked positively green.
“Your cartel didn’t send you, did they?” Alex laughed, and then shook his head. “You aren’t the first to approach me on your own, you know. I guess a bunch of the half-bright but all-the-way ambitious types thought that might be a good idea. But you are the first to bring a wingman along, my friend.”
“Can I ask a question?”
Alex looked over at the girl who’d walked into the gym, and his good mood evaporated instantly.
“Yes,” Alex said reluctantly.
“Were all those ambitious types who approached you so far from the Hegemony?”
“Yes.”
Anastasia put her hand to her mouth in parody of shock.
“Oh my. Well, then I guess that makes it my turn, doesn’t it?”
Alex tried not to stare across the mat at Anastasia, focusing instead on stretching his calves. He’d never seen her in anything that didn’t fit her Gothic Lolita aesthetics, usually corseted dresses in black, with elaborate bows and ribbons and lace. On a couple of different occasions, he’d even seen her carrying a parasol on sunny days. Her shoes were always shiny leather with precarious heels, and her black hair was always elaborately coiffed.
But the girl stretching on the worn gym mat across from him was dressed casually, in a t-shirt and yoga pants that cut off at the knee, her hair in two tight braids that poked out on either side of her neck. She looked like any girl that you might see in the facility. But she was Anastasia, and the little Alex knew about Anastasia made this whole situation run contrary to Alex’s expectations.
“Are you sure about this?”
He eyed her warily, trying to gauge exactly how bad the situation he found himself in was.
“You have been doing this for how long, now? A few weeks?”
“More than a month,” Alex said defensively.
“Right,” Anastasia said, smirking. “I’ve only been doing ju-jitsu since I was five. You truly do not stand a chance.”
Alex looked at Anastasia doubtfully. It wasn’t that she was a girl; even if he’d had notions about that sort of thing, Collette, one of the student instructors in his ju-jitsu class had disabused him of any such thoughts by throwing him around like a ragdoll. And that didn’t even factor in the damage that Margot had done to him. Rather, it was that Anastasia was at least a foot shorter than him, and built like a girl who might be in junior high.
It didn’t help that this particular girl was apparently the future head of what was reputed to be the most terrifying cartel of all, and he had a feeling that if he managed to hurt her, that the consequences would be grim. When she’d gone to change into her gym outfit in the locker room, Edward had appeared from somewhere, given Alex a polite nod, and then cleared out Nathan and Frederick, who were too petrified by Anastasia’s arrival to even protest. Edward had taken up a position at the gym door, his arms folded, seemingly staring off into space. Alex didn’t see him sending people away, but no one came into the heavily-used gym during the entire time Anastasia was there. Later, he would come to realize that things always worked like that, whenever Anastasia was involved.
“Let me make sure you are clear,” Anastasia said, standing up and twisting from side to side, “I throw you three times, and you listen to whatever I have to say, for as long as it takes me to say it. But we are only doing tachi-waza. I don’t feel like rolling around on the ground with you. Yes?”
“Standing only, I get it. And I only have to throw you once to get you to go away?” Alex asked doubtfully. “That doesn’t seem fair.”
“Nothing is ever fair, not if I have any say in it.”
“Whatever,” Alex said, shrugging and taking his position. “When you’re ready.”
Anastasia grabbed Alex’s shoulder and behind his neck, and he adopted a similar grip on her. When they were this close, he was very aware of how much bigger he was than her and he felt reluctance. Then she smiled at him, and the casual contempt in the face she made erased that reluctance. Cautiously, he attempted to exert force on her shoulder, trying to shift her balance on to her back foot, where he would have all the leverage. For a moment, he even thought he was succeeding, before he felt a tug and his center of gravity shifted, out of his control. He struggled to right himself, to redistribute his weight and counter the momentum, but he knew it was already hopeless. She shifted direction effortlessly, moving along with his momentum, executing a perfect shoulder throw, flipping him over her back and then planting him solidly on the mat, shoulder first, with an impact that drove the air from his lungs.
“Ippon!” Anastasia said, smiling down at him and offering her hand. “Two more?”
Alex ignored the hand, sitting up and rubbing his shoulder. He attempted to look nonplussed, and then abandoned the effort. He was fairly certain he looked as embarrassed as he felt.
“Actually, I think you made your point,” Alex panted, looking pained. It wasn’t that Anastasia was stronger than him, he thought, but the difference in their skills was so great that any further attempt would only yield him more humiliation. “Why don’t we skip to the talking part?”
“You big baby,” Anastasia scolded. “And after I warmed up, too.” She sat down cross-legged a few feet away from him on the mat. “It seems to me that you have been a popular boy, since you arrived at the Academy.”
“I guess so,” Alex said, giving up on massaging out the kink is his shoulder. “It’s mostly been stuff like this afternoon. Some idiot approaches me and tries to get me to have a private talk, which always ends up being a half-assed recruitment speech.”
“And your suitors. Are they always from the Hegemony?”
“I told you already. Always. Why is that, anyway?”
“I would be upset, were it was any other way,” Anastasia said. “The Black Sun has a centralized leadership structure. When we make a recruitment approach, we do it as an organization. Whereas the Hegemony is at best a loose affiliation, and any cartel that gets the idea will try and approach you, independently. But, don’t think too badly of them, as it is primarily an issue of timing. With Eckhart and Tuesday out on Field Study until winter session, there is a leadership void for the Hegemony at the Academy. After the New Year, I am certain they will make a formal attempt.”
“And that doesn’t bother you? I thought that they were your enemies.”
“I don’t give the Hegemony enough credit to let them worry me,” Anastasia sniffed. “And the Black Sun has no enemies. At worst, there are other cartels that we have philosophical disagreements with.”
“You sure about that? Because they seemed to be very afraid of you.”
Anastasia smiled at him. It wasn’t a pretty thing, severe and a little malicious, but at least it made her seem a touch more human.
“As they should be,” she said, sounding satisfied. “Would you like to know what makes me different from everyone else who has approached you thus far?”
Alex nodded wearily.
“I am the only one who doesn’t need you, Alex.” Anastasia leaned forward, and spoke with sincerity, her manner composed and serious. “Neither I, nor the Black Sun, need you in order to fulfill our ambitions and goals. My cartel’s dominance and my own position within it are assured. We would hardly turn you away, should you desire a further association with the Black Sun — to the contrary, we would welcome you, as you have the potential to become quite useful. But, wanting and needing is not the same thing. Do you see the distinction?”
“Yes,” Alex replied sullenly. “Very flattering. Are you really so confident in the Black Sun?”
“Of course,” Anastasia said, blinking and looking a touch surprised at the question. “You needn’t take it from me, though. Ask Emily what she thinks the next time she tries to take you home — oh, she may couch the language a bit more, but I promise you that she sees what I see.”
“Which is?”
“The Black Sun Cartel is roughly the same size as the entirety of the Hegemony. With our affiliate cartels, we are somewhat larger. And we have no internal divisions or disputes; unlike the Hegemony, we do not waste our energy fighting each other.” Anastasia glanced briefly up at the clock on the wall, and then back to Alex. “If you factor in the Academy, there are an average of nearly two students affiliated with Black Sun for every one affiliated with Hegemony. Time and circumstances are on our side, Alex, and we are patient. We have been waiting for generations for the time to be right, and we won’t move until it is. And everyone can see the tide changing.”
“That all sounds great. I’m happy for you, really. But, if you don’t need me, then why are we having this conversation?”
Anastasia gave him another, more predatory smile, and he liked this one even less.
“We are, of course, not overlooking your considerable potential.” Anastasia paused and cocked her head to the side. “And then, there is the fact that I cannot simply allow you to join the Hegemony.”
“Oh?” Alex said, grimacing. “And how would you stop me, assuming I even wanted to do that?”
“I won’t try and persuade you the way Emily would, if that’s what you are thinking,” Anastasia laughed. “No offense. I was going to try reason, actually. I don’t think you would want to join the losing side in a fight if you had other options. The more you learn about the Hegemony, the less, I think, that you will find yourself sympathetic toward them. Don’t think that because Emily is a nice person that the Hegemony itself is benign.”
“And if reason doesn’t work? What’s after that? Vaguely worded threats, maybe?”
“No,” Anastasia said emphatically. “I don’t make threats. I have never seen the point. The next step would be bribery, to be frank. If you have no interest in doing the right thing, then perhaps you would be interested in doing right by yourself. So, if a number were to pop into that busy head of yours, well, you come speak to me directly, and I will be happy to make it happen.”
“You mean, like, money?” Alex asked, wide-eyed.
“Yes, Alex.” Anastasia said, amused. “I mean money. In virtually any amount that you care to name. Or, any other kind of material possession. Cars, houses, those blinking black boxes that boys love so much, whatever you like.”
“Wow,” Alex said faintly, his head swimming. “I have to at least give you points for honesty and forwardness, if nothing else.”
“Go ahead,” Anastasia said encouragingly, “pick a number. Surprise me.”
“Not right now,” Alex said, then caught Anastasia’s superior look and hurriedly added, “maybe never.”
“In my experience, the only things in this world that don’t have a price are those without value. And despite all appearances, you certainly do have value. Let us assume,” Anastasia said reasonably, “that I am simply offering to pay you with the wrong currency. Shall we talk for a moment about your little friend Emily? She’s certainly found a receptive audience in you.”
“What?”
“Surely you have noticed that, lovely though she is, Emily is hardly the only girl on campus, yes?” Anastasia’s eyes were full of laughter, her face a bit cruel. “I mentioned that the majority of the students are destined for the Black Sun, after graduation, which means they are going to find themselves under my jurisdiction, eventually. I am certain that I could make any introductions that you might need. Similarly, I can assure you that they any advances you make will be well-received.”
Alex looked at her with obvious shock and distaste.
“That’s going a bit too far.”
“Would you prefer that I invite you home? Make moon eyes at you during class?” Anastasia said mockingly. “I am trying to make a point, Alex. I don’t want you on my side as much as you want to be on my side. I can make things very easy for you.”
“And I’m guessing,” Alex said warily, “that on the flip side, you could make it very hard for me, right?”
Anastasia appeared to consider a moment before responding, and in the interval, Alex noticed her eyes dart back up to the clock. If she had someplace else to be, he wondered irritably, why didn’t she just go?
“I suppose I could,” Anastasia allowed, looking displeased. “But I don’t care much for that sort of thing. I am not here to try and make you do anything. Particularly not something that I have the utmost confidence that you will do of your own free will, eventually.”
“How can you be so sure?” Alex wondered aloud. He found Anastasia’s tremendous confidence unnerving — her demeanor was so self-assured and authoritative that he had to stop himself from nodding along in agreement as she spoke. He’d underestimated Anastasia, in more ways than one, he realized. “Are you one of those people who can see the future or something?”
“No one that I’m aware of can ‘see the future’. If you are referring to precognition, then no, I am not a precognitive.” She smiled almost wistfully, much to Alex’s surprise. “It would be much more convenient if I were, though. Have you ever read a report written by a group of precognitives, who are collectively trying to out-think other groups of competing precognitives?” Anastasia clucked disapprovingly. “It borders on utter gibberish, let me tell you.”
“Fascinating,” Alex muttered.
“Oh, don’t be sullen,” Anastasia scolded. “I offered all the money, power and girls that you could desire. How can that possibly be such a bad thing? Or, is it that you prefer Emily’s recruitment tactics?”
“You seriously need to stop bringing that up,” Alex said petulantly. “I barely even know her. And, no one is recruiting me into anything.”
“Certainly. I assume that it is normal for you, then, arriving at a new school, to have the prettiest girl in class fascinated by you from day one, yes? Does that sort of thing happen to you often, Alex?”
Alex looked concerned for a moment, and then his gaze hardened.
“Wait,” he said slowly. “Are you threatening Emily?”
“Honestly!” Anastasia scoffed, looking scandalized. “How often do I have to say it? I don’t make threats, Alex, and I am certainly not threatening poor Emily. Even if you want to see her, what is it to me? You won’t necessarily fall in love. And even if you were to get married, that still wouldn’t change a thing.”
“What?” Alex said, putting his head in his hands, frustrated. “I thought — I mean, Michael said that she was part of the Hegemony, and…”
“Michael is a great teacher, but he lacks political savvy,” Anastasia said with conviction. “If you feel like taking Emily up on her rather obvious offer, then go right ahead. I have heard good things. It isn’t as if you automatically join the Hegemony, because the girl you are dating happens to be a member. Anyway, do you plan on spending the rest of your life with the first girl who is willing to sleep with you? And, who is to say that she will remain in the Raleigh Cartel, for that matter?”
Alex wanted to smack his hands down on the mat, to push her away from him, to stand up and yell until he was hoarse. Alex did none of these things, because he was not stupid, and this was not the first time this had happened to him.
He couldn’t even remember the guy’s name. Nothing in the faculty, which was a sort of cross between a mental institution and a prison, had seemed to happen without the deeply tanned Mexican’s hands getting involved. Alex had the bad fortune to meet the man in person, something that rarely happened to anonymous white convicts, but the whole ‘killing your entire family’ thing seemed to resonate with him on a level that Alex found profoundly disturbing. He did not want to talk to him about that, didn’t like the man’s warm smile and dead eyes, and in any other situation, Alex would have simply left. He’d taken a number of beatings for doing exactly that, and he was not afraid of another.
But he was afraid of that man. Not because of anything he did or said, in fact, he’d been cordial. He had not threatened Alex or even spoken to him harshly, even when Alex admitted that he remembered little about his life up until the point of the fire, and virtually nothing of the actual event. The Mexican had been polite on the two occasions following that they had encountered each other, and Alex had passed his time peacefully in that particular institution.
He’d been afraid of the man because of the way he looked at Alex, like he saw what was going on his head, and felt a little bit sorry for him. There was something in his disconcertingly perfect smile that implied an absolute assurance, such a complete and total advantage that it didn’t even merit contesting. He’d seen it in the faces and actions of the people that surrounded and fawned all over the Mexican, inmates and guards alike.
And he could see it again in Anastasia’s eyes, and in the eyes of people who looked at her. Picking a fight with her would be worse than pointless, it might even be impossible. Alex understood now why people were afraid of the Black Sun — and it wasn’t the cartel, powerful though it might have been.
It was the girl sitting in front of him, glancing at the clock impatiently.
“I figured that the cartel thing was for life,” Alex said, shrugging, fighting down the urge to ask why she kept looking at the clock, if there wasn’t some place she would rather be. “She said she was born into it.”
“Certainly, as I was into the Black Sun,” Anastasia acknowledged coolly. “But, nothing obligates us to die where we were born, Alex. We make a choice when we leave the Academy, the same choice any orphan makes. Sometimes there are surprises, defections even. Don’t you think it reflects poorly on the Hegemony that all they see in Emily is a future homemaker? I’m certain that I could find her something more meaningful to do, in the Black Sun.”
“Wait, I get it,” Alex said, shaking his head. “But, I don’t think she would turn on her family.”
“What is to stop me from recruiting the entire cartel?” Anastasia glanced at her fingernails, looking vaguely disappointed. “I don’t have to worry about problems of scale. Therese Muir is much more practical than Emily, and she would most likely be receptive to the right offer. I am certain she would want to bring her beloved baby sister along.”
“You’d go that far,” Alex asked, wonderingly, “to get me to join your cartel?”
“It’s not all about you, Alex,” Anastasia said dismissively, standing up and walking to the door to open it for a very puzzled looking Emily, a water bottle in one hand, her iPod in the other. She looked blankly from Anastasia to Alex and then back to Anastasia.
“Hello Emily,” Anastasia said casually, smiling at the stunned girl. “Care to join me for the three o’clock Yoga session?”
“If you are ever going to pay attention,” Mr. Windsor said patiently, “then today is the day. This is the single most important piece of work that we will do this session, though I realize that for some of you this will be a lecture that you have had before…”
“Several times,” Anastasia said quietly, sounding bored.
“…but this does not in any way reduce the value of a return to the topic! Please pass this around, thank you, should be enough for everyone? Good, then.”
Alex took one from the stack of documents that Emily handed him and then passed it on to Vivik. Emily looked terribly disinterested, and even Vivik seemed less than thrilled. Alex took a closer look at the stapled document he’d been given.
It was seven pages long, with nearly twenty numbered articles, followed by a block of text, composed of a single run-on sentence that used the word ‘whereas’ at least four times. Alex immediately gave up on reading it. He tossed it on the desk in front of him distastefully, then looked up at Mr. Windsor and was surprised to see him smiling at the unhappy class.
“It is a formidable document, yes? It was not designed, I’m afraid, for a casual readership. But don’t worry, I’m not going to ask you to read it — though I would add that anyone too lazy to read the document that lays out their fundamental rights cannot claim to be too surprised when said rights are taken from them — but, I do want you to at least have a concept of the intent of the Agreement. Now, those of you who’ve been with us through grade school, I want you to go ahead and share what you’ve learned with newcomers in our class. The Agreement, you see, has four main functions. Miss Martynova, could you tell the class one of them?”
Anastasia rolled her eyes and answered in monotone.
“The Agreement established a universal code of conduct and applied it to all Operators and cartels equitably. Now, I am going to sleep until this session is over. Please don’t call on me again.”
Alex was only a little surprised that Mr. Windsor let it go with a smile. He was getting used to the way people treated Anastasia.
“Very good. Miss Martynova is better than a textbook, class. There is little that I can add, except that this code of conduct will be utterly critical to your life, going forward. Ignorance will not be considered an excuse if you take action outside of the Agreement, and the punishment for violating it is dire. But, do what you will. Now, Eerie,” Mr. Windsor said, turning to and clearly startling the changeling, “can you tell me another function of the Agreement?”
Eerie nodded hopefully, and then her face gradually fell when it became clear that more of a response was required. Eventually, Windsor took pity on her and repeated the question, followed by another long pause while she considered. Alex found the way her forehead wrinkled and her eyebrows scrunched while she thought to be unaccountably endearing.
“Um,” she said, so quietly that Alex could barely hear her, as if she was humming to herself, “well, you know, the government and stuff. The Committee and the Board. All of that.”
“Very good!” Mr. Windsor enthused. “The Agreement does indeed set up the foundation for a formal government in Central, providing centralized rule over the cartels, as well as a mechanism to impart that universal code of conduct Miss Martynova mentioned earlier. And for those of you who subscribe to the notion that this was a bad idea, allow me to remind you that cartel feuds would have killed off the majority of you before you were eighteen, were it not in place. Now, Margot, a third, if you please?”
“The Agreement set out the terms and conditions under which Central could intervene and regulate the affairs of the cartels, and established the Auditors to enforce the Agreement,” Margot responded, sounding no more or less disinterested than she always did.
“Yes,” Mr. Windsor affirmed, nodding in agreement. “This was perhaps the most contentious part of the Agreement, as previously, cartel politics had held precedence over everything else in Central. Before the Agreement…”
Alex tuned out. He couldn’t help it. He just couldn’t see the relevance — other than agreeing to join the Academy, and allowing his Activation, Alex hadn’t been offered too much in the way of options, and he didn’t expect that to change much. After all, no one had bothered to ask him if he wanted nanomachinery injected into his blood in the first place.
Alex was busy stewing over it, when he was jarred from his ruminations by Emily, who pushed her notebook up and sideways on her desk until it was in the field of his vision. He ignored it for a moment, until he realized that the note on the top corner of the page was intended for him.
“If Windsor had told the class in advance,” Emily’s immaculate cursive read, “everyone would have ditched today. Most of us have the Agreement memorized by now.”
Alex pushed his own notebook into place, and then thought about it for a moment, chewing on his pen cap without realizing he had started. He stopped in mute embarrassment when he realized what he was doing.
“Can we still ditch?” Alex wrote hopefully, his own writing a pitiful scrawl next to Emily’s very feminine penmanship.
Emily’s eyes widened, and then she frowned at Alex, who decided to hurriedly return to the notes on Mr. Windsor’s projector. He was blushing furiously, he knew, and he sort of wished he hadn’t asked, even while part of him was still hoping she would agree.
“…that’s right, Choi.” Mr. Windsor continued on cheerfully, unaware or unconcerned with the class’s complete disinterest. “The final intent of the Agreement is to define Central’s relationship with the outside world, establishing the parameters of a unified foreign policy. Please pay special attention to the various amendments here that concern the Society, the Anathema, the Fey, and other associated…”
Emily shrugged, and then smiled weakly at him. Alex felt uncomfortable, as if he had suggested something inappropriate, and he regretted it, a little. He was sure that she would refuse, and why wouldn’t she? Emily actually wanted to go to the Academy, after all. Who was he to interfere, because he was bored? But, he had to admit that he was so very, very tired of homeroom.
“Wait a couple minutes, and then meet me outside by the drinking fountain.”
He hadn’t even noticed her write the note, but it was unmistakably hers, purple pen and a little circle instead of a dot over the lower-case ‘I’. He tried to catch her eyes, but she had already stood up and quietly excused herself, as if she was headed to the bathroom. Alex sincerely hoped that no one but him noticed her blushing as she did so, but the combination of an amused look from Anastasia and an elbow digging into his side from an indignant Vivik disabused him of any such notion.
“Dude, what the hell?” Vivik hissed at him. “What are you doing?”
Alex gave him a lame smile and then went back to staring blankly at Mr. Windsor, doing his best to ignore Vivik’s fuming and Anastasia’s smirk. It was a long four minutes, but that was as much as he could give it. He excused himself as quietly as possible, stepping over Vivik’s legs, ignoring the way the Indian kid looked at him. Vivik’s crush on Emily, Alex told himself firmly, was not his problem.
Emily, he reminded himself on his way out of the classroom, was his problem.
She was waiting for him by the drinking fountain, her smile fragile and uncertain. She looked nervous, and kept sneaking furtive glances back toward the classroom, as if she was worried that Mr. Windsor would come out after them.
“I’m sorry,” he said, walking up to her with his hands buried in his pockets. “I don’t know why I made you do that. All our stuff is still in the classroom, too, so Windsor is bound to notice.”
Emily shook her head, and Alex was fascinated by the motion of her blond ringlets as they bobbed along with the gesture.
“He won’t say anything,” she said, reassuringly, putting her hand on his arm, “and Vivik will collect our stuff at the end of class.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” Alex said glumly. “I think he’s probably mad. He likes you a lot, you know?”
Emily sighed and frowned.
“I know, silly. Of course I know.”
She said it gently, but Alex felt like an idiot. Somehow, he couldn’t remember that Emily was empath, she seemed so normal. Of all the people he had met in the Academy, he thought, she was the most like a real person — not that he was entirely sure what he meant by a ‘real person’ in the first place.
“He’s been like that since he showed up, last session. Maybe I shouldn’t have been as friendly with him, but, well,” she fluttered her hands helplessly, “everyone was being so mean to him, what else could I do?”
Emily sighed again, looking unhappy, and Alex racked his brain futilely for a change of subject.
“Anyway, what’s done is done,” Emily said, tightening her grip on his arm and guiding him gently away from the classroom. “We should make the best of it. Let’s go somewhere, okay?”
Alex let himself be led along by her, obliging when she linked their arms. He was very aware that the side of her chest was pressed against his arm as they walked, and he found it difficult to think about anything else. That was probably why he missed it, the first time she asked.
“What?” Alex said, shaking his head and trying to focus on the girl next to him. Or, rather, on her face, and the words she was saying.
“I asked if there was anything you wanted to do,” Emily said, obviously repeating herself.
“Uh, not really,” Alex admitted, “I hadn’t actually thought about it. I’m sorry; this is lame, isn’t it? I just wanted out of there.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Emily said, clutching his arm and snuggling closer. “I don’t mind. I was going to say, that if you don’t have anything in particular that you wanted to do,” she added shyly, “we could go back to my place and hang out. I know it was weird last time, but Therese will be working all day, and she won’t get back till late. I could make us lunch or something…”
Alex might have been slow, he was prepared to admit that, but he wasn’t stupid; at least, he didn’t think that he was stupid. He’d already opened his mouth to agree when he noticed a tall figure in black walking the opposite way on the sidewalk, close enough to them that he could see the toothy grin, and his heart sank, and he didn’t bother to say anything at all. Emily waited for a moment, then nudged him when no response was forthcoming, then finally looked over at him in annoyance, in time to see Alice standing in the path in front of them, arms crossed across the scrawled ‘Emperor’ logo emblazed across her t-shirt, her eyes hidden behind sunglasses, a broad smile affixed to her face.
“Well, well,” Alice chuckled. “And here I thought I would have to go all the way to Mr. Windsor’s class to find you, Alex Warner. You must have gotten out of class early, huh? And Emily Muir, you must have been helping him find the Administrative building, right?”
“Oh dear,” Emily said, one hand coming up to cover her mouth. “I wasn’t expecting to see you here, Miss Gallow.”
“Yeah,” Alice agreed tolerantly. “I get that a lot. Thanks for bringing him this far, Emily. If you hurry back, you should have plenty of time to make it back to class before lecture is over.”
“Right,” Emily said, nodding helplessly, then slowly backing away, giving Alex a sad look before she turned away. “Maybe I could bring your books by, later, okay, Alex?”
“Sure,” Alex said, licking his lips nervously, somehow afraid to take his eyes off of Alice Gallow even to say goodbye.
Alice stood there, until Emily was out of sight. Then she slapped Alex’s shoulder and laughed uproariously.
“I’m sorry,” she managed, a minute later, still out of breath. “I couldn’t help myself.”
“That sucked, Miss Gallow,” Alex said, trying like hell not to sound like he was whining. She looked cheerful enough this morning, but Alex couldn’t totally put all the stories he’d heard about Alice Gallow out of his head when he spoke to her, and it made him cautious. “I hope you actually have something you needed to talk to me about.”
Alice laughed again quietly, then walked over to a nearby low wall, and sat down on the sun-warmed stone, patting a space nearby to indicate Alex should also sit. After a moment of ineffectual and half-hearted glaring, he joined her.
“Pretty self-righteous for someone ditching class to get all cozy with Emily,” Alice observed. “But, yes, not to worry, I am not here to waste your valuable time. Have you thought about what we talked about the other day?”
Alex was about to say ‘no’ when he realized that wasn’t strictly true. He had actually given it a great deal of thought, he just hadn’t come to any firm decisions. He didn’t understand Black Protocols, or anything of the kind, so it had been a bit difficult to formulate an opinion. But, he figured that when it came to Alice Gallow, honesty was definitely the best policy.
“Yeah, I did,” he admitted slowly, considering. “But, I’m not really sure that I have an answer for you.”
Alice looked at him with something that was either amusement or contempt. Either way, it made Alex feel profoundly uncomfortable.
“Emily’s a pretty girl, isn’t she?”
Alice asked the question quietly, from behind her inappropriate smile, kicking the heels of her boots against the stone wall as if they were chatting about the weather.
“What?”
The confusion is his voice had already started to change into worry.
“The girl you were just snuggling with. The blond,” Alice reminded him helpfully. “Pretty, right?”
Alex nodded. It seemed like the safest bet, since he didn’t know what he would have said.
“Pretty helpless, too,” Alice continued on blithely. “I truly hate that, you know. So, what would you do if I decided that I hated her so much that I was going to do something about it, Alex?”
“Is this hypothetical,” Alex asked carefully, “or do you actually hate Emily?”
“Does it matter?” Alice’s voice was like ice-water, sending shivers up his back. “What if I wanted to hurt Emily? Would you try and stop me?”
Alex shook his head and inched away from Alice on the wall. He wasn’t sure what was going on, but he was sure he didn’t like it.
“Could I?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Alice said firmly. “Either you would try or you wouldn’t. Nobody’s asking you to succeed.”
“Sure,” Alex said, shrugging and doing his best to look unconcerned. “I mean, if I could, and if you were actually going to do that, then sure, I’d want to stop you.”
Alice patted him on the leg approvingly and stood back up. Just like that, the threatening atmosphere dissipated.
“Good enough for me. We were going to put you through the Program no matter what, truthfully, but I’m glad to hear you’re willing. You should probably go back to class, now. Still plenty of time.”
“That isn’t what I meant when I said…”
Alice put a finger up to her lips.
“Shh. How else you gonna stop me, Alex? A strongly worded letter? Make a call to your member of Congress?”
“Wait,” Alex said, scratching his head, “you said something about putting me in a program, right? What are you talking about?”
“Not a program. The Program. You’ll find out tomorrow in your Applied Combat Fundamentals class,” Alice said, walking off, waving without looking back. “Say hi to Mitzi for me.”
Alex watched her walk away, dumbfounded. It was a minute or so before it all clicked into place for him. He was, of course, doomed. But, Alex found that he was still confused on at least one significant point.
“Wait, Miss Gallow,” he called out after her. “Who is Mitzi?”