The wounds had healed by morning. Clean, complete, like the previous night had been a different person's problem. The system had done its work quietly while I slept.
The sheets were a different matter. I changed them, folded the evidence, and got ready.
Mute was still on my mind. Not from fear. Fear wasn't the right word. A level three teleporter with a grudge had used me as a wall decoration for a full minute, and the only thing that had saved my nose was Sherry reaching for a door handle she hadn't opened. That was not a situation I intended to repeat.
One thousand charge for defense skills, I thought, pulling on my shirt. Let's get to work.
***
Sherry was waiting in the corridor. We walked to class together, falling into the routine that had assembled itself without either of us deciding on it. Two days at Hogsby and already a routine. Inside the walls moved fast.
All students in their seats. Except one. Mute's chair was empty.
He's probably somewhere on campus crying his heart out, I thought. Poor guy. Genuinely.
Mable and Annabelle were in their usual spots at the front. Both acted perfectly normal as we passed. Mable didn't look at me. Annabelle looked at me exactly as much as she always had.
I sat at the back. Sherry beside me. Instead of Professor Bagins, Daphne walked through the door.
Transparent glasses. Purple long-sleeved shirt rolled to the elbows. Navy blue skirt stopping at the knee. Black heels. She carried herself like someone who knew she was walking into a room that hadn't asked for her and had decided to walk in anyway.
"Good morning," she said. Informal. Almost a question.
The class returned approximately nothing. A few murmurs. Most students stared at their desks with the focused disinterest of people who had already decided this period didn't count before it started.
She was not popular here. I didn't know why yet. I added it to the list.
"Professor Bagins is off campus today," she pressed forward, finding her footing. "The Dean asked me to step in. As you know, supervisors are coming after lunch."
"Your teacher," Sherry whispered beside me, clearly delighted. "The probability girl and now your teacher. You're really having a week, Bram."
"Stop," I said.
"Doctor Reed has developed a method," Daphne continued. "The Dean wants us to try it before the supervisors arrive." She paused. "Who believes leveling up is possible?"
Silence. Not one hand. Not even a polite charitable one from someone who felt sorry for her.
She absorbed it without flinching. "We're going to work in pairs. Each pair gets a private space. The goal is to find ways to help each other level up."
I sat up straighter. Private space, I thought. Two people. No audience.
"What did she say?" I asked Sherry. I'd caught enough but I wanted every word confirmed.
"Missed it again?" Sherry said. "Pairs. Private rooms. Help each other level up."
I looked at the class. Eleven girls. May was near the middle, twirling her hair, not looking at anyone in particular. She'd been smiling at me since day one. She was the obvious choice, the clearest path to another full charge, the most cooperative variable in a room full of variables. If I moved fast, she'd be mine before lunch.
"Are you going to be my partner?" Sherry asked.
I looked at her. Sherry was the only real friend I had at Hogsby. I wanted to spend time with her. That was true. It was also true that she could not help me level up and I needed to level up badly enough that Mute's attack last night felt like a memo I had failed to read in time.
"You should make new friends," I said. "Expand your circle."
Her smile flickered. Just for a second, barely visible, and then it came back. But something behind it had shifted and I saw it and I knew she had felt it.
Too blunt, I thought. That landed wrong.
Daphne was waiting at the front with the expression of someone regretting every administrative choice that had put her in this room. Sherry raised her hand. First hand up, throwing Daphne a lifeline.
Don't choose me, I thought. Please.
"May," Sherry said.
She said it with a smile that was not warm. It was precise. The smile of someone who had assessed the situation, identified the most useful move available, and made it without hesitation.
May. I stared at the back of Sherry's head. May was the easiest, most guaranteed option in this room. The one I'd been planning to pursue. And Sherry had just taken her off the board.
I rejected her, I realized. Not cruelly. But she heard it. And this is her answer.
The rest of the class paired off. Isabelle and Annabelle immediately. Mable's hand moved toward me then corrected itself and landed on the quiet girl in the front row. Wells took the larger girl.
Pairs assembled around the room and when it was done I was sitting at the back alone, the one item nobody had picked up off the shelf. Thirteen students. Odd number without Mute.
"Someone doesn't have a partner," Sherry said, turning around with a smile that was definitely satisfaction now.
You're not helping me. You're blocking me.
"Abram." Daphne's voice from the front. She was looking directly at me. "I'll be your partner."
[LEWD LEVELING SYSTEM]
[Subject: Daphne, Ability unknown. Status: Burn out.]
I looked at her. Burn out, I thought. She's a burn out. That's why she doesn't have a citizen tag. That's why the students don't respect her.
Daphne looked back at me with the professional expression of a teacher making a practical decision. She had no idea what I had just learned about her from a system she couldn't see.
Not May, I thought. Not who I wanted. But maybe still useful. I stood up. The class filed out toward the laboratories.
[Note: Cameras present in all lab rooms.]