Delay after delay had built up to this moment. A place to call home, even for the short stay at the academy was the second step towards a stable foundation for continued growth. With this one addition, many of their basic needs that took up much of the duo’s hours would be reclaimed for more improvement. The need for a comfy place to sleep in private also floated around their thoughts of improvement.
“Fen” I said with a shaky breath. “Yes, Ben?” Fen replied. “I” Ben paused, “I don't know how the door works,” I said with as straight a face as I could. The tablet I had slung under my shoulder pulled me across the last few feet of the hall remaining to our new home. Fen had grabbed the tablet from me with no regards to its owner leaving me dangling from the shoulder strap. A shifting noise caused my eyes to dart up. The door had disappeared into the adjacent wall revealing our new castle.
I scrambled into the room before the door quickly slid back into place and sealed. My eyes did not rest on the entrance for long as behind me I could hear cushions being stress tested. Turning to match what I heard, with my brain's interpretation of the noise, revealed Fen bouncing on the meeting areas cushions. The meeting area itself was simple, having only a single round seat with a metal table along the inside. Fen had found a button to lower the table to the floor, and was currently throwing a pile of backrests together in the middle. The nest took shape faster when I opted to move a few extra pillows I had seen by the door. It was our suite now, and we would take every privilege we could.
“This is going to be so much better than the floor in the gym!” I shouted. Fen looked back at me as the thought hit us both at the same time. I could see her face also move through excitement, confusion, realization, and elation before we both spun our heads around. Simple white doors lined the wall around two sides of the room. Above the first row of doors was a walkway holding a copy of the door pattern. Words were not used as we both made for the top floor. Fen, using her species to her advantage, simply stepped up to the first door at the top of the stairs, closest to the front entrance. Fortunately, I had my eyes set on the soor around the inside corner, at the end of the walkway. Together our rooms bookended the upstairs rooms.
Inside the much more private rooms was a glorious fold out bed, accompanied by heavenly grey blankets. I jumped for the bed and sat on the edge, bouncing while I looked at the rest of the room. Beside the door, facing the wall was a small dark metal desk. A desk I had completely missed upon entering. It seemed to be fused with the floor upon my admittedly short lived attempts to move it elsewhere. I was distracted in my interior design fantasies when I caught a glimpse of something shiny impeded in the back wall. Upon further inspection I decided that a locker was given to the resident of the room. The floor to ceiling locker was clearly made of a more specialized metal and seemed to be completely seamless. I moved my hands across the front surface only to catch a splinter in my palm. The locker made a mechanical whirring, then swung open to reveal a spacious storage. A small walk-in closet of space was available inside. I complimented the chef and spun to continue my enthusiastic exploration.
A ping from my tablet stopped me from my attempt at disassembling the dresser. “Ben, I am told you have a suite at the academy now. Please call me through the suite’s communication panel when you finish breaking in your room” read the message from Jun. “Fen!” I yelled. “For stars sake Ben. Don’t yell so loudly” came Fen’s voice through the walls of my room. “Now that is cool” I said, testing out the new room to room comms. “Yes, what is it? Why did you yell at me” Fen asked, seeming a little annoyed. “Jun wants to talk” I said concisely. “Ummm, give me a second” Fen replied with thumping sounds in the background. I reluctantly made my way back to the door looking for a lock. I flinched as I realized the locking mechanism for this door was likely similar to the oversized room locker. With a careful brush of my hand over where a door handle would be, I felt a prick at my palm again. The door whirred and swung shut, refusing with the wall. Only my name along a black outline of where the door used to be remained.
After some fiddling with various parts of the seating area, I found a, way to tiny screen. It flickered to life with a greeting and a bright flash of light. “Welcome, mage cadet Walker, and trainee Ashford” a gentle robotic male voice echoed through the suite. “I am your digital assistant during your stay in this suite. I can facilitate communication, information gathering, and schedule keeping. Please feel free to call on me at any time” the wall voice continued. “A fucking D.A in the suite! That's basically cheating” Fen said, covering the entrance to her room while the door sealed behind her. “How is having a D.A cheating?” I asked, suspicion overflowing as I watched Fen guard her room. “It will allow us to offload all our remember mes” She explained. “Ahhh, so appointments, and classes” I replied, watching Fen play off her odd behavior.
I settled back into the pillow nest we made in our early efforts for comfort, with the small screen in one hand. I searched for Jun’s room using her full name in the directory. A few experimental pokes later, and Jun’s hologram was sitting on the edge of our ransacked seating area. Fen had plopped down on the other side of the nest, and was fidgeting. “Hey, We just got here this morning, but of a tough go of it before that” I said. “I heard Doctor Offsman’s report on your species, problem” Jun said tentatively.
“Jun, two of us have already made the decision. I made my choice because I want to use the ability that you gifted me. I will forever be grateful for the second lease on life you gave me” I said, leaning back to show the lax nature of the situation to me. “I can’t speak for Mike, but I think he is enjoying his second chance too” I said with a sly grin.
Jun seemed to relax a little bit after hearing about Mike’s situation. “I heard they are keeping you busy, Jun” I said. “They, I am quite busy. I was just on a call with the doctors investigating the failed summoning attempt by the head summoner here.” She said, pausing for a few heartbeats. “I hear that while the summoner will live, she is permanently crippled. Their mana filter practically exploded leaving her exposed. Her body reacted how all newborns do, and created a mundane mana filter to protect her again” Jun said as tears rolled down her face. “I tried to warn her about the cost increase in her circle, but she was confident in her ability. She did summon someone, for a moment anyway” She stopped again.
“Jun, It does not sound like it is your fault, and if nothing else you have shown other summoners what not to do. The head summoner’s sacrifice was not in vain, if you continue your efforts” I said with a gentle tone.
“Don’t worry. Ben, I need to ask you and the others an important question” Jun practically asked with a brave face. “First I should explain the odd similarity associated with your arrival. My summoning circle can only summon the dead” She said, pausing to comport herself. “The circle is meant to take advantage of how much less of a cost is associated with dislocating inanimate objects and live ones. Mana seems to place a high cost on any effect pertaining to living creatures. I leverage this— discount in cost along with gifting a bare minimum strength filter, and the smallest possible mana bank. The circle capitalizes on all of these with one low cost caveat. The now dead creature must have died with consent to be summoned.” Jun’s explanation ended for a moment. I laid back on the uneven pillows to commune with the empty ceiling. “You want to know if your way of summoning humans is ethical, and or want a humans’ opinion on the matter?” I asked, catching Fen’s horrified face. Fen was staring at Jun’s hologram as if she was seeing a voidborn sitting in the room with us.
“The most recent summon from Earth is in a bad mental state. She— she will eventually come around, but I worry her trauma from being summoned will last forever” Jun admitted. “I don't know if I should keep putting humans through the extreme summoning”
I sat still, keeping my eyes on her. Listening is what she really wanted, while she worked through her thoughts. I got comfortable in the silence while Jun warred in her mind. A crashing sound came from the side of the suite. I flinched, slowly turning to see Fen, frozen above a pile of metal pots on the ground at her feet. I shot a surprised look past Fen to the full kitchen that had appeared out of nowhere.
The kitchen had probably always been there, but I had just now seen it. My interest of the alien looking machines attached to the counter top and wall moved me from the pillow nest.
I scooted right past the scrambling Latrod to the toaster looking device on the counter. No way was there a space bagel. The hunt for space bagels filled my mind before a white box the same size as the room vault stopped me in my tracks. Fen had beat me to it and already had a hand swinging the door open. Sure enough, cold air flowed out onto the room. I basked in the fresh feeling after the mad scramble to explore our new home. Fen shivered and slammed the door closed.
A snickering noise from the sitting area derailed Fen and I’s experimentation with a sliding tray that seemed to disappear items, back to their home in the cupboards. Jun let loose a cackle after Fen tried to shove me into the tray. Fen’s attempt at humor lightened the air in the room greatly, and Jun seemed to relax slightly. “Jun, It's up to you. I’ll let you know, don’t stress it. I think most humans want a second chance at life. Plus, who would want to give up space magic” I said, muffled by the halfway successful attempt to disappear me into the cabinets. Fen and I had almost gotten the door closed on the tray when I gave up and crawled back out. Jun was decidedly more sturdy in her appearance compared to when we called her at the start. “I will talk it over with the others. Thanks Ben, and good luck with the dish washer” Jun said, before she hung up the call from her end laughing to herself.
“A dishwasher, Score!” Fen said. I agreed with a solid head nod. I was too absorbed in the space microwave to pay attention to Fen who had just found the utensils.
Half the day passed before the suite was thoroughly turned over by both Fen and myself. I had found the apparent equipment room through the first door left of the entrance. An oversized washroom was separated by a door to the equipment room, but also had a door that opened into the main suite area. The sterile appearance of the washroom was unkempt by a small cleaner robot that had almost killed Fen from shock when it appeared through a door in the wall.
A closer examination of each room revealed a small private bathroom with both a shower, and waste disposal system. I washed up before heading back to the walkway. Leaning on the rails, I let my mind go blank. I had a bed, a way to grow through the academy , and a partner in crime. I balanced the good and the bad after arriving on station, and good was catching up quickly. My tablet pinged from where I had abandoned the sci fi tech on my new bed. I retrieved it to find a new list of reading material, a report on station lifestyles, and most importantly the start date of my new class.
I still had not figured out why I was able to consume so much knowledge after arriving on station. These manuals would have put me to sleep before I was summoned, so why was I so interested in standard wrench sizes for United Front stations. Well whatever, I guess I will at least get through the mandatory reading materials before class starts, maybe.
With a comfortable place to stay, money in my pocket, and the time training at the gym, two weeks flew by. Henrietta and Mable had stopped Fen and I in the dorm hallway a few times to chat about who our counterparts would be when training started.
I had even run into the Vaccini, the dark blue lady seated behind us in class. She had been mixed into another classroom after instructor Phi had lost his mind. Supposedly he had run the class ragged with random study material and excessive physical training. So many people dropped out after the first two weeks that the few remaining students were divvied up into other classes. She described the instructor as annoyed more than cruel. I let the thought drift to the back of my mind while I focused on training. If she was right, I would need to be at least somewhat prepared. I did not want to fail again.
I grasped desperately at my tablet with my sweaty hands on the ride across the dorm connection. My body shaking was so loud it threatened to break the early morning silence. I could hear Fen rubbing one of her back legs from behind me. Being trapped in the small box on the trip to the main cluster was decidedly worse than the open air walk the rest of the way to the academy entrance.
The circle courtyard was the same as last time except the mob of cadets was far smaller. We agreed to arrive an hour early, to avoid getting caught in the rush we experienced last time. The early arrival turned out to be completely unnecessary as only about half a full class showed up to the entrance hall. Fen tapped at her communicator after we decided on a couple seats near the front. An eternity passed as the seconds ticked by at a glacial pace. A couple other cadets also arrived early with their squads but the majority arrived just before the start time on the notice. Mike had shown up at a comfortable thirty seconds before start with Anna trailing behind him. Both were sweating heavily through their uniforms, probably from some early morning training at the gym that ran over time. Those two always got carried away lifting the freeweights.
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“Your assigned classroom will be sent to your comms devices” came a quiet male voice that somehow still carried across a room of talking people. A second later all the tablets in the room chimed. The silence of the main lecture hall was deafening before cadets began slowly standing, and moving to the assigned room. Fen turned to me only to share a confused look. Neither of us lingered on the strange behavior for long before we also made our way to the assigned classroom.
“I don't understand why he didn’t just give us a room number out loud. I mean, we were all right there” Fen said in a hushed voice. “I think he just doesn’t like to talk” I said. “Just a guess though. I can’t figure out what is going on with him” I said, passing a cracked classroom door listening in on the lecture for a moment. The next couple doors were open and cadets were writing something at their desks in silence. Following the numbers on the doors, our classroom should be the next one.
“And without the need to create the effect on repeat we create an uptime advantage. How would this advantage help when the strength of the effect is reduced so far as to be able to continuously be utilized. Constant uptime effects are those used for detection. Effects that are so far widespread, and optimized to the utmost, are the sole domain of specialized scout mages. Diviners are among those who have potential for this special use case as well; however the effect is barely usable for more than a slight reaction speed increase. The main fallback is paying attention to two realities at the same time. It would be the equivalent of staring in two directions at the same time and trying to aim in your blind spot. Not impossible, simply difficult to pull off with minimal gain” A elderly Mican woman spoke from the front of her class. Her shoulders rolled forward over her torso, leaving her folded over on a dark cane for support.
I glanced down at my tablet to check the notification. Turning up to the door I could see the numbers matched. “Maybe Instructor Phi gave us the wrong number, and we have to find his class ourselves” I whispered to Fen. “I very much doubt that your pain in my rear instructor gave you my classroom number for no reason, cadet” Said the old Mican from her wooden stage as the other students all looked out the door at us. “Sorry for interrupting your lecture instructor” I said apologetically. “Nonsense, I can see that you were assigned my class for now at least. Best to not ask questions, and find a chair. I will verify your attendance with your instructor at the end of the day. Please sit, so I may continue my lecture” She said before waiting for us to find a seat. Fen followed so closely behind me that she had to remain in step to not trip over my feet. A bench seat was left open on the far side of the classroom that matched the one from our first experience in instructor Phi’s classroom. It had just enough space to be comfortable for Fen to do her normal sprawl while I found a small lip to place my tablet upright to record the lecture.
“Now let us talk over some of the least successful attempts at—” The old lady carried on. Fen and I both struggled to stay awake after the instructor began taking questions that were exact repeats of the surprisingly well crafted lecture. Only a couple questions related to the negative effects of continuous magic use actually interested me. Learning that constant strain of the mana filter was unhealthy for the mana bank capacity surprised me. It seems when the filter is constantly processing mana that the bank never gets to cycle down. The bank of mana begins to fall behind in ability compared to the filter. While this training regime is the polar opposite to the one used by summoners, it has zero downtime if one can continue to practice while asleep or multitasking.
“I get why we were assigned this class instead of instructor Phi’s lesson today” I said, the mental strain of the day leaking into my tone. “I don’t understand how the cycles work, but I don’t care that much either. I get to attend my own classes as soon as you get your second squad member” Fen said. “You will still have to trade off with the other squad members on guard duty. Which means you will have to still attend some of my classes. Just be thankful you don’t need to test” I said, holding my head in my hand. “Do you think the instructor would let me work on bodyweight exercises in the back of the classroom?” Fen asked me. “”Not a terrible thought Ashford” Came Instructor Phi’s voice from beside Fen. He had appeared from nowhere and was now casually walking next to Fen. “Instructor” We both blurted out at the same time. “Relax. I am just here to see if you picked up any useful information today. I was pestered by that hag to take you back to my class” Phi said with his usual whisper quiet voice. “I enjoyed the explanation of aura effects. The general use cases seem flexible” I said in reply. “I find the application more interesting— in the long term. I will warn you now Cadet Walker, The aura effects are good on paper but are near useless in active combat, where seconds matter” Phi said. I went to look at him to reply but he was gone from the hallway. Fen jumped a little when she realized his disappearance as well. The uncanny way instructor Phi got around was unsettling in a strange way. I always felt the air go cold when he appeared, as if I had no say in the matter of his appearance.
“The way instructor Phi just appears will haunt my dreams” Fen said quietly, after confirming that he had actually left. “I second that. Fen, let's just make it back to the dorms. I have some stuff I want to try in quiet” I said, scratching an itch on my back that had been out of reach while sitting on the bench seats in class. Fen leaned down and scraped my back a few times in just the right place. Her strength pushed me forward with each motion but the itch was crushed in short order. “Why not try it at the gym, It seemed like the main weak point of all the aura mages before was the lack of ability to concentrate in actual battle. If you can't focus at the gym you will never be able to cast out auras against the voidborn” Fen said. “Ooohhh perfect, thanks Fen. I think you just want to destroy that obstacle that tripped you yesterday” I replied. “That log maze was way too tall. I doubt anyone else could have made that jump even half as well as me” Fen said, aggravatedly shuffling her feet on the floor.
I could just imagine the ambush I had experienced while being carried by caps. A detection effect could have revealed the hiding positions of those asshole bugs before Caps needed saving. I could feel anger getting the better of me as we pivoted to the closest trainee gym. I strained under the dumbbells weight letting out my hate of the voidborn while barely paying attention to my aura. I had generated a miniscule aura about one inch in diameter centered inside of me while I lifted. Class from earlier had given a simple circle for a regenerative effect to practice. I had memorized the main regeneration factors for muscles and removed all the bone, cartilage, blood, and other body parts to make the spell simple enough for the lackluster capability of my mana filter. I had nearly given up when I tried to cast the simple regeneration effect when we arrived at the gym, as the circle was given to beginner mages to improve their weak mana filters. I was apparently so weak that I had to simplify the effect to only cover muscle regeneration, and even then only a small sphere was possible. Figuring that any practice was better than none, I moved on with the day's weight training while focusing on maintaining the simplified regeneration aura.
“Fen, what was training for you like when you started in the military?” I asked straining under the last rep for my set. “Well, I had some strength, and endurance already, from long, uurgh, days, in the shop” Fen said as she finished a set of sandbag squats. The sandbag squat was designed for Latrod’s to specifically strength train their extra legs. “I had a head start there, but the tactical courses killed me, specifically the guard courses. Almost all the targets I had to protect in training were bigger than me, making body blocking near impossible. I made up for the disadvantage with extra vigilance and flexibility” She said, forming a wall with her legs to show off her idea. “This works to confuse and intercept shots. Unfortunately it does not stop them. If the target is hit at all then I lose points for the exercise. The damned test was so annoying I carried the damned V.I.P target through the course out of frustration. Since it wasn’t technically against the rules, and was still weighted the instructor let me pass. The grade given was a fail one since one round still contacted the target, but the V.I.P would have easily survived. I also broke a time record in the process, but that was not part of the assessment parameters at the time so no bonus points there” Fen carried on about her training through the evening, and into dinner.
“So the rounds they use are real because the mage cadets going through basic healing instructions are there to patch you up?” That is intense. Guess the practice like you play saying really is true here” I said in shock. “Haha, yeah. Those bloodthirsty instructors loved shooting up the new guys” Fen said, fondly staring up at the ceiling.
We made it back to the dorms in short order to find a line of students waiting to get across. “Hey, Ben, Over here!” Henrietta yelled over at us. We cut across the lines to where the two well muscled women were playing a board game rather than wait in line. Looking over my shoulder I could see how slowly the line was moving and quickly decided that waiting in line was going to be far too boring. “What's up Henrietta?” I asked, sitting down next to Mable. Mable was staring at the board intently, trying to manifest a miracle. “Ain’t no sense in standing the whole time. Trust me. We waited yesterday” Mable said with a sigh. She placed a lightly colored square next to another on the board and Henrietta fell back onto the ground with a grunt. “She always gets the best of me with these games. Right when I think I might pull out a win, she weasels her way to victory. Like she had planned the whole game in advance” Henrietta said. “I just don’t like being backed into a corner” Mable explained. “You always take so long with your attacks that I have time to think over each move. When I finally catch a mistake in your long game, I take full advantage” Mable said, also falling back. Both women looked exceptionally bored. “Want to see a shutdown section of the station?” I asked, looking over to see the same lines of students growing larger. “Oh, you mean the laundromat you and Fen stayed at?” Henrietta asked, sitting up from the ground. “Yeah, plus the other areas we haven't explored yet” I replied, excitement at another adventure slipping into my voice. The duo on the ground both looked over at the line to the dorms. “Fuck it. Lets get lost for a while”
Henrietta grabbed the pieces off the board and Mable packed away the flat parts. They worked together expertly to bag the game before we set off. “Did you both end up in the wrong classroom today?” Mable asked, absentmindedly combing her fingers through her short hair. “We ended up in a class about aura effects. Mostly about how useless they were in most cases” Fen said, remembering how boring the lecture had been. “I think that the aura effects are frowned upon here. Most of the information was about how the magic had failed to become useful, leaving the mage behind in traditional training” I explained.
It seemed that the historical uses of mana heavily affected the current mage training. In a way, I could understand following historical presidents. I also had already mastered the ability to use my mana filter while asleep due to the unfortunate circumstances of my summoning. I figured the main failure points could be overcome by starting early, and constantly training. I would leave the decision to pursue aura magic until after I had heard the other options. From my understanding the effects mana could cause were near infinite, and followed very few rules.
“Oh oh, there it is!” Henrietta said, nearly jumping off the ground. “This place is creepy” Mable followed up. I could see the laundromat just down the abandoned street. It looked a little worse off than when I first found it. “I remember it in better shape before” I said my thoughts out loud to defend my old home. “I feel like it is off from what I remember before” Fen said with a bit of a wary look. I agreed, something was off with the front door. It seemed like something big had pushed through it, stretching the frame. “Quite the romantic getaway” Henrietta joked, poking her head into the doorway. Mable walked past the dramatic mage cadet to investigate the inside. We all trailed into the building one by one disappearing past the clouded windows into the dark interior. “Oh, I wondered where I left that shirt” Fen said, moving to a piece of fabric hanging over one of the closet doors.
A distant skittering sound caused my bones to freeze in place. I could make out something sharp scratching in the distance at the smooth street we had just been on. “Fen, Henriette, Mable” I said in a loud whisper. “Be very quiet, and move to the storage room in the back” I said pointing at the open doorway in the far corner. “What’s back—” Henrietta said before Mable’s hand cut off the loud dwarf mid sentence. Mable faced me and nodded before carrying the squirming dwarf off to the back. Fen was staring at me in confusion after watching the dwarf get carried away. I put my finger in front of my lips slowly and shifted my eyes to the front door. I could tell Fen had picked up the skittering sound when she looked back at me in terror. I motioned at the back room and the door that laid on the ground next to it. Something large had knocked it off its hinges sometime between now and our last visit. I watched her move quickly before pausing and looking back at me. Her eyes went wide as she froze in place. I followed her actions and halted my creep towards the door. I maintained a leg in the air mid step, and balanced on my remaining foot.
The scratching was moving directly behind me from what I could hear. The front door was bumped and it bent over the warped frame, partially obscuring the doorway. My heart wanted to run out of my chest in that moment of terror. My mind flashed back to the sound of caps would be assassin skittering behind us from its hiding spot. I shivered at the all too present memory.
The sound of scratching passed the door outside, making its way further down the empty street. I did not wait for the sound to go away before I moved to meet the others in the back room. We opted to leave the door on the ground to avoid any unnecessary noise, and to avoid an accident if we dropped the door. Henrietta was released by Mable and let down to the ground. “Wha—” She barely got one syllable out before Mable had grappled her mouth shut again. The stubborn dwarf was going to need an explanation. I typed a few words out on my tablet to explain what happened and flashed it in front of the dwarfs face. Her eyes narrowed as she read angrily before her limbs went limp, and eyes went wide. She nodded as best as she could against Mable’s white knuckle grip. Mable cautiously set the short cadet mage back on the ground and waited.
Fen and I had taken up positions in line along the wall beside the other two to hide behind the door frame. I didn't trust the clouded windows and crooked door to hide much.
Henrietta’s tablet pinged with a single notification of receiving a message and my heart dropped out of my chest. We all scrambled to our comms settings to silence any notification noises that might come from our own devices. I began typing a message furiously to Mike. I let him know the location we were at. He messaged back asking if we were joking. I replied with a quick response in all caps to get station security immediately.
After waiting in the dark I began to hear Fen rubbing her back leg that she had laid across her lap. I shifted one hand to her leg also, attempting to calm her anxiety. I didn't look back as I kept an eye on the door and the street outside.
The whole world outside flashed red, then flashed red once again. The third flash was matched with a short siren. The distant whaling of the alarm was from far down the street towards the connection to the station. A voice replaced the siren for a moment with completely inaudible words before the ground beneath us rocked, and gravity vanished. Screeches of the voidborn filled the air as the once lifeless station burst into activity, and skittering filled the streets outside.
