Chương 2: Chapter 2

The grounds of my third-level academy weren't far from the Plaza. Within a few more minutes I had reached the gates, bright and metallic with a huge wrought-iron number 3 in the center. At this time of the day, the gates always stood wide open, waiting to accept students. Others already walked ahead of me, on their way already to the academy's main doors. I followed them, holding tight to my backpack. The weight of the textbooks inside felt like it would soon tear the straps off again.

Another academy student appeared beside me; the shadow neared my feet first, and the dark blue uniform and gray backpack followed. I looked up and met the deep brown eyes of Cas Rayner. My intended.

"Hey, Miranda," he said, nudging my arm with his elbow. "How are you?"

I felt my face warming. "I'm fine. You?"

"Great. Are you ready for the exams?"

"I hope so."

We had reached the door. Cas stopped and rested a hand gently on my shoulder. "Miranda, you're ready. You've been acing programming and operations stuff since we were in Second Level."

I smiled and swatted at his hand. "You would know that."

"Of course." He grinned.

We entered the front doors of the academy and walked into the entryway. There were two full floors of classrooms and a huge, open-air entryway with sets of stairs bridging the two levels together. The academy was built of metal and glass and shone wherever light touched it. The buildings, from Entry Level to Fourth Level, were some of the most impressive structures on Incipio, and they remained well-maintained even though the government had established them many decades ago.

Our classroom was on the second floor, up the left set of stairs and down a long hallway made mostly of huge panes of glass overlooking the academic district and the edge of Incipio. Though no cloud cover had hit the continent today, some of it still lingered below, obscuring any possible view of Terminus. It was rare for anyone at all to be able to see Terminus. Not that it was impossible - I'd seen it from the Edge Districts a few times when I was younger.

We cleared the hallway enclosed in windows and stopped at our classroom. Cas held the door open for me and followed me inside.

The left wall of the classroom was made of windows, too, but the other three walls were solid. A digital screen covered the front wall, though today it was powered off. Desks stood in rows throughout the room. Cas and I took our usual seats next to our classmates. I sat on the far side of the room, in the leftmost row of desks and next to the window, and Cas sat two rows over in the front.

The girl ahead of me turned around, her mostly-blonde hair whipping over her shoulder. "If I fail, make sure to hold off the Officers while I jump to Terminus."

I smirked. "Shiri, you'll only fail if you draw all over your score sheet."

"Shh!" she hissed, jerking her head in the direction of our instructor. Still, she smiled.

"Miranda," a voice whispered from my right. I turned and met a pair of teal eyes framed by eyeliner and surrounded by a head of reddish-brown hair - Kalle Curran, one of my earliest classmates and friends. When I smiled, she held her hand out under her desk with her fingers curled into a half circle, her thumb sticking out at the bottom and pointing towards the floor. The gesture formed the shape of a half heart. A gesture we'd learned in First Level as a sign for caring about each other and obeying the System's rules, but one we'd adapted over the years as a sign that everything would be okay. I made the shape of the half heart back with my hand; without the aisle, it would have been complete.

Instructor Trado stood up and moved to the front of the room. "Good morning, everyone," she said. "We'll start the test now. Please, no talking."

Kalle nodded at me, and I nodded back. This was the test we'd trained for since we'd started Third Level. It would mark our last hours at this academy.

Instructor Trado walked past my desk and dropped the exam papers in front of me. I turned my eyes away from Kalle and toward the first question.

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