Sabir thought that today would go better. It wasn’t like he came unprepared. He knew exactly who his teammates were, but even in his wildest dreams, things didn’t break down that fast. He sighed, trying to hold back a tension headache. He’d rather dive into a Ruin and face an army of Mechs than figure out what to do with the four underclassmen following him.
He knew Brooke would get beaten in a spar, but he also said he wouldn’t give her any special treatment. If she was going to get better, she had to push herself. It didn’t shock him that Savannah took her apart that easily. In fact, taking her apart might be too generous. It implied that it took more than one step.
The match between Ibsen and Savannah threw him off guard. He saw in Ibsen’s profile that he was a medic by training, not a fighter. In theory, the matchup was perfect. Savannah was leagues more skilled, but she lacked the raw physical strength Ibsen had. It should have let him see how they both handled being at a disadvantage. Instead, Ibsen just didn’t fight back. He would ask the boy about that soon.
And Gibbs was something else altogether. Once Gibbs jumped in, Sabir knew he lost control of his team. Gibbs’ profile said that he had a lot of experience fighting, but so did Savannah. The smaller girl didn’t stand a chance. Honestly, with his entire status page blocked out, Sabir could only wonder if he could even fight Gibbs in a straight fight.
All of that was to say nothing about the clear tension that settled on the group. Savannah was silently fuming, refusing to meet anyone’s eyes until she got answers. Ibsen looked like a kicked puppy. The giant also refused to speak, although it looked like it was because he was still beating himself up over something. Gibbs just looked on guard, like he was surrounded by a pack of wolves. And Brooke…
Well, Brooke was Brooke. If she was bothered in the slightest, she didn’t let it show. Even as they walked into the student section of campus, Brooke was still trying to engage her teammates. Her suggestion that they should make sparring a regular thing wasn’t met with as much enthusiasm as she clearly hoped. She stopped talking once Sabir gave her the secret signal to keep quiet.
Sabir led them in silence from that point on. They passed the dorms and entered another building. This one looked like the dorms, although it was structured differently. Each room was bigger, and it was for good reason.
He brought them up to the third floor and opened an unmarked door. Once they were inside, he motioned for them to take a seat. The room was pretty barren, especially considering it could fit ten people easily. Still, there was a small wooden table and hard chairs scattered around. Each person pulled up a seat.
“Alright, everyone,” Sabir started, “I think we need to have a talk about what happened.” The blank looks he received told him that it was obvious. He was only slightly encouraged by his sister’s head nodding. “Brooke, would you mind starting?”
“Oh, sure,” she replied. “I guess everyone already saw me fight, but I’m not amazing at fighting. Not yet at least!”
“How did you get accepted?” Gibbs asked.
“My Core Ability. I call it my Dangercore. I can’t activate it on command, but when I’m in danger, I get a huge boost to my Potential and some new Proficiencies. I’m way faster and stronger, and I can fight really well.”
Gibbs nodded appreciatively. “That’ll do it.” He turned his head to Ibsen. “How about you, big guy? Why didn’t you fight back?”
“I would like an answer as well,” Savannah added. Ever since they finished sparring, the girl had gotten a lot quieter and soft-spoken. Her voice now seemed almost embarrassed.
“I… um…” Ibsen stumbled over his words. Immediately, his face went red. Sabir would have jumped in to help him, but he didn’t have a clue why the boy wouldn’t fight back. There was nothing about it in his file. “I don’t…” His voice trailed off.
“I didn’t catch that,” Gibbs said.
“I said, I don’t like fighting.”
The silence that followed was almost deafening. Ibsen looked down, clearly afraid to see what anyone thought. “You go to a Sentinel school,” Savannah said. “What do you mean?”
“I’ve never liked fighting,” Ibsen replied. “I’m a healer. My Core is called Damagecore. It lets me take on other peoples’ wounds and heal them. I’d rather do that than have to fight.”
Savannah nodded, although she still looked somewhat unsure. Sabir felt similarly. Sentinels and doctors rarely crossed professions since both required extensive training. There were a few Sentinels who were trained as field medics, but even those were rarer than they should be. But having an Core that could heal was incredibly rare. When Sabir first saw that he was leading a team with a healer like that, he was overjoyed.
Now he was starting to see that things wouldn’t be nearly that simple. If Ibsen refused to fight, then they were always going to be short a fighter. Even if he was patching them up and letting them fight longer, the odds would always be slightly against them. And until Brooke caught up, it would be like half their team was out of commission.
“Even so,” Savannah said carefully, “why wouldn’t you just learn to fight if you’re going to be a Sentinel?”
“I’d rather not talk about it,” Ibsen said, showing the first aggressive sentence Sabir had ever seen from him. “I’ll train with everyone, and I’ll spar, but I won’t be able to fight back.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Sabir jumped in before anyone else could say anything about it. It was definitely not a plan, but anything else today would just cause arguments. “Gibbs, is there anything you’d like to say?”
The boy cast a look in Sabir’s direction. In that moment, Sabir used his own Core Ability to read Gibbs, but immediately felt like he hit a wall. It temporarily confused him, but Gibbs just shrugged. “I have a lot of training,” he answered vaguely. “I’ve been in a lot of fights. I had to pick up some skills.”
“And why can’t we read your status page?” Savannah asked. “You set everything to hidden.”
“I like my privacy,” Gibbs said with a shrug. “If you guys need to see something from it, I can show you.”
Sabir nodded. He knew about Gibbs’ past, but he wasn’t going to say any more than Gibbs wanted to. Honestly, he didn’t blame him for being uncomfortable revealing such a heavy secret after everything that happened. For better or worse, his proficiencies were probably full of illegal and concerning skills. One day, he might have to tell the rest of the team, but he figured he should give Gibbs the opportunity to first.
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
“Well, with that out of the way, I guess I’ll explain a few other things.” Sabir stood up and extended his hands around the room. “The most important thing is this room,” he said. “This is our base of operations. When you’re not in your dorms or class, this is the perfect spot for you to come. Only our team is allowed in here, so it’ll be our new meeting spot for everything but sparring.”
“It’s a little… barren, isn’t it?” Gibbs asked.
Brooke nodded. “It’s definitely got a… what’s the opposite of a homey feel?”
“Anti-homey,” Gibbs said.
“Yeah, that.”
Sabir chuckled. “Well, it’s supposed to be customizable. Which brings me to my next point. Money. Or, more precisely, credits. As students, all of your meals and housing is taken care of, but we still earn credits for work we do. Specifically, killing Mechs and completing missions will earn us credits, which we can use to buy weapons, ammunition, and supplies for this room. With that, we can customize it however we want.”
Brooke gasped and jumped to her feet. “We should get table tennis!” When no one responded, she kept going, although a little quieter, “You know, for team bonding.”
“We’re not getting a game table,” Savannah shot back. “We have better things to buy.”
“All in favor of table tennis, raise your hand!”
For a moment, no hands went up. Ibsen shot a glance in Savannah’s direction, but the girl’s hands were planted as firmly down as they could go. Gibbs actually bobbed his head to the side for a few seconds, as if thinking before he did end up raising his hand. Savannah didn’t look happy about that.
“So, is that two against two?” Gibbs asked.
“Two against three,” Sabir corrected him. “Just because I’m team leader doesn’t mean I don’t get a vote, and I do agree that we should focus on more important things. Right now, we have 100 credits that the school gave us to start out. I’ll be managing it, so if there’s anything we need, we’ll discuss it as a group, and I can buy it for us.”
Everyone nodded in agreement. Sabir spent the next few minutes going over less interesting logistics, like their class schedules, dorm rooms, and meal plans. He mentioned where they would be sleeping, and that all their luggage had already been delivered. Once that was taken care of, he told them to get some rest and be ready for classes to start the next day.
Ibsen was out the door first. Although Sabir did his best to cover for him, he knew that not fighting in a Sentinel school was going to be tough. Gibbs was next, although he left at a much more leisurely pace. Brooke told Sabir that he did a great job before she left too. Then, all that was left was Savannah.
Sabir expected her to want to talk to him, although he thought it would happen a little later. “What can I do for you, Savannah?”
“You and Brooke seem pretty close,” she noted, as though trying to make small talk. “Did you know her before today?”
Sabir chuckled. “I’d hope so. She is my sister.”
By the way her eyes widened, Savannah hadn’t pieced that together yet. “Sorry,” she said quickly. “I’m just surprised. She admitted that she can’t fight, and you’re… I mean you’re supposed to be one of the best.”
“I’m not really that impressive,” Sabir shrugged. “My team was really skilled. If you want to see the best, you’ll have to meet them.”
“I hope I get to,” Savannah replied honestly, although it was obvious she didn’t believe Sabir’s attempt to deflect. “I actually have something else I’d like to talk to you about.”
“Go ahead.”
“I’m… frustrated,” Savannah said carefully. “I’m sorry I kind of had a meltdown while we were sparring. It’s been a long day, and everything didn’t seem like it was going well.”
“I understand, but you should probably apologize to Brooke and Ibsen more than me.” Savannah nodded solemnly. “I understand your frustrations too. You want to join Apex, right? I saw it in your file.”
“Yeah, but they won’t take me unless I’m top of my class. I can do it,” she added quickly, but Sabir knew it was more for her own sake than his. “I’m just worried that I won’t be able to with my team like this.”
“It’s a mixed bunch,” Sabir put it lightly. “Everyone here has great potential though. I think they might just surprise you.”
“What if they don’t?” In that moment, Sabir could feel the girl’s anxiety wash over him. “I… I messed up my chance to join Apex once already, and I only get one more chance to prove myself to them. I need every advantage I can get.”
Sabir put his finger on his chin. He mentally noted that he meant to shave before meeting his team and completely forgot. “How about we give them a chance first? I’ll even make a bet with you.”
“A bet?”
“Give them a month. We have some serious hurdles to cross first, but I think we’ll have a lot of them ironed out in a month. By then, I bet we’ll be ready to fight real Mechs during our first Ruin exploration. If we’re not, then we’ll talk about you transferring to another team.”
“They let first-year teams into Ruins that early?” Savannah asked.
Sabir wasn’t surprised. It was a little early for a new team to dive into an ancient structure, filled with deadly mechanoid warriors. Some people, like Savannah, came with prior Ruin diving experience, but those were rare. For most, it took a few months of training before they were ready to fight Mechs. Still, Sabir believed in this team. “If we’re ready, they’ll let us go. What do you say?”
Savannah nodded immediately. She smiled, and that put Sabir at ease. At first, he was worried that the girl was going to be hard to get along with, but she quickly was proving that she wasn’t a bad person as much as she was a jumble of frayed nerves. “Thank you,” she said, now that her fears were at least somewhat put to rest.
“Of course,” Sabir said, gathering his things off the table. “I hope the whole team knows that I’m here to help if you guys need anything. You should probably get to bed soon though. It’s getting late, and you still have to unpack.”
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In the male dorm a few buildings away, Ibsen was scanning the halls for his room. It took him longer to find because it was tucked awkwardly in one of the corners. Before he got to the door, Gibbs popped up in front of him, startling him. “How’s it going, Doc?” Gibbs asked.
“I’m not a doctor,” Ibsen replied. “That’s what they call my dad.”
“Well, it sounds like you’re the one who’s going to be patching us up, so you’re pretty much my doctor now. You’ve got a lot of work ahead of you too, because I haven’t seen one of those in a long time. It’s either Doc, or I start calling you medic, but it doesn’t roll off the tongue the same way.”
Ibsen chuckled. “I guess Doc is alright.”
Gibbs shot him a smile. “Hey,” he started, sounding somewhat nervous. Ibsen didn’t think the smaller boy was afraid of anything, given the confidence he showed all day. “I just wanted to say that I respect your decision to not fight.”
“You do?” Ibsen asked, genuinely surprised. Considering how powerful Gibbs was, that was the last thing he expected to hear.
“Yeah. I think it takes a really big man to not attack when you’re being attacked. Um…” He looked up at Ibsen’s much larger physique. “That wasn’t supposed to be a joke.” When Ibsen just laughed it off, Gibbs kept going. “I honestly wish I had your guts.”
Ibsen felt a pang in his stomach. “Thanks,” he said simply. He didn’t want to continue the conversation at all, so he put his key into the door and opened it. Gibbs followed after him, taking in the room.
“Looks like we’re going to be roommates too,” Gibbs said. “That’ll make things easier.”
“Yeah, well, they try to make teammates roommates,” Ibsen replied. “It’s something about building relationships.”
“Cool,” Gibbs said, hopping onto one of the beds. “Wait, does that mean…”
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Savannah felt fried. She walked down the halls utterly exhausted. Having three spars in a row, one of which she gotten beaten to the point where her Cell almost shattered, didn’t help, but that wasn’t all. The counselors had no idea how to get her into Apex. Her team was… not what she expected. Her only respite came from her talk with Sabir.
Savannah rested her head against the wooden door as she slid her key in. She was under no illusion that she was going to unpack tonight. Her only goal was to say a quick hello to her roommate and then pass out. She opened the door.
“Savannah!”
That noise immediately banished all thoughts of sleep as Savannah’s fight or flight went into overdrive. Her assailant was a foot in front of her, well within striking distance. Savannah’s hand lashed out quickly, infused with as much electricity as she could manage on short notice.
The person crumpled to the floor with grunt. Only after the fact did Savannah realize what happened. “Brooke, what are you doing?” Savannah demanded, not sure if she should help her teammate up. Considering the number of volts she just took, she probably wasn’t going to be able to stand.
“Don’t startle my roommate,” Brooke said from the floor. “Noted. Don’t worry. Won’t happen again.”
Savannah was still reeling from the fact she just assaulted a classmate so she didn’t process what Brooke said for a second. Once it clicked, and she took in the mess Brooke already made of the room, her eyes widened. “Roommate?”