Dear Diary,

Last night, shortly after I dragged myself back to my room, Marie arrived with a tub atop her cart. Not a tub of something, but an old school sheet metal tub. She set it on the floor in the center of my room, then closed the door with her still inside. After a quick curious glance at my easel-shelves, she slid open the side of her cart and pulled out the first of four oversized kettles. She stood there expectantly; after a moment I realized she wanted me to strip and get in the tub. I wasn't sure what to think about that. After a second of consideration, when I realized that while I didn't think of Marie as a girl, per se, I definitely didn't think of her as a guy, so I peeled my sweaty clothes off and climbed into the tub. I had to bend my knees to fit all of me in. Once I did, she said, "Lean." and pushed my shoulder forward.

I followed her instruction, only to have her dump a kettle of near scalding water over my head. Before I finished spluttering, she started scrubbing my hair. A relaxing floral fragrance filled the air, and I gave up and gave in to Marie's less than tender ministrations. Another kettle of water rinsed my hair, then she massaged my scalp with another dose of soap, moving down to my back after she'd scrubbed my hair to her satisfaction. I think she used a loofa; something rough scraped across my back after she soaped it down. I swear I started purring, and I blessed the shallow water, since it meant I didn't drown myself when I leaned as far forward as I could, resting my head between my knees as Marie scrubbed the tension in my back and shoulders away.

After the third dousing, she tugged my hair into one big handful and said, "Back." I followed her instruction, and she wrung most of the water out of my hair. When she reached around to the front of me, I jumped up and as far away as I could without leaving the tub entirely.

"That's okay, Marie. I can take care of my front." She frowned a little, handling me a soapy cloth and a flat hunk of rock with a handle on one side. As I ran the soapy cloth over my boobs, my limbs, and all my crevices, getting everything good and soapy, I said, "Thank you for doing my hair and back."

"de nada," she replied predictably. I scrubbed my arms, hands, legs, and feet with the pumice stone; the crevices got extra cloth scrubbing. I had no intention of exfoliating my nips or my lady bits. I handed the cloth and pumice back to her and stood sideways in the tub, holding my arms out just a little. She replaced the bath tools on her cart and pulled out the final kettle of water. I squeaked a little when the scalding water sluiced across my breasts, a little more when Marie managed to flick a solid splash into each of my pits and my crotch. The kettles went back into her cart, and she pulled a fluffy towel off one of the shelves before racking the final kettle. Marie made a little 'turn around' motion. She hadn't clawed me yet, so I turned in place as instructed.

What followed reminded me of nothing so much as being dried by my mom as a toddler. She started with my hair, worked her way down from there, not giving me much of a chance to object when she wrapped the towel all the way around me to dry off my front. She pulled my foot out of the tub, setting it on the floor when she'd dried that leg, then repeated the process with the other one. She lifted my hair, lay the towel across my shoulders, and nodded toward my chair, "Sit."

By this point the fatigue of the day had joined forces with the hot water to turn me into a submissive dress up doll for Marie. She lifted the tub, water and all, and placed it atop her cart, then moved behind me. Starting at the bottom, she combed the tangles out of my hair, then proceeded to comb all of it from top to bottom. I'm not sure, because I lost count, and might even have fallen asleep, but if she did the full hundred strokes it wouldn't surprise me. When she finished I had no more fucks to give about modesty. I thanked her once more, handed her the towel, and collapsed into my bed.

I fully expected to wake up sore in places I didn't know I had, but when Marie knocked on my door, I sprang out of bed as quickly as any other day.

That's to say, not very quick, but I wasn't sore at all. I have no idea whether to thank Marie, my new body, or some combination of both. I opened the door and, while she changed my linens, pulled on a clean uniform. I left before she finished, and before I walked down the hall I said, "Thanks, Marie. For the sheets and the bath and... well... everything. Thanks."

I barely heard her mutter, "de nada," and then I was off, headed for the Dining Hall. I met the rest of the ROTC crew at our table. I'd managed to make it before the final restocking of the table, and proceeded to demolish a solid three trays of food and three loaves of bread. By the second loaf of bread the other three gave me some side eye, but just before the third they started making bets with how much more I'd eat. In the end I didn't stop because I'd assuaged my hunger or because the food ran out. A bell announced the end of breakfast, with two maids standing at either end of our table pointedly staring at us until we left them to clean up. I 'walked with a sense of purpose' down to the Library; the other three fell in behind me, Angel matching my steps, Saffron having to skip a bit to keep up, and Bill toddling along like a helium filled caboose.

When we got there, a nun already had the Sloppy Dozen seated in the carrel chairs. When we arrived, out of instinct I snapped a quick salute, which drew a giggle from the nun herself. "You don't need to salute me, sweetie." She gestured to the four remaining carrels, all to the left of the entrance. Once we got to our seats, she hopped up to sit on what I thought of the checkout desk just inside the doors. I hadn't realized how much height her carriage gave her until she had to hop up like that.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

"My name is Sister Cheryl. Some of you I've met, others are new to me." She paused, then spoke with a wry smile, "I guess I'm now officially Archivist Saturday as well, at least until Headmaster Miles finds a new Archivist. This is my first time handling the mental half of the admissions testing, so please bear with me. Today you'll be taking a number of tests designed to evaluate your Reason, your Memory, and your Personality. Do you all have writing utensils?"

I raised my hand, and when she nodded to me I said, "I don't, Sister."

"That's fine. Everyone else, raise your hands if you need something to write with." Seven other hands shot up, including Angel and Saffron. Bill, of all people, had three colored glass pens that looked a little like fountain pens. He handed one extra to Saffron and the other to Angel; he looked at me and shrugged an apology, to which I shook my head to let him know I wasn't upset; not only did it seem he'd known the other two longer, I'd grabbed the seat furthest from him, more or less by chance.

When Sister Cheryl got to me, she murmured, "Have you had any mana training yet, Candidate Diaz?" When I shook my head, she riffled through the pens in her hand and pulled out a metal fountain pen. "Let me know if this runs out of ink during a test. Have you used one before?"

"Not much."

"Okay then, I think I've got an extra in the desk, I'll fill that while you're testing and switch off with you between tests. Now, does everyone have a writing utensil?"

At our chorus of nods and 'yes', she nodded and returned to the front desk, pulling a short stack of paper from within. "We'll start with some simple arithmetic. Finish as many as you can. If you show your work that will be assessed along with your answer, if you do not your aptitude will be assessed entirely based on your answer." After she passed out four pages to each of us, she returned to the front desk and pulled out an hourglass.

"Is everyone ready?" Before we'd even finished nodding, she said, "begin," and flipped the hourglass.

I'd worried about this portion of the admissions process; if they asked me anything about history, culture, or geography I'd be shit out of luck. The first page turned out to be nothing but simple math problems; the hardest was multiplying two three digit numbers together. I'd lost my cell phone with my purse, but I still remembered enough from my math classes to do that much by hand. As Sister Cheryl suggested, I wrote everything out. The second page had a few algebra problems, which I remembered how to do, and one question each using Trig and Calc, which I did not. I mean, I hadn't even taken Calculus, but I remember seeing the curvy symbol on the cover of a Calc textbook. Trig I'd had as part of Geometry, and I didn't remember anything at all beyond that. I just guessed at answers, writing 'IDK' in the spot where I'd put my work for the others. Geometry proofs filled the third page. I hadn't passed the Trig section of Geometry, but I'd squeaked through with a D for the year. I gave each question my best, writing everything out.

The final page had two word problems. I'd never really gotten how some people considered them alien gibberish, but I also never had much luck solving them. Again, I gave it my best shot, writing down my logic on why I did the calculations I did, then wrote out the math. I set my pen down and held up my hand.

Sister Cheryl whispered, "Did you need something, Candidate Diaz?"

"I'm finished."

"Did you want to check your work?"

I shook my head, "nah. If I do I'll just start doubting my answers and screw up the things I got right."

She nodded and reached to take my papers, "There is some wisdom in that." She paged through them, and I noticed that my answers had smudged, luckily not into illegibility. Eyes widened slightly, she said, "Arabic numerals? You've been tutored then?"

"I guess my math teachers just liked them better?"

Looking at my final page, she frowned. "Is this... it's not Arabic, not even transliterated. Phoenician letters, but what language is this?"

"Uh, English? I'm sorry, my handwriting is pretty awful."

She blinked at my answer, "handwriting aside, do I want to know how you learned to write in English of all languages?"

"Uh... tutors?"

At that she gave me the deep frown you'd expect from someone trying to keep themselves from bursting out laughing. "English. Tutors." She sighed, lay my papers on the front desk, and turned back to me with one hand across her eyes. "Just tell me you're not wanted for piracy anywhere civilized."

"Not that I'm aware of, Sister."

The rest of the day went similarly, although without any more commentary on my using Arabic numerals or writing in English. Some of the tests were speed trials, others memory checks not unlike what I'd taken on the ASVABs. One section reminded me of a personality test I'd taken back at Eastside. Eventually, when the light wells just started to fade, she gathered up the last of the tests and dismissed us to dinner.

We arrived just as the meal hit our table, and I spent the next two hours showing the other ROTCs what real binge eating looked like. I think I low-key terrified the Maids; by the third time they'd replaced all the food on the table they'd started lining up carts full of food next to our table, just waiting for me to devour their last offering. At one point right before the bell rang to indicate Dinner was done, Marie passed by our table, dropping off a tiny cake with an almond baked into the top of it.

"Aww, you didn't have to. It's not even my birthday!"

She just nodded and went back to doing Marie things.

The ROTCs and I meandered home, hanging in the entryway to the girl's dorm. When Bill followed us into the dorm, I gave him a look to which he shrugged as if to say 'No idea'. "I'm not gonna complain about free food, but damn I miss food with some kick to it," griped Angel. We all agreed, taking a few minutes to bitch about the lack of burn in our meals before breaking up and heading back to our rooms.

Today Marie brought me breakfast with a note from Sister Cheryl, letting us know we'd find out tomorrow morning which of us were Cadets, and which of us needed to pack our bags and head home. I spent the day reading with my door open, but none of the ROTC kids dropped by, and nobody even looked in as they passed my room. A nice, relaxing day reading. No tension winding my whole body up like a spring or anything. Nope. I am the soul of calm. Not nervous or anything like it. Really.