> Me: New dream.
>
> Me: Need to talk.
>
> Marzi: Its 2 in the morning
>
> Me: You’re awake anyway.
>
> Marzi: I’m not
>
> Marzi: Write it down
>
> Marzi: Save it for tomorrow
“So much for therapy,” Calvin muttered, re-checking if Miss Marzi had woken up.
Last night’s dream had been increasingly confusing for him— if it even was a dream. Waking up afterward, there was an unexplainable feeling that it wasn’t one. There was a difference, a vague feeling of familiarity, unlike dreams.
’Dreams leave you confused after, not during’, He thought.
It took minutes after waking up before he started collecting himself and wrote the details into his holowatch. He remembered the names: ‘Dom’ and ‘Viktor’, he didn’t even know why he knew the man’s name was spelled with a ‘k’ instead of a ‘c’, but he felt certain it was. He remembered the location, the alleyway whose only population was muck, filth, and rats. He remembered the thugs, looking like the most stereotypical thugs you’d see in the darkness, wearing their cliche rags and cliche iron pipes.
’They didn’t seem superpowered, at least. Or were those rusty iron pipes tinker tech? I don’t know what’s tinker tech anymore.’
Out of all the details he could remember, there was one that nagged him despite how small it felt compared to everything else. Nonetheless, he looked it up through the Academy’s network, specifically in the online library.
’Discontinued more than a decade and a half ago,’ He re-read the information on his holowatch, the news article talking about the rise of credits and the halting of paper money generation. ’That… can’t have been a memory. Ten years ago, I… or Orion… Dom? Whoever the fuck… I can’t have been— well, maybe he saw it in a book or something? But then why would I be dreaming about it? Fuck, this is so… annoying.’
“You okay?” Ina’s question snapped him out.
“Huh? Ah, yeah… just, thinking about stuff. The nightmare, you know?” He replied half-heartedly, closing his holowatch’s display.
He sighed, looking towards the distance while trying to pin the dream to the back of his mind.
They were currently sitting on top of the walls at the back of the dormitory, in between the battlements while having their breakfast. The sun slowly rose from the horizon, visible above the unusually low height of Green District’s cityscape. Calvin wanted so bad to make some coffee, but there was a line of other early risers in front of the machine that made him give up immediately.
’I should’ve brought Sam’s coffee maker. That thing made coffee like a dream.’
Quinn looked towards him, munching a burrito, while Ina asked, “Nightmare?”
“I slept in a shoebox while you two slept like Queens in your five-meter square royal suites.”
“Rich girl privileges,” Quinn spoke with her mouth full. “Oweh~”
Ina pinched her cheek. “I told you already, they’re sucking up to us.”
“And by extension, our parents,” Quinn added.
“If you adopt me…” He muttered.
“Gross.” Quinn fake-barfed.
Ina chuckled, “It’s just a few meters extra.”
“And a private bathroom.”
“Which is just a few meters.”
“How did they even know you were going to pick those rooms?” He asked, taking a bite of his own burrito. ’Hmm… eggs.’
“Tinker magic,” Ina answered, shrugging. “Probably our holowatches.”
“All this time I thought tinker tech was supposed to be rare,” He muttered.
“It’s not that rare, just expensive. For now,” She explained, resting her face on her hand as she turned towards him. “More supers, more tinkers, more tinker tech.”
“More things to buy, less money to buy with,” Calvin added.
“Just stop being poor— oweh~”
“Yeah yeah,” Calvin chuckled, “do you guys have plans today? I think I want to go out, visit my therapist.”
Ina looked at him for a moment before sighing, “Calvin…”
His brows curled, “What?”
“You still haven’t read the rulebook, huh.”
“What does that have to do with—”
Before he could ask, Quinn had sent him a snippet of text from the rulebook as if she was already anticipating his question. He looked at her who was giving him a mocking smirk, before opening the file with eyes full of suspicion.
> Rule 17.3 - Student Movement Beyond Campus Boundaries:
>
> "No student shall exit the campus premises without the express written permission of their designated guiding teacher or other appropriate staff, except in cases of emergency. To obtain such permission, students are required to submit a signed permission slip to their guiding teacher at least 24 hours in advance of the intended departure time. Failure to adhere to this regulation may result in appropriate disciplinary action as deemed fit by the school administration as well as a deduction of up to 500 academy points."
“What the hell? Really?”
“That’s what you get for not reading~” Quinn teased.
He closed the file, “Are they that strict?”
“You can find out if you want to. But that five hundred academy points means bye-bye to your personal toilet for the near future.”
“That’s some bullshit— we’re stuck here?”
“That’s school for you,” Quinn groaned, deflating. “Free buffet, though?”
“Wait, what? Really?” Calvin immediately perked up, opening the rulebook.
“Every. Meal.” She grinned.
“Where is it?”
“Not part of the rulebook, glutton. It’s just expected” Ina smacked him lightly, “We have children of other supers, children of council members—”
“—children of the rich,” Quinn added.
“Plus, we’re future heroes. Did you think they’d starve us and make us hate this place?”
Quinn finished her burrito, “That’s just a recipe for villains.”
“Petty reason to turn to villainy,” Calvin muttered.
Ina shook her head, “There’d been pettier.”
“So, what? We can’t leave for years?”
“No? There’s holidays, special— look, Calvin, just read the damn document.”
“But it’s so long…”
“It’s thirteen pages.”
“Back to back!”
“Give it up, let him suffer,” Quinn said, hugging Ina’s arm.
Calvin crossed his arms and started thinking of a way to go out. He could probably talk with his therapist through a call, but he was too busy thinking of a way to game the system. “School hasn’t started, I’m not a student yet, technically?”
“You already registered.”
“They won’t know I went out.”
“Oracle would.” Quinn reminded him, knowing his paranoia with the watchful peeper.
“Damn it,” Calvin laid flat on the ground, watching the dawn sky turn brighter. “Okay, so those plans are out. What are we doing today?”
“We can go to the libra—”
“Fight club!” Ina immediately interrupted.
Quinn visibly deflated, “No…”
Calvin smiled at the melting pink ice cream woman, “Are you sure it’s a fight club and not just some teens beating each other up.”
“There’s a difference?” Quinn asked.
“You went to sleep yesterday and Quinn didn’t want to watch with me, I had to go alone.” She pouted, pinching Quinn’s cheeks.
“Oweh~”
“Why would they still be there?” He asked, dubious that the admin wouldn’t interfere.
“Bewauth therth a thorm full tuh—”, Quinn stopped speaking and grabbed Ina’s hands. “Because this is a dorm full of superpowered wannabe-hero teenagers with little foresight and a lot to prove.”
“You make us seem so shallow.”
“Because we are.”
“Let’s just go!”
----------------------------------------
Ina forced the two to finish their breakfast while they walked down from the walls, dragging the two of them around the castle grounds to get to the courtyard. Sure enough, two teens were fighting again in the middle, with something a little different this time around.
“Wow!” Ina gasped excitedly while Quinn let out an unusual hum.
“Is that an arena? Did they bring an arena?”
There was a new installment in the middle of the courtyard. A stage, like a fighting ring, in full black and spanning a size similar to a basketball court’s, albeit circular. There were stands surrounding two sides of the stage like some sort of colosseum, reminiscent of the real fight clubs Calvin and Ina frequented.
Not just the stage, but the area surrounding was also filled with other stuff. Vending machines, self-checkout food stands, and a large holographic screen replacing the ‘betting screen’ from yesterday.
RANKING BOARD
1
Helena Rosswell 2
Alex Duffy
3
Ivan …
“They shelled out for this one, huh,” Quinn muttered, staring at the stage.
“It’s a ranking screen!” Ina said excitedly, jogging closer.
Calvin and Quinn looked at each other with a wry smile before catching up to their friend. “At least we’re not the ones sparring with her this time.”
“You do know you’ll still have to exorcise her if she loses control.”
“Why just me? You’re stronger. I only have my pebbles.”
“Because I’m your sponsor and you’d want to keep me happy if you want to keep getting your allowance.”
“I have an allowance?” He looked at her like it was news to him. And it likely was.
Quinn rolled her eyes, “Of course, you didn’t read that part.”
“What would I even spend it on? We need points, not credits.”
“You signed the contract,” She shrugged. “I knew there were going to be points, but I didn’t know they would use it like this. Thought they would at least let us buy other stuff with normal credits.”
“Yeah… wait, what did they even bet with yesterday? Credits are useless here?” He asked as they caught up to the excited Ina.
Ina turned to answer him. “They were betting with credits— I mean, credits, credits. IOUs, probably going to be cashed in later when the academy actually starts giving out credits.”
“School’s not even started and some are already in debt,” Calvin said, chuckling. “Wait, you didn’t bet, did you?”
Ina looked away, ignoring his question.
He turned to Quinn who was nodding with clear disappointment.
“I was on a streak… I thought I could win it all back…” She muttered.
“That’s how it starts,” He shook his head, acting like a disappointed parent.
Quinn patted him on the back, “She started long ago.”
Prying away his judging eyes from the guilty Ina, he turned to the fighting teens.
He felt a feeling of recognition towards the two of them, now that he had walked closer. One of them he instantly recognized as the sweat-armor guy from yesterday’s fight. The other was only a vague familiarity, but he was fairly sure he knew him.
Unfortunately, it was still the first minute of the fight, which probably meant they weren’t using their powers yet.
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He asked Ina before about that ‘custom’, and she explained it as an unspoken rule. Generally, it was for supers unfamiliar with each other, to roughly gauge how much they can take in a spar without dying, at least when superpowers come into play. However, he had a feeling this time it wasn’t just an unspoken rule.
He looked away from the arena, turning his attention to the newly installed ranking screen. The list was scrolling automatically, with only the top ten being glued to the top.
“When did that happen?” He asked.
Quinn turned to him, “When did what?”
“The ranking screen,” he gestured to the big purple holographic display, “there’s a hundred names on it already. It hasn’t been a day yet. Did I sleep for two days or something?”
“I don’t know,” Ina shook her head. “Queenie?”
“We were together playing games the whole time yesterday, Ina,” She reminded her.
“You have games here?” Calvin said, brow raising.
“Welcome to the future, old man. Yes, we have games.”
“No, that’s not what I was asking— never mind,” He turned to the arena. “That other guy looks familiar for some reason.”
“I don’t know anyone that gross,” Quinn said, grimacing.
“Sweat guy?” Ina asked.
“No— not sweat guy, the other guy.”
“Ah, he was in the workshop,” Ina reminded, her attention still on the fight in front, “cutlery summoner.”
“Ah!” Recognition clicked as she mentioned his power.
“You two are so alike sometimes,” Quinn muttered.
“Yeah, Lonnie, right? Didn’t know he would apply here too.”
“How would you know, you never talked,” Quinn said, smirking.
“We did,” He said, unsure, “He’s doing pretty good.”
“I know, right? He’s not just attacking like most guys, he’s trying to trip him up and attacking the thinnest parts of that sweat armor. Look, he made a spoon right where the other person’s stepping and— yeah, see! Although if I was him I would’ve made…”
Her two friends zoned out as Ina went into her own world, commentating on the fight on the stage like she was being paid to do so. Calvin was paying some attention to her words, although his thoughts lay more towards the rankings, specifically why they were there.
“You looking at the rankers?” Quinn asked.
“No— well, I was just thinking about why they’re going this far. There’s a stage, rankings, seats, food… it’s like an event. And don’t tell me it’s in the rulebook too.”
“How would you know it’s not in the rulebook,” She chuckled before explaining. “It’s probably because of this too.”
Academy Hero Department Fight Club Rlues first minute no powers(unless you two dumb kids think its not necessary)
no killing or maiming(i will break your neck you if you try)
no destroying the arena(if you even can)
you can challenge any rank
up to three challenge for a rank or a person a day (i dont want to see the same person beat the same people up)
defeated rankers get ranked down a level
SPORTSMANSHIP
ill add more rules if i need to
---
REWARDS
1st - 20pts a day
2nd–10th - 10pts a day
10th–30th - 5pts a day
30th-99th - 3pts a day
100th - 1pt a day(pity point)
“That way of writing… typing? Whatever, it looks familiar,” He muttered. “When was that?”
“Found it on the Academy’s homepage earlier,” She answered. “You could get some points now and make your room bigger. You can get a bathroom after five days as the first ranker.”
“First ranker? With that girl here?” He smiled wryly, nodding his head towards Ina who was still watching the fight.
Quinn gave him a grin, “You can keep up with her.”
“She probably needs it to pay off the IOUs anyway,” He said, shrugging.
“I can hear you, you know,” Ina said, flicking him on the forehead and grabbing his wrist.
“Good luck~” She waved to him.
“You’re coming too,” Ina said, grabbing her wrist as well.
“What? I don’t want—”
She interrupted raising a finger, “I’ll give you one coupon.”
Quinn immediately turned serious, “Five, at least.”
“One.” Ina was adamant.
“Three.”
“One.”
“Deal!”
The two shook hands, and Ina summoned a small piece of paper from her pocket.
Calvin tilted his head to read the small text on the piece of paper. ’Hug pillow for one night? Really? Rich people are weird. Or maybe just Quinn.’
“Let’s sign up!”
By this point, Calvin was used to getting dragged by the wrist. Ina dragged him towards the former betting stand, now placed ringside and beside another ranking screen.
The lion-haired woman was still manning it, the same manic smile she had on yesterday was still on her face. Seeing her grin like that while watching two teens beat each other up with superpowers made Calvin get the urge to call CPS— if they had one in this world.
Ina knocked on the table’s synthetic wood, grabbing her attention.
“Hm? Oh! It’s you again, honey. How are you? How’s the dorm? Did you get a good sleep?” The woman spoke with an attempt of a soft smile, although to the three it looked more like a predator’s vain attempt to lower their prey’s guard. “Sorry to tell you, this ain’t no betting stand anymore. Management caught me! Ha! Still, this is way better than nothing.”
Ina was flustered for a moment before shaking her head, “We’re not here to bet, Miss Cruz.”
“Bah, Miss Cruz. You’re making me feel like a fossil. Maxine’s enough, honey,” She shook her head, her menacing smile not leaving her face, “So, you’re signing up? And you said we? You and your boyfriend? And his girlfriend?”
“Boyfriend?” “What?” “Ew.”
“Pft. Ha! I’m just teasing you honeys,” She grinned, seeing reddened and grossed-out faces. “Here’s how this works honeys.”
Miss Cruz, or Maxine as she would like to be called, started explaining the gist of the ranking battles. Essentially, it was more of a ‘challenge’ type event than anything else, where you go and point at whomever you want to challenge and fight in the ring. Except you point at the screen, and you get queued afterward. It didn’t guarantee a fight on the same day, but it was better than just waiting randomly for the ranker to hang around the arena or to ambush them in a public place with a challenge.
“Can we use weapons?” Ina asked, staring at the rule.
“If I think your power needs a weapon to function properly, sure. Otherwise, we fight fist to fist, like true heroes!”
’True heroes?’ Calvin thought. “That kinda feels unfair. Won’t Physics would win most of the time?”
“It’s a ranking battle, not a fair battle,” She said, turning to him with the same intense gaze, “Don’t you think weapons would make it less fair? Rich people relying on expensive tinker tech? Bah! Use your powers, your muscles, your own strength to win!”
’Well, there goes my plan to pull out a Glock. Not that I have one. Do Glocks even exist in this world?’ Calvin couldn’t help his curiosity and asked the woman. “How is this… allowed?”
“Because they don’t want me gone from this place,” She laughed. “Just pick, honey. Don’t worry about other stuff and just fight. Prove yourself!”
“I pick her.” Ina immediately, and predictably, pointed towards the top of the list— the first ranker.
“Ha! I’m really liking you, honey!” The woman clapped, grabbing the holowatch scanner lying on the table. “Person or rank?”
“What’s the difference?”
“Are you challenging the person or the rank? If it’s the person, you get to fight them whether they go down the list or not. If it’s the rank, you just fight whoever is first. Made the rule up when someone wanted to settle a grudge.”
“Rank,” Ina said, nodding as if it was obvious.
“Good!” She said, gesturing for her wrist. Using the device, she scanned it for a second before Ina felt her holowatch vibrate, obviously getting a notification. “How about you, honey?”
“Let’s go with the second,” he said, not even looking at the list.
“What? Scared?” Ina smirked.
“Yes.” He nodded unabashedly. “Actually, no, third.”
“Why third?” Ina asked in a whisper.
“That girl’s going to go down a rank when you beat her,” He explained. “Don’t want to fight someone back-to-back.”
“I see?”
Maxine chuckled, scanning his holowatch. Calvin saw the message saying he’s been queued for the challenge, with a best and worst-case estimation of time before he goes up.
’Thirty minutes?’ Calvin was surprised at the best-case time.
“What about you, honey?” She turned to Quinn.
“99th rank,” She immediately answered, looking towards Ina with a sly smile. “The deal was just to fight~”
“To know your limits is good as well!” Maxine said, scanning her holowatch the same way.
“Heh~ ow…” Quinn’s cheeks were assaulted once more by Ina.
“Be here before the best case time, honeys. Or I’ll have to drag you here myself and chuck you in the ring,” She warned, her face not changing yet somehow becoming more menacing.
“We’ll be in the stands.”
Ina dragged the two of them once again, heading towards the top of the stands. As they sat down, Quinn took out three buckets of popcorn and three bottles of soda, handing them out to the other two before burying her head on Ina’s shoulder.
“How much food do you have?” Calvin asked, bewildered but grateful.
She smirked, remembering the hole she left in her house’s kitchen, “A whole pantry.”
“Aw, they’re done?” Ina groaned, looking at the stage.
Lonnie, the cutlery-summoning boy was on the floor, while the sweat guy was soaked standing on top of him with his fist in the air.
“Dramatic,” He muttered.
“Get used to it, we’ll be hero-ing for the next few years. Drama’s probably going to be a class somewhere down the line,” Ina said.
“I wonder if we’ll get a class teaching how to make puns and quips.”
“That’s talent, not a skill.”
“Then how come every hero does— woah, what’s happening?”
Two black cloth-like materials spewed out from underneath the arena, rising up above the stage and covering it with a dome of ebony curtains. Moments after, the cloth was slurped back underneath, revealing a squeaky-clean and sweat-free surface along with the two previous combatants, similarly scrubbed to normalcy. Their bruises, gone. Their shirts, untattered. The sweat, thankfully evaporated.
“Fight’s done, they’re resetting,” Ina explained before pausing and turning to him with dramatic confusion, “You’ve never seen that?”
Calvin glanced at the now-empty arena, “No? Is that… normal?”
“It’s everywhere in sports! You’ve never seen it on TV?”
“I don’t think he knows what a television is, Ina. Oweh~”
Calvin pinched her nose, “I know what a television is. I just… don’t watch sports. I watch news, movies, whatever,” he said, a bit too defensively, “They’re not using the armbands anymore?”
“That arena is the armband,” Ina pointed upwards.
Calvin followed her finger, only now noticing the holographic ‘health bars’ floating above the stage.
Unknown VERSUS Unknown
▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰ 100%
100% ▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰
“Okay, that is cool,” Calvin said, the gamified fighting ring making him smile. “Why don’t they have this in normal fight clubs? Is it expensive?”
Quinn smirked, “What do you think?”
“It’s really expensive, super rare, and closely regulated by all councils,” Ina explained.
“Then why is there one here?”
“Council regulations. Council children.”
“Ah,” Calvin nodded, just another instance of ‘rich privileges’. “How does it work?”
“It’s tinker tech. If people knew how it worked, it would just be called ‘tech’.”
Calvin was going to ask a few more questions when two new teens went up on stage. One of them looked timid and thin, overall the very opposite one would think of being a hero. What’s unusual, though, was her choice of clothing for the fight. Although it was morning, it wasn’t morning enough to still be wearing pajamas, especially during a fight.
The other was a black-haired girl, wearing a similarly black dress and black— well, everything. Her colour choice was rather single-toned, to the point where even her fingernails and lipstick were as dark as her hair. Everything contrasted greatly against her pure-white skin, making her the gothiest girl Calvin had seen in his two lives.
Calvin squinted to get a better look, also finding her vaguely familiar.
The health bars on top updated, revealing their names— one of which made it click why the black-haired girl was familiar.
Sharle Camuela
VERSUS Regina Myscroft
▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰ 100%
100% ▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰
“That’s…”, He snapped his fingers, remembering the name. “Ink raven girl. Right?”
He turned to the two and flinched, seeing their hostile indifference to his question.
Quinn’s was obvious, as she had beef with everyone who ran away when Ina was hatching, Regina included. Ina’s was less so, the only time he remembered them interacting was the first day of the workshop.
’Actually… I think they were hostile back then too?’ He struggled to remember, but he was fairly certain they weren’t on friendly terms.
“I would bet so hard on that other girl if I could,” Ina grumbled. “I hope she has a good power.”
“I hope so too. I hope she’s a fire elementalis.”
“Or lightning.”
“Watching her writhe on the ground would be great…”
Calvin turned away from the two witches casting curses towards the oblivious Regina, turning his attention to the fight itself. He watched as a timer up on top counted down, making the girl in PJs skitter and titter underneath Regina’s icy gaze.
A loud ringing rang out, like the bell of a boxing ring. Regina immediately dashed towards Sharle at the sound.
The girl dodged to the side, before blocking a kick to the head from Regina. She ducked down after, narrowly dodging a follow-up kick.
’Are all rich girls amazing fighters?’ Calvin thought as he watched. While they weren’t as great as Ina, he wouldn’t last long against them with his six months of experience.
After waiting for the agonizingly long minute of un-superpowered fighting, Regina finally backed away. With two hands in the air, she summoned her ever-so-familiar birds made of ink and blackness.
With a gesture, the birds shot out.
Sharle dodged to the side, albeit a bit too slow. She looked at her sleeve, seeing it bloody and shredded by the bird’s beaks and talons.
Sharle Camuela
VERSUS Regina Myscroft
▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▱ 87%
96% ▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰
“Hooh…” Calvin let out a sound, seeing the birds much more realistic than before.
“What? Are you impressed?” Ina asked.
“…” Calvin glanced at her faux-nonchalance, feeling a trap from the question. ’I probably shouldn’t answer that.’
She summoned more ink birds, shooting forward like arrows loosed from a bow. Incredibly, the other side dodged them with ease this time, almost like she could see where they would land before they shot out.
With every bird shot out, she was inching closer to Regina despite her slowly backing away.
Shooting birds, dodging birds, and now slapping birds away, Sharle was slowly gaining the upper hand as the ink proved ineffective against her skills.
It took a minute, but finally, Regina had no place to back off to anymore. It took only moments before Sharle got close enough to send a slap to her face.
“Yes!” “Let’s go!” The two stood up, cheering on Sharle.
“These two…” Calvin muttered, shaking his head.
Turning back to the fight, his eyes widened as Regina fell to the ground like a statue pushed off its pedestal.
Sharle sat on the ground beside her, panting. Despite that, Regina made no move— or rather, she couldn’t. The ink-haired girl was frozen on the ground.
“That’s her power?” Ina said, her voice full of wonder.
“That’s useful,” Quinn commented.
Calvin said nothing. He was trying to look closer at Regina, a nagging feeling at the back of his mind telling him he knew that power. He’d seen it before.
’Frozen? No, she’s not frozen…’ He could barely see from the stands, but he was sure her head and hands were moving, albeit very slowly.
After resting for a moment, Sharle stood up and started gingerly kicking her opponent on the ground, her attention divided between apologizing and glancing at the health bars on top. Quinn and Ina kept shouting to kick her harder, though.
It took a while, but she finally managed to empty it with her love taps, ending the ranking fight. Sharle let out a sigh of relief, crouching down to touch Regina, undoing her power’s effects.
Ink bird girl immediately unfroze, feeling a momentary daze before standing up and summoning ink birds. Sharle raised her hands and pointed to the health bars above them.
Sharle Camuela
VERSUS Regina Myscroft
▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▱▱ 73%
0% ▱▱▱▱▱▱▱▱▱▱
The black cloth once again rose up, covering and resetting the stage and the two women’s conditions.
“That was something,” Calvin commented, watching as the two leave the stage, one grumpy and one fidgety.
“Her power was amazing, but that girl sucks so it’s hard to gauge how strong Sharle actually is.”
The three continued watching a couple more fights before Ina’s turn came up.