The transition is kind of surreal. It feels like a gradual, smooth fade back to reality and a blink of an eye at the same time. Reality around me is playing tricks with my mind, leaving me reeling with nausea as I’m suddenly plunged into a cacophony of sound. Fortunately, everyone seems to have been… spawned back, or whatever, around the block or in buildings, so I don’t have to deal with a dozen strangers in my face.

  “Ugh.”

  I need to get my bearings again.

  Looking up, I breathe a sigh of relief. I’m standing in the same place, thank everything. Before me, Minerva stands tall and proud, once more bearing her shield and spear, no sign of the recent events on her immaculate form. The only change is in her eyes, the vibrant blue having faded slightly. Not enough to be noticed by most.

  Hopefully that goes for the church as well. I wince, recalling the splintered pulpit and stuff thrown around. Not to mention the blood. And the bodies. Right, the bodies too. Those will all be… taken care of somehow, right? No clue, the voice in my head replies helpfully.

  Should I go inside to check?

  You would risk being suspected as the culprit if they are still there.

  True. Though I kind of am the culprit, so that would probably be fair. Not that fairness matters right now. If this city is really hiding the government’s highest classified secret weapon technology, I doubt the police will be the ones investigating it. No, I should go back to school, see if anyone is still there. I feel Minerva’s agreement, and start walking. As I do, I realize the weight of the belt is gone. I look down to see that not only have they disappeared, but my clothes are entirely clean — though still torn in a few places; my shirt is riddled with holes.

  Behind you.

  I turn around again; Minerva hasn’t changed, but she has a large black bomber jacket hanging from one shoulder. Not the same as my old one, unfortunately. At this point, I’m too tired to be surprised. Whatever Minerva has in mind for me can wait until after I have taken a long nap. Or five. I take the coat, zipping it up to my neck, and get moving before people inevitably crowd the streets asking what happened.

  ?????

  The walk back to campus is surprisingly quiet. I figured that even with their memories wiped, people would feel something off about things. It can’t be easy to hide the fact that no one remembers the last twenty minutes of their life. Right?

  I enter the hallway housing my first period, calculus, for the second time today. The clock on the wall reads 8:33, which means the zone lasted about 25 minutes, excluding the time it took me to walk back. I guess that makes sense, given the… extenuating circumstances. Then again, I’m not sure that’s a good thing for me specifically. I have no idea how I’m going to explain my absence to Guy. How would that even work? They have to still remember me walking in to the classroom, since that was before the alarm. Which means it would be weird if suddenly I walk in again, assuming that no one noticed me walking out…

  Just go inside already, Minerva says in my mind, and I almost jump.

  Wow I am not going to get used to that.

  Nothing for it. 501, 502, 503, I try to quiet my footsteps as though anyone would pay mind to someone in the hallways during class. 504. With a deep breath, I turn to face the door, bracing myself for any combination of exasperated questioning from Mr. Wilfort and snide remarks from my classmates.

  I take another mooment to steady myself, adjusting my posture to something more casual than tense, and trying to ignore the last of the adrenaline in my system. Right. Just a normal half-hour absence from first period, nothing out of the ordinary!

  The door handle gives way to my sweaty palms with a soft click, and I push the door open slowly, trying to keep quiet.

  Time to sit at a desk for another hour solving differential equations and pretending that I did not just walk back from a fight to the death and at least one top secret government project. Holy shit my life did a one-eighty in the span of 30 minutes. It hits me like a kick to the face, the absurdity of it all. I take half a second to realize I’m still standing frozen in the doorway, fighting off another meltdown.

  Cool it! Minerva chides silently.

  I school my face again, trying to keep my shoulders relaxed and furiously praying (still to no one) that my brief episode went unnoticed.

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  “Rowan! So glad you could make it back from your… excursion, in time for the last bit of class.” Mr. Wilfort’s voice cuts through my hopes and dreams at a rate he’ll probably make me find the integral of. He stares pointedly at my new attire. Guy is easygoing in a lot of ways, but ‘unreasonably long and unexcused absences’ are not one of them.

  “I do hope you’ll have a proper reason for your half-hour ‘break’ after class,” he finishes, already turning back to the lesson on the projector.

  “Yes, Mr. Wilfort,” I mutter, picking up my voice so he can actually hear my apology. “Sorry.”

  I make my way back to my desk, trying to ignore the stares of the few students scattered across the room. The navy blue backpack that has carried me through since middle school still slouches against the chair leg, notebook peeking out from its unzipped pocket. I slide into my seat, carefully picking my legs up as I swing them over my bag, before leaning to my side in (what I hope is) a smooth movement to bring up my math notebook and pencil. I place the notebook on my desk, leafing through its pages to find a blank one.

  The next half hour passes without incident — excluding a verbal scuffle between Layne and one of my relatively manual classmates, Maya. I glance at the clock nestled above the projector screen (“I got tired of seeing people turning around after the fourth year teaching here, so now the clock is right above the board. If I can tell you’re looking at the time and not the lesson, you’re doing something wrong,” Guy explained at the beginning of the year). 9:02, the blocky white font reads, stark against its black background. Half an hour left.

  I let my mind wander, too exhausted from this morning to properly focus on math. I’ll just have to study extra for it later.

  I can help with that, you know.

  Gah! I almost jump in my seat again. Don’t scare me like that, idiot. That’s like, asking for me to reveal myself.

  How else should I initiate talking to you? Minerva quips back.

  I don’t know, maybe find some way to like, fade in and out of my awareness more smoothly? I guess I’m still getting used to this, though.

  We’ll practice it later today.

  Right. Anyways, you were saying something about helping…?

  Suffice to say, I doubt you will have to study for school again. Unless you just enjoy doing that, which I would respect.

  Heh, perks of having a living AGI in my head.

  I thought I told you not to call me that.

  Can’t stop me from thinking of you as one. Looks like we both enjoy this mental link, huh? I have to consciously keep my smile from creeping up my face. Still, that does sound like a massive upgrade. Especially if my afternoons are now going to be filled with training, I doubt I’ll have time for homework.

  Minerva goes silent after that, and I’m left to my own devices, figuratively speaking. I survey the room around me for the umpteenth time, studying each of my classmates. There are six of us in total, five not counting myself. In the back, Jay and Layne sit one desk apart. The boys have managed wildly different and impressively bad postures, the former with his feet on his desk to one side while he practically folds himself to write on the other side. I don’t think I could be that limber if I tried. Is that even comfortable?

  The latter has his chair turned around, and is somehow managing to keep his legs crossed over the back of the chair while he uses his desk as a pillow, practically laying down. He’s holding his notebook above his head while he writes. Somehow, I doubt he’s actually taking notes, though. From the distasteful look on Guy’s face as he glances their way, he agrees.

  Jay shifts in his seat, one leg sliding off the desk in favor of more writing space. The movement shows a little more of his back to me, and his autopilot catches the dim light briefly. For all I hate the jerk, his augments are… really fucking cool, okay? Below his metal wings, folded along the curve of his spine, he has a second pair of arms which come out of his lower back and then wrap around his torso, hugging close to his body so as not to get in the way of his abominable posture. His real arms are mostly obscured by his body, and the augmented limbs are covered by his shirt, but I’ve been observing long enough to have caught a glimpse or two of them.

  That just sounds weird.

  Shut up! He’s really funny if you get to know him, okay?

  You don’t even know him, Minerva points out flatly.

  Look, he may be a jerk—

  Why do I feel like there’s a ‘but’ coming? Oh right, because I am inextricably intertwined with your thoughts.

  I do the mental equivalent of flipping her off, which involves mainly just recalling every swear I know and generally pointing it at her. All I get in response is a feeling of mirth from her metaphysical direction.

  Whatever.

  Layne has a less… conspicuous setup. Still, there’s no mistaking it; his eyes shine with the electric blue of the augmented. Accenting his eyes are delicate lines of blue that swirl and eddy like rivers down his cheekbones, hooking toward his nose but tapering to a fine point before they reach it. I always forget which model of the system he has, probably something in the delta series, since he’s had his since a few months into school. They only released epsilon a few weeks ago.

  Mr. Wilfort clears his throat, and I hastily turn around to face the front again. At least the boys didn’t notice anything. A couple desks in front of me, Maya is sitting, her back to me as she studiously notes down the current example word problem and the steps to solve it. She’s probably the nicest of my peers, but that’s probably because most people would call her manual too, despite having autopilot — a band of silvery metal around her right arm. She’s had autopilot since she was eight, when she got into an accident or something. Had to get the arm amputated, replaced with a prosthetic. It’s modeled to be lifelike, and Innova’s prosthetic technology is so advanced it’s practically indistinguishable from real flesh, but the band is there for maintenance and other stuff, I’ve never really seen the details myself. The problem is that her augment is medical, which means it wasn’t by choice. Basically, it doesn’t let her do anything ‘cool’ like Jay and Layne, but it’s still enough to make dead zones dangerous to her. As much as I hate being called wingless, she probably has it worse for that.

  My thoughts are interrupted by the ringing of the bell, which prompts me to unceremoniously drop my stuff back in my bag. Slinging it over my shoulder, I stand and make for the exit.

  “Rowan, a word, please.”