Reianna didn’t want to look at Banca, but the sight of her with no hair made Reianna look again. Some of the boys kept their hair close-cropped, but nobody had hair as short as Banca’s.

  It made sense, cutting it short so that it would grow back out evenly, but Reianna was surprised that Banca would have agreed to it. Everything Reianna knew about Banca was that her identity was tied up in her appearance.

  Her matching eyes and hair, her stunning beauty, how she was “strong, but not ugly bulky.” Banca’s hair had been one of her treasures, with its long and luxurious locks. Her hacked-up hairstyle hadn’t been attractive, but Reianna never would have believed she’d shave it down to a lilac fuzz.

  Reianna didn’t feel sorry for the girl, though. All she felt was annoyance that Banca was still beautiful with no hair.

  After watching Cayelyn and the others greet Banca and take her into their pod, Reianna called out, “Pods, forward!”

  The class moved as one, and they followed Reianna out of the dorm hall. Their noble friends from the other classes waited for them in the lounge. Banca joining Class E was the talk of the school, and none of them flinched when they saw her marching in Cayelyn’s group. That didn’t mean they didn’t stare, though.

  Trotting out and into the training fields, Reianna led them over to the Class E area, and the pods spread out. “Ryleegh, your lead!”

  “Yes, Reianna!”

  Ryleegh pulled away from her pod and stood at the front of the field, waiting for the rest of the students to get into their places. As it was Banca’s first time working out with them in the morning, Reianna was tempted to buck the rotation and take the lead herself so she could watch the girl, but she decided against it. Maintaining the schedule outweighed her curiosity.

  Taking a position so she could see Banca out of the corner of her eye, Reianna waited for Ryleegh to start the stretches.

  “We start with morning stretches,” Cayelyn explained. “Just copy whatever Ryleegh does.”

  “Why doesn’t Reianna lead it?”

  “She does sometimes, but we have a set rotation. Today is Ryleegh’s turn.”

  Reianna wanted to face forward—to ignore her new classmate—but her attention kept wandering back to Banca. Even though it was her first time doing the stretches, Banca’s motions and form were perfect, like she’d been doing them her entire life.

  Unable to help herself, Reianna began recording Banca. The smoothness of her motions was hypnotic.

  “Stop looking at her,” Fawna said.

  “I’m not.” Reianna shut off and deleted her recording.

  “Yes, you are.”

  “Fine. I just—”

  “Just don’t. Eyes forward, Miss Santi.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Reianna locked her eyes on Ryleegh, but until the end of the routine, she had to fight the urge to look over at Banca again.

  At last, the warm-up ended, and Reianna ran to the front of the gathered students. “This morning, we’re doing a speed run!”

  Several students groaned.

  “We can do sprint-slows at my pace if you guys are unhappy about it.”

  “No, Reianna!” several students said.

  “10k! Your fastest pace! If you don’t finish in under forty-five minutes, you’re a Yani at gamenight tonight!”

  Reianna pulled up the timer on her interface. “Go!” she shouted.

  The students took off and headed out into the fields. After waiting a few seconds, Reianna took off after them. As she passed other kids, she gave them pointers on their form.

  When she reached Banca, Reianna was once again blown away by how perfect the girl’s movements were. In her mind, Fawna scolded her again, so Reianna pushed ahead until she was in the lead spot.

  Normally, others weren’t able to keep up with her, but today, the plodding of feet echoed behind her. Glancing over her shoulder, Reianna saw Banca pacing her.

  Reianna picked up her pace.

  Banca still followed.

  Again, Reianna picked up her pace.

  Again, Banca followed.

  Soon, even the fastest of the other kids were left behind, but the distance between her and Banca never shrank.

  As each kilometer in their run passed, Banca never faltered. Reianna wanted to push ahead faster, but was already going at a pace she was unsure she could maintain.

  “Hit the barn…turn right…then follow…the wall around.” If Banca was that fast, Reianna would just let her finish first. It wasn’t a race, and Reianna had already beaten Banca when it mattered the most. If the girl was that desperate to win, she could have it.

  Reianna slowed her pace.

  Banca slowed her pace.

  The distance between them didn’t change.

  Reianna stopped and spun on the girl. Banca stopped as well.

  “What’s your problem?!”

  “You beat me.”

  “I did! Do you need me to beat you again?”

  Banca shook her head. “I…my skills haven’t…No. I can’t beat you.”

  “Then why are you following me?!”

  “Should I follow someone else, who can’t beat me, while you push ahead?”

  “You followed Ryleegh’s lead earlier!”

  “No, I followed your lead. I copied your movements.”

  Reianna’s face flushed. “What part of I hate you don’t you understand?”

  “If I’m going to live, if I’m going to survive, I need to be as strong as you. So, I need to do what you are doing.”

  “No! Things are different for you now, Banca. You’re a commoner. You’re in Gerenet-Shr’s class. You don’t have to survive alone. Cayelyn, Jame, Kolt, and Kamryn, they’re what you need to survive.”

  Reianna turned and ran again. Banca followed.

  Once more, Reianna stopped. She pushed Banca back. “Don’t follow me! I’m not in your pod. You’ll never get me to like you. Others might, but I never will. I won’t blame them. I won’t think less of them. So, it’s okay. Go be with them and befriend them. Just leave me the Yani alone.”

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  Reianna took off at a sprint. This time, Banca didn’t follow her. After a hard forty seconds of sprinting, Reianna had to drop her pace, but glancing behind her, Banca wasn’t there. She still stood in the spot where Reianna had stopped her.

  When the first twinge of guilt hit Reianna, she screamed. She would not feel guilty about treating that girl like she needed to be treated. Again, she picked up her pace and clenched her teeth.

  Banca needed to learn that she wasn’t alone. Her new world wasn’t like her old one. Gerenet-Shr had fostered a bond between the students of Class E. They would help each other. They would save each other.

  That bond had grown to include Emmah and Zophia, Luvina and Eoghwin, Uscar and the others. In time, it would grow naturally to include Banca.

  But not for her.

  She would never have a bond with Banca.

  Heading back into the training ground, as she crossed the goal, she collapsed to the ground. Thirty-nine minutes. She’d never broken forty before. She lay on the ground, panting. Her body screamed at her from her exertion, but she felt good. She felt…

  “Gaaah!” She screamed and hit the ground.

  Tears rolled down her cheek as the memory of being forced to race Fawna on all fours came into her mind, followed by Banca’s beating over Reianna losing on purpose so that Fawna wouldn’t be beaten for it.

  Reianna grabbed a handful of dirt and threw it. The wind blew most of it back on her.

  Why did Banca have to come into her life? Why couldn’t she disagree with Gerenet-Shr’s reasoning?

  The class was too grateful to him. They would never turn on him. They all knew that he was and would be the thing that saved them, that would train them to survive in their world.

  But that ill will brewing dissipated after his lecture. Reianna was still hurt, but she loved him too much not to forgive him. Deceiving him about what Banca had been doing to her was probably just as painful for him as having Banca show up in her room one night had been for her. It didn’t make it hurt less, but it made the hurt less permanent. She could forgive him.

  Standing up, Reianna brushed herself off. The others would be back soon, and she didn’t want them to find her wallowing, literally or metaphorically.

  The other kids trickled in, individuals at first, then as larger groups as the forty-five-minute mark approached. Banca came in with Cayelyn and Kolt. Her eyes slid over Reianna as Reianna greeted the returners.

  Reianna cupped her hands over her mouth. “Miya! Malcalm! You’ve got thirty seconds not to be Yani tonight!”

  The two stragglers pushed harder. Other students came to wait with Reianna, and they began a countdown with fifteen seconds left.

  “Five! Four! Three! Two! One! Over!”

  The two stragglers shot past Reianna, one second over her timeline.

  “I present to you tonight’s Yani!” Reianna yelled.

  The other kids roared.

  “Drownin’ water…banana peel gaggin…” Miya said, bent over with her hands on her knees, panting. Her breath was white in the cold, late-winter air.

  “I didn’t slip! Your legs got in my way!” Malcalm retorted.

  “Stubs and bubs, no flubs.”

  “I don’t care how short your legs are! I can still trip on them!”

  “Spread out more, next time,” Reianna said and patted Malcam’s back.

  Walking over to the rest of the kids, Reianna swirled her finger in the air. “Pod up! Let’s go bathe and eat.”

  The class and their friends got into their groups and went back inside. As they passed the cafeteria, they also passed by students from other classes already heading in to eat.

  “Dude! Check it out! Banca’s bald!”

  “Hahaha! She looks like a Yani ballsack!”

  Reianna looked over her shoulder to see Banca’s reaction, half expecting the girl to lash out at the boy mocking her, but she didn’t even look at them.

  Relieved that Banca didn’t drag Cayelyn and the others into a fight, Reianna pressed on. Once they got to the outcropping on their floor, the class split—some staying to talk with their noble friends longer, others heading inside to take a bath.

  Both Reianna and Fawna headed in. Crystal ran around them when they got back into their room, panting and wagging his tail. Kneeling down, Reianna said, “Hand!”

  Crystal put his paw in her hand, and she checked it for blackness. There was nothing.

  “Other!”

  He pulled his paw back, and Reianna inspected it as well—still clean. She inspected him, and his integration rate was still at 3%. “Good boy,” she said and ruffled his ears.

  “What did the lilac Yani say to you?”

  Reianna’s heart twinged as she looked up at her roommate. She’d wanted to protect Fawna’s innocence, but failed. Even though the words weren’t directed at Reianna, the acidic tone still ate into her.

  “Just…she doesn’t understand Class E. She thinks she’s still in competition with everyone.”

  Fawna laughed. “She thinks she can beat you?”

  “No. She knows she can’t, but she just wanted to imitate me to get stronger. Hey, Fawna.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Can we…not call her a Yani? I know you hate her just as much as I do, but she’s a classmate now. Plus…I don’t like hearing you call people that.”

  Fawna smiled. “Okay, Rei. Just for you. Do you want to bathe first?”

  Reianna looked at her dirt-covered uniform. “Yeah, I’ve got dirt all over me. If you don’t mind?”

  Fawna shook her head and clapped her hands. “No. Go on. Hey, Crystal, come here, boy!”

  The dog bounded over to Fawna, and Reianna watched them for half a second before heading into the bath and scrubbing the dirt and hate off of herself.

  Pods went at their own pace to breakfast, and Reianna didn’t see Banca there, nor when they got back to the dorm after breakfast. She didn’t see the girl again until Caylen’s pod walked into their classroom. After Cayelyn pointed Banca’s seat out to her, Banca sat without a word to anyone.

  Since Banca sat behind Reianna, Reianna wasn’t able to see how the girl reacted to Gerenet-Shr’s lessons, but he never once stopped to warn her, which meant she had to have been paying attention, even if she never answered one of his questions.

  The bell rang for lunch, and as she and her pod left the room, Xav and his pod came over. “Hey, Rei.”

  “What’s up?”

  The two pods fell in sync as they walked the hallways to the cafeteria, but all of them were quiet, and Reianna could feel them listening in on her and Xav’s conversation.

  “Have you heard what soup they’re serving with lunch today?”

  She shook her head.

  “It’s pumpkin.”

  Pumpkin soup. The soup that the nobles had dumped on Class E the first day of school.

  “Some of the others were wanting to welcome Banca with a bowlful on her head.”

  Reianna frowned. “We are not wasting food or bullying someone.”

  “I know. That’s why I’m telling you.”

  “Tell them I…”

  “What?”

  “I have an idea. Tell everyone but Cayelyn’s pod to get a second bowl and follow my lead. But if anyone so much as dares to spill a drop on her, they’ll be eating off the floor for a week.”

  Xav nodded. “Spread the word, guys.” He and his group split off. Speaking in street so Banca wouldn’t understand, they told the entirety of the class.

  During that food attack, Banca had been front and center for the action, and the class was still sore about it. While Reianna understood their anger and felt it herself, she didn’t want to stoop to the nobles’ level and waste food.

  “What are you going to do?” Fawna asked.

  “Just copy what I do.”

  As Xav had promised, pumpkin soup awaited them at the cafeteria line. Reianna wondered what Banca must have been thinking when everyone but her and her pod asked for a second bowl.

  Still taking the lead, Reianna went and sat in the section that had become the Class E area of the cafeteria, on the far side of the room, so they had to walk the farthest once they got their food and once more to return their trays.

  Reianna sat and waited for everyone else to sit as well. Banca sat at the table in the furthest back, next to the wall. Cayelyn sat beside her, Kolt sat across from her, and Jame and Kamryn filled in around them. Without a word, Reianna took her second bowl of soup and carried it over to Banca.

  Everyone’s eyes were on her as she lifted the bowl, as if she was going to pour its contents on Banca’s head, then placed it in front of her instead. Reianna turned and went back to her seat. The rest of the class, except for Banca’s pod, followed suit.

  Twenty extra bowls of soup sat in front of the girl, and she looked at them in confusion.

  “Don’t waste food,” Reianna said.

  Banca looked at all of the soup in front of her. She set her fork down and put her hands in her lap.

  Kolt grabbed one of the bowls and drank it down. Cayelyn took one and finished it off as Kamryn and Jame followed suit.

  “Don’t waste food,” Kolt said, taking another bowl.

  “Don’t waste food,” Cayelyn agreed, taking another for herself.

  “Don’t waste food,” Jame and Kamryn said as they took their second bowl.

  When her pod went back for a third bowl, tears began rolling down Banca’s cheeks.

  On their fourth bowl, Banca picked one up as well, though she didn’t repeat Reianna’s mantra. She quietly drank it and added the empty bowl to the pile her pod had made.

  Kolt and Jame finished the last of the bowls, then divvied up the empty bowls so that all five members of the pod had the same amount to take back to the dirty dishes window.

  Banca’s tears stopped, and some of the stiffness in her had vanished as well. Reianna cleaned up her tray and left the cafeteria with her pod in tow. She loved her classmates. She hoped that they could give Banca what she needed, because Reianna knew she couldn’t.