Yeah. First day, first class, S-plus anomaly with a hand-holding exception and a terrifyingly stacked support team. I take a breath, grip my pen, and wait for the instructor to start.
I pick an aisle seat, third row from the back—close enough to see, close enough to the door that my lizard brain stops screaming. Forge jackets fill in around me, navy and gold everywhere. First-years only, but there's that hum you get when nobody in the room is under B-class. Tiny leaks of power, a faint buzz in the air. No weak links here.
A girl drops into the seat diagonally ahead of me—copper-brown skin, curls in a puff, nose ring, a notebook that looks like it's seen war. She plunks a little metal dragon on her desk. It stretches, blinks, curls its tail around her pen.
I blink.
She catches me looking and grins. "Articulation and micro-kinetics," she whispers. "He's mostly cosmetic. He won't bite your ankles. I'm Rue."
"Sol," I whisper back. "He's cute."
"His name is Gasket," she says solemnly. "Nice to meet you, Sol-the-Echo. If you pass out or start zapping, I've got a fire blanket and two grounding clamps."
"You… what?"
"I live on your damaged hallway," she says. "Facilities briefing was thorough. You okay now?"
"Working on it," I admit.
"Same," she says cheerfully. "We can trade coping mechanisms later."
Before I can answer, the room quiets. Someone steps into the doorway.
Prof. Kaur. Again.
Same House Forge jacket with the sleeves shoved up, same tired eyes, same comm band with way too many mods. She drops her satchel on the desk with that familiar thump.
"Morning, Forge," she says. "Yes, it's me again. You did not escape me after orientation; I'm your Foundations instructor too. Condolences."
A couple of people laugh nervously. She taps her band; her name and course title flare on the wall.
PROF. S. KAUR
Hero Foundations I – House Forge
Her gaze sweeps the room, fast and sharp. When she hits me, there's a flicker of recognition—ah, my Echo—and a tiny nod. Then she moves on.
"First order of business," she says. "Welcome to the least populated House at Aeternum. Roughly ten percent of students get sorted Forge. You are the ones who like systems, scaffolds, and asking 'why' three times in a row until people regret speaking to you."
A low ripple of laughter; she smiles, just a little.
"We stay small on purpose," she continues. "Radiant can stack beam clashes to the ceiling. Veil can fill a ballroom with spies. Tempest and Terra can wrestle storms and fault lines. Forge? We are the bottleneck. We design the systems everyone else has to live inside."
She lets that sit.
"Second," she says, "reminder from orientation: your classification letter is one axis. It is not the axis."
She taps her band again; the three overlapping circles—SKILL, POWER, JUDGMENT—appear.
"This class is about everything that doesn't fit neatly on your League power report."
She glances at me once more when she says that, then snags the front of the desk and hops up to sit on it.
"For the record," she adds dryly, "Aeternum doesn't take below B-class powers. Congratulations, you all clear that bar. Some of you are A-class. Some of you are… more exotic shapes on the graph."
Half the room instinctively tries to look at me and then freezes when she lifts a finger.
"Eyes front," she says mildly. "We've already established in orientation that we don't gawk at our classmates like rare zoo specimens. Extra reading is still on the table as punishment."
Heads snap back to the board. Rue mouths I love her at me.
"Good," Kaur says. "Now. You already know the usual spiel from the welcome assembly. I'm not going to repeat it.
"Today we're doing three things: expectations, a tiny amount of syllabus, and a diagnostic that doesn't affect your grade but absolutely affects how much I bother you."
My band buzzes; a packet labeled FOUNDATIONS I – FG DIAGNOSTIC pings into my feed.
"Forge," she says, "is about systems thinking. So your 'test' is questions. No multiple choice, no trick wording, just you and your brain. Twenty minutes. Honest answers. I don't care if it's bullet points or emotionally charged paragraphs."
She starts pacing slowly as she talks.
"Also, House reminder from orientation: I take accessibility seriously. Physical, cognitive, sensory, emotional. If you have diagnoses, accommodations, or just weird brain settings, tell me. Forge is where we build structures around reality, not pretend it doesn't exist."
That lands hard in my chest. Again.
"And yes," she adds, "what happened in the East Tower yesterday is part of that reality. No, we're not dissecting it today. Not until my Echo is more than twelve hours out from a medically induced nap."
The corner of my mouth twitches. A couple of kids who clearly didn't know I was in the room suddenly put it together and go very still.
"Open your diagnostics," Kaur says. "Answer as best you can. When you're done, sit back and breathe. Don't peek at your neighbors. I'll be doing my usual creep-walk through the aisles, pretending to check your progress while actually mapping where you store tension."
Notifications buzz all around. I tap my band.
First question: Describe your power in your own words. Not the League's. Yours.
Okay. We've done this once already, in my head; this time it goes on record.
Echo-Blooded: Archive-type.
My brain/body takes "snapshots" of other powers when I'm exposed to them. I don't get full copies, more like weakened echoes. They store somewhere inside me and I can "pull" them under certain conditions. Feels like being a walking, slightly feral API with incomplete documentation.
I grimace and keep going. Three situations where using your power would be wrong even if it would work. One thing that scares you about your power. One thing that excites you. In a crisis, what do you notice first? What do you miss?
I lose track of time answering. Somewhere in there, Kaur passes my row. She doesn't look at my band, just at my posture. I realize I'm hunched; I force my shoulders down. She gives a tiny approving nod and moves on.
"Time," she calls eventually. "Freeze your answers. I've got them."
A soft chime confirms submission.
"Breathe," she says. "That's the hardest thing I'll ask you to do today."
A visible exhale rolls through the room.
"Since most of you are allergic to volunteering," she adds, amused, "I'll bribe you. Three people share one answer, you get first pick on lab scheduling in week three. No trauma-dumps, just a snippet."
Rue's hand shoots up like it's spring-loaded.
"Worth it," she mutters.
"You, with the micro-dragon," Kaur says, pointing. "Go."
Rue straightens. "Rue Santos, articulation and micro-kinetics. Something that scares me about my power is that I can adjust other people's tech without them noticing. Little tweaks, big consequences. I'm afraid I'll 'fix' something in the moment and only find out later that I broke it at the worst time."
Kaur nods. "Good. Systems impact awareness. We'll hit invisible modifications and consent in week five."
Two more share—magnet boy with pacemaker fears, time-slow girl afraid of trapping people. Each answer makes my own feel less like an outlier and more like part of a pattern.
Kaur looks satisfied.
"Here's the Forge version of the welcome speech," she says. "All of you are strong enough to be here. None of you are safe enough to be unsupervised. That includes me. Our job is not to pretend otherwise. Our job is to build systems so that when—not if—something goes sideways, the fallout is survivable."
Her gaze snags on me for half a beat, then moves on.
"We don't flinch away from what our powers can do," she says. "We make them boringly reliable. Radiant can have their dramatic explosions. We build the rails they explode on."
Rue whispers, "Blasphemy," and Gasket sneezes a spark.
"Homework is in your feed," Kaur finishes. "Just a short reflection, three questions, max a page. Next class we start hard-light basics and emergency chain-of-command. Class dismissed. Walk. Do not sprint. I know where you live."
Chairs scrape, bags zip, noise spikes.
I stay put for a second, letting the rush clear. No rescue party; they'd said at breakfast they wouldn't pick me up again until lunch. Independence practice, Leo had called it. "We'll swoop for food."
I sigh, tap my band, and pull up my schedule.
MONDAY – YEAR 1, HOUSE FORGE (VEGA, SOL)
08:00–09:00 — Opening Assembly (Auditorium) ✅
09:30–10:30 — Hero Foundations I (House Forge – Kaur) ✅
10:45–11:45 — Power Control & Safety I (Mixed Houses – Training Hall C)
12:00–13:00 — Lunch (Off-Campus Pass – Aranda Family Escort)
13:15–14:15 — Hero History & Systems I (Mixed Houses – Lecture Hall E)
14:30–15:30 — Echo Observation & Integration I (Small Group – Med/Research Annex)
15:30–??? — "Strongly Encouraged Study/Rest Block"
Cool. One checkmark down, one class to survive before I'm allowed to eat my first official "college hero" In-N-Out with my emotional support twins.
I stand, sling my backpack over one shoulder. Rue falls in step as we head for the door, Gasket now perched on her collar like a smug gargoyle.
"So," she says. "Fire blanket buddy slot still open, or are you booked solid with S-plus twins and Veil chaos?"
"I think I have a rotation," I say. "But yes. Always yes to fire blanket buddy."
"Excellent," she says. "Kaur loves over-prepared Forge kids. It's like catnip."
At the stairwell, we split. She peels off toward an upper-floor lab, I follow the signs downward to the Training Halls.
TRAINING HALLS A–D →
The air gets cooler, more echo-y, the further down I go. Heavier doors. Better soundproofing. Somewhere distant, something thuds against reinforced walls.
Outside Training Hall C, a cluster of first-years mills around—Radiant red, Hearth greens and browns, Veil black, my Forge navy. A Radiant boy bounces light between his hands; a Hearth girl is idly hardening and softening a patch of floor tile with little pulses of power. A Veil kid edges into a shadow and then back out when a ceiling sensor chirps at them.
I hover near the wall, trying to look like I belong here.
The door hisses open. A sweaty class spills out, arguing about who overshot the target. Behind them, the instructor appears—broad shoulders, dark curls, Radiant crest with a little Forge pin at his collar, thick insulated gloves in one hand.
"Next group," he calls. "Inside. Find a boundary line, stay behind it until I say otherwise. If you explode prematurely, I deduct cool points."
We file in.
Training Hall C is big and modular—gridlines on the floor, retractable barriers around the edges, sensors hanging like little metal spiders from the ceiling. A chunk of the floor is roped off with a glowing yellow perimeter.
"Welcome to Power Control & Safety I," the man says once we're in. "I'm Instructor Moreno. Radiant by birth, Forge by paperwork. I handle fire safety, blast math, and yelling nicely when you're dumb with your output."
His name blinks overhead when he taps his band:
INSTR. L. MORENO
Power Control & Safety I – First-Year Cohort
"You've all cleared the entry bar," he says. "B and A-class only, no C-class, no 'my power only works when Mercury's in retrograde.' You can all do real damage. My job is to make sure you can also all not do damage, on purpose."
His gaze sweeps the room. When it slides over me, there's a split-second of recalculation—oh, that Echo—but he doesn't linger.
"You already did the soul-searching in Foundations," he says. "Here, we do physical calibration. Today's mission is simple: find your one."
He taps his band; a scale appears on the wall.
0 – Off | 1 – Minimal | 5 – Working Level | 10 – Full Output
"Every power in here has a one," he says. "Barely on. Candle flicker, not bonfire. Ember, not wildfire. Your job this term is to find your one, hold it, and get back to it reliably. If you can't find one, you never touch five in my hall. Ever."
Radiant kids look personally offended. A Hearth boy winces like he's already imagining having to hold back. A Veil girl just smirks.
"House pods," Moreno calls, pointing. "Radiant, far line. Hearth, on the anchored mats. Veil, where the sensors can still actually see you. Forge, near line with me. Echo, you're with Forge but you're on the yellow stripe, not the firing line."
That last bit is clearly for me.
I drift to the edge of the Forge cluster—a handful of navy jackets I don't know yet. The boy closest to the actual line has dark skin, a buzz cut, and a slim metal ring hovering lazily over his palm, rotating like a slow coin toss.
Moreno plants himself in front of us, gloved hands on his hips.
"Forge first," he says. "You're the ones I want calibrated before anyone lets you write protocols."
The boy with the ring raises a hand. "Respectfully, sir, I've never written a protocol in my life."
"You will," Moreno says. "Forge builds rails. Everyone else either rides them or crashes into them."
Then his eyes flick to me. "Vega. Echo note."
My spine goes straight. "Yes, sir?"
"You are observation-only today," he says, firm but not unkind. "League clearance. That means: dampener stays on, no deliberate copying, no output attempts. You do not step over the yellow stripe. Your job is to watch calibration and find your internal one—what 'barely paying attention' versus 'about to grab' feels like. You tell me after if you notice the difference. Understood?"
That actually sounds… manageable.
"Yes, sir," I say.
"Good. Attention control is still control. Don't underestimate it."
He claps once. "Okoro, you and the toy are up. Tiny output only."
The boy—Okoro—steps onto a marked line, hand palm-up. The metal ring rises a little higher, spinning lazily.
"Power on to one," Moreno says.
The ring's wobble smooths out into a clean, even rotation. Okoro's shoulders relax as he settles into that barest hum of power.
"Off."
The ring drops neatly into his waiting hand.
"Nice," Moreno says. "Next."
He cycles through the Forge pod: a hard-light kid makes the thinnest possible shield outline; a girl with kinetic barriers raises a faint shimmer around a single cone; a tech empath gently "wakes up" a gauntlet without activating it.
From my stripe, I watch. Not the way I usually watch—diving for the "shape" of their powers like a magpie after shiny things—but the way Moreno asked: surface-level. I practice sliding my awareness up and down like a dial inside my own head.
Zero is looking at their shoes, not their powers. One is noticing glow, motion, breath, without letting my vision tinge gold. Two is where the familiar itch starts, the urge to catalog, to store.
I keep yanking myself back to one.
Moreno doesn't call on me, doesn't ask for a demo, just occasionally flicks a glance my way to make sure I haven't inched over the stripe.
We rotate Houses. Radiant kids produce the tiniest glows, just enough to cast a faint shadow. Hearth students send little pulses through the floor, firming or softening a single tile instead of raising walls or craters. Veil practices "soft presence," stepping their aura up and down while the ceiling sensors track them, like learning to use a dimmer switch on their own existence.
By the time he calls, "Dismissed," my brain feels lightly sanded and weirdly… organized. I didn't grab anyone's power. I know, with embarrassing clarity, the line between "just watching" and "about to Echo."
"Vega," Moreno says as we're filing out. "Yellow stripe worked?"
"Yes, sir," I say. "Zero, one, two. No… downloads."
He nods once, satisfied. "Good. Keep that dial in mind for Echo Observation this afternoon. And hydrate."
"Yes, sir."
In the quieter hallway outside, I lean against the wall for a moment and check my band.
Hero Foundations: ✅
Power Control & Safety: ✅
Next: lunch.
As if on cue, three messages ping in quick succession.
DIANA: LUNCH RUN. Parking Garage B, Level 3. I have secured the family car.
LEO: In-N-Out initiation time 😈 You are getting a double-double. This is non-negotiable.
LÍA: Downstairs. Seatbelt or I revoke your Echo privileges.
My stomach growls so loudly a passing Hearth kid looks over. I push off the wall, roll my shoulders out, and follow the little blinking route on my band toward Garage B instead of the cafeteria.
Two classes down, one "one" found, no hallways destroyed, and an off-campus pass with the current strongest twins in the school. For a first morning at the most prestigious hero college on the planet, that's… honestly better than I dared hope.
———
I follow the little line on my band toward Garage B, trying not to overthink the fact that it's labeled OFF-CAMPUS PASS – ARANDA FAMILY ESCORT like I'm a package being signed out.
The crowds thin as I leave the main academic cluster—fewer students, more staff, more service drones humming past with crates. The noise drops from cafeteria-level roar to parking garage echo. Door, stairwell, concrete. The air smells like metal, ozone, and the weird lemony cleaner they use on every surface here.
LEVEL 3 →
I push through the door, squinting at the shift from bright hall to open ramps and sunlight slanting in from one side. Rows of sleek academy vehicles sit plugged into charging stations, each marked with House crests and department logos.
My band pings: [PARKING BAY B-17] with a little arrow.
I'm halfway there when someone steps out from between two cars and blocks my path.
"Hey. Archive."
I stop so fast my sneakers squeak.
It's a girl—tall, broad-shouldered, wearing a Radiant jacket unzipped over a tank top, dark blond hair braided back tight. Her House crest gleams on one side; the other side has a little enamel pin of the Aranda twins' stylized dragon-sun logo. Her comm band is scuffed like it sees a lot of use. Third-year stripes on her sleeve.
Her eyes flick down my body, taking in the Forge crest, the dampener, the slightly-too-new blazer.
"Huh," she says. "Smaller than the hallway footage made you look."
"Oh," I say, because my brain is very helpful. "Uh. Hi?"
She doesn't move. "You Vega?" she asks, even though she obviously knows.
"Yes?"
She steps a little closer, just inside my bubble. Heat rolls off her skin in a way that's not entirely normal—Radiant hum, low-level.
"Name's Kenzie Vale," she says. "Third-year. Radiant. B-class." She taps her crest like a badge. "I just wanted to get a look at you before the rumor mill made you bigger than you are."
That… doesn't sound ominous at all.
"I have—uh, I have to meet—"
"The twins," she finishes for me, smiling without warmth. "Yeah. I know. Everyone knows. Lía and Leo Aranda, current top S-class pair. League princess and prince. Children of Aurora Prime. And somehow, on your first real day, you get their tower, their House's golden ticket, and a personal family escort off-campus."
Her gaze sharpens.
"Funny," she says. "Some of us have been here three years and still haven't been invited up once."
My stomach dips. "I… didn't ask for that," I say carefully. "I just—woke up there."
Kenzie laughs. It's short and sharp. "Yeah, I saw the med report summary," she says. "Poor fragile Echo. Had a little zap and woke up with a private suite and the queens of the school cooing over you like a lost puppy."
The flush crawls up my neck before I can stop it. "I didn't— I didn't 'zap' on purpose," I say. "I panicked. And it was an accident. And I'm on observation-only, so—"
She rolls her eyes. "Relax, Archive. I'm not scared of you." She leans in closer. I instinctively lean back until my shoulder bumps the concrete pillar behind me.
"But I am pissed off," she adds softly. "Because there are kids in Radiant who have been bleeding for this program since they were twelve. Training camps, junior leagues, competitions. People who actually match the twins' stream." She taps her chest. "We're frontline. We take hits. We don't… glitch in hallways and get handed everything because we're rare."
My heart's beating too fast. My brain is cataloguing every exit, every security camera. My OCD pings at the thought of touching the garage floor.
"I didn't take anything from you," I say. My voice comes out smaller than I want. "They just—chose to help me."
Her jaw flexes. "Yeah," she says. "They did choose. That's the part I'm testing."
Before I can ask what that means, she plants one hand flat against my shoulder and shoves.
I go down hard. Knees first, then palms. Skin scrapes against rough concrete; pain spikes bright, stupid hot. My brain immediately throws up a screaming contamination alert—floor, dirt, whatever's been on this surface—and I have to swallow a gag, breathing through my teeth.
"Oops," Kenzie says blandly. She hasn't even broken stance. "Careful. Wouldn't want you to short the whole deck, right?"
I blink up at her, heart racing so hard the dampener buzzes.
"Why?" I manage. "Why are you—doing this?"
She looks genuinely surprised for half a second. "Because somebody has to," she says. "You think the Arandas don't already have enough pressure? League, House, family, expectations? Now they've got an Archive to babysit. Someone with the rarest subtype on record who can't even walk to lunch without an escort and a medical file."
Her lip curls.
"You're a liability," she says. "To them. To everyone who has to stand next to you on a field. And if they're too soft to see it, someone else needs to put you back in your lane."
She takes a step forward like she might do it again. Something in me flinches—a little electric prickle under my skin—but the dampener keeps it down, a hiss behind glass.
"I'm not trying to be their… anything," I say, voice shaking. "I just want to learn how not to hurt people. That's literally the point."
"Then consider this a pop quiz," she says. "Question one: when someone pushes you, do you fry them? Or do you stay on the ground and hope your S-class guardians swoop in to save you?"
I hate that my eyes sting. I hate that my palms hurt and my brain is screaming get up get up get up, you're touching the floor, and I hate that I keep thinking:
If I had my electricity, would she still be doing this?
I don't move.
Kenzie snorts. "Thought so," she says. "Word of advice, Vega? The twins are heroes. Legends in the making. They don't need dead weight hanging off their capes. If you care about them at all, you'll keep your distance. Let them work with people who don't… break."
She starts to turn away—
—and stops, leaning down just enough that I can feel the heat of her power close to my face.
"And if I see you dragging them down," she murmurs, "I'll make sure Echo or not, you remember your place."
My hands curl on the concrete. The scrape burns.
"Hey!"
The shout cracks across the level like a whip. Kenzie straightens. Footsteps, quick and furious, slap against concrete. A car door slams somewhere nearby.
Leo's voice, closer now: "Back up."
I twist around. Leo is striding toward us, Radiant jacket half-zipped, hair wind-mussed like Diana took the last corner too fast. His whole posture is wrong—none of the usual lazy slouch, just straight lines and coiled heat. Behind him, Diana is jogging, tablet in one hand, keys in the other. Her expression goes from what did you do now, cousin to murderously flat in half a second when she clocks me on the ground.
"Wow," she says. "We were gone for, like, five minutes."
Kenzie lifts her chin, expression smoothing into something carefully respectful. "Aranda," she says. "I was just—"
"Harassing my teammate," Leo cuts in. His voice is low and nothing like the joking drawl I'm used to. The air around him wavers faintly with Radiant heat. "On school property. In a monitored area."
Kenzie's mouth tightens. "I was just talking to her. She slipped."
Diana snorts. "Right, the classic 'she slipped into both palms and both knees while your hand was on her shoulder.' Totally believable."
Leo reaches me without looking away from Kenzie and offers a hand. I stare at it for a second—my brain doing the OCD flinch, the electricity flinch, the everything flinch—then push myself up without touching him, using the pillar instead. My scraped palms complain; my pride complains louder.
"I'm okay," I mutter. It sounds unconvincing even to me.
Leo finally flicks a glance down, sees my scraped knees, and inhales slowly like he's counting to ten in his head.
"Kenzie Vale," he says. "Third-year. Radiant. B-class Terratype. Your coach talks about you a lot."
She straightens a little at that, like she can't help it. "Yes, sir."
"Funny," Leo says pleasantly, "she never mentioned 'picks on first-years' as one of your skills."
A muscle jumps in Kenzie's jaw. "I'm looking out for you," she says. "For you and Lía. There are plenty of Radiants who would kill to be on your team. You don't have to settle for—"
"Careful," Diana says, tone bright and deadly. "You're about to finish that sentence in a way that gets you reassigned to remedial PR."
Kenzie looks between them, clearly doing the math between her temper and her record.
"I'm saying," she settles on, "that not everyone thinks this is a good idea."
"Great," Leo says. "They can file a concern with Admin like adults. You don't get to vet people by shoving them into concrete."
His gaze goes cold in a way that reminds me abruptly who his mother is.
"And for the record?" he adds. "We didn't 'settle' for Sol. We picked her. House Forge picked her. The Director picked her. Mom picked her. You don't have standing to overrule that."
The word Mom lands heavy. Kenzie's eyes flick instinctively toward the nearest camera bubble in the ceiling, like she's wondering who might be watching.
Diana smiles without showing teeth. "Protocol says," she says lightly, "that any physical harassment of an Echo on day one gets automatically logged and reviewed. Especially post-incident. Lucky you, we didn't hit the emergency flag. Yet."
I swallow. I hadn't even thought to hit any kind of panic button; I just… folded.
Kenzie's fists clench, then unclench. "This isn't over," she mutters, but she steps back.
Leo's smile sharpens. "You're right," he says. "It's not. There's still a whole season for you to prove you're not the kind of hero who hits down instead of up. I'd focus on that."
For a second, I think she's going to say something else. Then she spins on her heel and stalks away, Radiant crest catching the light, braid swinging like a tail.
The moment she's out of earshot, my legs decide they're jelly. Diana is at my side instantly, steering me to lean against the nearest car instead of sinking back to the floor.
"Okay," she says briskly. "Quick check: concussion, spontaneous combustion, existential crisis?"
"Just… bruised," I say. My voice comes out thin. "And contaminated. And embarrassed."
Leo exhales hard, like he's been holding his breath since he saw me down. "I'm sorry," he says. "We should've met you at the door."
"That would defeat the independence practice," I say weakly, trying for a joke. It lands like a damp napkin.
Diana's eyes flick to my scraped hands. "We'll clean those before we even think about burgers," she says. "I have wipes in the car. Like five kinds."
"Six," Leo corrects absently. "Mother added the sterile ones after the Manila incident."
"Right." Diana squeezes my shoulder—over the blazer, no skin. "Look at me, Sol."
I do.
"That?" she says, jerking her chin in the direction Kenzie went. "That wasn't a test you failed. That was a third-year having a meltdown about her parasocial relationship with your new family. Not your fault. Not your job to fix."
The word family hits the same way Mom did. My throat does something stupid.
"I didn't… I didn't defend myself," I say. "I just froze."
"Good," Leo says.
I blink at him. "What?"
"Good," he repeats. "You're on a dampener. You're twelve hours out from a medical ward. The last time someone grabbed you in a hallway you turned the lights into a rave and almost fried your nervous system. Freezing instead of nuking the deck? That's progress."
I let that sit for a second. "Oh," I say quietly.
"Also," Diana adds, "you did the bravest possible thing for our In-N-Out run: you didn't make us late. Come on, Archive. Let'sgo decontaminate you and bribe your nervous system with fries."
She jingles the keys. Behind her, a sleek dark car flashes its lights—the Aranda family ride, all sharp angles and understated flex.
Leo opens the back door with a little flourish. "Princess seat," he says. "We'll do antiseptic and emotional processing on the road."
"Is this… safe?" I ask, eyeing the car, the garage, the cameras.
"With us?" Leo says. "Safer than the garage, apparently."
I huff out something that might one day grow up to be a laugh. "Okay," I say. "But I call dibs on window seat. And… hand sanitizer. A lot of it."
"Already in the cupholder," Diana says. "Along with alcohol wipes, bandages, and a printed list of Kenzie Vale's disciplinary points, because I am petty."
That gets a real laugh out of me, shaky but genuine. I climb into the car, careful with my scraped knees. Leo slides in beside me; Diana takes the driver's seat like she was born behind the wheel.
As we pull out of the bay, the academy shrinks in the rearview mirror, and the road to greasy, salty, off-campus normality opens ahead. Two classes, one bully, zero catastrophic lightning events, and a promised double-double.
I lean my head back against the seat and exhale, the tension in my shoulders finally loosening a notch.
"Okay," I whisper, mostly to myself. "I can do this."
I'm still a bit twitchy, eyes fixed on the ragged hole in my new jeans and the shiny-red scrapes on my palms.
"Um," I manage, voice thinner than I expect. "Lía. Where is Lía?"
The question surprises me as much as them. It just… slips out.
Leo turns toward me immediately, the joke he was about to make dying on his lips. "Hey. She's okay," he says quickly. "She's in a meeting with Mother—hero scheduling, Echo protocols, all that fun. She couldn't get out in time, so we're the lunch cavalry."
I nod, but it doesn't land. My chest feels tight. Like there's not quite enough air in the car. I drag in a breath, then another, a little too fast.
It doesn't register as panic in my head—just a buzzing restlessness, like my whole body is on a five-second delay.
It's fine. She's just in a meeting. It's not a big deal. You don't need her here. You barely know her.
My fingers tremble anyway.
Diana twists around in her seat, eyes narrowing. "Okay, time-out," she says gently. "Sol, can you look at me for a second?"
I drag my gaze up from my scraped hands. Her face comes into focus.
"There you go," she says. "You're breathing a little fast. Not your fault, just data. Can we try a slower one together? In for four, hold for two, out for six. I'll count."
"I'm fine," I start to say, but it comes out a little breathless.
"Yep," she says, not arguing, already counting on her fingers. "In—two, three, four… hold—one, two… out—two, three, four, five, six."
I follow almost on reflex. The first breath shakes; the second is better. By the third, my shoulders actually drop.
"Good," she says, softer. "That's it. You're safe. Garage goblin is gone, you're with us, and no one's going to shove you again unless they want to deal with three very annoyed women and one Radiant drama queen."
Leo puts a hand over his heart. "Rude. But accurate."
I suck in another breath, slower this time. "Sorry," I mutter. "I don't know why I— I just… when you said she wasn't coming, it felt… wrong."
The word surprises me. Wrong, like a missing piece. Like the picture in my head of safe already quietly included her and my brain short-circuited when reality didn't match.
"You don't have to know why yet," Diana says. "You just got electrocuted, adopted, and bullied in under forty-eight hours. Brains get clingy when they're overwhelmed. It's allowed."
Leo's comm buzzes; he glances down, then smiles a little.
"Speaking of clingy," he says, "Lía says hi."
My head snaps up. "She—what?"
He taps his band and forwards the thread; Diana's screen lights up, and she reads aloud, half for me, half for drama:
LÍA: Status report.
DIANA: Rescued. Scrapes only. No discharge. En route to lunch.
A pause, then:
LÍA: Good. Please tell Sol:
1.She did nothing wrong.
2.I am proud she did not spark.
3.I am sorry I was not there.
The tightness in my chest stutters. "She's—proud?" I echo.
"Yes," Diana says firmly. "That's the word she chose. On purpose. You didn't explode, you used the dampener, you survived a bully and didn't turn the garage into a light show. That's a win in grown-up Echo math."
My breathing evens out another notch. I press my scraped palms together carefully, like I'm holding that list in place.
"Can you—um—tell her something for me?" I ask.
"Hit me," Diana says, thumbs already hovering.
"Say… 'Thank you. I'm okay. I'll bring you fries next time.'"
She grins and types.
DIANA: Message from Sol: "Thank you. I'm okay. I'll bring you fries next time."
Three dots. Then:
LÍA: Unnecessary. But accepted.
Another ping:
LÍA: Please reassure her I am not angry with her. I am angry with the situation. And with Kenzie.
Diana snorts. "Translation: she's making a list and Kenzie is at the top."
I let out a shaky, embarrassed little laugh. "Okay," I say. "That… helps. A lot."
"Seatbelt," Leo reminds gently. "Then burgers. That helps too."
I buckle up this time without fumbling quite so much. The band across my chest feels like a line pinning me back into my body instead of floating two inches above it.
As the car glides back onto the road and into real daylight, the academy shrinks in the mirrors. My breathing stays slow. My hands still sting, my jeans are still ruined, and I am absolutely not ready to unpack why the absence of one girl made my brain hit sirens—
—but I know she's out there, mad for me, texting fries instructions. And that makes the world feel a little less sharp around the edges.
———
I dig into the little pouch Diana passed back, fingers finally doing something useful. Antiseptic wipe, first. I tear it open with my teeth, unfold it, and start on my palms. It stings—sharp, clean, a different kind of burn than concrete and embarrassment. I move to my knee, dabbing around the torn denim, hissing under my breath.
By the time I'm done and go in with hand sanitizer—two pumps, rubbed in until my skin squeaks—my brain feels… clearer. The sting gives all the static somewhere to go.
Okay. Data: hurt, but clean. Contaminated → decontaminated. Check.
By the time we pull into the In-N-Out lot, my breathing's normal and my hands smell like lemon chemicals instead of parking garage.
The restaurant looks… weird.
The whole place is lit up, fryers humming, neon palm trees glowing—but the dining room is empty. No line, no chatter, no toddlers with ketchup faces. Just workers behind the counter, all in paper hats and red aprons, looking up as we walk in. One of them brightens like she's been waiting.
"Hi, welcome in!" she says, stepping right up to the register. "You can order whenever you're ready."
I glance around at the deserted dining room. "Is it… closed?"
"Temporarily reserved," Diana says under her breath, steering me toward the counter. "League security plus school PR. They didn't want your first off-campus lunch to turn into a livestream. Or a stampede."
"That's a thing?" I whisper.
"For S-class twins and one Echo?" Leo says. "Oh yeah. You'll see."
He steps up first, grin sliding back into place like it was only ever on pause.
"Double-double, animal style, extra grilled onions, fries animal style, chocolate shake," he rattles off.
Of course.
The cashier taps it in without blinking.
Diana goes next. "Cheeseburger, no tomato, extra pickles, fries well-done, vanilla shake," she says. Then, pointedly: "And can we get the fries in a separate bag, please? For contamination control," she adds in an undertone just for me, like a little secret.
Then Leo turns to me, eyes bright, practically vibrating. "Okay, Archive," he says. "Hit me with it. Double-double plain, right? Meat, cheese, bun?"
I freeze, mid-breath. "How'd you know?" I blurt, genuinely shocked.
He smirks and dusts off his shoulders like he's just pulled a rabbit out of a hat. "I'm good like that."
Diana reaches up and flicks the back of his head. "Don't let it go to your head," she says. "That's Lía's order too."
Warmth does a weird slow roll through my chest, like someone turned a dimmer up behind my ribs.
"Oh," I say, a little stupidly. "Um. Yeah. Double-double, plain, please." I clear my throat. "Pink lemonade. Regular fries and—"
"Chopped chilis on the burger," the cousins say in unison.
We all stop. I look at them. They look at each other.
"Okay, freaky," Diana says, but she's grinning.
The cashier just smiles patiently. "So that's a double-double, plain, with chopped chilis, regular fries, and a pink lemonade?"
"Yes, please," I say, cheeks hot but… in a good way.
Leo slings an arm over the back of my chair once we sit down to wait, careful not to jostle my knee. "Told you," he says smugly. "You fit."
I stare at the empty restaurant, the clean table, the workers calling out orders over the sizzle of the grill and feel the last of the garage shake off like dust. Stinging hands, pink lemonade, double-double plain with chopped chilis—
Yeah. For right now, that's enough.
———
They bring the food on those little red trays and my mouth immediately starts watering. It smells like melted cheese, toasted bun, salt, and faintly-orange sauce that will absolutely ruin your blazer if you drip it. My stomach does a full-body sigh.
We dig in. No witty banter, no heroic speeches. Just three starving supers demolishing burgers like overcaffeinated chipmunks. Fries disappear. Shakes go down. The cousins make happy little noises they'd probably deny under oath.
Halfway through my burger, I realize my jaw has unclenched for the first time all day. By the time I'm down to my last few fries, the buzzing in my brain is mostly gone. Just… warmth. Fullness. Salt.
I glance at Leo, then Diana, both busy torturing their fries in sauce, and a thought hits me so hard it almost makes me choke.
Lía's in a meeting. She didn't get to come. She told me it was unnecessary but accepted.
I wipe my fingers carefully on a napkin (once, twice, again because OCD says so), then reach back to my back pocket. The emergency twenty I always keep there crinkles between my fingers.
Before I can overthink it, I slide out of the booth.
"Where you going?" Leo asks around a mouthful of burger.
"Bathroom's that way," Diana points helpfully, the wrong direction.
I shake my head, cheeks already a little warm. "I'll be right back."
I walk up to the counter. The same cashier looks up and smiles, clearly recognizing me from five minutes ago.
"Hi again!" she says. "Need anything?"
I put the twenty on the counter, palms still faintly pink from the wipes. "Um. Double-double plain with chopped chilis," I say. "Fries. And a vanilla shake, please."
Her smile widens just a fraction, like she gets it immediately. "Same as your first order, but with vanilla instead of pink lemonade, right?" she says. "Is this… to go?"
"Yes, please," I say. My throat does that stupid tight thing again, but in the nice way this time. "It's for—"
I almost say my friend and then think of Lía's messages, her bullet-point reassurance, the fries request.
"—my person," I settle on, softly. "She couldn't come."
The cashier's eyes crinkle. "Got it," she says. "I'll make sure they're extra careful with the fries. Name for the order?"
"Lía," I say, and it feels… right. Like the last click of a puzzle piece.
"Perfect." She taps it in. "We'll call you in a minute."
I slide the twenty across the counter. She takes it, makes change, and I tuck the bills back into my pocket—emergency fund diminished but not gone.
When I turn back toward the booth, Leo and Diana are both watching me, matching little knowing smiles on their faces.
"What?" I ask, because my face is already heating up.
Leo lifts his pink lemonade. "Nothing," he says. "Just—welcome to the family tradition of 'thinking of the twin even when they're not in the room.'"
Diana props her chin on her hand. "You realize you just voluntarily spent your own emergency cash on Aurora Prime's heir," she says. "If my mother finds out, she's going to cry. And then adopt you harder."
My ears go hot. "It's just… fries and a burger," I mumble, sliding back into the booth. "She said it was unnecessary, but she accepted, so… statistically speaking, that's a yes."
Diana laughs. "Forge logic applied to friendship. I love it here."
The cashier calls, "Order for Lía!"
My heart does a weird little skip.
"I got it," Leo says, standing up before I can. "You stay. Avoid contamination. I'll supervise the bag integrity."
He trots off to the counter. I watch him pick up the neatly bagged food and the vanilla shake in a cardboard drink holder. The cashier says something; he grins, says something back, then returns and sets the bag on the table with a little flourish like it's sacred.
"Mission accomplished," he says. "Hero delivery pending."
I look at the bag, then at the shake, condensation already beading on the cup. "Thank you," I say, quiet.
"It was your idea," he replies. "We're just the logistics."
I glance at the name written on the receipt stapled to the bag—LÍA in neat block letters. For a second, I picture her in some conference room, listening to her S-class mother talk policy, unaware there's a double-double plain with chopped chilis and a vanilla shake waiting in the back seat of the family car.
From me.
Warmth flares in my chest, bright and steady.
I pick up my own pink lemonade and raise it a little. "To… House Forge," I say lamely at first, then correct myself. "To… my people. I guess."
Leo clinks his cup to mine. "To your people."
Diana joins in, grinning. "To your people, and their excellent taste in burgers."
We drink. Outside, cars roll past on the street like it's any other lunchtime. Inside, at an empty In-N-Out reserved just for us, my hands still sting, my jeans are still ruined, and there's a bully waiting back on campus who thinks I don't belong with them.
But there is also a bag on the table with Lía's name on it, bought with my crumpled emergency twenty. And that feels like a choice I made all by myself.
———
We're back in the car eventually, sun lower now, the world outside all heat ripples and freeway noise. I'm in the back again, seatbelt snug across my chest, clutching Lía's bag of food in both hands like it's some kind of sacred relic. The paper crinkles when the car hits a bump; I automatically adjust my grip so the burger doesn't slide.
Don't squish it. It has to make it to her intact. That's the whole point.
Diana's in the driver's seat, sunglasses on now, one hand loose on the wheel. Leo is beside me, scrolling his band, occasionally humming along to whatever soft pop playlist Diana queued.
I stare at the back of her head for a second, then clear my throat. "Um. Diana?"
She glances at me in the rearview. "Yeah, Archive?"
I look down at the bag, then back up. "Leo and Lía told me that I'll eventually get… sponsorship money? Or something? From brands. League. I don't really… understand the pipeline yet."
My fingers tighten on the paper. "Do you mind making sure it goes to my parents? They… they've been working for so long. They deserve it. Not me."
There's a tiny silence, like the air itself hits pause.
Then Leo snaps his fingers. "Oh! I knew there was something I forgot." He turns toward me, eyes bright. "Lía arranged something with Mother. Said to ask for your permission first."
My brain immediately goes to something terrible, like they've decided to adopt my student loans. "Ask my permission for… what?" I ask carefully.
He grins, softer than his usual showboat smile. "Moving your 'rents outta the projects and setting them up grand style," he says. "Mi familia es su familia style."
My heart stutters. "Wh—what?" I choke. "No, they— you can't just—"
"Relax," Diana cuts in gently, taking the next exit with a smooth turn. "No one's bulldozing their house without talking to them. Or you. This is more like… options menu. Mother has money, influence, and a frankly unhealthy love of redemption narratives. You tick all three boxes."
Leo nods, tapping his comm band. "Lía sent me the summary," he says. "And by 'summary' I mean a twenty-page doc with charts. Step one: verify you're okay with sponsorship cash not going into your personal frivolous spending account. Step two: set up a secure fund with your parents as primary beneficiaries. Step three: housing upgrade proposals."
My hands are shaking again, but for a different reason. "They— they wouldn't take it," I say automatically. "My parents. They're proud. And it's your family's money, and League money, and sponsor money and I haven't even done anything yet—"
"Ah-ah." Diana lifts one finger from the wheel. "Incorrect. You have, in fact, already done several things. One: survived being Echo-Blooded in a non-Echo world. Two: got into Aeternum on merit. Three: saved Kaur from having to explain to Mother why her shiny new Archive blew up on day one in a hallway."
"That last one is a bit of a stretch," I mutter, but my chest does a weird warm ache.
Leo leans his head back against the seat, eyes on the ceiling. "Look," he says. "Mother grew up with leaky roofs and food insecurity and no backup plan. Mom grew up in a country where the wrong power got you disappeared. They both crawled out of that and then spent the rest of their lives making sure other kids don't have to."
He glances at me. "You think they're gonna look at 'two exhausted Mexican-American F-class parents who raised an S-plus Echo and somehow kept her alive this long' and go, 'nah, leave them in the same zip code'?"
I press my lips together. My eyes sting. "They'll feel like a charity case," I say hoarsely. "Like they failed. Like they couldn't provide and had to be rescued by— by heroes."
Diana sighs, but it's soft. "Okay, so we don't frame it like that," she says. "We frame it as: 'The League is investing in the support system of a critical asset, and also your mom makes the best arroz con leche on the continent, and Mother wants visitation rights.'"
Despite myself, a laugh squeaks out, fragile and startled.
"So the sponsorships?" I ask. "You'll… reroute them?"
"If you say yes," she says. "We can set it so your appearance fees, branding deals, and prize cuts from future tournaments funnel into a family trust first. You still get a stipend—food, clothes, therapy, whatever you need—but the bulk builds security for your parents. Retirement, better place to live, medical stuff. All legit. Paperwork. Taxes. We do this a lot."
Leo shrugs one shoulder. "My 'personal' sponsorships cover, like, five percent of my life. The rest goes into League funds, House projects, and this big umbrella account Mother uses to bribe people into being safe."
"That's an oversimplification," Diana says. "But not wrong."
I look down at the bag in my lap. LÍA written in neat block letters. My emergency twenty, turned into food for someone who could buy the whole restaurant franchise without blinking.
"What if they say no?" I whisper. "My parents."
"Then we adjust," Diana says simply. "We make it college funds, community funds, whatever they will accept. We do not force. Ever." She catches my eye in the mirror. "Consent isn't just for powers, Sol. It's for money too."
The lump in my throat gets huge. "I just…" My voice wobbles. "They've done so much with so little. Mom cleaning offices at night. Dad doing two shifts. Saving every penny so I could have notebooks and bus passes and allergy meds. And now I'm here, in this car, holding her lunch, and you're talking about moving them out, and it feels like— like cheating."
Leo's expression softens in a way I haven't seen before. "Hey," he says. "You didn't cheat. You rolled a weird power and survived long enough for the right people to notice. Your parents didn't cheat. They tanked a nightmare difficulty mode and still got you to the spawn point. This?" He gestures vaguely at the car, the suit, the future. "This is what it looks like when the system actually does its job for once."
Diana nods. "Also, if you say no out of guilt, you're basically telling your parents, 'I had a chance to make your lives easier and chose suffering instead.' Which, like, very Forge of you, but maybe not the move."
I snort, watery. "Weaponizing guilt is illegal."
"Incorrect," she says. "It's how half of Forge gets their projects approved."
We hit a red light. The car hums quietly. I stare out at a normal little neighborhood—laundromat, taquería, tired palm trees. I picture my parents in our old apartment. The peeling wallpaper. The way the heater rattles in the winter. The way Mom always says, Es suficiente, mija. We're fine, even when her hands ache.
My grip tightens on the bag in my lap.
"Okay," I say, voice small but steady. "You can… set it up. Sponsorships, League money, whatever. Make it go to them first. Just… give me veto power if anyone tries to slap their faces on a billboard, okay?"
Diana grins. "Easy. 'No unauthorized parental branding.' Got it."
Leo fumbles with his band. "Texting Lía," he announces. "She's going to pretend to be all clinical about it in the doc, but she's been vibrating about this plan since your file hit the system."
My band buzzes a minute later.
LÍA: Thank you for trusting us. We will proceed carefully. Your parents deserve rest. You deserve ease.
Another line pops in, almost as an afterthought:
LÍA: And I am looking forward to meeting them.
I clutch the bag tighter, like the warmth in my chest needs something to anchor to. "Me too," I whisper, mostly to myself.
The car turns onto the road back toward the academy, towers glinting in the distance like a different planet waiting. I sit there, scraped hands in my lap, Lía's food cradled like an offering, and let myself imagine—for the first time in a long time—my parents in a place with no leaks, no sirens, no fear of the next bill.
Sponsorships, hero money, League logistics, House Forge spreadsheets. If it all means they get to breathe? Then yeah. They can have every cent.
———
The drive back feels shorter. One minute it's palm trees and freeway, the next the academy towers are rising up again, all glass and light and invisible shields. My comm buzzes with the auto-log: OFF-CAMPUS PASS – CLOSED. Like I've been checked back into some very fancy prison.
Diana pulls into the staff-and-family loop near Forge Tower. The car glides to a stop; the engine hum drops.
"End of field trip," she says, putting it in park.
I blink, a little dazed by the light shift, then remember the bag in my lap. The paper's warm from my hands. Vanilla shake condensation has dotted the drink holder.
I turn to Leo and gently press the bag and shake into his arms like I'm transferring a very small, very important bomb.
"You have class with Lía next, right?" I say. "Give this to her, please."
He opens his mouth—probably to tease, probably to make some smooth comment about how she's going to react—but I'm already popping my seatbelt. Before either of them can say anything else—before I can see whatever expression is on Diana's face in the mirror and overthink it to death—I duck out of the car.
"Thanks for lunch!" I call over my shoulder, already backing away, backpack bouncing against my spine. "See you after Echo stuff!"
"Sol—" Leo starts.
"Don't blow up any more hallways!" Diana yells instead, because of course she does.
I laugh, half wave, and then turn on my heel and head for the academic wing at a brisk almost-skip, letting the crowd swallow me up.
Next class: Hero History & Systems. New room. New people. New chance to prove to myself I can do something today that isn't panic, fry, or get shoved.
Behind me, in the car, there's a girl's name on a bag and a vanilla shake sweating in its holder. Ahead of me, for the first time, there's a future that doesn't feel completely out of my hands.
———
Leo adjusts his grip on the bag and shake as the car doors thump shut behind him. The Forge tower lobby is all cool stone and blue glass. Students move through in little currents—House jackets, comm band chimes, the distant hum of elevators.
He takes the stairs two at a time up one level, then leans against the wall outside Lecture Hall C.
Right on cue, the door opens and a small wave of upper-years spills out, laughing, arguing. Lía comes out last. Her hair is pinned up again, House Forge jacket back on, tablet tucked to her chest. There's a tightness around her eyes that means meeting with Mother plus three administrators and too many charts.
She spots Leo, opens her mouth to ask why he's loitering—
—and then her gaze drops to the bag and the drink carrier. She sees the name stapled to the side: LÍA.
She stops.
Leo pushes off the wall, suddenly feeling weirdly self-conscious for a guy who regularly gets punched through walls on live TV. "Delivery for you," he says, holding the bag out. "From Sol."
Her fingers tighten just slightly on her tablet. "From… Sol?" she echoes.
"Yeah." He nods at the receipt. "Used her emergency twenty. Ordered your exact thing on purpose. Double-double plain, chopped chilis, vanilla shake. Wouldn't even let us touch it."
Something flickers across Lía's face—surprise first, then something softer, something that looks suspiciously like fond.
"She should not be using emergency money on me," she mutters automatically. But she takes the bag with both hands, careful, almost reverent.
For a second, she just stands there, staring down at it like it's more complicated than beef and cheese.
"Did she… say anything?" she asks quietly.
Leo thinks of Sol clutching the bag in the back seat, nervous and determined and pink faced.
"She said," he replies, adopting a mock-formal tone to hide the tug in his chest, "'Please give this to her.' And then she ran away before we could tease her."
The corner of Lía's mouth lifts, small but real. "Very on-brand," she says.
She starts to turn away, then pauses. "Leo?"
"Yeah?"
Her fingers smooth the top of the bag once, a nervous little motion he's only ever seen when she's truly thrown. "Please tell her later," Lía says, eyes still on the grease-stained paper, "that I… liked the gesture. Very much."
Leo's grin goes wide and slow. "Oh, trust me," he says. "She's going to hear that."