The Over-Break System

’Four fucking hours. ONE Class.’

Apparently Professor Wallin thought four hours of Bloodlines, Refinement, and Resonance Plates counted as one perfectly normal Year Five Class. Benny had stopped pretending he wanted to be there. Gabby had declared herself done thinking for the day, and even Brance looked ready to agree.

After Class, Cynrik stared at the three failed-identification results on his Watcet. The more he compared them with Wallin’s notes, the more the extra warning on his own test bothered him. He hadn’t expected the Academy’s identification methods to work on an Æsir Bloodline, but the way his Plate had reacted was another problem entirely. Its silver Runes had turned black before the machine ’recovered’ without so much as a crack.

Brance’s voice broke into Cynrik’s mind link. {{Cyn. You’re going to walk into someone...}}

{{Then they should get out of the way.}} Cynrik shifted around a pair of slower Students without lifting his eyes from the display of his Watcet.

{{Or you could wait until we’re home before trying to solve the entire fucking lecture.}}

{{Wow, Brancie. Four hours with Wallin and you’re already an expert. Maybe you should teach tomorrow.}} Cynrik lowered his wrist when Selene steered him toward the side of the corridor, only to realize she wasn’t watching him at all.

Melody was up ahead, showing Benny something on her Watcet. He said something Cynrik couldn’t hear, and she laughed hard enough to nearly stumble into him. Benny caught her by the elbow, earning another laugh and a swat across his arm. Cynrik had seen them act like that hundreds of times.

’Then why the fuck does it keep bothering me?’ Claire. Sancaster. A handful of coincidences he couldn’t make fit anywhere else, with Melody’s name somewhere near the middle. But she was only guilty of having a good time with her boyfriend, and he knew better than to turn a suspicion into a verdict.

{{Darling.}} Selene squeezed his arm, bringing his attention back to her. {{You can stop staring now.}}

{{I wasn’t staring.}}

{{You were about to miss the turn because you were watching her.}} There was amusement in her voice, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. {{You still think something’s wrong.}}

{{I think something doesn’t add up. Different problem.}}

After glancing over to Melody and Benny, Brance looked back to his Brother. {{And what happens if she keeps acting exactly like Melody? How long are you planning to hold that against her?}}

’Heh. Straight for the throat, huh?’ Cynrik almost fired back with a smartass answer, but Brance wasn’t joking; Selene’s silence told him she wasn’t either.

{{I don’t hold it against her,}} he answered after a moment. {{If there’s nothing there, there’s nothing there. But I’m not gonna pretend those other things didn’t happen because I don’t like where they’re pointing.}}

{{Good,}} Selene replied. {{Then remember she’s still one of us while you’re figuring it out.}}

{{I know, Sel.}} Up ahead, Benny talked with both hands while Melody shook her head, laughing; Cynrik returned to his Watcet because watching them walk home wasn’t going to tell him shit.

Back at the dorm, Gabby was demanding food and a permanent ban on lectures with more than three diagrams, while Brance was reminding her that she had asked Wallin half of the questions for the lecture. Gabby shot Brance a scandalized look and declared that he’d obviously stopped loving her. Benny laughed, with Melody joining in as the two of them followed Gabby into the kitchen.

”Love you too, Sunshine,” Brance called out to Gabby as she turned around to give him a kiss on the cheek before sitting down on the couch.

”Heh, see? That’s what you get for encouraging her,” Cynrik told his Brother as he passed. Brance opened his mouth to argue, then shut it again when Gabby stretched across his lap.

”Are you two disappearing again?” Gabby asked, looking up from Brance’s lap as Cynrik and Selene walked down the hallway. ”Because if you are, I’m saving you both something. Last time Benny said he’d do it, there wasn’t a damn thing left.”

”I said I’d save them some,” Benny said from the kitchen. ”I didn’t say I’d defend it with my life!”

”Which is exactly why you’re never in charge of the leftovers,” Melody added, sounding entirely too pleased with herself.

Still laughing, Selene promised Gabby that she and Cynrik would try to make it back to the Academy for dinner. Brance was still glaring at his Brother, no doubt getting ready to list off all of the possible problems that could arise from Cynrik’s proposed activity. Cynrik raised a hand in the air and said, ”Yes, yes, Brancie. I’ll do my best not to blow up my workshop. Happy?”

”That’s a disturbing way to phrase it,” came the reply from behind him, followed by Gabby’s laughter as Selene pulled him into their room.

With the door shut, Cynrik checked the room’s protections for disturbed formations or traces of foreign Mana while Selene flopped onto the bed, sprawling across it as she opened several holograms on her Watcet. He found nothing out of place, but just as he reached the last readout, Selene laughed and rolled onto her side.

”Mom’s already asking when we’re coming over.” She held up her wrist to show him Cinyah’s message. ”We’ve been back at the Academy for five minutes, and she misses us.”

”Heh, that sounds like Mom, alright.” Cynrik leaned over to read the message, then went back to adjusting the protection he’d been checking. ”Tell her we can come by. I finished the Load Point at the cottage.”

For a couple of seconds, the only sound in the room was his Watcet chiming as he closed the security readout.

”Darling.”

He looked up to find Selene sitting upright, her attention no longer on Cinyah’s message but on him, staring as if he’d grown another head.

”What?”

”You finished the WHAT?”

”Oh, that.” He scratched the side of his head and tried not to grin. ”Last time we were there. Took a few tries, but it’s stable.”

”A few tries?” She swung her legs off the bed. ”You mean the thing you’ve been working on since we figured out how badly normal Shadow Realm travel sucks? The thing that kept doing all kinds of interesting shit to your test objects?”

”Interesting is one word for it.”

”Cynrik.”

”Yes, Selene?”

She reached out and hooked two fingers through his collar, pulling him close enough that he had a very clear view of her narrowed eyes. ”You’re showing me. And then you’re telling me how the fuck you pulled it off, before I decide you’re hiding something.”

-He has been obsessing over it, if that helps.-

”Seriously, TOBS?” Cynrik complained, earning a delighted laugh from Selene. ”You could’ve just kept your mouth shut, you know!”

-I could have.-

”Oh, fuck off.” He caught Selene’s hand before she could ask the fairy for a complete record of his experiments, taking them into the Shadow Realm the usual way as dark shadows rolled over their feet and swallowed the dorm.

They arrived inside Hárauður-Virki exactly where the Academy’s location in Reality dictated, and Cynrik let Selene get her bearings before pointing toward the surrounding Fortress. ”There. Same entry, same place. Haven’t changed a damn thing about that.”

One glance at the Fortress walls was enough; Selene looked back at him, already working out what the Load Point meant. ”You wouldn’t need to, would you?” she said slowly. ”If you can get from here to the cottage without walking across half the Realm, it doesn’t matter where we came in.”

’Hehehe, there she is.’ He knew that look: give her one piece of the problem and she’d start lining up the rest on her own.

”Exactly. I can’t step into the Shadow Realm at VSFA and step straight back into Reality at Pinhurst. Reality still decides where we cross over. But once we’re in here…” He lifted his wrist and brought up the stabilized coordinates he’d recorded near the cottage. ”That’s where the Load Points come in. I fix a location first, keep the anchor stable, and use it to move us across the Realm without making the trip on foot.”

Selene leaned in to study the Runic inscriptions on his Watcet, her shoulder pressed against his as she followed the lines on the screen. ”And how bad is the Mana cost?” she asked, looking up at him.

”Eh, define ’bad.’” He tilted the Watcet toward her so she could see the cost figures. ”Distance and weight both count against me. Bringing you along is one thing; hauling the entire crew is another. And if I forget something at Pinhurst? Wellll, I guess it wasn’t important enough to remember then, was it?”

He tapped the cottage’s coordinates. An intricate script of inscriptions appeared around the stabilized location point, showing Selene the space he’d locked in place. ”It’s not REALLY true teleportation, more a copy-pasting of how the transfer between the two realms works, so wormhole bullshit.”

”You sneaky bastard.” Selene laughed. ”We can get home without anyone knowing which way we went, can’t we?”

”What, you wanna walk halfway across the Realm and then explain to Mom why we haven’t eaten?” He held out his hand, and Selene took it after one last look at the inscriptions on his Watcet.

”Alright, Darling. Show me.”

Cynrik held Selene’s hand as he focused on the cottage’s Load Point. The anchor answered with familiar resistance, and he pulled her closer. He checked the coordinates and Mana required for the trip, but one last thought stopped him before he could activate the transfer.

”Oh, by the way, you haven’t eaten anything recently, right?”

”Darling...why the fuck does that matter?”

”Noooo reason~.”