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Alex was so caught up thinking about this that he didn’t notice Vivik’s friendly chatter, pointing out interesting sites along their walk, and he didn’t notice when it stopped, either. Or that he was abruptly walking alone, Vivik having stopped in his tracks several feet back, with the rest of the people who were paying attention to what was going on around them. He didn’t even see Mitsuru until he’d practically walked into her.

He managed to stop in time, a step away from colliding with her. She stood in the sidewalk, arms folded in front of her. The uniform she wore was superficially similar to his, but with a black blazer, rather than blue, and with a completely different patch on her breast pocket. The last time he’d seen her, her hair had been tied back, and now that it was down, he was surprised at how long it was, hanging almost to her waist, silken black and utterly straight. She looked at him emotionlessly with her unnerving red eyes.

“Boy,” she said softly, “you should learn to watch where you are going. It seems to be a reoccurring problem.”

Alex recognized her immediately, of course — the list of people who’d saved his life recently was pretty short, and there weren’t too many attractive ladies with crimson eyes on it.

“Oh,” he managed, trying to collect himself, “I think that, um, I think I owe you a thank you, for, well, you know.”

Panicked at her blank expression, his stuck his hand out.

“My name is Alex,” he said, his voice suddenly ridiculously small and squeaky. “Thank you for helping me.”

If Mitsuru had any opinions on the matter, her face gave Alex no clue of it. She continued to stare placidly at him. Eventually, he let his hand drop to his side. As Alex tried desperately to think of something to say, his cheeks reddened under Mitsuru’s impassive eyes. When he heard Vivik hurry up next to him, he felt profound gratitude for the intervention.

“Miss Aoki,” Vivik said apologetically, “good morning. Have you met Alex already? Today is his first day.”

Mitsuru gave Vivik a small nod, her eyes never leaving Alex.

“I’ll see you on the seventeenth, boy,” she said, abruptly striding past them, heading back the way they’d come. Alex couldn’t help but watch her walk away. She looked better in a skirt.

“What the hell was that?” Vivik wondered. “You already know her, Alex?”

“Sort of,” Alex admitted, shakily resuming his walk to class, trying not to notice that people were staring and whispering.

“And what’s with seventeenth?” Vivik asked with a huge, mischievous grin. “You haven’t even been to class yet and you already have faculty asking you out?”

Alex felt a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. He dragged the repeatedly folded class schedule from his jacket pocket, and looked at it grimly.

“Oh man,” he said softly. “Fuck me. The seventeenth is the first day of the ‘Applied Combat Fundamentals’ workshop, seven in the A.M. I am so dead.”

Vivik nodded, and slapped Alex companionably on the shoulder.

“’Fraid so,” he said cheerfully. “Miss Aoki has quite the reputation…”

“For what?”

Vivik lowered his voice, and looked seriously at Alex.

“I heard she’s a psycho,” Vivik confided, glancing around suspiciously to make sure no one was walking near enough to them to hear. “I heard that she killed another Operator, a while ago, and so they kept her locked up or something for a long time. She’s supposed to be like a hundred years old…”

Alex looked at Vivik skeptically.

“She’s supposed to be what?” he scoffed. “There is no way she’s a hundred years old.”

“You can’t rely on looks to make that kind of determination here, Alex. Lots of Operators can control their appearance, or slow down their aging process,” Vivik explained patiently. “It’s probably a bit much to try and absorb all at once.”

Alex just shook his head.

“Man, she’s not a hundred years old…”

“Yeah, okay,” Vivik admitted. “You’re probably right about that.”

“Here we are,” Vivik said, pointing to a four story building made from the same monotonous slate grey stone is everything else, set back in a stand of middle-aged oak trees. The creek burbled nearby, detailing a gentle curve around one side of the building, and then disappeared into an underground channel. On the other side of the building there was a large grassy field, vivid green under the bright sun.

“This is much nicer than Bakersfield,” Alex said to Vivik, grinning.

“I’d hope so. I’ve been to Bakersfield once,” Vivik said, with a laugh. “Come on, let’s get moving, we’re gonna be late.”

Vivik used his swipe card to open the door, and then led Alex up a flight of stairs to the second story. The interior of the building was cool and airy, with polarized glass in the windows and buff-colored tile flooring. There seemed to be four classrooms on the floor, but Alex only saw students crowded at the doors of two of them. Inside the nearer one, it was a typical lecture hall — three rows of seats with attached writing desks in a half-circle around a raised dais and podium, with muted grey carpeting and a bank of fluorescent lights overhead. Behind the podium, there was a chalkboard and white board, flanked by a table with a laptop, projector and a tangled mass of cables.

Most of the class had already arrived, and Alex seemed to feel every eye in the room migrate to him as he and Vivik entered. The students were lounging around the room in small groups, talking in low voices — clearly cliques had already been formed and social rankings established. Alex knew with an iron-clad certainty that he was going to be a very-odd man out.

As Vivik led him to a seat near the center of the room, Alex’s anxiety worsened. Vivik had greeted a couple of students with nods on the way in, but no one had spoken to either of them, and Vivik clearly intended for them to sit by themselves. It dawned on Alex that it was very likely that the person Michael had picked to help Alex assimilate had not, in fact, made any friends himself. Alex resolved to have a serious discussion with Michael on this issue, as soon as he got enough nerve to.

Alex was so gloomy over his social prospects, sitting beside the now silent Vivik in the padded plastic seats, that he almost didn’t notice the blond girl until she was standing directly in front of them.

She was slender and tall, almost as tall as Alex, with long blond hair teased into curls and brilliant green eyes. She wore the same uniform as everyone else, but she it looked nicer on her, Alex thought. Quite a bit better.

“Are you going to introduce me to your friend, Vivik, or are you planning on keeping him all to yourself?” She leaned down as she talked, looking at Alex with a playful smile. “So unfair.”

“Not at all,” Vivik sputtered. “I simply haven’t had an opportunity to introduce you, yet.”

“You have one now,” she said sweetly, still looking at Alex.

“Alex, this is Emily Muir. Emily, this is Alex Warner.”

“Pleased to meet you, Alex,” Emily said, holding out one hand to him.

“Pleased to meet you, Miss Muir,” Alex said, wincing. He hadn’t ever, in his memory, referred to a girl his own age as ‘Miss’, and couldn’t imagine why he’d picked now to start. The hand he shook was smooth-skinned, soft, and recently manicured. Alex wondered if she was wealthy or just very concerned with appearances.

“Emily,” she corrected, her smile revealing perfect teeth. “I have to admit that I’d heard you were joining our class today. I think most people here have already heard some version of the story.”