CHAPTER 11 – Life on Mars (2)

After dinner and a light bit of homework, she completed a circuit around the campus.

Her roommates did not join her on the final run because they were completely exhausted by the first day. Halle was knacked because she was overwhelmed by the workload, and Ava because her routine was torn to shreds by the Dance Chair.

As the Junior had put it succinctly, good is enough is good enough—but it sure as hell ain’t Guilliam’s audition material.

This was a new bit of information that Eppie had learned about her friend. Ava’s original goal had always been Guilliams, but she wasn’t good enough for their junior division. She did, however, make it to LAPA, and if she could graduate with honours, then she had a chance for the real Guilliams—their college conservatory located in Manhattan.

Curfew at LAPA was very generous, with campus students allowed to return as late as 10 PM. Eppie returned to her room at 9, showered, then sat down to perform a ritual she had not engaged in almost two decades.

Homework was… surprisingly effortless.

Her first task was to finish Antigone, which she had done a few decades prior.
Her second task was to isolate three instances of Hamartia, which she did in about thirty seconds.
She had a journal entry due in the morning. She did this in 10 minutes.

The same went with World History and Algebra,

At 10, Mama Josefina came knocking to check that the girls were at home and safe, then went about her patrol of the rest of the building.

Eppie then lay in bed, plotting the information she had gathered thus far.

The gazelle girl.
The redhead.
A boyfriend from… China?

They were certainly a multi-cultural array of villains. The gazelle girl was clearly terrified of both herself and the redhead. The redhead was clearly surprised to see her alive and well, and held enough grievance to pop a vein when she smiled. As for how the boyfriend might feature into the story, Eppie had no idea, but the cliche was right there.

And how should she approach all of this?

Years of experience in corporate conspiracy had informed her that she should feign innocence and do nothing until more information revealed itself. Her knowledge of the school, her role within it, and the role of the people within it, remained far too incomplete. Until she had a better idea of what to expect, it was safer to be reactionary than take action.

Besides, with the [System] on her side, she could probably outrun cars…

“[System],” she said to the darkness. “Raise [Physicality].”

She woke up tired the next day.

This was no surprise, because she woke up twice thinking about that shifty silhouette by the Union building.

After expending her daily allotment of [Causality], she topped up her [Stamina] and packed her duffle for the second day of school.

Her block lessons for the day were Algebra II, English Honours, and World History. The first concluded with quadratic functions, the second with Stichomythia, and the third with the Enlightenment.

Then, she ventured into the administrator’s office to tutor her student in the dark magic of Excel.

“Your request for competency has been granted,” Coordinator Carr informed her with a face full of scepticism. “Friday is the earliest you can take it. 730 AM, Salazar Hall. Admin wants you back in your course if you fail. First Physics. You get one shot for both. Japanese is in the afternoon. Same thing. Salazar Hall, Language Lab. Pass, and you get to skip languages until May, where you’re re-tested for college credit.”

“Fair,” Eppie thanked her director, then waited for the “but”.

“What?” Carr blinked. “Anything else you’d like to know?”

“VP Thomas was fine with this?”

“She is.”

“And the Principal?”

Her Operational Director pursed her lips. “I didn’t ask.”

Eppie pursued no future questions. Inter-staff politics wasn’t her area. Her only goal was to free up her hours for Chemistry and Languages. Both English and World History were essential to her survival, both of which she needed to get a grip on what she could possibly use to harvest [Causality] and to avoid burning her [Dasein] by accident, because in 2007, Google hadn’t yet ascended into the realm of Big Data. As for Algebra II, it was easy enough to take, and it gave her time to think and plan her moves; otherwise, she would have had a random hour or a 40-minute break between her blocks. Call it pedantic, but she really hated irregular schedules.

Coordinator Carr’s Excel lesson continued.

Though there were no more windfalls of [Causality].

By noon, the sun was a scorching ball of fire that made her long for the beaches of Santa Monica, her mansion, and her private pool. The weather had gotten so humid that even the more reserved students were switching to crop tops, skorts and camisoles, with the guys choosing to practice their lines in the amphitheatre in wife beaters. The consequence of so much hormone on open display was Eppie cringing at the fluttering gazes her peers shot her way, causing her to rapidly retreat from the quad into the safe confines of the theatre.

After a heavy meal, she wandered around the quad and the amphitheatre, hoping to run into trouble.

But alas, even the villains had heavy study loads.

At 12:50, she arrived early at the studio classroom and received an approving nod from the presiding instructor, a locally renowned musician-turned-actor, Patsy Seyrova.

Compared to the bookish authority of Costello, Seyrova was aggressively Eastern European and Draconian in her no-nonsense. Her movement instructor was classically trained in every way, seemingly in everything. A violinist by trade, she was also an accomplished ballet instructor hailing from a school with a Russian name Eppie could not spell on Google. Seyrova was pale-skinned, thin-lipped, with a profusion of darkly hued curls knotted into a controlled bun. She wore liners that made her look like a stern schoolmistress from the old country.

With her peers shuffled into a perfect circle, Eppie watched nervously as the instructor approached on tiptoes, her posture regal and perfect, gliding across the Marley floor in her all-blacks.

The students fell into deadened silence.

“Welcome to day two. Most of you know me. Some of you do not. No matter.” The instructor’s Russian accent, Eppie felt, added immensely to her authority. “We begin with plasticity. Follow my lead.”

Her instructor landed first with the ball of her feet, then the skin of her sole.

“Now, find your vertebrae. Unfix your spine. You are a segmented being, each column, each muscle, under your direct control. Slowly… slowly… release your head. Feel the weight…”

Eppie allowed her head to droop.
Her skull felt like a laden jackfruit hanging from the branch of her body.

“We will now move. Do not listen for my cue. Do not look for it in your peers. Find the impulse. Give control to the minute muscles of your body. We are Flaneurs of a city, we wander without purpose. Immerse yourself in the walk.”

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

They began to walk, not as one, but as a group. With her upgrades [Physicality], she was transcending her inexperience to finally feel the minute changes in her body, the way her sinews relaxed and grew taut, the way her feet contacted the floor.

The heat of the surrounding bodies, moving in a mimed city.

She dodged without effort, moved with grace, she—

“Euphemia,” her instructor’s voice cut in like a sushi knife. “Don’t lead. You are a pretty girl, yes? Wrong. There are no pretty girls here. You are a pedestrian, not the main character of a Young Adult Fiction pretending to be one of the common people.”

“Er…”

“Shush… no words. Only malleability. Protest with your body,” Seyrova snapped, but her face didn’t wear her heart on her sleeve, as Costello had done. “Your body is now rigid. You have fallen out of Neutral. Calm. Try again.”

Eppie tried, as did the others, and failed.
What she did gain, however, was a tiny thread of truth, tied to the Plutonian cave and its abstract veritas.