SIXTY-FIVE: Intake

 

“So,” Alden said at the conclusion of a very long voicemail to Boe, “Jeremy is an angel among men. And I can’t believe you thought you could really get him to hit you. You bastard. I will be calling you every day and leaving messages, even if you never reply. But you’d better. I’m sorry for…I’m just sorry about it all. Take good care of yourself. Talk to you tomorrow.”

He ended the call and waited a minute just in case there was going to be a reply. When there was none, he flicked off the kitchen lights and stepped out of the apartment.

As the door shut behind him, he heard the bolt slide into place automatically. It opened in response to a command he could give through his interface, too, so there was no need to keep track of keys.

“Oh, hey!” said a voice. “New neighbors!”

Alden looked up to see a tall blonde girl exiting the apartment across the hall. She was wearing faded jeans and a long-sleeved cropped shirt. She had a mild Southern drawl, and she was carrying a tray covered in clear plastic treat bags.

She’s gorgeous, Alden thought.

Then he had to stop for several seconds and analyze that thought. Because it had come on confusingly strong and quickly.

He did notice when other people were nice to look at, but it was in the same way that he took note of whether or not he liked the appearance of a plant or a painting. He had been trying to avoid overthinking it or defining it before he was summoned. Not quite getting something that was so important to others made him feel left out.

Either being away from his own species for too long had done something unexpected to him, or the neighbor girl was really, ridiculously beautiful.

It’s the second, he concluded. I’m still me. She’s just an extra amazing painting…wait, is that an okay thing to think about someone else?

She was the same height as him. Athletic. She had one perfectly charming dimple to go with her warm, perfectly charming smile. Her skin was flawless. Her eyes were an impossible shade of gold, with brighter gold around the pupils. Her face was so symmetrical, except for the strategic dimple, that Alden was sure he’d need a computer to find so much as an eyelash out of alignment.

“Do you want a treat bag?”

“Sorry?” He shoved away his fascination and blinked down at the hand she’d just extended.

“A snack bag!” she said brightly, waving it at him. She was still propping the door to her apartment open with a hip. “It’s got my card on it. I made enough for everyone on our floors.”

“Oh. Thanks.” He took the bag. Even her voice was remarkable. She sounded like she could host radio shows.

“It’s homemade granola. You should take some for your roommates.”

“I don’t actually have any,” Alden told her before she could pass him more bags. “I’m the only one in the apartment for now. I’m Alden. From Chicago. Hi.”

“My fellow ex-American! I’m Natalie. From South Carolina.”

She tapped on the business card she’d attached to his bag, and he glanced down to see that it said Natalie Choir — Room 914 —Cook of the Moment (price on request).

“Cook of the Moment!” Alden felt enlightened. “The S-rank Rabbit skill.”

He was betting she’d gotten some extra foundational enhancement points to allocate as an S-rank, and that most of them had gone into Appeal.

Natalie beamed. “You’ve heard of it?”

“Yes. Awesome choice. I heard one woman who has it stopped a deadlock at the UN with a single pasta dish.”

“Oh my gosh,” she gushed. “She’s so cool! When I got here a couple of weeks ago, and word went around that there was a new Rabbit who’d chosen it, she teleported in from her job on Artona II just to make dinner for me and my roommates.”

“What was that like?” Alden asked curiously.

She stared off into the distance. “Dangerous. One of my friends cried when we had dessert because the meal was almost over.”

Alden was now really looking forward to eating the granola. But maybe not in front of other people.

“Thanks for making it vegan,” he said, holding up the bag.

“Oh yeah! Vegan, gluten free, no peanuts…for my advertising snacks I always try to hit as many diets as I can without ruining flavor. Wait, how could you tell?” She peered down at her tray. “It doesn’t look off or something, does it?”

She sounded anxious about it. As if someone rocking an S-rank skill might really need to worry that her free, magically perfect food would offend a bunch of hungry teenagers.

“I’m just a good guesser. It looks great.” He tucked it into the pocket of his hoodie and headed down the hall.

Natalie Choir let her apartment door shut and tagged along after him.

“I haven’t seen you around. Did you just get in yesterday?”

“Last night,” said Alden. “You said you’ve been here two weeks?”

“Yeah. Me and all my roommates arrived within a couple days of each other. They try to fill whole apartments at once, so don’t worry. You won’t be on your own for long!”

Alden suspected he would, but he didn’t see any reason to explain that. “How many Rabbits are here right now?”

“A hundred and eighty-three,” she said promptly. “Now four, since you’re here.”

“You memorized the exact number?”

“For the snacks!” She held up the tray again. “I’ve already delivered another one of these to our counselor’s desk.”

She kept filling him in while they waited in a large community space for the elevator to arrive. There were beanbag chairs and an air hockey table. Floor-to-ceiling windows looked out on the next building over. Natalie said that apartment tower was almost entirely for Brutes.

“Staying here in intake has been way more fun than I thought it would be,” she said. “I was going to go straight into the School for the Arts at Celena North High as soon as I arrived, but then I decided it was better to settle in for a couple of months after all. It’s a relief, you know? To be surrounded by other people who are totally new to the island.”

“I can see that. It’s probably easier to figure it all out with people who are in the same position.”

Of course there would still be newbies in the Apex high schools’ dorms, but a larger percentage of the kids their age would be native Anesidorans.

“Shapers and Healers are on the floors below us,” Natalie said. “And Meisters and Adjusters are above. There are only a few U-types here right now, but they have their own floor at the top of the Brute tower. They don’t mingle a lot. Wrights are in that square, blocky apartment building. And Sways are over there,” she pointed at a low brick structure that looked distinctly prison-ish. “It’s actually very nice inside. They mingle even less than the U’s. I think they have their own community building activities for credits. Oh, and any ultra-rares usually get mixed in with the Healers or us Rabbits.”

She paused for breath just as the elevator arrived.

They stepped inside, and Alden pressed the button for the next floor down. It opened onto another community area, this one dominated by a large circular desk with a scrolling digital sign across the front that listed currently ongoing dorm activities. Right now, it said “breakfast” in multiple languages.

New counselor, Alden noted as he stepped out of the elevator and spotted a young woman with brown skin and an edgy-looking undercut hairstyle. She was filling some of the welcome gift bags. She must be the day shift person.

She didn’t wear a physical name tag, but she had one through his interface. “Neha” floated at the top right corner of his vision.

“Hi, Neha!” Natalie said, setting the tray of granola beside another one that was already there.

“Hey again, Nat.” She had an Anesidoran accent. She looked past the girl to Alden.

“And Alden,” she added.

“Do I have a name tag, too?” he asked, surprised.

“No. You can if you want one. There’s a setting. But I actually just got in and got an update on your situation. It had a picture of you from last night. And there’s a note saying you arrived without luggage. I was about to call and ask if you needed someone to go get basics for you.”

Alden shook his head. “I’m going to wander around the neighborhood and buy some stuff on my own, if that’s okay?”

“You’re not a prisoner. Go. Be free. Call me if something goes wrong during the day, even if it’s just something minor. There’s a loosely enforced curfew while you’re staying in intake, but it’s midnight. Until then, nobody will bother you.” She paused. “You want a buddy?”

“A buddy?”

“There are volunteer mentors who take new kids and show them around. I can have one meet you?”

“No thanks,” he said. “I’d rather just explore. But I wanted to ask about having visitors in the dorm…”

“Depends on the visitor. Random locals—no. They would flood the place if we let them, and it’s supposed to be a haven just for you new kids. Pre-approved tutors or class mentors—yes.”

“Family?”

“Oh. We can’t teleport in guests from home for the first few months at all,” Natalie said in a sad voice. “Didn’t your pre-arrival guide tell you?”

Neha glanced between her and Alden questioningly. She raised an eyebrow at him. She obviously wasn’t going to bring up his business in front of people without his permission.

He figured it would all get out eventually, but there was no reason to rush it.

“Thanks anyway,” he said. “I’m going to walk around and buy myself a toothbrush.”

“Dental hygiene,” said Neha, turning back to her gift bag prep. “Always important.”

Before Alden left the building, he stopped briefly on the second floor to check out the cafeteria. But as soon as the door opened and the sound of a throng speaking a dozen different languages hit him, he retreated.

So many people. Too much input. Not even the smell of hash browns could tempt him.

He shook his head at himself as he strode out the building’s front doors into the cool, clear morning. I wish I could have a quiet first meal with Kibby. Does that make me crazy?

He turned down the sidewalk and headed toward a set of gates that led onto the street. A security guy opened them for him, and he was officially walking around in F-city as a proper Avowed for the first time.

It was so surreal.

Here was a human city, full of city sights and sounds. There was traffic. People were out jogging. Someone was walking a shitzu.

A week ago, Alden had been living in a vault on a silent moon with a single other person.

He wondered if he’d have felt just this out of place if he’d gone back home instead of coming to Anesidora.

I think it might actually have been worse, he decided as he watched a guy around his own age do push-ups in the narrow stretch of grass along a bike path. He had an honest-to-goodness boulder on his back as an extra weight. One of the green ball caps they gave you in your welcome gift bags at the dorms was on the ground beside him.

Where does one purchase a boulder anyway? Did he bring it with him from home?

Anesidora was artificially made. It wasn’t like the other teen could have dug his pet rock up out of the ground or taken it from a convenient mountain.

I think…it might be easier to try to fit in with boulder guy than it would be to try to fit back into my old life. I hope so anyway.

He kept walking. His interface offered him maps and notifications about the businesses he was passing, but he turned the helpful feature off with a thought. He decided he wanted to see things with his own eyes and figure it all out the old-fashioned way.

It was a distraction. Distractions were good. His new affixation was still a giant weight on his mind. He wanted to ignore it.

I think this is a low-rank neighborhood, he decided as he watched a yoga class rolling out their mats through a studio window.

It wasn’t like locations in F-city were deliberately sorted by rank and class. That was a more common thing in Apex, to make sure really powerful people could use their talents without accidentally killing squishy ones like Alden.

But even here on the southern portion of Anesidora, people tended to group together with those who had similar needs and lived similar lifestyles. So maybe this was a D & F-heavy community. Boulder Dude was by far the most conspicuously superhuman person Alden had spotted around here, and he’d come from the dorms.

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He walked on, peering through shop windows and people-watching.

The weather was around fifty degrees. The sun was shining. Alden found a Mexican restaurant with a walk-up breakfast window and ate an unholy amount of chips and guacamole while he sat on a bench and counted drones in the sky.

He tried to remember if he’d ever seen a bird on Anesidora apart from the decorative geese and ducks in the parks, and he couldn’t.

I hope we have seagulls or something at least. No birds at all would be depressing.

A voice call notice flashed, and he answered when he saw it was Neha from the dorm.

“Hey,” the intake counselor said. “I was going to call you right after you left, but mornings are always busy. Took me an hour to duck into my office so we could talk without being overheard. You said you wanted to bring family into your apartment?”

“I booked a teleportation slot for my aunt. I’m going to pick her up in an hour and a half.”

“You haven’t seen her since you got back home?” She sounded sympathetic.

“I haven’t. I literally teleported in straight from the Triplanets last night.”