Nagoya, Japan

Wednesday, August 31st, 2050

I thought back to the first time I met Hiro. He had seemed like a complete incompetent. Well, back before he had gotten his Immortal Form under some semblance of control, I suppose he had been.

My, how things had changed. Yukiko’s body glowed a bright red as she gripped Hiro tightly with her Gravity Shift affinity, as did he. My Mimic Vision let me see his own affinity at work, pushing against Yukiko’s encumbering magic. His fine control was impressive; he empowered the parts of his body in sequence, using very little energy.

“How much did you give him?” I asked.

“I don’t have an exact measure,” Yukiko replied. “I think this is a shade over twice normal gravity.”

And yet, he still powered through it as we ran through our morning stretches. It made me wish I really was going through the War Game with him. Ah, well.

Mr. Maki’s voice echoed through the stadium. “Look alive, everyone! I see some drooping shoulders out there. You should all be excited! You’re about to graduate.”

Kowalski’s hand shot up. “Does that mean we all passed the tests?”

Mr. Maki crossed his arms across his chest, grinning wickedly at Kowalski. “Now, that would be telling. The exams aren’t done yet! You will all get your combined grades once the War Games are over.”

The Polish boy’s shoulders slumped. “Please, sir? The suspense is killing me.”

“You’ll have to learn how to wait,” replied Maggie. “When you’re in the field, you will have to learn how to deal with uncertainty.”

I made a note to ask Kiyo or Paul if Mrs. Perera had been so stingy with the test results. I could see Mr. Maki dangling the scores over his students’ heads to motivate them to try harder in the War Games. I could see Maggie doing it for her own enjoyment.

I could even ask them in person, if I couldn’t wait. I had heard that the second year students were deep in the woods, but all of the first year classes had assembled in the arena for practice. For once, the double-sized football field felt a bit cramped, with the hundreds of students present.

We dispersed into our groups. With so many teams, we couldn’t all use the stadium at once. Some of the laggards, like our dear Mr. Kowalski, were kept behind for some individual instruction. Those of us who weren’t seen as needing more support were told we could practice anywhere on the school grounds we cared to, as long as we didn’t “break anything expensive,” to quote Mr. Maki.

Hiro and I had earned the Divine Blade’s trust, obviously, so we had found a quiet section of the forest near a small creek, far away from the designated practice areas.

“Hey, check out what Ms. Edwards and I have been working on!” Rei pulled out an iron sphere the size of a golf ball from her blue tracksuit’s pocket. I could see the magic build up in her fingers, sending the ball floating into the air. It wavered dangerously in the air until she balanced it out with her other hand.

Hiro smiled pleasantly. “That’s a cool trick.”

“Not exactly useful in a fight though,” I said.

The air around her hands wavered like pavement on a hot day an instant before the iron ball shot straight through a maple tree, coming to a halt in the trunk of another. Birds for a kilometer around took to the air, voicing their panic and protest at the sudden commotion.

“Holy shit,” said Hiro. He covered his mouth a moment later, before giving Rei a shallow bow. “Sorry, pardon my language.”

Rei beamed proudly at him. “No, that is the response I was hoping for. I think this could be our secret weapon during the games.”

I raised an eyebrow at her. “You realize we aren’t trying to kill our opponents, right?”

“Huh? What do you mean?” she asked. “The Peace Bond will take care of that.”

“And what if it doesn’t?” I countered. “If that punches through the force shield, you’ll turn the other student into pulp!”

Rei frowned at me. “I didn’t think you were such a worrier.”

“Magpie has a good point,” said Hiro. “Can you fire it with a little less ‘oomph?’”

She bit her lip as she thought it over. “I don’t think so.”

Hiro tapped his foot as he pondered the situation. “Oh, I’ve got it! Ms. Yamaguchi, do you have more of those bullets?”

“It technically isn’t a bullet, since it doesn’t have any propellant built into it,” said Rei as she fished another one out of her pocket. “It’s more like a musket ball.”

“Technically, the bullet is the piece that is fired out of the gun. The cartridge is the part that contains the bullet and the powder. So, this would qualify as a bullet.” There were advantages to dating a sniper. If Rei was going to be a little know-it-all, she could at least be accurate.

Hiro smirked at me. “Did Kiyo teach you that one?”

“Yes, actually,” I said.

Rei glared at me at my correction, but she didn’t say anything.

Hiro’s Immortal Form flared in his hands for a moment, crushing the iron ball completely flat. A moment’s grinding later, and he gave it back to Rei as a pile of iron shavings.

“Try it with these,” he said.

Rei gaped at the iron powder in her hands. “What do they feed you?”

Hiro laughed, looking oddly sheepish. “Same thing as everyone else.”

I gulped involuntarily. Whatever else I did on Saturday, disabling Hiro had just become my top priority. There was no way in Hell I wanted to face him when he realized the truth about me. I’d seen him break a man’s neck before, and the man had been made of metal at the time.

Rei examined the former bullet, taking care not to blow them away. “What am I supposed to do with these?”

Hiro pointed at a nearby pine sapling. “Exactly what you did with the bullet. No, don’t let them clump up together, keep them separate.”

“That is not as easy as you make it sound,” she grumbled. “The bits and pieces want to stick together.”

“C’mon, I bet you can if you try.” I don’t think he was aware of the power of his smile, but it cut off Rei’s protests.

Still not fully understanding, Rei closed her eyes and put her affinity to work. A cloud of iron particles floated between her outstretched hands. “Stay behind me, I can’t hold it much…”

A spray of death flew out from Rei. When she was done, the sapling still stood, but just barely; every last one of its needles had been blasted away, and only a single branch remained.

Rei stood stock still, surveying the damage. Of all the reactions I had expected, a single tear rolling down her cheeks wasn’t one of them.

Hiro rushed in, forcing her eye open. “Oh no! Did you get a piece in there?”

She shoved him back. “N-no, it’s just… I finally feel like I’m good for more than bricking smartphones. Once Mr. Marlowe helped me figure out how to modulate my powers, it was like a door opened up.”

Hiro flashed me a knowing smirk. “Magpie’s good at that.”

“I suppose I have some talents there,” I said. “And now you have a way to use your new trick without punching a hole through someone.”

Hiro nodded. “Yup, that shouldn’t be able to get through the Peace Bond, and it’ll register as a hit.”

Funny that Hiro of all people had helped make sure Rei wouldn’t punch bloody holes in her fellow students when we attacked the school. Our Father Below knew I wanted to minimize casualties. He was only building up a future enemy. I supposed that after all of the times I had helped Hiro, Rose, and the rest, I was due for some payback.