Chapter 236: 236 | A Question of Ownership
Felicity crossed at thirty-three minutes flat, which put her comfortably under the cutoff. She walked over to where I was standing, her face flushed and her chest heaving, and the compression top she wore was doing things that made me grateful Sloane wasn’t here to see where my eyes wanted to go.
"That was horrible." She managed between breaths. "That was the worst thing I’ve ever experienced. I love it."
"You love it?"
"I finished eighth. That’s better than I expected." Her smile was exhausted but genuine. "Progress feels good even when it hurts."
Students continued crossing the finish line over the next several minutes. Caden stumbled in at thirty-four minutes and fifty-two seconds, cutting it close enough that Steele actually looked up from her tablet to mark his time. Percy finished at thirty-three minutes and fourteen seconds, his face completely composed, his notebook already back in his hand to record his own performance data.
Rina crossed at thirty-six minutes and eight seconds.
Steele’s voice cut across the field. "Soleil. That’s a repeat tomorrow."
Rina’s shoulders slumped. Her ears, those distinctive sheep ears, drooped visibly against her white hair. She didn’t argue. She just nodded and walked toward the water station with the posture of someone who had expected to fail and received exactly what she anticipated.
I felt a spike of something that might have been sympathy. Or frustration. Hard to tell when I was still catching my own breath.
"Conditioning continues." Steele addressed the group without giving anyone time to recover. "Core circuits. Forty-five minutes. Plank variations, sit-up rotations, and holds. Those who finished under time may take water. Those who didn’t, start your circuits immediately. You can hydrate when you’ve earned it."
Rina moved directly to the circuit stations without stopping at the water table.
The core circuits began immediately. Four-person rotations through exercises designed to systematically dismantle every muscle group in the abdominal chain. Standard planks first. Then side planks. Planks with single-arm reaches that destroyed shoulder stability.
Planks with alternating leg lifts that made the hip flexors feel like they were tearing in real time. Hollow holds that compressed the spine and made breathing require conscious effort.
Steele circulated between stations with the detached precision of someone conducting quality control on a manufacturing line. She corrected form like she was debugging code.
No emotion. Just the gap between current state and acceptable state, vocalized clearly so the student could close it or accumulate additional time as consequence.
"Holt. Your hips are dropping below neutral. Correct it or hold for thirty additional seconds."
Caden produced a noise that belonged in a nature documentary about wounded animals. His hips corrected.
"Good. Maintain that position."
She moved on without waiting to see if he maintained it. If he didn’t, the next correction would cost him more time.
"Ortega, good form. Hold it."
Camille’s jaw tightened with satisfaction.
"Belmont." Steele stopped beside my station. I was in the middle of a side plank, my obliques burning and my arm shaking with the effort of maintaining position. "Your core stability is better than your registration suggests. Significantly better."
I kept my eyes on the ground because looking up would probably collapse me.
"I do extra work."
"Clearly." She crouched down to my eye level, which put her face uncomfortably close to mine while I was in no position to move away. "The question is why someone with your apparent capabilities chose to register a profile that undersells them so dramatically."
I couldn’t answer that honestly. So I didn’t answer at all.
Steele watched me for another five seconds before standing. "Add fifteen seconds to your hold, Belmont. For the evasion."
I added fifteen seconds.
My obliques had opinions about this. None of them were positive.
The session continued for another ninety minutes. Sprints. Burpees. Partner carries where I ended up hauling Caden across the field while he made increasingly dramatic complaints about his impending death. Agility ladders that Steele made us run until our footwork stopped being sloppy, which for some people meant running them a dozen times.
By the time she finally called for cool-down stretches, the sun had climbed high enough to turn the morning cool into genuine warmth. Sweat dripped from my face onto the grass as I reached for my toes, my hamstrings protesting every inch of the stretch.
"Tomorrow." Steele’s voice carried across the field. "Same time. Those with repeats, arrive thirty minutes early. Dismissed."
Nobody cheered.
Nobody had the energy.
I collapsed onto my back and stared at the sky, which was that particular shade of California blue that made you understand why people paid absurd amounts of money to live here. My chest rose and fell with breaths that were finally starting to slow down. Every muscle in my body had filed a formal complaint with whatever divine authority handled physical abuse cases.
Caden flopped down next to me. "I’m dead."
"You’re talking."
"Posthumously. This is my ghost. I died on that third burpee set and I’ve just been haunting my own corpse ever since."
Marco collapsed on my other side. "Same. Ghost club. We should get jackets."
Felicity walked over and looked down at the three of us with an expression that was somewhere between amused and exhausted. "You all look pathetic."
"We are pathetic." Caden didn’t open his eyes. "Accept us as we are."
"Hmm." She turned her attention to me specifically. "You held back again. During the run."
"I finished fifth."
"You could have finished first. Maybe second if Ortega caught a tailwind." Her smile was too knowing. "You’re going to have to try harder eventually."
She walked away before I could respond, her ponytail swinging with each step, her hips moving in a way that my exhausted brain still managed to track despite my body’s complete lack of cooperation.
Caden made a noise. "Dude."
"What?"
"Your girlfriend is going to kill you."
"Felicity and I are friends."
"Sure. Friends who stare at each other’s asses during conditioning sessions." He finally opened his eyes, squinting against the sun. "I’m not judging. Hardy’s hot. But your girl is scary. Like, genuinely terrifying. And she has fire powers."
"Sloane trusts me."
"Does she though?" Caden’s grin was weak but present. "Because I’ve seen how she looks at you, man. That’s not trust. That’s ownership. You’re her property and she’s just letting you wander around because she knows you’ll come back."
