Chapter 241: 241 | Everybody Counts Something [GT BONUS]
Not ’any questions.’ Not ’does anyone have questions.’ Just the word, delivered as both invitation and expectation.
Camille’s hand went up from the end of my row. "The Accord sets minimum licensing age at eighteen for academy students. But the entrance exam is administered to applicants who are already eighteen, meaning we’ve already reached the minimum age threshold by the time we arrive. What happens to students who entered the academy at seventeen through the recommendation track?"
Her eyes flicked toward Petra’s position in the upper row without moving her head. It was the kind of look that communicated everything while technically looking at nothing.
Mercy’s expression didn’t shift. "Recommendation track students who enter before eighteen operate under provisional observer status until their birthday. They may attend classes and participate in supervised training but cannot access the Provisional License that permits supervised field use. The distinction is administrative rather than practical for most students. The exceptions are relevant only if a field incident occurs on campus before the student’s eighteenth birthday, in which case the legal liability framework becomes significantly more complicated."
"So they’re students without being students," Camille said.
"They’re students without being licensed to do anything dangerous in public. At this institution, those are very different categories."
Camille’s mouth curved into something that wasn’t a smile but lived next door to one. She’d gotten the answer she wanted, and the answer had confirmed something she’d already suspected about Petra’s status. Petra, from her elevated seat in the back row, showed no reaction. Her posture remained perfect. Her face remained composed. The leather planner on her desk remained closed.
Theo raised his hand from the front row. "Ms. Mercy, you mentioned the survival rate difference between licensed and unlicensed Aspect-bearers. Does the Accord’s legal framework actually reduce the danger, or does the institutional support structure around licensed Heroes just make them harder to kill?"
Mercy’s attention settled on Theo with something that might have been approval, or might have been the same neutral assessment she applied to everything. On her, the difference was invisible.
"Both. The Accord reduces danger by creating accountability structures that discourage reckless engagement. The institutional support, agency backing, medical infrastructure, and intelligence networks, reduces mortality by ensuring Heroes are not operating alone against threats they have not been briefed on. The distinction matters because it determines whether you credit the law or the system built around the law. The answer the Accord wants you to give is the law. The answer the field data supports is the system."
She picked up her tablet. "The honest answer is that the Accord created the legal justification for a support system that already needed to exist, and the support system is what actually keeps you alive. The law gives it permission to function. Remove the law and the system collapses. Remove the system and the law is a piece of paper that cannot stop a bullet."
The room processed this in silence.
"That concludes session one. Read sections two through four before Wednesday. You will be tested on the material, and the test will not be multiple choice." Mercy gathered her tablet and marker with economical movements. "Dismissed."
Nobody moved for approximately two seconds. Then chairs scraped and voices emerged and the classroom filled with the sound of twenty teenagers returning to their natural volume after ninety minutes of enforced attention.
Caden leaned over the back of my chair. "I’m in love."
"With Hero Law?" Marco asked from beside him.
"With the woman who just made Hero Law sound like she was describing how she’d personally dismantle anyone who violated it." Caden’s eyes followed Mercy as she moved toward the door. "She’s terrifying. I want to buy her dinner."
"She’d eat you alive," Marco said.
"Promise?"
I stood and gathered my tablet, keeping my face neutral despite the fact that Caden had just articulated approximately forty percent of my own internal monologue from the past ninety minutes. The other sixty percent involved more specific observations about fabric drape and the way Mercy’s calves looked in her training shoes, but the general sentiment tracked.
Percy closed his notebook with a single clean motion and fell into step beside me as we filed toward the door. "The lecture covered fourteen percent more material than the posted syllabus suggested for session one. This indicates either an accelerated curriculum or an instructor who does not adhere to her own scheduling framework. I find both options concerning for different reasons."
"Percy."
"Yes?"
"The lecture was good."
Percy considered this for approximately one full second. "The lecture was informative. The instructor’s delivery style is consistent with someone who has internalized the material so thoroughly that teaching it requires zero additional processing capacity, which frees cognitive resources for real-time student assessment. She was reading us while we were reading the syllabus."
I stopped walking.
Percy stopped beside me. "That observation made you uncomfortable."
"That observation made me aware that she saw everyone who wasn’t paying attention."
"You were not paying attention for four minutes during the second quarter of the lecture. Your gaze was directed at the podium area rather than your tablet."
"Thanks, Percy."
"I’m providing data. The data suggests you should maintain tablet focus during future sessions if you wish to avoid the instructor’s notice."
We emerged into the atrium, where the two cohorts mingled in a river of charcoal blazers and silver collar pins. I caught sight of Felicity near the vending machines, her blonde ponytail swinging as she laughed at something the girl beside her had said. Felicity’s blazer hung open in a way that made her white shirt visible underneath, the top two buttons undone, and for one fraction of a second she caught my eye across the crowded space and smiled with the full warmth of someone who had decided I was worth smiling at.
I smiled back. Then looked away.
Camille appeared at my left elbow without warning, a skill I was beginning to associate with dangerous women at this academy. She walked in step with me, her skirt swishing just above her knees with every stride, the fabric of her shirt pulling taut across her chest in a way that was nobody’s fault except the uniform manufacturer and possibly the Ecchi Logic trait conspiring with standard physics.
"Belmont."
"Ortega."
"That was good. Mercy’s good."
"She is."
"She also looked at you three separate times during the section on Provisional License restrictions. I counted." Camille’s brown eyes held mine with the specific intensity of someone who counted things that mattered. "Most students got one glance. You got three."
"Maybe I have a memorable face."
"Maybe she read the same file Steele read and arrived at the same conclusion." Camille’s pace didn’t change. Her voice didn’t lower. She made no attempt at subtlety because subtlety was not something Camille Ortega bothered with. "People keep looking at you, Belmont. Faculty. Students. The blonde girl at the vending machine who you just smiled at. The white-haired girl with the horns who watches you every time you enter the common room and pretends she wasn’t watching when you look back."
I kept walking. "I didn’t realize I had a biographer."
