Page 41 of Flickerstate

“Mine neither. So he must have been in Bree’s. Where is she?”

“Haven’t seen her.”

I check my phone. One minute till class starts.

Since Candace and I staged our intervention, Bree has come home by eleven (give or take fifteen minutes) and set her alarm for six. Last night at dinner, she mentioned, happily, that her homework has gotten easier since she started sleeping more. And she’s arrived on time to the few classes we share.

But what if she’s late for the trial today?

Door 12 opens. Dr. Langmore steps inside, shaking rain from an umbrella. Dr. Ortega and Mr. Davis follow. Behind them comes a middle-aged man in an argyle sweater.

As usual, Dr. Langmore’s arrival kills student chatter. “Welcome to the first trial,” she says into the hush. “Many of you know Mr. Dennison, who teaches the junior navigation clinics. He’ll help us run today’s trial.”

I check my phone again. Class has started. Dread burbles in my stomach. What if Bree’s sick? Would Dr. Langmore let us reschedule? I doubt it. What if, without telling me or Candace, Bree decided the Academy demanded too much pain for the gain and became the firsttransfer to drop out? Would I have to fight through the trials with a two-person transfer team against trios of Academy lifers?

My heart slams against my ribs. My breathing shudders, all out of rhythm.

Dr. Langmore gestures. “Teams One and Two, with me. Teams Three and—”

Bree stumbles through a door to my right. Mud and grass stain her torn jeans, and her left knee oozes blood. She’s blinking down tears.

“What happened?” I whisper when she reaches me.

“I fell,” she whispers back. “My last class is across campus. I ran, but the rain made everything slippery…”

Guilt jabs me. While I imagined catastrophes where Bree ghosted our team, she was injuring herself trying to get here on time.

“We’re with Mr. Davis,” Candace says. “Let’s walk. I can look at your leg over there. I’ve got Band-Aids and Neosporin in my bag.”

I’m not surprised Candace stashes first aid supplies in her designer leather satchel. I bet she carries emergency tampons and a burner phone too.

We head for the room’s south end, where Mr. Davis is waiting for us.

At the nearest table, Candace pulls out a chair for Bree, unbuckles her satchel, and rummages for supplies. “This may sting.”

Mr. Davis begins taking attendance. “Team Eight… Bree Allen?”

“Here,” she says without her usual chirpiness.

He peers at Candace, cleaning Bree’s scrapes with a sanitarywipe. “Does she need the nurse?”

“No,” Candace says.

Elena, Rafe, and Carrie trade glances. I know what they’re thinking: If Mr. Davis sends Bree to the nurse, Team Eight will be down a navigator, fatally disadvantaged in the trial.

“She looks pretty dinged up,” Rafe offers hopefully.

“Bree?” Mr. Davis asks.

Bree blinks down tears and lifts her pointy chin. “I’m fine.”

Mr. Davis frowns. “If you’re sure.”

When he moves on to Team Seven, Candace applies Band-Aids to Bree’s knee, straightens, and gives her a slap on the shoulder. “Good man.”

Bree blushes, smiling shyly at Candace. For a giddy second, I think about throwing Rafe the deuce. His sad sabotage attempt failed—Bree came through!

Mr. Davis explains the trial to us. Weather events are probabilistic, and some of the world’s best navigators are working with climate scientists to pioneer nav-assisted disaster response: using nav to curb wildfires with dampening winds, for example. As high school seniors, we won’t be trying anything that big today, but we’re applying the same principles. Mr. Davis will light ten tea candles on a lab table and open the nearest door. Each team has to navigate to a future where the wind, blowing through the door, extinguishes the candles in order, one to ten, in less than a minute. But because this is a test of our channeling, we’re not doing head-to-head matches like in the siphoning duels. Instead, the teams choose one member to navigate, using power channeled to that member by the other two.