The moment Finn Barnaby saw the soldier across the airport, he knew there was no avoiding a conversation. Finn shouldered his backpack as he walked down the seemingly endless corridor from his international flight. The trip from London left him tired, grainy and not really in the mood for company. […]
West Private University had a number of faculty conference rooms for its various departments. Only its Hero Certification Program located their faculty rooms below ground. There were any number of good reasons for doing so, including security, anonymity and minimizing damage to school grounds. The Dean of West Private’s HCP […]
Finn’s taxi pulled up in front of Lambert Acres and he whistled at the sight of it. It was a private off-campus house, obviously sized for parties. Two-story, but surprisingly sprawling with an acre of woodland around it as play. The carport led to a four car garage with attached […]
Jia woke with the dawn. She lay in bed for a minute, swathed in blankets against the cooler Florida night air. Blinking sleep out of her golden eyes, she just listened for a moment. The hum of the house’s central air provided a faint but pleasant white noise. Beneath its […]
Alley hit the showers after breakfast, eager to get clean after her morning workout. The blasting water also did wonders to get a certain Chinese girl out of her head. Sun Jia. God, she was hot. From the moment she laid eyes on the petite golden-eyed beauty, Alley knew she […]
Nate was the first one out of his class, the instant it was dismissed. He made a beeline down the rapidly growing crowded hallways of Elba Hall Science Building. Just in time, he reached the bathrooms, plunged into a stall and locked himself in. It took a few minutes to […]
“Welcome freshmen!” The Dean looked over the assembled freshmen, nodding in satisfaction at what she saw. She stood at a podium overlooking a sea of serious, nervous faces in the auditorium, the largest room at West Private HCP and the only one that could comfortably house the whole student body. […]
Gym started out with a traditional run. By the time she hit her second lap, Jia remembered how much she’d enjoyed these. Then she hit the beginning of the tenth lap and knew she was in trouble. Thankfully, Professor Matthias switched them over to push ups. Only Jia started flagging […]
Lambert Acres was far more subdued when Finn got home than it had been last night. This evening saw Nate sprawled across one of the three couches, his cat Perpugilliam stretched out on her side in front of him, enjoying the occasional idle scratch. Julie had claimed one of the […]
Alley’s smartphone went off and she answered it by reflex. It’s time, Corporal. Alley went from playfulness to perfectly serious in a second. Thankfully, no one was in a position to notice. Everyone had survived the arduous week more or less intact. Seven students had washed out already, dropping the class […]