20

At the end of the week, their first rankings went up. Michael had attained first in shield and overall conditioning. He thought his performance on the hill the other day was the reason for the conditioning award, but the shield was a very welcome surprise. His other rankings were middling, with his sword being the only thing of note sitting at fifth, but he was last in nothing. Ollie and the other mages obviously crushed in the magic categories, but they were the bottom three in all physical categories. It seemed a bit unfair to include them, but they were starting to catch up physically, and there had to be a starting point for them somewhere. Davi was the only other person with two top rankings, sword and hand-to-hand, but Pyotr had the one for best overall combatant. The rest were scattered among the others, with Adebisi taking Spear, Iqbal bushcraft, and Feng taking Form. It was a good reminder that it wasn’t just his little clique that possessed talent. The one thing that was suspicious to him was Marcus. He’d placed fourth or fifth in every single category except weapon maintenance, but of course when he’d asked him about it, he’d deflected. Michael suspected he could have ranked higher in a few areas but was unwilling to stand out more than he already did.

With his new privileges, Michael got himself an extra pillow, blanket, socks, and gloves from Dugan. These weren’t part of the standard kit and would be his to keep. He’d bought the socks and gloves a bit larger than he needed—he had a feeling that his body had a ways left to grow. He still had a silver left over and chose to save it. In the cafeteria most of the others requested something breaded or fried, but Michael asked for something from one of the cooks’ homes, a specialty dish from where they were from. He was rewarded with a delicious fish soup and an extra portion at mealtime from the woman he’d complimented on making it, while Davi and Pyotr had to deal with mediocre fried chicken from a culture they’d never seen fry anything. He understood their impulse—it was food that reminded them of the old world, but it seemed better to focus on what the new world had to offer. At least, that was his high-minded thought at that moment, as if his every other thought hadn’t turned to what the rest of his family back on Earth had been doing.

Pyotr had discovered that there was a small lake on academy property, and he, Davi, Ollie, Marcus, and Michael had requested to go to it on their day off. They spent the day learning how to swim with odd new proportions and came back to their bunks refreshed from a full day’s rest, though Michael still spent a bit of time with Meera and briefly visited the infirmary to heal who he could as they’d grown used to.

When the barracks were clear of all but them, Marcus had everyone follow him into the bathroom.

“I know we’re all getting to that age, but I’d really prefer to avoid the circle-jerk,” said Ollie as Marcus made his way to the corner.

“Sorry, man. That’s not the plan today,” Marcus said with a smile. “I know that’s what you were really hoping for, though.” He took out his knife and pried out a large tile from the corner of the room. He reached in and grabbed a small metal bucket with a lid on it. He angled his face away, and he used the knife to loosen the lid a bit.

Michael’s nose was immediately assaulted by the smell of alcohol so strong he was certain it was burning out what little nose-hair he had. He shook his head and squinted as Marcus showed off a vile-looking brown slurry with chunks of fruit floating inside of it.

“You made hooch?” asked Pyotr with a smile. “Like they do in the prisons?”

Marcus nodded, pride clear on his face.

“That’s why you were taking all that fruit. I thought that might be the case but was not certain.”

He reached back into the hole and pulled out a ladle, one of the same ones used at the water barrels.

“Dammit, is that the one that went missing? When Dugan reported it missing, it got Patel beaten.”

“Patel’s an asshole,” replied Marcus. “Besides, I didn’t want to drink directly from the bucket.” He dipped the ladle into the brown slurry and held it up. “Who’s first?”

Pyotr grabbed it without hesitation, spilling a bit on the floor in the process, and took a deep, long sip. His face flinched a bit as the burn hit him. Then he shook his head, quickly letting a hiss of air out from between his teeth. “That is disgusting. Is like if a pitcher of sangria was raped by the devil.” In spite of his words, he took another sip, his face contorting again as he did so.

Ollie reached for it next, and Marcus pulled the ladle away before he could grab it. “I don’t know, man. I may need to see some ID.”

“Fuuuck you,” replied Ollie, reaching for it again and taking a sip.

After that was Davi, whose pale face immediately flushed from the alcohol, and then it was Michael’s turn.

“Well, I guess it turns out you’re never too old to be peer pressured.” He took the ladle and had a long sip of his own. It burned like fire all the way down to his stomach, where he immediately felt it start to prepare an unfortunate future for him. “Damn, Pyotr. Your description was spot-on.” He coughed a half-dozen times with his eyes streaming tears.

Marcus then had a sip of his own, managing a slightly more controlled look on his face than the rest of them had managed. Michael guessed he’d been having tastes here and there before he’d decided to share his bounty.

“Another round?” he asked with a smile.

Everyone but Michael awoke the next day in a haze of misery as the aftereffects of the alcohol took their toll on all of them. Michael likely would’ve felt the same, but he had the luck of his high recovery preventing him from being too hurt by it. Only Pyotr managed to get out of bed at the same time that he did, though he looked miserable doing it.

“I used to wake up hungover on eggnog and still went to dance as the rat-king on Christmas. This is nothing.”

Michael laughed a bit at that and decided to be proactive for his friends. He retrieved all of their canteens and filled them with fresh clear water, then he helped each of them get into their uniforms and get their beds made so they wouldn’t be forced to do extra squats and push-ups with hangovers. In Ollie’s case, he had to literally carry him out of bed and toss him into a cold shower to get him moving. He sent some uniquely disgusting Australian curses in his direction for that, but he could stomach that more easily than the hooch he’d ingested the previous night.

He saw Marcus talking to a few of the other Penitents, the ones that had also earned some silver by making it to the top of the boards and saw them slip him some copper coins. He approached him.

“What was that about?”

“Just a little side business. It’s not like we’re going to be able to drink all that shit ourselves.”

“You sure that’s a good idea? They had Lee caned for fighting a regular the other day. Who knows what they’ll do if they catch you with this.”

Marcus shrugged. “I’ll take the risk. Eventually, we’re going to have a chance to get out of here. When we do, we’ll need some extra scratch to get by. The more we can gather before then, the better off we’ll be.”

Michael frowned at that. He knew Marcus wanted out, but on his terms, smarter terms than the ones Xiu had taken that had gotten him hung on a short rope.

“I mean, you weren’t planning on spending all that silver you earned on gloves and blankets, were you?”

He hadn’t really considered what he was planning on doing with the money beyond getting himself a few creature comforts. They were interrupted by the entrance of Kline and his soldier escorts. They scrambled to stand in front of their bunks and ready themselves for uniform and bed inspections. Michael realized too late that while he’d managed to help all of his friends tidy their beds and uniforms, his own bed was still unmade and his uniform improperly buttoned.

Kline stopped in front of him, frowning as he looked at him and his bed.

“Hold out your hands.”

Michael looked at him, surprised, as they’d been doing mostly physical exercises instead of the hand beatings since they’d reached a certain physical age. Still, he complied, holding out his hands.

Kline smacked his knuckles twice in quick succession with the thin reed.

“Now drop and give me fifty. On your knuckles.”