Quietly, Jethro slipped down from his sleeping pod. The dorm room’s silence, broken only by the soft snores of his roommates and the purrs of their chbeasts, made the space feel thick and watchful.
Jethro paused once his feet touched the floor, checking if anyone had woken up or had stopped snoring. Thankfully nothing but the soft cadence of sleep.
Cogsworth, Kekius’s Brain Turtle, lifted its head from the circuit board it was tinkering with. Its green, glassy eyes fixed on Jethro, unblinking and keen.
Sizing him up for a few seconds, it simply lost interest and returned to its ticulous wiring. Jethro couldn’t afford to sigh, but he was relieved.
He was still dressed in the sa clothes from earlier, knowing full well that volcanic caverns and fla forests would likely ruin anything clean for tomorrow.
Once he was certain that no one was awake, Jethro carefully scooped up Scorch from his pillow, the red glint in the lizard’s bulby eyes fixed on Jethro, a low thrum vibrating in his chest.
Balancing Scorch on his shoulder, Jethro tiptoed to the door and eased it open.
Unlike what one would expect, the dorm room doors were not locked. Beastcorp understood so students would like to train in the dormitory facilities late at night, and so allowed open access to that. Anything to produce stronger tars.
Slipping through the door like a shadow, Jethro paused. Down the dim corridor, near a junction, a small group of students huddled, their whispered conversation carrying just enough to confirm they were breaking the rules of lights-out.
Late night cliques and gatherings were not allowed.
’Idiots,’ Jethro thought, ’but useful idiots right now.’ Their noise masked his own passage. He didn’t want them to see him, and he didn’t want the more quiet ones who were likely heading to the training facilities or just unable to sleep, to see him either.
So, tiptoeing and lowering his head, he ghosted past them, hugging the wall. Scorch watched from his shoulder, like a kid in a scary ride, yet having a twisted form of childish fun.
The lift doors sighed open as he approached, capturing the attention of two students who looked his way.
But Jethro was already inside, and the darkness thankfully hid his appearance behind a silhouette. He jabbed the button for the ground floor, heart hamring against his ribs until the doors sealed him in.
Now he could let out a sigh of relief as loud as he wanted.
He glanced at Scorch after. "The things I do for you, you crimson lizard." He smiled. "You better not let down, you know."
Scorch croaked softly.
Jethro noted, not for the first ti, that Scorch was croaking more now than nodding to communicate. ’That ans he’s entering Juvenile Stage pretty soon. I should begin so sync exercises with him.’
Once that was decided, he reached into his pocket, fishing out the Portal Box. He spun it around softly, filling the dull neon blue traces of light on its tal skin.
Because of this tiny powerful box, Jethro was finally going to find out whether this knowledge he had in his mind was true. It was the threshold to actual power. To making sure people treated Scorch with more respect.
People like Nyro Vexx.
During the frantic hours after escaping Eryn and Jessamine, but before eting Kekius and Oand at the tram, Jethro had used the chance to study the Portal Box in a secluded study nook.
From what Professor Luria taught, he knew how the Box worked: It tunneled between two existing points mapped in its system, bending reality for a brief but stable passage.
The Box had a holographic display that showed all the ’checkpoints’ it had mapped in its system across the entire Academy, all labelled with alphabets. But the only one that mattered to Jethro was the one outside the Academy: Checkpoint K
That was the exit, the only checkpoint in this Portal Box that was beyond the heavily guarded walls of the Beastcorp Academy. Any other checkpoint could serve as his entry point, but the closest one was Checkpoint V.
But even as close as it was, it still promised to be a hurdle. Still, at least it was possible. Which was sothing he couldn’t say about the Academy Gates.
They weren’t re gates. They were a layered fortress with walls of aether-infused tal and plascrete, scaling over thirty-foot, guard towers bristling with sensor arrays that scanned for thermal signatures, aether fluctuations and unauthorized comms.
Patrols prowled the grounds with hoverbikes and security chbeasts in the Gold to Platinum Ranks lurked beside guards.
Smuggling out a pebble, let alone a student and a chbeast, was a fantasy. That was the real reason for the stolen Box.
Even if he’d managed to save enough credits to buy one, he’d never have been allowed a checkpoint outside the walls.
Buying his own would have ant paperwork, authorizations, interviews with instructors and the security director— layers and layers of rules that only a high ranked tar or a trusted noble could navigate.
It was never going to happen for soone like him.
So he improvised.
A soft thud signaled that lift had arrived at the bottom floor. Jethro stowed the Box and moved with purpose, slipping quickly through the lobby and finding the exit marked ’Maintenance.’
That wasn’t an exit ant for students— wasn’t even common knowledge to most students. But Jethro moved like he knew exactly what he was doing, and where he was going.
In truth, he did. Though the knowledge for this price was heavy.
After he had finished studying the Portal Box, before reuniting with Kekius and Oand, he’d gone hunting for information— the kind only the school’s low-level fixers traded in.
Jethro followed a trail of pointed fingers to an information broker. He was a gaunt third-year with perpetually shifting eyes. Jethro rembered he had a weird na that sounded like a cooking ingredient. Sothing like garlic.
In any case, Garlic had laid out the map for him: "West service alley. Third vent cover. It looks welded but don’t worry, the lower left bolt is fake. Jest pry it and crawl fifty feet. Drop into the old storm drain.
"There are Sensor Drones there so be careful, those stupid chbugs catch everything. Just wait until they buzz off. The blindspot lasts only ninety seconds which ans you have to move fast. After that, go through the exit grate under the periter wall access stairs. That pops you right outside the dorms, first-year."
Jethro hadn’t trusted him at first. The guy looked exactly like soone who’d sell you out for a snack. But the thing with third-years, especially guys like him, was that they often seed disconnected from the goings-on of the school because they were in the middle of the other students.
Garlic most likely hadn’t even heard of the rumors, talk more of knowing who Jethro was, so he had no reason to dupe him.
From Jethro’s standpoint, he was a hopeless Silver-Rank tar, who had nothing good going for him, and decided to make a living from his rascal knowledge of the ins and outs of the school.
But then again, he was sure that Garlic would know his na by sunrise. He only hoped he wouldn’t co back demanding for more money.
He’d already given up his last 8 credits and his lunch for tomorrow just for that information. It was a brutal deal, but he had no choice. This was about Scorch, and it was a "go big or go ho" situation.
Although now he had no more money left, he was most likely to go hungry.
Now, pressed low in the reeking storm drain, Jethro pinched his nose and fought back a gag as stinking water lapped at his knees. The access stairs to the periter wall walkway was just ahead, but Jethro wasn’t moving, and that was because the Sensor Bees were there too.
He waited, watching them buzz about, their stinger beeping with a red light as they scanned the periter.
Soon, they turned in unison, their stingers now directed at another side. Jethro quickly bolted out of the water, towards the stairs.
’One... two... twenty...’ he counted in his head. He had to be exact, the Sensor Bees would reset their sweep soon, and if their sensor stingers caught him, he would be finished.
He ran faster, while maintaining silence and at the sa ti, counting in the depths of his anxious mind. ’Seventy three...Seventy four...’
He found the loose grate and lifted it just enough. ’Eighty five... eighty six... eighty seven...’
He slid Scorch through first, then squeezed himself inside, shutting the grate as soon as his mind arrived at ’Ninety.’
The Sensor Bees turned instantly, searching again for trespassers.
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