Chapter 6 Arya

After such a lazy Christmas break, it was a real struggle getting back into schoolwork, which, insanely, this place resumed the day after New Years.

I woke up late and walked around until noon before I realized I'd put my pants on inside-out. When I ran back to my room between classes to fix that, I discovered I'd also forgotten to put on deodorant.

To make matters worse, Tobias's behavior at the ball weighed on me, and thanks to his dad sticking around the last two days, I hadn't had a chance to speak to him about it. The whole thing felt off, though I couldn't quite put my finger on why. It seemed I was destined to be the last one to know pretty much everything that affected my life.

So, when I arrived at defense training and saw Caesar motioning me over, I couldn't help but groan.

"Hello, Arya. I'm sorry to do this to you on your first day back, but I'm going to need you to stay for an additional hour today. We need to step up your training."

"Of course, we do," I sighed, unintentionally letting the sarcasm seep into my voice.

Caesar didn't seem to notice. "We're going to try you in another sim."

I kept my disdain to myself this time, though the sim room was not my favorite way to train. When I sparred against Caesar, I at least knew he wouldn't really hurt me. With the sim room, there was no guarantee of my safety. It was all so real. I understood that was the point, to prepare me for real-life battles. But I wasn't any more eager for it than I would be to get a root canal—in fact, I might prefer a root canal.

I held back during class, saving my energy for what was to come. After all the other students trickled out, I went directly to the sim room to await Caesar's instructions. When he joined me, he wore the same wearied expression as the day he'd told me about displaying my skills to the general.

"If you don't mind me asking, what did the general think of my test?" I ventured as he tapped instructions into the sim's control panel. "Did anything come of it?"

He looked up, caught off guard by the question. Then he closed his eyes and sighed. "I'll be frank with you, Arya. The general is concerned your training isn't progressing quickly enough. If he had his way, he'd pull you out of the school and oversee your training himself."

I scrunched my brows. "Can he do that?" I asked, my voice wobbling.

He held my gaze as he promised, "Not as long as I'm the director of the Dome. But either way, it's wise to kick your training up a notch or two."

I nodded, understanding the need for it but doubtful I could keep up with any more notches.

Caesar tapped the panel with finality. "Alright, you're ready to go."

I shook out my hands, flexing and stretching my fingers as I walked into the bright white room and closed the door behind me. I vaguely noted that the lights had been repaired since my tryst with Tobias—just before they dimmed.

The walls pixelated away at the same time as water pooled at my feet, the level quickly rising up my legs. The familiar prickle told me it was saltwater, and as fast as I could, I pulled off my shoes, socks, and sweatpants before my tail could come out, tugging my shirt down past my hips to hide my brief moment of nudity.

By the time my legs had merged together, the water had risen meters over my head, leaving me completely submerged. I appeared to be floating in the lake outside the school, the Dome's glass twinkling below me in the filtered light of a midday sun. It struck me as unfair for a moment, as the lake water wasn't saltwater, but maybe Caesar had forced the transformation to ensure I didn't drown.

I stayed still for a moment, recovering from the forced transformation and the embarrassment of having to disrobe in front of Caesar because of it. I didn't wear my swim top anywhere outside of the mer training room because I never expected to need it, but the sim room never failed to shatter my expectations. I vowed in that moment to never go anywhere without it again.

Something rammed into me from behind, sending me hurtling through the water. I twirled around in the stony arms that trapped me, finding a male vampire baring his fangs in a wicked smile mere inches from my face.

My reflexes took over, and I repelled him with a pulse of water that radiated in all directions. The vampire was flung a few feet away, and I sucked water through my gills with the shock of using such an attack. I didn't realize I could do that with water.

The vampire found his bearing and jettisoned toward me once more, swiping his clawed fingers through the water at me. I shimmied backward, dodging his attacks the best I could. His speed was too much for me, and he landed a gash across my upper right arm, red liquid seeping upward from the wound.

Clutching my arm with anger and wounded pride, I turned tail and torpedoed into the open water with a speed I didn't know I was capable of—but then again, I'd never been chased in water before. I looked over my shoulder and saw that the vampire was gaining on me. I willed the water to part and propel me faster, but with each inch I gained, he gained two.

Before I knew it, he had chased me toward the surface. I had no choice but to leap out of the water.

The naked air chilled my body instantly, and before I could dive back into the lake, another pair of hard arms closed around my waist and yanked me upward. I flailed like a fish on a deck trying to get free, but my tail was surprisingly heavy out of water, and I had no idea how to maneuver myself. I stretched and tugged until I could see enough behind me to know what had happened.

My captor hung by a rope from a helicopter that ascended with increasing speed. The space between me and the lake's surface was getting bigger and bigger with each rapid beat of my heart, and I soon realized that a fall from such a height would wound even a mermaid.

I couldn't fend off the vampire without my legs—my balance was too thrown off. But my deeply rooted sense of privacy reminded me that I couldn't shift back because I had nothing to cover my ass now, and I wasn't willing to put my lady bits on display in such a way for the sake of a simulated fight.

No, I would have to win this fight in the air as a mermaid.

I gritted my teeth and swung my tail backward at my attacker with all my strength. My strike loosened his grip enough for me to turn around in his hold. Now face to face, I scratched at his cheeks and neck. His skin was so thick and hard that my nails hardly grazed him. Stupid vampires!

Suddenly, I had a thought. It made no sense, but I went with it anyway. Just as Ms. Heather had shown me, I flicked out my fingers, and to my amazement, my nails extended into long, sharp talons.

I stared at them for an instant, stunned by my ability to use harpy moves while in mer form. Then, I curled my fingers into claws and dug them into the side of the vampire's neck.

The vampire shrieked and released me, and gravity grabbed hold of me. I flung out my hands, grasping for his clothes, but I grabbed nothing but air.

True panic filled me as I hurtled downward at a breakneck velocity, the mirror-like surface of the lake coming up to meet me dangerously fast. Even in a sim, if I landed on that water, I would need an urgent trip to the infirmary. I couldn't land. What was I supposed to do, fly?

I gasped as I realized that was exactly what I would do. If I could use my harpy nails in mer form, then I should also be able to use my wings in mer form! It was my only option, so I had to try.

My panic over my situation was so great that I didn't need to try very hard. As soon as I willed my wings to come out, they did, and with such urgency that they ripped through the back of my shirt.

As soon as they were fully extended, I cupped them like parachutes, catching the air and putting an immediate stop to my fall. Catching my breath, I flapped them hard until I was ascending again. I flew upward, a hysterical laugh bubbling out of my chest at the fact that I was both a mermaid and a harpy in this moment. It was almost too incredible to be true!

Something small and dark whizzed past me from behind, stealing this moment of fascination. I turned to see the helicopter coming after me, one vampire shooting at me as another pulled the wounded vampire up by the rope from which he dangled.

Fuck, I just can't win!

I narrowed my wings over my back and darted through the sky like an eagle chasing prey—even though I was the prey in this situation. More shots were fired, and bullets sailed by me, barely missing. As fast as my wings could carry me, I still never gained distance.

It became clear that running wasn't going to win this fight. Just like the first sim. Just like in real life. I had to put an end to them.

I soared upward and arched back down in their direction. Aiming right for them, I could see the bullets coming and dodged them just in time. I had no idea what I was going to do when I reached the copter, but I knew it was the only way to end the sim, one way or another.

As I got within yards of them, I wondered if I could create a large enough gust of wind with my wings to throw them off course. Not knowing what else to do, I flapped my wings toward them with all my strength. The wind that emanated was strong enough to knock a pedestrian off their feet but not enough to alter the helicopter's flight in the slightest.

It kept coming, and the gunman kept shooting. One bullet grazed the upper right side of my tail, and I growled at the pain. Now I was mad.

Instinctively, as I had done with my fingers to extend my talons, I flicked my right wing out toward them. Amazingly, feathers flew from my wing and shot at the copter-like blades. One pierced the shooter in the chest, causing him to fall out of the helicopter. Several stabbed into the black metal of the copter's outer shell and through the glass of the windshield. But the winning shot was the one feather that stuck in between the spinning blades on the top, seizing their rotation. The copter plummeted like a rock toward the lake below.

All I could do was stare in amazement as I hovered. No one told me harpy feathers could do that! They seemed so soft and gentle. What the actual fuck?

Before the scene around me finished pixelating back to the white walls and floor of the sim room, Caesar opened the door, applauding with great enthusiasm.

"Arya, that was... Wow! I've never seen anything like that before," he praised as he picked up my sweatpants and brought them to me.

I took them, and he immediately turned around to let me unshift and slip them on.

"I still can't believe I did any of it," I exclaimed, standing back up with my pants on. "And my wings—I didn't know harpy feathers could do that!"

Caesar turned back around to face me. "It's a higher-level skill, one that takes many harpies years to master, mostly because harpies are mild by nature and tend more toward healing than offense. Not only were you able to shoot your feathers well before expected, but you were able to do it while in two different shifter forms!"

The excitement in his animated face made him look boyish for a moment and not the brooding professor who was several years older than me. The fact that I was responsible for this change in his usual dower demeanor made me swell with pride.

Well, I was swelling with pride for several reasons.

"I have no doubt that you'll be the salvation of us all," he said, leading me out of the room.

That comment should have broadened my smile, should have fattened my head to the point of exploding.

But it didn't.

I'd done something unheard of today—existing in two shifter forms at once—and I'd beaten a more advanced level simulation than I'd ever done before. But that didn't mean I could save the world.

Hugging my tennis shoes against me as we walked across the defense room, I prayed I wouldn't let everyone down, Caesar most of all.