The artificial gravity was worse than they expected—pulling them slightly downward and sideways at once, like trying to balance during a shipwreck. The moment anyone moved, the floor tilted a fraction—subtle but destabilizing.
"No powers?" another cadet said, voice strained. "But my ability is balance."
"Then you're screwed," Frank said dryly.
Margaret squinted at the beam. "We'll have to go one at a time. Even weight, no sudden shifts."
The tension spread quickly, like static in the air.
Then a voice from the middle of the group—Rhia, the girl with the sharp eyes and sharper tongue—broke the silence.
"Uh… does Malik count as a failed crossing?" she asked. "Since he's not here and all. That's minus one point already, right?"
Heads turned.
Half the group winced.
The other half glared.
Peter sighed. "Wow. You're smart. But you didn't have to say it."
Rhia shrugged. "I'm just being practical. We're already starting behind. Better to know where we stand."
"We stand," Margaret said pointedly, "on this side of the beam. Still together."
Rhia's gaze lingered on her, unreadable. Then she said, "Right. For now."
Xander clapped his hands once. "Enough. Strategy time. Fastest and steadiest go first. No heroes. If you fall, you fall. Reset, wait for the next. Focus on footing."
Margaret added, "Whoever has martial training or movement-focused backgrounds—go early. Set the tone. The rest of us can learn from their rhythm."
Someone in the back groaned, "Malik would've fallen anyway."
Frank tensed but said nothing.
Margaret ignored the comment. For now.
One by one, names were assigned, shoes adjusted, palms wiped on uniforms. The bridge gleamed, impossibly thin, like a blade.
This was their first test. Their first public score.
And already, they were one step behind.
Victor stood at the edge of the group, arms folded, silent since they entered the room.
He wasn't intimidated. He wasn't confused. But he was... unsettled.
Why didn't Malik fight me?
That question had haunted him since the Mutation Trials. Everyone else saw Malik as a mystery or a fraud. But Victor had felt something in that final moment, a tension that didn't belong to fear. Malik chose not to fight. And Victor couldn't figure out why.
"Strongest goes first," someone suggested.
And like a tide turning, every head turned toward him.
Victor blinked.
"Why is everyone looking at me?" His voice was calm, unimpressed. "Without my ability, I'm the weakest. I trained for years with it. Without it, I'm just... a guy with good hair."
Some chuckled. Others frowned.
Then Frank—quiet, gangly, often underestimated—cleared his throat.
"We could hold hands."
A pause.
Then laughter. Dry, sarcastic, dismissive.
"If one of us falls, we all fall," someone said.
"But if one slips," another added, "they can be dragged back onto the pole."
"With this gravity?" a third scoffed. "We'd just all die together."
The group devolved again—arguments weaving into counterarguments, doubts soaking into the air like cold mist. Voices overlapped. No plan was perfect. No one wanted to be the first to fall.
The timer on the far wall ticked down—
00:00
A chime echoed across the chamber.
"BEGIN."
The floor vibrated. The beam glowed. They were out of time.
The group split almost instinctively—some clustering into pairs, others opting to go alone. No unity. No clear strategy. Forty-nine uncertain hearts trying not to be the reason the team failed.
"I'll go first," said a proud voice.
It belonged to George, the boy who had ranked fifth during the Mutation Trials. Confident. Muscular. Known for his agility when his gravity-bending powers were active.
But now? Now he was just a body on a beam.
He stepped forward, calmly, precisely. One foot in front of the other. His arms extended like wings as he walked the line.
The room held its breath.
One meter. Two. Ten. Then, halfway across, he stopped.
Dead still. His foot twitched once. Sweat dotted his brow.
He looked down, and for the first time, they all realized: the pit wasn't just a design. It went down forever—a synthetic abyss designed to mess with perception. Endless depth. No floor. Just fall.
And the gravity tugged harder. George's knee shook.
One wrong step, and he'd be the first point lost.
I wonder… if I knew someone was behind me, would I feel this nervous?
George's thoughts flickered like static as he stood, trembling slightly, at the midpoint of the beam. His pulse thundered louder than the silence around him. He regretted going alone. Regretted opposing the idea of teamwork just moments ago. Regretted needing to prove something.
But ego was a stubborn thing—it didn't just live in the chest. It anchored the feet.
So he adjusted his mindset.
One breath. One step. Another. He made it. Barely.
When his boots landed on the far platform, a small ping echoed from the board overhead.
FALCON TEAM SCORE: 1 POINT.
Encouraged murmurs rippled through the group. Someone else stepped forward immediately. Braver, perhaps. Or more foolish.
They didn't make it past the fifth meter.
"Damn," someone hissed as the cadet slipped off the beam and plummeted into the synthetic abyss, only to be caught by the containment field and lowered back to the start like a fallen chess piece.
One by one, more tried. One by one, more failed. Some made it halfway. A few lost footing at the very start. The gravity, the pressure, the mental weight—it was too much.
That's when it finally hit them:
This was never about individual success. The instructor had said it from the beginning. Team progress.
Frank, quiet until now, blinked at the board. His mind had been running the entire time—mapping angles, calculating tension, imagining momentum like math.
Nine cadets remained on the original platform.
He stepped forward slowly. "I think… I can get us across."
The group turned toward him.
Margaret tilted her head. There was something sharp behind her eyes now—not just curiosity, but a dawning realization.
He wasn't just the quiet one. He was smart.
"Let Frank guide us," she said before anyone else could interrupt. "We've lost almost everyone. At this point, what do we have to lose?"
A few heads nodded.