Snippet #1668984

Ian Traves-Hamilton watched the coach as it receded into the distance. He had completed his check list of the important things, before it was fully out of sight. Not that it mattered, really. To arrive at the Academy with nothing but what he stood up in might have been even more of an adventure. Trouble was, he had a certain anal cast to his mind that he had never quite been able to shake off.

Suitcase (check). iPod (check). Phone (check). Flash drive containing various hacking programs that might come in useful (check). Open mind (check). Yep - got all he needed.

Well, he was here. here of his own free will. Whatever it might bring. The humiliation of rejection, of being unchosen? A mysterious new fate? Whatever, it was too late to back out now. He'd spent his orphanage leaving-grant on this trip. He could, if he wished, walk away now - but then he'd have nothing. Nothing except the regret of never knowing what might have happened.

He'd been putting off the moment, and he couldn't do so any longer. He looked up at the Academy, in the distance, behind the gates. The long drive, and beyond it, the main building itself, his home for the foreseeable future. He did not even know himself if he regretted the impulse that had brought him here. He began repeating the mantra he'd written for himself, the one designed to remove any regret.

I do this from choice
The price for this is one I chose to pay
This road take me where I chose to go
I chose this.

And then, unable to delay any longer, he hitched the strap of his backpack, picked up his suitcase, and walked briskly towards - what?