We didn't have time to process the list before Hayward ordered us to go to our assigned groups. He divided us into four groups of six, so Hayward, Murray, the doctor, and Mr. Rehm were each assigned six of us. 

"Let's go, people!" the doctor said. "We've got work to do!" 

It's not like we had four hours to do whatever he wanted, right? There was plenty of time. Regardless, I sighed and caught up with the rest of the group. 

Hayward divided the field into equally spaced quadrants where the instructors could do whatever they wanted without any distractions. A giant concrete wall of sorts suddenly began to rise through the ground. Emily and I locked eyes as it was growing. She was assigned to General Murray's group. I desperately wanted to run to her, to tell her that we would be okay. That we would make it through this together. That we were going to survive. 

I didn't know what was coming over me. We'd only been friends for a little over a week, but now it felt like we had been best friends since childhood. No, that didn't feel right. It wasn't a best friend thing. 

Suddenly, Emily smiled. It wasn't a happy smile, yet it filled me with reassurance. The anxiety that was rapidly swelling inside me started to withdraw. Her smile told me that she could handle her weight. I didn't need to worry too much about her. 

Just before the wall covered her body, Emily placed a hand over her heart. She nodded, her expression becoming more serious. I did the same after she vanished behind the wall. 

Yeah, she'll be alright, I internally thought. Emily's strong enough to handle her own. She's strong and independent, but why do I have this urgency to protect her from danger? I've never felt this way before, so-

My thoughts were interrupted by the doctor's voice booming over us. "Alrighty! With that out of the way, let's get this party started! Here's what we're going to do first." 

I glanced at the group that I was with. Taryn stood with crossed arms closer to the doctor, but I didn't know anyone else with us. Out of the six, there were three males and three females. It made me wonder how they decided to separate the groups. 

"We're going to do some basic offense and defense drills," he continued. "Nothing too serious for now. As the days progress and improvement occur, we'll eventually increase the difficulty of these drills. To start, let's get comfortable with your amazing abilities."

He had me line up about ten yards opposite a taller girl with long, wavy blonde hair. She wore a blank expression as if she was stuck attending a boring lecture. I couldn't deny that she was beautiful, but there was a lot of trouble reading her emotions. It was like she was staring into oblivion. I recognized her picture on the list. I believed she was Natalie Cavanaugh, but I couldn't remember her power. 

The doctor moved in front of our line. "This side will go first offensively. All I want you to do is a basic attack. Not too fast or strong, but I want you to challenge your opponent. I don't want anybody getting hurt yet. The objective of this drill is to get an idea of how your abilities work. The other side will defend, guarding your attack however possible. You may jump out of the way or shatter the attack with your own, but you may not deflect it back to your opponent. Are there any questions?" 

This seemed simple enough, but I knew it wouldn't be so easy later in the future. A shorter boy of Eastern descent hesitantly raised his hand. He could easily pass as a young teenager. 

"Yes, Daiki?" 

Daiki. I remembered that his ability was Aerogenises. He spoke similarly to a child worried that he'd get in trouble. "W-What if I'm not good at defense? I don't know how to guard against attacks." 

The doctor pondered how to answer that for a moment before shrugging. "Figure it out. If you get hit enough times, you'll eventually figure out how to shield yourself. Besides, it'll be my entertainment to see you struggle." 

We were truly his puppets. The doctor was only here to mash and mold us into his human shields to use in battle. I suppressed my anger, and his response didn't put Daiki at ease either. 

"Any other questions?" 

Nobody answered him. He pressed his hands together excitedly. "Good! Without further ado, let's begin! We'll start with Elijah and Natalie."

I turned to Natalie, who was now looking at me with a certain expression as if baiting me to strike at her. Of course, there was no desire to do so, but I had no choice. I didn't want to find out the repercussions if I refused.

Dropping into a stance, I felt the ground beneath me resonate throughout my body. It was like the earth was speaking to me. Opening my eyes, I thrust my palm forward and sent a column of earth toward Natalie with moderate speed. 

Natalie countered by holding her hand out and effortlessly created a shield of ice. The clash made a solid thud sound, and the column of earth shattered on impact. As I stood in awe of her raw power, she simply sighed and turned the other way. It was like she didn't care to be here. Was it that Natalie had a lot of confidence? There was no way to be sure. 

"Brilliant!" the doctor cheered. "That was such an amazing display of power. However, Theta, I want you to react a bit sooner. If this was a real battle, the timing of raising your shield could be too late. Do you understand what I'm saying?" 

Natalie slowly turned her head to the doctor, not changing her facial expression in the slightest. The doctor furrowed his eyebrows while stepping forward and started to speak, but Natalie spoke before he could form his sentence. 

"Yes." 

The tone of her voice caught me off-guard. It didn't match the rest of her composure. It was soft and gentle, similar to a mother caring for her newborn child. 

Maybe there was a part of her that was soft and gentle. 

I couldn't dwell on it for too long. The doctor stepped before Natalie, standing inches away from her face, and spoke in a menacing tone. "You will answer me when I talk to you. Don't forget that I have the shock switch. I will make you feel more pain than you've ever imagined. Do you understand?" 

Natalie's demeanor changed briefly before quickly returning to her emotionless expression. "Yes." 

"Splendid," the doctor said while taking a step back. "Now, take a strike at Alpha." 

My eyes widened. She didn't hesitate to send a large wave of ice shards in my direction. They came quicker than I anticipated, but I brought my forearms to my face to create a wall of earth barely tall enough to cushion the impact. Even though the shards didn't hit my body, the wall wasn't durable enough to last through the attack. I was pushed backward, sliding on my feet. 

Despite her behavior, Natalie was stronger than she looked. The doctor slowly clapped his hands. "Well done, Theta. Next, we have Taryn and Chandler. Delta and Zeta. Delta, you may begin." 

Taryn wanted to protest, but it seemed like she was beginning to learn her lesson in arguing. She lowered into a fighting stance and formed a fireball into her hand before launching it at him from her palm with decent speed. 

Being tall and skinny with thin, straight dark blonde hair, Chandler raised his hand and created what looked like a small blueish force field. Taryn's fireball evaporated with ease after it collided with it. She frowned as if wondering how it evaporated so easily. 

"Zeta," the doctor said, motioning to him. 

He grabbed the force field and suddenly threw it like a frisbee. It curved and was bound to hit Taryn before she threw her hands violently to the ground, creating flames powerful enough to lift her off the ground and high enough for Chandler's attack to sail under her and crash into Hayward's makeshift wall. Taryn landed safely on the ground, flipping her curly hair over her shoulder. 

The doctor applauded and stepped in between them. "Excellent. Zeta, how large can you make your barrier?" 

"About my height," Chandler answered. 

"Good, good. I want you to work on creating that barrier as large and durable as possible." 

Chandler nodded. "Yes, sir." 

The doctor turned to Taryn with a glint in his eyes. "Why did you jump?" 

"What?" she asked, dumbfounded. "You said we could jump out of the way if I needed to. I was just doing what you said." 

"If he threw multiple attacks at you while you were in mid-air, how would you have avoided or countered them?" 

Taryn frowned, trying to find an answer. "I would've just moved out of the way." 

"Did you see the trajectory of his attack?" the doctor interrogated a bit more forcefully. "They curved toward you. Even if you were moving, those simple attacks could still prove deadly, especially if this was a legitimate fight. The best defense is an even better offense. Do you understand what that means?"

She nodded wordlessly with an intimidating look in her eye. The doctor straightened his posture and matched her intense glare, speaking threateningly. "Do you understand?"

"Yes," she answered with a hint of attitude. 

The doctor reared back and slapped her across the face. The suddenness of it caused Taryn to stumble backward. I was shocked but didn't move. My instinct told me to run and help her, but that would only ignite way more problems. 

Holding her cheek, she turned back to the doctor and lunged forward to attack him, but he pulled a remote out of his pocket and aimed it at her. 

"AUGH!" 

Taryn screamed in agony as she dropped to the floor, writhing in pain as the electrical current coursed through her body. While she was seizing, the doctor stepped closer and kicked her as hard as she could in the stomach. I winced.

"You forced me to do this, Delta!" he screamed at her. "If only you didn't have your bitchy attitude, this wouldn't have happened!" 

I could only watch as the doctor kicked her again, this time in the ribs. My heart sank as she continued to scream in unbearable pain. This was inhumane. I could never wrap my head around the fact that people can be okay with torturing a person like this. Yes, she had an attitude and came off rude, but that doesn't mean she deserves any of this. I could bet that it was how she coped with her fear.

Finally, Taryn stopped seizing from the electricity. I felt tears coming to my eyes as she continued twitching. There was no way to imagine how much pain she was in. I felt utterly helpless.

The doctor kicked her again in the ribs before wheeling around to face us. "That should serve as a fucking reminder to you of who's in charge here!" 

His voice was different. It was erratic, or maybe deranged was a better term. Regardless, hearing him made my skin crawl. 

"Does anyone else need a reminder!?" 

"N-No sir," we answered staggardly. 

"I said, does anyone else need a fucking reminder!?" 

"No sir!" 

The doctor ran his hands through his greying hair before turning back to Taryn, who remained lying on the turf with her hands holding what could be broken ribs. I could see that she was crying, and I wanted to run over to her and help however I could. It was meaningless with the doctor ready to electrocute me. 

"Get up!" 

Taryn slowly pressed her hands to the ground and tried to push herself up, but she couldn't get off her knees. The doctor suddenly grabbed a fistful of her hair and forced her to look at him. He screamed so loud that I feared she'd go deaf.

"I said, get the fuck up before I fry your brain! I don't give a shit how much you're hurting! If I tell you to do something, you'll fucking do it! So GET UP!" 

I could feel my hands trembling with fear as his anger progressively worsened. I wasn't even taking the beatings, but watching it happen almost hurt just as bad. What would happen to Taryn if she didn't, or couldn't, get up? Was he going to kill her? How would he do it? Would he electrocute her to death? I didn't want to think about how excruciatingly painful of a death that would be. 

The doctor pulled Taryn's hair to get her to stand up. She yelped in pain but still used all of her willpower to stand up. Miraculously, she pushed off one leg to hobble to her feet. The doctor let go of Taryn's hair and pushed her into her spot. She stumbled but stayed standing. 

Panting, the doctor scanned us with deranged eyes. They didn't look like this before. He spoke sternly as if trying to control his temper. 

"Now, without further ado, why don't we continue this exercise without interruption? Does that sound good?" 

"Yes, sir," we said in unison. 

He scanned us again. His hair was wild and sticking out in multiple places, looking like your stereotypical mad scientist. The doctor finished panting before straightening his posture. 

"Good. That's good. Let's get back to it." 

I wasn't sure if he was power-crazy or something was wrong in his head, but his man was dangerous. He didn't have powers to my knowledge, but his high influence status made it so that it didn't matter. 

The doctor had us continue our training for another hour. Natalie never seemed to break her composure, only to furrow her eyebrows as she attacked. Her ice abilities, or Cryoprotection, seemed great for defensive purposes. Offensively, the speed and strength of the ice was limited. I couldn't overthink it now, as this drill wasn't a duel to the death. 

That made me wonder how difficult the drills would end up becoming. How far would Hayward and his crew push us? What if we couldn't live up to his expectations? 

I couldn't ponder it for long, because Natalie sent a wave of sharp ice that would easily pierce my skin straight at me. I threw up a sturdy wall and bailed backward in case the ice got through. The collision shattered most of the wall, and I could see Natalie looking at me with a blank expression.

It was truly survival of the fittest now.

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