The train released everyone at a boarding station. Three adults dressed in the black and green colors of their school greeted Ruby and Oni with open hands and polite small talk.

The older students moved on with their luggage, while the two young friends joined a group of so many other kids their age.

Someone squealed.

Another child shrieked louder for the sake of it.

Conversations, more like max volume babble, went on unending, putting the noise from Cabin Four to shame.

A private bus awaited them at a parking lot's curb-side, lit with noon-time sunlight and glossy exterior. The double-decker vehicle, done in onyx black and striped with vibrant green across its length, thrust open its doors.

"Hooray! New students, let's go!" A fourth faculty member invited them all to stampede aboard.

Combustion dust and bubblegum, leather and that new car smell — two dozen kids seiged the interior through these scents of childhood and fresh adventures on their way to the schoolbus' second level. Footsteps charged upward to the deck that overlooked all sides.

While the faculty was persuading everyone to take seats, all the kids wanted closest to a window.

Ruby and Oni stayed close with their hands on the glass and their faces squashed against the pane, for one of the school's adults had blocked Oni's watcher from boarding.

Fangs outlined the hole of his mouth in a bared threat, one warning away from tearing into his enemy. The black that framed his eyes angled sharply. He jabbed a finger at the employee's chest, upward at Oni's window, and at himself for emphasis. The malevolence of his mask displayed stronger, then, over when Ruby had first met him.

He evoked flame in his side of the argument, but his enemy zapped back with unheard retorts.

The faculty member cocked his head. He folded his arms in defiance.

Nothing the masked man said changed his opponent's status for a solid three minutes of scorching and friction, until the man in his white business suit stalked away. He shoved both hands in his pockets in defeat, before the school employee boarded at last.

Neither Ruby nor Oni had heard what went on between the two, so the details of their fight remained something as bad as their imaginations made it out to be.

Oni chewed their thumb. "He's gonna be so mad."

"Big deal." Ruby eased into her seat between Oni and the glass.

"You don't get it." Oni flattened back against their seat, too, but they kept both elbows tight to their sides and covered their mouth with both hands. "He goes with me everywhere. He's supposed to."

Ruby fixed her tiara. "What's he gonna do?" but Oni didn't have an answer.

The bus kickstarted before their conversation finished.

Both of them shushed once intercoms in the ceiling broadcasted someone's voice.

"Welcome to Spot, children: capital city of our island region. If you're eager and you know it, clap your hands!"

Applause, cheers, absolute joy erupted from the first years.

The intercom speaker continued. "For many of you, this is your first visit to Spot. You won't see much of it once we get to school, so consider this your tour and enjoy the view of our island's greatest city. We'll have some lunch, see the most popular landmarks, and finish with a walk through one historic monument: Eraclock. Please stay seated at all times until this bus comes to a complete rest. Thanks for listening, kids, and stay awesome. Now, enjoy some tunes sung by our very own: Mr. Monad!"

The speaker's voice transformed at the beginning of a chorus, cresting with more energy, greater promise, than the last speech. It was a pop song most renowned on the radio — the hook of one hit single performed in its original version by Casey, the newest teen girl sensation.

Mr. Monad sang it for them all.

Once Ruby recognized it, she and two dozen of her classmates shrieked it in unison.

This will be the day we waited for!

Ruby couldn't match the melody or notes the whole time, but roaring the words loud enough to strip her throat made up for her poor singing.

Oni didn't join the chorus, instead bobbing up and down trying to keep time with the beat of the lyrics. The child's smile didn't reach their eyes. The enthusiasm didn't infect them as much as it had Ruby.

Mr. Monad led the students through ten or so minutes of songs while their bus maneuvered city roads.

Downtown brick facilities hemmed the street-sides, where traffic lights jutted out from wrought-pewter hangers and lanterns awaited nightfall on the building corners. Bus stops and screen panels displayed transit schedules one side or digital advertisements on another. Pedestrians and business men dotted the walkways, especially at intersections where they clumped awaiting a walk sign.

The bus circled one round-about, its center a plinth that displayed a bronze statue of a man. Upright, his chin up, both hands on the top of his shield, whoever the local subject was had guarded this place with metal intent.

Brick stacks in their precise cubes made way for white-stone complexes, colossal-sized so they could house multiple offices among many floors. These structures slid away, too, once the school bus entered Spot's business district.

Here, diners competed side-by-side for lunch orders. Cars lined outside drive-thrus so long, some of their tail-ends were backed into the street. Traffic slowed to take caution around these places.

In other areas, cars took up parallel parking spots on the left and right, for slower restaurants were also open, offering sit-down experiences where hungry folks could leave their drive for air-conditioned parlors.

Ruby and the other kids shouted at the intercom for food, until the vehicle found a parking lot outside Wicked's: a local chain that served onigiri and noodles, among other things.

Ruby bounced in her seat as their ride coaxed into the lot. "Ramen! Ramen! Ramen!" evolved into a chant her classmates echoed even after the bus fully stopped.

Ruby wouldn't go on to remember much of her meal except how it reinvigorated Oni into the child who'd made their first impression on the train. They slurped their meal twice as fast as Ruby, propped themself over the back of their seat to chat up their neighbors, and the happy pitbull energy lit their face up once more.

The rest of her journey didn't have as much of an impression on Ruby, either. She glazed over historic landmarks during the drive past. She ignored the intercom's droning voice while Oni and the kids behind them argued Top Game cards.

Whoever the faculty member was reviewing every subject never carried their voice. Monotone ruled sentence after sentence, until it seemed easier to listen for earthworms or butterfly farts.

Anything Ruby would've learned throughout the tour of Spot slid into her head and out the other side, for the friends she was making stole all her focus.

What she did learn was how everyone sought holographic cards of the newest hotshot hunting team from Beacon Academy. Getting the new team's regular cards was a big deal on their own, but Oni needed the shiny ones, because they wanted to be one of Remnant's finest Top Game card collectors.

For instance, Oni also owned two of the prized rainbow edition cards of Cake — not one, but two of the same! — even though the company only made twenty copies.

That confession left the other two kids skeptical until it could be proven true.

However, attention in the bus changed when the site of their final visit emerged over the crown of a nearby knoll.

Ruby didn't know when the scenery had transformed from yawn-worthy office buildings to grass-laiden plains and mounds; from a concrete jungle laced with asphalt veins to curving paths made out of dirty gravel.

The din of the bus' second level quieted once the intercom silenced, too. A collective breath was held by all the first years who knew what they were looking at, even if they didn't understand it.

Everyone knew, but no one was certain: how could it analyze the moment of a child's birth to foretell their health?

Signal Academy had referenced it in brochures. Ruby's family had nodded sagely once they were reminded. Faculty had hinted at the start of their journey where they'd be coming that afternoon. None of that and no pictures to speak of described what Ruby was going to see.

This was tradition.

The first years' most sacred custom.

The secret forbidden from Oni's watcher — from all outsiders who would interrupt the event, including those older kids who'd already experienced it.

Even six-year-olds respected the honor and expectation of coming here — something about it nagged at the back of Ruby's mind — for it would be their first interaction face-to-face with the education that would guide them to their future.

The students clambered out onto grass feathers whispering under the wind. Fragrance that only happens outside under a temperate afternoon sun lifted through Ruby's feet and within her legs. Her fingertips sensed unseen tension which prickled through her knuckles. It was energy gliding with the same presence as a breeze, except it stirred her aura instead of her hair.

Faculty organized their children by alphabetized last name, which separated Ruby and Oni for the first time all day. Then, they walked single file up a dirt path, a shallow incline to their destination.

She mouthed what the people of Patch called it, how it felt with her lips and tongue without saying aloud, for a mystical force that's been named must begin to reveal itself to the one who faces it.

Her first test:

Eraclock.