Hashim Kamal was not built for running.
It wouldn't be exactly true to say that he was unathletic, but it wouldn't be much of a stretch either, especially if you payed more attention to his track record than his body. His exercise came from fighting for scraps or station, not intense, focused, deliberate training. In that regard, you might say that he was just a bit behind the others, most of whom had trained for years, honing their bodies to repel the strongest of monsters.
Pitting him against other students of the Academy wouldn't be a fair comparison, by any means.
Because Hashim Kamal refused to lose.
When he saw the rack of weapons laid out, his fingers itched. His eyes instantly trailed over the swords. Every mind except for Hashim was briefly shut out from his brain. There was silence, perfect silence.
None of the swords were good, by any measure. Of course they wouldn't be. Just simple, mass-manufactured trash. Enough for students who would probably break them.
But Hashim wanted more. His hunger overwhelmed him. He grasped for one of the blades immediately, his composure shattering.
Jake, Xavier, and Regus together were hardly enough to suppress his desire. Even Regus, whose very being overshadowed Hashim's own. Jake receded to allow Regus to fully come to the front, and he forced Hashim's hand down and to the side, grasping a simple shortbow. None of them, even Hashim, remembered walking over to the rack.
They weren't ready for this. Not yet. Maybe some day, they would be. But such absolute control scared Xavier, and Jake followed along. Regus wanted their image to remain building, of course. Simply displaying their might so early, even if it was only a facet of them, did not appeal to him. Eventually there would be a time, but not now.
Regus intended to stand out, yes. But he didn't intend to display his true power.
Not that he could, yet. They would need to figure that out. But once again, that would take time.
Regus turned around. Unsurprisingly, he was one of the only two next to the weapons. The other was a tall woman who was looking at him with slight amusement.
"I've heard of you," she said in a heavily accented dialect of Argrian, the official language of the united continent.[1]
Toon supplied that she was from one of the raider tribes, a few small individual groups who had been loathe to submit to the new authority of the Council when it had been founded. Eventually, of course, the women among them had grown bored, and had decided to move to the center of the continent near the Academy, forming the Northernmost town of the four that thrived nearby. They still had a subculture there, built around forging and testing weapons, though the testing was much more dangerous than it would be in most establishments with similar business models.
He had heard of her, too. Xavier seemed a tad angry that Toon knew her while he didn't, but it was sometimes easier to find certain people in books over the real world. Her name was Lillian Sky, one of the newer members of the Council. She had led her people here to where the Academy was starting to sprout up, causing many people to suspect prior connections between her and some other members of the founding. Her presence was beneficial to the up-spin of the Academy's attendance. Having "foreign" students brought to learn was certainly a boost in its evaluation for many people.
Regus, personally, didn't care. Unless she got closer, she was just another name in the endless pile of faceless administration that he would eventually have to defeat.
He nodded silently, following Anguis's quiet instructions.
Show no surprise.
Not that there was any to show.
Keep silent. Such an obvious statement doesn't deserve a verbal response.
Lillian held his gaze for a moment longer. Regus felt a burning in his stomach, but he didn't show it. She was doing something. He didn't know her exact ability, just that it was strong. She was supposed to be attractive, but Regus, again, didn't care. One person was as different to another as the other was to them. Why should one configuration be more pleasing than the other?
Humans would have their oddities. He liked to think that he wasn't one of them. No human was the same, but no one was as strange to them as he was.
No one.
[1] This is what everyone is and has been speaking, if you're confused.