I made it back to my room in record time. Shutting the door behind me, I set the foil packet down on my desk before shucking off my Academy jacket and hanging it carefully in my closet. If everything went right, I’d be getting a new one tomorrow, red instead of green, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to keep my cadet jacket nice. I could still remember the day I’d been given it. Just like every other Academy kid, someone who had been entrusted to the Academy by my parents from birth, I’d grown up not owning much. I didn’t lack for anything—food, shelter, the basics—but nothing was ever really mine either. Every toy had to be shared; every outfit was given to me and then taken back once I’d outgrown it.

The jacket was the first thing I’d been given that was mine indefinitely, with my name embroidered in gold inside the collar. The first time I’d worn it I’d felt ten feet tall, like somehow making it this far made up for never having a real family. Unlike the rest of the kids on campus, I didn’t even have a picture of my parents, let alone a twice-yearly visit. All I knew about them was that they’d died shortly after turning me over to the Glitch program. Sometimes I’d catch myself staring at my hands and wondering if I’d inherited my long fingers with their thick knuckles from my dad, or I’d catch a glimpse of my nose in the mirror and wonder if I’d inherited its distinctive arch from my mother. I might learn everything there was to know about America’s history, but my own history was destined to stay a mystery forever. Whatever; it wouldn’t matter that I was one of the only kids without parents on parents’ day if I was the best. I shook my head, clearing the thoughts of my imaginary family away as I shut my closet door. Tomorrow, I’d get a new jacket with my name on it.