First night

William walked through the big double doors, old as the building they were made from. The original tendons in the wood could be seen as well as where the original handle was taken off and a newer one was replaced, likely for security.

Walking through the halls, William saw more men who looked stiff and clean. They did not stop or look down on him they just kept on walking.

Coming to the end of the hall of red bricks and doors, there was a single door on the wall decorated by two heavy claymores with hilts worn and dinted from battles behind a big hide-covered shield.

A deep voice boomed when Williams knocked on the door "Come In" William swallowed, fearing the unknown voice behind the door. If this collapsed his whole plan would fall apart and he would have to return to his house.

The door creaked as it was opened. Looking past the grand wooden desk, he saw who the voice belonged to. It was an aged man of about fifty years old with a red beard with a few white hairs scattered through it. Blond light hair covered his head. He was massive, making the big desk look small. This was the first person he had seen with a beard, it was well maintained and curated like all the other soldier's appearances.

"Take a seat, William," said the middle-aged mountain of a man. From the chair William got a sense of how big this man was. He was very tall, even sitting down this was not in any doubt, his shoulders broad blocking out the sun that shone through the window behind him.

"I hear from my good friend that you are having some problems at home, is this so?" the man said scrutinising William's face as he said so. " Yes sir I am," said William.

"Your principal is a good friend of mine and an even better judge of character so I have admitted you on his request, I hope you live up to his recommendation." Said the man behind the desk.

"I'm not sure I introduced myself, I am Taranis, nice to meet you, William," said Taranis.

Leaving the room a few minutes later William left the room and headed back towards the sunken green barrels of a barracks. They looked like barrels from afar and as Taranis had told him at length when a high-ranking official came he had mistaken them for barrels off in the distance, the name stuck however and now was hung up above the barracks door.

The door swung open and a stench hit William. One of sweat and hot metal. 

the rows of bunks lined the walls with one personal foot locker for each person at the end of the bunks nestled next to each other no wider than the bunks themselves.

William found all eyes on him as he walked in, it was silent, dead silent.

Only when William took a few steps in and closed the door did the silence break "What is this shit, I thought you were an officer" Yelled one of the men standing at attention by the bunks with the rest of the men.

As if that was a signal the rest of the men broke from their stance and started swearing as some went to sit on the beds.

Three boys walked up to William, staring him down.

You gave us quite a fright there said the leader, Peitro Sascha. He was rather short, with longer than normal hair flowing down from his head, a waterfall of black, he was in the front of the group. 

He introduced the other two men who followed him, Arnaldo Gilberto and Allard Patton.

Arnaldo was the tallest of the men, almost catching up to William in height, but apart from that he was very plain, just chubby with curly brown hair. He was nicknamed Gil. It rolled off the tongue faster.

Allard was a redhead. His hair looked like hot coals, his hair short. A long stubble of red hair he was the shortest of the three with big eyes that shone emerald green.

While being introduced to each of the boys, William looked at them and sized them up, they were well-built with slightly tight muscles all over them, even the cubby boy Arnaldo had muscles in his arms showing through the layers of fat.

He looked at them and wondered if the only difference between the boys wasn't lifestyle as here it was all very strict and controlled but dictated by pure genetic lottery, each being doomed or blessed from birth and able to bend the fate their genetics gave them the ability to shape their own fate but never being able to fully break free.

William saw the room was small and dark with little light flowing down from the middle row of lights. After William introduced himself briefly to the three boys he moved to an empty top bunk and slung his body on it before he started unpacking his gear, only leaving the necessities in the bag. While the rest were placed neatly into the locker at the foot of the bed.

The first day at the military academy was fast, never stopping he had to try and catch up on his own time to be up with the rest of the class.

William was never a good studier, he was always just intelligent enough to not have to study and still receive good marks.

He had to learn formations for the school with its different routines and formations, some were foreign to him completely and for others, he had a strange feeling of familiarity with them, he snapped into the formation without a second thought.

After the morning roll call and formations, he had exercise till 8 a.m then came the learning that went on for 4 hours until 12 p.m. when lunch was had after an hour was free time to be spent as they may between working out, relaxing or doing whatever they want for 1 hour before they went back into the classrooms until 3 p.m when they got off again until dinner and they where in bed by 9 pm for a 6-6:30 a.m start.

William obviously had a problem. Unless it was the time to sleep he had far too limited time to get out of the academy and make his way to the base to scout it out.

Through the next few days William practised to see how far his shadows could move while holding contact with him.

If william concentrated, he could see through the shadows eyes but if he didnt it was like a sense of knowing what the shadow could see and hear.

Five days went by where in his free time william would sit under a lone tree on the hill close to nothing he could experiment with the shadows, he found this "training ground". After walking past it on his third day, he saw how the shadows danced on the ground in random patterns that fell down from the thick clouds above, moving as if alive. Where better to hid a living shadow then here?

Due to his time spent as the other cadets thought sleeping, he was able to get a good idea on how far the shadow could go before he would lose contact with it, as the shadow drew further away from him he felt the sense weaken.

It was not until about a weak later when William was almost caught practising, he did not see his new friends walking to his tree to talk to him, he felt their hand reach down and touch his shoulder and in a panic he sent the shadow to the barracks to hide in its shadow, further then he had sent it before he lost contact with it.