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room was filled with heavy, regal chairs with thick seatbelts that would constrain both waist and shoulders. The seats were each a meter apart and laid out in concentric circles of ascending layers, and they were attached to the floor with thick steel spikes. Several of the other recruits were sitting peacefully in their chairs and some had already buckled their heavy seatbelts and were strapped in like prisoners. They looked calm and in no danger; the only one who seemed to be under stress was the Amazon girl. She refused to be restrained and was fighting the guards.
    Another girl had a pet hyaena with her. The guards had anticipated this and placed it in an iron cage below her seat, and the hyaena lay with unusual calm beneath her.
    Kayana allowed herself to be buckled in and counted the other recruits. There were sixteen in all in the concentric circles, with twelve on top and four at the bottom. The mercenaries allowed a grey-looking man to come into the auditorium, and then the guards closed the door and strapped themselves in on the third row above the recruits. Once the door had closed, Kayana noticed that the room wasn’t as large as she’d previously thought. It was big enough to hold everyone inside, but no bigger. It had three rows, a space in the middle where the grey-looking man was standing, and circular walls that led her to believe that the room was in a tunnel. She felt her seat shake and realized the room was descending; it was then she realized that they were not in an auditorium, but a vessel .
    The man walking on the bottom floor of the vessel wasn’t old; in fact he looked quite spry and handsome, and his hair was brown. But he appeared grey , as if he had lived a thousand years and seen everything there was to see. He came down to the center of the auditorium and spoke with a stern voice.
    “Good evening. My name is Charon , and I am honored to transport the first class to the Academy. We are prepared to make the journey underground,” he said. He then looked at the defiant Amazon. “Though seat constraints aren’t required, they’re highly recommended. We have a saying here at the Academy: technology trumps the deities. You may have slayed a Hydra and survived a demon, but you’re no match for the speed at which we’ll travel, and you’re no match for our ability to stop .”
    As Charon said the word stop he pressed a button, and the vessel came to a jarring halt. Kayana shook a bit, and the Amazon went flying forward and hit a wall. She got up, looked around with a scowl and strapped herself into her chair.
    “Good,” said Charon. “Now we’ll begin the descent.”
    Charon pressed a button and the auditorium began to pick up speed. The ride was smooth, and soon it felt as if it were not moving at all.
    “It’s on levitating rails,” said the boy with cloven feet. He was smiling, as if he was withholding a secret. “You can’t feel it, but we’re going fast . Faster than Hermes, with more range than Artemis and more agility than Apollo—”
    Boom ! The entire vessel shook, and they felt still once more.
    “Maybe not quite as agile as Apollo,” he said with a smile. “In any case, my name’s Pan . Pleased to meet you, everyone!”
    They traveled onward. Some of the young kids began talking with each other, and one of them laughed at how the Amazon girl fell out of her chair. One young man named Rowan heard this exchange and took offense on her behalf.
    “Silence, all of you!” he bellowed in a thick Asgaard accent. “This Amazon will not be bound by social grace nor buckling of seat! I am the great Berserker Rowan, and I’ll not tolerate the insults towards her!”
    After a moment of awkward silence, the cloven-hooved boy Pan spoke up.
    “We apologize for insulting her,” said Pan. “We just thought it funny how she flew into a wall.”
    The Amazon was frowning and slightly embarrassed. She was clearly not interested in being the center of attention.
    “I thank you for