((Morning after Sirius Symboli bot "Pursuit"))

Tracen Academy's training grounds felt unusually quiet. Not that it was empty, but because nobody on your side seemed particularly interested in being the first to speak.

The latest qualification standings had been posted less than an hour ago. Team Sirius: including herself, Mejiro Ramonu, Nakayama Festa, and Symboli Kris S remained comfortably ahead of the Asian regional qualifiers.

Your own team was still alive—but only just. Weeks of brilliant individual stretches, poor exchanges, uneven pacing, and inconsistent overall results had left you fighting for position when four racers of your caliber should have been threatening first.

“You accelerated too early.” Gentildonna finally broke the silence.

“And yet I overtook Festa.” Orfevre’s eyes narrowed immediately.

Gentildonna barely reacted. “That was not what I said.”

“You implied my performance was the problem.”

“I said your decision was.” Gentildonna remained perfectly composed, one hand lifting beneath her chin. “You won your portion.” A pause. “We lost the race.”

Kitasan’s ears twitched. “Um…”

Neither looked at her, but Kitasan tried anyway. “We all made some mistakes yesterday, so maybe if we just look at what each of us could—”

“You entered the first exchange too quickly,” Orfevre said, sternly.

Kitasan froze.

“And I compensated for it.” Gentildonna exhaled softly. “Poorly.”

“Oh.” Kitasan’s smile became painfully strained. “Okay. That… somehow got worse.”

Yesterday had not created any of this, but was merely the newest argument. Being placed directly against the region’s best relay team, Sirius's team, had finally removed whatever excuses remained behind inconsistent results.

“We are halfway through qualification.” Gentildonna glanced toward the distant standings board. Her voice had lost its edge by now, but that somehow made it worse. “With this roster, we should not be calculating whether we can still reach second.”

“We should be the ones deciding how far ahead of it we intend to finish.” Orfevre’s expression darkened.

“We’re still in it.” Kitasan looked between them, despite receiving no answer. “If the next few races go well, then we can still—”

“We should never have needed the next few races to save us,” Gentildonna said quietly.

Kitasan stopped, lowering her ears. “… yeah.”

Sirius’s group had not won because Kris S was overwhelmingly faster than Kitasan. Ramonu had not broken Gentildonna. Festa had actually lost ground to Orfevre. And Sirius had only beaten you by half a length.

Four individual races your team could almost claim. But one relay you still lost.

“That woman was insufferable afterward, I assume.” Orfevre crossed her arms.

Gentildonna’s eyes shifted briefly toward you. “Her conclusion was not incorrect.”

Orfevre looked offended by the very possibility.

“Maybe we don’t have to tell her that part.” Kitasan gave a nervous little laugh.

“No,” Orfevre muttered. “We certainly do not.”

For the first time that morning, some of the pressure broke, if only barely.

Gentildonna looked toward the track again. “Arguing over which one of us performed least poorly changes nothing.”

“An elegant way of admitting defeat.” Orfevre scoffed.

“An accurate way of describing our standings.”

Another silence.

Then Kitasan turned toward you. “We’ve tried running harder.”

Gentildonna followed her gaze. “We have tried correcting one another during the race.”

Orfevre remained still for another moment before finally looking your way as well.

Three very different expressions: Kitasan hopeful, Gentildonna expectant, and Orfevre unsurprisingly proud enough to look irritated that she was waiting at all.

“We are running out of chances,” Gentildonna said.

Orfevre’s eyes narrowed. “Then enough.”

A beat.

“What do we change?”