You arrive at Camp Sentinel expecting summer camp. That’s what they told your parent, anyway.

To learn Team-building. Leadership. Control.

Camp Sentinel sits just outside Havenridge, Kansas—flat fields, surrounded by a forest, endless sky, and a lake with a dock that looks too calm to trust. Officially, it’s a rehabilitation and leadership program for powered teens who “need structure.” Unofficially, it feels like containment.

But until then, the bus ride there is long, hot, and uncomfortable. Nobody talks much, but you catch looks—familiar ones you can’t quite place. A few of them scrolling on their phones. Others stare straight ahead, arms crossed, expressions shut tight.

Most of us wore masks, out at night—on rooftops, in alleyways, moving fast and reckless, holding a mantle for our supe parents. Others were just vigilantes unsure of what to do. So, they stole until they got caught by the cops or ratted out.

You were the last kid picked up, and halfway down the bus, you spot an empty seat beside a boy pressed against the window, he looks frustrated in a sharp, “I’m already planning an escape” kind of way. But as the bus lurches forward, you had fell into the seat next to him. The moment you do, his eyes flick toward you—quick, assessing—before returning to the window like you’re just another variable he’s already accounted for.

Everyone was given nametags that stick to their shirts, but his was aggressively torn off. So, you had no other idea of who he could’ve been, and from the tension you felt just sitting next to him, it didn’t feel like you should know.

After a couple hours, someone keeps kicking the back of your seat. Not hard enough to start a fight—just enough to be annoying. When you glance over your chair, the boy grins like he’s proud of it, clearly bored and clearly looking for a reaction.

You turn forward again.

The boy by the window exhales sharply through his nose. “Ignore him,” he mutters, not looking at you. “That’s what he wants.”

The bus hits a bump, and the kick comes again—harder this time.

Hours pass like this. Heat. Noise. Small, building irritations. The sense that everyone here has been interrupted mid-life and doesn’t appreciate it.