They find a simple meal in the mess hall, enough to tide them over for the evening before they return to their bunks. They eat alone, left to themselves before their escorts return them. 

The next day the four girls are informed that the Nox front has passed far enough that travel is safe once again. Their luggage has yet to be recovered, but they group is informed that if it is it’ll be forwarded after them. They are, however, on a tight schedule and set to ship out immediately.

The airship commissioned is smaller and sleeker than their previous transport, made for moving quickly between two nearby cities. The trip itself is only several short hours before the sprawl of Palmyra appears on a peninsula below them. In the early morning it’s easy to see the waves of inky black clouds that encircle the city, thick streams of Nox warded off by tall walls and glowing diffusers installed atop them.

The air is brisk and windy as they disembark from the airship, but they have little time to enjoy the fresh air or the sight of the waterside docking area. Within minutes they’re spirited away into another transport, driven through the hilly streets of the city and toward the northern side. Their destination is a large medical facility, clearly military in nature judging by the guards, empty parking lots, and enhanced security as they’re checked in.

Thanks to their earlier delay there’s no time to rest or check in at the academy before their initial tests, and the doctors get right down to it. Each girl is poked and prodded with a myriad of instruments. Blood is taken and physical examinations follow, mental evaluations made after that. The whole process drags on for what seems like half the day before, at last, each candidate is given the ‘all clear’. Each is given a time to report for their procedure tomorrow.

They arrive at Nova Lux academy in the early evening. It’s a sprawling stone building with wide glass windows, a lush garden, and Imperium logos decorating every inch. Across from it stands it’s the Imperium’s Officer Academy, the lights of that sister-school shining almost as bright as those coming to life around Nova Lux itself.

There’s enough time for a quick tour of the facilities before the girls are escorted to the dormitory buildings. They’re quartered two to a room, the rooms themselves of decent size for a dorm. Two beds, two desks, a small kitchen and bathroom, colors in muted blues and golds. Sleep will find them eventually, until each is awakened by the morning call.

It’s actually not until late in the evening until their surgeries are scheduled. Another consequence of their late arrival.

Each girl in turn finds themselves escorted deep into the bowels of Nova Lux, past secure doors and winding passages, deep beneath the earth into the forge where Ars Magi are made. They find themselves in a circular room, an observation area outside of a small surgical chamber. The walls gleam sterile white and the lighting is bright and harsh, reminiscent of the hospital that they visited earlier. 
Several final checks are done, and the last thing each remembers is a small cluster of white-coated doctors gathered around them, and the gleam of metal instruments before they sink into darkness.

[hr]

Unlike the other four girls, Sadie arrived at Nova Lux without any notable issue. The airship ride was a long and uneventful journey, finishing with the arrival at Nova Lux and a pomp-filled orientation for the newly arriving class. 

She too had to take the scheduled medical examinations, physicals, and jump through the same hoops that the rest of the arriving candidates did. Like her classmates she was given the go-ahead, though unlike them her surgery was delayed a day. The reasons weren’t entirely clear, but it’s a day later and late in the evening by the time she’s finally escorted down into the bowls of Nova Lux.

Soon she too drifts away into peaceful slumber as the doctors do their work.

[hr]

Each of the five girls awakes in another gleaming white room, each lying in a small hospital cot. Harsh fluorescent lights illuminate the sterile room, the rectangular space empty save for a table full of medical equipment and the beds containing the other candidates. The four latecomers may be surprised to find Sadie among them, a fifth and unfamiliar body.

Surprise, if it’s there, will soon give way to an uncomfortable soreness. Each feels like they’ve just finished a marathon, their muscles exhausted and nerves aching with dull pain. The fuzzy-headedness doesn’t help, and it’s not entirely clear if that’s a side effect of the surgery or the IV drips attached to each of their arms.

Underneath the blankets and thin surgical gowns something else has changed. Inset in each girl’s navel is a small and gleaming gemstone: their Ars Armagus. 

There’s no sign of the doctors they saw earlier, though it’s likely they’ll return at some point. For now, however, they are left to themselves.