Rain arrived without weather patterns to justify it, droplets falling upward from the ground before reversing mid-flight and descending normally, creating visual stuttering that made the courtyard appear frozen in multiple moments simultaneously, and Conrad Coleman stood beneath the overhang outside Building 3 watching precipitation defy physics while mentally cataloging tactical responses to environmental hazards that shouldn't exist.
He'd been at the academy for two years.
Specialized in strategic analysis and threat assessment, his academic focus built around understanding force multiplication, resource optimization, and the kind of calculated risk evaluation that made him valuable in simulations and theoretical exercises even if practical application remained hypothetical.
The current situation was not hypothetical.
Conrad pulled out a small notebook—he'd started keeping physical records three days ago after noticing that digital logs occasionally contradicted themselves when reviewed later—and made precise entries documenting the rain's behavior, noting timestamps, angles of deviation, duration of abnormalities.
Across the courtyard, he spotted Reynard Bell doing something similar, the two of them engaged in parallel documentation without coordination, both apparently having reached the same conclusion that maintaining independent records was necessary when reality stopped being reliable.
Movement near the fountain drew his attention.
Uno Nao stood in the rain, completely still, water falling around him but not on him—not through active deflection or magical shielding, but through something closer to the rain forgetting he was a valid target, droplets adjusting their trajectories to avoid contact without appearing to notice they were doing so.
Conrad made a note: Subject demonstrates passive environmental non-interference. Rain does not acknowledge his presence.
He'd been tracking Uno for six days now, ever since Professor Schneider had repeated the same lecture segment four times in Advanced Tactics without appearing to notice, and Conrad had looked up from his notes to see Uno sitting three rows ahead, expression neutral, presence somehow responsible for the temporal malfunction in ways Conrad couldn't articulate but felt certain about nonetheless.
Threat assessment was Conrad's specialty.
Identifying danger, quantifying risk, developing contingencies for hostile scenarios—he'd trained himself to recognize patterns that indicated escalation, to notice subtle indicators that preceded violence or collapse or systemic failure.
Everything about Uno screamed threat.
Not hostile threat—Conrad didn't think Uno had malicious intent—but existential threat, the kind that couldn't be negotiated with or defended against because it operated at a level where negotiation and defense weren't applicable concepts.
The rain stopped as abruptly as it had started, leaving behind puddles that reflected buildings at wrong angles, and Conrad watched Uno turn and walk toward the main academic complex, students unconsciously creating space around him, and made another note: Observe from distance. Direct engagement inadvisable until more data available.
Inside Building 7, Otis Knight sat in Applied Ethics listening to Professor Naito Yoshito discuss moral frameworks for authority-based decision making, and tried to focus on the lecture instead of the growing certainty that something fundamental about the academy's institutional integrity had fractured.
Otis believed in systems.
Believed in rules, structure, the frameworks that prevented chaos from consuming organized society, and his entire academic trajectory centered on understanding how to maintain order through legitimate authority applied consistently and fairly.
But consistent application required consistent reality, and reality at the academy was becoming distinctly inconsistent.
The lecture continued with Professor Naito's usual measured authority, each point building logically toward conclusions about duty and obligation, except approximately every seven minutes the professor's voice would skip backward, repeating the previous sentence with exact intonation before continuing forward as though nothing had interrupted the flow.
Otis counted the occurrences, documenting them in margins of his notes: 11:37 - repetition. 11:44 - repetition. 11:51 - repetition.
Seven-minute intervals, perfectly regular, suggesting pattern rather than random malfunction.
He glanced around the lecture hall, searching for common variables, and his gaze settled on white hair three rows ahead, perfect posture, neutral expression, and Otis felt certainty crystallize: This student correlates with all documented irregularities.
Not proof.
Not evidence that would satisfy rigorous investigation.
Just pattern recognition suggesting causation, and Otis trusted pattern recognition because patterns represented order attempting to communicate itself through observable phenomena.
The lecture ended without conclusion, Professor Naito dismissing class mid-argument as though he'd completed his intended material, and students filed out with varying degrees of confusion, some apparently having noticed the abrupt ending while others seemed satisfied they'd received complete instruction.
Otis remained seated, watching the white-haired student stand and move toward the exit with that same measured efficiency he applied to all movement, and on impulse Otis stood as well, following at a distance that maintained observation without appearing confrontational.
The student—Otis struggled to recall his name despite having seen him multiple times, the information sliding away whenever directly accessed—moved through corridors with navigation that suggested familiarity despite having enrolled recently, and Otis tracked him through two building transitions before the student stopped abruptly and turned, meeting Otis's gaze with eyes that showed awareness without surprise.
"You're following me," the student observed, statement rather than question, voice quiet and even.
Otis felt briefly embarrassed before professional interest overrode social discomfort, and he stepped forward with the directness he typically applied to difficult conversations.
"You're connected to the irregularities," Otis said, matching the student's observational tone. "I've documented seventeen instances of temporal anomalies, all occurring in your proximity."
The student tilted his head slightly, minimal acknowledgment, and when he spoke his response carried neither confirmation nor denial.
"Correlation isn't causation," he said, echoing the kind of analytical caution Otis normally championed.
"True," Otis agreed. "But when correlation appears in every instance across multiple contexts, dismissing it requires more evidence than accepting it."
Something that might have been approval flickered across the student's expression before settling back into neutrality, and he turned to continue walking, apparently unbothered by Otis's continued presence.
They walked in silence for several meters before Otis tried again.
"What are you?" he asked, the question emerging more bluntly than intended.
"A student," came the immediate reply, delivered with the same finality that made further questioning feel simultaneously necessary and futile.
"That's insufficient classification," Otis pressed. "Students don't cause reality to malfunction."
"Reality was already malfunctioning," the student replied calmly. "I just make the malfunction obvious."
The answer was strange enough that Otis needed several seconds to process its implications, and by the time he'd formulated a follow-up question they'd reached an intersection where three corridors branched away from each other, and the student paused, looking at Otis with that same careful attention.
"You believe in order," the student said, not asking, just observing. "You think systems should function correctly."
"Yes," Otis confirmed.
"Even when correct function requires accepting that some things can't be ordered?"
The question felt like a test, philosophical inquiry disguised as conversation, and Otis considered it seriously before responding.
"Order that can't accommodate disorder isn't actually order," he said slowly. "It's just forced compliance pretending to be natural law."
The student nodded once, minimally, and Otis felt certainty that he'd passed whatever evaluation had just occurred, though what passing meant remained unclear.
"My name is Uno Nao," the student said, offering information without being asked, and Otis repeated it silently, forcing retention: Uno Nao, Uno Nao, Uno Nao.
"I'm Otis Knight."
"I know," Uno replied, then turned down the left corridor and disappeared around a corner, leaving Otis standing alone in the intersection wondering whether that had been genuine conversation or simply Uno acknowledging that observation had occurred.
Either way, Otis now had a name to attach to the phenomenon, even if the name felt unstable in his memory, requiring active effort to maintain.
He pulled out his notebook and wrote it down immediately: UNO NAO - Central variable in all documented irregularities. Claims reality was already malfunctioning. Philosophical stance: some things cannot be ordered.
The documentation felt inadequate, incapable of capturing the full strangeness of the encounter, but inadequate records were better than no records, and Otis had committed to maintaining observation regardless of whether his understanding ever caught up to his data.
In the academy's medical wing, Jane Malcom sat across from a student having what the official diagnosis called an "acute anxiety episode" but which Jane recognized as something more fundamental—a crisis of perception, the moment when someone's awareness exceeded their cognitive ability to process what they were aware of.
"I can't remember his face," the student was saying, hands trembling, voice tight with distress. "I know I talked to him. I have notes from our conversation. But when I try to picture him there's just... nothing. Empty space where a person should be."
Jane listened with the patient attention she'd cultivated through years of training in psychological support and spiritual counseling, her dual focus on mental health and metaphysical wellbeing making her the academy's unofficial resource for students experiencing existential difficulties.
"Tell me about the conversation," Jane suggested gently. "What did you discuss?"
"I don't remember," the student admitted, frustration evident. "I know it happened. I wrote it down. But reading my own notes feels like reading someone else's handwriting. The words don't connect to any actual memory."
Jane made careful notations, documenting symptoms that had become increasingly common over the past few weeks, students presenting with similar complaints about missing memories, unstable recall, the sense that interactions had occurred but couldn't be verified through normal cognitive processes.
"Do you remember a name?" she asked.
The student's expression went blank, eyes unfocusing, and for a long moment they sat in silence before the student shook their head slowly.
"I did," they said quietly. "A minute ago I definitely knew. But now it's gone."
Jane watched the cognitive deterioration occur in real-time, memory actively degrading during observation, and felt the familiar mixture of professional concern and personal unease that accompanied cases she couldn't actually help because the problem existed outside any framework her training addressed.
"This isn't the first time you've experienced this," Jane observed, referring to the student's file where three previous episodes were documented.
"No," the student confirmed. "It keeps happening. I keep forgetting the same person. Or maybe different people? I can't tell anymore."
Jane finished her notes, offered the standard reassurances about stress and academic pressure and the importance of adequate rest, and scheduled a follow-up appointment knowing that follow-up would likely reveal the same symptoms without improvement because improvement required addressing root causes and the root cause appeared to be reality itself malfunctioning in ways that defied therapeutic intervention.
After the student left, Jane sat alone in her office reviewing case files, seeing the pattern emerge across seventeen different students, all describing similar symptoms, all referencing interactions they couldn't remember with someone they couldn't identify.
Her training in spiritual counseling suggested this might be metaphysical in nature—some entity or force disrupting the natural connection between experience and memory—but her training in evidence-based psychology resisted jumping to supernatural explanations when mundane causes remained possible.
Except the mundane explanations didn't fit.
Mass hysteria required shared trigger, and these students had no common experiences beyond attending the academy.
Stress-induced memory problems didn't present with this specific pattern of forgetting, where certain interactions vanished completely while everything else remained intact.
Neurological issues would show up in medical scans, and every student she'd referred for evaluation had returned with clean results.
Which left her with the uncomfortable conclusion that something genuinely anomalous was affecting student cognition, something that operated selectively and consistently, and her role was to either ignore it and continue providing ineffective support or acknowledge it and attempt intervention that might prove equally futile.
Jane closed the case files, stood, and walked to her window overlooking the central courtyard where afternoon classes were transitioning, students moving between buildings in patterns that looked normal from this distance.
A student with white hair crossed her field of vision, moving with measured efficiency, and Jane felt sudden certainty that this was connected—not proof, just recognition that observation and pattern and instinct were all pointing toward the same source.
She didn't know his name.
Couldn't remember if she'd ever been told it.
But she knew he was central to whatever was happening, and pastoral care required addressing suffering at its source rather than treating symptoms indefinitely.
Jane gathered her materials, left her office, and began the process of documenting what she'd observed, creating a formal report that would go to administration and likely be filed without action, but which needed to exist as evidence that someone had noticed and someone had tried to respond appropriately even when appropriate response exceeded available resources.
The report took two hours to complete, and by the time she finished, the white-haired student's image in her memory had begun to blur, details fading despite having seen him clearly less than three hours ago.
Jane wrote his description while she still retained it: White hair, silver eyes, perfect posture, approximately 170cm, speaks minimally, presence feels like absence.
Then she added a note to herself: Remember to remember. This is important. Do not let this fade.
She didn't know if the note would help.
But maintaining intention seemed better than passive acceptance of forgetting, and Jane had built her entire practice around the principle that conscious choice mattered even when outcomes remained uncertain.
In the academy's underground archives, Cuthbert Schneider stood surrounded by historical records dating back to the institution's founding, searching for precedent that might explain current irregularities, and finding instead evidence that irregularities had always existed but had been successfully contained or eliminated until now.
Three previous incidents matched current patterns.
1847: A student whose enrollment could never be verified despite physical attendance. Records showed the problem "resolved itself" without details about how.
1923: Temporal anomalies concentrated in the eastern wing. Administrative response: "Wing demolished and rebuilt. Issue corrected."
1967: Mass memory disruption affecting forty percent of student body. Solution documented: "Subject removed. Memories restored gradually."
Each incident had been handled, contained, erased from official history except for fragmentary references in maintenance logs and architectural records, and Cuthbert understood with growing certainty that the academy had faced this before and had responded with increasing levels of force until the problem disappeared.
Which meant the current situation would likely follow the same trajectory.
Observation, documentation, attempted containment, and if containment failed—removal by whatever means necessary.
Cuthbert didn't know who the target would be, but pattern recognition suggested it would be the white-haired student he kept noticing and forgetting, the one whose presence correlated with every documented irregularity, the one whose name Cuthbert had to check his notes to remember: Uno Nao.
He made copies of the historical records, created backup documentation in multiple physical formats, and prepared a comprehensive report that outlined the pattern and suggested that intervention would likely follow historical precedent.
Then he paused, pen hovering over the signature line, and wondered whether submitting this report would help or simply accelerate the violent response he was predicting.
If he remained silent, perhaps the situation would resolve differently.
If he spoke up, he might trigger exactly the outcome he was warning against.
The ethical calculation paralyzed him for several minutes before he decided that warning was always preferable to silence, even when warning proved ineffective, because at least warning meant someone had tried.
He signed the report, filed it through official channels, and walked back to his office knowing that documentation was complete and intervention would follow, and hoping that intervention wouldn't require the kind of erasure historical records suggested was typical administrative response to problems that couldn't be solved through normal means.
Above ground, the academy continued its careful routine, and deep beneath the oldest buildings, in chambers where corrections were authorized and enforcers were summoned, Ray Loss's approach was being tracked by systems that couldn't quite locate him but knew with certainty that he was coming.
The collision between unstoppable force and immovable object was approaching.
And everyone who'd been documenting, observing, and trying to understand would soon discover whether witnessing was enough or whether some things required more than observation to resolve.