Morty doesn't get back to her immediately, probably absorbed in whatever he's doing in his Workshop class.

Costume Shop is with Mrs. Ryan, a woman who wears multiple shades of beige in the same outfit.

"Who can give me a reason to wear a costume?" she asks.

The beiges are infuriating. Teddy distracts herself by answering.

"They don't make clothes rated for the kind of stuff mutants do." Teddy doesn't actually understand the advantages of a "costume" over, say, high-quality unbranded sports gear, but she's willing to play along. If only because there are few things worse than a dead-silent classroom after the teacher has asked a question.

"Excellent answer." Mrs. Ryan puts DURABILITY on the board. "What else?"

“To protect your secret identity!”

"Certainly." SECRECY.

“A uniform, so the police and public can recognize you.”

"Absolutely." RECOGNITION.

"For armor, or protection. Maybe your costume is your power."

"Excellent." PROTECTION.

“To show off a killer bod!”

"Why not?" KILLER BOD.

A papery-skinned girl wearing a surgical mask raises her hand. "To hide a deformity, and blend in."

“Very good," Mrs. Ryan says, putting up BLENDING IN. "All the costumes we’ve spoken about until now are meant to stand out. They deliberately attract attention. But there is a completely different kind of costume. As you can see from your fellow classmates, many of them have slight differences. Something that noticeably sets them apart from the common press of humanity. In some of these cases, a cleverly designed costume can conceal the difference, allowing the person to walk unnoticed among ordinary people. I have a particular fondness for these costumes, since they pose a greater challenge to the seamstress."

Now that Teddy considers it there are GSD cases that fall between her 'gold contacts and sparkly nails' and Zafira's unhideable end of the spectrum, who might benefit from this kind of thing. Not actually sure that's a costume, per se. But maybe POWER ARMOR, SPORTS BRAS, ASSISTIVE DEVICES, ETC. SHOP doesn't fit as well on the syllabus.

Wait, do I even technically have GSD anymore? Teddy's medical chart must be mostly crossed-out text at this point.

Mrs. Ryan continues talking about the purpose and benefits of a good costume.

"A costume doesn't have to be brightly-colored spandex," she says. "Champion did many great things, but his aesthetics should not have influenced following generations as heavily as they did. Some students have powers that can make their costume a foregone conclusion; most of you do not. Perhaps you want to model your aesthetic after a Roman centurion, or an avenging angel, or a Xenomorph. The sky is the limit. By the end of the semester, you will have either a physical mock-up or illustration of a costume that could serve you throughout your career. Please have concepts for me by tomorrow; a concept can be as specific as 'I want to have a Mister Mystic look, but with more elaborate shoulderpads' or as vague as 'something in a nice red'."

The bell rings. A few seconds later, Teddy's phone buzzes.

She checks her phone as Victoriatus gibbers fruitlessly into her headspace about 'chiffon'.

I've got a couple of Mystic Arts friends, yeah. Where would you want to meet? And it's not a weird request at all, we're at Whateley, this stuff comes up!

Teddy's plan is to break the Curse News gently to Morty with an expert that he likes nearby. Involving teachers and/or medical professionals is not something that occurs to her.

I know like three locations on this campus that aren't hiking trails. Dealer's choice. I get out at 4:30. 🤪

Email sending noise. Teddy grabs her bag and goes to leave class.

~Teddy, what if it's a gold satin half-skirt!~

Vic.

Sorry. What if it's a gold satin half-skirt?

No. How do you not know how I dress?

How do you not know how you could dress?

Teddy argues silently as she proceeds to her next class.

We can meet up at Twain at 5:00, then! Unless you'd rather meet at your own dorm instead of at mine. Or you'd rather meet at the Crystal Hall, but it gets pretty crowded when everybody gets out from classes. So, one of those places, but preferably not the Crystal Hall. Unless you prefer it.

Her next class is Intro to Psychic Disciplines. She gets there early.

Twain works, one dead poet statue is as good as another. 🙄

is there a weird psychic test on entry or is this more of a survey course.

There is not a weird psychic test! Their instructor comes in, wearing a crisp black pantsuit, and introduces herself as Dr. Vesmarran. "That's D.PSI, or doctor of psionics. My thesis was in knowledge sharing. Not teaching, per se, but the art of taking knowledge from one person's mind and copying it over to another's. I don't use the technique in class, you'll be sorry to hear; it's effective, but it requires a much more in-depth knowledge of the recipient's mind than I intend to gain for any of yours. I've occasionally been known to imprint a language or a minor psychic technique on a student who really impresses me. Other than that, the only person who gets the benefit of my powers without paying my fees is my wife. Now, does anyone want to hazard a guess what we'll be learning in this class?"

It is so cool that her psychic teacher is a woman with a wife. And! A doctorate! Whateley is great.

Less great is this knowledge-sharing stuff, again. The entire philosophy of it is still incoherent to Teddy, and the practice apparently extends past Reba the Whitman Grifter and into the upper echelons of Whateley's psychic department. Bah humbug. If you want to learn Latin instantly then you should absorb an ancient gold ghost into your brain like the rest of America. Teddy's here to bend spoons.

Teddy hates to leave professorial questions unanswered, but she knows a trap when she sees one. 'Teacher asks new students what the class is about' is a trap.

A boy raises his hand shortly.

"Mister Mallory," Dr. Vesmarran calls.

"I don't know what you're going to be teaching, but I'm here to learn psionics."

She nods. "Good answer - or, well, fun answer, which is similar. You don't know what's in my head! If you did, you'd be set. But you're not going to find out what's in my head for a while. Now, does anyone in here have a PSI rating of any level, or any experience with psionics?"

Two boys raise their hands, identical twins who look like they should be in a resort ad of some kind.

"Mister Manos," Dr. Vesmarran says, "...and mister Manos. I see my surnames-only stratagem isn't going to work here. Konstantin and Gavriil, wasn't it?"

"Kostas," says one of them.

"And Gav," says the other.

"Gav has some training..." the first starts.

"...but Kostas is the one with the PSI rating."

"Alright. Gav," Dr. Vesmarran says, looking a bit like she's licked a lemon as she utters the nickname, "what's the first thing we teach?"

"Theory and consent."

"Bingo. You're not putting your greasy little fingers in anybody's heads just yet, kids: first, you learn to keep your hands to yourselves. Don't worry, we will learn some basic techniques before the end of the semester, but before then you will know exactly what the rules are."

If Teddy wants to do telepathy before then then she can just talk to Vic. And she plans to keep everyone out of her head if she can, at least unless the knock first. And wipe their feet.

I do think we'd be better at receiving company if it wasn't all one room in here. Most minds have more partitions than this, Teddy. And I at least deserve a sitting room.

Don't you have a costume to design?

I can do two things!

"Now, before we get into theory and consent, does anyone have any questions?"

A girl with a nervous mien raises her hand. "How can we defend against psychic intrusion? That's the main reason I'm taking this class."

"My first tip is not to mention that you have secrets," Dr. Vesmarran says. "Psychics are, as a rule, incredibly nosy. More to the point, however: do you ever get songs stuck in your head? Suddenly remember that you have to breathe, or feel like your tongue doesn't feel right in your mouth?"

"Yes..."

"The best exercise to strengthen your mind against intrusion is to invite such disturbances, and extirpate them."

"Extirpate?"

"Destroy them. Completely. Get a song stuck in your head, and through sheer force of will, rip it out. Start breathing manually, and then go back to breathing automatically. If you do that about three times per day, first of all, you'll no longer be annoyed by petty bullshit like having songs stuck in your head, and second of all, your mind will be much more resilient against intrusion. We'll discuss other techniques, but for ambient resistance, there's nothing better."

The girl considers this. "That sounds... really weird. I thought you were going to tell me to imagine a brick wall around my brain, or put my private thoughts inside a basket, or something."

"Have you ever tried that? It takes up an enormous amount of mental bandwidth, and it's not even particularly effective. Get songs stuck in your head and ruthlessly murder them. Works every time."

Teddy is, god bless her, actually taking notes. They aren't color-coded yet– but give it time.

Meanwhile, Victoriatus rifles through Teddy's mental dressing room. Spandex he casts aside, as well as anything day-glo, but there's something about all these leather scabbards and steel climbing equipment... perhaps bronze would be a happy medium there... pants, of course, are an enduring fashion this millennium, although they seems so restricting to him... as the spirit mulls, he runs the blue silk of the headband Teddy wears, out there in Psychic Disciplines, through his hands, and in his grip it becomes cloth-of-gold.

Well, the headband doesn't become cloth-of-gold. Not physically. But if Teddy thought about it, she might find herself wondering what color it really was.

Dr. Vesmarran starts talking about psychic consent. Basically, you do not do anything to anyone's brain without them explicitly asking you to, including looking at it, and until you have a certification you don't do anything without supervision either. If you have psychic abilities such that you can't help reading surface thoughts, you'd better be damn sure you don't look any deeper. If someone attacks you and your only means of self-defense is a psychic technique, it's permissible to use that technique - usually. If it is found that you have broken these rules, the consequences will be severe: anything from work detention to expulsion or even arrest, depending on severity and whether or not it's a repeat offense.

"We take telepathic ethics very seriously here," Dr. Vesmarran says. "We'll talk about some edge cases tomorrow." And the bell rings.

Teddy tucks away her notebook, whose first page now reads TELEPATHIC ETHICS (TELEPETHICS) across the top. She's got some thoughts about the idea that some students' only means of self-defense is psychic techniques. Sensei Tolman would probably agree with them.

She double-takes at a reflection she sees on her way out of the class. Why is her blue silk headband blue silk? Shouldn't it. Hm. No... This all makes complete sense, but it doesn't. Argh.

Vic. What are you doing.

Victoriatus hides something guiltily behind his back in her mind's eye. I'll fix it.

Try to stop breaking things in the first place. Use your own damned thoughts.

But yours are so pretty!

She's got gymnastics next, her last class for the day. The class is small and largely female (there's one boy, who introduces himself as Callum Donnelly and who looks like a Disney prince who got really fucking buff), and the teacher, Mrs. Suleiman, is a woman of advancing years who professes to have worked with Cirque du Soleil. Teddy is the only freshman in the class and accordingly the only one Mrs. Suleiman doesn't already know, so she sets her to showing off much as Sensei Tolman did earlier in the day.

Teddy could get used to this. She's dressed out in basic black tights.

It has been more than a little while since she's done scored-and-graded gymnastics, but it's like riding a bike. She's a bit light on formalism, heavy on improvisation, and there are obvious points where one technique and another have started to sort of slouch together, but she's really very good at this besides that. Her movements are rugged and strong and explosive, except at very specific points where they verge on ballet. There's less room than you might expect between this routine and her kickboxing one earlier in the day. Teddy seems a bit uncertain about how much she's supposed to incorporate her super-strength, though; she's clearly using it, but it's more like she's juicing up baseline moves rather than doing anything novel.

Afterwards she makes enough eye contact with everyone that they know A) she's open to review and B) she's not scared of upperclasswomen.

Callum applauds when she's done, as do a few of the girls. One of the girls, icy blonde and disturbingly pale, sniffs. The teacher nods thoughtfully.

"You're very good - which I suspected, because the algorithm placed you in the top-tier class, but it's good to have confirmed. If you don't mind, I'm going to take a moment to go over a few techniques you seem a bit rusty on?"

Teddy indicates that she would love that. She didn't just take this class because the all-knowing algorithm said so. Or for the praise. Or the compellingly unflappable competition.

(Applause, it would seem, causes a mild particle effect of gold in Teddy's immediate vicinity. It's subtle enough that she misses it, although she'll probably notice the fine golden dust on her arms later on.)

Mrs. Suleiman goes over the relevant techniques, telling the other students to stretch while she demonstrates.

After several minutes of demonstration (she's shockingly flexible, especially for a woman of her apparent age), she gathers everyone together. "Alright," she says, "this isn't going to be quite like previous classes. Those were teaching core skills; this class is going to be more of an independent study. That does not mean it's going to be easy; I'm going to make sure you all work as hard if not harder than you did in my previous classes. I want you practicing something at all times. Don't be afraid to ask for my help if you think you might be doing something wrong, or if you just want to show off. If you can't think of something to do, I'll give you something to do based on what you've been doing. Any questions?"

Callum raises his hand. "Can we work in pairs? Some of what - Teddy, right? - what Teddy was doing looked really interesting, and I'd like to see if I can integrate it into my style. And, Teddy, it looks like you're not really working with your Exemplar bit, and I can help with that."

Mrs. Suleiman nods. "That's fine with me if it's okay with Teddy."

Teddy is blazingly happy that she's lucked into an upperclassperson's independent study course. Thank you, creepy algorithm.

"That's very nice of you. I think partnering up would be a great idea." Because honestly, it is. Besides the obvious benefits of sourcing advice from as many people as possible, Teddy just does better when she has someone to work against. She loves jogging alone but there's nothing quite like racing, you know? And it's like that for everything. Interdependent study! "I've been an Exemplar for a month now? So the onboarding would be nice."

Callum, true to his word, asks her about a couple of the moves she showed off, then explains some ways she could make her increased strength and speed work for her.

"You've got to adjust your expectations," he says. "You did a really impressive set, but - when you jump, you're not jumping like you know how high you could go, you're jumping like you know how high you used to go. The part of being a mutant that they don't show on TV is just a lot of obsessively measuring how high you can jump, how much you can lift, how fast you can run - and then doing that again every couple of weeks until it starts to level off. It's pretty grueling, but it's worth it, because when you know exactly what you can do, you can work until you do that every time."