He's got this. He's short, which means more weight limit in packing. He's got moves with the dozen little opal dust-painted butterfly knives he can put mana into and pull back towards him without touching. He's got a positive attitude. He's got pen-pals in the Melbourne enclave so like, sure, he's not in in, but he's sort of in. He's got plenty of stuff. Six sets of clothing including a snazzy denim jacket with anti-mal fire patterns woven into it (it'll burn out in a few uses but he figures the burn patterns will look cool), spare shoes, six pens and a pack of ink refills, a very slightly enchanted first-aide kit and a bunch of assorted pills his parents got and lots of drilling on what to use for what, one proper healing cookie (all they could afford), a magic detergent ball, various sturdy long-lasting toiletries, a magic shaving razor that won't dull, dozens of little opals that work pretty well for mana, packs of letters to hand out to people and maybe swing an introduction with, a lightweight music player with a thin little solar charger, and assorted candy, chips, stuff like that - for trade when everyone really starts to miss it. Just lots of stuff. And... His violin, a surprisingly light instrument, plus four years' worth of spare strings and bits and bobs, with a slim book of some of his favorite sheet music. He knows English, Mandarin, French, German, American Spanish, and serviceable bits of Korean, Japanese, and Danish. He'll be fine.

He has to have this whole thing in the bag. He has to stay super confident, almost overconfident, 'cos otherwise he'd freak out and go all depressed and floppy and die. Hey, maybe he'll still die, but he'll do it with verve and style. His folks smile their brittle bittersweet smiles at him and he pretends that nothing is wrong and he's going on a wonderful adventure that he'll definitely come back from and tell them exciting stories about. Besides, they have to save up for Sasha's turn. She's just three now and she's such a cutie and oh god this might be the last time he ever sees her-

-Okay, bad coping strategies aside, the scholomance is obviously his best shot. Still, he knows himself and he knows he has to stay positive. Self-delusion is a legimitate survival strategy, mate. What are ya gonna do? And so it is that at 10 AM he's sitting outside having had a lovely bacon breakfast eight hours ago and spent the morning singing bittersweet songs with Danny and Gloria, with Mom and Dad, bags in his lap and staring out at the scraggly sun-baked ground. Sitting there and smiling.

When he feels the pull, he says, "Well here I go. See you soon!"

Because he's got this.