With tents set up, Weems gathered everyone in the main clearing and waited for the noise to settle.
"I can see most of you aren't interested in instructions," she said. "But it's my job to give them, so here we are. There aren't many rules. Just a few that matter."
She looked across the group.
"Nobody leaves the camp and goes into the woods. Not now, not after dark, not for any reason. I don't want to hear that someone had a compelling urge to explore at two in the morning. The woods are easy to get lost in and considerably harder to get found in."
She let that sit for a moment.
"You also don't have your phones out here. Which means if you wander off and end up at the bottom of a pit, nobody's going to know about it until it's already the headline on tomorrow's news." She paused. "That's not a metaphor. Stay in the camp."
A beat.
"That said — I'm not here to make this miserable. Every activity is available to you. As long as you stay within the camp boundaries and you're not putting anyone else at risk, you can do whatever you want." She looked across the crowd one more time, her gaze landing briefly on Ethan.
"Whatever you want. Within the boundaries."
She stepped back.
"Enjoy the trip."
Before Weems could step back a horn sounded from the tree line.
Everyone turned.
A man in a scout master uniform marched into the clearing followed by ten cadets in identical formation, chests out, chins up, moving like they'd rehearsed this entrance specifically.
The man at the front had the kind of posture that suggested he'd never once slouched in his life and considered it a moral failing in others.
Every Nevermore student stared at them.
The collective expression was some variation of who are these people and why are they here.
"I'm sorry," Weems said, stepping forward. "Who are you?"
"Ron Kruger." He stopped precisely three feet in front of her. "Cadet Master, Phoenix Division." He looked around the camp with an expression that suggested he found it lacking.
"We reserved this campground six months ago. Camp CLAW. Annual outing. It's on the books."
Weems looked at him.
"We also reserved this campground," she said. "Nevermore Academy. Also on the books."
A silence settled over the clearing.
"Then someone double booked it," Kruger said.
"Yes," Weems said. "They did."
Neither of them moved.
"We're not leaving," Kruger said.
"Neither are we," Weems said.
"I have been training these cadets for six months specifically for this trip," Kruger said. "I can't have them miss the opportunity to test those skills. You're here for camping. You can come back after we're done."
"You want my entire school — a hundreds of students — to leave," Weems said, "so that your ten members can have the campground to themselves."
"One is recreational. The other is disciplinary training. They're not the same."
"That distinction doesn't hold," Weems said, "because the owner of this campground happens to be one of my students." She looked over her shoulder. "So I'm afraid we have the upper hand."
Every head in the clearing followed her gaze.
Ethan was sitting on a tree stump with a bucket of popcorn, watching the whole thing with quiet interest. He looked up and found the entire camp — Nevermore students, cadets, Kruger, Weems — all staring at him.
He ate a piece of popcorn.
"Is that guy seriously the owner?" someone in the cadet line muttered.
"I genuinely don't know," Ethan said. "I own a lot of properties. I can't be expected to keep track of all of them." He looked at Weems. "But if you're saying it's mine then it probably is."
The silence that followed had a very specific texture.
"Is he bragging right now?" another cadet whispered.
"Yeah," Ethan said. "Don't let it bother you. I'm rich. It's just a fact."
Enid put her face in her hands.
Kruger looked at Weems.
"It seems we have a winner," Weems said pleasantly. "You're welcome to leave whenever you're ready."
Kruger's jaw tightened. He pulled out his phone and called the camp booking office directly, putting it on speaker with the confidence of a man who was certain the records were going to back him up.
"I need to verify ownership of this campground," he said. "The name given is—" he looked at Ethan, "—unconfirmed."
"Just give them the family name," Weems said. "Corvin. They'll know it."
Kruger repeated it into the phone.
The pause on the other end was answer enough. When the booking office confirmed it — yes, the Corvin family, yes, full ownership, yes, absolutely the owner — Kruger's expression went through several stages before settling on something tight and unpleasant.
Weems smiled.
It wasn't a large smile. It didn't need to be.
Behind her, the Nevermore students had caught on. The same smile was spreading through the crowd the way these things do — quietly, person to person — and by the time Kruger hung up.
All Nevermore students were looking at him with the patient, cheerful expression of people who had just won something and were in no hurry about it.
"So," Weems said. "You were saying something about disciplinary training being more important than recreational camping?"
Kruger said nothing.
"No?" She tilted her head. "Didn't think so."
Kruger looked at his cadets. Then at the camp. Then at Weems, who had not stopped smiling.
He put his phone away.
"Fall out," he said to the cadets, turned on his heel and walked back toward the tree line the same way he'd come in — chest out, chin up, posture completely intact, which was the only thing he had left.
The cadets followed in formation.
***
A/N: And on Patreon, The Boys arc started.
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