The Weight of Teeth
The gym smells like rubber and salt, that particular brand of early-morning sweat that hasn't yet curdled into something foul. Six-fifteen, and the fluorescent lights buzz overhead like they're complaining about the hour too. Nikolai Vikoff stands at the free-throw line, bouncing the ball once, twice, feeling the familiar grain of it against his palm, and lets the whole world narrow down to the orange rim fifteen feet away.
He sinks it. Of course he does.
"That's twelve in a row, Vikoff." Coach Reyes doesn't look up from his clipboard, but there's a note of something like reverence in his voice, the kind usually reserved for things people are afraid to examine too closely. "You trying to make the rest of these guys look bad on purpose, or does it just come naturally?"
"Natural talent," Nikolai says, flashing the grin that works on everyone—teachers, teammates, the girls who linger by the gym doors pretending not to watch, the boys who want to be him badly enough that it curdles into something uglier if he's not careful to manage it. He catches the rebound off the net before it hits the floor, quick as thought, the sort of reflex that no human could manage and most hybrids can't…
