"Hello! Are you a freshman at the Interstellar Academy?" a middle-eastern girl with a light blue hijab greeted Sungjong. He nodded in response. "Great! Please fill out as many of these tags as you need and attach it to this bag! We're going to have them shipped straight to your rooms, so take out anything you want to keep for the trip and place them in a carry-on now!

 

"Thanks," he took the piece of paper from her and shifted to the side, finding and empty area among the other students filling out the form as well. Name, assigned dorm, ID number, contact phone and email address. He didn't have much with him, just two suitcases and his guitar case, so it wasn't long before he finished. 

 

The girl noticed that he was done, pausing before she would talk to the next person in line. "Great! Let me take that for you..." The tag caught her eye, "Oh! You're living in Dijkstra Hall? Awesome! I'm going to be your RA this year! My name's Jazmin. And you are...?"

 

"Sungjong," he said, smiling slightly, "It's nice to meet you." He fumbled around a bit awkwardly before extending a hand - handshakes were proper procedure, right?

 

Thankfully, it seemed that they were, as Jazmin took his hand and shook it. "Well, I'd better be getting back to take care of all of these new year one students, so I'll see you later!" She took his bag and placed it with everyone else's in a cart. Once that was full, a burly man rolled it off towards another dock, presumably where the cargo ship was.

 

"Yeah. Bye," he said quietly as he looked up at ship in front of him. It wasn't particularly large - the Interstellar Academy tended not to take too many students from earth. Humans tended to be less than qualified for the Academy, considering Earth wasn't exactly spectacular at training exceptional cadets. Still, it was large enough to sustain the high speeds necessary to reach the Academy in time for welcome week, not to mention carry enough provisions for three days of student meals.

 

He looked around in hopes of finding his friend, Woohyun, pushing his black hair out of his eyes, but to no avail. Not wanting to be one of the last few people on the boat, he made his way up the ramp and down the steps onto the ship's deck.

 

There, another RA greeted him. "Hello! If you'd like to drop your stuff of in your temporary room, please go that way," he pointed towards an open door, where students and parents were squeezing in and out of the living quarters, "We figured it might be best for you to get a head start on meeting your roommates, so you'll be rooming with whomever you've been assigned to!"

 

He nodded, muttering a quiet "Thanks" and moving towards the entrance. He waited as one especially obese parent made it through the opening and ducked inside before everyone else had to fight their way through. By the looks of the quarters, there were only maybe sixty or so students coming from Earth, but the number of people on the boat would have suggested otherwise. It was hard to believe that those sixty students composed of all of the students from Earth that were attending the Academy, from Freshmen to Seniors. 

Luckily, his room was the first one on the left, and he quickly opened the door and looked inside. The room was decently spacious with one set of bunk beds. Unfortunately, his friend and roommate was still yet to arrive, so he took to lying on the top bunk and browsing his phone, listening half-heartedly to the hustle and bustle going on outside. 

 

"Welcome to space school," Sungjong muttered to himself.