Val sat at her desk at in her office/lab at the Baxter Building, working on an essay for one of her college applications. She was a little late getting them in, so early action wasn't definitely out of the picture, but that was only invented to make applicants sweat out the process a little bit longer.

She didn't know where she wanted to go yet. She was going to be too young to live in a dorm, as she wouldn't be turning eighteen until well into her freshman year, so she wanted something close. But something with a good science department. Something that would give her a challenge. A program that would keep her on her toes.

Essays were the easiest part. If the school had a prompt, you wrote an essay based on that prompt. If not, then you just wrote the same essay for each school and just replaced the name of the college.

Hearing a knock on her door, Val perked her head up.

"Come in."