"The door's open. Who's going out?"
"Shouldn't it be the one who answered the question?"
After suggesting with a cunning smirk that Ally should be sent out first, Harold was only able to see the young lady for another second as Noah quickly stood in front of him.
Even Ally was forced to take a step back when Paul pulled her and blocked her using his own body. "No," he said as if it was a command. "Whoever goes first will be waiting outside alone. Who knows what kind of traps are waiting for us outside?"
Vince grinned again. "We have to vote. Do you mind presiding over the election, ex-president?"
Kingsley sighed. "Let's make it quick. Point your finger to the person you want to exit Louie's Hall first."
Arkin and Harold were the first to raise their hands, and due to the ongoing tension between them, they pointed at each other. The others were surprised because of how the two chose, but they just didn't say a word, knowing that their decision could not be changed anyway.
The whole hall was silent when a hand went up again. A finger pointed at Arkin again.
"A-Ally..." Paul called the young lady's name with slightly widened eyes. Like everyone else, he could not believe that she had chosen so quickly.
The man being pointed at frowned. From the pale index finger pointed at him, Arkin's gaze crawled until his eyes met the owner of that finger. "Why me?"
"I'll answer the next question and send him out next," Ally simply answered while motioning to Harold.
Arkin's lips slightly parted until one side curved upwards. His eyes narrowed. "Do you have a boyfriend, Allysa? If you don't, I don't mind being yours."
"Arkin," the former student council vice president called his cousin in a serious and threatening tone. He frowned when the young man just laughed and started walking towards the door.
"You can't scare me, Noah. Allysa Santino trusts me," Arkin said while waving, not even sparing them one last glance.
Noah's eyebrows furrowed even more as he absentmindedly looked at the young woman his cousin was referring to.
Right after Arkin came out, the double doors of Louie's Hall closed again. A familiar sound of the doorbell was heard again as another question was displayed on the screen.
WHAT COMES NEXT?
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Ally slightly frowned as she stared at the screen but remained calm. She then turned to Vince. "Do you know the answer?"
The young man's lips parted a bit and he shook his head. "I'm still figuring it out."
"What!?" Hailey asked in disbelief. "You sent someone alone outside and now you can't answer the question?!"
Ally looked at the former secretary with no emotions in her eyes. "Do you know the answer?"
Hailey just closed her mouth and looked away in annoyance.
"Does anybody have an idea of how we can solve this problem?" Kingsley raised his voice so that everyone could hear him.
"The Summa Cum Laude doesn't know what to do, and you expect that we have an idea?' Harold said sarcastically.
"We're not expecting any help from you." Hailey glared at the young man. When Kingsley gave her a meaningful look, she dramatically dropped her hands from holding her waist. "What? That stupid Arkin would say that if he's here."
Shaking his head, Kingsley just took a deep breath. He looked around at his companions. "It's not just Vince and Allysa who are capable of thinking inside this hall. We don't know Arkin's status outside and there's only one way to find that out: let's answer this question, engineers."
With those words from their former—and current—leader, the graduates tried to think about the problem displayed on the screen. They forced their brains to remember every single formula, every single logic, and every single thing that they learned as engineering students, but no one was able to say even a word that could help them solve it.
"It's been twenty minutes! Come on!" Hailey closed her eyes in annoyance as she almost slapped her own forehead.
"Hailey," Kingsley called her softly. "Calm down."
"How can I calm the hell down when we're not sure if that stupid guy is safe outside?!"
"You worry too much about Arkin," Jerome said with a knowing smile. He snickered when the young lady's gaze hit him. "I'm just saying, you're more nervous than the cousin."
Hailey and Kingsley both turned to Noah and found the young man frowning as he sat on the side of the stage. They looked at each other.
"Of course, there's no way he's not worried." Hailey sighed. "He really shuts himself away from people when he's thinking."
"Go, try to comfort him," Kingsley ordered in a whisper.
The former SC Secretary winced and then shook her head. "We're not that close to...you know what I mean."
Kingsley sighed then nodded. He looked back at his former vice president who was obviously deep in thought.
"I don't," Jerome said slowly as his eyes narrowed in confusion. His gaze shifted back and forth at the two. "I don't understand. The three of you were famous when we were students. You're always together. Almost everyone envied how close you are."
"We're really that famous among other students, huh?" Hailey jokingly brushed her hair off her shoulders. "Well, we're close enough to joke around each other, but Noah is still a closed book to me. Yes, he considers me as a friend, but I don't have permission to flip the cover. So, yeah…"
Jerome raised his eyebrows. "I didn't know our former vice president is that mysterious—"
"Fuck!"
Everyone turned in shock, not because of the sudden shouting in the silent hall, but because they did not expect to hear Vince Pascual's voice so loud.
"You figured it out?" Ally asked quickly.
The young man nodded and then spoke with gritted teeth. "And I hate that I used more than twenty fucking minutes for this simple brain teaser."
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