The silence left in Ice Hawk's wake was quickly broken by the six students.
"What do you think he means by 'unique'? Who do you think the Heroes watching us are? WHAT IF I SLIP UP AND GET EXPELLED ON MY FIRST DAY?! My parents would kill me…that's it. I'm leaving. Let's get the HELL out of here!" Finn frantically grabbed his best friend by the arm with his sweaty palms and rushed towards the men's locker room door. Atreus rolled his eyes and smacked Finn on the back of the head with his free hand.
"Tighten up, wimp. We made it this far easily. Chicken out now, and I'll kill you before your parents get a chance," he said coldly.
Finn froze in his tracks and slowly turned his head around, one eye twitching.
"Who are you calling a WIMP?! I'll smash these evals and show EVERYONE I'm not a wimp! TUH! Kill me? Just try it."
Atreus smiled at the sight of his friend's angry face and patted his back.
"Relax. We got this."
Finn's expression softened as the realization of his overreaction dawned on him, and he looked at the ground embarrassed.
"Thanks for snapping me out of that. Lost my cool for a second there. Now, I'm gonna get these muscles warmed up. Lord knows how much it hurts when I get a cramp while I use my powers. Care to join me, asshole?" He cracked his neck, tossed his new tracksuit jacket to the side, and began to stretch.
"Let's do it. Just promise there won't be any more freakouts until AFTER the evals...wimp." The two best friends grinned at each other, bumped fists, and began preparing for the mysterious task ahead.
In the opposite corner of the room, Oliver was lazily lounging about on the bench and fiddling with his watch while the other boy from Britannia leaned against the wall yawning. Aurora was sitting cross-legged near them, eyes closed. Her fists rested on her knees and her rhythmic breathing was near silent. She looked serene, almost divine…
'Hmph. She's not half bad looking. Too bad she's such a pretentious smartass…' Atreus shook his head and concentrated back on getting ready.
.
.
.
As Atreus continued to stretch with his friend, he saw Rose standing to the left of them with her head down, quickly pacing back and forth. She absentmindedly muttered to herself as she gnawed on her fingernails. Unknowingly, she was headed on a collision course with Finn, who was completely zoned out, engrossed in his stretching. Atreus noticed the accident about to occur and used his powers to zoom in between them faster than the blink of an eye, preventing them from crashing into one another.
*WHOOSH*
He had successfully gotten between the two.
His plan to help his friends, however, backfired catastrophically.
Rose shrieked, startled by the white-haired boy appearing in front of her so quickly. A searing beam of fire reflexively shot from her hand, aimed straight for Atreus' face. He narrowly dodged the attack, but he lost his balance in the process. He stumbled into Finn, and the velocity of their crash sent the two boys sprawling towards the wall.
*THUNK*
A network of large cracks appeared in the white brick wall, webbing upwards from where Finn's head had collided with it. Aurora gasped as she was startled out of her meditation. The two Britannian boys next to her shot up, speechless at the sight of a giant metal man slumped against the wall.
Finn groaned as he stood up. His massive, now silver body shone brightly under the harsh lights of the white room. He was now so tall he had to duck down to keep his head from hitting the ceiling.
"Ta-da…," he sang weakly as he rubbed the back of his neck. Even though his metal face didn't change color at all, everyone could tell he was blushing in embarrassment.
"Awww dammit! These were brand new…"
His shirt was laying on the floor in pieces, tattered from his dramatic change in size. His tracksuit pants suffered the same fate, but he was still wearing black shorts that had stretched with him to this new size.
'Thank God I'm always prepared,' he thought to himself as he cleaned the mess of his torn clothes. He walked over to Atreus, who was still facedown on the floor and reached his hand out.
"Sorry man, you know I accidentally transform when I get spooked out." He pulled Atreus up.
"I was hoping to keep my powers a secret just in case…," he muttered to himself.
Atreus was hunched over, holding his stomach. He was laughing so hard he couldn't breathe, hardly a sound coming from him.
Rose was the first to break the awkward silence from the rest of the group.
"What a pair you two are," she joked. "One of you with super speed, the other can turn into a great metal giant. Looks like you can cover each other's weaknesses. Very clever if you plan on teaming up. Sorry about almost blasting your face off, by the way. Sometimes it just…happens."
"No worries. I'm not quite a speedster, though."
Atreus threw her a sly grin and winked.
The red-haired girl tilted her head in curiosity.
"Not a speedster? Then what the hell are your pow-"
A robotic female voice interrupted before she could inquire further.
*ZZT* "Rose Thomas, please enter your practical evaluation."*ZZT*
She gulped, shot the boys a nervous glance, and quickly disappeared into the next room.
.
.
.
One by one, the students were called in to complete their practical evaluations. Following Rose was Oliver, then the other boy from Brittania. Finn and Atreus had both finished preparing and waited nervously.
*ZZT* "Finn Jones, please enter your practical evaluation."*ZZT*
Finn struggled to enter the evaluation room thanks to his massive size. He managed to shrink just enough to squeeze through, but not without the sound of scraping metal grating everyone's ears.
Atreus and Aurora were the only two left. The black-haired girl had returned to meditating in the corner opposite Atreus, eyes closed and breathing level.
Atreus, impatient and bored, strolled over to her.
"Aurora, right?"
"Mm." Her eyes remained closed.
"Uhhh, alright. Listen, I don't know what Finn or I did to piss you guys from Britannia off, but you've all been-"
"I'm not from Britannia," she interrupted sternly.
"Oh. Sorry I'd assumed just because of-"
"Those two idiots I arrived here with? Please."
Atreus' eye twitched in irritation.
"I was gonna say your accent."
He began to turn around, annoyed.
"...Although, you're not wrong about them being idiots."
Aurora huffed as she stifled a laugh. She regained her composure and opened one eye.
"Indeed. But no, I'm not from Brittania. I'm from Singhar…not that it matters to you."
"Hmph." Atreus stuck his hands in his pockets as he began to wander the room.
"...I…I apologize for my comment towards you and your giant oaf of a friend. Seeing as we'll most likely be classmates, it would be mutually beneficial for us to start off on a better foot."
Atreus stopped walking and turned towards her, a slight smile on his face.
"All's forgiven. I think we're even anyways considering the…y'know…burnt hair thing…"
*ZZT* "Atreus Wolfe, please enter your practical evaluation."*ZZT*
Aurora glared at him as he walked towards the door. Atreus looked back at her, grinned as he threw up a peace sign, and swung the door open.
He walked down a long, dark hallway and opened the door at the end.
"Whoa…"
Before him was a massive arena. Sitting on a platform suspended above the field with Hardlight technology was none other than The Champions.