"I can't believe the semester exams are tomorrow!" Kiba dropped a pile of books on his bed. "I have so much studying to do..."
"Arf!"
Clack! Clackity-clack! One of the Inuzuka's eyelids popped open. What's going on? he thought for a second. "Aw, no! I fell asleep in the middle of studying!"
"You retain information better if you sleep instead of stay up late cramming."
"Says you! I don't remember ever seeing you asleep!"
The computer screen in front of Jeremy went black. "Looks like you're in for a treat then," the blonde said, getting up out of the chair. He was already in his pajamas, and he was soon atop his bed, the covers pulled back loosely. "Well, g'night."
"Night."
Wah! Wah! Wah! Shikamaru rolled, or rather flopped, over to glare at his roommate. "Why did you set your alarm?" the chunin grumbled.
"Well, it is test day, and if you get up earlier, you will have more time to study," said roommate responded, slipping his shoes on.
"And what makes you think I need to study?" Shikamaru mumbled, not getting out of his bed.
"Well, I had noticed that you did not study yesterday, so I assumed you were going to do so this morning." The genin got up from his bed and started to smooth out a few wrinkles from the sheet.
"Maybe I just wasn't going to study," the lazier of the pair huffed.
"Even so, it really is such a waste to sleep in so late. What could you possibly gain from it?"
"My sanity, most likely," the Nara grumbled, sitting up at last.
"Hey, guys," Ulrich mumbled, setting his breakfast tray down on the table.
"Hey, Ulrich, what took you so long?" The other students were close to finishing their meals.
"Studying," he muttered drowsily.
"Yeah, I figured. Wake up early, like Mr. Wake-Up-at-Four-Thirty-In-The-Morning here?" Shikamaru said.
"Actually, I normally get up earlier; I just thought you might not want to wake up that early." The students gave Lee a weird glance.
"Yeah, because 4:30 isn't early at all," the black-haired chunin muttered under his breath.
"Well, I'm going to go to the classroom early," said Aelita, standing up from the table and handling her gray tray.
"All right, go ahead."
The girl spun around and put up her tray, then stepping out into the outdoors. The minute she left the cafeteria, her breath came out in cloudy puffs, similar to the ones high above her. "Brrrr..." She shivered.
The air of the classroom was thick with anticipation. Some students looked casually around the room, some drew, and some fidgeted in their seats, the tension finding them unable to sit still. A series of sharp, loud clacks led to the room, and the teacher in her high heels stepped in, closing the wooden door with a faint click. She was holding a box full of papers, a few fluttering out from their container. The box found itself on the table, and the loose copies were promptly picked up.
"All right, class, clear your desks."
A few nervous shuffles ensued, as well as some quiet coughing.
Ulrich nervously tapped a pencil on his desk, while Odd nonchalantly jammed one up his nose. He recieved a dark-eyed glare and slipped it out before the teacher looked toward him. After a massive shuffling of papers on the teacher's part, she cleared her throat and began reading out loud mechanically from the script before her.
"Today you will be taking..." She droned on, stumbling on a word or two and shooting a few glances at the class periodically.
Tk! Tk! Tk! The roof played the same sound as it would during a rainstorm. No one paid attention, being too tensely focused on the packets the teacher was handing out. Each test made a flopping sound as it made contact with a desk. The drops on the roof tapped harder as someone cleared his throat nervously. The pauses between drops grew longer, and the noise grew louder. Suddenly, a warped, metallic screech sounded above the students, several more following, and large cones of ice plummeted into the building. Screams came from terrified students fleeing their desks in the center of the room, where the ice had fallen. A few girls quivered behind an overturned desk as more and more icicles interrupted the former silence. The thunking stopped, and no more shards of ice fell. A few people started to get up, but the icicles, which had never even begun to melt, flew into the air and hovered about a meter above the ground. They swirled slowly in a circle, blade-like edges outward. Then the pace sped up until the ring was a blur of whirling, frozen needles. The classroom was now silent, as if the students unanimously decided that screaming their lungs out would not do them any good.
A blonde head popped up from behind one of the building blocks of the desk fortress and jerked back and forth a few times before spotting its pink-haired counterpart. Jeremy ducked back under the shelter and crawled over to his friend. "I didn't bring my cell phone or my laptop because of the test rules," he whispered, "It must be X.A.N.A.!"
Aelita peeked over the top of a desk before sinking back to her previous position. "How are we going to get out?" she whispered back.
"Come on," Jeremy said quietly, starting to move to another desk.
Whack! The ring of ice had finally decided to attack, colliding with the desk nearest to Jeremy. There was a clunk and a metallic shriek as the desk bent to the icicles' will. A few stunted screams resulted from this, and after a moment of shock, the bespectacled boy continued around the U of desks. The icy circle hovered in the air ominously as the Belpouis and Aelita made their way to the edge of the semicircle nearest the door. Jeremy nodded at Yumi, who was in the vicinity and inched closer to the pair.
"Odd! Ulrich!" she whispered, turning her head around for a moment, then whipping it back to sneak a peek at the newest X.A.N.A. attacker. The two mentioned boys crawled to the group, as well as the rest of the Lyoko warriors in the room. "So what are we going to do?" the black-haired girl whispered, directing the question to Jeremy.
"It doesn't look like we'll be able to open the door in time, before it can get to us, I mean," the blonde whispered back, playing tactician due to the absence of a certain Lyoko warrior. "So it looks like we'll be playing bull-fighter," he finished, adjusting his glasses.
"So who's our matador?"
"I got it." The purple-clad Lyoko warrior leaped over the desk barrier toward the test-conditions-locked door. "Hey! Over here!" Odd waved his arms around, shouting at the ring of ice. Immediately realizing the opportunity, it flew at the boy. "Toro!" he shouted, jumping to his left. The icicles slammed into the door, which bent and showed a few cracks but was still standing. "Is that all you've got?" Odd taunted, leaping back in front of the target. X.A.N.A. shot toward the blonde, who ducked out of the way. Suddenly, the ring pulled upward, just grazing the door.
"He knows what we're up to! It won't work now!"
"Uh!" Odd kicked at the crack in the door, which sent up a few chips of wood but did not seem to do much good.
"Forget this!" The Inuzuka jumped over the fortress and landed his own kick in the door, which started to give, the bottom portion jutting back. One attack later, the wood was ripped from its respective hinge and thrown into the hallway. Odd, being closest at the time, crawled out first, the other Lyoko warriors following shortly after.
"Kiba, are you coming?"
The mentioned brunette turned to the questioning rosette. "I'll take care of this thing. Just hurry up and get to the factory!" She hm-ed a response and crawled out the former door, running to catch up with the others.