Ok, so a piece of advice: if you are having a shampoo war with a friend, (Yes I know I'm a misfit.) don't get deodorant in their eye. They will never forgive you. On with the chapter:

Chapter 20

Adrian tried to calm me down the next morning. Lets just say it didn't work. "Adrian! My life and career all depend on THIS DAY! You are just not going to calm me down." I practically screamed at him.

"Ok! Sorry!" He wrapped his arm around my jacket-covered torso. We were all required to wear the guardian uniform so we would get used to fighting in it. "But you will do great."

"I don't want to be great." I said. "I want to be perfect."

"Who knew Rose Hathaway was the perfectionist?"

I slapped him lightly on the arm. "Shut up!"

He smiled, knowing he had calmed me down a little. He held the door to the gym open for me, and I stepped inside. They had set up a couple of tables, and different guardians sat behind each one, giving people the times their physical test would occur and what room they had to take the written test in. Adrian kissed me on the cheek. "This is when I leave."

I quickly pulled him into a hug, and he tipped me chin up to kiss me lightly on the lips. "Good luck." He murmured.

He pulled away and walked out the door. Ok, Rose. You can do this. I stepped up to the nearest table, where Stan was sitting with a bunch of sheets of paper. "Rose Hathaway…" he muttered, looking for my name.

"Good morning to you too." I replied.

"Ah here!" He ignored my comment. "You are the first fighting against Guardian Petrov." I mentally cursed my bad luck. "And you are taking the test right after in the Biology lab."

"Thanks." I went to find Lissa, who was taking her final exams today.

"Hey Liss!"

"Hey Rose!" Her hair was pulled into a sleek bun, and she was wearing a white bubble skirt and pink tank top. She looked beautiful and ready, compared to me. I had my guardian's uniform on, but my hair was a mess. I hadn't bothered with makeup, and to make it short, I looked like I had just rolled out of bed.

She started smoothing out my hair, trying to get it to sit flat. "Liss, don't bother. It will just get messed up again when I fight Alberta in a few minutes."

"Fine. Good luck. I have to get to my test." She squeezed my hand and took off, catching up with Christian and linking her arm through his.

I walked into the gym where I would be fighting, and started stretching my arms.

"Hey." Violet greeted me from behind. April was behind her, starching her calves and counting the seconds softly to herself. "I am so nervous."

"Same." We all started running around the gym. "I feel like I am gonna fail this. I feel so unprepared."

"You? You are the best in the class. If you fail, we all will." April said.

"Thanks, but you guys are great. I guess I'm just scared. All of my life depends on this day, and well… I'm not usually like this. I'm just really freaked out."

"Calm down." Violet assured me. "You are going to do great. We'll be cheering for you." She said, and we parted ways.

I stood in the center of the gym, waiting. "Hey Rose." A voice said from behind me.

"Wha-" I turned, and saw Adrian. "What are you doing here?"

"Some guardian caught up with me and asked me if I would be willing to be the person you are supposed to be protecting. They were short on Moroi, so I said I would do it." He explained.

I heard someone clear their throat. "Ready?" Alberta asked.

"Sure." I stood in front of Adrian, and she attacked. She landed a blow in the gut, and I countered by hitting her while her balance was off. She stumbled backward, and I hit her with a solid kick. Then, out of nowhere, there were four more guardians attacking. "Shit." I got the first down after a minute, 'staking' them and moving on to keep Adrian from being captured. I kicked the first one, who's face I couldn't make out, really hard, sending them flying backward. I could vaguely hear people cheering for me from a little ways away, but I couldn't focus on that. I punched, and 'staked' Alberta. I killed two of them easily by kicking them then knocking their legs out from under their bodies. Out of nowhere, a guardian tackles me, and I'm pinned under him. I manage to get a hard enough hit in the face, and he is startled enough so I can get him off me and stake him. Once he was 'dead' I collapsed next to him.

That's when I smelled it. Dimitri's aftershave. "Dimitri?" I ask.

"Yes Roza?" He's breathing heavily.

"Wha- Why are you here?"

"They let me off easy. I'm on probation. And by the way, that was remarkable."

"Thanks comrade." I said before Adrian helps me up and hugs me.

"Amazing." He murmured into my hair.

Alberta managed to pick herself up, and comes over. "Nice job Rose. You get an A."

* * *

Apparently, April had her camera with her, and had recorded the whole thing, and showed it to her sister, who, being the social person she was, went and told everyone. And I mean EVERYONE. So now everybody had seen the video by the time I was done with the written part of my test and had changed out of my uniform, all of the novices had seen it, and some of the Moroi too.

"Awesome job Rose!" Alex called to me in the hall.

Yeah! That was so cool!" Called another novice.

"ROSE!" Lissa screamed, grabbing me into a hug from behind.

"Let me guess… April showed you the video."

"Of course she did!" She squealed. "And I am so proud of you!"

"Um, thanks?"

She grinned. "We need to celebrate."

As we were walking down the hallway, Adrian came up and laced my fingers through his. "Yes we do need to celebrate." He added. 'For you doing amazing in your trials, and for Lissa doing well on her finals."

"How'd you-" Lissa started.

"You always do well on your finals." I interrupted her. "Its not that hard to figure out that you did well again." She grinned, and we all got soft serve from the macine in the cafeteria. Mine was chocolate with Oreos and hot fudge. Ahh… sweet chocolate.