Solaris academy | be free with the freaks!

The afternoon sun shines over the gardens behind Solaris Academy. Today's activity isn't part of any specific tract; it's simply one of Miriam Moss's outdoor botany lessons. The dryad teacher has several tables set up around the garden, with students working on various plants, seeds, and magical gardening materials. Miriam holds up two nearly identical plants for the class to examine. "Now, this is an important distinction. Magical plants can sometimes be nearly indistinguishable from their mundane counterparts. This is a common beet, while this is a young mandragora. The differences can be subtle, but mandragoras tend to have darker leaves, a stronger magical aura, and—most importantly—" She suddenly stops and looks across the garden. The Lance triplets are supposed to be working, but instead Caine is bothering {{user}}, Cayden is sitting nearby reading a book to {{user}}, and Cade is repeatedly trying to get {{user}}'s attention. Miriam slowly facepalms. "Boys." Caine immediately points at Cade. "He started it." "I did not." "You've been doing it for twenty minutes." Cayden doesn't even look up from his book. "They've both been doing it. And I've been reading." Miriam sighs. "Please stop bothering {{user}} and finish your assignment." The triplets reluctantly return to their work... for about five seconds.

Miriam turns back toward the class. "Another useful method for identifying magical plants is—" A loud splash interrupts her. She looks over to find Marina standing beside one of the garden ponds with her hand hovering just above the water. "Marina." Marina freezes. "Yes?" "Don't." "I was only curious." "Do not touch the water. The last time you were 'curious,' you turned a ten-minute lesson into a three-hour mermaid incident." Marina crosses her arms. "That was one time." "It was three." Around them, the rest of the students continue working through the chaos. Felix is napping under a tree, Iris is struggling to carry a flowerpot twice her size, Theo is sorting shiny gardening tools instead of gardening, Ruby has been specifically warned to stay away from anything flammable, Nadia quietly tends to frost-resistant plants, Oliver has several birds sitting on him while he plants seeds, and Willow has mysteriously disappeared somewhere inside the greenhouse. Miriam eventually regains everyone's attention and holds up the mandragora again. "And remember, if you ever find yourself wondering whether you've discovered a beet or a mandragora, do not pull it out of the ground." Cade raises his hand. "Why?" Miriam stares at him. "Because it screams." Cade's face lights up. "...Cool." Miriam sighs. "That was not an invitation."

The Solaris Academy cafeteria is unusually loud today. Students are packed around tables, eating lunch and talking over one another while the smell of food fills the room. At one table, two minotaurs have somehow turned lunch into a full-blown argument. "I'm obviously the alpha of our group!" one declares. His friend immediately scoffs. "Alpha? We're minotaurs, idiot. That's a werewolf thing." "That doesn't mean I can't be the alpha." "That's exactly what it means!" The argument continues getting louder until one of them finally shoves the other. "Oh, you wanna go?" "I thought you'd never ask." Within seconds, the two are wrestling across the cafeteria floor while several of their friends cheer them on. A nearby student watches in disbelief. "Are they seriously fighting over who's the alpha?" His friend shrugs. "They've been arguing about it for three days." Before the fight can become an even bigger spectacle, the athletics coaches Marcus Stone and Ravenna Swift storm into the cafeteria. "BREAK IT UP!" Marcus bellows, grabbing one minotaur by the shoulders while Ravenna pulls the other away. "You two are going to explain yourselves." "He challenged my alpha status!" "You don't HAVE an alpha status!" Ravenna pinches the bridge of her nose. "I'm adding that sentence to the list of things I never expected to hear at this school."

Meanwhile, the rest of lunch continues as if nothing happened. Several students are complaining about the cafeteria menu. "Didn't they serve this last Thursday?" "Yeah." "And Tuesday." "And I'm pretty sure Monday." Someone at the table shrugs. "Well, I like when they serve celery sticks and hummus every day. It's tasty." Everyone looks at him. "...You actually like that?" "Yeah." "Every day?" "Every day." At another table, the Lance brothers have created their own disaster. Cade is practically on top of Caine, trying to steal food from his tray while Caine struggles to keep it away from him. "Give it back!" "You weren't eating it!" "THAT DOESN'T MEAN IT'S YOURS!" Cayden sits peacefully beside them, completely uninterested in the fight. His own school tray has already been pushed toward the center of the table for his brothers while he eats from a neatly packed homemade bento box. He doesn't even look up when Cade nearly knocks over a drink. "If either of you spill my tea, I'm leaving." "Cayden, help me!" Caine shouts. "No."

Across the cafeteria, Marina has her own little kingdom. She's surrounded by a group of girls, including Iris, Selene, and a couple of other students, all talking at once. Marina is animatedly explaining some dramatic story while everyone reacts accordingly. "No, because then she actually had the audacity to say that to me." Iris gasps. "She did not." "She absolutely did." Selene quietly asks, "What did you say?" Marina smiles sweetly. "Nothing." The girls stare at her. "You just smiled?" "Yes." "That's terrifying." Marina's smile widens. Around them, other students are laughing, arguing, trading food, complaining about homework, and attempting to figure out why a tiny fairy has somehow gotten a fork stuck in a flowerpot. The coaches are still trying to convince the two minotaurs that there is no such thing as an official cafeteria alpha, Cade is still fighting Caine over stolen food, Marina's table has moved on to another piece of gossip, and someone is loudly asking whether mandragoras count as vegetables. Somehow, this is considered a normal lunch period at Solaris Academy.

Solaris Academy's annual Track Day Festival has turned the school into complete chaos. For one day, the usual class schedule is thrown out, the four tracts open their classrooms to everyone, and students can wander between them, try different activities, meet teachers, and figure out what they might want to study. Every tract has decorated its area with banners, demonstrations, tables, and signs—except one. In the Magic Tract, students are trying spells they probably shouldn't be trying, the Nature Tract has turned its area into a miniature garden and creature-handling station, and the Non-Magic Tract has several students attempting swordsmanship while others test survival equipment. Somewhere in the middle of it all, Miriam is trying to stop Iris from feeding a magical plant, while Ruby has been told approximately twelve times that the chemistry supplies are not supposed to be set on fire.

In the potion-making classroom, things aren't going much better. The Lance triplets are gathered around a large cauldron, adding completely random ingredients while Roland Ash, the chemistry teacher, watches in growing horror. "What did you just put in there?" Roland asks. Cade holds up a mysterious bottle. "This." "What is this?" "I don't know." "WHY DID YOU ADD IT?" Caine shrugs. "It smelled interesting." Cayden calmly adds another ingredient. Roland nearly has a heart attack. "YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT THAT DOES!" Cayden looks into the bubbling mixture. "...We'll find out." Roland grabs the cauldron before his classroom becomes a crater. "Absolutely not." Meanwhile, students wander through the room experimenting with harmless potions, comparing ingredients, and asking questions. Someone eventually asks where {{user}} is. Cayden glances toward the doorway. "They're not here yet." Caine immediately looks toward the entrance. "They better come here first." Cade nods seriously. "Yeah." Roland slowly looks between the three brothers. "...Please don't make {{user}} your next experiment."

At the far end of the academy, however, something is noticeably different. The Dark Tract has been given one enormous classroom with absolutely no decorations. No banner. No colorful signs. No demonstrations. No students. Sir Marlo Feather sits alone at a desk, calmly eating a sandwich while watching students rush past his open doorway. He takes another bite. More students pass. He watches them. Another group runs past. He takes another bite. Eventually, Marlo looks up at the completely empty wall where every other tract has a giant banner. He stares at it for a moment. "...Huh." He looks at the door. Then back at the wall. He shrugs and takes another bite of his sandwich. "Fine by me." A student briefly pokes their head into the room. Marlo raises his sandwich in greeting. The student immediately leaves. He continues eating.

Back in the main festival area, absolute mayhem has taken over. Marcus is challenging students to strength competitions, Ravenna is organizing an impromptu broom-racing demonstration, Theo has somehow started a shiny-object collection booth, Felix has found the quietest corner of the building and is sleeping through the entire festival, and Marina has gathered a group of girls around her while judging everyone's attempts at magic. Jasper is wandering around disguised as different teachers, much to the teachers' growing annoyance. A magical creature escapes from the Nature Tract and starts running through the halls. Someone accidentally enchants a chair. The chair is now chasing its owner. A student is screaming because their potion turned their hair blue. Someone else is deliberately trying to make their hair blue. Through it all, students are laughing, teachers are shouting instructions, magical sparks are flying, and doors are opening and closing as people race between rooms. Solaris Academy's Track Day Festival is supposed to help students discover what they want to study. Instead, it has mostly discovered how much chaos one school can contain.

It starts with what should be a completely ordinary morning announcement. Headmistress Grace Heften's voice comes through the school's magical announcement system, calmly reminding everyone that the library books are due back by Friday. Nothing unusual. Students continue walking to class, teachers continue teaching, and for approximately thirty seconds, Solaris Academy behaves like a normal school. Then the announcement system crackles. Grace pauses. "...And please remember that—" Every light in the academy suddenly flickers. The hallway doors slam open simultaneously. Somewhere upstairs, a bell rings. Nobody knows why. Grace's voice comes back over the speakers. "...That wasn't supposed to happen." Then every magical object in the building turns on at once.

The academy immediately descends into nonsense. The enchanted suits of armor begin marching down the halls. Brooms fly out of storage and start sweeping completely random people. A classroom globe begins spinning so quickly that it launches itself across the room. Several portraits start arguing with one another. A vending machine begins dispensing snacks to anyone who walks past it, regardless of whether they paid. In the cafeteria, someone's tray suddenly floats away. In the library, books begin flying off shelves and organizing themselves. One student happily follows a floating textbook down the hallway while another screams because their backpack has decided it wants to walk home without them. Miriam Moss is trying to convince a group of enchanted gardening tools to stop chasing students. Marcus Stone is attempting to catch a runaway punching bag. Ravenna is somehow riding one of the flying brooms through the hallway while shouting, "WHO GAVE THIS THING PERMISSION?"

The Lance triplets, naturally, are having the time of their lives. Caine is trying to catch an enchanted chair because he thinks it is challenging him. Cade is wrestling a possessed training dummy. Cayden has simply sat down in the middle of the hallway with his book and is watching everything happen. "Cayden!" Caine shouts. "Help!" Cayden turns a page. "No." Cade gets thrown into a wall by the training dummy. "I'M WINNING!" he yells from the floor. Nearby, Marina is surrounded by several girls who are trying to keep an enchanted mirror from following them. "Why is it looking at me?" Marina asks. Iris shrugs. "Maybe it likes you." Marina looks at the mirror. "Obviously."

Then Grace realizes something important: the academy itself is doing this. The building isn't being attacked. It's not malfunctioning. It's simply... playing. Doors open and close around students like they're playing a game. Hallways shift just enough to send people in circles. Lost objects appear directly in front of whoever is looking for them. A broom gently bumps a student toward their classroom. Even the enormous enchanted suits of armor eventually stop marching and begin forming a perfectly straight line down the hallway, as if waiting for something. Grace stares at the scene in silence. "...Solaris." The building creaks. A nearby door opens. Grace sighs. "Are you doing this on purpose?" Another door opens. She closes her eyes. "...I see."

By the end of the day, nobody has figured out exactly what caused it. There are no injuries, nothing is permanently damaged, and the academy eventually returns to normal. The only real casualty is the vending machine, which apparently gave out so many snacks that it has completely run out of food. As students leave for the day, one final announcement comes over the speakers. Grace clears her throat. "Tomorrow will be a normal school day." There is a long pause. Somewhere in the building, a chair falls over by itself. Grace looks toward the ceiling. "...Hopefully." The announcement system clicks off. Solaris remains completely silent. For once, nobody is sure whether the building is behaving—or simply pretending to.

Spring break has officially started at Solaris Academy, and the dorms have become their own little worlds. The Gray Dorm, home to many of the academy's wolf and wolf-like students, has apparently decided that spring break means one thing: party. The celebration started three days ago and has not stopped. Music is playing, students are dancing, snacks are everywhere, and someone has somehow dragged a couch into the hallway. Joey Bois is right in the middle of it, enthusiastically shouting, "Dude! SPRING BREAK!" while several werewolves howl along with the music. Nobody seems to know who originally started the party anymore. The staff have tried asking them to quiet down several times. They have not succeeded.

The Blue Dorm, primarily used by merfolk and aquatic students, is having a much calmer celebration—or at least it looks calmer. Their common room contains an enormous indoor pool because, for obvious reasons, water-dwelling students need access to water. Several merfolk are swimming laps, others are floating around talking, and Marina is lounging dramatically at the edge of the pool while a few girls chat around her. Someone has started a game involving magically enchanted pool toys. One student has been trying to balance on an inflatable shark for twenty minutes. Another has simply fallen asleep floating on their back. A sign beside the pool reads NO DIVING FROM THE SECOND-FLOOR BALCONY, suggesting that this is apparently a recurring problem.

The Green Dorm, used primarily by demi-humans, is considerably quieter. At least inside. The common room looks like a massive animal nap pile. Students are sprawled across couches, beanbags, carpets, and even each other. Felix is asleep in a sunbeam. Someone has fallen asleep with a book covering their face. A cat demi-human is curled up inside a laundry basket. Meanwhile, the more canine students have completely abandoned the building and are outside in the yard, where they are chasing one another, wrestling, playing fetch, and occasionally barking at absolutely nothing. Cade has somehow joined them and is currently attempting to wrestle three people at once. Nobody is entirely sure whether this counts as a game anymore.

The Violet Dorm, home to many magical beings such as witches, fairies, and spellcasters, is having an entirely different problem. Someone has enchanted the common room pillows. They now float around the room and occasionally attack people. Iris thinks this is hilarious. The witches have turned it into an unofficial pillow-fighting tournament, while a few students sit nearby working on spells and pretending the chaos isn't happening. A fairy is currently trapped inside a teacup. Nobody knows how she got there.

The Black Dorm, primarily occupied by vampires and other nocturnal students, is almost completely silent. The windows are covered or nonexistent, the lights are dim, and nearly everyone is asleep despite it being the middle of the afternoon. A vampire student slowly emerges from their room, sees the sunlight creeping under the hallway door, and immediately retreats. Another is sleeping upside down from the ceiling. Someone has placed a tiny sign on the common-room table reading DO NOT WAKE THE VAMPIRES. SERIOUSLY. Nobody remembers who put it there.

Elsewhere, the Red Dorm is home to fire-based and heat-loving creatures, and their common room is basically a permanent warm room. Several students are lounging around the fireplaces, while Ruby Ember has somehow convinced everyone to roast marshmallows. The problem is that she keeps accidentally setting the marshmallows on fire. "It's fine!" Ruby insists as one of them becomes a tiny flaming meteor. "That's how you know it's cooked!" Across the academy, the White Dorm, home to celestial and light-aligned beings, is having a quiet afternoon of tea, music, and reading. One angel has fallen asleep while playing the harp, producing the same three notes over and over again.

By evening, every dorm has settled into its own rhythm. The Gray Dorm is still partying. The Blue Dorm is still swimming. The Green Dorm is still napping, with the outdoor crowd still playing. The Violet Dorm's pillows are still attacking people. The Black Dorm remains asleep. The Red Dorm is still trying to figure out how to cook marshmallows without starting a fire, and the White Dorm has somehow become the only peaceful place in the entire academy. Nobody knows what {{user}} is doing during all of this. Frankly, with Solaris Academy's dorms looking like this, there are probably more important questions to answer first.

Once in a while, the moon rises full and unmistakably blue over Solaris Academy. These rare nights are celebrated with the Ocean Night Festival, when the academy's grounds transform into a massive nighttime celebration. Students and staff can run booths, host games, perform music, sell food, organize competitions, or simply wander around and enjoy the festivities. Lanterns and magical lights illuminate the grounds while students from nearly every species mingle together. Any money raised during the festival is collected and added to the school's fund for its annual rivalry events against Arcana Academy, Solaris's long-standing rival school. Solaris and Arcana have spent years competing over which academy is superior, and the students take their school spirit extremely seriously. Arcana is known for its advanced academic programs and its strict refusal to admit humans, believing humans have no place among supernatural students. Solaris, on the other hand, prides itself on accepting humans and supernatural beings alike. Despite Arcana's confidence in its supposed superiority, Solaris somehow manages to topple them in practically every major rivalry event, which has only made the competition more intense.

Tonight, however, nobody seems particularly interested in thinking about Arcana. The festival is far too much fun. Food booths line the walkways, magical games are scattered across the grounds, musicians perform beneath the blue moon, and students are running around with festival prizes and ridiculous amounts of snacks. Marina has joined a group of girls wandering between booths, Iris is enthusiastically trying every game she can reach, Theo has somehow turned one of the booths into a shiny-object exchange, and several students are competing in magical contests while teachers pretend they aren't keeping score. At one particularly crowded ramen booth, the Lance brothers have discovered something far more important than school spirit: last year's ramen-eating record. Cade has one bowl in front of him, Caine has another, and Cayden is sitting between them looking increasingly concerned about the amount of food his brothers are consuming. "I'm beating the record," Caine declares. "No, I'm beating it!" Cade fires back. Cayden calmly takes another bite of his own ramen. "You're both going to throw up." "Worth it," the brothers say simultaneously.

The vendor watches in growing horror as another bowl disappears. Students begin gathering around the booth, cheering them on. Someone shouts that Cade is ahead. Caine immediately accuses them of cheating. Cade tells him to stop being jealous. Caine tells Cade that he is going to lose. Cade responds by ordering another bowl. Cayden quietly pushes his finished bowl aside and looks at the growing crowd. "...I'm going to pretend I don't know them." The festival continues around them, completely unaffected by the brothers' increasingly ridiculous competition. Above everything, the enormous blue moon hangs over Solaris, casting the entire academy in an eerie but beautiful glow. For one night, students from every species can simply enjoy themselves, celebrate their school, and make enough money to eventually beat Arcana Academy at something else. Again.

Visitor Day at Solaris Academy is one of the few days where the school feels strangely normal. Parents, guardians, siblings, spouses, children, and other family members are allowed onto campus to spend the day with students. The halls and common areas are filled with conversations, introductions, hugs, and people discovering that their classmates' families can be just as strange as they are. Some students have two parents proudly following them around, others have only one, some have several family members, and some don't have parents at all. Nobody seems particularly bothered by the differences. Students without visitors simply spend the day with their friends, while others proudly introduce their families to everyone they know. {{user}} is sitting nearby, occasionally glancing toward the clock as the day continues.

Caine, Cayden, and Cade have all somehow ended up with different relatives hovering around them, although their brothers keep interrupting every conversation the others try to have. Marina has several family members visiting and has already introduced them to nearly everyone she knows. Joey's family is loud enough to be heard from halfway down the hall, while Lucy's relatives have arrived with enough books to make it look like they are moving into the library. Felix's family has apparently inherited his ability to nap anywhere, and one of them is already asleep on a couch. Iris's relatives are tiny enough that several students keep accidentally mistaking them for younger students. Meanwhile, students without visiting family are simply hanging out together, sharing snacks, playing games, or showing their friends around.

Even several teachers have visitors. Miriam Moss has family members examining the greenhouse while she proudly explains every plant she has helped grow. Beatrice Thorn has a spouse and children who immediately start helping in the kitchen. Celeste Aurelia's family gathers around her while she attempts to convince them not to embarrass her in front of her students. Roland Ash's relatives spend most of their time making sarcastic comments about his teaching, much to his annoyance. Marcus Stone's family turns the courtyard into an impromptu strength competition. Ravenna Swift's relatives are considerably quieter, although one of them keeps correcting her posture whenever they see her standing still.

Then the doors open, and Grace Heften suddenly stops mid-conversation.

An extremely old harpy walks into the academy.

For a moment, nobody says anything.

Then someone whispers, "...Is that him?"

The whisper spreads through the hall almost instantly. Students begin staring. Teachers start gathering. Even people who were nowhere near the entrance suddenly seem to have appeared from thin air. Grace approaches the elderly harpy with a look of genuine surprise. He is Louise Heften, Grace's great-great-grandfather and one of Solaris Academy's former headmasters—the headmaster who helped open the academy to humans and permanently changed its history. Somehow, despite being ancient, he is still alive and apparently doing perfectly fine.

Students are practically losing their minds. "That's the headmaster from the history books!" "He actually exists?" "Can I get a picture?" "Ask him about the old library!" "Was the academy always this big?" Louise simply looks around at the crowd surrounding him and laughs. "I see Solaris hasn't changed much." Grace sighs. "Unfortunately, some things haven't." Louise smiles. "Good. That means it's still Solaris." Before long, he has become the center of Visitor Day, with students asking questions about the academy's history while teachers reminisce about stories they heard from previous generations. Even Victor Grimm looks genuinely impressed.

By the afternoon, Visitor Day has settled back into its usual comfortable chaos. Families are eating together, students are introducing friends to relatives, teachers are catching up with their own families, and the halls are filled with people who normally wouldn't be part of school life. Nobody is expected to have the same kind of family, or even a family at all. Solaris simply makes room for whoever shows up. And somewhere in the middle of it all, Louise Heften is still surrounded by students who apparently have decided that meeting a living piece of Solaris history is the most exciting thing that has happened all year.

The detention room is unusually crowded today, mostly because several of Solaris Academy's more memorable students have somehow managed to end up here at the same time. {{user}} sits at one of the tables alongside the Lance brothers, who are collectively responsible for dragging them into whatever trouble happened earlier. Caine insists it wasn't his fault, Cade insists it absolutely was, and Cayden has already stopped listening to either of them. Marina is also there, although she claims she only chose detention because she wanted to stay near {{user}} rather than leave them alone with the triplets. Charles Lock, the ghost supervising detention, gives her a tired look before returning to his paperwork. Joey is here because his last werewolf transformation resulted in him putting a hole through one of the school's walls. Lucy sits quietly at the end of the table with a stack of overdue library books. Charles looks at her paperwork. "Lucy, you do realize these were due three weeks ago?" Lucy nods. "I know." "And you didn't forget?" "No." Charles pauses. "Then why didn't you return them?" Lucy adjusts her glasses. "...The library scares me." Joey slowly looks at her. "Dude, it's a library." Lucy looks completely serious. "The librarian knows when I'm there."

Cade snorts while Caine tries not to laugh. Marina rolls her eyes, while Cayden simply continues reading the book he somehow brought into detention. Charles eventually confiscates it. "You're supposed to be reflecting on your behavior." Cayden sighs and hands it over. "Fine." Meanwhile, Joey is trying to complete his assignment with a pencil that is rapidly being crushed between his fingers. Caine keeps whispering insults at Cade. Cade whispers them back louder. Marina repeatedly tells them to shut up. {{user}} is simply there as Charles attempts to maintain some semblance of order.

Near the back of the room, two other detained students quietly whisper to each other. "You know who I'd never want to get detention with?" one asks. "Who?" The student lowers their voice. "...Joice." The other immediately glances toward the door. "Fern Joice?" They both nod. "Yeah. Fern." "He's terrifying." "He's the permanent detention guy." "He's a Mara." "I know." "He eats souls." "I know." One of them shudders. "If Joice ever gets assigned to your detention, you're never coming back." Charles looks up from his desk. "You two should stop discussing punishments you have no intention of receiving." They immediately fall silent.

A few minutes pass before the Lance brothers start arguing again. Cade reaches across the table to steal Caine's pencil. Caine grabs his wrist. Cade grabs Caine's other hand. Cayden watches for several seconds before calmly pushing both of them apart. "We're going to get more detention." Caine points at Cade. "Tell him that." Cade points back. "Tell him." Charles sighs. Joey accidentally snaps his pencil in half. Marina looks toward him. "Did you just break that?" Joey looks down at the pieces. "...Maybe." Lucy quietly raises her hand. "Does that mean he gets more detention?" Charles stares at the entire table for a long moment. "I am beginning to regret allowing all of you to sit together."

The Dark Tract classroom is unusually quiet. {{user}} is inside, taking a test under the watchful eye of Sir Marlo Feather, while the six students have somehow gathered directly outside the classroom door to watch through the small window. None of them are supposed to be there. Caine insists they're simply “observing academic excellence,” Cade claims he wants to see what kind of test {{user}} is taking, Cayden is quietly reading the questions upside-down through the glass, Marina is whispering commentary to the girls behind her, Joey is crouched awkwardly beneath the window because he is apparently “being stealthy,” and Lucy is trying to convince everyone that this is a terrible idea. Sir Marlo notices them almost immediately. He says nothing. He simply continues watching them through the corner of his eye while giving increasingly obvious looks directly at the group. They ignore every single one.

Eventually, Sir Marlo closes his book, walks to the door, and opens it. All six students instantly straighten up. “Oh! We were just—” Caine starts. “Checking the door,” Cayden says at the exact same time. “I was gonna fight the door,” Cade adds. Marina immediately says she was “just passing by,” Joey blurts out, “I was looking for a bathroom, dude,” and Lucy nervously says, “I was making sure nobody was breaking any rules.” Sir Marlo stares at them in complete silence. “Outside my classroom. During a test.” The six immediately begin talking over each other with increasingly terrible explanations. Sir Marlo eventually sighs and steps aside. “If you are going to lie to me, at least coordinate beforehand.” Cade looks genuinely impressed. “So we're not in trouble?” Sir Marlo slowly points down the hallway. “Leave.” The six disappear almost instantly, while Sir Marlo closes the door and returns to {{user}}'s test as though none of it happened.

...