4 Deja vu I've just-(yes it's still the flashback)

Fyren was in for a surprise that day when he walked into Mr. Alnald's class and was about to witness physical superiority, the likes of which he had never seen before.

Melfis was standing and talking with Mr. Alnald. Hold on, I left class before her, how did she get here so fast? And without me noticing her go by?

Fyren lined up with the rest of the class to listen to Mr. Alnald's instructions for the day. Melfis stood next to him.

"All right class!" Mr. Alnald shouted, "today we have a new student, Melfis Ur!"

Amid the greetings toward Melfis, Mr. Alnald shouted, "To be a man, you need to be able to handle anything thrown at you!"

The students looked confused before Mr. Alnald's teacher's assistant, an energetic student in the grade above Fyren named Goz, sighed and explained.

"If you couldn't tell, that means an obstacle course."

He then proceeded to tell them all the steps to clear the obstacle course, pointing and gesturing dramatically.

The class lined up with Melfis behind Fyren, who patted his head and ruffled his hair. Some students looked towards them and snickered, to which Melfis promptly replied by sticking out her tongue.

Finally, it was Fyren's turn to run through the course. "Ready…Go!"

Alright, sprint to the tunnel, climb through, sprint to the pull-up bar, ten pull ups, next the logs. Over, under, over, under, under, over, over. Into the pit, climb up the rope, ring the bell, jump to the net, climb down. Across the tight rope…carefully… don't slip… alright the climbing wall. Across the bars, down the slide, into the pool under the bridge and out of the water. And lastly, three flips over the bar.

"Seven minutes on the dot, good job," Goz said with an impressed smile while Mr. Alnald stood by, and nodded with a "Hm!"

It was Melfis' turn, after some quick stretching, Melfis jumped into the course. She was a blur.

"Wow, three minutes! We have a new record!"

Melfis mock-bowed to her makeshift crowd, whose jaws had slammed against the ground at her performance.

"That was amazing," Fyren gasped, "my score was terrible, but yours I've never seen even close to before."

Melfis sighed and smirked, "you've only seen the beginning of what I can do."

I guess I better stick around then.

Fyren walked down to his room at the end of that very eventful day. Upon entering his room, he didn't even hang up his jacket on the coat hook by the door before his legs buckled and he fell on his bed, asleep.

It seemed like only a few minutes before Fyren heard a knock on his door. He shot back up to his feet, and after attempting to smooth back his messy, dark hair, which he was unsuccessful in doing because of the hair spray keeping it in place, and pushing up his glasses he opened the door and, lo and behold, it was Melfis!

"What are you doing in the boys' rooms?!" He whispered frantically.

"I need to show you something," she replied.

She led him out of the room and into the Janitor's closet next door.

"I didn't even know this door was unlocked."

"It wasn't… until I got this key," she replied, dangling a key in front of Fyren's face.

They went into the closet together and walked towards the back where a rather large vent was against the wall.

Melfis slowly pushed the vent back, which swung open like a door, and entered a passage about a couple of feet long before reaching an identical vent. After pushing that vent open they emerged in a room that was the mirror image of Fyren's.

"Welcome to my room!"

Fyren looked around the room and saw a book on the bed titled: Forbidden Magic: A Tragic Tale of Love.

"Uhh, what's that?" Fyren pointed at the book.

"Ignore that!"

Fyren was slightly amused, "So what did you bring me here for? It couldn't just be to show me your room."

Melfis grinned, "I knew you'd ask that, Fy-guy, c'mon."

She once again led Fyren down the dark corridor between her room and the Janitor's closet, but this time they took a right turn onto a path too dark for anyone to see unless they were specifically looking for it.

"How much farther?"

"We're here."

Melfis stopped abruptly and Fyren nearly crashed into her, he looked over her shoulder and saw a vent similar to the one connecting Melfis' room to the closet on the ground. They both knelt down and looked through the openings in the vent.

There they saw a dim-lit, circular room with a podium up against the wall and gray desks with chairs in an almost complete circle around the podium. On the floor was a blue rug, stained with age, with a motif of the interlinking "O" and "L" of the Order of Lance. Five figures sat in the shadows. From the sound of one of their voices, Fyren could tell Mr. Alnald was one of them.

"I already know one we should take," he said.

"Alright," said a gruff voice, "what about the new one? I swear by my shiny bald scalp there's something up with her."

Melfis tensed by Fyren. That's Mr. Pischer's voice, Fyren thought, he must be talking about Melfis.

"I saw her scores from the screening, she's nothing like any of the other students, but it looks like she can't use magic currently," a new voice said. He came under one of the few lights and Fyren saw he was the teacher for the second year of Magic Languages, Mr. Ebiner.

"Can't or won't?" another new voice said.

"What do you mean?"

"You know the Ur siblings, especially her brother, Lakintu."

"She showed barely any remnants of an outside Feron signature, nor any sign her ferons were ever open."

"But there's no way someone with that high a score can't open her Ferons!"

"She's an anomaly then," the new voice said.

A pair of red eyes flashed in the darkness toward Fyren and Melfis.

"Let's get out of here," Melfis and Fyren stood up and hurried out of the passageway into his room.

After catching their breath, Fyren turned to Melfis, "What did they mean by that? That you can't open your Ferons?"

Melfis sighed, "Can I trust you?"

"Of course."

"It's true. I can't, even with my screening score, and even though my physical strength and abilities are way above anyone else's. And I mean way."

"You don't have to rub it in."

"Can you keep this a secret? I don't want anyone else knowing."

"Sure."

"Whelp, I guess I better get back to my room. See ya Fy-guy!"

Fyren was left in his room, alone with his thoughts.

Back in the present, Fyren lay on his bed after school, wondering if there was something Melfis was hiding from her discussion with Mr. Alnald that had to do with that meeting they spied on the previous year.

I wonder if Mr. Alnald knows we were spying on him.

Fyren sat upright and sighed. The next couple days we have off to train for the Magic Exam Preliminaries. He got up and took off his tie, unbuttoning part of his shirt to ease the strain on his neck. Walking over to a cooler he kept in his room, he picked up a can of Fizzy and opened it with a familiar crack/click/pssh. Alright, homework time. He pulled out his office chair and plopped in it.

As soon as Fyren had taken out his pencil he heard a knock at the door. He got up and headed toward it. It suddenly opened inward, barely an inch away from smashing into his head. Lo and behold, it was Melfis.

"I forgot you had all the keys to the rooms from the Janitor's closet." How could I? She just used them this morning to fiddle with my alarm.

"You know it Fy-guy!"

"So what do you need?"

Melfis smiled, "Aw c'mon, Fy-guy, can't two buddies just have a chat?"

"Yeah, but you never come in here just to talk."

"You know me too well, Fy-guy, here, let me show you something."

She led Fyren out of his room, the dorm area was silent and empty, the chairs were pulled in to the tables and the fireplace stood cold. I guess everyone else is already enjoying their break. Melfis quietly opened the door to the closet and went down the secret passage.

"Do you ever get that feeling of deja vu," Fyren murmured.

"What'd you say?"

"Nothing."

They continued down the passage until they came upon the same vent where, just a year ago, they overheard the conversation about Melfis. They both knelt down and looked through the vent.

Once again, five figures were congregated in the musty room.

"So have we decided who to take?" Mr. Alnald asked.

"That's still assuming this great calamity will befall this school, and if that happens, I will emerge from the shadows as a shining and sparkling light of justice!" said one of the voices not belonging to a teacher Fyren knew.

"Regardless, they will still be there and unless we want them in the hands of the enemy, we have to decide who to take." That's Mr. Ebiner, Fyren thought.

"Well the obvious choice is that girl, the one with the amazing scores."

"Her scores aren't so amazing in my class," Mr. Pischer grumbled.

"I have another one in mind," said Mr. Alnald, "I sense that he has a lot of potential, if he can muster up the confidence to utilize it."

"That would be Raph, right?" Mr. Ebiner said, "I completely agree."

"Hmmm, his scores are average in my class, "Mr. Pischer remarked.

"Let's see," one of the new voices said, accompanied by the sound of shuffling papers, "Raph Ta'ki Tabar, he's from the Sangunum Kingdom."

"I think we should wait for the Exam," the voice of the red-eyed figure said, "If I see a fellow Blood Feronest taking part, then I might just take them."

"Well, our business here is done, we'll see each other in two days at the Magic Exam Preliminaries."

As Fyren and Melfis watched the group leave the room, they once again saw a flash of red eyes from the shadows before it left the room with the others. The two students got up slowly and walked back to their respective rooms. Fyren's Fizzy was now flat. Sighing, he started to wonder who the two people with their teachers were among everything else they had heard. However, he came to the same conclusion: I'll find out in two days, at the preliminaries.