The night stretched on, long and merciless. Kairos, Robin, Sam, and Drake huddled in the tutorial hall, surrounded by a fortress of textbooks, notebooks, and empty energy drink cans.
The air was thick with exhaustion, anxiety, and the faint smell of toast bread and egg.
Kairos rubbed his eyes for what felt like the hundredth time. "I can't… I can't feel my brain anymore," he muttered, staring at the wall of formulas and diagrams that looked more like hieroglyphics at this point.
Robin, who had just attempted to explain a concept using hand signs, looked equally frazzled. "Does anyone actually understand this? Or are we all just… pretending?"
Sam groaned, his face buried in his notes. "I think my notes are lying to me. That can't be right."
Drake leaned back in his chair. "Relax, bro. It's fine. We're all doomed anyway."
Kairos threw a pencil at him. "Relax? This is not the time for philosophy, Drake. It's exam apocalypse out here!"
The group fell into silence for a moment, the weight of impending failure pressing down on them. Then, like clockwork, someone muttered a single word.
"Snack?"
Instant chaos. Empty wrappers were dug out, crumbs scattered across notes, and Kairos nearly lost his sanity watching Drake attempt to eat toast bread with one hand while flipping pages with the other.
Hours passed. They quizzed each other, argued over answers, corrected mistakes, and occasionally stared into the abyss when something simply didn't make sense.
Kairos discovered a horrifying truth about his life: formulas could betray you. Theorems could lie. Even logic itself seemed to be mocking him.
Kairos was busy trying to memorize some dense theorem when he realized he was mixing it with another theorem. "Wait… what? Why is this… oh no. Ah"
Sam groaned so loudly Kairos almost feared structural damage. "My brain… i think it stopped working ."
By 3 a.m., desperation had set in. Everyone had crossed into zombie territory. Eyes were bloodshot, hair stuck out in every direction, and every noise especially a squeaky chair or a creaking ceiling felt like a personal affront.
Kairos muttered to himself, staring at a particularly nasty problem. "If I survive this, I'll… I don't know… build a shrine to my sanity."
Drake, already half-asleep on a pile of notes, whispered, "Shhh… don't disturb the survivors."
They continued like this, surviving on caffeine, minimal snacks, and sheer stubbornness. Every time someone thought they had understood the topic, a new question appeared that crushed their confidence.
By 5 a.m., Kairos realized that he could no longer distinguish between theorems, equations, and random notes he had made in frustration. His notebook looked like modern art more than anything academic.
Robin finally leaned back, eyes barely open. "We made it… sort of. Maybe we learned… something… probably not."
Kairos looked around at his friends..disheveled, exhausted, and borderline insane and gave a tired smile. "Hell… complete. Absolute hell. But at least we survived together."
Sam yawned. "Next time… we start a week earlier."
Drake snorted. "Yeah, sure. And I'm joining Hogwarts while we're at it."
Kairos laughed, a little hoarse, a little bitter. "Fine… but in a few hours, we face the real test. And nothing, I swear, will prepare me for the chaos that is that exam."
The first light of dawn crept through the windows, bathing the hall in pale gold. The night of hell had ended, leaving them battered, bruised, and marginally smarter or at least marginally more aware of how hopeless they were.
Kairos took a deep breath, staring at his coffee-stained, ink-smeared notes. Somehow, he had survived. Somehow, he would survive the test too.
…probably..... probably.
By 7 a.m., with the exam scheduled for 8, the group decided it was time to wash up and get ready. Groaning, stretching, and muttering curses at the night's study marathon, they split up to tidy themselves.
Kairos quickly returned to his dorm, brushed his teeth, splashed water on his face, and tried to shake off the fog of exhaustion. He grabbed his bag, double-checked his notes, and started running toward the lecture hall.
Time was slipping. Every step felt heavier than the last, every street seemed longer than it should be. He glanced at his watch: 7:59 a.m.
"Okay… I can make it," he muttered, pumping his legs faster, adrenaline fueling him despite the lack of sleep.
The exam hall came into view. Relief surged until the horror hit.
The doors were closed.
A strict notice was posted on the door: "No entry after 8 a.m."
Kairos froze. The words didn't register at first. Then the reality hit, like a brick to the chest. He was too late. After a night spent grinding, reading, and memorizing every formula and note, he wasn't allowed to write.
He stumbled backward, his mouth opening and closing, producing nothing but incoherent murmurs. "N-no… this… can't… I… studied… I… spent the night… I…"
Robin and the others weren't there yet, and he was alone in front of the closed doors. Panic seeped into every fiber of his being. He tried to force himself to speak, to make sense of it, but his words came out jumbled:
"Equation… theorem… formula… write… now… no…I...awake....no...sleep....how!"
Passersby gave him confused glances, but he didn't notice. Time seemed suspended. Every second that ticked by felt like an eternity, and his brain couldn't process anything other than the night of hell wasted and the test slipping out of his hands.
He staggered a few steps, muttering to himself, pacing in place, horror plastered across his face. "I… I can't… can't… no… no…!"
Thirty minutes passed like this. He didn't faint. He didn't even move from the spot for more than a few steps. He was trapped in a state between disbelief, panic, and utter despair.
People walked past him, murmuring, giving sidelong glances, but Kairos was lost in his own personal apocalypse.
He fell on his butt, still muttering, still trying to make sense of the cruel reality. Every syllable was a desperate attempt to reclaim control:
"I… studied… the whole… night… I… can't… not… allowed… they… they… don't… understand…"
He didn't care about anything else. His focus, all-consuming, was on the injustice of hours of effort being rendered meaningless by a single closed door.
For the first time in his academic life, Kairos felt utterly powerless.
And there he stayed, a lone figure of horror and muttering, as the rest of the campus moved on around him, completely unaware of the internal apocalypse that had just begun.