-Sophie looked in the mirror, and then at the wall on her right. Fitz was on the other side of that wall, and when she met him in the hall, they would be escorted to the room where their first cognate trial would take place. It was finally happening, and the butterflies in her stomach could barely be silenced by the drumming of her fingers on her arm.

For the trials, she and her cognate had to change into matching white bodysuits with flattering black piped grey paneling that was made to endure the stress of the terrains they would be put in. Her hair was up in a high ponytail, and her knee high boots matched the black of the piping. The only things of hers she was allowed to wear were her cognate rings. Nervously, she tugged out an eyelash. The suit made everything seem more... intense- and it was, it was just more closely related to something out of a sci-fi movie. Correction, something tacky out of a sci-fi movie.

There was a knock at the door, and she didn't even answer it, she just opened it, her hands running off of the door handle to twist together at her stomach. Tiergan gave her a sympathetic smile, and put a hand on her shoulder, guiding her out of the room gently. Fitz was behind him, and Tiergan's hand moved to his shoulder as well, the air smelling of pep talk as he spoke, "Listen guys, you'll be fine. You've worked really hard, and you two have a stronger bond than any cognates I've ever seen." Neither teen replied, and they walked the rest of the way in silence.

They soon reached a pair of large metal doors that swung open to reveal a cold chamber with a high ceiling and a small table in the center with the legs twisted in design. A man and a woman sat together on the opposite side of it, and stood when they saw them walk in. They dressed in matching clean cut suits with dramatic black capes. The gaze the pair was giving the two up and coming cognates was more bone chilling than the temperature of the room. "Welcome," the woman said in a monotonous voice to Sophie and Fitz before nodding shortly to Tiergan, "Sir Tiergan, you are dismissed."

Sophie looked back at her mentor worriedly, and he gave them a small, reassuring smile. Patting their backs comfortingly, he whispered, "You can do this," before turning away, and walking out the door, the doors clanking shut behind him. As soon as their mentor left the room, Fitz and Sophie's hands snapped together as they stood side by side, awaiting the first trial that would decide their fate. The male proctor's mouth flickered with a smile, just for a moment, but the woman's blank expression stayed the same. Sophie didn't know which sign meant what- they could both be set in a negative or positive meaning.

"My name is Aurora Volrat," the woman explained, "and with me is my associate, Harold Arniga. We will proctor your cognate trials today."

Harold stepped forward with an extended hand, "Sophie Foster and Fitz Vacker, what an exciting pair," his eyes glittered with amusement, "we've been waiting for you to come since Tiergan informed us that you had started training to be cognates."

Sophie and Fitz held their hands out at the same time, to which the proctors' faces pursed in interest, but Sophie let Fitz go first after a brief telepathic conversation filled with nervous rambling. Harold then gestured for them to sit down opposite he and his colleague, a direction to which they obeyed, waiting impatiently for their first task.

"For your first task, you will each project three memories from different points in time with one another in them onto these papers," Aurora explained as Harold passed them each three sheets of paper.

"It will be like a relay, one of you will find a memory, project it onto one of your papers, then the next one will find a memory, project it, etc. The use of other special abilities will not be considered cheating," the male proctor informed as he sat down.

"This will be timed, the faster you do it, the better your score," continued Aurora, "you'll be scored on time, precision, memory, and cooperativity. Avoid using the same memories, it will subtract from your score if you decide to."

Harold held out a timer, and pressed the start button as he announced, "Your time begins now."

Sophie immediately turned to her cognate, and their other hands snapped together. She closed her eyes and transmitted the question, "Do you want to go first, or do you want me to?"

"I'll go first, I'm slower," he decided, and that was that. After about a minute, she felt his hands part from hers and she opened her eyes, watching as he grabbed a piece of paper and carefully projected the memory of when they first met onto the page. They were 16% of the way through the trial.

She then took his hands again and dove into her cognate's mind. Carefully, the built the rope, tied it around her waist hastily, the other end to his core memories, and jumped into the depths of his memories. Sophie let herself free fall for a few seconds before latching onto a ledge, her body dangling wildly. She then started looking around at the memories around her. Briefly, she scanned them until she saw blonde hair and brown eyes, then recognized it as her face. She didn't let the strangeness of watching herself climb rocks in a game of base quest settle too much on her mind before she captured the memory, and started to climb back up. When she reached the top, she immediately came back into her own mind so she could project the image onto her first sheet of paper. 33%

Before he went back into her mind for another memory, Fitz asked, "What if instead of climbing back up, we just force each other out, to save time."

"Good idea; and you don't need to climb down, just tie the rope and jump," she complimented, and waited for him to get the next memory.

"If we weren't in each other's mind scapes I'd accuse you of being reckless," he chuckled, and she couldn't help but smile.

Fourty-nine seconds later, Fitz transmitted, "Done!" and Sophie forced him out quickly. As she opened her eyes, she saw Fitz finish projecting the memory -the two of them at Vesta Vita's- and waited a second before returning into his mind. 50%

The rope she had made before was still tied to the core memory, and Sophie quickly pulled the other end up, tying it back around her. She let herself free fall longer this time she jumped before grabbing onto a small ledge, and looking around. This time, she found the memory of when they had their first Telepathy session together, grabbed it, then transmitted that she was finished. As soon as she was out of his mind she grabbed the next sheet of paper, and projected it. 66% Less than a minute later, she heard Fitz transmit he was done, and she forced him out again. The memory of when they organized the cognate drawers, 83%

She went in again, her mind racing. She was struggling to think of what she could grab as tied the rope around her waist again, but suddenly had an idea when she saw the glint of the two rings on her thumbs. Sophie jumped down into the cavern of memories, trying to judge them correctly. She grabbed a ledge to stop herself, her body swinging so much from the sudden stop that she almost lost her grip. When she looked around, she saw that she had gone too deep; two weeks too deep. Gathering her wits about her, she started to climb as fast as she could. Along the way, Fitz asked her if she was okay, and she quickly responded that she had dropped too far. By that time, she had spotted the right memory in all it's glory, and was about a foot away from its grasp before her hand slipped and she fell. Desperately, her hand shot out, and an idea appeared.

Sophie quickly started forming a new rope, forcing herself to remind herself of all of those good feelings she got from playing base quest or holding hands under the table during lunch. Soon, the memories stretched into the shape of a rope in her hands and as she gripped one end firmly, she chucked the other as far up as she could. Sophie focused on the memory she wanted, and to her relief the end of the rope may not have been thrown high enough, but the end had zipped up to meet the memory of Fitz giving her her set of cognate rings like they were attracting magnets. Without wasting a second, she started to pull herself up, and when she was close enough, touched the shimmery surface before giving her cognate the go ahead. Once she was back in her own head she scrambled to get the last sheet of paper, projecting the memory onto it before just dropping the paper onto the table with the rest of them, 100%

Harold turned off his timer at the same time as Aurora picked up the papers, starting with Sophie's stack. Harold grabbed Fitz's, and a dull, yet blanketing wall of light shone from the ceiling down onto the table, separating the proctors from the teens. Sophie didn't hear anything on the other side, so she assumed the two adults were transmitting, and she turned to her cognate with an anxious smile. Immediately, Fitz wrapped her in a hug, and they held each other tightly as they waited for the test administrators to finish. "Are you okay?" she asked Fitz over their mental bond after she felt him start to shake- or was that her? Sophie couldn't tell.

"Yeah, you?"

"I am," promised Sophie, though she was rattled, "that was intense."

"And fast."

"That too," she agreed, and heard someone outside of their link clear their throat.

"On to the next trial," Aurora announced as the two broke apart, and stood up, walking out a large door behind her that mirrored the ones Sophie and Fitz had entered that she hadn't noticed before.

"How did we do?" Fitz asked Harold.

"I'm not authorized to tell you that," the man answered before looking out at Aurora and turning back to the teens, "but I can tell you that by going on to the next trial, it means you passed the first." 

Sophie let out a quiet sigh of relief and laced her hand with Fitz's as they walked through the metal doors to the next part of this quest that would make or break them.