Jimin walked into school on Monday morning with a harassed expression. Aside from staying up past midnight to do her homework that she had put off until the last moment, her dad had been gone when she woke.

So, when she had woken up twenty minutes after her alarm had rung, with no one to wake her when she overslept, she had to rush out the door. There had been no breakfast on the table, so by the time she'd gotten to school, her stomach was already grumbling in protest at its mistreatment.

Jimin was still fuming on the inside when she sat down at her desk. She wanted to put her head down on the desk's cool and smooth brown wooden surface - she thought that even with the classroom in complete chaos and the ruckus going on, she would still be able to sleep for a few moments - but she resisted the urge. People would look at her strangely.

She sighed as the shrill bell pierced the air, and the teacher walked in with a harrassed expression. Mrs. Lee brushed her fly-away hairs out of her face and tucked them safely behind her ear.

She was in a bad mood, it was obvious, and the whole class could tell. Mrs. Lee slammed her books down on the teacher's desk and cast an eagle eye around the class room.

"Jung Daehyun, detention," she said in a no-nonsense manner and looked down and opened her role book. Jung Daehyun apparently didn't pick up her mood, however.

"Why?" he asked defiantely.

"For chewing gum," she snapped, and began to call out the names from the role book. Everyone replied with a simple “yes” or “here”.

Daehyun was about to protest some more, but a girl who sat behind him took it upon herself to keep him silent. She kicked the back of his chair. When Daehyun turned around at him, she hissed at him to keep his “trout lips shut”.

When the bell rang an hour later and the class finished, there was a silent understanding of relief among the students. Some of them leant back in their seats and stretched out their limbs, and the rest began quitely chatting amongst themselves, waiting for the next teacher to come in.

"Someone should give her a yoghurt or something,"  Yixing whispered to the boy next to him.

"I know, right?" he replied. "I just hope she isn't like that for the rest of the week."

By the time that Biology rolled around, everyone was exhausted, cranking and wanting to go home. It didn't help that their slightly eccentric Biology teacher, Mr. Kim, came in with wide eyes and an “exciting announcement”.

"Guys, I've got great news," he said as soon as he dumped his books on the table. "I've noticed that a lot of you -" he looked at certain students who cringed away from his gaze and sunk further down their seats, "- have been having a hard time getting a good grade. Therefore, I decided to enter you all in a science fair!"

His eyes twinkled with anticipation and he looked around at the annoyed pupils, expecting a similar reaction to his. When he didn't get that, his smile died down. He twisted his lips up in a grimace.

"Sir?" A boy held his hand up in the air. "How will particpating in the county's science fair help our grades at all?"

"Simple. If any of you place, you get extra credit," Mr. Kim replied. "And, of course, you'll learn plenty in the process!"

Everyone groaned. A science fair meant extra work and extra work meant less down time.

Jimin leaned forward and absent mindedly tapped her fingers against Sora's chair.

Mr. Kim proceeded to mention the various aspects that they could do their projects on, and he explained that the top five projects in the class would be entered.

He wrote all the students' names on the right side's of the classroom down and put the folded pieces of paper into a big metal biscuit tin. He shook it several times and walked around to each student on the left hand side of the classroom. They took a name out each.

Jimin was silently relieved that he did it this way. She wasn't sure if she would have anyone to go with if they got to choose their partners, and she didn't want to be that awkward person at the end of it that had to go with the only other person that was left over.

When the teacher came up to her, Jimin put her hand in the tin and moved her hand around a bit before grabbing onto a piece of paper, she withdrew her hand and held the paper with two hands as Mr. Kim went to the next person.

When the left side of the classroom had gotten their paper, they opened them together. Jimin looked at the name that she'd gotten. Park Chanyeol was written in Mr. Kim's messy hand writing.

She looked at the boy. He had one of the widest smiles she'd ever seen, eyes that resembled a doe's and he was extremely tall. He was one of the twelve weird boys.

Sora turned around in her seat in excitement. "Who did you get?" she demanded.

"Park Chanyeol," Jimin replied, still looking at the name. She looked up at Sora and saw one of the widest smiles she'd ever seen in her entire life.

"That's great, that's great," Sora responded mechanically. "Guess who I got?"

Jimin shook her head. "No idea. Who?"

"Jung Daehyun," she squealed, but kept her voice down, so that only Jimin could hear.  Jimin thought that Sora must have a crush on the trout lipped guy.

The right hand of the class room were eagerly looking at the left side, trying to discover who had their names.

"Alright, you can discuss what you would like to do with your partner for ten minutes," Mr. Kim announced.

Immediately, some people got up and marched over to their partners. Sora skipped away happily, and Jimin got up nervously. Of all people, why did it have to be one of those boys?

Jimin walked over to Chanyeol with shaky legs. He looked up at her with expectation. He looked like a little puppy, Jimin thought.

"Hi!" he said cheerfully, much like he did last week. "Did you get my name?"

Jimin nodded and held out the paper to show him. "Yeah, I did."

"Cool." He nodded. "I'm Chanyeol, by the way."

Jimin blinked at him. "Um . . ." She wasn't sure if he was being serious or not.

"Jimin, right?" he asked, pointing at her.

"Yeah, I am." She frowned, but said nothing about his introduction.

"Sit down, then," he told her.

Jimin grabbed a chair and desk and pulled them towards Chanyeol's seat. She managed to get there before her classmate, who was also looking to take that chair.

"So, what do you want to do this project on?" he asked.

"Not sure," Jimin replied. She wasn't a decision maker - she was awful at decisions, in fact. "I guess ecology would be a good project to do something on; with the forest being near and all."

"Ecology? Like studying habitats?" Chanyeol asked.

"Yeah. It'll be interesting. Or we could do something else, if you want." Jimin bit her lip, seeing Chanyeol's hesitant reaction.

"What's the easiest thing to do? Isn't there something like sticking plants in coloured water and seeing how the roots change colour?" Chanyeol asked.

"If we do that, we'll probably fail. That's not a very hard thing to do," Jimin told him. "At the most, we'll manage to scrape a pass."

"What would we do the ecology project on? Deer and grass? Foxes and rabbits?"

"Well, something more exciting." Chanyeol scoffed at Jimin's words, who, in turn, blushed. "How about we think over it tonight and get back to each other tomorrow?"

"Well, there's plenty of time left."

No sooner had the words left his mouth than the bell rang and eveyone clammered out of the classroom, eager to get home and eat dinner, surf the web or hang out with friends.

Jimin was heading towards the front gate on her lonesome, when someone grabbed her bag and pulled her back. She held onto the straps as she was dragged backwards.

"Ah! What are you doing?" she asked and turned around.

The twelve boys whom she had previously had a disagreement over the wolves were behind her. Jimin gulped. The tall guy, Kris, who had gotten angry, was much more intimidating up close. She had never realised that he was so tall.

"Is something wrong?" Jimin asked. She'd noticed that there was two boys glaring at her. They were standing next to each other and they were both staring intently at her . . . almost like they were suspicious of her . . . worried that she would bring harm to her.

Jimin dismissed the thoughts as soon as they entered her head. She was just being stupid.

"Your phone number," Chanyeol said. Jimin noted that he was almost as tall as Kris. "I need your phone number."

"Um, why?" Jimin asked.

"For scientific purposes. Now give it." Chanyeol snapped his fingers and held his hand out. Jimin ped the pocket in the side of her skirt that was hidden perfectly by the seam. She took out her phone and unlocked it by drawing a Z on the screen.

Mutely, she handed it over to him. Chanyeol opened up the contacts, input his name and number, rung his number, hung up and handed it back to her.

"Perfect." He stayed silent for a moment before adding, "You have a really old phone, by the way.

Jimin hummed in acknowledgment and put it back in her pocket and zipped it up. She blinked at them. They were all on the extreme opposites of each other. On one hand, they had guys that towered over her, but on the other, they had boys that didn't seem that much taller than her, perhaps a couple of inches.

One of them had pale skin, almost like snow, yet another had a darker complexion. Several of them had mature facial features, and Jimin was certain if she had seen them outside of school and if they weren't in their uniform, she would assume that they were roughly twenty-something. But, in their group, they had a few people who had baby faces, that made them almost endearing.

The group definitely had diversity, that was for sure.

Jimin bobbed her head a few times. She wanted to say something more, perhaps apologise for her comments last week, but she couldn't find the words.

She nodded again. "Well, I guess I'll be off." She pointed her thumb over her shoulder. "I have to go home; my dad'll get worried about me if I'm home late or anything."

"Sure, sure," Chanyeol said.

Jimin turned robotically and marched out of the gate. She cocked her head to the side, contemplating the twelve. Them just staring at her and not saying anything had unnerved her.

"So you're with the wolf hater?" Luhan laughed, as Jimin's figure disappeared and they all started walking together down the road. "Lucky!"

"Hey, at least I didn't get guys like the other three!" Chanyeol protested.

"Yeah, but if you don't watch out, she'll come and shoot you." 

Sehun mouth twitched up, but he forced his poker face on. There was no way that he was going to laugh at something that Xi Luhan said. No way.

Jongin noticed Sehun's inner battle to keep a straight face and whispered it to Kyungsoo, who smiled broadly. Oh Sehun was in for some teasing.

~* Fighting *~