Jace had been doing his best to stay busy in the days leading up to this. He knew the protocol, he knew what to expect. Results online first, and then paper packet in the mail with all of the information for what he got wrong so he could check everything over, because even one wrong answer might have been failure in his mother's eye.

None of it mattered if he passed though, he got to move into the next step of his professional career.

He had been saying for weeks, months, that he wasn't ready for the exam when his mother pushed him into it, but he couldn't say no to her and he couldn't let her down, so he'd studied. He'd juggled his work for her, his school, and studying.

And--despite how concerned he'd been about potentially failing, he'd actually felt pretty good about the exam. Or, maybe it was just the immense pressure finally being off his shoulders?

--No, he felt good about it. He hadn't struggled with any of the questions. He'd wished he had a bit more time on the essay questions, but there had been very few things that stumped him. He'd written down everything he could think of, he'd double checked every question he could remember.

He'd done good. He'd earned the break he'd taken between now and his exam. And, it wasn't like he hadn't been studying, or working. He'd just not been buried under it.

He was still working in the office. He was still going through a book every week or so. His mother was still quizzing him, assigning him homeworld. He had less school work to worry about. He was powered up--that was a new thing, that was pretty time consuming, but he'd only barely begun to dabble in it. He didn't want to be irresponsible and go out and get himself killed, or hurt--he knew he couldn't hide it from his mother if he wound up in the hospital, and she would absolutely ban him from doing anything that could hurt his career or their reputation.

So, it was best she didn't know. Which meant, playing it safe.

It also meant that he'd started training with Callan, and honestly, he didn't know what he'd have done without Holden there.

Callan on his own seemed to come in one of two forms: ready to reassure you and push you to be the best you could be, and the absolutely terrifying one that looked like he could snap you in two just by blinking too firmly at you.

When Jace agreed to train, he anticipated in-the-ring-Callan, with full on beast persona, ready to push him until he died of exhaustion.

Holden being there meant he got Disney Callan, who was so attentive and patient, and pushed them, but always, somehow, seemed to know exactly when to stop. And then always had a new recipe for them to try to replenish the energy they'd lost. Really, he should have just trusted that Callan was going to be the same person he was in all of his videos online, but he doubted the people on the internet understood the sheer mass that Callan was in person.

The whole point was that Jace had been working very hard, and hardly even noticed that Xander was always off with Nelson. And, he wasn't, now--but Jace strongly suspected it was because he had intended to celebrate when Jace's name showed up on the passing list.

His heart was pounding in his chest and he refreshed the website despite knowing it was still two minutes to midnight.

He passed. He knew he passed. He had to pass.

He paced his room again, and it was still 11:58, so he refreshed again, just in case.

Okay, no change.

He paced around the room again and sighed, trying to force himself to calm down.

It really wasn't working. He drew in a great breath, held it, and walked back to refresh again.

Still 11:58. Still no update.

He had tried everything to be ready for this. He thought about putting on his pajamas, trying to go to bed, but he hadn't been able to. He was dressed like he'd just come back from the office--even though he'd been home for hours. The house was quiet, like they were at least pretending to sleep, but the light was on in the office so he knew at least his mother was up.

He knew Xander was up, because why wouldn't he be and--

Oh! 11:59. Refresh. No update.

Another circle around the room. Jace sighed heavily and refreshed, and circled, and refreshed, and then just collapsed into the chair at his desk and refreshed fifteen times in a row without even seeing the page, and then when the internet lagged he hurled himself out of his chair to pace again.

By the time he made it back, it was midnight.

He refreshed again.

The page changed; there were names, now.

His heart was in his throat and he could hear his pulse in his head, deafening. The blood was rushing so quickly through his eyes that he felt like he couldn't see, but he knew his name was going to be there, so what even was the problem?

He skimmed the list for the passing names. Somewhere between I and K--there were very few J names. It was a quick search.

Jianmin wasn't there.

Huh. Okay, weird. Maybe he refreshed too quickly.

He did it again, scrolled.

Back to J.

No, still no Jianmin.

One more refresh, one more scroll, and then it hit him that his name wasn't on the list.

Which was weird, because the only reason his name wouldn't be on that list was if he hadn't passed, and that--

The house was silent. Except for the sound of a chair scraping from the office. He was suddenly hyper aware that his name was not on the list and if he had seen it, that meant that everyone looking for it had seen it. Which meant his mother had seen it. And she was on her way, now, to tell that she'd seen it. To scold him for not trying hard enough, and--

Jace wasn't really thinking when he slammed his computer shut. He wasn't really thinking when he yanked open his window with such ferocity that it didn't even have a chance to squeak. It was pure fluke that he was even still wearing shoes, and he would have still leapt through his window even if he hadn't been. The window was closed behind him, like that was somehow going to be enough to stop his mother from chasing after him--and he ran.

He didn't know where he was going, or why he hadn't just been able to suck it up and deal with her disappointed rage, but he had to go.

Jace had worked hard--his hardest. He'd done his best.

And it wasn't enough.

And, maybe it was never going to be enough.