Bump.

Jesus fuck.

If that's not what he outwardly said, that was roughly the emotion Pinky was feeling. Is "jesus fuck" even an emotion? God knows. He's too full of concussion to care.

"I have told you before about the hazards of that mouse wheel."

Pinky sits himself up and rubs the back of his head. "Poit." And then, "Brain, I. Don't see why it does that. Do you think it doesn't like me?"

"It's a mouse wheel. It's completely devoid of emotion."

"Gosh, I do love your sense of humour."

That was intended sarcastically. As usual, his cagemate does not pick up on it. It makes him wonder if Brain even has the capacity to process humour, sometimes. Or maybe he just doesn't get Pinky's own brand?

He decides it's probably irrelevant for now.

"Anyway." says Brain, and Pinky realises he zoned out for quite a worrying amount of time, "Once you're quite done with throwing yourself off the exercise wheel-"

Pinky huffs. "I fell."

"Falling off the exercise wheel. That's not important. What is important are the matters we have to attend to."

Pinky shrugs. Nonchalance is a talent of his. "Don't worry, Brain. I already watered the plants."

"I-"

Brain looks somewhere between exasperated and surprised.

"Pinky, we don't have any plants."

"Oh."

An awkward silence.

"I don't know what I watered, then."

Brain mutters something under his breath; Pinky's not entirely sure what. Some kind of thinly veiled insult, maybe? It's hard to tell. He figures he needs to react anyway, judging by the vibes his roommate is giving him, and raises his eyebrows.

"Are you going to get the ice?"

Brain, in the meantime, struts over to the cage door and unlocks it again. As usual, it swings wide open. He vaguely wonders if this lab even has staff. And hell, do they try? Are they aware their mice just wander all over the place doing whatever the hell they feel like? Such is a mystery.

"Ice for what." This makes him stop, and pause, for a moment.

"For that burn, Brain. Whatever you said it was probably meant to be scalding."

Narf. Brain ignores this particular brand of humour (copyright Tumblr®.com, trademark 2014) and gracefully jumps down the table stairs, managing not to fall, and mouses his way over to a corner. Pinky's descent is somewhat less graceful (ie, falling), and he ends up flopping right next to Brain, landing on his stomach with a none too pleased expression on his face.

"I seem to recall warning you about the stairs, as well."

"Bro."

"What?"

"Nothing, Brain." Somehow he feels like this joke would fall flat. "Go on. What were you going to show me?"

Brain decides to let this particular obscure joke go, and pulls his associate along with him, before uncovering a machine in the corner, which previously had a blanket on top of it.

"Behold."

"It's a very nice blanket, Brain. I like the colour."

God, Brain thinks, it's almost like he does this deliberately. And little does Brain know, he does. He's never really concerned himself with it enough to figure it out, or if he had, the cause. It was just something he sort of lived with. (If anything, it was due to his own attitude. Pinky's personal brand of retort against Brain's constant insults and narcissism was... well, making his life as difficult as possible.)

(Brain has also never been very good at sarcasm. Unfortunately, sarcasm is what 80% of Pinky's humour runs on.)

"I am referring to what was under the blanket."

Pinky studies it carefully. "It looks like a vacuum cleaner."

"For the-" Brain stops, then, mid expletive, and pauses. "Oh. Yes. You're right, actually. It does."

Pinky opens his mouth.

"No, we are not cleaning."

Pinky shuts his mouth again.

"And no, you can't wear an apron."

"But I'd look so nice, Brain. Like those tv shows where they have the cafes."

"I hate to break it to you, my friend, but your life is not Tokyo Mew Mew." And ending the discussion with that tidbit of information, Brain hops closer to the machine (not literally. He is a distinguished man of science and he is going to bloody act like it) and gestures to it, or rather, a small button on the side.

"Are you aware of what this machine does, Pinky?"

"Well, we both know the answer to that, Brain. You honestly can't expect me to know if you don't tell me."

Which was a good point, admittedly.

"Can you guess?"

"Well I already guessed vacuum cleaner. And then you started spouting off about maid cafés."

Also true, though a little harder to admit. Brain thinks about bringing up the rubber pants joke in retaliation, and decides against it.

"Then allow me to explain."

"I'm all ears, Brain. Well. About thirty percent ear, technically." He pauses, taps the side of his head, idly. "If I was a hundred percent ear, that would be horrifying, haha!"

This was succeeded by a small, quiet "Narf."

"You would be a lot easier to deal with." Brain pauses for dramatic, and possible comedic, effect. "As I was saying. To put it lightly, this machine is capable of completely reprogramming DNA."

"Lovely."

"Was that sarcasm?" He's never quite sure.

"No."

"Good."

"But. But why are you trying to reprogram our DNA in the first place? And what does that have to do with the blanket?"

"The blanket was covering up the machine."

"Aww, it's shy."

"Pinky, please just shut up." There's a pause, while Pinky complies with this, before Brain continues. "We are altering our DNA temporarily. To make our goal of taking over the world a little easier. After all, nobody's going to listen to a pair of little lab mice."

Pinky droops. "Oh, Brain, you really are going to make me one hundred percent ear."

"I'm tempted. But no, that is not the intended use." It could be a side effect, but he doesn't dwell on this. "What I am trying to do, however, is turn us both human."

Another pause.

"Why."

"Because as I said, nobody is going to listen to a bunch of lab mice. "

Pinky frowns. "It's worked well enough so far."

"Well, evidently not, Pinky, because we're not there yet-"

"Oh, and who's fault is that."

And Brain doesn't have an answer to this.

Pinky continues, oblivious. "Apart from which, Brain, what exactly do you want to accomplish with that? Once it's done, I mean, or. Or how, really."

"I'll phrase it simply for you. It's September. The presidential elections are next month." And there's that wry smile again. "Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?"

"Well, I think so, Brain." Pinky squints, in mock thought, tapping the side of his face absent mindedly again. "But I'm fairly certain Kanye West was at least implying that she was a gold digger."

Brain doesn't find it funny, apparently.

"I'm confiscating your radio."

"Oh come on."

"I don't intend to back down on that." And again, the point is quickly dismissed. "What I was going to say was that once the machine has it's desired effect, I run for President."

"Poit. Um. Good idea, Brain, but-"

"What." Why does he insist on doing this every time? Brain chooses not to dwell on the fact that Pinky is usually right because that cancels out the entire point.

Pinky is still frowning. "Um. America's not exactly the world, though."

"Well, it is to most Americans." Brain shrugs. "Besides, I'll just meddle endlessly in the business of other countries until I end up ruling the whole planet anyway. That tends to be the usual strategy."

"You've thought this through."

"I don't like the implication that I don't generally think my plans through, Pinky."

"Erm. Shirley Temple."

Brain's face reddens considerably.

"Be quiet."

There was also the hacky-sack sack-kicker thing, but he puts that out of his mind. "I. I don't see any reason why we shouldn't start now. We need to spend a lot of time building up the public to trust us. I'll also have to acquire a large amount of money from somewhere."

"But why?"

"To get into Congress." Brain gives the machine a shove, and it trundles pitifully into the middle of the room, away from any furniture and possible opportunity for mistakes. "I hope you're ready."

Pinky's really not. He stares at the machine and thinks privately that he has very little choice.

"As I'll ever be."