The Day Before the Third Challenge is Due:
The Door Opens
XxXxX
At ten o'clock the next morning, a frayed and desperate Marui burst into the room where Kamio's group was meeting.
Brushing aside Shinji and Hiyoshi, he said, "Kamio, I—" before stopping short at the strange sight that met his eyes.
Kamio and Kirihara were both literally on the edges of their seats, eyes as round as quarters, less than five inches away from the television screen, playing Resident Evil with their mouths slightly agape.
"Uh, hey…Kamio?" Marui asked. "I was wondering if you could give me Tachibana Ann's telephone number."
There was silence except for the sounds of screaming, running, and wicked chainsaws coming from the videogame.
"Kamio?" Marui said again.
"Geghhe…" Was Kamio's response, without so much as turning around. Kirihara nodded in agreement.
"What the hell's wrong with them?" Marui asked in bewilderment, turning to Shinji.
"I don't know," said Shinji very seriously. "I'm actually a little worried; I called Tachibana to come check in on them. He ought to be here any moment. You see, I left them here to play Resident Evil so that we could get some ideas for the commercial. I come back one day later, and neither of them has moved. I think they've gotten really into the game or some—"
"OH MY GOD! KILL HIM! KILL HIM!" Kirihara bellowed at the top of his lungs.
Marui and Shinji jumped and turned to see Kamio battling a possessed-looking priest. The priest lunged at Kamio and started gnawing his neck.
Kamio and Kirihara both screamed, in loud, painful shrieks. "OH MY GOD! KILL HIM, AKIRA!!!!" Kirihara screamed so loudly that every glass in the room cracked.
"I'M TRYING! HE'S GOT ME BY THE NECK!!!" Kamio shouted back.
But then Kamio managed to break loose. He stepped back, took aim with his gun, and shot the priest's head off. A slimy centipede wormed its way out from inside.
"Sick," they both said, then fell back into silence as they continued to play.
Marui and Shinji stood in stricken silence.
"…they've got it bad," said Marui finally. "How are you going to make the advertisement?"
"Wait until they beat the whole game, I guess," Shinji shrugged. "I won't be able to move them until it's over. Why did you say you came here anyway?"
"I need Ann's phone number," Marui said, forcing himself to peel his eyes away from the other two. "You wouldn't have it, would you?"
"No," said Shinji in a deadpan voice.
"Well where could I get it?"
"Kamio knows," said Shinji.
"Well, that's not really an option now, is it?!" Marui snapped. Then he calmed himself. "What about her brother?"
"I wouldn't ask Tachibana," said Shinji. "He'll rip your head off if he thinks you're trying to get close to Ann. Kamio's the only guy he lets near her."
"God damn it! Where am I supposed to get a girl!?" Marui shouted, tearing at his hair. "I suppose next thing you'll be telling me to approach Fuji Syuusuke!"
Then he realized what he had just said, and they both laughed.
"Just wait for Kamio," Shinji suggested. "He'll come around…eventually."
At this point, the door suddenly opened again and in pranced Oshitari, Jirou, and Atobe.
"What the hell are you doing here?" Shinji asked, bewildered.
They ignored Shinji and Marui and strode straight across the room to Kamio.
"Kamio, Darling, we need your services," said Atobe, cutting straight to the chase. "You are wanted for your exceptional writing abilities!"
"Mehhu," said Kamio.
"Kamio, I'm talking to you," said Atobe, leaning down to look at him directly.
"Get out of the way!" Kamio and Kirihara cried, both scrambling to look around Atobe at the television screen.
"There's no point trying to talk to him," said Shinji from the other side of the room. "He's been like that since he started playing Resident Evil. Doesn't register anything else."
"Hm," Atobe put one hand to his chin. Then in one swift motion, he crossed over to the video game system and pulled the plug.
What followed was the loudest screaming of terror and agony that the world has heard since the release date for the new Harry Potter movie was postponed. All the windows shattered as Kamio and Kirihara bellowed in frustration at all the data that they hadn't saved and Atobe had just lost them.
"Now that I have your attention," said Atobe, cleaning out his ear, "we need you, Kamio, to write a script for our group."
"YOU BASTARD, I'LL KILL YOU!" was Kamio's eloquent response. He and Kirihara threw themselves at Atobe and began strangling him with his own tie. Oshitari and Hiyoshi came to the rescue, pulling them off Atobe.
Atobe looked slightly ruffled, and sat up, rearranging his collar.
"Does this mean you consent?" he asked.
"Of course not!" Kamio snapped, struggling to break the hold that Oshitari had on him. "I'll never help you now!"
"How about giving me Ann's telephone number?" Marui asked, coming over now that Kamio was off the game. "I need it for my commercial."
"You ruined everything!" sobbed Kirihara. "We had almost gotten to disk two!"
"How about it?" Atobe pressed again. "I'll pay you fifty bucks, we'll call it even."
"Never!"
"Okay fine, we'll say one hundred bucks, but no more than that!" said Atobe angrily. "Now get off your ass and start thinking!"
"I won't!" Kamio roughly broke free from Oshitari. He seemed to have regained some of his sense, because he didn't attack Atobe again, but he still looked very angry. "I'm not your writing service!"
"Then maybe you could be my phonebook," said Marui, annoyed at being cut out of the conversation. "It's an easy job, I swear."
"Why do you want to talk to Ann anyway?" Kamio asked.
"I need to ask her about her bra." Said Marui. Then he paused. "Okay, that came out wrong—"
"Kamio, please write the script for us!" Jirou suddenly begged, putting his hands together in a praying gesture and dropping to his knees. "Please write it! I don't even care if it's good, I just don't want to do it!"
"I don't think you have to worry about it being good if you're writing it!" said Kamio.
There was a collective gasp.
Then Kirihara laughed and slapped Kamio high five.
Atobe stared at Kamio impassively for a long moment. He opened his mouth to speak again, but was interrupted by the door opening. In walked Tachibana.
"Okay, we seriously need to get a lock on that door," said Shinji, staring at it.
"Hey, I heard that Kamio was in trouble or something," said Tachibana, blithely strolling in and not noticing anything amiss. "What's going o—" he stopped dead at the sight of Atobe, Jirou, Marui, Kirihara, and Oshitari all surrounding Kamio. "What's this!?" he exclaimed.
"Hey, I'm just here to get Ann's phone number," said Marui, forgetting what Shinji had told him earlier.
"You're…what?" Tachibana breathed.
Marui's eyes widened. "It's not what it sounds like!" he promised. "I just need to ask her a few questions about bras!"
"WHAT!?" Tachibana leapt onto Marui and started beating him up.
"So what do you say, Kamio?" Oshitari asked, turning back to the redhead and ignoring the fight completely. "We're paying customers here!"
"Are you guys really that persistent or are you just complete idiots?" Kamio asked. "Why would I have changed my mind in the last thirty seconds? It's going to take me all night to finish Resident Evil now! I'll never help you!"
The doorbell rang.
"Oh my God, does everyone know we're here!?" Kirihara cried in exasperation, going to get the door. "What do you want!?" he roared as he flung the door open.
"Um, I was just delivering a pizza…" said the guy at the door nervously.
"Oh, that's mine," said Shinji coming over, and pulling out his wallet.
In the meantime, Hiyoshi had managed to pull Tachibana off Marui, who now had a black eye and was missing a few clumps of hair.
Atobe sighed. "Sorry Jirou. It seems you'll have to go scriptless, since Kamio is a bastard. I have no more business here. We'll just have no script. Let's go, the ladies are waiting in the car." Atobe snapped his fingers and the three of them began to leave.
"Ladies!?" Marui's head snapped up. "You have girls with you?"
"Three to be exact." Atobe said, pausing disdainfully as he put on his jacket. "They're visiting from Brazil."
Marui did some very quick thinking.
"Could I meet them?" he asked carefully. "It would mean a lot to me."
Atobe considered this, as he re-teid his shoe laces. Since Marui looked so pathetic and ragged, not to mention stupid with his new bald spots, and had gotten his ass kicked by a minor character, he agreed and Marui's request. The four of them parted together.
Kamio's group stared after them.
"Well, I'm off if there's no other problem." Said Tachibana, looking quite pleased with himself.
The door closed.
"...."
"Does it seem strangely silent in here?" Shinji asked, taking a bite of his pizza.
Kamio and Kirihara looked over at the game system.
"Think we have time to beat it before the third challenge begins?" Kamio asked.
"If we play all night."
"Better get started, then!"
They hooked the system back up and Shinji settled for watching them with his pizza.
XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx
Meanwhile....
The far more functional group of Eiji, Oishi, Aoi, and Inui were preparing to film their shampoo commercial, like good little students should. Everything was in place and Inui had brought in a high-tech camera for them to use for the duration of the commercial. Eiji was fluffing his luscious locks in preparation for his part, while Inui was pushing around a cart of ice cream for his role as the ice cream vendor. Oishi was prepping Aoi, the self proclaimed "star" and main character in the commercial, to do his part.
"Okay Aoi…you have one line." said Oishi, already tired out from the effort it had taken to get Aoi to stop being so hyper and bouncing around.
"One whole line!? YAY!" Aoi cried, absolutely thrilled that he got to be a star.
"Yeah, listen carefully," said Oishi, sucking in a deep breath. "Your line is: When I was young, all the other kids in school and the teachers used to tease me because of my crew cut, but when I bought this fantastic shampoo, my classmates started to respect my hair!"
"Okay, cool! So that's my line?" Aoi said breathlessly.
"Yep, that's it. You got it?"
"Of course! Bring on the camera, I'm ready!"
"Alright then," said Oishi, walking over to the camera and positioning himself behind it. "Remember to look sad for the first part of the sentence, but then look happy when you start talking about the shampoo." He reminded Aoi.
"Yeah, yeah, I get it!" said Aoi impatiently. "Just run the film!"
"Okay," Oishi cleared his throat. "3……2……1……and…action!" he pressed the 'record' button.
Aoi strolled out into the frame, looking sad and trailing his feet languorously. Then he looked at the camera and froze.
"....."
After about fifteen seconds of silence, Oishi pressed 'stop' on the camera.
"Aoi, what happened?" he asked, peering around the camera. "You froze up!"
"Y-yeah!" said Aoi. "I'm sorry, I just got stage fright for a minute there! I'm fine now!"
"Okay, then let's take two," said Oishi, pressing 'record' again.
Aoi walked sadly into the frame. He took a deep breath. "When I was young, all the teachers in school—"
Oishi pressed the 'stop' button.
"No, Aoi," he said, peering around the camera again. "The line is: 'when I was young, all the other kids in school and the teachers used to tease me because of my crew cut, but when I bought this fantastic shampoo, my classmates started to respect my hair!' Got that?"
"Yeah, I've got it!" said Aoi happily. "That's pretty much what I said anyway. Let's do it again!"
"Okay…"
Oishi pressed 'record'.
"When I was young, all the other kids in school and the crew cuts—"
"Cut!" said Oishi, with a tinge of annoyance to his voice. "That's not right, Aoi! It's 'all the other kids and the teachers', okay?"
"Yeah, yeah I've got it!" said Aoi. "Go again!"
"Oishi pressed 'record'.
"When I was young, all the other kids in school and the teachers would tease my crew cut because of the fantastic shampoo that I bought!"
"Cut!" Oishi looked annoyed. "Aoi, they didn't tease you after you bought the shampoo, did they?"
"Oh, right!" he said, slapping his forehead. "Silly me! Give me another chance, I'm sorry!"
Oishi pressed 'record'.
"When I was young, my teachers respected my hair because my classmates bought this fantastic shampoo—"
"Cut!" Oishi started looking desperate. "Aoi, are you sure you don't want someone else to do this line? Inui could do it!"
Inui nodded.
"Wha—no! No! I can do it!" Aoi cried, looking on the verge of tears. "I'm sorry, I just wasn't concentrating! I know the line, I'll do it now!"
"Fine." Oishi pressed 'record'.
"When I bought this shampoo—"
"CUT!" Oishi screamed. "It's when I was young! And then you say that people made fun of you until you bought the shampoo!"
"I know! I know! I'm just nervous, sorry!" Aoi cried. "I can do it! Give me one more chance!"
Oishi ground his teeth and pressed 'record'.
"When I was young, my classmates made fun of my crew cut, but then when the teachers bought some respect, they started to shampoo—"
"Cut, CUT!"
"I can do it this time! I promise! I swear to God, I can do it!"
Oishi pressed 'record'.
"When my crew cut was young—"
"CUT!"
"I KNOW THE LINE! I swear to you, I know it! You're making me nervous! Just give me one more chance!"
Oishi pressed 'record'.
"When I respected my classmates, they teased—"
"NO, AOI! The classmates are teasing your hair, but they respect you after you buy the shampoo!"
"I've got it now! Run the film!"
Oishi pressed 'record'.
"When my respects shampooed my classmates—"
"CUT!"
"When I was shampooing my teachers—"
"CUT!"
"When I was young, my classmates crew cut my respects—"
"CUT, CUT, CUT!"
Oishi broke off, panting and very red in the face, while Eiji and Inui watched in awe.
Oishi took a deep breath. "Aoi, it's obvious that you're not quite ready for this line," he said in a would-be calm voice. "I'm sorry that I asked too much of you. But I'm going to have to ask you now to please exit the stage, now."
"No…senpai…please." Aoi's eyes bubbled with tears. "Senpai, ever since I was a child, it's been an ambition of mine to become a great actor. I know that that probably won't ever happen but…please. Just let me fulfill this little shard of a dream. Please let me." He shut his eyes and bowed. "I'm sorry for all these mistakes; I wasn't focusing. Please, I beg you, just give me one more chance!"
Oishi glanced at Eiji and Inui, who shrugged. Oishi turned back to Aoi. Although he didn't like to admit it, he had been very touched by that little speech.
"Alright Aoi," he said finally. "One more chance."
"Oh, thank you, senpai!" he cried joyfully, wiping his eyes. "You won't regret it!"
"I hope not…" Oishi repositioned himself behind the camera. "Ready?" he asked.
"Of course."
"Action!" Oishi pressed 'record'.
Aoi dragged his feet as he entered the scene. He sighed and looked at the camera.
"When I was young, my classmates and teachers used to tease my crew cut, but then I bought this fantastic shampoo and it OWNED their asses!"
Eiji, Oishi, and Inui stared, mouths hanging open.
"Oh, I am awesome!" Aoi cried, totally unaware that he had said anything wrong. "Who's awesome? Aoi is! Bring on the next scene, baby!"
XxXxXxXxX
The rest of the groups also spent the final day of preparations perfecting their various techniques, arguing with their team members, and just generally being awesome. However, all the others were doing live-action commercials, so we'll have to wait for the performance to see how they came out!
XxXxX
A/N:
What a good title for the chapter, if I do say so myself! Get the pun?