It's Kind of a Funny Story

Chapter 19

It was a not-so-peaceful midnight in the Omega dorms, room 133. Curfew had been about an hour ago, but no one really paid much attention to the rule, and it was rarely inforced as long as people weren't too obvious about it.

Milos was practicing scales on the trumpet as he had been since 10 PM- very, very loudly, by the way- because it was required for band, but he'd had too much other homework to start earlier. Meanwhile, Kyoya sat on his bed with stacks of chemistry papers which all looked to him like they had been written in Greek. He was failing that class horribly at the moment, and they had another test next week which he was not looking forward to. Nikolai sat next to him, text-book open in his lap, with death-metal screamo music blaring through his head phones almost as loudly as Milos's trumpet practice.

"WHAT'S AN ISOELECTRONIC SERIES?" He yelled, unable to hear over the music.

"I believe it is a group of-"

"WHAT? I CAN'T HEAR YOU!"

Kyoya cleared his throat and said, a little louder this time, "I said, it is a group of ions that-"

"WHAAAT?"

Milos had to play even louder over all the yelling.

Kyoya reached over and pulled Nikolai's headphones off, then dropped them off to the side. He could still hear the music perfectly. "Does that help?" he asked patiently.

Nikolai looked at the headphones in slight curiosity for a moment, then back at Kyoya. "Oh. Yeah." He'd had those on so long, he'd completely forgotten about them. "You practice really loud, Milos. Huh. I never knew that." He shrugged. "So right, isoelectronic series?"

Kyoya nodded and answered, "A group of ions that have the same charge."

"Close, but no. A group of ions with the same number of electrons. Like, even though Magnesium 2+ and Aluminum 3+ are in different periods- and they have different charges- when you find where they end up on the table, you see that they both have the electron configuration of Neon. Same number of electrons as Neon, and as each other. So they're part of the same isoelectronic series."

Kyoya was never going to get this. He barely knew what the difference between an atom and an ion was, let alone anything more in-depth! Between this class, and the sudden influx of projects from his business administration class, plus the play, plus having to do some important paperwork his boss had sent him earlier that week (which he hadn't even had time to start on yet), he was quickly becoming completely and totally stressed-out.

"How does shielding work?"

Kyoya actually knew this one since their teacher had made a point of emphasizing its importance. "Electron shielding is when electrons on the innermost levels of an atom "shield" the electrons that are likely to be found farther away from the nucleus. All electrons are attracted to the nucleus of an atom, where the protons are found, but repel each other. Those that are closer to the nucleus repel the ones farther away and prevent them from getting near the nucleus, which is why atomic radius increases as you go down the period."

Nikolai glanced at the clock on his cell phone for the fifth time that evening. "Yeah. Perfect. You're really not that bad at this stuff. I don't know why you think you are."

"Possibly because I earned a 52 percent on the last test and it brought up my average."

"That sucks."

"Hai, it does."

He checked the clock once more. "Hang on one second." He got up and went into the small bathroom, then knelt down and opened the first cabinet on the right. Paused. "That's weird..." He rifled through the top shelf, then the bottom one just to make sure he hadn't missed anything. Next, he went through the middle cabinet, then the left one, then all the drawers. "Hey, Milos," he said, carefully stepping over piles of junk as he walked back into the main room. Said Serb was too engrossed in practicing trumpet scales to hear him. "Milos... MILOS!"

That got his attention. "What?!"

"Please tell me I didn't throw out a ton of stuff from the cabinets this morning."

Milos shrugged, adjusting his music stand and making some marks in his song book. "Okay. You didn't throw out a ton of stuff from the cabinets this morning."

"That's a lie."

"You just said to say it, not that it was true."

"But that means..." He looked at Milos, then at the cabinets, and back again. "...Oh. Oh! Crap!" He tore out of the room at lightening speed, accidentally knocking over one of Kyoya's notebooks and sending papers flying in the process. The door slammed shut behind him.

Milos was slightly confused, but just went back to practicing anyway. He hadn't gotten three notes in, when suddenly, there was loud banging on the wall. "HEY! WILL YOU PEOPLE SHUT UP IN THERE? YEAH, I'M TALKING TO YOU, NEMANIC! SOME OF US ARE TRYING TO SLEEP!"

What a lovely time to be hearing from their next-door neighbor. Milos gripped his trumpet and jumped up onto Kyoya's bed, which was pressed against the wall they shared with Dawson and Co. in room 135 (even-numbered rooms being just across the hall). More of Kyoya's papers scattered. He put the instrument right next to the wall and started playing as loudly and badly as possible.

Dawson began banging even louder, yelling a stream of profanities that no one under the age of 35 should have heard. Which was fine, since it was only barely audible over the screeching.

"IF YOU DON'T SHUT THAT (bleep)ING PIECE OF (bleep) RIGHT NOW, I'M GOING TO (bleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep )!"

"BRE, REPEAT THAT IN ENGLISH, DAWSON! I DON'T SPEAK STUPID!"

Kyoya decided that this just might be the right time to make an inconspicuous exit. He wondered where Nikolai was. Maybe that would give him an excuse to leave the battlefield before the slaughter began. He carefully got up, leaving his chemistry work still spilled out all over the floor and under the bed. He opened the door, only to have something- or someone- fall backwards into him at knee-level.

"Dude, not again!"

"Jeff?" Kyoya raised an eyebrow as his neighbor stared up at him from the ground. "It is probably none of my business, but if you do not mind my asking, what exactly are you doing?"

Jeff was camped out in the hallway with his pillow and blanket, leaning against 133's door and right in line of fire to get stepped on, looking as though he was about to sleep out there. He even had an old, worn-out teddy bear in his arms, which he immediately shoved under the pillow the moment he realized he'd been discovered. He sat up as he replied, "Too loud in there, man! School tomorrow, lots of tests and stuff. I'm hanging out here, away from the war zone. Or, ya know, I would be if you guys would stop opening the door so much."

That actually wasn't a bad idea. Jeff might have been onto something here.

"I sincerely apologize. But do you know-"

He didn't get any further than that, as there was the sound of excited giggling and two pairs of footsteps.

"Em, can I go back to bed now?" Belle asked sleepily as she was practically dragged down the hallway. She had been asleep less than four minutes before, and wished that she still was.

"Not until we tell them the good news!" Emillia half-sang, half-said.

Belle mumbled something incomprehensible. Emillia had no idea what she'd just said, but she could make a pretty good guess. "I know I could have woken up Avery instead, but unlike her, you're not going to yell at me!"

She spotted Kyoya standing there with the door wide open. Without warning, she leapt over someone- she didn't bother to see who- laying on the floor and crashed into Kyoya. He went careening backwards and landed sprawled on his back with an energetic Sicily on top of him.

"Guess what?!" She demanded excitedly, practically jumping up and down with glee as she stood. "I heard this really loud noise all the way from the Alpha dorms so I came to see what was going on- Belle came too- and on the way we ran into Sydney, and she told us something which she heard from this guy in her math class, who heard from Castel, who heard from Clara, who heard from- eek!" She let out a little yelp as Jeff came up and hugged her from behind.

"Oh, hi Em!" he said, "This place be trippin', yo! So how's-"

Emillia really had no room to complain since she surprised people with hugs all the time, but it caught her off-guard, and she immediately spun around.

"Stop being such a pervert!" Cue crowbar.

"OUCH! But all I said was hel-AUGH!"

Meanwhile, Dawson and Milos had been yelling at each other this whole time through the wall, and Milos had just about resolved to give it up for the night. He didn't care about Dawson, but he really didn't want to wake up the whole Omega dorm. Well, maybe just one more note wouldn't hurt... He took a deep breath and ground out a middle-C on his trumpet capable of bursting someone's eardrums. With a grin, he nodded contentedly and decided that that was good enough.

He jumped off Kyoya's bed and maneuvered around Jeff being murdered by Emillia, and Belle who was curled up with Milos's history textbook just to keep herself awake somehow, to put his instrument away.

A door slammed shut, and Dawson stomped into 133, absolutely seething with barely-contained rage. "Give me the trumpet," he said, not sounding nearly as enraged as he looked.

"What for?" Milos asked, genuinely wanting to hear the answer.

"So I can shove it up your ass."

Somehow, that did not sound like a 'just kidding' tone. Not at all actually. It was more a 'you'd better believe I'm dead serious' tone. Either way, Milos didn't bother to ask for clarification. "Bre, have you ever considered anger-management classes? They would do you a world of good."

"Have you ever considered, uh, non-retard classes? Because 'bre' is not a word!"

"I know that! It is just something I say!"

Dawson ignored him. "Maybe it's a word in Siberia, but-"

He interrupted, "Siberia? How many times have we had this discussion? Five times? Seven? I've lost count! I am not, nor have I ever been, from Siberia."

Dawson guessed, "Um, Mongolia then?"

Cue facepalm. "Yes, and Emillia is from Zimbabwe."

He rolled his eyes. "No, she's Italian, everyone knows that. Idiot."

"Emillia, dude, I'm not a pervert! I've only stalked you like once!" Jeff backed up into Dawson as he tried to get away from a crow-bar wielding Emillia. Dawson shoved him away.

As Emillia proceeded to pummel the younger football player, Milos interjected, "I think you would have to stalk someone at least ten times before you could truly be called a 'stalker'. The term is really very relative."

Everyone, including Emillia, just stopped and stared at him.

"I am only speaking hypothetically here!"

Kyoya cleared his throat softly as the noise returned to its previous decibel-level. "Um, excuse me. I do not mean to be rude, but would you all mind keeping the volume down? I have a test to study for and..." No one paid a bit of attention.

"Freak," Dawson muttered.

"Loser," Milos retorted.

"Stalker!"

"Liar!"

"When you get run over by a car, it shouldn't be listed under accidents."

"I heard that when you were a child, your mother tried to hire someone to take care of you, but the Mafia wanted too much."

"That's not true!" Emillia chirped. "The Mafia doesn't charge much at all!"

Kyoya nervously clutched his text-book and bit the eraser of a pencil. "Never mind. Please forget I said anything."

There was a knock on the door. Kyoya vaguely thought that that really wasn't necessary. After all, the door was wide open and no one else seemed to care about knocking. Still, he appreciated the politeness. "Come in."

It was Castel from room 132 across the hall. He looked like he'd just been woken up and forced out of bed, and he sniffled a few times as he came in. He almost tripped over Belle, but luckily, he noticed her at the last second. "H-hi. Um, my roommates sent me over. They wanted to know why we weren't invited to the wild party." He looked around the room at the discord and chaos. "Wow, this really is a wild party, isn't it?"

"It is not a party, it is a mad house. Please, please leave while you still can." Kyoya informed him in complete seriousness.

"Castel, Castel!" Emillia exclaimed, "Did you hear the good news?"

"Wh-what good news?"

"The good news that I keep trying to tell everyone!"

"No, I guess I haven't." He sniffled again. "What is it?"

She looked thrilled that someone was finally asking. Jeff looked thrilled that she was finally preoccupied with something that didn't include murdering him for alleged 'pervert-like activities'. "Yay~! So I have just heard from Sydney, who heard from-"

"Is it bad that I'm not even surprised anymore?" Nikolai, who had just gotten back, asked from the doorway, talking more to himself than anyone else. "I leave for five minutes, and suddenly half the freakin' school is in here?" He threw up his hands in surrender. "Yeah, sure, why not?"

Castel tilted his head to one side, coughing quietly. "You weren't invited to the wild party either?"

Emillia cut in, "This is a party? Aw, I should have brought some yummy cannolis!"

"Hannibal the Cannibal, throw a party?" Dawson asked incredulously, glancing at Milos, "Yeah right! He'd probably skewer Samurai Jack here and use his innards as decorations."

"Bre, I am not a cannibal, and Kyoya's organs would make terrible party decorations! Give it up already!"

"So... what exactly am I supposed to tell my roommates then?"

"Come on Em, let's just go."

"Doesn't anyone want to hear the good ne- JEFF! Get back here!"

"Okay, fine, I stalked you twice, but that's it!"

Nikolai and Kyoya exchanged glances.

"This. Is. Stupid." This could conceivably go on forever, couldn't it? Nikolai figured he could either do something about the state of chaos the room had just fallen into... or he could go to bed and ignore it. What a tough choice. At least, until he had an idea. It was the proven simplest, most effective way of ending a party, guaranteed.

"What is your problem, Dawson?" Milos yelled. "I've never done anything to you!"

"Oh really? What about the time when you-" Tchhhh. Dawson stopped in mid-rant, his attention snapping to the blonde standing two feet away with a spray bottle aimed at his face. Stunned, he wiped away a bead of water running down his temple. "Did... you just spray me with that thing?"

"Nyet."

Tchhh. "Stop that."

"Leave." Tchhh. Tchhhh.

Castel carefully came over and asked, "I'm sorry, but I really need to tell my roommates someth-" Tchhhh. He looked down at his now slightly damp night-shirt. "What was that for?"

"What part of 'leave' don't you people understand?" He sprayed Castel again, then Dawson twice more. It wasn't his fault if they couldn't take a hint.

Dawson looked at Milos as if to say 'what's his deal?'. Milos shrugged. Dawson scoffed and started for the door. "Freaking wack-job. Whatever, this party is lame. Come on Jeff." He dragged his halfway-murdered friend up, rolling his eyes in exasperation. "She barely touched you, stop being so dramatic."

Jeff immediately grinned and came back to life as they headed back into their own room. "You're no fun, bro! I was just practicing my death-scene for the play."

Belle was already out the door and halfway down the hall the minute she realized she finally had an excuse to get back to sleep. Castel just gave a little "um, okaayyy..." and backed out hesitantly, never taking his eyes off Nikolai's spray bottle as though it was a real weapon.

Emillia pouted, seeing that she was the only intruder left. "But doesn't anyone want to hear my news?"

"No." He sprayed her once right between the eyes. "Go away."

"Fine! Don't listen to me then! Meanie-face... Belle, wait up!" And with that, she was gone.

Kyoya closed the door behind her, then leaned his back against it with a relieved sigh. There was a long moment of silence. In such a short time, the idea of no noise had become such a foreign concept that they actually had to hear it in order to remember that it even existed. "I have never been so glad for quiet in my entire life," Kyoya admitted, breaking the silence. He locked the door just in case, which, in retrospect, probably should have been done from the very beginning.

"Well that was fun." Nikolai fidgeted absently with the spray bottle. "But, ya know, next time you guys decide to have some impromptu wild party, a little heads-up would be kinda nice. Just saying."

"Kill-joy," Milos said under his breath. Tchhhh. "Bre, someone is going to have to take that from you, I can just tell."

"Woe to the unfortunate soul who tries, da?"

OoO

Please, someone spray your guests with water when you're trying to get them to leave your party, and tell me how it works out! Heh, and I bet you're all wondering what Emillia was trying to tell everyone. Pity she kept getting interrupted. ;3

Also, if you haven't already voted in the poll, please do so now! Once the next chapter is posted, that poll will be taken down and the winners announced. There will probably be a new poll then too, just for the lolz~ :)