Come Eat with Me and Be my Bro / And We shall all the Pleasures Know

[crystal_ballin]

That Fries and Ketchup, Meat and Cheese,/ In all that Tasty Burgers Please.

Who: Hagakure, Hajime, Asahina, Joel, Kumatora
What: 2am Burger Run
Where: An All-Night Burger Place
When: 2am March 8th
Warnings: Hagakure.

Hagakure hadn't gone to sleep yet. He'd been updating his Japanese-language Cryptids wiki for the last six hours, engaging in post after post of discussion on what sources on not-real-at-all creatures were the most trustworthy. Finally, at sometime just before 2am, he was finished. For the evening. There were still hours and hours worth of material to go through.

His stomach grumbled at him. He hadn't had anything to eat since dinner and that was like eight hours ago by this point. He needed something to eat. But he was going to have to go off campus to get it; the cafeteria wasn't open and Hagakure wasn't the Super High School Level Lockpicker. His choices of food at this hour were probably limited. The best bet -- burgers. But, should he brave a burger run alone at this hour, and risk alien meat abduction alone? The answer: a firm no.

He looked over at his sleeping roommate. What a beautiful cherub he looked, asleep soundly in the sleep that only the virtuous and just could sleep. He probably wanted a burger.

"Hey, hey, Jime. Jime, get up. Jime. Jime. Jiiiiiimeeeeeeeeee."

Comments

[inspirethefire]

Hajime had not been enjoying sleep as much as he'd been enjoying not being awake. Hours he got proper sleep were few and far between, and generally induced by pure exhaustion. Time spent awake cycled training, classes, studying, and more training, until he collapsed into dark and dreamless repose.

With only a couple hours of rest behind him in this moment, messages from the outside world were slow to drill into Hajime's awareness. He rolled further into his pillow.

"Mmmmguh?"

[crystal_ballin]

"Jime, let's go get burgers," said Hagakure. "Put on some pants and grab your wallet, dude. I'm starving." Hagakure walked over and shook Hajime's shoulder. "Come on, dude, let's go."

[inspirethefire]

"Ahhgk?" He squirmed under Hagakure's touch, squinting up at him. "Burg... Hagkure what time is it...?" Waving Hagakure off him, he fumbled for his glasses.

[crystal_ballin]

"It's burger time, dude," said Hagakure convincingly. His stomach growled a growl to add further emphasis to the point. "Burger time."

[inspirethefire]

Though his brain was doing all it could to keep up, Hagakure was not making it easy for him. "I don't have a car, if that's what you're after." There was no other apparent reason for him to be invited.

[crystal_ballin]

"What, dude, no," said Hagakure. "I want you there to be there with me, dude!" said Hagakure. "Safety in numbers, dude."

Aliens probably don't want to risk abducting two people's burgers.

[glazedandconfused]

Aoi had been having trouble sleeping ever since Sakura's departure, which was a problem, mostly because when she had her (fairly recurrent) nightmares, she didn't have her best friend to go to. Sakura had always offered her room and her bed in the event of a sleepless night, so now Aoi, having spent the evening tossing and turning, was in a bit of a bind.

She quickly ran through potential candidates for room-sharing. Togami was a jerk. Ishimaru was still flipping his lid, and she couldn't even bear to look at Mondo. It came down to Hagakure, a fellow survivor, and a bunch of other classmates who were actually dead. The choice seemed obvious.

Knock knock, Hagakure. Knock. Knock.

[inspirethefire]

The knock had come at a convenient enough time to keep Hajime from too much unnecessary musing. His eyes slid to the door. "How many numbers did you invite, exactly?" Still, he was getting out of bed. He was already awake, after all.

[crystal_ballin]

"I didn't invite anybody, dude," said Hagakure, sort of confused at who would be knocking on the door at 2am. He walked over to the door, however, and opened it up and suddenly was greeted with the sight of Boobs-chan, femme incomprise.

"'Hina! What're you doing up, dude? 'Jime and I are about to go get burgers."

[glazedandconfused]

"You're going for burgers!?"

Those were the magic words. All thoughts of nightmares and murderschools and friends killing friends was completely forgotten.

Burgers.

"I couldn't sleep. Can I come?"

[inspirethefire]

Hajime was very suddenly back under his covers. There is a girl in the doorway and he's in his pajamas.

"Hah, ha ha, common issue it seems, sleeplessness, isn't it, hah..."

I shouldn't tag at 3am

[crystal_ballin]

"Put some pants on, dude, there's a girl here," said Hagakure, "and lets go get burgers."

He turned back to the door. "'Hina, 'Jime's gotta put on some pants, okay? You can come, but he's probably shy around women because he's never had sex before, so he doesn't want you to see his underwear. Do you mind giving him time to change?" he asked suavely. For Hagakure. Which wasn't very suave.

[glazedandconfused]

"Oops, sorry!"

Aoi turned around. That was what she did, she turned around. So Hajime could change, and they could go get burgers.

[inspirethefire]

The wait was stalled an extra fifteen seconds as Hajime gaped, open-mouthed, at Hagakure. If he were the type to know about things like the bro code he would be citing it right about now, but instead all he could do was be horrified and angry but mostly horrified.

"You. You're gonna." Hajime fumbled around for a non-gross pair of slacks. "You're gonna have a talk later. With me. We're gonna talk." An empty threat. He'd probably try and forget it as a waking hallucination. Zip, pants are go.

[crystal_ballin]

"What?" said Hagakure, as he blithely watched Hajime pull on some pants. "I read your tarot like a hundred times, dude. I needed to make sure you weren't going to kill me in my sleep. The virgin thing and being uncomfortable around girls for that reason came out of that."

He shrugged, as if this were a totally normal thing for somebody to talk about or do. "There's probably a brothel around if you wanted."

Ha. Ga. Ku. Re.

[glazedandconfused]

"I want to get burgers!"

Aoi yelled into the hallway, still facing away from the open door, in an apparent effort to steer the conversation in some other direction. Any. Other direction.

[inspirethefire]

"YES, BURGERS SOUND GREAT."

Hajime grabbed the first shirt and jacket he came in touch with, and was still in the process of pulling them on as he pushed past his roommate and out the door.

"Good evening Asahina it's great to see you well let's go get burgers."

[crystal_ballin]

"Alright, let's go, dudes," said Hagakure happily moving onto the topic of burgers from 'Hajime's lack-of-sex life.'

He shut the door behind him and off they went, off into the night, off through the dorms and off to where surely, at this late hour, they would meet no other wandering souls such as they. Surely.

[golonghorns]

That's what you think, Hagakure.

That's what you think.

Joel was a bad sleeper. He could hardly remember so much as a nap where he hadn't woken up with a start and a fevered gasp as his night terrors receded and he realized he was awake.

The downfall of human civilization and the things a guy had to do to survive it weighed heavy on a mind at rest, apparently.

Tonight was no exception. He grasped at the alarm clock and saw that it was around 2am. He pulled himself off of his bed - still fully clothed, just as he'd lay down - and poured himself a big glass of cold water.

The main problem with waking up at this time of night was that it was hard to get back to sleep. Glancing out his window he could see that it was a clear night and considering he was wide awake, he figured maybe a walk would tucker him out a little. He downed the last of his water, grabbed his room keys and a pistol to shove into his pocket and walked out.

As he wandered between the dorm buildings, he happened to spy something that didn't surprise him. Maybe it should have. But it didn't. And that was worrying. It was Mr. 'please don't shoot me dude' himself. (Or Mr. 'dude I want to build a chicken coop', if you prefer.) Along with another boy and a girl.

He had to wonder what a group of teenagers was doing up and around at this time of night and came to the conclusion that it was likely something nefarious. Which was fine by him. Shoot, kids would be kids and it wasn't as though he hadn't wanted to raise some hell when he was their age. Unfortunately with a little brother to look after, it hadn't quite worked out that way...

...still. He was a teacher here. He ought to make some sort of... effort. Or something. And Hagakure seemed like an OK kid, if weird. Better he find them now than some other, stricter teacher later.

"Hagakure." he said, stepping out of the shadows. "I reckon there's a reason you're runnin' around after curfew?"

[crystal_ballin]

Hagakure shrieked. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH, DUDE!" he screamed as he stumbled back away from Joel.



"Don't, dude, don't, don't do that, dude, don't surprise, don't, dude, don't, dude."

[glazedandconfused]

Oh my god, Hagakure. Aoi could not take you anywhere. She hadn't met Joel yet, but he seemed like an authority figure, which meant she needed to get them out of trouble, because Hagakure certainly wasn't going to.

"Sorry about Hagakure," she said, attempting to support his weight. "We're just going to get burgers. Do you...want to come?"

That would solve everything.

[kumagypsy]

"Dude." Speaking of authority figures, they now had a resident assistant staring them down. "Can we maybe not scream at the top of our freakin' lungs at 2 in the goddamn morning?"

[inspirethefire]

Oh, sure, Hagakure can talk about other people's virginity without batting an eye, but he can't handle even someone with a low-burning spirit surprising him without collapsing. What a heroic leader of this ragtag band.

"Apologies, Kumatora. We were just going out for a late meal, we didn't expect to run into so many people at this hour."

[golonghorns]

They were just going out to get burgers. Oh ok then.

....burgers.

It had been literal decades since Joel had been out to get burgers. His hard earned ration cards generally went on staples. He'd buy the occasional grilled rat. And of course, he was an avid hunter.

But it had been twenty some years since he had indulged in a double bacon cheeseburger and the mere thought of it had him hungry. He was unsure how strictly enforced the curfew was in this school but damnit - he was faculty. Faculty could bend the rules a little, right?

"I'd be happy to be a faculty escort." he replied to Aoi. "Wouldn't be right to let a bunch of kids roam around town in the early hours by themselves."

Perfect excuse to say yes.

And he had no clue who the pink haired one was (OK so now he had seen blue, green and pink hair in this place.) but she had a point.

"Hagakure will be quiet from now on, Miss. I'll see to it."

[crystal_ballin]

"Dude," said Hagakure, panting for breath. "Just. Don't surprise me while wandering school halls late at night, dude. Sorta. One of my things." PTSD High school, man. PTSD high school. As long as something didn't remind him of it, he was fine. As soon as something reminded him of it, he really wasn't. His insipidity was his only salvation. "Sorry for the noise," he said to the girl in pink.

"Do you have a car?" he asked Joel hopefully. Teacher = money = car = driving to a burger place instead of walking = vastly decreased chance of alien abduction.