Room 307, Monday Evening

[dollpocalypse]

After an hour and twenty-five minutes spent trying to trace a text message that had just come in on his phone, Topher was forced to conclude two things: one, it was legit, and two, he sort of wanted to crawl under his bed and never come out ever again.

But there were bags of chips under his bed and he really didn't want to find out if the chips had rodent friends down there, so he had to settle for burrowing under the blankets instead, laptop open in front of him as he vengefully and imprecisely shot at zombies in a video game.

Like this weekend hadn't been bad enough. Like he hadn't gotten a stupid (albeit newly vanished) haircut and a hangover. Like he hadn't made a total moron out of himself in front of Ben and Jello Girl and Peter, then hurt his hand making the world's shittiest piece of technology. Now he'd done something to piss Tony off too, and -- here was the kicker -- he didn't even know what it was. Because Tony already knew about that stupid fanfiction story that that bitch Karla had told everyone about, and he hadn't been mad at him after the whole lap-sitting thing on Thursday night, and their encounter as kids on Saturday hadn't been too horrible, and nothing bad had happened in frat, so... what was it?

For a second, he wondered if maybe Kenzi had said something... but they weren't close, were they? He dismissed the idea and shot furiously at zombies. The volume was up ridiculously high, but he wasn't too bothered by the noise of the explosions right now. Or the gore. Even the stuff that normally squicked him out was fine.

[[Door closed, post wide open. This kid. So much emo.]]

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[lockestheway]

"We're the kind ones," Peter informed him. "If they want to rot, it's not our fault."

[dollpocalypse]

"Yeah!" Topher exclaimed.

Except, well.

"I mean, I dunno," he amended, mellowing a little. "He's still awesome."

[lockestheway]

"Tony Stark is just a teenage kid who tries to be nice and occasionally fails horrendously," Peter said, picking up Topher's phone and holding it up. "And don't let me get started on my sister."

He missed her, that was the problem. He'd missed her since May.

[dollpocalypse]

Topher didn't want to get into the details behind his feelings, even if they were right at the forefront of his mind: Tony was brave and smart and let him hang around and he had a shiny lab filled with stuff that he didn't mind letting Topher look at. And he was great in bed.

"Your sister sucks," he muttered. "You're awesome. Who doesn't want to hang out with you?"

[lockestheway]

All the people who'd rather be hanging out with Ender.

He almost said it. But that would make him sound like a worse down-on-his-luck whiny loser than... well, than Topher. "Like I said," he said, "Her loss, right?"

[dollpocalypse]

"Well," Topher said, glancing up at Peter with sincerity in his eyes. "Yeah."

Hey, there was one fanboy who was all Peter's, at least.

[lockestheway]

See, and here Peter thought he should really be feeling even more ashamed of himself for feeling better because of that.

"Right," he said, like he was completely certain of that all along.

He glanced around the room. "So, what do you do here that isn't killing zombies or taking things apart?"

[dollpocalypse]

"Put stuff together?" Topher offered. "Play with your desk? Uh... I dunno. Piss Dave off."

So... not too much, really.

[lockestheway]

"Your roommate?" Peter guessed. "What's he like, anyway?"

Sure, now you start showing an interest in someone's life, PETER.

[dollpocalypse]

"He's okay," Topher offered. "Kind of weird. I think he has a girlfriend."

He shuddered.

[lockestheway]

"Oh, come on, just because you've got this one-sided fued going on with Stephanie Brown doesn't mean all girlfriends are bad by default," Peter said, rolling his eyes.

[dollpocalypse]

"This one's the radio girl," Topher added. "The Southern one."

A beat.

"She wiped barf on my pillow."

So, you know. She sucked.

[lockestheway]

Peter craned his neck up to see the pillow... two inches from his head.

He sidled further down the bed. "Okay, she might need some lessons in personal hygiene," Peter copped.

[dollpocalypse]

"I changed the sheets," Topher informed him.

Actually, he'd thrown the sheets away. Same thing.

"And I think she did it 'cause she hates me," he shared. "I can't remember if she's one of the ones who's punched me."