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“No, no, no. <******** your sword. I'm going to plow you with this staff. Watch me. No. God damnit. STOP HITTING ME.”

Andeon did not take well to being beaten by a girl.

The Gemini twins had spent the afternoon lounging in Mackenzie's apartment, engaged in a heated battle of Soul Calibur IV. It was a game Andeon had prided himself on in it's earlier editions. Unfortunately, months of being dead, nearly dead, and then fighting to save the world had interefered with the hours of practice and hand-exercises (read as: masturbation) necessary to maintain top gaming performance. He was sprawled out in the bean bag chair he had claimed as his own, wearing only a pair of flannel pajama pants and his glasses. In a rare turn of events, his hair was down and resting on his shoulders, his face twisted in an expression of intense focus; tongue sticking out of one side of his mouth, nostrils flared, brows drawn down over narrowed eyes. Fingers moved at a frantic pace, mashing down buttons in the PS3 controller.

“Oh, you slut, don't you ******** block me. Snuzzles,” Andeon whistled sharply, and a familiar scuttle was heard as something began racing in from the bathroom, “Get her.”

The little youma scampered into the living room, his dozen feet clicking against the floor before he leapt for Mackenzie's face, legs spread and ready to wrap around her head in an attempt to block her view of the television.

“That's what you get for playing Ivy.”

Andeon cackled like he had lost his damn mind, a well-placed combo taking the remainder of Ivy's life down to zero. The controller clattered to the floor as he stood, dragging Mackenzie up with him. One fist thrust into the air, hips swaying from side to side in a victory dance. He flicked his wrist, and suddenly Andeon was doing the Fork In The Garbage Disposal, spinning around with Mackenzie in tow.

“Ting ting ting, t-ting ting, bioooootch. C'mere, Snuzzapoo.”

The beanbag let out a low whoosh of air escaping through the seams as he flopped down into it, dragging his partner back down. Their perpetual third wheel leapt from Mackenzie's face with a gleeful little screech, scampering up to take his preferred position in a nest of dark pink hair. Andeon held up a thumb, and Snuzzles bumped one sharp leg against it in a miniature version of the well known sign of bromantic affection: the Fist Bump. Snuzzles, as always, had Andeon's back.

With Mackenzie in his lap, Snuzzles on his head, and a cold beer only a henshin away, there was little more than Andeon could ask for in life. However, neither Andeon nor his partner in crime were well known for their ability to sit still and behave. In his opinion, they had been behaving for far too long. Why, it had been nearly a day since they'd been thrown out of a bar or given a Breathalyzer test, almost a week since they had to jump a fence of some sort to escape an angry dog.

“I'm bored.”

They were two words that never, ever lead to anything good. Well, for the rest of the world it never lead to anything good. For Andeon Boskovic and Mackenzie O'Connell, it usually lead to something great. In their time together, they had accomplished more ridiculous feats than most drunken college students could manage in a year. They had narrowly escaped getting arrested for public intoxication, but fortunately the authorities took pity when one of them was able to cry on command and explain that they were trying to drink away the horrors of being part of some horrible organ trafficking ring. The one crying, of course, was Andeon.

Mackenzie O'Connell's tears could cure cancer. Too bad she never cries.

He pulled Mackenzie in close, wrapping both arms around her waist and curling up beside her. She didn't have to ask what he was doing, as it was something he did almost every day she worked. Andeon, with his grip around her waist tight and secure, buried his face in her hair and inhaled one deep deep breath.

“Mmmmm. Coconut.”

He then promptly began trying to chew on her bangs.

Andeon could list at least a dozen reasons that he absolutely adored the woman whose hair he was chewing on in contemplation. There was the fact that she was a zombie-killing badass, the cute face, the way she looked in a plaid skirt, the ability to take him on in a drinking contest... well, there were really just too many to list. Among these, however, was most certainly her ability to sense his thoughts and feelings. There was nothing he could hide from her, nor she from him.

Another one of those things that came with being a Gemini.

He squeezed her tightly, grinning at her suggestion. Moments like this were just more bullet points on that long, long list.

“Why yes,” he said, grinning from ear to ear, “That sounds like an excellent idea. It's,” Andeon glanced up at the tacky Budweiser clock that he demanded Mackenzie let him hang on the wall, “just past curfew for Crystal.” They really had spent all day sitting in that apartment. “Let's go kidnap Hero and see if we can get her drunk.”

“Hero has the aim of a blind man with Parkinson's,” Andeon said with a grin that made the already politically incorrect statement that much worse, “Besides, we've already died twice. We have another seven lives, right?”

Because apparently they were cats.

“Illegal is just another way of saying 'way too much fun', sweetness,” Andeon pulled the ski mask on over his head, not bothering to go hunt down a shirt. Sure, it was freezing outside. Sure, he might get frostbite on his n****e and become Sailor No-Nips, but that was better than being caught running around outside wearing one of Mackenzie's shirts. His own shirt was lying in one corner of the apartment, having landed there after being covered in beer, baby oil, and itching powder.

It's better not to ask why.

“Wonder Twins! Form of, impending alcohol posioning! Twenty bucks if you get Hero to make out with you and I get it on my camera phone.”

Thankfully neither of them had to indulge in a game of Russian Roulette and Eenie-Meenie-Miney-Moe, because -- due to past worries -- Hero Barrett opened up her window in a move of serendipity, possibly anticipating someone who was never going to come by. Her red head looked down upon two people in ski hats, trespassing waivers and bad attitudes, and she stared down at Andeon and Mackenzie as though they were college pirates come to swashbuckle the Crystal Academy for Snooty Girls With Money. They probably would have found that interesting.

"It's not my cousin," she told Miriam Jacobs, who was probably getting pretty sick of this by now.

"Congratulations," said Miriam, head under her pillow.

She didn't even bother with a coat any more. Hero skinned her way down the trellis to where Team Gemini had broken into the school, obviously only for the purposes of informing her where the bomb was, cheeks bright pink with the cold.

"Where's the danger?" she demanded.

Ah, their Dear Leader.

"Why aren't you in henshin?"

Dear, dear leader.

"Do you know that you're trespassing?"

It suddenly struck them: Hero Barrett looked very tired and wan and actually very unhappy. She was wild-eyed with the thought that there was something on fire, in danger (was Pisces stuck in the well?) and that they had come to inform her of the fact. This was a charity of them.