Behold, the lair of the trash gremlin

deuce flips another page in his math textbook, one blink away from sleeping right where he's sitting. he could see the light from ace's phone light up as he idly scrolls through magicam. poor guy's mind was racing, making itself known when he was moving around in his bed to get comfortable and Not Sleep at All. deuce could hear him shuffling for a solid 30 minutes. it is way past curfew and his other roommates were snoring away, unaware of their dilemma.

Ace sits upright all of a sudden, turning off his phone to tell deuce that they should sneak out to ramshackle and sleep there. he thinks it's a stupid plan and just a way to visit yuu, but finds himself shaken awake the next minute by the redhead. soon enough, they pack up a blanket, school uniform, and a pillow to comfortably sleep there (knowing how humbly bare the dorm is, even with renovations)

the both of them make their way from the mirror chamber all the way to ramshackle's living room, but the walk there is practically a hike by itself. they're too tired to even search for any available rooms and decide the lounge's couch is the best place to sleep on. they don't even argue who should sleep on the dusty floor, just squeeze as best they can onto the couch. deuce tucks in both of their blankets, and they're out like a light (so much for pulling an all nighter).

. . .

epel, in pomefiore, kept falling asleep only to wake up right after. tired of constantly moving around and the chance of waking up his roommates (who would most definitely cry about their beauty sleep), he decides sleeping anywhere but in pomefiore would be better—and there's only one place in school where he could crash! he packs up his pillow, blanket, and uniform to trek down to ramshackle.

he marches his way to ramshackle's doors and enters the living room, only to find ace and deuce sprawled all over the floor, messy blankets on top of them. epel notices the pillows on the couch and question what the hell they were doing, but reconsider that it's late in the night to actually think it through. he grabs both pillows and stuffs them under their heads (wondering how they managed to fall without waking up) and fixes their posture so they don't have a kink in their neck. taking the couch is VERY tempting... but...

epel places a pillow down on the ground and lies down next to deuce, who's next to ace that is next to the couch. epel tucks their blanket in, then his on top, and finally finds the sleep he was trying to get.

. . .

jack wakes up to a feeling of being incredibly hot, sweaty, and his heart's beating a little bit too fast. his ears are pinned back and his tail's fur stands up, guarded. he heaves for cold air in the stuffy room, filled with the air of three other freshmen. there's a little thought in his head that has been replaying a certain scene in his mind.

he had a nightmare.

jack wasn't sure what it was about, but he rather not dwell on the details. it's too hot in his room and he wouldn't like to burst out crying this late at night with this many people around, so he sneaks out of savanaclaw for a short walk. hopefully this clears his mind and cools him down.

he doesn't know where he's going walking around, just the replay of the nightmare slowly fading away the longer he walks. soon enough, he finds himself standing outside of ramshackle's doors—is it okay for him to let himself in? he opens the doors and carefully, walks inside to the living room.

he finds ace and epel snuggled up against deuce in the means for warmth. it's kind of cute actually. Jack curses himself thinking that he ran into a slumber party, but the fact they aren't in any of ramshackle's rooms makes him consider otherwise. unfortunately, they were better prepared than him, jack didn't bring anything but his pajamas.

Jack snatches a ramshackle pillow from the couch and fixes everyone's blankets to drape a bit on themself and the person next to them. with extra blanket space, jack lies down next to epel with the couch pillow, trying to get as much pomefiore blanket left over. he finds himself cooled and calmed down, falling asleep.

. . .

diasomnia has always felt cold to sebek. sometimes, in the dead of winter nights, sebek barely gets a wink of sleep from trying to stay warm.

the retainer sighs and sits upright, figuring that he should go visit the washrooms and perhaps go on a quick patrol. he leaves his room.

. . .

[ system booting... exiting recharge mode... ]

ortho's eyes open and light up, taking a moment to scan his environment.

it's too dark, nobody's awake, even idia's gone to sleep. what time is it, ortho thinks to himself before his eyes widen from shock at the time. it's incredibly late at night, why did he boot so early?! a quick scan of the reminders that he had set up had been incorrectly put in. well, isn't that something.

he could set up another reminder and continue recharging his battery, but it was made to last hours under the most extreme conditions. it seems better to go to ramshackle and meet yuu there! besides, he can bring an extra charger just in case, like he does with his PE gear.

he gets changed into his school gear, and flies away while scanning his to-do list and double checking every single reminder's time. nobody's walking in the hallways at the dead of night, so ortho practically zips through the hallways and out of ignihyde fairly quickly.

he approaches ramshackle and quietly opens the door, detecting a sudden increase in temperature. ortho peeks into the living room, his hair illuminating the room only by a small amount. he looks at how sebek and jack are huddled close to each other while epel clings onto jack's tail, ace and deuce clung onto each other. he internally saves this into his memory bank, and then stops hovering over them.

ortho stops floating to prevent the possibility of a breeze waking up the resting freshmen. he fixes the blankets sprawled all about so they don't have to rely on each other for warmth. he considers trying to fix their heads onto their pillows, but thinks his hands might be too cold and would wake them up...

he thinks that they had a sleepover, a little sad that he wasn't invited. it doesn't matter, he'll just have to greet them waking up! he decides to join in and preps for a sleep mode, with a reminder to wake up sometime an hour after sunrise. that should be the time most students will wake up, right? at least, anyone outside of his dorm...

ortho takes a nearby chair and quietly lifts it above the freshmen, placing it in by a round table. wrapping his arms atop the table, he imitates what seems to be the most ideal form of sleeping in class, or at least watching other students in his class do it and get woken up by lucius. he doesn't suffer the consequences of a sore neck fortunately, so he rests his head on one side to look at the soundly sleeping freshmen. saving this into his internal memory drive again, he activates sleep mode, feeling his eyes close and lights dimming low.

. . .

grim wakes up a little hungry for some tuna cans. as long as he doesn't make a ruckus, he should be able to sneakily munch on a few cans...!

he slyly pushes the door open, and with great haste, runs down the hallway as quiet as a cat direbeast can be. he slows down to hop down the stairs, but nearly jumps out of his skin seeing a sudden mass of soundly sleeping freshmen.

he counts six of them, completely confused about why they're here at ramshackle. are they greeting the great grim?! wow, too bad they suck at planning! he completely forgot his plan to get into the kitchen and break into a few cans of tuna.

he carefully paws his way around the freshmen, noticing how they're all completely passed out. he hops onto the couch and looks at ortho, noticing how despite his flaming hair moving around (as a flame should be), he also appears to be unconscious like the rest of them.

grim yawns, looking out the window and being reminded that he should be getting back to sleep. the walk back to yuu's room is too much work, and besides, it's warm and cozy where he is here!

grim circles around the couch, finicky with where to sleep. he ultimately decides to sleep near ortho, as he radiates some warmth. curling into himself, he snoozes away.

. . .

yuu wakes up, thirsty for some water.

sitting upright, yuu notices that grim isn't in the room and the door is slightly opened. they sigh, knowing that grim broke out and probably ate a few tuna cans. they hop out of bed and immediately beeline straight to the kitchen.

however, as soon as they approach the stairs, they're surprised to see a bunch of freshmen in the living room, all passed out on each other. what the hell, is this some sort of prank? yuu shakes their head in disbelief and amusement, some uncoordinated prank this is. they do go back into the kitchen to get some water (and checking the tuna stash, which appears to be untouched...?) they exit the kitchen and head upstairs again.

in a couple minutes, yuu has a lot of pillows and blankets in hand. they gently lift everyone's heads to fit the pillows that were available, and swapping out the couch pillows with actual pillows. those without blankets were given one by yuu, draped over their bodies. even ortho got one, yuu assuming that his fire isn't going to burn down the blanket if idia's hair hasn't set anything ablaze. hopefully.

yuu places their personal pillow and blanket on the couch, careful to not step on ace and grim. speaking of grim, they pick him up only for him to hang like a limp noodle. yuu holds grim close and turns to face the freshmen.

impromptu sleepover, they think, funniest thing ever. they close their eyes, and fall into a dreamless sleep.

. . .

jack was the first to wake up, but was stuck in sebek's tight grip. jack couldnt wiggle his way out of the death grip sebek had him in, so he had to wait it out... thankfully, sebek did wake up not too long after, used to his routine. cozy and warm for the first time in a good while, sebek takes awhile to get used to his environment, notice a Wide Awake Jack frozen solid. sebek lets go of jack and apologizes, bowing to the floor completely embarrassed. jack reassures him that it isn't anything to worry about, though his cheeks are rosy.

they look around to notice that everyone literally just came to sleep in the ramshackle living room, hell even ORTHO got here. they decide to go out for a morning jog back to the mirror chamber to get back to their dorms. they do fold the ramshackle blankets and pick up the ramshackle pillows under their heads, putting it on a different couch that yuu and grim isn't sleeping in.

ortho reboots up and notices jack and sebek gone, but yuu and grim have joined in. he decides to wait for the others to wake up, pulling up a few things on his to-do list while killing time. he's really happy about the blanket yuu gave him while he was in sleep mode, wrapping it around himself while he works.

epel wakes up after, vil's morning makeup routine somewhat drilled into him. he wakes up in a shock from not recognizing where he is—alerting ortho—but does calm down remembering what happened. ortho checks up on epel, who did NOT know he was there, spooking the poor guy. after a small conversation, epel hits up ramshackle washrooms.

yuu wakes up after, yawning and sitting up. ortho greets a good morning and yuu waves back. they slide away from grim, draping their blanket over the direbeast, and head into their bedroom to freshen up.

ace, deuce, and grim are the last to wake up. they don't know what the hell is going on, but somethin good is cookin in the kitchen!! they make their way to notice yuu, epel, and ortho cooking a small breakfast. the voices of sebek and jack casually chatting travels into the kitchen.

. . .

ace - shit sleep schedule

deuce - pulling an all nighter

epel - restless/cant sleep

Jack - nightmare

sebek - cold

ortho - woke up too early