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Luca stared into the various wires of the motor on Tracy's bot. He really wished the girl was as organized as he was when it came down to color coding the wires. Tracy had simply requested him to see why her bot's battery died significantly quicker than when she first made it despite changing out the battery so frequently. Together, they had changed out the battery and reconstructed a new one despite how pricey it was, yet the bot still did not work. Luca promised his best friend that he would look into it, but the tangle of inconsistent wires was truly unmotivating to look at.
"Balsa, stop tapping your foot for God's sake!" The croissant haired man called from the other side of the dorm.
"Beg for me to," Luca sneered at his dorm mate, Edgar, while still looking at the wires in the bot that were looking more like one of Tracy's questionable stews.
"Ugh, you grow more distasteful every day," Edgar aggressively stabbed his paint brush in the pallet without moving his eyes away from the painting.
Luca continued to tap his foot subconsciously but fortunate for him, before Edgar could throw his paint water at the man, a blonde, energetic girl slammed open the room of the dorm open making Edgar's brows furrow in frustration and leaving Luca startled.
"Have you ever heard of knocking?" Edgar grunted, checking the spot he was painting to see if any paint smudge.
"Ah! Sorry, Edgar! I didn't realize you would be here," Tracy apologized and tucked her hands into her denim overalls.
"Absurd that I am in my own dorm room! Forget me, for the first time ever I pity Balsa for having to put up with you in half of his courses," Edgar turned away from his painting and pointed towards Luca.
"Are you allergic to saying my first name?" Luca annoyingly rolled his eyes to his roommate he has known for months now.
"It's informal!" Edgar countered.
"Objection! Defendant, you regularly choose to use my first name despite us knowing each other for less time and me being a girl!" Tracy dramatically attacked Edgar's counter toward Luca, pointing her finger straight towards the "defendant."
"You are NOT Phoenix Wright! No way you just countered my statement with me not being sexist."
"Since when have you played Ace Attorney?" Luca laughed at Edgar, who always whined whenever he and Tracy would play at night on the console they saved up for together.
"Don't need to when I can hear you guys in my sleep screaming whenever that red jacket doofus comes on screen."
"THATS MILES EDGEWORTH THROW SOME RESPECT ON HIS NAME!" Tracy shouted loudly enough for everyone on their floor to likely be able to hear.
"Anyways, Tracy, I love you, but what are these wires?" Luca pointed wide-eyed in distraught at the bot's motor on his desk. "This is worse than the stew Professor Burke made at last year's Christmas party!" It seems there are many bad cooks within the engineering department of the school.
"Oh, don't worry, I can fix it myself! I passed by Professor Lorenz and he gave me some tips-" Tracy very quickly got cut off by Luca slamming his hand on the desk.
"PROFESSOR LORENZ? AS IN FUCKING ALVA LORENZ? MOTHER FUCKER GAVE YOU ADVICE BUT TOLD HIS OWN INTERN 'SKILL ISSUE' OVER A GENUINE QUESTION?" Luca bursted in disbelief. He has had a complicated history with Alva, and although he can respect the man for his genius mind, he was greatly offended over the time he got told he had a skill issue when asking about the best suited formula for static energy.
"Besides the point! I also passed by Jack," Tracy began before Edgar interrupted him.
"I find it strange how in America it is completely fine to refer to a teacher by his first name," Edgar questioned. No one in the group was born in America. The closest if anyone to having enough experience to be deemed an "Honorary American" was Tracy as she has been here since middle school.
"Not really normal it just happens that he won't give us his first name," Luca added.
"How strange, so he enjoys being disrespected? Kinks get stranger and stranger the farther away from home you go," Edgar drifted back to his painting, trying to relocate the spot he was working on.
"You know he is British too, right?" Luca smiled at Edgar, regretting his words since they now implied that his country has strange kinks.
"You!"
"I mean, Martha spread around he was actually an assassin~" Tracy noted, but shrugged her shoulders. "Of course, I'm sure that's just a rumor! Only thing that can kill is that massive hat he's got on there."
Indeed, the man had a very tall yet thin hat. It was like he read an article about famous Americans, saw Abraham Lincoln, and took his iconic hat as a way to blend in.
"When I passed by him today, it occurred to me that it must be great for ring toss!" Tracy cheered, wrapping her hand around her fist.
"... you looked at Jack's hat and immediately thought of ring toss?" Edgar raised a brow at the girl.
"Hmm..." Luca hummed, resting his chin on his elbows.
"Who would not? It's the perfect shape!"
"And what rings would be large enough for that, hmm?"
"Well, actually, Tracy makes a good point," Luca joined in. "As for rings, didn't you say Jack has these plastic ones hung on the wall of his classroom?"
"Balsa, have you lost your bloody mind?" Edgar looked almost offended at what Luca was suggesting.
"I think he did the moment Alva threw a physics book at his head," Tracy mumbled suppressing her giggles.
"Rude! Listen, I know Jack said he would cut anyone's fingers off that would touch his rings, but come on! You're his favorite student! He would spare your fingers for sure so that he could get another one of your paintings in the next art competition!" Luca reasoned, standing up from his desk. He walked over to the entrance of the dorm and slid on his sneakers that have definitely seen better days.
"I cannot believe this."
Edgar, despite having full right to stay in the storm, still chose to follow the duo in front of him. Perhaps he did find the point Tracy made about Jack's hat amusing and was convinced by the fact his fingers would be safe.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~○●○~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Luca, being the tallest of the group, poked his head at the highly placed rectangular window of the art studio. It was just big enough to let in natural light, but still small enough to prevent any outside distractions.
"Coast is clear," Luca whispered to Tracy.
"HUH? I can't hear you!" She shouted in the noisy mess of students going to their 6PM coures.
Edgar pushed her forward as Luca got off of his toes to open the door. To his dismay, he noticed there to be a keypad!
"Goodness! How will we get in now?" Luca cried out rather dramatically considering the situation was the trio trespassing into the art studio.
"Move it." Unlike how Edgar gently shoved Tracy, he was not as considerate towards Luca. Although Luca was about to fight back, his eyes lit up once he found that the door was open to the art studio.
"I love you Edgar!" Luca hugged his best friend affectionately, a complete 360 from his previous mood.
"Wait, did you just type 1111?" Tracy perked her brow up and adjusted her robotics coat.
"He is not the smartest guy," Edgar sighed, walking into the studio.
He flicked on the light switch and revealed a rather neatly put away studio. Since break had only ended recently, no one had begun any projects in class yet, so all the canvases were neatly packed away.
"Now where are those famous rings?" Tracy began to search around the room, peering into boxes that only revealed excessive amounts of paint.
"No touching! Here just grab the rings and go," Edgar put his hands onto the wall where the rings were, but widened his eyes in confusion of not feeling anything. "That's peculiar, where are they- oh," he looked up at where the wall met the ceiling seeing the two rings hung up there. He stood on his toes and jumped, reaching his arm as high as he could. It was not that Edgar is short but rather the rings were placed very high up.
"Move over Ed, I've got this," Luca smirked as he tried to effortlessly grab the rings, but it seems he way overestimated the two inches he had over Edgar. "Fuck, Tracy! Get on my shoulders!"
Luca bent down and allowed for Tracy to practically vault onto his shoulders. Despite his less muscular appearance, he effortlessly lifted Tracy to reach the five rings.
"Ok Mr. Sleeper Build Balsa," Edgar sneered.
"Good, you're finally not calling me a twink."
"You started it!"
"No!"
"Guys be quiet," Tracy hushed the two men. They all quieted down and were able to hear footsteps coming from outside.
Luca let Tracy down once she gathered the last ring, and poked his head to the nearest window. To the worst of everyone's fears, there was that familiar, tall hat, bouncing with every step Jack took.
"Fuck! Hide behind that cabinet!" Luca whispered loud enough for everyone to hear.
"But wait! Galatea's sculptor is behind there," Edgar called out in fear of the art being hurt.
"Don't worry, I saw Helena and Luchino help her move it to the other art studio," Tracy without waiting for Edgar, spoke as she ran into the corner.
Edgar soon followed the two and grabbed the curtain that was used to hide Galatea's statue earlier and threw it on top of the gap between the cabinet and the wall. Just in time, the only noise left in the room was Jack's rather loud footsteps from his squeaky shoes walking to his desk at the front, right corner of the room. It faced the only full window in the room which seemed painfully inconvenient during sunset to be blinded while trying to do grades.
"Shit, how do we get out? We've practically cornered ourselves," Tracy panicked through whispers.
"It's all thanks to this genius Balsa! We're fucking dead mates," Edgar, significantly more British than usual, complained.
"Wait but this is a great opportunity!" Luca pointed, peaking his eye through a small opening in the curtain at Jack sitting at his desk, faced towards the wall.
"For?" Tracy questioned, but then remembered the rings in her hand. "Ah! I call going first!" She snickered.
"Holy shit, it's over for us," Edgar smacked his hand against his face in cringe towards the situation he found himself in.
"I can't get a good angle from here," Tracy sighed, but noticed the desk with the front covered towards the middle of the room. "I'm going in."
"Wait! Tracy!" Luca called out in fast whispers, and grabbed Tracy's arm. By the time he did, one click from her shoes going past the curtain signaled a clear issue. The boots she wore were quite loud against the tiled section of the floor.
"Thanks for the save," Tracy smiled, and in the most unhinged, unexpected matter to anyone in the group, she quicker removed her shoes leaving her only in elmo socks.
"What the fuck," Edgar said in the most disgustful tone. Indeed, he has seen many things in this art room, but someone whipping off their shoes to play ring toss on his teacher's hat is not one he expected to see.
Tracy creeped over slowly to the desk towards the center of the room. She kneeled down, careful to not hit any of the metal chairs that would certainly alert the teacher of suspicious activity before even getting to throw one ring. Once set in place, she glanced over to Luca and Edgar who for the first time ever, shared the same thought of praying for the clumsy girl to not cause a ruckus.
She turned back over, fixed on the teacher's hat. It was simple, all she had to do was throw a ring on the teacher's hat. Edgar had described the man as so oblivious to the two students in the back of the classroom making out nearly every project session that Tracy was sure he would not even notice where the ring was coming from.
She peered over the desk just a tad bit and grabbed the clear ring that felt more like silicone than Edgar described. Of course, it made sense for Edgar to not know the specifics of the ring considering he never touched it. She was hardly bent on her knees as she chose to take the underhand approach at throwing the ring. Quickly, in fear of the professor turning around at an awful moment, she sloppily threw the ring too far, having it land on Jack's desk!
She quickly bent down, fully expecting the man to come over and investigate, but what was heard was a creek from his chair spinning as he moved the ring against the ledge on the chalkboard. Inside the curtain, a sweaty Edgar and Luca breathed out the heaviest sigh of relief ever heard from the homosexual species as a whole.
Tracy turned back to the two, giving them a thumbs up that they are still safe. Quietly, she moved back to the curtain area and passed the rings to Edgar.
"Nuh uh! Here, Balsa, you could go first," Edgar offered, too worried after seeing the disaster that nearly landed on Tracy's plate.
"What a gentleman!" Luca grabbed the rings and went over to the same spot Tracy was in before.
He got up much quicker than Tracy now that he analyzed how truly oblivious Jack is to the suspicious behavior in the room. Luca, having played on his school's tennis team back home, had far better aim than Tracy. He also knew better than to underhand throw rings. Seriously! He knew Tracy was a genius but she was terrible with any outdoor games and lacked common sense as a whole! Who would underhand throw a ring?
Luca, showing the correct form, threw the blue ring diagonally with enough force so that it could land through the hat. It wobbled a bit like a basketball on the ring of a hoop trying to make it in, but at last, he showed far more success than Tracy.
"Wooo! Go Luca!" His friend screamed in lowercase to not cause any noise. Luca gave a thumbs up in response and picked up another ring, knowing well that Edgar would still have no interest in this little game.
He grabbed the yellow ring besides him, and once again, with flawless aim, he dashingly landed the ring through the hat once again! Only this time, the professor reached on top of his head in reflex to the abnormal sound.
"Shit!" Luca whispered and ducked down.
Jack pulled off his hat revealing a shockingly oval head that not even Edgar had seen before. It felt more apparent now that his hat was not an American disguise but rather one to hide his 2019 Wednesday Addam's shaped head!
"Joseph? Burke?" Jack, startled by the appearance of the two rings called out the names of his colleagues.
"EXCUSE ME?" Luca, more shocked by the interpretation of him calling the rings by the names of staff members no longer cared about hiding.
"Balsa! You are supposed to be hiding!" Edgar jumped from out of the curtain to yell at his dorm mate, but soon realized once locking eye contact with his teacher that he was well beyond fucked.
"Oh my gosh..." Tracy stepped out from the curtain, looking at the rings on the ground and back at Jack.
"Sir, I apologize on behalf of these two, but I would like to make it known I did not throw-" Edgar was cutoff by Luca.
"WHY ARE THE RINGS NAMED AFTER THE ENGINEERING AND PHOTOGRAPHY TEACHER?" Luca shouted with tears coming from his eyes.
"W-well! Why were you in my room?!" Jack fired back, but Tracy intervened.
"EWW I SAW THIS IN A HAREM FANFIC! YOU MANWHORE!" Tracy blurted her accusation to the teacher.
"Tracy! That is rather rude! I don't care what rumors you hear from Martha but you cannot go accusing the staff member like this!" Edgar defended his teacher.
"I CAN EXPLAIN. PLEASE, I'M NOT A MANWHORE!" Jack flared his arms out and put his hat back on to cover his oval shapped head.
"ANSWER THE QUESTION." Luca demanded, but was greeted by silence from a distressed Jack.
"Oh my gosh... he did do the deed with Burke, didn't he?" Edgar gasped, horrified at his teacher.
"Why does Burke surprise you but Professor Desaulniers doesn't?" Tracy asked the man next to her.
"Everyone knows Joseph is sexy as fuck that's why. He's nearly fifty yet looks younger than most twenty year olds at this school," Luca instead answered.
"Those damn French genetics," Edgar mumbled rather jealously knowing he is part of the majority at this school.
"Still proving my point that Jack is a manwhore," Tracy shrugged.
"NO, NO! I WILL EXPLAIN NOW. I HAVENT DONE IT WITH EITHER OF THEM I SWEAR!" Jack panicked at the intimidating trio demanding answers. "These rings... uhh... are my muses! They are named after my uhh... lovers! From Britian!"
Worst liar ever.
"TRUTH DEFENDANT. NOW," Tracy demanded.
"FINE FINE! THEY ARE WHAT YOU THINK," Jack confessed.
"UGH! DISGUSTING! EW," Luca dropped the remaining two rings in his hand. The sound of two more rings hitting the floor were louder than Luca's panics.
"Wait! Two more rings... two more sex partners!" Edgar gasped in shock, slowly losing respect for his teacher with every ring.
The dark blue and green ring were left on the floor, at the center of the studio.
"The green is clearly Mr. Beck," Edgar analyzed.
"EMMA'S FATHER? NO..." Luca cried at the news that he had remnants of the marketing teacher's excretions on his hands.
"Oh please, that bankrupt marketing teacher is way too loyal to his ex wife, even Emma says so herself," Tracy countered. This brought some relief to Luca, but now he was more horrified of who those rings belong too. Then, a certain man with a strange reptile obsession came into his mind.
"Professor Diruse?" Luca, much more calmly suggested. Something about the secretions from a vegan soothed him more than that of someone's father.
"Oh yes, makes sense why the ring would be green, to hide those lizard secretions," Edgar noted, happy the first part of the puzzle was solved.
"LIZARD SECRETIONS?" Luca gasped, losing any peace he felt in his mind.
"Ok but who does the blue ring belong to? Professor Xie Bi'an?" Tracy suggested, but was quickly turned down by Luca.
"He is far too loyal to that other twink that picks him up from campus every day," he noted the rather intimate relationship between the two men.
"Ah! I've got it! Professor Antonio from the music theory department!" Edgar raised a finger, looking like the nerd emoji.
"Ah! That makes sense," Luca agreed, but once the room fell into silence, he began to scream again. "WAHHHH THAT DEMON HAIRED MAN'S SECRETIONS WAHHHH!"
"Luca Balsa! Do you see me panicking? I held those longer than you!" Tracy confronted her friend.
"BUT IT FADED FROM YOUR HANDS BY NOW," Luca cried out.
"Someone really has got to get these kids a biology class..." Jack muttered, bringing the unwanted attention back to him.
"This is absolutely disgraceful!" Edgar cried to his teacher. "I have always viewed you as an idol of some sorts."
"The same man you curse out every evening is the same one you idol? I call bullshit," Tracy exposed her friend, leaving him embarrassed despite it clearly being Jack who should feel pure embarrassment in this situation.
"Wait a moment," Luca raised a brow towards the chalkboard. "The ring that Tracy threw."
Everyone's eyes darted over to the chalkboard, revealing the slightly clear ring that was left. The ring Tracy had thrown earlier had been completely forgotten about! Wisely, Jack stayed silent not wanting to accidentally expose himself like before.
"No..." Edgar and Tracy both widened their mouths in unison.
Suddenly, the door to the art studio squeaked open. From the door stood a tall man. That man was Alva Lorenz. It all clicked.
"QUINTUPLE WHORE!" All three of the friends shouted back at Jack. Luca gave one look of disgust towards his professor, but he expected this outcome seeing how everything else had been turning out.
"What on earth is happening in here? Luca, you are twenty minutes late to giving me my back massage. I will have to deduct points from your internship for forgetting to report to your duties." The man firmly stated.
"Why the fuck are you giving that man a back massage, Balsa?" Edgar queried the strange internship assignment.
"I accidentally electrocuted him..." Luca admitted rather casually considering his words.
"That's a discussion for another day children- hey, wait a moment? Why is my ring on the chalkboard?" Alva questioned, seeming to forget the audience in front of him.
"Oh my fucking gosh," Tracy began before turning to the slowly deteriorating Luca.
"Hmph, no wonder he needs a back massage," Edgar threw in disregard for Luca's crippling mind.
"J-jack! You said you would hide this from everyone! How did anyone even find our rings?" Alva panicked, turning into a worse state than Luca.
"Well they weren't very well hidden considering they were on wall display," Tracy stopped realizing a key word Alva had said. "Wait! What do you mean 'our' rings?" Everyone noticed Jack glanced away from everyone at the scene, especially Alva.
Luca circled around the floor with his fingers on his chin."'Our rings.' So wait a moment, Alva is Jack's only partner?" Luca rashly concluded, but Tracy stopped him.
"But how come the rings have names of other teachers at the campus?" Tracy pointed out the earlier situation that led to this.
"Well, you know, I will admit I never technically lied, but never corrected you bunch earlier..." Jack quietly added in a truthful, shameful tone.
"So he's not a complete whore, but-" Edgar was interrupted by Alva stomping over to his now revealed partner.
"You display the rings I specifically requested for you to hide and go around lying about you having an affair with multiple staff members? How despicable!" Alva cried to Jack.
"Alvy sweetie," Jack started, only to be met by the disgusted faces of everyone in the trio. "I did it for our own good so no one would know about your, well-"
"What good is risking our rings to get stolen? I had those custom made commissioned at four hundred dollars a ring!" Alva explained the illogical choice Jack made of displaying them.
"And how could I not display such wonderful art-" Jack tried to continue the conversation away from exposing a secret he knew these bright students in front of him would soon pick up.
"That wonderful art was great for ring toss!" Tracy grinned with the intent of mocking the two men.
Luca seemed less amused with the whole thing. Being a natural analyst, something seemed very wrong. The rings were large enough to fit through Jack's hat which approximately had a circumference of slightly under eighteen inches. Therefore, the rings would have to be greater than that value, and if the truth is now out that those rings belong to Alva and he had them custom made...
Luca's face turned pale and sickly green. "Oh god, I'm going to be sick," he ran out the door, pointing to the top hat on Jack's head before dashing away.
"What is wrong with him- oh my gosh," Tracy then noticed the point Luca had made.
Edgar noticed too, his eyes following to Alva's fly. He pitied Luca once again for having such a fast thinking brain.
"BLOODY HELL! HOW COULD A SCRAWNY MAN POSSESS SUCH A BEAST?" Edgar cried out loud enough to echo through the whole studio. Following Luca, both him and Tracy bolted out of the studio leaving Alva and Jack awkwardly behind.
"You might want to start being nicer to that intern of yours..." Jack sighed looking at the rings on the floor that only fit tightly for one man on this campus.
"And I would start paying that student of yours for showing up..." Alva suggested, staring at the same sight.
"What about the robotics girl?" Jack mentioned Tracy who Alva had little to bribe her with.
"Eh, she will be pleased enough with the battery component I borrowed from her last week," Alva sighed, knowing that she must have been racking her brains out for the past few days.
The trio that abandoned the studio silently walked back to their dorms. Although Tracy and Luca planned to play the new Ace Attorney game at Luca's dorm, everyone agreed that it was best to leave each other in peace. After all, all Luca could think of now was wanting to bathe himself in bleach.