The Case of the Missing Markers -The MudDog

Summary: Gil learns that not all kinds of crazy can be beat down with a good dose of common sense. High school AU.

Warnings: Maybe language? Definitely some OOC-ness. Elliot's legs.

Author's Note: I haven't posted in forever and now I'm posting something totally unrelated to any of my ongoing stories and I'm sorry! Just not sorry enough to not do it. Anyway, this is more a fun thing for me than a serious piece of writing, so don't expect a strong plot line or anything. That aside, I hope you like it, and thank you for reading!

At 3:30 on Wednesday March 5th, Gil entered room H230 and discovered a message on the whiteboard.

Until such time as SAB formally relinquishes all claims of ownership to the aqua blue, dusk rose, and autumn leaf whiteboard markers, originally residing in room H230, relocated to H144 as of Tuesday March 4th, POW Nightray shall remain in the custody of SCAF. The location of the prisoner shall not be disclosed until such time as SCAF receives written confirmation from SAB in agreement to the terms. The document must be signed by all acting members of SAB (with the exception of POW Nightray) and must be hand-delivered to SCAF Secretary/Treasurer Rio, preferably directly following his baseball practice on North Field. 6:00 is good. Thanks.

Beneath the message was a sketch of some animal, done in black marker, which Gil figured might be a bloodhound, though he really couldn't tell.

There were no whiteboard markers. Just the eraser, a lone wolf on its cold, metal ledge, and Gil had to sympathize. He was the only one who ever came on time to the biweekly meetings of the Student Activities Board.

Oz showed up ten minutes later with the usual blob of gum in his mouth. Pink, Gil saw, as Oz blew out a bubble. The front of his hair was tied back into two pigtails and Gil was sure his combat boots had lost another buckle since last time he'd seen them.

Oz popped the bubble and chewed it back into his mouth. "Geez, Gil, you look like someone drowned your gerbil. What's up?"

Gil lifted his chin off his arms. "I haven't had a gerbil since I was seven," he said, "and it died of old age. This is worse." He nodded at the whiteboard and then buried his face back into his sleeves. "The student council stole our markers."

Oz followed Gil's nod. "Dusk rose was my favorite," he said. He paused, then added, "But at least they said 'thanks.' Oooh, and they drew a chinchilla, look! Isn't that cute?"

"It's a bloodhound," said Gil.

"How do you know?"

"I'm better with animals."

"Hello," said Sharon from the doorway, "Sorry I'm late."

"Hlumm," Gil said without looking up. He didn't need to. Sharon wore the same clothes and the same expression every day. Summer dress, cardigan in a shade of pastel – blue usually – and a smile so sweet, so benevolent that it made Gil's hair curl, and Gil's hair was already more than curly enough.

"So they took Vincent?" Sharon said, having read the student council's note without prompting.

Gil uncovered his eyes. He'd been right about the sundress. Tulip pattern today. "I'm not worried about Vincent," he grumbled. "The problem is how to get the whiteboard markers back when we're outnumbered."

"We won't be outnumbered if we get Mr. Break to help," Oz pointed out.

"He won't help," said Gil. "He enjoys watching us suffer."

"You need to be more optimistic," Oz told him, coming over to sit on the neighboring desk and frowning down at the top of Gil's head. "A positive attitude is the first step to success."

"Doesn't seem to have helped you much."

"I don't have a positive attitude." He was still frowning, and Gil began to feel uncomfortably judged. There was something not at all fair about being judged by a boy in pigtails. "Underneath all the rainbows, I'm quite negative. Right, Sharon?"

"Mmhmm," Sharon agreed absently as she bent to examine the sketch on the whiteboard.

"See?" said Oz. "But that's not you. You're more like a flower, and you need to embrace it or you're going to end up dead with your intestines eaten out by the people you thought were your friends."

"Mmhmm," Sharon nodded. "Is this a chinchilla?"

Oz hopped off the desk and skipped over to Sharon's side as if Gil's imminent disembowelment had not just been the topic under discussion. "That's what I said! Gil's convinced it's a bloodhound, but it's two to one now."

"I didn't say I was convinced it's a bloodhound," Gil protested, "I just think it looks more like a dog than a chinchilla. Don't chinchilla's have really tiny ears?"

"Abstract art," said Oz. "You can't trust the proportions."

"Hmm," said Sharon.

Gil was about to explain why they were both very much wrong when his thoughts were derailed by the eerie wheeze of an opening cabinet, and he snapped his head about to find Mr. Break stepping down from the beaker cupboard. "Hello, children," he said as he dusted off his sleeves and then reached back to retrieve his coffee mug from among the beakers, "I hear that the Armed Forces of the Student Council have absconded with poor Vincent."

"It's the Student Council Armed Forces," Gil snapped. He hadn't meant for it to come out so heated, but it was mostly Mr. Break's fault for popping out of odd places without proper warning. Gil had never liked surprises.

"They have the dusk rose marker," Oz explained.

"And aqua blue and autumn leaf," Sharon added as she looked up from the board.

Mr. Break sat down behind his desk, plucked Emily off his shoulder, and dropped her into his coffee mug. "Hmm," he said as he stirred the puppet about with his pointer finger.

Gil glanced back at Oz and Sharon for confirmation that this was normal Mr. Break behavior. They both had him for chemistry, so they were more accustomed to his peculiarities than Gil, and neither of them seemed at all perturbed by current events.

Then again, Gil did not place much faith in their judgment. It had always been his job to ensure that their meetings maintained some semblance of sanity. "Mr. Break, is there a reason…" He motioned to where Emily spun about in the mug.

Mr. Break poked at the puppet's head to more thoroughly submerge her. "She enhances the bitterness," he said, "And it's not like she can feel it, now is it?"

"Hot!" Emily protested.

Mr. Break patted her on the head. "Shhh."

"Hot!" Emily repeated.

Mr. Break smiled at Gil. "Don't you have a set of whiteboard markers to rescue?"

"Dusk rose!" said Oz.

"The student council should still be in H144," Sharon pointed out. "I think their meetings run until 4:20."

"But we're outnumbered!" Gil protested. "There are four of them and only three of us, and they have our markers as hostages."

"And Vincent," said Sharon.

"We can take them!" Oz already had the door half open, waiting for Sharon and Gil to follow. "I'll say smart stuff, and Sharon will look cool and intimidating, and Gil…" Oz trailed off, blinking at Gil with crooked eyebrows. "You'll be there for backup."

"Why did I ever agree to do this?" Gil grumbled to his sleeves.

"Because we let you be president," said Sharon, which was true, but Gil had been hoping they'd leave it as a rhetorical question.

He sighed and stood. Oz had already left, and Sharon's hand was on the doorknob. "Where my people go, I follow," he told the whiteboard.

"Lemmings," Mr. Break beamed.

"What?" said Gil.

"Oh, nothing. Just thinking out loud. Theories on the student council's lovely drawing."

"It's a bloodhound," Gil frowned as he pushed into the hallway.

"Hmm," Mr. Break hummed.

"Hot!" said Emily.

The door groaned closed behind him, and Gil set off down the hallway, practicing the expression he'd use against the student council. It had to be tough, but intellectual. He couldn't look like some thug. He had to look cultured, but not snobbish. It was difficult, and by the time he'd descended the stairs to the first floor and begun counting down the even-numbered side of the hall, he figured the look he'd managed was probably more constipated than anything.

In the end, it didn't matter. Whatever expression he'd managed to cobble together fell to pieces when he was snatched by the waist and dragged into H130, where, before he had time to say anything more than, "Nglaah," he found himself tied to the teacher's desk by a rough band of fabric. Denim, if he had to guess. It smelled like denim.

"Well, well, well," said the cultured voice of Elliot Nightrey, student council president and knot-tier extraordinaire, as he gave a final tug to the binds around Gil's wrists and then moved to stand in front of him. "If it isn't Gilbert Nightraye."

Gil blanched. The cloth tying his hands was definitely denim. Jeans, in fact. Elliot's jeans, because Elliot wasn't wearing pants. Uncovered as they now were, his legs were very pale and very skinny, like an albino spider, and a shiver crawled up Gil's spine. He didn't like spiders. He didn't like Elliot's legs. He didn't like Elliot at all really, and especially after his role in the kidnapping of the Activities Board's markers.

"Nightrey," he muttered.

"Yes," said Elliot, "Fear me, Gilbert Nightraye, for you are my prisoner now." He frowned. "And stop staring at my knees."

Gil jerked his neck to the side. "Well, why'd you take your pants off?!"

Elliot turned a bit pink, but he stayed where he was. "I didn't have rope, so I came up with an alternate solution. I don't need your approval."

"I don't need the image of your legs burned into my brain!"

"Then sign the contract," Elliot said, though he didn't meet Gil's eyes as he dropped the sheet of paper he'd been holding onto Gil's lap, "and I'll untie you."

Gil wiggled a bit trying to shake the paper off. "Never," he said. "The markers are ours, and, as the president of the Student Activities Board, I can't let you just take them without suffering consequences."

"Alright," said Elliot.

"Alr—" Gil didn't know what to do with that. "Don't you have some evil plan?"

"Me?" said Elliot. "No, I prefer to make it up as I go. It's very liberating, I've found. But, if it makes you feel better, I'm sure Council Members Rio and Jacky have done the appropriate amount of plotting in dark corners."

"Oh," said Gil. "Well… where are they?"

"In a battle to the death with Vesalius and Reinsworth. Alice is probably there, too."

"Oh," said Gil. He still wasn't entirely sure what this meant for his current situation with Elliot, who seemed perfectly content to just stand there pantless and do nothing. "Um… so are you going to join them then?"

"No. I'm just going to stand here."

Gil was saved from having to come up with a response by a loud bang on the door, which sprung open a second later to admit a perky head of pigtails in combat boots. "Hey, Gil!" they said.

"You!" said Elliot.

"You!" said Oz, pointing back at Elliot with wide eyes before retracting the arm to tap at his chin. "Actually, who are you?"

"He's the Student Council President," Gil said. Why couldn't Oz stay updated on even the most basic school news?

"Aha!" said Oz. He once again snapped his arm towards Elliot, who took a little step back on reflex. "Are you the one who drew the chinchilla?"

"What chinchilla?"

"It's a bloodhound," Gil scowled.

"What?"

"Do you know the Pigeonhole Theorem?" said Oz.

"Why—" Elliot began.

"Can you list the ingredients in SPAM?"

"Why would I—"

"Who was the third Prime Minister of England? Could you give me the closed form for a finite series of alternating, inverse factorials? What is the difference between a watermelon and an elephant?"

"I don't—"

"The answer," said Oz, "is that the watermelon has seeds."

Elliot was shocked into silence. He didn't move when Oz walked around him, or when he began to untie the jean cuffs around Gil's wrists, or even when Oz folded the jeans and placed them neatly atop the desk.

"See," said Oz as Gil followed him out the door, "That's how it's done."

The last thing they heard from H130 as the hinges squeaked shut was, "But I know the Pigeonhole Theorem," and Gil almost felt like turning around to give Elliot a pat on the back. Fortunately or unfortunately, his conviction to never again lay eyes on Elliot's legs was stronger.

"I know how it's done," Gil scowled. "I was just trying to collect information on our enemy's movements while their guard was down."

"They're all in H144. Except Alice."

"Well then," Gil said, tugging his shirt collar straight, "What are we waiting for? Let's go rescue our markers."

"It's not that easy. They've hidden them."

"They've— Is this preschool?!"

Oz beamed through his gum. "It's much more fun than that. In preschool there was always spit on things when you got them back; this time it will just be the bitterness of defeat, and I've always liked my markers bitter."

"Why do I work with you people?"

Oz pat his shoulder but said nothing. He smiled instead, and then he opened the door to H144.