Survival Of The Fittest

"Hey, hey, hey, hey, Volker are you okay?"

Marco didn't look at all. "Do-d-don't puke on the-don't puke here."

Benny stood up to try to help Marco get into a location where he could come down or release his alcohol. But his limbs said no. They were tired and telling him to stay on the ground and it probably was not important or worth it to be active.

So he just continued lying on the grass.

Marco shot up off the ground and sprinted off in a random direction, stopping just short of a tree in the yard.

The heavy amount of alcohol he had just imbibed in such a short timespan finally took effect, and mixed in with the aerosol pigmented good feels and it just made... bad feels.

The green and blue painted manlet emptied the contents of his stomach out onto the tree for what felt like a solid 30 seconds. He stopped, and once he thought he was done, even more came out.

Eugh, that peach vodka is not as good going up as it is goi- and another one. HELL YEAH MARCO, YOURE WINNER.

Wordlessly he stared at the puddle on the ground, pins and needles left most of his body by now. Marco raised his arm into a thumbs up.

“I’m good! I-I’m goo-“ Captain Planet got a taste of the paint lining his lips and gums, and off like a rocket he went again.

“I r-regret this decisio-“ the spew continued.

"Turns out huffing paint and alcohol don't mix well, eh?"

Benny grinned and giggled. He rolled to the side until he was not lying facing up but lying facing down. He used his hands to support his head while his elbows were pushed against the grassy ground.

"Don't forget to drink later. Stay hydrated, bud."

Benedict looked at the puddle next to Marco. It looked very disgusting.

"I won't tell Forrey-Forrest that that was you."

Well, actually it was very apparent that this puke puddle was created by Marco simply by the color of it.

Another stream trailed out as Marco had trouble trying to not laugh at his situation. He kind of brought it upon himself to be completely honest. This was a stupid idea, and when you play stupid games, you get stupid prizes. "Eugh… I'll hydrate this fuckin' tree!" Marco's tongue slid against his teeth and he shivered as the paint-vodka-vomit combo lingered in his mouth. He gagged and heaved but nothing came out.

"...Well I accomplished something today." Marco grabbed the bottom of his shirt, and brought it up to his lips, wiping away the vomit and some of the paint. "Made a blue and green tree, I did that." Marco locked eyes with Ben, before starting to laugh again.

"This whole night has been one big schadenfreude clusterfuck."

Benedict laughed with Marco. Those were some absurd happenings tonight. Benny used his hands to push himself up and after what felt like half an eternity he managed to stand on both feet.

"C'mon, let's go back in," Benny suggested with a big grin. Then he looked at the puddle with a disgusted grimace to show that he didn't want to stay near this messy pool.

Marco laughed again, but it wasn’t as funny now. Benny wanted to go back inside, but Marco rather wouldn’t.

“Iunno maaan.” Marco felt like shit, and for some weird reason he was thinking it might not just be the paint and booze. “Thinking I should prolly call it quits.”

Marco wasn’t sure what there was left for him. There really didn’t seem to be a point going back in. Hell, he’d went into the garage in the first place to get away from the mong moshpit.

In a surprising amount of awareness Marco had realized it was probably not a good idea to go back into the building, even less so now that he was absolutely drenched in paint. But that wasn’t the point.

Before this, he was thinking that maybe he could find some way to stealthily wreck the party out of spite, but honestly, why?

What was the point? The damage was done. Ariana was going to do a /r thathappened and probably overblow everything out of proportion because of course she would. Emmett was going to continue being spineless because one joke outweighed like a year of friendship. Everyone else would shit talk Marco behind his back, or to his face if there were more than one of them for moral support, but that was nothing new.

Honestly he didn’t even understand why he came in the first place, he knew how people were. People took themselves too seriously, they didn’t want to have fun with others, they wanted people to have fun with them.

No you can’t have fun, because it’s not our fun. Marco didn’t get it. Marco could handle being the butt of the joke, especially if the joke was funny, he didn’t care. Everyone else on the other hand though, no they were off limits. They spend all their time shit talking and mocking, but when it comes to take their licks, no no no! Not me, you can’t pick me!

Marco didn’t want to go back inside. He’d rather stay out here, huff more pigment look at the stars then puke his guts out again, because even though he was murdering brain cells and tearing stomach lining, at least he felt good for a little bit before it happens.

“Why? What’re you planning on doing?”

"I dunno, man. It's waaaay too early to go home now-ah."

Benny shrugged. He still wanted to do something. He wasn't planning on missing more things. Marco on the other hand voiced that he wanted to go home and looked like he needed a break. Probably for the better for him to go home and sleep over the sickness. Benny staggered a bit into the direction of the entrance to the mansion again, following the sound of the music.

"I'm going back, for sure. Uh, you comin' or you leavin'?"

Marco didn't look too fucked up and seemed to be able to talk and stand properly enough. He was a big boy and would be able to walk home safely on his own. But it doesn't hurt to ask.

"Is your home far away from here?"

“Kinda.” It was weird though. Benny was nice. He wasn’t a shitter. He was like the rare individual that actually seemed to give a shit.

The fact he voiced his concern about Marco leaving, and the fact that it was about if he could get home rather then if he wanted to made Marco realize something even he hadn’t thought about.

Marco was planning on walking home alone, tipsy as fuck covered in paint. If a police officer found him he’d already be screwed and that’s not taking into account the fact he was covered in paint. He’d fail the breathalyzer even if he hadn’t coated his teeth in greens and blues.

“Maybe, iunno, maybe I should probably stay a bit. Maybe stay with you or something.”

They’d fare better if they didn’t walk home alone. But there was still another problem even if they waited to sober up before leaving.

“We should probably clean up though... we’re kinda fuckin’ looking like smurfs right now.”

Marco seemed to have changed his mind and now wanted to stay. Benny was fine with that. It wasn't like Benedict wanted to get rid of Marco or anything.

"Oh shit, yeah, we're covered in paint. There-there is uh, a bathroom somewhere."

Benedict walked further into the direction of the music.

"Soap and uh water should do."

Benedict gave Marco a confused look.

"I hope," he mumbled.

((Mikki Swift continued from The Good In Everyone))

"How the fuck did they open the garage?!"

Mikki's trip to the garage had involved more randoms stopping her in the hallway, accidentally getting some nasty-smelling drink spilt on her in the kitchen as she went to throw away the empty solo cup, grabbing a dishcloth from the sink that hadn't been stained or stolen yet, pocketing it for no real reason, before finally making her way to the garage door.

When she got there, she saw part of a scene that she suspected was happening - random shit scattered on the floor, a ladder not where it was supposed to be, spray cans nearby, and a paint-stained bag. Yup, some fucking burnouts had been doing whippets, like this was some poverty central joint. Mikki felt a spike of anger inside of her temple as she even noticed that the garage door was open, exposing the grody scene to the world, so she rushed over and piled everything into the bag, cans and random shit included, and threw it behind a box. If that was important shit to Forrest or her dads she'd have hell to pay tomorrow but for now she needed to find the fucking shitbags doing D-level drugs at an A-level party.

"WHERE THE FU-"

She'd rounded the corner to find the culprits in the grass; two boys contorted in various positions, over a giant puddle of vomit against the tree. The vomit was whatever, birds or insects or whatever would come eat it, or they could hose it away tomorrow, but these two weren't exactly masterminds, whoever they were, and probably mixed something they shouldn't have.

Mikki's determined pace upgraded itself to a concerned sprint as she ran over to the staggering idiots, noticing that one of them was Marco, the boy she'd just not too long ago threatened to remove from the party for starting shit. Shit, she was still going to have to yell at Ariana, right? Another time. Mikki mentally filed away whatever grievances she'd suddenly had with Marco and became an actual party host.

"Shit, you guys okay?!" Mikki's sprint caught up to Marco and...Benedict, was it? Whoever it was he was just as covered in paint as Marco was, only with less vomit all over his shit.

"You didn't swallow fucking paint did you? If I have to call an ambulance and stop my party I swear to god Marco you won't fucking live 'till graduation if I have anything to do with it, fuck."

First step, be concerned, make sure nobody was dying. Next step, reem them the fuck out for doing whippets at her goddamn party. But the first step still needed to finish.

Marco kept his head down as he leaned against the tree. He continued to spit up small globs of paint saliva as Benedict was mentioning they could wash off all the paint with a shower. Yeah that'll probably wo- Mikki was running right towards them. Marco had suddenly felt scared. Very scared. He stumbled back and gasped out. "Ap- Aww fuck!"

At that point, Mikki had closed the distance, and started questioning them. 'What the fuck were they doing, did they drink the paint, she was going to kill them'. The usual stuff, if you take out the 'did they consume paint'. Marco could only really give out "Err-" or "Ummm" as Mikki continued on. His eyes darted between Mikki and Benny, hoping for some sort of answer or something to really say.

It was pretty hard to focus, what with Mikki starting to freak out combined with the booze and paint on his brain inhibiting his judgement. "Derrr-errrumm…." Fuck. This whole night was a mistake! At this point he just said the first thing that came to his head, not really focusing on what Mikki was saying.

"Uhh… Yeah."

Oh shit. They were in trouble. Normally Benedict wouldn't be scared if someone angry came at him, but the paint-induction lead him to feel much more primal fear-y feelings.

"D-don't worry, Mikkey. Uh. We're. Both fine."

He stammered, but kept a grin on his face.

"No need to worry, heheh."

Benedict's confused head was not sure what to do next. His first instinct was to be ready to bolt. But that's not who Benny was. He wouldn't leave Marco alone. He had to take responsibilities for his actions. He moved

"Come on, Marco, hehehe. Let's- let's- let's uhm."

He didn't know what to say either.

"Jesus fucking christ at least the stoners can form a sentence."

The flare of panic in Mikki's stomach had rescinded the moment she realized neither Marco nor Benedict were in any danger of dying on party property. She was either being way too calm right now or had just been way too much of a spaz to think earlier, so now that she knew they were fine, she was fine.

Still, she felt that rush of hosting duty push her forward, so she followed her questions up.

"Well, not having you walking around looking like you just fucked in the throat by the entire Blue Man Group, so-"

Mikki tossed the mostly-clean dish towel at Benedict.

"Stay here, wipe yourselves down, I'll be back in a second."

Mikki turned heel and jogged back through the garage, returning under a minute with a 32 oz bottle of olive oil. Somehow, this wasn't the first time she'd had to clean some deadbeats up who'd gotten paint all over themselves, so she was well aware of what to do by now.

"Right, well you're not going back inside covered in paint, and you're not walking off into nowhere and falling into a ditch for the crackheads of Chattanooga to find you, so guess what boys, you're getting cleaned up. Who's wants to go first?"

Marco steadily calmed down as Benny managed to calm down Mikki. Phew. He thought he was up shit creek without a paddle for a moment. Mikki threw Benny a towel and left to get them more stuff to clean off with. He looked towards Benny as Mikki disappeared. "Well... That went better than we thought it would." Marco stared back at the house. "Yeah, I'm probably going home after this, I'm kinda done." Marco continued to lean against the tree, still feeling nauseous. Honestly, he was pretty sure this wasn't the paint at this point. He made the smart ass decision to drink a quarter bottle of straight vodka.

Once Mikki came back, Volker was puzzled. "Uhmm wait a minute..." She said she was getting us stuff to wash off with, why does this water look dirty? "Wait is that oil? What the fuck?" The realization hit Marco that they were going to have to use fucking COOKING OIL to clean themselves off. "Uhm…" No. No, no, no. That's just gross, ew!

"Wait a second, can't we use water?"

Crisis Averted. They were not getting kicked out yet, they just got some witty remarks about having had sexual intercourse with the Blue Man Group. Benny used the towel to rub his face into it while waiting for Mikki to get back, without much effect. Marco exclaimed his delight about their consequences not being as bad as they had expected and declared going home after this.

"Yeah, I-I think I'm also d-done."

Funny how stressful a party could be. Usually parties were less stressful and more relaxing. Oh, cigarettes. That'd help. He took out his pack of cigarettes out of his pocket and lightened one while waiting for Mikki to return. After taking two drags he could feel being much more relaxed. After five more he was not shaking anymore.

Mikki Swift returned with a bottle of olive oil and Marco was curious about whether that's right. Benny threw his cigarette to the ground and stepped on it.

"No, water doesn't help. Soap and oil are much effective to get rid of paint."

Benedict grabbed the bottle from Mikki's hands and splashed a portion into his towel. He rubbed his face into the now oily towel to demonstrate to Marco how effective it was. The towel was now very painty but Benny's face had a bit less paint on it.

"See? You should try it out for yourself. You got green on you."

Benny felt much more relaxed. He now aimed the bottle of oil at Marco's face and decided to pressure it between his fingers so the oil would splash into the green face of Marco. This was accompanied with a loud, but fake Benny laugh to cheer up the mood.