When Chanyeol and Minseok arrived, the party had been going on for a couple hours. They didn't mind crashing it fashionably late.

Chanyeol eyed the others eagerly. "A lion, a tiger, and a panda bear. Oh my," he sighed. "It's like a smorgasbord."

"Buffet closes at one. Remember your curfew."

"Sure thing. . ." But he was already making his way to the lion.

"Oh, look. A pussy." Minseok stiffened. Even softly spoken, that voice was like dropping ice down the back of his shirt. "Left your pet home for the night, did you?" Kyungsoo sneered.

Evidently, he was a striped insect. A queen bee, which Minseok really wanted to comment on, judging by the tiara and wand-slash-staff he carried. Baekhyun, a fairy that dropped glitter with he slightest movement, and Jongdae, wearing lens-less glasses and tapping a ruler against his hand like a riding crop, stood to Kyungsoo's immediate left, just a step behind him. To his right, Yixing spaced out, in awe with all the costumes and touching his dark, feathery wings.

Minseok smiledand shrugged a shoulder, latex creaking. "Nah, I just let him off his leash. He's sniffing out some treats tonight. Careful. He's aggressive when hungry."

"I'm sure you'd know."

"Jealous?"

Kyungsoo couldn't respond without sounding like a petulant 4-year-old, so he settled for rolling his eyes and brushing passed, smacking Minseok with his wing.

"Bitch."

"Cuntwagon."

Baekhyung and Jongdae tittered behind Kyungsoo, mindless drones following their queen. Yixing paused long enough to smile at Minseok. "I like your costume; you look very cute."

"Thanks. . ." 'Cute' wasn't quite the idea, considering skin-tight latex and knee-high boots, but Yixing's attention was more on Minseok's face than body, appreciating the black lines across his cheeks that Chanyeol had insisted on.

Yixing nodded and slipped into the crowd. He was an airhead, but he was the easiest to get along with in the plastics. He was probably only kept around because he sang and didn't mind the others' insufferable personalities.

The party was largely like all Kyungsoo's other parties. Lots of loud music, loud conversations, and even louder personalities, particularly when the red plastic cups were set up in the kitchen.

Minseok caught sight of Chanyeol every once in a while, chatting up unsuspecting freshmen.

Speaking of freshmen, Jongin had Lu Han trapped in a corner, hovering over him as if to block out all sight of the hundred-plus potential spectators. Lu Han looked content enough fiddling with his soccer ball but smiling brightly at whatever the dancer--appropriately dressed as a Chippendale--was saying.

He made his way outside, where people still took up every inch of space around the in-ground swimming pool. That delicate sense of personal danger didn't start shrieking until he felt something his the back of his shoulders, and he pitched forward.

The water was frigid. Night time in October does that. Minseok broke the surface with a spluttering gasp and immediately coughed on the chlorine water. Safely on dry land, the others laughed or groaned in sympathy, but no one offered to help him out, and while his costume didn't allow much movement even dry, it was near impossible to move when wet. Which was odd, since it was practically a scuba suit. He had to swim until he could reach the bottom of the pool and climb up the steps.

A red and white soccer ball touched the edge of the steps innocently.

"So it's true. Cats really don't like the water." Bee, fairy, and questionable educator all smirked at him.

Minseok shivered in the cool air, but his body was on fire. He shook his hair from his face--the eared headband was gone--and stared Kyungsoo right in the face. "Better be careful, queenie."

He stalked passed the wide-eyed not-so-innocent and accidentally lost his balance, slipping on water that conveniently dripped off him and bumping his bony shoulder into what little was there of Kyungsoo's. The grand tiara slipped from around the pom-pomed antannae and hit the ground with a bounce. Minseok recovered his balance and caught the tiara. With his boot.

It crunched.

"Bees die after they sting."

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