They reached the dorms, and Max walked over to the large grey
building were a cranky old man who looked a lot like...a toad?! was
standing and reading off of a list. Max approached him and said,
"Hey Mr. T. Where are me and Frosty Boy going?" Mr. Toad looked at
his list, glanced back up, and said, "It looks as if you've been
assigned the same dorm, Room 504!" Max looked at him in horror.
"You're kidding, right?" Mr. T shook his head. "No, I'm not. Better
get settled! The Sprites will be around in a couple of hours."
"Well, I'm not too happy about this, either, Pizza Maniac," Boreas
quipped, smirking. "But I'd rather you than Flour Boy. By the way,
what are Sprites?"
Max sighed as he walked down the hall towards the dorm room. "The
Sprites are just that. Sprites. Y'know, Fairies? They come and help
you customize your dorm, and after that, they clean it."
Max shrugged. "Yep." They reached their destination, a dark brown
door with a gold plate that read, 504. Max pushed the door open, to
reveal a generic-looking dorm. "This will change once the Sprites
get here." He pointed to a door on the other side. "You want that
one?"
"Yeah, why not." Boreas opened the door, then closed it
immediately. "Wait. How does this work? Do I just...think of what I
want my dorm to look like or something?"
About an hour later, there is a knock on the door. Max is startled
awake and sits up. "Hm? Oh, yeah." He gets up and opens the door. A
tall woman and a short one, both with green hair and blue pantsuits
step in. "We are The Sprites. Oh, it's...you. Where is your
roommate?" Max walks over and knocks loudly on the door. "Frosty
Boy, The Sprites are here!"
The Sprites nodded. "I see you've given and appropriate nickname
for him...now, tell us what you want in your dorm room. We have a
lot of ground to cover." Max scratched his chin. "Hmm...same as
last year." They turned to Boreas. "And you?"
The taller one wrote something on her clipboard, and the shorter
one flicked her fingers. The dimensions of the two rooms seem to
wobble and distort, it is a dizzying effect. When it stops,
Boreas's room is just as he described, and Max's is painted in blue
and yellow, with a JOKER poster on the wall and a large silver
mirror. "Thanks!" Max says. They sniff in unison. "Just don't make
the same mistake as last year. In a flash, they are gone.
Max nodded. "It's too bad that they don't have any other powers,
they're really powerful. Like, they could make this room a swamp
filled with alligators with just a snap!"
Max looked at his wrist, pretending there was a watch. "Hmm..." He
then looked up at him. "I think in a few hours. It's almost lights
out. I'm gonna go see if Fauna is ok." He opened the door and
walked out.
Boreas wanted to go follow, but after his outburst today...it was a
no-go. Deciding to talk to Fauna tomorrow, he simply called to
Max's retreating shadow, "tell her Elephant Ear is a weird name!"