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"Preposterous. No, absolutely not, this is--"
"Everything you've always wanted to do?"
"This is the worst idea I have ever seen from you, and that says something, Claude von Riegan." Lorenz Hellman Gloucester pinches the bridge of his own nose, and Claude swears, that might just explain why it's shaped that way. It's hard not to be amused at the man's reactions, especially when they're so intense. "...you seem to be staring. Do me a favour and cease this instant."
"Too true. Couldn't help myself, really." Easy smile, easy dismissal and shrug. Lorenz huffs even more. "You'll see, though. By the end of this, I'll have sold you completely that--"
"It is impossible. You will not ever, not in a million years, convince me again that I can… I can kill an ant by screaming at it."
From the back of the Golden Deer classroom, Hilda cracks, failing to stifle her cackling any longer. Lorenz is red enough that Claude worries he could blow.
"Oh, please, do not tell me you were in on this as well." He practically stomps over to her, and there's tears streaming down her cheeks by the time Lorenz arrives. "You two are incorrigible! Out of all the senseless, inane arguments, I--"
"Gloucester, please. You're just upset because you didn't make it work the first time! You just have to scream a liiiittle bit louder, and--"
"Goddess, you are insufferable! Do you sincerely think that this is doable?" Thank the heavens Lorenz's capacity to be worked up is higher than his suspicion towards Hilda and her laughter. "Why would you not do it yourselves, then?"
"Elementary, my dear friend." Claude flourishes with a bow, and at the end of his extended arm, a small, dead ant. Lorenz scoffs just at the sight. "Behold! The fruit of a successful experiment!"
"Ridiculous." He bends to examine it closer, and the result is still the same. "Poppycock. I refuse to acknowledge your… your experiment. For all I know, you may have killed it a number of different ways."
Yelling an ant to death, it turns out, would never be popularized. Figures.