Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Melvin sat alone in his bedroom, the place dim save for the light of the sunset through the window, and a single lamp that illuminated his cluttered, but neatly organized desk.

He held his head in one hand, while the other tapped a pencil against the table as he contemplated a collection of blueprints for a new invention before him.

Thanks to the school being temporarily shut down due to… recent events... having left the entire elementary school building tipped on its side; for once he was without homework to do, and could spend all his time working on some new inventions.

Which of course deeply upset the school obsessed nerd, who as you could see when he got up from his seat and walked over to his science-themed wall calendar to longingly look at a marked-off date further down, was literally counting down the days until school would resume. 

Said calendar also showing that the word ‘Poopageddon’ had been marked on the calendar a few days before, but it had since been crossed out. And rather aggressively too in comparison to the clean red x’s he used to mark the passing of a day normally.

Picking up the red pen hanging on a string from the wall, he made another red x on the calendar, marking this as the third day since Professor Poopypants’s failed attempt to rid the world of laughter, before Melvin returned to his desk to continue working.

He started adding                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                a few notes to the blueprint, when he heard a small tapping sound.

Startling slightly, he looks back and forth for the source, and hearing it again, he’s able to zero in on the sound, finding that it was coming from his window.

Intrigued, he slides out of his chair and heads over to investigate, where he sees a bumble bee repeatedly head-butting the window, which stops and hovers in place as it sees Melvin approach, giving Melvin a chance to lean in and squint at it, getting a good look at its passenger. A tiny man, wearing a sparkly purple suit and a villainous smile, who waved at the boy and said a dubiously cheerful

“Hellooo Melvin.”

“Professor P?”

He replies in bewilderment, opening his window and allowing the bug and tiny man riding it to fly in, making a crooked looping path around the room before coming in for a landing on the desk. And Melvin, with an expression of wonder on his face, watching them go before trotting over and crouching at the edge of the table so he could see the tiny man gracefully dismount his bumble bee at eye level, his smile getting wider with excitement as the tiny Poopypants walked up to him and saying.

“You’re so tiny professor!”

“Yes yes, thank you for pointing out zhe obvious Melvin.” 

he replies sarcastically, brushing pollen off his sleeves before standing up straight with a clap of his hands and a click of his heels

“Now, vhere can we find your labor-atory?”

“Well… I mostly just use the garage, but mom and dad have some more advanced stuff in the basement I’m allowed to use sometimes.”

“Good! The more advanced zhe better, we need..”

He’s interrupted as he sees the incoming giant hand from the grinning Melvin, clearly looking to poke the tiny professor, and freaked out a little bit with a

“Vhat? What are you doing! Don’t poke me!”

Arms flailing angrily to try and smack away the finger, which recoiled away, but the shouting, noise, and giant hand had spooked the Bumble bee, which took off to the shout of

“NO NO NO NO NOOO!!!”

From Poopypants, as the bee looped around a few times before flying right back out the open window, earning a facepalm from the tiny professor, his face turning red and teeth clenching before he snaps at Melvin

“UrrrggggGGGG, NOW LOOK WHAT YOU DID!” 

though his anger is short lived as his tone quickly changes  to one more of misery and defeat 

“It’ll take me forever to catch another one of those.”

His sighs, letting out a short

“Fine, fine, I didn’t need it now anyway.”

Calming himself down a little before his attention shoots up again as he looks at Melvin, who was nervously rubbing the hand he had tried to poke Professor Poopypants with, looking a little guilty as the tiny professor aggressively walks towards him, rubbing his hands together and saying.

“Alright Melvin, zhere is no time to lose,”

Coming to a stop at the edge of the table and pointing up at Melvin

“ Now, show me around your house so I can get a fee-aling of vhat we’re working with here.”

There’s a pause as Melvin collects his thoughts, before his face turns from an expression of nervousness to a judgmental look of skepticism as he leans back and crosses his arms.

“Why should I?”

“...What?” 

Poopypants responds, taken aback with surprise, before continuing,

“Vhy are you suddenly asking why? I thought we had a good thing going here. I talk about extra credit… you do whatever I sayyyy… And besides! I let you tag along for zhe poopageddon! You think just anyone would let a fourth grader participate in that?

We brainwashed a whole school into having no sense of humor and fought a superhero in a giant fighting robo-toilet for pete's sake! How is zhat not the coolest thing you have ever done in your puny insignificant little adolescent life! You should owe me for at least zhis one last thing.”

“Ummmm, in case you hadn’t noticed? You aren’t a teacher anymore, meaning you can’t give extra credit.”

Melvin replies before he starts to pace back and forth a bit, still keeping his arrogant tone.

“And not only that, but it turns out the extra credit you were supposed to give me for helping with your plan never went through. Believe me, I checked multiple times .

So if anything, it is you , who owes me .”

“Oh right, I forgot I can’t bribe the little suck up with extra credit anymore.” Poopypants angrily muttered to himself under his breath before responding to Melvin with

“Fine, so I can’t give any extra credit. 

But, uhhhh…... you at least have to admit you had, ummmm…. Fun? Or somezhing? Helping me out with my villainous schemes? Right? ”

But Melvin isn't swayed.

“Yeah about that. You know this whole supervillain thing you’ve been doing? Having had some time to think about it…”

He starts counting on his fingers as he lists his gripes,

“We did kind of wreck the school , you had me skip over half a day of class without making up for it with my grades, we disrupted the other classes at school that day, we got the police involved who are still out there looking for the perpetrators, and we… ”

but he’s interrupted by Poopypants’s shout of

“Uuuuuggh, Melvin get a life outside of sckhool why don’t you!”

He says as he sits down sassily on the edge of the table, thoroughly unimpressed with Melvin’s whining.

And honestly … JUST WHAT did you EXPECT to happen with my whole ‘Super-villain thing’?”

(Poopypants doing finger quotes for supervillain thing)

“We literally made a giant robot attack toilet to oppress the masses with! And I explained to you many times about my plans to bring about a new world order!

The whole thing was literally spelled out for you in a comic book even! Vhich I know for a fact you read! Multiple times!!  

I could not have been more clear about my intentions.”

Melvins confidence faltering under the accusations, he looks at his shoes and fidgets.

“Yeah, but I didn’t think it would get the police involved… although... that does seem pretty obvious in retrospect….”

“Yeah, and who’s fault is it for not picking up on the obvious Melvin?” 

The professors tone still dismissive and sarcastic.

“Mine, I guess…but that still means…..It…. It means I broke the rules! I was complicit in criminal activities for personal gain!!! I’m no better than those troublemakers George and Harold!!! I’m gonna be in so much trouble!!”

Panic rising in Melvins voice as he starts clutching his head and hyperventilating, prompting Poopypants to hop up from his sitting position, waving his arms to get his attention

“Whoah, whooah there Melvin,” 

Moving closer to the edge and precariously reaching out from the table, the tiny professor pats Melvin on the elbow awkwardly

“Hey kiddo, nobody’s getting in trouble.”

The attempt at comforting having turned Melvins panic more into holding back tears.

“But,*sniff* we have to turn ourselves in don’t we?”

“No we don’t.” 

Poopypants says surprisingly sincerely and cheerfully with a smile

“*sniff* We don’t?”

“Pfft, nooooo. I mean shuuure, maybe if we’d been a bit more successful with zha poopageddon, Maybe I’d be fine taking a leeeeetle more credit for it. Althooooooough, considering zhe plan was foiled by a pair of fourth graders and an inexplicable giant flying baby man in a cape…”

“You mean Captain Underpants?”

“Yhah Yhah. That was just embarrassing,”

A bit of a chuckle in his voice, before his tone turned deadly serious

“ An embarrassment they’ll pay for…”

Before returning to his lighthearted tone with an awkward laugh of

“But who in their right mind would want to take credit for that? Really, vee should probably just cut our losses for now and call it a test run of ze humor disabling technology. And I don’t know about you, but I don’t go telling zhe whole world every time something goes wrong while I’m testing out one of my inventions, do you?”

Poopypants quickly looks at the table around him, and snatches up one of the blueprints before waving it around

“Like this one! Vhat if it blew up in your face while you vere testing it? Would you stop everything? Go and whine to mommy and daddy that you made a mistake and then give up?”

“No?”

Melvin responds questioningly, though looking away and fidgeting with the hem of his sweater vest, he continues glumly

“...No, mother and father made it clear I shouldn’t bother them with stuff like that…”

“Exactly! Because that’s what us vengeful science types do! You don’t give up and turn yourself in, you just suck it up, fix the various setbacks and unfortunate side effects, and keep going! Because stopping everything to go tell people about it would just waste time better spent making amazing world changing inventions! ”

“*sniff* I guess that’s true.”

Melvin replies, wiping tears from his eyes with a bit of a smile returning to his face.

“Hahhh, see? You aren’t some wimpy quitter who lets one leetle setback get them down! So no more of zhat sniveling,”

His tone going from comforting to mildly threatening as he continues with

“ And no more talk of turning anyone in.”

He puts down the blueprint and trots back to the middle of the table, putting on a more cheerful tone with a bit of spin and jazz hands.

“And heyyyy, I haven’t even told you why I came here looking for your help yet! Cus I’ve got something pret-tty cool plaaaaannned.”

“Are we gonna rebuild the Turbo Toilet 2000 and try to wipe out laughter again? Because I think they've already taken the Turbo Toilet to the recycling center.”

“NO! Welllll…. Maybe later.”

“But… if you don’t need my unique brain to help run the haha-guffaw-chucklomatus disabler ray, what do you need my help for?”

Poopypants looked back and forth at the contents of the table, before running to grab a blank blueprint paper and a small pencil that had been sharpened almost down to the nub, which even then still seemed large in Poopypants hand.

“Here, vhy don’t I just show you.”

Moving quickly, the professor smoothed out the blank blueprint and started drawing, Melvin leaning over top of him to watch. Intrigued, but still a little sniffly.

“I just need your help… building a few things… so I can get back to normal, and then, I’ll be out of your hair like it never happened.”

Words sinking in, a big smile grows on Melvins face with an excited shout of

“*Gasp* OH MY GOSH! YOU WANT ME TO HELP YOU BUILD A NEW SIZEARATOR 2000!?!!?!!”

He shouts, bouncing on the balls of his feet in excitement.

“ What !! Are you crazy?”

he snaps back, turning to Melvin in surprise, pausing his drawing for a moment to pace back and forth a few times

“The Sizearator 2000 was a true and utter masterpiece of science!! It is far too complex and delicate a machine for us to just go and build in some backwater suburban fourth graders house!

No! When I built that ray I was a scientific rockstar in my home country, with a tricked out lab, zhe biggest scientific research grants New Swissland could provide, and like, 3 whole interns to help me out!

Not to mention… I ALSO WASN’T STUCK BEING THREE INCHES TALL!!!”

Face red and steaming at that last bit, he turns away from Melvin, his anger fading about as quickly as it appeared, and his tone instead becoming more thoughtful, taping the pencil against his chin twice before he continues drawing.

“No, vhat you’re going to help me do is try and replicate some of my verrrry earliest working prototypes, vhich should give us juuuuuust enough to get me back to my normal size……. There .”

With a smile, he stands up, and turns back to Melvin with a dignified pose, revealing the two blueprint drawings showing the boxy looking shrinking ray and enlarging ray from the original captain underpants books, though each were connected to a lot of additional bulky equipment in the diagram. Giving the impression that together, these machines might take up a small bedrooms worth of space. 

He points to one at a time with the eraser of his nubby pencil.

“One is for shrinking, the other is for enlarging. Any questions?”

Melvin leaned in, squintily inspecting the drawings, which were a bit on the small side despite Poopypants having drawn them as large as he comfortably could, and he pointed to the image labeled as shrinking ray.

“…Yeah, ummm, why should we build another shrink ray if we only need to get you back to your original size? Shouldn’t we just build the enlarging ray?”

“I’ll tell you why Melvin. Because dhere is no way am I making that mistake twice!!

If we vhere to only build an enlarging ray, then before you know it, something would go wrong and zhen I’d be stuck as a giant man instead of a tiny man, which would make it even harder to build such a complex machine to undo the enlarging because I vould have thee giant sausage fingers.”

He wiggles his fingers for emphasis.

“Not to mention, if I end up too big to fit in a building? Oof, zhe terrible sunburns I would get waiting for my shtupid interns to fix zhe sizerator, not even able to enlarge me a giant umbrella or a giant bottle of sunscreen while I wait. So NO! We are building both before we even attempt to try to resize me.”

Turning back around, The Professor grabbed the pencil again, laid the paper flat, and started expanding on the blueprints, deconstructing the ray’s and listing parts they’d need, with Melvin continuing to watch him work.

“Ok Professor P…. although, I still don’t see why you need my help to build them. I mean, I’ve never even attempted anything this advanced before, and you were the one who made most of those impressive modifications to the Turbo Toilet 2000.”

“Oh believe me Melvin.”

He replies with an eye roll, but not looking up from his blueprinting.

“Coming to a fourth grader for help building my signature scientific invention isn’t exactly what I’d call zhe proudest moment of my life. But being three inches tall makes finding anything better a real pain in da hiney!”

He puts down the pencil for a moment to complain more thoroughly.

“Not only do you have to constantly worry about being stepped on, or hit by a windshield, or attacked by some shtupid bird, but every little bit of distance you have to travel is like ten times as long!

Like, do you have any idea how hard it is to get anywhere on a bee? You can never get them to fly in a straight line! I was getting queasy from all zhe loop-de-loops in the first 10 minutes! And zhey keep wanting to stop at every, flower, they, see, it is so annoying!

And everything is so spread out . I can’t find any one place with all the materials I would need to build anything useful, and on top of that, everything is so big and heavy, even if I find what I need, I can’t transport it where it needs to go at zhis size.

So then I figure, Oh, I’ll just catch a ride to a store downtown where I can find everything I’d need in one place for a basic robotic mech suit to even out zhe playing field for a while.

But then, after I FINALLY managed to flag down a taxi to try give me a lift to the city, I find out, OH, apparently I can’t afford to hire a taxi, ”

His face turning red and steaming again as he takes out his wallet, grabbing a handful of cash from it,

“Because Cab drivers WON'T ACCEPT MONEY ZHE SIZE OF CUPCAKE SPRINKLES!!

Furiously throwing the handful of paper money and coins, as well as his wallet, on the ground in front of him, the wallet bouncing and further spilling its contents of credit cards and coupons while the paper money fluttered softly to the ground.

“In fact, NOBODY WILL!! ”

The tiny Poopypants was literally vibrating with anger now, his hands balled into fists and his heavy breathing was through clenched teeth.

Catching his breath a bit he turns to Melvin and continues to yell, though with less intensity in effort to not blame his frustrations on the boy, or become too incoherent to be understood.

“For three days now I have been trapped in a 6 block radius of suburbia surrounding zhat accursed ele-mentary school!”

His head turning towards the window and pointing with one hand

“Look! Look at it!”

He runs across the desk, climbing a stack of books on the edge of it that’s close as he can get to the window, gesturing at it with one hand, his voice breaking and eyes turning sad as he says

“Zhis is as far as I managed to get in a full day of non-stop travel.”

Before falling to his knees dramatically, clutching his face in his hands and his voice taking on a defeated tone.

“And you can still see it from here .”

And indeed you could. Thanks to the school having been placed on its side, it was nearly six stories tall, easily dwarfing the surrounding 2-3 story residential homes that would have normally hidden it from view in the distance.

Melvin's gaze turned from Professor P. to the window and back again, feeling sympathetic to the tiny man and a little bit upset with himself for having underestimated just how tough Poopypants had had it these past few days in comparison to himself after the failure that was Poopageddon.

Hesitantly, he reached a hand out to gently pat Poopypants on the back, which was very jarring for the mini man, almost knocking the glasses off his face.

Spooked and quickly scrambling away and to his feet to avoid the giant hand touching him again, Poopypants tried to regain some of his composure, standing up straight with his heels together and pushing his glasses back onto his face with a finger, before saying.

“Well…*ahem*”

The professor clearing his throat to try and dispel some of the awkwardness.

“Soooooo, vhat do you say Melvin? Are we on the same page now? Can we get to work returning me to my normal size now?”

“Umm, sure Professor, I mean… I think so?”

“EXCELLENT!”

With considerable speed, the energetic miniature professor quickly rolled up the blueprint he had made like it were a giant carpet and offered it to Melvin, taking the opportunity of Melvin leaning over the desk to accept the blueprint to hop onto Melvin's arm and quickly scurry up him, startling the boy a bit, though it was short lived as he quickly calmed down when the tiny professor sat down on his shoulder and said with enthusiasm.

“Now, let’s go check out those labor-atories, I wanna see what ve’ve got to work with!”

A somewhat evil looking grin on his face and rubbing his hands together.

“Oh, I’m not supposed to leave my room during homework time.”

“…….Vhat.”

“It’s homework time. It doesn’t end for another half an hour and I am not supposed to leave my room during homework time.”

The professor sat there silently, mouth agape for a moment, then started wildly sputtering a bunch of half-finished words in shock and bewilderment, before finally being able to get out the words,

“But you shouldn’t even HAVE homework! Zhe whole school is shut down!”

“So?”

“SO!?! YOU’RE JUST SITTING AROUND IN YOUR ROOM FOR NO REASON!!”

“Well, it’s important to keep to the schedule, and I have plenty of things to work on anyway. Didn’t your parents ever assign you a designated homework time?”

“ NO!!! And they certainly never made it so that I wasn’t allowed to leave my room! Like vhat if you have to go to the bathroom! ”

Melvin took Poopypants gently from his shoulder and held him out in one hand.

He then leaned over and grabbed a nearby door handle with his other hand, giving it a turn and letting the door swing open.

“I’ve got my own bathroom.”

You could practically hear an angelic choir as the door opened, revealing a dazzlingly white and shiny full bathroom, complete with bathtub/shower. And at the opening of the door, a bunch of little fancy gizmo’s revealed themselves, nearly all of them clearly of Melvins own design, even including a soothing little ornamental fountain, just to send it over the top with fanciness and excess .

Professor Poopypants stared transfixed at the sight, until Melvin reached over and closed the door shut, snapping him out of it.

“…Okayy, I will admit, that is a REALLY nice bathroom.”

“Why thank you.”

Melvin replied with pride

“I have put a lot of work into it.”

“Yhah! You can really tell, what with that automatic tooth brusher and that little fountain, really just ties the room togeth… WAIT, NO!  We’re getting off topic! So you said there’s only 30 minutes of zhis…‘Homework time’…Left.”

Poopypants doing an extremely annoyed set of finger quotes over the words homework time,

“Vhat about after that?”

“Well then it’s bedtime.”

Melvin stated matter of factly.

“...Bedtime?”

He replies back, his tone the questioning disbelief of someone having their spirits crushed. Though Melvin doesn’t pick up on this.

“Yeahhh. I’m really not supposed to leave my room until tomorrow morning.”

“ TOMORROW MORNING!!!!!!! ”

The sudden shout giving Melvin a bit of a fright as Poopypants continues shouting,

“You expect us to wait until tomorrow morning!! We’ve got far too much work yet to do! We can not afford to be wasting time like this! Now show me the labs!!!!”

“But I’m not supposed to…”

“YES I KNOW MELVIN! YOU ALREADY MENTIONED THAT! YOU’LL JUST HAVE TO MAKE AN EXCEPTION!

NOW GO!!! NOW!!!!!”

Startled by the yelling, and not being the sort of kid able to refuse a direct order by an authority figure, he panics and almost drops the professor, before being spurred on by the professor's insistence like a startled horse.

Grasping the excitable professor a little too tightly in his hand, which silenced him with an unpleasant “*HURK*” sound, he runs to the door, throwing it open and sprinting down the hallway, holding the tiny professor at arm’s length out in front of him in both hands as if the tiny man would somehow lead the way of the fourth grader’s frenzied sprint towards the garage.

However it isn’t long before Melvins spooked sprint through the house is stopped dead in its tracks, as a feminine voice shouts.

“Melvin!!”

As he passes an open door, causing him to immediately freeze in mid stride, Poopypants still held out in front of him and struggling to breathe in the tight grip, as Melvins gaze slowly turns to the door, which opened into a mostly dark room, save for a single bright overhead light that directed nearly all its glow to a table in the middle of the room, casting unnerving shadows and silhouetting the room's occupant.

In the room, was a middle aged woman in a white lab coat and black rubber gloves, though her facial features were too shadowed to make out. She was seated, but had her head and torso turned to stare down Melvin from across the room.

In front of her was a table covered in circuit boards, delicate machinery, and the tools that would be used to work on them.

She started to rise from the chair…

Melvin, beginning to get his wits about him, quickly shoved Professor Poopypants in one of his pockets and tried to look innocent, rocking back and forth on his heels with a guilty smile on his face.

“Hello mother…”

The figure came into the doorway, revealing more of her features, starting with a mop of curly orange hair the same shade as Melvins, and a pair of big tinted magnifying goggles that almost looked like little telescopes strapped to her face, though she grabbed the outlandish gear and moved it from her eyes to the top of her head, showing another pair of square glasses underneath and a lightly freckled face.

“What are you doing outside your room! You should know better than to be going around making all this racket! You had better have a good reason for abandoning your studies during your designated homework time young man.”

“Well I, Uhhhhhh…”

Down in Melvins pocket, after having spent a few moments comically gasping for air thanks to having had it nearly choked out of him, Professor P. ever so carefully and quietly peeked out of the pocket to watch, readying himself in case he would need to make a break for it.

“ I’m waiting .”

Her tone showing how increasingly annoyed she was becoming with her offspring.

“Ive…”

Biting his lip, Melvin makes a quick glance down at the tiny professor in his pocket.

“I… need to go down to the garage to… cross reference my available materials to determine my preparedness for an unexpected extracurricular opportunity.”

She looks unconvinced.

“…Mmmm-hmmmm, and you couldn’t do this earlier to avoid being an obtrusive nuisance to the household?”

“It was… a bit too unexpected for that.”

He responds, refusing to meet her gaze.

Her eyes squint at him in a judgmental stare, but she relents, putting her goggles back on and heading back in the room to her work.

“Fine, but don’t let it happen again! And if I catch you stomping through the house like a crazed elephant again, there will be consequences!”

She sits down, puts her goggles back on, picks up a soldering tool and gets back to work on a circuit board, giving off a bit of smoke and flashing light as she worked.

A forced, uncomfortable smile on his face, Melvin stiffly takes a few quiet steps down the hall until he’s out of view and earshot of the door.

Where he lets out a huge held breath, bracing himself against the wall with one hand and continuing to pant and gasp in as hushed a tone as his racing heart and trembling body would allow, barely able to believe he had just done that!

He had just been deceptive to an authority figure! He had (almost) told a lie to his own mother! In order to protect a wanted criminal no less!

He didn’t know if he could take much more of this.

The professor, having stuck himself halfway out of Melvins pocket, looks at Melvin’s attempt to contain his panic with an expression of slight worry.

He thinks to himself for a moment, considering Melvins history of tattling on others and recent desire to turn the two of them in to the authorities. It’s clear that being even mildly tricky and underhanded would be more difficult for the young boy than perhaps it should be. He may have to play this more carefully than he was expecting.

He soon comes to the conclusion that perhaps some positive reinforcement was in order.

“Good job Melvin!”

Melvin pauses in his panting, his gaze turning down to look at the tiny professor, who he’s shocked to see is giving him a double thumbs up from his pocket, along with a twitchy, forced smile.

“…Really?”

Melvins mood quickly lightening at the praise.

The Professors fake smile growing even larger and more forced, with him beginning to sweat as he says through his teeth.

“Yhah… you... totally did it.”

Melvin rises, a smile returning to his face as he stands tall with confidence, which soon turns into a self-absorbed and cocky expression as he starts to cheerfully strut down the hall, with a whisper of

“Alright professor, let’s go see that garage!”

Poopypants lets out the breath he had been holding, slumping against the rim of the pocket and clutching his head in one hand as he says to himself.

“Ugghh, I can already tell zhis is going to be so much more difficult than it has to be.”

Now that he was a bit more with it, Melvin is able to carefully sneak down the stairs and the rest of the way to the garage without being noticed.

Taking the professor in one hand once again, Melvin opens the door, revealing a large 4 car garage that otherwise could have been considered pretty spacious…

If it weren’t cram-packed full of shelves filled floor to ceiling with sci-fi-esk technology and blinking, beeping scientific doohickys, with all additional space being filled with tables and workstations for all manner of scientific endeavors.

Much of it having that jury-rigged feeling of having been cobbled together from random junk and whatever broken machinery a genius fourth grader could get their hands on.

“HAH Hahhhhh! Now we’re cooking with plutonium !”

Professor Poopypants shouts, rubbing his hands together with glee, before turning to the boy with an exclamation of

“Melvin, Blueprints.”

Melvin obliges, handing the professor the rolled up blueprint from earlier, and lowering his hand to the ground, only getting about halfway before Poopypants hops off, quickly unfurling the too-large paper, and with cartoon impossibility, pulling the nubby pencil from earlier from out of his coat.

Before trotting down an aisle between two shelves with considerable speed, attention darting back and forth as he inspects its contents, and Melvin following close behind with an excited smile on his face.

“This is where my parents and I keep almost all our spare parts, so if we've got it, it'll be here. But if we're still missing anything, there's a scrap yard down the road which we can also check. That's where I get most of the materials for my personal inventions.”

“Good to know Melvin, wh’ell head over there first thing after vee finish taking inventory here. Now let’s see…. ve’ll need this one.”

He says scampering to an unrecognizable little gizmo and dragging it out from the bottom shelf. Melvin soon picking it up and trying to inspect it, but not having any time too, as Poopypants quickly pulls out another gizmo with a shout of

“And this one.”

Throwing it at Melvin and almost causing him to drop the first one to catch it.

“And zhis one.”

The stumbling having made Melvin fall behind the quickly moving professor, he has to jog a bit to go grab the new thing Poopypants had pointed at, while Poopypants climbs some random junk like it were stairs in order to reach a shelf more at Melvin’s eye level and continuing to walk along it, still holding the blueprint out in front of him and occasionally placing checkmarks by items on the list.

“And zhis one, and this one, ooo zhis one looks fun!  And this one… and those two.”

“Over here?”

“No, top shelf, and little more to the left.”

Putting down the growing pile of items, Melvin pulls over a rolling staircase and quickly ascends to grab the two bits of machinery, only to find them to be heavier than expected, making him considerably slower and more wheezy coming back down, while the professor continues on like this for a good while, up until it reaches the point where Melvin says.

“Professor, I can’t see what you’re pointing at.”

Turning around for a look, he sees Melvin, his face hidden by the large pile of materials he struggled to carry, his knees wobbling under the effort.

“Ughh...fine.”

The Professor replies, marching over to Melvin as he folds up the blueprint and stows the nubby pencil in his coat, before he jumps off the shelf and onto the pile of things Melvin was holding.

“Let’s drop these off at the table and then see vhat else we can find.”

“Sh-sure thing professor.”

Melvin replies shakily, before slowly making his way over to the table, each step Melvin took requiring considerable effort under the weight and size of the load.

Making it to the table, which was flanked by an impressive looking glass chemistry set full of differently colored liquids, he dumps the pile onto it, Poopypants gracefully riding the cascading pile down before he’s able to jump off onto the table itself. Smoothly unfolding the blueprint again and starting to pace back and forth; tapping the pencil against his chin a few times thoughtfully and saying,

“Already off to a good start Melvin! Good start….”

Catching his breath and wiping sweat from his brow, Melvin smiles at this as he watches the professor pace back and forth, Melvin clearly still enjoying himself a whole bunch with having a peer to do science with, and can barely contain his excitement when he replies.

“And I bet I can still find a lot more things we can use! What else do we need?”

The professor smiles and lets off a little chuckle seeing the boy so happy, reminding him of himself during his own childhood when he was excited about a new invention

(and let’s be honest here, well into his adulthood too, cus Poopypants is excitable and hyper as heck even to this day despite being in his late 50’s)

He fluffs out the paper and scans the page.

“Well let’s see!.. Do you have a toaster?”

“Uhhhhhh, no.”

His mood dampening somewhat at the first missing part.

“Cassette player?”

“...no.”

“...Hmmm, extension cables?”

“Yes!!”

Melvin shouts, running off then coming back with an armful of extension cables

“Fuses?”

Melvin holds out a large Tupperware container full of them, lightly shaking the box for emphasis.

“Tron-splitter?”

Melvin pulls a sheet off a large machine in the corner revealing a large ray gun looking thing and replying,

“Check!”

“Ooooo, vas not expecting you to have that one! How about an axionic reconfigurator?”

Melvin sets a pretty large and complicated looking contraption onto the table with a heavy thump before stepping back and saying proudly

“Got that one for-my-birthday.”

“Quantum resonator?”

“Dad’s got one downstairs in the basement.”

“Duct tape?

“Yeah, but you can never really have too much.”

“Ooooo, yhah, good point Melvin, I'll just put us down for some of the other basics just in case.”

He says, jotting a few extra things to the list.

“Nowwww… Telescope?”

“Oh….. do I really have to disassemble my telescope Professor?”

“Well, vee need more than one, so we’d probably have to go get a few more anyway, so I’ll just leave it on the list.”

“Thanks professor!”

Melvin replies as he runs off to go grab some more things. Poopypants continuing the checklist when he comes back in earshot to dump a few things by the table.

“Crypto-magnetizer?”

“No,”

Melvin pauses to rub his chin thoughtfully for a moment.

“But, I think if we were to combine the crypto-recombobulator and the retro-para-semi-magnetizer, we could probably make one!”

“Excellent! How about Tesla coils?”

Melvin gestures to a big set of sparking and zapping coils in the corner of the room.

“Hmmmm, smaller.”

Melvin pulls out a pair small enough to fit in the palm of his hand from behind his back.

“Larger!”

Poopypants motioning with his hands in imitation of something growing in size

Melvin picks up a medium sized set of tesla coils from a table

“PERFECT!!”

Time skips forward like a sped up video, the pile on the table getting larger and larger, and Melvin getting more and more tired, until, as time slows back to normal speed, he's leaning against the table, propping up his head in one hand and staring off into space through half lidded eyes. Mumbling yes or no every time Professor Poopypants lists off another part or material. Until he’s startled awake with Poopypant’s shout of

“HAH! That’s the last of it! A few trips to pick up the missing supplies, and we’ll have all we need to make zhe most basic forms of the shrinking and enlarging machines!

Oh no, wait. Heh heh… I feel silly even asking about this one, but you have a lava lamp right?”

He says, tapping the paper with the end of his pencil for emphasis.

“Lava lamp? Hmmmmm, nope. No lava lamps.”

“WHAT! But they’re like the most sciencey looking lamps there are! How can you be a genius child inventor and not have at least one lava lamp?!”

Melvin just shrugs. Which gets a frown from the professor.

“Fine, but when vee go shopping, we are getting two .”

Poopypants writing that down on the blueprint as he started to walk towards the edge of the table and continues with,

“One for zhe enlarging machine, and one for you to keep….. So I can feel less embarrassed hanging out with you.”

He says that last part dismissively as he hops off, using a pile of stuff near the table as stepping stones to safely make his way down.

“Now, before vee get started, I want to reiterate zhis Melvin. These rays will not be like the sleek and elegant sizearator 2000. Zhey will still be very bare bones, need constant repairs, and will no doubt break down after every use like some cheap lawn mower!

Zhey will be neither safe , nor reliable , and zhey certainly won’t be efficient! These things are gonna be killer on the electric bill, that’s for sure!”

“Well, *Yawn* it wouldn’t be the first time one of my creations has caused a blackout. And if we're being completely honest, it probably won't be the last!”

Melvin still managed to stay pretty excited about all this despite how drowsy he appeared.

“Zhat’s the spirit Melvin!”

Though the professor's tone then turns more intense and ominous,

“But I want to make sure this gets through your fragile little tiny child skull. Do not think you can be all cheeky and start humoring silly ideas of making your own sizearators behind my back once I'm gone! Zhis is very dangerous technology, messing around with it all villy-nilly could be potentially catastrophic!!!
And even if you were somehow able to start safely replicating zhe technology on your own, then it’d mean you’d either out yourself to zee authorities as having vurked with me, vhich could get you in big trouble and make things even harder on me because of it, or you’d be taking credit for my inventions.”

Though his tone lightens a bit as he continues with,

“Which is really just a jerk move in general Melvin, don’t go trying to steal another scientist's thunder.”

“*Yawn* sure thing professor. You can *yawn* count on me-WHOOPS!!”

As Melvin walked towards the tiny professor, he suddenly trips on one of the piles of spare parts that had grown on the floor after the space on the table had been filled, which then started a small chain reaction, causing even more things to fall loudly to the floor with metallic clattering, Poopypants having to leap out of the way to avoid being crushed in the mini avalanche.

Melvin quickly scrambles to his feet and motions like he’s gonna try and grab some of the parts that were rolling away, but freezes when he hears the sound of the doorknob rattling.

Someone was turning the handle from the other side! Melvin having hardly a moment to react as the door is suddenly swung open with a bang!

Though unlike Melvin, Poopypants, with his more trained reflexes, is able to quickly scamper behind the nearest shelf and out of sight just as the threatening figure came into view.

It was a middle aged balding man in a white lab coat and glasses, who was aggressively brandishing what was clearly some sort of laser-weapon, which sparked ominously and cast the man in an intimidating mad-scientist strobe light sort of glow.

Though a look of realization appears in his eyes as he says in a questioning tone,

“Melvin?”

Before lowering the weapon, all hints of intimidation quickly dissipating as he turns off the ray gun and sets it down on a nearby shelf, revealing him to be a very benign and mild seeming man both in looks and tone of voice, with what hair he had left on the sides of his head surrounding his chrome dome being straight and light brown, and his round dark green glasses appearing very similar to Melvins.

“I t-thought we might have been getting burgled, or at least that the raccoons might have gotten in again. What in science's name are you doing out of your room this late young man?”

Melvin takes on a surprisingly confident and proud of himself tone as he replies back,

“Mother gave me permission to use tonight's homework time to work on an unexpected new extracurricular activity in the garage.”  

Though his confidence is quickly crushed with his father sputtering back with,

“H-homework time? Son, it is 3 hours past your bedtime! ”

The father collecting himself more, crossing his arms and taking on a more scolding tone

“Even if you did somehow manage to get some unexpected permission to allow for a temporary change in your schedule, that is no excuse for t-this level of irresponsibility. How will you be fully prepared for school tomorrow when you’re missing 3 hours of sleep!”

“I…. actually don’t have school tomorrow, it's closed for the next 2 weeks at least...”

“That’s no excuse!!”

Poopypants, having taken the long way around, stealthily peeks his head out from behind a nearby shelf, dashing across an opening to hide behind some debris on the floor, thus closing some distance between him and Melvin.

His father then grabs Melvin by the hand and starts to pull him to the door.

“N-now you are going straight to bed young man!”

Though Melvin resists for a moment, motioning back to the spilled pile of parts and pleading.

“But I have to reorganize the pile!”

“It’ll be there in the morning.”

The father replies with disinterest as he picks up his hefty ray gun, giving Poopypants just enough time to dash out the door and hide before Melvin and his father pass through and close the door behind them. Melvin's father making a quick detour to put away the ray gun in a small closet by the door, before grabbing his son's hand again and leading him towards the stairs.

"Honestly Melvin, I don't see what could get you to fuss over some side project like this. Did you somehow fail to plan ahead for a school event?"

“No.. it’s not for school...”

“It’s not even for school!?!!”

Melvins father shouts as he reaches the stairs, still holding Melvin by the hand as he leads the boy up, with Poopypants darting close behind him.

The tiny professor comes to a pause at the base of the stairs and looks up at what might as well have been a mountain before him, giving him a sense of vertigo at the intimidating scale of the obstacle ahead.

Holding his face in one hand and letting out a sigh of frustration, he then sets himself to the task and starts climbing after them. The fully carpeted stairs making it slightly easier on him with each handful of shag giving him a solid handhold to climb with, despite the shake in the stairway with each step Melvin and his father make ahead of him threatening to dislodge the tiny professor and slowing him down even further.

“Is it for a science show outside of the school?”

“No.”

“Are you c-competing in a contest for a future scholarship?”

“No…. But it is an excellent learning experience!”

Melvins dad facepalms and let out a bitter sigh.

“Melvin, your whole life is a c-carefully structured learning experience. Meant to give you and the family the highest overall quantity of success in the scientific and academic fields as possible.”

Poopypants, panting and wheezing and soaked in sweat, manages to make it up the stairs, having to brace himself shakily against his knees for a moment to catch his breath, before stumbling to a nearby doorway to hide in, leaning against the doorframe and still wheezing as he peeks his head out just in time to see Melvin and his father reach the door to the kids bedroom down the hall.

"Is this some hormonally driven bid for independence Melvin? Do we have to take precious time from our b-busy schedules to set up another lecture about the irrationality of pre-teen rebellion for you?"

“No, it's not… no?”

“R-really? Because I would have expected better from you than to stay up past your bedtime working on some random, non-academically motivated invention like this.”

Melvin stares at his feet glumly.

“But... it’s important.”

He says meekly trying to defend himself, which just causes his father to stop and let slip a boisterous laugh.

“HAH HA HAH hah hahhhh.... Important!? Melvin, important inventions are for the adults . You only just turned t-ten years old, you’re not nearly capable of creating anything worthy of being called Important yet! And not one of those frivolous, j-juvenile inventions are worth disregarding the carefully calibrated schedule your mother and I have set up for you.”

Across the room, Poopypants temper rises at what he just heard, with his face turning beet-red and his tiny hands balling into shaking fists.

Melvins father then carefully shoves the dismayed boy into his room, who turns around to stare timidly up at his father as he fidgets with the hem of his sweater vest.

“M-maybe once you’re in college, then you can start thinking about staying up past your bedtime working on inventions. But for now, I don't want you to open this door until you’re scheduled to do so. Understand?”

“Yes sir.”

“Good. Now g-goodnight son.”

“...Goodnight father.”

And he closes the door maybe a little too forcefully, causing Melvin to flinch a bit at the impact.

The boy then turns around glumly, and walks slowly to his desk to tidy it up, his eyes downcast and dragging his feet as he moved. 

Making it over, he starts smoothing out and stacking the blueprints he had been working on, eyes lingering on his latest blueprint for a household appliance, the soda recarbonator. A special cup which prevents any soda put in the cup from going flat. 

His brow knits in a slight scowl, his fathers words about his inventions being juvenile and frivolous echoing in his mind as he puts a hand on the blueprint, the paper starting to crinkle under his hand as it starts to ball into a fist in anger, but then relaxes, with Melvin letting out a sad, heavy sigh. Instead smoothing the blueprint back out with his hand. Not being able to bring himself to take out his frustration on the soda recarbonator. 

Even if the invention might be inadequate for impressing his parents, that was his fault for not being good enough, not the recarbonators fault. And as his parents had made clear, even basic, unimpressive science for children is still of inherent value, even if it doesn't make one competitive among the higher ranks of academia his parents were educating him for. 

And Melvin, personally, still took some personal pride in his inventions, and had been looking forward to building the soda recarbonator. But the frustration was nonetheless still there.

He sighs again, before turning over the blueprint so he doesn't have to look at it, and instead starts stowing away his various drafting implements like rulers and calipers, when he hears a very small, but forceful knock at his door.

He immediately jolts to attention like someone who had missed a step walking down the stairs.

He had forgotten about Professor Poopypants!!

He hears the undersized knocking again, this time sounding more angry and forceful, and he rushes to the door, reaching out his hand to turn the knob, though he pauses with hesitation.

His father had specifically told him not to open the door until the scheduled time tomorrow morning.

His hand shakes in place a few inches from the doorknob, unsure of what he should do, but steeling his resolve, he closes his eyes and looks away, and grabs the doorknob to turn it, opening it just enough for the professor to slip inside.

You could practically see the steam rising off the tiny red-faced man as he stomps his little feet angrily into Melvins room, turning and grabbing the door, and slamming it shut behind him in a frankly impressive display of strength from the tiny man, and startling Melvin with the noise. Before turning back around with a growl through clenched teeth,

“WHERE DOES ZHAT GUY GET OFF CALLING MY SIZARATORS FRIVOLOUS, JUVENILE, AND UNIMPORTANT INVENTIONS HUH!?!? Lets see HIM win a Nobel peace prize in inventing stuff!!! I've never even heard of a ‘Doc-tor Schmee-dlly’ before, and he thinks he can insult MY inventions?”

“Umm, professor, its ummm… his name is Dr. Sneedly . With an ‘N’?”

“Yhah yhah, whatever Melvin. 

Poopypants starting to cool down, but still crossing his arms in a huff at the indignity of having a less credentialed scientist unwittingly critique his top scientific accomplishment.

Melvin rubs the back of his head nervously, trying to get a bit of a handle on the situation.

“Well…. So I guess you’ll be sleeping… here? Somewhere?”
Melvin looking around the room trying to think of how he was supposed to accommodate the tiny professor.

Poopypants removes his glasses briefly to try and rub the frustration out of his eyes.
“Yhah… looks like that's all the pro-gress that is going to be made for today. Should probably hit - tha - hay, or however it is that saying goes.”

“Sooooooooooo, how is this, supposed to uhh… work?”

“Vhat? Sleeping?”

Poopypants replied condescendingly.
“Oh you knowww, it usually involves a bed , where you then would be expected to lay down with ones head on a pillow, perhaps get all snuggly under some covers, and then gradually lose consciousness as one enters a state of dormancy which zhe layman would colloquially describe as sleeping . Any of zhis ringing a bell Melvin?”

“Right! Bed, Pillow, blanket. Let me seeee, what I haveeee…”

Melvin goes over to his closet and opens it. Revealing a number of inventions to help with sorting clothes and such, to which Melvin gives the command of,

“Closet, retrieve spare pillow and blanket.”

And a little mechanical arm reaches into the top shelf and delicately hands Melvin a pillow and a neatly folded sheet with a colorful pattern based on artistic depictions of atoms. And then looking around the room thoughtfully, he trots over to the other side of his bed away from the door, Poopypants following along behind him, and opens the lowest shelf of a dresser. Where he then sets up the pillow and blanket in the drawer like a little bed one might make for a kitten. Then gestures at it to the professor.

“See, this way you won’t be in an obtrusive location that can be easily tripped over, but you also can’t easily be seen from the doorway in case my parents come to check on me.”

“Oooooo, yhah, good thinking ahead Melvin. Would rather not have to deal with those two.”

The mini professor climbs up onto the pillow and plops himself in the middle of it comfortably. 

“Yhah, this’ll work.”

“Well…. okay. Alright then. Guess I'll just start myyyyy….”

Melvins tone getting a bit braggy

“Thirty three step nightly bedtime hygiene and skincare routine!”

“Thirty three steps!? What are you, an actress in her late twenties desperately trying to cling to the same appearance she had at 16? Just brush your teeth, and like, wash your hair or something!”

The professor turning around to tell off Melvin a bit more directly as the kid opened his bathroom door.

“And newsflash Melvin! Ten year olds do not need to be having a skincare routine! Your skin is already soft like a little baby at that age.”

“Respectfully, disagree.”

Melvin replied a bit smugly as he closed the bathroom door behind him.

Professor P. plopped back into the soft pillow, staring up at the clearly labeled constellations of glow in the dark plastic stars on Melvin's ceiling, his eyes slowly closing….

Before he's suddenly jolted awake, letting off a small scream of surprise and attempting to scramble away. His eyes focusing to see Melvin in a science themed pair of pajamas and slippers standing in front of his open bathroom door with steam gently filtering out the doorway, his arm still outstretched from when he poked the tiny professor awake.

“Hey, Professor, the bathrooms free if you need it.”

Poopypants angrily frowns then groans and drags his hands down his face in an expression of exhausted and annoyed frustration.

“uuuuUUHHHGGGGG MELVIN! FOR THE LOVE OF…… Don’t just! UGGHHHH!”
The tiny professors voice takes on more of a whiney tone as he rubs his eyes again.
“Melviiiiiinnnnn, I am sooooo tired, I had to climb so many stairs that vere just, so shtupidly huge. I've been having to sleep in like trees and under rocks and stuff, and I just have not had a real break for days! Just STOP BOTHERING me until morning!”   

“Really? Uggh.”
A twinge of disgust on Melvins face and in his tone.
“You’re really not even going to brush your teeth?”

“JUST GO TO BED MELVIN!!!!!”

He pauses, then shrugs, closes the door to the bathroom, then heads to his neatly made bed. Pulling back the covers, stepping out of his slippers, getting in, taking off his glasses, setting them on the nightstand, and laying in bed quietly for a moment, before turning towards Professor P and saying,

“Hey Professor, you think maybe tomorrow we could…”

But he’s interrupted with Poopypants’s retort of,

“Melvin!! Zhis is not some guurly child sleepover for you to wax poetic about zhe mysteries of life until 3am! I’m only even here because it would probably take me like… a week to find a hotel!”

“Huh… are you implying this qualifies as a sleepover? Because…. Well I suppose I wouldn't know if it was. I don’t think I've ever had a sleepover before.”

“I am implying it is NOT a sleepover Melvin! Pretty shure it does not count as a real sleepover unless it's with chil-dren your own age doing… like… silly sleepover activities.”

The visual style changes to a more abstract thought bubble style of animation as Professor Poopypants starts to paint a picture with his words.

“Zhis is more like being trapped in someone's house because your car broke down and zhere's nowhere else to go for miles. So you're stuck there waiting for ze tow truck.
But it turns out the house belongs to one of your former coworkers you don’t know very well.
So on the one hand, zhey probably aren't some scary weirdo with a basement full of human bones who are looking to add yours to their collection, but on zhe other hand, now it's even more awkward because you've got to act all nice and chatty and ‘catch up with old times’ even though you barely knew zhem. Vhich is almost even worse vith just how painfully awkward it is!”

Melvin's expression loses a bit of its luster.

“Oh…. I suppose that would seem to be a more accurate analogy for the current predicament.”

“Ehh don't sound so disappointed kiddo, you probably aren't missing out much anyway. In my professional experience, zhe whole cohabitation thing is rarely all it's cracked up to be. Suuuure it MIGHT SOMETIMES be fun the first couple days, but just wait til you’re in college where you’re having to live with roommates who are blasting their rock and roll records at 3am and eating their grandmothers sauerkraut straight out of the jar with zheir unwashed hands!”

That sauerkraut comment kinda threw Melvin for a loop.

“....I will admit, that doesn't sound particularly pleasant.”

“Yhah, though thee MOST frustrating part is pro-ba-bbly just not really having your own space anymore. Everyone leaving all zheir stuff everywhere, not cleaning up after zhemselves, having to put up with snoring, zhat sort of thing. And made worse with not having all zhe amenities of home on top of zhat, since college dormitories can be pretty bare bones. Back when I first stayed in a dormi-tory, we did not even have like, an oven… or a refrigerator.” 

“Oh… I… I've…. never really thought about college like that before. I know I'm supposed to go to college someday. Perhaps around when I turn fourteen. But, staying… somewhere else? That doesn't even have a refrigerator? Kinda blowin my mind here dude.”

The Professor pauses for a moment, picking up on the implications, and sat up in his little makeshift bed to turn towards Melvin, saying in a curious, and slightly worried tone of voice,

“Melvin, I know you said you've never been to a sleepover. But have you really never even traveled before? Like… on a vacation? Or to visit some weird old relatives or something?”

“Well…. No. Can't say that I have. But… there have been quite a number of times where grandma has come to stay with us.”

His voice getting bitter as he says through a scowl.

“Grandma Margaret and her three cats shedding everywhere, knocking things over, and making me sneeze all the time.”

His voice starts rising in anger

“I keep telling my parents that I am old enough, and responsible enough, to be left at home alone when they leave to attend their science conventions. But noooOOOOooooo, they keep getting Grandma Margaret to come babysit with her three cats! And I end up being too busy sneezing the whole time to get anything productive done !!!”

Melvin even kicking his feet in frustration a little near the end.

“Never even spent zhe night outside your own room huh?”

The professor ponders for a moment, rubbing his chin thoughtfully, before a bit of an evil grin splits across his face.

“Heh heh, vell if you think ol granny coming to visit is bad…”

The Professor pitched his voice low like he were telling a scary story, spookily gesturing with his hands for emphasis.

“Imagine spending zhe night at a place with… a Regular Bathroom.”

You could practically hear the dramatic “DUN DUN DUUUUUNNNN!!!” musical horror sting as Melvin gasped, pulling his covers up to his eyes in fear, as Poopypants leans in further with even more sinister a tone,

“No more being able to do your thirty-threeeee step nightly hygiene and skincare routine! You vould have to go months without zhe automatic tooth brushers or zhe self washing toilets! Because building codes vould not allow such heavy modifications to the existing structures of the dormitories…. to keep up with zhe high turnover rate of students!!”

Melvin gasped in terror again “They… wouldn't even let me install my inventions from home??? Professor P. that sounds horrible!!” 

Panic starting to leak into Melvins voice As Poopypants let off an evil laugh and even slapped his knee at how hilariously easy the sheltered little nerd was to tease.

“HA HAH HAH Haaahhhhh…. Ahhhh, nawwhh I'm just messing with ya Melvin. Your parents probably won't send you to a regular college. Zhey've probably been saving money your whole life to send you to some fancy school with a fancy private dormi-tory and keep you from having to slumm it with zhe rest of de students.”

He falls back into the pillow with a slight bounce of the cushion, tiredness creeping into his voice.

“Not zhat it will do you any good with learning to be independent or getting zhe street smarts enough to stand up for yourself being shtuck on your own your whole life. But hey, zhat ain't my problem. Long as I get to wipe out laughter, I don't care vhat you do with your life.”

The professor settles into the pillow more, and showing his age a bit, his breath slows, and he quickly falls back to sleep with the sound of tiny snoring. Melvin glancing in his direction for a moment, before looking back up at the ceiling, deep in thought. Clearly, the kid had a few too many things left to think about before he would be falling asleep as well.