Love is a movement
Love is a revolution
--Switchfoot

"Bruno," Boots begs, "be reasonable!"

"Absolutely not!" Bruno strikes some sort of pose that he probably thinks stands for truth, freedom, and the MacDonald Hall way, but really just makes him look like a drug pusher.

"Just come back into the room," Boots wheedles, eyeing the passing students of Dormitory 3 who are rubber-necking at the situation. Boots can't blame them; the pith helmet and unit standard (i.e., Bruno's hockey stick with a construction paper sign affixed that reads "REVOLUTION NOW QUESTIONS AFTER LUNCH") is a new low even for Bruno. "Please, Bruno, people can see you!"

"Then they'll know that the Revolution starts here!" Bruno announces, starting down the hall, banging his hockey stick along the floor, and Boots knows that there's no stopping Bruno Walton when he starts speaking in audible capital letters, but still he's hoping to actually make it through his last year at the Hall by graduation rather than eviction, and he dashes out of the doorway of 306 to catch Bruno.

At the end of the hall, Boots gets in front of Bruno just as he opens the door to the stairwell and throws his arms wide to barricade the doorway.

"I can't let you do this!"

"Out of the way, O'Neal." Bruno swings the hockey stick within a half-inch of Boots' nose, but Boots has long since grown immune to these empty threats. "You're holding up the war machine!"

"Bruno, please, there has to be some other way!" Boots gropes frantically for a way to distract Bruno until at least after World History, when he'll have had some time to think. "We can have a meeting of the Committee during lunch!"

"There's no time for that!" Bruno snaps, face flushed and eyes glinting in a way that would make Boots want to strip him down and roll him over right there in the hall, carpet burn or not, if Bruno weren't focused on ruining Boots' life at this particular moment. "It's five minutes to class! It's now or never, Revolution waits for no man!" Bruno turns to march down the hallway to the other staircase.

"Five minutes to class?!"

Pete's door comes slamming open, catching Sidney square in the back as he passes by, and throwing him forward to slam against Boots' knees, who is still stationed unfortunately at the top of the stairs. Boots has just enough time to see Bruno turn around with a look of comic shock that no doubt matches his perfectly, and then everything goes warm and dark.

It's the most perfect dive with a three-quarters flip in the history of MacDonald Hall; unfortunately there is no pool at the bottom of the stairs.

When Boots wakes up, his head and wrist are both throbbing, and Bruno is half in a chair beside Boots' hospital bed, half sprawled on top of Boots' legs, fast asleep and drooling. He's still wearing the pith helmet.

"Hey." Boots reaches to shake Bruno, then hisses several choice obscenities when he accidentally uses his hurt wrist. Cradling his injured arm against his chest, Boots moves his leg over instead and jabs Bruno in the cheek with his knee.

"No oatmeal, thanks," Bruno mumbles, then cracks an eye when Boots jabs him again. At the sight of Boots awake, Bruno launches himself up to wrap his arms around Boots' waist, chin digging into Boot's rib cage, and when the attack seems to have mostly settled, Boots lets his hurt arm rest across Bruno's shoulders.

Bruno mumbles something, and Boots uses his good hand to push Bruno back a few inches so he will stop delivering secret messages directly to Boots' intestines. "What?"

"I said, you're alive!" Bruno scuttles back into his chair, and Boots winces as his wrist jars again, but says nothing because Bruno's face and arms are covered in wrinkles from the sheets, which means that's he's been here for a good while.

"How long was I out?" Boots asks, noticing that the light outside the window is golden with late afternoon sun, and that Bruno's eyes are a little bloodshot.

"Five hours." Bruno's voice is quiet, and he's twiddling the sheet between his fingers.

"How did the revolution go?" Bruno looks at him with puzzled eyes, and Boots clarifies, "I mean, did you come here afterwards or what?"

"Oh, that." Bruno smoothes the sheet back down and gives Boots a smile. "It was cancelled."

"Cancelled?" Boots groans, thinking about how long he's going to be hearing about this; 'we were totally going to change the face of education forever, but then O'Neal here went and cracked his skull open'…

"We can do it later," Bruno shrugs, and Boots' jaw drops. "Besides, they had to take you away in an ambulance, and there were sirens and flashing lights, and Elmer fainted, so it was kind of like a revolution after all! Mark's got it all on film, we're going to have a showing as soon as you get back."

Something warm and liquid washes through Boots' veins as Bruno goes busily about inspecting Boot's wrist, and he hopes fervently that it's morphine.