“Oh yeah?! And who made up that rule?!” complained Vianna as Ned pointed out the rule of all rules. She poked him in the ribs once more as he bopped her nose - this was no time to be treating her like his unofficial adoptive little sister! She was still determined not to lose. Not just yet. “This party’s going to flop anyway, and when it does, you still have to spend the rest of the night here. By yourself.”

Feeling rather smug and confident, Vianna didn’t wait for the boy to respond and continued, “I’ve brought just the necessary weapons to destroy your little party, Hall.” She waved an arm to gesture toward the armada of ghosts that had invaded the dance floor, turning from Ned and toward the ghosts with a bright smile…

… Only to find a good half of them circled around the dancing banana who had stolen the show - and their attention. A few of the ghosts even tried to copy its masterful moves before taking the giant fruit up in their hands to go crowd-surfing.

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me!”

Meanwhile, back at the bar, Victor was chuckling softly to himself. Not many things amused the boy, but Airi showing off her smarts was on his list of laugh-worthy things, especially when she was catching him off-guard. Like at that moment, when she kindly agreed to the boy’s accusation of Robert’s clumsiness, but in a way that the other Ravenclaw didn’t look all that bad. How typical-Airlia.

“Perhaps you need a new partner, then,” he suggested, dismissing the topic of the dumb nerd.

And then Airi was having a meltdown right before his cold blue eyes, as she finally came to the realization that MacGhilleseatheanaich DID have a crush on her. The look on her face was priceless, and Victor’s amusement transformed into a twisted sort of satisfaction as she turned to him for help. Oh, he loved when people asked him for help. Because it gave him the opportunity to deny it and watch them drown.

But.
Airi was a key element in his plan to destroy Robert MacGhilleseatheanaich the third.

“There is no way around it, Mondai. You’re going to have to crush the gi--MacGhilleseatheanaich's sweet little heart,” he said, taking a sip from his firewhiskey. And as he spoke, the pleased smile on his face completely contradicted the tone of concern he was trying to put on. Victor was usually good at hiding his true intentions, but faking kindness or concern for others had always been particularly challenging for him. He couldn’t begin to understand how some people were capable of expressing these emotions naturally.

Victor pretended to look thoughtful for a moment (he had already planned everything out the second Robert limped back to the group a few minutes ago) before speaking again, “I assume actually telling him your lack of interest would be… awkward,” he started, “So a better option might be to show him instead. Let him realize it on his own.”