Music room 3, the home of Ouran High School's infamous Host Club.
The doors are wide open and the sounds of chatter and laughter come from inside.
He curtsies elegantly.
"Now, was that your test," he wonders, inclining his head toward one twin, "or yours?"
Kaoru shoves something into his hand and both twins abruptly shove away from him and race out of the room.
"This is not particularly chivalrous!" he calls after the twins.
Bomb defusal, bomb defusal, bomb defusal. Shockingly, Belinda's etiquette lessons didn't cover this. Nor did her magic lessons. He actually doesn't even know if just pumping the thing full of dissonance will break it or just make it blow up faster.
Ariel makes a snap decision. He grabs an empty covered dish from a nearby table and shoves the bomb inside. Then, focusing on harmony, he tells the dish that it's made of metal and metal is strong, it's like steel, it's harder than steel, it's bulletproof and more relevantly bombproof, it's - well, that's going to be a minute. He puts the dish on the floor and waits for the boom.
Ariel laughs.
In retrospect it probably should have been obvious that the Hitachiin twins were not actually going to murder him with a bomb. He feels kind of silly. Well, at least he passed their first test, even if he did make an ass of himself on the second.
The twins re-enter, look at each other, and shake their heads sadly.
"Ah, the wasted potential," Kaoru says.
"What's the point in saving someone's life if you're going to look dumb doing it?" Hikaru says.
"If you don't know what you're doing, you should leave it to the professionals."
Hikaru nods at Mori.
"Well, at least I saved myself from the terrifying rain of confetti," Ari chuckles. "I do apologize, gentlemen. My reflexes took over; I need to adjust to less murderous society than I am accustomed to."
"We," he says, "are going to play Go."
He snaps his fingers and the twins hurry into a closet and return with a Go table.
Kyoya pulls up a chair.
"White or black?"
"White, please."
Ariel sits as well, crossing his legs casually. "If you're looking for professional play, I regret to inform you that you'll be disappointed. My game is chess." And he's barely any good at that, not that he'll mention that now.