Warning: excessive amount of actual quotes .

Phil followed Dan upstairs, expecting Dan to either be passed out asleep on Phil's bed, or getting ready for bed tiredly. What he didn't expect to be greeted with, was Dan scrambling through his games collection.

"Dan, what are you doing?" He asked.

"Looking through your games, what does it look like?" Dan replied, like it was obvious.

"Yes, I know that, but I thought you were tired. You couldn't even get up the stairs earlier."

"And now I'm not," Dan said, smiling. Phil rolled his eyes at Dan's weird behaviour. He really did change his mood quickly. Maybe he was past the point of tired now, to the point of a huge amount of energy for no reason. "Philly come play," Dan instructed, when Phil had yet to respond. Yep, Phil had no doubt that Dan was tired. He kinda wanted to see where this went, find out more about this tired side of Dan.

"Okay fine. What do you want to play?"

"How about mario kart?" Dan suggested, chucking the box over to Phil.

"Looks like I have no choice in the matter," Phil grumbled, despite not actually being bothered. He was certain he could beat Dan at mario kart, he was the master of mario kart. He went over to the console and inserted the disk, and Dan grinned childishly, then plopped down on the floor, waiting for the game to start up.

"I'm so gonna beat your ass at this Phil," he boasted. This made Phil smile, Dan really was competitive with everything, which was sort of odd, considering he never liked to try hard.

"Oh, I don't know about that," Phil challenged.

"Philly Philly Phil, what have you gotten yourself into," Dan sang, shaking his head.

"You're the one who wanted to play." Phil pointed out. Dan just rubbed his hands together in glee. The music started up and it was enough to get Phil excited, and confident about winning. "But you know, I'm gonna totally win this...beast" He added halfheartedly. He knew he was going to win, that wasn't the problem, he was just rubbish at showing off while still sounding sophisticated.

"Can't handle your fighting talk" Dan scoffed sarcastically. Phil looked lost for words as that, as clearly he wasn't very good with retorts. Dan clicked through the game, getting to the different cc options. He hovered over 150cc.

"No way!" Phil objected.

"Oh come on Phil, go fast or go home," Dan insisted. Phil sighed, there was no way Phil could do 150cc, which really highlights something he wasn't willing to admit. If Dan could handle 150cc and Phil couldn't, Dan would truly be better than him, and his pride was not ready to take a bashing tonight. There was a chance, however that Dan was just bluffing and trying to make Phil admit he wasn't as good, but not actually be able to win with this speed. So yes, Phil would have to give in and do 150, just to show Dan up.

"Okay sure, if you want to lose go right ahead," Phil said, as calmly as possible.

"150 it is then," Dan confirmed, smiling like a cat who got the cream. Phil rolled his eyes at Dan, the guy that had gone back to his usual arrogant self, who assumed he was going to win. Phil's face hardened with determination after thinking that. He would win, just like how he would win the jumper contest.

--

To say Dan felt happy would be an understatement. He just felt so at ease for once in his life. He'd only known Phil for a few hours but it had already become difficult to dislike him. Sure, he was still as annoying as ever, and just as competitive, but instead of that making him angry, he kind of liked it? was he some sort of masochist who enjoyed putting himself in pain? He honestly didn't know. All he knew was  instead of feeling like he wanted to show Phil up by winning mario kart, he just felt like he wanted to spend time with Phil, while maybe seeing that sad look on his face when Dan was ahead of Phil by miles. But it was in a completely different way to before. He couldn't really explain it, it was just something he felt.

Dan was quite content moving around the course, absentmindedly pressing all the right buttons to move while thinking all of this, and still winning, when Phil interrupted his state of harmony. It had only been a minute into the course but clearly Phil was getting bored, or maybe subconsciously saying things.

"I'm skidding. I'm gonna take the left one," Phil commentated. "jump" he instructed himself. With that, Dan looked over to Phil annoyed with a questioning face, and then drove into the wall of the road.

"don't narrate everything I'm doing, you're distracting me" He whined. When Phil smirked with success Dan accused, "is that your strategy, distract me with irrelevant comments?"  now trying to focus again on the game.

 Phil ignored Dan's words and seemingly carried on playing. "take this turtle cannon" he said, when he threw a green shell at Peach.

"It's a green shell," Dan corrected, again distracted by Phil's stupid comments. Why hadn't Phil used this level of distraction while making the jumpers? clearly he was a natural. Dan then thought back to the conversations, and listening to muse and realised, that's what Phil was doing all along!

Again, Phil ignored Dan's comment and muttered, "stupid baby peach. what are you doing driving a car? that's so dangerous." Dan couldn't help chuckle at Phil's whining and with that, forgot all about his doubts of Phil's intentions.

He couldn't help agreeing with Phil's statement. "yeah, who gave these babies a go kart?" he added. Dan was sort of getting the swing of this talking and driving so complained, "what computer fires a red shell backwards?" as a red shell caused him to go off course again.

"clearly you need to up your game"

"says you!"

"hey!"

thus started the art of banting and driving, and they were both fully invested in showing off.

Can you believe this 'oneshot' is now in double digits?

Do you like the new cover??

should be able to publish another part later today, but don't hold me to it