DISCLAIMER: Bumper belongs to me, but the rest of his identical, fuzzy l’il bunny buddies belong to Swibco. Walter belongs to Spartacus and is being used with permission. All recognizable characters belong to Marvel. The anonymous professor belongs to my school -- I’m assuming. I really have no idea how those things work and I really don’t care. My mind no longer belongs to me, if it still exists at all (it’s finals week!). This is a muse fic written in an attempt to avoid working on three, yep, count ’em, *three* take-home exams due within the next week. Feedback can be sent to the psychiatric ward, where I’ll be living once I get the tests finished.

"C’mere, Bumper," I called from my seat in front of the computer. I looked over toward my bed and watched as two fuzzy little purple ears emerged from behind the throw pillows.

"Are we writing now?" he asked as he struggled to climb up from his usual sleeping spot. It was quite a feat for Bumper, considering he’s just a tiny ball of fur with two giant feet and no arms.

"Yeah. Come on over here and help me out."

Bumper’s nose twitched excitedly as he hopped over to the computer and perched himself atop the monitor. "Bumpity, bumpity, bumpity, bumpity ..."

He flashed his happy bunny smile at me and hopped up and down, obviously excited about the prospect of writing again. "Monet fic! Monet fic! Monet fic!"

"Ummm ... not exactly."

"Oh." Bumper pondered this for a second before his eyes brightened once again. "HeeheeeHEEE! X-Men sillyfic!"

"Not right now."

Bumper stopped jumping. He scrunched up his face in concentration and wriggled his little pink nose. "Jubilee story?"

I sighed. I could tell already that this was a bad idea. A *very* bad idea. "Actually, I need you to help me with another project. Something a little different this time."

At that moment, Bumper looked down at the floor and saw the stack of law books beside me. He scowled (as much as a bunny *can* scowl, anyway) and turned his back to me.

"No, no, no, no, NOOOOOOO!!!!"

"Hey, it’s not like I want to do this either, OK? Unfortunately, my grades kinda depend on it." I sighed. Purple bunnies are notoriously unpredictable; they can be as temperamental and impatient as a three year old, and only about half as cooperative -- if I'm lucky enough to catch mine on a good day.

I tried another approach. "OK, uhh, how about, you help me finish these tests, and then I’ll finish the Monet story, OK? Then we can do the other ones over the break."

Bumper contemplated this for a few moments, then opened his mouth.

"No, no, no, no, NOOOOOOO!!!!"

"But I have to finish --"

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Bumper tried to cover his ears with his non-existent arms. "No, no, no, no, no, no ..."

Ooookaaay. This was obviously working out well. Time for Plan B. I typed a quick e-mail message, sent it, then sat back to wait. Within a few minutes I heard a knock at the front door.

I shook my head as I watched Bumper still hopping around, then got up and went to answer the door.

"Hiya!"

I blinked at the leather-jacket clad orange dragon that stood there. "You must be Walter," I greeted the creature.

"Yep! The boss sent me. He says you need some help."

"Does Sparty always make you use the front door?"

"Nah, only since I left his window open that last time I came in. Man, was he ticked! All those little guys on the ’puter started running at the first sign of freedom. Y’ever see a beanie stampede? It’s not pretty. And don’t even get me started on the Maximals and the Pokémon ..."

Walter stepped inside and saw the purple bunny hopping like mad around the bedroom. "Hey, Bumper."

Bumper stopped in mid-hop, doing sort of a cartoonish halt in mid-air before landing a split second later. "Walter!" The bunny hopped over to me. "Look! Look! Walter’s here!"

I looked skeptically between the pair. "You two know each other?"

"Muse con," they said in unison.

"Cool place ya got here, Bumper."

"Uh-huh! See, I have my own bed on the pillow next to the bear --"

"Not to be rude, but can we get to work here?" I hated bossing them around like that, but I did have deadlines to think of, after all.

"Sure," Walter sat in my chair and propped his feet up on the keyboard.

"Just make yourself at home," I muttered.

"Hey, thanks!" Walter flashed a big, goofy grin. "So, listen, what fic are we working on? I have a great idea for a Rogue story -- just wait ’til you hear it! This is so cool! The boss almost *never* lets me do any X-Men stuff --"

"Walter," I cut him off, "we’re not doing fanfic. Not right now, anyway."

Walter’s draw dropped so far it almost hit the floor. "NO FANFIC?!" he panicked. "Then what am I doing here?!"

"Well, actually, I need help with some of my essays for class and --"

Walter let out a wail so loud and so full of anguish that it was as if a thousand muses cried out all at once.

"NOOOOOOOOOO! No no no no no NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" He started banging his head on the keyboard. After a few good slams he stopped and cast his eyes heavenward. "Why, God? WHY?!" Walter put his head back down and started sobbing.

"Oh, stop. It’s not that bad. And anyway, why are you complaining? I’m the one who actually had to sit through these courses for a whole semester and learn absolutely nothing because of that damned Socratic method -- oh, and did I mention that I have to pay a ton of money to have the ‘privilege’ of sitting in these classes? Then I get to write a paper that counts for one hundred percent of my grade, and now I can’t even do that ’cause I have a whiny little dragon hogging the computer!"

Walter glanced up, and I could tell from the look on his face that he had learned too late not to get me started on one of my anti-higher-education rants. Even Bumper had stopped hopping around and sat on the floor, looking up at me quizzically.

"I’m sorry," I told them. "It’s just that I’m under so much stress right now and this lack of cooperation isn’t helping one bit. I know you guys don’t want to write this stuff. Hell, I don’t want to write it either, but unfortunately I’m stuck.

"So here’s the deal. You can either whine about these assignments, in which case it’ll slow me down even more, or you can help me finish so that we can go back to writing fanfic."

I bent down to look Walter in the eye. "Choose wisely."

Walter paused and scratched his head. "Do I get bathroom breaks?"

"As long as you take ’em in the bathroom, sure."

Walter hopped up. "OK, I guess I can help. Anyway, it’s still better than making wallets for the boss, and this way I know I won’t fall into the cardboard box and end up in Hong Kong again."

I shook my head in disbelief. "What about you?" I asked Bumper. "Are you in on this or what?"

"If Walter’s helping, *I’m* helping," the bunny insisted. Luckily my muse is also as competitive as a three year old.

"Hey, this might be kinda fun after all," Walter exclaimed as he peered over the top of one of my books, which he held open in front of him. "But I’m gonna have to get into a lawyer-like mood here. Can you flip on ‘Ally McBeal’?"

"I could, except that it’s not on tonight." I watched as Bumper dragged my backpack into the room, wearing the strap as a headband and tugging it behind him. "Need help?"

"I got your notebook." He stopped before me and let the strap fall in front of him. "What should I do now?"

"Ummm, I think Walter might need some help looking up some things."

Walter brushed the notion aside. "Nah, I just need to start thinking legal stuff. But I gotta get in the mood here." I could see the wheels turning in Walter’s mind. "Can I wear your sheep pajamas?"

"No."

Three hours later ...

I came back from the kitchen to find Walter and Bumper sitting in front of the computer. "Hey, I made you guys some hot chocolate," I told them as I set two steaming mugs on the shelf beside the computer. I peered over Walter and tugged Bumper aside so I could see the screen. They had the word count feature open, and it read 2,500 words.

"Hey, good job, guys. You got it exactly right. Did you finish that while I was in the kitchen?"

Walter grinned as he stretched and leaned back in my chair. Bumper could hardly contain himself -- I could tell he was trying as hard as he could to stay put.

"All done! YAY!" Bumper’s nose twitched and his eyes crinkled up in his own version of a bunny smile.

"See? That wasn’t so bad, right?" I knelt in front of the desk and clicked the mouse to close the word count. "Now we can write fanfi --"

I cut myself off as I looked at the words on the screen. It took about three seconds for the information to register. I took a deep breath, counted to ten and tried to stay calm. "Walter? Bumper? What exactly did you write in this paper?"

"Like it?" Walter beamed with pride. "No offense, but the stuff you wrote was kinda boring. We thought we’d lighten it up a little. You know, put in some drama, some comedy, some action ..."

"And some mutant supervillians," I concluded as I read through the text. I let out a sigh in exasperation. "Serves me right for leaving you to work on this alone. Well, I guess I’m writing this one over again."

"Why? We already handed it in!"

I turned very slowly and glared at Bumper. "You did *WHAT?!*"

"While you were in the kitchen. We went over to the school and put it under the teacher’s door."

This time it took even less than three seconds for the panic to set in. I started hyperventilating and sat down on the floor. Visions of a transcript full of Fs filled my head as the room started to spin.

Walter sat beside me. "Soooo ... can we do fanfic now?"

I grinded my teeth together and tried to remember that I should not use that kind of language in front of impressionable young muses. I could feel another rant coming on, but unfortunately, I knew that wasn’t going to solve my problem.

Suddenly I spied the answer over in the corner of my room.

"Sure, we can do fanfic now," I said as I smiled one of those smiles that looks oh-so sweet until you realize that the person smiling is out to get you. "Why don’t you go get the comics from that box over there so we can use them for research."

Bumper cocked his head to one side and lifted an ear. "Me too?"

"No, I have a special job for you."

"Hey, I don’t see any comics in here," a muffled voice came from the box.

"Keep looking," I said as I grabbed a fat magic marker and a role of duct tape from the desk drawer. "They’re in there."

"Are you su - HEY!" Walter yelped as I slammed the lid on the box and taped it up. I scribbled an address on the side before I walked outside to the mailbox and dropped the box in the slot.

"Is Walter coming back?" Bumper asked as I walked through the front door.

"Not for awhile. But maybe he’ll send you a postcard when he gets to Hong Kong.

"In the meantime, I have to redo my paper before tomorrow morning so I can go to my professor and try to convince him that someone did this as a joke."

I picked Bumper up and put him back on the bed, surrounded by a pile of comics. "Since you hate this legal stuff so much," I explained, "I’ll give you some other stuff to read. Have you ever seen Larry Hama’s run on Generation X?"

"No. Is it good?"

"Oh, not as good as the job you guys did on my essay." Bumper wriggled his nose and clapped his ears together in anticipation. I laughed to myself. He definitely had the mind of a three year old.

Epilogue . . .

The professor sat at his desk in his plush office, thoroughly enjoying the quiet solitude that the night offered. There was just something about the atmosphere of the abandoned hallways at night that he loved. He sat with his feet propped up on the desk, savoring his cup of coffee. By this time tomorrow, he would be up to his eyebrows in more of those drab essays that he always received from his students. He thought that after twenty-two years he would have seen some originality, but none of them ever showed any imagination -- ever.

He heard a commotion outside his door and looked up in time to see a paper slide underneath the frame. As he glanced toward the hall he saw two shadows that appeared to be . . . a dragon? And a bunny? The professor made a mental note to stop working so hard.

He picked up the paper and started to read, preparing himself for the same boring analysis he had read a thousand times before. It wasn’t long before a smile crossed his face. Finally, someone had managed to make this material interesting!

The professor chuckled as he got to the part about Magneto and the X-Men. He flipped back to the front page and hastily scribbled an "A" before returning to his place in the story.

If only all of his students could be this creative.

AUTHOR’S NOTE: OK, that’s all, folks. I have to put away the fanfic and go write my *real* paper now, which most definitely will not be getting an "A" considering I know less than nada about any of my courses this semester. But I can always dream, can’t I? ^_^