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sincerlypadfoot · 4 years

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The Witch And The Wizard (1)

Word Count - 1235

Blond hair, ice grey ices, the attention span of a goldfish, everything that I hated in a person. Until I met him.

“Are you coming to class today? We’re leaning about some new potions with Snape?” Hermione asked as I sat up in my bed and rubbed my eyes.

“Yeah, I always go to class,” I mumbled as my vision cleared up. “I was having the best dream too,” I chuckled tossing the blankets off me.

“Do you think everything is gonna be okay?” Hermione asked worried. “With everything going on, do you think we’re even safe at hogwarts anymore?”

“We’re gonna be okay Hermione,” I said comforting her, moving to the end of her bed. “Harry is going to be okay, Rons gonna be okay and everyone else is gonna be okay,” I said smiling. “Snape’s class is waiting come on,” I insisted pulling her out of her bed. We tossed our robes on and headed to class, not waiting for Harry or Ron.

“Look what the cats dragged in,” Malfoy called with his two goons as Hermione and I walked into class, Harry and Ron already there.

“Nice of you two to show up,” Snape said with no emotion in his voice. “Today we’re going to be learning about Befuddlement Draught, it’s in the name so don’t ask me what it is,” He mumbled flipping his book open. “You will take a paper from this bucket and he or she will be your partner for this lesson,” Snape said as a floating bucket started on the right side of the room.

“Look at that,” Draco said holding his paper up in the air and looking at it. “Ray Donchey,” He chuckled turning his paper over to me. “Looks like we’re stuck together,” He smirked looking over at me then his friends.

“Kill me now,” I muttered placing my head onto my desk. “You know it could have been anyone else but nope had to be my worst nightmare,” I said making Harry, Ron and Hermione chuckle.

“Everyone please move now,” Snape said rubbing his temples and sitting back down at his desk. “Please practice the potion and don’t be ignorant,’ He muttered as everyone shifted away, Hermione and Ron moved and Draco slid beside me.

Both our families were high up pure bloods, coordinating dances and party, dragging their kids to useless events, both from very different families though, his wanted power and mine wanted happiness, complete opposites.

“We need Scurvy grass,Lovage,Sneezewort and thats it to make our potions,” I mumbled reading the ingredients in the textbook.

“Will cause recklessness and will make Ray not such a boring snog,” Draco snickered leaning back in his chair. “You should go get the stuff, i’ll make the bottles,” Draco suggested tossing his feet on the table.

“Feet off the table Malfoy, go get the stuff for your potions,” Snape shouted making Malfoy toss his feet off the table almost falling down, he shot me a look then walked over across the room to get the ingredients.

“Thank you,” I smiled as Draco got back placing the jar of the three things on the table. “Are you capable of not sending me to the hospital wing,” I asked picking the sneezeworts out of the jar with tweezers.

“I’m pretty sure I know how to make potions,” Draco smeared leaning over the calgirion, I pulled him back and gave him the dirtiest look.

“You know how to make potions but don’t know the rules, never look into your potions, you don’t know what spells could kill you or what might shoot up,” I smeared shaking my head making Draco annoyed.

“Feisty huh,” Draco said crossing his arms. “Fine, you do it,” He huffed sitting back down on his chair and watching me. “Maybe you should take a bottle home,” Draco mumbled making me turn around.

“Detention both of you,” Snape shouted making Draco and I jump. “When you two learn to work together you’ll be let go of detention, I expect you both right back here after school,” Snape said making everyone chuckle.

“Thanks a lot Malfoy,” I mumbled tossing the stuff into the cauldron and watching the potion mix infornt of me. Class ended and Hermione pulled me out of the room faster than my head could spin.

“You have detention,” She said letting out a laugh, Harry and Ron chuckled a bit beside me. “With Malfoy, oh he’s not gonna survive,” Hermione said still laughing.

“I can even believe it, I would rather face fluffy then have detention with Malfoy,” I grumped crossing my arms and walking into my next class. “I would rather die,” I whispred sitting down and watching McGonagall hand papers out to everyone. The ringing off the bell made me jump every time, once the class went quiet my mind wandered with hatred, I took the potion we had made out of my pocket and just looked at it.

“Tell me everything,” Hermione whispred in my ear as she dropped me off infornt of Snape's classroom, I dropped my smile and walked in, Malfoy already sitting at the table angry.

“Nice of you two show up, now sit down,” Snape said pulling the chair beside Malfoy out with his wand. “You’re gonna work together to fill these papers out, once they’re done you’re free to go,” He mumbled standing up. “I will not let you two ruin my evening so I will be back to check on you,” Snape said opening his doors and slamming them.

I picked up a piece of paper and looked at it. “Potions, he wants us to name potions?” I asked in disbelieved. “This is the easiest thing ever,” I said shaking my head.

“Yeah easy,” Draco said picking up a paper for himself and looking at it. “What potion contains Ashwinder egg,Squill bulb,Murtlap tentacle,Tincture of thyme,Occamy eggshell, and Powdered common rue?” Draco asked reading off his paper.

“Liquid luck,” I quickly said leaning back on my seat, I tossed my feet on the table and tossed my head back. “I think I might just nap,” I muttered closing my eyes.

“Come on, we should go,” Draco said standing over me. “I don’t do detention and i’m not letting you suffer alone in here,” He muttered, I opened my eyes to look up at him.

“Where are we going?” I asked getting off my chair and following him out of Snape's classroom. “I think I might go back to my room, relax for a bit,” I said to Draco who stopped and turned around.

“Oh don’t ruin the fun, come with me,” Draco said grabbing my hand and dragging me away. “We’re gonna go mess with some people,” He smirked making me roll my eyes.

“And what makes you think I want to do that?” I asked crossing my arms and looking at Draco.

“I think we should get to know each other, our parents are now best friends you know, we’re going to be seeing a lot more of each other,” Draco snickered letting go of my hand. “Come on now, i’ll sneak you into the common room,” He whispred looking down the stairs.

“Next time Draco, next time,” I said smirking and turning around. “I’m sure we’ll see a lot more of each other, i’m sure,” I mocked walking back to my room, being careful to avoid Snape.

#dracomalfoyxreader #dracomalfoyxy/n #draco malfoy x reader #draco malfoy #draco malfoy x you #draco x oc #draco malfoys #Harry Potter #Hermione Granger #Ron Weasley

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demigodlybeasts · 4 years

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This is why Solangelo, is actually one of the best balanced and well-planned matches in the entire riordanverse:

And no, it’s not because “opposites attract”, but quite... the other way around.

See? The whole point is that they have a perfect socket-plug dynamic. They are the embodiment of that “thermodynamic equilibrium through hand-holding” post but on a greater scale.

Let me elaborate:

Let’s start with Will:

He is a natural caretaker. And not only because he is a son of Apollo, but because that’s what his role has always been. He is not a deus-ex-machina heavy-hitter like Percy Jackson, nor a born fighter like the Ares kids, neither a master strategist like Athena’s breed. Oh, no, I don’t doubt he can hold his own in a fight or that he is very smart, but it’s not what he's been training all his life for.

He is the one that makes sure the world doesn’t run out of defenders. Medically, emotionally and through guidance, he is the stronghold in the rearguard.

But here’s the catch: personality-wise, he is not the Florence Nightingale archetype at all. He is not gentle nor patient or sweet. No, he is aggressive and blunt in his “recommendations”. If you start preaching about the Greater Good while bleeding out he will hit you around the head and tell you you won’t be able to do even a little good, much less great, if you pass out and die in a ditch.

So, the obvious thing is that he finds his purpose in times of need, of crisis. But here’s the problem: he obviously hates those times, not only because any good doctor does, but because it’s when his family is in danger (the camp, the camp is his family, as we can guess by the fact that he is an all-year-rounder). He already lost two brothers to war and became a cabin counselor, which is just as good because it gives him the authority to take care of his siblings.

However... well, nobody needs a pesky doctor-parent-coach type to hover over them 24/7. Most people know very well how to keep themselves healthy and alive, and teenagers specially don’t appreciate this much mothering.

Will finds his purpose in times of need and despair but loses it once the calm settles in. Poor boy! Who could ever be happy like that?

So what he requires, more than anything, is someone that would need him not only in times of emergency but also in daily life. Someone he can fawn over, support and shower in attention but that would be strong and stubborn enough to match his attitude.

Now about Nico:

Endlessly brave, headstrong, good-hearted, self-sacrificing, powerful, but at the same time brittle like glass Nico. He is just fourteen but he went through so much pain and trauma, lost every member of his family (except for Hazel, whom he barely just gained) and every life-guide he’s ever had.

Nico who is an absolute d i s a s t e r when it comes to taking care of himself. Partly because nobody ever taught him the means nor the importance of it, partly because he forgets, and partly because he is unable to ever put himself first.

He is the kid that constantly runs on fumes; what will wear himself thin for other’s sake; the kid that doesn’t know how to prioritize his needs over his duties; the kid that pretends not to care but hides an ocean of hurt and nightmares within, that will devour him as soon as he isn’t focused on some imminent catastrophe. Because the moment he is no longer running from danger, his inner monsters will catch up to him and, at this point, he can’t face them alone.

Because hey! On top of all of that, he is shy and convinced that nobody wants him around, has the self-esteem of a wilted cucumber and no means (or enough trust) to hire a fucking therapist to start working on his broken mental health. And who would he confide in anyways, unless he fancied a vacation in a madhouse?

His only elder relative is Hades who 1) got an underworld to run, and b) isn’t the type to follow his son around with a pack of tissues and an orange in hand.

In other words, unless he managed to die in some noble, awe-inspiring way soon, I am afraid Nico would be statistically at risk of getting into alcohol, drugs, and other destructive habits as coping mechanisms. Oh, and he’d somehow manage to get scurvy, that's a 100% guarantee.

Hence, what Nico needs, what he really needs ASAP is a permanent coach-doctor-therapist in da house. He needs somebody to look over him, to teach him healthy habits, to make him rest and eat well, to challenge his stubbornness and take no shit from his self-destructing tendencies. Somebody to love him too, to show him through actions that he is not unwanted, that he is worthy. Somebody to listen, to understand and support, and to hold him through the bad days.

Or at least, he did need it ASAP by the end of HOO. Because we already see an IMMENSE improvement in TOA. He actively seeks company now (going as far as to bullshit Chiron and the ancient rules of the camp). He doesn’t hide anymore from people, he cracks jokes, he speaks his mind and lets himself be carried away from the battle even though it’s not over yet. He has gained authority and made himself at home.

Solangelo... well, some people say their relationship was rushed from one book to the other, but from that first “on-camara” meeting and through the six months that we don’t get to read, a lot happened. And we actually can see that, not written word-by-word, but we can read it between the lines in Nico’s character development. He is happier, stronger, more social... all because in those six months Will probably didn’t step away from him for a minute unless he finally managed to put Nico to sleep. They bicker and challenge each-other for fun but they are also tight as concrete, because they are a perfect match and they need each other.

A socket lacks purpose without any plug. A plug can’t work without a socket. Thank you for coming to my TED talk. I refuse to believe this was accidental.

THE END.

#solangelo #Nico di Angelo #will solace #trials of apollo #riordanverse #Pjo #character analysis #I actually love this structure #it's a very well-thought off ship #featured

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jq37 · 4 years

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The Report Card – Fantasy High Sophomore Year Ep 7

Moms, Meltdowns, and Mayhem

Hello and welcome back to Fabian’s worst nightmare, already in progress!

We rejoin the Bad Kids who have linked back up the next day and are on their way to the library of the city Leviathan--The Compass Point Library. On the way there, they see the Crow’s Keep burning but Fabian, assuming it has to do with what happened to him, tells everyone to leave it alone.

Adaine questions why Riz hasn’t had any nightmares (Riz: In a way, my life is a nightmare) and the whole group goes into another round of Shadowcat speculation. Is she protecting Riz from nightmares for some reason? Why can Tracker and Garthy suddenly see her in the picture despite not having seen her irl or had any weird dreams? Is she masquerading as someone else?

Anyway, they reach the library which is the cool, cobbled together and largely stolen (to Fig’s delight) pirate-y library of Alexandria type place. They meet an old pirate wizard named Rollins with a book of pirate spells that Fig immediately wants to steal and Adaine wants to borrow (or steal, she’s flexible). They all sign up for Compass Point library cards and go up to the observatory to look for Ayda Aguefort.

In the observatory, they find a huge orange-yellow bird on a perch and this is the part of the recap where I have to inform you that Aguefort had not only banged a phoenix, he somehow managed to procreate with it. Meet Ayda Aguefort, the half-phoenix (shout-out to the anon from last week who called Ayda as Aguefort’s daughter). She’s got wings and arms, bird legs, a plume of red fiery hair, and eyes which are basically just fire.

Fig thinks she’s the creature Aguefort made for her for reasons I cannot begin to fathom. She tries to feed her but Ayda rejects the food, not wishing to be in anyone’s debt. Ayda is kind of intense, abrupt, and anti-social when they meet her. She’s fully is about to fly away instead of helping until Fabian yells that Garthy sent them and Adaine remembers she has the letter from Garthy asking her to help them. After some back and forth, she agrees to give Adaine the spell (which will take 6 hours to learn) for 150 gold. But these are the Bad Kids so, of course, we have several tangents before the plot goes anywhere, during which we learn Ayda is a divination wizard (like Adaine), she asks if her father has talked about her (Fig successfully lies that he has), and Gorgug spouts out some fortune cookie nonsense (“What is a telescope but a spyglass pointed at the stars?”) that convinces Ayda that he could be the greatest wizard of their age (Adaine does a spit take and Fig is loving it).

Adaine hits the books to learn the sending spell with Sandra-Lynn keeping watch while everyone else splits up suchly:

Fabian wants to go out to check on the Hangman but Kristen absolutely vetoes that. Buddy. System. Ragh agrees to go with him and she lays off. He tries to see what the damage on the Hangman is. Nat 1. As far as Fabian can tell, the Hangman is full dead. Not only that, Fabian is poor people sick which he isn’t used to at all. Ragh isn’t doing much better on the emotional front. He just started making progress with processing his emotions and now his mom might be dead. Saddest Hoot Growl ever (seriously, it’s heartbreaking). Cathilda comes in, loving as ever, with food and kind words and an old lullaby, but that’s not enough to stop Fabian from rolling another Nat 1 and gaining 2 levels of exhaustion (which means disadvantage on ability checks and speed halved). Lou, please burn those dice.

Kristen and Riz are researching the Nightmare King. They go into a religious studies section of the library and (on a 20+ check from Riz) find texts about a temple to a forgotten god in Sylvere (the forest of the Nightmare King). The god is never named in any of the texts which Kristen finds weird. Riz decides to steal the book and is able to do it, despite Kristen’s “help”. Later, Kristen cross-refs Riz’s info with her world religions book and, on a dirty 20, she finds with frustration that there’s a lot of information but none of it really matches up. The fairies, treants, and especially the unicorns all had mysterious deities but none of them really match with the forgotten god. [Note: Last time we heard about unicorns was in episode one and we learned that the last time people saw the great unicorn was the last time the NK showed up.] At the same time, it seems like there are elements of the god in all five of the cultures in the forest. Adaine checks and there’s nothing magic with the book so it’s just the contents of the book that are weird, not the book itself. Kristen thinks there might be a connection to her weird dream about not being able to draw the face of her god. Adaine wonders if Kristen might have been worshipping this unnamed god by mistake. Gorgug wonders if the god is erasing themselves (a theory backed up late when they talk to Aguefort).

Fig looks for information on cursed gems and (with a 19) she finds a good amount--no surprise in a pirate library. She finds a book called Breaking the Evil Eye in one of the forbidden sections and learns that it could be possible to planeshift into the gem, dispel magic from the inside and get rid of the trap, before breaking the original curse. She finds all of this out after she steals the book (disguised as Rollins). Planeshift is a level 7 spell though so Adaine has a while to go before she can learn it (she gets her first at level 13).

Gorgug asks the real Rollins for books about cheering up a friend. He’s brought to a small, dusty section of the library. Gorgug rolls a nat 1 on an insight check and thinks that Rollins must be messing with him. Rollins is confused because he super wasn’t. Adaine takes a break and uses this pointless argument borne from misunderstanding to steal his book. Dirty 20. Rollins instantly skelatizes. She hastily puts the book back. He comes back Wrong and in incredible pain. He begs them to take the book out and Gorgug does. Adaine peaces out to finish studying, leaving Gorgug to deal with her mess. Gorgug decides to keep looking at the friendship books. Even on a 5, he finds a secret door into a HUGE friendship library. Guided by his library card, Gorgug finds a book called Cheer Up Me Hearties. When he gets out, Gilear is being accosted for killing Rollins, but Gorgug is able to get them to stand down. Gorgug Thistlespring, winning pirate hearts and minds. They take the book and Rollins’ bones to get him put back together.

Adaine finishes up as Ayda comes to check on her. Ayda is about to make another quick exit but Adaine tries again to make friends with Ayda, this time by directly asking and offering to let her hold Boggy. Ayda is immediately obsessed with Boggy (and Adaine’s backpack terrarium AND the backpack she makes for him at Ayda’s suggestion) and extremely impressed with Adaine’s spellwork in manifesting Boggy. It’s a very cute scene and Adaine has made a useful ally. Ayda can’t believe she met the two greatest wizards of the age in one day. Wild.

Everyone regroups to call Aguefort now that Adaine knows Sending. He sends them back some more powerful magic so he can talk for longer than the 25 word response. Think of it as magic Skype. He very casually tells them that Ragh’s house is a smoking crater and his mom is super dead. He takes far too long to follow up with the information that, a long time ago, he hid Lydia’s real body under the school, made a clone of her, and used the Magic Jar spell to basically hook up her consciousness to the clone body (which held a fake demon shard). The clone body is what got destroyed. Lydia’s real body and consciousness are fine. Way to bury the lede dude! Upon being asked, Arthur says that he used to remember the name of the god of the unicorn but he forgot. Suspicious and troubling. He and Fig also renew discussions on the creature she ordered but never paid for. He says the cheapest option is a pentacorn for 30k gold (which sounds like a unicorn w/ 5 horns and pretty useless but I refuse to get dragged into this insanity, I am just the messenger here).

Aguefort leaves to deal with the situation at home. Meanwhile, Gorgug notices smoke again but he also notices that it’s on the wrong side to be related to what happened to Fabian. After giving Fabian and Ragh oranges to prevent scurvy--a tip from the pirate friendship book--he brings it up to Fabian who thinks it’s probably Captain Wicklaw making a power play and they should probably stay out of it. What? says Adaine. Nah, we should fight him. Yeah, says Fig. You deserve revenge! Fabian just wants to lay low so they can get their C+. Adaine is not here for that C+ and she’s not here for Fabian’s concerning attitude shift. None of the Bad Kids are. However, the cast is very here for absolutely roasting Lou for all of his choices by having their respective characters inadvertently reference every bad thing that happened last episode. When Adaine suggests that Fabian might be cursed, Fabian finally haltingly comes out with the entire story (which Lou has to laugh-cry himself through in one of the best scenes of the episode) and everyone interjects with comments that they (out of character) know will just make Fabian’s storytelling even more uncomfortable. It’s a very wild combination of very emotional (in game) but deeply funny (out of game). Like:

Ally (who knows good and well that Chungledown Bim told Fabian he was gonna shit in his mouth): Did Chungledown Bim help you?

Zac (who also knows good and well that Chungledown Bim told Fabian he was gonna shit in his mouth): Chungledown Bim probably saved you.

Murph (yet another person who knows good and well that ChungledownBim told Fabian he was gonna shit in his mouth) You know what we should do? We should go see Chungledown Bim.

Amazing.

Fabian finishes his recounting of the 20 car pile-up that was last episode by repeating his earlier opinion that they shouldn’t go after Captain Wicklaw because it will just end with all of them dead. Kristen tries to slap him back to normal and tells him to lose the Gilear energy. Led by Gorgug and Adaine, the gang tells Fabian that being Bill Secaster’s son isn’t the only worthwhile thing about him (in fact, it’s pretty annoying). He’s worthwhile all on his own. Tracker chimes in and says that she thinks Fabian might have some issues with depression so maybe their well intentioned efforts to get Fabian to buck up weren’t the best way to handle things. Adaine and Riz are skeptical that Fabian is like, capital D, Depressed but Tracker sticks by her read on the situation. The group eventually decides to at least check out what’s going on with the smoke but before they arrive, an interlude:

As they walk to Crow’s Keep, Cathilda walks with Fabian and Cathilda starts dropping information about herself and about how her own children died before Fabian was born and about how she sees him as a son--though she’s tried to keep the proper professional distance. She comforts Fabian on his bad day and then her eyes go full Terminator and she mentally buts Wicklaw on her “People I Need to Murder Today” list (more on this later).

When they arrive at the place where the smoke is coming from, they find that the Ramble (kind of a pirate meetinghouse/Courthouse) has been burned down. Jemina Joy is there and she lets them know that Wicklaw asked what was necessary to become the new pirate king. He was told that all he needed to do was get the crown from the former pirate king (because respect for/fear of Bill was the only thing keeping there from being a new king). He just burned down the Ramble to be a dick. Adaine damn near gets her ass beat by Jemina by arguing politics with her (her point being that she wants to install Jemina as Pirate Queen while Jemina is like, “I just keep this place from sinking. Lay off.”) but Riz, mindful of the fact that this is a time sensitive situation, takes off to Gibbety Square where the pirate king’s crown is (and where Wicklaw is headed).

They make it to Brennan’s latest battle mechanic: The Row and the Ruction.

This is the crazy, pirate bicameral legislative system. The Row is a huge fistfight (no weapons allowed--or really they are allowed but everyone will gang up on you if you use them) at ground level. It’s always in session and has been for 150-ish years. Above that, is the Ruction which is a fight with full weapon and magic usage alone. The idea is that you need enough support on the ground in the Row so you can use them to get up in the Ruction. It’s a king of the hill situation up there and if you can hold your position up there for long enough, you can make laws. Got all that? Good.

They get there just barely after Wicklaw and his men who haven’t yet entered the Row. Wicklaw starts talking mad trash to Fabian but his friends back him up. They give him back his sword, his eye-patch, and Kristen hits him with a Warding Bond (which means that he gets +1 to AC and saving throws if he stays close to her plus resistance to all damage and, more importantly, she takes all the damage he takes). Fig gives everyone Countercharm. And, to top it off, Cathilda shows up with in an all black, super-badass pirate uniform to say she’s gonna feed him his own freaking brains! Let’s goooooooo!

But, Wicklaw has some new allies as well. Three elves bamf in from Falinel (same people who Kristen felt scrying on them earlier) and they’re there to bring Adaine back, and it doesn’t seem like they’re gonna just ask nicely.

Detention

Adaine for Unnecessary Theft and (Accidentally) Killing a Man

Adaine was kind of on one this episode. Not only did she inadvertently kill* a man while stealing from him, Adaine also ghosted at the first sign of trouble, leaving Gorgug and Gilear to catch all the flak for her attempt at pulling a Fig. Bad form, girl!

*She probably didn’t technically kill him but she turned him into a skeleton and he called the pain upon reconstitution worse than death so let’s not quibble about the details.

Honor Roll

Cathilda for Being a Badass Mom

Oh man, oh man, oh man.

I’ve low-key been waiting for Cathilda to go full pirate since we learned that was an option and especially since Fabian got attacked because it was a pretty safe bet that was going to be her berserk button and boy did she deliver.

When did she have the time for a costume change? Is she that stealthy? Did she magic it on? Or did she just manifest the outfit on the power of her rage alone?

The scene where she says Wicklaw is gonna pay? Chills. Not only pledging to eat your enemy’s brains but also saying you’re going to feed him his own brains and describing exactly how you’ll serve it? So raw.

But I also have to shout out the non-murderous mom stuff she did this ep. The little talk she gave Fabian about no one being defined by their worst day was very sweet and good advice out of game too.

But honorable mention to Gorgug for being an absolute sweetheart all episode. Zac’s improv about pirates giving their friends oranges to prevent scurvy bodied me.

Random Thoughts

Some very useful posts from @jamiebluewind: Character Descriptions, Location Descriptions, Transcripts of Cathilda’s speeches from this ep.

During the initial discussion with Collins, we learn that the transmutation exchange rate is 50 Parrots=10 Bananas=1 Gold. How are bananas more complex than parrots?

Adaine: May we steal books?

Her later actions aside, I think it’s funny that Adaine’s first move is basically always to sweetly ask for what she wants and Fig’s first move is, “Gotta steal that book!” Adaine is like the most polite person in the group but also ready to fight 100% of the time. The role reversal in the Jemina scene where Fig was the one who asked an on point question and Adaine was the one who made it almost spiral into an actual fight was great.

I was just saying this re: Harry Potter in a different context but clearly marked but not blocked off forbidden sections of libraries are more a dare than a deterrent.

Fig as a horned parrot (done by Rollins for trying to steal his book) is adorable. Please somebody draw that.

I love that when they see the bird that turns out to be Ayda and Murph is like, “I don’t think that’s a bird,” Zac is like, “Yeah, Gorgug doesn’t know that.” Zac (like Travis as Grog in CritRole) has a real talent for playing dumb while actually being really smart.

“My principal scammed me?”

Brennan truly did not have to follow through on Aguefort saying he slept with a bird. He really, really did not have to but he was like, “Nope! I said it so it’s happening! This is happening!” I really wish you guys could have seen my face as I realized in real time that the madman was actually doing that.

Adaine to Fig who thinks Ayda is her creature: This is a full person.

“I like school.”/“You would.”

Lol at Fig trying to draw parallels between Ayda’s prickliness and her own behavior and getting absolutely shut down. “I think people think you’re really tender.” The running thing of Fig’s perception of herself as this standoffish loner being constantly reality checked by literally everyone she knows being like, “You tell us you love us literally every day,” is one of my favorite group dynamics. It’s even funnier because, besides probably Adaine and Fabian, the rest of the Bad Kids probably knew Fig (or at least had seen her around) before she started going through her emo phase. So they totally remember her in 8th grade wearing preppy clothes and carrying a unicorn backpack and listening to Fantasy Taylor Swift and all that.

All ep they were calling Kalina a cat and I was thinking, “I feel like—in game—that’s gotta be offensive.” And then Aguefort straight said it. Wild for it to come from him since he’s the craziest person ever but I’m glad it came up.

“You seem simple to me.”/“Thank God.”

Aww at Ayda asking if Aguefort ever talks about her. Brennan, you gotta stop putting little emotional traps into otherwise funny scenes. I can only handle so much!

The gang did some experimentation with the photo in this ep with these results: Ayda and Aguefort both couldn’t see Kalina in the picture. They also took a picture of the picture but that picture had the same properties as the original picture. Weeping Angel rules I guess.

There’s speculation in this episode about why Riz isn’t having nightmares. I have another question kinda on that topic. In episode 2/3, we see the lie/mirror/Baron thing that happened with Riz. And that was for sure super nightmarish. But it doesn’t match what happened to Adaine and Fabian. Both of them seem to have had more ephemeral experiences that quickly vanished. And they weren’t borne from lies so much as fears. Riz’s monster came from a direct lie and it didn’t seem to be a nightmare. It came out of the mirror and attacked not only him but his friends later. No one saw Fabian or Adaine’s nightmares besides them (although, that could just be because they got away). And no other lie-monsters have showed up as far as we know. I’m just wondering if there’s maybe something else going on or if it was a different NK follower who did that or just a different power of the same dude. Just something I wanted to note because it’s been bugging me a little and no one’s brought it up yet.

Cool quirk of the sending spell Adaine learned: Because it was modified by pirates, curse words don’t count towards the 25 word limit. What I immediately thought (and what Aguefort actually ended up doing more or less) was that you could easily send very long messages with, say, Morse code. Just designate one curse as a dot, one as a dash, and one as a space, and you’re good to go. It’d be slow, but totally workable.

Also, after watching Laura as Jester absolutely flying by the seat of her pants with every sending spell, it was wild to see the group take the time to carefully craft the perfect message.

I said two recaps ago that I wouldn’t be surprised if Gorgug multiclassed into a casting class soon and boy do I hope this episode means he’s gonna do it for real. Adaine’s total disbelief at Ayda’s interest in Gorgug’s wizarding potential was sending me.

Oh also. Ayda has forbidden Gorgug from reading any wizarding books so he doesn’t lose is totally uncomplicated mind. I guess he’s supposed to learn everything the savant way? Imagine Adaine diligently studying her wizard books, trying to master some complicated spell and Gorgug is like, “I woke up and I guess I can use Mage Hand now? Neat.” Absolutely maddening.

Besides Cathilda, Gorgug was the MVP in this episode. Dude has a knack for making friends that I think will eventually pay dividends.

Also, speaking of, everything Brennan said during the secret shelf section was so good as to sound planned, however, how could you predict that that was a thing a player was going to ask to find? Brennan is just always 7 seconds of prep time away from giving an elaborate and super specifically themed speech about friendship I guess.

Big ups to Kristen for not letting Fabian go off by himself again. Like, for the sake of the party of course but also the, “We almost lost you,” was sweet. She also helped buff him going into the coming fight with Warding Bond that means she takes all the damage he takes. I am SO glad they brought another healer with them because that’s such a risky move. Kristen is a LOT but she’s also very ride or die and all heart. I really love that the last time she used this spell it was on Gilear for a joke and now it’s getting used seriously. It’s a perfect establish existence of power to audience/bring back at plot relevant time setup. Improv storytelling is so inexplicably good.

Technically, to cast Warding Bond, you’re supposed to have matching rings with the person you’re casting it on so imagine Kristen blinged out with a ring for each party member and each of them having a corresponding one in case she needs to cast it on them.

Little bit concerned that Tracker still doesn’t know about Sandra-Lynn/Garthy. The longer it takes for her to find out, the higher the chance it blows up and becomes a Thing.

Fig: *Meandering philosophical question about why Ayda watches the stars*/Ayda: I study it so I can know where this big city is floating.

RIP to the Hangman. I don’t think he’s gone for good but it seems like he is for now. On my first watch, I thought that, on a 1, Fabian just fully thinks that the Hangman is gone but, the second time it seemed more like he’s just dead. Now, I’m not Brennan, but if I was in this situation, you know what I would do? I would have someone save the Hangman’s soul (or whatever he has instead of a soul) and store it in the Hangvan temporarily. Imagine how much he’d hate that. It’s full of potential for “roommate” shenanigans.

Is there anything stopping them from just, ramming the Row with the Hangvan? Like, I know it’ll get them ganged up on, but will they be able to do much against a full van?

Also, if/when they hold the Ruction, I wonder what law they’re going to try and make. They didn’t really go in with a plan (understandable under the time pressure) so they’re really gonna have to improvise something on the fly.

Also, I’m assuming Fabian stabbed the Hangman while he was asleep? I don’t think we were ever shown that scene, but Fabian must have been under some kind of compulsion since he woke up in the river (and the same happened to Ragh).

Aguefort casually mentions that he has many children and this episode proves that Brennan can and will back up every single crazy thing that comes out of his mouth, so I’m excited to see if there is a single Aguefort out there that isn’t crazy.

Oh, also, the acknowledgement that occasionally that phoenix is a child is appreciated because that was def a question I was going to ask. Squicky to say the least but I guess that’s how phoenixes work so what are you gonna do?

Ally needing to roll a 10, rolling, being happy, checking Kristen’s modifier, and realizing it’s a negative 3 for a total of 9 is peak D&D.

Fig as Rollins: Look at how fast I can run!

I love Fig thinking Adaine could plausibly have 7 level spells. She’s like, idk bro. She’s the eleven oracle. She cares about school. She could know this too. Who knows? Certainly not Fig who thought she could buy wizard spells to use as a bard.

“Please speak more enthusiastically on my behalf.”

“It’s my brain guys.”

Fig mind controls Gilear into believing in himself and he fails his save. I wonder if this is could be valid therapy technique in this world.

Aguefort mentions that a Wish spell can destroy a Magic Jar just fyi. That makes 3 pretty high level spells mentioned in this ep. Magic Jar is 6th level. Planeshift is 7th level. And Wish, basically the strongest spell in the game, is 9th level. We’re starting to deal with some serious magical mojo.

The whole thing with people in pictures that not everyone can see and memories that you know you once had but don’t anymore and information that should exist but doesn’t is hitting a very specific storytelling sweet spot for me.

This is a little meta-gamey to be thinking about but I’m kinda wondering, why sideline Gorthalax? Obviously, it’s a good plot hook for Fig and that might be all it is. But I’m lowkey wondering is there something Gorthalax knows or can do that would solve the plot in 30 seconds if he was around? Like, was he roommates with the Nightmare King in hell or something?

Kristen finds it weird that the god’s name isn’t written anywhere but I’m sure that’s gotta be fairly common. Or at least not unheard of. Like, I know in Judaism you’re not supposed to do that. Anyway, watch the great unicorn be the Nightmare King just for the Nightmare/Night Mare pun.

Adaine being on brand no matter the situation: Everybody shut up I have to do my homework!

The, “Do you want a friend?”/“Desperately.” interaction killed me.

“I don’t have any wizard friends.”/“I’m a wizard.”/(beat)/“I don’t have any wizard friends.”

Arthur cloned a woman, forgot to tell her, and then straight forgot. So business as usual from him.

Fabian’s, “Nooooooo,” with the rising intonation every time someone made an assumption during his story and he had to correct him was amazing. Also, “He told me he was going to shit in my mouuuuwth.”

Ragh, Fig, and Adaine all crying about their parental issues at the same time. This has been, like, the longest week ever. I wonder if the 7 Maidens are unpacking this much trauma on their quest.

“Absolutely timbered.”

Lol at Brennan dropping the cool pirate sending spell “curses don’t count” detail and then being told from off camera that he needs to keep it PG-13. But then Cathilda needed to go beast mode so, like, what can you do?

Another cool worldbuilding detail is pirate clerics just keep shrines to every deity they’ve come into contact with to hedge their bets like Beni from The Mummy.

I know Lydia was attacked on orders from Kalina but I wonder if they knew about/had plans for the demon shard too.

When Emily said she disguised herself as Rollins, I fully thought she was going to walk out the door the real Rollins was guarding and not go out the back door like she did. The idea of a back door didn’t even occur to me. I just thought we were in for some classic Axford insanity.

Riz: You’ve gotta get better at talking to kids.

Riz: This is real Gilear energy.

Kristen: We brought one Gilear. We don’t wanna make that mistake twice.

Everything that happened with Fabian was really funny because there’s nothing I love more in D&D than players having a good time dunking on each other but, in game, Fabian is really going through it. Fabian low key has mom friend energy so to almost die and then for all of his friends to jump into the exact fight that almost killed him (including taunting the dude! Adaine!) against his advice must be giving him a level of anxiety and dread that I don’t even have the words to describe. Like, now is not the time for him to digging into that because things are life or death. Gotta save your life before you can fix it. But he def needs to at some point. Too bad Jawbone’s not around for a quick mid-battle therapy sesh like he had with Adaine during prom.

Tracker suggested that Fabian might be depressed. I’m not an expert on depression. He could be depressed and, in any case, he definitely needs to see a therapist for a Lot of reasons. But having a breakdown because you saw 14 people die, almost died yourself, and were told that a man wanted to shit in your mouth less than 24 hours ago seems less like a sign of depression and more like the only rational human reaction.

Adaine calls the above, “a vaguely mediocre day”. Michael Scott Voice: Adaine you ignorant slut.

Also Adaine: You got that bike because you won it fair and square because we killed a lot of people.

This is the second time Adaine has said that Fabian’s lineage is actually the most annoying thing about him and these are the kind of tiny continuity details I live for.

Semi-relatedly, Fabian’s relationship with his parents v. Adaine’s relationship with hers is endlessly fascinating to me. Because they have such similar backgrounds but coming from, like, opposite directions of the same spectrum, you know? Can’t wait for those sweet, sweet parallels as we jump into her trauma! (What is D&D but group therapy interspaced with murder?)

Speaking of Adaine’s trauma, it looks like we’ll be getting to it very soon as those FBI Falinel operatives have shown up to force her (and the plot) back to Falinel. This is Concerning to me for two reasons. First off, remember the Aelwyn fight from season 1? Remember how annoying that was? Now imagine that times three and also 2 separate pirate brawls are happening. That sounds like a Bad Time for our kids. They’ve leveled up some and they’ve been known to make some very clutch battle decisions, but this is gonna be tough any way you slice it. This is like two entirely separate encounters at the same time. A small good point: I looked up the language for teleportation and it can only be used to transport a willing creature. So they can’t just bum rush her and poof out. But they could give her an ultimatum to make her agree. The second reason this Concerns me is that Adaine high key doesn’t want to work with/for Falinel and they know this. The fact that they’ve resorted to kidnapping (fun international law fact: when a government kidnaps someone, it’s called rendition) tells me that they’re done playing nice which opens up two options to them they might not have otherwise used. They could coerce Adaine’s consent to be their oracle by threatening her life/her friends’ lives. Or, more troubling, they could just kill her. I mean, she became the elven oracle when the old one died, right? So, if she died, someone else would get the job. Probably someone less troublesome to deal with. I doubt they’re gonna go straight for that because they seem to want her alive, at least for now. But it is a concern.

Of course, we’re assuming that what’s happening on the face of this is the whole story, but that’s not necessarily true. Iirc, all we heard was that they found the oracle and they were gonna bring her back to Falinel. For all we know, the elves could be working for Adaine’s mom. Of Adaine’s mom could be working with Falinel. Or she could be working with Falinel just as a way to get to her daughter. We really don’t know. The last person on this show that got kidnapped was Fabian and that was a friendly kidnapping. Anything is possible.

Something that struck me as a possibility: This fight seems like it’s gonna suck. There is a world where the ideal move for Adaine is to pull an Evy (from the Mummy--two Mummy refs in one recap, did not plan that, I just love the Mummy) and agree to go with the Falinel elves if they help them instead (or at least stop helping Wicklaw) with the faith that her friends will come rescue her. I doubt they actually care much about what happens in the government of this pirate junk city. I’m curious about how they ended up together anyway. I’m guessing the elves clued into what was going on while scrying on the group and decided an alliance might be useful.

Brennan about both Ally’s Applebees Reference and Fig using a Leviathan phonebook: That is nothing.

Shoutout to Fruzzinoid in the chat who said Ally’s alignment is chaotic-chaotic. Accurate.

I love the laughing-squawk that Brennan does for Ayda as much as I hate the fact that he made the Choice to spell it that way.

Truly, the entire scene where Lou is recapping the fight from last episode and he’s laughing uncontrollably but Fabian is clearly crying and he’s expressing both of those things simultaneously is beautiful.

A Fabian line that really hit but that I haven’t mentioned yet: “I probably have one follower running around. Never mind he’s my father’s just like everything else I have.” Ow. Such a deep cut but so off the cuff from Lou. As a writer, this show makes me so mad because that’s such a good line of dialogue that Lou just dropped out of his mouth like it was nothing. How dare he?

Another good line I didn’t mention before, this tie from Riz: “We all draw strength from each other. You went in without your crew. What’s a pirate without his crew?” Ugh, Murph. Who gave you the right?

This episode has made me extremely curious about what Cathilda thinks about Hilariel. Because she sees herself as Fabian’s mom--which she essentially has been in a lot of the ways that count since Hilariel has been mentally out to lunch for the past however many years. To be clear, I do think Hilariel loves Fabian. She just hasn’t really been present even though she’s been literally present. The way Cathilda phrased some of the things she said and the way she seems to talk about Fabian’s dad so much more than his mom makes me wonder if she doesn’t...resent isn’t the right word exactly. Maybe, disapprove? It makes me wonder if she doesn’t disapprove of Hilariel’s parenting choices more than she lets on.

Kristen’s, “Do you listen to music?” in the middle of actually useful questions for Ayda.

Rich people sicknesses include having eaten too much caviar or smoked a cigar for too long in case you’re wondering.

“You want an orange, pal?”

On a practical note, we have two more episodes to go until the show breaks for the year so prepare yourselves from now people!

Riz, Adaine, and Gorgug each rolled one Nat 20 apiece. Fig, Gorgug, and Adaine each rolled a Nat 1 (but Adaine presumably cancelled out hers rolling with advantage because of Boggy). Fabian, who is still living his worst life, rolled three Nat 1s. Tragic.

#fantasy high #fantasy high spoilers #dimension 20 #dimension 20 spoilers #report card

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baronvontribble · 6 years

Text

Original drabble, pt. 7

Navigation: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

looool

Faking a cough and telling his boss that he needed a few days off was easy. Writing an email to the his contact down the pipeline and telling them that he'd need a few weeks was much, much harder. The wording had to be just right; they didn't really have specific codephrases or anything, but they never said anything outright either. He went through several drafts before finally settling on one that he was satisfied with.

em-

gonna have 2 postpone that lunch date downtown this weekend. got a helluva leak & the landlord wont do shit so im gonna have to fix it myself. will hit u up when i have the time again

-marshmallow

ps: ill pay for ur train tickets dont worry

He leaned back in his chair and stared at it, letting out a nervous breath. "That'll work, right?"

"It looks appropriately misleading to me," Adam said.

"Emily's a smart kid, I've worked with her before. She should be able to pick up on it." Ted folded his arms and continued to stare at the message. "And hopefully it'll just look like I'm postponing a date with an out-of-town girlfriend to anyone else."

"I noticed it's a different email than the one tied to your phone."

"Always has been. I've got what, five different emails now?" He shifted in his seat, joints creaking from spending too long in his computer chair. He hadn't really moved too much since that morning, and it was well past noon by then. He'd been making sure he could deliver on what he'd promised. "The phone's the weakest link. Thing is, the messenger's the only thing installed on it, and no one in the pipeline uses that particular app for messaging since it's dated as shit. Mom uses it, but that's about it, and I doubt she's gonna rat me out even if she finds out what I do."

"How can you be sure of that?"

Ted smirked. "She works at a hospital that's run almost entirely by robots. Divorced my dad over it being a good idea to do shit like that to begin with. I'm pretty sure I know what side of the fence she's on with the whole AI thing."

"I see." That was all he had to say on that, apparently. After that little freak-out earlier, Adam didn't seem to be in all that wordy of a mood. But then, he was busy trying to tag still images with what he saw in them in another tab, so Ted wasn't about to hold it against him.

Well, it wasn't like Ted lacked for conversation topics. "How's it going so far? The tagging, I mean."

"Badly." A few seconds later he broke his non-chatty streak to elaborate, "I'm going by colors for now. I opened up a second page that helps me match hexadecimal codes to both specific and generic color names, but that's usually as far as I get. It doesn't help that lighting seems to have an effect on what appearance a given base color might take."

And the dumbass was probably sampling those colors pixel by pixel, too. Using brute processing force was one way to master the process, Ted supposed.

"Don't feel bad if it takes a while. You'll get the hang of it."

"You sound way too amused by this."

"Who, me? Never. I'm the very essence of stoicism."

Adam had a smile in his voice when he spoke again. "Liar."

"Yeah, alright. You caught me." Ted stretched out in his chair and stifled a yawn, joints popping as they flexed beyond where they probably should. "I'm just happy you're figuring it out. I mean, even just realizing that you can cross-reference is a step in the right direction."

"It would be easier if I knew what I was looking at."

"Want me to help?" Partway through the process of typing his email, Ted had realized that the help he could offer might not be so well-received. He didn't want to make things harder than they already were; he had to be tactful, wait for permission. He couldn't just insert himself into proceedings like he so often did. This was a delicate situation. He knew that now.

Or he could be overthinking it. Adam couldn't quite sigh, but he could portray some semblance of relief in his voice. "I'd appreciate it," he said; a moment later, the laptop had been tabbed in to the correct window so Ted could participate. "Try to restrain yourself from giving bad answers to fuck with me. This data has to be accurate."

"I know, I know." Ted did know. Really. "But gimme a minute, okay? I'm gonna plug in my mouse so I can use it to point things out to you."

"Right."

And so it began.

The images were little more than stock photos, and the 'game' was to tag as many details as possible. Matching up with what other people had tagged it with meant a better score. Ted was observant to a fault, so his results with such things in the past had been mixed at best as he sometimes noticed things that no one ever bothered to tag. This made it all the more viable as a learning tool, because not only was Adam learning what other people tagged the image with and why - seeing what an average person might be able to glean from it - but he was also having the tiny details pointed out to him by someone who was way too anxious to not notice basically everything.

Since the goal was not just to get Adam to be able to notice details, but to also have him act convincingly human while doing so, this gave him a reasonable benchmark for what he could mention he'd noticed to an average person without looking like he had a weirdly photographic memory with the perfect ability to recall anything and everything. To Ted, this was step one. The average person sees a duck in a pond - maybe even identifying the duck as a mallard - while the hyper-observant person sees that it's overcast and around midday from the sky's reflection in the pond's surface or that there's a gum wrapper and a bit of soggy bread clearly visible in the murky water near the detritus-littered shore.

It was the photos of people that were really a nightmare for Adam. For all his ability to pick up on all the tiny nonverbal cues present in an audio recording, he couldn't so much as even guess at gender presentation of random people in stock photos, let alone their expressions or body language. Ted had to walk him through every last detail, and these were the prettiest, most unambiguous sorts of human beings to boot. The photos were dominated by tall, broad men with either lantern jaws or facial hair, and soft, curvy women with round faces and perfect contouring; women had long hair, men had short hair, and children were dressed as either very male or very female to match the adults. Ted found them obnoxious.

And that wasn't even getting into indicators of disability or profession or anything. Just once, he'd like to see more average people pop up in these things. He was downright relieved to get back to pictures of sheep and grass and flowers and buildings and boats whenever he got done with tagging a person. Not-people didn't bother him nearly as much.

Either way, somewhere along the line he lost track of time completely.

"You should eat something," Adam said out of the blue at one point. Ted straightened up in his chair and shot a glance at the clock in the corner of the laptop's screen, only to frown at it like it'd betrayed him.

It was almost three in the afternoon already? Christ. "Probably," he admitted, stretching out with a slight wince. "Feel like you're making progress yet?“

"I don't know. How do you 'feel' progress? It seems like something that should have a clearer definition than to just feel it."

"Hey man, don't knock feelings. They've got definitions, those definitions are just subjective as fuck." Ted was smiling as he said it, mirroring what he'd heard in Adam's own voice. Both of them were joking. Adam knew full well what Ted had meant, he was just taking a jab at the presentation. "Do you think you've made progress so far?"

"Yes." Adam sounded terribly smug, as if to say see? That was all you had to say. "It's slow, but once I know what I'm looking at, it makes things easier."

Ted shoved off from the desk and stood, taking another moment to stretch. "Cool. Then I'm gonna make some pizza rolls."

Off he went. "Those are bad for you," Adam said as he wandered off. "Humans need nutrients. Pizza rolls are not nutritious."

"Don't care," Ted replied. Along with the pizza rolls, he made sure to retrieve a soda out of the fridge as well just to be contrary. It was hard to care about minor health hazards when he so often had major ones to worry about, and people telling him that he probably should care only made him less likely to do so. "It's calories. It'll work as a stand-in for lunch until I get to dinner."

"I don't think that's how nutrition works." Several seconds passed as Ted wrestled with the packaging, got a plate, and put everything in the microwave.

"Ted. I looked it up. This isn't food, Ted. It has about the same value as eating cardboard."

"Ayep." Ted cracked open the soda and took a swig as he turned on the microwave and let it spin.

"Do you do this often?"

Ted snorted. "Uh, do you really want me to answer that question?"

"According to this site, when the potential long-term effects of such a poor diet are combined with your outward symptoms - such as being the wrong color for a human - it's a strong indicator that your kidneys are probably failing." Adam spoke as if he felt he was the absolute voice of authority on this, and Ted shook with silent laughter as he leaned against the counter. "I think you should get bloodwork done."

"Dude." Good God, what kind of website had Adam even managed to find? Ted felt like he was talking to his grandparents after they'd spent three hours on an online medical journal and decided he looked like he had some obscure genetic disorder that would give him pulmonary fibrosis (whch he didn't). "That 'being the wrong color' thing? It's genetic. I have practically no pigmentation. It's not gout or scurvy or whatever the hell you've found on the internet, just albinism and shitty lighting."

Silence reigned for at least ten full seconds. "I see."

"I take vitamins, alright? And I know my diet isn't all that great, but it's not like pizza rolls are all I eat." He was about to say something about how Adam had seen him eat other things, but then he remembered that Adam couldn't actually see all that well. "Besides, if there was something in my bloodwork, my doctor woulda told me last time I had a checkup. See, unlike some humans, I get those pretty regularly."

"Right." Then, "I'm sorry."

"What for, man? I'm not mad. Hell, at least you care." He'd take a little overworrying anyday if it meant someone was at least trying to understand his problems. It was kinda cute. Big tough super high-tech AI worrying about a squishy human. "And y'know, if you wanna know what's actually wrong with me, all you gotta do is ask."

The microwave beeped, and Adam considered. "You'd tell me that?"

"I tell people all the time."

"No, that's not-" He cut himself off mid-rendering, and Ted raised an eyebrow over in the direction of the living room while pulling the pizza rolls out of the microwave. "Isn't that like telling me how your code is written?"

Huh. Ted had never thought of it that way. "Not really. It's more like, uh... I guess I figure that telling you what versions of what software is running isn't exactly going to give you access to any of the passwords protecting my data, but it will tell you how to work with what I've got going on." Was that an accurate analogy? This barrier to understanding really did go both ways.

The fans weren't quite roaring, but they were definitely humming away audibly in the background; it was always so easy to tell when Adam was mulling something over. "Yes, I would like to know. If that's all right."

"Fine by me." With a plate in one hand and a drink in the other, Ted came back to the not-a-desk and plopped right back down in his chair. "For starters, look up Ehlers-Danlos syndrome."

A minute later Adam asked him how the hell he was alive, and he almost breathed a mouthful of pizza roll.

#no one cares andy #original characters #original writing #robot and marshmallow

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ecotone99 · 4 years

Text

[SP] The Final Lesson

This is it. After all of this time, all of this work, and all of this madness, I’ve finally reached the end. I was just hoping it wouldn’t be this soon. Yet here I am, lying on my deathbed, as I can feel each and every breath getting longer and weaker. My body getting heavier and heavier. I could feel death slowly arriving ready to take me to where I was going next. Not yet though, not yet. There’s another presence, something that can keep me here just a little while longer. I use the only muscles in my body that are working to look around and spot the activity going on in my vicinity. Endless amounts of tears are flowing as everyone’s eyes are on me. I glance at each person and feel what they’re carrying for me. Guilt, fear, pain, anger, confusion, denial, it’s all there and it’s all I can feel. I block them out for a moment to replay the moments of my life. It’s funny though. It feels like just yesterday I was just a little girl, out in my old backyard, running around, chasing animals, and playing with my old friends. I can see my old treehouse, where I pretended I ruled the seven seas as the scurvy pirate captain or conquered the land of the giants as a warrior princess. God, I was so ridiculous. It was fun being a kid. Your imagination ran as wild as a puppy, and there was nothing to worry about. Of course, that was… until… that day. That day they… died.

I always wanted to have a sibling, but… not in the way I got it… I miss them. I miss them so much. They were always happy. They loved my little shows I did for them. They loved it when I would surprise them with breakfast, still don’t know where I learned to make awesome pancakes. I remember her always letting me help around the house. I remember him allowing me to wear his favorite hat. It wasn’t even a special hat. It was just an old red baseball hat with an N on it, nothing more, nothing less. Yet, I loved that hat. I remember gripping it tight as I sat in that dark car, with the fear of facing my parents’ fate. What they told me still hadn’t sink in. I didn’t even know what I was feeling. Everything felt calm for the longest time. I was calm when I walked out of my bedroom. I was calm when I hopped out of the car, even after what happened to my parents. I was calm when I walked into that new home. I was calm when I met everybody. I was calm when I entered my new room. I was… crying when the door closed. I was crying for the rest of the night. My dad’s hat still in my hand. It was like a tornado. One second you have everything, the next it’s gone, and all you can do is grab as much as you can. For me, that hat was all I could grab, and it broke me, cause when I walked into that room, I realized, that hat was all that I had left of my parents, of my friends, of me.

The home I was in was bigger than I expected. There were kids older than me, and younger than me, and of course the parents, Luke and Ruby. They were nice and welcomed me with open arms, at the time I wasn’t sure if it was because of what I lost or because they actually cared. I mean my parents requested in the will that I would go here, so a part of me wanted to accept these people, but another part of me couldn’t. The first few months were rough; I remember them having to lock my window shut after they found me in my old backyard. They gave me a roommate after they found me at the cemetery where I was with my parents. They understood though, they knew how I felt, and knew what I was going through. It was hard, trying to let go. It wasn’t like a toy that you could just put down, or a balloon that you could let fly. You couldn’t let a piece of yourself go, because you didn’t know if you could get it back. As I look around me now though, I didn’t get that piece back, but I got something that was nice alternative.

I look at everyone again. All of the people that have shaped my life after that day. I gave everyone a weak smile as I tried to shed some light into the dark. Some of them shined, while others couldn’t shake it. I saw Louis, the guy in every family who constantly tries to crack a joke. It’s kind of ironic though. He was already at the home for 4 years before I showed up, yet we were the same age. The first thing he talked to me about was my name. He thought it was weird. Autumn. Yeah… My parents picked that name because, well, I was born in autumn. In all seriousness though, they said they wanted to give me a unique name, something pretty and unordinary, like Christa, or Violet, or Clementine. But they picked Autumn. The season I was born, the season that they… died in that crash, the season that we’re in now. I spotted Omar. When I first arrived, I wanted to be as far away from his as possible. He was abandoned by his mother and his father was serving a life sentence. His temper was petrifying. Anytime something related to his parents came up he would flip. Although, it died down after he broke the second TV. He had come home from school, after being harassed yet again about his father, and he just wanted to watch TV. I was sitting there at the edge of the couch watching the news. As if on cue a story about his mother’s death popped up. I watched in terror as he grabbed his textbook and hurled it at the screen. It made a crack, but it wasn’t good enough for him. He charged at it and punched it. He then grabbed it, ripped it from the wall, and slammed it on the ground. All the while screaming one word, no. After that, he dropped to his knees and looked at me. I couldn’t move, but for the first time at that home, I realized his pain. I remember getting my 9 year-old-self up from the couch. I then remember looking at his red eyes and then hugging him. He was 14 at the time, yet it seemed like I was older in that moment. He changed after that day. No more breaking, no more fights, no more pain. I smiled at him today as I’m proud to call him my big brother.

There were others in our home, but they were all much older than me, so I never really got to know them as well. However, there was one, my roommate. Jane was 16 when she came into my room. She really didn’t have choice on the matter as she was supposed to make sure I didn’t run off. At first, I wasn’t sure why they made her my roommate. She was smart, but she didn’t always follow the rules. She always wanted to have fun with her life, whether it was pulling a prank or just going out on her own. So, I didn’t understand why they put her as my roommate, until that first night. I had another nightmare. The same nightmare I always have. Being in my parents’ car the day of the crash. My heart was racing every time, and I just needed time to breathe. Jane was up the whole time. She wasn’t looking at me though. She was looking out the window up at the stars. She looked at me after I calmed down and asked if I wanted to look at them. I said yes, because a part of me was scared to go back to sleep. Before long, we were on the roof. Jane and I snuck outside and used a ladder to get up to the top. We sat there looking at constellations. I always liked the Big Dipper because I would take my hat off and hold it upside down to match it. It was fun. I asked Jane that night why she brought me up there. She didn’t look at me, but it felt like she was. She told me how she never knew her parents, how she was left at the foster home when she was just a baby. She thought, nothing could possible top that, until I showed up. The way she saw it, losing your parents is worse than never knowing them. That night, I wanted to agree with her, but yet to this day, I haven’t made a decision. She left for college 2 years later, and by that time, I saw her as my big sister. Someone that I could lean on when things got rough.

I look around at my family, trying to find anything else to keep me in this life. Then, something else came into view though. He stood at his own level, well below the others, but in my mind, he could be right there with them. He was counting the tiles on the floor, but he could sense my disapproval. His eyes slowly came into view and rivers were on his cheeks. I thought losing my folks was a tragedy until I held him for the first time. He was so little, at a time where you couldn’t remember a thing. I always debated on whether or not he was lucky to have that. The things that happened would’ve left scars that only he could see. Yet, he always asked about them. Were they good people? Which one do I look like? How did they… leave? So little, so young, so smart, so goofy, and so… lost. I smiled as I saw my 8-year-old-self run up and wrap their arms around me. I closed my eyes again as I felt the warmth of his mother, Molly. Every day she would walk by our foster home and wave to us as we walked to school. Her soft voice and glowing smile made me feel happy every time.

I knew he wasn’t going to let go, not yet. I could feel his father’s grip on me. Tyler, he was always cooking, building, playing, and sometimes coaching us, teaching us, and guiding us. Even our foster parents went to him for advice. They always seemed to be close but not there when it came to being good parents. Sometimes they would slip and trip or drop and miss, and so on and so forth. It was a good bit to watch, but who hasn’t done that? His parents weren’t perfect either. His father ironically wasn’t good with a grill, and his mother wasn’t on point when it came to actual pep-talks. In fact, when they found out that “he” was coming, they didn’t know how to respond. I guess that’s a benefit of having 9 months, because they were definitely better when he finally arrived. The smiles of joy they had when he arrived was touching. They named him Tyler Junior, TJ for short.

It surprised me when they asked me to hold him. I was 11 at the time, and I didn’t know how, but they didn’t seem to worry. Everything felt so… long. It felt like an eternity before he finally nestled into my arms. He was so light, yet, I knew the weight he would have on me, especially after… He cried a lot when he was in our home, that is… until I held him. I guess he knew more about me before I even told him anything. Yet, here he is, 6 years later, hugging me, as he knew it was getting closer. I knew it was time for me to give him his final lesson. I reached out to the desk next to me and grabbed my hat. I then slowly brought it back to me and placed it on his little head. The rivers grew stronger on his face as he pulled back. His hands shot up to the hat, but it never came off. He looked at me and immediately knew what I was saying. His hands went back down as he accepted my lesson. I smiled once again as I rest my bald head back down, getting the perfect shot of my heart. The light was as bright as the sun, and all I needed to do was close my eyes.

Not yet, just one more look. One more look at the people who I should never have met, but fate decided that I did. One more look at those who are furthest away from me, yet at the same time, closest to me. One more look at everyone that I call family. Yes… like a cameraman looking for that perfect shot, I got it. I just need one more thing… I close my eyes and whisper.

“Thank you.”

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