come_sailaway | JUNE EVENT: CAMP

JUNE EVENT: CAMP

early on June 10th, Friday's morning announcements end with a request for everyone going on the latest excursion to meet her in the atrium. she seems in noticeably better spirits than she had been last time, and she leads them cheerfully to the tender. once they are all aboard, and the door is securely shut, the interior fills with gas, and, perhaps, their last thought before they slip into unconsciousness is "oh shit, not again."

passengers wake up on a rickety old school bus, driving down a dirt road surrounded by woods. what is it that they notice first? that, no matter what they were wearing before, they are now wearing a camp t-shirt and legitimately horrifyingly short shorts? the overstuffed backpack between their knees? the words "take one down and pass it around" dying on their lips? the fact that Friday is absolutely driving the bus?

or, maybe the fact that it's already slowing down, pulling up in front of a massive wooden sign, saying:

CAMP AION

when they get out of the bus, Friday is the one to divide them up into their cabin groups, and she is the one to give the counselors their very official-looking clipboards and whistles. she explains that they are in charge, and that she will be back to pick them up in a week, and... very little else. she responds to nothing outside of whatever is on her unseen little script, and she gets back on the bus shortly after, leaving them there.

welcome to camp. let's make some summer memories!

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Marc looks momentarily apologetic when he startles the other guy, but-- yeah. Sometimes talking about something else helps, sometimes distractions are the only thing that stop you from running around every doom scenario or bad memory running around in your head.

"Huh." He reads the one that's held up. "Do they help?"

He gives a wry smile. "I can face any challenge... Good mantra to have."

"You can be useful in other ways, you know..." It doesn't have to be-- any of that. "You just need more confidence in yourself, Steven."

( they're both momentarily caught on the concept of time. natsuno thinks about starvation, and at his question, clarke's struck by just how long they've known each other without her ever... really... telling him much about herself. has it really been three, three and a half months?

is this a different brand of dishonesty?

her fingers stay at reaffixing the noose, and for a second she just looks at him. blank, shocked, the weight of her life story on her tongue but so, so bitter. not that long ago she'd levelled the number of people she killed at diana abel and witnessed abject horror reflected in the other woman's eyes — a reinforcing moment, that she was more blood-soaked than the creatures of nighttime horrors.

but it's just a second. the mask of a halfassed grin gets slapped back on, and clarke shrugs. )

Long story. I guess the short version is only 100 of us were sent down to Earth at first. Well, 102 actually.

( and there's that vague obfuscating again. 100 criminals sent down to earth from space. 102 people becoming 97 all because of a rough landing, not to mention how only 40-sum of the original number were alive by the end of the next month. )

( alright alright, she'll cave. )

I'm bothered enough I can't sleep. ( and there's a very pointed glance at the flamethrower he'd deigned to drag up here with them. two of the same mind, it seemed like obviously he got it. )

"I was in Egypt. Had some business there." Well, easier to make it sound casual than the fact he was a failed Marine-turned-mercenary.

But he does give a curious look at that. "A camp that was modelled after the old west, huh?"

He's been in England. Not sure he's seen anything like that... but he doesn't tend to go for gimmicky stuff too much. "I was a soldier, so I spent some nights under the stars. I can't say it was ever like this."

Steven clutches onto his upper arms nervously as if he can save them from any hungry bug. If anyone, bugs or otherwise, wanted to bite chunks out of him, let's be honest - he wouldn't be able to fend them off.

"I guess that's strange too..." He's a city boy. The only birds he sees are pigeons and magpies and sparrows, and they're not too noisy, so he didn't notice that straightaway.

"These shorts are an abomination," he mutters. He has to do a bit of a waddle while he walks, afraid they'll ride up too high. "I'm so indecent. Hope I can get rid of them... once everyone else does." He doesn't want to be accused of 'ruining the fun' or whatever hazing ritual this is supposed to be.

[What is it with teenagers being so damn stubborn? Maybe he'd been too, when he was stalking off to join the Marines, but every kid here wants to insist going it alone, no matter what happens. It's... a lot.]

I was just gonna go grab you a bottle of water and a cool rag, but-- if you're sure.

[Hopefully she doesn't get too dehydrated, but hey.]

Huh? [Oh. He straightens up a bit, shrugging his shoulders.]

Marc. Steven found me, yeah. Did you run into him here or back on the ship?

There's no monster in the woods. There's no creature in the lake. There's no sleeper agent placed among the passengers, no sigils, no indication of anything nefarious at all.

So what, then, is the point?

It's the only question on Skulduggery's mind tonight. The fourth day has turned out exactly the same as all the other days; early wake-ups, vaguely-scheduled activities, and mostly unstructured free time. They hadn't been left any instructions at all, and yet everyone is doing their best to somehow... what? Salvage their camping excursion? As if they aren't all animals in a zoo, being watched by some bored child?

The whole thing is stupid. They shouldn't be playing into the captain's game like they are. And if the captain wanted the experience of visiting a summer camp, he could be experiencing it himself. Maybe if he did that, instead of using passengers as proxies, he wouldn't have a black hole where his soul should be.

Hah. Even if that were true, he would just sell it over again. He'd trade the feeling over for a chance to learn how to properly sculpt the root system of a summer elm tree.

The sky is the same here as it is on the ship, namely that there's no familiarity in the stars. Skulduggery makes random shapes from them, distantly aware that they might not be stars at all, as artificial and not-quite-right as the trees. Impressive, but not quite to the point of deification. Not yet, at least. It still needs more work.

Maybe the next event's trees will be more real than these ones. Maybe the stars will finally start making sense. For all their sakes, he hopes not.

Nobody's just like that. He moves his head back a bit, watching her arm with an unhealthy amount of confusion and doubt, and then he averts his gaze, pulling his hands in to cover his tummy.

"Did the doctor do something to you?" That's... horrible. He looks at Ava again, and then his gaze strays yet again.

"Does it hurt?"

"Sure, that's the one. Sounds like you had a lot of assholes." So it does sound like there's some-- capacity there, doesn't it? He shifts a little nodding to the space next to him.

"Did you want to sit down for a bit?"

I love blue.

( and green, and the purples and pinks found among flowers, and the brown of tree bark, the white of clouds, and the orange of sunset. really the only color clarke probably hates on some visceral level is red. and the darkness of black.

mizuki finishes fastening the bracelet, and clarke gradually drops her arm. it's a strange sensation, something new weighing against her pulse point, but not an unwelcome tether. )

Reminds me of the sky. Back home, I mean, this — ( a gesture to the air around them, this sliver of mysticism built on the captain's whim. ) — I mean, it looks the same, but it's still different.

Hey--

[He sits up a little bit straighter.]

I'm not-- I still got dignity, alright? A pair of ridiculous shorts isn't gonna take that away.

"Yeah? You're-- confidence, kid..." Really confident. But then again, cocky teenagers are nothing new, are they?

"That's what I'm thinking... and I'm not-- my twin's on the red team. Not interested in playing that kind of a game."

Skulduggery decided to put aside the idea that this is the afterlife, just for a minute, and focus on the more pressing issues at hand. That is, reassuring Steven that everything is going to be fine.

"The last excursion was a highly-structured battle to the death, which has left everyone understandably nervous as to what we might encounter here. The lack of structure so far indicates that we're most likely not dealing with another death match." Probably. Maybe. He actually has no idea, but he's going to say it confidently enough to hopefully give somebody else peace of mind. "The reason it's so quiet, why there aren't any animals or insects, is because the magic here is limited. Nothing is alive here, not even the trees."

He tilts his head, thinking over for a second, and then nods. "And you haven't annoyed me yet. I'm enjoying your company." It's probably the first thing he's enjoyed all day, honestly.

"What's wrong with beetroot?" Steven doesn't put it back but he does close the cupboard and move over to follow as instructed, finding a place to sit where he can watch Marc while holding his beetroot in his lap.

He's perfectly capable of cooking but the thought of putting 3 hours into a kitchen for a hot meal is... well if he's also cooking for Marc that's another thing entirely. Of course he would. But he's not sure how Marc's going to like his food. He's making a funny face about beetroot already.

"Are you cooking something for me?" Steven's eyes seem a little bright at the prospect, as though he's never been cooked for and it's kind of a big deal to him.

Hey, she's pretty cool, handling all this shit and not just-- curling up in a fetal position somewhere or something.

He won't call her out on any nerves.

"We come back, right? What's that-- even like?"

Murderbot considers for a moment, and then moves to occupy that space, very particularly careful not to touch Marc at all. It's strange--where it came from, it wasn't allowed to sit, so to be invited to do so by a human, it just hits different.

"I was leased out by an insurance company for planetary surveys and mining installations and other situations where they'd lose money if shit went down. Yeah, there were a lot of assholes. And corporate politics. And...yeah."

"Yeah, I'm gonna make you something. Just gotta give me a second to figure out what. Seems the kitchen is fully functional... even if I'm not sure they're using it." Which is just-- weird. Makes him wonder if they're even actually on an island or if they're somewhere still on this ship, or--

Well, better to not think about it. Better to focus on coming up with ingredients for something Steven will eat.

He pauses when he notices that look and manages a small smile. "Hey, c'mon... I never said I was a great cook. Don't get your hopes too high."

But hey-- stuffed baked potatoes. That's always a winner, right? And there's enough cans of stuff to make it appealing, give it some flavor.

Hey, at least-- Marc is generally used to insanity. He is pretty insane after all... and sometimes, it's just easier to roll with it. So, sure, talking magical skeleton and a weird Captain that kidnaps people and sends them to summer camp.

Why not?

And why not just-- go wandering in the forest? "Really? How is that even possible... you just wind back in a circle?"

Four days they've been here. Four days of her moping around about the fact that she's barely even seen any of her friends, because they're divided into different cabins, onto different sides of the camps in assigned colors that are probably meant to mean something but don't because there doesn't appear to be any actual competition. No goal. Just whistles and clipboards to represent an authority she doesn't actually have.

If there's supposed to be a purpose to any of this, apparently that's up to her, and Ava is sure she's failed this task as badly as anyone is capable. It would have been better if she hadn't tried at all, because at least she'd have the excuse that she simply didn't care for any of it. But truthfully, Ava had wanted more out of this experience. Fun, as petty a thing that might be.

She's let her cabinmates back in, because it's difficult to sustain being irrationally territorial when they keep knocking and whining. And instead she takes off on her own to find somewhere quiet to sulk and enjoy this night, as artificial as it must be. This isn't a planet, nor actual land... just a rendering of, and so there's no rotation or orbit or real sun nor moon. Deep in thought, Ava nearly tramples over Skulduggery, who is musing such similar thoughts of his own.

"Shit, sorry, didn't see you," Ava apologizes.

Steven glances over at Marc and seems to be considering it for a bit before lowering his gaze and nodding a few times, wringing his hands in his lap again. He doesn't feel he has to be right now. Not ever, when Marc's around. Maybe he's not-- inside Steven anymore, can't call on him whenever he needs to, but if he's still there he can still front for them both. And Steven can help them both out if Steven's around, too. That's still how it works. They don't have to operate-- completely independently.

"Can I stay for a bit, first?" he asks softly. "Before someone else stops by."

She's been curious enough about Palamedes, since the information seeking meeting. Had expected him to come around at some point, poking at her for answers. But perhaps he'd lost interest, or perhaps she simply wasn't there any of the times he might have come by.

Still, she isn't so sure he's the sort that she wants to trust. From such a brief impression, he seems knowledgable about a manner of subjects, decently intelligent which isn't quite the same thing. But curious minds can be dangerous, the motives behind their search for answers, their intentions on how to utilize what's found out.

She knows, being dangerously curious herself.

She doesn't find him on purpose, quietly drifting through the area. But she pauses in recognition, shifting invisible when she notices the knife. And watches as he cuts himself upon it. Her eyebrows draw together, more confused than concerned. Was he performing some sort of ritual? Ava quietly sneaks closer, to find out what the hell he's up to.

... Okay, well. You know, he's very anxious. So she's probably not too far off on the complaining bit...

But either way, Marc's gonna give it his best. He huffs out a short chuckle and shakes his head. "Good to know, I guess. And forget the head start... don't think I'll need it."

Okay, what? "That doesn't even make sense. Where does the water come from, in that case? Are there sigils on the inside of the tap to draw water from elsewhere on the ship, maybe?"

Nope, getting sidetracked. Skulduggery reaches for another branch, gets tired of the charade, and ignores the next few trees entirely out of spite. "I didn't know you cooked," he comments idly. "Not surprising, since I don't eat, but still."

... You know, Marc might not be against trying to brew some toilet wine, potential blindness or food poisoning be damned. But he's not sure they've got the time and-- really, it's just a kick to the nuts that they can't give adults some drinks here. What kinda camping trip is it without a few beers?

He huffs out a laugh though, turning to head back into the kitchen. "Yeah, well... that's pretty tempting, yeah? And it's all over the ship. Wonder how they even get a bottomless supply?"

Or maybe it'll dry up one day and that'll be that, but that's a depressing thought, isn't it?

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JUNE EVENT: CAMP

CAMP AION

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[night, field] it doesn't have to be a whole big thing, all the time

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