May 2018 Archive, part b

I'm awake, little groggy but doing alright now. Feels good. The surgeon and his team were awesome.

Time is an illusion. Happy birthday!

And good luck with your surgery!

Birthday was awesome and the margaritas were amazing. :) I'll definitely post an update on how surgery went—nothing graphic, though, I promise. Here's hoping I'll be able to hang around while recovering, because I'll be bored without y'all.

I bid you well, most currently most prolific PPC writer.

And good luck with the surgery!

Have a cake. I hope the surgery goes well.

Good luck with the surgery too. When you get out, have a super-special birthday cupcake! It's chocolate with chocolate chips and chocolate icing!

We're the same age, you and I. Yes, we are. Heh.

Congrats on your getting Legal Drinking Age batch. And I wish you good luck on your surgery!

Best of luck with your surgery, and whatever you're planning to finish afterward, I'm sure everyone's gonna be HYYYYPED. :)

Here, have a celebratory Tabby Slime from Slime Rancher! "Those stripes, that tail, that wiggle, wiggle, wiggle."

If you want more cake, I have a black-hole chocolate one with red berries coating. And red berries fruit juice. Or kir for celebrate 21st birthday.

Also, good luck with your surgery operation.

and congratulations! I know I don’t really know you well, so perhaps it is an odd thing to feel, but I am still excited for you. I hope you have a wonderful birthday, and good luck with your surgery!

It's been a good year or so that I've known you, and I've gotta say, when I met you as a newbie I was a bit terrified, but now I've got a massive load of respect and consider you a friend. With that, congratulations on your upcoming surgery, and hope all goes well!

- Maxewell

That sounds like it'll be super exciting for you! Stay safe and may you stay in key!

It seems the other thing already got deleted, and it didn't work anyway. You can delete, I guess.

May or may not be around today, but usually available after 6:00 Eastern Standard Time

Unfortunately this isn't a prompt. My laptop is not working at the moment, and I don't have an ETA for it getting fixed. While I do have the family computer to use when I can, I can't use it regularly and so I may not be able to post a prompt next Monday. If someone wants to come up with one (or two) and post it in my stead, be prepared to do so (but NOT UNTIL NEXT MONDAY), you never know, it may all be back to normal before then. I'll try and let you know over the weekend.
Novastorme
PS and for those who are reading this and are on the Discord, yes this is why I haven't been on the last few days, please could one of you apologise to everyone on my behalf, thanks.
PPS the family computer wants to auto-correct apologise to apologist, weird huh?

“Daggeeeeeeeer!”

The dragonborn looked up from his bench, adjusting his glasses as he did so. The lamplight gleamed off his bronze scales. “What is it? Can’t you see I’m working?”

Talia, for her part, had been bent over a workstation opposite her partner until moments before. Now, she was staring at him irritably. “The network’s down. Still. It’s been three days, so would you care to explain what the holdup is?”

“The holdup, my dear partner, is that I’m not a network engineer. So I had to study up on how the mess that connects us to the mass of chewed gum and duct tape that HQ jokingly calls a network. That was the first day.” Dagger’s tone was tinged with that special indignation of an engineer who had just had his competency questioned.

“Right,” said Talia. “No, I get that, but what about the other two days? Were you just sitting around doing rude things to yourself?”

If Dagger could scowl, he would have. As it stood, he just gave it his best approximation. It got the message across, at least. “Nothing of the kind. The next days were spent running new cabling through our RC, because the old wiring was put in when 115200bps was blazing fast.”

“So what’s left to do?” asked Talia. “Just flip the switch and wire us in.”

“I was getting to that. The only thing that’s left is putting the ends on the cables. And I can’t do that, so I need you to help.”

“Why me?”

Dagger held up his hands. “In case you haven’t noticed, I have claws.”

“Ooooh… Right.” Talia frowned. “So how do I help?”

“Do you like slotting small wires into tiny slots?”

“Not particularly.”

“Too bad. Get over here and I’ll show you the ropes. Just make sure you don’t miss any slots, and that you get the order right. I’ll be watching to make sure.”

Talia sighed melodramatically. “No bets on whether my hands will hurt after all this repetitive detail work, I suppose. All right. Let’s get this over with…”

--

Talia’s hands did hurt, as she had predicted. Her eyes and head hurt more, though: fine detail work could do that to you. She lay on the cot that passed for her bed in the RC, trying to relax before she got back to any sort of real work. Suddenly, she had a thought. “Hey, Dagger?”

He gave a grunt.

“How did a Dragonborn get a degree in Electrical Engineering anyways?”

Dagger let out a long, slow sigh. “I really, really, don’t want to talk about it.”

'Are we really, Bingle?'

'Oh, yes, quite certainly, Finch. In between checking this watch of mine, and checking our, frankly, unnecessarily large collection of prime condition wall clocks-'

'Your collection.'

'I can confirm with a nearly one hundred per cent accuracy that we do, in fact, seem to be late.'

Finch didn't even look up from his magic eye book, which he had scientifically determined to be (as of now) the single best way in which for any sapient, intelligent being to ignore the crawling and cold death that slowly comes for us all. 'Well, that-s a bloody shame.

'Very much, oh, absolutely.'

'Yes. That-s horrid. We can-t have that.'

'The guilt we will feel, Finch, when we come back to there, eventually!' Bingle wailed, glancing at his watch and backing into his corner of the RC and under the sheets of his bed.

'I-m burning alive with guilt, myself,' Finch agreed, optical sensor really narrowing hard at this particular page.

'Yes, yes indeed. We are late. Terribly, terribly late.'

Finch! Bingle! You, you're late!

Bingle crumpled out of his bed, spilling the sheets to the floor and smashing his face on a tile.

Ummm! What are you two doing? Ninetwo was standing in front of the swinging door like a foreign conqueror.

Finch was a trained veteran in these situations and he immediately charged on the offensive with a pointing actuator. 'What the hell are you doing in here? How did you even get in here?'

Well, I-

'Is that a bloody key?!' Finch pointed down at Ninetwo's frond, nestled in which was a key to their RC. 'Did you unlock - do you have a copy of -' He glared at Bingle. 'Did you give her a copy?!'

'I did no such thing,' Bingle argued from beneath his sheets.

The door swung open again: 'Hrmmm, yeah, guys, we need to go, we're late.' Anne swayed in, taking in the nooks and crannies of the room. She lazily swung another copy of their RC's key on her finger.

'You have one, too?!'

'Hrm? Oh, yeah, yeah. Bingle gave me a couple.' Finch gazed at her with a red melting rage and she was as solid and untouched as a cliff wall.

'Did I really do that?' Bingle exclaimed, pulling himself up and glancing at Finch. He made a face like he was being torn in half by an invisible giant. 'Oh! I did, yes. Ahah!'

'Bloody give!' Finch hissed, snatching the keys from Anne and Ninetwo.

Umm. I have a spare, too. I'll just get that out-

Finch grabbed it out of her frond before she even fished it out of her pocket.

'Shoo! Out!' and he beat Anne and Ninetwo, stumbling, out of the RC. And he pulled the door shut and hovered right back to his book.

'A damn shame, Bingle, that we-re late.'

'Very tragic, yes, Finch,' Bingle agreed, rolling into his bed and shutting his eyes. 'But there really wasn't anything we could do about it.'

There had been no new missions for an hour and a half, which was extraordinary. The only problem was that the Ironic Overpower was guaranteed to give Edward and Kat a mission within the next few minutes as soon as they started doing something.
Kat was currently singing along to “A Whole New World” and Edward had very quickly put his new earplugs in. Kat’s singing was absolutely horrendous.
Edward was half-heartedly playing Solitaire with his mind not really on the game. He’d played about five games so far and won zero. The current game was not looking promising.
Kat said something, but he couldn’t hear her through the earplugs. He took them out and said, “Sorry, what was that again?”
“We should do something.”
He nodded but asked, “What? The IO is going to give us a mission as soon as we start!”
“Whatever. I’m so bored I think I want a mission.”
Kat would probably regret that as soon as they did.
“Shall we play a card game?”
“I can’t think of any good two-player ones.”
“There’s loads of four-player games. Why don’t we play two players each?”
That seemed like a sensible suggestion. Edward agreed. He was going to say that cooperation between teams shouldn’t be allowed but decided there was no point – they’d both just cooperate anyway.
He suggested that they play Hearts and when Kat agreed gathered up the cards he had been using for Solitaire and began dealing, very quickly. He’d had a lot of practice at dealing cards. Once all fifty-two cards had been dealt he picked up one of the hands and cringed.
It was absolutely awful! Seven high clubs, a singleton Queen of Spades… He might as well try to take every card there was with this. His other hand was a lot better and he decided he would try to take all the penalty cards.
Kat’s first player played the two of clubs and her second showed off its club void with the Ace of Spades. Edward played the Ace and his second player the six. He took the trick and led his nine of clubs, which looked quite high but was actually his second-lowest club.
His other player played the three and Kat’s players played the five and the Ace of Hearts respectively. Edward kept leading clubs for the next five rounds, but by this stage Kat had figured out what he was up to and was refusing to dump any more hearts.
He so far had the seven highest hearts, three dumped by Kat’s players and the others by his own player. The King of Spades hadn’t come out yet so he couldn’t lead the Queen. What he could do, on the other hand, was lead diamonds; Kat had used up a lot of hers by dumping them on Edward’s clubs.
He led three rounds of diamonds and Kat wasn’t forced to play any more hearts or the King. However, Edward still had the highest remaining heart, which he led to take another trick and three more hearts. Now all he had was a heart and the Queen of Spades. The heart was the highest remaining, but there was no guarantee that he could force out the King.
He led the heart, fingers crossed, and his other player played a low spade. As Kat’s first player was about to put down a card…
[BEEEEEEEEEEEEP!!!]

The bell rang and the students began packing their things, chattering excitedly. She kept her head down, flinching when she felt Jessica's elbow jab her in the side as she passed. It could have been an accident, not at all intended to be malicious, but she still didn't want to risk looking up. If she met Jessica's eyes, there would be hell to pay, so she focused on packing up her cauldron and books, waiting for the class to file out before she slipped away.

The other students liked to hang out in the courtyard during their free period, which meant the library would be hers. She limped along the corridor, slowed down with the weight of all her textbooks crammed into her bag.

She could hear voices up ahead and she flattened herself against the wall, heart pounding, wondering if someone had stayed behind to jump her. Nervously, she peered around the corner, and her racing heart skipped a beat when she realized it was Teddy Lupin talking to Victoire Weasley.

"So, Hogsmeade is coming up soon," Teddy said as she began backing down the corridor the way she came. "Want to go with me? We could go to the Three Broomsticks, make a date of it..."

She didn't stick around to hear Victoire's reply. Beautiful, talented, perfect Victoire, who had the most obvious crush on Teddy that of course she would say yes. Who wouldn't? Jealousy gnawed at her stomach as she pushed aside a tapestry to reveal a hidden staircase. This route would take longer, but at least she wouldn't have to risk anyone seeing her cry.

She gave the library a pass and continued up to the seventh floor, to Gryffindor Tower, to her dormitory where she pulled her bed hangings shut and curled up on the quilt, hugging her bag to her chest. Her heart ached from the loneliness.

Laughter drifted up from the courtyard through the open window. She closed her eyes and listened, glad that for once, nobody was laughing at her.

Ce’rana of Borune forced herself to focus on the book in her hands one more time as she picked up her pace. The halls of HQ weren’t the most cooperative thing, and neither was the IO; both had tossed her obstacle after obstacle - spider mites in her flowers that she had to take care of before they spread; a chance encounter with another Agent that started with her wandering straight into him and ending with her having to go back and pick up her book again after she’d dropped it; and now, making her even more hopelessly lost every time she glanced up from her book.

All she wanted was to be able to figure out where in Nedra’s name Rudi’s had gone off to. Alex had promised to get the both of them a non-Cafeteria dinner after yet another horrible mission; all she had to do was meet him there. There was no good reason for her to be late, and she could practically feel each second ticking past.

The Dryad barely even blinked when she wandered into the wall again, instead forcing herself to look up and turn the corner like a sane individual. She would get nowhere by letting her frustration mount until she broke down crying; if she did that, she’d stop moving, and wasn’t that the key to actually getting anywhere in this cursed place? To keep going forward without paying attention until you somehow wound up where you needed to go?

Obviously not, if another wall to the face was any indication. Ce’rana allowed herself a moment of pettiness to glare at the wall and kick it before looking around to see where she was supposed to turn. And of course she wasn’t actually at a corner this time - one of the few dead ends in this place. She growled and turned around, determined to pay attention to nothing but the words of her book this time.

“Rana?” Her partner’s voice called out from behind her. She paused before slowly turning again and looking up at him. It took her a few moments to work out some possible reason for Alex to have been behind her - in a dead end, of all places. It wasn’t like he could have teleported.

“...please tell me you didn’t go looking for me,” she muttered at last. “Because I do not need finding.”

Alex crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow at her, even as he leaned to one side… on the door to Rudi’s.

The tiny agent looked up a little more to take in the sign, the door, and her partner all at once. She blinked. She took a slow, deep breath. Finally, she spoke. “That was not there ten seconds ago.”

“It’s been right here the whole time.” Alex gave her a knowing grin. “Now, come on. Your raspberry mousse cake is getting cold.” He turned around and slipped back into Rudi’s.

The Dryad glared at the door for a few moments as it swung shut behind him, mentally daring it to disappear, before opening it again and following her partner to the table in the corner. At least he’d gotten her something nice.

...of still doing the Purim RP this year. While it feels like ages since Purim actually happened, it's actually only been about two months, which seems somewhat reasonable. It could work. I think I've even done it this late once before.

The main thing, beyond lack of time for a bit (and also a bunch of different events and so on running when I did have a little time), has been that I'd need to finish both an opening scene (tradition!) and the starting post. Then again, I could probably do that...and it would be nice to keep this going...

I...seem to be doing this. Look out for it hopefully this week, I guess? At current glance, I basically just need to write a continuation/ending for a short scene and adapt an opening post into existence from the previous years.

For anyone who doesn't recognize/remember it: the Purim RP is basically agents, Boarders, you name it dropped into somewhere in HQ for a Purim party. What's Purim? It's a Jewish holiday commemorating the events of the Scroll of Esther (basically, an evil plot was foiled and the Jews of Persia and Medea were saved from massacre). Popular activities of the party variety include costumes, a type of cookie called hamantaschen, and optional drinking. There's more depth to the holiday, but so far that's the main part that's shown up in the RP, which, well, it's an RP of a party, not of people hearing the Scroll read or giving charity or gifts of food and drink to their friends/neighbors...

Anyway. Yes. I am apparently doing this again. Keep an eye out!

~Z

I was not aware of this. I checked myself, and it's not working for me, either, although I can log in and edit my files. I've sent off a help request to Lycos, and I'll keep the Board updated with what I learn.

~Neshomeh

One: "You are educated evil, and might have to kill the evil ONE teaching educators before you can learn that 4 corner days actually do exist"

And, the other: "Death wobbled meretriciously, erring on the side of butch with a strong scent of whiskey on their jaw hinge."

As 700 rounds per minute blazed across the bombed-out no-man's-land that used to be the city's most exclusive club, all that Corporal Allen McCormick could think was: "Did I leave the stove on?"

Here's the sentence:

She wanted me to play out the string, to find the place where she had stopped and was waiting for me, to follow the bread crumb trail until it dead-ended into her.


So: Published, badfic, or something I made up?

And I'll add one of my own: "It was the only dream she was allowed to have and in truth it was the only dream she wanted to have. After twenty-four years she'd come to learn that there was a certain kind of alleviation achieved through the act of taking another's life."

Chelsea put on her kitty ears headband. She looked to her partner and asked, “Whachu going as?”

“A pirate,” said Lemon. She just put on a black eyepatch and was now wrapping a yellow bandana around her head.

“You’re already kinda dressed like a pirate without the eyepatch and bandana, though.”

Lemon did not respond to that comment.

Chelsea looked at Lemon’s outfit, then back at her own. She was wearing a pink, sleeveless dress with a short, poofy skirt and now she was considering changing into her ninja outfit. Her mind went back and forth, trying to decide between going as a pink catgirl or a ninja.

“Are we ready to go?” asked Lemon.

“Uh, hang on a sec.” Chelsea took the top part of her ninja outfit and pulled it over her dress.

“What are you doing?”

Instead of answering right away, Chelsea looked down at her feet. She took off the pink boots she was wearing and put on black two-toed boots. Now she was dressed as a kitty-eared ninja with a pink skirt.

Chelsea grinned. “Nyow I’m ready!” she exclaimed, striking a pose.

Lemon covered her mouth, trying not to laugh.

“What?”

“Nothing. Let’s go.”

---
((I think this is my first time rping, so I’m not used to this. Anyway, my agents are Chelsea, an Inkling (Splatoon) and Lemon, a rat (Sonic the Hedgehog).))

... that any agent must undergo. One of these is being thrown headfirst into a strange environment where everybody is dressed or shaped in ways that are incredibly odd and expected to interact with the world. Of course, most of the time, this is called a mission, not a party.

Still, he was determined to make the best of it. He tugged on his dress, wondering if he should be trying to cover his leggings. It was a deep purple with some kind of fur cloak, and those with the relevant experience might recognize it as that worn by Liliana Vess as the Last Hope. Indeed, it seemed that, aside from leaving him male, a disguise generator had been used to make him resemble her as closely as possible. He wasn't sure if he should have gone all-out and changed his gender as well, but then again, he hadn't chosen his costume.

The agent lurked around the edges of the party, watching as other people slowly trickled in. What exactly was he supposed to do here?

"Anthropology," said Thoth. "I consider it research into ancient religions." He cast his eyes about the room. "Although it seems that we should have come in costume."

"Well I was going to," Tom replied huffily, "when you decided to torch my costume."

"To save your life. When I discovered that Talia and Dagger had started a betting pool over who was going to beat you up first."

"Well, if you're so into the costuming thing, why don't you wear one? You still have your Halloween cost—"

"Under. No. Circumstances."

Tom shrugged. "Suit yourself. I'm really just here for the food."

Sophie List flushed as red as the wig she was wearing. "That's not what I was suggesting!" she said.

"Lust objects are nothing to be ashamed of. But I'm not going to dress up as yours." Theo uncrossed his arms with a sigh. "But I will dress up, if it will make you stop pestering me." He turned to his closet and shuffled through it, finally pulling out a dark green cloak. Mud cracked and fell off the hem as he put it on over his white T-shirt and blue jeans. "I'm a Ranger. Happy?"

"Have you ever washed that?" Sophie asked accusingly.

"No. It's authentic. Come on, or we'll be late." Theo opened the door to their RC and walked out, Sophie following behind him.

"Your hair is still up," she pointed out. Theo pulled the hairband out of his hair and looped it on his left wrist, letting the pony tail fall across his shoulders. "I can see your tennis shoes," Sophie added, still critical.

"Then don't look," Theo said.

"They're bright red; I can hardly help but look," Sophie said.

"You're wearing a black turtleneck and black jeans with a Black Widow patch safety pinned to your belt," Theo said.

"But at least they're all the right color!" Sophie said.

The argument got them to the party fairly quickly. Sophie grinned as she looked across the room, taking in others who had arrived and finally seeing the refreshment table, which she made for immediately, abandoning her argument and her partner at the door.

As she plugged in her headphones and started up Google Docs, Twistey recalled the high likelihood of disastrous consequences occurring if she'd joined the fun last year. Bull in a china shop, indeed. Over that year, she'd developed a trick of channeling a terrible concept in a hidden way, resulting in something that was not offensive, just vaguely menacing. That was the reason why she could give away the character her thoughts had turned into, because it had been generic to the point of looking like it was related to something else entirely. Which reminded her, she needed to give it away.

But that didn't matter now. The Purim party hadn't even happened, and so no harm was done. Now it had rolled around again, and she was quite prepared this time. She knew some of her agents-to-be were going to go, and she wanted to surprise them a little. But still, she knew she had to keep incognito. Zingenmir's rules.

Twistey couldn't work without music, so she looked through YouTube to see what its suggestions were. Mostly Animusic. She'd gotten back into that a while ago, having loved its music and animation since childhood. Seeing one video, she remembered something she would love to do. "Aha", she thought, dialed up one of the pre-agents who had decided not to go, and began to write her costume into reality.

-------

"Hello! Listen, I finally found a costume for you that you might be able to go in. ...No, you do not have things to do, you're a semi-fic blip and you're not an agent yet. ...There's social anxiety and there's isolating yourself from everyone because you don't feel you're normal. Agents are an interesting bunch, there's a lot of them who don't know their parents either. ...Yes. And about the costume, no one has to see your face, hear your voice, or anything like that. I know right, it's great! ...We'll communicate with written signs, gestures, and music. First thing we'll do is ask the host if we can DJ, so it can be that we won't even have to interact with anyone. Okay, you're in? Sweet! Put your hair in a wig cap and get a binder if you have one. I have some really cool wearable electronics for us. See ya at my place. Goodbye."

-------

Amber Callahan, no relation to Kitty or any other agent with that last name, was peppering an agent with questions about HQ. When did a typical day start? What tools would she be equipped with for missions? What kind of person could she expect for a partner? The nature of HQ time, the severe underequippedness, and all that only made her more excited. Amber had always had a thirst for adventure. This seemed to worry the agent to no end, but despite the look in their eyes, they smiled and nodded, then continued answering in an even tone of voice.

The Callahan siblings (Erika, Amber, and Connor, from oldest to youngest) had collectively decided to go as characters who wouldn't require masks, excessive face paint, or wigs that were a different color than their actual hair, just so that the crowd could get to know what they actually looked like. Connor was immediately recognizable as Ron Weasley, though he'd remarked that he was "too quiet for the part." Erika had reused a formidable cosplay of Moira from Overwatch that she had saved up to buy, and it looked like she was getting more in character as she got more comfortable. While Moira isn't really a costume one can ruin Purim with, the younger Callahans would have to keep her in check. Amber herself wore the magnificent blue-and-yellow dress of Mrs. Whatsit from the new "A Wrinkle in Time" movie. Amber's best friend Miriam had helped her with her makeup and other such things - too bad Miriam hadn't been able to come. Oh well - Amber had her phone with her, and she could send Miriam all the photos of great cosplay that she could handle.

Just then, Amber heard a loud sound coming from the entrance. Specifically, a series of notes played on a higher and lower synthesizer. She spun to face the direction the musical noise had come from. Two gleaming, futuristic robots, their fronts covered in large pentagonal buttons that she assumed made the music, glided into the room together and made their way towards the host. Things just got more interesting.

-------

The blue Starship Groove robot, presumably male, pulled out a sign reading "Can we DJ?" and showed it to the host. The red one began pressing buttons with one hand and gesturing with the other, first pointing to "her"self, and then making a motion that resembled scratching a disk on a turntable. They waited for a reply.

-Twistey

(Here's a reference for Twistey and the reluctant pre-agent's costumes):

Marina said as she entered the room with her partner, looking at his masked face. "And you just had to use that Disguise again, uh?"

Richard, wearing a black coat, black clothes, red gloves and a black and white mask, grinned slightly, "You can talk. you used the same one too, and it is an even cheaper one."

Marina, who was wearing a brown trench coat, a collier with a silver pentacle, and had an engraved staff in hand, shrugged before raising her other hand to list points "Not my idea to come. That's as good as I can get without Disguise Generator like you. And finally, if he can go to a party disguised as a series B vampires, I can do this. Just be happy I'm not going here with robes and a pointy hat with stars on them. Oh, and a wand to go with them."

"But you still intend to enjoy the party too, right?"

"Well, I'm here now, so I could as well profit from that..."

Charlotte, clad in a simple but elegant red gown, looped her arm through Ix’s. Her hair was now golden thanks to the disguise generator, but she otherwise looked the same as ever, her purple glasses somewhat out of place in her Princess Buttercup costume,

Ix readjusted her Dread Pirate Roberts mask and shrugged, grimacing. “Not until I feel better about showing my face in public, and we both know that’s not going to happen. Besides, admit it—I look good in this.”

Charlotte laughed and shook her head as they entered the party. “You look good in everything, hon.”

Because that's definitely happened by now. It's beautiful!