fandomtownies | The Boards, Wednesday Evening

Troy got a few different kinds of pizza -- works, Greek vegetarian, and four cheese -- and since he couldn't remember if anyone was vegan or not, he erred on the side of caution and picked up a handful of single-serving salads.

Show up, make sure everyone's still here, grab food.

Mercy came in, but really wasn't interested in eating - hadn't been for a while. So, she was just here and quietly watching and trying not to let her nerves get the better of her.

Raven was staying clear of the dorms as much as possible, and she headed to the Boards after spending the day in the library.

She usually wasn't one for dark corners, but she was doing her best to keep to herself, just listening quietly and avoiding the circle of chairs.

Miley had done some evaluating over the weekend. This thing that was happening was scary, yes, but she was also pretty tough. She had nerve (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nHW5t_NGAM), after all.

So yeah. She was here, with a slice of pizza with a ton of toppings on it, and she didn't look scared at all.

Take that, Nothing.

Elphaba was thankful for the salad, and had snatched one up. She could easily eat, the stress wasn't that terrible to her. She was remarkably calm, given her state the other week.

She'd given up on being scared and frustrated. She'd do what she must, because she could.

Pizzzzzzza!

Live in the moment. In this moment, there was PIZZA.

Billy ~~had totally been here, god self~~ grabbed a slice of pizza and tried not to look nervous. He wasn't worried about his own safety, because he was an idiot like that, but he worried about everyone else getting back to where they'd come from safely.

On the stage there was a circle of chairs, facing inward; Troy sat in one, smiling softly as he waited for everyone else to sit down.

"We're going to do something a little different today," he started, as soon as most people had made their way into the circle. "One of the reasons we decided to do the showcase the way we did is because it's important, especially when you're somewhere like Fandom, to learn as much as you can from the people around you. With... everything going on, I think it's probably even more important. So what we're doing today is telling stories. Anything you want -- something from your holiday traditions, something that happened to you, something you heard about, some other traditional story. And we're all going to listen, and remember, because stories are important. They're what shape us.

"So just... Anything you want to tell. Doesn't have to be good, maybe it's only something that's important to you. Maybe it's how you named your first pet. Just tell a story."

"When I was a kid," Troy started, "I dunno, six or seven years old, all I wanted for Christmas was a red bike. Most of my friends wanted things like Nintendo systems, or TVs, or CD players, but I'd seen this bike in the store, and man did I want it. The thought of riding around town on a shiny new bike was all I could think about for, like, two months.

"So I woke up Christmas morning, and I tore downstairs, and there in the middle of the room? Was the bike. It had this ginormous bow on it, too, but my parents hadn't tried to wrap it or anything. I pretty much ignored my other presents, just so that I could get the bike and take it outside and start riding it. I mean, I'm from Albuquerque, it's not like we get much snow or anything, so it was basically perfect bike riding weather.

"My parents we're pretty awesome; Mom went in to make breakfast while Dad took me outside. I was just riding around the neighbourhood at this point, not really going anywhere, just happy to be on the bike, right? And I turn to look back at my Dad, who stopped to talk to one of our neighbours, and I miss a pothole -- and I go flying. Tumble right over the handlebars, and there's this really loud crack when I hit the ground, and all I can do is cry, because my arm hurt so bad. Dad came running, I mean, I was screaming my head off, and he helps me to the side of the road -- and a car come speeding down and runs right over my bike. Blows a tire. So we end up there with me on the side of the road with a broken arm, my Dad shouting with the driver of the car because apparently its our fault that he wasn't watching where he was going, or something, or that my Dad didn't have a chance to clear the road because his son had a broken arm, and all I can think is that my bike's ruined.

"So my Mom ends up driving me to the hospital, which is totally the way she wanted to spend her Christmas day, right? And I end up with this huge cast, and it's actually kind of awesome? But still, all I can think about is the last time I saw my bike, all twisted up from the guy's car, and I start crying all over again. I mean, I'm inconsolable. And then we get home, and Mum takes me into the living room --

"And there's another bike. It's used, sure, but turns out the guy who hit the other one? Calmed down and decided that he'd give me his son's old bike to replace mine. I rode that bike for six years. It's, like, my favorite present ever -- even more than the red one."

If Mercy tried to talk about any of this stuff she was going to lose it. Just thinking about it had her throat choked up. So she sat and hoped just not to be noticed.

"Every year for Winsol, my parents would get me an ornament for our Winsol tree," Karla said, sounding almost shy as she spoke. She called in a small wooden box and lifted the lid. Nestled inside and swathed with deep gray velvet were six crystal ornaments. "They always tried to get me ones that were beautiful but had meaning as well."

She plucked the ornaments out of the box, one by one, and explained each one before passing it around. She figured that most people knew to be careful--and she'd just be extra-vigilant when Hank was holding one.

"The snowflake is the easiest," she explained. "Winsol takes place in the depths of midwinter, starting on the longest night of the year. My home Territory is Glacia and winter is always a time for deep snows and ice." As was late fall and early spring.

Glacia got a lot of snow.

"The dancing girl is because on the first night of Winsol, we dance for the honor and glory of Witch. It doesn't matter whether you're at a big party filled with hundreds of glittering people or in your own home by yourself. At midnight, you drink a toast--it's the best luck to share a cup with someone--and then you dance. At least once. The unicorn is a member of the kindred race of Blood. They have their own Territory in Sceval. There are old stories of how one of first Witch's companions was a unicorn, and she would ride him when she needed to travel. The crystal chalice is the Blood's symbol for the person's Self, especially the mind. It is said that if you can draw the image of a person's crystal chalice from within them, you can see what they are truly like."

The next ornament, a crystal hourglass mounted in a real stone bracket, was small but very heavy. "The hourglass is a symbol for one of our castes, the Black Widows." Karla pulled on one of the thin silver necklaces she wore and pulled out an hourglass pendant from under her shirt. "I belong to the Hourglass myself--it means I am a member of that caste. I'm a journeymaid Black Widow, which is why the sand in my pendant is divided evenly into both halves. Apprentices have all their sand at the top, and fully-trained Black Widows have their sand all at the bottom. It's impossible to know for sure until puberty, but when I was born, I showed all the signs of being a natural-born Black Widow, so my parents got me an ornament to show it. The web is related to that. Both Healers and Black Widows spin special webs to focus their Craft. Also, for the Blood, your inner Web describes your...ability to do Craft. It's kind of complicated, but so long as your inner Web is intact, so are your abilities."

After she'd shown all of her ornaments, Karla added, "I used to have two more, but they've been lost. One was crystal star; there's an old poem among our people with the line, They spiral down into ebony, catching the stars with their tails. It's a poem about the great dragons who created all of the Blood. No matter how faint, every member of the Blood from all the myriad races can claim kinship to the dragons. The last was a prancing silver horse that I'm pretty sure had no real connection to Winsol, other than we often use horses to pull our sleighs around Winsol time. I was just little and loved horses a lot."

Edited 2011-12-07 20:12 (UTC)

"Christmas is a big thing for us, back home," Miley volunteered, her voice sounding unusually steady after the past few weeks of uncertainty and wavering. "We almost always celebrate it at home in LA, but there was this one year where my daddy -- Robby Ray, if any of y'all know him -- had to do a show in, like, I think it was St. Louis the day before Christmas Eve. Except, like, when he got back to the airport and was gonna fly home, it was all snowed in. So Jackson -- that's my big brother Jackson, he's a total snotwagon -- and I were back home, like, waiting for Daddy to show up on Christmas Eve so that he could reach the top part of the tree since Jackson's totally short, but then he called and told us he couldn't make it. And we were way bummed, and I was gonna go to my BFF Lilly's house 'cause even though her mom is a check-grabbin' stick-in-the-mud, I still didn't wanna be stuck on Christmas with only Jackson. But then we looked outside and guess who was there? No, seriously, guess."

A pause. Okay, she wasn't waiting for guesses.

"My Aunt Dolly -- that's Dolly Parton -- was out there with her helicopter."

Yes. She just said helicopter.

"And okay, like, it was sort of annoying, 'cause it was, like, way loud in there and like a thousand degrees, but she totally flew us down to St. Louis, and then we got my daddy and he got some food from a restaurant in the airport and brought it out to us." Miley flashed a big smile at the group, then concluded primly, "And that's the story of how we all had Christmas in my Aunt Dolly's private chopper."

So, so spoiled, this one. Seriously.

"This is actually the story I've been working on for the show," Elphaba said. "It's the origin of Oz, the oldest version of the story. It's not exactly pretty, it's a little crude, and I think some of it seems like it might have changed over the years. It's no tale of a jolly fat elf that brings toys, but it's part of Oz's history."

"Before there was Oz, there was the Fairy Queen Lurline. Bored of her home, she went on a voyage. When she grew tired of flying over the desert, she stopped and called from the desert sands a font of water hidden deep beneath the earth’s dry dunes. The water obeyed, in such abundance that the land of Oz in all its variety sprang up almost instantly. Lurline drank herself into a stupor and went for a long rest on the top of Mount Runcible. When she awoke, she, well, she'd drank so much water that she had to relieve herself in great amount, and this became the Gillikin River, running around the vast tracts of the Great Gillikin Forest and skirting through the eastern edges of the Vinkus, and coming to a stop at Restwater. The animals of the land lived on the ground and thus of a lower order than Lurline and her retinue." She paused. "This is some of the story that feels added, if you ask me."

"The animals had come into their being as rolled clots of earth dislodged from the exuberant plant growth. When Lurline let loose, the animals thought the raging stream was a flood, sent to drown their fresh new world, and they despaired of their existence. In a panic they flung themselves into the torrent and attempted to swim through Lurline’s urine. Those who became intimidated and turned back remained animals, beasts of burden, slaughtered for flesh, hunted for fun, counted as profit, admired as innocent. Those who swam on and made it to the farther shore were given the gifts of consciousness and language. Thus, from there came Animals."

She sighed. "I suppose it's not the best story. It feels a little denigrating to Animals, in fact. But it's the version I know."

When they ping in!

The cloud-thing surrounding the island had Troy... more than a little concerned, yes. But he was at the point where he was going to defiantly go about things as best he could.

Jono was beyond the point of looking grim today, hunched forward in his chair and holding his coffee against his chest as though he was afraid his heart might stop beating without it. That the shield had flickered off that morning hadn't gone unnoticed.

He had more books sitting next to him, most of them grudgingly dog-eared after he'd run out of sheets of paper, bits of string, anything to mark pages that had anything to do with... pretty much anything.

Rehearsing was the last thing on his mind.

How about food? How about chocolate-drizzled popcorn, shoplifted from... somewhere?

"Noms?"

"... Pardon?"

Jono apparently did not speak Internet-Teenagerese.

It was one of Kenzi's first languages! "Foooooooood," Kenzi explained, holding out the bag of delicious sugary popcorn. "C'mon, gotta keep your strength up. Eat drink and be merry."

Yeah, you can fill in that last sentence yourself, Jono.

"And I'm going to keep my strength up by eating popcorn, am I?"

It was going to get stuck in his teeth and he was going to be sad forever, Kenzi.

"It's pure energy! Without calories!" Okay, exaggeration. Kenzi shoved a handful in her mouth. "Also I want to see you make a face."

Jono was already making a face, giving Kenzi a sort of sideways look, accompanied shortly after by a shake of his head.

"At least you're honest about it, I suppose..."

"I try to be honest," Kenzi said seriously. She grinned. "That I'm not an honest person. Are you sure you don't want any?" She paused. "Also, anything to get you looking less down, Boss."

"I am not down," Jonothon protested. "I simply look that way naturally."

Well,'naturally.'

"And probably haven't slept a full night in a month, now."

Which was beside the point.

"... Fine, I'll try some of your popcorn, luv."

"Yay!" Kenzi handed over a handful, and studied his face. "You do kind of have just a grim face. Totally aside from the coloring and the lines and stuff. Sleep is good, I take naps." Nom nom nom nom. It also left her awake in the night in case something wanted to sneak up on her.

... The colouring and the lines and stuff. Jono looked slightly pained for a moment as he accepted the popcorn, refraining from making a comment on that... comment.

"I'm not saying I don't sleep, of course. I just don't sleep well. Particularly not when just outside the window, there's a giant void of nothingness just waiting for our shields to give out."

An optimist, Jonothon was not. He shrugged, and then popped a few kernels into his mouth.

...

Chocolate was going to be the death of him. It just was. He'd get back to the conversation when he wasn't slumping backwards in his seat and closing his eyes, then.

Kenzi was the person making vajayjay jokes to her friend the succubus. Tact was for people who weren't her.

"That, yeeeeeah." Kenzi made a muppet-face of extreme dismay: all huge eyes and quirked mouth and shock. "I'm repressing. So hard. Hard hard hard hard hard. You never know! We could all die before then anyway!" Trufax!

Only now Kenzi would be cackling in glee at that look. YAY!

Jono pulled in a slow breath as he regained his composure, here. Wonderful. If there was anything he liked more than being told he'd probably be dead within the week, it was being laughed at.

Kenzi was so getting a sour look.

"I'm aiming to make it through this in one piece, thanks."

He was stubborn, dammit.

"Go you," Kenzi cheered, then popped more popcorn into her mouth. "S'good, isn't it? We gotta be all focused on cool stuff. If we're not the people who can fight." She gave her bag of popcorn a mournful look. As weapons against freaking out went, it wasn't the best. "So yeah. Not thinking. Thinking bad."

As was proven by most of the conversation so far.

Jono could tell.

"Speak for yourself," he intoned. "I might not have anything to fight just yet, but while I'm not bloodying up my knuckles, the least I can do is try to dig up more information about these 'Auditors.'"

Hence the growing wall of books around him.

"Thinking helps with that."

Kenzi had only small but blind confidence in everybody else's ability to find a solution; and absolutely none in her own. She looked at the books dubiously, then back to Jonothan, hopeful. "Is it working?"

"Not even a little bit."

Thank you, Jonothon.

"... But at least it means I'm not sitting around feeling useless."

"Nuts."

Kenzi brightened. "But! Then! It's doing it's job! Which is to keep you from going crazy. So woo!" She nodded hard. Researching was like not-thinking! For smarter people! She frowned. "I can bring you more food? Bland food. Not-passing-out food. And a pillow?" Look, she was gonna stick with her strengths. Nothing to steal, no one to con; food it was.

"I'm probably fine without the pillow, luv. I do live just upstairs, after all."

There would be something horribly the matter if Jonothon couldn't just go and get his own damn pillow.

"... Really, you don't need to get anything for me at all, Sunbeam. But thank you for the offer."

"I did not know that." Note to self: Don't prank the theater after-hours. People living there! Kenzi gave him a concerned look, and shrugged. "Well, if you're sure. But that's what I'm here for, ya know?" She got up, and tilted her head. "Flats are basically painted. Rapunzel 'n' me are going to pretty them up this week, then move on to the other stuff. Like the snow."

SNOW. SNOW SNOW SNOW.

"Did you settle on what you were going to use for snow, then?"

That seemed like a much saner topic, really, than the end of the world.

"Talked it over with Billy; there's this non-toxic just-add-water stuff that makes tons of snow that should work just fine. It's a-- polymer?" Yeah, Kenzi had no idea what that meant, except it probably wouldn't melt everywhere. "Gonna experiment with it on Sunday, maybe, see if it looks good on-stage."

"I'd say I preferred if you did your experimenting outside first, just to be on the safe side, but there's not much of a safe side to being outside at all, really."

Really.

"Sunday, after the performers have left, then."

"Will do!" Kenzi bounced and then put the popcorn down. "Just leaving this here. Help yourself!"

And boing boing boing on up to the stage to check on what else she could mess with!

I should be around all afternoon, and around-but-a-little-SP-ish through the evening!

The Boards, Wednesday Evening

Arrive/Mingle/Nom

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Rehearsal

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Talk to the Directors

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OOC