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[squish36-writes-and-draws]

Sesquipedalian Adventures of the Self-Proclaimed Definitely not a Nerd (he's wrong though)

Word count: 119.6 Garwins (7058 words)

Summary: It's definitely still Garwin Day, alright? I'm not 24 hours late. Actually, I'm being more accurate because Ivy Day 2012 was March 29th. Anyway. There's a spelling bee at Garwin's school, and blonde 12-year-old problems ensue.

TW: swearing, suggestive humor

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @faggot-friday @kamikothe1and0nly @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @i-loved-while-i-lied @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death @dizzeners @thefoxysnake @olivedumdum

On Ao3 or below the cut!

    Garwin absentmindedly flicks through the decks of Quizlet flashcards he’s been through at least a hundred times as teachers mill about the gym co-opted into a facsimile of a classroom. It’s not as though there are so many spelling-addicted nerds in this school that all of them couldn’t fit into a single actual classroom, but apparently this will look better on Canyon Crest’s Instagram page, so everything gets to become a logistics nightmare. 

    The nightmare has moved on from a never ending line of folding chairs, despite there only being need for forty-eight between the student participants and the proctors scoring each of their tests, and now it gets to feature the all-powerful ‘No Signal’ glyph plastered across the center of a projector screen, gleaming solidly as though taunting everyone that has contributed to causing this exact moment. 

    It’s still a long fifteen minutes until the proceedings are to officially begin at five-thirty, and the participants, told unsuccessfully to show up twenty minutes before anything interesting was to happen, have finally started to filter in. Shannon in-his-Spanish-class-Sophomore-year Turing and Gerry don’t-make-eye-contact-don’t-make-eye-contact Barker are among the first to join him. Let’s just say that it’s not particularly surprising they’ve arrived at the same time or that they choose to sit next to each other on the bleachers, quite noticeably not leaving room for Jesus.

    Garwin is only privy to their…canoodling…by the sheer coincidence of being at school the entire time at Science Olympiad practice. Even then, he was kicked out of there at five, leaving him to stake his claim to the most choice of homogenous plastic chairs. 

    It turns out, it doesn’t take long for Garwin to grow bored as his attention refocuses on the Quizlet cards that are his lifeline this evening. Thankfully, he’s saved from actually having to study—perpetually remaining in a state of pretending to study—as more victims file into the gym, slowly filling up the chairs. Even Shannon and Gerry realize at one point or another that they will be forced to disentangle their limbs as they stake out their own seats. 

    Gerry flashes Garwin a half smile as he passes, choosing the seat a row ahead to Garwin’s left. It takes everything in himself to not glare back. It seems as though one of them has moved on from that particular breakup a bit more than the other. Garwin is under no obligations to be civil, but it is generally good practice. 

    Especially when he finds Abraham James’ eyes boring daggers into his back. To be completely fair, Garwin didn’t realize when their English project meetings turned into dates. He still can’t exactly tell where the line lay. Though, in hindsight, the fact that they continued after the project was due should have been a better indicator than it was. 

    Garwin doesn’t recognize the swarm of likely freshmen that filter into the gym together, laughing boisterously and he’s stuck with the realization that he’ll be leaving the Science Olympiad team’s future in at least some of their unworthy hands. Not all of them, of course, but there’s only so many people around here that are willing to spend their free time studying instead of literally anything else. 

    And, actually, now that he thinks about it, he’s pretty sure one of them is actually on the Division B—sixth through ninth grade—Scioly team. Bethany, her name might be? It doesn’t really matter, but it helps to prove his point.

    Garwin turns away, his focus returning to the Quizlet deck that he hasn’t been through in its entirety once this evening, and he notices John from-his-Sweeney-class Shelley. AP Environmental Science isn’t a particularly difficult subject and the reason the scores are so bad is because everyone universally agrees upon this and chooses to not study, but the teacher makes the whole thing an unbearable pain in the ass. As such, the class becomes more about surviving the teacher, and, before long, the class and teacher are interchangeable. 

    Then Victor and Clay—god knows what their last names are—come bounding into the room, and let’s just say that just because they’ve somehow managed to get into Garwin’s calc class, there’s no way it didn’t involve copious amounts of teacher bribery because there’s no way either of them should be allowed to do the derivative of y = x. 

    At this point, the cycle of people showing up and Garwin vaguely recognizing most of them has dulled to extraordinary lows, so much so, in fact, that he’s opened up the Quizlet designed for last year’s countries round. It would have been as advertised on the can except whoever made the list wasn’t informed that Czechoslovakia isn’t a country anymore, so instead it got to be the round of countries along with one former country. Capital cities—between Ouagadougou, Phnom Penh, and Ljubljana—could be fun though. Transliteration from one language to another always has such wonderful results. 

    Garwin’s phone clock ticks over to 5:35 before the triumphant calls of victory echo throughout the gym at the technical difficulties being resolved, blazing a rectangle of bright white title slide of a presentation into everyone’s retinas. The proctors waste no time in fanning out to their assigned locations, and Garwin is surprised to see that all of the seats are filled—no, that’s not right. There’s still one left empty, being presided over by the wrathful eye of Sweeney. Whoever is the unlucky soul to arrive last is going to be in for a bad time, and Garwin feels a tinge of pity in the darkest recesses of his chest. 

    He’s ended up neither winning nor losing the lottery with Faber. It could be better, but Garwin’s never been particularly proficient at English on the macroscopic level, so it’s difficult to put in any more than the bare minimum of effort. 

    It’s nice that whoever planned this managed to coerce the principal into being the official announcer. It would be even nicer if Garwin genuinely believed that Morgan could spell USA. Not the fully spelled out version—the acronym itself. 

    “I would like to start by congratulating each and every one of you for making it this far. You’ve had to beat two thousand other students just to be in this room today.” He pauses for unnecessary dramatic effect. “I’m sure all of you are familiar with the rules for this evening, but just in case you aren’t, there will be four rounds. The first two are the theme rounds of Literary Devices, followed by Fossils. This is followed by a round where you will be presented with a word and have to identify whether or not it is misspelled before correcting it. The final two will then go head-to-head in a general knowledge round.” 

    Morgan shuffles his index cards before continuing, “Each word inside of the theme rounds will be read by me, followed by a definition and its language of origin, before I repeat the word once more. This will be read twice. If, for whatever reason, you need it read again, please raise your hand. After that, you will hand your paper to the proctor and the correct answer will be revealed on the slides. If your answer matches the slide, you get a point. The fifteen of you with the greatest number of points will go on to the second round, the six will go on to the third round, and, like I said, the top two will enter the fourth round. Points carry across rounds, so one bad round can still hurt you even after it’s over. Is all of that clear?”

    Nods slowly wobble out across the almost-crowd of students. Morgan waits five seconds longer than reasonably necessary before switching from his index cards to a stack of papers that invariably has all the answers. 

    “Before we start, just to make sure we all get the process, there will be a practice question. Your word is Chicago. Its definition is ‘a midwestern city located on the shores of Lake Michigan, also known as the Windy City.’ It originates from the Canadian French form of an Algonquian word. Chicago.”

    Morgan repeats all of that, being thoroughly tuned out by Garwin, who is instead wondering who is enough of a slut for College Board to use their practice question as the inspiration for the practice question for this. God, it would be so funny if this counted as copyright infringement. 

    The slide clicks over to the proper spelling, and Garwin passes over the scrap of unofficial paper over to Faber, who dutifully struggles to read his handwriting as he places the tiny plus in the left margin. One whole nanopoint. Garwin has never been so proud of himself. 

    “If everyone is good, let us begin with the first round. The first word is enjambment. Its definition is ‘the running over of a sentence from one verse or couplet into another so that closely related words fall in different lines. Lines stride over more than one line.’ It originates from French. Enjambment.”

    In the amount of time for Morgan to read that all again, pass the paper over, click the slide, and confirm that Garwin did, in fact, spell ‘enjambment’ correctly, he’s nearly ready to take his pencil and see what happens if he pushes it into his eye socket. 

    “Polysyndeton,” Morgan takes his sweet time stretching out each syllable. “The repetition of conjunctions in close succession. For example, from page six of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby, “the shining secrets that only Midas and Morgan and Maecenas knew.” It originates from Latin. Polysyndeton.”

    If it wasn’t nerd behavior to have a favorite rhetorical device, that would certainly be one of Garwin’s top choices. What does it do? Nobody knows. But it’s fun to use and fun to say, especially in front of people who don’t know what polysyndeton is so it sounds like he’s making up fancy new words for no reason, which is enough for him. 

    After the whole end-of-word housekeeping is over, Morgan flips through the pages on the pedestal in front of him, and Garwin could swear it’s an IPA chart. Not—not the beer kind of IPA. Not Indian pale ale. International phonetic alphabet. It’s basically a pronunciation guide on steroids. This next one is sure to be a hell of a word.

    “Caesura.” 

    Hm, what do you know? An absolute clusterfuck of a word that starts with a hard C sound and almost certainly doesn’t look like it should if the frantic IPA reference is any indication.

    “Pauses that occur within lines of poetry, either grammatical or rhetorical. It originates from Latin. Caesura.” 

    Something tickles at the back of Garwin’s memory, but he can’t access it, even when given the entirety of Morgan’s reread to try to unlock its secrets. He’s left with transcribing it as kaysuera which looks so inherently, viscerally wrong. The reveal of the proper answer is equal parts ‘that still looks painfully wrong,’ ‘I guess that does look more reasonable,’ and ‘holy shit I was thinking about the pronunciation of Julius Caesar. The Ides of March were two weeks ago. You have no reason to be thinking about his assassinated ass this evening.’

    That’s one point lost to the ether, but Garwin has to accept it and move on. There are many more points to be gained, so he can’t quit now. 

    “Metonymy. The use of the name of one thing for that of another of which it is an attribute or with which it is associated, such as ‘crown’ in ‘lands belonging to the crown.’ It originates from Latin. Metonymy.”

    This one is a return to form, which is to say that it made its way into Garwin’s Quizlet deck. He fills in the empty line with half a mind before he goes back to the doodles on the scrap paper that he has discovered are far more interesting than this competition. 

    As he’s having this exact thought, almost like he planned it in advance, Sophie Foster comes barrelling into the room, a deep blush splattered across her cheeks as she settles into the Sweeney seat, breathing heavily. Of course she’s been invited here. 

    In a cruel twist of fate, it was already decreed in the original rules handbook email—the same one that Dorktionary here inevitably did not read long enough to find out what time this was to start—that any late arrivals would not be extended the privilege of making up any missed words. That means, if he’s counting correctly, he’s three points ahead of the special Sophieflake, and, with any luck, she may get eliminated before that photographic memory becomes a real threat. 

    Her first real word, and, by extension, Garwin’s fifth follows quickly. “Synesthesia. A subjective sensation or image of a sense other than the one being stimulated. It originates from Latin. Synesthesia.”

    There are about fifty percent too many of the letter ‘s’ in there, but Garwin’s fairly certain that he’s managed to predict the most likely balance on the scale from too many to not enough. It’s soon revealed that this confidence is not unfounded with the answer being revealed to match his own. The image of the jumping powerline gif that makes sound fades from his mind as he refocuses himself for the next word. 

    “Synecdoche. A figure of speech by which a part is put for the whole, such as ‘fifty sail’ for ‘fifty ships’, or the whole for a part, such as ‘society’ for ‘high society.’ It also originates from Latin. Synecdoche.”

    Faber’s mouth curls into a smile, underlined with just enough malice for Garwin to question every life decision that brought him to this place. He knows that they went over synecdoche—and its much more reasonably spelled brother, metonymy—in class, but if it weren’t for the blessed gift of Quizlet, he would have been lost to the abyss. 

    He turns in the paper, and Faber seems to take pleasure in striking it out even before the answer is revealed. ‘Synechdoche’—the version Garwin submitted—is close enough to ‘Synecdoche’ that it should be accepted. It’s not like he went absolutely, unequivocally excessive with the letter ‘h’ like that one day in his Physics class following the Synecdoche lesson. At least he didn’t turn in Shyhehchhhdhohchhheh, and that should be worth at least half a point. A pity point, perhaps. A nanopoint. A pity-induced nanopoint. 

    Before Garwin composes enough of his simmering thoughts into a full-blown three hour video essay, the next word is upon him, and whoever built this list was not interested in pulling punches. 

    “Chiasmus. An inverted relationship between the syntactic elements of parallel phrases. For example, from stanza 34 of Oliver Goldsmith’s poem ‘The Traveller,’ ‘to stop too fearful, and too faint to go.’ It originates from Latin. Chiasmus.”

    This one quite notably did not appear in Faber’s poetic devices extravaganza, and, as such, it did not migrate to the All-Knowing Quizlet. Garwin gets to guess the spelling, which is more likely to turn out painfully. 

    When the answer is revealed, Garwin’s relief is nearly strong enough to be described as his soul leaving his body. There is no corner of himself that he wouldn’t sell in exchange for a point. 

    “Epistrophe. Repetition of a word or expression at the end of successive phrases, clauses, sentences, or verses especially for rhetorical or poetic effect, such as in Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address ‘of the people, by the people, for the people.’ It originates from Greek. Epistrophe.”

    Garwin makes gratuitous eye contact with Faber as he passes over his answer. It’s Faber’s fault that he was assigned a group presentation on “Sestina” by Elizabeth Bishop, whose form is entirely built upon its use of epistrophe. Sestinas are absolutely labyrinthine, and if Garwin has to explain it again, his eyes are going to rot out of his skull. 

    “Onomatopoeia. The naming of a thing or action by a vocal imitation of the sound associated with it, such as buzz and hiss. It originates from Latin. Onomatopoeia.”

    Maybe the person who made this set is more than a bit of a sadist. That many vowels next to each other is pretty much a linguistic orgy. 

    It also makes the properly spelled word carry an inherent sense of misspelling, which is far more significant. Somehow Garwin manages to pull every single one of those vowels out of his ass in the proper arrangement to gain a point, fanning the flames of his already overblown ego. 

    “Believe it or not, we’re at our final word.” Morgan smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes.     

“Epistolary. Written in the form of a series of letters—for example, Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula. It originates from French. Epistolary.” 

    Garwin’s eyes narrow. He just recently finished reading the Dracula Sparknotes for his independent reading project. If it sounds like he has a lot of different English projects that are somehow all simultaneously relevant, well, that’s because Faber assigns a lot of shit. Including a 500 word essay that’s due tomorrow by 8 a.m.. Garwin hasn’t started it yet even if he should have because that would involve planning ahead, and he can’t have that. 

    The time between rounds is agonizingly long as each of the papers is copied into a spreadsheet to calculate the nine that are going to be forcibly ejected from existence. Sophie is not among them, much to the horror of literally everyone who ever existed. Shannon is, however, much to Garwin’s delight and Gerry’s dismay. She finds a nice place on the bleachers to make her new home because she obviously can’t be more than ten feet from Gerry at any given moment. 

     Garwin hasn’t realized until now that Melanie Thompson—his one and only ill-fated girlfriend from sophomore year that, if nothing else, forced him to go through a self-realization character arc into polyamorous homosexuality purely out of spite—is here. Or rather, was here would be more accurate. 

    John from APES is also eliminated, looking thoroughly dejected. He was probably just here for the dinosaur round. Maybe Garwin won’t be forced to sit through another spinosaurus monologue tomorrow. 

    “Our next round is the fossils round, and in addition to the names being read by me, I’ve been informed that images have been prepared on the slides. After this round, we will pause for a five minute break. Is everyone ready?”

    Significantly fewer heads are available to nod at this question, though it is kind of funny watching from the corner of Garwin’s eye Shannon nod from the bleachers. Like the opinion of her eliminated ass matters anymore. 

    “All right. Your first word is Astraeospongia, a genus of saucer-shaped Silurian fossil sponges having 6-sided stellate spicules and important as Paleozoic index fossils. It comes from Greek for ‘star sponge.’ Astraeospongia.” 

    The picture of a limestone-looking glob made of tiny stars appears on the screen. Garwin thanks those lucky stars that a word bank for only this round was published long ago, because scientific names would be a goddamn nightmare without it. Still, the vowel threesome is a bit tricky. It narrowly balances itself out by listening to Morgan struggling to pronounce the definition during both reads.

    He just as narrowly gets the point for that one, and refocuses his mind for the next one as a fishy-looking guy crawling out of the water appears on screen. Put simply, it’s friend shaped despite it being the reason we all pay taxes. 

    “Tiktaalik, a Devonian transitional fossil between lobe-finned fish like Panderichthyes and amphibious tetrapods like Acanthostega, discovered by Neil Shubin in Alaska. It comes from Inuktitut for ‘large freshwater fish.’ Tiktaalik.”

    This list was so clearly written by someone who was deep in a Dinosaur Train revival phase and was nowhere near expecting Morgan to be the one reading out these definitions that absolutely cannot be from a reputable dictionary. They don’t read like dictionary definitions. 

    Garwin nearly shoves his fingernails through his palm at missing the double a. There’s no reason he should’ve missed that. 

    “Arthropleura. Carboniferous millipedes that grew up to 2.5m long as a result of the higher oxygen levels present in the atmosphere at that time. It comes from Greek for ‘jointed ribs.’ Arthropleura.”

    The thing on screen is kind of like that one Wild Kratts episode where a king cobra looks them in the eyes, but 120% more millipede and 10% less threatening, with a similar cartoonish rendering of old CGI. 

    It’s also 1200% larger than it should have ever been allowed to become. The Carboniferous might have boasted 30% oxygen levels compared to today’s 21%, but that’s excessive by even those Meganeura-infested levels. 

    Garwin is almost so caught up in his musings that he forgets to submit his answer, but he gets it turned in just in time. 

    “Lambeosaurus. Herbivorous members of the family hadrosauridae that are known for their hollow crest and lived during the Late Cretaceous. Its name comes from Lambe’s lizard, from Lawrence Lambe and Greek. Lambeosaurus.”

    Garwin finds himself essentially putting the letters into a blender and unable to untangle them into an answer that makes sense. Eventually, he just erases the whole thing and calls it a ‘Lame-o-saurus’ because, well, it’s a hadrosaur. They don’t deserve respect. The only ornithischians who do are the ceratopsians because bird-hipped coolness is proportional to the number of stabby horns a dinosaur has, and Kosmoceratops wins that contest with almost no contest. It would be a good spelling word too. 

    The answer is revealed and Garwin gazes into the doodled hadrosaurid dinosaur’s blank eyes, contempt written plain across his face. 

    “Merycoidodon. An oreodont that somewhat resembled a pig in appearance and was native to North America during the Eocene to the Miocene. It comes from Latin for ‘ruminating teeth.’ Merycoidodon.” 

    That’s a bit of a departure from form. Paleozoic drug-induced fauna is consistently more interesting than ‘pig but slightly to the left.’ Garwin can only hope that the Cenozoic doesn’t take up too many words. Merycoidodon is a little annoying to spell at first, but once figured out, it’s stored quite nicely in the back of one’s knowledge bank. Garwin pulls it successfully out of said knowledge bank. 

    “Ichthyosaurus. Extinct marine reptiles of the Early Jurassic specialized for aquatic life by a streamlined body with a long snout, limbs reduced to small fins for steering, and a large lunate caudal fin. It comes from Greek for ‘fish lizard.’ Ichthyosaurus.”

    Fish lizard. What a bunch of absolute buffoons. It’s literally just a game of taking the stems and duct taping them together. Ichthy- could be difficult if it wasn’t ingrained in his psyche. Maybe that Quizlet was doing more harm than good. 

    “Coprolite—”

    Garwin stops listening, giggling to himself. You people put dinosaur shit on the list? And, more importantly, what the fuck is the middle vowel? Garwin eventually settles on ‘copralite’ which, unfortunately, single handedly dashes his dreams for receiving a point for a properly spelled word. 

    “Coelacanth. Extant lobe-finned fish that first evolved in the Devonian and are more closely related to mammals than to ray-finned fish. It comes from Greek for ‘hollow spine.’ Coelacanth.”

    Coelacanth is one of the words that just doesn’t sound like how it is spelled. Now, how it’s spelled is still a mystery, but coelophysis—a Triassic theropod dinosaur—implies that it’s somewhere near coelocanth. That still looks inherently wrong, but the oe vowel combination is not going to look normal anytime soon. 

    It’s also not going to get Garwin a point anytime soon, because he managed to not get the point for flipping the ‘a’ to an ‘o’. Can’t copralite and coelocanth just switch letters and everything balances out? Garwin’s spiral into depression has to wait, though.

    “Eurypterus. Silurian arthropods commonly called sea scorpions, though they are not true scorpions of the order Scorpiones. It comes from Greek for ‘wide wing’ or ‘broad paddle.’ Eurypterus.”

    A Jaekelopterus appears on screen where a eurypterus should be. They’re both sea scorpions, it just so happens that the former is three whole meters of sea scorpion compared to Eurypterus’s estimated maximum length of two feet. It could also technically be another genus like Pterygotus. The important part is that the picture is wrong and therefore this is all a lie. 

    Jaekelopterus, despite its not being in the officially published word bank, would be an absolutely lovely word to spell in one of these. Make the others suffer. Garwin is so consumed by the thoughts of this suffering that he nearly forgets to submit his own, correct, spelling of Eurypterus, which would have been a painful mistake. 

    “And we have already arrived at the end. Your final word is Sacabambaspis.” Morgan pronounces each syllable slowly, as though afraid of butchering its pronunciation. To be fair, he probably would be if he cared that much. “A genus of jawless, armored fish that lived during the Ordovician period, named after the village of Sacabamba, Bolivia. Sacabambaspis.”

    Whoever was given the responsibility to control the slides waited for Morgan to stop speaking before revealing the little doofus. Words are insufficient to describe how silly the little guy looks, but a defining feature is the eyes look like googly eyes. They have one fin—the tail fin that looks like it could be very accurately recreated in play-doh—the whole thing looks like it could be recreated in play-doh. And, of course, it doesn’t have a jaw, and instead it has a triangular mouth that hangs open. 

    Bothriolepis swallowed mouthfuls of mud and digested the organic matter inside, and Sacabambaspis doesn’t look far from that, although Placoderms like Bothriolepis existed in the Devonian, not the Ordovician. They’re united by their distinct look of never experiencing a single thought in their lives, which, honestly, sounds kind of pleasant. It certainly sounds more pleasant than this drudgery of spelling words. There’s not even a justifiable reason why this is a useful skill. Spellcheck exists and getting ruthlessly clowned upon by a Discord server can still happen because the stupid QWERTY keyboard is designed to be convoluted because people were typing so quickly, they’d jam the goddamn typewriters. 

    The five minute break that follows is much more like eight, and when it does end, the pool is narrowed down from fifteen victims to a mere six. Sophie is among the survivors, as is Abraham. Gerry seemingly got evaporated, bringing Shannon with him. Bethany did as well, but she’s taken Shannon’s place on the bleachers, watching each and every one of those remaining left alive, and it wouldn’t be surprising if she was responsible for a massacre in order to make herself the winner by default. 

    “Our next round will be a little different. We have a list of ten words, nine of which are typos from student papers and one of which is spelled properly. It is your job to identify if the word is spelled incorrectly, and then fix it. Is all of that clear?”

    In other words, it’s the most annoying type of true or false question. Garwin nods, calculating his chances across those remaining. There’s only one he doesn’t know, and he’s mostly convinced Victor and Clay got their hands on the answer key, because there’s no other justifiable reason they should have gotten this far. 

    Morgan takes this opportunity to go sit down, leaving the running of the slides to whoever was doing it already. There’s no need to read out atrociously spelled words. 

    The first is resluts. 

    Off to a great start. Garwins eyes narrow, thinking back to last year when he corrected this exact typo. It wasn’t, however, a student typo. It was a teacher typo, but it doesn’t make any sense that a US History teacher would be choosing the words. Maybe there was a Google Form for favorite typo submissions. Or maybe it’s a common enough transposition that none of this means anything. 

    Garwin corrects resluts to results and passes the paper back to Faber for grading, even if he already knows in his heart that he’s successfully gained that point. 

    The answer is revealed, and the slides click to an absolutely gorgeous second word: mauntaim. 

    It takes a second to realize that it once used to be mountain before it got corrupted. How it got corrupted will forever be a mystery because spellcheck should have caught and corrected it long before it made its horrible way to these slides. 

    Mountain, believe it or not, is not particularly difficult for Garwin to spell properly as he turns it in for a point. 

    The third word is regrettably less simple: Carribean. 

    Garwin can’t help but wonder if that was at all inspired by last year’s countries round, even if it isn’t a country in itself. It still has enough double letters to make everyone regret their life choices, but not much more than that. It’s just that seeing it on the big board makes Garwin question himself. He closes his eyes, trying to spell it without the pulsating insistence of that arrangement of letters, but it has slipped from his mind at the suggestion of the other. 

    It’s not the one spelled correctly, but he marks it as such. There’s something inherently wrong with it, but he can’t quite figure out what it is, let alone how to fix it. When the slide switches to the answer, Garwin buries his head in his hands, unable to cope with how he could have ever been so stupid. It’s Caribbean, goddamnit. He should have known that. 

    Wallowing in self-pity can only do so much good as the slides march forward. Diptheria. 

    Okay, first of all, what student has to write out ‘Diptheria’ and how is it possible that Coyle actually noticed that it was spelled wrong? Garwin isn’t convinced that Coyle even knows how to spell it properly, and he’s the one in charge of teaching microbiology. 

    It’s that exact class in microbiology that has impressed upon Garwin’s mind that it’s spelled diphtheria and it’s caused by Corynebacterium diphtheriae. He doesn’t remember much else. Pseudomonas fluorescens is fluffy and causes fin rot in fish. Does that count? 

    The slide ticks forward, and the disappointed groans are deafening. Little miss perfect Sophie Foster seems to be the only other one unaffected. Disappointing, but to be expected. 

    The next word is broccoli.

    That is, in fact, spelled correctly, and Garwin checks off the appropriate place on the sheet. He’s not sure who thought broccoli would be a difficult word, but he’ll take the point where he can get it after a five-second crisis where he has to question his entire belief system to triple check that it’s right. 

    And then the slide changes to colckwise. 

    Garwin has a very different kind of crisis seeing that. The kind of crisis that is accompanied by an aneurysm—which would be a lovely word for the next round. The kind of crisis that is also accompanied by vividly painful memories of his physics teacher telling him about a typo one of his former students, who is now a teacher here, made during a curriculum mapping meeting. On a whiteboard. This was not induced by a keyboard. 

    It’s pretty clear that it was just out there to make him angry because the proper spelling of clockwise is a single transposition away, and it turns out that it worked better than it had any right to be. 

    At least the next one, quater, is a funnier typo all around. 

    It’d be even funnier if he hadn’t found it on a college website. His lord and savior Yale would never do him dirty like that. It’s not even on a quarter system, so there’s next to no reason to even encounter the issue. 

    Then the slide turns to Green Papper, and Garwin feels the rage of a thousand suns boiling inside his chest and an undeniable urge to laugh and cry at the same time. The fact that it’s two words instead of just the one is mildly annoying, which is to say absolutely infinitesimal against the flood of Papper’s horror show. 

    It, um, isn’t difficult to fix the problem to pepper. Garwin hopes everyone else that has gotten this far has an equal lack of difficulty. It would be concerning if they did.

    The next is Illiniois. 

    Back to skirting around the countries round. Illinois already has enough vertical lines to make it look like the living embodiment of simplified loss.jpg, but adding one more bonus one can’t hurt that much. You just have to blame the French transliteration for what it has become. 

    The last, and almost least, flicks onto the screen. Liscense. 

    Garwin nearly throws his pencil down in utter defeat. It looks almost like it could be right, but he knows for a fact that it has to be wrong. Broccoli was correct, it had to be, so liscense has to be wrong. Do why doesn’t it look it? 

    He massages his temples before succumbing to the peer pressure and marks it as spelled correctly. If he hadn’t sold his soul to college apps, it would have left him at that moment. 

    Faber looks at Garwin, plainly disappointed in the abilities of his student, as he gets up to give the master of slideshows all of his final scores. The screen in the front switches to a spreadsheet of each competitor’s scores in each round, and Garwin watches and waits as they come filtering in.

    Morgan steps up to the podium once again, staring at the board like he’s new to public speaking. If he hadn’t been principal since the beginning of the last school year, Garwin might give him the benefit of the doubt, but he has no doubt left over. Morgan has absorbed all of it, and that means Garwin is allowed to make his own mental snarky commentary. 

    “As you can see behind me, our two finalists are—” Morgan pauses for dramatic effect, probably waiting for a drumroll that doesn’t come “—Sophie Foster—” he pauses for applause that doesn’t exist “—and Garwin Chang!” 

    Not sure why they’re in that order when they’re literally tied at 23 points out of 30 possible each, but you do you. Alphabetical order would have been reasonable. 

    The silence is deafening, despite that being a tremendously overused cliche. The only sounds are of chairs being moved so that the eliminated can either leave or make a home on the bleachers to watch the final tedious showdown. The one person he doesn’t know spends more than a standard amount of time staring at the back of Sophie’s head, his cobalt eyes glinting in the fluorescent lights. 

    Neither Garwin nor her majesty cephalosaurus are willing to move from the places they staked out so long ago. They’re logistically important, not a parasocial attachment formed through a weakly-held belief in luck. 

    “The person at the end of this fifteen-word round that has the most points will be the winner. The first tiebreaker will be the points scored in this fourth round, then the number scored in the third, and so on and so forth. I’ll read each term, definition, and language of origin twice before revealing the answer. Is that clear?”

    Garwin’s neck is starting to get tired from all the nodding. This is not difficult to understand. 

    His brain also locks down into emergency mode, fueled only by enough spite to want to destroy Sophie like the pathetic child she is. There almost isn’t enough space for commentary between all of the letters bouncing around in the alphabet soup of his mind.  

    “Eviscerate. To take out the entrails of, disembowel. It comes from Latin. Eviscerate.”

    “Syzygy. A roughly straight-line configuration of three or more celestial bodies in a gravitational system, such as a lunar or solar eclipse. It comes from Greek. Syzygy.”

    Garwin curses those lined up stars for choosing such a word to describe themselves. 

    “Acknowledge. To recognize as genuine or valid. It comes from Old English. Acknowledge.” 

    “Fluorescent. Bright and glowing as a result of luminescence that is caused by the absorption of radiation at one wavelength followed by nearly immediate reradiation usually at a different wavelength and that ceases almost at once when the incident radiation stops. It was coined by English mathematician and physicist Sir George G. Stokes. Fluorescent.”

    It would be so funny if his middle name was also George. It would be even funnier if Garwin manages to transpose the ‘u’ and ‘o’ and fail just now that he’s so close to triumph.

    “Bureaucracy. Government characterized by specialization of functions, adherence to fixed rules, and a hierarchy of authority. It comes from French. Bureaucracy.”

    “Sesquipedalian. Given to or characterized by the use of long words. It comes from Latin. Sesquipedalian.”

    Garwin’s going to have to remember that one for Faber tomorrow. If a word doesn’t have thirty percent more letters than strictly necessary, you better believe Faber has never said it in his life. 

    “Sovereignty. Supreme power especially over a body politic. It comes from Middle English. Sovereignty.”

    Something something James Madison something something AP Gov. 

    “Convalescence. To recover health and strength gradually after sickness or weakness. It comes from Latin. Convalescence.”

    “Vicissitudinous. Marked by or filled with the quality or state of being changeable. It, once again, comes from Latin. Vicissitudinous.”

    Wow, it’s almost like English was heavily influenced by French—quite noticeably a romance language—when William the Conqueror fucked shit up during the Battle of Hastings, 1066. 

    “Cubicuboctahedron. A convoluted shape where square faces and its octagrammic faces are parallel to those of a cube, while its triangular faces are parallel to those of an octahedron. It comes from Greek. Cubicuboctahedron.” 

    Someone involved in this folded their word of the day calendar into one of those. That probably doesn’t logically work that way, but neither does the word cubicuboctahedron.

    “Vacuum. The emptiness of space or a device creating or utilizing a partial vacuum. It comes from Latin. Vacuum.”

    Ah. A double-u that isn’t a ‘w.’ It’s almost like Garwin learned how to spell it in 4th grade and never looked back. He’s not sure anymore why there was spelling involved in a science class, but that doesn’t erase the useful part of the memory. 

    “Entrepreneur. One who organizes, manages, and assumes the risks of a business or enterprise. It comes from French. Entrepreneur.”

    Or, more accurately, the DECA team when they aren’t underage drinking. 

    “Feign. To give a false appearance of, or induce as a false impression. It comes from Middle English, after a very long line from proto-indo-European. Feign.”

    You know, some pie sounds really good right about now. 

    “Committee. A body of persons delegated to consider, investigate, take action on, or report on some matter. It comes from Latin. Committee. 

    “And for your last word of the night: borborygmus. Intestinal rumbling caused by moving gas. It comes from Latin. Borborygmus.” 

    Garwin was doing well until that point—hell, he thought he was doing well including that point, but boborygmus is not borborygmus, ruining his streak and hope for a perfect round. Still, maybe it’ll be enough to put Blondie back in her place. She’s a godforsaken twelve-year-old. She has no right to be anywhere near a high school, let alone being in half of his classes. He’s taking six APs at the same time right now, and his only other hour of the day is a study hall so he doesn’t devolve into a serial killer. 

    But it can’t be, can it? 

    The universe has divinely selected Sophie motherfucking Foster as its lord and savior, superior to all other beings that have ever been created or will be created. 

    Which is to say—she got a perfect score. Of course she did. Why should he have ever expected anything less?

    Garwin forces himself to breathe, somewhere between seething anger and complete despondency. But there’s no use getting mad when the game was rigged from the start. This just means he can refocus on Science Olympiad. Yeah. State is on Saturday. That might be a good idea. 

    And, well, it’s hard to feel anything other than mild annoyance while doing a titration until he starts drinking the titrant, and at that point, the HCl has already burned through his esophagus, so he has larger problems than losing at a pathetic little spelling bee. 

    Garwin picks up the shattered remains of his dignity, and kindly gets the fuck out of there. He’s spent enough hours in this hellhole for a single day, and now he gets to go do homework. Yippee. 

    As he returns home, he gets the day’s mail from the mailbox, and his breath catches in his throat. 

   For some inscrutable reason, he almost forgot that today was Ivy Day, and now the Yale logo is staring at him mockingly. He doesn’t even bother unlocking the door before tearing the envelope open. 

Dear Garwin Chang,

    The Yale Admissions Committee has completed its evaluation of this year's candidates, and I am genuinely sorry that we are not able to offer you a place in the Class of 2016.

    I realize that this decision may come as a real disappointment. I hope you will understand that the decision reflects the extraordinary range of talents represented in our applicant pool and not a judgment about your own abilities or potential. Of the nearly twenty-nine thousand individuals who applied to Yale this year, most are fully capable of doing outstanding work and making a unique contribution to a campus community. It is painful to us that we must turn away so many superbly talented students. 

    You may be tempted to ask what was lacking in your application. In truth, it is usually difficult for us to point to obvious weaknesses when so many applicants have demonstrated real achievement and potential for the future. Our decisions say far more about the small number of spaces available and the difficult choices we make than they do about a candidate's personal and academic promise.

I hope that the replies you receive from other colleges this spring will soon erase any disappointment regarding Yale's decision, and that you will go on to great success in your educational pursuits. 

Sincerely, 

Leto Kerlof

Leto Kerlof

Magnate of Undergraduate Admissions

    Tears well in his eyes, blurring the world as he fumbles for his keys. He wants nothing more than to crawl into his bed and live there for an eternity. 

    But as he stumbles up the stars, his plans for revenge are already piecing themselves together. 

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

Import Cygnus Oscuro

Summary: Creative Writing Final. It's a fedex humans are space orcs au. They're forced to be in the proximity of one another and it's fun for everyone except for those directly involved.

Word count : 5244

TW: one (1) swear word, auton (robot) racism including an in-universe slur (thanks, Fitz), absolutely incomprehensible worldbuilding (thanks, Squish)

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @faggot-friday @kamikothe1and0nly @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @i-loved-while-i-lied @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death @dizzeners @thefoxysnake @olivedumdum @loveution

On Ao3 or below the cut!

Bonus worldbuilding / q&a / suffering because I doubt any of this makes sense

    import pandas as pd

    import numpy as np

    import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

    from sklearn import datasets, model_selection, metrics

    from sklearn.model_selection import train_test_split, cross_val_score

    from sklearn.preprocessing import *

    from sklearn.neighbors import KNeighborsClassifier

    from sklearn.metrics import *

    “Once again, what do you mean by Eifelia? The planet itself or the system as a whole, including its moons?” Sophie asks, staring out the window at the receding planetary surface as their spaceship affectionately called the ‘Cygnus Oscuro’ lifts off the ground. 

    “Eifelia has only one confirmed inhabited moon, Batyrbai. Your home planet of Datson is the only satellite in the Telychian system to have more than one moon that is suitable for habitation. Supplies were acquired at the port of Darriwilian, located at 25.78, -80.21, on the planet of Eifelia itself,” Dex replies, reading off the coordinates from the corner of xor vision. 

    It’s very easy to read off coordinates when xor neural network is constantly searching for information that it thinks will be helpful to xem. It, more often than not, is entirely extraneous information, but it is difficult to discern when, exactly, it will be of assistance. 

    Dex continues, “Five crew members departed in preparation for Eifelia’s cyclical festival of Batyrbai appearing full in the sky from the dark side of the planet. In turn, three crew members embarked.”

    Dex’s fan freezes up. “One of these crew members is human, which hail from Earth, most accurately described as a ‘Death Planet’. It is located in the system of Sol, 40.3 light years away. Take care to avoid any and all possible conflicts.” 

    Sophie fixes Dex an unbelieving look. “They can’t be that bad.”

    Article after article scroll across Dex’s field of vision. “They’ve earned their infamous reputation and most are highly unaware of it. Did you know they have contests to see which one can suffer through the most capsaicin-induced pain? Then, to cool the pain, they consume a drink full of near-impossible-to-digest lactose sugar.”

    “Yeah, and you can bend titanium without even a second thought.”

    “I’m sure a dedicated enough one would figure out how to do that.” 

    Sophie rolls his eyes. “I’ll make sure to tell Keefe not to be an intergalactic space wyrm this week but I don’t think that’s going to be happening any time soon.” 

    Dex’s processor runs the numbers, and Sophie is correct for once. In any other situation, a correct prediction from him would be a thing to praise, but in this particular case, it’s more worrisome for Keefe’s safety.

    stars_df = pd.Dataframe(data=stars.data, columns=stars.feature_names)

    stars_df.iloc[39060]

    name                “Beta Pictoris c”

    distance_ly         60         # light years, 3*10^8 m/s

    yerkes_stellar_class    “A6V”

    mass                4658.44    # Eifelia masses, 4.13*10^24 kg

    orbital_period         197.55     # Eifelia years

    grav_accel         182.470    # m/s^2

    surface_temp        1250       # kelvin

    “Greetings,” Dex’s assigned partner says as Dex slides into the chair next to him. His voice is blanketed with a thick accent Dex’s processor is unable to place, though the circling loading sign in the top corner is certainly trying. Such is the curse of exploring new planets faster than xor updates are able to keep track of them. 

    Today’s mission is expected to make that problem worse, although only slightly.     

    “I’m Fitz,” he says, holding out a hand.    

    “I’m D3x+3r,” Dex replies, not actually pronouncing the numbers like numbers even if they should be pronounced like numbers because they are numbers. The loading wheel is still circling around itself. “Although most people call me Dex because apparently two syllables is too many. I don’t understand it either.” 

    Fitz’s hand falls into his lap. “Nice to meet you, Dex.” He pauses. “Unless you have anything else I’ve forgotten, I think we can probably get going down to the surface so that we can get back sooner than later.” 

    Dex pushes away the loading circle in favor of the small transport ship’s inventory list. “I believe we have everything. If that is a false presumption, the communication link with the Cygnus Oscuro is up and running.” 

    Fitz gently undocks from the Cygnus Oscuro and that’s when Dex’s processor finally decides to provide xem with any information. It’s odd how it’s so proficient with useless information and finally now that it’s relevant, it takes a suspiciously long time. 

    It apparently doesn’t think it’s a major priority to know that xe’s just been sealed into a very small shuttle with a human. No big deal. This is both fine and normal. It’s not like they’re documented to have very short tempers. 

    Now the accent makes sense. Humans have hundreds of different languages, owing to their incredibly diverse geographic distribution. Most other species, including the Eifelians, only exist in small pockets in the corners of their worlds. Humans looked at that and went ‘no, I don’t think I will.’ Any other species is almost immediately recognizable by their accent but humans. They live to be difficult. 

    Even if the accent hadn’t been atrociously obvious in hindsight, the lines streaking across his skin—Blaschko lines, Dex’s processor claims—should have given his heritage away. The even more entertaining part is that most humans don’t even know they have them. 

    Dex’s processor is able to pull up Fitz’s official file without too much difficulty, and that seems like a mostly safe conversation to have instead of stilted silence. “So, how long have you been part of Parallax?” 

    “Well, my parents have worked here since before I was born, so the answer I usually give is, ‘Yes.’ How about you?” 

    “I was built on Gzhelia roughly 250 Eifelia years ago.” Dex pauses, converting this to a unit hopefully a little more familiar to Fitz. “That’s a little more than 4 Earth years.” 

    Fitz’s brows draw together. “Built?”

    Dex’s fan pauses in such a way that it sounds like a sigh as xe pulls back the artificial skin away from xor wrist, revealing the wires twisting underneath. A green fiber optic cable shimmers in the artificial light of the shuttle. 

    “I am aware that I am running on slightly older hardware, but I promise that my software is as updated with the most current Parallax Dataframes an update cycle half an Eifelia year ago could provide. Again, for ease of conversion, that is about three Earth days.”

    “You can stop with that. The conversions. I’ve grown up around more Eifelia time than Earth time.” 

    “I apologize. I was simply trying to prevent any incidental miscommunication before there was an issue. I will refrain from it in the future.” 

    The table of conversions still floats in front of Dex’s vision like a temporary burn-in.    

    Dex and Fitz sit in a silence that even Dex’s emotion identifier that was deprecated two years ago can identify as uncomfortable. Xe really should get around to installing a new one. 

    Fitz is the one to break the silence. “How’d you know I was human? Your little CPU tell you?” 

    Dex nods slowly. “Yes, it did, along with installing several files explaining your species’ customs. I can feel one of them slowing down my SSD flash memory with its sheer size.” 

    “Yeah, yeah, we all get it. Humans are big and loud and dumb and there’s so many of us that you can’t be bothered to learn all of it.” 

    Fitz flicks a half-dozen switches, initiating the landing sequence of the shuttle now that it is within the last thousand kilometers of altitude. The reason that it has to be activated so early is due to Beta Pictoris C’s incredibly high gravitational acceleration, causing the shuttle to have a much higher velocity than if it were under the gravitational influence of most other planets. 

    In other, more numerical terms, gravitational acceleration on Beta Pictoris C at the surface is about 182.970 m/s2, while, for reference, Eifelia’s is 8.011 m/s2. Of course, they are still up in the air, meaning that their orbital radius is slightly larger than the planet’s radius, but that really is not that much of a difference due to the sheer scale of the planet. 

    It’s no wonder Parallax has chosen the two of them for this mission—they’re the most likely to not be crushed under the sheer weight of the surface gravity. Or, more accurately, their own weight due to the increased surface gravity. 

    Fitz touches down gently, one of the very few landings Dex has experienced without involving a significant amount of screaming. 

    “Are you ready to go find one amino acid and then leave?” he asks, standing up. 

    Searching for life on planets like these is, for lack of a better descriptor, a neural-network-numbing process involving taking a few dirt samples while trying to make sure that Dex’s zinc components don’t get instantaneously vaporized, among other problems. 

    A-type stars aren’t even the hottest ones out there, but they’re on the very edge of what is believed to be habitable due to their instability. Their scarcity in the universe also makes it much more unlikely for life to have the opportunity to form around one. 

    It’s nearly inhospitable to every life form currently described, leaving a few carbon-fiber autons to figure out how to sample things on stars-forsaken planets that are literally half the surface temperature of Eifelia’s home star, Telychia. 

    “It would probably be beneficial to don some protective clothing before doing that, even if Beta Pictoris C is nearing aphelion and we have landed on the night side. Do you happen to know if it is tidally locked?”

    “That’s not in your file system?”

    “I regrettably am unable to locate it if it is.” 

    Fitz rolls his eyes, muttering, “Turing incomplete,” under his breath. 

    It takes a few milliseconds for Dex’s processor to provide the context to that statement, and that context is not a flattering one. Its origins lie with both the first human theoretical computer scientist, Alan Turing, and it became popularized due to Earth’s history with artificial intelligence. 

    It’s…not a pleasant history. 

    “Do you believe that infinite memory is possible? Because everything is technically only Turing complete when it is assumed to have infinite amounts of memory, which is impossible to create in the real world. Thus, every device, including this shuttle and your knee replacement is Turing incomplete.

    “Yeah, but at least I can feel emotions.”

    Fitz slides the heat suit’s helmet over his head, obscuring his face.

    “Most of your emotions are induced by shifts in hormonal signals. The Floians don’t have hormones. Does that mean that they too are artificial because they do not experience emotions in the same way that you do?” 

    Fitz opens the shuttle door, pressing himself against the wall to avoid being blown away by both the swirling, windy atmosphere blowing dust into all of the delicate machinery of the shuttle and the zeroth law of thermodynamics. 

    Dex’s fan immediately kicks into its highest gear, and it will stay there as long as the door remains open, barring some catastrophic, friction-related disaster. 

    “The Floians had to figure out how to evolve on their own. That should be a reasonable enough distinction for you.”

    “That implies that genetically modified organisms don’t count as organisms. And then, most autons learn via a reinforcement algorithm that mimics how evolution works in order to train a neural network. That’s the thing that I have making decisions in my ‘little CPU’ and its trillion transistors. How many neurons do you have again?”

    Fitz steps out into the outside, his suit making him look like a large orange nebula. Hopefully the door doesn’t decide to close with its own artificial consciousness like last time. That was not a fun time. 

    “Why do you ask when you could just search through your files? I’m sure it’s in there.” 

    “The answer was 135 billion,” Dex says flatly. That would be a more relevant description if xe was able to inflect xor speech more, but xe has found the setting to make xor voice a specific frequency and uses it a touch more than xe probably should. 

    Fitz turns back to Dex. “What are you doing? The sooner we get these samples into your file system, the sooner I stop looking like the stay puft marshmallow man.”

    Dex smiles as the image flashes across xor vision. Xe follows Fitz down the ramp, revealing the expected vast desertlike landscape of Beta Pictoris C.

    It’s significantly too hot for water to remain liquid but—there’s something odd about the erosion patterns. Those might not just be wind erosion. Xe downloaded a whole library of algorithms a couple of months ago. 

    Ignoring Fitz’s demands to know where xe’s going, Dex approaches one of the striated, gray rock formations. 

    url = 'https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/e/2PACX-1vTCZgoegOH a49SFXYU-ZZTdCkgTp0sn&single=true&output=csv'

    rocks_df = pd.read_csv(url)

    features = rocks[["depth", "width", "mohs_hardness"]]

    label = stars_df["class"]

    X_train, X_test, y_train, y_test = model_selection.train_test_split(features, label, test_size = 0.2, random_state = 42)

    model = KNearestNeighbor(n_neighbors = 53)

    model.fit(X_train, y_train)

    new_rock = pd.Dataframe([7,4,6.5])

    pred = model.predict(new_rock)

    A smile blossoms across Dex’s face. “We’ve got liquid erosion. It’s slightly less viscous than water, but liquid erosion nonetheless.” 

    Fitz stares at xem, waiting for an explanation that takes a long time to get there. 

    “I’m going to have to run some simulations on the ship because I don’t have enough RAM for the kind of resolution I want, but there’s potential that there used to be water here, and I’m sure you’re aware of how water and life are synonymous. Most of the time.” 

    Dex carefully scrapes off a corner of the ashy sandstone column for further study because xe, quite unfortunately, doesn’t have a built-in mass spectrometer. It’s also generally good practice to collect samples. 

    Another aspect of good practice is to look at more than one rock before drawing conclusions about an entire planet. 

    Dex traces into the dirt a simple sketch of Fitz in his marshmallow suit. He’s lucky to have all of his appendages attached, let alone proportional. Dex then takes a sample of the dirt. The mixing helps to paint a better picture of what the sand is like, rather than just the solar-radiation-exposed topsoil. 

    Suddenly, Fitz swears, pointing at something in the vial. That something is a little creature wiggling its way around the glass. 

    Dex nearly drops it, which would have been a less than ideal decision, as xe tries to find the little guy who is desperately trying to not be seen. 

    The little guy is a fairly standard arthropod-style body plan, with an exoskeleton, a number of legs that is larger than 2 and smaller than the number required for ‘burn it alive’ algorithms to kick in. So somewhere in the 6,8,10 range is probably pretty reasonable. 

    Although, to be fair, even numbers are more of a guideline than anything else. Once again, Earth is an exception to the rule with a three legged fish down in some of the deepest parts of its oceans. Also echinoderms with their five-fold radial symmetry. 

    “You, uh, might want to put him down,” Fitz suggests. “You don’t want to be charged with kidnapping should that little bug guy who I’m now going to be naming Fred turn out to have a consciousness.”

    Humans’ inclination to name creatures that have no way of communicating with them is a fairly large section in their file overview. It seems as though this can even occur with inanimate objects, which just links to a page advertising a pet rock, whatever that’s supposed to mean. 

    Dex pours the vial back onto the ground and attempts to take another sample without kidnapping another Fred. 

    Is that how human naming goes? Does it really matter? 

    The only reason this is a question is probably because It feels like all of Dex’s wires are currently being poached in the water designed to cool them. 

    There’s another one in the next vial. And the next. It’s almost like spontaneous generation but, like, not yet disproven by putting meat in a jar and covering it so maggots don’t get laid on it. 

    Yeah, that’s literally what the humans decided to do. Specifically one named Francesco Redi. Seems like a waste of calories for a species who needs to eat a lot of them to support their endothermic metabolisms. At least they figured it out in the end. 

    The fourth attempt seems to be safe as Dex only fills the vial halfway and shakes it extensively to avoid accidental kidnapping. Now the only possible complication could be microscopic creatures, but that’s past the point of reasonable care. 

    Fitz spends another few minutes gallivanting around, likely wandering around for more interesting samples, even if the entire report is already writing itself in the back of Dex’s processor. 

    He returns with a half dozen more samples of varying mineral compositions which get stored in his marshmallow suit’s pockets. “I saw another guy. Sorry I couldn’t get a picture, but he kind of looked like a scorpion. If you know what those are.”

    Dex nods, projecting a picture of one onto the first rock ledge just to prove that xe has image files stored in xor drive. 

    “Yeah, he looked kind of like that.”

    Dex switches the picture to a different one, one that isn’t necessarily a true scorpion. That doesn’t stop Eurypterus from colloquially being called a sea scorpion. It also doesn’t stop them from being extinct on Earth for around 252 million of its own years. 

    Fitz repeats, louder this time, “Yeah, he looked kind of like that.” 

    Fitz’s new best friend the Beta Pictoris C scorpion, who notably has yet to be blessed with a name, hops up onto the rock ledge, and it’s remarkable how similar they look, albeit the hologram being significantly larger. Blue swirls across its hardened exterior, and its pincers look like they’re very ready to reduce the number of fingers Dex has. 

    A warning light flicks on in the corner of Dex’s vision, cutting off access to xor files. 

    “We should probably be getting back to the ship. I have the coordinates of our landing point so that a larger, more prepared team can conduct a more detailed study. And before you begin to state that we are that team, if I am to stay out here for much longer, I will probably end up shutting down, and that is a burden I would rather not impose upon you.”

    It’s kind of odd how Dex’s vision is able to start flickering as xor processor threatens to have enough for the day. One would think it would work the same as when it gets too cold, but no. One second, xe’s completely fine and the next, xe’s restarting after eighteen hours trapped in an avalanche. 

    This is a normal experience. It’s not Dex’s first time, and most other autons xe has communicated with have had similar ones. It’s a risk associated with the job, and xor data won’t be lost in anaerobic environments the same way that data in an biologically-designed brain will. 

    Unless that brain belongs to an obligate or facultative anaerobe, but the vast majority of intelligent species do require some form of a gas to function. Many use oxygen, but carbon dioxide, methane, hydrogen, and carbon monoxide are fairly common as well. 

    Dex and Fitz make their way back into the spaceship and make absolutely certain that the hatch is sealed before peeling off their marshmallow suits. Dex’s blinking temperature warning sign disappears, but xor fan still remains running at full speed. 

    Fitz collapses into the pilot’s chair, sweat streaking down his brow, and barely waits for Dex to sit down beside him before lifting off. 

    They once again sit in an uncomfortable silence, punctuated only by the sounds of Fitz flipping various switches on the shuttle’s control panels. 

    Dex makes half a note that xe should learn how to fly a ship at some point, although Sophie would rapidly abuse that particular ability. 

    Once xe’s back aboard the Cygnus Oscuro, xe locates the mass spectrometer in order to analyze the samples before Fitz starts telling everyone about the larger portion of their discovery, because then xe’s going to have to answer other people’s questions instead of xor own.

    url = ‘https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16lsnIQaP37r682gKuz CZp-YqLgCis-Ln4PSaDEpiAjw/edit#gid=0’

    mass_spec = pd.read_csv(url) 

    compounds = []

    for i in range(mass_spec.size()): 

        id = identify(mass_spec[i]) 

        compounds += id 

     It turns out to absolutely no one’s surprise that liquid water doesn’t exist inside of the rock samples, but tricobalt tetraoxide, Co3O4, is in there, and it is a liquid at the planet’s surface temperature. It’s certainly a choice for an electron donor, and it’s kind of a wonder the entire planet isn’t bright blue with the Cobalt (ii) ions. 

    Dex isn’t surprised to find out that by the time xe’s had enough time with the samples that the entire ship knows about the little arthropod that was found, even if they aren’t formally related to the Earthen order of arthropoda Fitz is comparing it to. 

    They look similar. It’s close enough. 

    What Dex is surprised to find is that everyone wants a tour to see them despite the fact that the vast majority of the crew would acquire heat stroke almost instantaneously. This is xor thirty-sixth mission to actually go down onto a planet for the first time—autons are cheaper to replace than biological organisms—and this is by far the biggest response to a new species. 

    It’s odd. Xe doesn’t like it. 

    Dex’s neural network wants to blame it on Fitz, and there really isn’t any data to contradict that particular hypothesis. It also makes it a very difficult hypothesis to test, which makes it significantly less useful as a hypothesis. 

    On the other hand, a useful hypothesis would be one relating to the actual little alien creatures that for some reason are able to live on a planet that’s more similar to a furnace than a habitable landscape. 

    And so, against all logical reasons surrounding the temperature of a planet known to be at least twice the temperature of the hottest previously confirmed life forms. Of course it’s on Earth. Hydrothermal vents don’t look like a place where organisms could live, and then they’re just down there chilling. That’s probably not the best choice of a descriptor. 

    When in doubt, the answer is more often than not ‘Earth is a weird planet.’ 

    The journey back down to the surface with Fitz passes with significantly less fanfare than the first, the beeping of the ship being obnoxiously loud in the deafening silence. 

    They touch down, Fitz not taking as much care as last time with making sure the landing has as little of a change in momentum as possible, which is to say that it’s nowhere near the gentle landing of the first trip. 

    Fitz leans back and sighs. “Do you have any commentary you’d like to provide or are you ready to go and collect data so we can finish our reports on this planet?”

    “I mean, I’m always collecting data, even if it's only a live feed of my precise coordinates getting thrown into a plaintext file never to be seen again, so the answer is closest to both of the above.” 

    That does not seem to be the answer Fitz wants as he takes one of his bags of human snacks—potato chips, according to what’s printed on the yellow label—and throws it into the garbage can in the corner. 

    “Wow.” Dex’s visual apertures widen. “I didn’t realize that throwing projectiles with accuracy was a human skill. I’ll make sure to add that to my files, as well as to the main system.”

    Fitz’s eyes flash, his features drawing into hard lines. “Are you physically incapable of not being condescending? I get it. I’m a human. I’m from a death planet. Humans are weirder than fucking dark energy. It doesn’t require that many comments about it to get your point across!”

    Dex pauses, letting xor neural network fully process Fitz’s statements before replying, “I don’t understand where I was being condescending.”

    “You just did it two sentences ago!”

    “I did not do anything two sentences ago. It was genuinely quite interesting how your species has evolved to throw objects with accuracy, even ones with high surface area to volume ratios such as that bag of chips, because it is not something that has been documented in any other intelligent species.” 

    “Oh, please. It’s a basic skill.”

    “Do remember that your species evolved in part to bring down large prey such as Mammuthus primigenius. Throwing spears at a wooly mammoth directly led to that ability being rewarded with a higher rate of nutrients, and thus resulted in the following generations being more able to throw spears as well.”

    “You know all of that but you didn’t figure out that throwing things is pathetically easy? Your little auton brain isn’t very good at drawing conclusions from data you have, is it?”

    “It is simply something I did not have cause to consider before now, though I do recognize that it would have been quite easy to identify without the inciting event.”

    “And you’ve also said that you have a very large file on humans. Most of our games are based around the concept of throwing a ball. Was that not enough information to extrapolate that maybe we’re good at it?”

    “Games of chance are common in many species. It follows that this could simply be a manifestation of that desire in humans, so games like your ‘basketball’ or ‘baseball’ do not provide sufficient evidence to draw conclusions such as the ones you’re suggesting.”

    Fitz rolls his eyes. “Why do I even bother? It’s not like you’re going to change your mind. You don’t have a mind to change.”

    Dex wants to explain that xor neural network is actually changing its dependence on its individual notes on a regular basis, but that doesn’t seem to be advantageous in this particular context.

    Fitz rolls his eyes, muttering in what is likely his native tongue—one which Dex has not downloaded the translation file of—as he gets into the marshmallow suit once again. 

    They go out, describe a half dozen new arthropod-esque species, each with more legs than the last, and return with more samples with as few words as possible. But nothing is ever allowed to be simple. 

    The hatch on the shuttle has decided today that leaving itself open in the blistering heat is not something it likes to do, and while Fitz and Dex are distracted, it shuts its doors. 

    In turn, it opens the floodgates for Dex to learn some new fun human swear words when Fitz notices what’s happened. 

    “No reason to worry,” Dex says, making xor way through the sand to open up the back emergency panel that exists for exactly this reason. 

    “Uh, I left the keys in there. There’s very much a reason to worry.”

    “And I’ve got admin privileges. It’s fine. Go back to looking for the next beetle you’re going to call your son.”

    “Don’t be rude to Benny like that. He’s not that replaceable.”

home@Cygnus-shuttle-3:~$sudo su

home@Cygnus-shuttle-3:~$******

root@Cygnus-shuttle-3:~$ufw disable 

    There’s no particular reason why the firewall sometimes decides to make the hatch close, and this is enough of a solution for Dex to not go searching for an answer. 

    As the door begins to open again, Fitz asks, “So, what’s the password?”

    “I’m the password.”

    “Yes, yes, I understand that you’re helpful. Now, what’s the password if this were to happen again and you aren’t around?”

    “I’m the password. It’s literally just my name. D3x+3r. It’s got an uppercase character, lowercase character, number, and a special character. My friend Sophie thought he was hilarious when he heard it, so now it’s my password for everything. Don’t tell anyone.”

    “I won’t. I don’t even know where the special characters are even if I wanted to.”

    “The ‘t’ is replaced with a plus. The ‘e’s are fairly obviously transliterated to ‘3’s. There’s nothing fancy going on here.”

    Fitz turns to walk away but stops himself. “The name Sophie feels a little familiar. Does he by any chance know a Keefe?”

    “Yes, actually. The two of them dated for a while. Although I’m not sure if that should be in the past tense. I stopped asking for updates a while ago.” 

    Fitz laughs. “Stars, I wish I could figure out how to do that. I’ve never escaped from them.”

    “Just kind of stare blankly into the distance and people will stop wanting to tell you things. They’re usually doing it because they want compliments on whatever it is they’re telling you, and by depriving them of that, they stop wanting to do that.”

    “Are you sure you’re an auton?”

    Now it’s Dex’s turn to laugh, a sound xe was very much not designed to make, so it sounds more like an out of tune record skipping. “Yeah, I think so. I’ve walked into too many door frames to have gone this long without getting a contusion, which is another thing your species doesn’t particularly care about getting.”

    “Case in point: I found one on my leg yesterday and I have no idea how I got it. It’s already green and I’m not sure how I hadn’t noticed it before. I guess that’s what I get for being from a death world.”

    Dex gestures widely to the rolling desert around xem. “I think Earth’s death world status may be a bit outdated. If this isn’t a death world, I don’t know what is, and, by comparison, I’m pretty sure Earth is an absolute paradise. You didn’t have to evolve to use tricobalt tetraoxide as an electron donor.”

    “We’ve also had five mass extinctions,” Fitz interjects. 

    “So has everybody else, including the Datsonians, even if their government would rather not admit that out loud. You’re not special.”

    Fitz snaps his fingers inside of the marshmallow suit, which does not work well with the thick padding of the gloves. “And that’s exactly what I wanted you to admit.”

    “Is that why you volunteered to come back down here?”

    “That was mostly a decision based on Parallax’s inability to find another poor sap that would be willing and able to come down here.”

    “Wouldn’t it be really funny if they send a Gzhelian in your place?”

    Fitz smiles, the sound of the air conditioners they use onboard the Cygnus Oscuro at a nice, toasty 200 kelvin having kept him from sleeping for nearly as many hours as Dex has wanted to disconnect xor audio input. 

    A beat of silence stretches in the space between them, but for the first time it isn’t immensely uncomfortable. 

    “We should probably be getting back inside the shuttle before it decides to close again,” Dex says, even if it would be very entertaining if they stood outside long enough for it to grow its own intelligence again. 

    After all, that’s kind of how xe got here. Xe’s going to get replaced by a shuttle door within the next couple of Eifelia years. 

    Xe’ll probably get assigned to, like, repairing the Cygnus Oscuro in all of the places the non-auton mechanics are unable to go, but at least xe’ll have discovered a wondrous new world before that happens. 

    while True: 

        # avoid getting hit by Fitz’s projectiles

# no, seriously, they’re dangerous

        update_coordinates()

        data_status = upload_data()

        if (data_status == True):

            break() 

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

(Digital Handwriting reveal lol)

Quick little universe glossary (the parentheses are the names that exist in Earthen astronomy - i.e. they have wikipedia pages)

Most of the known life is around the ultra-cool dwarf star Telycia (based on Trappist-1) and it has seven planets around it. Bashkiri (Trappist-1b), Chthonia (Trappist-1c), Datson (Trappist-1d), Eifelia (Trappist-1e), Floiae (Trappist-1f), Gzhelia (Trappist-1g), and Hadrynia (Trappist-1h). Life is confirmed to exist on Datson, Eifelia, Floiae, and Gzhelia. The first civilization to go out exploring the stars was Eifelia, which is why it's so much of a significant presence. Most of these are named after Earthen geological time periods (mostly subcategories of the Cambrian) and just kind of corrupted for my purposes because most of them are closer to demonyms so I had to do what I had to do.

Bonus fun facts about the Telycian system: I imagine Datsonians as kind of looking halfway between humans and Diictodon. Don't ask how that works. I didn't get that far. But Diictodon is just a little guy and I want him to exist. Eifelians probably look like humans so then the makeup budget is less lol. Floiae is an ocean planet and Floians are essentially bipedal cuttlefish, w-shaped pupils and all. They're also kind of like if seaweed has consciousness. As for the Gzhelians - they look like platybelodon and I don't want to elaborate. Gzhelia has a very low orbital eccentricity, so that's why the Gzhelian described in the story has that air conditioner. 200 kelvin is like negative 73 degrees Celsius. So uh it's very cold.

For the sake of trying to not make my presumably-Earthen readers cry because of the amount of new planet names I'm throwing around, I've tried to stick to the Mercury, Venus, Earth naming system, although the official Parallax names are going to be Sol b, Sol c, Sol d. Yes this is the same naming convention used by Earthen Astronomy to name exoplanets, as can be seen with the Trappist-1b etc. names above. Yes, it does start with b. I don't know why, I'm just trying my best here.

Beta pictoris is essentially the same both inside the au and out in the real astronomical world we know, which is nice. It is worth noting that there are two confirmed exoplanets--Beta pictoris b and Beta pictoris c--and B pic c is the one closer to the star because it was discovered second.

Conversions: 1 Eifelia year ~= 6 Earth days. That's why all of the conversions are absolutely WILD. Eifelia masses and Earth masses are pretty close to equivalent (4.13 * 10^24 kg vs. 5.97 * 10^24 kg). Earth's constant of gravitational acceleration is 9.81 m/s^2. Kelvin = Celsius + 273.15. Be glad I didn't bring out the fun temperature scales (Rankine, Delisle, Reaumur, Romer, Newton. I was kind to all of you). Stellar Classifications have a lot of systems, but the one I've seen the most is OBAFGKM where O is the hottest and bluest and M is the coolest and reddest. The sun is a G-type star.

Q&A: Why does Eifelia use the metric system? Shut up. I needed to make this understandable to you, random reader. Stop questioning my motives. What's going on in the code stuff? The first one is just importing some libraries, then Dex uses a machine learning model called a KNN model (don't worry about it) to determine the erosion, then goes into a linux command line to turn off the firewall, and then ends it with a loop. The code parts are written in python, excepting the linux, of course. All of the hashtags are just comments. They aren't read by the compiler. They're partially reader assistance and partially me being silly at the end there. What is wrong with you? I don't know either. What happens if I click on the links? The one is a link to scioly and the other is a throwaway spreadsheet. I don't know why you'd care that much but have fun. (Feel free to add more questions in the replies lol I have a feeling none of this makes sense.)

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

It's Getting Dicey

Summary: It's the secret santa fic...Happy New Year @ultralazycreatorfan! I know I told @song-tam that it'd be here on the 30th and then that didn't happen and then I said it'd be here on the 31st and then I was struck down by a headache. Hooray. Anyway. Dex, Lovise, Sophie, and Keefe get together to play some bunco. "What's bunco?" you ask. A game that involves rolling dice. And swearing at dice. A lot of swearing at dice. Xe/xem Dex, it/its Keefe, he/him Sophie. You know how it is. Enjoy!

Word Count: 4398

TW: swearing, at least two (2) lewd jokes

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @faggot-friday @kamikothe1and0nly @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @i-loved-while-i-lied @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death @dizzeners @thefoxysnake @olivedumdum @loveution

On Ao3 or below the cut!

    It’s always a fun day when Dex finds xemself a new project. It’s an even more fun day when xe decides to rope other people into that project without telling them what they’re getting roped into. 

    Lovise is currently living in fear of what Dex has found this time. Xe’s not maniacally supervillain laughing quite yet, so that’s a good sign, though it’s certainly not removed from the realm of possibilities. 

    All xe’s done is drag Sophie and Keefe, presumably kicking and screaming, to Rimeshire. These three definitely can’t cause massive amounts of chaos. To be fair, with a Sophie comes a Sandor, so it can’t be all bad, but it’s still quite unsafe. Ro’s still off somewhere chasing down Cad, so she’s, thankfully, not a concern either. 

    “Hello, everyone. I thank you all for meeting with me on this fine evening against your better judgements—,” Dex begins. 

    Keefe interrupts, “That’s an understatement,” a smirk playing on its lips. 

    Dex gives it a look, a hard edge creeping into xor voice. “--The reason we are gathered here today is because I was recently informed about a human game by the name of bunco. I was also told that I would need to gather multiple willing victims in order to play. I think Sophie was simply trying to avoid me, but here we are anyway, so if you would please explain to us the rules.”

    “I should just jump out your window,” Sophie grumbles. 

    “With or without teleporting before hitting the ground?” asks Keefe.

    Sophie considers its question for a moment. “I haven’t decided yet. I guess we’ll see if I go splat.”

    Lovise flinches as Sandor pinches the bridge of his nose. “Today’s objective is that we’re trying to avoid an Elwin call.”

    “He’ll be so splat, there won’t be any need,” Keefe says, flipping its hair out of its eyes. 

    That really does not improve the situation by any meaningful metric. 

    Dex glances back and forth in the silence between Sophie and Keefe several times before asking, “The rules, please?” 

    Sophie leans forward and clasps his hands together. “Well, we aren't going to get very far unless you have six sided dice.” 

    Xe leans back, and without even looking, pulls out a clear box of more dice than xe should be trusted to have. And cards. And twenty-sided dice. And flat circles that probably have some purpose. Where xe got all this, Lovise doesn’t know. She doesn’t ask. 

    “How many do we need?” Dex asks, the dice clinking around in the hard plastic shell as xe digs them out of their prison. 

    “If we want to be nice and share, then three. If not, then we’re gonna need three per person.” 

    “Keep your grubby little hands off my fucking dice. Give me some d20s, baby.”

    Dex blushes to xor ears as he hands out dice to everybody. Keefe pouts when it’s given d6s instead of the d20s like it wanted. 

    Sophie leans back to look at Sandor. “Are you sure you don’t wanna play?” 

    Lovise then takes that opportunity to make the very bad life choice of kneeling down to join their little circle. What’s the worst that can happen? They throw dice at me? I think that’s gonna happen either way. 

    Two matching dice and one mismatched die, all in shades of green, roll their way towards her and settle just shy of being in her lap. A slight twinge of disappointment flickers in her chest that she doesn’t get Dex’s gold-plated plastic one, but that’s probably lost under xor bed or something.     

    Sophie stares at Sandor for another long second before jumping into an explanation of how to play. “Bunco has six rounds—round one you’re rolling for ones, round two you’re rolling for twos, so on and so forth. So, uh, Dex, if you would roll your dice for us, please.” 

    Dex rolls xor metallic red Clan Sea Fox dice from xor adventures playing Battletech to get a 1, 3, and a 4. 

    “Very nice. I guess we should probably nominate a scorekeeper—”

    Sophie is interrupted by the crashing sounds of Dex rummaging through the shit in xor room. Xe claims there’s a system. There’s no system. Miraculously, xe finds both a piece of paper that’s only used on one side and looks like it’s only been through a few avalanches, as well as a pen whose ink is almost guaranteed to be drier than ogre skin. 

     These get shuffled into Lovise’s responsibility because she seems “trustworthy.” Considering she’s thrown more games of Catan than one would think in order to make sure Dex doesn’t pout, that’s probably not ideal for integrity’s sake. 

    “So this is round one, so just kind of make a table tracking our point values with tally marks or some similar system if you guys don’t have that. The column headers can just be our initials or something. Be lazy. Just give Dex one point for that one xe rolled.” Sophie turns back to Dex. “You may roll again. And, yes, that does mean all the dice. We’re not playing Yahtzee, Keefe.” 

    Dex rolls again. 3,5,5. 

    “Because you didn’t get a one, the turn moves to the next victim. Do we wanna go clockwise or counterclockwise? Or are analog clocks not something that exist around here?”

    Before this devolves into a shouting match, Lovise suggests, “You go next so then I’ll go last.” 

     Sophie picks up his dice and begins shaking them. “In case I forget to mention it, three of any number that isn’t the round number—say I roll 3 fours right now—that’s worth five points. Rolling three of the target number is 21 points and is called a bunco. And we’re going to keep rolling until someone hits 21 points, and then we go to the next round rolling for twos, et cetera.”

    He lets the marbled, matching blue dice go. 2,5,6. 

    “Damn it. You gave me the cursed dice, didn’t you? Whatever. Keefe, it’s your turn.”

    “You better have given me the good dice.” Its dice don’t match by any means—one black and blue, one marbled brown, and one beige—but they’re all stolen from Munchkin, made obvious by the helmet representing the number one. 1,4,5. 

    “Lovise, please mark down a point and Keefe, you go again.”

    1,2,4.

    “One more point. Roll again.”  

    “Again? Exile.” 2,2,3. 

    “Holy fuck, I just thought you got five points. Don’t do that again. Lovise, it’s your turn whenever you’re ready.”

    The unfamiliar plastic dice are awkwardly light in her palm as she rolls. 1,2,4. “Can someone count how many I’m going to have to add so I don’t have to keep pausing?”

    Dex nods and puts a finger up—thankfully not that finger—as Lovise scoops the dice up again.

    1,1,2. 

    Sophie leans forward, his head in his hands. “If you had just gotten a bunco, I would have jumped out the window.”

   “Is that worth one point per one rolled, or some other weird stacking rule like rolling three?”

    “It’s one point per one rolled. So in total, she’s gotten three points this turn. One-seventh of the way to the end.”

    “One-seventh of the way to one-sixth of the way to the end,” Keefe corrects. 

    “I’ll do my best,” Lovise says as she scoops the dice up again, only to roll a 3,5, and 6. She marks down her three points. “To be fair, I did try.” 

     “That you did. Just not enough,” Dex says. Xe rolls a 1,1, and 2, prompting another Sophie-stroke. On the reroll, xe gets a 1,6,6. On the next reroll, xe gets a 3,5,6. Lovise writes all this down, bringing xor total up to 4. 

    Sophie’s turn again. 2,2,5. “This shit is so fucking rigged.”

    “No, that’s just how probabilities work sometimes,” Dex says as Keefe rolls. 1,4,6. 

    Sophie counts on his fingers as Keefe’s streak continues with a 1,5,5. 

    1,1,5. 

    2,2,4 and it all comes crashing down. Those four points bring its total up to six. 

    The turn comes back to Lovise, who rolls a 2,4,5, leaving as quickly as it arrived. 

    Dex seizes the opportunity to get a 1,4,5, followed closely by a 4,5,5. Sophie is blessed with a gorgeously useless 3,4,4, paralleled by Keefe’s 2,5,6. 

    Lovise follows that up with a 1,2,6, forgetting to ask someone to count and instead pausing to write it down on the scorecard. The next roll is a 1,4,5, which doesn’t get written down, and then 3,3,4, which has no reason to be marked. This brings her up to tie with Dex, though the both of them are still trailing behind Keefe. 

    Dex fumbles this opportunity to take the lead with a 2,5,6. 

    Sophie, on the other hand, is sulking something fierce when the turn comes back to him, convinced the ones on the dice are never going to appear. It turns out, with a roll of 1,1,5, they do, in fact, have ones on them, and those are his first two points on the board. They’re also his only two points on the board as his next roll is a 3,5,6. 

    Keefe and Lovise get a grand total of zero points during their turns with a 2,3,4 and a 3,4,6, respectively. 

     They do, however, learn that having a straight of numbers like Keefe’s does not count for any points. This is bullshit and should be amended to make this a more enjoyable experience for everyone involved. 

    And that’s when Dex decides to show off. Xor first roll is 1,3,4. Standard. Normal. Trustworthy. The next is 1,3,5. Like. Okay. You’re being a little extra there but go off I guess. And then the third roll. 1,3,6. 

    Stringing together three points in three separate rolls is a little absurd, which is why it gets nuked by a 3,3,5 moments later. This one turn didn’t net that many points in the grand scheme of things, but it does bring xem ahead to eight. More than a third of the way to the end goal. 

    The ones fall off the dice for an entire cycle, rotating around the entire group until Sophie’s next turn before any more points make their way onto the board. He does get a 1,1,4 so it’s not nothing, but the excitement quickly fades as the reroll of 2,3,6 materializes. 

    This brings him to four, narrowing the gap between first and last place without changing any placements. 

    The ones don’t appear again until his next turn, revealing themselves with a roll of 1,2,4. The reroll is a 5,5,6. 

   “Damn it. I really thought that was gave me five points.”

    Keefe tilts its head. “I guess you just can’t count.”

    “You’re right. Dex, do you have any integer dice?”

    “No changing dice in the middle of the game. What happened to last time when you cried for the blue ones?”

    “You’ve cursed the blue ones since the last time we played Munchkin!”

    “Or maybe I just wanted to make sure that you could successfully run away instead of getting violated by a tongue demon next time!” 

    “That’s just because you transed my gender and the fucking tongue demon got rid of my cheese grater of peace!” 

    Munchkin is an…interesting game, Lovise will give it that. 

    “I was just being accurate to the real world!” Dex argues. 

    “The real world hadn’t figured that out yet! You just wanted the -5 modifier during my next combat phase.”

    “Maybe I have a new ability that’s predicting the future. Did you ever think about that, Mr. I-have-five-abilities?”

    Sophie looks at Keefe, who shrugs. “I can’t tell what people’s abilities are, dude. After they’ve manifested, fucking forget it.”

    “Oh, please. Like you two haven’t had your hands all over each other since we were staying at Alluveterre.”

    “Yeah, but my ability’s on the newer side, so there’s not a whole lot I can do. Now, can it be my fucking turn, please? I need to show all of you how you roll dice.”

    Sophie huffs. “Sure, whatever.”

    Keefe gives him a bright false smile as it rolls. 1,6,6.  “Lovise, if you would mark that down, I’d appreciate it greatly.” 

    She had already written it down and is waiting for it to roll again. 1,3,3. 

    Keefe’s confidence hits the rafters as it scoops up the dice again, only to have it come fluttering down in tatters with a 3,5,6. It’s currently tied with Dex for first place. 

    It passes the turn to Lovise with a not-insignificant amount of grumbling. She gets a point with a roll of 1,3,4, but doesn’t have the necessary luck to get a string of rolls as her turn dies with a reroll of 2,2,4. 

    She’s up to six points, and at this rate, the gnomes are going to get Ravagog back before the first round is over. 

    Dex doesn’t choose to help this problem with xor roll of 3,5,5. It was so close to being promising. 

    Sophie and Keefe each pick up a point on their next turns. Keefe’s currently working on getting three dice to show the same face and it isn’t working quite yet, with two doubles in a row. (The first roll was a 1,3,3 and the second was 4,5,5.)

    It’s a whole cycle through their turns—Lovise 2,3,4; Dex 2,4,5; Sophie 3,3,6; Keefe 3,5,6—before Keefe officially declares, “The ones have fallen off the dice.”

    Lovise proves that to be not quite accurate by finding a 1,4,4 somewhere in there. Then, just to make sure, she finds a 1,1,3. That’s the last of the ones on her dice for now, however, ending her turn with a 3,4,6.  

     That brings her up to 9 points and into the lead, though not by much. 

    Dex rolls a gorgeous, worthless 2,3,4 on xor next turn, and Sophie follows that up with an equally beautiful 3,5,6. 

    Keefe can’t let this stand any longer with a turn composed of rolls of 1,3,6; 1,5,6; and 2,6,6. Its total comes to 11 and they’re nearing the halfway point. Though, dice will be thrown if Keefe wins, so trying to lengthen the game any way possible is advantageous.

    That’s Lovise strategy as she rolls a nice, normal 1,4,4 and scratches it onto the scoreboard. She picks the dice back up to get a 4,5,6. 

    Straights really should count for points, but when you’re playing with a bunch of gays, they don’t. Also that’s what Sophie says the rules are, but that’s the better reason. 

    This turn brings her to a total of ten points. A nice, round number. 

    Dex, on the other hand, has other plans. Xor starts off by rolling a 1,4,6. As one does. Xe continues by rolling a 1,3,5. As one also does. 

    And that’s when shit gets tense. Xe rolls again, but doesn’t get a one. Xe does, however, get a 2,2,2. 

    Five points. 

    Keefe’s bloodthirst is gleaming in its eyes as Dex picks up the dice again. Thankfully, Lovise doesn’t have to hold it back as xe rolls a 2,3,5, killing xor streak.

    That doesn’t reverse the past. The damage is done. Xe’s at fifteen points after pulling off that move. 

     “Always keep in mind that anyone can get a bunco at any time. Three ones and this is all over.” Sophie then takes his own advice and tries his best to make that happen. He’s actually fairly close with a 1,1,6 and an aneurysm from Keefe. His second attempt, a 3,5,6, is notably less successful but still brings him to eight points. 

    Keefe is not successful in its own 4,6,6 attempt. The grumbles that the dice are cursed have begun once again in greater force this time. 

    Lovise and Dex both pick up a point on their next turns and then the ones fall off the dice for two entire cycles. As in, it goes through Sophie, Keefe, Lovise, Dex, Sophie, Keefe, Lovise, and Dex before another point is on the board. 

    Where do the ones go? Nobody knows. They’re definitely still on the dice—Keefe checked. Loudly. They just don’t appear. For eight rolls in a row. 

    Sophie interrupts this spiraling trend with a 1,2,3 like a light in the darkness. Then, he gets a 1,3,6 with significantly less symbolic meaning behind it. He follows this up with a 2,3,5 that makes the veil of inky blackness fall over them once again. He’s up to ten points, so he’s still in last place, but less firmly so than before this last turn. 

    It’s Sophie’s next turn before the dice bless the group with a holy one in a roll of 1,3,6. It’s strangely fitting how the forgotten middle child of his previous round is now the roll that slows the encroaching emptiness. 

    Its luminescence is snuffed out almost as soon as it began like a candle on a windy night with a 2,4,5. 

    “Come on, you worthless sons of bitches,” Keefe mutters as it shakes the dice. 1,3,4. “Ooh, swearing at the dice is the answer? You should’ve told me this earlier. You pieces of shit better give me a one.” 1,3,4. 

    “To be fair, I’m kind of surprised it took you this long to figure out that secret,” Dex says. 

    Keefe ignores xem. “Please, motherfuckers.” 2,4,5.

    Unfortunately, Lovise doesn’t get to learn new swear words from Keefe’s newfound Polyglot ability with the end of that streak that took it to thirteen points. 

    It’s said that some humans find thirteen to be an unlucky number. It’ll be interesting to see if the dice agree with this superstition by grinding Keefe’s point gains to a halt. 

    Lovise rolls on her next turn—2,2,4. It’s getting real fucking old rolling and rolling and having nothing new to show for it. 

    Dex’s turn is filled with as much excitement as Lovise’s just was. Which is to say, none. Xe rolls a 4,6,6. Lovise thought xe got three 6s, but no. If xe had, the round would be over and Dex would be inventing a new victory dance. 

    Sophie, however, doesn’t let that stop him. 1,6,6. 1,4,6. 1,2,6. The dice seem rigged—almost like he isn’t even rolling them, but different ones are ending up as the ones and sixes. The only reason Lovise even bothered to notice was that she doesn’t trust any of her company that much. 

    Then Sophie decides to roll a 2,6,6, proving that all of this was meaningless speculation. But he is up to thirteen—tied with Keefe—so that’s nice for everyone except for Lovise in last place.

    It takes a whole cycle of grumbling, swearing at dice, and definitely not purposely rolling them at others before Keefe gets another point. Actually, two points. 1,1,4. It ends up only being those two points, as its next roll is 2,3,3 and a couple of tears that it wasn’t worth five points. That brings it up to fifteen, gnawing at the back of Dex’s heels for the honor of being in the lead. 

    The dice giveth and they taketh away. 

    They taketh away Lovise’s, Dex’s, Sophie’s, and Keefe’s next attempt to get points.

    “Bless me with your golden glory,” Lovise whispers, eyes skyward as she shakes the dice. 1,2,6. 

    She scratches her twelfth point into the paper before returning to the translucent cubes taunting her. She rolls again. 2,4,6. 

    Then it’s Dex’s turn once more—3,4,5. A roll that has absolutely nothing.

    Then it’s Sophie’s turn once more—3,3,6. If only four threes would count for something. Saw the dice apart. Do whatever it takes. 

    Then it’s Keefe’s turn once more—2,4,4. It’s a sharpie away from drawing extra dots. If every side has six dots, every roll is five points. 

    Then it’s Lovise’s turn once more—4,5,6. Straights still don’t count for points. With the way this game is going, it seems like the gays don’t either. 

    When the turn returns to Dex, expectations are on the floor. Then xe rolls a 1,5,6. That’s xor seventeenth point. Four more and this is over. Four more and two becomes the magic number. 

    Xe rolls again. 

    2,2,2. 

    Lovise’s breath catches in her throat. Five points. Bringing Dex to 22 and the round to proceed forward. 

    It’s almost poetic how the first round ends with the next magic number, come to bestow them with its splendor before it disappears from the dice forever. 

    Sophie, a smirk playing on his lips, taps on his Imparter in what looks like a very controlled fashion until an ear-splitting bell noise echoes through Dex’s room. 

    The only reason Dex merely flinches away and doesn’t banish him immediately from the premises for all eternity is presumably because rolling dice game fun when you win.     

    “My family’s bunco game has a bell that comes with it. That’s the closest I can do. Technically, I think the rules say you’re supposed to ring it only when you get a bunco. But we used to ring it at every available opportunity.” He turns to Keefe. “Which is why it’s as far from you as I can possibly get.” 

    Keefe pouts overdramatically, a feat considering it was already doing that at Dex’s accomplishment. 

    But Dex’s accomplishment means nothing. There’s five more rounds before Dex starts arguing that they should play the extended edition with the d100s xe inevitably has stored somewhere. 

     The following rounds feel as though they race by. 

    The twos round, Dex wins once more by rolling a triplet of 2s, except this time it’s worth a full 21 points. Keefe made it to 20 before Dex pulled that one out of xor ass, which is highly suspicious, so a dice trade is initiated. A diagonal cross results in Lovise getting Sophie’s blue dice and vice versa with Lovise’s green ones. 

    The threes round, against all odds, Dex wins again. If xe isn’t cheating, that’s one Exile of an accomplishment, and if xe is, xe’s not doing a very good job at hiding it. Dice are traded again, and Lovise ends up with Dex’s metal Battletech ones. 

    The antepenultimate fours round, Dex takes it upon xemself to win again. Xe has the audacity to get a triplet of 1s and 3s in the same roll streak. The fact that xe hasn’t been burned at the stake like the witch xe is is a fucking miracle. 

    Lovise having to fight off a feral Sophie and Keefe is not a fight that’s going to be pleasant. Don’t get her wrong, she’d still win, but she might get a couple of bite marks.

    They switch the dice again, and Lovise ends up with her original green dice, traitorous in their assistance of Sophie and Keefe over the past two rounds but magnificent in their return. 

    The penultimate fives round, Keefe finally gets to stop the waterfall of crocodile tears and replace them with actual tears as the dice finally decree that it’s worthy of winning. Dex has already won the game beyond defeat but it’s not about winning anymore. It’s about not losing and second place is still better than last place. 

    Now, to be fair, second place is the first place of losers, so maybe it’s just trying to say that it’s the top loser in the world. That would make a lot of sense. 

    Dex is also, notably, allowed to keep xor dice. All of the useful rolls were used up and xor seven points at the end of the round didn’t seem like enough of a threat. 

    And it is finally time for the grand finale. The ultimate challenge of dice throwing. The sixes round.

    Lovise gets so, so close to winning. She has twenty whole fucking points. Yes, all of the points are fucking. 

    And then Sophie just decides, “oh, yeah, I’ll get a bunco. No big deal” as the dice settle into a 6,6,6. 

    It is, in fact, a big deal. 

    Sandor will be hearing about this moment for all eternity. Lovise will make him suffer. He deserves it for his charge’s utter impunity.    

    It may or may not have been Lovise’s mostly-unintentional death glare that caused Sophie and Keefe to fabricate reasons to not be at Rimeshire anymore as they light leap away. 

    Dex begins stuffing the dice back into the box, clinking as they slide down unwillingly, forming a lopsided hot mess. 

    As soon as she’s certain Sophie and Keefe have vacated the premises, Lovise turns to xem and asks “How’d you cheat?”

    Xor hands fly up, framing xor face with xor palms out. “To be completely fair, I only cheated in the second round.”

    “I didn’t ask ‘did you cheat?’ I asked ‘how did you cheat?’”

    Dex digs out the Battletech dice xe was using in the first two rounds and rolls them around in xor hand. “It’s really easy to load metal dice, especially when you’ve got magnets to turn it off when someone wants to check if they’re loaded. I haven’t figured out how to load high numbers with it yet. And, besides, I forgot to do it in the first round and it only shifts the probabilities a little bit. It’s not cheating that much.” 

    “Yes it is.” Lovise pauses for dramatic effect. “Next time, if you have loaded dice, I expect some too.” 

    Dex throws xor head back, laughing. “I’ll make sure to get around to that as soon as possible, but first: I gotta go get some snackies from downstairs.”

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

All the Lemon Squares Argon

Summary: Another renamed fanfic from my creative writing class, this one's assignment was to use setup and payoff in a major element of the story. In the story, Fitz and Dex have a final chemistry presentation project where Fitz has chosen to bake lemon squares, but they've been stolen. I'm not sorry for the pun that is the title.

Word count: 6946

Tw: mild sexual innuendo, jokes about poisoning baked goods, food

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @faggot-friday @kamikothe1and0nly @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @did-i-say-you-could-get-up @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death @dizzeners @thefoxysnake @olivedumdum @loveution @notyourlegacygirl

On Ao3 or below the cut!

    Fitz doesn't even get a chance to sit down next to Dex before Dex’s gorgeous periwinkle eyes glitter up at him with a thousand new ideas. This is going to be…interesting. 

    “What if we could get powdered galactose?  Or lactose? Hm. That’s probably not the best idea. Milk sugar might do weird things chemically. Although that might be the fact that it’s a solution of water and butterfat. Or we could get fructose. That should work.”

    He’s so pretty when he gets like this—especially when I can’t understand half of what he’s saying and I know I’ve missed a lot of context.  

    “We’ve already decided on the parameters of the experiment. We are going to stick with the plan,” Fitz pleads, trying to appeal to Dex’s sense of pretending to be organized. 

    It doesn’t work very well. 

    “What about aspartame? Or Splenda? Is that a brand name? Yeah, it probably is. I should look that one up before putting it in the presentation. Generic Splenda.” 

    “Dex,” Fitz starts, hoping Dex’s name recognition reflex is strong enough to get through this whirlwind of thoughts. “We are not doing any more of this. We have enough. It’ll be fine.” 

    “I wonder what the sweetest one is. Then again, that might not be the best option. Ratios and all that.” 

    An image of the crumbly mess that would follow flashes through Fitz’s mind. He’s forgotten sugar before and it was not a fun result. Better than the three sticks of butter incident in terms of the clean-up, but at least that remained edible. Not that the sugarless one was inedible—that’s a very difficult bar to overcome, but it wasn’t pleasant.

    “It would. But, honey, will you please—”

    “Yeah, honey would be fun!”

    I was calling you that. I realize my error now.  

    Dex’s tirade is finally ended by the school bell ringing in the last hour of the day. It takes a solid five minutes for Mr. Sweeney to take attendance and get the presentation loaded for the group unlucky enough to get drafted on this fine spring Monday. 

    Because AP Chem isn’t already enough of a land of suffering, Mr. Sweeney has graciously decided to fill the time between the exam and the final with a little presentation on whatever chemistry experiment each pair of lab partners wants to do. 

    It can be live or in a video that contains both of you, and it should be relatively safe. This group—composed of Stina and Rissa—has decided that they want to spend an absurd length of time talking about baking soda. Heating it up, predicting the products, hearing about both its and sodium carbonate’s use. Because those are definitely not the same thing. One is used in baking and the other is used in soap. Our class is all in for a riveting ten minutes. 

    Fitz is pretty sure they just found a lab on the internet and followed it, which is a valid method to do things. Once you’ve crossed that mental boundary, though, you should at least try to find an interesting one. He’s heard one group arguing about plating a penny in brass or something. That’s fun. 

    It might be considered defacing currency, but it could easily be argued that that’s the appeal of it. 

    But no. They get to sit there for ten whole minutes, and half of that time is waiting for the sample to heat. Curse you, thermodynamics. Dex doesn’t stop suggesting ideas for how they could embellish their own presentation in a few short days, but Fitz isn’t even sure they’re going to finish what they already have on the agenda. 

    While they’re painfully waiting for the baking soda to heat up enough that it decomposes, Dex asks on the lab table in blue, fine tip expo marker, How are the lemon squares going? 

    The big idea for their project is that they’re going to be taking glucose and sucrose and seeing what happens when they react with Benedict’s Solution. Who’s Benedict? Some guy, probably. It’s a shame they’ve turned him into a soup. At least he’s blue from the copper(II) ions. 

    Fitz should know this by now, but that’s what Wikipedia at two in the morning the night it’s due is for. 

    Anyway, it turns orange in the presence of a reducing sugar, like glucose, and doesn’t react with others, like sucrose. Why do we care about those two? They were the most easily commercially available and it’s taken until today for Dex to start suggesting more sugars for them to try. 

    They’re also performing a taste experiment between lemon squares made with glucose and those made with sucrose. It’s good practice to bring the audience snacks while presenting. 

    Of course, it was a whole process choosing the variety of pastry to be used in this project. As in, Dex asked really nicely for it to be lemon squares—puppy dog eyes and all— and Fitz is incapable of telling him no. It was also convenient that the recipe Fitz had didn’t use brown sugar, and could thus be closer to a controlled test. 

    I made some last night, Fitz replies, and Dex has begun doodling either a chocolate chip cookie or an asteroid on his side of the table. It’s the most precious thing Fitz has ever owned and he will cherish it forever. 

    Dex pauses his masterpiece to say, That’s good.

    Yeah, um, so, about that, Fitz barely manages to write around Dex’s arm, this morning I woke up to find them disappeared. 

    Dex has to erase some of the previous conversation to ask, Well, what’d you do with them? 

    I remember specifically putting them into the back of the cabinet above the microwave. 

    And they weren’t there this morning? 

    Nope. 

��   That marks the first time Dex has stopped talking long enough to think for the first time since last Wednesday. 

    Fitz erases a space to write, smearing a haze of blue across the table.

    Don’t worry about it. I’ll make more tonight.

    And then those are going to disappear.

    I’ll put them somewhere else. 

    Until that gets raided too. 

    Then I’ll make MORE. 

    I don’t think you have that many eggs. 

    That’s why grocery stores exist. 

    Before they know it, the presentation is over, and it doesn’t really affect a whole lot. There’s three presentations a day. It’s still going to take a week to get through all of them, but it does make it so that it doesn’t take longer than that. And that’s somewhat relevant. 

    This next one is over the most classic science fair project of all time: the baking soda volcano.  It’s not surprising that Jensi and Valin are the ones to try to blow up the classroom. 

     Dex writes the chemical reaction on the table with accompanying chemical structures before they’ve even gotten off the title slide. 

     NaHCO3 + HC2H3O2 → NaH2C3O2 + CO2 + H2O 

    Jensi also takes his time explaining acid-base chemistry like we’re all fifth graders, which likely isn’t that far off. “You see, class, baking soda, or sodium bicarbonate, is a base, which means that when it comes into contact with water, it is able to rip off some of water’s hydrogen atoms, resulting in an increase in hydroxide ions. And then when vinegar, also called acetic acid, is dissolved in water, it releases hydrogen atoms, forming hydronium ions. Do any of you remember the chemical formula for hydronium?

    Crickets fill the room as Dex writes H3O+ on the desk without a single thought. Mr. Sweeney is probably off crying in the corner as their final grades slip lower and lower. 

    “That’s alright,” Valin continues, “it’s combining the two reactants that’s the fun part. When an acid and a base come into contact with one another, they undergo a double replacement reaction. In this case, sodium and hydrogen switch places.”

    The presentation flips to the next slide, filling in the products of the reaction as CH3COONa + H2CO3. 

    Sodium acetate can be written either the way Valin and Jensi did or the way Dex did. It’s a matter of preference or something about organic chemistry. Now, carbonic acid, on the other hand, is a bit more of an issue. 

    Jensi points at the second term. “But that’s not its final form. This last reactant here breaks apart into water and carbon dioxide, so there’s a second reaction inside of the normal reaction.” 

    Yes, yes, we all know how carbonates work, Dex writes. 

    Fitz laughs silently. 

    “And, with all that in mind,” Jensi flips to the next slide and lowers his goggles from his forehead to where they’re supposed to go over his eyes in true mad scientist fashion. “It’s time for eruption.” 

    Everyone has seen a baking soda volcano before. It’s not surprising when it bubbles up and oozes out of the beaker that Jensi and Valin didn’t even bother to make look like a volcano. It is nice to note that they did bring food coloring to make the lava foam orange and didn’t get it on the ceiling, which is a win for everyone. 

    And then Dex has to ruin it. Did you know this reaction is actually endothermic?

    That’s big fancy chemistry words for “it gets cold.” Curse you, thermodynamics. Lava isn’t supposed to be cold. Fitz is going to personally take this up with the second law of thermodynamics. It’s not going to work, but entropy deserves to feel bad about what it’s doing. 

    Valin and Jensi putz around for another five minutes after their initial volcano has stopped reacting, mostly just adding more vinegar or baking soda at random intervals to see how the increase in concentration affects the rate of the reaction. Definitely not just standing around to run down the clock for the next group. 

    That next group is the brassing a penny group, and it takes them so long to get to their experiment, the entire class is freed from the confines of the school building before it’s over. Except for Fitz. He still has to play chess for an hour. 

    It comes and goes with more blunders than Fitz would care to admit, but that very quickly doesn’t matter when he shows up at Dex’s house to work on homework. And by “work on homework” he means “desperately hope that he doesn’t get horrifically distracted before they accomplish a nonzero amount of progress on the chem project.” It doesn’t seem likely. 

    And then that probability crashes to zero. 

    Dex is found standing in his room at a bulletin board, winding a red string around thumb tacks stabbed into sticky notes. 

    In the middle is a picture of Fitz and a torn-off corner of notebook paper with a three dimensional lemon square drawn on it. Fitz can tell it’s a lemon square because it’s been messily colored in with a yellow crayon that doesn’t show up very well. 

    “Do I want to ask?” Fitz asks hesitantly. 

    Dex smiles into the board. “No, I don’t think you do. But that doesn’t stop me from explaining it. Here in the middle is you, of course. There’s only a few people that know that we’re baking for this project and that I made you do it.”

    “How do we know that the person who took them even knows about the project? Do you not realize how often I find myself baking? I have a problem.

    “Good point.” Dex adds a lopsided question mark to the sticky note with the word ‘project.’ “That doesn’t really change who might have had access to the stash. Which is where our suspects come in.” 

    Dex turns to face Fitz, gesturing widely toward the board like any of it makes sense. His handwriting is absolutely atrocious right now, a sure sign that he’s put more thought into this than it deserves. 

    “Our first suspect is Keefe. I don’t trust him. He’s got a long history of making things disappear. Case in point: Mrs. Cuddles. One day, she was here in all of her stuffed animal glory and the next, we’ve never seen her again.” 

    “We never proved that it was Keefe.” 

    “Well, we really should get around to doing that.” Dex points very intentionally at nothing. “He is also likely to know you well enough to know where you would hide things.” 

    “You have fun asking him. I’m not interrogating my best friend.”

    Dex’s eyes glimmer, and Fitz knows all hope is lost. “We should absolutely do an interrogation! With threats and everything!” 

    “Until he asks for a lawyer,” Fitz deadpans, trying to calm down Dex’s racing thoughts. This is both a common situation and one that Fitz is very bad at de-escalating. 

    “Your dad could be his lawyer.” 

    “I feel like that would make things objectively worse.” 

    “Yeah, it probably would. I think we should declare independence and therefore we don’t have to comply with constitutional rights. Who needs those anyway?” 

    Fitz blinks. He expected for Dex to increase his outlandish ideas in a short amount of time, but not that quickly. 

    “I mean, if you wanted to take the ‘the first amendment protects you from the government, not the Dex’ approach, that would be entirely reasonable without having to prove sovereignty. That would take a while.” 

    Dex smiles. “I forgot about that. That’s perfect. When do you think you can take Keefe into custody?” 

    “I’m not doing it, you do it.” Fitz pauses, trying to think of a good reason why because he clearly did not think through the implications of this before saying it. “You’re the lead investigator here. You’ve got the corkboard and everything. I’m just a guy who happens to be here.”

    Dex looks at him, not believing any of what he just said to be true, but accepting it as fact anyway. 

    “Please don’t let this end with Keefe having a restraining order against us,” Fitz adds. 

    “I make no promises, sweetheart.” 

        Fitz’s faded, once-pink hair falls into his face as he pushes his glasses up to pinch his nose. 

    Why did I know that was going to be his response? 

    Fitz shouldn’t be surprised the next day after school to find Dex in his basement, Keefe sitting at an old wooden table, the lights dimmed as low as possible before total darkness. The incandescent bulbs don’t much like this as they flutter in pain like they’re having a little bit of a stroke. 

    “About time,” Dex says, leaning against the wall. 

    Fitz turns on the lights. “This needs to be taken down about three notches. Keefe, I’m sorry he’s like this.” 

    “I’m not,” Dex and Keefe reply in alarming unison. 

    What did I sign myself up for and why do I do this to myself? 

    “Dex, if you would please proceed with the reason we have gathered y’all here today, that’d be great. Some of us have homework that we actually do,” Fitz suggests. 

    “That’s what study hall is for,” Keefe replies. 

    Dex interjects, “No, study hall is for Wordle.”

    “That’s what English is for.”

    “No, that’s when you do the homework you didn’t finish at home or in study hall.” 

    “Okay, yeah, that’s almost fair.” 

        It isn’t often that Dex concedes a point in an argument. Or maybe Fitz isn’t good at arguing with him. Fitz is very distractible when it comes to Dex and that might affect his debate skills. Or it could be that he knows Dex will pout for a month and a half if he’s proven wrong, and Fitz just lets him believe that he’s right. Yeah, that’s it. 

    Dex bounces off of the wall and slides into the chair across from Keefe. Fitz takes a seat, off center, directly next to Dex, close enough that Dex’s infamous left handed elbow jabs are a serious threat. 

    “First, I would like to confirm that you are, in fact, Keefe Sencen. Is this accurate information?” 

    “What, no middle name?” He looks at Fitz. “Do you not know it?” 

    A smirk tries to blossom on Keefe’s lips but quickly gets shut down by Fitz’s own. 

    “I absolutely know what it is. I didn’t think you wanted to acknowledge how you were named after your father, considering everything.” 

    Dex continues, “This is not a government-sanctioned interrogation, and, as such, you are not entitled to any of the protections provided by the Bill of Rights. Miranda rights do not apply here. You are not getting a lawyer unless you want one of my siblings, who are, by the way, not recognized by the bar association.” 

    “This is quickly sounding like more and more of a trap.”

    “It’s like five questions. You’ll be fine. The most severe sentence you will receive is mild disappointment.” 

    Keefe gasps sarcastically. “Not that, never that. How am I going to cope?” 

        “On the seventh of November of this year, it was discovered that a tray of lemon squares went missing. Do you know anything about this?” Dex asks. 

    “No,” Keefe replies, fast enough to not think but not too fast to be suspicious. 

    “Are you absolutely sure?”

    Fitz adds, “They would have been above my microwave.” 

    “Yeah, I’m sure.” Keefe shifts his attention to Fitz. “You made lemon squares and didn’t tell me?”

    “I guess you should’ve taken chem with me.” 

    “Well, I wouldn’t have gotten them either way, considering they’ve been stolen. But, now I know you have a recipe for them, which means I have the ability to annoy you enough to convince you to make them. Who’s the real winner here?”

    “So you’re sure that you didn’t take them? You’re not just being difficult because that’s your only personality trait?” 

    “Actually, I have two. Beauty is a personality trait. But I was very unaware of that particular stash. The one under your bed and in the back of the lazy susan are less safe.” 

    Fitz swears. “I just found that one a week ago and now you’re telling me I have to find yet another one?”

    “You could always use your closet. You’ve already got everything else in there.” 

    Dex snorts. 

    “You knowing where it is would take away the whole concept of it being a hiding place. And then you’d figure out how to sell it on the black market.”

    “I wouldn’t do that. That would risk my own stash. Although your sister is going to stiff it out with that bloodhound nose of hers faster than I’ll be able to raid it.”

    Dex interrupts, “Do you think there is a possibility that Biana was the one to find the lemon squares?”

    “Possibility? Absolutely. I don’t know why she wouldn’t have been your first suspect. She literally lives in the same house as the lemon squares. She would’ve had the largest window of opportunity.”

    “Like you aren’t there almost as much.”

    “That’s because Biana is usually off gallivanting with her friends.” 

    Keefe has a slight inflection on the word “friends,” but what he’s trying to imply there remains unclear. Knowing both of them, it’s probably more than a little gay. 

    Fitz waits a beat before saying, “I’ve got to go get to making another batch. If more go missing, I want you to expect that we will be seeing you again.”

    “I also expect you to come to us, whether it be in person, in an overcomplicated disaster of scavenger hunt clues, or anywhere in between, if you find out any information. We can offer a better bribe than those other people can.”

    “Dex,” Fitz hisses. 

    “What? It’s accurate. It’s not like this is going to lead to a crime syndicate,” Dex replies. 

    “You never know. Alvar could be involved.” 

    “He probably still thinks of you as a fifth grader. I know I do the same with my siblings, and I see them every day. Unfortunately. But that means he likely believes that you shouldn’t be trusted to operate the oven on your own.” 

    “Unless he’s been purposely watching you only to ruin your final project,” Keefe suggests. 

    Fitz holds his head in his hands. “There’s no reason to exaggerate this as much as you are. Next you’re going to be telling me that I should poison the next batch to find out who took them.” 

    “That’s actually a good solution,” Dex says. “You’d make sure there are no more stolen lemon squares…after those, at least.”

    A couple of bitter almonds crushed up into the crust would make that far easier than it should be. Cyanide is known for being delicious. 

    …And that’s exactly why I shouldn’t be allowed access to Biana’s Amazon Prime account. 

    “Are we done here?” Fitz asks tiredly. “Or are you two going to come up with a conspiracy theory to explain the entirety of thermodynamics or something? And do I really have to be here for that?”

    “Hey, there’s probably a fourth secret law of thermo somewhere,” Dex argues. 

    “There already is. The zeroth law. If A is in equilibrium with B and A is in equilibrium with C, then B is in equilibrium with C, remember? You’d need a secret fifth law, and at that point, that’s unrealistic.” 

    Dex laughs. 

    “Please don’t figure out a way to violate any of the laws while I’m gone. I don’t want to deal with the consequences of that. That would imply that the project would have to change and I’m not putting that much effort in between now and Friday.” 

        “I hope you know that’s my goal in life now.”

    “I knew it would be.” Fitz sighs silently. “I’ve got too much homework to keep following this conversation. Just have fun doing whatever it is you find yourself doing this evening.”

         “Let me know if you need distracting from your homework.”

    I give myself fifteen minutes before I’m going to be taking you up on that offer. “I won’t, thanks. Have a nice evening.” 

    “I won’t. And I’m sure you won’t either.” 

    Keefe snorts. 

    “Both of y’all are legally required to have a nice evening. Because I said so. And now I’m going to leave you to it.”  

    Fitz leaves without any more argument, because he’s had enough of that for today. There’s a limited amount of coherent thoughts he can have while being faced with Dex’s dimples and that number is very, very low.

    The next day interviewing—interrogating—Biana goes much the same as Keefe. Which is to say, it’s a complete waste of time for everyone involved. She threatens them slightly more, but that’s to be expected. 

    Fitz spends far too many hours reading scientific papers about glucose and sucrose and a few other sugars just for fun instead of working on the actual project part of the project. 

    It’s to make it as accurate as possible. Yeah. That’s why he didn’t get to bed until two in the morning. 

    That might also be due to the fact that he spent a few hours surveying his house to look for the most advantageous spot to hide the next batch of lemon squares—and with two slices per person in class, it’s not particularly easy to find anywhere even remotely helpful. 

    There aren’t a whole lot of viable options left between Keefe and Biana’s incessant searching for hidden snacks in the walls. Even behind the fish tank in his dad’s office is no longer safe. 

    Eventually, he finds a light fixture that will surprisingly work quite well. They might get a little warm from the heat given off by the lights if they’re turned on. Curse you, thermodynamics. They’ll be fine. 

    Then, and only then, at like two in the morning, is he able to make more. Most of their cooking time is being stuck in the fridge and it gets left there overnight. 

    The next day is Thursday, and Thursdays are good days. Neither Dex nor Fitz have anything to do after school, which means Fitz can drive Dex home. 

        “I made more lemon squares last night.”

    “Oh? And how did that go?” Dex asks, staring firmly out the window. 

    “Well, they weren’t there when I checked them again in the morning.”

    Dex swears. “Is there anything else we can do?”

    “Not unless I don’t let them out of my sight until tomorrow morning when I let Sweeney take custody of them. Do you think I could maybe make and leave them at your house? I don’t want to get up at four in the morning and that’s pretty much my only other option. I’m not staying up all night just to make them at a reasonable time.” 

    “I would rather gouge my eyes out with my pencil than wake up at that heinous hour. Good luck to both you and your sanity. Stars know I’m not going to be doing that. I’d pull another all-nighter before I do that one.” 

    It takes a second and a half for Fitz to realize what Dex just said. 

    “What do you mean ‘another’ all-nighter? Dex, we’ve been working on this.”

    “Well, we’ve also been working on this project for a few too many days for me to just ignore this whole mystery situation we’ve got going on.” Dex’s voice cracks. “I have to solve this problem. I have to find out what happened. We’re going to be very lucky if I get anything tonight.” 

    “Then I guess we just have to make sure you don’t think about the problem. If we don’t think about it, it doesn’t exist.”

    “You’re not playing the object permanence game with me today, Fitz. We all know I’m going to lose and I don’t like doing that.”

    “There’s no such thing as losing. Either you win the game and pass out in the middle of our presentation tomorrow, pushing it to Monday as you get dragged to the nurse’s office, or you get to sleep.”

    Dex sighs. “You do raise a fair point. I can’t get on a first name basis. Keefe and Sophie may have been the first to accomplish that particular honor, but that doesn’t mean they’re ever going to let me live it down.” 

    That wasn’t the point I was trying to make, but whatever works, my darling. 

    Fitz reaches over and gently squeezes Dex’s hand. “We’ll figure it out. I’m not failing a project over this. That’s not something I’m physically capable of doing. Besides, if something does happen, we’ve still got Benedict’s solution and a hot water bath. It’s not as fun or as memorable, but it’s functional.” 

    “Ah, yes, copper sulfate soup. I’m sure it’s very tasty.”

    “The forbidden gatorade. The fact that it’s that shade of delicious, delicious blue is so unfair on so many levels.”

    “I thought you were supposed to be the responsible one.”    

    “Well, it’s not my fault it looks so drinkable. Also, you’re a very bad influence on me.” Fitz smiles. 

    “I know. But I’m just picking up what Keefe started. Can you feel the corruption sinking into your bone marrow?” 

    “Yeah.” Fitz says bluntly. 

    They unceremoniously get out of the car, and Fitz leads the both of them towards the kitchen. They’re trying to be productive today and making another batch of lemon squares before sitting down and getting distracted seems like something productive. 

    He checked after Biana’s interview yesterday to see if Dex’s house had all of the ingredients, and for some unknown reason, they did. Why do they own so much glucose? Normal table sugar is sucrose. That would be reasonable. Glucose is not. 

    It might be a little out of date, but at this point, Fitz’s just hoping to not have to do the conversion from baking powder to baking soda. After making the crust and throwing it in the oven, he discovers that his hopes aren’t fulfilled. 

    How am I supposed to measure a sixth of a teaspoon of baking soda?

    And also, why does this always happen? They should really standardize this. Make everyones’ lives easier. 

    Just to be even more difficult, it decides to spill onto his shirt, right next to the flour and powdered sugar from the crust. Flour has no reason to get everywhere and yet it does. 

    Dex leans over the kitchen island where he’s seated, looking up from his phone for the first time in several minutes. “Am I going to be allowed to quality control these?”

    “No. We barely have enough for our victims—sorry, classmates—as it is.”

    Dex snorts. “Have you poisoned these again? Fitz, we talked about this. This is a crime against humanity.”

     Fitz finishes whisking the second lemon filling—the sucrose one—and the oven timer goes off a few moments later. He checks the crusts, and they’re both beautifully golden brown. 

    I need to bake here more often. This oven is better than the one at home.  

    “Says the guy voted most likely to become a dictator by our chem class.”

    “That simply means I know what I’m talking about.”

    “That’s funny, because I’ve never known what I was talking about in my life.”

    “That seems like a you problem.” 

        Fitz pours the filling into their proper crusts—differentiable by one of glucose’s corners being less than all the way to the corner—before sliding both pans back into the oven. 

    That can be Dex’s piece. I just can’t tell him that yet. 

    “Do you have any other homework tonight?” Fitz asks, leaning across the island counter to match Dex. 

    “That really is your only mode of conversation, isn’t it?” 

    “Yeah. It’s sad, isn’t it? I’d ask if you had any new personal projects going, but I think I know the answer to that.” 

    “You do?”

    “You’re fully occupied solving my life’s problems. You don’t have enough time to start something else.”

    “It’s lines of reasoning like that one that make me want to start a new project just to prove you wrong, and I hope you know that.”

    “And now I can ask you very nicely to channel that feeling and work on the presentation we have tomorrow. Unless you forgot that it was tomorrow. Did I mention it was tomorrow? We have a presentation tomorrow and we are extraordinarily unprepared.” 

    Dex tilts his head, considering. “No, I don’t think you did,” he replies flatly. 

    “So do you think it might be a good idea to get the slides open so that progress can be made towards readiness?”

    “No,” Dex replies, getting his laptop out of his backpack and hitting the keyboard approximately fifty percent more than necessary to make it turn on and start functioning. 

     Its fan immediately starts running, producing a high-pitched whine on top of the normal laptop fan sounds. 

    Dex smacks the side of the keyboard, likely an effort to make it stop doing that. It doesn’t. “Curse you, thermodynamics,” he whispers, along with a few stronger suggestions for what friction can do to itself. 

    “I’m going to be hunted for sport if Bex hears this. I’m going to my room. If you need me, you can literally just text me. You’ve done it before. I believe in you.” 

    I don’t know which one of your siblings that is, but I’m not letting you go back in that room while that cork board is still there. I need a focused Dex and that would not be a focused Dex. 

    “Or we could head down into the basement,” Fitz suggests. “I can probably still hear the oven going off from down there and being in the room where we interrogated our suspects seems kind of fitting.” 

    “That’s fair,” Dex says, picking up his still-open backpack and laptop as he begins to descend the stairs. 

    Fitz tries to brush away some of the suspicious white powder dusting the front of his shirt. It doesn’t do a whole lot, but maybe now it won’t be as ground into the carpet lining the stairs and lower level. 

    Fitz finds Dex arguing with one of his siblings—it might be Lex, but it’s difficult to tell. All of their names rhyme because their dad thinks he’s hilarious, only making Fitz’s life more difficult. 

    “Why are you turning down the opportunity to go trash my entire room?” Dex demands. 

    “Why are you so willing to give me that opportunity? Last time you were this agreeable, you planted stink bombs under your bed!”

    “To be fair, that was objectively hilarious.”

    Maybe-Lex smiles. “It was fun banishing Rex outside for a week.”

    I remember that happening. 

    “Just find somewhere else to go live for the next couple of hours. If that ends up being outside, that’s your problem. I have the Fitz and since he’s a guest in our house, that means he, and by extension I, have superiority.” 

    The corners of Fitz’s mouth widen into a smile and his heart flutters slightly. 

    Hearing him use that argument never gets old. It’s kind of pathetic. I’m kind of pathetic. 

    More-than-likely-Lex huffs and stomps up the stairs. The carpet muffles most of his anger. 

    “Sorry about him,” Dex says as he sits at the table, friction causing the laptop to shriek as he slides it back because he put it down too close to the edge. Fitz’s ears want to bleed. At least the journey got the fan to stop screeching for whatever reason. 

    Fitz takes a seat across from him, the chair still ominously warm from probably-Lex sitting there. And then, from the all-encompassing silence left behind, comes the sound of Pop Rocks emanating from the table itself. 

    Fitz looks up to find Dex moving his laptop to the far end of the table so he can get a closer look. 

    “What on Earth was Lex doing here?” Dex whispers to himself. 

    Ah, so I was right on which one it was.  

    That’s not the takeaway you were supposed to make there.

    Fitz shrugs. 

    Dex pokes the table. “It’s sticky.”

    “Now I definitely don’t want to know.” 

    “Not like that. Get your mind out of—” An idea blossoms in Dex’s mind, and without any warning or elaboration, he runs upstairs. 

    A cabinet slams closed. “Where’d you put the baking soda?”

    “To the right of the pantry, top cabinet, bottom shelf, right side.”

    “Thank you!” he yells, running back down the stairs and to the table, becoming a living example of the doppler effect. He pours far more than the recommended serving size of baking soda onto the table, and the popping sound intensifies. 

    Dex swears triumphantly. 

    “Care to elaborate?”

    “No,” he says, looking at Fitz, dimples prominent and so close Fitz could probably count his freckles. “Bicarbonates react with acids to form a salt, water, and carbon dioxide.” 

    “I know. Why is that relevant right now?” 

    “I just dumped an entire mountain of baking soda on the table and it started reacting with whatever Lex left there. That means whatever he left there was more than likely an acid. And, no, it’s not that kind of acid. Probably. It wouldn’t leave gook on the table like that.”

    Fitz’s eyes narrow but he doesn’t ask why Dex would have this information. The answer is probably a Wikipedia rabbit hole. “Do you know what it could be then?” 

    “This isn’t a very helpful answer, but, no, I don’t, and I don’t know what other tests I can do to narrow it down from literally everything else.” 

    “Don’t you literally carry around a gallon of Benedict’s solution? I fully believe there’s something in your backpack that can solve this conundrum.” 

    “Not quite that much, but, yeah, I’ve got some. For reasons we do not discuss.” 

    It’s because it’s the forbidden gatorade flavor.

    “I’ve got the oven going if you need hot water. If that would help. I don’t know. There’s a reason I just let you do the chem labs without getting myself between you and a bottle of one-molar HCl.” 

    “That’s a valid solution to the problem. I wouldn’t get between me and my son HCl either. Benedict’s might be helpful. Then we’ll be able to figure out where to go from there.”

    “The presence of reducing sugars,” Fitz corrects, and he feels way too proud of himself at knowing that fact. Even when Dex already knows it. 

    Dex grumbles, “Close enough.”

    He runs back upstairs to get a spoon and a small glass, filled with a tiny splash of water. He scrapes off a corner, and it forms an off-white peak on the edge of the spoon before it gets dunked into the water and swirled into solution. A few added drops of Benedict's solution makes it a pale blue color before Dex runs it back upstairs once again to throw it in the oven. 

    “That glass better not shatter into my lemon squares!” Fitz yells, but Dex probably isn’t listening. One must respect the science, and the lemon squares get to deal with the collateral damage. 

    Yeah, the crunchy topping is on purpose. It’s isomalt. Totally. 

    Dex spends a very long thirty seconds pacing, the floorboards creaking with every step he takes. 

    He was probably counting in his head, because when he decides the timer is up, he’s running, once again, to the oven to get the sample out. 

    “It’s orange!” Dex yells, echoing through the house. That must be a wild sentence out of context. 

    “That’s a good thing, right?” 

    “That means you’re gonna move on to the next phase of inquiry: the smell test.”

    “Why aren’t you doing it?”

    “Do you really think I just let you sniff the chemicals in the lab for fun? I don’t smell things very well. I’ve got a library of, like, five things, and even then it has to have a lot of smell for me to even be slightly aware of its presence. We’ve been over this.”

    There’s so many reasons why this could very easily be a very bad idea, some of them involving ammonium hydroxide or chemicals like it, but Fitz is just going to trust Dex’s omnipotent chemistry knowledge. He’s done it all year, and he’s not failing AP chem yet. 

    So long as Fitz is well enough to take the final so that he can definitely not cheat off Dex on it, it should be fine. 

    Dex comes rushing back down the stairs, nearly spilling the forbidden now-orange juice on the carpet.

    He finds Fitz trying to waft the airborne aromatic molecules into the air, his nose slowly inching closer and closer to it. 

    Something registers, and he has to have smelled it wrong. His brows knit together. “There’s citrus in there.”

    The pieces click together—the smell, the stickiness, the presence of reducing sugars in a place where they typically wouldn’t be, and the acid. Citric acid, malic acid, ascorbic acid. Maybe some other acids. 

    “...These are the lemon squares.” Fitz takes a deep breath, before quietly asking, a dark undercurrent running through his words, “Have you been the one taking them?” 

    After all this, all the work Dex has claimed to have done to try to find them, if he knew where they were the entire time that’s—that’s absolutely unthinkable. And if he wasn’t the one to squirrel them away, having them end up in his house of all places is terrifyingly coincidental. 

    Dex puts his hands up defensively, his voice rising in pitch and threatening to crack. “Let’s think about this logically. I would’ve known exactly why you made those. Do you really think I would take them? Do you really think that little of me?”

    Fitz stands. “Then how else would your siblings get their grubby little hands on them?”

    “Why do you expect me to know? Why don’t you go ask them if you’re so concerned with where my priorities lie?” 

    “Keefe,” comes a yelled voice from the great beyond of the upstairs. So quick to throw their source under the bus, but that also means Fitz’s best friend lied to both Fitz and Dex without so much as a moment of hesitation. 

    …I’m not even disappointed, Fitz thinks, and that realization is…kind of depressing. 

    But that also means Dex’s siblings have another source if they’re willing to give that one up so easily. 

    Just because this one case might have been solved doesn’t mean the possibility is removed from the future. They’re going to find a way. At least finals season is upon us, so the baked goods will be plentiful because the stress is plentiful. 

    “I’m sorry,” Fitz whispers, staring at the baking soda hills to deliberately avoid eye contact with Dex and his perfect periwinkle eyes. 

    Dex sits across from him. “I can’t apologize for their actions, but I can apologize for not thinking of them during my whole process. I just figured I would know if they were stashing it in my own house, you know?”

    “Yeah, that’s fair. I don’t trust Biana enough to use that same logic with her, but I get where it would be coming from if I did.” 

    Dex smiles softly. “How mad would you be if I were to join you on that particular endeavor?” 

    Fitz smiles. “So mad.” 

    Dex takes Fitz’s hand, smearing the baking soda across the table. 

    And then the oven timer goes off. The lemon squares are done, and all that’s left is for them to cool off and be powdered sugar. Then they’re ready to go for tomorrow’s presentation. It’s not the most prepared he’s ever been, but at this point, it’s good enough. Monosaccharides and disaccharides aren’t that bad to just completely ramble about with no notes. Dex knows too much for his own good anyway. Between that, some unhelpful clip art, and a four in the morning rabbit hole, everything will be fine. 

    Besides, it’s not like any of the other students will care. They get snacks. 

    “You, uh, might want to go check that before they get taken,” Dex suggests. 

    “Yeah, yeah, I know, I know,” Fitz mumbles, beginning the long journey of trudging up the stairs. 

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

It's Easier if I'm to Blame, Yeah, It's Easier to Numb the Pain

Word count: 2919

TW: Near-death experience

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @faggot-friday @kamikothe1and0nly @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @did-i-say-you-could-get-up @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death @dizzeners @thefoxysnake @olivedumdum @loveution @notyourlegacygirl

On Ao3 or below the cut!

Once again, this was a thing for my creative writing class, but this one was actually supposed to be a fanfic, not just a barely-concealed fanfic like the other two. Essentially this is that one scene in Neverseen where Fitz and Dex become friends. Yes, I know it's been done before. I've done it before. This is the most hinged fanfic I could write and to be fair I wrote kotlp chapter 3 like two years ago and this is from Fitz's pov. It's completely different

    “Can I…um…talk to you for a sec?” Dex asks, his voice sharper and brighter than it has any right to be, ripping a spiraling Fitz out of his daze. 

    For Physic to admit so plainly that he just nearly died that’s—that’s terrifying. 

    Sophie might go through that on a far too regular basis, but for Fitz to get that close to his own demise makes him feel things he’s never felt before. It’s a kind of fear and a lack of control he’s never had before, even while he was watching Sophie drag herself back from the edge of fading away. 

    It’s an even deeper affront to his being than that. Elves are supposed to have an indefinite life span; they aren’t built to process the concept of their own mortality. 

    “Uh…sure,” Fitz replies slowly, glancing up to find Dex studying the floor. 

    Fitz’s Mom herds Keefe and Sophie out of the room, and Physic follows suit, her bejeweled half-mask glittering in the sterile lights as she goes. Keefe, ever insufferable, proclaims that he’s going to be eavesdropping. Fitz throws a pillow at him for his impunity. 

    It is very quickly made obvious that this was a bad decision as Fitz’s chest screams with pain. 

    The inky veins of arthropleura venom may have been drawn out of his skin, but he still has a long way to go before he’s fully healed. Physic’s scolding tells him as much. 

    The look Physic gives Keefe as she warns him to not throw it back is unexpectedly familiar, but Fitz can’t quite figure out why. At least the pillow isn’t allowed to make a return. Keefe is sure to remember this, though. Fitz will regret it one day very soon. 

    Dex waits for several seconds, head turned to the door, watching for the slightest sign that Keefe might be making good on his promise. Eventually he gives in and turns his attention back to the floor, gaze occasionally flicking up at Fitz. 

    Fitz smiles reassuringly, to no effect. 

    “I’m so sorry,” Dex whispers, voice ragged. He’s so quiet, Fitz wonders if Dex actually said anything or if his thoughts were just so loud that Fitz’s Telepathy picked up on them. 

    The next time Dex dares to look at Fitz, a tear streaks down Dex’s cheek. He quickly swipes it away.

    More than that, though, is the guilt etched into every single line, every single freckle. 

    Guilt is the most dangerous emotion an elf can have. Fitz has seen its effects. His father’s mind broke from the weight of Prentice’s conviction. 

    The ironic part is that Prentice’s sentence was to spend the rest of his indefinite lifespan with his mind broken for assisting the Black Swan and, now, Fitz, Biana, and their Mom have joined that exact same organization.  

    And, yes, Sophie was able to heal his Dad, but what if she couldn’t this time? What if Dex shattered and Fitz was the reason why? 

    I’ve already had to go through losing someone because of Prentice’s exile. I can’t let it happen again. 

    “Dex, listen to me.” Fitz waits until Dex’s eye contact lasts for a whole second. “I don’t blame you. I don’t blame you in the slightest—”

    “It was my gadget! It’s why you’re like—like this!” Dex’s voice cracks as he gestures to the bed Fitz is going to be trapped in for the next week. 

    Fitz’s hackles rise, meeting Dex’s anger head on. Anger is a safe emotion, at least until he starts saying things he’s going to regret. But he doesn’t care if he regrets what he’s saying so long as Dex understands. 

    “Correct me if I’m wrong, but last I checked, you aren’t a Charger. So unless you’ve suddenly manifested another ability and then didn’t spend a week proclaiming it to anyone who would listen, that was not your fault.”

    Dex’s voice takes on a dark edge. “Zarina wouldn’t have been able to do this.” 

    Memories of Councillor Zarina, lightning crackling in her palms and the faint whiff of ozone it caused as the air electrified, rush through Fitz���s mind. “She would’ve happily electrocuted any one of us if she thought it was the right thing to do.”

    “Since when has the Council acted upon ‘the right thing?’” 

    Fitz’s mouth opens to argue that the Council isn’t malicious, just overly cautious with a tendency to cover up every possible controversy, no matter how small, but he thinks better of it. The memories of Sophie’s Ability Restriction surface, too fresh in both of their minds to ignore. 

    Dex probably blames himself for that, too. But that isn’t his fault, either. He set out to build an Ability Enhancer. It was the Council that twisted it into what it became. He was just following orders to not get his family banished. 

    “Since when have you not blamed them for every inconvenience you’ve ever experienced?” Fitz smiles amusedly, a recent event coming to the forefront of his mind. “I think one day I heard you probably working on your gadgets around five in the morning cursing them out. I don’t think they gave you that paper cut.” 

    “Okay, most importantly, why were you awake that early? And how could you hear me? We are quite literally in separate treehouses. And, also, it was a splinter, not a paper cut, thank you very much.”

    Dex’s petulant smile doesn’t quite reach his dimples. 

    “I’m surprised Biana hasn’t told you about the horror stories of living with me. I’m apparently what’s called a ‘morning person’ and I should be placed in the Sanctuary to prevent the extinction of my species because it’s critically endangered.” 

    Dex’s smile widens, becoming more sincere. He looks like he almost wants to laugh, but his lips stay pressed together. That’s when Fitz makes it his personal mission to make Dex laugh before he’s allowed to leave this room, even if humor as a coping mechanism is Keefe’s specialty. 

    Fitz’s grand plans are suddenly impeded by a coughing fit, every muscle in his chest protesting with every single movement. A metallic taste tinges the back of his tongue and the skin of his chest feels impossibly tight. Between coughs, he can see the guilt flashing across Dex’s face, and it makes his chest ache in more ways than one. 

    Fitz doesn’t even get the chance to catch his breath before Dex begins a rambling apology. “I’m sorry I did this to you, and I’m sorry about the Ability Restrictor, and I know it wasn’t used on you but I’m still sorry about how it turned out, and I’m sorry for that day you came to the store and I acted like a buffoon, and I’m sorry for—”

    Fitz interrupts him before he can work himself into even more of a mess. “How many times do I have to tell you that I don’t blame you for what happened with the arthropleura?”

    “But you should.” 

    “There was absolutely no malicious intent behind anything that went down. You need to stop blaming yourself.”

    Dex shakes his head. “Intent doesn’t absolve me of responsibility.”

    “Fine, then. Why don’t you blame the Council? You can do that. It’s very easy to get pissed at Councillor Zarina for short circuiting your gadget. It’s even easier to blame Councillor Clarette for calling the arthropleura there in the first place. Who’s to say no one would’ve gotten hurt if your mini smoke machine gadget thing hadn’t decided to be extra explosive?”

    Dex looks…thoroughly unconvinced. 

    “Or, if you want to think about it this way, I share responsibility too. If I hadn’t thrown your gadget down the hallway, things could’ve gone very differently. Worse differently, but still differently. You can blame me for everything, you’ve done it before.”

    Dex has returned to studying the floor, the uneven lines of light gray grout separating the slightly darker gray tiles. It’s the only room Fitz has seen in the entirety of Alluveterre that doesn’t feel like it’s a treehouse. It’s empty, cold, and smells faintly of hand sanitizer. “I used to hate you, you know,” he whispers. 

    His inflection on the word ‘hate’ seems to imply that those feelings might not entirely be in the past, but they certainly aren’t what they used to be. He wouldn’t be getting this worked up if someone else—like Stina—was the one impaled by the antennae of an oversized millipede. 

    “Yeah, I do,” Fitz replies simply, not breaking eye contact. 

    “And that doesn’t bother you?”

    “I mean, I don’t entirely understand what I did to merit that kind of response, but, like, you’ve been more than willing to tolerate me in recent months. Why should I let that bother me? The past is in the past and it’s not like it’s going to reemerge.” 

    Dex turns away from Fitz, now studying the window that looks out onto the treehouses that make up Alluveterre. 

    Fitz can’t really see outside that well with the whole staying-horizontal thing, but Alluveterre itself has taken on a new atmosphere after going to Exile. 

    It should feel more open, but they’re both just as underground, just as claustrophobic. 

    The feeling of being trapped in that place, struggling for every breath as the venom coursed through his veins, is going to haunt him for a long time.

    Maybe that’s the real Vacker legacy…nearly dying in the middle of Exile going to visit Prentice. 

    The surrounding circumstances around the visit couldn’t be much more different. His Dad went down there with Sophie to break Fintan’s mind. He went there to break Prentice out. 

    So much has changed in so few months, there’s no saying where it might go here. All Fitz knows is that Dex is an incredibly skilled Technopath and that he would rather have Dex on his side than against him.

    Dex has the capacity to be scary when he wants to be, but he can also be incredibly stuck in his own head, like right now, as he continues to stare out the window. 

    “What if the past does reemerge?” he whispers. 

    Fitz looks at him, but he doesn’t turn to make eye contact. “Nothing is going to be a linear process. If you end up deciding that your initial opinion of me was correct, I might get a little mad. That’s just how I react to things sometimes. And I also have an intense desire to be liked by everyone—holy Exile, what was in those painkillers?”

    Dex’s response is almost automatic. “It was actually the Oremideae leaves. I think your Great-times-a-gadjillion-uncle-cousin-whatever discovered them. They’re really good at preventing infection, but they also inhibit a little bit of the blood-brain barrier, both physiologically and psychologically. I didn’t realize they’d kick in this quickly…but, I mean, they were crushed...which would increase absorption rate. I can go if this is weird for you.”

    Fitz can barely focus on the details of what Dex is saying. He goes off on alchemy-adjacent tangents quite often during the limited instances they’ve interacted and as much as Fitz wants to learn new things, there’s something so inherently distracting about Dex. 

    “You don’t have to go. Just don’t get mad if and when I say something stupid.”

    “I’m sure you won’t say anything stupid.” Dex’s attention lands on Fitz once again, and he takes a few steps toward Fitz’s bed-prison. 

    “You never know. I am very untrustworthy in that regard.”

    Dex is only a large step away from the foot of Fitz’s bed. He sighs. “I really am sorry for everything and a half.”

    “I thought you were supposed to be good at maths. Infinity plus half an infinity is still infinity. It won’t change. There’s no reason to operate on an infinitely large quantity.”

    Dex’s tone is flat as he says, “It was hyperbole.”

    “Oh.” That would make a touch more sense. I’ll just blame it on my brain not functioning, that’s completely plausible. 

    Dex lowers himself onto the farthest corner of Fitz’s bed. It’s way larger than the ones that Elwin has in the Healing Center at Foxfire, it’s still really close compared to Dex’s normal trend of staying as far away from Fitz as physically possible. 

    But it’s not a level of closeness that’s anything significant in any other case. 

    Dex’s words are low, almost to the point where Fitz thinks his filter has slipped to the point of accidentally reading Dex’s thoughts, but it doesn’t have that familiar echoey quality and Dex is avoiding eye contact once again. 

    “I just want you to know—really know—I’m so sorry about what happened to you. I’d like to promise that it’ll never happen again, but that’s just not something I can guarantee with any level of certainty. That terrifies me to no end, but I guess it just comes with being a Technopath. Hurting everyone around me is just…inevitable.” 

    “Maybe,” Fitz concedes, “but you’ve also saved us so many times with your Panic Switches and even those first two gadgets today that didn’t malfunction. I don’t remember if you heard about me when my Dad’s mind was broken, but, well, I was a bit of an absolute mess and I lashed out at Sophie. Maybe hurting everyone around me is just an inevitable part of my personality.” 

    They sit in silence together for a long moment. 

    Fitz breaks the silence first. “I guess that means that we should be friends. Mutually assured destruction and all that.”

    “Even despite the fact that I used to hate you?” 

    “Yeah. A little animosity will keep things interesting. It’s an integral part of why I’ve tolerated Keefe for so long.”  

     Dex’s laugh isn’t as light as it used to be, back when they didn’t know each other. They’ve both been through so much, and there’s still so much unknown ahead of them in the future. 

    “‘Interesting’ is certainly an interesting word choice. But I guess I’ll try. That’s the biggest commitment I can make. Don’t be mad when I start acting like a blockhead again.” 

    Fitz smiles, struggling to keep his chest muscles from throwing another fit, this time induced by laughter. 

     Dex has been subjected to the worst of the prejudice it can offer, he’s still here fighting for change. He can be bitter at times, but it’s well deserved. Justified, even. Acting like a blockhead would be the least of Fitz’s concerns if he was in Dex’s situation. 

    The idea that the worst Dex could do is act like a blockhead is just so far outside of what he should be allowed, it’s almost comical. 

    Or maybe it’s those Oremideae leaves. 

    Fitz is enveloped by a strong urge to give Dex a hug, but he can’t tell whether it’s from pity, admiration, the realization that he’s truly broken through Dex’s shell for the first time, or something else he can’t quite describe. 

    And that’s the same time that the playful grin drops from Dex’s face. 

    “I should probably leave you to rest and heal. Let me know if there’s anything I can do or get you or—”

    “Actually, I do have one small request, if you don’t mind.” 

    Fitz immediately regrets saying that, but there’s nothing he owns that’s more important to the healing process. 

    “I don’t mind at all. What can I get you?” Dex’s face is lit up, even if he doesn’t want to show it, with the rush of being helpful. It’s the one thing Fitz remembers from that day at the store—Dex’s absolute delight when he knows where something is. 

   “Under my bed, there’s a stuffed dragon. He should be pretty obvious. Please try to keep him away from discovery by others.”

    “By ‘others’ do you mean Biana or Keefe?” Dex asks as he stands, leaving behind an empty, warm corner of the bed. 

    “Yes,” Fitz answers, realizing he’s been smiling like a complete and total doofus long enough to make his face muscles hurt. 

    Dex is gone for a long minute before he returns, brandishing a ruby red dragon, its eyes and sparkles twinkling in the fluorescent lighting as its wings slowly flap from the movement. 

    Elwin may have given Mr. Snuggles to Fitz when Fitz’s Dad’s mind shattered, but it’s hard to remember a time before it was in his life. 

    Fitz hadn’t noticed the emptiness settling into his chest after Dex left, but now that he’s back, Fitz is filled with the kind of longing that doesn’t want him to leave again. 

    “Thank you,” Fitz mumbles as he squeezes Mr. Snuggles so hard it takes a few seconds to return to its original shape. 

    Dex smiles. “Like I said, let me know if you need anything.”

    “Likewise,” Fitz replies. “Although my capabilities might be a touch more limited at the moment.”

    Well, that’s an understatement of the century. 

    Dex leaves without further comment, and Fitz settles himself down into his pillows, clutching Mr. Snuggles close to his chest, the familiar soft fabric a comfort to his otherwise aching muscles. 

    He’s almost drifted off into sleep when Keefe saunters into his room, apparently brought in by the power vacuum left in Dex’s absence. 

    And then his gaze lands on Mr. Snuggles sticking out from under the covers. The unrestrained joy as he wrestles Mr. Snuggles from Fitz’s dazed grasp is refreshing to see after knowing there’s been so many weeks that Keefe has been in such a dismal state. 

    Less refreshing is him parading Mr. Snuggles around and yelling through the entirety of the tree houses of Alluveterre. “You guys have to see this!”

    Unmapped stars, have mercy on me.

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

It's late but Day 4: Fedex Trucks

I started this this morning. I need help.

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @faggot-friday @kamikothe1and0nly @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @did-i-say-you-could-get-up @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death @dizzeners @thefoxysnake @olivedumdum @loveution @notyourlegacygirl

Pink haired Fitz owns my soul

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

Chekhov's Sunglasses

Word count: 673

TW: none

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @faggot-friday @kamikothe1and0nly @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @did-i-say-you-could-get-up @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death @dizzeners @thefoxysnake @olivedumdum

On Ao3 or below the cut!

This is another small thing from my creative writing class. For this one, we were given three objects and told to use the setup/payoff structure with it. I picked out the sunglasses, as one might be able to tell. Fitz doesn't exactly show up, but it was still Fedex-inspired so under Fedex week it goes.

Dex wakes up to find soft rays of sunshine glittering through his window. Normally he wouldn’t notice a thing like that but his brother has bribed him to go outside for the first time this summer. 

Lex’s words, not his. Although they’re probably fairly close to true so the distinction isn’t exactly necessary, but it is important because it makes Dex feel like he isn’t a recluse. 

It takes Dex longer to get out of his bed than he’d like to admit due to the consequences of getting out of it—namely, the outside. While it hasn’t yet gotten hot out, if the fact it’s the middle of July and the absolute lack of clouds is any indication, it’s going to get there sooner or later. 

There’s only a very slim chance that this adventure is going to end before Dex gets heatstroke, and even then, it may not be over. It may never be over. 

And so, he takes as much time to pack everything he could possibly need to live out in the woods for at least the next week, including the several gallons of sunscreen he needs to make sure he doesn’t become a lobster within the first quarter of a second. 

Dex sighs, looking around his room like he’s never going to see it again to double check he hasn’t forgotten anything important. 

Well, other than his army of emotional support stuffed animals, but they won’t exactly fit inside the backpack. He’s tried. It didn’t work. 

His gaze lands on Zoe, a hot pink unicorn who is very determined to not be wearing her sunglasses. He fixes it, then thinks better of it and slides them into his backpack. 

“And that’s what you get for taking them off every day,” he mutters. 

Another five minutes is spent triple checking that he hasn’t left anything before he surrenders himself to his fate. 

His fate drags him outside by the wrist, barely letting him get his shoes on before threatening to dislocate his shoulder.

The outside is almost, but not quite, as unpleasant as it looks from the inside. Its abundance of bugs makes that a very easy distinction, but at least there are pretty trees, and the smell of ocean salt is growing heavier in the air with every turn they take and every trail they track. 

Slowly, there starts to be more signs of the impending ocean in the sand that Lex seems to be trying to kick into Dex’s eyes. 

“Behold,” Lex announces, gesturing wildly where the trees open up to reveal the glittering teal expanse in front of them. 

He looks very proud of himself, but the beads of sweat trickling down Dex’s back are less than thrilled with this whole adventure. 

“Yes, that is, in fact, an ocean. Good job.”

Lex huffs and runs out onto the beach, kicking off his shoes at least ten paces before it was safe to do so, and he probably cut his feet on the rocks. Dex takes a much slower approach, preferring to avoid injury if he can help it. 

The sun is even more blinding when there aren’t any tree shadows to block it, plus it is getting reflected by the bright white sands. 

Okay, fine, they’re more of a cream color but that’s still too bright.

Dex sets down his backpack, his spine popping in at least four different locations and several different directions. 

His fingers brush against something in the side pocket, smooth and not usually there. It’s kind of embarrassing he took this long to remember that he brought sunglasses with him on this odyssey. 

He slides them onto his face, the frames glimmering iridescently as the world darkens to an almost manageable level. 

But then—no. 

Fish people don’t exist. That’s not how this works. 

The seaglass lenses shimmer as Dex looks out over the ocean, revealing an entire world that definitely does not exist. 

This is fine. This is normal. I’m not losing my mind. 

…The accuracy of those statements have yet to be evaluated. 

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

Carry a Torch

Word count: 4401 <- untrustworthy number

TW: alcohol

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @faggot-friday @kamikothe1and0nly @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @did-i-say-you-could-get-up @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death @dizzeners @thefoxysnake @olivedumdum

On Ao3 or below the cut!

I would thoroughly recommend reading this on Ao3 if possible. I originally wrote this as a screenplay for my creative writing class and, as such, tumblr nuked the formatting. Ao3 did as well, but less so.

That being said, it's kind of important to understand my larger concept. This is a script for a pilot episode of a TV show. Each episode is going to be featured around a song (and I was forced to write this one which is why it's bad) so at the end, it's a concept album. You will not be allowed to have the rest of the show. I refuse to write it.) This also takes place in 1925 so I've thrown some less than successful slang in there.

INT. EVERGLEN RECORDING STUDIO - MIDDAY - 1925

KEEFE leans over the antique Vernon family heirloom piano where FITZROY (FITZ) is playing. The intro credit music stops as FITZ looks up at him. 

FITZ sighs. 

FITZ

Let me guess. You’ve been thinking.

KEEFE gasps overdramatically.

KEEFE 

(feigned surprise)

Why ever would I do such a thing? You 

know thinking can only lead to dangerous

outcomes. That being said, I did have a

thought. 

FITZ

Stars, why do I even bother anymore? 

KEEFE smiles annoyingly. 

KEEFE

Because I’m very difficult to get rid of.

(beat) 

I trust you know we’ve been looking for 

a new venue since Tam dusted out on us. 

FITZ 

And whose fault was that? 

KEEFE

Legally? Not mine. 

FITZ pinches the bridge of his nose. KEEFE is unbothered by this. 

KEEFE (CONT’D)

Anyway I was talking to Sophie—

FITZ

Anything that starts like that is certain 

to end badly. 

KEEFE

Fitzroy Avery Vacker, listen to me for a 

second for once in your life. Foster has a 

cousin whose family has a place we could 

use. It’s not the most ideal—

FITZ 

(interrupting)

Then why are we even going to bother with

considering it? 

KEEFE

The back corner of a coffee shop is 

better than nothing. Not all of us are 

lucky enough to leech off your parents.

FITZ pauses for a moment, considering making KEEFE verbalize why, exactly, he cut off his relationship with his parents. 

FITZ

I take it that means you’ve already booked

it.

KEEFE

It’s one gig. Do your best to tolerate it. 

KEEFE turns toward the back door. No one knows where he is going, probably including himself. 

FITZ

You know I won’t.

KEEFE

And you know I don’t care. 

The door closes behind him and FITZ cracks his knuckles before going back to playing the piano. 

INT. SLURPS AND BURPS - LATE EVENING/NIGHT

Slurps and Burps is a coffee shop during the day and a Speakeasy at night. People mill about, the space filled with chatter. 

BIANA is sitting at the counter, swinging her feet as she talks to SOPHIE, drinking what is likely spiked coffee. 

DEXTER (DEX) and FITZ are getting everything set up for the performance this evening. FITZ is trying to be helpful. DEX is left moving the piano mostly by himself. 

DEX

(breathing heavy, teasing)

My guy, did you fill this thing with rocks? 

FITZ

(indignant) 

No. It’s just built to last. 

DEX

(proud of his pun)

Well, it could certainly last through me 

driving a car into it. 

FITZ

Why would you ever find yourself in that 

situation? 

DEX shrugs. 

DEX

I don’t know. 

FITZ looks over at KEEFE, who is flirting with some random extra. 

DEX adjusts the piano into its final resting place. 

DEX

Can I get you anything? Java, tea, what 

have you. We’ve got everything.

DEX lowers his voice. 

DEX (CONT’D) 

A little bit of moonshine? It’s a family

recipe. 

FITZ

(low, dangerous)

You know, it’s probably not very good 

business practice to disclose that 

information to just anyone who walks in 

off the street. Somebody’s going to call

copper. 

DEX

(unconcerned, irritated)

You rat me out, you’re out of a job. 

FITZ snorts. 

FITZ 

I didn’t want this gig in the first place. 

FITZ raises his voice. 

FITZ (CONT’D)

Isn’t that right, Keefe? 

KEEFE

I got no context, so whatever makes him 

look the most like a sap is the one I 

want. 

KEEFE spends the rest of the conversation watching them. 

DEX

(voice low) 

Then why are you here? Why did you even 

bother?

FITZ leans against the piano, almost protectively, trying to make himself look relaxed. He is not. FITZ shrugs stiffly. 

FITZ

I had nothing better to do. Trust me. I 

tried. I really did. 

DEX

(maximum sarcasm) 

Wow, that must have been so difficult

for you. 

FITZ

Lay off it, alright? I’m here for Keefe, 

regardless of what you might want to think.

DEX

I want to believe you’re a sap, and you’re

not exactly giving me much evidence to the

contrary. 

DEX takes a sip out of some unspecified alcoholic beverage. This is a speakeasy, after all. 

FITZ

Oh, so you’ve talked to me for what? Five

minutes? And now you think you’re an 

expert in my every waking thought? Every 

detail of my inner psyche? 

DEX puts his hands up, defensive. 

DEX

I didn’t say that, Socrates. Watch your 

tongue the text time you try to blow 

things out of proportion.

FITZ

Like that isn’t blowing things even 

further out of proportion? 

DEX

If I remember correctly—and please 

correct me if I am wrong here—you were

the first to threaten me and my family, 

so I think that’s more than a fair 

trade from your perspective.

The lights flicker, signaling the start of the show. It is operated by DEX’S BROTHER #1.

DEX

Well. 

DEX presses his lips together. 

DEX (CONT’D)

(bitter)

I should tell you to have fun up there, 

but I don’t think you’re capable of

that. Break a leg and all that 

superstitious nonsense. 

DEX shifts to his customer service voice, laced with passive aggression. 

DEX (CONT’D)

Let me know if I can get you anything 

to make your time here slightly less 

inconvenient. 

FITZ turns away without a reply or a second thought. 

EXT. - HAVENFIELD - MIDDAY, FALL

SOPHIE and DEX are sitting under a Jacaranda tree, leaves beginning to fall but not completely bare. They are complaining about many things. FITZ is a large topic of discussion on this fine day, and also KEEFE and BIANA to a lesser extent. 

DEX

How do you put up with all of them on 

a daily basis? 

SOPHIE

Determination, resilience, a lack of 

other valid career paths, and a dash 

of—

SOPHIE wiggles her eyebrows. It is unclear which one she is wiggling her eyebrows about, but that ambiguity will be important. 

DEX sighs. 

DEX

Okay, like, on the one hand, I get what

you’re saying and, yeah, you’re 

absolutely right.

SOPHIE laughs. 

SOPHIE

That’s because I’m objectively correct.

DEX is too far in his own head to react to SOPHIE’s comment. 

DEX

But, like, how can you reconcile that 

with that personality? I don’t get it.

SOPHIE 

There’s nothing to get. Admire from a 

distance and your problems solve 

themselves. Easy. 

DEX pauses to consider this answer.

DEX

No. I don’t like that solution. Give me 

a better one. Replace the personality

itself. You went to college. You have a 

fancy degree in marketing or something. 

Figure it out. 

SOPHIE

Okay, first of all, that was several 

years ago and I haven’t used it since. 

DEX 

You have a photographic memory. Don’t 

try to pull that on me. 

SOPHIE doesn’t know how to reply to this for a beat. 

SOPHIE

(feigned anger)

Damn. How dare you know all my tricks? 

Anyway, I don’t think personality 

replacement was covered in my curriculum. 

Sorry. But do let me know if the store 

needs new customers. 

DEX

Some might argue there’s already too many

people. That doesn’t excuse the fact that

you’re supposed to know the answers to 

life, the universe, and everything. This

has been thoroughly established. 

SOPHIE

Well, I don’t. Sorry. 

DEX pauses for a long time, somewhere in the realm of several whole seconds. 

DEX

I just wish…things would be easier. 

SOPHIE smiles softly, encouragingly.

SOPHIE

On which front? 

DEX laughs bitterly. 

DEX

Yes. 

DEX pauses, debating with himself if he should elaborate.

DEX (CONT’D)

(frequent pauses, struggling with sentences)

It’s just that…Fitz is…tangling 

everything together. I used to be able

to go to work without getting trapped 

in my own mind. And, well, to be 

completely honest, I don’t much 

appreciate it. 

SOPHIE

You should go tell him that. 

DEX physically flinches away from this idea. 

DEX

I have an even better idea. How about 

you go tell your boyfriend Keefe? 

He’s the one that concocted this whole 

booking-Slurps-and-Burps-for-a-gig

disaster. He should be the one to unravel

this Gordian knot of a situation. 

SOPHIE

I’m not dealing with your problems. 

You can talk to Fitz yourself or you 

can deal with it. 

DEX

(Making himself sound useless on purpose)

But, alas, I’m incapable of speaking 

with people in rational terms. Whatever

am I to do? 

SOPHIE

(not buying into DEX’s act)

Don’t make me show you what irrational

terms sound like. 

DEX sighs, defeated. This is going to be unpleasant, but he’s already concocting the bribery he is going to offer KEEFE to make him want to relocate. Preferably without destroying his and SOPHIE’s relationship. 

DEX is also fairly easily convinced to do things he doesn’t want to do while also being immensely stubborn. 

DEX

Fine. 

EXT. RECORDING STUDIO - THE NEXT DAY, DAYLIGHT HOURS 

DEX walks up to the door and argues with himself in his mind before knocking. 

Inside, FITZ sighs and stops playing piano. As he stands, his joints sing the song of their people. Unlocking the door, he finds DEX studying the ground and fidgeting with his sleeve. 

FITZ 

Hello! What can I—

FITZ realizes who is standing in the doorway and drops the polite act. 

FITZ (CONT’D)

(flatly)

—What do you want?

DEX is irritated by this in an effort to not be thinking about how he is engaging in a conversation. 

DEX

Believe it or not, not everything is 

about you. I’m here to speak with 

Keefe.  

FITZ considers this, leaning against the doorframe. 

FITZ

Nah, I don’t believe that one. Besides, 

Keefe isn’t here. I don’t know where 

he is or when he’ll be back. Sorry. 

DEX feels a rush of relief, taking a deep breath. 

DEX

It’s probably futile to ask you to tell

him that I was looking for him, but I’m 

going to hope anyway. 

DEX turns around to leave. 

FITZ 

You’re exactly right. 

DEX

You don’t have to sound so disappointed. 

BIANA (O.S.)

(yelling to be heard from across the studio)

Fitzroy! Stop being so obnoxious! 

BIANA’s voice comes down from a yell to a normal speaking voice as the sentence goes on and she gets close enough to push FITZ out of the doorway and take his place. 

BIANA (CONT’D)

I’m sure Keefe will return sometime 

soon. 

FITZ

(muttering)

Lies. Filth and lies. 

BIANA 

(to FITZ)

He’s going to get hungry sooner or 

later. 

FITZ seems to accept this, rolling his eyes and wandering back to his precious piano.

BIANA

(to DEX)

Can I get you anything? Fitz has an

obsession with baking and we’re

always trying to get rid of the 

aftermath. 

DEX smiles awkwardly as he shakes his head. BIANA turns to not be outdoors anymore and DEX follows her inside. 

DEX

I mean, if you want to sell them at 

Slurps and Burps, I could always

ask my parents. 

DEX shrugs. 

DEX (CONT’D)

I’m sure they’d agree, but I’d rather 

present a possibility than a guarantee, 

you know. 

BIANA

You sound like him.

DEX and FITZ look equally offended by this and avoid eye contact at all costs. 

BIANA takes this opportunity to leave DEX and FITZ together for a length of time while she investigates this route. 

BIANA 

Well, I’ve got some extra time today, 

so I can go ask your parents myself. 

Don’t knock each other off while I’m 

gone, got it? 

FITZ and DEX watch her leave. This is the same door that KEEFE used in the first scene, not the front door. 

FITZ

(yelling after her)

How many times do I have to tell you to

stop meddling in my life?

FITZ huffs. 

DEX gets up to leave out of the front door that is still open. 

FITZ

(irritated and tired)

Where are you going now? 

DEX

…Leaving? 

FITZ

Well, don’t. Biana is going to think 

I’ve planted you in the backyard or

under the floorboards. 

DEX releases an exasperated sigh and sits down on a conveniently placed stool. 

FITZ (CONT’D)

Believe me, I wouldn’t say that unless 

it was absolutely necessary. 

DEX

(his temper finally snaps)

What is your problem, dude? You’ve been 

nothing but rude during the ten minutes

we’ve interacted. I understand if you

don’t like me. That’s understandable. 

But you’re like this toward everyone. I 

can also understand you didn’t want to 

do the gig for whatever reason, but 

instead of being like that about it, you

could’ve figured out a way to sit in 

time out until the last minute. It’s not 

that hard. There’s a very nice storage

closet where I’ve spent more hours than 

I’d like to admit hiding from people.

FITZ’s hands drop forcefully into his lap. 

FITZ

(equally angry)

Why should I explain myself to you? I 

couldn’t care less about what you 

think. I don’t know why you think I 

would. 

DEX

Oh, I don’t know, basic human decency?

I really don’t care if you disagree,

but I tried my best to be pleasant, 

and you made that very, very difficult. 

FITZ

That seems like a you problem. 

DEX

Well, I’m sorry you couldn’t tolerate

a single evening that wasn’t precisely 

what you wanted to do. That must have 

been so hard for you. It’s almost like 

I’m not trapped in that coffee shop 

every single day. 

FITZ

Again, that seems like a you problem. 

I don’t see why I should be concerned 

with a you problem. 

DEX

And I don’t see why I have to put up 

with your—

DEX gestures vaguely at FITZ, unable or unwilling to say what he’s thinking. 

FITZ

(challenging)

My what?

DEX

Your general existence. I don’t want to 

be here as much as you don’t want me to

be here. I would adore being able to 

leave you alone, but it looks like 

neither of us are going to get what we

want. 

FITZ

So you’ve made it your personal mission

to make yourself as infuriating as 

possible in the meantime? 

DEX

I guess so. You didn’t exactly make it

difficult for me. 

The sound of the back door opening stops FITZ from responding. KEEFE enters, mild surprise at seeing DEX but he also doesn’t care that much. 

KEEFE

Did you miss me? 

FITZ and DEX

(in approximate unison) 

No. 

FITZ and DEX look at each other—this is a pretty significant milestone in them agreeing on something. They laugh. 

INT. SLURPS AND BURPS - MIDMORNING

FITZ enters, the doorbell announcing his presence. He makes eye contact with DEX’S SISTER at the counter. 

DEX’S SISTER

Dex! Your friend is here!

DEX appears from the back, expecting SOPHIE or maybe even KEEFE. He has severe dark circles and is immediately irritated by FITZ’s presence. 

DEX’S SISTER trades places with him, though she will be listening to their whole conversation. 

DEX

What do you want this time? 

FITZ

I do believe you’re a tea shop when 

you’re not running from the police, and, 

as such, I’d like a small Earl Grey.

DEX gives him a look. The kind of staredown that requires invocation of the if-looks-could-kill meter. 

DEX takes some of the hot water from the coffee and unwraps a teabag, allowing it to start steeping. 

DEX

And you had to come here for that? 

FITZ

You’ve got the best tea in the shortest

distance from my apartment. 

DEX

You can make tea yourself, you know. 

FITZ

Yes, but, you see, then I have to 

Interact with Keefe. In that case, 

the amount I would spend in bribery is 

significantly greater than venturing 

out into the world. 

DEX

I can almost see that.

DEX hands FITZ the scalding mug of tea. FITZ touches it and flinches away. 

DEX (CONT’D)

Can I get anything else for you today?

FITZ

If you have a least favorite muffin, 

I’ll take one of those. 

DEX studies the muffins for a long second before choosing a victim. It is placed into a white paper bag that is slightly too small for both his hand and a muffin. 

DEX

That’ll be $1.05

FITZ takes out his wallet and slides over a $20. For reference, this is roughly $350 when adjusted for inflation. That is also why the price of a tea and muffin is scaled the way it is. 

DEX’s eyebrows react appropriately to the amount of money this is. 

DEX

(projecting calmness and irritation)

Singlehandedly paying for a week’s rent

isn’t going to make me like you. 

FITZ

Okay. That’s not going to stop me. Just

think of it like a starting point. A 

deposit in exchange for dealing with me

and my—

FITZ gestures vaguely at himself. 

DEX

I’m never going to live that one down, 

am I? 

FITZ

(almost, but not quite, playful)

Not if I have anything to do with it. 

DEX

Lovely. 

FITZ

Careful, I’m willing and able to have 

Keefe perpetuate it even further. 

DEX

I hope you know that my siblings have 

already added it to their very limited

vocabulary, so there’s really no need. 

DEX realizes this may result in additional perpetuity because it sounded like he was trying to make FITZ stop and that means he could take it as a challenge. 

DEX (CONT’D)

Although, I guess there is a constant

need to make me suffer as much as 

possible, so it’s really up to your

discretion. 

FITZ takes the tea, no longer giving him fourth degree burns, and his muffin. 

FITZ

Would you care to dine with me on 

this fine morning? 

DEX makes sure there aren’t too many customers, in case he would be needed to work. There are not. Most of their income comes in after sunset. 

DEX

(loud so his siblings can hear)

Yes, I would like to get paid to not

work. 

FITZ flashes a small smile that DEX does not see.

FITZ and DEX sit at a booth in the corner for minimum visibility. There aren’t many other people and if they get into another argument, they don’t want to be public entertainment. 

DEX

It really is remarkable how determined 

you are to both piss me off and remain

a patron here. 

FITZ

Well, I’m sure you could solve the 

latter fairly quickly. 

DEX gestures widely to the doorway to the kitchen, where his siblings are trying to not be caught eavesdropping. 

DEX

Behold. The reasons I am physically 

incapable of kicking you out. I do that, 

I’m never going to hear the end of it,

and that’ll get out to the rest of our

customers—because of course it will—and

then suddenly they start going down the

street for their mediocre morning coffee. 

FITZ

Well, I’m not a coffee person, so I can’t

review yours, but your Earl Grey is quite

nice. 

DEX lowers his voice conspiratorially. 

DEX

It’s even nicer with a little splash of 

something. If you get what I mean. 

FITZ

(voice low to match)

It’s not even noon yet. 

DEX

Then come back later. Time usually 

travels linearly in the forward 

direction, and then it’ll be after noon

and you’ll have to come up with a new

excuse. If that new excuse just so 

happens to be that it’s not five 

o’clock yet, wait until I tell you about 

what else time can do. It can travel

linearly. In the forward direction. 

DEX’S BROTHER #2 (O.S.)

And we don’t have a band tonight so then

maybe you’ll perform and Dex will be—

DEX turns and points at him. 

DEX

Don’t finish that sentence if you don’t 

want lead poisoning. 

FITZ smiles. 

FITZ

Allegedly. 

DEX

Allegedly. 

DEX turns back to FITZ. 

DEX (CONT’D)

You don’t have to if you don’t want to. 

FITZ

And that sounds like you’re trying to get

rid of me. I’ll see you tonight then. 

FITZ brightens his smile and leaves. DEX doesn’t take any opportunity to argue with him, despite the fact that he has more than enough time to react. 

When the door shuts, DEX releases a big sigh, deflating. 

INT. SLURPS AND BURPS - AROUND SUNDOWN

Slurps and Burps is once again filled with many patrons, and they are once again filling the room with chatter. The piano is already in place, as are BIANA’s saxophone and KEEFE’s drum kit.  

FITZ

(at KEEFE)

Stop looking at me like that. 

KEEFE

(feigned oblivious innocence)

Like what? 

FITZ

You know what you’re doing. Being all 

self-righteous. 

KEEFE

I don’t know what you’re talking about. 

FITZ cycles through a few arguments before deciding it isn’t worth it. 

FITZ

Forget it. We don’t have time to argue 

about this. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I 

do have a small change to the setlist. 

KEEFE

Shouldn’t that have been discussed 

previously? 

FITZ

It’s not like you would care either way.

What’s it you tell me? Fitzroy, it’s 

jazz, nobody cares about the setlist. 

Half of it is already improv. 

KEEFE

That might be accurate, but that doesn’t

mean I like it. 

FITZ turns away, grumbling to himself and searching the crowd for DEX. 

When he does eventually find him, FITZ smiles hesitantly. 

FITZ

So this might be an odd request, but 

please hear me out before you say no. 

DEX

(already irritated)

Go ahead. 

FITZ

(quickly, in a single breath)

I may or may not have a tendency to 

process things by writing songs, which 

I’m sure is a massive surprise 

considering why I’m here. I don’t 

remember exactly why I was talking to 

Sophie a couple of days ago, but that’s 

beside the point. Anyway, I happened to 

be blessed with the songwriting curse 

immediately after she left, and when I 

emerged from the cave, the song’s point

of view was a little wonky. And by that 

I mean, of course, that I tried to 

project into your head, which is really 

weird now that I’m saying it out loud. 

DEX

Calm down. I don’t need you passing out

on me. I don’t want to call Elwin. He’s

already mad at Sophie. I don’t need that. 

FITZ takes a deep, slightly shaky breath. 

FITZ

On a scale of 1 to 10, how likely would

it be that I could ask you really, 

really nicely to do the verse that’s 

attempting, probably very badly, to 

be in your point of view so that I 

don’t have to ask Keefe to do it? 

DEX

About a -7, presuming it’s a logarithmic

scale, but I’ll do it anyway. 

A pause. 

FITZ

Why? 

DEX

Don’t question my motives. Just be 

aware that I don’t know what I’m doing

and if I think about it too long, I’m 

going to go cry in the bathroom, so 

don’t let me think. 

FITZ

Got it. 

A longer pause, FITZ contemplates telling DEX something to help with the fact that his blood pressure is visibly rising. 

BIANA (O.S.)

Fitz! It’s nine. Get going. 

FITZ

(yelling over to BIANA)

Who is this punctual person and what 

have you done to my sister?

FITZ turns back to DEX and pulls a crunched piece of paper out of his pocket. 

FITZ (CONT’D) 

Here’s the lyrics. I didn’t have time to 

formalize any sheet music, but just kind 

of…vibe with the music. That’s kind of 

this whole genre’s mission statement, 

isn’t it? 

DEX

I am regretting my life choices. 

FITZ

I’m sorry to hear that. You’ll be fine, 

though. If not, I’ll bribe everyone with

muffins until the complaints stop. 

DEX

(physically shaking)

Okay. 

FITZ takes his place at the piano, making eye contact with KEEFE. 

FITZ

Trust me, okay?

KEEFE smirks. 

KEEFE

Yeah, of course. I’d let you lead us off

a cliff. 

FITZ

A wouldn’t expect anything less. 

FITZ begins playing an introduction, underscored by low rumblings from KEEFE’s floor tom after the first bar. FITZ’s focus remains squarely on KEEFE.  

FITZ (CONT’D)

(singing) 

HE LEANED OVER THE PIANO

WITH THAT MISCHIEVOUS GLINT IN HIS EYE. 

HE’S BEEN THINKING ABOUT SOMETHING

AND NOW THERE’S NO GOING BACK. 

The tempo ticks upward as KEEFE’s drums develop into a polyrhythm. FITZ leans back, his gaze landing on the ceiling. 

FITZ (CONT’D)

THE WORLD IS ALWAYS MOVING FORWARD

I’M HANGING ON TO WHAT I’VE ALWAYS KNOWN

WHAT I’VE KNOWN HAS GOTTEN ME THIS FAR

WHY BOTHER CHANGING THAT?

FITZ finally looks at DEX, his irritation over the past few days on full display in his tone. The instrumentation drops out for a beat. 

FITZ (CONT’D)

WHY DO YOU HAVE TO BE SO DIFFICULT WITH ME?

WHY DO YOU FIND SUCH PLEASURE ANGERING ME?

IF I COULD LEAVE, I PROMISE I WOULD, 

BUT I DON’T HAVE A WAY TO ESCAPE. 

I DON’T HAVE A WAY TO RUN AWAY FROM THIS PLACE

AND SO I’LL KEEP ON OCCUPYING YOUR SPACE. 

DEX’s voice is so soft even the people standing next to him probably cannot hear him. He’s staring firmly at the ground. It’s not exactly symmetrical in the vocals or instrumentation with the first verse, but there’s no need for it to be. 

DEX 

(singing) 

SHE’S ALWAYS MY WORST INFLUENCE

BY PUSHING ME OUTSIDE MY COMFORT ZONE. 

IF ONLY SHE WOULD UNDERSTAND

I WANT TO FIND AN ESCAPE. 

DEX gains a bit more confidence, staring at FITZ’s shoes and singing slightly louder. 

DEX (CONT’D)

THE WORLD IS ALWAYS MOVING FORWARD, 

I’M STILL RUNNING FROM WHAT I’VE ALWAYS KNOWN. 

WHAT I’VE KNOWN HAS GOTTEN ME THIS FAR

WHAT MORE CAN LIE AHEAD? 

DEX fixes a death glare on FITZ. 

DEX (CONT’D)

WHY DO YOU HAVE TO BE SO DIFFICULT WITH ME? 

WHY DO YOU FIND SUCH PLEASURE ANGERING ME?

IF I COULD LEAVE, I PROMISE I WOULD, 

BUT I DON’T HAVE A WAY TO ESCAPE

I DON’T HAVE A WAY TO RUN AWAY FROM THIS PLACE

AND SO I’LL KEEP ON OCCUPYING YOUR SPACE. 

Two bars of SILENCE echo through the room. 

FITZ and DEX 

(start softly, crescendoing)

IF I STAY HERE AND YOU STAY THERE

I’LL STOP STEPPING ON YOUR TOES 

IF WE PRETEND LIKE NONE OF US CARE

MAYBE IT’LL COME TRUE. 

THAT DOESN’T MEAN THAT I’LL EVER LIKE YOU

AND YOU DON’T HAVE TO LIKE ME. 

PACIFY THE ELDER GODS 

AND THEN WE’LL BOTH BE—FREE. 

There is a long break, filled with instrumentation. BIANA and her saxophone have a whole narrative arc. DEX goes and runs off into the back, trying to never be seen again. 

FITZ

WHY DO YOU HAVE TO BE SO DIFFICULT WITH ME?

WHY DO YOU FIND SUCH PLEASURE ANGERING ME?

IF I COULD LEAVE, I PROMISE I WOULD, 

BUT I DON’T HAVE A WAY TO ESCAPE. 

I DON’T HAVE A WAY TO RUN AWAY FROM THIS PLACE

AND SO I’LL KEEP ON OCCUPYING YOUR SPACE. 

END SHOW

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

Prompt:

Your story or scene should be set in Kowloon Walled City. Use the complexities of the setting to guide your story or scene. Be creative and engaging. Allow the setting to play a role in what you create.

Word count: 815

Smog has enveloped the walled-city-enclave-monstrosity called Kowloon, turning its bustling, all-encapsulating darkness into slightly more polluted, bustling, all-encapsulating darkness. It’s on days like these that Qiaoxian feels most trapped, unable to leave his family’s tiny apartment or else his lungs will protest against the very idea of breathing.

But that, unfortunately, isn’t always an option.

If his family is going to make rent this month, he can’t exactly afford the luxury of staying home for what usually amounts to half the month, every month.

The pollution has always been bad, but it also feels like it’s constantly getting worse. Tasting the air is more common than not being able to taste it.

At least the food, in comparison, is an improvement, although a slight one.

Qiaoxian readies himself for dealing with the outside world—for both the emotional toll of dealing with people and relishing the last large breaths he can take before putting on a mask made from an old t-shirt of his brother’s.

It probably doesn’t really do anything other than make him more uncomfortable, but it’s not worth the risk of passing out on the street, because that’s how you get kidnapped and Qiaoxian doesn’t trust himself to go without it.

He makes his way down to his family’s store, avoiding eye contact with everyone he passes as he goes. Keeping his gaze down and focused at his feet, he counts the number of gum stains that cover the sidewalk in nearly its entirety.

It’s impossible to gain an accurate count, but it does keep the mathematical part of his mind occupied without having to think too hard. It’s almost calming, the simple routine a constant in his life in this ever-changing, ever-building city.

Sometimes it feels like the population doubles every day—and there’s already more than enough people here.

Qiaoxian opens the door with the key under the mat—it’s actually safer than him getting pickpocketed and losing it completely and allowing some random person access to the store.

There are a few products that are behind the counter for a reason.

His Grandfather originally started a store, based in the principles of traditional Chinese medicine, and when Qiaoxian’s family relocated to Kowloon, the concept came with them, even if he had never truly met his Grandfather.

The reason why is probably a long story that Qiaoxian didn’t want to get into. If the situation was extreme enough for all contact to be cut off, there’s bound to be a massive amount of drama behind it that has absolutely no bearing on his life.

Door chimes singing the song of their people as he enters, Qiaoxian then begins his morning routine of checking the inventory and fixing all of the little things that somehow migrate out of their assigned places.

It’s his siblings. If they do it by accident, they’re the most disorganized people ever to exist. If they do it on purpose, they’re the most infuriating people to ever exist—including the customers themselves.

In the back corner of the drawer of deer horn, Qiaoxian finds a note. It’s probably on the newer side, considering that it isn’t caked in that much antler dust, but it may have gone unnoticed for a few days.

What is certain is that it’s from Waijin, her bubbly handwriting incredibly obvious now that this has become a regular routine, even if the specific drawer does change.

Qiaoxian is almost convinced she does it just to see how well he’s paying attention to detail and she could very well have a gambling ring set up around him. It wouldn’t be the first crime she’s committed.

Hey, Qiaoxian. Huijun wanted me to let you know that he’s got another Quantum something-or-other exam coming up soon and needs your brain to help him study because he’s apparently too distractible on his own. I didn’t ask what all that meant and I don’t want to know. Just, you know, figure out when you’re free and I’ll tell him to be at your usual border meetup spot.

Qiaoxian almost begins vibrating with anticipation. It’s been two months since the last set of exams, and there’s nothing in the world more interesting than Quantum Mechanics.

But it’s not like Qiaoxian can actually admit that aloud, the mockery from his sister echoing through his mind with the mere thought of it.

He quickly replies to Waijin’s message on the back of the index card she used, If Saturday evening works for Huijun, that’s probably the earliest I’ll have this week, taking into account that you take between three to five business days to actually find my replies.

And, with a final flourish of his pen, his answer is complete. Qiaoxian stuffs the index card back into the very visible transparent antler container before flipping the sign at the front of the store to “Open,” thereby inviting the floodgates of people into his personal space.

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

Prompt: write a story in ten minutes containing:

- place: a rooftop OR the nosebleeds section

- color: orange

- 2 items from the following: lipstick OR a feather OR a pair of socks

Word count: 278

Nex stands atop the roof of the abandoned warehouse she calls her own. It’s the middle of the night and the stars are shining overhead, barely visible against the lights of the city.

It’s a lunar eclipse tonight, and she would give anything to be staying up absurdly late to watch it with Alea.

Instead of watching it with her, she’s busy dealing with the mess her alter ego, Aurora Irae, left last night. Namely, the plan didn’t go to plan, and now she gets to deal with the consequences…with the smoky calcium-ion-orange arson method.

Even now, the moon is dimming beneath the Earth’s shadow, but it hasn’t quite taken on the characteristic reddish tinge of a lunar eclipse.

Nex sits down on the edge, feet dangling down below. She notices a small feather on the side, large and dark. Maybe it’s that bird that’s been harassing her for the past few weeks with its song all evening long.

It sounds like a demon bird, and that’s how she has decided its name, Demon Bird.

She adds it to her collection, as it is not a bald eagle feather and therefore is not illegal to own in the United States, and a tube of lipstick decides to fall out, plinking on the ground down below.

Stars. That was Alea’s. That’s going to be a fun conversation.

One might think that the hardest part of hiding an alter ego would be the big lies—the denial of committing crimes, but it’s the small things that add up.

It’s the small things that are the dangerous ones. It’s the small inconsistencies that are going to lead to the whole lie unraveling.

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

Fanart of the last line / birthday present for @/kamikothe1and0nly's FedEx fic Delivery. Go read it.

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

As promised here's Timmy from Garvar chapter 4. If you even care btw.

I spent way longer on this than I'd like to admit (~7 hours for one guy. Don't like that.)

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @faggot-friday @kamikothe1and0lny @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @remember-me-in-another-time @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death @dizzeners @thefoxysnake @olivedumdum

I tried a couple of new things with this - mostly the undulating throne thing. I couldn't exactly find a reference I liked but this was close enough.

Look at my sahelanthropus tchadensis skull. Look at it.

The red circley things are a reference to how Timmy is secretly Mothman

Timmy is to me what Keefe is for Shannon. But also mothman.

Historical accuracy? What's that? (Shoes don't match the suit thing, hair's probably atrocious, etc etc)

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

Okay I'm wiped out from AP exams but I never released Gisela from the sexywoman bracket and it's villain week so I guess I've contributed now, @kotlcvillainweek @honey-the-dinosaur-ate-our-kid @aesthetic-screeching

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @gaslight-gaetkeep-gayboss @kamikothe1and0lny @nyxpixels @florida-preposterously @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @arson-anarchy-death

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

So for the keeper art challenge hosted by @an-ungraceful-swan I got Keefe, so here are my Keefes:

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @gaslight-gaetkeep-gayboss @kamikothe1and0lny @nyxpixels @florida-fruity-frog @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @never-mourn-the-good @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @cotyledon-tomentosa @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @hi-imgrapes @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome @katniss-elizabeth-chase @cherryys-stuff @arson-anarchy-death

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

Hey i made a dex

Look at xem programming at five in the morning. Xe has such a horrible sleep schedule it almost rivals sophie's

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @gaslight-gaetkeep-gayboss @kamikothe1and0lny @nyxpixels @florida-fruity-frog @poppinspop @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @never-mourn-the-good @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @cotyledon-tomentosa @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125 @blossomsxgalorex @callum-hunt-is-bisexual @xanadaus @callas-pancake-tree @hi-my-name-is-awesome

[squish36-writes-and-draws]

In honor of the Little Mermaid / Moana Fedex AU (Fathoms Below) that'll be released this week, I may have made a little art to procrastinate

A little fun fact I had stored in my brain for such an occasion as this: About 10% of the Melanesian population is naturally blonde. It typically fades as the person gets older, so while Keefe is technically a couple thousand years old, o ia's also a shapeshifter, so I mean we aren't dealing with normal human laws of physics so we don't have to worry about it.

It's also unrelated to the mutation that caused blond hair in Europeans, and there's a fancy word for that: convergent evolution. It's like how there's a gadgillion different evolutionary paths to crab. If you win jeopardy because of that, I want a cut of the profit. /hj

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added/removed!): @stellar-lune @gaslight-gaetkeep-gayboss @kamikothe1and0lny @nyxpixels @florida-floppy-frog @poppinspop @crystallinewalker @uni-seahorse-572 @solreefs @books-over-boys @rusted-phone-calls @when-wax-wings-melt @cotyledon-tomentosa @good-old-fashioned-lover-boy7 @dexter-dizzknees @abubble125