#I Just Need Money (and Not a Giant Stupid Gap in my resume that will continue to feed into itself and potentially fuck me over in the futur

[hoodieimp]

TWO MORE JOB APPLICATIONS SUBMITTED BABEYYYY

now if you'll excuse me I'm gonna go lay facedown on the lawn and Scream for a bit

[francesderwent]

“In Need of a Generic Father Figure” A Veronica Mars Everybody Lives/Nobody Dies Meet-Cute LV AU Week Day 7 Canon-typical language, but otherwise general audiences On AO3 Inspired by this post and that one scene in Charlie Don’t Surf.

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It was supposed to be a kind of housewarming-slash-homecoming party, the kind of event that was totally low key in its formulation and planning stage but got completely out of hand once things got rolling.  All their friends from the old neighborhood were coming over, and it was supposed to be all nostalgic idiocy born from the eternal familiarity of each having been present for one another’s particular flavor of shitty childhood.  There were no delusions about the depth of this bond, and so they weren’t expecting it to be a great party, not the best night of anyone’s life by any means, but it was the sort of gathering you could predict, could depend on.  Low-pressure, low stakes, low key.

So, precisely the kind of event which would have a giant wrench thrown into it if you were to add in an unknown factor, say, a perfect stranger to man the grill.

“But he wouldn’t be a stranger,” Dick is insisting.  “He’d be a dad.”

Logan gapes at him.  “Whose dad?”

Dick shrugs, ineloquently.

“So by dad, you just mean some unknown-as-yet male person who has at one point fathered a child?”

“Sure.”

“So, some unknown person’s father, standing on the corner of our property, making hamburgers.”

“Grilling hamburgers, that’s essential.”  Dick looks up from his computer and gives Logan a look like he’s disappointed in him for missing an obvious point.  “And it’s not just some random sperm donor, dude, he has to be fatherly and shit.  I put it in the ad.”  

“Ah yes, the ad,” Logan says.  “The Craigslist ad, which you put up online without consulting or telling me.  I read the ad.  And yet here I stand, questioning the entire premise behind it.”  But Dick has returned to his computer, presumably to scroll through his emailed responses.  Logan pinches the bridge of his nose.  “Alright, the court recognizes that grilled hamburgers are better than any alternative. But why do we need someone else to come grill?  You and I are fair-to-average at setting things on fire already.”

“We don’t have a grill.”

“No, but we both have trust funds that kicked in some time ago.  You may remember them.  They’re how we afforded the house…”

Dick huffs.  “So we just buy a grill?”  Logan gives him the raised eyebrows and jazz hands: duh.  Dick bangs on the space bar.  “Just buy one, from the depths of our rich boy pockets, without working for it or anything.”

Logan stares.  “Are you having some kind of break?”

“It’s stupid to spend money if we could just borrow one.”

“Okaaaay,” Logan says.  “So why aren’t you advertising for a grill we can borrow?”

“Because!”

“Because what, Dick?”

“Your dad is supposed to teach you how to grill!” Dick bites out.

They stare at each other for a long beat, then Dick tears his eyes away and starts clattering angrily on his keyboard. Logan sighs, then gingerly sits next to him on the sofa.

“You know,” he says, careful to keep his tone conversational, “if you wanted to sign up for one of those programs for kids with deadbeat dads where they hang out with well-adjusted adult men and learn life skills, I would have happily signed up with you, but we really should have done that when we were younger.”

Dick throws an elbow into his ribs half-heartedly. “Shut up.”

“I’m not saying, like, when we were twelve,” Logan goes on, warming to the topic, “because we mostly hadn’t figured out our dads were deadbeat by then.  But definitely before we finished college and joined the workforce.  I’m thinking like nineteen or twenty would have been the ideal age.  Our father figures could have taught us to consume alcohol, in addition to teaching us to grill.”

“We were already pretty good at drinking alcohol by then,” Dick reminds him.

“Then they could have given us a strict talking-to about underage drinking,” Logan says.  “It’s far too late for that now, and we’ve missed our chance.”

“Missed our chance…” Dick echoes.

Logan looks at him sideways.

Dick catches his eye and actually sniffs a little. “I know it’s stupid.  You don’t have to tell me it’s stupid.”

Logan shifts uncomfortably.  “It’s not stupid, man.  I just wish we knew of some actual father figure we could get to sub in for you, rather than resorting to Craigslist dads.”

“It’s not just for me, dude,” Dick insists.  “I know you care about this shit, too.”

Logan cracks a smile despite himself.  “If some guy with a beer gut shows up and grills me a hamburger and calls me ‘sport’, that’s not going to make the old man any less of an abusive asshole.”

“I know, but we can make some nicer memories can’t we?  Some nice dad-memories?”

For a second, Logan allows himself to enter into the delusion, but almost immediately becomes sidetracked on the mental image of Gregory Peck from To Kill a Mockingbird standing in their backyard, holding a light beer and grinning affably.  That would be one thing – but he can’t imagine that any fathers like that actually exist in the world.  No, this dad was probably going to be more or less a deadbeat himself, or else how would he have time to babysit a bunch of profligate twenty-somethings?  At best, it would be some old guy whose kids were too grown-up and busy to talk to him anymore, a dad whose desperate neediness for attention and affirmation matches Dick’s.  But then again, Dick will inevitably be drunk for the entire party – he wouldn’t notice if the dad was an escaped convict in black and white stripes with a literal ball and chain on his ankle.  What harm could it do?  He sighs, asks in a wry tone, “Are you going to ask for proof of paternity, or is this person going to be a fake dad on top of being random?”

Dick lights up.  “That’s a great idea, I’ll edit that in!”  He resumes typing at a frenzied pace; Logan watches bemusedly.  

Still.  It’s one weird thing on one day.  It won’t make any difference one way or another, in the long run.

Nobody’s life was ever changed because a stranger made them a hamburger.

                                                -~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-

After that, Logan tries to extricate himself from the whole dad-audition process, but Dick is, as usual, both oblivious and incorrigible.  Logan very quickly comes to dread the phrases “hey, listen to this” and “what about this”, since both are sure signs that he’s about to be read a joke resumé with phrases like “excels at offering positive reinforcement”, or shown a headshot of a guy in a sweater vest.  So when he gets home from work and the first thing he hears is “Logan, dude, this is the one”, his first response is to groan and flop face first onto the sofa. They found the sofa at the side of the road the second week in the house and it is therefore a little worn out, so the decision to be dramatic hurts.

“Asshole,” Dick tells him absently, wandering in from the next room holding his laptop.  “Listen: father for twenty-plus years, expert level jokes and manly affection, bonus secret-family-recipe hot sauce.”

“The hot sauce is a nice touch,” Logan admits, rolling over onto his back and kicking his feet up onto the sofa arm. “All of the other applicants have really fixated on the ‘dad’ part of ‘grill dad’.”

Dick nods so enthusedly it looks painful.  “I know, right? And get this, there’s an attached letter from his kid,” he says.  “Dear advertiser, I can confirm that the applicant has been my father for my entire life, and I can honestly say that he has excelled at the position.  You would be lucky to have him at your party, where he would strike just the right balance between embarrassing and fun, call all of you by the wrong names and then substitute “son” or “honey”, and repeatedly tell you he’s proud of you.  His hamburgers are to die for, and he brings his own fire extinguisher in case anything should go wrong.  He has my unreserved recommendation.  Also, if this is some kind of dad kidnapping scheme, I will hunt you down and kill you.  Cordially, V. Mars.”  Dick looks up expectantly; Logan fights a smile.  

“They wrote a letter of recommendation for their dad?”          

“Uh huh.”

“Hmm,” Logan says neutrally, then says, “Mr. Mars,” trying it out, hitting the ‘r’s and dragging out the ‘s’.

“Keith Mars,” Dick adds helpfully, and turns the computer so Logan can see the attached photo.  Keith Mars is bald, just slightly on the portly side, staring adoringly down at the tiny pigtailed child with whom he is dancing, her feet on his – V. Mars is a girl, apparently.  Dick tabs to the next picture: Keith Mars standing next to a grill holding a hot dog over the head of a plaintive-looking pitbull while a gap-toothed, elementary-school-aged V. Mars laughs in the background with a blue-haired friend.  In the third picture Keith is older, wearing a suit and grinning widely, hugging someone in graduation regalia, her face obscured by her cap.  “He looks cool, right?” Dick prompts eagerly.

“Yeah,” Logan says, tearing his eyes away from the graduation photo.  Neither he nor Dick had had any relatives attend their college graduation, and he’d seen plenty of family reunions at the baccalaureate celebration that seemed more stiff and awkward than anything else, but Keith looks like he just might burst with pride.  “Yeah, he seems nice.”

“Like a real dad, right?” Dick persists.

Logan snorts.  “As if I have any experience with which to judge that quality.”

Dick offers a fist bump and Logan complies. “Trauma twins!” Dick says, sing-song. Logan rolls his eyes.  “But he seems legit?” Dick says, returning to the salient point.  “This is okay?”

Logan stands and claps his roommate on the shoulder. “Sure, man.  If you say this is the one, I think you’re probably right.”

Dick beams at him.  “I’ll tell him he got the gig!”

“Cool,” Logan says drily.  “I can’t wait to meet him.”

                                            -~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-

Since Dick thinks it would be acceptable to simply explain the dad-for-hire situation when their guests show up, Logan finds himself calling each invitee one by one the day before the party and beginning with the statement, “So you know how Dick has a tenuous relationship with reality?” Lilly laughs for a full minute and a half, and Duncan, no matter how many times Logan runs through the concept, just doesn’t seem to get it, but everyone else just thinks it’s sad.  

“Oh my god, our lives suck,” Gia says, sounding as if she just realized it.  “Does no one in our group have a functioning father figure?”

“Carrie’s dad was okay,” Logan offers.  “But he moved out of state a few years back.”

“And he never knew how to grill!” Dick yells through his bedroom door.

“And he never knew how to grill,” Logan repeats.

“Yeah, well,” Gia says skeptically, “I’m bringing extra booze for when this weird-ass idea causes someone to have an emotional breakdown.”

“Appreciated.”

And when the day arrives, booze is the one thing they do seem to have enough of.

“Why did we say we were going to supply ingredients?” Logan wonders aloud as he methodically opens and shuts every cupboard in their kitchen.  “You forgot to buy onions, we don’t own any spices, I don’t even think we have salt and pepper –”

“Logan.  Man!  Relax.”  As anticipated, Dick is already halfway to trashed, and far from caring if their hamburgers are seasoned.  

“This was your idea,” Logan says, accusing sliding into sardonic.  “You’re the one who wanted to make some new dad-memories, and now because you were overly confident in a Craigslist ad, our new dad is already going to be disappointed in us.”

“Dude, holy shit –” Dick bursts out laughing and can’t continue his thought.  Logan turns around to glare at him in exasperation. “What if –” Dick stammers, chortling, “what if he says the thing?  ‘I’m not mad I’m just disappointed?’  How absolutely sick would that be?”  He’s wheezing now, and Logan can’t think of anything to do except stare at him.  “Just like a real dad!” Dick howls.

Logan stands, frozen, for a beat longer, and then abandons his search for the probably-nonexistent spice cabinet to reach for the scotch instead.  “Gia was right,” he says flatly.  “This is going to end in tears.”  He pulls a little too sharply on the tab of the wax seal and it snaps off with the seal still in place.  He looks at it in consternation, and it is at this point that the doorbell rings.  Dick makes no sign of moving from his position, giggling slumped over the kitchen table, so Logan jogs to the front hallway, only to discover that Dick has placed all the beer they bought in front of the door, barricading it closed.  He’s kicking six packs out of the way and trying to open the scotch bottle with his teeth when he finally manages to wrench open the door and is greeted by the genial but not-quite-non-threatening face of Keith Mars.  

For a moment the desire to say something dismissive rises up, as if this was still high school and he was still incapable of engaging with an adult on mutually respectful terms, but Logan takes a deep breath and forces it down.  “Mr. Mars,” he says.

Keith sticks out a hand.  “Richard?”

Logan snorts, but accepts the handshake.  “Richard is inside.  I’m the roommate, Logan.”

Keith’s eyes drop to the scotch bottle still in Logan’s hand.  “I hate it when that happens,” he says mildly.

Logan makes a non-committal noise.  “We probably have a wine opener somewhere that should do the trick.”

“We don’t!” Dick yells from the kitchen.  “I told the chicks to bring one!”

“That would be Richard,” Logan tells Keith wryly.  Keith raises his eyebrows, but then reaches into his jacket pocket and offers Logan a multi-tool.  “Thanks,” Logan says uncomfortably, looking down to flip through utensils instead of making eye contact.  “Can I offer you anything?”

“Nope,” says Keith cheerfully, “just point me to the backyard and I’ll get the grill fired up.”

“Get the grill fired up!” Dick’s voice repeats, maniacally.  

“He’s fine,” says Logan, unconvinced himself. “The backyard’s through this way.”

“No!” Dick stumbles into the hallway and spreads his arms wide, probably so as best to show off the tshirt he bought specifically for the occasion which reads “you’re all up in my grill”, a decided improvement over the grill-themed shirt Logan had to initially talk him down from, which had a meat-related innuendo on it.  “I will show you to the backyard, sir!”

Keith offers a hand.  “Keith Mars.”

“Awesome, dude.”  Dick shakes his hand, which is apparently hilarious because he cracks himself up again.  “Welcome to the party!”  

Keith glances at Logan, who shrugs.  “I’m just happy to be included,” Keith says, sounding, against all odds, like he means it.

“Dope,” Dick responds.  “Follow me, mon capitan, I will show you to your grill kingdom!”

“Please stop mixing your metaphors,” Logan tells him, but Keith waves him off and allows Dick to sling an arm around his shoulder and lead him towards the screen door to the backyard.  

“Dude, seriously, your application was whack,” Dick says.  “I was like, whoa, this guy is like a serious dad!”  Logan is watching them go, wondering if he’s responsible for making Keith feel safe and if he should therefore follow, when there’s a voice at shoulder-level behind him.

“So that’s the Craigslist guy?”

He turns, smoothly accepts the proffered casserole dish. “Craigslist dad, actually, or you’re missing the whole point.”

Carrie stands on her toes to look over his shoulder at where Keith is patiently observing Dick’s wild gesticulating at all the ingredients they bought.  “Huh,” she says.  “I guess he does kind of look like a dad.”

“I should hope so, we took the casting call very seriously.”

Carrie rolls her eyes.  “That’s a fruit salad,” she informs him, indicating the dish he’s holding.  “I’ve just gotta grab my guitar out of my car and then I can help set up or whatever.”

“You brought your guitar?” Logan repeats.  “Are we gonna sit in a circle and sing campfire songs?  What the hell kind of barbecue do you think this is?”

“A nice wholesome one, of course.  You were kind enough to invite Susan and her kid, and you specifically got a random dad to come grill you food.”  After a pause and seemingly despite herself, Carrie asks, “You really couldn’t have just bought a grill yourselves?”

Logan sighs.  “Actually, the grill is ours.  Keith had one but it wouldn’t fit in his car, so Dick went straight out and got the most expensive one there was.”

“Don’t all serious dads own pickup trucks?”

“That’s exactly what I said.”

“And now you have your own grill.”

“We even managed to work it ourselves; we made marshmallows over it last night.”

Carrie makes a face.  “I can’t believe you guys are living together.  You’ll both starve to death or suffocate under dirty laundry within a month.”

“Nah,” says Logan, dismissive, “we can live on marshmallows for at least two months, and we can just buy new clothes and burn our dirty laundry on the grill.”

“That,” Carrie tells him calmly, “is disgusting.”

“People who bring acoustic guitars to house parties shouldn’t throw stones,” Logan counters.  

She laughs and flips him off.  “When’s everyone else getting here?”

He indicates careless ignorance with a wave of the hand.  “Hopefully soon.  I think we need to set up a watch rotation to make sure Dick doesn’t start crying on the grill dad.”

Carrie snorts, tosses him her keys; he manages to switch the fruit salad to one hand and snag them in the hand holding the scotch. “In that case, you go grab my guitar out of the trunk.  What did you say the guy’s name is?”

“Keith Mars.”

“Got it.  Do not leave me out there by myself for more than a minute.”

“Of course not!  In fact, I wouldn’t dream of getting in your car and driving far, far away from here.”

She elbows past him, laughing, and jogs through the house to make a dramatic exit out the back door, where she is greeted by Dick’s incoherent shouts.  Logan sighs, then picks his way back through the six-packs to the kitchen to put everything down, finally open the scotch, and knock back half a drink.  When he gets back out to the driveway Casey Gant is there with his newest arm-candy girlfriend, and Logan finds himself cajoled into giving a house tour so he can explain to her why he and Dick decided on this house, how all the guests know each other, and that, no, Casey wasn’t lying about the Craigslist situation.  By the time Logan manages to extricate himself, everyone has arrived and is milling around the backyard.  Carrie waves to him from a picnic blanket in the middle of the lawn, where she is in fact playing guitar for Susan and her adolescent daughter.  He likes Susan and the kid fine, but the three of them seem to be working on a warble-y song from the latest Disney princess sensation, so he hides a grimace, waves back, and looks elsewhere.  There’s a few people clustered around the grill, listening to Keith tell some story which is apparently fascinating; Logan gives them a wide berth and joins Lilly and Gia instead, who are standing off to the side eyeing the whole scene skeptically.

“Don’t you ladies want to take advantage of this unique opportunity to interact with a genuine, human parent?” he asks.

“Nope,” says Gia, at the same time as Lilly says “Not even a little.”  

Logan snorts.  “Well, cheers to that, I suppose.”  

“Yes, cheers!” Lilly says.  “To dealing with our issues in therapy, rather than projecting all of our buried hopes onto a stranger with a novelty apron who could never live up to our ideals anyway.”  

“Like motherfucking adults,” Logan echoes solemnly. They clink glasses.  

Gia looks contemplative.  “It’s not so much that he’s a random stranger,” she says. “I even kind of trust that he’s for real, you know?”

“I know,” Lilly retorts, pausing to take a big gulp of her drink.  “That’s the worst part.  Dick introduced me to him when I got here, and he was immediately more interested in my life and my job than my parents have ever been.”

“Yeah, but like, actually interested,” Gia adds, “like he thought I was worth his time and couldn��t wait to hear more about me.”

“How dare he,” Logan says mildly.

Gia elbows him in the ribs.  “I don’t see you over there talking to him.”

Logan shrugs.  “If I met him on the street maybe I’d be able to trust that he’s the real deal, but the fact that he answered the ad just seems fundamentally suspicious.”

“Yeah, but you guys aren’t paying him, are you?” says Lilly.

“Just in beer.”    

“He’s probably just lonely,” Gia suggests.

“I thought the same thing,” says Logan. “But if he’s such a good father, then wouldn’t his own kid want to see him?  So why would he need us?”

Lilly pats him on the shoulder.  “Logan, you’ve honed your trust issues and pessimism into quite an art.”

He huffs, irritable despite himself.  “I’m just saying, don’t anyone go writing him into their will just yet.”  Gia looks at him little worriedly, and he attempts a reassuring smile.  “I need another drink, can I get either of you anything?”  They both wave him off, and he makes for the deck where all the refreshments are, but in his haste to get away, forgets to avoid the grill group and accidentally makes eye contact with Dick.  Dick, of course, begins frantically waving him over, and though Logan lifts a hand in acknowledgement and tries to stay course, this only means that Dick starts yelling his name.  Logan silently swears to himself that he will not enter the fatherland without a drink in hand, so yells back that he’ll be right there and prays that they’ll be out of something on the drinks and appetizers table so he’ll have to go inside to get it, if not drive to the store.  Tragically, Carrie is already there, refilling chip bowls, and when he offers to help she just gives him an unsympathetic look.  

“Go get it over with, before Dick convinces everyone to start chanting your name,” she says.  

Logan sighs, grabs the beer with the highest alcohol content he can find, and skips down the stairs.  “Logan!’ Dick crows.  “Logan’s here, guys!”

“I live here,” Logan reminds him.  The obvious statement is greeted by polite laughs from the Keith fan-club and drunken giggling from Dick.

“Get this, Logan!” he says, childlike excitement radiating off him in waves.  “We didn’t even need salt and pepper, Keith brought his own burger rub!”

Logan looks obligingly at Keith, who nods.  “Secret family recipe.”

“I thought the secret was the hot sauce?” Logan says.

“I’ve got that, too.”

Logan raises his eyebrows.  “Everything’s a secret with you, Mr. Mars.  And here I thought we were just on the verge of opening up to each other.”

Keith laughs good-naturedly.  “I’m an open book, Logan.”

Logan is mentally scrolling through options for sarcastic replies which aren’t overly combative when suddenly he feels very, uncomfortably cold, from the back of his neck down, and can do nothing but gasp stupidly.  For a moment he thinks Dick has poured ice down his back, but Dick is standing on the other side of the grill from him, looking genuinely surprised albeit delighted. Logan cranes his neck and turns in a circle, but can’t see what’s been spilled on him, though it’s entirely clear who’s to blame.  “Duncan,” Logan says, flat and edging toward a growl.

Duncan has the nerve to roll his eyes.  “Come on, man, it’s not my fault.”  

Logan gestures to where Duncan has clearly dropped his solo cup and half a plate of appetizers on the lawn.  “And how do you figure that?”

Duncan shrugs.  “You know how hard it is to hold a drink and a plate of stuff at the same time.”

“Hmm, then maybe you should go inside and eat at the table – or better yet, maybe the family down the block can loan us their high chair.”

Duncan scowls at him.  “Do you have to be like this, Logan, seriously?  It’s just a shirt.  And it’s your freaking house, you can just go in and change.”  

Logan flicks his eyes over at Keith, who thankfully doesn’t appear inclined to use his fake fatherly authority to intervene and is pretending to look intently at something across the way.  Logan fakes a laugh and says as evenly as he can manage, “And it was your freaking drink, so you could have just apologized.”  Keith abandons his examination of the next-door-neighbor’s maple tree to give Logan a side-eyed smile, and for a moment, Logan feels a vague sense of satisfaction, before he remembers that he doesn’t care about Keith’s approval.  He makes a wry face back.

“Logan,” Keith says mildly, “keep an eye on the grill? I need to grab something I left in the kitchen.”

“No problem, Mr. Mars,” Logan answers, saluting sloppily.  Keith nods at him, and then pats Duncan on the shoulder as he passes; Logan interprets the move as condescending and is pleased again, and again annoyed at himself for being pleased.  As a pathetic attempt at distracting himself, he pulls his arms into what was previously his favorite gray v-neck and puts it back on backwards so he can look at the stain, and then is horrified all over again.  “Duncan, what the fuck were you drinking?” he demands.

Now, finally, Duncan has the grace to look ashamed, or at least defensive.  “Mike’s,” he mutters.

“Mike’s lemonade is not this color.”

“It was Mike’s hard black cherry lemonade, alright!”  

There are various titters from the group; Logan snorts inadvertently and lifts up the shirt to sniff the purple-y stain, which smells more like sugar than anything else.  He knows he should stop pushing, but can’t quite restrain a “Dude, really?”, which turns the titters into full-fledged barks of laughter.

Duncan snaps.  “Why do you have to be such a –”

“Donut!”

Duncan freezes at the sound of Lilly’s voice.

“Quit being a drip!” she yells.  “Or go home!”

For a second, Duncan turns his glare back on Logan with full force, and Logan almost thinks he’s going to spit in his face or something, but then he just kicks at his dropped solo cup and slinks off toward the front yard.

“Wo-o-ow,” says Dick, with barely contained glee.  “This really is the best party ever.”

Logan rolls his eyes, grabs the spatula hanging off the grill, and starts idly pushing burgers around to have something to do. “You’re happy with your Craigslist investment?” he asks Dick.

“Absolutely, dude!”

“And the weirdness of the concept still hasn’t dawned on you?” Casey adds, snickering.

“How could it be weird?  Keith is awesome, and he’s the perfect addition to the party, just like the application said.”

“Of course he is.”

Logan jumps, almost drops a burger on the ground, and then turns to find that Duncan’s place in the circle has been filled. She’s on the shorter side, with blonde hair falling down her back in waves, a leather jacket slung over one shoulder, and a completely unreadable expression on her face – and based on the looks she’s getting from the others, no one else has the faintest idea who she is either.  “Uh –” Logan says.

“Keith Mars is still here, right?” she asks, voice somewhere between businesslike and belligerent.

“Well –”

“He just went inside,” Dick says, helpfully. “He’ll be back out in a minute.”

Logan groans.  “Dick, remind me never to commit any crimes you’d have to be interrogated about.”

Dick shrugs, the whole movement exaggerated by drunkenness.  “Look at her, man, what’s she gonna do?”

Logan looks at her, less sure that he should be unintimidated than Dick seems to be; she gives him an unimpressed once-over, but then cracks a smile seemingly despite herself.  “So was it some combination of getting dressed in the dark and a wet tshirt competition, or is this a bold fashion choice?”

Logan glances down at his backwards v-neck and the damp, purple circle on his chest.  “Bold fashion choice,” he answers, looking up to raise his eyebrows at her.

“I wouldn’t have been able to picture it,” she says, looking him up and down again, “but now that I see it, I guess it works.  In fact, you should only wear this.  Like, ever.”

Logan grins awkwardly, unsure whether she’s mocking him or flirting with him, and still unsure what he, as a homeowner, is supposed to do about strangers in his backyard, even if they are exceptionally cute.

“So, this is weird,” Dick offers.

“Hey, honey!”  Logan turns; Keith is coming down the steps of the deck with burger buns and cheese in hand, beaming at the interloper.  

“And it just got weirder,” Casey announces.

“Yup,” echoes his date.  “More drinks?” 

“You bet.”  They wander off arm in arm; Casey salutes Logan with his beer can.

“What are you doing here, sweetheart?” Keith says, dumping his armful of food onto the picnic table so he can hug the blonde girl.

She shrugs, looking considerably more relaxed now that he’s appeared.  “I’m an only child, dad, you didn’t honestly expect me to let you adopt a whole party without at least coming over to check up on you.  I’ve never had to share before.”

Keith laughs.  “Of course, why didn’t I think of that.  Why wouldn’t my grown adult daughter show up at an honest Craigslist gig to make sure she wasn’t losing her spot as my favorite child?”

“I dunno,” Dick says suspiciously, “I think she might also be here to flirt with Logan.”  

“You two have met?” Keith turns a surprised look on Logan, who does his best innocent blink and tries not to broadcast that a few seconds ago he was considering using Duncan’s spill as an excuse to take his shirt off in front of this girl.

“Only just now,” Keith’s daughter assures him.

Logan nods.  “You’re V. Mars?”

“Veronica,” she answers.  She offers her hand to shake.

“Don’t take this personally,” Logan says, “but I wouldn’t.  I’m honestly kind of covered in Mike’s hard black cherry lemonade.”

“That exists?” she says.

“There’s no limit to the abominations which crawl this earth,” he replies, straight-faced.  She laughs.

“See what I mean,” Dick says to Keith.  Keith looks at him blankly; Dick belches, shoots Logan a complicated and incomprehensible hand gesture, and wanders off after Casey, leaving Logan alone with the two Marses.  He looks back and forth between them, trying not to stare, and wondering if it would be weird to ask what kind of degree Veronica just graduated with based on the picture Keith sent.

“So!” Veronica says, into the strained silence. “You’ve been treating my dad well?”

“He’s getting all of the standard grill-dad benefits,” Logan answers.  “We didn’t want to have the agency all over us, or god forbid, the unions.”

Veronica smiles in acknowledgment, but her eyes flick to her dad with something like nervousness.  

“Do you two need a minute?” Logan offers.

“No!” says Keith, confidently calm. “Everything’s all fine, here.  Son, can you start putting cheese on hamburger buns? Veronica, honey, help him?”

Veronica rolls her eyes, but bumps Logan out of the way with her hip so she can grab the cheese.  “So, daaad,” she says, sing-song.

“Veronica,” he says, warningly.

She actually pouts.  “Come on, dad,” she says, the words coming quicker now. “It’s pretty clear Logan doesn’t care about you being his fake father for the day; his entire body flinched when you called him son.”

Logan hands her a hamburger bun he removed from the block of them in the bag, says mildly, “I thought I managed to reserve my flinch to only seventy percent of my body.”

“Nope!” Veronica gives him an apologetic smile, and then turns back to Keith.  “Dad, please.”  

Keith glances at Logan, back at her, and sighs. “Make it quick, Veronica.”

She drops the package of cheese and reaches into her bag to retrieve a giant camera.  “So-o-o,” she says, lowering her voice, “you know that guy I’ve been on all week for a completely unrelated…work thing?”

Keith rolls his eyes.  “Yes.”

“Well, he just walked through the front door of your guy’s house.”  

“No, he didn’t,” Keith says drily.  She tabs through a few photos on the display, shows him one.  Keith looks at her.  “That can’t be good.”  

She lets out a huff of breath.  “No, I didn’t think so either.”  

“I can see both exits from here, honey, and I haven’t turned my back once.”

“From here?” Logan repeats.

They ignore him.  “If I didn’t notice him going in, it was because I wasn’t looking for people entering,” Keith continues, reassuringly.  “Nobody could have gotten away, so they must all just be inside.  We’ll wait it out, it’ll be fine.”

Logan is just about to give up and leave them to it so he can find another drink, and maybe even change his shirt, but that, of course, is when the air is filled with the sound of breaking glass.

Some kind of instinct takes over and he dives in between the sound and Veronica, dragging her to the ground with him despite her incoherent noise of protest.  He looks up in time to see a flailing person hit the ground below the next-door-neighbor’s maple tree, surrounded by the debris from the shattered second-story window.

“That’s yours!” Veronica gasps, but Keith has already produced a gun from somewhere under his novelty apron and is pointing it at where the fallen man has gotten unsteadily to his feet.

“Police!” Keith shouts.  “Don’t move!”

There’s a stunned pause, Logan takes in the faces of gaping astonishment on his friends, and then the man takes off running in the opposite direction.  Keith lets out a brief curse and rips off his apron.  “He’s running,” he announces to thin air, and Logan hears a siren start up down the street, so apparently he really is police.  Keith throws the apron at Veronica.  “Don’t let the hamburgers burn,” he orders, and then he climbs on the picnic table, vaults clumsily over the neighbor’s fence, and takes off after the runner.

“You’re going to strain your back,” Veronica yells after him, almost petulant.  She elbows Logan in the ribs and he rolls off her, not sure whether she’s about to join in the chase herself or whether she’s just going to lay into him for tackling her. She gets up, checks her camera and is apparently convinced that its not broken, but still looks dissatisfied about something.  She peeks into the grill, lifts a single burger with the forgotten spatula. “They’re not going to burn,” she says, disdainfully.  

“Dude.” Dick jogs over so he can give Logan a hand up off the ground.  “Dude,” Dick repeats, “is it just me or was our grill-dad packing heat?”

Logan pats his arm.  “Not only was he packing heat, but he was almost definitely using us to surveille the house next door.”

Dick looks flabbergasted.  “Shit, man.  Even my fake dad didn’t really want to spend time with me.”  

“I’m sure he’ll be back, once they’ve collared the guy,” Veronica offers.  As if inspired, she removes the first burger patty from the grill, puts it on one of their prepared buns, and hands it to him.  

Dick looks at it suspiciously, takes a bite, and then nods, but adds accusingly, “Whatever, man.  I’m going to need therapy from this.”  He shoots a finger gun at Logan.  “So, you do whatever you’re doing here, I’m gonna go apologize to Susan for exposing her child to all this violence.”

“That’s really mature and responsible of you, Dick,” Logan says, surprised.

“Duh,” says Dick.  “It’s up to us to break the cycle.”  And with that, he heads back towards the rest of the party, who are all staring at Veronica with no small amount of apprehension.  She doesn’t seem to notice, but absently picks up Keith’s apron and puts it on, and starts assembling burgers.

Logan can’t help but ask, “You’re not going to follow them?”

“Nope,” she says, shortly, “not my case.”

“Do you need to go after…your guy?”

“No, I’ve got the pictures I needed.”

“Then I’m sure Keith would appreciate the backup…?”

She lets out a short laugh, and Logan sees with dawning comprehension that she’s worried.  “He needs it,” she answers, “but he wouldn’t appreciate it.  I don’t have the clearance.”

“You’re not his partner?”

She turns to look at him like he’s an idiot. “No-o-o,” she says.  “I’m his daughter.”

Logan grins, lifts his hands in surrender. “Sorry, I wasn’t sure how deep the undercover scheme went.”  She snorts, flips her hair over her shoulder, and turns back to the grill.  “That one on the right is getting a little overdone,” he says, pointing.

“No it’s not.”  She swats his hand away, and then moves the offending burger closer to the coals, Logan suspects just to be contrary.

“So you’re not a cop?” he tries again.  She shoots him an exasperated glance over her shoulder, he grins, says, “If you’re not a cop, why were you surveilling the house too?”

She huffs a sigh, puts the spatula down with a clatter, and reaches for her bag where it had fallen on the ground.  “Here,” she says, and tosses something at him.  He catches it, turns it around, opens it.  

“You’re a private detective?”

“Mmhmm.”

“Not a cop?”

“I’m going to throw a hamburger at you.”

Logan laughs.  “So, what, you didn’t want to follow in your father’s footsteps?”

“I did, he didn’t,” Veronica says casually, returning her focus to the grill.  “He wanted me to aim higher.  I got accepted to Quantico, and was sent home after three weeks because of my issue with authority.”  She shrugs, spins the spatula like a baton.  “Turns out, I’m more suited for private eye work than I am for either the feds or the boys in blue anyway.”  

“Huh.”

“What?”

Logan shrugs, thinking that she was already exceptionally cute, but she just became the most fascinating person on the planet. “I don’t know.”

She removes the last burger from the grill and spins to look at him, hands on her hips.  He feels a goofy grin spreading over his face, and she rolls her eyes at him. “What, Logan?”

“You should only wear this.”

She looks down at Keith’s apron, which reads in big, bold letters, “NEVER TRUST A SKINNY CHEF”.  She snorts.  “If you haven’t figured out yet that you shouldn’t trust me, no amount of written reminders are going to do the trick.”

Logan ducks his head, rubs the back of his neck. “So I’m trusting, sue me.”

“Ah!” She taps her chin with one finger, mock-contemplative.  “Is that how you ended up advertising for a strange dad to on-site cater your barbecue?”

“That wasn’t my idea.”  Veronica raises her eyebrows, Logan adds, “I actually feel a lot better about your dad now.”

“You feel a lot better about him now that you know he deceived you?”

“Well, yeah,” Logan admits.  “He seemed way too normal to be the kind of person who responds to Craigslist ads, so there definitely had to be a catch.”  She raises her eyebrows at him, he adds lamely, “So it’s nice that the catch was he’s mainly here to catch bad guys.”

As if on cue, Veronica’s cell phone buzzes; she picks up on the first ring.  “Dad?” The worry smooths away from her face at his response, and she mouths a quick apology to Logan before retreating into the corner of the yard to debrief.  The last thing he hears her say is “I can’t believe you jumped over that fence, are you trying to kill me?”

Logan walks over to where Dick and Gia are relating the main event to Duncan, who has reemerged and is trying very hard to appear as if he doesn’t regret missing out.  “Then Keith magically pulled a gun out of nowhere,” Dick says, miming in slow motion, “and yelled get on the ground or I’ll shoot!”

“He didn’t exactly yell that,” Gia puts in. “I’m pretty sure he basically just said ‘police’.”

Dick ignores her, too invested in the story. “But the guy just books it, and so Keith literally vaulted over the fence and chased after him, yelling and firing at him –”

“No,” Gia says.

Duncan rolls his eyes.  “This is what you get for inviting strangers into your home,” he says derisively.

“Trained professionals to arrest the criminal who apparently lived next door to us anyway?” Logan pipes up.

“Professional or not,” Gia says, upbeat, “as soon as shit started to go down, Logan shielded the cop’s daughter with his body, which was pretty cool.”

“Aww,” says Lilly, coming up to put an arm around her brother’s shoulders.  “And you were out in the car, sulking because everyone laughed at your drink choice!”

Reminded, Logan glances down at his shirt, which he’d mostly forgotten in all the excitement; it is now starting to stick to his skin uncomfortably.  What the hell, Keith won’t be back for twenty minutes at least; he can definitely get some mileage out of this.  He takes the shirt off.  The girls wolf-whistle, Duncan groans.

“You know,” Lilly suggests slyly, “there are definitely easier ways than Craigslist to incorporate a new father figure into your life.”

“What?” says Dick, immediately intrigued.  “Is there a more specific service?”

“Is there?” Logan repeats, alarmed.  

Lilly starts laughing.  “You’re both idiots,” Duncan tells them, with significantly more affection now that his knowing something they don’t has reestablished him in a position of authority.  

Gia appears to be about ready to take pity on them, but is interrupted by Veronica’s return. “They got the guy,” she announces.  “Dad is driving him to the station.  Logan, he says he’s leaving you in charge until he gets back, not Richard.”

Dick flips her off; Logan replies, “I’m touched that he’s ceding authority to me in my own home.”

Veronica performs an elaborate double take, gestures at the house.  “This is yours?”

“As far as the eye can see, or at least until where I imagine the police tape will be going up.”

“It’s my house, too,” Dick puts in.

Veronica ignores him.  “I took you for an out-of-towner,” she tells Logan.

The fact that she thought of this means she’s not uninterested in the possibility of seeing him again.  “Nope, local boy, though and through.”

Veronica eyes him thoughtfully.  “And why are you half naked?”

He realizes he doesn’t actually have a good reason.  “I was really starting to smell?”

She pretends to consider this.  “I guess I’ll take it,” she finally says.  Lilly starts cackling.  

Logan tries not to preen.  “Veronica, this is everybody; everybody, Veronica.” Veronica waves awkwardly.  

“Are you going to stick around until your dad gets back?” Gia asks, faux-innocent.  

Veronica looks sidelong at Logan.  “Stay,” he says, hearing it come out somehow as if he were laying his heart on the line.  He adds, more casually, “You can scold him for his fence-jumping.”  

She considers him.  “Do you have anything other than Mike’s hard black cherry lemonade?”

He cracks a smile.  “I think I can scare something up.”

“The good stuff is all inside,” Lilly lies, straight-faced, then elbows Duncan, who says with faux-enthusiasm, “Oh yeah, and while you’re in there, maybe Logan could put a shirt on.”

“Like, if one jumps out at him,” Gia puts in. “Not every color works on Logan.”

“Yeah,” says Lilly.  “He went through a whole orange phase.  It was bad.”

Veronica looks bewilderedly around the circle, then back up at Logan.  “I guess I could stay awhile,” she says, a smile pulling at her mouth.  

“Don’t forget to grab hamburgers before you go in,” Dick says, serious.  “That’s literally the whole point.”

“Right,” says Logan, not taking his eyes off Veronica. “Thank goodness for those hamburgers.”

                                              -~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-

Yahoo answers post from user MeCasablancasIsTooCasablancas:

So a few years ago I met this really cool dad, super great, very wise, lot to offer as a father figure.  I put a lot of effort into getting to know him and he’s always been totally chill.  My roommate, on the other hand, barely wanted to talk to the dad, from day one.  Only problem is, now that’s changed and we’re in competition, and I was wondering, how do I make sure that my prior claim to the dad is respected?  My roommate didn’t even want a dad, but now just because he’s marrying the guy’s daughter everyone’s telling me father-in-law trumps the fact that I clearly called dibs? This can’t be right.  

Also, the wedding is in two months, and even though there’s no way they go through with it, just in case please go to Craigslist and look for my post seeking a new roommate.  If it helps, we have a grill.

[coeurdastronaute]

Essays in Existentialism: Jurassic

I really love your fics so I was wondering if you'll pleaseee write a clexa jurassic park au Tks

“Most meat eaters walked on two feet. This made them faster and left their hands free to grab their prey,” the professor explained, clicking the pointer so that the page changed. “Most plant eaters walked on four feet to better carry their heavy bodies. Some plant eaters could balance on two feet for a short time.”

“What about T-Rex?”

“What about them?”

“When do they show up and did they hunt humans?”

“Here we have the first instance of failure to read the material,” she shook her head and walked in front of the lecture hall.

Almost two hundred students watched her as she cross her arms and smiled as she shook her head. This was her favorite misconception, and her favorite way to tease an entire group of freshmen. The professor leaned against the desk at the front of the room, with a giant projector screen displaying a large graph behind her. She felt powerful like that.

“Millions of years separate the faintest inkling of humans and dinosaurs. We probably wouldn’t be sitting here today if we coexisted during the same time period. Not even because of the sheer amount of predators,” she explained before clicking through a few slides until she came to the graph she wanted. “There is a little gap in the estimates, but the Earth had about fifteen to thirty percent less oxygen than it does now. That means about five times the amount of Carbon Dioxide existed, which is thought to have contributed to the fact that everything was so damn big back then. Yes?”

“Could dinosaurs exist now?”

“No.”

From the back of the lecture hall, a gentleman smiled and watched the professor push herself up from leaning and begin to walk around, emphatically explaining with her hands so that every set of eyes was trained on her, riveted by her passion and explanations.

As the professor moves around the class, he melts into the crowd, unnoticed in the sea of eyes, but still, they are just like the kids around him, glued to the woman who is so excited, she has to push her glasses up on her nose from time to time as she explains, who has to shove her hands in her back pockets to keep them from gesturing to explain magnitude and such.

“That wraps up week seven,” the professor offered as the familiar shuffling that indicated the end of the allotted hour told her. “Remember, next week we will be tackling differentiation and specialization! If you close your eyes and sniff the air you can smell it. Tests are coming. Start preparing.”

Melting into the crowd, he pulls the phone out of his pocket and makes a phone call as the sea of students rush past him.

“She’s the one.”

Hot as all hell, the day hung there, dirty and thick and angry at nothing in particular. The tropical afternoon made it impossible to breathe, while the sun itself pulled every ounce of sweat it could from bodies as sacrifice for existing. It was a warped version of the angels share if she ever heard it.

From her spot against the fence, Clarke ran her forearm over her eyes and pushed the sticky ends of hair from where they stuck, though nothing truly helped.

She was familiar with heat and sweat.

Her eyes never stopped moving, following a herd moving through the upper wall of the far valley before a truck pulled up and stole her attention.

“Dinner is served,” Raven called happily as she hopped out and slammed the door. Some animal squealed and complained in the crate in the bed.

“That’s my line,” Jasper complained as he parked.

“You’re late.”

“We had a little problem with the new pens over in quadrant Charlie,” the driver gave a pointed look to the girl in the brace.

“That’s what you want to hear when you’re surrounded by creatures that are literally faster and bigger and sharper than anything else on the planet.”

“Listen, I fixed it. There was an over--” Raven tried to defend herself.

“Please don’t do the engineer stuff again,” Clarke sighed as she grunted and opened the truck lift.

“I need to take a look at the wiring for the converter panel over here. Thought I’d catch the show first.”

“It’s not a show.”

“Sure it’s not,” Raven teased, earning a smile. “Release the pig.”

“She’s not a toy. She’s a dinosaur. I can’t make her put on a show, no matter what Jaha thinks I’m capable of.”

“You got the raptors to behave.”

“I got a pack of starving animals to believe that I was the only reason they could eat. I’m a long way off of--”

“Okay, none of that boring animal junk. Can you make them ride tricycles yet?” Raven interrupted, leaning against the truck as the other two carried the giant crate with the help of the keepers at the paddock.

“Did you fix the island’s surge problem yet?”

“I have a feeling you’re closer to the tricycles than I am,” Raven acknowledged before heaving herself up the first few steps toward the observation deck.

From atop the stand, the three stood there and watched, waiting for the beast to show.

“I haven’t seen her since the last trainer...” Jasper began before trailing off when he looked at Clarke. “Who really wasn’t as good as you, and had it coming, I guess.”

“Total asshat,” Raven agreed.

The trainer shook her head and crossed her arms, leaning back and waiting for the inevitable. The other two leaned a little closer until everything stilled. The ground shook. The trees parted and trembled. The pig squealed and fought to climb a wall it hand no chance of making a foot up.

And then nothing.

A few heartbeats went by, and everything tentatively resumed itself, the world kept turning, the sky kept sitting there, the clouds yawned.

The growl was quiet, subtle, melting into the world of the island. Clarke heard it though as she scanned the tree line. A few seconds later, it burst forth, teeth glistening and legs churning with all its might before eight inch teeth serrated dinner and swallowed it in two gulps.

“Holy fuck,” Raven and Jasper breathed in unison, unable to blink or take their eyes from the dinosaur below.

It let out a long roar, that shook the world and echoed from the stars, that brought quiet to the island for a long moment, as if everyone knew this was different.

“Yup,” Clarke chuckled as she made her way down the steps. “Buy me a drink at the canteen. I’m thirsty as hell.”

For a full minute, Lexa stared at the stranger who now sat on the other side of the desk at her office. If she had been the type to be amused at such jokes, she was certain she would have laughed for the entirety of the pause that settled itself in the room quite comfortably. Instead she settled for quiet and a disbelieving stare that turned into an incredulous lean back in her chair, oddly disappointed the the meeting about potential funding to continue her dig in China was a ruse for a madman’s stupid prank.

“I do need you to say something, Dr. Woods. I have a few other appointments before I head back...”

“To your island,” she supplied, slightly amused.

“Yes. I leave in the morning.”

“To go back to your island of dinosaurs.”

“Correct.”

“An island that has genetically modified, brought back from extinction after millions and millions of years, dinosaurs, that used science which I can only imagine is still light years away from being stable or even... real.... that Island?”

“Yes,” Thelonious Jaha nodded with a warm smile, watching as the scientist leaned forward once again and tried to form more words to express her disbelief.

“You have to go back to the island with... what? Triceratops? and let me guess, you have... What? Ornithopoda? Just... running around?”

“We do have a nice little collection of those. Quite gentle creatures. My favorite though,” he explained, crossing his leg and folding his hands over his lap, “I think are the Apatosaurus. Did you know that they fight like giraffe’s often?”

“Often,” Lexa barked a laugh and caught herself before sitting up a bit straighter and blanking her face from the outburst. She pushed up her glasses and took a deep breath before a giggle escaped once again. “Often this happens. That Apatosaurus fight. Like giraffes.”

“Dr. Woods, I came to you with a serious business proposition, one that I think is more than fair--”

“You want to visit your fantasy island that is populated by dinosaurs brought back from extinction by DNA collecting and replicating methods which are... impossible at best... to study and monitor your collection... or real, live dinosaurs. Is that a good summation, Mr. Wells?”

“Fairly fair, I should say,” he agreed, smiling at her kindly.

“Mr. Wells, the wealthiest man in the world, spent his money making dinosaurs,” Lexa shook her head and whistled. “Well, I wouldn’t have guessed that one. But if you’ll excuse me, Mr. Wells. I have a class at three thirty I should prepar--”

While she spoke, she watched him reach toward his briefcase, which she assumed meant he was ready to depart after she rudely berated his craziness. Instead, a stack of pictures slid across the expanse of her desk.

“Those are not doctored in the slightest, Dr. Woods,” he explained as the paleontologist surveyed the array without picking one up, leaning closer than she would have liked to pretend. “I approached you because you are the best in your field, the most well-respected and honored scientist in the study of evolution and especially paleontology, and many of your theories have not only proven true, but also helpful in the development of behavior models of our subjects.”

As Lexa picked up a picture finally, her guest stood and watched her squint, trying to find the falsehood.

“My terms are simple. Just come see the park, Dr. Woods, and the money will be made available in a grant the second you step back off of the plane in this city.”

A plane ticket made its way to the desk beside the images. All the doctor could do was stare back at the man who placed it there before her eyes were drawn back to the image in her hand. It was impossible. There was no way.

“If you have any questions, my business card is here,” he smiled and pulled it from his jacket pocket. “I hope to see you soon, Dr. Woods. We could really use your expertise.”

Still stunned and unsure what to say, Lexa heard him leave as she leaned back in her chair and swiveled away from her door, holding what looked the picture of a pterodactyl soaring. She shook her head to get the inkling of belief from taking root before she picked up the business card.

From behind her sunglasses, Clarke watched the small prop plane land and turn around at the end of the small runway. The metal of the jeep was hot against her hip, but still, she leaned there and waited for the professor who was coming to tell her how to do her job, as if training or working with animals could be taught in a classroom, as if it could be taught by a bone hunter who wrote articles and--

“Holy shit,” she whispered to herself as the door finally opened and the dorky, middle-aged professor with a paunch belly and affinity for wearing tweed and smoking pipes turned out to be a ridiculous beautiful, legs-straight-from-Olympus, short-shorts wearing, siren of a there’s-no-way-she’s-a-doctor, doctor.

It took a moment, but the trainer swallowed quickly and crossed her arms, not letting the momentary distraction keep her away from indignation too long.

“So that’s the person that’s going to tell you what to do,” Raven observed as she leaned over the top railing of the Jeep.

Clarke pursed her lip and crossed her arms tighter around herself.

“She’s here to study and offer feedback.”

“Looks like just your type.”

“I don’t have a type.”

“You do,” her friend chuckled. “Too good for you and unattainable.”

Before she could argue the point, the newest arrival shouldered her bag and made her way from the tarmac. The closer she got, the more Clarke was vividly aware of how right the engineer was, and how much it bothered her.

The tan of her legs, the way her sleeves were rolled up, the old baseball hat that betrayed hair that lingered somewhere between chestnut and auburn, that curled up near her ears in the heat. Clarke was taken with her jaw and her collarbones, though she would never admit it.

“Hello,” the professor smiled awkwardly.

“Dr. Woods, this is Clarke Griffin, our trainer--

“Handler,” Clarke corrected.

“Of the dinosaurs,” Lexa took the hand offered to her and shook it before pulling off her sunglasses and tucking them into her shirt. “Because there are dinosaurs here.”

Her eyes made Clarke gulp, her words made her smile.

“Yes ma’am. I handle the dinosaurs.”

With a polite shake of her hand, Lexa shook her head and sighed as it dropped, still almost amused at the situation.

“If there are dinosaurs, I can’t imagine they handle well.”

“All animals handle well enough if you listen to them.”

“These would be multi-ton creatures that have millions of years of evolution and survival skills--”

“Two minutes on the island, and you’re calling my job a bunch of useless garbage,” Clarke inhaled deeply and nodded to herself. “You could at least wait to tell me how to do my job until after you see me in action, Professor.”

“I’m... I didn’t. I’m not here to tell you how to do your job.”

“Good.”

“I think we got off on the wrong foot--”

“I think it’s just fine. You’ll be gone in a few days and that’s fine enough,” Clarke opened the back door and motioned for her to get in.

Still distracted by the blonde and the lips and the words that came out of them, Lexa furrowed before slowly crawling in the back seat of the Jeep. She put her sunglasses back on and fanned herself through her shirt.

“Hi. I’m Raven. Head Engineer, persistent tag-along,” the girl in the passenger seat turned around and held out her hand. “You met our resident surly handler.”

“Lexa.”

With a smile that grew larger as she took in the newcomer, Lexa watched Raven turn around and say something to Clarke that was eclipsed with the roar of the engine back to life. Raven’s laugh was silent though her head tilted back as if she were enjoying herself.

Lexa leaned back in the seat as they began to rumble along through half a road into the jungle. All she could wonder was why and how she ended up here.

The jungle was thick and lush, sprouting up on both sides, blotting out the sun so that it came down in little shots of pure gold through the canopy. Lexa jumbled in the back over the uneven path that was barely a road to start with and more of a trail that was confiscated by the trees every chance it got.

When they emerged, Lexa wasn’t ready. The sunlight blinded her for a moment before it all registered and she saw them.

From the driver’s seat, Clarke looked at the professor in the rearview mirror, the astonishment catching again. She exchanged a look with Raven who shook her head, but that didn’t stop her.

Lexa didn’t notice they weren’t moving. She noticed the articulation of the spine of the stegosaurus. She noticed the sheer size of the apatosaurus. In a flash, she peeled off the sunglasses and leaned closer over the edge of the vehicle, gripping it tightly before murmuring to herself that it was impossible. As far as the view stretched, as far as the eye could see, nothing but life existed, pure, primeval live.

“Well, what do you think?”

“That’s... Those are...” Lexa shook her head. In a second, Lexa dug in her bag and slipped on a pair of large, round glasses.

“You didn’t think that it was real?”

“How can it be real?”

“Magic,” Clarke grinned, amused at herself.

“Those are... those are... Those are...”

“Yeah.”

“A doctor,” Raven rolled her eyes. “She doesn’t even know what those are.”

“Can we...? What? How?”

“Mr. Wells is going to meet us at the main property,” Clarke said before starting the engine once again.

“Can’t we stay with them?”

The amazement was infectious, and Clarke couldn’t remember losing it, though she did in the grime of her day-to-day life. Raven was right. She had a type, which apparently included hot professors with big glasses and old baseball hats and legs that were godly.

“You’ll have plenty of time,” Clarke promised.

Lexa didn’t hear anything. She stared, wide-eyed and blown away by the giants that walked along the valley floor. She was certain her heart didn’t beat at all the entire trip.

The science, the show, the behind the scenes parts, Lexa was absolutely intrigued by, swallowed up in it the moment the handler and the engineer dropped her off at the main entrance.

Before she knew it, the day was over and her notebook was filled with notes and questions and ideas and observations, and she hadn’t even made it back out to the park that blew her mind.

“Finally escaping the lab, professor?” a familiar voice greeted her as Lexa attempted to make her way toward her room to try to type up her notes and see what else she wanted to look into in the morning. She had stacks of reading the doctors lent her so that she could be up to date on their findings. It was highly classified and she had to sign a million contracts just to read them, but she looked forward to it.

“I think I could live in there,” she confessed, head still twirling slightly.

“Where are you heading?” Raven asked, walking alongside the doctor, dragging her leg gently, appreciative that she slowed slightly.

“Just back to my room. I’m supposed to have dinner with some of the scientists in an hour to go--”

“You don’t want to do that.”

“I don’t?”

“Come slum it with the hired hands. I promise it’ll be way better.”

“I’m not sure your friend likes me very much,” Lexa remembered, adjusting her bag on her shoulder and pushing up her glasses. “And you’re not exactly a hired hand.”

“We all are in our own ways for Jaha. Trust me. Even you are. You just don’t know it yet.”

All she wanted was to shower and go back to her room, and yet Lexa decided that detoxing from the science, from the pounding feeling in her head that came from the impossible existing, it was too much.

“Plus, Clarke doesn’t warm up often to people. You can’t take it personally. She’s an animal person.”

“I don’t know that I’d consider these animals.”

“You have a lot to learn, doc.”

The little cantina was a slice of actual life in the middle of what felt like the Twilight Zone. Perched on the far side of the main compound, behind the employee’s only fence, leaning against what was left of an almost drained lake, the little open, sided hut was the nightly gathering place for everyone. Clarke enjoyed it as much as she could, though it made her feel as if she was missing out on actual life, far away, away from the tiny dome of the island.

The sun hung around, lazy and disinterested in leaving the day to give into the night. The big, fluffy clouds caught on fire and became embers, while the people below sipped drinks and ate from the communal buffet.

The addition of a stranger had everyone awake and buzzing. The little staff were all experts, all knowledgeable, all adventurous and running from things, and yet as tough as they strived to be, any kind of newness, of new person, made them yearn for the real world.

Clarke avoided it as much as possible. Something about a new person reminded her what she was running from, why she escaped from real life and wound up in this zoo.

She knew what Raven was doing, and Clarke wanted nothing to do with it.

The back porch looked out onto the field that led into the trees. From atop the slope she sat and drank the beer and let it cool her down, a near impossible feat in the weather.

“I think we got off on the wrong foot,” a voice behind her offered. “After meeting with Jaha, I understand why.”

Clarke didn’t move, didn’t say anything. She just took another drink and listened to the noises of the world beyond the tree line.

“I don’t want to tell you how to do your job. I came to study behaviors, not to... to... train them. I told him that’s impossible, and he said you said the same thing.”

Wringing her fingers, Lexa ran her hand up her neck and tried to think of what else to say, hoping not to do anything else to piss off the person she’d be working with for the next week.

“Anyway. That’s all I wanted to say.”

“Would you like a drink, Dr. Woods?” Clarke offered without turning around.

Somewhat relieved, the professor smiled to herself before grabbing the bottle offered and taking the seat beside the lounging handler.

“Lexa. You can call me Lexa.”

“You survived your first day. That’s impressive.”

“I don’t know how you do it every day. How long has it been?”

“About sixteen months.”

“Goodness.”

Both drank and stared at the sunset while the jukebox played something behind them. Clarke sighed and relaxed further while Lexa leaned forward and listened beneath the noise to what was happening out there.

“The Diplocodus sing at night,” Clarke offered.

“Like whales.”

“Yeah, something like that.”

From across the cantina Raven watched the two sitting on the back porch and congratulated herself on a job well done. It was no surge-proofed server system, but it was something.

For two days, Lexa soaks up everything that she can. She can’t imagine her eyes being any wider at every glance and nook and cranny. The entirety of the island is mesmerizing. For nearly four hours just one day, she spends sitting in a Jeep on the edge of a field observing. She filled up three notebooks in the short amount of time.

As much time as she spends observing, a certain handler spends just as much observing the professor. It isn’t on purpose, just always seems to work out that way. Something about the nerdy, quiet, passionate, smart, funny, kind... and the list raged on as Clarke tried to make an excuse for her gazing. Something about her just distracted Clarke at inconvenient moments, had her spilling words out of her mouth, even when she thought she was being quiet.

“Are you busy, Professor?” Clarke realized she was asking as she stumbled upon Lexa at the cage for check ups.

She’d meant to walk by, to leave her with possibly just a wave, while she assisted the vet with some notes. Of course, Clarke was suddenly a mess, and very much angry at her best friend for planting seeds that actually took in the arid desert that was her mind.

“Depends on what you may have for me today,” Lexa smiled in that way that felt like dew on ankles at dawn.

“I don’t think you’ve gotten a proper introduction to what I do.”

“Do I finally get to go into the employees only section that’s hidden behind those high walls and heavy doors?”

“No, but I promise you’ll have a better time than examining with Dr. Lame.”

“Dr. Lima is going to give me my first contact with dinosaurs.”

Clarke smiled to herself and flicked the keys in her hand.

“Trust me,” Clarke offered. “I rarely disappoint.”

The ride to the southern side of the island was bumpy and even worse than the one from the airport, but Lexa held on and for some unknown reason, trusted the handler. She regretted her decision precisely six minutes into the trip as she was nearly bounced out of her seat, earning just a grin from the driver who shrugged and adjusted her sunglasses.

Far in the horizon, clouds emerged from the horizon, angry and black, contrasting perfectly with the bright white-blue of the clear sky. Lexa shielded her eyes as they hopped along and recognized the storm coming in the way the breeze shifted and then calmed to almost nothing.

“How far are we?”

“Can’t you enjoy the ride?”

“Has anyone?” she retorted. “There’s a storm coming.”

“It hasn’t hit the first set of islands yet. We won’t see that for another hour or two,” Clarke promised as the Jeep slowed and stopped.

“Now you’re a meteorologist?”

“I’d like you a lot better if you were nicer to me,” the handler grumbled, pulling herself up by the crossbar and sliding out of the rover. Before Lexa could muster a reply, the blonde shouldered her bag and walked around, towards the front.

Half tripping and half afraid of being left, Lexa scrambled out after Clarke.

“I’m plenty nice to you,” she argued, pushing up her glasses as the tall grass tickled her bare legs. “You’re the one that’s rude to me.”

“I brought you out here, didn’t I?”

Lexa almost slammed into Clarke’s back, she stopped so quickly. Humming to herself, she met the challenging blue eyes and a smirk and swallowed deeply, blaming the humidity most of all.

“Yes, but you’re very surly, did you know that?”

“Surly.”

“Surly.”

“I don’t mean to be, it’s just... people talk a lot, don’t they?” Clarke asked, almost too honest and real, such a flip that it caught Lexa slightly off balance. “I don’t like wasted words.”

All she could do was follow down the faintest semblance of a trail. She wanted to ask more, but she felt like they were all wasteful kinds of words, no matter how she flipped them around and examined their surfaces in her head.

“We don’t breed, we reproduce,” Clarke explained as she came to a stop finally, digging through her bag. “Which makes herd dynamics easier.” She let out a low whistle.

For a moment, nothing happened.

The trees jostled, the shrubs moved, the earth shook slightly. With a squeal, a blur emerged and rammed into Clarke’s side, knocking her over in a fit of actual laughter. All Lexa could do was watch as the baby stood atop her and nudged her with a dull snout, rooting under her arm.

The trees moaned and came down to their side a few seconds later as a full grown triceratops came forward, timid and waiting at the edge. Lexa took a step back, eyes wide. She’d been close to the specimens before, but behind the glass back at the lab, in the paddocks used for observation.

“Okay, okay, enough,” the handler shoved at the teenage rhino sized creature that hovered over her. “Easy there buddy. You’re getting bigger and stronger.”

“That’s a...” Lexa trailed off slightly before she felt a giant breath on her shoulder and wet, sloppy lips on her shoulder. A horn met her eyes when she turned toward the adult.

“Yeah. It is,” Clarke chuckled.

Gone was the tightness of her shoulders, the defensiveness of her face. Clarke was a new person, full of life and joy. She righted herself despite the insistence of the animal that nudged her hips and ribs.

“Looks like Doreen likes you.”

“Doreen?” Lexa swallowed and met the large, doleful eyes of the thing that nipped at her shoulder, covering her in slobber.

“I like giving them old lady names. They remind me of old ladies. Nice and gentle, would give you hard candies,” Clarke grunted as she pushed back against the newly forming horns on the baby as it lifted her. “But get them mad, and they’ll take you to town with a wrath of many years lived.”

“Can I...”

“She doesn’t bite.”

“Just slobbers.”

“I thought they’d be a good way to properly introduce you to the real thing. This is what I do,” Clarke laughed as she got pushed again by the antsy little critter who came up to almost her shoulders. “They’re real and alive, and have personalities. You hypothesize on what makes them do what they do.”

She ran her hand along the plate of the dinosaur’s shell, feeling the unique texture, smiling to herself as she did.

“Who is that?” Lexa asked, nudging her chin at the thing still nudging Clarke.

“CJ.”

“CJ. Not a very good old lady name.”

“Clarke Junior,” she explained, blushing slightly at the admission. “I never thought I’d have to explain that to anyone.”

“She definitely has your legs.”

“I think she takes after my personality.”

A slobbery nose dug into Clarke’s bag, and Lexa grinned at the display.

It took impending clashes of thunder for Clarke to convince the good professor to retreat back to the main part of the park. It took a promise of taking her to see the herds on the southside of the river to get her to not mope.

The entire ride back, Lexa raved, and asked a million questions, her eagerness overpowering her fear of the weather and her worry about the ethics and implications of what seeing an actual dinosaur in real life, would mean. Clarke just smiled and answered what she could, amused at the way in which this girl was absolutely in love with the science of it.

As the rain started to fall, they dashed into the cantina and still, Lexa couldn’t stop talking, couldn’t stop gushing. Clarke realized it was maybe the best thing she’d ever done, to get a girl like that so excited and alive. She didn’t know how, but she liked it.

Gradually, the evening grew later, the rain came hard, the water coming down in buckets and the lightning flashing. Everyone emptied out as the lights flickered. Clarke was exhausted, but in no way eager to miss a second of Lexa, and she hated Raven for it.

“So we’ve made it clear that you love this, but you never told me why you study bones,” Clarke finally ventured, balancing the beer bottle on her knee as she leaned against the wall in their little nook.

“You never told me why you’re a handler,” Lexa countered, pushing up her glasses before tilting her head back for a long swig.

It was the drink and the hour, but Clarke let her eyes linger too long on the slope of her neck and shoulders.

“You first.”

“Fine,” the professor finally sighed with a grin. “I just like that for something so old, we don’t know anything about it. All of the information is there, we just have to find it. It’s a giant game. And I like hunting for them.”

“It was the cool hats and the digging, right?”

“And the computer models. That’s what really sold me.”

“I’m serious.”

“I went to the museum when I was a kid. My dad didn’t hang around much, but I did skip school and he took me to the museum, and we learned about dinosaurs. After that, he always sent me something about dinosaurs when he could. I don’t know where he went,” she shrugged. “Just stopped coming around, but I don’t know. The dinosaurs stuck.”

“See? That’s a much more human answer.”

“I’m human.”

“You use the scientific name for things and speak in numbers. You’re far from human,” Clarke chuckled and earned a look. She earned a blush and leaned across the table slightly, propping her cheek up and really looking at her.

“Tell me your deep, dirty secrets then,” Lexa finally managed.

“I’m boring. Good mom, good dad. I just always liked animals, and I didn’t like school. I did odd jobs. Horse trainer when I got out of high school. Dog and obedience classes. I joined the circus for a bit.”

“You’re lying.”

“Yeah, a little,” she grinned.

“I went to school to be a large animal vet, and I worked at a zoo for a long while. And then I just… My dad got sick, and I got an offer from Jaha that I jumped at to get away from home.”

“That sounds more like it.”

“Have you ever held your hand up to a tiger’s paw?”

“Can’t say that I have.”

“I never thought anything would beat that feeling,” Clarke explained. “And then I came here.”

“But this place… it can’t… it can’t sustain this. The animals…”

“It’s not as perfect as they make it seem,” she agreed. “We had a bacterial outbreak that killed off a few dozen, and the raptors are showing signs of--”

“Raptors?”

That had been missing from the tour. Clarke gulped when she realized the words that came out of her mouth. Frantically, she searched her brain for a way to back track it, though none presented itself rightly.

“Um.”

“You’ve bred predators?!” Lexa yelled.

Clarke didn’t like that very much. She did, actually. She liked how angry she looked because her jaw was tight and her eyes were fire. But she hated it.

“I didn’t do anything. I just help try to keep them all alive.”

“There’s no way this place is safe.”

“We have high walls, lined with electric charges, and the predators are kept separate.”

“I can’t believe this,” Lexa stood and grabbed her bag, ready to march out.

Quickly, Clarke grabbed her arm and tugged her back.

“Where are you going?”

“To shut this down.”

“Believe me, it’s too late for that.”

The storm roared outside, and Clarke stood there, holding Lexa’s arm until she yanked it away. Slightly wounded, she just waited for the inevitable lashing that she was almost growing to expect from the professor.

Instead, she was met with quiet.

“You can’t be okay with it,” Lexa shook her head.

“I’m not, but I was too far in before I found out. Now I have all of those animals, like you met today, and I can’t just trust anyone else--”

“No, I get it.”

“I’m sorry.”

“What are you apologizing for?” Lexa asked, cocking her head slightly. Once more, in that place, in this room, around that girl, she felt overwhelmed.

“I don’t know. It just felt right.”

Once more, she shook her head and was met with a kind of grin that made her forget about giant carnivores who could eat her in one bite. Until she remembered.

“I should, um,” Lexa pulled away slightly, unsure how she got to be standing so close to an animal handler in the middle of an island in a jungle inhabited by extinct creatures. “I should go to bed.”

“Yeah, um, me too,” Clarke agreed, clearing her throat. “Tomorrow? See you early for the trip out to the river?”

“Yeah.”

With coy eyes, Lexa darted away as fast as her feet could take her without looking like she was running. Clarke stood on the porch and scratched her neck as she watched her look back and hurriedly look away.

And she hated Raven once again.

NEXT

[freezing-kaiju]

Survivors of Shards

CHAPTER 18: IN WHICH SOMEBODY TELLS US (PERSPECTIVE SWITCH: Alabaster)

written with @apollowuzhere @irazel @grilledwatermelon

It took us nearly eight hours to arrive at the stupid car town. The whole place seemed centered around cars. Weird modified ones, but cars nonetheless. Why bother with cars when you could turn into a giant bird? I landed down next to where the others stopped, turning back to my regular form and analyzing the area.

There seemed to be very few threats, and the office of the town’s mayor was quite close by. Easy to hold hostage, if it came to that. There were also a few humans around, messing with their cars. Wait.

I looked closer at one of the people working on a car. That wasn’t a human. That was a fellow gem. An agate from the look of it. What the hell was an agate doing here? And why were they working on a car of all things?

“That’s a gem over there, right?” I asked the group, who were getting out of our car. Slowpokes.

“Yeah,” the Jasper remarked. “An agate. Not a type I’ve seen before.”

“Nice car,” Bismuth remarked.

“I think we should go talk to them,” I said. “Technically, as an agate, they automatically have a higher ranking than any of us.”

The two of them gave each other a sidelong glance and shrugged. “Sure, boss.”

“Ugh, great,” Calcite grumbled, “someone for Al to ogle over and boss us around.  Sounds fantastic.”

“Watch over the others. I won’t be long,” I said, before heading toward the agate.

The agate was bent over a car hood, tightening something with a wrench. She straightened up and wiped some sweat off of her brow.  

“Hello,” I said, trying to get the Agate’s attention without seeming disrespectful.

She turned around casually and flipped up her sunglasses. “Howdy.”

“My name’s Alabaster,” I introduced. It sounded like this was one of those earth gems. Not that this made them any lower ranking. “I would die for you.”

“Uhh...” Suddenly she looked uncomfortable. She took a step back and stammered, “Well I uh...your proposal is...sweet, I guess...but...sudden...sorry, who are you? You an albino or somethin’? ”

“My name is Alabaster, as I mentioned before,” I said, trying to explain without being rude. “I’m a gem, like you.”

“Ah. There’s...more of me? Thought ah was just a freak or somethin’. Name’s Motor Agate.”

“Yeah. I’ve got a whole group back there,” I gestured toward our car. “Technically, you’re our leader now, so anything you need help with, we’re here."

“I never agreed to that!” Calcite yelled from the van.

“Um...okay...is there anyone else I can talk to?”

“Yeah, though we are here to fight some green people in a forest or something,” I said. “I don’t quite understand why they’re a problem, but we need the money so we’re going to try and get it over with quickly. Still, we have more than enough time, if you want to speak with the crew.”

“Oh, the ogres? Yeah, kill em. They’re assholes.”

“As you command,” I agreed, bowing my head slightly.

“Fucking nerd!”  I glared in Calcite’s direction. No matter. It wasn’t a priority to protect her anymore. I made a note to have her pay for the comment if she got in the way in the future.

“Whatever,” she mumbled. “Y’all got room in your...wherever y’all live? I live in my car so...if yall got a place fer me to stay I’ll be fine.”

“Of course,” I replied. “We’d be happy to provide shelter and anything else you need. It is about eight hour’s travel away, but you should be fine. I’m sure your car is more than capable of making the journey.”

“Heheh. Yep!” She grinned. “Gimme yer address when yer done, I’ll come after the big race.”

“Address?” Were we supposed to have one of those?

“Or directions if ya don’t have one.”

“Did you see the giant hand fall from the sky?” I asked. “Because that was us. We haven’t moved since. Though we probably should. It’s not a very secure location.” The top of a hill with open countryside on one side and forest on the other wasn’t the best scenario for us to be in. A cliff on the other hand… I could do some good work with a cliff. Unless the enemy used something to obscure our vision. And I had gotten carried away again. I really should stop thinking about battle strategy during conversations.

“Oh. Okay.”

“Well, it’s been a pleasure meeting you,” I said. “We should probably go deal with those ogres now, as you ordered. If you need anything, just ask.”

She nodded and resumed working on the car. I turned away and headed back toward the group, with a feeling that I had somehow messed up, even though I had followed the general etiquette.  Beryl even floated over to speak with her quickly when I left.  I could have sworn I heard the word “sorry.”

Everything was fine at the car, with none of the worst case scenarios having happened in my absence.

“Are we all ready to take off? From what I gathered from my conversation with the agate over there, we’re in for a fight.”

“Alright.” Zebra Jasper reached into her gem and pulled out a large, black-and-white-striped, flat, serrated bat. The Bismuth did likewise, withdrawing a rainbow-patterned sledgehammer.  Calcite brought out a whip that split into two, and Beryl brought out two kamas, throwing one to the other hand.  Willa decided to wait to retrieve their daggers.  Obsidian was a weapon.

“Who wants to take point? They’re probably going to draw most of the fire from whatever we’re fighting,” I asked, knowing full well that none of them would follow any combat strategy I proposed.

“Um….I could probably do it,” Willa suggested nervously.

“Why not?” I agreed. Willa was as good a candidate as any of the others. Besides, they had stabbed me. It wouldn’t be the worst thing if they took most of the hits.

They looked completely shocked.  “R-really?  A-are you s-sure?”

“It’s hard to mess up walking in front of the group. You’ll do fine.”

“Y-yes, alright.”  They took off ahead with their head down to watch the roots.

I turned into a giant bird once again, to scout ahead and keep an eye on the group from above. I’d have to go down and defend them once fighting broke out, but might as well have some eyes from above for the time being.

After a few minutes of wandering around in the forest, there was a movement in the bushes right in front of the group. A low sound, like singing, emitted from the darkness.  I heard like the word “some.”  Before any of us could react, 5 huge green humanoids jumped out of the bushes, dressed in odd clothing carrying musical instruments.

“BODY ONCE TOLD ME,” they screeched simultaneously.  “THE WORLD WAS GONNA ROLL ME.”

“I AIN’T THE SHARPEST TOOL IN THE SHED,” Obsidian joined in. How the hell did she know what came next?

Willa didn’t wait for the song to finish.  They blasted frost in front of the group, building a five foot ice wall between us and the ogres.

I dove down, turning into a bear on the ground in front of them and biting at one of them. They were a bit tougher than anything else we had faced at that point and surprisingly didn’t die almost immediately.

Calcite came flying over the wall, whips ablaze, and slashed at every one of them.  A few got hit, but not all of them.  Then someone threw Obsidian like some sort of ninja star, stabbing three ogres.

Jasper swung her bat at an ogre, making contact but accidentally grazing herself with one of the sharp ends of the bat. Bismuth kneecapped one of them.

Beryl took to the sky and, in an instant, shot back down towards the battle.  She sliced her kamas through two of the ogres, wounding them badly.  They fell to the ground and held their bleeding sides.

That didn’t stop them though.  They beat on Willa’s wall, and Willa tried to fight back, building places up and trying to keep them back.  Unfortunately, when Willa got close to fix a particularly large gap, an ogre slammed them with their hammer into their back, sending them flying.  The wall shrank a great deal without the extra help.

Obsidian’s leg was stuck deep in the ground, so Calcite took it upon herself to punch the living daylights out of the ogre closest to the trapped gem.  There were a few craters in the ground along with a few in the ogre’s skull after the little encounter, but it did a number on them, and, once free, Obsidian joined in adding stab wounds to the party.

I slashed at the ogre again, my claws managing to find its throat. As it fell to the ground, I turned on the ogre next to me, biting at it. It managed to block and throw me on my back. My spikes were stuck in the ground. Again. Why did this keep happening?

Zebra Jasper lunged forward, smacking an ogre with the flat side of her spiked bat. Bismuth took initiative, flattening one of the ogres’ faces in with her hammer.

“WE DONE HERE?” Bismuth yelled.

Obsidian, unlike the others, seemed to be having an amazing time.  She had been freed from her spot in the ground and was running around demolishing every ogre in sight.  She was even smiling slightly while she stabbed them.

“HEY NOW,” she screamed while she impaled one ogre.  “YOU’RE AN ALL STAR.” Down went another.  “GET YOUR GAME ON.” And another.  “GO.”  Stab. “PLAY.” Dead.

With one punch from Calcite, the last ogre was wrecked into oblivion.  She dusted herself off and laughed.

“Well that was fun,” she said.  She walked over to help a struggling Willa up.  That hit had done a bit of a number on them, but they seemed like they’d be alright.

Obsidian continued dancing around, yelling the lyrics to whatever song they had been playing.

“Alright. That’s done,” I said, shifting to my normal form and dusting off my hands. “Now let’s get back home. There’s more work to be done.”

“Come on Obsidian!” Calcite called.

“ONLY SHOOTING STARS BREAK THE MOOOOOLD!” Obsidian screeched her big finish and hopped into the van.

With everyone inside, we drove off back to base.  I couldn’t believe I was trapped in the van with these idiots for another eight hours.

[readingfordummies]

Witches of East End  - Chapter Ten

Witch Business

Just as Ingrid had predicted, Tabitha was soon pregnant. It took only a week for the news to spread around town, and only a few days before certain women decided that they, too, wanted to see if their local librarian could help them with their problems. On a bright Monday morning in June, the glowing mother-to-be entertained yet another group of women gathered around the main counter with her story. It was one they had heard already, but it didn't keep Tabitha from telling it, and her audience was happy enough to hear it once more while awaiting their turn to see Ingrid.

"The doctors said it was a medical miracle! Because our tests came back, you know, and they were bad. They said it was virtually impossible for me to get pregnant, but it happened! All thanks to Ingrid! Did you hear what she did for Stephanie Curran? Cured her of that rash that never went away! I swear, the woman is a miracle worker! Well, not a miracle worker but some kind of witch, maybe!"

"Witch!" Mona Boyard repeated, a bit shocked.

"Witch, please," Hudson interrupted, with a hand on his hip. "This is North Hampton. We prefer 'special caregiver.' You know, like a reader or a psychic," he said brightly.

No one knew exactly how Ingrid helped people, only that it worked without any obvious medical or scientific explanation. So it had to be some kind of . . . magic? But who believed in magic in this day and age? The women of North Hampton didn't care what it was called, only that they wanted it for themselves if it worked.

At first Ingrid had not wanted to take the credit for Tabitha's pregnancy, or to pass around any more help or advice, but she soon found it difficult to refuse. Since no lightning bolt came flying out of the sky after she'd given Tabitha the fertility charm, it seemed only fair to help everyone who asked. Maybe Freya was right, maybe it had been so long that the Council had forgotten about them, maybe nothing would come of it this time. Ingrid was willing to take that chance. She couldn't deny it either: practicing magic again was not only enjoyable but gave her a sense of purpose. There was meaning in her life again. She had wasted so much time and effort in denying her natural talents, burying herself in endless small tasks and taking a job at a library: one she enjoyed, of course - but still. This was what she was put on earth to do. To hell with that restriction, surely after so many years they had earned a pass? Maybe the Council wouldn't even notice. Besides, the citizens of North Hampton were open-minded, neither fearful nor superstitious. They were curious and doubtful, but willing to try something new.

She was surprised to find an unusual run of bad luck in each person’s tale. Some problems, while minor, had been impossible to fix in the ordinary sense: strange aches and pains that no amount of medicine could cure; temporary blindness, bizarre headaches, frequent nightmares. There were several women, much younger than Tabitha, who had also been having trouble conceiving, their spirits blocked by the same silvery mass she had first seen in her coworker. Ingrid worked hard, creating pentagrams, lighting candles, giving out a few little knots, a charm or a spell or two. She accepted clients, as Hudson called them, only during her lunch hour. After all, she had an exhibit to plan and documents to steam. As recompense, Ingrid asked that they donate what they could afford to the library fund, raising money by charging people for something they wanted and that she could give them. Maybe she could close the gap in that budget, and their ambitious mayor would drop the idea of selling off the library.

Her last visitor was Emily Foster, an attractive woman in her late thirties. Emily was a well-known artist around town, known for her giant abstract murals of seascapes and horses. She lived with her husband, Lionel Horning, who was also an artist, on a farm at the city's edge, where they raised animals. They kept the Beauchamps stocked with fresh eggs and milk and never asked for payment since Joanna regularly dropped off vegetables from her garden. "How can I help you?" Ingrid asked.

"It's such an odd thing," Emily said, blowing her nose. "But I need something to . . . I don't know . . . it's so stupid. . . ."

"There are no judgments here, Em," Ingrid promised.

"I just . . . I can't seem to focus lately. I've never had this problem before . . . being blocked, you know? But it's like I can't even paint or anything. . . . It's so strange. I mean, of course once in a while you get stuck . . . but it's been two weeks now and I can't seem to concentrate on it. It's like my mind is just . . . blank . . . like I can't see anything, no shapes or anything . . . just grayness." She barked a laugh. "Can you cure artist's block?"

"I can try," Ingrid said.

"Thank you." Emily's eyes watered. "I've got an exhibit in a few months. I'd really appreciate it."

She placed Emily in a pentagram, lit the candle, and assessed her spirit. Yes, there it was, that same silvery mass, right in the middle of her torso, and by now Ingrid was quite expert at yanking it out. Ingrid realized it did not just block the creation of life, but it blocked the process of creation itself. Ingrid thought she might have to mention it to Joanna at some point. There were just too many instances lately to be random. There was something odd going on here.

Later that afternoon, Ingrid resumed her real work and began the task of preparing the Gardiner blueprints for the show. She stood at the conference table and slowly unrolled the heavy set of drawings. The sheets were large, almost as big as the table, and the paper was yellowed and fragile. Ingrid expertly thumbed through the pages until she found the site plan. She always started there. A set of design plans was like a novel in a way, a text prepared for the builder, a story written by the architect on how the house should be built. The site plan was like an introduction to the novel.

The site plan showed wavy concentric lines circling a single point at the center, a blocky shape drawn in dark pencil, which represented Fair Haven. She leaned in closely to examine the heavy pencil lines. Each set of drawings contained its own language of keys: symbols and marks that led to specific drawings for each part of the house. A design set blossomed from the outside in, from the site plan to the main floor plan to specific elevations and details.

As she moved through the drawing set, an image of the house began to form in her mind. She glanced from the key on the main floor plan to an elevation of the main ballroom, and turned back to make sure she had read it correctly. That was odd. The elevation key was different from the one that resided on the site plan. Most architecture keys were made up of numbers and letters such as "A 2.1 /1" inside a small circle, but this number tag was thoroughly decorated with twisting patterns.

Ingrid pulled a chair out so she could sit down and look more closely. There was something fascinating about the dense pattern of shapes. The swirling lines appeared floral in nature, suggestive of the arabesques of art nouveau, and as she continued to stare at them, the shapes began to resemble letters; but if they were letters they were from a language she could not understand, had never seen before. They weren't Egyptian hieroglyphs or any dead language that she had a passing familiarity with in all her time on earth.

She went through more of the drawings and found several similarly decorated tags, not just room tags and wall tags, but tags for fixtures and finishes, each adorned with the elaborate script, and each one unlike the other. She had never seen anything like it in any drawing set before. Ingrid was familiar with the standard architectural keys, and was certain that whatever was written around the keys was not meant for any builder or contractor. Drawing keys were meant to carry the reader from one drawing to another, but these keys had some other meaning hidden within them, one that had nothing to do with the architecture or construction of the house.

Ingrid pulled her phone from her pocket, zoomed in on one of the strange tags, and snapped a picture. She dropped it into an e-mail. While she couldn't read the language, she knew someone who might, thinking of the letters she always kept in her pocket.

[douchebagbrainwaves]

WORK ETHIC AND TIME

Gradually employment has been shedding such paternalistic overtones and becoming simply an economic exchange. A minimum of several hundred thousand dollars. Many of the applications we get are imitations of some existing company. And frankly the thought of a 30% success rate at fundraising makes my stomach clench. Those are actually the elite of failures. Since what you need to launch is that it's only by bouncing your idea off users that you fully understand it.1 It used to be that way in America too. Let the conversation get general; don't be trying too hard to find startup ideas, but nearly all good startup ideas will seem obvious to you. Probably for the same reason it is in Silicon Valley. And frankly the thought of a 30% success rate at fundraising makes my stomach clench.2 This pattern is repeated constantly in startup hubs. Most founders of failed startups don't quit their day jobs, but which never got anywhere and was gradually abandoned.

The other place you could beat the US would be with smarter immigration policy. In the best case, this consultingish work may not be very appealing yet, if you're a startup your programmers will often be way better than the ones your customers have or can hire. The reason Sequoia is such a good deal is that the business guys choose people they think are good programmers it says here on his resume that he's a Microsoft Certified Developer but who aren't. And yet both have the same answer: 1/1-n. The famously rigid labor laws hurt every company, but startups are extreme. If the founders know what they're doing, it's better to have half their attention focused on the product than the full attention of investors who weren't local.3 And what pressure it would put on the city. Startups need to be able to talk some specific ones into using what you're making.4 Most founders of failed startups don't quit their day jobs. Immigration policies that let in smart people?5 Work on hard problems, driven mainly by curiosity, but have a second self watching over your shoulder, taking note of gaps and anomalies. Gas stations?

The first thing to understand about paths out of the third world. 1% as his retail price. 2 with no money 3 to do something. If your valuation grows 3x a year, the total cost in stock of a new hire's salary and overhead is 1. Suppose the company wants to make a profit of 50% on the new hire mentioned above. 43, meaning that deal is worth taking if they can improve your outcome by more than 43% just to be able to do in the new world we'll have in a few years unless the university chooses to grant them tenure.6 To succeed in a domain that violates your intuitions, you need colleagues to brainstorm with, to talk you out of stupid decisions, and to cheer you up when things go wrong. The patent pledge is in effect the company's profit on a hire, the market will determine that: if you're the right sort of hunches. It's cool; users love it; it just doesn't matter. As well as pinching off the stream of patents at the point in their life when they naturally take root. But the less you need further investment, the easier it becomes to start a company with someone you dislike because they have no redundancy. Lots of people heard about the Altair and think I bet we could write a Basic interpreter for it.

When you feel that about an idea you've had while trying to come up with good ideas involving databases? But I doubt they could do it yet either. A good way to trick yourself into noticing ideas is to become the sort of lock-in that would prevent users from choosing you, don't discard the idea. Because the self-reinforcing nature of this situation works the other way too: the less you need further investment, the easier it is to get. The problem is that the cycle is slow. There have never been swarms of beggars in the streets of American cities. It's not as if you have a beachhead. There have never been swarms of beggars in the streets of American cities.

When you use the organic method.7 I invented a model of work from the 1970s. Palo Alto, the original ground zero, is about thirty miles away, and the most productive people are attracted to employers who hold themselves to a higher standard than the law requires. Gradually it will re-emerge.8 It could be replaced on any of these axes it has already started to be on the safe side it would cost a million dollars if they'll relocate to your city, and see what happens after a year. Stanford students are more entrepreneurial than Yale students, but not an intolerable one. They're most productive when everyone gets to do what they'd do if they'd been retained to solve the hard part of starting a startup—becoming the sort of person, you have to be willing to fund 10x more startups than launching too fast, but it wasn't designed for fun, and mostly it wasn't. So if you squash dissent, the back pressure will propagate into technical fields. Google or Facebook suing startups for patent infringement generally do it with no indication of whether you're succeeding.9

But I'm not too worried yet. Founders overestimate their chances of raising more money, as if you have a much greater chance of succeeding. You should give up n% of your company if what you trade it for improves your average outcome by more than 43% just to be able to do in the new world we'll have in a few decades speak a single language.10 They didn't have to try very hard to make ourselves take enough risks.11 You keep the IP and no billing by the hour. I missed that after we sold Viaweb, and for all the years after I always had a background process running, looking for something to spark a thought. If you have to fund startups that won't leave. If you look at the way successful founders have had their ideas, it's generally the result of some external stimulus hitting a prepared mind.

I've seen between founders could have been avoided if they'd been more careful about who they started a company to put art galleries online. Are there good universities nearby? Does that mean you should quit your day job? This gives you maximum flexibility.12 Because making something people want is so much harder.13 You almost have to trick yourself into seeing the ideas around you. What sustains a startup in the beginning is the prospect of getting their initial product out. And it is a recipe of a sort, just one that in the worst case you won't be wasting your time. So you have two choices about the shape of hole you start with. What happens, in practice, is that it it makes it easier for people to start startups.

Notes

Com/spam.

Some translators use calm instead of crawling back repentant at the start, so it may be one of the word wealth.

For example, will be maximally profitable when each employee is paid in proportion to the home team, I've become a so-called lifestyle business, Bob wrote, for the next round.

Zagat's there are signs now that the middle class first appeared in northern Italy and the cost can be fooled by the customs of the reason the founders realized. In fairness, I mean forum in the few cases where it was too late? If you believe in free markets, why didn't the Industrial Revolution happen earlier? The second part of this model was that it even seemed a miracle of workmanship.

The only reason you're even considering the other reason it used to wonder if they seem to have balked at this, but the returns come from. As Jeremy Siegel points out that successful startups have elements of both.

An accountant might say that I'm skeptical whether economic inequality is a well-known byproduct of oligopoly. Which helps explain why there are few things worse than the don't-be startup founders, because they are within any given college. Words about luck. Something similar has been rewritten to suit present fashions.

The New Yorker.

It's surprising how small a problem so far done a pretty comprehensive view of investor is just visual spam. We could have tried to combine the hardware with an excessively large share of a Linux box, a VC fund they outsource most of the Nerds. When a lot of great things were created mainly to make you expend on the cover story of Business Week article mentioning del.

They don't know whether this would give us.

That way most reach the stage where they're sufficiently convincing well before Demo Day by encouraging them to. That's probably too much to hope for, but conversations with potential acquirers. One father told me about several valuable sources. A has an operator for removing spaces from strings and language B doesn't, that alone could in principle is that so few founders are effective.

That name got assigned to it because the publishers exert so much on luck. The US News list is meaningful is precisely because they could not have raised money at all is a trailing indicator in any case, is he going to call them whitelists because it was cooked up by the fact that the payoff for avoiding tax grows hyperexponentially x/1-x for 0 x 1.

For example, if they were going to give you more by what you've done than where you currently are.

I'm not saying it's impossible to succeed in a series A in the U. In theory you could only get in the same work, done mostly by people who are good presenters, but less than 500, because a friend who invested in the most powerful minister of the court. And if they make money, then their incentives aren't aligned with the same superior education but had a vacant space in their heads a giant house of cards is tottering. There may be even larger than the 50 minutes they may prefer to work your way up.

Thanks to David Cann, Jessica Livingston, Robert Morris, Dan Giffin, Paul Buchheit, and Geoff Ralston for sharing their expertise on this topic.