fandomhighdorms | Magic Reserves, Wenesday Afternoon, The Preserve

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Magic Reserves, Wenesday Afternoon, The Preserve

When people began arriving at the meeting today, they would see that things were a bit different than usual today. For one thing, the snack table has it's usual assortment of warm beverages, but was missing the normal variety of snacks and there were a ~~handwavey~~ number of wooden chests piled off to the side, each one sporting a heavy iron padlock on the front.

"Greetings," Karla said, looking a bit more composed than she had at the last meeting. "We've got a fair bit to do today, so we should probably get started quickly. First, we have a talk from Tara, who was kind enough to volunteer this week," she paused to give Tara a grateful smile, "and then, we have an activity."

Merlin nodded and stepped forward. "Inside these chests is... pie." Oh, it was so spooky and magical sounding. "But, as you see, they're rather firmly locked up. So, the exercise today will be to get the contents of the box--unharmed--using whatever skills you have at your
disposal."

Mmm, pie. "Fresh-baked," Tony added. "And if you get one out, it's all yours."

Karla was really regretting that the three of them hadn't had enough time to bake the pies themselves, but hopefully J,GoB pies would be an acceptable substitute. "So, let's give Tara our attention--and a pie of her own for volunteering--and then we'll see how well your pie-retrieving skills are."

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Chortling, Dinah re-focused again, and said absently as she slipped the paperclip into the lock, "Okay, Madame Magic 8-Ball. Can you see how much fun I had this weekend? Or is that cheating 'cause I already know the answer?"

"I can see that with my magic 8-ball eyes," Francine answered. "Just from the look on your face. What all did you do?"

"Ooo, what didn't we do?" Dinah sat back on her heels for a second to burble. "Swimming! Rock climbing on ruins! Flying motorcycle! Jumping off tall things hanging onto Jak! He has superpowers at home, it was incredible."

Plus, smoochies. Heh.

"Flying motorcycle?" Oh God, do not tell Arthur such a thing exists, Dinah.

Not until or unless she gets one to gloat over him with, anyway.

"It's called a zoomer? It has a propeller and this kind of drive to it, but basically it's the size of a motorcyle, except it flies. Jak let me drive it." Dinah grinned hugely at the memory. Bounce! "There was a racecourse there, we busted the track time, I wanted to keep doing it forever." She sighed happily, and finally triggered the lock on the chest.

Francine was glad she'd had such a good time, but couldn't stop being Francine. "You wore helmets, right?"

"...we didn't get hurt?"

That's not a yes, Dinah.

"Ooo, look! Apple!"

"Diiiiiinah! I like your brains inside your head. Mmm, apple."

"Me too! On both!" Dinah sat down and carefully started to cut up the pie with a plastic fork. "It's just, we kind of got ahead of ourselves. Having fun. Jumping off things." Dinah grinned dorkily at the memory. "Jak has good arms."

Francine grinned. "For jumping off things, or for looking at?"

"Both!" Dinah squinched up her eyes at Francine, trying not to laugh. "Both, okay?" She nibbled on the apple, and muttered, "Good kisser too."

"Oh ho ho ho ho, I see how it is. You went all the way to another... what, planet, dimension? Just so you could get smoochies without the squirrels reporting about it."

"No!" Dinah squeaked around a mouthful of apple. Then she blinked. "...maybe?" Did that make her a bad person, or just a really paranoid one, that it looked like a good idea in retrospect?

"Trust me - there are days when it seems like a great idea to me."

"Yeahhh," Dinah said mournfully. Worries of telekinesis moments during rather close quarters came right after the squirrels in her list of concerns there. At least that hadn't happened yet? "Is it wrong, that I wonder if that sixth floor room would be... off limits?"

Francine blinked at her for a moment. "The kitchen?"

What - it was her favorite room on the 6th floor.

Dinah laughed, then said, "No. And not the ball pit, either! There's a, um. Isolation room. Up there. For telepaths or people having issues...."

Yeah, making out-- or anything else-- probably didn't count, hunh.

"Ohhhh, that room. Yeah, that's probably not what they had in mind." Francine broke off a bit of pie with her fork and studied it, which made for a nifty lack of eye contact. "The Arms has, um. Nice rooms." Said not at all wistfully, no.

"Really?" The squeak might've been back in her voice, and suddenly Dinah felt a wave of Awkward, for a lot of reasons: Francine and Merlin's break up, the fact that it was way too soon to be considering this, really, the slight fear she still had for furniture in her vicinity.... Dinah took another bite of pie to try and ride it out, before muttering, "Not that... I mean. It's new. Way new. I just." She sighed. "It feels like you have to plan everything out, you know, not to get incredibly embarrassed or caught in the middle of an earthquake around here. No romantic swept-away-in-the-moment stuff on Crazy Island."

"Well," Francine said slowly, catching that wave too, though only a little for the breakup compared to Things She Hadn't Talked About Yet To People Not Involved In Them, "Crazy Island has like... two hundred people crammed into a space that's smaller than some apartment complexes I've seen in Texas, and everybody's... well, a lot of people, are really close, from going through all those earthquakes together. It's not so surprising that we're all in each other's business."

"Yeeeeah." Dinah sighed, put the pie down for a second, and felt the sudden urge to hug Francine for telling her about the Arms, for talking to her about this. "I don't want to, you know. Rub your nose in this, after you and Merlin's... ending. I won't talk about it if you don't want, sometimes." Francine seemed pretty okay with it right now, but it needed to be said. "Did you have a good Halloween and Samhain?"

Francine had two options for replying to that question. One was open her mouth, look troubled for a second, and sigh deeply. The other was laughter, drier than Arrakis, but genuine, at least. She went with Door Number Two.

"Merlin turned Katchoo into a bunny."

"He what? Why!? He has got to quit doing that," Dinah said, totally distracted now. "Punishing people with animal transformations is going to get him the wrong kind of rep!"

"He wasn't!" As far as she knew, anyway. "He did it to keep her from--" I thought of something that couldn't hurt you and it came out bunny... "--doing something dumb. Raven was accidentally making people love her, and Katchoo got caught up in it."

Blink. Blink. Blinkity. Owl Eyes. Because... whoa.

"... that was probably a smart thing to do."

Because look! Raven was still alive!

Magic Reserves, Wenesday Afternoon, The Preserve

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