Main Campfire, Saturday... Noonish

[lockestheway]

Peter had actually gotten up a hell of a lot earlier that morning (to talk to Val about their strategies for tomorrow's essays, obviously) but since it was a Saturday, he had a hunch the other students would still be in their nests. He didn't make it out for breakfast - or really, brunch - until noon as a result, and walked the extra few feet to the main campfire just to keep things even.

He lit up the campfire with a brief thought towards little firebug Val, tossed a bag of marshmallows aside, and began to pry open the plastic packaging on a bunch of hotdogs. Combined with the buns, he'd be having brunch just fine, thanks, and might draw out some of the more interesting people around here.

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[shes-got-legs.livejournal.com]

Half the time, Ariel didn't bother sleeping in, because it was just too much time to waste that could be used exploring. Besides, she'd gotten into the habit of sneaking out in the wee hours of the morning when it was less likely she'd be caught.

So it was a returning Ariel, dusty from the wild west with her satchel full of prizes, that rambled toward the campfire. She was drawn in, first and foremost, by her stomach, which caught the promise of roasting hot dogs in the air, and then her eagerness to check things out grew with the sight of who was already there.

"Oh, perfect!" she gushed, grinning brightly as she plopped down next to Peter. "What've we got? I'm starving."

[dollpocalypse]

Noonish was a little on the early side for Topher to be waking up, but by some freak accident, he managed it. He ambled out to the campfire still in his pajamas, all the while wondering if he smelled hot dogs.

"Oh, hey," he yawned as he took a seat on one of the logs.

[lockestheway]

"We've got some hotdogs and some buns," Peter said, barely managing not to snicker at his own little innuendo there. He threw the bag of buns in her direction.

He still managed to avoid laughing.

[lockestheway]

"Topher," Peter greeted, with one quirk of his eyebrow. "Good to see you back in the right size and shape. Well, comparatively speaking."

[shes-got-legs.livejournal.com]

Ariel caught the bag easily enough, with a little smirk of her own as she gave it a critical look. "Mm, nice buns, Peter," she remarked, because she couldn't not. Buns, like legs, were a part of human anatomy that would continue to be utterly fascinating to her until the end of time. "Any fixings?"

[dollpocalypse]

"So witty," Topher assured him, voice laden with heavy sarcasm. "Can I get one?" he asked, indicating the hot dogs.

[lockestheway]

"You'll have to bring your own," Peter said, sticking his sausage - snicker - further over the fire. "I'm afraid I'm all out."

[lockestheway]

"Oh, I know I am," Peter said. Smugly. "But knock yourself out." He tossed the package at Topher. "Been up to anything interesting lately?"

[shes-got-legs.livejournal.com]

"That's okay," said Ariel, easily finding her own stick for toasting, because she'd had a favorite and she put it in a special spot so it would always be there when she made it to the main campfire. "I guess I'll just have to make up for it with extra hot dogs."

That was just an ordinary giggle there, really.

"How's it been, Peter?"

[lockestheway]

"Oh, you know, nothing has blown up and no one has turned into anything they're not," Peter said, projecting more above-it-all than he really felt about the whole situation. "I've been thinking about buying a Stetson. I think I'd fit in mighty fine with a Stetson..."

[dollpocalypse]

Topher set to work putting a hot dog on a stick. It was surprisingly challenging to get the angle right, but he managed it.

"Oh, you know, not too much," he said. "Some crazy chick went all vampire on me and bit me last week. And my computer teacher wants us to carry around these little fake pets, or whatever."

Both were equally distressing.

[lockestheway]

Peter pulled a face he hoped looked sympathetic. "Someone bit you?" he said, "Did you get that checked for rabies? Because I'm not sticking around if you start foaming at the mouth."

[dollpocalypse]

Topher was... going to go ahead and hope that rabies was a dealbreaker for students applying to Fandom.

"Well, let me know if I do," he said dryly. "I'll be sure to head toward the cabins."

[lockestheway]

"Good," Peter said, and added, like the loving, emphatic man he was, "If you're going to bite someone, bite someone who isn't me."

Really. So sympathetic.

"So-- what, do you have a pet rock now? Oooh, or an egg. Please tell me it's a pet egg."

[shes-got-legs.livejournal.com]

"A Stetson, huh?" Ariel asked, tilting her head and looking at Peter as if picturing one perched on his head. She nodded. "I think that'd be a great idea. Might even be able to get one at an exceptionally good price at Pixie Dust on say, I don't know, Tuesday?"

Something else got her attention, though. "No one's turned into anything they're not? You mean, recently? Because that was so not the case last weekend, or did you miss that?"

[lockestheway]

"I'm just counting by the last couple of days," Peter explained. "I think it preserves the sanity better that way. One weekend at a time, if you will."

[dollpocalypse]

"I wish," Topher replied. "An egg, I could just swap for a new one. These are these little keychain monsters that whine at me when they want food or sleep or whatever."

He was not proud to say that in the day since the assignment had been given, he'd already gone through nine of them. It really would be quite disappointing if he ended up failing Computers 101, all things considered.

[shes-got-legs.livejournal.com]

Ariel nodded, carefully keeping an eye on her roasting wiener in the fire. "That makes sense," she said, in the tone of someone who felt she had a much better threshold for testing sanity than just a few measly days. "Did you change into anyone last weekend? I was still someone named Ariel, and still a princess, but I looked different and had magical powers and apparently some friends named Thundarr and Ookla."

[lockestheway]

"Oh, god, like one of those Japanese electronic monster things?" Peter cracked up - see our earlier note re: his very empathic nature - and grinned at Topher. "It's going to be very sad if that makes you fail Computers 101 after all the shit you've shown you're capable of pulling."

[lockestheway]

"No, I just stumbled into someone who had," Peter said, but didn't elaborate, because there was something much more important to harp on about. "Thundarr and Ookla? What, did they hail from the depths of the rainforest?"

[dollpocalypse]

"Right? Right?" he exclaimed. Clearly they were brain twins, because Topher was positive that this kind of irony would be hilarious if it were anyone other than himself.
"Like, I could make him an electronic monster if he wants one so bad," he continued. "But keeping one alive? That's just annoying."

[shes-got-legs.livejournal.com]

"No," said Ariel, her big blue eyes lighting up. "The future! Apparently, two thousand years ago, some planet caused the moon to smash into a thousand pieces, knocking the earth's gravity all out of whack and creating natural disasters to destroy nearly everything. But civilization apparently survived and grew. I was some sorceress from a long line of knowledgeable magic users; Thundarr was a barbarian, and Ookla was something called a Mok, and they all rode horses and stuff. It was pretty cool."

[lockestheway]

"A post-apocalyptic future," Peter said, pulling his hotdog out of the fire. "Now there's something no one has ever come up with before." He snagged a bun and began the process of shoving the wiener in the bun.

... Snicker.

"Where does the island get this stuff?"

[lockestheway]

"Can't you just crack the damn thing and program it so it doesn't die?" Peter said, sensibly.

This was the guy who was going to wind up with a dozen kids some day. Fear.

[dollpocalypse]

Huh. That was... really smart.

"Oh yeah," he said, as though suddenly remembering that that was what he was good at. "I should do that."

For someone as cocky as he was, he really had issues with knowing his own strength. It was a character flaw that would end up bringing the apocalypse.