fandomhigh | Fandom High Welcome Picnic, Front Lawn of the School, All Day: Part I

Entry tags:

!event: welcome picnic

Fandom High Welcome Picnic, Front Lawn of the School, All Day: Part I

It was a new year, and with the new year came the new spring term, and Fandom High was all set to welcome its new students, along with those just returning from holiday trips home. It was a familiar setting for the latter bunch: there was the requisite bonfire, with tables and chairs scattered around it, as well as the buffet table with ~~moddable~~ warm food and drinks.

And of course, name tags and lists of Big and Little Siblings as well as roommates. Yep, the weather was okay (if snowy) for early January, and Fandom was all ready to celebrate the start of a new term.

[OCD up! This is part one of the picnic, specifically for meeting siblings, roommates, and teachers. The rest of the picnic is happening here. Since it's outside, the picnic is open to all students, teachers, and townies!]

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Oh, wasn't that just the cherry on top of the epic shit-sandwich that was today? Had Chuck's father really stalked him all the way out here to make sure he-- what, behaved?

Chuck had an exhausted Max resting in his arms, so he held off on confronting Herc for a whole whopping five minutes before giving in.

"Oi, old man!" he bellowed, stalking towards him. "Does the PPDC know you're skiving off?"

Max was the happiest dog in the world. He ripped the leash right out of Herc's suddenly-slack-with-shock hand and ran over to Chuck as fast as his little legs would carry him, barking excitedly, his entire butt wiggling with the force with which he wagged his little stub of a tail. Dad was back! DAD WAS BACK! He'd been gone for forever but now he was back, just like Max had always known he would be! And, sure, he didn't smell exactly the same, but he was Dad!

Herc, meanwhile, was just. Going to stare.

Say something, Hansen. Say anything.

"Chuck."

That word meant about a million things, really, my boy and you're dead and this cannot be happening, but it just came out stunned. There were so many things he would like to say to his son, but this Chuck was--fifteen, he had been fifteen when Herc got him Max for Christmas, and there was the puppy tucked in his arms--and he wouldn't understand.

Herc had never really known how to talk to his son, and that didn't seem to have changed, but he had to try again. "Chuck, I'm not--I'm not who you think I am," because he'd never sent his son to boarding school, unless the Jaeger Academy counted.

"What, is this Max's dad or something? You gone dog-mad on me?"

Of course Chuck ignored what Herc was saying in favor of squatting down to pat the older bulldog on the head. Scritch behind his ears. Tiny Max in his arms stirred enough to notice the other dog, stretching his tiny neck out in an effort to sniff the newcomer.

Chuck didn't even look up to get a glance at Herc's face, or he might have considered, just for a moment, actually paying some attention to his father's frame of mind.

"No, this is--this is Max. He just got older, is all." Herc got older, too. About twenty years in one split second, it felt like.

He was explaining this badly. What else was new?

What?

Chuck ceased the ridiculous amount of attention he was lavishing on the older dog a couple seconds later, then sat back. "I'm starting to wonder if they just slip something into the water 'round here," he said. "What the hell did you send me to?"

"I didn't send you here," Herc told him. "I'm not--I'm not your father. Not exactly. I mean, I am," God, that wasn't something he would ever want to deny, "but--did anyone tell you about this island? It's a bit weird." Understatement.

"Well, with the ren faire folks and the goths and whatever idiots dressed up those squirrels and my father suddenly insisting he isn't my father except he is and oh, Raleigh bloody Becket walking around--" Chuck stretched up, saddened puppy Max in his arms. "I really hadn't noticed!"

Edited 2014-01-04 22:09 (UTC)

Okay, so he'd seen Raleigh. Herc could work with this. "Did you happen to notice that Raleigh Becket looks a bit younger than you're used to? And that I'm older, and that these two dogs have the exact same markings? Look, the island's--it's a bit like the Breach, only so far it hasn't spit out any kaiju. It's a place where dimensions overlap. I'm from a different one. I never sent my--my son to boarding school, I'm pretty sure I would remember that."

That would imply Chuck had managed to find a break somewhere in his fit of angry ~~self-pity~~ self-righteousness to observe any of the listed items. Or Herc's state of mind, for that matter.

"Right," he said flatly. "Well, that explains it all, doesn't it?"

It really did, said a voice in the back of Chuck's brain, in a weird sort of way. He tried to ignore it. Something in Herc's tone of voice made that more difficult than it should've been.

Maybe it would've been better for everyone involved if Isabelle had punched him in the face after all.

Edited 2014-01-04 22:26 (UTC)

"Not all of it," Herc said, his voice a little rough. Then he cleared his throat and said, working for normal, "This place will always manage to surprise you." And right now it had him on the ropes.

"C'mere, Max," he tried. The dog glanced at him and went right back to beaming up at Chuck with pure doggish devotion. Even if Chuck had gone and gotten another him somewhere. Why did you go and do that for, Chuck, wasn't Max good enough?

That glimpse of roughness in Herc's voice was downright unnerving. Shame about that, too, because Chuck had had a nice riot act prepared to read him about this place.

"He likes me better than you," he said instead, squatting back down. "Don't you, boy?"

He scrunched up his nose at the older dog. Reached out and scritched him behind the ears again. There. That felt-- better. Under the current unnerving circumstances. "'s good to see you too, whoever you are," he informed... the dog, of course.

"I told you," Herc said, a little irritated, "he's Max." As if to confirm it, the dog looked over at him when he said his name.

He wasn't touching the part about Max liking Chuck better; that had always been true. He was Chuck's dog, after all. Herc was just the one left.

"Whatever," Chuck said, with an idle roll of his eyes. He patted Max's cheek. "You stick with the old man, make sure he doesn't lose more of his marbles."

He'd sort this insanity out some other time. He'd managed to go most of the day without getting rattled and now that streak was in danger of ending and he didn't like it one bit.

Edited 2014-01-04 22:53 (UTC)

"C'mere, Max," Herc said gruffly, and this time Max did as he was told.

Herc needed a drink. Herc needed all of the drinks.

"I'll, ah...I guess I'll see you around, then."

"Well, thanks to you-- not-you, whatever-- I'm stuck here until the end of the semester, so yeah, sure."

Right, this picnic thing was over. Chuck needed a drink. The kind he technically wasn't allowed to drink.

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Fandom High Welcome Picnic, Front Lawn of the School, All Day: Part I

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