fandomhigh | Wednesday Afternoon Assembly, Wednesday, December 9, 2020

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!event: assembly

Wednesday Afternoon Assembly, Wednesday, December 9, 2020

Today the students were meeting Anakin in front of Portalocity. "I am your special guest speaker today," he said, "and so I am going to provide an introduction to this festive winter season. The best way I can think of is to, frankly, not be on this island. We need to go to the heart of the action."

He looked decidedly unthrilled. "We're going to a mall."

In 1993.

"In a slightly different timeline," he added. "We will first help out packing up baskets for the holidays for people who are food insecure--" Anakin remembered too well what that felt like, "--and then we will be going to a mall to shop for gifts--credits will be provided--for ~~moddable~~ children at the shelter. And you can stand in line and meet Santa."

That red-coated weirdo.

"I am here to answer any questions."

Yes, ask the guy from another galaxy about this holiday. It'll go well!

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Outside the Portalocity office. How novel!

Buying gifts for children with someone else's money was definitely an activity Wei Wuxian could get behind, but he was still a little unclear on the local traditions. "Who's Santa?"

"He's a big, fat man in red and white who spends all year watching us to judge if we're good or bad," Nina explained. "And then, like, if you've been good on December 25th, you'll have presents from him!!!!!!!!!!"

She considered that.

"He's like a really weird twist on the radio squirrels?????? Only instead of drunk notes all year it's presents once a year!!!!!!!!"

See, the thing was, Nina had read all the books about him and knew he wasn't real in most world but... he could be real here and that was his M.O.

"What happens if you're bad? And, uh, what counts as bad?" Wei Wuxian asked. Raising an army of human puppets probably counted as bad, huh.

Could it really be called an assembly if it was more of a field trip?

Well, they were aseembling for it, so that was enough to satisfy Astrid's own particular brand of pendantry. She liked the idea of helping at the food bank more than the idea of the mall, though, and wondered if the kids would also like having their portraits drawn or something.

There was definitely a selfish part of Troy that felt it was unfair that a kid who never got to have Christmas presents was now buying Christmas presents for kids who also didn't get Christmas presents, and if that meant that he could get away with maybe sneaking in a Christmas present for himself in there...

On the one hand, Wayne didn't much care fer kids.

On the other hand, this was fer the charitables, and he was always in support of the charitables.

So overall, he couldn't help but approve of this particular assembly, even if he was mostly just hoping he didn't have to actually deal with the kids too much in the meantime...

"Can we, like, do shopping for other people too???????????" Nina asked, because why not multi-task?

"If you have time after you've gotten something for your youngling, then yes," Anakin said.

Nina's eyes were serious even as she smiled.

"I would never neglect my youngling," she promised.

She wouldn't. Nina had too many years of being that child that got nothing to do anything but go all out for the child she was given.

"I have every faith in you," Anakin said with a genuine smile. "I thought this would be a task uniquely suited to the students of Fandom."

"Oh, how sweet," Elli murmured, delighted at the idea of buying for disadvantaged children even if she was a little confused about the holiday.

Looooots of big cardboard boxes, and even more canned goods to sort evenly into each one. Go by the moddable lists and help out!

This was definitely where Wayne felt he could be utilized best, packing those boxes with alacrity and precision and honestly quite content to do this part of it all day if he could. Especially since this part was all charitables and no kids.

"Oh, Wayne!" Elli called out, when another volunteer jostled her. "Help, please!"

Or else she was going to drop her stack of canned goods everywhere.

Wayne was almost there jus' about as soon as he saw that stack starting toward tipping.

"Way ya go," he said shortly as he went to relieve her of the stack entirely. "Careful there, Elli."

Miles was always willing to lend a helping hand and in this particular case he was hauling around large boxes of canned goods that was way to big for a kid his size to handle.

Shuri was trying to come up with a easy, efficient and inexpensive conveyer belt system in her head as she worked. The giant cans of green beans were heavy.

Sure, 'Yana could do this. And if, occasionally, she seemed to move a little faster at it than she should, well, that's what magic was for, right? For doing Good Things?

Lana was still utterly confused by this whole charity thing (both the people needing it and the people giving it), but it was hardly the oddest thing about Earth.

So she was sorting and carrying things. Probably heavier things than it looked like she ought to be able to carry, but if anybody was bothered by that, they could get lost.

The hair is big, the clothes are mysteriously missing the two inches above their bellies and are just so, so shiny.

Each of you has a little paper angel with the name, age, and clothing sizes of your moddable child on it. Get an outfit and a toy using the credit card that takes the money from the School Board because Anakin is ~~petty~~ thoughtful like that!

Or you can go stare at Santa's village and boggle. That's where Anakin is.

Well, the year was right! But malls were still pretty foreign territory to Astrid, who almost felt more out of place despite how much more familiar and right everything around her felt. It was a little distracting, spotting all the differences of things in the future she'd kind of gotten used to, but it felt nice, even if it was a different dimension of the same year.

She was mostly focused on the kid on her little paper angel right now, anyway. She'd been that kid a few times, albeit briefly. If she wasn't at Fandom, she'd probably be that kid again. So she wanted to do right by this kid in a way that really only Starr and Claire had ever done for her.

Look, the song was ancient by now, but Nina was giggling a little as she looked around.

"Ohmygosh," she said, "this looks like something out of a Robin Sparkles video!!!!!!!!!!"

Nina... probably spent too much time on the internet.

Sure, sure, she'd get to the shopping bit, but giggling first.

"... Okay. I have to admit I have no idea who Robin Sparkles is," Miles admitted.

"You haven't heard of her?!?!?!!!!!!!!!" Nina asked, scandalized. "Wait, maybe you know her biggest song?????? The chorus goes:

Everybody come and play
Throw every last care away
Let's go to the mall, todaaaaay!!!!!!"

Nina was not even sorry, Miles.

Edited 2020-12-09 18:29 (UTC)

Miles just sort of stood there wondering if this was some kind of joke.

"Yeeeeeeeah. No," Miles said shaking his head slowly. "Can't say I have."

He was just a tad bit scared.

Nina squinted at him.

"Are you, like, sure you come from a universe like this one?????????"

Maybe it was a universe thing?

Tahani noticed immediately that this mall was full of vintage finds and so her 9 year old charge was going to be the most fashion-forward kid at her school.

She was supplementing the school credit card with her own which should've gotten her points towards the Good Place but alas, her clothing choices were all made by Bangladeshi child labor...

Illyana just looked at her little paper angel dubiously. "How are we supposed to know what the child likes with just this information?" she asked. "...what do children even enjoy?"

It was no different than any other Earth mall, as far as Lana could tell. She was absolutely going to get something practical and warm, and...what even were appropriate gifts for an eight-year-old here?

They would be getting a huge science kit. Hopefully they were nerds, too.

He's trying to see if he's accidentally beaten this Santa up--there'd been a few.

Have fun!

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Wednesday Afternoon Assembly, Wednesday, December 9, 2020

Arrive and Mingle

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Help out at the food bank!

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Let's go to the malllll!

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Talk to Anakin!

OOC