fandomhigh | Intro to Fandom; Monday, First Period [12/05].

Intro to Fandom; Monday, First Period [12/05].

"It may be a little hard to believe," said Summer, getting things underway for that morning's class, which had relocated itself to the Danger Shop, "but the semester's almost over. Which means that not only have you gone through many lessons from Stark and myself about the weirdness of Fandom, but you've experienced quite a bit of it yourselves, already. One thing we hadn't really touched a whole lot on so far, though, is this place." She gestured around her at the Danger Shop, which, right now, was mostly just blank and waiting to be used. "The Danger Shop. And something we haven't really had yet, either, is a pretty big full-scale invasion of something."

“We haven’t had any invasions in nearly a year,” Stark said. The Fans didn’t count as an invasion and nothing at all of note had happened when they were here anyway. Right? “Which is very unusual for here and you should all be ready in case something happens soon. Something is almost certainly going to happen soon. I’m surprised nothing has happened already.” That was comforting, wasn’t it?

"So the Danger Shop here," Summer continued, "is going to throw a variety of potential bad guys at you to fight, in a simulation of the town itself. If you haven't had any of your teachers use this yet in any of your other classes, basically, this is great for training because you can't actually get hurt here, it's all a simulation, so it's a good way to fight things even if you're not much of a fighter. It will also generate a wide variety of weapons for you to potentially use against our incoming invaders, but since this is supposed to be a learning and prep experience, try to think of unique ways to defeat your enemies and work together to really make the most of your own individual skills."

“Nothing will hurt you,” Stark reiterated. “So there aren’t any real risks and you can try things that maybe you wouldn’t normally. One time, one invasion, a friend and I were fighting off things with stale cupcakes.” Because of course they had done that. “So even if you aren’t familiar with weapons perhaps you can find something else to use. And…we do have weapons in here. Weapons and things to use them against.”

And, with that, Summer went to the controls to turn on the simulation....which was definitely going to go exactly to plan, right?

....right?

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Stark would have responded to that, perhaps to ask if the book were a manual, but instead he was collapsed in a heap (and wearing different clothes) from exhaustion.

What Summer had to think about this impromptu nap in the middle of class was yet to be determined, but it was very clear that Beth Smith did not approve, squinting judgementally at Stark from the dining room table.

Stark, now awake and standing, turned to face Summer (or Beth, or whoever might be there).

"I hate when this happens," he said, though he didn't look particularly upset about it.

"Ohmygod," said Summer, "saaaaaaame."

Just ignore the fact that this came off as incredibly insincere, the way it was matched with a wink and a fist bump with her brother.

Stark's response, naturally, was to lift the edge of his mask and let a little light out.

"Who's that?" he asked, looking somewhat amazed.

"Oh, that's just Mor--Ugh!" Summer started, until, out of no where, she bucked back as if suddenly hit right in the eye by some invisible force, with a groan of pain. Already, she could feel a black eye starting to form as her hands, probably helplessly tried to lift themselves up for protection against this unseen assailant.

While Stark would normally be quite upset by this turn of events, instead he had closed his eye and was leaning against a blue woman looking more peaceful than he did nearly ever.

"Are you alright?" he asked very calmly and quietly.

"Never better!" Summer sang back, her one hand now not lifted in defense so much as a general gesture of approval, while the other one was tended to by a manicure technician, black eye already faded and forgotten, although the blue-black shades seemed to be reflected now in the paint being plastered onto her nails. "Now who's that?"

"That was Zhaan," Stark said, avoiding eye contact. "My..
Zhaan."

Just the very dead love of his life. No big deal.

"Oh," said Summer, quietly, eyeing Stark a little with uncertainty, but there was a cautious kind of curiosity there, too. "Zhaan from..."

Her finger just pointed up, toward the ceiling, toward the air, toward....well, space, obviously.

"From space. From Moya. From home," Stark agreed, looking very frightened as Zhaan cradled his face from just out of view.

Summer might have had more to say about that, but she was definitely very distracted by Christina LaCroix, of all people, seemingly appearing out of nowhere to hug Summer right now, and a hug from Christina LaCroix was always a very good, and very distracting, hug.

"Heh," she managed to get out. Eloquently. "Ohman, uh..."

Just give her a second. She knew Christina would be gone in a fleeting moment, so she might as well just take a time out to enjoy it, right?

Stark wasn't getting any hugs! So Stark was going to pout about that, just a little bit.

"Oh. You have a friend here."

Well, Summer did. Now she didn't, but she did have her phone out, and she was angrily punching numbers into it.

"I'll calling the moose," she said crossly. "To complain. About this glitch. It's bullshit, and I hate it. Like, if you're going to give me a hug from my alternate-dimension girlfriend, at least keep her around long enough for a little more, because, believe me, that hug held a promise."

Stark was...surprised (sure let's go with that) to hear that.

"Ohhhh," he said, had thrown back. "I didn't know you had a girlfriend!"

"It's kind of complicated." Oh, look! Christina was back, and dropping helpful exposition, grinning over at Summer with a sheepish sort of blush, tucking her hair behind her ear. "Summer and I are dating in a different dimension, one where her mom is allergic to wine so she's not an alcoholic, and she dumped Summer's dad so they never had Morty, and so both of them are, like, so much happier. We're just friends in our dimension, which is kind of a shame, we'd be pretty hot together, riiiiight?"

Christina giggled a little, nudging Summer's shoulder.

"Too bad she's got that boyfriend, I guess!"

"Too bad," Stark agreed through gritted teeth. He'd fallen to the floor, suddenly maskless.

Where was someone with a shirt they could conveniently rip off and hand him to cover his face with when he needed them?

There probably was, but whether or not they actually could was entirely up to the Danger Shop, apparently.

Case in point, all Summer seemed to be able to do just then is just sort of stare at Stark while the room shifted into Needful Things.

No, not that one.

Or that one.

That other one.

Stark's mask, miraculously, was back in place and he was more looking intently at Summer and their surroundings.

"I really dislike when that happens," Stark said. "I need it."

And he felt very naked without it. Which maybe he ought not to think about in this company.

"That's a little fucked up, man," Morty offered. Encouragingly. Because he was there and staring now, too.

"Morty," Summer felt compelled to add, because really now, "that doesn't even begin to register on the scale of fucked up things we've been through and witnessed. Get out of here."

Edited 2022-12-05 22:26 (UTC)

"It is," Stark agreed solemnly, now lit from an external gold light source.

"Why does your face glow like that, anyway?" asked Beth, judging Stark yet again from the dining room table, while Summer just wanted to roll her eyes and wonder not only why her family sucked, but why half of them needed to be here right now, ohemgee....

"I'm not entirely corporeal," Stark said, looking off into the distance like he was expecting something terrible to happen with this admission. "I'm not human."

"You know what?" asked Summer. "This is too much right now. It's only a matter of time before this goes from my awkward family to my awkward life. I'm getting out of here."

Which is when she turned to make good on that and started to run out of the room.

Stark turned in the opposite direction now to watch her go.

"Summer! Please stay?"

Summer did manage to run out of the danger shop....

....but she walked back in a later, book in arm, hand lifted in a wave.

"Hey, Stark! I'm here, sorry I'm late, I didn't miss anything, though, did I?"

Did she actually forget, or was this just a desperate attempt to pretend nothing that happened in the last however many minutes happened?

Who could even tell?

That was shocking and Stark stumbled back against a wall.

"What are you doing?"

And Summer was just going to stare back at Stark.

Maybe slightly down.

No reason!

"I was coming into class," she said. "What are you doing?"

Stark was suddenly holding a gun and ready to shoot something or someone.

"I'm staying in class!"

Summer's palm promptly met her face.

"This goddamn day!" she said. "Doing its thing."

"It is!" Stark said from where he was now having the masked side of his face smashed against the floor.

"Let's do something in the Danger Shop, we said," Summer said, starting to laugh at the absurdity of the whole thing, the remote control to the danger shop in her hand as she waved it around a little. "It'll we fine, we said! Nothing weird can happen in a danger shop class!"

Stark let out a little hysterical laugh of his own from where he was now strapped into a chair that was very clearly a torture device of some kind.

"Why didn't we know better?"

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Intro to Fandom; Monday, First Period [12/05].

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