Fandom High Welcome Picnic, Front Lawn of the School, Saturday, All Day

[bigdamnprincipal]

So, it wasn't Fall yet by a long shot. The temperatures were still high, the leaves were still green, and the calendar still said August. But the calendar of consumerism didn't care about reality and thus, the welcome picnic was decorated for fall. The tables were covered in reds, oranges, and yellows, there was apple cider in the punch bowls and, of course, if the food on the table could come in pumpkin spice form, it was here in pumpkin spice form.

Enjoy your basic seasonal welcome picnic, everyone!

Comments

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

"Ah," said Henry.

Beat.

"What's a necromancer?"

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

"I can raise the dead." Oversimplification, sure, but it was what he could do, so...look, he was going with it. "Some people are uncomfortable with that." Understatement.

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

Henry wouldn't say he was proud of what his mind flicked to in an instant - the bodies of his parents, hope, then disgust at himself because that was hardly the Godly way, was it?

The "What, like our lord Jesus Christ?" that made it out of his mouth instead was more a product of that complicated series of thoughts than any genuine question that he had, but it was probably for the best.

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

Erasmus's mother was Christian, so he knew this from going to church with her when he was a kid, before he'd decided his father's religion made more sense to him. "No. They're still dead. It's not a miracle. What I do is just sort of...temporary."

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

And that made him feel even worse for thinking it in the first place.

"Well," Henry said, attempting to pick up his good mood where he left it, "There's not a great deal of dead in the dorms, so I doubt it's going to come up much for us as roommates, eh?"

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

There were more dead than Erasmus would have expected in the woods, though, but he was filing that under 'none of his business' for right now. Maybe there was an old cemetery in there or something!

"Probably not," Erasmus said. "I just thought you should know." In case Henry wanted to ask for a new roommate, he didn't say.

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

"We all have our things around here, I think," Henry offered. "I'm from 1403. In Bohemia. That's," he added triumphantly, "...In Europe."

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

"Oh, wow," Erasmus said, because what else could you say to that? "And how's that, uh, working out for you?"

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

Henry was mainly trying not to get hung up on the practicalities and grander implications of the whole necromancer thing. Erasmus seemed anxious about it as it was, and with the massacre at Neuhof so close to his own mind, Henry wasn't so sure it would be wise to venture that way at the moment.

So he blabbered on.

"Confusingly, mainly," he said. "I do like pizza. I'm unsure about hot pot, which appears to be both a soup and a stew, though I'll eat anything. It is very handy to be able to get water so easily in the dorms, I'll give you lot that. Unless I'm assuming incorrectly that you're from this year?"

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

"I am," Erasmus said. "I didn't even know different times were an option until right now. I've never had a roommate before--only child--so if I'm being annoying or anything just...tell me?"

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

"Why, are you a terrible snorer?" Henry asked, amusement suffusing his voice. "My m-- well, people say I can sleep through anything, don't worry."

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

"I don't know. I don't think so," Erasmus said. "But it's good to know that if I am it won't be a problem."

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

"Ah, we'll be alright, then," Henry promised. "

(He could do that. He would one day share quarters for long weeks with Hans Capon, who had won the Most Annoying Man In Rattay award 19 years running, and somehow not only not murder him but enjoy the experience. The chances of Erasmus being anywhere near as bad were very low.)

"I'm sure you'll be a fine roommate. And don't worry too much about the island, either, no one's the like to burn witches at the stake or anything."

Bold claim when you barely knew anyone, Henry, but.

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

"I'd like to see them try," Erasmus scoffed. "You don't mess with the covens."

And if you were like him and of warlock stock, you gave them a wide berth and they did the same to you.

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

"...Well, I can't say I've met a coven before," Henry said. "Unless you count that one time on the beach where Harley and her friends set fire to all of her things and I had to 'be cool'..."

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

That was a drunk coven (and Henry), but Erasmus didn't know that.

"If your world doesn't have necromancers, maybe they don't have witches, either," he suggested. Or maybe the witches kept to themselves because someone wanted to burn them. "Do you have vampires? Ogres?" He was just naming random species now trying to find someone from a normal world.

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

Henry squinted as his Czech brain attempted to mold that English into something he understood. "Giants and monsters and the like?" he said. "Well, I've heard tales, but I can't say anyone I know has ever seen one."

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

"'Monster' is derogatory," Erasmus said, almost on automatic. "Okay, so we'll put that down as a 'maybe.'" He could work with 'maybe!'

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

"What?" Henry said.

Genuinely confused by those three words in that order.

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

"You shouldn't call someone a monster," Erasmus explained. "It's rude and hurts their feelings."

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

Henry frowned. "You said monster first," he pointed out. "I thought we were talking about demons and such."

Honestly, Henry didn't really believe the stories all that much, but who knew? Madder things had happened to him.

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

Erasmus frowned as he tried to play back their conversation in his head. "No, I didn't."

Stupid faulty translation magic.

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

Sadly for both of them, even the precursor to the English vampire had only barely begun to manifest itself in folklore in Henry's time. There were stories, of course, of things that drank blood and only hunted in the night, but they were far from what Erasmus was likely thinking of.

"You asked me if I knew giants or monsters," he pointed out.

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[stringstothesoul]

"I asked if you had ogres or vampires where you're from," Erasmus protested. Those were totally different words!

In modern English.

Re: Meet Your Roommate

[thatsmysword]

"You just said the same thing," Henry protested.