Test Drive #4

[magicademymods]

Test Drive #4



The Scary Door

The classroom door looks different today, bearing a few small but noticeable scratches on its upper corner -- and also it happens to tremble, as if with excitement, the moment anyone reaches for the knob. That gives it away. This isn't the classroom door at all!

And it isn't the bathroom door. And it isn't the door to the staircase. And it isn't the door to the hallway. But wherever you go, there's this door that really, really, really wants you to open it, and it doesn't seem to take 'no' for an answer...

Acting in Concert

One thing anyone sharing a campus with Valhudor students must accept is that every once in a while a performance just appears out of nowhere, much in the way of a tornado and with the same ability to suck in anything nearby as collateral damage. Today what looked to be an innocuous group of musicians heading back from class turned into a flash concert without warning. Not a bad thing for a music-lover, actually, and listening to their pleasant tunes only got better as more students saw the opportunity and joined in.

Right up until the drama students showed up and promptly hijacked everyone nearby into a play.

So here you are, in Fantasticked finery, trapped in a bit part in front of a growing crowd. The two ringleaders of this disaster appear to be putting on an entirely improvised performance about two warring houses, because apparently they love stage-dueling (and have had three different scenes of it so far, each of them so sexually charged the allegory is barely allegorical), while the orchestra merrily matches music to action. As for your role? 'Improvise!' they said brightly.

And like that you're up, across from a partner who clearly did not enter this voluntarily either. Better think fast... the one thing uglier than a crowd who have a performance ruined is Valhudor students who have had their mating-dance-slash-play ruined.

Definitely Not Worrying

The spring day is perfect. Bright blue sky without a cloud in sight, sunlight that pushes the perfect temperature just onto the side of 'pleasantly warm', a gentle breeze that drifts over the grass and cools what the sun warms... it's bliss, if not outright soporific, and almost everybody is outside lounging in the grass and enjoying just how wonderful it is.

Then Headmaster Birony comes tearing around the corner of a building like the hounds of hells are at her heels. "Hello, students!" Despite her bright smile, she doesn't break her stride for a second as she zooms past. "Run like hell! Chaos bees!"

And that's when the swarm of chaos bees races around the corner after her, wings filling the air with a deafening buzz.

Now the thing about chaos bees is that they resist magic of all forms, and they have their own particular magic that makes the results of their stings... highly unpredictable at best. You might have your hair turn white, or your skin turn blue. You might blow up like a gum-chewing girl in need of juicing, or feel the uncontrollable urge to form a gang, snap your fingers, and have a dance-fight to drive the Jets out of town. Whatever happens, the effect is never permanent, but maybe Headmaster Birony has the right idea.

Late Night Party

Without a curfew (and with good sound-protection spells on the Towers), students don't always go to bed like responsible adults. This party is still going strong at 3 in the morning, lit by balls of color that float in the air and full of music and dancing and just-for-fun mage dueling that is just a little more dangerous than it should be thanks to it being far easier to talk someone into a late-night mage duel when they're tipsy. As spells crack against each other and feet slide over the grass in time with the beat, everyone's having fun! Even party-poopers can find another wallflower to talk classwork with while enjoying the snacks and the drinks. What a great place to meet fellow students and socialize!

((alternate post image))

Comments

[silverity]

Ohhh, so this is a man with an ego! Harald can’t help but crack a wider smile as well; this will most certainly be some interesting company. “Is that so?” he purrs as he takes a seat next to the man. His owl cranes its neck to peek at Tony’s book.

“Harald,” he answers. “Do you have an interest in plants? I find that an interesting branch to specialise in, jokes unintended.”

[200percentextradad]

"Not so much, but when my options are limited in the field of study, magic plants seem the least of my worries," replied Tony. "My field of operations are more along the line of technology than anything else."

He leaned back, tapping WEDNESDAY's pages as the familiar's pages flipped. "WEDNESDAY and I were just going over the notes for tomorrow's lesson. Pays to have everything memorized."

[silverity]

“I see, that makes sense.” Harald reaches up to his own familiar and coos to it to get him something to drink. “Technology, mm? An ally of mine held an interest in that sort of thing. Of course, that’s a rather broad topic; if you don’t mind sharing, what in particular did you specialise in?”

He briefly considers leaving this rowdy gathering a bit early for the sake of going over his own notes. “Not a bad idea... I find the verbal incantations of most magic types to be most... difficult to keep track of.” Harald chuckles. “Of course, that’s what I suppose I get for specialising in the one invoking old, empty gods.”

He isn’t a nonbeliever himself - his own devotion to Odin in his world cannot be understated - but he’s more than aware of how most people here view the entities spoken of in the incantations of Intimation.

[200percentextradad]

"Robotics, computers, programming, industry, it was fairly broad owning a tech corp back home," replied Tony, pausing to take a drink from his cup. "Stark Industries dabbled in a lot of things and I have a personal interest in a lot of things."

"Magic's not my strong point I admit, so it's something I want to keep tabs on when I'm here. Most magic that I encounter is usually trying to kill me."

[silverity]

This draws a hearty laugh out of Harald. He leans forward with his elbows on his thighs. “Is that right! I am not an archaic man by any means, but I have to say, I’ve recently had some fairly perilous runs with technology myself! I feel strangely in my element here, surrounded by mysterious forces only narrowly wrangled into submission by humans.”

His owl returns and releases its foggy hold on a glass of some kind of juice, and Harald takes a sip. “Though I can’t say I’ve practiced magic in such a pure form, or at all. For awhile, in fact, I was an Air Force pilot.”

[200percentextradad]

"Either it be science or magic, the world may never know what sort of mystery life holds," said Tony with a raised glass.

"Is that right? I know someone who came into power and was also a Air Force Pilot. Her name's Carol." said Tony. "Probably one of the toughest women I know, considering she can punch a god on a regular basis and flatten him to the ground."

[silverity]

Harald mirrors the gesture with his own glass before taking a swig. You can say that again.

"So I see! Perhaps there's just something about pilots..." Specifically pilots who find the military to be useless in the face of the sorts of threats Harald's had to deal with, but he understands that such a subject might be sore for some folks, so he doesn't mention anything about that. "Granted, I was working with the gods as opposed to against them, but nonetheless!"

There's a moment of pause as Harald finds himself without something to say. Briefly, his gaze fixes upon another pair of students preparing to duke it out across the room. "Hah... I couldn't imagine raw magic such as this existing in my world. We settle most of our conflicts with card games."

He sits up. "There's... more to it than that, of course, for these cards possess links to other worlds and planes of existence that most people will never bear witness to. But most of the time no one just pulls out a gun to shoot someone who's threatening to end the world, even though we have those sorts of weapons at our disposal. That's just... how my world works. We have subtle levels of magic and gods and weapons of mass destruction, and yet we settle everything with card games."