( mingle ) field day + camping trip!

[officialnotice]

FIELD DAY & SCHOOL TRIP

JUNE 8TH

FIELD DAY

With the current school semester coming to a close and summer vacation on the horizon, school administrators have elected to end the year on a high note with an invigorating Track and Field Day at the park, in order to better foster fitness and health in the children (outside of their government mandated physical education classes, anyway).

The event is, of course, open to the community at large, whether you have a current affiliation with the school or not. Because, well, everyone could stand to get up off their couches for an afternoon of running around in the sun. Or, in the case of residents with a particular sun allergy, under the shaded tarp canopies that dot the field here and there with healthy snacks, drinks, and some of the less expansive games available today (such as, oh, a nice sedate beanbag toss).

Wayward Pines thrives on the inclusion of all varieties of people, after all. Even those that aren't, strictly speaking, people at all.

All of the most recognizable games are available, of course: sack races, relay races, three-legged races, any sort of race you can think of, really; flag football and dodgeball with soft spongy balls to keep anyone from getting too competitive (the school nurse is on hand just in case though); a massive tug-of-war rope that spans nearly the entire field; and water balloon and blanket tosses. If you're not too sure what the latter is you can ask Linda at the makeshift juice bar and she'll be all too glad to explain for you.

Actually, on second thought, don't ask Linda anything. Don't give her the satisfaction.

JUNE 8TH - 9TH

HELLO MOTHER HELLO FATHER

While most of the citizens of Wayward Pines disperse back to their homes or jobs as Field Day draws to a close, the students, teachers, and a small handful of volunteer chaperones simply relocate the festivities to the campground in northeastern forest for a two-night camping trip. The evening of the 8th and the first half of the 9th run smoothly enough; tents are set up, marshmallows are toasted on an open fire, sunblock and insect repellent liberally applied, a thin veil of nostalgia and bonhomie settles around the entire event and people are in generally good spirits, despite the... excitement of last month.

All in all, it's a pretty great day. Of course, something's got to give.

There's no warning, no steady build up or slow decline. On the afternoon of the 9th, between one breath and another, the power to the fence surrounding the town increases exponentially, and anyone more than 100 yards from town feels suddenly exhausted and de-powered. And unfortunately for the students and staff trying enjoy a weekend of nature and simplicity, the campground falls squarely outside of that 100 yard perimeter of safety.

The camping trip is called to an abrupt end, and most of the camping gear is left abandoned while everyone drags themselves slowly home, but perhaps even more troubling is the question that's on everyone's lips (whether they choose to risk actually saying it aloud or not): why did it happen?

And what does it mean for the future of Wayward Pines?

MOD NOTES

This is a catch-all for any and all threads pertaining to the field day or the school camping trip! This includes the point at which the camping trip is rudely interrupted by the Precautionary Measures event. You're welcome to make your own logs for the rest of the Precautionary Measures event, as there will not be a catch-all for this one. The next mod log will be going up on the 19th!

PLEASE INCLUDE IN YOUR TOP-LEVEL SUBJECT LINE: Character Name, date, location, and open or closed, to help keep things a bit more organized.

If you have any questions regarding this event, feel free to ask them here.

Comments

jyn | field day!

[realists]

Having very little serviceable memories of Wayward Pines has been not really a problem for Jyn. She knows how to tie shoes (knowledge she doesn't need) and other various unhelpful tidbits -- easy bake oven! grapes! bicycle! tea! -- but she doesn't know many specifics to life on Earth. This may also be hindered by the fact that she hasn't gone to school since she was four, but what the kriff is field day??

Percy explained dodgeball but it didn't do the game justice and all the imaginings Jyn had about a nice team building sport where the big guy protected the little guy until he was the last man standing were very false. This is garbage.

This studious, um, study finds her squinting into the sun and watching all this chaos happening, drinking a Tang. (Which is disgusting and she promptly spits out. God damn it, Linda! She never should have trusted something Linda made, she'll have to go back for a juice pouch later to wash out this disgusting flavor.) For not the first time, she feels annoyed that she is missing all the memories everyone seems to have to gives them a tie to this place. She has one or two, but they're not lashed to her with memories of a happy home life. She doesn't even get fake happy families and that's just bullshirt. What if she wanted to remember being the reigning Wayward Pines Academy dodgeball champion?

Please force her to participate.

the fun has arrived.

[holdmybeer]

[ did someone say force her to participate! sauntering on over like he IS the wayward pines academy dodgeball champion supreme lord of the field say he slips an arm around jyn’s shoulders and pulls her backward. ] Didn’t expect to see you here. Having fun? [ he notices the tang she’s got in hand crinkles his nose, eyes lifting to the table linda’s got set up with ‘punch’ and ‘brownies’. ] If you keel over I know who to blame [ he winks at her. ] and, trust me, I’ll make sure she gets her just desserts.

How about joining me for a game of peg people we don’t like with water balloons under the guise of some field day fun?

[volitaunt]

Poe would force her to participate, if things were different.

There are circles in which he feels almost normal, mostly in places like Go Ask Alice, Weaver's--where the people he thinks of as de facto Resistance tend to congregate. But he sees the nervous looks of those who have adapted to life in imprisonment. Parents shuffling their kids out of his way and people whispering and avoiding coming too close.

He's a friendly person. The sense of being outcast would've been punishment enough, without being grounded. One on top of the other casts a shadow across his heart that's impossible to outrun.

BB-8 is the one who spots Jyn and leads the way over to her. Poe musters up a smile, nodding to the distinctly orange beverage she has in hand. "That looks like it'll either cure or kill you."

Cain (Roman) | 8-9th | Field Day / Camping

[aeturnus]

field.
Overall, the field and track day was a great idea. Get everyone out in the beautiful weather and active, team-building activities balanced with competitive games. Just how it should be, all in all. He worried briefly about the huge number of residents who had to still be recovering from all the accidents that had occurred hardly a week ago but that wasn't going to stop him. If he saw anyone flagging, he'd probably direct them to a stationed nurse and leave it at that.

No, for now, Roman was going to eye all the activities and realize something fairly important. Turning to whomever happened to be closest at the time, he said, "I can't decide which one to try. What do you think?"

camping.
It wasn't necessarily an event meant for parents and adults to show up on. Just for the kids to hang out and have a good wind-down for the year, letting it go out with a bang. On the other hand, Roman was known well enough and his own daughter was attending so of course he would volunteer as a chaperone for the event. It was a pretty good gig considering he'd had plenty of practice over his long life... even if he couldn't remember any specific examples right now. It was there. Somewhere. Totally.

Most of the early day he could be found helping with tents or securing items for the more paranoid of kids even though no bears would likely come close to them. They weren't really that far out from the town at all. Still, if it helped them be at ease and make a better experience for everyone else, why not?

precautionary.
When the drain came, he dropped like a sack of bricks. Breath hard to pull, muscles aching, confusion threading through his veins. His first instinct was to locate Iris in the panic that soon began to bubble over, and then it was to get to safety. Get himself there and make sure the people he cared about were there, too. It wasn't just him but he felt—ill, almost violently so. Movement wasn't going to come easy.

What he was really worried about was making it somewhere protected from the animals he heard in the woods. Those were not good sounds and he felt some definite dread for how vulnerable he was in relation to their proximity. Hell no.

camping.

[regulatingpressure]

❰ raven's not actually sure what possessed her to come camping. sure, it seems like something she'd be into, but not right now. not with everything so fucked up in her head, with her memories and her other memories, as if that makes any sense at all.

maybe that's why she's out here. because she doesn't remember much, but a lot of what she does remember is out in the woods. or in a camp surrounded by woods. a camp built around a dropship that plummeted from space, but she's forcing herself to bench that particular memory until it fleshes out a little. otherwise, she's just gonna drive herself up the wall about it.

at some point, she figures out that driving herself up the wall is pretty much inevitable unless she finds something to do with her hands. so she casts a glance around and latches onto the first project she sees: a tent half-pitched. ❱

I'll take this side, ❰ she says, jogging up to steady one of the wobbly poles. but then raven catches sight of who exactly is on the other side, and his face jogs a sliver of memory loose. a sense of familiarity. a name. ❱ Roman, hey. ❰ it comes with a brief grin before she drops to a knee to finish threading the pole through the loops along the corner of the tent. ❱ How'd you get suckered into this one? ❰ she feels like she knows him through someone, but she can't place it. ❱

camping.

[alizes]

Iris is pretty sure she is supposed to be embarrassed at having her father around. And there is, of course, a small part on the back of her mind that is a little bit embarrassed- every teenager is probably going to feel the same when confronted with a doting, caring parent when she’s in front of all her classmates so she just sucks it up and tells herself to stop being silly.

All in all she’s handling it pretty well. She made sure he said hi to her friends right away, she’s seen him around… definitely not ignoring him even though she’s also very clearly doing her best not to be seen gravitating towards him too much. It’s a delicate equilibrium to maintain some sort of social status, which thanks to having a teenage daughter Roman probably knows by now just how important it is.

But that doesn’t mean she isn’t going to talk to her father at all, and she does walk over to him once her tent is all set up. She did it all pretty easily- her memories are confusing, fuzzy, and she never knows which part of them to believe but what she knows for sure is that her family has always done her best to make sure she’s self-sufficient and independent and can handle herself. And survival was apparently a pretty important skill to achieve, and one she took very seriously.

So she’s approaching her father with a grin as he finishes help some kids set up the tent, arms crossed on her back.

“Someone looks like he’s actually having fun.”

camping;

[paragon]

[ Steve's been keeping his head down since he returned from his apparent week-long disappearance. Not because he's got any desire to do so, but because he has no choice in the matter. He's tried like hell to say any of it aloud, to continue what he started, but the harder he tried the faster he felt consciousness slipping away from him every time. So he stays awake, since it's the least — and quite possibly the most — that he can do.

Truth is, it's got him in a funk. He doesn't know what to do with himself, which has never sat well with him, and he doesn't think any amount of well-meaning kicks to the backside are going to make a difference this time.

Still, he'd signed up to chaperone this trip before any of that had gone down. Anything's better than sitting around the house dwelling on it, and hell if he doesn't care about these kids. Following through was never really a question. He helps set up camp, directing the kids to where they'll be sleeping, and maybe even secures a tent or two alongside Roman early on. It keeps his mind off things until nightfall, and he can still keep himself occupied by making sure the fire is fed and confiscating any smuggled booze before anyone can get in any state past tipsy.

Once that settles, however, so does he, sitting on a log with sketchpad and pencil in hand. On the page is a rough outline of a different fire than the one currently lending its light. You can tell by the Howlies penciled in in somewhat greater detail around it, all grown men in uniform, of a sort, though at the moment Steve's fingers are still as he looks into the flames. ]

shirou. camping, ota!

[redundead]

[ CAMPING, shirou has decided, is the kind of thing you do with your dad on a fall weekend that he's actually home. just the two of them means you can pack dinner ahead of time, fill the cooler up with things you can cook on the little camp stove, and be done with it. at least one of you will know how to pitch a tent, and it'll definitely be quiet enough to just sit by the fire and admire stars.

camping with all of your classmates (whose names are still slowly coming back), is not like that at all. first of all? hot dogs. why? its... cheap, sure. he'll acquiesce to that. but its so not good... nobody even brought sweet potatoes! you're all degenerates, and its awful, and he'd really like to be back home with juno and the familiar kitchen that doesn't have any empty spaces when it comes to the name of things.

also, he's been helping too many people with their tents, and that might have been a mistake, because his ribs are starting to hurt again.

shirou is sitting over at one of the campfires, idly rubbing at the ache that won't go away and watching everyone else go about their business and cook their disgusting hot dogs. he'll have to make one for himself, eventually... ]

[dislikeable]

❰ joining him in the "what the hell are hot dogs" section of camp is katniss. instead of hot dogs or marshmallows, she appears to have some sort of plucked and headless bird on a roasting stick this evening, freshly-shot based on the bow and quiver over her shoulder.

his campfire happens to be the least occupied, so she's sinking down on a log a few feet to his side, lowering her kill into the upper licks of flame with every intent to roast it like it's a completely normal thing to do.

she doesn't say anything just yet. after all, it's not like she knows him. ❱

[bird_thing]

[hot dogs probably aren't at the top of tobias' list for human food he misses, if he's honest those marshmallows they're roasting are looking far more tempting, but the fact that he'd have to morph human to actually enjoy them is still a big enough determent for him to resolve to just lurking around the edges of the camp and eyeing the students warily.

which means he's more or less positioned perfectly to observe shirou by the campfire, and after solid minute or so of watching him with gleaming hawk eyes from a tree overhead, he finally says something.]

< What's wrong with your chest? > [thought-says something. whatever.]

[dragoness]

[ shirou might think hot dogs are gross, and you know what? eliza might have seen the face he pulled at the stuffed tubes of meat substitute.

and you know what happens when eliza has a one-up on some poor unsuspecting kid?

she tortures him with it.

sidling up to shirou, she leans over his shoulder and sticks the raw hot dog in her mouth, biting it in half and chewing loudly next to his ear. ]

Danny | Camping | June 8 and 9 | Open

[invisibill]

Camping:
Danny had never had a normal camping trip. As far back as he could remember (and he could, now that he had the majority of his memories back), every single camping trip had ended in disaster. His parents would spent the entire trip trying to find ghosts in the woods or a ghost would actually show up and attack or he'd nearly get eaten by a ghost fish.

Even Danny could figure out a pattern like that.

So he was fully expecting this trip to end in disaster. But in the meantime there were s'mores and a campfire and a bunch of people he sort of knew. He slides a marshmallow onto a stick and looks around as he takes a seat by the campfire.

"So anyone know any good ghost stories?"


Precautionary:
Danny spends the first few minutes after being depowered facedown on the ground and mumbling irritably into the forest floor. Somehow, this figured. He hadn't felt this wiped out since the last time he'd gotten hit by one of his parent's more creative anti-ghost weapons.

Slowly, he levers himself off the ground by holding on to a handy tree, then looks around for any fellow campers.

caroline forbes • open

[coy]

open to all;

[ Caroline was an excellent chaperone. If you had the misfortune of being around her, she definitely subjected you to some sing-a-longs, sickeningly sweet forest-themed crafts (think pine cone earrings), and she built her tent in record time. Caroline was the over-achieving, over-patched Girl Scout that everyone kinda hated back home. She's not obnoxious, just... enthusiastic. And it's her chance to play the game, to make it look like she was settling back into normal life after losing too many friends.

The camping trip also gave her an excuse to be in the woods, to try and figure out if the Salvatores and Katherine were being held somewhere.

She'll teach you how to do a s'more or she'll get you crafting or even help you setup a tent but she'll also be a little distracted.]


closed to allison argent;

[Caroline does manage to slip away, she thinks unnoticed, to go inspect the fence. That's when it happens. Without warning. Without preamble. One moment she's walking and the next she's forced to her knees, like she's been punched right in the throat. She doesn't even get the chance to gasp, she just collapses and her hands move to her throat, mouth open in a silent scream.

She can't breath. It feels like there's a force pushing down on her face and no matter what she does, she can't draw breath. Caroline doesn't realize what's happening, that if she zipped away from the fence, she'd be able to breath again. She thinks only that she's going to die here and might do so, over and over until someone finds her. Or maybe, she might not come back this time.

And just before she starts to black out, she hears the sound of rushing footsteps and she wonders to herself if this is how Stefan disappeared...]

closed to bucky barnes;

[ She doesn't die, at least. She makes it home, sucks down two blood bags and collapses on her couch. That's when she lets herself start to cry and she finds it hard to stop, the memory of her first death becomes even more clear than before. She can't tell if time had muted the memory or if being in Wayward Pines had done so. Either way, she remembers now how it felt to die and how terrifying it had been.

And like she had been when she first awoke as a vampire, she's alone.]

the ota;

[dislikeable]

❰ this is all katniss's fault, really.

she's been at the camping area on and off for most of the day. she's seen the way this woman in particular has an uncanny way of dragging people into activities they don't seem to want to do and maybe even making them like it.

and yet somehow, it strikes katniss as a good idea now, as she watches her peel white goo off a stick with two crackers, to ask: ❱

What is that? ❰ equal parts skeptical and apprehensive. ❱

[zymasoldat]

[ The lights are on at Caroline's home. That's what Bucky notices as he passes the house on his evening run. Last he heard, she went along with Steve and the other chaperones to supervise the town's kids on their end-of-year camping trip.

Maybe it's nothing. He could just shrug it off and keep running. And, maybe for some folks, he would. But Caroline's a lot like Kenzi, in that even though he knows he doesn't really know her, he still considers her family. She's Steve's kid sister. He remembers her tagging along with him and Steve, and looking out for her, treating her like he would his own sisters. If his instincts are telling him something's up, he's gotta listen to them.

He probably should ring the bell or knock or something, but it's not like he wants to give the heads up to whoever's inside if they aren't supposed to be there. He enters the house silently, moves through the foyer, picking up on the sound of her crying from the living room. ]

Caroline? Hey. I saw the light on and... [ He keeps his voice gentle, trying not to startle her as he approaches. ] What happened?

[volitaunt]

[ Caroline went camping. That's Poe's first thought, when he finds out what happened in the woods. After making sure Alex is all right, her house is his next stop. He roars up on his motorcycle (running wasn't fast enough), kills the engine, and feels an immediate surge of relief at the fact that her lights are on.

Looking for her here first might have been the right choice after all.

He jumps the front steps and knocks hard on her front door before remembering there's a doorbell. Which he also presses, for good measure. ]

emma swan | june 8 + 9 | field day + camping | ota

[sheriffing]

field day.

[ forget Linda. as one of the high school’s physical education teachers, Emma knows her way around field day.

fake memories tell her that these school events are nothing new for her, but it’s hardly necessary. the lies that fill her mind aren’t anywhere near the incentive to play along that putting on the whistle and looking out for her students is.

she might be on the sidelines, but Emma is a visible part of the activities, cheering people on and checking in with them at any sign of injury. she’ll happily throw water balloons at her fellow staff members (it was an “accident” both times), but aside from that she’s doing more to assist in making the event go smoothly than to join in the fun.

it’s not hard to catch her running around, but if you cheated in one of her races, odds are she’s coming up to you first with a lecture in playing fair.]

camping.

june 8th

[ at the time, volunteering for the camping trip made sense. the school was looking for chaperones and Emma was looking for a distraction, both from spending too much time searching for information about her missing neighbors, and from facing the reality of a father who had more fake memories than real ones. she knows it’s only a matter of time before he remembers who she really is to him, but for now she’ll take family any way she has it, and that means playing along as a teacher here and trying to keep everyone safe.

apparently taking the savior out of storybrooke doesn’t make her feel any less responsible for the people around her. sue her.

the first day goes well, and in the early hours of the camping trip Emma’s biggest problems are extra crispy marshmallows and tents that are easier to put up by ignoring the paper directions. Emma spends as much time off on her own as she does mingling, investigating the forest around them with the excuse of wanting to stretch her legs. she's a little distant at times, but maybe that's to be expected. the last time she went camping was in Neverland, and the memories aren't exactly happy ones.]

june 9th

[ …luckily she’s not far from the campsite when the power to the fence increases. all of her efforts to stay upright only waste the energy she needs to move, and Emma tumbles to the ground seconds after everyone else around her, weaker for the time she spent trying to keep herself from falling.

it’s as sudden as someone flipping a switch, from an energized crowd of campers to people scrambling to make any progress at all, and all she can do is gasp for breath and try to get a hold of herself so that she can call out to the people around her. everything’s sore, and she doesn’t have the strength to stand (she barely has the strength to breathe), but she manages a slow, agonizing crawl towards anyone who might be close. they need to get out of here, it’s all she can think of.

that, and the fear that this is some kind of trap they’ve dragged everyone into.]

[postpartor]

[ Sharon watches Emma moving through the events and can't help be a little bit impressed. Her memories are still very much an open landscape, occasionally populated by people and events that don't make a lot of sense without context. The narrative this place has given her is simple, it's complete, and--wearing her badge on a lanyard, migrating through the crowds--she can feel herself fitting in to the lie.

But she'll never forget that's what it is. She can't. She's living the lie with purpose, now, though, which means being the friend she vaguely recalls being to Emma.

She catches the other woman coming off a lecture to two cheaters, and smooths a hand over her mouth to hide a smile. ]

Geez. I'm glad you weren't my PE coach.

Clary Fary | OTA

[babyhunter]

Field Day

Field day was one of those things that Clary remembered from when she was little.
She'd always dragged her mother with her and demanded that the pair of them compete in everything. Clary had always been a little bit competitive, even as a child. Jack and Percy were in those memories too. Hanging with friends, relaxing and running around giggling. The memories were so bright and vivid but they made Clary wonder.

So much has been happening. Is it really okay to have fun and pretend it's nothing?
In the end, she relents. Clary wasn't sure what else to do and she tried to forget the twisting uncertainty in her chest but participating in the games.

Not all of them but she can be found in the middle of a balloon fight or chasing down a kid with a flag. Capture the Flag wasn't really an event but Clary would definitely get people to play it. Other than that she can be found watching the various things her friends are doing and cheer them on.

Camping

Clary didn't remember begin a very big camper, at least not the kind of camping that involved tents. As she sat at the edge of one of the bond fires she remembered going to a farm house a few summers. It had started as a mess but the owner had been fixing it up. The owner. Who was that?

She was lost in her thoughts and zoning out towards the flicking orange flames. Clary zoning out wasn't an unusual occurrence but it was usually into her sketchbook and not a fire. Her backpack was next to her, she'd brought her stele out of habit and her sketchbook after Caroline said she wanted to see some samples. She also wanted to work on the sign for Glug Glug and get the perfect draft over to Percy. Besides her art supplies there was a bag of marshmallows at her side and a few sticks.

Later that night she's doing a favorite for Jack and on the look out for Eliza. She had no idea why she was getting in between these too but she'd promised and Clary liked to think she was the sort of person who kept her promises. Who knows, maybe they can do each others hair or something. Isn't that what girl friends do?

Precautionary

It shouldn't have been a surprise. After everything that's been happening, Clary should have expected something to drop when half the town was at the camping trip. She felt stupid for letting her guard down but then she didn't even know what one person could even do. Was there a way to stand against an enemy that you didn't see? One that you weren't allowed to talk about?

She wandered away from the activities just before 4:30. She'd told everyone that she was going to go pick up sticks or something for the fire. Clary was going to use the time to think and sort through her thoughts though she didn't have much luck.

Clary groaned softly when she'd felt her powers drain from her. Her palm pressed against her forehead and she fell unceremoniously on the ground. She felt weak and tired. Was she sick?

She didn't know what was going on but Clary didn't want to get up. She didn't even want to walk. Instead she laid on the ground, staring up at the afternoon sky. It was pretty and as she laid there she thought about how she might draw it; maybe use water color. It didn't really cross Clary's mind that she was in the middle of the woods or that there might be wild animals around. There hadn't been attack in so long.

Justine || Before Precautionary Event || OPEN

[ishisstrength]

Field Day/Camping - June 8th

[Justine is one of the many chaperones at the event. She doesn't stay for the full two days but is moving between the town and the event grounds. She runs errands for different tents at Field Day while keeping a first aid kit with her at all times. She isn't a doctor but she's had a lot of first aid practice and is licence to perform CPR if it's required.

She doesn't think that she'll get the chance to use her skills but she's walking around just in case.

During these two days Justine can be found in heels. She looks a little link a school teacher wearing a black pencil skirt that stops at her knees and a white button down top. She is comfortable and movies through both the event grounds with practiced ease.

At Field Day Justine most notably is walking around with bottles of water that she's passing to students and other chaperones. She'll be seen carrying boxes between tents and direct anyone who needs to find the nearest bathroom. As the event moves to camping she's seen passing out bags of marshmallows, gram-crackers and chocolate for Smores and watching over those who were bound to stab themselves with sticks. Luckily, she has more than enough band-aids to go around.]

Ana Lewis June 8th and 9th.

[seeyaduke]

June 8th
[Camping. Ana had never really been a camper back when she was in school. Oh, she'd had memories of being a girl scout, but she was entirely certain that in her old life in California her family had never been the sort to go out and pitch a tent or spend time sleeping out of doors. It really didn't go with who she was, but it did go with who she was trying to be right now. Fitting in, infiltrating and figuring out what the hell was going on.

So she wore yoga pants and a hoodie and helped with cooking and mingled with everyone before taking a run through the woods. After the camp was all set up, she once again offered sword stick lessons to anyone who wanted them, although this time, she bought a couple along that were perfectly straight and weighted. With Clary the first time this had been improvisational, and these ones weren't.

That night, Ana offered some truly scary ghost stories, putting her English degree to good use as she mined all of the cliches from gothic horror, trying to avoid gore when she could, and keeping the scarier stories until after the younger kids had gone to sleep. After most people turned in though, Ana lingered at the fire, her toes almost too near it and just watched the flames as if she was taking the first watch.]

June 9th.

[Ana is sitting on a log slicing off pieces of mango with a pocket knife that looks a little out of place on a teacher when the fence goes off. For a second, it feels familiar, her body stopping against her will, but she doesn't remember quite how. She crumples forward, the air in her lungs too much pressure even. It's all she can do to blink for a moment, a tear slips from her eye and rolls down her cheek. As she tries to move, the knife slips into the meat of her thumb as her body contracts, and it's all she can do to hiss in pain.

Letting the knife and the mango fall to the ground, Ana turns and tries to move towards the nearest person, unable to catch her breath in order to ask if they were all right. But the oddest thing for her was that she could still feel her finger bleeding, and it still stung. That wasn't supposed to happen! Her wounds healed up but this one wasn't. Crawling feels as familiar as this powerlessness and she just manages to ask:]

What the hell?

8th

[00nothing]

I wouldn't mind learning a little. [alex approached with a deceptively mild smile and easy slouch, eyeing the sticks set aside with mild interest.

ian had taught him a lot before he died, after all, but somehow fencing had never quite managed to make the list (which is a little concerning since he'd woken up one day to the distinct memory of having learned marksmanship at some point. to be fair, he's not entirely sure what possible use sword fighting could have, but then he feels much the same about the billiards, the guns, the pick-pocketing for godssakes.

he might as well add sword fighting to the list in that case. at the very least he'll have a very interesting cv when he's an adult.]

elsa | camping ( ota )

[dendrites]

❆ june 8.

[ marshmallows. she remembers roasting marshmallows when she was younger, skipping off to the woods with friends, ( safely ) starting a fire. all it took was a little jogging of her memory to turn her sheer reluctance into eagerness for a bit of nostalgia. and what more could she want when she's been feeling so lost?
so, there she is, an eager volunteer chaperone for the local camping trip.

there should be no surprise that elsa is the most responsible, overprepared with what seems like every variety of camping supply known to man and woman. she's even come with both the spray and clip on bug repellant. and, look at her, she's even taken to setting up a tent ( blue, natch, to match the rolled up kerchief headband keeping her loose hair away from her face ).

the nice thing about this outing is that it brings yet another layer of normalcy to the proceedings.

she's busying herself with setting up inside her tent, or she's busy setting up the s'mores ( of course ) just outside if you'd like to bother her. elsa's happy to buzz around like a little bee – worker, not a queen in this instance – and will flash a pinked smile once her attention has been grabbed. ] Yes? Hello!

❆ june 9.

[ if one has spent enough time around elsa, one might notice that the air isn't so warm around her, that her mere presence seems to cool everything even in the heat of summer. or maybe not.
after all, this town is seemingly picture perfect and you could just be imagining things.

all she wanted to do was go for a walk with some friendly faces and perhaps spot some birds. ( she has a bird guidebook on hand because of course she does ). after lunch sandwiches have been consumed, that is where she has headed, kerchief still in hair, hiking boots laced up all nice and tight, book tucked into the back pocket of her shorts.

for someone who prefers the indoors, she isn't doing that bad of a job, really. once she has set her mind to it, she can do just about anything.

of course, the clock strikes... afternoon and suddenly elsa's best friend is this tree which she's begun to lean against heavily to keep herself upright. for the first time this month, sweat drips down the sides of her face and she can feel herself sinking. it doesn't look as if she's the only one. ]

[seeyaduke]

[Ana takes a deep breath, and she closes her tries trying to use all of the tricks that both Storm Shadow and the therapist she'd attempted seeing after Rex had died had taught her about controlling her breathing and her heart rate. Square breaths, in one and out two but that doesn't seem to stop the weak feelings that are moving along her limbs. Hearing a noise, Ana looked up and saw one of her best friends here fall, and she just groaned loudly.

Ignoring the pocket knife she had cut her thumb on, Ana pushed herself up to her elbows and started to drag herself towards Elsa. Really, she couldn't remember the last time everything hurt this badly. Even when she had died there hadn't been this pain. It reminded her of the time that Rex had turned off her nanomites because she fought their programming, but at least then it was everything! This was different and she wasn't healing; she could still feel blood on her thumb.

She wasn't supposed to bleed for more than thirty seconds or something. It surely had been longer than that!

Reaching Elsa, Ana pushed her unwounded hand out to the woman, and grabbed hers.]

I've got you.

charlie smith | bbc's class | open (cw: hints of a panic attack, possible discussion of genocide)

[omnicides]

( june 08th: evening ) hello mother, hello father

[ there's a bonfire and there are marshmellows. charlie's never had marshmallows before and they're delicious, gooey and sweet and melting on his tongue, the fire flickering and the stars above him brighter than they seem from within the town limits. noise pollution, he's read about that once.

someone's smuggled in alcohol and passed it around and charlie may have had one or two sips too many, or perhaps just enough: he's feeling warm and floaty and content despite everything that he remembers, all the things that he's done, despite not knowing why he's here or what is happening.

he tips his head back to look at the stars. idly, he says: ] It's beautiful, isn't it? [ to whoever is sitting near him. whether he means the bonfire or the camping trip or the stars, well, that's really anyone's guess. ]

( june 09th: afternoon ) drag yourself home

[ there's no built-up and no warning, from one moment to the next, charlie is on the ground, feeling like a heavy weight is pressing down on him. all around him there's still open space, but he feels closed in, unable to move, unable to breathe. he feels disoriented, too, his vision blurring. ]

June 8th.

[seeyaduke]

[Ana's not an idiot; she was a teenager once and a popular one at that. She's been around more than a few outings like this when enterprising kid smuggled in some alcohol but as far as she's concerned as long as no one gets out of hand or is taken advantage of or is puking on her shoes, it's not really a big deal. Of course she is keeping an eye out, so when she hears Charlie talk, Ana lazily looks towards him, and then leans back to look at the stars like he is.]

Yeah, I suppose they are. They're a bit different here than the ones from back home, though. Of course that could just be that we're out of the city.

[Home, clearly was not the small town of Wayward Pines; there was no way in hell that she'd call that a city. Instead it was a town, and barely one at that at some points. The Baroness had been on bases that had double the number of the people in the town in seemed like, at least the people that they saw and spoke to on a regular basis.]

tobias | 9th | closed to nyx

[bird_thing]

[despite falling into the appropriate age range for the field day and camping trip,
tobias hadn't technically been invited, what with not attending school or having any real legal presence within the city, but considering the whole exercise is taking place along the edges of the woods, where he lives, keeping him out would have been more or less impossible even if someone had ever thought to actually try in the first place.

(they hadn't.)

he's been more or less content to observe the activity from above, having no real interest in struggling through the motions of a human body for the very minimal payout of interacting with his peers. he didn't exactly have a great track record with other kids his age, after all.

about midday of the 9th, as tobias is gliding between one tree and another, he feels like he's suddenly been hit with a jolt of... something, and immediately starts to plummet from the sky as he loses all strength and fine motor control. he's makes a terrified hawk screech of sound, sends out a frantic thought-speak call of:] < HEEEEEEELLLPPP! >

[and basically? it'd be really nice if someone caught this poor bird boy before he hurts himself too badly. he might even be grateful or something.]

[sirnyxalot]

[Despite having felt the effects of the fence before, Nyx isn't caught by any less surprise than anyone else on the trip. The weakness is crippling and he's driven to his knees before he can even think to figure out what happened.

They weren't anywhere even close to the fence, what the hell?

Under normal circumstances he'd have given himself a moment to catch his breath and then turn his thoughts towards figuring out what happened to Iris and Jack, but the frantic call for help is too urgent to ignore. It's probably fortune that has him looking up to see some poor hawk plummeting from the sky, because he hasn't put two and six together yet, but he'll push himself up anyway to catch him first before looking for who else needs help because who would seriously let him just hit the ground?

Sorry it's probably still a bit of a rough landing, Tobias. He's not quite at his best either.]

[comic_relief]

For Aranea | July 9th

<sub>[Just like that, the jamming field falls like a shroud over the camp ground, and just as quickly Jack joins the rest of the retreating campers stumbling out of the woods, gasping for breath and any drop of stray power he can wring from his body. Is that how cadets like Machina and Rem had felt when a Crystal jammer was activated near them without warning? Empty, cold? Like a shell, or a machine whose cable had been abruptly ripped from the wall, rendering it inert. It's a horrible feeling words can't articulate.

In secret, he's been out to scout the walls surrounding Wayward Pines before. The feeling is the same, but the dampening effect on his magic had never been this sudden or traumatic before.

Jack absently runs his hands over himself on the way back into town in the manner of someone who's caught a chill or had a limb go numb, rubbing feeling back into himself. That sick feeling of nothingness can't go away fast enough.

It's a Jack--paler than normal and moving with a quick, wary intensity--who slips into Lagomarcino's and immediately presses himself to the window to watch a patrol officer walk past going the opposite way. The authorities are the last people he wants to cross paths with right now. Did they have something to do with whatever that? He releases a breath he'd been holding since he stepped onto the main street.]</sub>

For Eliza | July 9th, evening

<sub>[If asked, Jack would say he's dealing with the events at the camp ground the same way he deals with everything that threatens to unsettle him--by tucking it away in a corner of a box in a vault in the very back of his heart where it can be forgotten and he can move on.

His dreams are more honest.

Instead of stretches of green flatland and Rubrum's warm southern weather that he usually wakes up aching for want of, that night he dreams about the battle that started it all--the Akademeia Liberation. Except he's not liberating his oppressed countrymen this time, he's one of the oppressed in need of saving. One of thousands of legionaries who feels the exact moment when his powers are cut at the stem. He dreams he's turned to helpless, gasping bullet fodder by the jammer, the stench of blood around him thick as spoiled fruit, men in tiger masks swarming like fruit flies...

The scene changes, but the pressure in his chest and the feeling of unbearable powerlessness doesn't. He's in the dark, walls of stone all around. The air is stale. His limbs don't want to move. He can't get out. No one answers his calls. Trapped. A rat in a trap, a rat scratching at the walls of a cell...

His heart gives one hard, lurching beat, propelling him to wakefulness with a sharp intake of air.

Shit.

For a second Jack sits and feels his limbs shake and his heart pound, letting the ball of bright, hot fear in him loosen, and wonders not for the first time if this place isn't making him go a little crazy. Groaning softly, he gets out of bed and heads for the bathroom. He won't be getting back to sleep like this, if at all. The back of his shirt is soaked through in sweat.]</sub>

[unweaving]

[ She's on her way out - freshly fed, and with a little package of chocolates tucked into her bag because she's not immune to impulse buys - when she spots Jack ducking into the store and lurking in the window, somehow looking worse than when she'd first met him fresh out of hospital. She takes a second just to watch before she strides up to him, the clatter of her heels on the floor purposefully loud to let him know someone's coming. ]

Well, you look like shit.

pietro maximoff | june 9th | closed to laura & katniss

[windchasing]

[ Pietro is helping with the post-lunch dishes when it hits. He's not sure how he keeps managing to find chores to do during what is supposed to be some kind of vacation, but maybe it's just that he gets impatient waiting for his classmates to take responsibility for things, and maybe that has less to do with his classmates and more to do with him. Though he's lightened up a little from the night before, 'camping' still feels too much like living rough to him, only dressed up like it's some kind of fun game instead of an unpleasant necessity, and he keeps gravitating toward whatever tasks scuff up that nostalgic veneer.

Or shatter it altogether, as it happens. The dish tub tumbles out of his hands first, soapy water sloshing out across the ground to turn dirt to mud as Pietro sinks to his knees and further, barely managing to get a hand awkwardly under himself as he falls. The ground comes up too fast — everything, suddenly, is moving too fast, except him, his limbs heavy as lead weights and his chest tight and his lungs on fire—

Breathe. In and out. Pietro struggles to find his rhythm again, panic and anger rising to overtake the sudden, exasperating slowness of his autonomic nervous system, because this feels familiar. ]

Fence, [ he manages, squinting out at the obnoxiously too-fast world. ]

june 8th, for steve

[windchasing]

[ When the organized activities start winding down for the day is when things get difficult for Pietro. After all that's happened these past few weeks, in the absence of a distraction, those wild fears start roaming through his mind again. There's a fence around them. There are cameras everywhere. There are trackers in their legs. And he's here with a bunch of his classmates on a camping trip like they're starring in some heartwarming after-school special. Like everything is perfect, when it isn't.

The snap of a plastic spatula under his scrubbing brings him back to reality. Back to the shelter he's standing under, helping clean up after dinner, with—

Mr. Rogers. Of everyone here, after everything he and Poe did, surely he would understand. Pietro glances behind him, making sure they're out of earshot of any of the other teachers, before he starts, ]

How do you— [ he gestures, frustrated, at all of it, ] do this, like nothing is wrong.