| Title: And the button masher becomes the
mashee. Time: Thursday, March 25, 2004 The Thespians: Elijah Cruise and Pascal Curio Location: Allis Memorial Center - Auditorium Notes: First scene after the little bet. This is going to be harder than I thought it would be. Rated PG-13 for some swearing. I think the 'F' word is in there. I'd just like to mention that this is a crazy crazy scene. Crazy in a good way. First Elijah's getting on Pascal's nerves, and then freaking out on her, and then they come up with this idea, and it just all progresses to the point where it's like... AHH! What's going to happen next? |
| +---[ Allis Memorial Center - Auditorium ]-----------------------------------+ | | | A vast catacomb of what appear at first sight to be stiff backed oaken | | chairs stretch out, lined in neat rows but movable, allowing for users to | | change the seating positions should need be. The rug is an enchanting | | azure, smooth as an untossed sea yet soft as the down of a baby chick. | | Toward the front of the vast room, a platform with stairs on its left and | | right sides rises up, the area for speakers and presenters to get the full | | attention of those watching. About the stage, several rows of enormous | | curtains - yellow, red, black, and green - can be drawn across, as well as | | partial dividers, allowing for a vast amount of events to be able to | | occur. | | | +----------------------------------------------------------------------------+ |
| It had been an exceptionally long day. Elijah had spent most of it brainstorming ways to get revenge on Billy and his three friends. Right now he's pacing back and forth across the empty auditorium, contemplating. "Hmmmm... I could hex them." He pauses, then shakes his head. "No, too simple. It needs to be extravagant. Maybe I could make them grow a third arm... no... again, that's just too easy." Another pause, "Or else... there's something brilliant that I could pull at the end of the year feast! Everyone would be there! It's brilliant! Yes!" |
| Pascal Curio had spent almost an hour today, in front of her mirror in her dorm room, practicing her niceties. She had several options. She could hide in her dorm for a whole week, or she could go out and make Toby's life miserable by being the nicest, the most agreeable person on the planet. Still, she's only in the auditorium to come and see if she had left her notebook behind from the last time she was in here. So, she doesn't expect to see Elijah, and clearly, this being her first interaction after the whole 'bet', it's going to be interesting. "Elijah, hello!" She forces out in a chime, a smile plastering on her face. "What are you planning?" She caught the last bit of his speech, being 'It's brilliant! Yes!' |
| Pascal's chime makes Elijah dart around quickly to face her. "Uh..." he blinks a few times. Was she smiling? She only did that around the falcon, right? Weird. He pushes the thought aside momentarily, "Pascal, it's gonna be /wicked/! I have it all figured out! Billy and his little friends won't know what hit them." He cackles as a smile spreads over his lips. He raises an eyebrow at her still present smile, "What happened? You must have done something truly horrible to look /that/ happy..." He narrows his eyes. |
| Nowhere in her situation was Pascal not allowed to lie, and here is probably the most perfect time slip in a little white lie, just not to throw Elijah off guard. "Oh, I didn't do /that/ much," she says coyly, ducking her head. She's clearly using that statement in that tone of voice to leave the recipient guessing. She really hasn't done /that/ much, she hasn't done anything at all, but he doesn't know that. Time to change the subject. She takes another step closer towards him and looks around the room. "What's going to happen? What are you planning on doing to them?" Living vicariously through Elijah for this week will have to suffice. |
| "Oh come on, don't be so modest! I don't think I've ever seen you smile." The young man sits down in one of the many chairs. He leans back in his seat and puts his feet up on the back of a chair in front of him. "As far as what I'm planning, it's a work in progress. But I have time - it's not gonna happen till the end of year feast. Then BAM!" he claps his hands together. "They'll get severely hit with... whatever it will be." He shrugs. "It needs to be a million times worse than the love potion. That was a paying job, this one is pure revenge. You know." Elijah half smiles. "So... hexed anybody lately?" |
| The first thought that strikes Pascal as she sits down on one of the chairs by Elijah is so sprawl there with her regular scowl of 'I hate the world' on her face, and so her mouth twitches as she fights to keep the scowl away, and the smile on her face. She turns and though she crosses her arms and sprawls lazily in the chair she's still smiling at him. "Oh, you know how it is. A push here, a shove there, /maybe/ a little hex or two." She's still lying through her teeth, but she's good at it. And again she changes the subject. "So," a pause. "What did Billy do to warrant a punishment worse than death?" |
| "He breathed." Elijah runs a hand through his hair. "The kid is so damn annoying. Have you met him? Billy Asterik, boy hero!" the last part is said somewhat sarcastically. "The kid wears a fucking cape. Can you imagine?" He rolls his eyes. "He's such a prick, and he dares challenge me. THe kid's in bloody eighth grade, and he dared insult me." He shrugs, "I honestly don't care what he thinks about me, but I got a reputation to keep. Can't let more kids think they can insult me and get away with it." |
| Elijah's little rant there warrants something that sounds like a chuckle coming from Pascal's mouth. "Right," she says, wording her words very carefully, the same care used in her tone of voice as well. "So he's insulted you," she repeats the facts back to him quietly. "And... you decided that you were going to wait to get revenge?" Point that she's getting at. Why didn't he kick Billy's ass when he could have? Pascal leans back in the chair further and mulls this through carefully. "Don't think I've met him. Sounds like it'd be hard to forget meeting someone with a cape." And then a forced smile. So hard to keep her tone from being condescending. |
| "Actually, I hit him pretty good, but the kid used Wingardium Leviosa on me and escaped," he shrugs. "I think I probably hit him pretty good despite it though." Elijah runs his tongue over his lips. "I would have kicked the crap out of him then and there if he hadn't run away like a little coward." He shrugs. "Instead I swore to get him and his little friends. It'll have to suffice, I'm afraid." |
| This would have been the perfect opportunity for Pascal to give Elijah a hard time about letting an eighth grader run away, and her face twitches again as she fights to keep herself in line. "That's, too bad," she says, expelling a deep whoosh of air from her lungs at the same time. And then she runs her hand through her hair, her own little gesture of frustration. A look back up at Elijah followed by a wan smile. "So what's the plan again? Or is it a big secret that you can't tell anyone until you've perfected it?" |
| Elijah Cruise is more than surprised he didn't get some sort of teasing for letting an eighth grader run away. "I'm working on the plan. When I have a better idea of what it'll look like, I'll let you in on it. Just don't tell anyone else." He shakes his head, "Man, this school bites. Meh, soon enough it'll be ours, then all the little imps will listen to our every command." |
| Pascal chews on her lower lip thoughtfully and ducks her head nodding at Elijah. She continues to slump even further down in her chair, her face screwed up in a rather funny expression as she stops focusing on looking 'nice' for a moment. She fidgets and sits back up slightly and nods again. "Not a word, of course," and she taps the side of her head with yet another wan smile. "And it'll never been soon enough until the control is ours /right/ now," she says with more enthusiasm than she should, having her own little agenda and her own little people to deal with all at the same time. |
| "Uh-huh..." Elijah is a people watcher. Her fidgety behaviour and constant smiling were becoming... creepy. "Yeah, control will be good..." He squints his eyes, trying to decide if this is a dream, or if Pascal is /really/ Pascal or some extremely good transfigurer. Or something. He could test it. Yeah, that was a good idea. He clears his throat, "So... I saw that falcon the other day... the things really ugly." Sure, insult yourself while you're at it. |
| If Elijah was testing, then Pascal was clearly falling for the trap. She sits up and her eyes flash defensively as he insults the falcon, but that flash is quickly masked as she just, smiles politely and sighs a bit. "Are you sure it was the right falcon then?" She inquires, her voice light and her hands clenched in her lap so tightly that her knuckles are turning white. "It must have been a different bird then. The one I see is beautiful, really." Her voice just gets thinner and thinner. "Was it doing anything strange?" |
| The eye flash was the reaction Elijah half-expected. Although he did think she'd call him an idiot or something of the like. The cheery voice and crossed hands, however, are almost more than Eli can take. He clears his throat, "I'm almost positive. The thing had these beady green eyes. Real ugly coloring... it was inside too... I thought you said it was a /free/ bird..." He shrugs. "Nothing too thrilling, I'm afraid." |
| He's pushing her buttons, and doing an extremely good job. Unfortunately for Pascal, she has yet to learn how to walk away when she's about to lose. Hopefully the stakes will help her in that learning. Her voice is extremely thin and flat as she continues to speak, and once more she runs her fingers through her hair with a slightly agitated sigh. "I'm sure you saw a different falcon then," but she knows he probably saw the same one; she'd seen it inside too. "It's cold outside anyway, maybe he's just looking for someplace warm, and the school's the only place. Weren't you the one that said falcons couldn't function in the cold?" Now her voice has got a slightly more defensive edge to it, that she can't hide. |
| Oh good, at least she's got an attachment to the falcon after all. Maybe it was Pascal. Why was she acting so weird? Elijah glances at his fingernails non-chalantly, "Well... I'm almost positive it had to be the same one. I'm not sure /what/ you saw in the beast. So hideously ugly..." He shakes his head. "Kind of like your cat..." Ooooooo. Maybe he should quit while he's ahead? |
| Ouch. "It's a lot better looking --" and here she stops, her voice animated and her face slowly beginning to flush. Pascal just about lost it all right there, and the sheer irony would have been that she lost to Elijah. She tilts her head to one side, and then the other side, avoiding eye contact with the boy as he insults her cat, and then the bird. So much for cordial feelings towards Elijah, he's lost his brownie points. She narrows her eyes at him, and with another deep breath, forces a smile on her face. "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder after all, Elijah." Another pause. "We can't all think alike now, can we?" She knows he's trying to get on her nerves, and she narrows her eyes just a bit at him again, forever keeping her voice light, and 'cheerful'. |
| "That's it, what's going on?" Elijah frowns. "You're acting funny." He crosses his arms and frowns. His eyes are narrowed. "You're acting like..." a dramatic pause "...one of /them/! Those people who we want to take over. Remember?! You're not yelling at me, or exploding at me. Are you /really/ Pascal?" He stands to his feet, and demands "Who /are/ you?! And /where/ is Pascal?!" |
| A list of requirements flashes through Pascal's mind as her eyes flash yet again; she's pissed off at him. No hexing, no name calling, no poking fun at. She stands up though she's nowhere near his height, and her inability to do anything to him means that she's taking her anger out on a chair, flinging the one she was just sitting on into a row of chairs just behind her. Her hands are clasped firmly to her hips though her fingers twitch for a wand right now. She stands in front of Elijah, shaking quietly, her face stony and pale as she tries to calm herself down without much success. "Don't you /dare/ talk to me that way, or accuse me of being who you /think/ I may be, Elijah." So far, no hexing, no name calling, no poking fun at. She's okay, but her tone is far from cheery. She takes a few more deep breaths, and plasters that smile on her face that seems to make Elijah that much more irritated and paranoid. "I don't even need to yell at you, or insult you to make you get defensive." Now she seems slightly more smug. "You always just /let/ me win!" And now the cheery tone comes back, for a good reason. |
| Okay, well she /sort of/ lost her temper. Taking anger out on chairs was a Pascal-ish thing to do. "You're acting funny," he repeats as he sits down again. Elijah's arms are still crossed over his chest. He tightens his jaw and clenches his teeth, "So what if I /let/ you win?" Interesting. Quite the comment. "And as far as making me defensive you could have been a teacher or somethin'. Someone /real/ good at transfiguration. Some people can transform shape so well that no one would ever know it." Although, Elijah had /never/ heard of anyone transforming into someone else. "We've got a lot going on, I can't be too careful..." |
| With her original chair gone, Pascal pulls up another one, and props her legs up onto one across from her. She's made a little bit of a mess with the chairs again, and she crosses her arms, the scowl again trying to twitch its way onto her expression. She presses her lips together into a thin line to drive the scowl away and her voice is slightly shaky as she tries to make it as flat as possible. "Since when did you become so paranoid, Elijah?" She could say so much more to harass him on his paranoia since old habits die hard, but here she chomps down on her bottom lip to keep from saying anymore. |
| Elijah Cruise is surprised again as she doesn't expand on the paranoia. "Uh..." he shrugs. "Overnight." He puts his feet up on a chair in front of him. He rubs his nose, "Whatever. All I know is you're acting funny." He scowls. "And the bird's not ugly. I only said that as a test." A pause. "And... your cat's not bad... for a cat." He continues to frown. That could almost be an apology. Almost. Shaking off his paranoia, his frown turns into an involuntary smile, "How bout we have some fun, eh?" |
| I'm cutting the log here
for the second part, because we've suddenly diverged into a little bit of
a different plot. ;) The little potions masters. |
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