smash_logs | Don’t worry about the future.

Entry tags:

Don’t worry about the future.

Who: EV ERY ONE
What: Graduation. Prom.
When: The evening of May 31st.
Where: The Stadium.
Warnings: WHO KNOWS

It's a beautiful spring evening at Smash Academy, the barest hints of summer just beginning to touch the stadium floor, which had been rearranged into a platform overlooking neat rows of chairs meant to seat the gathered crowd of faculty and students. Towards the other end of the complex was the arrangement for the prom that was to follow. Food and drink, chairs and tables, each with a floral centerpiece, and, of course, a dance floor.

title or description

Before everyone could get their party on, however, there was the main event of the evening. From his place at the podium, Master Hand watched students and staff alike find their way into the stadium. With the recent shadow bug invasion, there seemed to be tensions in need of dispelling. If the Headmaster knew one thing, however, it was that some silly antics were not going to ruin this esteemed event. Not tonight. Not if he could help it.

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HEY DUDES! Here's how stuff is going to work. We kick off the log with GRADUATION. This part of the log will be divided into separate threads. I'll post them all at once, so feel free to hop around, mingle, post whenever, wherever.

HOWEVER, once the PROM starts, it will be up to you guys to post your own threads. Please check out last year's log if you'd like an idea of how this works. Everything after the thread titled "DISMISSAL" (I will post that in a bit, so don't post prom threads until I have that up!) will be considered prom, though don't let that stop you from continuing to post in the graduation section.

Please label all your threads appropriately! (Examples: "SHENANIGANS AT THE FOOD TABLE", "DANCE-OFF", "THE PUNCH IS SPIKED", "BOTHER X" In general, a location + what is going on in the thread is the way to go. Obviously, more than one thread can take place at the same location.   Linking back and forth when and if you thread hop is very much appreciated. If things start to look a bit laggy, we'll bump to the next page. Most importantly, TAG YOUR DUDES, HAVE FUN, and let a mod know about any problems or concerns you might have!

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"While you have a point, I can't help but think we'd get held responsible for not stopping them in time. We'll see if the Headmaster feels the same way. I won't step in until you do." As if it was an unspoken vow. Or a vow without explicitly stating it was a vow.

Mostly because she knew there was an overprotective part of her that still played Connor's mother, though he was no longer a boy. After all, he could handle himself and so could most of the other students. It was an establishment for brawling, after all.

"The Headmaster." Jon replied with a rueful smirk. "I'm not convinced he's overly concerned for the safety of the student body as a whole. Have you ever noticed he's at his most.... Present when there are times of peace? Like today, for example. On stage, presenting diplomas. Once the proverbial you know what hits the fan, though. Ah, our great gloved employer is nowhere to be seen or has so little to say on the matter he may as well be absent."

"I suppose that's true." She'd taken note of it and it reminded her sometimes of the men with the power back in her time. History had a way of repeating itself, it seemed. And if not the specific events, then the symbolism that led to said events.

"Maybe it should be him we're watching out for then."

"Perhaps. I don't feel any... malevolence from him." Jon admitted. "But avoidance in the face of malevolence amounts to much the same thing. All it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing, etcetera, etcetera."

"Inaction," Ziio nodded, well familiar with the concept. "Better to try to do something and not succeed than to do nothing at all." And somehow she got the idea that Connor would have agreed with her. Her whole existence had been based on action and inaction, and the resulting inaction or refusal to act had resulted in the so-called flames that took the village and her.

"Exactly." he replied with a nod. Yes, they definitely had similar ideas on this stuff.

"I'd sooner be in league with a person ready to do what needs to be done when it needs to be done. Folk content to do nothing when they are needed are... It's a mindset I've no time for. Let's put it that way."

Because that was the politest way he could phrase it.

She nodded once more. "I can sympathise."

After a moment, she thought about leaving it at that, but then decided that he had, once or twice, told her a little about him. It couldn't hurt for her to return the gesture.

"When my homelands were invaded, my people refused to take action, saying it was against our beliefs. That we had a greater purpose. I wanted to make them see that by doing nothing, our purpose would end up as nothing, and the Clan Mother would not hear of it. It wasn't a war I fought alone, but I stood for myself, and not them."

But still she loved her people and still they loved her for they showed her compassion, and to her son as well. There weren't many people in the world who would have done such, she thought.

He listened with the silence and respect that seemed proper. Of course, he knew some of what happened in the Americas when his people arrived. He was no fan of the colonial mindset. It was all the things he disliked about Humanity in general.

Assuming, of course, she was talking about invasion by Europe. Not a smaller scale invasion by another group of her countrymen.

"I can understand wishing for a life of peace and a higher purpose than violence. However, when the folk you face don't have those same motivations..."

He searched her face as he spoke. He wasn't sure how it was appropriate to respond beyond that. Though, there was one sentiment he felt he must express plainly.

"I'd have fought alongside you."

Muskets couldn't kill Werewolves. (Though he'd wager they hurt.)

"I didn't need you to."

It was instinctive and not wholly truthful because Ziio knew she couldn't have fought them off alone. That was the whole reason she bartered Haytham to help her. Shaking her head.

"I understand what you're saying. I'm not accustomed to having someone say it. I never said I'd needed help, but I bartered a man to assist me." And gave up secrets that weren't hers to give. And it all resulted poorly in the end anyway, leaving her jaded, which was a feeling she'd tried to forget. Funny, how it was coming up now.

"Mind, I never said you needed my help either." Jon replied carefully. "Simply that you'd have it. Have and need are different things."

Having, Needing and Accepting were all entirely different. The third was the hardest to reconcile. At least, it had been for him. He'd wager it was the same for her.

"Unless you told me to sod off. In which case that is exactly what I'd do."

Bartered a man? He wasn't familiar with the term, and quirked an eyebrow. "And how, ah. How did that go?"

She appreciated how he watched himself with what he said. In some ways they were quite a bit alike. She might have been a little more primitive, but even if she was, he certainly wasn't going to say it like that. His question, however, beckoned her to pause.

"...Hm." How to even begin going into all of that. That was stuff she hadn't even told Gordon. In fact, she had to wonder if Connor even knew. He probably did, considering he had Haytham's journal. And she had his journal, too. Two journals. One further along than the other. Hers was behind.

"He helped me kill a man who did horrible things to my people. If it were not for him, I would not have lived, I think. He was a good man, in some ways, but my efforts were for very little, it'd seem. There is little I can do about it now and nothing good waits for me in those lands."

Jon sighed. He knew enough to guess that she was probably right. "I'm glad you were able to exact some measure of justice." Though, how much justice could the death of one man bring when stacked against many evil acts? He was unsure. It was probably something so far outside his ken he'd be better not thinking on it too hard.

"Well. This place is... certainly a land of second chances. I've likewise nothing to return to in my homeland. That was proven to me time and again. And I'm in a position to travel back, should I chose to."

There was no chance of him doing so, however.

"I would say you at least have the opportunity to, except if I did, I would not wish for it. Things happen for a reason, I have found. I am not interested in leaving this place just yet or the people here."

For if she did, there certainly would be no returning. But she couldn't really expect much of anyone else in the academy to understand that sentiment.

"Ever feel like going back, even though you have nothing to go back to?"

"No." he replied without hesitation.

Then he paused, his gaze drifting past her for a moment. He owed it to her to be a little more forthright than that, surely?

"...sometimes. Sometimes I see a photograph of London. Big Ben or the Thames. And it crosses my mind for a moment that I should like to see it again. Feel the fog in my nose and the rain in my hair and buy cheap fish and chips in a newspaper. Then I remember that the world I'm from is full of small, impotent feeling souls who've more violence in them than sense and I remember being shot at and chased with fire and I remember the only place I truly felt like myself was the wood, anyway."

He cleared his throat and shrugged slightly. "And we've a perfectly serviceable wood here, as you know."

He didn't seem like such a rough and tumble animal when she heard him then. Not that he really had been much before. But then, in those moments, when she looked at him with her deep brown eyes, Ziio thought she saw something more. Obviously more than whatever the people in his homeland saw when they looked at him.

"Yes," she agreed with a short nod. "Yes, we do. It suits you well, better than you would otherwise be. You should stay here for a while." Because it was the closest she could get to saying she wanted him to.

"I intend on it." he replied, doing his best to draw away from the melancholy thoughts of home sometimes inspired within him. "I've responsibilities here. And folk I'd not see again, were I to leave for good."

Of course, she was included within that number.

"I'm also able to enjoy the city here without thoughts of discrimination. At least, most of the time." There had been the instance of Human vs Non sentiment. That had been short lived, though. "And that's to my liking. It may not be old London town, but it has it's charms."

"That it does."

Ziio nodded slowly with that in consideration. "Charm is one way to put it. It is nothing like the world I come from or the things I saw and I have certainly seen my fair share of things."

But she got the distinct impression that Jon probably saw more. She just wasn't going to bring that to light. "I imagine you and I will both see much, much more while we're here."

"Aye. And I've a suspicion we'd both feel disappointed were that not the case."

They currently lived in an age of miracles and marvels the likes of which he'd never conceived back home. For her, it would be even moreso, he'd wager.

Not that he was a huge fan of technology. Still, that didn't mean he couldn't enjoy it's benefits.

"I think you're right," and it wasn't often that Ziio agreed with someone. "In light of that, let us stay true to ourselves."

Something she thought would be reasonably easy for them both. Too stubborn to change for anyone else, after all.

"Agreed." he replied with a nod and a smile to match hers. Wry, candid and rare.

And then in that moment, they must have looked akin to one another, despite representing night and day in many ways. Birds of a feather had a way of flocking together and the more time she spent with him, the more Ziio began to take notice of it. He was good company and he was a good, dependable, and reliable man. And she was beginning to recognise that she liked that in him.

How terrifying.

"Thank you for your company."

"Likewise." Jon replied, offering the smallest of bows in her direction, though his smile spoke of a very genuine gratitude. He always found her good value as far as company went and tonight had been no exception.

"Enjoy the rest of your evening, and I hope your gifts are well appreciated."

His motion didn't go unnoticed by her and she thought it was too... She didn't think it fit her. Respect? The motion wasn't one she really recognised, but it didn't seem anything the way the outsiders she'd known would have acted. Ziio thought about doing the same in return and instead, opted for a low dip of the head, acknowledgement and feeling an odd sense of flattery that she couldn't quite explain.

"As do I," Ziio replied. "Have a good evening, Jon. Let's see one another again, when you have the time."

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Don’t worry about the future.

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