#brawlrog

The portrait ladies whisper to him: There are nocturnal critters running amok. Some may not don their uniforms, but their allegiances remain clear. Ignihyde, Savanaclaw, a single Heartslabyul, Diasomnia. It takes a heftier bribe to wrangle more intel, but none that harms his resources at large. One lady describes a boy of pleasant conversation. 

“A gentleman of worldly intellect,” she had crooned, “Bless his heart, his soul seems far wiser than his young age. He makes me yearn for the ability to travel— Oh! And his pink streaks of hair are the most endearing thing.” 

A bioluminescence soiree buys her silence, and then some.

The following Tuesday is an odd day for a midnightly stroll, but there are evidently students who care little of time. Azul’s sharpened steps have all but dulled in the wake of anonymity. He needs not to conceal himself, housewardens are exempted from curfew by nature, but a wise predator never gives their location. He is on the prowl after all, for a craving of devilfish. 

(Though, he supposes squid would be fine, if at least not an empty bounty.) 

Silver tresses gleam under hints of moonlight. It’s curious how a trait born to conceal him beneath the sea could become his greatest bane upon land. He brushes one rebellious strand of hair back beneath his hooded jacket as he rounds close to the kitchen. Ms. Delacroix did inform him of habitual snackers. By what his nose detects, her intel proves true. 

Azul slips into the kitchen with ease. It’s quiet and, by the looks of it, empty. Had his target left early? The housewarden rounds one counter, scanning the kitchen’s interior. No one is here but there are ingredients carelessly abandoned. The search is futile.

Azul turns on his heels, ready to make his leave. When, suddenly—!!!

“ADELLA—!”  He nearly shrieks out a curse, jumping back. One hand snaps towards his pocket, fingers pressed to where his magipen resides. His heart thunders erratically against his ribcage, eyes blown wide as he analyzes the newfound appearance— Then, he sighs. “…Shall I take that as your idea of a greeting, Mr. Lilia?” 

”Is it even legal for the school to open up a dorm this run down to its students?”

If there was a single thought that could speak for the majority of Night Raven University’s freshly displaced students, Deuce had little doubt that would have been it. It was already making its rounds among some of the members of his own dorm, particularly those of more affluent backgrounds, and even Deuce had caught himself thinking similarly now that everyone was settling into their temporary housing.

It wasn’t that far from the truth either, considering how the only real residents in Ramshackle were a two half-students. It had been easy for Deuce to tell which rooms Yuu and Grim had frequented the most just from how clean the areas had been in comparison to the rest of the building. The rest . . . Well, it did still run on electricity, as opposed to magic. It was a miracle that the place was still functional at all.

Mission... start!

"So, this is the famed chicken coop?"

Kalen stood next to Lilia, looking over the sheet of paper given to him by Azul. Based on the map, this had to be the place. From where they stood, chicken's wandered peacefully about. Kalen felt his heart stop -- they looked so cute!!

"Azul told me that a dude came over here and had an accident with the chickens," He recalled something about someone being sent to the infirmary... probably wasn't an important detail, "But I can't imagine how. These little guys look harmless!"

where:  heartslabyul dormitory, rose maze. when:  time unknown, against the setting sun. who:  @brawlrog. ♣️

IT STARTS LIKE THIS:  Trey’s got notes sprawled out against one of the common room tables and a textbook balanced on his lap, off the heels of a relatively quiet day. The metaphorical Vice Housewarden hat’s been hung in his room, untouched all day with nothing needing his attention, and the literal cap on his head is off-center, tipped forward to hide his furrowed brow as he’s lost in thought. There’s more room and peace to be had in his dorm—an inarguable fact—but there’s a certain feeling in his gut when things have gone a little too well. This is a better spot to watch his peers come and go.

It’s rarely an unfounded gut feeling, either, but no one pays him much mind other than polite greetings as he’s working through equations. This type of math’s never come naturally, and although it’s cumbersome by hand, it’s easier to check if he shows all his work—

“Um, Trey?”

There it is. That tone freshmen take with his name in their mouths, equal parts desperation and fear when need something and anticipate punishment. He holds his breath. He closes his eyes while his expression’s hidden from view.

He looks up with a smile, pushing the brim up with a flick before pushing his glasses up his nose with a smile. “What’s up?”

The freshman’s sorry state says it all, pink shirt streaked with mud and a few new holes and bruises surely smarting from ornery beaks.

The flamingos.

It’s how Trey ends up with a pocket full of seed and ears to the wind, jacket shrugged off with his things and shirt temporarily magicked a lovely pink to match the colors of the setting sun. (There’s no rule against corralling flamingos in white, but feeding them makes the birds far more willing to listen, and Trey would rather be safe than sorry.)

He’s stepping lightly, knowing if they’re in a particular mood, unless he starts with an offering they’ll easily hoist themselves over the hedges. It’s poor form to simply cut through the shrubbery, too—mostly because they’re thick, beloved and well-maintained by decades of students before him, which means in the matters of herding them, it pays to check around every corner. Trey can’t say he knows the maze by heart, but he can leave seeds out at every corner, and it’s but a simple flick of his wrist, magic pen in hand, to have Paint the Roses change clusters of leaves to a temporary stark-white.

He’s got an hour before it becomes too cumbersome to see, and about that long until the arrows fade, and ten minutes of walking finally has his ears perking up at the haughty honks of their beloved dormitory mascots.

One corner rounded to meet a dead end. The blue mass of feathers is unmistakable, sitting now that it’s had its fill of running freshmen ragged and escaping. Trey keeps his back to the corner, fishing out seed and scattering it around said corner.

The wind seems to almost rip into the thick fabric of the jacket Deuce had thrown on in his prior need to get out and get out now. It rushes past him in a violent gale as he passes the university gates; harsh, unrelenting, but soothing all the same. From beneath the darkened visor of his helmet and the pinched tension on his brow, there is a smile. Small and perhaps a bit wavering, but resilient in its existence nonetheless.

In a way, being enveloped in the wind like this feels like a homecoming.

With a practiced lean, Deuce guides his blastcycle down the rest of the road that leads up to Night Raven University at a speed that most would consider beyond reason, though the ease and confidence that lines his shoulders as he takes the more risky turns speaks to a wealth of experience; to anyone with a discerning eye, this would not be Deuce’s first time at taking these sort of risks. Nor would it be his last, to those that had come to know him better.

As the town begins to appear before them so too does the inherent boldness that strengthens his bones. Where one would think to slow down, Deuce simply revs the engine and continues to speed along through quiet town streets until he is nothing but a blur of color and sound to the town’s residents; aside from a few startled sounds, the sudden interruption to their day is otherwise an uneventful happening. He heads down towards the south-eastern side of the island, overtaking the docks until he finally comes to a sandy stop on an empty stretch of beach, as far from the rest of the town as reasonably possible.

With a quiet sigh, Deuce pulls off his helmet and leaves it to sit on a spot at the front of his handlebars before moving off his blastcycle entirely. A salty breeze greets him as he does, cool against heated skin. As he steps closer to the waterline the furrow of his brow lessens, and for a moment there is nothing but calm as he breathes in the ocean air.

Inhale, exhale.

Inhale—

          “Fuck you, Ace! You asshole!”

FIVE HOURS IS AN INCALCULABLE LENGTH OF TIME FOR A CHILD.

Even if he keeps time diligently, there is always margin for error. People get distracted—the exact thing his mother warned him about the first few times he’d been allowed to help in the kitchen. Trey had taken that lesson to heart, he thought—

It doesn’t matter what he’d thought, because he’s frozen, the buffer of his parents not nearly enough to shield him from the tirade of now, the consequences for losing time is more of it lost.

Mrs. Rosehearts is someone he knows by reputation—by Riddle, in scant sentences, often punctuated by what he’s not allowed to do before trying anyway. He may have seen her about town, but he’s never properly taken in her face or her presence. Respect and reputation doesn’t mean a lot to Trey. What is captured in fragments in the endless crawl of words. In some ways, he is glad that she barely looks at him at all. His parents are the targets of her ire.

Her reputation precedes her: an important person about town knows how to command every single second. Five hours melds together in precise, measured words, every single second wielded against his parents, every scathing cut beating back the temptation Trey has to crane his neck to look beyond her legs to glance at Riddle in the faintest hint of an apology.

That makes it worse. Trey stands behind them, thankful he cannot see their face, but their posture and every counter—when they can get a word in. Five hours is a long time to listen to a menagerie of repeat phrases that will linger long after Mrs. Rosehearts has left the room. He’s just a boy, he didn’t know any better. It’s all true, and yet the deference does not seem to slow down the lecture.

Not all of it goes over Trey’s head. In the gap between his mother and father, he can glimpse her livid face. It’s rude to stare, he knows this, and yet he’s transfixed; he barely registers under her gaze, but the expression sinks to somewhere deep, beyond his ribcage, and will ache once he’s finally sent to his room. Five hours means it is dark by the time they’ve been released.

Trey will not remember a single word his parents said that day, but he remembers the first and last time he’d spoken to Mrs. Rosehearts with childhood clarity. He remembers the whites of her eyes, even if not a single second had been spared on him.

If anyone had informed a fresh-faced, first-year Ruggie that back-alley trades would be the norm at Night Raven University, he would have laughed. These spoiled little kittens? He’d ask through giggles, No way! The moment the sun goes down, they’d go squealing for their mommies at the faintest sight of their own shadows. However, as it turns out, Ruggie’s perception of his schoolmates was far detached from reality. Who would’ve thought an elite school of Twisted Wonderland’s most promising mages would result in a surplus of illicit trade? Sevens, there’s even a dormitory that specializes in shady deals! 

So much for prestige, huh? 

(Well, he supposes that’s what Royal Sword University was for.) 

Night Raven University’s love for fucked up economics is what lands Ruggie into a predicament. Y’see– He’s failing metallurgy. There’s no need to sugarcoat it; it is what it is. Despite the tutoring he’s been receiving from Leona and the best effort his brain could give, alchemy just isn’t for him. You gotta throw him a bone for giving his best effort, though. Y’know, between balancing his school life with part-time gigs, the upcoming spelldrive tournaments, and the desire to just have a second of time for himself, Ruggie tried his best. It’s not an excuse to soften up the failure on his end, though— It’s just a fact, just as the reality of him on the verge of failing is just another facet of life. There’s no use moping over it; he’s just gotta set himself on the right path again, by any means possible. 

(Because if Leona found out that Ruggie was failing despite his generous tutoring efforts, it’d be the end of it for Ruggie. And, as the captain of the spelldrive team and the housewarden of Savanaclaw, Leona’s gonna find out about Ruggie’s unfavorable marks pretty soon. ) 

In what could possibly be the greatest stroke of luck yet, it seemed as though the stars heard Ruggie’s desperation and blessed him with an opportunity— An extra credit opportunity offered by the Science department. Poor hyena’s eyes nearly bulged out of their sockets when he read about it in the school’s newspaper. For a moment, he was hopeful. Then, the next, dreadful. Again, Night Raven University’s loved for predatory economics is what leaves Ruggie fucked up. For, in the pursuit of extra credit via faerie bread, it turns out that a certain dormitory sabotaged the dust supply. Better yet, because of Professor Crewel’s severe grading system, suddenly a grand majority of students on campus needed to make this damned bread?! Rich people seriously don’t have anything going on for them besides their money!

Alas, the desperation is what leads Ruggie to the “streets” (see: the DMs over Magicord). Ironic. Now, Ruggie has experience. He’s done these types of deals before– Real ones. Normally, he was on the dealing end but, as it goes, Night Raven University always opens doors for new opportunities. He got trustworthy intel from some of Octavinelle’s boys during Lounge hours, even landed himself with a contact number. This guy’s a real mad hatter, one of the bouncers had told him with a wink, after hauling his workload upon Ruggie. Got me some good Briar diamonds from him. The mysterious student in question had a reputation, apparently. The only drawback was that they were fae, or something of an intimidating species.

Now, two hours past evening, Ruggie’s waiting near the Great Tree in the woods behind campus. He’s hidden behind some bushes, a dark hoodie drawn over his flattened ears. Weary hyena has his magical pen held tightly in his grip: You can never trust anybody on campus. Still, the agreed meeting time he made with the mysterious student draws close. He strains his senses, if only to detect the faintest presence of another. 

march 23rd, 20XX

i don't know what to make of lilia vanrouge. he is reliable and unpredictable in turn - truly, when you think of old stories of the fae, i think lilia vanrouge is the one who comes to mind most clearly.

he is, for lack of a better word, capricious. his mood comes and goes with the wind, and his whims are unknowable. for example, his insistence on playing that awful sort of music kalim favors. why they couldn't just stick to classical, i'll never understand, but to each their own.

though, when i say that lilia is reliable...i do mean it. i don't say such a thing lightly, after all. there are few people in the world who are reliable. after all, to be reliable is to be a constant. and few things are, sans the sun, the moon, and the passage of time.