estoria | ( OPEN ) i don't want a mental suplex, i want quality customer service

Who: Elliot Nightray (

meriter) and you!
When: IC 11/25—11/27
Where: Residential District (primarily the CERES Gymnasium) + Shopping District (anywhere)
What: Elliot has a terminal allergy to common sense: a lesson in three (four) parts, comprised of psuedo-drowning, Machiavellian swindlers, and terrible book taste, respectively speaking.
Rating/Warning: None, probably.

1. INSERT SWIMMING PUN HERE (ceres gymnasium.)

[ In reconciliation of every self-deprecatory impulse in his body, Elliot actually shows up for lifeguard duty for the first time in two weeks.

He'd been staving off the financial necessity of having real credits on hand to buy very real things for a long while (like microwave dinners, for one thing, considering he'd survived thus far on a diet of refried peas and mashed potatoes with the consistency of clumping dirt). Monetary gain: the true motivator of any stalwart teenager in these trying, trying times. It wasn't as if he was going to turn to his brothers in some prostrated act of weakness. Just because he'd been hairsplitting nebulous concepts like coming to the gym during his technical shift and maybe staying the whole period instead of flat-out leaving whenever it suited him didn't mean he was a stranger to manual labor. Not at all.

So. It's just another routine day at the swimming pool, and by the third hour he's sweating bullets attempting to get a grip over his genteel, strait-laced Victorian morals. There are just so many exhibitionists about in the afternoons, all in varying levels of undress, and he's blistering red up to his ears keeping his gaze trained at all the patrons without turning away at the sight of scantily-clothed bodies. Literal lingerie, at that — it was nothing short of incredible that Vessalius hadn't succumbed to utter debauchery, exposed day in and day out to water-slick forms and all manner of loosened morals. He'd always been a weird kid, anyway.

But his tension reaches a culminating point hits when someone's apparently spritzing out at the deep end of pool, an arm stuck out and frantically waving him over. Reluctantly, Elliot strips off his jacket and cravat and strides over, peering down at the swimmer in question with scrunched eyebrows a stare tipped toward palpable disdain. ]

[ Too bad he doesn't have any sense of peripheral awareness to comprehend the rather peculiar grin he's shot with until the stranger's got their hand grappled around his, and then — ]

again

[ — he falls in. Panic briefly settling in his lungs, he spends a second or two in slantslide vertigo, water rushing around in some great, disorienting deluge before he kicks up, hard, breaks the surface with audible frustration. ]

I HATE THIS JOB!

2. CULTURE OF THE YOUNG AND VAIN (around, somewhere ...)

[ When his mood considerably sobers, he takes his paycheck for a supermarket splurge to refuel his stockpile of frozen dinners and comes away with several plastic bags full of cheap, cholesterol-inducing foods. Normally he'd head straight for his apartment, but Elliot decides to take the scenic route and ends up finding the kitschiest merchant stalls known to man. One minute he's minding his own business, and the next he's surrounding by a copious amount of creams and lotions purported to rejuvenate youth, like he'd just been plunked in the middle of a health ad and was ethically obligated to spout off some hypocritical drivel about the losers who'd buy into such scams. Seriously.

Well, beggars can't be choosers. Elliot wastes no time forcing his way to the front to blithely jab a finger at one of the offending vendors in question. ]

[ You know, because there's nothing wrong with waxing poetic on insurrection to the merchants. With this kind of bullheaded mentality, Elliot's lucky he isn't get his ass hauled away by security guards right this minute. ]

3. LMAO, SPOILERS (still around ...)

[ Wayward hellion of paltry exasperation that he is, Elliot Nightray can't get by without self-gratifying himself on one of the finer things in life. Namely, literature. So he makes a habit of scanning the shelves of the bookstore with a probing fixation at least once a week, turning up his nose at the YA section and heading for the classics to spend hours turning through the pages, scouring the contents for answers, or maybe just a quick read.

Only — today it's different, because he's currently engaged in some kind of weird, heated argument with the cashier. On closer inspection, it's composed mostly of angry, one-sided outbursts, like: ]

at all

[ Or: ]

Holy Knight

[ If nothing else, bystanders can at least pick up on the fact that there's a very frustrated fanboy hogging the front desk to blather on and on about the most emotionally bloated, self-indulgent novels to ever grace the Latowidge Academy library. ]

4. CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE (wildcard!)

~~i didn't put him in school~~

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ haha, wow, what a nerd.

watch how slick elliot is nearly tripping and earning himself a premature death as he spans the length of the starting block again. the lengths he goes to project himself as perfect, superior, and absolute in everything are seriously unrivaled. he's so cool. why wouldn't anyone want to know elliot nightray???? people should be falling over at his feet to praise him, but alas, maybe it's for the best that normal pedestrians aren't venerating him, what with the mass populace having a smaller collective intellect than a bag of prepackaged peanuts in terms of motor skills. ]

The score's now one-one, but perhaps I overestimated your swimming ability? Maybe we should tally another point on your side. Remember, the first to three wins.

[ outstretching one palm, he makes a fist, than lifts a finger in accordance with the count. one goes, then two, and at three, he makes a seemingly flawless arc (it's more like a belly flop by professional standards, but this is amateur racing, here), and goes headfirst for his second win.

so much for sportsmanship ... imagine if elliot wasn't a dumb, prickly hedgehog for once ... imagine with your heart ... ]

[If Elliot wasn't a dumb prickly hedgehog, Oz would have been much slower to befriend him... So honestly the only one his hedgehogging is working against here is himself, okay. NOW HE'S STUCK WITH OZ. FOREVER STUCK. EVEN IF HE'S A RUDE SHIT CHEATER...

Which Oz will dutifully call him out on:]

Do the countdown with some warning next time!!

[He sputters it out over a mouthful of deliciously chlorinated water, and then pushes off to follow suit. At least Elliot does some semblance of an arc... In Oz's attempt to close some of the distance, he literally just throws himself into the water as far out as he can make it.

Which obviously isn't conducive to fast swimming?! He wasn't thinking this through... So Elliot will definitely be getting another point ahead of him this round even though Oz is much closer on his heels this time, and he slaps his palms flat against the tile when they get back to the starting blocks.]

First to three, right?!

[CONCEIVABLY, HE STILL HAS A SMALL CHANCE OF WINNING...]

[ LOVE HIM

But maybe they're doomed forever to same bantering dynamics — Oz always goading him forward, only to be outdistanced by Elliot, dead-set on proving his value in this strange, strange universe with the talking microwaves and its kooky cerebral games.

Quick as a lark, he steals himself his second win without much effort, making an obtusely pedantic gesture to check his (invisible) watch as Oz paddles his way into last place. ]

Since I'm nothing but considerate, I think we should even out the score. It wouldn't be fun if I won so easily. Does two-two sound alright with you? This will be the last race.

[ Repeating his prior motion in the prior two matches, he raises himself to his full height, stretching unnecessarily while grinning away like the fucking lunatic he is. ]

I thought you wanted to count together. It was for your own benefit, Vessalius. It'd be humiliating if someone caught us here reciting numbers like a bunch of blathering schoolchildren, but if it means that much to you, I'll oblige just this once. Hurry up already.

[ A beat passes, and then, insipidly spoken: ]

In return, let's make this a punishment game. Whoever loses has to obey the other's orders for an entire day. That's fine with you, isn't it?

[ IF HE PLAYS HIS CARDS RIGHT, HE CAN LITERALLY MAKE OZ KISS HIS SHOES (GROSS) AND TAKE OVER BOTH THEIR SHIFTS WHILE HE GOES OUT TO THE STORE JUST IN TIME FOR THE SUPPOSED ARRIVAL OF THE HOLY KNIGHT SERIES TO SHIP IN ... ]

[WOW SLOW YOUR ROLL ELLIOT NIGHTRAY. He pulls himself back up onto the platform, looking generally peevish and huffy in his fluffed rabbit way.]

Fine! Two-two! [He says, like that would make any difference at all in the potential outcome of this race?! It's clear that Elliot is a better swimmer, so who even knows why he's trying...

Maybe, true to his squishy shonen roots, he just likes being able to spend time with his good friend Elliot... Even if it's in a doofy swimming competition. He holds a hand up quite adamantly!!]

A punishment game is okay, but you're definitely counting with me this time! Ready?

( OPEN ) i don't want a mental suplex, i want quality customer service

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