bandaids won't help you here (Edmund)

[haley]

Her gladius was seriously out of whack. Something was throwing it off as though she was trying to fight with a rubber toy rather than the long piece of Imperial Gold that it was. And frankly, that sort of ticked her off. Sure, she had a knack for winning, but fighting using a rubber toy sword was not working out. And it had cost her two very embarrassing losses on the training field and, well, that was just not something she could put up with. Where would her reputation go if she kept losing? She was representing her mother here! Victory herself! Or Victoria if you wanted to be technical, but she sort of figured that with the personified deities, just capitalizing whatever they personified worked the same way. And from the one time she’d met her, her mum was pretty cool, so she had a decent feeling she wouldn’t mind anyhow.

But back to business. Haley Campbell was on a mission, and her extremely important purpose – at least to her – showed in every step of her gate and especially in the ‘get in my way and I will fillet you with a rubber-ish sword’ look in her eyes. She was not to be denied her right to kick people’s sorry butts! Add something about for the glory of Rome and honor of her mother and that sort of thing here. But right now, she was unabashedly more concerned about that look that nasty little legacy of Mercury gave her when he royally handed her pride to her on an imperial gold platter. Little jerk. Oh, he only thought he’d heard the end of this one. Like Fortuna would like him that much.

The forges were ahead, not very far from the armory, and seeing as this was her favorite gladius, she was not about to just chuck it and go get a new one. No, it was time to make sure that this thing got the proper attention and treatment that it needed and deserved, even if that meant she would have to threaten or bribe a Vulcan kid or two. That was last resort, though. Those kids were kind of… what did you even call a blacksmith nerd? Well, whatever it was, that was the term for them. So she hoped that just by presenting a weapon with a little ‘you’re the only ones who fix this’ comment (minus any ‘help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi’ because she was definitely not some weird honeybun headpiece lady) or something else that might be construed as flattery towards their art, would do the trick. Not that she was totally opposed to making it known that she meant business.

She, ignoring the heat and the possible bad idea that it was to walk right into the forge uninvited and in jeans and a regular t-shirt, she did just that. “Alright, anyone who can hear me, got a situation here. This here gladius has sadly passed away into the land of virtual uselessness and I need someone who knows what they’re doing. Any takers?” Short, sweet, and very bluntly to the point. That was how she preferred it anyhow.

Tag: Edmund
Word Count: 525

[Deleted]

If there was any such thing as "free time" at Camp Jupiter, he spent it in the forge. Edmund remembered giving up training sessions to lurk in the forge. Sure, he had gotten into trouble for it and everything, since the regime they were trying to mimic was like... ancient Sparta (or just Rome), but he didn't care. He had nothing to loose. Nothing alive, anyway. So he just continued being him, and decided to deal with the consequences later. As of now, he had his little armory inspection. Everything immediate seemed in shape, well supplied, and fixed. So, he went over to what he normally did during his free time. Lurked by himself and made a biplane. This one was near-ish to started. It was one of... six he had made so far. Two more to go before the date, meaning he could take his sweet time with the last two. Maybe even make them fly. He tapped his fingers on the work bench, trying to think of ways that he could get wires inside of a wooden plane, and make it look like it was totally natural. Ah well, he had six more months to figure it out.

The demigod boy sighed, his dark brown eyes drifting around the dark room. Dark, except for the forge fire. Then again, his eyes were well adjusted, it was outside that was too bright to him right now. Even though it was kind of hot and stuffy in here, he had gotten used to it over time. Just like he had semi-gotten used to the idea that the fire wouldn't leap out and decide to burn him. He could actually stay in here. One fourth conquered fear. .5 points to the Roman demigod! Great, now he sounded like a some sort of professor from Harry Potter. A slight smirk flickered over his face as he began to carefully carve out the biplane again. As of now: just a box of solid wood. That would change in a month or so... He just stayed there, calmly carving... until the door opening the forge disrupted it. The light from outside nearly blinded him. Yeah, definitely too used to the near darkness. Edmund's eyes passed over the silhouette standing in the door frame, confirming what he thought. Joy... another human being. And a rather loud one at that. His virtually silent (with exception to the crackling fire) world got shattered as she announced herself.

"It's hard for me not to hear you," he snapped, looking at her and noting a knife, or rather, as she called it, a gladius, in her hand. Well, now he knew why she was here. Why would any other camper decide to come into the hot, stuffy, dark forge (with a cranky, and usually irritable Edmund in it) other than to get their weapon fixed? Or to demand them to make something else? If she wanted a new weapon, she could have easily gone to the armory, but nope. She wanted this specific gladius. Ah well, whatever. "I'll do it," he said after a moment, shrugging slightly and holding his hand out for the knife.

IC: 533

[haley]

The forge was hot. That was by far the first thing you noticed going into it. Even standing in the doorway as she was, it was impossible for Haley to argue that this place was boiling lava hot. And then there was the fact that only after announcing her presence, that the place was virtually deserted. And the fires were still going. Yeah, that totally wasn’t screaming fire hazard. Then again, this place gave ten year olds dangerous weapons. So maybe there really wasn’t any place to talk there.

She stepped inside and immediately second guessed herself on that one. This place needed air conditioning in a bad way. While it was nearly impossible to live at Camp Jupiter and not be used to some measure of heat, this was seriously pushing it. How those Vulcan kids stood it, she didn’t know. Maybe all their nerve cells had melted so they couldn’t feel it or something. Yeah, she’d just go with that explanation. And speaking of melted nerve cells, low a beyond, there was present none other than possibly the grumpiest kid in this gods forsaken place: Edmund Simons. He had about as much charm as a tarantula and the personality skills of a scorpion ballista.

And he appeared to be the only one here. Oh, joy of joys. She would almost be tempted to turn back and return to the relatively floweringly hospitable and lovely land that was Camp Jupiter, but there was the slight problem that her gladius still was not in the best fighting condition. And this was her trusty rusty (minus the rust) battle friend. So if that meant putting up with Sir Edmund the Annoyingly Negative, then she would. Besides, she wasn’t exactly miss popular sweetie pie herself, so she supposed she really had no room to talk. Such a shame. Giving Ed a once-over though keeping the ‘I really wish it wasn’t you I had to talk to’ comment to herself due to the fact he actually had agreed to help. She held out the short sword to him. “There’s something off about the balance. Guess it’s been through one too many rough fights. Haven’t gotten anything done to it since just after Orthys.” Then she remembered he was sort of doing her a favor. “Oh, right. And thanks. Sorta fond of this one is all. Never forget your first weapon or something inspirational and totally not up my alley like that. But inspirational sayings aside, think you can fix it?”

She shifted her weight to one foot and finally looked over what he apparently had been working on before she came in. Wait, wood? That was something she hadn’t expected to find here. From what extremely little she knew about Vulcan kids, didn’t they tend to chill with metals more? Ah well. Her ADHD kicked in as it so often did. “So what’s that?” She was really tempted to go over and have a look herself, but even Haley knew the limits of personal space, even if she didn’t always observe them so well.

Tag: Ed
Word Count: 511
Notes: Sorry it’s late! And short!

[Deleted]

Two of the most notable things of the forge: heat, and semi-darkness. After the eyes got adjusted was when the viewer saw everything that was around them: half finished projects, molding templates, metal, hammers, hilts, the whole nine yards. Most people complained about the thing that hit them first: heat. From where he was standing (uh, sitting rather), she was letting cold air in (then again it was January). It was easily a lot worse in the summer, but still, if someone opened the door then too, they would still be letting cool air in. Heat toleration was either acquired from being there all the time, or just one of those half Vulcan things. Ed remembered being fairly hot the first day he had decided to step foot in here, probably not as hot as some other campers, but hot nonetheless. After a few visits though, he felt close to nothing. If anything, outside was cold, and in the forge was comfortable. So maybe it came with both? He really had no idea; all he knew now was that he could probably stay in here all day if given the choice.

His eyes tracked up, finally getting a semi good look at the female who had shattered his calm world. Her face was still half masked in shadow, and flickering along with the fire. The voice and partial weren't familiar, but that wasn't worrisome to Ed. He seldom could match face/name to anyone around here. True, he had probably seen her around, had probably heard her name around Camp. For gods sakes, he probably even got a name/face somewhere along the six year line but just couldn't remember it. Now? If asked to put the two elements together to form a name/face with personality check on the spot? Nope. Not happening.

They both seemed to size eachother up; a lesson that Edmund had learned early in his Camp career. It was next to normal and could almost act a greeting in this Camp: say hi mentally while you look at your opponent to make sure he/she won't stab you! Then, she finally gave the knife over. He wasn't sure why, but some people got almost taken aback whenever he agreed to fix or make something for them. What else was he going to say? "Sorry, I hate you so therefore I will not fix your blade"? He didn't have much back up for that, even if he did decide to say it (which he never had). Edmund nodded slightly as she said it was off balance. He could feel that. "Not surprising," he stated flatly in a matter of fact voice. Many, if not all, of the fights here were rough. He just shrugged slightly. "No problem..." he said somewhat warily. Kind of weird to have people thanking you. First weapon and all that attachment stuff... figured.

At the vital question he looked down at the hilt again and then gave the sword a few gentle swings. It didn't feel right at all. He had gotten taught how to rebalance. Or more liked stalked and watched. "Yes," he said simply. The point of balance was off... as she had picked up. Anyone could pick that up from their own sword. He carefully inspected the part of the blade that was the closest to the hilt. His attention was diverted by her voice. Edmund automatically looked over. Right, his in-a-month-or-so-to-be-plane. "A block of wood," he said flatly.

OOC: No no no! It was great <3
Okay his muse is like... raging for some reason >.<
IC: 595

[haley]

Haley didn’t much like this place. Then again, that could just be that part of Haley that wasn’t fond of places that felt about nine hundred degrees, cramped, in her opinion, with various who knows whats, and always at risk for a fire to break out of something. She’d never heard of a fire breaking out or anything, but then again, she didn’t pay attention to the news around the camp much anyhow, so that wasn’t saying anything at all. For all she knew, this place could have been rebuilt five times in the last two years. And it would be just her luck lately that it would go up in flames again during this visit. Boy, that would royally stink. Possibly literally because they had some weird looking smithy stuff in here.

She watched as he held the gladius and checked it. Man, if she thought it was off balance, it had to be bad, so no doubt he was likely thinking her crazy for having still been fighting with it. She often times thought herself crazy as well. His tone bugged her though. She had a brief idea to shove a harmonica in his mouth just to give it a little audio interest. The kid was about as exciting as paint drying on growing grass. She would have said something, but that was probably considered rude. She vaguely wondered if all Vulcan’s kids were this exciting. After all, when she didn’t make a habit to talking to a lot of people, it sort of happened that she didn’t know much about a lot of other people. Ah well, their loss. They didn’t get to know the wonderfulness that was Haley.

Not only was this place stuffy, but the guy in front of her was not making things any less better. She could almost feel her eyelids drooping. Heat sort of had that effect on her. That was why she had gone to extra lengths with getting multiple blankets for her bunk – she easily had double the norm. She may not like the sweltering heat so much, but she didn’t like cold much either. Ah, picky picky. So she watched him test the blade and look at it from this angle and that angle and stuff she didn’t really understand before she had to distract herself. Well, that and her AHDH didn’t allow much for paying attention for a long period of time. Neither did her knack for not wanting to pay attention for a long period of time.

Which brought her attention to the project lying abandoned. Part of her felt bad about interrupting, but the other more vocal part didn’t care so much. He was sort of the go-to guy for fixing stuff, so surely he was used to this sort of thing. But curiosity took the best of her and she had to ask about it. At his answer, though, she crossed her arms and gave him a did you seriously just say that? look. “Really? I didn’t notice,” she said sarcastically. “Well, I am so glad you are here to clear things up, Captain Obvious. I never would have guessed that. Come on, I mean what are you making. I can’t exactly see just setting a block of wood on a counter in the sweltering heat and staring at it. You had to be doing something.” Nosey, yes, but that was Haley for you.

 
Tag: Ed!
Word Count: 569

[Deleted]

Graphic Credit to Cori!

It had taken a few days for Edmund to get comfortable in the forge. When he first came in here, a month or so after turning thirteen, he wondered how people didn't get claustrophobic. As he thought about that though, being surrounded by things were almost comforting. It almost felt like his messy room back at home. Then again, being so crowded and close cornered could be considered dangerous to some, but he had gotten used to that. Right after he saw claustrophobia in a positive-ish way. Luckily, ever since he had been nine, there had been no other reports of anything burning down. That being said, he felt semi safe. As safe as Ed could get to feeling in a Roman Camp with a fire burning a few feet away from him. In other words: his definition of "safe" wasn't exactly safe at all. To normal people, his safe would be four feet away from a hungry lion.

Ed actually had no idea how this girl had even considered sparring with this. It wasn't just off balance a little. It was horribly off. Truth was said when she declared it useless. How a she could fight with this and win was close to an impossible feat. From his six years here, he had gotten one fact right off the bat, and fast: Romans did not like to be bested. It got even worse if they were descendants of whoever the goddess of Victory was. Oh well. It certainly could've contributed to her mood when she walked in here. Oh gods, just his luck if he got an angry, bested daughter of Victory. Then again, even if she didn't walk in here like that, there was minimal chances of catching Ed in a good mood; he was probably camp's resident grump. Pegged so on probably day one. It was safe to say that throughout his six years of service, he didn't get along with, well... anyone. No one got along with him either; he made sure of that.

He settled the gladius on the table, trying to figure out the exact place of imperfection. Then he felt her eyes on him. No doubt for that smart response he gave. He could just see it: typical roman glare, maybe an eye roll, with crossed arms and a "really?" look across a scowling face. But he wouldn't let that glower face unsettle him. Mostly because he made them himself. After living six years with the romans, very few things could actually unsettle Edmund Simons. He gave a shrug. "You asked what it was," he said simply in his usual flat voice. "I thought that you could identify texture, shape, and object by now." He turned the gladius slightly, finally identifying the place of weakness. There was half the cure. "Oh, now we get more specific. Good job!" he said sarcastically, looking up from his work slightly. No doubt he'd get bashed for yet another smart comment, but he didn't care. Getting criticized was no stranger to him; it was almost easier to accept than praise, truth be told. "Biplane. I'm making a biplane," he said shortly.

IC: 536

[haley]

Haley was growing less and less fond of this place. And the company. Seriously, did this Edmund kid know what socialization was? Or maybe he was allergic to smiling. He better have some really, really good reason for being such a bothersome little stick in the mud. She pondered what she would do if he didn’t, and came to the conclusion that ignoring him would be best. Considering she really had not invested interest in making sure that Grumpy the Smith was happy go lucky. Really, all she had anything invested in was that weapon. Small talk wasn’t strictly necessary to function. Telling her it was a block of wood? Well har, har. Didn’t he just think he was a right smart little guy? Smarta** was more like it.

She rolled her eyes at his response. Seriously, this kid needed an attitude adjustment. Not that she usually didn’t herself, but that was another story. She knew she needed to be a little more positive. Him, she wasn’t sure about. So she did the only thing Haley-ly plausible and informed him. “Are you always this much of a total dipstick? Or do you find great fun in pestering people?” Not that she could blame him really if he said he did find it fun. She rather did as well. But she didn’t like being on the receiving end. Which probably should have taught her some deep, valuable lesson on why she should be nice to others and that treat others as you would have them treat you thing, but it really didn’t. After all, she was Haley Campbell. She did have a reputation at stake here.

At least he was helping her out with the sword thing. And by the look of it, having some success. If only he’d shut his stupid mouth. “Oh, okay. I see. So I’m not allowed to try for some nice conversation without being insulted. You should deem yourself lucky really, most of the time I’m the one insulting.” She picked up a random tool she had no idea what it was used for and looked it over. “Biplane, hmm? Can’t say I would have guessed that one. Awfully not Roman of you, don’t you think? Know a handful of people here who would better think maybe a toy soldier or a dart gun or something equally as warlike and unpleasant. If you weren’t being such a right little pain in the rear with your smart aleck attitude, I’d say it sounded like a cool idea. But you are, so I won’t.”

Tag: Ed!
Word Count: 426
Notes: Sorry this is pitifully short. My muse just cut out halfway through. Hope it's okay.

[Deleted]

Edmund had probably lost ideas of socialization a couple of years ago. Sure, he still remembered cues and all, but it didn't mean that he followed them any more. He was probably horrible at being social these days. Social in the nice way, at least. And yes, Edmund easily be diagnosed with an allergy to friendless, sociableness, and smiling. He was pretty much allergic to anything positive. A ton of allergies, along with his already diagnosed ADHD and dyslexia. He probably hadn't smiled, kindly that was, since he was nine. He had, of course, smirked on occasion, but that was it. Perhaps once in a blue moon. And small talk? Forget it. He couldn't for his life. He could, technically, but he was horrible at it. Edmund had been aiming for a selective mute, but after coming into this Camp, it was impossible. He just gave the curt facts and 50-97%% of the time lied. If people thought he was a smart alec or antisocial (which he was) whatever.

The sixteen year old boy looked up as Haley retorted back with a response of her own. Oh Romans would be Romans. Snap backs and fighting to the death and all that Roman-ish stuff. He wasn't even offended at her questions. "Both," the dark haired boy said with a shrug and without a second of hesitation. His face was completely serious too. "Easily both," he nodded in confirmation, his voice the usual, forever to be monotone. He was an annoying, emotionless, cold camper and he knew it. No need in denying it. In fact, he'd probably be the first to point it out or correct someone. It was also true that he semi enjoyed annoying other campers; it was interesting to figure out what made them tick. Apparently Campbell (and probably a few others) disliked his curt, completely to the point answers. She had asked what it was... and he had told her exactly what she wanted to know. It was a block of wood... simple as that.

He eyed the point on the sword once more before crossing the forge to get some of the tools. At her comment he gave a shrug. "That's how it usually works around here. I don't believe in luck," he said in his normal tone, his eyes slightly rolling. "Meaning you've run out of come backs? Let's call the media," he scoffed sarcastically. Ed finally found what he was looking for and returned to Campbell's gladius. He started to gently, but firmly tap the metal around the hilt back a hair or so. It was either that or it needed to be reinforced. The camper just shrugged as Campbell pointed out that the bi-plane was an odd, non-Roman-ish choice. Ed had always been the weird one out. Whatever. "Fine by me," he snapped, tapping on the gladius again. He didn't need her to be interested in what he was making. He would make what he wanted.

OOC: It's all good ^^
IC: 508