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nonstranger
Aug. 5th, 2013 11:36 amCam has his head in Jellybean's lap and is reading reports (levitated above his face with his little dollop of Wellspring magic), when his eye twitches like he's getting brainphoned. Then he chuckles softly.
the interdimensional community
May. 2nd, 2013 12:22 amCam knows when Jane goes because the Janepoint says so.
It's still very smart - smarter than Cam's laptop, smarter than the average shrub - if wizards talking to a thing makes it brighter like a reading light, having Jane inhabit it is the equivalent of ignited magnesium. It can probably do anything Jane could do, if Cam tells it. Probably could even eat the Internet that Jane was politely keeping her chompers away from.
But it's not her anymore.
[Jellybean. Tilly.]
It's still very smart - smarter than Cam's laptop, smarter than the average shrub - if wizards talking to a thing makes it brighter like a reading light, having Jane inhabit it is the equivalent of ignited magnesium. It can probably do anything Jane could do, if Cam tells it. Probably could even eat the Internet that Jane was politely keeping her chompers away from.
But it's not her anymore.
[Jellybean. Tilly.]
good guesser
Apr. 4th, 2013 08:09 pmCam is taken entirely by surprise when his office door doesn't lead to his office, but instead to a bizarre sort of bar.
He has Grace and his manual - he always carries them, in a backpack sort of thing with one cross-chest strap - and not much else on him to handle this situation. It might be Iggy. It might not be Iggy. He is not sure.
He looks around, concludes only that he is confused, and closes his eyes and listens instead.
He has Grace and his manual - he always carries them, in a backpack sort of thing with one cross-chest strap - and not much else on him to handle this situation. It might be Iggy. It might not be Iggy. He is not sure.
He looks around, concludes only that he is confused, and closes his eyes and listens instead.
seedling enterprises
Apr. 2nd, 2013 03:44 pmJenny is helpful. Cam can fill out forms - actually, he's good enough with paper that a lot of the time he can just command forms to fill out themselves - and he can sound like a grown man on the phone, but for the handful of things that require an adult to go somewhere in person, she's useful. He grows - he's adult height before his sixteenth birthday, and if he grows a little stubble and holds himself right and talks in the level, mature way he's learned on the phone, he can meet with investors and clients in person, and Jenny only has to do things that require proof of age. She's still handling most of their money, at that point, but Cam's doing the business end.
He calls it Seedling Enterprises. He has a field in which he grows test plants to make sure they're stupid, and to take their seeds; after he's happy with a strain, he sends it off to a partnered firm with operations in Mexico for mass reproduction and he has someone else handling distribution. Seeds are much easier than pharmaceuticals. He hasn't given up on being able to make wonder drugs, but they're harder to make and drastically harder to scale, so he's starting with the plants.
Matilda and Jellybean aren't the most consistent helpers - they have their own stuff to do - but Jellybean is good at talking properties into the seeds and Matilda's good at turning ideas into spells that Cam himself can use, when they show up and entertain themselves at Seedling for a day or a week before haring off. They're even a net positive after factoring in all the time Cam and Jellybean spend making out.
Cam asked Renée, early on, to keep an eye on any kids at her school starting to talk to non-person objects with atypical pauses between their sections of the conversation, and so he now routinely babysits a third-grader wizard named Luke (for cheap, but not free, because Luke's mother doesn't know about magic and Cam doesn't want to explain to her that her son is earning his supervision by talking to plants) and casually violates child labor laws with same. Luke, for his own part, couldn't be happier with the arrangement, especially since Cam was on hand to command a rabid dog presumably sent by Iggy to stand the fuck down.
Cam's sixteenth birthday present to himself is finally letting Jellybean into his pants.
It is a good present.
It's about a month later that Cam tells Jellybean: "Luke's mom tried to set me up with her niece, the other day, and I told her no thanks, and she asked me if I had a girlfriend, and I said no, and she asked me if I had a boyfriend, and I didn't know what the hell to tell her. I wound up saying something about not wanting to discuss my personal life. And now I'm wondering if I have a boyfriend."
He calls it Seedling Enterprises. He has a field in which he grows test plants to make sure they're stupid, and to take their seeds; after he's happy with a strain, he sends it off to a partnered firm with operations in Mexico for mass reproduction and he has someone else handling distribution. Seeds are much easier than pharmaceuticals. He hasn't given up on being able to make wonder drugs, but they're harder to make and drastically harder to scale, so he's starting with the plants.
Matilda and Jellybean aren't the most consistent helpers - they have their own stuff to do - but Jellybean is good at talking properties into the seeds and Matilda's good at turning ideas into spells that Cam himself can use, when they show up and entertain themselves at Seedling for a day or a week before haring off. They're even a net positive after factoring in all the time Cam and Jellybean spend making out.
Cam asked Renée, early on, to keep an eye on any kids at her school starting to talk to non-person objects with atypical pauses between their sections of the conversation, and so he now routinely babysits a third-grader wizard named Luke (for cheap, but not free, because Luke's mother doesn't know about magic and Cam doesn't want to explain to her that her son is earning his supervision by talking to plants) and casually violates child labor laws with same. Luke, for his own part, couldn't be happier with the arrangement, especially since Cam was on hand to command a rabid dog presumably sent by Iggy to stand the fuck down.
Cam's sixteenth birthday present to himself is finally letting Jellybean into his pants.
It is a good present.
It's about a month later that Cam tells Jellybean: "Luke's mom tried to set me up with her niece, the other day, and I told her no thanks, and she asked me if I had a girlfriend, and I said no, and she asked me if I had a boyfriend, and I didn't know what the hell to tell her. I wound up saying something about not wanting to discuss my personal life. And now I'm wondering if I have a boyfriend."
the self-knower
Mar. 29th, 2013 10:22 amVague and grandiose chat about motivated capitalism take up the rest of the wizards' evening. Plans are made for Cam to learn about worldgates the following (skipped from school with Renée's kind accomplicehood) day and, assuming he catches on quickly enough, to go to New York and meet Jenny and talk about her operating as their business proxy.
Presently it's bedtime, and Cam goes to his room and Matilda and Jellybean go to theirs and Cam has the chance to ask Grace what on earth she meant.
"Well," Grace says, whispering, "you've been holding off on labeling because you're only fourteen, but people stabilize at different ages, don't they? And as near as I can tell you've been stable for almost a year now. Not on either, but on whichever. I think you're just as likely to get a crush on Jellybean as Matilda and vice-versa, and I don't think it's because you're still undeclared, I think you're just wired that way."
Cam considers this. "Okay," he says. "I can live with that."
"I should hope so," says Grace, and Cam laughs, and he goes to sleep.
He's still on a sleep cycle appropriate to school, so he may be up before Jellybean and Matilda in the morning.
Presently it's bedtime, and Cam goes to his room and Matilda and Jellybean go to theirs and Cam has the chance to ask Grace what on earth she meant.
"Well," Grace says, whispering, "you've been holding off on labeling because you're only fourteen, but people stabilize at different ages, don't they? And as near as I can tell you've been stable for almost a year now. Not on either, but on whichever. I think you're just as likely to get a crush on Jellybean as Matilda and vice-versa, and I don't think it's because you're still undeclared, I think you're just wired that way."
Cam considers this. "Okay," he says. "I can live with that."
"I should hope so," says Grace, and Cam laughs, and he goes to sleep.
He's still on a sleep cycle appropriate to school, so he may be up before Jellybean and Matilda in the morning.
greetings and defiance
Mar. 25th, 2013 11:51 amCam studies. He studies madly. The next week elapses with him having very little sense of individual days. He doesn't want anyone to know anything special is up, so he goes to a movie with Renée and to a friend's house after school to play Nintendo games and Charlie gets his weekly phone call and he shows up to his classes and gets his homework adequately done. But other than that he studies. He wants to be fluent in this thing inside three months if possible. It's easier than Spanish, he's motivated, he can use it in everyday conversations as he asks passing animals and convenient plants how smart they are (dogs: smarter than goats; squirrels: about goat level; his friend's hamster: dumb as a rock; shrubs: way dumber than trees; indoor potted rosemary: just a step above grass) and chats with Grace, he's basically dropping himself in an immersion course with some inconvenient English here and there so he can interact with humans. He thinks three months is ambitious but reasonable.
He's not actually doing that many spells. He does wheedle tofu into tastiness on a nightly basis, and when he feels a cold coming on he looks up a spell about that, but he wants to know what he's doing before he gets going on what he most wants to be doing, because he wants to be doing big things. He swore to oppose death. He meant that.
Today he is preparing to oppose death in his backyard. It's threatening rain and he doesn't want to be all the way down the street with Leafy if the clouds open up. The jerk tree doesn't talk to him if he doesn't talk to it and it's perfectly serviceable as something to sit under, anyway.
He's not actually doing that many spells. He does wheedle tofu into tastiness on a nightly basis, and when he feels a cold coming on he looks up a spell about that, but he wants to know what he's doing before he gets going on what he most wants to be doing, because he wants to be doing big things. He swore to oppose death. He meant that.
Today he is preparing to oppose death in his backyard. It's threatening rain and he doesn't want to be all the way down the street with Leafy if the clouds open up. The jerk tree doesn't talk to him if he doesn't talk to it and it's perfectly serviceable as something to sit under, anyway.
quiet, this is a library
Mar. 22nd, 2013 11:19 pmCam's in the library, waiting for Renée. "Waiting" here means "browsing until a quarter hour after ostensible meeting time". Renée is supposed to meet him here - on the way home for both of them, him from high school and her from elementary where she teaches kindergarten - but she is rarely punctual. Her co-workers or stray parents or the principal keep her after and Cam does notebooking, does homework, looks at the contents of shelves. It's a fine arrangement.
Today the contents of shelves don't seem so pleased with the setup, and one attacks him when he stumbles into a stack. Specifically, it tumbles onto his head. That's gonna hurt for a while. He picks it up to tuck it away again.
It says, So You Want To Be A Wizard.
Heh. Mis-shelved. This is a nonfiction row. Or maybe it's about stage magic or something? Cam's not going to find any use in that either, he can just about eat dinner without impaling himself on a fork and certainly shouldn't be handling delicate props, but it could be diverting while he waits for Renée and he wasn't finding anything else. He flips it open.
It's more interesting still than that; it's presenting itself like an actual guide to wizardry. This'll kill a whole afternoon with pleasant escapism. Cam checks it out, then turns around and spots Renée coming down the sidewalk. He bags the book and goes out to meet her.
At home, he takes it out of his backpack. The plastic film on it - it did have some, right? Just like every other library book? - is gone. Maybe it didn't have any. He didn't write it down; he's not sure. It doesn't look like a library book now. But it still says So You Want To Be A Wizard and he still wants to pretend to be a wizard for a bit, kill some time, put off U.S. History homework. He flips it open. He reads.
Today the contents of shelves don't seem so pleased with the setup, and one attacks him when he stumbles into a stack. Specifically, it tumbles onto his head. That's gonna hurt for a while. He picks it up to tuck it away again.
It says, So You Want To Be A Wizard.
Heh. Mis-shelved. This is a nonfiction row. Or maybe it's about stage magic or something? Cam's not going to find any use in that either, he can just about eat dinner without impaling himself on a fork and certainly shouldn't be handling delicate props, but it could be diverting while he waits for Renée and he wasn't finding anything else. He flips it open.
It's more interesting still than that; it's presenting itself like an actual guide to wizardry. This'll kill a whole afternoon with pleasant escapism. Cam checks it out, then turns around and spots Renée coming down the sidewalk. He bags the book and goes out to meet her.
At home, he takes it out of his backpack. The plastic film on it - it did have some, right? Just like every other library book? - is gone. Maybe it didn't have any. He didn't write it down; he's not sure. It doesn't look like a library book now. But it still says So You Want To Be A Wizard and he still wants to pretend to be a wizard for a bit, kill some time, put off U.S. History homework. He flips it open. He reads.
