Weekly 4

Sandy-Dunes's submit code: | order of cabins visited: 9, 4, 12, 8, 11, 3, 1, 5, 7, 10, 6, 2, 13 | prompts chosen: 1, 1, 1, 2, 2, 1, 2, 1, 1, 1, 2, 2, 1 | we love the POLAR BEARS <3

Beginning

104 words

“Hello there, my friends!!” Ri shouted happily as he prepared to go on an epic adventure on the high seas.

Except… there was no one with him!! Oh no!!! How could he go on an epic adventure in honor of the alpha fourth weekly if there was no one to go with him?

This simply would not do. He should really beat it out of this boring white void that he always floated around in, and collect his friends like the way Mazasa would be collecting his decorations.

That sounded a tad strange, but Ri did not particularly care, because he was already off!!



Poetry

215 words

Ri blinked as he landed on a ship. A ship? Well, he did mention going in the high seas, and apparently it got taken literally.

He surveyed the ship that he landed on. It was quite the sigma vessel, sleek and shiny, and with a gigantic flag at the top. It continuously changed from a French flag to a pirate flag. Neat, if he thought so.

He was about to check out what lay belowdecks of this ship when he suddenly bumped into someone.. Blinking, Ri found that it was his bestie Germain!!

“Ayyy Germain!!” he said happily, greeting him with a firm handshake that any businessman would approve of.

“Oh, hello, Ri,” Germain replied, dazed. “Are we on a pirate ship?”

“A French pirate ship,” Ri corrected gleefully. “It’s perfect for us!! A perfect symbol of our friendship and you know the funsieness of this whole entire fic, if that wasn’t clear enough.”

From the way Germain stared at him, it obviously wasn’t clear enough. But no matter! Ri was sure that the rest of their adventures on their little trusty ship would reveal how epic everything is. In the meantime, Ri had to make a plan.

“Alright, should we go and search belowdecks??” he asked Germain, who shrugged and made to follow him.



Folklore

220 words

The two of them prowled through belowdecks for a bit, checking out all of the sick decor. Ri grabbed the maps that lay in what he assumed to be the captain’s room (definitley stealing that for himself, he decided) and also nabbed this cool sailor’s hat.

Germain chuckled a bit when he saw him emerge from the room. The captain (well, infantry captain, which was obviously not equivalent in rank to the naval captain that Ri was now) was holding something of his own.

“Is that a bobcat?” Ri asked.

“Yeah,” the bobcat replied. “I’m Bobcookie!! Nice to meet you two.”

“And he talks,” Ri said in delight.

“Of course he does,” Germain sighed. “I should’ve known things would start being weird when you’re around, Ri.”

“You’re literally a hater “ Ri said, then reached over to pet Bobcookie. The bobcat was very adorable, if he thought so. “Okay, Bobcookie, you’ll be our ship’s mascot!! Hooray!!”

“By the way, where did you come from and why do you talk??” Germain asked the bobcat.

“Great question! Unluckily enough-”

“You don’t happen to know the answer,” Ri finished for him. “Well, anyways, guys, come on! I don’t think there’s anyone else down here, so we should probably go above deck.”

Germain set Bobcookie down, and together they followed Ri back into the sunlight.



Solarpunk

211 words

The sea glittered brightly as the ship sailed through its clear waters. As Ri looked out over the horizon, he could see something approaching.

Squinting, because the something happened to be in the same direction as the sun hanging halfway up the morning sky, he scrutinized it. It seemed to be a smudge of brown, but it was too far away for Ri to get any more information.

“Do we have binoculars anywhere, Germain?”

In response, Germain handed over a pair of Knott’s Berry Farm binoculars. They were relatively low-quality, but it was better than nothing, and Ri could just make out a small boat.

“Sails!” he instructed his one-man crew. Well, maybe two, because Ri was also part of it. Two and a half if he counted Bobcookie. So Ri and Germain made to unfurl the sails as Bobcookie watched them curiously, and once they were only halfway up they started carrying the ship in the direction of the boat.

“Woah, slow down, maybe,” Ri suggested, trying to furl the sails back up. Meanwhile, the ocean currents were also carrying the boat closer to them, and soon enough Ri recognized who was on board. Camphora, Basil, Leander, Muiren, Madeline, and Buteo!! “Woah this is so November 2022 core,” he said.



Non-Fi



Script Interlude

167words
Listened to Enchanted and Slush by Taylor Swift!! And decided to write something extra lol

“I was enchanted to meet you!” Ri announced.

“Huh?” Germain said.

“Oops sorry. I mean that’s the song we’re listening to (well I think we need to listen to a full song so there’s another one after this) and we’ve gone too long without a bit of writing so I thought I’ll add in a little something for fun-”

“You’ll confuse the point-adder though!” Bobcookie contested.

“Nah, Sandy’ll self-add this then.”

Germain frowned at the two of them. “Can you stop talking about Sandy?”

“And focus on getting us up first,” Basil added.

“But if I’m all dressed up!!” Ri protested.

“In the world of boys he’s a gentleman,” Germain added dreamily. “Wait what??”

“I don’t know what you guys are yapping about, but just get us up there!!” Madeline yelled up at them. “We’ve been out here for hours now.”
Bobcookie grabbed up some rope in his mouth and tossed it down to the Wolfsbane gang down below; Ri grabbed the other end just in time.



Fantasy

216words

One by one the Wolfsbane gang climbed up the rope. Basil slipped precariously in the process, but fortunately he did not fall into the ocean and drown!! If he did that would be slightly sad. Quite sad indeed.

“Anyways, guys, want some Starrgo berries?” Camphora offered to everyone. Germain scrutinized the berries carefully, being the only one out of the group (aside from Bobcookie, perhaps, but Bobcookie was a bobcat and didn’t really eat berries) never having interacted with one before.

When everyone else accepted a berry and enjoyed its healing effects, he shrugged and took one too. “Mhm, this is good.”

“I’m telling you, you should come to Starrgo more often,” Ri said brightly. “It’s such a cool place. A bit too unrealistically utopian of course-”

“Can you stop badmouthing our world?” Buteo asked with an eyeroll.

“Okay okay sorry about that.”

While they were talking, Ri took a glance at Germain and saw him basically radiate. Must be the effects of the berries for someone who had never been exposed to them, he thought. Germain noticed him staring and looked down at himself, then let out a gasp.

“Something wrong?” Leander asked mildly, looking back from the water.

“Nothing,” Germain said quickly, trying to hide his surprise, while Ri tried to hide his amusement.



Bi-Fi

Made this tea and tropical fruit punch mix and added some bits of watermelon? It actually did not end up tasting that good but WHATEVER.

Gothic

229 words

“Oh, come on!” Ri suddenly called out, much to everyone’s confusion. “I was having so much fun going around the seas!!”

Suddenly, the ship seemed to pass through some strange barrier, because a second later the seas became more smoky and something blocked out the sun.

“Ayy, we’re still on the seas!” Bobcookie said cheerfully, and the new arrivals started at the sight of him speaking.

“Wait… it’s the Hood and the Bismarck!” Ri called out as he gawked at the ships.

Indeed, the two battleships were exchanging a bunch of fire as some airplanes swooped overhead and fired as well.

“What in the world?? Okay how about we get out of here,” Germain said as he turned the ship around and made to head away in the opposite direction, but compared to the technologies of even the 1940s the wooden ship was going at a pitifully speed rate.

“Sooo what do we do now?” Camphora questioned.

Madeline drew out her saber and shook it at the warring warships. “Fight, of course!!”

“Yeahhh I don’t think we’re doing that,” Ri said. “If only we can head into another glitch and get away from here…

Right as he said these words, he noticed something glimmering a weird color in front of the ship. It was a patch of water, but it seemed darker than the surrounding water. Perhaps that way?



Mystery

220 words

Indeed, the ship glitched through that too, fortunately escaping the Battle of Denmark Strait.

Unfortunately, they had just noclipped into the Backrooms!!!

“Where are we now, Judge Breguet??” Camphora asked as she surveyed the surroundings of the level.

“Oh, that’s a great question… wait, what’s that?” Ri pointed to something floating in the water. Wait one second, it looked rather familiar to him… “A Level Key!!”

“And are you going to explain what that is, in addition to where we are?” Basil asked with raised eyebrows.

Ri sighed. “Well, if you insist—but let me fish this Key out of the water first.”

He dropped one of those claw thingies (like the ones found in those claw machines) into the water, which successfully grabbed the Key! When it came up, Ri gasped in delight. “A Key straight to the Hub!! I didn’t know these existed”

“For the last time, Ri Breguet, do you mind explaining everything?” Germain gazed at him dispassionately. “You see, we aren’t universe hoppers who happen to know everything. I’m assuming we’re in those ‘Backrooms’ though.”

“Oh, you’re too kind, Germain. And right you are! Alright then.” Ri spent the better half of the next hour explaining Backrooms lore as the ship mindlessly drifted around Level 7.

“Why do you always end up in the Backrooms???” Germain sighed.



Sci-Fi

203 words

Ri was about to answer when he suddenly sneezed!! Oopsies. As he sneezed he zoned out for a moment, and he could see the next sequence of events that would go down in this fic. (Probably. Assuming some random wild prompt doesn’t come up.)

The events involved him bringing the whole gang and their ship back to the Hub, where the Keymaster would be bouncing around the place like it was a bouncy castle, and then they would all be doing the floss and spinning fidget spinners like it was 2017!! Then the Keymaster would give them an infinite supply of keys to eat, and then they’d eat the keys, and then they’d teleport out of the Backrooms and onto the White House while playing Roblox and throwing horseshoes at Secret Service Agents.

Wait. What?? That didn’t sound right to Ri. He thought that there should be some arson and jaywalking involved in the whole thing. As well as running over Petain. He never missed out on a chance to entertain the thought of running over Petain.

“Ri, you okay?” Germain’s voice startled him out of his very realistic flashforwards. Hey, who knew, it may just happen!! Anything was possible in these fics.


Horror

Played the Egyptian War simulator on Scratch!!

Dystopian

I followed the workout instructions LOLL

Thriller

260 words

Ri blinked as he heard Germain’s voice, and suddenly the whole ship teleported from Level 7 to the Hub.

“You,” the Keymaster boomed as he saw Ri’s French pirate ship completely wreck the place.

“Oh, hello there,” Ri said nonchalantly. “Nice seeing you again.”

“Can you please just get out of here?”

“Germain!!” someone from behind the Keymaster called out. It was Simon! And next to him were the whole German gang: Max, Klaus, Kurt, and Reinhard. Even Alinia and Gertrud were there, for some reasons.

“Wait, why are we here too??” Flavius and Breen asked.

The Desert Trio and the CVS/French/KYS and Die Trio existed as well, gawking up at the ship. Hindenburg too, and Hans and Monk, and basically literally everyone!!

“Well, looks like this fic just got a lot more complicated,” Ri announced to literally everyone gathered there. “This isn’t great!!”

“You don’t say,” Bobcookie said. “So, uh, what’s going to happen now?”

“That’s a great idea. You know, I do think this might be the end,” Ri said, calculating. “Yes, we’ve been to all of the cabins now, and I’ve collected- I mean, met all of you!! Hooray!! Wait, except-”

“Yes, I’m here too,” Jikdus said, appearing right next to Ri. “But for heaven’s sake, my boy, what have you gotten yourself into?”

“Great question,” Ri said confidently as everyone scrambled around him in confusion and the Keymaster kept fuming. “Luckily, I happen to know the answer. CHAOS!!! And that’s a wrap, folks!!”

“So this is going to just end on a cliffhanger?”

“You got it, Mx. Jikdus,” he replied with a sharky grin.



End

145 words

“Oh, never mind. 100 words left!!”

Ri lept on top of the ship and bust out a microphone. “HEY GUYS!!! It’s me Ri!! I just wanted to say, thanks for adventuring with me. It was super fun. And I’d love to continue this again someday if you wanna! Actually yeah there should be a sequel to this soon where we bust all of you out of here. Honestly though I think there are too many AUs around here, they’re all blurring together…”

“Are you done yapping yet? Out of curiosity,” Germain asked.

“Right, sorry bestie! But yeah, I had the time of my life… sailing the seas with you <3”

“Aww that’s sweet,” Gertrud said.

“So I sure hope I’ll see you guys again! But in the meantime, in case I don’t: good morning, good evening, and good night.”

With that, he headed back out.

A-Sad-Invention wrote:

freaksterylike

so john j pershing core

MC Daily 7/26

338 words

Camphora walked through the streets of Petrichor, dazed. The city was in a better shape than Limestone, yet it was still damaged almost beyond recognition.

Why did the Organization have to do this?

Perhaps not the Organization anymore. They had proclaimed a new name, one that would mark them as legitimate in the eyes of the government. Proclaimed new ideals and new futures, ones that scorned the Starrgos of the past.

But to Camphora, they will always be the same: shifty-eyed, hiding in the shadows, afraid to confront the Shore Guard and all others who stood against them. She remembered Captain Strigid’s promise, the one she fulfilled to the death. She remembered Violet’s request and Charley’s wary alliance, and where did that get both of them?

Nowhere. Nowhere at all. They were both on the run again, both of them, with Mel’s death still hanging fresh in their minds. Jexe was gone, too, and that strange man in the fedora, the fifth member of the little outsider band that had fought and divided against the cracks between the Guard and the Organization—well, Camphora didn’t care much for him. Not anymore.

At least Basil was still here, besides her. She’d have company in the misery that was the destruction of the Guard, the pervading influence of the Organization seeping through the governments. It wasn’t an official takeover yet, but it was only a matter of time.

“Judge Breguet,” Camphora said as she recognized the figure standing in the road in front of the two.

He looked up, face evidently somber, hands clutching his hat.

“I’m sorry, Camphora. I’m so sorry.”

Was this about…

“March and Theo?”

“I’m sorry,” he repeated, turning away.

And the most dreadful images flooded Camphora’s mind, the ones that Ri had prophesied could happen but none of them expected. The temple shattering, all hellfire raining loose metaphorically onto this continent. It must be the reason for all this.

What life was there left for her, a rogue from the Organization? An orphan on both accounts?

frying pans ;D

But at this moment Sandy was interrupted by a loud clanging. Out of nowhere, a stack of frying pans suddenly appeared on one of the tables near where they were standing right now. Campers began screeching in delight and seizing the frying pans.

“FRYING PANS SUPREMACYYY,” someone said eagerly.

“What in the world is going on right now.” Kiram said, staring at the frying pans.

“Yeah I’m not sure either,” Sandy said cheerfully, fully decked out in like three frying pans. “But want one?”

Shrugging, Kiram and Milukna both took a frying pan and stared at it. The frying pans were shining and seemed new—obvoiusly. Who wanted ot wave around a greasy old used frying pan? No, the frying pans had to be kept in tip top condition if they were to be fawned on by the adoring SWCers.

max bio (updated)

the short version: sweet 15-year-old kid who'd also a soldier in wwi




the long version:

Born to a German father and a Chinese mother (bear with me as I figure out the plausibility of his parentage) in the first month of the 20th century, Maximilian was surprisingly a happy enough kid, if you don’t count the 10^2934 times he was teased by other kids and the odd tension in his family that he never really understood until he grew up. Speaking of growing up, his father (a former officer) thought that it was a grand idea to pressure his son into enlisting to fight in French trenches at the ripe old age of 15!! Great character-building experiences, am I right???

So Max bid farewell to his family and Hamburg and suffered for three years in the trenches, by the end of which his friends have all died, gotten taken prisoner, or sent home. He himself was taken prisoner by the Americans, stewed in a POW camp for a couple of years, found a dog and returned to Hamburg for a decade before beating it out of the country in ‘33 and somehow settling in San Francisco. And the rest of his life is mostly domestic bliss, fifty years of it! He deserves it.

MC Daily 7/28

426 words - a continuation of my mystery market fanfic hehehe

Meanwhile, Skog kept running away as Duo and his henchpeople continued pursuing him. He was glad that those Mystery cabin furries didn't turn him in, but now he still had this problem to deal with. And Blahaj!!! That shark literally pointed him out to the vengeful Duolingo people. Once this was over Skog would never let him forget about it, but first he had to stay alive and focus on not getting kidnapped by the green owl.

So he scrambled between the pieces of furniture scattered across the store. For a toy bear he was rather good at fleeing from pursuers, and he finally spotted a good hiding spot beneath a bed. He wiggled in there and heard the footsteps of the other bear pass by. Falstaff or whatever. What a quirky name. Skog didn't know why the fellow brown bear was working for the freaky owl, but it was what it was. It wasn't like he could do anything about it right now, stuffed underneath a bad and holding his nonexistent breath.

He stayed there for the majority of the day, listening to frightened yells and running all around his hiding spot. Only when darkness and silence began to fall and the campers returned to their cabins, did he finally dare to come out and survey the area. Indeed, the IKEA was basically deserted. Except the workers, of course, but they didn't really target him, being a mascot and belonging to the place at all. So he stalked around, until he bumped into…

“Oh, there you are, Blahaj,” Skog sighed, rolling his eyes. The shark was lying down on a bed, staring at him triumphantly.

“Well, hello there, Skog? How has your day been?”

“Don't remind me,” Skog snapped back and headed away. “Thanks a lot, by the way.”

“Well, you do need to learn your Russian,” Blahaj demurred. “I mean, Russian's a good language, and you did make a deal with Duo when you signed up.”

“I never knew that they would threaten to kidnap me and burn this IKEA to the ground, though??” Skog said.

“Yeah, they were really close to doing that. Half of the campers were freaking out,” Blahaj replied, sounding a good bit amused. “Good thing we convinced him that you moved on to the next IKEA over.”

“Thanks a lot,” Skog replied. “Now can you stop talking to me?”

“Sure, whatever,” Blahaj said, flipping onto his belly and wriggling into a more comfortable spot on the bed. “Good night, Skog.”

Skog walked off, leaving Blahaj snuggled in the blankets.

Character Showroom #3

Noah stuck around doing random stuff in his apartment. His roommate was out for the day and the power’s been out for the past day, so Noah resorted to just cleaning up the whole place and making all three meals for the day in one sitting out of boredom. Now he poked around the tiny space for something to do, because many of his hobbies did involve some form of technology and were difficult to really work on offline.

As he bustled around his tiny apartment - curse NYC and its horrid living spaces - he stepped on a creaky floorboard. A very creaky floorboard. Noah was an architecture major back in the day (hence he was even more bothered by his apartment than most other people would; it was difficult to adjust to such a horrible place when he had learned that buildings could be so much better) and knew that floorboards did not creak that much (although to be honest it was something anyone would know, architecture major or not), so he decided to investigate.

When he tapped it again though, this time with his finger, it completely gave way beneath him. Suddenly, the rest of the floorboards followed suit, and Noah was plunged into utter darkness.

Hacking, he came to in a dark dusty space. He had no idea where he was, how deep he had fallen, or what in the world actually happened to his poor apartment. He rather regretted ever having hateful thoughts of it, now that it was gone and his landlord was going to beat him into pieces. Not literally. But landlords were quite ruthless, he recalled with a shudder. His current landlord seemed alright, but who knew what could happen.

Especially since Noah destroyed his own apartment and ended up in some mysterious place.

He staggered up and tried to find the walls of the place for support, but there was nothing. Even worse, his hand landed in a puddle as he tried to pull himself up, and he dearly hoped that they hadn’t landed somewhere in the sewer system. That would be rather bad for him.

St. Petersburg, Russia
January 20, 1905

The streets of St. Petersburg are choked with dirt. Dimitri coughs raggedly into his threadbare jacket as his breath scatters into the air. It is far too cold for anyone to be outside - as far as he can remember, more people have frozen to death this winter than ever before.

With every step he feels as if he is sinking deeper and deeper into the snow, slowly disappearing under the sprawling city along the Neva.

But he makes the trip home like he would any other day, passing by the streetlights and the other factories spewing smoke into the gray winter sky. He enters the hostel near the factory and trudges past the other workers' rooms, trying not to shiver. The air is scarcely warmer inside than it is outside.

When he finally returns home, he opens the door to find his wife Liliya bustling around, preparing supper. Aleksandr, of course, is nowhere to be seen. The gangly young man is often away from home these days, attending his secretive meetings and hiding in some corner with newly acquired books. Books banned by the government. Books that Liliya would sniff haughtily at while Dimitri tries his best to ignore her, but this nearly always sparks bitter arguments.

Of course, Aleksandr also does not have the most clever hiding places. This time Dimitri finds him under the bed; he bolts when he hears his father's footsteps.

Liliya enters the room too, staring at Aleksandr, who has just finished dusting off his shirt. He picks his book up and continues reading. Pausing for a moment, she raises her eyebrows.

“Why are you reading such…” she begins.

Dimitri has heard such disapproving remarks countless times. Of course, just like him, she does not have the heart to turn Aleksandr in. That would be unthinkable.

Yet protecting him and discouraging him are not mutually exclusive, Dimitri knows.

“It's dangerous!” she continues as Aleksandr turns to the next page, brows furrowed in concentration.

“No knowledge should be banned,” he says fiercely, and buries his face deeper into the book.

Liliya clicks her tongue, but this encounter ends the way the others all do: mother and son separate—neither satisfied—while Dimitri frets. This will end terribly; he thinks with a sense of foreboding.

He often wishes that he didn't have to consider the whole business with the Tsar. The only thing he cares about is the miserable wages at the factory and the rising prices to live here. Not to mention that so many others are being forced into more cramped living quarters, and his family could very well be next.

Yet this has to do with the Tsar, doesn't it? Isn't he responsible for these things? That's what Aleksandr claims, anyway, reading from his newest pamphlet. The Tsar himself, the source of Dmitri's family's troubles? Doubtful. Dmitri cannot hope to connect his image with the grueling machinery and mindless work of the factory. Surely if the Tsar knew of the Russian workers' woes he would remedy them, Aleksandr counters, and returns to his reading.

Liliya brushes past the two of them, and Dimitri follows, after one last glance back at Aleksandr still deep in focus. Despite his son's loud opinions, Dimitri is proud of him. He truly is. His ideas are indigestible, but he's every bit the headstrong and brave boy that Dimitri and Liliya raised. She adores him too, Dimitri knows. In the end the distance between them comes from their different minds. Not even affection can fully bridge that.

***

Later that night, when the moon rises and Aleksandr steals off to his meeting, Dimitri finds Liliya silently sorting through her clients' laundry.

“You shouldn't upset him so,” Dimitri murmurs.

"And I should just let him out into the streets at night, going God knows where, fraternizing with God knows what people? They are dangerous, Dimtri, as you should - “

”I know,“ he murmurs. ”I've heard their ideas. It will… it will get them all killed.“

”They must stop!“ Liliya snaps. ”The Tsar is not to blame for the failures of everyone else.“

Dimitri runs a hand wearily over his face. ”I don't know, Liliya,“ he says, after a long pause. Dear God, he just wants to survive. In the end, as long as the Tsar isn't personally at their door, he means nothing to Dimitri.

Liliya closes her eyes, sinks onto the bed.

”I'm worried for him.“ She looks up, and the dim light shadows the bags under her eyes. ”He's - he's fighting all that is holy. It's blasphemy to go against the Tsar, Dimitri, going against him is going against God.“ She looks up, slightly desperately. ”The power he wields…I cannot imagine what it would be like fighting that."

Blasphemy. Dimitri has never understood this - as long as Liliya and Aleksandr are home, have enough wages to survive, what else matters?

“He's an adult, Liliya. We've taught him well enough, I think.”

Liliya shakes her head. “I don't know how much we can do in the face of the company he keeps.” She stares down at her hands. “He won't listen to me anymore. Talk to him, before tomorrow.”

He doesn't want to deal with this. But in the end, he just nods.

Liliya exhales, and Dimitri's heart lurches. “Wait -” He takes Liliya's hand. “It will all be okay. I promise.”

Liliya sighs shakily, her hand sitting limply in Dimitri's. She doesn't respond, but he can hear her anyway: I don't know anymore.

***

January 22, 1905

It is colder than usual, that morning. Aleksandr refuses to look at Liliya, and Liliya mutters darkly every time she looks at him. Dimitri, though, just watches snow collect on the windowsill, and lets himself freeze from the inside-out.

The night before, Aleksandr hadn't arrived home until far past when Liliya and Dimitri fell asleep. Dimitri watched Liliya clean their flat two, three, six times, before she finally fell into bed, curled into herself. He will come home, Dimitri wanted to say, but he didn't know if he had faith in that himself.

But he is there, nose buried in a book as always.

“Aleksandr?” Dimitri attempts, as he pulls on his jacket. “You - you must get ready for the factory.”

“I'm not going to the factory today, Father.”

“Like hell -” Liliya snaps, but Aleksandr just sweeps her a frigid look. She throws her hands in the air as he returns to her book.

“What - what do you mean?” Dimitri asks.

“There is much beyond the life of a factory worker,” Aleksandr says seriously. “I am learning things the divine destined for us.”

Oh, please. Dimitri has a good mind to find the people Aleksandr's meeting with and shake some hard sense into them.

Aleksandr snaps his book shut. “Papa, what I'm learning is important! I promise I will be at the factory tomorrow. Big things are happening today.”

Dimitri closes his eyes. He sometimes thinks his son is more stubborn than Liliya herself. “We need the wages,” he protests weakly.

“Tomorrow,” Aleksandr promises earnestly. “Please, Father. Today I journey to the holy - isn't that always what you and Mother are talking about?”

Something in Dimitri buckles. What must it be like, he wonders, to believe in something so deeply as his son does? Pilgrims, travelling to the beyond?

He watches Aleksandr pull on his threadbare coat, a horrible sense of dread settling in his stomach. I'm sorry, Liliya.

***

The foundry is as gray as always: blast furnaces groaning, crucibles belching sparks into the air, workers pushing through the hot, tar-like air. It is strangely barren that day, however. Strikes have not been uncommon, especially the past few months, but something about that day…

But Dimitri just pushes his hair back from his face, heaving another load of iron into a mold of God knows what. He tries to take no notice of it, to keep his head down and focus on nothing but his wages, as always.

But Dimitri always listens.

“…told me there would be a huge strike today.”

Dimitri jolts upright.

“I heard they're protesting to the Tsar,” another voice pipes up, “and they're marching to the palace.”

“Is this why this place is so empty?” a third voice asks, but Dimitri's stopped listening. Blood cold, he remembers Aleksandr's words: big things are happening today.

He wouldn't. He wouldn't - he would never -

“Wait, but how can they protest to the Tsar? The Tsar left the palace yesterday.”

“All I know is I heard the Tsar himself ordered the shooting.”

Oh.

Shooting.

Shooting.

Shooting.

Aleksander.

***

The streets of St. Petersburg are full of shadows. Dimitri chokes on them, the sea of people in this city walking on the cold hard gravel and the freezing earth. But there is nothing he can do except to get there, get there quickly through the fog of panic clouding his mind. He does not know where his feet are leading him, not until he stares into the bewildered face of Liliya and realizes that his steps have guided him home.

The words spill out of him in a waterfall. A shooting, something terrible happening at the palace. She stares at him, drops her ladle on the floor, and follows him out the door.

Together they run the opposite way from where Dimitri has arrived. They race towards the Winter Palace, and even in a blind panic they know they are on the right path, by the occasional sight of the lost-looking worker gazing over at the two of them. It seems that the whole city has seen and heard the tragedy that covers the snow outside of the palace.

Finally the two arrive, with the cold of the snow seeping deep into their skin. Red, red, so much red. Pilgrims, shot dead before their place of worship. The palace shadows the many many motionless hills and valleys atop of the snow, flowering crimson. How can they hope to find Aleksandr amongst everyone else in this horrid site of such a crime?

Then Liliya makes a soft sound. It sounds like someone half choking on air, air leaking through a hole in her chest. “Oh,” she whispers, then collapses to her knees.

There, half-buried in the snow, lies their son. Hands folded over his chest, face soft and sweet and angelic.

Dimitri blinks, like that'll change the scene in front of him. Like it'll change their son's body cracked open -

He blinks again, and Aleksandr still lies splayed out, eyes blank and forever unseeing.

“A - Aleks?” Liliya stammers. She drags herself to Aleksandr, places trembling hands on his face. “Aleks, Aleks, it's - it's Mama. ”

He doesn't respond. His eyes, his beautiful, earnest eyes, so open, so passionate - oh, God, he believed in what he believed so deeply and this is where it got him?

“The Tsar did this,” he whispers. Blasphemy - is this not blasphemy? Their son, dead, their family, shattered - what is less holy than this?

“We don't know -” she begins feebly, but her hands curl against their son's skin.

"We are in front of his palace, Liliya.“ Dimitri says hollowly. He tries to move his hand, tries to rest his hand against her shoulder, but strangely his limbs feel like they're made of sand.

”His -“ Liliya stares up at the palace, eyes lighting with cold fire. ”Oh.“

”There is nowhere to turn,“ Dimitri mumbles. He stares at his hands, slowly turning red, red, red. ”They are all dangerous. Everything Aleks read, The Tsar, God – “

”Do not say his name,“ Liliya snarls suddenly. Her eyes remained fixed on the palace. ”He has abandoned us, Dimitri! He is gone!"

“I don't know what to do now,” Dimitri whispers. Something like a sob gasps out of him.

All around them, families bow their heads over their loved ones, mourners at prayer. And still, the lights of the palace gleam against the red rivers in the snow.

thanks to elfie, zai, lora, snowy, and inky for critiquing <3


a/n here! highly recommended to check this out if you're not a panelist or judge

MC Daily 7/29

SCRIPT PODCASTERS
You are very alpha!!
The most epic podcasters to ever grace
The great Scratch Writing Camp’s face

With your entertaining tracks repeated on loop.
Your podcasts are better than eating fruit!
I stayed tuned and permanently attuned
To your very lovely bops of tunes

You’re just so alpha
The most alpha
Of all of the cabins here
(Even Mystery, I fear)

But if I have to say, I would relay
To the very alpha hosts
That script is truly the most deserving
Of the best kind of learning
Because podcasts are just so alpha!!

(Spoken) disclaimer I have basically never listened to a podcast before but since you guys are so cool I’m just going to assume that podcasts are as equally as you guys

SCRIPT PODCASTERS
The true alphas of SWC!!
How can I ever dream to be
As alpha as all of thee!!

If I had the choice to renounce my allegiance
I would make your way to you, the script Legion
And together we will all work on the podcast
And be literally the most slay alphas!

Now this anthem draws onto a close
As I decide whether to spontaneously explode
But no, it would not be optimal
Because I must keep celebrating your ALPHANESS!!!!

Critique for @unercornshine

Hiii there overall I loved this piece! The themes you were trying to get across were really clear, and I really liked the characterization of the narrator as well, with their internal thoughts and how they responded to the setting. I'll just go over a couple of things I found unclear with the categories you asked me to focus on.


Grammar

As I briskly walked towards the door, I stole a glance at the golden framed mirror that stood tall at the corner of my ever-shrinking room.

this should be in present tense like the rest of your story!

like they’re the only ones

“they” is a bit unclear in this part of the sentence :0 I know you're referring to the “other people” in the sentence, but at first I was a bit confused because I thought you were trying to refer to “some people” instead haha - clarifying that would be a good idea!

like chests, each person hoards

“hoards” should be “hoarding” because otherwise this would be a comma splice :')

A smile can fix anything, it’s worth using a few seconds of your time and a few drops of your effort to make someone’s day, this is the kind of things they ought to be teaching us in school, rather than things like cavemen that will never benefit our lives in the future.

This is a run-on sentence ^^ you can split this into 2 or 3 sentences to make it more readable!

weren’t, they

I’m, so

For both of these the commas are typos and should be removed, I believe :0


Flow

I shove my keys (…) the lyrics filling my ears.

okay, so with this whole paragraph the sentences are a bit repetitive in that they mostly all start with “I” :0 it would be interesting if you spiced it up a little - so for example:

I stop when I get to the bus stop, my heart pounding in my chest

can be “When I get to the bus stop, I stop, my heart pounding in my chest”

With a deafening screech, the bus pulls up, opening its doors, beckoning us towards them.

The structure of this sentence was a bit confusing to me - it's a bit of a run-on sentence, and you can also clear up the unclear “them” pronoun since it's kinda close to the bus.

But aren’t you the one who secludes yourself, isolates yourself from others?

This was a bit confusing to read - who is the “you” referring to, exactly? I read it as some back-and-forth dialogue between the narrator and their own mind, so if that's what you were going for it might be worth putting this part in italics for clarity :>

A silence that splits through the air and leaves yet another scar on my heavily bruised body.

Such a cool ending woah :>


Word choice

who secludes yourself, isolates yourself from others

This is a bit repetitive, since “secluded” and “isolates” have essentially the same meaning :')

tragedies and keepsakes

Aww this is so pretty <3 I love it



So that's about the main things I noticed while reading through - overall, you did such an amazing job with this piece, and thanks you for letting me read through <3 good luck with the writing comp!

Sandy-Dunes wrote:

To Bleed on Hallowed Ground

by @Sandy-Dunes & @--tranquility
SWC July 2024 Main Entry
1994 words

St. Petersburg, Russia
January 20, 1905

The streets of St. Petersburg are choked with dirt. Dimitri coughs raggedly into his threadbare jacket as his breath plumes into the air. It's far too cold for anyone to be outside - more people have frozen to death this winter than as far as he can remember.

With every step he feels as if he is sinking more and more deeply into the earth, slowly becoming devoured by the sprawling city along the Neva.

When he finally returns home, he opens the door to find his wife Liliya bustling around, preparing supper. Aleksandr, of course, is nowhere to be seen. The gangly-limbed young man is often reclusive these days, hiding in some corner with his books. Books that Liliya would sniff haughtily at and Dimitri would try his best to ignore, but it becomes a difficult feat when they spark loud arguments.

Of course, Aleksandr also does not have the most clever hiding places. This time Dimitri finds him under the bed, and he swiftly bolts out once he hears his father's footsteps.

Liliya enters the room too, staring at Aleksandr, who was just finishing dusting off his shirt as he picks his book back up and continues reading. She pauses for a moment, raises her eyebrows.

“Why are you reading such…” she begins.

She is referring to the books again. Dimitri has heard her disapproving remarks countless times, but just like him, she does not have the heart to turn him in. Such a thought is unthinkable.

Yet protecting him is not mutually exclusive with discouraging him, Dimitri knows.

“It's dangerous!” she continues as Aleksandr turns to the next page, thin brows furrowed in concentration.

“No knowledge should be banned,” he says fiercely in reply, and buries his face deeper into the book.

Liliya clicks her tongue, but this encounter ends the way the others all do: mother and son separating, neither satisfied, while Dimitri frets. This has to build up to something; he knows it.

He wishes, as he often does, that he didn't have to consider this whole business with the Tsar, to be caught up between his family's conflicting opinions. The only things he cares about are the miserable wages at the factory and the rising prices to live here, at a time where so many others were being forced into more cramped living quarters.

Yet this has to do with the Tsar, doesn't it? Isn't it his responsibility, for these things? That's what Aleksandr claims, anyway, reading from his newest pamphlet. Dimitri doubts the Tsar himself is the source of his troubles; he cannot hope to connect his image with the grueling machinery and mindless work of the factory. Surely if the Tsar knew of the Russian workers' woes he would remedy them, Aleksandr counters, and returns to his reading.

Watching him, Dimitri remembers the days that the three of them had once spent in their lonesome village, miles away from this city. The crops often failed, and winters were bitterly cold, but it was the place Dimitri grew up in. The place that Aleksandr did, too. Dimitri recalls the two of them watching the first fall of snow together out on the riverbank, the sound of Liliya calling them to supper.

They've left that life in the past, and along with it those holy moments, sacred in their simplicity. Their life there itself was not any easier, but then they still cared about each other. There is only chaos and bitterness here in this city.

Liliya brushes past the two of them, and Dimitri follows, after one last glance back at Aleksandr still deep in focus. Despite his son's loud opinions, Dimitri's proud of him. He truly is. His ideas are indigestible, but he's every bit the headstrong and brave boy that Dimitri and Liliya raised. She adores him too, Dimitri knows. In the end the distance between them comes from their different minds. Not even affection can fully bridge that.


***


Later that night, when the moon rises and Aleksandr steals off to his meeting, Dimitri finds Liliya silently sorting through her clients' laundry.

“You shouldn't upset him so,” Dimitri says quietly.

"And I should just let him out into the streets at night, going God knows where, fraternizing with God knows what people? They are dangerous, Dimtri, as you should - “

”I know,“ he murmurs. ”I've heard their ideas. It will… it will get them all killed.“ He shakes his head. ”They aren't wrong, though.“

”Not you too!“ Liliya snaps. ”The Tsar is not to blame for the failures of everyone else.“

Dimitri runs a hand wearily over his face. ”I don't know, Liliya,“ he says, after a long pause. Dear God, he just wants to survive. In the end, as long as the Tsar isn't personally at their door, he means nothing.

Liliya closes her eyes, sinks onto the bed. Dimitri waits -

”I'm worried for him, Dimitri.“ She looks up, and the dim light shadows the bags under her eyes. ”He's - he's fighting all that is holy. It's blasphemy to go against the Tsar, Dimitri, going against him is going against God.“ She looks up, slightly desperately. ”The power he wields…I cannot imagine what it would be like fighting that."

Blasphemy. Dimitri has never understood this - as long as Liliya and Aleksandr are home, have enough wages to survive, what else matters?

“He will keep himself safe. We've taught him well enough, I think.”

Liliya shakes her head. “I don't know how much we can do in the face of the company he keeps.” She stares down at her hands. “He won't listen to me anymore. Talk to him, before tomorrow.”

He doesn't want to deal with this. But in the end, he just nods.

Liliya exhales, and Dimitri's heart lurches. “Wait -” He takes Liliya's hand. “It will all be okay. I promise.”

Liliya sighs shakily. "I hope you're right, "


***


Aleksandr doesn't get home until far past when Liliya and Dimitri fall asleep. Dimitri watches Liliya clean their flat two, three, six times, before she finally falls into bed, curled into herself. He will come home, Dimitri wants to say, but he doesn't know if he has faith in that himself.

But Aleksandr is home in the morning, nose buried in a book as always. Neither he nor Liliya say a word to each other, and the air is frostier than the winter's snap outside.

“Aleksandr?” Dimitri attempts. “You - you must get ready for the factory.”

“I'm not going to the factory today, Father.”

“Like hell -” Liliya snaps, but Aleksandr just sweeps her a frigid look. She throws her hands in the air as he returns to her book.

“What - what do you mean?” Dimitri says.

“There is much beyond the life of a factory worker,” Aleksandr says seriously. “I am learning things the divine destined for us.”

Oh, please. Dimitri has a good mind to find the people Aleksandr's meeting with and shake some hard sense into them.

Aleksandr snaps his book shut. “Father, what I'm learning is important! I promise I will be at the factory tomorrow. Big things are happening today.”

Dimitri closes his eyes. He sometimes thinks his son is more stubborn than Liliya herself. “We need the wages,” he says weakly.

“Tomorrow,” Aleksandr promises earnestly. “Please, Father. Today I journey to the holy - isn't that always what you and Mother are talking about?”

Something in Dimitri buckles. What must it be like, he wonders, to believe in something so deeply as his son does? Pilgrims, traveling to the beyond?

He watches Aleksandr pull on his threadbare coat, a horrible sense of dread settling in his stomach. I'm sorry, Liliya.


***


The foundry is as gray as always: blast furnaces firing, crucibles belching sparks into the air. It is strangely barren that day, however. Strikes have not been uncommon, especially the past few months, but something about that day…

But Dimitri just pushes his hair back from his face, heaving another load of iron into a mold of God knows what. He tries to take no notice of it, to keep his head down and focus on nothing but his wages, as always, those pitiful roubles that mean survival.

But Dimitri always listens.

“…told me there would be a huge strike today.”

Dimitri jolts upright.

“I heard they're protesting to the Tsar,” another voice pipes up, “and they're marching to the palace.”

“Is this why this place is so empty?” a third voice asks, but Dimitri's stopped listening. Blood cold, he remembers Aleksandr's words: big things are happening today.

He wouldn't. He wouldn't - he would never -

“Wait, but how can they protest to the Tsar? The Tsar left the palace yesterday.”

“All I know is I heard the Tsar himself ordered the shooting.”

Oh.

Shooting.

Shooting.

Shooting.

Aleksander.


***


The streets of St. Petersburg are full of shadows. Dimitri chokes on them, chokes on the cold hard gravel and the freezing earth, but there is nothing he can do except to get there, get there quickly through the fog of panic clouding his mind. He does not know where his steps are taking him, not until he stares into the bewildered face of Liliya and realizes that they have guided him home.

The word spill out of him in a waterfall. A shooting, something terrible happening at the palace. She stares at him, drops her ladle on the floor, and follows him out the door.

Together they run the opposite way from where Dimitri has arrived. They race towards the Winter Palace, and even in a blind panic they know they are on the right path, by the occasional sight of the lost-looking worker gazing over at the two of them. It seems that the whole city has seen and heard the tragedy that covers the snow outside of the palace.

Finally the two arrive, with the cold of the snow seeping deep into their skin. Red, red, so much red. Pilgrims, shot dead before their place of worship. The palace shadows the many many motionless hills and valleys atop of the snow, flowering crimson. How can they hope to find Aleksandr amongst everyone else in this horrid site of such a crime?

Then Liliya makes a soft sound. It sounds like someone half choking on air, air leaking through a hole in her chest. “Oh” she whispers, then collapses to her knees.

There, on a pile of bodies, lies their son. Hands folded over his chest, face soft and sweet and angelic.

Dimitri blinks, like that'll change the scene in front of him. Like it'll change their son's body cracked open -

He blinks again, and Aleksandr still lies splayed out, eyes blank and forever unseeing.

“A - Aleks?” Liliya stammers. She drags herself to Aleksandr, places trembling hands on his face. “Aleks, Aleks, it's - it's Mama. ”

He doesn't respond. His eyes, his beautiful, earnest eyes, so open, so passionate - oh, God, he believed in what he believed so deeply and this is where it got him?

“The Tsar did this,” he whispers. Blasphemy - is this not blasphemy? Their son, dead, their family, shattered - what is less holy than this?

“We don't know -” she begins feebly, but her hands curl against their son's skin.

"We are in front of his palace, Liliya.“ Dimitri says hollowly. He tries to move his hand, tries to rest his hand against her shoulder, but strangely his limbs feel like they're made of sand. ”God -“

”Do not say his name,“ Liliya snarls. She stares up at the palace, eyes lit with cold fire. ”He has abandoned us, Dimitri. He is gone!"

“They are all dangerous. Everything Aleks read,” Dimitri mumbles. He stares at his hands, slowly turning red, red, red. “The Tsar, God. There is nowhere to turn.” Something like a sob gasps out of him.

All around them, families bow their heads over their loved ones, mourners at prayer. And still, the lights of the palace gleam against the red rivers in the snow.

I just wanted to comment on this story, I quite enjoyed this story. This was a interesting piece of historical fiction and the ending almost had me shedding a few tears as I felt emphatic for the characters. Keep up the good work!

Critique for @CleverComment

Hey Clev!! Overall I loved your poem and its theme - it felt very genuine, and the emotional impact was super well-done too :>

My main points of feedback are gonna focus on flow, just as a heads up! The flow of your poem is a bit inconsistent at places, although I’m not sure if this is intentional or not—I can definitely see it as being intentional!

A quick note that I’m not exactly an expert at poetry, and in general feel free to disregard any pieces of feedback that doesn’t work with your plans!

First of all, the spacing is somewhat inconsistent—you start off not having any dividers and then end up using them (and two different kinds), and you vary between how many line breaks you use between stanzas ^^ I’m definitely not saying that this is necessarily something you want to avoid—however, I don’t think it always works the best in dividing up your ideas :0 the tilde divider at the end are okay, for example, but the ellipse dividers don’t work as well for me.

I also felt like some of the lines felt a tad repetitive to me, mostly in the beginning (before the “tick / tock” parts)—you dwell a lot on running out of time, which is really neat! But some of the ways you describe that (like with the use of mentioning how “years, weeks, seconds” pass, which I believe you did twice) are basically restating the same thing :’)

What I did enjoy a lot about your piece was the perspective! You maintained it really well, and the thought process of the narrator was really easy to follow along. It also did feel very realistic, as I mentioned earlier

A couple of in-line comments:

in nature, passage of time is
rising and falling of crashing waves,
moon’s waxing and waning face,
poignant yellowing of autumn trees,
birth of springtide flowers and bees -
drift of continents afar,
end of the life of a star.

I absolutely love this stanza <3 the rhythm and rhyming are both done so well and the imagery is lovely :> also totally unrelated but my comp entry title last session was Crashing Waves woah

that’s crazy.

and that’s cool.

The way you put all of these more informal/casual lines next to the really introspective ones is really neat to read: it grounds the reader and allows the themes to come through more easily, I think!

and that will be the true end to time.

Epic ending I’m a bit confused on what exactly “that” is referring to because you mention a lot of ideas in the previous stanza, but this is super cool either way <3


So that’s about it! I really enjoyed reading this, and I hope my critique was helpful - good luck with the comp <33

Critique for @Galaxy_Awesome

Hi Lax! Your essay was super cool to read aside from being a bit confused about the context of it before I reached the end, it was really engaging and overall pretty easy to understand!

For the record, I’m not familiar at all with FNAF :p the only thing I know about it is that there are animatronics possessed by dead children, and I could be wrong about even that haha.

On the structure of your essay: I liked that the transition from an argumentative sorta perspective over to a narrative story was very smooth—it didn’t feel jarring in any way! Also, mixing the two of them turned out to work pretty well for the argumentative purpose of the essay that you started out with! I read the narrative portion as a simple detailing of what exactly happened to Samuel and the reason he would be CEO (or was CEO? I was a bit confused about this lol more on that later), and the story actually did hit all of your key points pretty well, so props on that!

However, there are a good few things with context that would be really helpful to know :0 for one, a bit more information on Samuel and his relationship to the founders of the Faz Ent (I’m assuming he was the son of Henry Emily but that being explicitly stated would’ve been helpful). Another quick thing - adding more information to Samuel’s life in the 30 years between leaving would be a good idea! The only mention of it was his graduation, so it gave the impression that graduating was the only thing he did during all this time, which I’m assuming isn’t true haha

The CEO status of Samuel I was also confused about—it sounds like he’s the CEO in the books but only vaguely canon in the game? Just wanted to make sure, because I wasn’t very sure how you got all of that backstory if he wasn’t actually CEO in either media.

Also, I loved the humor in your piece ;D it was really fun to read and also helped the flow a good bit! Although I would say that the last paragraph would’ve also been a bit stronger if you reiterated your key arguments about Samuel being CEO, but it was still an iconic ending regardless :>

Soooo that’s about it! This was really cool to read and I sure learned a good bit of FNAF lore xD hope my critique helps, and good luck with the comp!

Critique for Lora

Hey Lora! You did such a great job with this story—the emotions of the characters and their relationship are so well portrayed, and the flow of the story really did so much to build up to the climax.

Most of what I’m about to point out is going to be grammar/syntax stuff, as well as a few things I found a bit unclear or repetitive. I do know that you’re right at the word count limit, so don’t worry if there are suggestions that doesn’t work, or ones that you don’t agree with!

Also, it would be a good idea to double-check your line spacing—there are some places where I believe there should be but aren’t line breaks, and other times where there are line breaks in the middle of a sentence ^^

Anyways, I’ll get on to in-text critiques!

There is a moment where

I believe it would be “when,” since you’re describing a moment, which marks time and not location!

Try to make the pain better for those who you talk to for hours so that when the coffin arrives and your body is placed, their grief can lessen

This part is a bit wordy—I feel like the beginning and the end of the sentence are basically saying the same thing? Overall the intro is just a bit too much of purple prose, and stylistically a good bit distinct from later parts of the story, so if you want to take a look and see how you can cut down on it, that might be a good idea. But thematically it connects really well to the rest of the story!

However, miracles happen. There's just one problem with that. This miracle wasn't a happy one.

I love this line woah <3 it’s such an interesting take on the concept of miracles (especially relating to disease)

This is death, Jake!

I feel like this line could be in italics instead, since it sounds like internal dialogue :0

I jump up

Tiny thing but I don’t think you can really jump up in a car xD maybe you can say “I suddenly straighten up” or something along that line?

"Scio te mentiri me.“ She says,

I think this would be grammatically correct with a comma instead of a period before the quotation marks, and then “she” in lowercase instead of uppercase! In general (because I think this comes up later too), when you end something in quotes with a comma, the word immediately after should be in lowercase :>

I gasp while indiscreetly

If you mean that he wasn’t obvious with this action, it should be discreetly ^^

We reach quicker

I think you mean “reach home quicker” haha

She stops to take a breath. She's crying heavily by now, glistening tear tracks streaming down her face. I can barely speak by now, my voice trembling as I open my mouth.

You said “by now” twice in the same paragraph, which is a bit repetitive—if you want to remove one of them maybe that’ll flow better!

Some stupid people in lab coats who can't save you know about your death, but no, your sister can't know about it!

Love this part too ) it’s just such a good depiction of the main conflict in this story, and the emotional impact!!!! So cool.

She looks at me and attempts a smile. “They say hearing is the last sense to go,” she whispers.

Beep. Beep.

“I'm so sorry for your loss-”

“I love you.”

And this is such an amazing ending oh my gosh—and a great callback to the line about the “stupid people in lab coats”


Soo I think that was about all I have! Aside from some grammar and flow stuff the rest of this entry is basically flawless <3 thanks a lot for letting me critique, and I hope this helped - good luck with the comp

reminder - this is a work of satire. the first world war was a human tragedy, and i hope the existence of this story will not diminish this fact. (i have a penchant for writing too many crack fics about serious topics and then regretting it later…)

1914

Once upon a time, the world lived in peace and harmony. Perhaps not complete peace and harmony, but it was far better than the disaster that would come after.

It all started one day in Sarizzjevo, a town full of rizzlers. That very joyous day, full of parades and songs praising the skibidi toilets, some speakerman pulled up and unalived these two skibidi toilets. Those two skibidi toilets happened to be Franz Ferdinand and Sophie!!

“Fatherless behavior,” the great Sigma skibidi of Austria-Hungary, Franz Josef, snarled as he pointed to the speakerman named Gavrilo Princip who had just shot the two skibidi toilets like the rizzler that he was. “You speakermen will PAY for this.”

However, the Serbian speakermen, being the Level 10 gyatts that they were, did not particularly want to pay for this. So the Austrians wanted WAR.

“Erm what the sigma,” Sigma Wilhelm, a skibidi toilet like his allies, said. “That’s not very skibidi.” However, because Germany had made a pact back in the day to support its skibidi allies, he was also obliged to follow them into the war!!

“I’m tweaking,” Titan Nicholas, the Russian Titan Speakerman, fretted now that his mobilization was complete. “Willy my bro, please don’t fight us.”

“No take backsies,” some random Austrian skibidi named Hotzendorf said. “That’s literally so copium core.” He rizzed until he got beat up five seconds later by the Serbian and Russian speakermen. -1000000 aura moment fr.

The skibidi toilets and cameramen of all belligerent nations prepared fervently for the great Ohio War. Meanwhile, the TV men Americans across the Atlantic ate popcorn.

“Your alpha needs you!” General (L) Horatio (Bozo) Kitchener’s camera head flashed from posters all over Great Rizztain, posters sealed with the stamp of the Alliance that represented the cameramen living in the west and speakermen living in the east. The Alliance also included the TV men, but only in name, as they were unfortunately staying neutral in the conflict.

And finally, all of the Austro-Hungarian skibidis had enough of the Alliance. They declared war!! And everyone else declared war on each other too because they were copycats.


“SKIBIDI DOP DOP DOP YES YES,” the skibidi toilets sang as they marched into Belgium. The poor Belgian cameramen were too ill-equipped to deal with the sheer force of the skibidi army, even at their sigma fort at Liège, and were quickly overrun.

On the other side of the continent, progress was being made against the speakermen as well.

“TAKE THE L!!” the skibidis mocked the Russian speakermen as they retreated en masse after their generals during the Battle of Tannenberg.

Overall, it looked as if the skibidi toilets kept up their mewing streak better than the Alliance did. But once the city of Parizz did not fall and the cameramen raced with the skibidi toilet up to the sea, it came to everyone that they were gonna be stuck there in Ohio for a while.


“Hey bestie,” a cameraman said to a skibidi toilet on Christmas.

“Skibidi dop dop dop yes yes?”

Other cameramen and skibidi toilets began to emerge from their trenches and crossed No-Sigma’s-Land. After socializing across their language barriers somehow, they started playing football. Or at least attempted to, as skibidi toilets didn’t have feet.

Still, it was still a very quirky day for both sides. If only they knew how long this war would become.



1915

When 1915 came around, everyone continued to busily wage war, both in Ohio and elsewhere. There weren’t really any iconic events, the ones that history books tended to mention. Everything was very bloody, though.

But one thing that did happen was that the Alliance had the bright idea to send the cameramen, among them RIZZACS, to fight against the Ottoman toilets. They were rather getting on the speakermen’s nerves, as Titan Nicholas reported.

However, it did not go too well.

“Chat, is this real,” Sir Winston Churchill said as he watched all of the cameramen get mowed down around him. He tried firing over at the Ottoman skibidi toilets, but the Giant Skibidi Toilets in front of him proved to be too imposing. “We gotta griddy back!!” With that, the traces of months of battle were left in the sand as the cameramen all retreated.

The rest of the year passed with more engagements on all fronts. Unfortunately, as the full scale of it was too large, more attention was given to Ohio in recordings of the Great Ohio, aptly named after the land where the cameramen clashed with the skibidi toilets.



1916

1916 began. Everyone was tired of Ohio by now. Halfway through the year, though, something interesting finally happened.

“YEEHAW!!” Brusilov screeched as he speedily blasted his way through the skibidi toilet ranks. Sure, a bunch of his own speakermen were dead on the field, but it was worth beating up the rizzless skibidis.

The cameramen to the west were rather glad that Russia was actually doing something!!! Because their own battles were rather bitter.


Shards of stained porcelain littered one battlefield, interspersed with broken plastic and shattered lenses. Inside the forts, French cameramen huddled together as they bore the earth-shattering explosions that ground more and more on their electrical psyche. Meanwhile, miles away, the British cameramen were confronted by the same sight out on No Sigma’s Land alongside a stormy river. Tanks rolled onward, a devastating forecast of what was to come.

This was a senseless war, mechanized by the rapidly developing technologies on both sides. What once was as simple as flushing toilets and melee combat expanded to raging battlefields of lasers and firepower. And it was the greater members of each side, the Alphas and the Giant Skibidi Toilets, that truly had the power to change the tides of battle; everyone else was simply trampled down by those more powerful than themself.

Why couldn’t the Titans and Sigmas just duke it out themselves, if they were such opps and they were so powerful? That was what Normal Skibidi Toilets and Normal Cameramen both wondered, but they continued the fight—they really had no choice.

Two more years.

Two more years, though neither the skibidi toilets nor the cameramen knew. Two more years of this misery.

“We gotta lock in,” the Titan Cameramen of the Alliance nations promised, as more of both young Alliance and skibidi soldiers became unalived in the conflict. Lock in they did, but this was far from joever.



1917

Thus the conflict continued into the next year. This time around, though, things were finally getting rizzy with the TV men, the “member” of the Alliance that had not actually helped out at all.

The Alphatania, which had a bunch of TV civilians, had gotten sunk by the underwater skibidi toilets back in ‘15. The skibidis, not wanting a new enemy, had agreed to stop mewing underwater. But they’ve started again, and worst yet…

“You all need to see this,” the cameraman told the TV men gathered at the TV embassy. “We’ve got tea.”

The TV men all huddled around, reading the note with growing dread.


Hey Mexico,

America’s not very sigma, if you ask us. So you should come and join the skibidis because we are very rizzy and can help you beat up America!!

Your bestie,

Germany


“That’s so sus,” one of the TV men said.

“Okay that’s it, it’s time to fight those nerds!!” another insisted. Soon enough, the Congress of the TV men declared war on the skibidis.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Sigma Wilhelm said. “We’re so cooked.”

However, the skibidi toilets also had something that the Alliance didn’t. THE RIZZING CIRCUS!! And it was led none by the legendary Manfred von Rizzthofen, also known as the Rizz Baron. In the same month that the TV men finally declared war, the Rizzing Circus shot down 89 Alliance planes. Although it wasn’t as if their existence would magically win Ohio for the skibidis, they were certainly iconic.

Also, Wilhem was not entirely right about being cooked. For the most part, the TV men took ten million years to beat it over to Ohio. The freaky John J. Pershing, who was alpha of the TV Rizz Force, didn’t even get over until June.

Even worse, Titan Nicholas had been banned from the server earlier in the year, and now the whole entirety of the Russian speakermen quit fighting after this guy Lenin became the new mod.

Things certainly were not looking up for the Alliance! Yet little did they know that the new year could bring an end to the war… if they paid their due fanum tax.



1918

“Hi everyone,” the Titan TV Man, aka Woodrow Wilson, said one day. “I’ve got 14 reasons why we will never take an L again.”

“What a load of yap,” literally everyone else, skibidi toilets and cameramen alike (and even TV men), agreed. Titan Wilson tended to be a yapper, especially regarding things that the Alliance didn’t fully agree with. Like how to prevent more Ls.

Also, it wasn’t until a year after their entering the Ohio War, when the skibidis launched the Sigmaschlact (the Sigma’s Battle) when the TV men finally became vaguely important. (“We got TV men help before GTA 6,” the cameramen all agreed.)

“Okay gang,” Ferdinand Foch, the new alpha of the SWC pack, said as he gathered the top members of the Alliance. “It’s time for the SWC meeting and we need to figure out a rizzing plan.”

“Scratch Writing Camp?” Douglas Haig asked. “Sir Winston Churchill?”

“Supreme War Council,” Foch corrected.

“What if instead of having a Supreme War Council, we had a Supreme Freak Council. And instead of beating up the skibidi toilets we make them freaky,” Pershing said.

Foch sighed. “Anyways, Pershing, I need your TV men in our armies so we can go and fight the skibidi toilets properly.”

“Nah I’mma do my own thing,” Pershing said.

“Pardon?”

“The TV men will only fight in a TV men's army, not with you freaky cameramen.”

“…”

“But since we’re losing, then sure yeah, I’ll help,” Pershing saidf.

So the rest of the war went on as the SWC worked together! Teamwork made the dream work, although unfortunately almost everyone hated each other’s guts. Still, though, the skibidi toilets lost the advantage they had during the Sigmaschlact, and were being rapidly pushed back out of Ohio, leaving a trail of ruins behind them. Ohio would never be the same again, even a century later, when the L war had long ended. And on it went.

It finally came down to one November morning. All other skibidi nations had surrendered already. It was just Germany left, and even they could bear it no longer.

Hence the delegation standing inside the train car. Alpha Foch and various cameramen, and across from him stood a skibidi toilet by the name of Matthias Erzberger. He was sent by the new government (now that Sigma Wilhelm was also banned).

“Well, it’s joever for you all,” Foch said.

“For Grimace’s s(h)ake, Alpha, please reconsider-”

“I’m good,” Foch said. “Sign this armistice, or the war keeps going and your skibidi toilets keep dying.”

“The cameramen and TV men will keep dying, too. You know, maybe this war was all for nothing,” Erzberger sighed. “Why didn’t we just live together in peace and harmony?”

“Peace and harmony are overrated,” Foch replied. “We Alpha Cameramen, just like your Giant Skibidi Toilets, have prepared our whole lives for this. If the Normal Cameramen and Skibidi Toilets got in the way, that’s just too unfortunate.”

But Erzberger continued. “You know, maybe we’re both betas, deep down. Betas who had destroyed the humans once, and now fought each other. Sure, maybe you say we’re an infective force, but the Alliance are paranoid losers who don’t griddy.”

“Holy yap of yappington,” Foch said. “Just sign already.”

“Okay, NPC,” Erzberger replied, signing.

And that was how the Great Ohio Rizz ended—not with a bang but with an L.

bonus stuff here

hi judges perhaps don't look :p

































A/N

HI BESTIES THANKS FOR READING THIS!! For the record I have 9k left to write today and I only have a bit over 10 hours so I really gotta hurry. Hence why this is going to be extra rambly. ALSO FRIENDLY REMINDER IF YOU’RE A JUDGE MAYBE DON’T READ THIS LOL I HAVE BAD MEMORIES FROM THE LAST CRINGEY A/N THAT I HAD.

Anywaysies so this is a very sigma fic about the Great Ohio aka the Great WAr!! Yes this ia WWI fic if you haven’t figured it out already. WWI is too depressing so I turned it into brainrot to cope but then it ended up being crangst anyway (crack + angst) which is very alpha. Just like me!!

But yeah. I kinda wanted to make two deepre connections through using this so if you wanna hjear me yap about it I shall yap about it now.

Okay so! The first thing is that in the fic, unlike in real life, the generals actually like fought in the battles and stuff. This was very different from real life because they just laid back and had actual ordinary soldiers fight the battles. But as you can see from the ending, it didn’t really do anything!! They still escape unscathed while ordinary skibidi toilets and cameramen/speakermen/TV men still die. And in a way, they were never really fighting, because they didn’t fight on equal ground with the normies!! Hence it’s a difference that still ended up being a similarity in a way.

In addition, something was was also similar between the real skibidi toilet lore and this brainrot WWI thing was the moral ambiguity of both sides. In WWI, I am of hte opinion that there really was no bad side!! Before you go and call me a Kaiserboo, I’d admit that yes both sides especially the skibidi- sorry, Central Powers, really did horrible things. One of these horrible things I left out of the fic, despite it being important to be learned about, because I thought that was just going too far to joke about it </3 yet overall, at least for Europe, there was a much less clear indicator of who was really i nthe wrong. Every belligerent was an imperialist nation who wanted more land and resources for its citizens, seizing the chance to war only because of a freakish accident. That wasn’t exaclty the accident, but I hope you catch my drift. Similarly, the skibidi toilets and cameramen were both morally ambiguous as well. There is really no clear indicator of who’s really “bad” in the conflict, because boht parties meant to fight towards their own benefit.

SO YEAH THAT WAS JUST BASICALY MY THOUGHT PROCESS1!! Turns out this actually did go a bit deeper than just brainrot. I hope you enjoyed reading and you learned about both WWI and skibidi toilet lore!! Yes writing this had turned me into a Gen Alpha I’m afraid. Anyways have some bonus materials that I edited out of boredom :>

to bleed upon hallowed ground - a/n

a clarification for the sake of historical accuracy - bloody sunday was intended to be a protest petitioning the tsar to fix the troubles of the russian people. the protest itself was not against the tsar, as by this point public opinion was not entirely against him yet.

the day before bloody sunday, the tsar left the winter palace because of a threat he’d received unrelated to the protest planned for the next day. the protesters were unaware of this, and so the march continued as planned. the tsar did not order the shooting on the protesters because he was entirely unaware of the protest until much after; in fact, he in his private journals deeply lamented the tragedy. however, the tsar was blamed, and this was a major event that turned mass public opinion against him.

this piece was written as an attempt to explore the mindset of a working class family in russia - much of the historical scholarship around bloody sunday focuses on the tsar’s perspective, and we wanted to explore the event from a non-royalist point of view.

Ri Breguet and his very awesome plan to run over a French marshal

Ri Breguet was not your average 16-year-old.

It’s a long story, but we have two thousand words, so let's spare a few to talk about it!

As a child, Ri was happily stomping around the coast of Normandy when he fell off a cliff and died. Or did he? turns out, he was rescued by some alien from a faraway planet called Kayows. This alien was known as keyboard spam (Jikdus for short), and happened to be a shapeshifter. They then saved Ri from a strange limbo between life and death, proceeding to train him in the way of the universes that was so commonly used by the denizens of Kayows. Ri spent the rest of his years going around universes and making friends with a wide cast of characters. However, he had one mission that suddenly sprang up.

To run over a certain French marshal with a car.

And no, not Joffre or Foch. Ri liked the two of them enough, even if they did bring just a tad too many casualties to a war that he would've fought in, if he had survived and continued to live as a normal French child in the dawn of the 20th century. No, he was going to run over their colleague, the Lion of Verdun. Or at least that was what he used to be, before the fateful years of 1939 to 1945.

“Enough with the context!” Ri said as he landed in the void. “It’s time to put my very awesome plan into action!!”

“Now what is this I hear about a plan?” Jikdus asked mildly as they materialized right besides him.

“Oh hi Mx. Jikdus!” Ri replied.

(i wrote something here between those two scenes but i can't find it anymore sobbing)

As it turned out, Jikdus was in fact very wrong. There would indeed be murder and jaywalking involved, by Ri and his victim respectively.

Ri dropped down in 1930s Paris, prowling around the nearest government buildings he could find. Unfortunately, as it was his first time really entertaining te notion of actually putting his plan into action, he completely forgot that his target was not in fact in France but rather across the pyrennees mountains. How awfully inconvenient!!

So Ri sighed and made his way to Spain instead. There!! Now he could search for the ambassador (for his guy was, for the time being, only an ambassador) at the right place.

And when he traipsed over to the French embassy, he let out a delighted gasp when he spotted the goofy guy that he had been looking for!!



Some quick background here. Ri Breguet was generally not a murderous kid. As a matter of fact, he preferred to avoid murder when he could, which was all the time because he was a flight person rather than a fight person. But sometimes the time came when you just gotta murder people to save their reputation, you know? Die a hero or live long enough to be a villain. And few people had that statement apply more to them than the French ambassador to Spain in 1939, who would do quite the questionable things.

Going from the Lion of Verdun to a senile puppet was not a great development for everyone. Ri rather agreed with the sentiment, although he doubted that his friend who actually fought at Verdun appreciated being cooped up in a fort for the better part of a year and experiencing things that are not quite Scratch-appropriate. But Scratch that. It was besides the point.



There he was: mustache drooping down over his wrinkly old face, briefcase loose in his hands. In Ri's opinion, the guy should just retire. If he did, then Ri wouldn't have to devise this very epic plan to run him over with a car, and his reputation would have been preeserved anyway, assuming he didn't do anything too silly during the occupation years. Which was a tall order, assuming his status, but it was worth consideration anyway.

But if he could save his reputation i none more uniferse, that would be enough for Ri. And running people wover with a car? It was flashy and classy, exactly Ri Breguet's style. The 16-year-old still had a trace of the rich life tha the had left behind all of those years ago in that little small seaside town.

It was a fine day in Madrid.

Mystery Market Fanfic

hi guys!! this is my fanfic and it's unedited because i'm too lazy :zany: maybe it will be edited someday though. in the meantime enjoy!!!!!!!

“Buddy what do you mean you ate the mangoes,” Kiram said angrily as he stared at the empty fruit holder thingy that was in the tavern. “I wanted to eat them!!”

“Sorry,” Milunka replied, not sounding particularly sorry in fact.

“Hey guys it's okay! I'm sure we can ask Altair for more mangoes~~” Lotto said in an attempt to make the two of them not yap at each other.

“No, I'm out of them,” Altair, who had materialized out of absolutely nowhere, told the three of them.

“Of course you two are always up to things like this,” Zenith sighed. “For the record, I wanted a mango too.”

Milunka only gave her a smirk and turned back to Kiram. “Well, looks like we’re going to have to wait for the next shipment to arrive, then,” she said. “Unless you have better ideas?”

“Actually, how about let’s raid the Main Cabin?” Zenith proposed to the group. “I mean the City Council, I don’t know anything about a main cabin whatever that is.”

“Hm,” Kiram said, seeming to be taking the suggestion quite seriously.

“For the record, my shipment won’t be arriving for another two weeks,” Altair informed them a tad haughtily. They got into a bit too much shenanigans for adults who were supposedly more mature than him. But they were a funny bunch, he’d give them that, and Lotto was very nice to him too.

“The City Council it is! Although I wouldn’t technically ‘raid’ them per se, that does sound a tad-”

Lotto’s mollifying remarks were forgotten as Kiram stomped towards the direction of the City Council. It was a bit far from the Market, that was true, but it wasn’t anywhere that he couldn’t reach on foot. Milunka followed him, obviously as eager about the mangoes as he was. Zenith and Lotto exchanged a look before they both shrugged and made to follow, while Altair trailed behind him.

“Alrighty, here we are,” Kiram said in satisfaction as he stood in front of the City Council building. It was decked out in gold and blue, and a large sign on it said “IKEA”.
“Let’s go in and ask for some mangoes, then,” Milunka decided crisply, despite the fact that she’d never been inside the Council before. Neither had the rest of the group of vendors, as a matter of fact; they’ve admired the building from afar, but none of them ever had to go inside. Fortunately enough for them, they all supposed. The City Council was rumored to be a great site of bureaucracy with many many “points” being accounted for. Whatever those were. None of the vendors were quite sure what exactly went on inside the Council, and they were too preoccupied with their shops to really care.
Until now. In any case, Milunka made to enter the building, and Kiram followed suit eagerly—he did not particularly want her to nab all of the mangoes for herself. The rest of the group followed, but Altair hung back slightly, narrowing his eyes at the building. Something about it felt off to him.

“Are we really sure that this is the path to more mangoes?” he asked nervously, eying the imposing building ahead.

Lotto furrowed their brow. “Yes, it does seem like a strange place to get mangoes. I mean, I'm not sure where Kiram gets all of his information from, but I can't trust that it's completely true. Who knows how many shady people hang out in his tavern? He's good at weeding them out, but I still don't know if we should act on this whim. Have you two even ever been to the City Council?”

Both Zenit and Altair shook their heads, and so they continued to look over at the Council.

“But I mean, we have to go after them,” Lotto said. “We can't just leave them there if they get teleported to some weird place!”

“Where could they even end up? I mean, I'm sorry, Altair, but it could be that this is just some normal building that we've never been to,” Zenith pointed out logically. Much like Milunka, she made Altair want to grit his teeth and sigh sometimes. They could be really stubborn, and really annoying. But he relaxed a little as he breathed in. These people were his friends, after all, and friends got on each other's nerves sometimes. It's not a bad thing, he reminded himself, although he was still a bit angry from the outright denial of his hesitation.

“Of course you would all think that, but-

Lotto, for his part, quickly sensed that things were starting to sour. ”Hey, hey, you guys. It's fine. I know that you have some worries about this building, and Zenith, it does look like a normal place, but let's just be careful, shall we? It wouldn't hurt.“

Thankfully, Altair and Zenith were quickly placated. Lotto had that effect on people.

”Now, where do we want to go? And what do we want to do?“

”They're already off,“ Zenith sighed, pointing over at the wide-open entrance to the City Council. A vague white light was glowing brightly out of the entrance, and together the there of them edged closer and closer to the door to investigate.

”I see what you mean, Altair. This… doesn't feel quite right,“ Lotto replied, surveying the door.

”But like you said, we don't have a choice. We have to get Milunka and Kiram back—or follow them in, if we can't get them back,“ Altair pointed out with an almost visible air of resignedness.

”Right you are,“ Zenith replied with equal steel. They were setting aside their differences for the trip at hand so far.

So without another thought, Altair stepped through the doorway, feeling Lotto and Zenith following.



The next moment, everything cleared, ending up with him sitting on a bed. Lotto and Zenith were next to him, and fortunately it was large enough to accommodate all of them.

”Where are we?“ Altair asked nervously, looking quickly around. He did not see anything that might've conveyed a hint of where they had arrived from; there were no doors for all he could see. Everything was stretched out around him in a labyrinth. Lotto was even more nervous, by the looks of it, but they didn't say anything.

”Well, I'll be darned if I know,“ Zenith said shortly and stood up. ”Time to go and look for them. There are obviously no mangoes here.“

”Or are there?“ someone said from behind the three of them.

Altair leaped off of the bed and whipped around, but it was just a friendly-looking bear. A stuffed bear, at that. Altair stared at it for moment longer, until it frowned and scolded him: “Yes, I can talk!! What's up with that face of yours?”

“He's just like that to everyone,” Zenith chuckled. Altair was about to protest, but thought it wasn't worth it. Either way, it wasn't any use revealing information to this strange bear; what could it do anyway?



Meanwhile, Milunka and Kiram were happily feasting on mangoes, completely unaware of the situation of their friends.

See, yes, they were concerned about why they hadn't been following the two fo them, but those concerns evaporated when they saw a gigantic restaurant in front of them. A restaurant that was solely dedicated to MANGOES.

There were baked mangoes, sliced mangoes, diced mangoes, frozen mangoes, mango salads and mango desserts: mango ice cream and mango rolled ice cream, which Kiram pronounced delicious and Milukna was sure he'd try to stewal for the tavern soehow. Not that the tavern was exactly a restaurant, mind you, but Kiram seemed to think it a good enough idea.

“Well, are we just going to stay here the whole time?” Milunka asked when the two of them were finished with their meal. Which was free of charge, to both of their astonishment, but like the good sport he was Kiram set down some coppers anyway. The cashier, who had blond hair and shoulders, only looked down at it in confusion and handed it back to Kiram.

“Obvously we have to find them, yes, but… where could they be?”

For the first time the two of them truly looked around at their environment. It did not seem easy to navigate. They didn't really even know what it was, really. A lot of furniture, to be sure, but also restaurants such as this. And also a flag with the colors of blue and gold, apparently. Neithe rof them were familiar with such a flag. Had they landed in an alternate dimension?

Judging by how delicious all of these mango food products were, Milunka thought so.

She stood up and made sure the table was cleaned up well enough for the most part, at least for the waiters to be able to clean up well anyway, and then turned around to survey the restaurant one more time before heading gout of the door. She would prefer to know where it was, in case she needed to return. Kiram followed her, walking with his hugely larger steps.

“So, where do we exactly start?” he asked cheerfully.

Milunka sighed as the prospect of the search truly began to weigh down on her. And not just the search—she realized that they also must find a way out of the Council. Heading continuously in one direction should do the trick, but she didn't know whether or not she was willing to put in the time for that. She considered going back to the cashier and asking them, in case they could help, but the two of them had better find Lotto, Altair, and Zenith first before they begin to ponder any escape plans. “Great question,” she snapped.

“Woah, woah, hold on there,” Kiram gasped with mock sadness. “How could you speak like that to me!”

“Very funny,” she said, completely unamused. “Well, I don't have any good ideas.”

“Then let's just wander continuously until we find them.”

“Are you serious?”

“Dead serious, I assure you.”

Milunka sniffed, but she didn't have any better ideas either. She knew they shoud've gone in together, but she also did not know that the entrance to the City Council would just completely teleport them to a new dimension.

As they began walking, they began to take note of the things in the place. There seemed to be a good amount of cozy furniture and a wide variety of little places for food. A huge bin of various stuffed animals were at a place that they passed by too, but none of them seemed to be any special in any way to mIlunka. She blinked as she looked at the bears, but again, nothing. Hrm. She must've been seeing things. This place did feel a bit creepy, now that she thought of it, but thankfully the people passing by gave her some comfort. At least neither she nor Kiram were alone.

“I mean, they're not showing up anywhere,” Kiram finally spoke up after a good hour. A lot of people had walked by and given them curious glances, as they weren't exactly human, but no one really questioned their presence. After all, there were stone animals happily trotting around too, which Milunka didn't think too much of. But after all this time, she did begin to pay a bit of attention to what everyone was doing. A lot of people weren't moving about but simply sitting around and chatting happily with each other, and still others were intently scribbling on papers or typing on… some devices that she didn't recognize. She scrutinized these devices further. They seemed to be emitting light while being propped up somehow, while campers would quickly press their fingertips against the little squares on the other side of the devices. Some of these campers were clacking very aggressively, she realized with a wince as she walked by some of them. Including one that… seemed somewhat familiar?

“Hey, you!” she called, and the girl turned around. Oh, yes, very definitely familiar.



In the meantime, Altair backed away slightly from the talking bear. It was quite creepy, if he thought so.

“Okay okay chill I just wanna confer with you and stuff,” the weird old bear said.

“That doesn’t sound very reassuring coming from something like you,” Zenith said nervously, folding her arms.

“Well but like you guys are literal FURRIES SO I’M NOT SURE WHY YOU HAVE A BONE TO PICK WITH ME OVER THIS??” the bear protested.

“I’m not a furry exactly-”

“Me neither!!” Altair protested. “I’m a hybrid not an actual furry-”

“I’m. Also not a furry? Sorry, not very familiar with the terms,” Lotto said sheepishly.

“Okay, fine. The point is you guys are all FREAKS and so you should just stop being hypocritical,” the bear said.

“Understood,” Lotto said hesitantly.

Altair sniffed, but didn’t protest more, because protesting was’t going to get any of them very far with this bear. Especially since they didn’t know where they were and they did need every bit of help they could get.

“In any case, can I introduce myself??” the talking teddy bear asked. No one had anything against the idea, so he continued: “The name’s Skog. I’m the mascot around these parts—so I can give you a good amount of info. But first, I’d love it if you could perhaps do something for me.”

“And why, dear ‘mascot,’ can’t you do this yourself?” Altair questioned.

“Great question, actually,” Zenith said. Altair was rather glad to see that she held no tolerance for silly goobers like talking teddy bears.

“Because as you can see I’m too petite and dainty,” the bear said with something that would border on sarcasm if it wasn’t so true.

“So you want us to carry you around?” Lotto asked.

“Yes. Carry me around and do some tasks for me, and I can help you out of here. But you better do it before night comes… here, what time is it? Ahh, 1:11. Lovely string of numbers, don’t you agree.”

Lotto promptly scooped up the bear and put him in the pocket of their apron. Skog gave a few grumbles of protest initially, but then quieted down as he settled into the pocket. “Well, this is satisfactory,” he proclaimed at last.

“Awesome!! Now can we get going?” Altair asked.

So with Skog’s direction, they headed to a mango restaurant. “Order some food for me,” Skog said. “Something mango-flavored.”

Altair groaned.

“What?”

“Can you like. Elaborate on your request, if possible?? Thank you??”

“Nah I’m good just get whatever you think I’d like,” the bear said mischievously.

“I’m not sure what you like, actually,” Zenith said stiffly to him. “Is there any consequence for picking the wrong thing?”

“There is, actually! If you pick the wrong thing I won’t help you get back to your place,” the bear said cheerfully.

Even Lotto looked shocked by this request. Who could’ve thought this innocent-seeming little bear could make such unjust demands of the three of them? “Are you sure you want to do this?” they asked the teddy bear. “That’s kind of unfair.”

“I don’t really care,” the bear cackled in reply. “If you fail then too bad!! You’re just be stuck here until night comes and then you’ll… hehehehe”

Altair towered over Skog as he spread his wings, seeming even more intimidating. “You’re going to help us no matter whether you like your thing or not. Or else.”

“You think that’s scary?” Skog yawned, seeming more bored than anything. “I’ve heard enough threats like yours. And you know that if I die you won’t get out either right?”

“There are other people we can ask,” Zenith said, but she seemed less sure of herself now. They all were. Skog had that kind of effect on people. (Well, they weren’t technically humans, but the point still stood).

“I’m the mascot. If you kill me no one will listen to you,” Skog smirked.

“A mascot. More like a tyrant,” Altair snarled.

“Okay, okay, we’ll get you your food,” Lotto promised quickly, not wanting to alienate the bear even more. It would be a horrid idea if the three of them couldn’t be able to leave, and annoying teddy bear mascots were worth appeasing in order to ensure their survival. Things were suddenly seeming very dangerous.

“Lovely,” Skog replied as he beamed up at Lotto.

Lotto then went on and strode to look at the many for the mango shop. Altair and Zenith both glared at sSkog for a moment longer and walked away to follow Lotto, who was now surveying the menu with interesting.

“What can I get for you?” the cashier asked curiously as they looked at Lotto's intense expression.

“Can you give me a moment? Thank you,” Lotto replied, sounding rather passive aggressive without meaning to.

“This sucks,” Altair said quietly, shooting a look back at Skog—who seemed oblivious to the absolutely anger radiating off both Zenith and Altair just a few feet away.

“Yes, but what can we do about it? We’ll just have to give him what he wants,” Zenith replied downheartedly.

“Okay, guys, do you want to come over and help me choose? I’m not sure what to pick here. You think he would like mango ice cream or mango cheesecake better?”

“Mango cheesecake,,” the cashier whispered suddenly.

“Really?” Lotto looked over at them hopefully.

“Yes, mango cheesecake, and he’d like some mango pudding too. He never eats anything else.”

“Well, thanks for letting us know,” Altair replied, eyeing them rather suspiciously. He wasn’t sure if he trusted this random cashier to not be part of the horrible scheme.

“I’m telling the truth,” the cashier replied, holding up their hands. “He’s a right old… well, you know. Sometimes. It’s not very fair of him to torture you three so much.”

“Thanks,” Lotto said genuinely. “Do you mind getting those done for us then?”

“Already done,” they replied, handing him the pudding and the cheesecake.

“Lovely, thank you!”

“Well, are we going to bring this back so soon? What if he suspects something?” Zenith asks.

“He won’t. He acts smart, but he’s actually a bit on the less intelligent side.“

”Thank you!“ Lotto said sincerely, and then turned back to head back to Skog, with Zenith and Latiar following warily.

”Here you go,“ they said as they set down the pudding and the cheesecake in front of the teedy bear mascot slash tyrant.

”Hm, not bad,“ Skog said grandly as he surveyed the helpins that he had been served. ”Now feed it to me.“

Lotto hesitated for a second and then asked, ”How exactly?“

”This isn't worth it,“ Altair whispered angrily to Zenith. ”We should just leave.“

”But Lotto won't. You know that,“ Zenith replied. ”And honestly this is our best chance of getting out.“

Deep down, Altair did know that, but he was also incredibly unwilling to cede any power to the teddy bear. It was so annoying, for goodness's sake.

Meanwhile, Skog had finished directing Lotto, and Zenith and Altair watched as he spooned the mango desserts through an opening in what was supposed to be the teddy bear's mouth.

”This is slightly messed up,“ Altair commented a bit more loudly this time. Fortunately, Skog, who was occupied with the feeding, did not seem to have heard.

”Mhm,“ he finally said when Lotto had finished spooning every single bit of the dessert while Zenith and Altair watched in awkward silence. ”Not bad. Okay, you guys pass!“

”You're going to give us the information on how to get out of here now, right?“ Altair asked suspiciously.

”Yeah! Duh. What else did you think I was going to do?“

Altair only glowered at the bear.

”So basically, just turn right after you leave and go straight until you see a big room with thirteen doors. They should be different colors. Find the one that's for your market and then go into that one, and you should be teleported back to the main cabin entrance.

“Main cabin?” Zenith asked.

“Yes. This is the main cabin for the session, and I'm one of the mascots,” Skog explained matter-of-factly. “It's IKEA.”

“What in the world is an eye key yeah?” Altair snapped.

“You wouldn't understand it,” Skog said. “Anyways, I want to head over too, so you guys will have to carry me.”

By this point, Lotto had given up trying to resist the bear’s commands; with a sigh they scooped him up and put him back in the pocket of their apron.

“Lovely! Now let’s go.”



“Sandy?” Kiram questioned as he stared at the escapee. It was indeed Sandy!

“Oh, Kiram and Milunka!” Sandy replied in surprise. “Nice to see you two here. Wait, how the heck did you get into the main cabin?? (Not that I would know, of course. Nope. Of course not!! What do you mean I’m the author of the fic??)” Fortunately, the two vendors were unable to catch the parts in parentheses

“We tried to go to the city council to get mangoes,” Milunka explained. “But it… evidently didn’t work, because Kiram’s information was faulty.”

“Hey, don’t blame me. You just went along with it!”

“But if you didn’t get the idea to go here I wouldn’t have needed to!!”

“Woah, guys, calm down,” Sandy sighed. “We’ll have to get you back, and fortunately I know where the way back to the Market is!”

“Well, the thing is that Zenith, Lotto, and Altair are also with us,” Kiram said nervously.

Milunka clicked her tongue. “Were also with us.”

“You’re kidding,” Sandy sighed. “The plot thickens, it seems.”

“INteresting way of putting it, but yes,” she conceded.

“We’re just going to have to go and look-”

But at this moment Sandy was interrupted by a loud clanging. Out of nowhere, a stack of frying pans suddenly appeared on one of the tables near where they were standing right now. Campers began screeching in delight and seizing the frying pans.

“FRYING PANS SUPREMACYYY,” someone said eagerly.

“What in the world is going on right now.” Kiram said, staring at the frying pans.

“Yeah I’m not sure either,” Sandy said cheerfully, fully decked out in like three frying pans. “But want one?”

Shrugging, Kiram and Milukna both took a frying pan and stared at it. The frying pans were shining and seemed new—obvoiusly. Who wanted ot wave around a greasy old used frying pan? No, the frying pans had to be kept in tip top condition if they were to be fawned on by the adoring SWCers.
Speaking of SWCers…

“You don’t know what this place is exactly still, do you?” Sandy asked. Kiram and Milukna both shook their heads. “Well, so basically it’s a writing camp and we do lots of writing and while we’re not hanging out around the Market we just como over here and write and whatever. And we’ll be gone by the end of the month.”

“Wait, what?” Kiram exclaimed, surprised. He’d gotten rather fond of the little escapees, doing their puzzles and taking the vendors’ help. How blindly trusting they were. But it wasn’t as if they really had any alternatives, hiding out while sticking like a sore thumb in the Courtyard.

“Oh uh it’s going to be a long story if you want me to explain,” Sandy said, seeming rather eager to avoid the topic if Milunka thought so.

“Wait one minute,” Kiram said before she could breach the topic. “So that means you come here a lot?”

“Huh? Yeah, sure do! I come over to submit my stuff and help add points once in a while. Just to hang out too.”

“I never would’ve thought,” he said. To be fair, it wasn’t as the vendors were holding the escapees under constant surveillance, unlike the patrollers tried to do.

“Mhm, well, that’s how it is. Anyways, let’s go find the rest of the gang now!!”

She bounded off, and the two vendors scrambled to catch up with her as they navigated the strange halls of IKEA. Turn after turn, they brushed past people, some of which Sandy said hello to. Kiram found that he recognized a few of these eager teens and tweens, and waved to them as well, while Milunka gave them a knowing nod.

However, circling around endlessly didn’t really work as well as Sandy seemed to have hoped it to be, and so she eventually resorted to asking people.

“Yeehawlia!! Have you seen an axolotl furry walk past with a normal-looking person and a half eagle hybrid by any chance?”

Alia, who was nose-deep in a book about the Romanovs, gazed at Sandy in confusion and shook her head.

“Reese! Have you seen some furries walking around lately?”

“Just these two,” Reese gestured to Kiram and Milunka trailing behind Sandy.

“CJ AND CRIM!!”

Indeed, the two other escapee leaders were standing in a corner and discussing seriously, and they both waved to Sandy when they saw her.

“Hey guys, sorry I must’ve missed the forum notif again—Kiram and Milunka are here, by the way!”

“How did you two get into here?” Crim asked as she surveyed the two vendors.

“City council,” Milunka replied shortly, glaring at Kiram.

“At least we did end up getting our mangoes,” he said.

“Anyways, we’re looking for Lotto, Zenith, and Altair,” Sandy explained. “Apparently they’re also at the main cabin, but Milunka and Kiram got separated from them.”
“Well, I think we would know if we’ve seen them,” CJ said thoughtfully. Then his gaze traveled to something behind the vendors, who turned around to look. “What’s that??”



“Can you give me some more water?” Skog asked as he nestled deeper into Lotto’s pocket.

Altair let out an audible groan, but took out the bottle and handed it to Lotto, who then gently placed it within the pocket. It was one of those mini water bottles, and Skog took a few sips of it before handing it back. From what Lotto could see, the stuffed bear did not seem a tad wet on his fabric surface. This mascot was truly an enigma, they thought.

Meanwhile, Skog continued riding in silence as the trio reached the dining room, and they were all rather glad that he quieted down and stopped annoying them with his annoying commands.

Until klaxons suddenly started to sound, startling everyone in the building.

“Attention. This is Duo speaking,” the voice came over the intercom.

“Wait since when did Duo have a voice??” a camper said to another, surprised.

“I’ve always had a voice,” the green owl that suddenly appeared in front of the gang said, glaring at the kids of SWC as his red eyes scanned the area around him. Suddenly Lotto felt the weight disappear from their apron as Skog took off to who-knows-where. Surrounding him were 73 people, all looking very menacing and multilingual.

“Spread out, everyone,” Falstaff instructed to Duo’s other goons.

“Got it,” Fari said brightly as she skipped away with Lily.

Lotto, Altair, and Zenith exchanged wary glances as some of the Duo goons approached them.

“Hello there,” Oscar said. “I hope you’re having a good day. In the meantime, do you have any idea where Skog might have gone?”

“Your mascot,” Eddy explained. “He’s been missing his Russian lessons since the start of the 2000s, and we just want to make sure that he catches up on them. Or else.”

“Oh my,” Altair said, a tad sarcastically. “That’s looking good for him, I guess.”

“But we have no idea where he is. We’re new here, you see,” Lotto explained in his usual cheerful voice, but both Altair and Zenith could hear the nervousness underneath.

“Is that so now,” Duo said as he fluttered to a stop right in front of them. “Hmm. You sure you haven’t seen a brown bear going around? Everytime we stop around here he’s never here, which is kind of suspicious to me, but hey it’s not the only IKEA Around there.”

“Oh it isn’t now??” Altair asked, sounding startled.

“That’s… interesting to know,” Zenith said diplmomaticlaly. To be really honest she did not lik ehte situation that they were in right now. If only Kiram had never gone off in search of manoges!! Alas, it was too late now.

“I bet it is,” Duo stated with a loud hoot, flapping his wings aggressively so that feathers fell everywhere around the trio. “Now, tell me: have you seen him?”

“More importantly, have you done your lessons?” Junior piped up.

“What lessons now?” Zenith questioned with raised eyebrows.

“But yeah no we have seen zero brown bears around here trust!!” Altair said. “Except for one of them…”

Duo leaned in, listening attentively.

“CJ1!!” Altair revealed, pointing to CJ, who jumped in surprise.

“Are you a bear??” Duo asked CJ aggressively.

“Erm Duo, he doesn’t really look like Skog,” Vikram said nervously.

“Nah he’s a perfect match. Let’s steal him now!!!”

“NOOO YOU CAN’T DO THIS I STILL HAVE TO BLACKMAIL ALIA AND LUNA,” CJ protested, but it was no use. Altair, Zenith, and Lotto all watched as CJ was carted off, but surprise surprise!! CJ WAS ACTUALLY ALIA!!

“Huh what the freaky skibidi slicers,” Duo asked. “You’re not the bear??”

“No I’m Alia!! I was trying to like imposter CJ so that I could do stuff but I’m not actually CJ trust,” Alia replied in a very convincing manner.

“If you say so,” Duo said skeptically.

Meanwhile, Altiar looked around, wondering where in the world Skog was. He wasn’t very fond of the goofy little bear if he had to admit it, because Skog was too goofy and caused much more trouble for he was worth. If he just let the trio get their ways, they would all be home by now, and reunited with Milunka and Kiram.

“Let’s get out of here,” he suggested to the others.

“What now?” Zenith asked.

“We need to run away while theyr’re distracted!!”

“Good idea,” she agreed.

“But it feels mean to just ghost them,” Lotto protested with another glance over at Duo, who was now intensely questioning Alia. Withotu a second thought, though, Altair scrambled off, and Zenith followed, so Lotto had no choice but to follow them.

“Phew, finally got rid of them,” Zenith said, and then paused as she saw something in the distance. “Wait a hot second…”



“It’s you guys!” Kiram exclaimed as he turned around to see the other three vendors making their way over to him and Milunka, as well as the mystery escapees. Who were all very alpha.

“I can’t believe we finally found you,” Lotto said with a smile. Then it fell as they realized something. “Well, we need to get out of here as soon as possible. This one freaky green owl is after us!!”

“You don’t say,” Crim said as she glanced about nervously. “Okay, we’ll show you the way out. Just… don’t appear to conspicuous.”

It was a rather tall order given that none of the squad was actually human and thus they were very conspicuous, but they all tried their best to remain hidden and elusive so that the campers wouldn’t find them sus and Duo’s henchkids wouldn’t find them at all. Unfortunately, that didn’t really work out that well, because five steps away from the cabin entrance Duo and his goons were patrolling very intensely!!

“Oh noes how are we gonna get past those freaks,” Sandy said. Then she suddenly realized the answer. “By being alpha, of course!!”

She put on an alpha costume and also gave costumes to the rest of the gang so that they would be hidden and unable to be detected by the very goofy Duo people. So CJ, Crim, and all five vendors donned their alpha costumes

As they followed Sandy over to the exit of the main cabin over to mystery.

“Halt,” Duo said as some random Mystery camper also tried to go into the exit. “We need to like search you real quick and you can’t say no because we’re meanies.”

“That’s so mean“ the poor camper said, but they had no choice as Duo’s goons patted them down and searched them carefully.

“Oay dokay I thnk we should be good. After allI don’t think Skog’s still like tailing us but like CJ is also a bear which might put him under scrutiny,” Crim said.

“Okie that makes sense!!” Lotto replied. “And-”

“THERE’S HIM IT’S SKOG!!!” someone yelled as they pointed in the opposite direction of the gang. That someone turned out to be Blahaj!! What a bad sport he was, doxxing Skog to the goofy Duolingo gang. But then you gotta do what you gotta do to your opps!!

“Okay hurry guys this is our last chance,” CJ told everyone as he glanced nervously over to where Duo and co were now pursuing Skog, the goofy mascot getting as far as he possibly could from the green owl.

The three escapees all stepped in, followed by Altair and Zenith, who were more than glad to be free of the chaos. Lotto went next after one last longing look over at Skog, leaving Kiram and Milunka behind to watch the chaos in the main cabin.

“Well, ladies first,” he offered.

“If you insist,” Milunka said, flashing him a rare smile. “First one in, last one out, eh?”

“You’ve got it,” he said. “And altogether this really wasn’t too bad of a trip, was it?”

“Not at all! We got our mangoes. Now maybe we should quit stalling and actually move.”

So he followed her through the door to mystery as it shimered close behind them



“Well, home sweet home,“ Kiram exclaimed as he saw the familiar market again. The escapees were probably lurking about somewhere, and he saw a patroller stare at him before nodding and walking on, obviously not questioning too much the whole crowd that had just emerged from the entrance.

Although that was probably because the crowd had dissipated. Kiram stared around, trying to find out where in the world everyone else was, but they seemed to have vanished. It was only him and Milunka, who was a few feet in front of him."

“Do you know where everyone else his??” he questioned her.

She was squinting at something off in the distance, and ti took a few minutes seemingly for her to get back to noticing him. “Oh, Kiram! I think they went that way.” She pointed in the direction she was squinting in. To be fair, it was getting rather late in the afternoon, with long shadows falling across the golden streets.

The two of them walked over in that direction, and Kiram realized that the vendors and escapees probably went to the courtyard. It was a nice hangout place, he admitted.

When he returns he finds the campers bright with eagerness, ready to put their plans and knowledge into action. They’ve found a way to escape, they all claim.

“Good for you all,’ Milunka said, and although her expression was seriously Kiram could hear how impressed and proud she was of the group. “Good luck with everything.’

So the escapees make their way… well, out of the market. Kiram watched them, wondered when theyd’ be back. If at all.

“Well, so that happened,” Altair said. “Now can we go and beat up the ghosts, now that this is over?”

So the five vendors happily made their way to the headquarters of the evil ghosts, bashing them up with Zenith’s supply of candleholders until they dissipated into the thin air of the mystery market.

“Wow, I wonder why it took us this long to do this,” Lotto piped up, dropping their candle holder onto the marble floor.

“Plot purposes,” Kiram said, amused. “Wait, look, they have a huge stash of mangos here!”

“‘From SWC,’” Milunka read. “Oh, so that’s what it was.”

“I think they’ve been confiscating my shipments this whole time,” Altair said, brows furrowed down. “Those lying-”

“No swearing, you summer child,” Kiram snipped, and Altair rolled his eyes, but smiled. This adventure with the gang had been quite the fun one. And now that he knew about the existence of this SWC, perhaps he’d return again: to the IKEA or whichever new location it ended up at.

For a moment he watched his friends. Zenith and Milunka wearing private smirks on their faces as they talked, Lotto nodding at something Kiram was saying before turning to smile at Altair. They were such great friends, he thought. No matter what, they were there for him, through thick and thin and questionable bear mascots.

With a smile he turned his focus back onto the mangoes. They were almost glowing with vibrantness, making Altair, and all five vendors as a matter of fact, want to dig in. Immediately.

So dug in they did—into the mangoes that they had been looking for the whole time. But like it was often said: maybe the real mangoes were the friends they made along the way <3

~end~