Logs:Of Peaches and Pilfering (Or, Switch™eroo)

Of Peaches and Pilfering (Or, Switch™eroo)
Dramatis Personae Echo, Kavalam, Spencer	2023-08-05 "You know, in theory I would like to be...educated...eventually."
Location <XAV> Roof - Xs Third Floor
The view from up here is phenomenal, a panorama of the expansive Xavier's grounds, forest and lake and rocky cliffs alike. Even without the view outwards, the rooftop itself holds its own delights, in the form of the tiny jewel of a flower garden tucked away up here, tended by one of the school's teachers. From the edge of the roof, with a veeery careful jump, it looks like it just might be possible to reach the treehouse in the old oak tree. Echo ate two fresh peaches while waiting the hour it took for these to bake, but that is not stopping her from biting into one of these almond-butter-cinnamon-sugar-topped versions even as she spirits them up to the roof, A Wind In The Door pinned awkwardly between her arm and torso. The droplet of juice that reaches the t-shirt she is wearing over her frayed-hem denim shorts is a problem for Future Echo. It is black (her wardrobe slightly restricted for now to what colors she thinks go with red glasses) anyway, who will know? She settles down cross-legged on the roof, seven peach halves remaining on the baking sheet to her left, book on the right, but doesn't tuck into either for a minute. Instead she stares up at the puffy cumulus clouds and then out across the lake for what seems like a full minute before slowly reaching for the book. Six peach halves, now. There beside Echo in lightweight yellow button-down and jeans, Kavalam is flopping back, staring up at the clouds as he munches down the half he has stolen. He's saying nothing about the juice that dripped onto Echo's shirt, but then again, he has a small rivulet currently running down his wrist. He licks it off, nodding approvingly. "What is on this. It is very good." Was Echo hoping for some quiet reading time on the roof, in the middle of summer, where she could very reasonably expect to be left alone? Well. Where there were only two teenagers up here suddenly there is -- -- a third. Spencer is wearing a purple t-shirt with a black cat casually tipping a mug over, captioned "BECOME UNGOVERNABLE", gray cargo shorts with a Nintendo Switch sticking out of one large (but not quite large enough) pocket, and red lowtop sneakers. He's appeared next to an small cluster of arcane instruments affixed to the bracket for the (recently replaced) weather vane. He's just reaching for one of these when he apparently notices he's not alone up here. "Oh, hey!" In an instant he's -- -- next to Kavalam and Echo. "How's things? I didn't think there were that many people -- ooh, peaches!" At least Spence doesn't just go ahead and help himself. "Jeez--" Echo flinches away from Kavalam before -- recognizing him? She relaxes somewhat, at least, especially when he compliments his stolen prize. "Oh, thank you, it's almonds and butter, mostly--" She notices Spence just before he blinks out of existence, and though this should theoretically be less surprising to her, her head still does a little shake of surprise when he appears. "Hi, Spence," she smiles before frowning and repeating, "almonds and butter and sugar and cinnamon...you can both feel free, but I didn't pay attention to my utensils?" she adds in Spence's direction, with the hesitance of someone who is not actually sure whether this is relevant. "Thought you'd be at home these days," she adds, softer. "Thank you," Kavalam says, as though he were not already simply helping himself, and polishes off the rest of the peach half he has stolen. "He is probably home. He is probably everywhere. -- Did you bring peaches. If you give them to Echo she will make them delicious. Are you," he's frowning at Spencer's pocket, now, and the marbled Joy-Con sticking out of it. "stealing my Switch. The nerve." He doesn't sound overly offended, to be sure. He does gesture, magnanimously, to Echo's peaches. "I will trade you." Spence's "Thank you!" comes in tandem with Kavalam's, with a good deal more enthusiasm though he still does not help himself. "I mean -- I had to eat whatever at Lassiter, in terms of the kashrut -- uh, kosher situation." Evidently the thought that the goyim might not recognize the word does not stop him adding, with a sliver of a smile, "Kashrut Situation is the name of my new punk band." Was he going somewhere with that? He's still not helping himself, but he does say, brightly, "Oh man, I'll bring some peaches on next trip." He looks back at Echo, with a tip of his head at Kavalam. "Yeah, I'm staying at my grandparents' right now, but I get -- huh?" His head whips back around to Kavalam. "I'm not stealing -- this is Gae's, he left it in Harm's room." "Sure, but that was...you know." Echo makes a pained face. "Well, if you bring some can I check with you about...kashrut...?" She does her best but the word is clearly unfamiliar. "Feel like if you put something in you have to get something out." She looks from Kavalam to the Switch to her peaches before throwing her hands up in an 'oh well' gesture and securing another one of her creations before Kavalam can barter them all away. "His grandparents are peach... orchardists," Kavalam informs Echo. "Peach growers. Sometimes, he brings very good peaches." He is getting up, now, transferring his Blatant Thievery as he plucks the Switch out of Spencer's pocket and goes to open Metroid Dread -- the first profile that pops up when it asks who is playing says "Kav". The second and third are for "Heals Plz" and "GOAWAYGAE", respectively. He hands the console back with a pointed lift of brows. "Echo is very good at the instruments, if you do decide to switch paths from thievery to music." "Oh!" Spence brightens at Echo's offer. "Yeah, I mean -- you don't have to, it's a lot of trouble to go through and it's not hard for me to bring them..." He gives a thoughtful hum. "You could also just teach me?" This hopeful prospect perhaps distracts him from Kavalam's not-very-sneaky pickpocketing, though his "hey!" is only mildly affronted. Even that affront evaporates into mere confusion as he frowns down at the screen. "Oh no, maybe I grabbed the wrong one! Did you both leave your Switches in Harm's room?" He sounds just a little skeptical, but he does hand the Switch back to Kavalam with a duck of his head. "Sorry, I didn't mean to steal it! I think teaching me music is probably a lot more work than a few peaches worth. I'm not very good with instruments." Not that he sounds discouraged in the least. "Not being very good is kind of a whole punk vibe." "Ooh -- do they grow any white peaches?" Echo says with interest. "I haven't had a good one since the last time I went...for a long time," she corrects. Her smile is wry. "I'd like to know how, at least? I mean, if you're willing. You have gone through a lot of trouble for us." She lowers her gaze to a bee, watching it buzz around a delphinium before also standing up, shifting awkwardly from one foot to another. "I don't think horn is a very punk instrument anyway," she says regretfully. "Wait, does everyone have a Switch? Maybe getting to try some video games can be my new peach fee." "Doesn't your brother also do the music very well?" Kavalam's brow is creasing, slightly. "Isn't Ryan Black your --" Though here he trails off, uncertain how this sentence should finish, and instead asks: "Is he alive, still, anyway? The Internet has been saying no but I think then you would be more sad." He takes the Switch back with a small bob of his head, wandering a short distance away to his backpack -- has it been there the whole time, probably -- and tucking the console away. Immediately he pulls out a second one, its controllers solid green and grey, and offers this to Echo. "You can try so many new games on this." Spence's scrunched expression is hard to read, but to judge by his answer of "oh, white peaches are...kinduva West Coast thing," perhaps it's an attempt to not look disdainful. "I don't think I can take credit for all that. We worked together to keep us safe. Anyway I think you can make any instrument punk if you have the right attitude, and yeah Shane is great!" His beaming is cut short by the next question, his smile not collapsing altogether but the effect is certainly dramatic. "He's alive," is quietly intense, "and he's my --" It's hard to tell whether he's broken off the thought in favor of reiterating the one before it or continuing it with, "-- Ryan. He's alive and -- hey!" This when Kavalam produces the second Switch. "That's Gae's!" He seems to take Kavalam's casual theft in stride, though, unsurprised and only slightly exasperated. "Ugh. I'll be right back," he says and vanishes -- -- reappearing in precisely the same spot only a few seconds later with yet another Switch (beautifully hand-painted with a forest full of creepy-adorable monsters) and several big, juicy peaches tucked into the crook of his arm. "She can play with mine, then." Echo just shrugs at this, thinking of somewhere very far away, probably. She is watching Spence's face carefully after Kavalam's question, but quickly looks down at her toes once it falls. She seems to have psyched herself up to speak when she is instead confronted with this colorful dance of consoles, which does not in fact help her close her mouth. "Um. Weren't you just calling him a thief -- but, thanks, I think? Definitely thanks, Spence." She eyes the newly appeared peaches. "Does your...would Mr. Black like almondy peaches?" she asks hesitantly. "Would it be stupid to send him a thank you present. Or some other edible. Not...the weed kind, I don't know how to do those yet." "Echo is borrowing it, now," Kavalam says of Gae's console, "Gaétan can have yours if he needs one so badly." He has also been studying Spence's face through this news about Ryan, and nods to himself. "I am glad. He --" He hesitates, lowering his eyes, and just repeats: "I am glad." For a moment he stares down at his backpack like he has slightly forgotten what he was doing with it. There is a small-crooked twitch of smile on his face when he does manage to look back up. "I am sure Spencer could teach you to bake those. For the music lessons." Spencer sighs dramatically and shoves his own Switch into the same cargo pocket from which Kavalam had lifted his earlier. "It's not stupid, and I'm sure he would love to try veganified almondy peaches, but he's not really allowed to eat regular food yet." His shoulders dip but, determinedly, do not sag. "Though I think he would be touched if someone learned how to make pot brownies just to thank him." He sets the peaches down in a neat row on Echo's baking sheet, except for last one, which he offers to Kavalam. "Of course Gae needs it," he says very seriously, "he hasn't played Tears of the Kingdom yet." "That also doesn't make sense--" Echo begins, but she has, at some point, taken Gae's Switch uncertainly from Kavalam. Perhaps this was just to end his holding it out. Her eyes drop, in time with Spencer's shoulders, to the peaches that she has been able to eat; her laugh, when it comes, is just a single chuckle. "I can take a lesson in that too, then. For the peaches. If someone sits with me through taste-testing." She looks at the console in her hands and holds it in Spence's direction with a questioning look. "What's wrong with the kingdom?" "If he cannot eat food -- how bad --" Kavalam's shoulders have gone a little tighter, his brow creasing. He presses his mouth tight and takes his own Switch back out, not turning it on but sitting down on his backpack with the toy on his knees. "Their princess is missing again and has been replaced by gloom. In the last game you saved the kingdom, but. I think. Maybe. It was a short-lived victory." "Sometimes, things don't make sense." Spence sounds very philosophical about this as he takes Gae's Switch back from Echo and gives her his own instead. "Tessiers are really good at rolling with that. I bet Gae won't even blink when I tell him about this whole Nintendo Switcheroo. Unless I call it that." He looks down at the one remaining peach his his hand. "It's pretty bad." It might not be entirely clear whether he was talking about Ryan or the state of the kingdom, since after a brief, heavy pause he says, "She's not missing. She's just --" He looks up at Echo sheepishly. "Sorry, spoilers. Sometimes, victory just mean you have to get ready to fight the next -- uh, incarnation incarnation of the Demon King. But you don't do that alone." He rolls the peach from one hand to the other. Nods sort of absently to himself. Looks back up at Echo. "We can have a taste-testing party." Then adds, very off-handedly. "I'm sure Luci won't mind." Echo is now looking at the monsters in the forest and not at Spence, her arms pressing in on her torso. "But maybe you still bear the consequences alone," she says softly. "Doesn't seem right." She sits back down slowly and gives a weak chuckle. "Uh, well, I would still rather ask in advance -- Gae at least -- but yeah, would probably also like to avoid getting kicked out of here for pot brownies. You know, in theory I would like to be...educated...eventually." Kavalam's frown is deepening. "I need that one. My save game is on there." He's getting up, now, to swap the consoles again, offering Spencer his in return for Gaétan's. He takes the peach, too, while he is at it. "Don't worry," he tells Echo, "there is almost no way to get kicked out of here. If drugs did it there would be very-few of us left. Probably as long as you do not kill a teacher --" He hesitates, frowning contemplatively. "-- probably as long as you do not kill Mr. Summers or Dr. Grey, you will be fine." Though Spence is actually still holding the Switch this time, he offers no resistance to Kavalam reclaiming it. Possibly he has lost track of whose is whose by this point. "Oh, I'll ask Gae," he assures Echo earnestly, "he'll probably want some, too. You wouldn't get kicked out of school for drugs anyway, but the Professor likes us to at least pretend to be sneaky about it." He considers the Switch in this hand, perhaps only now working out whose it is. "You know, for all the accusation of thievery, he was the one thiefing your peaches, so I think you should get his Switch." He trades Kavalam's Switch (probably) with his own, which he had only just given to Echo. "You can still come to pot brownie tasting, though," he adds to Kavalam, conciliatory. "Fair point. If they didn't already..." Echo grimaces deeply. Does she have any opinions about which Switch she is holding, or has she just turned into a slightly wide-eyed living console stand? Whatever her opinions are, she is behaviorally indistingushable from the latter. "Thanks," she tells Spencer again; is this for asking Gaétan or for delivering Kavalam's Switch? She is stifling a laugh while looking questioningly in Kavalam's direction, but she is also telling Spence that "You can take him a peach with that. To make up for it not being his." "W... You did do an entire terrorism and are still here," Kavalam says, "but then, many of the teachers also did the terrorism. Do you know, Gaétan discovered a great place for the sneakily doing drugs. I think Professor Xavier's family used to be bootleggers. Some time, maybe, he will..." His brows crease. "Maybe he will not show you, actually." His face has fallen slightly, with this. "I should get back to his house. He will enjoy the peaches." Spence takes back one of the peaches and tucks it into his other cargo pocket. "I'll bring more next trip down," he promises. "Let me know what you think of Tears of the Kingdom!" To Kavalam he just nods, trying and mostly succeeding to look nonchalant. "Not like I'm short on places to sneakily do drugs or anything. I got a whole world..." He frowns. "...or two. Oh! I'm going there anyway, c'mon. See you Echo!" He claps a hand to Kavalam's shoulder and with a wave to Echo they're both gone -- -- and Echo is left sitting on the roof with...someone's Switch that Spencer is...letting her borrow? She stares at it for a few seconds, then shrugs and hunts around for the power button, muttering under her breath. "At least fictional heroism doesn't have consequences."