Camp Sequoia

Professor looked at the people before him, his gaze falling on one, then switching to the other, then repeating this act a few more times. "Nice to meet you both." He said, smiling slightly. It soon faded as he reached back into his bookbag for the third time. Finally, he found what he had been looking for. He pulled a rather thick book out of his bag titled "Great Expectations" by Charles Dickens. A scrap piece of paper was placed in between pages near the middle of the book to be used as a bookmark. He flipped to the very back of the book and held it so that he was the only one to see the inside fo the book. Taped to the inside of the back cover of the hardback book were two twenty dollar bills and a ten dollar bill. He closed the book once again, after making sure that his money was still safe, and put it back in bag, but only after considering whether to continue reading it now or not. "So, why're you guys here?" He asked, changing the subject again. He's never really liked to talk about himself with company. He began to wonder if anyone was here for the same reason he was. He zipped up his bookbag and put it on the floor beside his bed. How long would he be able to stay here? With his (possible) friends? How long would they be here? What if he made other friends? He left those thoughts alone for now. "No use worrying about it now. That'll come later, in a few months at least, and that's still pretty far away." He mentally shook his head as if to shake the thoughts away.

((XD I made a reference! I'm halfway done with "Great Expectations" X3 it's a good book~ I recommend it to ALL OF YOU))

"Not even close," Eiko said with a small laugh, letting herself fall backwards onto her bed, her legs swinging rhythmically at the edge of the mattress. "I'm... uh, an oracle? That's as close as I can come to it anyways. I mean, I can see the future and stuff... Uh. Psychic? Weird girl?" She said the last one with a laugh, having obviously given up on trying to find a better name for her abilities. She started tracing random patterns on the bottom of the bed that was above the one she was laying on, thinking for a few seconds. "It mostly happens in my dreams though, and I can hardly control it yet. Hopefully that will change in this camp though." She wondered how much Ely and Kari could control their powers, and if she was the only odd one out that barely had a grasp on them. It didn't bother her too much though. It would all be a matter of learning.

----

Eiji smiled as he recognized the book Prof was holding, he had read it a few months back when his father had recommended it to him. He wasn't sure whether he should ask though, since the other boy had merely looked at the back of the book before putting it away, although he had seen him hesitating a little, as if he wanted to read it then. He could understand though, it was a very good and addicting book, from what he remembered. "Oh, my parents sent me and my sister here so we could... uh, meet more people like us?" He wasn't sure what to call himself and the others. Special? That sounded stupid. Abnormal? No, that was just offending. Uh. He'd think of that later. "By the way, you're reading 'Great Expectations', right? It's a really good book." He didn't even notice he had asked, too immersed in his thoughts of what he should call himself and others like him. He had been about to ask whether he had gotten to a certain part of the book, but he preferred no to take the risk of spoiling an important detail to the boy. He would hate it if it happened to himself, so he was careful not to make it happen to others.

"Ah," Yukari replied when Eiko explained how she was something like an oracle, "well I'm sure you won't feel like a 'weird girl' here since there are lots of kids here for camp."
She smiled up at Ely who had mentioned that quite a few kids were here for camp this year. This was Yukari's first time at camp so she didn't know how many kids the camp usually had for the summer.
"Say, it's getting close to lunch time. Want to go ahead and get in line before it becomes too long?" She suggested.
((lol we're getting lazy XD))

---

"I'm here 'cause my parents wanted me to come to camp," Aiden answered Professor's question, being friendly since it didn't seem like the other had been to camp before.
"Also, if you want to shower, it should be right through that door," Aiden suggested, pointing to a door further inside the cabin, "they said each cabin had its own bathroom so there should be a shower in there. And then afterwards we can all head over to the cafeteria for lunch."

((I have to see if it works: ))

Professor plopped backwards onto his bed and thought for a moment. "I guess it's not too late..." He nodded, not caring if he was the only one who knew he nodded or not. He reached into his bookbag and pulled out a clean(er) shirt and a pair of pants. He sat up, clothes in hand, and walked into the cabin bathroom. He shut the door behind him and looked around. There was a mirror above the sink, a toilet, and a shower with a curtain. Not the fanciest, but atleast there was everything a bathroom needed. The boy looked around once again. It wasn't a very big bathroom, but there was enough room for him to summon a demon. He put the toilet lid down, sat his clothes on them, and held his hands up parallel to his shoulders, palms up. He whispered demonic words, simple, bright purple pentagrams appeared on his palms and under his eyes, the blue in which became the same shade of purple. Runes in the same purple floated in the air around him, slowly forming a ring around Professor's frame. The ring slowly began to spin around him and another pentagram appeared under his feet. The bright purple faded into an oily black color.

There wasn't much room for him to open a portal that the demon could come through comfortably, so he decided to place the portal between his hands, dangerously close to his face (good thing it was a one-way portal). The swirling whirlpool of shadow slowly came into view, and eventually a clawed hand made of densly packed shadow reached through. Following the hand was a very familiar guantlet, then came the rest of the demon; a shape that was undefined. It had no mouth, just two deep blue glowing embers for eyes. No legs; it seemed to gather shadows from the rest of the room, which built up it's form in a sort of funnel, as if something was being poured up from the bottom. The runes and pentagrams disappeared, leaving Professor looking like his usual self. "Can you turn the water on?" He asked the demon, pointing to the shower. The demon made a few noises and turned away as the boy began to get ready for a shower. When the water was hot, he walked over and sat down in the bottom, still not a lot of energy after the long trip to the camp. He pointed up to a small shelf and the demon pulled down the shampoo. For a demon, this one was surprisingly gentle most of the time, and that's why he often summoned it. The demon began to scrub Professor's hair, it's lack of mouth and silence gave the impression that it didn't care...at all.

((long post, so I'll end it here I finally posted, so, if you don't like this post, then too bad XD atleast I posted and didn't do it the lazy way by doing a time skip...I feel so accomplished now...I'm gonna go watch Dane Cook
p.s. if no one can think of anything to reply to this, then I'll just post the rest of it later ))

Elymasu wriggled forward on the bed; now only half of her body lay on the mattress. The rest hung over the edge as she stared at the oracle.
"A psychic?" she repeated, grinning. "That is so cool! And not weird at all!"
Then Kari mentioned lunch; the cat demon slipped off of the bunk bed and landed on her hands and feet, in a crouch. A moment later, Ely leapt to her feet and bounced to the door with the cry of, "Food!"

At the door, she paused and turned back to face the other two girls. "What're we waiting for?" she grinned, eyes alight. "Oh, I hope there's fish!"
Suddenly, an odd sound reached her keen hearing and her head whipped in the direction of the noise. It was... odd, almost a thrumming, almost a screech, but neither of the pair. She forgot about lunch and bounded toward it, not knowing it was the boys' area of the cabins. She pulled open the door and then paused; the sound had stopped. Elymasu shrugged and continued, walking into the cabin and leaving the door open behind her. The cat demon walked through, curiously sniffing at the bed with the luggage on it before stopping at the door to the bathroom. A shower was running; she could hear the water through the pipes and splashing onto the tiles. With a grin, she knocked once and swung the door open. There was a boy in the shower, with an odd, shadowy thing with glowing blue eyes washing his hair.
"Hiya! Was that you making the weird noise?" Ely grinned at him, tilting her head to the side.
She didn't comment on his lack of clothing, or mind the fact he was showering. It made no difference to her.

Professor looked up at the newcomer, his eyes half closed and his expression indifferent. The demon didn't stop scrubbing his hair, but it replied in a series of demonic grunts and grumbles. "I can't tell her that, it's rude." He said, looking up at the demon. His voice was quiet and made him sound weaker than he already was. He rested his head against the wall and closed his eyes. "It most likely was me. Is that why you came in with no regard for the fact that this is a boys' cabin?" He asked the girl. He could almost laugh, if he hadn't been so tired.

((DX sorry guys, no motivation, need to work on other projects as well, and I'm kinda tired, so you get a short post...I'm sorry))

Her head tilted to the right and she frowned, confused. After a long moment, in which she was 'thinking deeply' (read: trying to remember if she'd seen any females when she came into the area), Ely grinned.
"I didn't realise!" the cat demon finally announced. "And what did your uhh..." she paused, searching for a label for the black shadow creature, "friend say that was rude?"
Her dirty blonde hair swung about as her neck straightened; her olive eyes had followed his head as it rested against the wall. He seemed tired, really exhausted; why else would he have someone else washing his hair? Unless he liked that kind of thing, which was totally fine with Elymasu; she even wanted to ask him about it, but he didn't seem to be just enjoying it, or even have the energy to be embarrassed about his nudity.

"If I didn't want to be rude, why would I say it?" Professor asked rhetorically as the demon kept scrubbing his hair. The mass of shadow gently moved his head under the water to rinse the suds out. The demon said something again, to which the boy responded in angry sounding demonic noises. They continued speaking until the demon reached for the bottle of shampoo once more. Professor turned to look at the girl, sighing. "I'm sorry, but what's your name again?" He asked, glaring at the demon out of the corner of his eye. He was seriosuly considering summoning a different demon, but there was no way he was doing that with a girl in the cabin. It was starting to get on his nerves, though, and he didn't need that right now. In all truth, he probably needed some sleep on his 'comfortable' camp bed.

((still no motivation...))

She tilted her head, considering what the stranger had said; it was a rhetorical question, but Ely didn't realise that. A slight nod was the physical affirmation of his logic making sense, and then she was listening to the angry noises he was making. Her head tilted the other way, until they stopped conversing; now she straightened and smiled at him.
"My name's Elymasu," the cat demon grinned. "What's yours?"

(( :c
/offers cookies ))

((lol, Bubbles, did you even bother looking at the map before you posted about Ely moving all the way over to the boy's cabin? XD And it's in the rules that girls are not allowed in the boy's cabins and vice versa.))

Aiden decided to just wait for Professor before heading to the cafeteria for lunch, since they still had some time left. He continued chatting with Eiji while they waited, though the chat was interrupted when a girl suddenly came into their cabin. Aiden stared for a moment, watching her as made her way over to the bathroom, seemingly oblivious of the fact that there were two boys in there and a third was showering. After a few moments of sharing confused expressions with Eiji, Aiden decided to show the girl her way out. This was a boy's cabin after all, and girls weren't suppose to be in there. He didn't want her getting in trouble on the first day.

He overheard her say that her name was Elymasu and then asked the other for his name. Without waiting for him to reply, Aiden picked her up, carrying her with his arm around her waist with her under his arm at his side. He then exited the bathroom, went to the door of the cabin, and set her down outside of the cabin.

"No girls are allowed in a boy's cabin," he told her, "it's in the rules and I think you should follow them. They're there for a reason."

Though, Aiden was a bit surprised that Prof didn't shout for her to get out of the bathroom since he had been bathing. Generally one does not see someone of the opposite gender naked unless they were close, like family or a lover.

"We'll find you in the cafeteria for lunch and you can talk to him more then. For now, please leave this area, since you're not suppose to be in this general area anyways."

---

Yukari watched as Ely enthusiastically jumped down, heading for the door. She turned to get them to follow, but when she heard something, Ely was suddenly out the door and gone. Yukari sighed, wondering what in the world was she going to do with a hyper cat demon like that.

"Well," she said, turning to Eiko, "let's go to the cafeteria."

The two girls exited the cabin and made their way to the cafeteria.

((Now that you mention it... it is quite a far way. xD ohwells.
And Ely doesn't care for rules~! >=o c:))

An arm wrapped around her waist before she could receive a response from her new-found friend, and she was picked up and carried from the room. She didn't wriggle, but pouted up at the boy speaking to her.
"It's not nice to interrupt people," she grumbled, almost interrupting him with the complaint.
The cat demon sighed when she was set down, and glanced back into the boy's cabin.
"Fine," she groaned, turning her gaze toward the new stranger. He had dark red hair and pretty yellow eyes, but no sparkly jewellery for her to enthusiastically examine.
Elymasu turned and walked away from the cabin, dragging her feet and looking at the ground for most part of it. When she reached the cafeteria on the second floor, she was grinning and bouncy once more. She waved at several people, who reluctantly returned the gesture, looking slightly apprehensive, until the demon sought out her two new cabin-mates. Ely skipped over to them, greeting them with a delighted "Hullo~!"

"Okay, a little too much for now." Professor said, resting his head against the wall and closing his eyes. The demon grumbled again, and the boy looked over at it. "If you're going to be rude, I'm going to summon someone else." The demon didn't respond, but instead turned off the shower and reached for a towel. Professor curled up in the corner of the shower and shook his head, but he held his hand out anyway. The demon handed him the towel and held out it's own 'hand', but his master rejected it. He put his free hand against the wall and, slowly and weakly, was just barely able to stand himself up. He really was tired after the day he'd had. The fact that he never sleeps and hardly has enough energy didn't help at all. He dried himself off and began to dress. When he was done, he looked over at his summoned companion with as much anger as he had the energy to focus into one glare, which was hardly any. "You'll have to carry me down to the cafeteria." He said after contemplating whether to summon a different one, leave it, or just go without a demon for a while. This was one of the strongest demons he knew, but he didn't weigh a lot anyway. And going without one wouldn't help; it's only waste more of his energy. He walked past the demon and into the main area of the cabin. He sat back down on his bed and put his dirty clothes bag into his bag, decided it was best to hold them there for now.

Eiko looked a little worried when Ely wandered off towards the boys area of the camp. Wasn't that against the rules? She nodded to Kari's suggestion of going to the cafeteria though, guessing it would be okay since it hadn't really been the cat demon's intention to break the rules. She had just seemed curious about something. Hopefully she wouldn't get caught at all though. Once they got there, she looked around for a bit, relieved that the line to get food wasn't too long. They were either early or late, but she didn't care either way. "What should we eat...?" She wondered aloud, not really asking. She was glancing at the food displayed behind the glass barrier that protected it against... student hands? Sneezes? The air? She had never been too sure why that glass was there.

In the end, she didn't even have much time to think about it before Elymasu returned, greeting them cheerfully. She smiled at her returning the greeting, before looking back to the food and just choosing one at random. "I hope all those stories about camp food being gross aren't true... Hey Ely, you've come before, right? How was the food back then?" She received her tray with a smile and a 'thank you' from the lady that was serving everyone, and stood a little to a side so Yukari and Ely could also get theirs.

--------

Eiji could only watch in half shock and half amusement as a girl walked brashly into their cabin, went into the shower, said hi to professor, and then was carried out bu Aiden. He finally closed his mouth that had been gaping when the door was once again closed, and they had the cabin to themselves again. "That was..." He stopped for several seconds, looking for the right word to express himself, although he couldn't quite find one. Sighing in defeat, he just left it at that, scratching the back of his head absent mindedly, as if it would give him his answer.

He looked over at the door that led into the shower, wondering how Professor could have handled the situation so calmly. If it had been him... the mere thought of being walked into during such an... intimate time made heat rise to his face and his cheeks turn a faint pink color. He looked away and turned to face one of the windows, trying to hide his blushing from Aiden. He soon heard the sound of the door, and a few footsteps that meant the other boy was out of the bathroom. He looked at his reflection on the glass, noting how the color was slowly fading, and how Profesdor was putting away his clothes, accompanied by some kind of... black... creature... thing. He frowned a little, forgetting about his previous embarrassment, and turned again to scrutinize the being. "Is this... your... uh... power?" He tilted his head a little, frowning, it was the first time he saw something like that. He was about to reach out with one of his hands, try to touch it, but he soon faltered and retracted. He wasn't sure what would happen if he did come into contact with it- was it even an it? He just waited for the boy to answer him, he was starting to get really curious.

Professor nodded from his place on the bed. "I summon lesser demons; the feral ones and a few that have a human form." He explained. The demon stood beside his bed and glanced between the boys in the cabin before settling its gaze on the one who summoned it. Professor closed his eyes and sighed. What did he expect? Of course his first day would be draining, especially with all of the excitment so far. He almost didn't want to meet any of the other campers...ever. So far he's missed the bus, had to be carried by a demon the whole way here, met his cabinmates, and took a shower, which was interrupted by a weird girl who seemed indifferent to the fact that she had wandered over to the boys' cabins and walked in on his shower. He didn't really have enough energy to do anything, or even feel that embarrassed. He just wanted to go to lunch, get some food, hopefully get back some more energy, and do nothing for the rest of the day. He hasn't had a day of rest, or a safe place to rest in even if he had the time, in a good while. "This guy is actually how I got here. He's strong, considering he's made of solidified shadows." His voice was flat and he sounded somewhat bored. He didn't like to talk about the demons that much, unless it was one of his favorites. He sat up and looked over at the demon, who looked away as he made eye contact. It seemed to be a bit irritated. If it could speak english, Professor was sure that it would complain about something to the other boys, since complaining to the little warlock would have no effect. He didn't care that much, especially when he 'doesn't have the energy to care'. If you could ask the demon, that was all just a lie so he could mooch off of others' energy and not ever do anything. Though, there's never been any reason to doubt him.

"So, what are your powers?" The boy asked to no one in particular. He'd be spending the whole of summer with these guys (most likely). He'd find out sooner or later, why not at the beginning? He hoped he wasn't being rude, though.

"I'm sure the food will be fine," Yukari replied to what Eiko had said. They received their trays and began to move through the line in the cafeteria.For that days lunch it was a taco bar. There was all fixings to make tacos and the campers were able to choose corn or flour tortillas, and then what they wanted on their tacos. Their choices for meat were chicken, beef, pork, or they could have a veggie taco if they didn't eat meat. They had all the rest of the toppings you could want to put on a taco: lettuce, tomatoes, salsa, cheese, corn, beans, sour cream, guacamole, etc.
"See, it doesn't look bad," Yukari said to Eiko as they reached the point where they had to start telling the workers in the cafeteria what they wanted on their taco.

Since the question was asked to neither of them in particular, Aiden spoke up first.
"My power is Pyrokinesis. Basically I can control fire."
He then waited for Eiji to say what his power was since Aiden assumed Prof was asking both of them.

((Oops, ya ninja'd me. x3))

She tilted her head, smiling thoughtfully as she tried to remember what the food was like the previous year.
"It depends who's cooking it," Elymasu grinned. "Sometimes it was brilliant, others it was horrible."
The cat demon chose the chicken for her taco, with few salad things within it. Ely was saddened that there was no fish, but chicken was almost as good. She grabbed a bottle of flavoured milk for her drink and stood beside Eiko. "It smells pretty good today, so I'm guessing they've got the good woman in. The man's the bad one at cooking."
Her eyes flicked to Eiko, and flared wide as she grinned. Then she stretched up onto her toes, peering over the bench and half-wall to see into the kitchen. A large woman stood at the stove and the demon did an excited, careful bounce. "It's her," she sang.

Eiko brightened visibly when she saw how tasty the food looked like, and laughed a little at Ely's comments. "Aw, I don't think you should be badmouthing the poor he-cook. If what you say is true though, I sure hope he's gotten better this year. I don't want to have to either eat something horrible or starve my way through the day," She switched her attention to the lady behind the counter for a while so she could choose the ingredients she waned for her taco, and then followed her roommates to one of the empty tables in the cafeteria, sitting happily on one of the chairs that was next to the window before the other two could beat her to it. She smiled sheepishly at them before digging into her food, the tacos smelled really tasty, so it was hard to wait.

--------------

"My power is basically seeing the past." Eiji thought for a moment whether he should try to explain it a little, but quickly decided against it. If they wanted to know, they'd ask. "Both of your powers look way more useful though."

"Ah, at least camp is starting out peacefully. I'm pretty sure as the days wear on, it'll be less and less peaceful since we have tons of teenagers holed up in here," Yukari noted as they sat and ate their lunch. As more and more sat down at tables with their lunches, the cafeteria became quite noisy with all the chatter.
"So, do you guys have boyfriends~?" Yukari asked, figuring it would be a topic to open to other things so they weren't sitting in an awkward silence.

---

"Mine's not that useful. I'm still working on controlling it," Aiden replied.

((D:))

The demon, stuffing her face with her taco, glanced up at the mention of a peaceful atmosphere.
She quickly swallowed what was in her mouth before saying with a grin, "There was so many fights last year. So much fun."
Ely neglected to mention some of them were her fault, with her erratic social skills and love of all things shiny.
"So, do you guys have boyfriends~?" Yukari asked them, causing Ely to giggle.
"I dunno," she replied thoughtfully, glancing around the cafeteria. "I think I had one last time, but I'm not sure if he's here again..."
She pushed her hair back with one hand, gently touching her fingers to the plate as she looked around for the boy.
"I don't think he is. Shame," Ely shrugged, looking to Eiko with a cheeky grin. "How about you? And you, 'Kari?"

"Haha, nah, I don't have one," she answered when Ely asked the question back. "I wouldn't mind finding a cute guy here to flirt with though~"
She glanced around the cafeteria to see if eyes could spot any good looking ones nearby. It was a shame when she didn't spot any, but maybe she'll find one later.

((ugh, sorry it's kinda short))