open rp } { emily's christmas furlough post

[iluvroadrunner6]

1. Pick one of your characters and one of mine. Or, browse the top levels I've left below. (You can also say Surprise Me.)
2. Drop prompts in places of your choosing.
3. Profit!

Cupcake AU meme | TFLN | Soulmates AU | Otherwordly | Winter Wonderland

Comments

[headmaster]

[Whether or not Josie realizes what she's doing, avoidance is something Ric could tell her a lot about. He wouldn't really, of course. He's too busy avoiding these sorts of conversations entirely with her. They can talk about it when she's older. When she's twenty-five or forty. When she's an adult and has an adult sister because they're both alive.

But as that kind of avoidance is distant and ambiguous when Josie enters his office. He looks up from his reading with a curl at the edges of his mouth. One daughter, no bruising, no visible hexes. There's a chance this will lead to a perfectly delightful place.]

Hey, Pumpkin. What's up?

[polydeukes]

I got put on a recruiting mission.

[She holds up the slip of paper in question. She knows it's going to sound weird, asking him to go recruit a student for the school he no longer works for, but she knows that for her dad, the kids always mattered more than the esteem of the position.]

I figured instead of me driving Uncle Damon's old car, you might want to go with me?

OKAY HELLO I am prepared to revisit this thread

[headmaster]

[The kids are the most important part of that school. Without the kids, none of it matters. He does perk up as soon as she mentions her intent, though his eyes squint a bit from the invitation.]

I might. But are you sure that's allowed under the new rules? Wouldn't want to upset Doctor Tool.

[polydeukes]

What Professor Vardemus doesn't know won't hurt him.

[She gives a small shrug, with that cute little face that says she fully knows she's skirting the rules, but she also thinks it's for a good reason.]

Besides, the rules don't explicitly say you can't.

[headmaster]

Well. [He looks up then, smirking faintly. She looks so much like her mother when she makes that face.]

Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should do it. But if it means we're pissing him off and there's nothing he can do about it, I'm in.

[polydeukes]

[She grins, before tipping her head to the side.]

C'mon. I already got the road trip snacks.

[She's honestly just excited for the trip and Dad time, even if there's the lingering dread about what she has to tell him.]

[headmaster]

[ he collects items from his desk and stows them in the top drawer beneath, for as much as a lock ever matters with this many witches in his life. It's more of a formality at best, and at worst a reason to give someone a guilt trip later for violating his privacy. ]

Sounds like you weren't expecting me to say no. Am I that obvious?

[polydeukes]

I don't know about obvious, but if you didn't enjoy recruiting students, I think you would have farmed it out to Mom or Dorian by now.

[There's a reason her dad makes all those trips. She knows he cares about the students, it makes sense that he would want to bring them all in himself.]

[headmaster]

[He smiles despite himself as he stands at last, fully prepared to let his daughter lure him wherever she needs him to be.]

Your mother just didn't always want to leave you two alone with me in the early days. She kept telling me I was a bad influence without enough supervision.

[polydeukes]

[She gives him an amused look.]

Wonder why that would be?

[The question is a lie. She knows why. But she loves him anyway.]

[headmaster]

[He shrugs as he swings his jacket off the back of his chair and over his shoulders.]

Apparently bedtimes are supposed to be more than general suggestions up for debates. Who knew?

[polydeukes]

Personally, Lizzie and I were big fans of the flexible schedules, by the way. And the cookies.

[Caroline, not so much.

And with that, they are off on the recruitment trip! She'll wait until they're a ways down the road to get to the meat of this adventure. Right now she's just going to enjoy dad time a little.]

[headmaster]

[Daddy-daughter time is a go! It won't be long before they're on the interstate on their way out of Mystic Falls with a full tank of gas and nothing but enthusiasm.]

So have you eaten a real meal today, or is there a stop at Cracker Barrel on the horizon?

[polydeukes]

I will take Cracker Barrel over truck stop snacks.

[Because gross. You never know how long those hot dogs have been there. And as the road passes them by, she awkwardly shifts her hair behind one ear.]

There's something I kinda want to talk to you about too.

[headmaster]

[Color him shocked by this unexpected turn of events.]

Yeah? What's that, honey?

[polydeukes]

It's about the Gemini Curse.

[Toooootally going to drag this out as long as possible.]

And who I think might be able to help us?

[headmaster]

[Well that escalated in an unpleasant direction. His fingers tighten around the wheel, but he manages to keep it off his face.]

I'm listening.

[And preparing to feel incredibly judgmental, honestly.]

[polydeukes]

[Yep, she knows him well enough to sense the judgement coming, especially when the answer is:]

Freya Mikaelson?

[headmaster]

-- is an old witch and a powerful one, but not the kind of person to whom we want to owe favors.

[He hasn't even gotten to the part where he realizes that she's gone out to visit her yet.]

[polydeukes]

Technically, she sort of owes me a favor.

[There's a pause, and in true teenage girl fashion:]

Please don't be mad?

[headmaster]

[Oh he's skipping right past mad and pulling into "furious".]

Josie what did you do.

[polydeukes]

That spell I used to make everyone remember Hope again? I ... may have tested it on Freya first.

[And she thinks that making it so that you remember your one and only niece after she was erased from existence should at least earn Josie a curse breaking favor.

Never mind the fact that Freya helped her write it, shhhh. If Josie hadn't gone to New Orleans to deal with what happened to Lizzie, Freya would have been oblivious to her niece's existence forever maybe.]

[headmaster]

[And with that, the car rumbles violently as he pulls onto the shoulder and sets it into park. This is not a conversation to have while operating heavy machinery.]

And how exactly did you happen to be close enough to test a spell like that?

[You are the grounded-est you have ever been Josette Saltzman.]

[polydeukes]

[She takes a deep breath. And then it all comes spilling out:]

So Lizzie still had one of Penelope's spy pens, and I had the journal it was spelled to come back to, so when Lizzie started writing about remembering Hope in her diary, I knew that it had to be related to the magic I used to save her from the Oni, and I knew everything she knew about Hope, including that she was a Mikaelson. And I knew that none of the teachers here would help me figure out how to make this work.

Since Freya was the closest Mikaelson available who also happened to know a crapton about old, powerful magic, I thought she might be a good choice. I also needed to see if Hope was really a Mikaelson and the only way to do that was to talk to an actual Mikaelson.

[headmaster]

[Somehow, that's actually worse than what he'd imagined would be coming.]

You mean you abandoned school to go gallivanting halfway across the country into one of the most dangerous cities in America alone? Andthat you made it back without Marty Poppins saying a word about it?

[Being upset with Josie is actually kind of challenging. He's already instinctively finding a scapegoat to redirect.]