After 72 hours of searching, I choose to believe that the SOS Brigade has proven conclusively that there are no groundhogs present on the island.  Winter will have to make up its own mind this year.

[Locked to Sheska and Julie]

I'm sorry to say, we will no longer be working at the station together. I'm afraid I've been let go. Do let me know if there's ever anything I can do to help.

[Locked to Kyon and Haruhi]

It seems that little stunt this weekend lost me my job at the station. Don't worry, though - all that means is that I'll have more time to devote to the SOS Brigade.

[Locked to Aqua, Aisling, Sirius, Rogue, and Sarah]

As my friends, I wanted to let you know that I won't be working at the police station anymore. However, I would appreciate if you could keep quiet about it.

 Speaking for me personally, if that wasn't the single most traumatic experience I've had on the island to date, it's because I've repressed the others and erased them from all consideration.

With that said, I woke up this morning without a mark on me, and after receiving an explanation and a billing statement, was unceremoniously evicted from the hospital and told to return to school.  This isn't a complaint; except regarding the bill.  Please don't take credit for treating my injury when the fact of the matter is that it disappeared on its own.  Even if life is something it's impossible to set a value on, this is excessive.  Also, after an event like that, it's clearly impossible for me to keep my mind on classwork, so I'll be absent for the remainder of the day.  While technically it may count as 'French leave,' hopefully the response will be less drastic.

Obviously it was completely beyond my control, but nonetheless, I'm sorry if I worried anyone.  No, excuse me, that's a terrible phrasing.  I'm sorry that I worried everyone.  

[text to Haruhi]

Although the nurses' account was somewhat confused, it sounds like you stuck with me through all of that.  Thanks, Haruhi.  If I vanished from the hospital during what turned out to be your lunch break, please believe that it wasn't my idea.

Who: Kyon & Haruhi.
What: Totally not a date ending in stabbing. Well, sort of.
When: backdated to Friday evening, Jan 24.
Where: The streets of New Moore.

In Kyon's opinion, any activity which required him to carry a forty-pound backpack probably didn't meet the qualifications of a date, since a pack mule could have played his role just as well. It wasn't entirely clear to him whether they were geocaching, benchmarking, or warchalking at any given moment, but as tired as his shoulders were, the confusion helped to keep his interest alive. Planting clues and prizes for treasure hunts and marking the area with encoded symbols would have been simple enough, but for efficiency's sake, they were also hunting for any secret markings or surveyor's marks left behind by city planners and civil engineers.

So far, the secrets of the city had yet to unravel for them, but the backpack was getting lighter, they were on their second roll of electrical tape, and through vigorous argument, they'd expanded their vocabulary of hobo sign-code by a dozen new invented symbols, meticulously catalogued.

Still, thinking of the confusion and headaches of future scavenger-hunters was enough to give Kyon a happy moment of schadenfreude.

"Hey, Haruhi, what about that alleyway?" He pointed down the narrow, dingy gap between the buildings, a glint in his eye. "If we want to test the courage and moral virtue of knights on quest, somewhere like that should be appropriate, right?"

[Iiiiit's big Dave. And in the background of his apartment, is that--]

So in the absence of an actual overlording alien seabitch to take down, it looks like my part in the Great Earth Turf War's been declassed to arguing with troll kindergartners about Dita Disgusta and how she definitely isn't the hero of Turbo Transformin' Power Soldiers. For the record, "Yeah huh she is!" is not a valid point of debate no matter how many exclamation points you tack to the end.

["Shut up, it totally matters!"

Oh god, is that little Vriska scratching up his furniture in the background? Dave, why.]

Yeah, no. Anyway, as dialogically fulfilling as I find this kind of intellectual back-and-forth, the little larva's looking for her mom. And I'm looking not to brood the Empress's get. Also she ate all the bacon I made for lunch. So if anyone's seen like a giant spider--

["Like, HUUUUUUUUGE!"

Dave has to tilt his head a little to indicate how hard he may be rolling his eyes behind his sunglasses.]

--Okay, a huge giant spider, drop me a line. Name's Dave Strider. Like the movie guy.

I knew it!!! Ha!

[There's some unintentional shakycam footage - deliberate video, but not deliberate shakycam - of an excited kid, thirteen or fourteen years of age, with one fist clenched in triumph. He's literally vibrating in excitement.]

The videophones are advanced technology, so unless this is a comics-style adventure or something video-game inspired there won't be magic too. It's too early to say if aliens or time travelers are involved, but that's not important. The real question is, why us?

It might just be a random sample, but it could be there's something special, too, and that's why we were taken. Quick, if you're getting this message, tell me everything that's unusual about you. Why would you be important to extraterrestrials?

Of course, if this is just the future it might be that something you haven't done yet is important. And if this is an alternate universe than maybe your cross-dimensional doppleganger is really the important one.

But... this really happened to all of us, right? So there's definitely a chance we can find out!

A principal of a school just squished my face and gave me a fairly impressive high-five. A person I don't recognize did, in fact, get me a pizza when I jokingly responded to them with the request upon being asked "Do you need anything, sir?" My phone's voicemail is full of who knows what. This Captain America figure is the coolest thing I have ever seen. And I think I'm secretly running the police department.

How is your day going, New Moore?

 Now that I've spent most of the day running across town, including a side trip to the school maintenance shed to find a shovel, I'm going to spend my evening somewhere warm where I can relax and get something to eat.  If you'd like to watch me open your present, you'll have to meet me for dinner.

How does the saying go? Ah, yes.

Bah, humbug.

WHO: Anyone and Everyone
WHAT: All the kissin's
WHEN: Dec 13 - 15
WHERE: Wherever you want!
WARNINGS: Affection, freak-outs, possible R ratings


Okay! Here's the post for collecting all your kissing logs! If you want to do individual Network posts and then lead in to kissing that way, that's fine, but if you're looking to do a straight up log, this is the place to do it. That way we don't flood the community with all the log posts.

Instructions:

1. Post your character's name. One reply per character so that they're all neatly organized.
2. When you tag to a character's thread, put your participating character's name in the subject line.
3. ???
3a. Please edit the post tags to include your character name for easier activity reporting
4. PROFIT!

Lydia, I finished my finals today, so we can do whatever you want tomorrow. And no class on Friday so I don't have to call it a night early if you wanted to go to (can't believe I'm saying this..) Lau's. Nathan's got some coupons he has to redeem anyway.

uh You don't have class either of those two days, right?

Since Christmas break is coming up, does anyone was to get together for some D&D? I know John's in.

Hey, would anyone be down for a Secret Santa thing this year? Or like whatever non-denominational holiday elf you feel like.

I want to organize it if people are interested! Like, no shady recruitment implied, haha. I just didn't want it to be like limited to the seven people I know well :)

EDIT:



SECRET SANTA STUFF HERE!

Rules:
- $20 max (not enforced)
- make sure you actually remember to do it!
- you give name, you get a name!
- fill out the thing below and leave it here so whoever gets you can know what you want!



<b>NAME:</b> who are you! <b>AGE:</b> so no one gets arrested for a badly thought out gag gift! <b>WISHES:</b> three to five things you want! <b>COLORS:</b> if you have a preference! <b>SIZE:</b> OPTIONAL! <b>OTHER:</b> anything you think might be relevant!

I suppose anything would be an anticlimax after a message like that.

They say it's always darkest just before the dawn. What I have to ask myself at the moment is whether or not the reverse is also true. Call it the calm before the storm, or a moment of grace, or whatever you like; as far as I'm concerned it's false hope and frankly I've had enough of it. I should have begun worrying seriously after the point this afternoon when the crazy things we've been subjected to the last few days started their retreat. Was it really a retreat, or were they just rallying their forces? Readying for the main assault after thoroughly testing our defenses?

Of course, anecdotal experiences should never be considered as objective data, but it's true that I've been less able to avoid danger since that point than I was before. At the moment, I'm hiding under a desk in the corner of a classroom, just past the edge of a section of frozen time. I have reception and power here, but the lightswitch is in the section of room where nothing works. Of course, the door is there too. And as I'm sure you could have assumed by now, i'm not alone in the room. No, there's definitely something else here. And while my current position is calculated to provide extra safety in the event of an earthquake, in case of Shadow attack it's not likely to do anything.

That's assuming the Shadow notices me, of course, which isn't a guarantee, but I'm not the type to assume that Murphy's Law is suddenly in abeyance, no matter how many natural laws have stopped taking effect or simply taken the day off.

In any case, this might be an awkward time to get philosophical, rather than asking for help, but the fact is that while my phone has power, it isn't receiving any signal, and all my ignominious and panicked requests were bounced unsent, which makes me seem a good deal more stoic than is actually the case. I'm going to save this message, then send it, just to be safe, and i'll be leaving this phone in the top drawer of the desk before I make a break for it.

Wouldn't waiting it out be the sensible thing to do? That's a possibility. But with just minutes to midnight, my chances are probably better now than they will be for the foreseeable future. When it comes down to it, I'm the type to take risks and believe in longshots, I suppose. There's no point in not admitting it now.

In the event of my death, Koizumi Itsuki is hereby appointed the executor of my estate, and Suzumiya Haruhi the primary beneficiary, with the exception of any secret writings I may have left behind, which I'm sure Koizumi can appropriately erase, burn, magnetize, randomize, or destroy, assuming such writings exist. Any recordings from this spring are of course top priority in that respect.

All right. Time to go. If you never see me again, New Moore, I should tell you: these last eighteen months have been fun. I mean that from the bottom of my heart.

What's more romantic than candle-light and flowers at sunset, more exciting than a flaming monster truck, more original than any club activity in the last six months, and still sane enough not to be mistaken for mysterious forces taking over the island or something I'd be arrested or committed for?

Please don't mistake this for a hypothetical question. If you can find me an answer in the next twenty-four hours, I'll make sure there are points in it for you, somehow.

Over the past twenty-two months, I feel that I’ve become a hardened veteran of the vagaries and exigencies of life in New Moore. Over that same span of time, I hope that school faculty and administrators have come to know me well enough to testify that I’m not the sort to find meaningless excuses to avoid schoolwork. In fact, my dedication to extracurricular activities means I’ve had to go far out of my way to avoid absences, so that my participation would be permitted. The penalties for missing a day are far more severe than anything levied by the school, and the consequences more dire than facing up to even something as serious as a meningitis scare.

With that in mind, please take the following proposal seriously: during upsetting anomalies, even if it’s impractical to cancel school, please treat all unexpected absences as excused. It might be impractical to take a drastic step like erasing school vacations to schedule them at the drop of a metaphysical hat, but short of that it has to be argued that during such creative reversals of the natural order, students might have any manner of reasons for incomplete attendance, many of which are left better unexplained, but nonetheless solid in their validity. Whatever steps are required to institute this change, even with only seven months until my graduation, I’ll gladly undertake them. Fill out paperwork, distribute a petition, lobby the school board or even run for a seat myself: whatever it takes. Immediate action is required, and I’ll be unflinchingly sure to do whatever I must.

That said, I know it’s pre-emptive, but regardless of the final decision, I won’t be coming into school today, and as outrageous and presumptuous an action as it may seem, I must strongly urge my fellow members of the Amelia Earhart Memorial Student Body to do the same.