Library Wars

[Toby Chastain]

"Truly, it was a fierce battle on the day the tan troops set out. The vicious.... what are those, Indians? .... Yeah, Indians. Wow, and they're red, that's not racist at all. The totally not racist Native Americans had all but decimated the tan troops, driving them back to the much dreaded and oft-maligned do it yourself section. Their backs were against the wall, and they'd lost at least three troops to the vicious stomping attacks of the Native Americans' trained dinosaur combatant. naturally they'd called for help.

"And lo, there was a... kind of bluish rider, that was sent from the West to summon the forces of the green army and--"

And Toby paused, arms raised holding up a blue cowboy figure hovering above several dozen green army men. The teenager stood amidst a small crowd of various plastic figures, most in the cheap, tiny variety. As he'd said, the various tan ones were set up over one section of the library, with the red "Indians" spread out below and a mass of green troops coming. All of which would have been perfectly normal coming from ye average five year old in daylight.

From a seventeen year old?
At two in the morning?

"Uh, hi?" Toby said to the new arrival. "I'm going to go out on a limb here..." he pointed with the troop, "can't sleep? it's cool," he gestured, "I got permission. And this is definitely more mature than it looks,' he looked around again, pursing his lips. "Well, not really, but it's a lot more fun than it looks."

[Max Fritz]

A pillow too hot that even flipping it over wouldn't help, roommate who insisted on playing whale sounds at night and a reluctance to sleep is what drove Max to wander through the school. Monitors avoided she moved from corridor to corridor. The roof was a viable option but too cold for her distinct lack of warm clothes. Delving further into the depths of school a singular voice was emanating from the library.

There was a guy. Stood in the middle of a bunch of plastic figures. She had certainly seen worse in the middle of the night. Door flung open, moving towards him.

A brief nod for an answer, eyebrows rose "I'm sure it is but why in the library?"

[Toby Chastain]

"An excellent question, Miss..." Toby trailed off, giving the girl enough time to say her name or to dance around the question. Either way, he knew that plowing forward and offering up something vaguely resembling an explanation would be needed, what with the plastic figures everywhere. "You see, if I hang out near the dorms, say, in the lounge, then I'm keeping everyone up with my antics and whatnot. But if I'm far away from everyone in a mostly empty place," he held his hands up to indicate the area around him. "There's actually a few night owls that show up from time to time," Toby lowered the hands and shrugged, "I just happen to have gotten permission and all. Happens when you don't sleep."

Toby then brought his hand up in a salute, before extending it in the (moderately cute) girl's direction. "Toby. Tobias Chastain, technically, but people usually just stick with 'Toby.'"

[Max Fritz]

"Uh Max..." She shuffled to lean against one the tabled, careful not to step on the 'troops' ( which would be more akin to nails with a lack of shoes). At the boy's answer she nodded. It made sense, even if the guy looked like he didn't normally make sense.

Eyebrows rose slighty at the salute, which she felt inclined to return but decided against it. Hand clasped hand, she shook it with a light grip. His long winded explanation of name caused Max to smirk "Max. Technically Maxine Fritz, but I prefer Max." Her smirk turned into a smile before releasing her grip.

Max scanned the array of plastic figurines, she gestured towards the green ones "So who is waging war on who?"

[Toby Chastain]

Part of Toby almost went "Max is a boy's name,' but he at least had slightly better control over himself than that. he couldn't stop the thought from fluttering into his mind, which he knew could be potentially a mess should this be a telepath, but that was just a chance you had to take. She took his hand, and that smirk told him that something landed.

"Ah, but with a name like Maxine, you're missing out on so many possibilities," Toby offered, smiling and half joking himself. he lowered the arm after the release, turning back to the figures. Toby leaned slightly toward Max and pointed.

"Right, so the Indians, and that's a racist color, right? Anyway, they've got the tan troops on the run up there. The blue rider was sent into the... that direction and is going to be bringing back hope in the form of the green in the light of day. I think I was aiming for Tolkien and landed somewhere just south of racist. There's probably a lesson in there somewhere," Toby took a breath, releasing it slowly as he surveyed the troops. "I'm sure there's an overly complicated backstory involving lots of fake languages and descriptions of trees in there somewhere. Or a lion."

[Max Fritz]

"And what possibilities would those be?" Her smile broadened, head tilted. Hands plunged in pockets, eyes now staring at the boy.

Eyes scanned the neatly set out troops. Max nodded as Toby explained the plastic war which was sprawled in front of them. And from it she drew one full conclusion. This guy was a nerd MEGA-NERD. Not that there was anything wrong with MEGA-NERDS, in fact Max might have been considered one, what with her late night surfing the internet. She pulled a hand from the depths of her pockets "Okay, so the blue rider is...Gandalf in this situation and the green ones are the eagles...but that makes the Indians the orcs...is that racist? I can't tell...but one question" She pointed towards the small dinosaur figurine "Does that one have a side or is it like a spastic Troll just flailing about the battle ground?" Max bit her lip before gesturing in front of her "Also what are they fighting over? The last twinkie? Or something equally ridiculous that other wars have started from?"

[Toby Chastain]

"If you don't know the possibilities, I'm definitely not telling," Toby replied almost automatically. He moved to fully stand beside Max so that the two generals could fully survey the battlefield before them. It seemed as if the girl more or less understood the troop deployment (nice) and Toby found himself nodding along, right up till the orc thing:

"Wow, you just went there. I mean, Tolkien got pretty close but you," he made a sliding motion with his hand, 'you just slid on into home," Toby paused for the question, following the finger. "I think that's actually Godzilla," he admitted. "I get a little bored staying too strict to the battle rules and all. It may have been Smaug. Or Barney. He still haunts the few dreams I get anymore."

Toby took another deep breath, crossing his arms as he continued to survey the battlefield. He nodded to the front of the battleground. "Pretty sure they're fighting over the Western section. Or sci-fi. I kind of just," he gestured toward them with splayed hands, "set them up and was figuring out the details from there."

[Max Fritz]

Max laughed a little at his answer "Hey, go big or go home." She shrugged her shoulders and raised an eyebrow, her smile becoming an expression of befuddlement "Wait Barney haunts your dreams? As in the purple dinosaur? As in the fucking child favourite?" Head turned to give him a sideways glance before cracking a smile again.

Gestured copied, Max nodded sagely. It made sense. Partly. It partly made sense to spend all night in the library surrounded by plastic figurines and waging war. But who was she to judge? He would probably find be surrounded by parts to be weird. She clasped her hands together, turning to Toby "So...how can I help the War effort, General?" A quick salute before standing to attention.

[Toby Chastain]

"Have you seen him?" Toby asked, giving Max a quizzical expression. "He has," he gestured toward his face, "that never wavering gaze and the overall feeling of a brainwashing cult leader. He ranks up there with the worst of horror monsters," and Toby was tempted to point out that he knew his horror movies pretty well, but that wasn't entirely true. He watched them, sure, but it wasn't, like, his "thing."

Besides, they had a war to focus on. Toby nodded and walked around the edge of the battlefield. "Well, that kind of depends on what direction we want to take the campaign. do the Indian/orcs rally and is this a crushing defeat that the heroes have to recover from later? Or do we turn the tide and reestablish some sort of status quo? "Toby paused again, considering. "The more we talk about this, the more racist poor Tolkien gets. Guy is taking a real beating in this conversation."

[Max Fritz]

Yep. Super MEGA-NERD. Bit of a weirdo. A tad unhinged. Max followed him as he paced around the edge "How about a short lived victory where..." She bent down to pick up a red and tan figurine "Our heroes are victorious." Holding up the tan figurine "But the indians/orcthingies have prepared for that and set up an ambush..." She stepped across the battlefield "Behind the ridge. Making our heroes downfall even greater." To emphassize her point, Max dropped the tan figurine.

She shrugged, moving back towards Toby "Just a suggestion, you're the commander in chief."

[Toby Chastain]

"And people say I'm dark," Toby said, his arms folded. "You know, that could work," he started walking around, nodding. "They get into a major conflict, both their armies decimated," he started knocking down a few troops as he circled, setting up rings of fallen. This did take a little bit of caution; didn't want to end up stepping on anything after all.

"Then, when they're decimated," he nodded toward the beast, "they have to go against the unstoppable monster," He paused, considering, "though I do think there's probably more figures or something around here somewhere. I mean," he waved a hand, "that is a pretty epic conflict, but it's something I could do on my own. And if there's another general involved."

He gestured toward Max, figuring that she'd probably catch on and want to help; unless she was suddenly struck by the lateness of the hour. Toby did remember what it was like to get tired, after all, even if it didn't affect him much anymore.

[Max Fritz]

Max nodded, taking on a very serious demeanour, as Toby started knocking down the troops left and right, following him with hands clasped behind her back. She turned to look around at the armies spanning this section of the library, a smile cracking through the serious look she had been holding. An arm went to hug Toby's shoulder, another scanning across the battlefield "We could go all Waterloo. A bit of cat and mouse? Or maybe go Civil War! Take some hills...wait is that racist?" Her smile faded as she pondered her own question.

After a moment she shook her head "I'm pretty sure it isn't..." She shrugged her shoulders before releasing her arm from Toby.

[Toby Chastain]

For a moment, they were almost arm in arm, and Toby didn't quite realize it until he almost did there. The prattle that came out of Max was dangerously close to what Toby could have produced himself. "I'm still kinda stuck in the whole fantasy realm thing, so, like, I don't think I'd wanna get French up in here," Toby gestured around it, before knocking over a few more Indians.

"Go go Godzilla," Toby hummed, before grabbing the monster and wiggling it about a little. "I feel like I should be making some statement about inevitable betrayal," Toby paused for a moment, looking around. "Time to start moving troops indeed. Nobody's gonna notice this guy at first..." and Toby started moving about the field again, shifting troops, giving the "not-orcs' the distinct advantage, at least for the time being. They probably had more heroes, after all.

[Max Fritz]

Max resisted making an inappropriate joke about getting French up in here. It would probably give this guy a minor heart-attack. Can you get a minor heart-attack? I'm probably sure most heart-attacks are major... She had kind of blanked out from what he was talking about so turned her attention back to the battlefield.

Stepping over a group of what looked like misshapen dinosaurs, Max shuffled two groups to open up her option for using a pincer movement around the main group of enemies. She tapped her lip as eyes scanned the options that lay before here.

[Toby Chastain]

The dinosaurs shifted into movement, and Toby couldn't quite remember having actually put those there, which had Toby wondering what all he'd gotten into position here. He paused for a moment, considering. "Are we doing this, like, in turns or is this all real time or..." Toby paused, tapping his fingers on his chin. "Nah, I'm overthinking it."

Toby moved into position, shifting a few green riders and some blue forces to head off the dinosaurs. Then he moved to push the tan forces a little further down, forming a line and trying to put some pressure on what was going on over there. Had to make sure to use the whole field, after all.

"And lo, the tan soldiers form a line, trying to make a last stand. While the Blue Rider and his troops tackle the vicious, I'm still going with dinosaur troops. Of course, none know of the true terrors laying around the bend,' Toby paused, moving over to look at the library lost and found. "Tell me there's a transformer in here or something..."