Exodia Destroys- Wait, this isn't right

[BlizzardeyeWonder]

[Camilla Bell continued from Such Poolishness]

Camilla looked around the meeting room and sighed.

Oh sure, not much had changed since the last meeting of the Magic: The Gathering club. Same old people, same old decks- and the latter was the problem here. Nobody's deck had changed, and Camilla's hadn't either, so the usual power balance with her holding onto the edge of the short end of the stick remained. Look, it technically wasn't her fault that she was too poor to get the latest expansions, but her kinda terrible play was all on her. Wondering what her win-loss ratio was, she soon abandoned that activity fearing the actual count would embarrass her out of the club. Guess that's what you get for being a filthy casual, eh?

That being said, there was a certain security in claiming to play 'just casually'. Nobody takes you seriously. Nobody takes your losses seriously. Nobody takes your triumphs seriously... but then again her latest triumph was finally completing the black-blue deck of her dreams! Only for it to be steamrolled by a sophomore. Well, steamrolled is an exaggeration, but you get the point.

The cards were alternatively in the deck on her lap or in her hand, as she scrolled through them, reviewing the deck she had made. Gravediggers, some black mana, some blue mana, a counterspell or two... the guy basically milled her deck when she had no useful counterspells in her hand, which robbed her of her gravediggers. That's luck, it seems. Perhaps there was something she was missing, but the nature of missing things is that they tend to stay that way for a while.

Sighing again, Camilla brought the cards in her hand down and shuffled them haphazardly back into the deck. Leaning back in the chair, she was mostly content to watch the next match unfold for now.

[Frozen Smoke]

((>tracert ParkerGreen.Pregame
3 | 37 ms 51 ms 48 ms Sisyphean Self-Maintenance█))

Thumbs met the edge of two piles of cards and tilted them up, the potential energy of both stacks pressing against the opposing force of friction on skin and sat steady, in equilibrium.

The two piles were brought edge to edge. He pulled his thumbs away. The cards struck each other as the piles intermingled, creating a harsh noise as 30-odd cards fell upon one another in quick succession, before being pressed in together to form a new, full pile. Only to be split and shuffled again.

Parker had read somewhere that 7 rifle shuffles was enough to randomise a deck of cards to the point that it was only very slightly more predictable than random. He realised, as he continued the routine of shuffling his deck a further six times, that perhaps he should look that up at some point. If only to be sure. His own match had been easy - When you were working to dunk on people with net decks, it wasn't hard to pick up percentage points just by looking at how the pros actually dealt with the other best decks in the format. The answer to that being fairly clear - Get underneath them with good threats and a tailored removal suite. He might have preferred playing control when he could get away with it, but playing control against other control decks was a good way to rely on draws, as opposed to outmanoeuvring your opponents gameplan. Exploiting a fundamental disparity in winning conditions was one of the best ways to get an advantage in Magic - If your opponent's game-plan progressing doesn't impact yours, and yours is faster, you generally win.

He shuffled his cards again, this time looking around a little more. He spotted Camilla with her deck messily dissected in front of her, like the classroom experiment gone wrong that it probably was. Lots of ways to get card advantage, but not a lot in the way to leverage that without a Scarab God or other big threat that could shut down an offensive push. Their eyes met awkwardly as he caught her looking at him looking at her deck, and the two of them somewhat naturally pulled away from one another. There was an awkward pause then, as he pondered whether or not to give advice to her. He didn't want to seem condescending, so he held his tongue on that. But he had to say something now, if only to make her feel less awkward.

"How's your deck treating you?" he asked, trying his best to sound like he didn't already know the answer.

[BlizzardeyeWonder]

Upon realizing she had made eye contact with someone, Camilla's first response was to look away slightly. Upon realizing he was looking at the hodgepodge of cards in front of her, her instinct was to turn away so hard her neck would snap. Neck-snapping was unpleasant, she imagined, so that didn't happen. Well, it was kind of to be expected that a more serious player like Parker would cast an eye at her deck, it didn't make it any less embarrassing when he asked the fatal question.

Not well. The answer was not well. Everyone knew the answer was not well. How was she not the laughingstock of the club again? She let out a disjointed, slightly forced laugh.

"Ah... same as it usually has." Camilla gave as her answer, with a slight nod. Parker would understand. "Always room for improvement, you know?" she continued with the understatement of the year.

She gently tapped the sides of the deck into a somewhat more acceptably rectangular-prism-like shape, under the pretense she knew what she was doing. Well, in a way she did. Camilla understood a few general strategy terms and how they applied. She wasn't so ignorant as to not know what a control strategy was like next to an aggro one. The deck she had right now was definitely more control than aggro. Maybe? Well, it did rely a lot on creatures coming back from the graveyard for a big offensive, but that took time, which was what the counterspells were for- in theory, anyway. The fact was, though, she often felt rather lost among more advanced players in the club, throwing around terms that sounded like they belonged in a military commander's office. She supposed she was able to pick up the gist of those terms through exposure and inference, but did she really know them? Probably not.

[Frozen Smoke]

It was surprising how much tone could change exactly what was being conveyed, some part of Parker noticed, as the relatively neutral "Same as it usually has" was layered with enough bemused disappointment that he understood that the results were below what she'd hoped for. Which wasn't surprising, Cam' was normally someone he played in the first few rounds, before she disappeared into the 0-X or 1-X brackets. Her comment of always trying brought at least some shine to it, and spoke of effort if not ability being applied to the task, which he could appreciate. Judging by the pile of cards in front of her she was clearly not the sort to copy someone else's theorycrafting, which he could appreciate from a philosophical point of view, if not a pragmatic one.

"All you can do is your own personal best!" he conceded with a cheery tone to her point, trying to make her feel a little more comfortable in her failure. It wasn't like it was just a meaningless statement either, it was entirely true, and why he kept playing at the weekly gatherings. Even when there was no-one left to beat, beating yourself, beating the version of yourself that didn't try - That was competition enough. Making sure you played to earn the biggest possible margin, making the fewest mistakes, tweaking your own game. That was how you improved. Minute, discrete steps.

"Did you have fun, at least?" he asked, trying to keep the conversation flowing, and out of curiosity as to just how she was taking it.

[BlizzardeyeWonder]

Camilla, keeping her light smile which Aunt Caroline called the Best Medicine (which was code for I-had-a-bad-day-but-that's-okay), nodded. She would have stopped coming to the club a long time ago if she wasn't having fun. Well, maybe the latest loss wasn't as fun. But hey, that's one bad apple in a sea of fresh fruit platters. Even when she lost, often, she could say she had a good time- an even better one when looking back and laughing at herself later. Ah, it's a good thing she never got invited to parties, because her idea of a joke was mercilessly bashing herself.

Actually it was kind of odd that the thought of Auntie came to mind with Parker's words. It was the kind of thing she'd expect from a wise old lady, but sounded just a little bit strange coming from the mouth of a teenaged boy. Perhaps even suspiciously cheery, but suspicion was too common of a thought for it to have much worth anymore. It wouldn't be right to say it had no worth, but maybe she should tone it down.

In the end, she kept the smile and nod routine while attempting to keep her overthinking of Parker's apparent cheeriness in the background.

"Seems I have some way to go before I reach my own best," she noted.

[Frozen Smoke]

Parker couldn't help but agree with that sentiment, it being something he tried to keep in mind himself. He pondered as to how exactly to respond to that, wondering just what he could say that wouldn't come across as weird, and finding no way to phrase it properly before brushing it aside. Their games had both gone relatively short compared to the horrendous control mirror that was going on, so they were going to be waiting a little while, and what better way to spend that time than chatting to someone like Cam.

Ok there were plenty of things he'd rather do than this, but most of them weren't things he could do feasibly, and that was an important distinction to draw.

Cam was one of the people he recognised the necessity of. The kind of people who's 30-35% win rate balanced out his other side of the bell curve. In the fighting game community, the term for someone like Cam would be called a pot filler, in Poker, she'd be called a fish. Unlike most, she seemed to recognise that and have a good attitude about it though, and he could respect her seeming desire to learn the system. Creating your own decks wasn't exactly easy, and that was the perfect thing to pick up on.

"It's cool that you actually sat down and made your own deck, rather than copying one from the internet. You got that over some of the monkeys here." he said, restarting the conversation as though the little pause hadn't happened. Identifying those who tried to create their own decks as separate - and above - everyone else like that would hopefully help her to feel like they shared a bond of some sort. "If you want to really stretch that muscle, you should come to one of the limited events on Thursdays at the Mall! Everyone gets 6 packs to build the best deck you can from them, so it's a lot fairer." He noted, expecting that someone who created their own deck would hold some level of resentment over the fact that others weren't competing with her on the same level.

[BlizzardeyeWonder]

At Parker's attempt to reassure Camilla, she could only keep smiling. Sure, maybe making your own decks had merit, but it's kind of like telling a kid who failed their art project Hey, at least you didn't copy Michelangelo, unlike those artsy farsty pricks in table 2. Especially when table 2 had the highest art marks in the class, or when the entire art project was about studying Michelangelo. Okay, that last point didn't really relate to Magic. I mean, the point of the game isn't to win, it's to have fun, right? Right?! Anyway, it definitely wasn't to copy someone else's deck. She wondered, then, had Parker made his own deck? There was only so many decks on the internet she could read about, and that number was way less than the infinite possibilities out there. Perhaps he did, perhaps he didn't. She didn't talk enough to him to know for sure. Though, whether he built his own decks was somewhat irrelevant to his point, she assumed. It was unlikely he was engaging in self-deprecating humor and talking himself down with the 'monkeys' after all. Didn't seem like his style.

Though, Parker's next point of coming to some event on Thursday was... admittedly somewhat intriguing. Oh sure she'd be in a crowded shop full of strangers but at least they would be strangers that she shared the magical interest of Magic: The Gathering with. At least she hoped so, and that's why she kept coming back to that store, even if she rarely talked to people there.

But hey, the idea of making your own decks on the fly sounded cool, even if Camilla wasn't the best at thinking quickly. That being said, there wasn't always a guarantee she'd be available on Thursday, so she shot back with the eternal old reliable-

"I'll think about it."

[Frozen Smoke]

Parker paused for a moment before accepting her postponing of the decision. The thought of asking her what she was worried about, or otherwise pressing her for details, did spring to mind. Often there wasn't much except people not wanting to be rude and outright refuse a proposal, but people were loathe to admit that they'd lie like that, so cornered themselves into going. But, he brushed that away. There wasn't a need to really press her to come along, drafts normally fired fine without him trying to stack the pods, and it'd probably put her off doing it in the future.

"Well, if you do decide to come, times and all that are on Infinity Flux's website." he paused for a moment, gauging her reaction a little. She seemed like she wasn't talking much, and he wasn't sure why. "I'd offer to help you via Facebook or whatever, but uh-" he put on a sheepish smile for a moment as he paused, feigning embarrassment that he didn't feel "Not one for social media." he finished up, before making eye contact with her again. "Guess I'm old fashioned or something."

Cam seemed like the kind of person who'd at least respect that little gesture of humility and open up a little, if not feel a little bit of understanding towards the idea of being socially disconnected. He didn't recognize her from any of the larger friendship groups he had tangential relationships with, so it was worth a stab, especially at his own expense.

[BlizzardeyeWonder]

At the mention of a website name, Camilla reached over for a piece of paper- being a math classroom, a bit of scrap paper was never far away, even if it wasn't in a very conventional place. In this case, she had spotted a loose grand 10 'challenge' problem with an empty backside haphazardly strewn onto a low shelf behind the unoccupied chair next to her. With handwriting that looked neat enough until you took a closer look seeing the trembling in the lines and habit-driven attempts at half-remembered cursive from elementary, she jotted down the website's name. Infinity Flux. She'd remember that. What was that thing about remembered, how you had to say something out loud a few times then write it down... oh well, the important part was that writing helped memory.

Folding up the scrap paper and shoving it in her pocket, she noted Parker's comment on his social media presence. With a suppressed sigh, she recalled her tumblr days.

"Thanks for the offer anyway," she told him. What would be the right thing to say in this situation? I mean, it was an offer, but he seemed somewhat embarrassed over not being able to deliver. Actually, was it even an offer? I mean, why would you offer something you can't even do and admit you can't even do? The pause between Camilla's remark and her next comment became painfully obvious the longer it went on, which felt like a while. It was probably not even a minute's length, though.

"I'll check the website. Should be free after four-thirty, but eh, you never know what comes up." Finally coming up with an answer to carry along the conversation, Camilla decided to attempt to strike up a bit more of a conversation. Or try, anyway. Her mother would be proud, at least. Hopefully. It was hard to read that woman at times.

"Maybe mom asks me to go get groceries for Auntie," she noted with a casual smile for a casual atmosphere, which immediately dissolved upon Camilla's instant notation of a harsh reality- Aunt Caroline was getting older. Oh sure, she might be alive and kicking at 78 years old, but for how much longer? Even if she doesn't die in the next 10 years, there's no guarantee she'd have the same vitality she'd always known in her great-aunt.

It was the thought of Auntie dying within Camilla's lifetime that made the former-smile-turned-neutral expression into a frown, if only for a moment.

[Frozen Smoke]

Parker internally cringed as that approach fell flat, making him look like he was antisocial rather than just uninterested in the backbiting he associated those sites with, which wasn't ideal in terms of making a good impression. Her noting down the times she was available was good, showed she was figuring out if she could attend the event, rather than if she wanted to. Subtleties like that were always important to figuring out what people were thinking, but they weren't always necessary, as Cam demonstrated quickly afterwards.

He shuffled his deck again, and broke eye contact, feeling uncomfortable watching the reaction in her. He knew the feeling, implicitly, just one generation less removed. The horrible feeling of pointlessness that planning more than a few months in the future came with. Having to bear some of the weight of the household, and the stress that came with that. The worry that any time you said goodbye, it could be your last time seeing them alive. It wasn't just hard to deal with, it was hard to become used to it. He worried how little it all worried him, at this point, but he was getting through it. That was what mattered.

He hoped his own expression wasn't as easy to read, even if he wasn't sure what emotion he was feeling, exactly.

He spoke up again after a few moments when he felt like he could trust his voice and face to not betray him, and be nice and casual. He didn't want to dredge up her life story, and he really didn't want to have to talk about his own. Just drag this conversation right back to the surface level and be done with it. This kind of shit wasn't what he nor her came to the club for.

"Groceries, huh? Do you cook too?" He asked, managing to keep his voice steady without it being entirely flat.

[BlizzardeyeWonder]

Parker's pause and reaction afterwards were a bit worrying. Camilla wondered if her reaction to her own thoughts had made him uncomfortable, but her expression brightened a bit upon his mention of cooking. If there was one thing she was grateful to her mother for, it was teaching her how to cook. Honestly, she was surprised more people didn't even try to learn. Not all meals would cook themselves, after all. Besides, it wasn't like you had to be a natural gourmet or whatever- Camilla sure wasn't. Thing is, even simple meals could make all the difference.

"Why yes, I do," she replied with a bit more liveliness. "What about you?"

She imagined someone like Parker would have some experience at least. Though... a bit more thorough examination of this particular instant made her wonder if he was hiding something- or hiding from something. Seemed like something of a jump, but not really? Groceries to cooking. It made thematic sense at least, but was it something people actually did in normal conversation? She needed to talk with more normal conversationalists to figure that out, but was forced to abandon that train of thought when she remembered she was in high school.

[Frozen Smoke]

He was glad that that had worked. Now if he just kept talking past that little hiccup, it'd be quickly forgotten in the flow of conversation. Breaking flow like that wasn't ideal, but the worst thing you could do was draw attention to it, rather than just move smoothly past it. His own expression warmed to mirror hers as he responded, this time without the awkward pause.

"Yup. 'bout the only creative thing I'm actually good at, great fun!" he explained, before turning the topic of the conversation back towards her. "Anything you like cooking in particular?" he asked with the aimless intent of provoking a response from her that he could work further from. Cooking was a nice, safe topic that he could keep on rails. And one he actually knew, he wasn't muddling along with cars or football here, he could actually look like he knew what he was talking about.

He was reminded why he didn't normally make idle conversation with people. This whole thing had lasted two minutes maybe, and he was already wondering what the point of putting all this effort in was for. It wasn't like Cam' was someone who was a friend, or could do things for him, but he'd felt like it was his responsibility to look after the resident run-out. So now he was committed to this little conversation until pairings for the next round were called, lest she think of him as someone who didn't care about her, and say as much to others.

At least he wasn't paying a major opportunity cost for it, not like he was going to get much done in this time anyway.

[BlizzardeyeWonder]

Camilla tilted her head to the side and back again once as she spoke, mostly just a tick she did whenever she had to talk about her accomplishments. No, being able to cook things wasn't really and accomplishment, wait, does talking about what you can cook count? She had no idea, but the ticks were still there. Little habits that implanted some sense of humility with them.

"Ah, mostly simple things," was her reply. "The first thing that comes to mind is grilled cheese."

Oh, that would annoy her dad so much. See, to him, making grilled cheese was a bit of art- the timing of toasting the bread on the stove just right, (he'd only ever use a particular brand of white bread for it, claimed it grilled better), making sure the butter spread evenly, cutting cheddar cheese blocks (and only cheddar!) so that four thin strips fit exactly onto one neatly squared slice of bread, and finally flipping one piece of bread onto another, perfectly centered. The memory of how serious it seemed to him made Camilla chuckle to herself, as she envisioned him arguing over the correct procedure over a spring lunch so long ago. Though, the laughter died out recalling the other end of the argument was her mother.

She was too young to think much of it at the time.

Leaning back in the chair, she looked down at her deck, and noticed her hands pushing at one side of the deck, creating a slight bulge of card edges on the other. She quickly patted the deck back into proper alignment and turned back to Parker.

"What about you?" she threw back at him. Conversation, even if not quite normal, was about give and take. Remove that and you're talking to a wall. Or worse, you were the wall. That was something Camilla felt she was more at risk of being than she'd like.

[Frozen Smoke]

Parker felt a tiny weight lift off his mind as Camilla just about stopped before she pushed her deck over and had to play 60 card pickup on the grimy floor of the Maths room. It had seemed like she had lost herself in memory for a moment, whilst presumably thinking about grilled cheese. He wasn't quite sure what to make of that, but at least he knew how to answer her throwing the question back at him. He had thought of an answer whilst he waited for her to answer, although it wasn't hard to do so, it was best to have it prepared and spell out exactly what you were going to say before you did it.

"Mostly fish dishes. Like Sea Bass or Cod." he said, with a smile "Reminds me of home." he added, wondering if she'd picked up on his accent at all. It was getting worryingly faint, lately. Either way, it would let her either enquire further, or move on with her own thoughts on fish. He found himself stiffening in his seat a little, realizing he'd been leaning forwards a little, subconsciously, the whole time. He tried not to draw attention to the trip in body language, wresting control of himself and drifting back into a relaxed pose in small, well spaced actions.

[BlizzardeyeWonder]

"Fish?" she asked, looking up. If she was turned towards Parker she'd be looking him in the eye but she forgot that step.

It was at that moment Camilla realized she wasn't one for making meaty, savory dishes. If anything, she was more of a baker. Well... technically baked goods can have savory taste, but that's a technicality for abominations like bacon-flavoured cupcakes. No, wait, she did make more savory dishes, they just involve meat a lot. Wait, is fish considered meat, or...?

"Ah, I sometimes try my hand at recipes with salmon," she continued, nodding.

She probably didn't sound like she knew what she was doing.

But in reality, despite her lack of practice with meat and fish, it wasn't to say she was totally clueless. There was a no more satisfying ending to a long day than cooking your own dinner, Camilla thought, and hey- sometimes she was craving salmon and some happened to be at the ready. Sure, it took some years to learn how to properly handle and cook fish, last she recalled she only really got the hang of it in grade 9. It was all worth it though- one more thing her garden was useful for was seasoning and she found that out pretty quickly.

"Ever tried seasoning with home-grown herbs? I find it satisfying." Camilla suggested, immediately regretting it, preventing her from actually fucking facing the guy she was talking to. Great, now Parker would think she was some sort of hippie or organic foods soapboxer.