OF: The Very Prestigious Solar Academy For Continued Excellence (Part 1/?)
Title: The Very Prestigious Solar Academy for Continued Excellence
Author: sidhefaer
Fandom: Uh... the solar system?
Pairing: Gen
Rating: PG-13
Length: 1897 words.
Disclaimer: Wait. Technically... yes? These versions are?
Summary: In which Earth is a total player, Mercury has computer trouble, Saturn is a bit of a dick, and Pluto is disowned. Full cast included. Don't miss the nonexistent British sitcom which Hasn't Been Made, But Should, Eventually. Planet-obsessed little brother, this is for you to read when you fully appreciate what all this "picture-less story" nonsense is.
Notes: This was thought up by sacha_dahoyle and I last night, and instead of illustrating it, I decided to write a bit of a story. I wrote the cast as being British, and as I myself am not, feel free to criticize my terrible attempt at the British vernacular. Also, technological mumbo-jumbo? I don't know the half of it.
"Oh, now you're having me on," Uranus said to Saturn. "No joke?"
"Nope," Saturn grinned, fit for a toothpaste commercial.
"Really, though?" Uranus paused. "That's too bad. Poor sod, nobody loves him."
They both snickered a little, but Uranus was almost entirely sure he was the only one who felt bad after. Saturn busied himself playing with his rings, one on each finger. Two of them were class rings. He had no idea how that happened. "Yeah. Except his mum, she'd love him anyway. I bet his she feels bad though. Him coming home having to tell her that. She probably disowned him like everyone else. "
Uranus snorted. "Sure. But how'd he get expelled? Because everybody kept beating on him?"
"Probably. He's too tiny. We can't have him in our halls, you know? Not anymore. He's been clogging them up forever, and now it's good riddance, I say. Besides, I hear his parents can't pay half of tuition. No wonder he's in rags all the time, shivering like anything."
"I guess. I do feel terrible, though. I'll miss him."
"Miss him or miss making a fool of him?" Saturn scoffed. "Whatever. Other fish in the sea. Good riddance."
"You only have a year left of school, you know," Uranus pointed out. "It's not you notice him half the time anyhow. It's a huge campus. He stays out of your way, and you don't give him the time of day, not like he ever asks. So I don't know what you're complaining on about. You hardly knew him."
"D'you suppose I'd be better off if I did? Am I missing out on an insightful, soul-mending relationship? I don't bloody think so."
"You're a right git," Uranus grinned.
"You're just as worse!"
"But I hide it better."
Saturn punched him in the arm playfully. "You won't have to, now Pluto's out of the running."
---
"Dial-up!" Mercury shouted. "Sodding thing!"
Neptune glanced up at her from under heavy eyelids and gave a long-suffering sigh. Mercury thumped the computer angrily. "Blasted internet, I get no connection here, admission takes it all up. Why are our dorms so close to the offices, anyway? There's no point in having the password to the administration hub if you can't get enough of a web connection to use it!"
"Try hitting it again," Neptune suggested dryly.
"Oh, shut it, you," Mercury snarled.
Neptune made a noise of complete disinterest and went back to reading her magazine. Mercury had glanced several depressing-looking fellows on the cover when Neptune had first bought it, but had declined further inspection due to the amount of mascara-soaked woe she had to endure with Neptune as it was.
"I don't deserve this," she moaned.
"Of course not," Neptune mumbled. "You have much more to offer the world."
"You don't understand! My life is within this small black box! I do everything with it!" She wrung her hands. "I have like fifty comments I need to reply to before my next class, I need to check my mail, I have to e-curbstomp some troll and delete my spam!"
"Life," Neptune sighed dramatically, eyes glazing over. "Is so unfair, don't you think so?"
Mercury stared daggers into the back of Neptune's silky blue head. "At least I don't read magazines about what kind of coroner sells the best hair gel for when you snuff it or how to get your vampire sweetheart," she jabbed, scrambling around the back of her computer for a unused USB port. "Or what urn is best suited for keeping your ashes all smokey-sweet for when your relatives go for a laugh."
"I'm going to have my ashes scattered in the wind," Neptune said wistfully.
Mercury threw her hands up in the air. "Why can't you just be normal?"
"Normal?" Neptune whispered quite seriously. "What is normal?"
"All right," Mercury huffed, "forget I asked, really, go back to Men in Lace or whatever it is you subscribe to. I'm going to go off and wheedle myself a new hub." She grabbed her brown jacket and stuck her phone into her jeans. "Don't touch Crater."
Neptune just looked at her.
"My computer," Mercury hissed exasperatedly, and left the door open on her way out.
---
He coughed as Mercury came into the tech shop, trying to put on an expression that somehow counterbalanced the dark circles under his eyes, which didn't work, unless you were into that kind of scary skeleton-look. Mercury smiled weakly at him.
"Hey, Venus," she said, and wrinkled her nose. "New kind of... deodorant?"
"Nah," he croaked. "Forgot to brush my teeth this morning. Sorry."
Mercury narrowly avoided gagging. It wasn't just that he'd forgotten to put on deodorant or brush his teeth. The guy reeked like a compost heap, honestly. No wonder he was always sick. All that bacteria, getting along swimmingly well in his orifices, making babies... she shuddered.
"Right. That's nice. Well, I need a new hub, and I need it cheap. You have any discounts on used?"
"Well, we have plenty of used. There any reason why you need a new one?"
"My internet offed itself," she explained. "The connection's especially terrible because we're next to admissions, and they steal all the bandwidth."
"Ah." He reached up behind him on a shelf housing several different PC models. Mercury steadfastly ignored the sweat stains under his pits. "I can help you there. Any particular kind?"
"Something modest? Well, no, I mean, it's doesn't quite matter so much to me. Nothing made of rainbows, though."
He snatched a lump off of the shelf. "Here you are."
"Thanks," she said. "Er..."
"Tell you what, even with the discount, I'll give it you for a day for free. If it works for you then you can pay me tomorrow."
"I actually have this gift card--"
He looked put out. "Oh."
Mercury grimaced. "--but that's really nice of you, really nice. I think I'll take you up on that, Venus, thanks a bunch."
Venus brightened, though it was a hard thing to pull off when one looked about as sickly as you can get without dying of Malaria or some such. He handed the package to her and smiled, though it came out more of a baring of the teeth since he was so skeletal. She tried to make a quick getaway. Venus was almost too awkward for her to handle, worse than Neptune, which was saying something.
"Feel better," she said uneasily, and left as quickly as her feet would permit her without looking too eager.
---
"Hullo, gorgeous," Earth smirked. "You look lovely as ever."
Sun dismissed him with a flyaway hand. "Don't even try it. It's never gotten you anywhere and I'm the one least likely to indulge you."
"Oh, but your radiance far surpasses that of any other woman. How could I not pursue you? It would be a crime."
"Don't smarm up to me, boy," Sun said. "Your charms may work on other girls, but I'm your teacher, and you need to learn to respect that."
"Terribly sorry, Professor Sun. But I can't learn respect if you don't teach me how. I've been a very bad student."
"Cut it out," Sun snapped.
Earth laughed. "Where's your sense of humor? Roasted in all that attitude, I imagine."
Sun sighed. Earth's grin widened as he leaned against her desk, flashing her a smile worthy of any suitable man, if he were ten years older. His eyes were especially enchanting. Green and blue all at once. He was, along with being too handsome for anyone's good, very intelligent. It was quite a problem.
She tried a new tactic. "What about that Moon girl? She seems nice. You'll have more luck with her."
"The albino one? Maybe," Earth debated, acquiring a pensive look she began to associate with internal ambition. "I could certainly get her. But she follows me everywhere. Like a dog, really, she's never out of my shadow. It's off-putting."
"Kind of like you," Sun replied shortly. "With me."
"Ooh, ouch. My poor heart."
"What heart?"
Earth sent her a smoldering look.
Good god. "Leave, please," she sighed.
"Am I distracting you?"
"Annoyingly, yes. Go."
"As you wish," Earth mock-bowed and showed himself out of her office. Sun rubbed her eyes and ran a hand through her hair. The things she dealt with at university. She remembered attending not so long ago, when she'd been young, but none of her students had been around then. She had no idea why she let Earth flirt so much with her, but it wasn't like she could deter him.
Slightly overwhelmed, Sun put in a call to her friend Alpha Centauri and settled down for a good long rant.
---
"You need to see someone about that face," Mars said carefully.
Jupiter heaved his huge body onto the couch and dug into the biscuits on the coffee table in front of them. "Sod off, Carrot-Top."
"No, really, big guy. I'm serious. It looks serious too. Real bad."
"Since when did you become the local dermatologist?"
"It doesn't take a doctor to figure out you have a problem," Mars said. "You've got it horribly. The, er, acne. Blemishes, I mean, to put it nicely."
Jupiter glared at him. "You think I don't know that?"
Mars shrugged. "I know the rash thing is a birthmark. But seriously, man. It's like a fireball shat on your face."
He barely managed to duck the swing, but managed to haul arse to the end of the couch in time. Jupiter looked livid. "I get enough of that already," he thundered. "Don't be a prat about it. Just because Earth's your cousin doesn't mean you can walk all over the rest of us."
"Sorry, sorry," Mars held up his hands in a gesture of placation.
"It's all right," Jupiter said, in way that illustrated that it was not, in fact, all right.
"You going to hit me if I sit next to you?"
"It's a possibility."
"All right," Mars cautioned. "I'm going to take a risk. I swear I'll never comment on it again. On my word."
Jupiter rolled his eyes. "Your word? There are truer things on American television."
Mars put on a very serious face. "I swear on the BBC."
Jupiter cracked a reluctant grin and patted the seat next to him, while he went for the remote. Mars settled down while Jupiter clicked on the telly, browsing through channels until he found a half-naked woman and staying put right there until she put her clothes back on. As far as either of them were concerned, this was a foolproof and rather excellent time-waster, as there were a lot of channels and enough naked women these days to fill a veritable sea of needy college students.
"You know what would be brilliant?" Mars asked, some time later, when they were both quite out of it and likely to drop off any moment.
"What?" Jupiter said sleepily.
"If I could actually score a girl like that."
"Highly bloody unlikely," Jupiter mumbled, nearly incoherently.
"Yeah, I know," Mars said. "But it's nice to pretend. Don't you sometimes?"
Mars' eyebrows drew together. "Jupe?"
But Jupiter was already asleep.
The great fat lump.
---
Pluto wiped his tears and sniffed quite pathetically. "Why?" He asked. "Why did you have to kick me out? I did nothing wrong. I did all my assignments. I know I didn't hang out with all of the other kids, I know was a bit cold to them, but we didn't really get along, and it's just not fair!"
Sun shrugged. "Nothing personal, darling. We just don't want you anymore."
"But why?"
"You know," Sun looked thoughtful, patting Pluto on the back, "I'm not quite sure. I'll think of something sooner or later, hmm?" She smiled and gave Pluto a little push out of her office. "Off you go!"
Pluto stared wet-eyed at Sun. "But I know I can do bet-"
She closed the door in his face.
Author: sidhefaer
Fandom: Uh... the solar system?
Pairing: Gen
Rating: PG-13
Length: 1897 words.
Disclaimer: Wait. Technically... yes? These versions are?
Summary: In which Earth is a total player, Mercury has computer trouble, Saturn is a bit of a dick, and Pluto is disowned. Full cast included. Don't miss the nonexistent British sitcom which Hasn't Been Made, But Should, Eventually. Planet-obsessed little brother, this is for you to read when you fully appreciate what all this "picture-less story" nonsense is.
Notes: This was thought up by sacha_dahoyle and I last night, and instead of illustrating it, I decided to write a bit of a story. I wrote the cast as being British, and as I myself am not, feel free to criticize my terrible attempt at the British vernacular. Also, technological mumbo-jumbo? I don't know the half of it.
"Oh, now you're having me on," Uranus said to Saturn. "No joke?"
"Nope," Saturn grinned, fit for a toothpaste commercial.
"Really, though?" Uranus paused. "That's too bad. Poor sod, nobody loves him."
They both snickered a little, but Uranus was almost entirely sure he was the only one who felt bad after. Saturn busied himself playing with his rings, one on each finger. Two of them were class rings. He had no idea how that happened. "Yeah. Except his mum, she'd love him anyway. I bet his she feels bad though. Him coming home having to tell her that. She probably disowned him like everyone else. "
Uranus snorted. "Sure. But how'd he get expelled? Because everybody kept beating on him?"
"Probably. He's too tiny. We can't have him in our halls, you know? Not anymore. He's been clogging them up forever, and now it's good riddance, I say. Besides, I hear his parents can't pay half of tuition. No wonder he's in rags all the time, shivering like anything."
"I guess. I do feel terrible, though. I'll miss him."
"Miss him or miss making a fool of him?" Saturn scoffed. "Whatever. Other fish in the sea. Good riddance."
"You only have a year left of school, you know," Uranus pointed out. "It's not you notice him half the time anyhow. It's a huge campus. He stays out of your way, and you don't give him the time of day, not like he ever asks. So I don't know what you're complaining on about. You hardly knew him."
"D'you suppose I'd be better off if I did? Am I missing out on an insightful, soul-mending relationship? I don't bloody think so."
"You're a right git," Uranus grinned.
"You're just as worse!"
"But I hide it better."
Saturn punched him in the arm playfully. "You won't have to, now Pluto's out of the running."
---
"Dial-up!" Mercury shouted. "Sodding thing!"
Neptune glanced up at her from under heavy eyelids and gave a long-suffering sigh. Mercury thumped the computer angrily. "Blasted internet, I get no connection here, admission takes it all up. Why are our dorms so close to the offices, anyway? There's no point in having the password to the administration hub if you can't get enough of a web connection to use it!"
"Try hitting it again," Neptune suggested dryly.
"Oh, shut it, you," Mercury snarled.
Neptune made a noise of complete disinterest and went back to reading her magazine. Mercury had glanced several depressing-looking fellows on the cover when Neptune had first bought it, but had declined further inspection due to the amount of mascara-soaked woe she had to endure with Neptune as it was.
"I don't deserve this," she moaned.
"Of course not," Neptune mumbled. "You have much more to offer the world."
"You don't understand! My life is within this small black box! I do everything with it!" She wrung her hands. "I have like fifty comments I need to reply to before my next class, I need to check my mail, I have to e-curbstomp some troll and delete my spam!"
"Life," Neptune sighed dramatically, eyes glazing over. "Is so unfair, don't you think so?"
Mercury stared daggers into the back of Neptune's silky blue head. "At least I don't read magazines about what kind of coroner sells the best hair gel for when you snuff it or how to get your vampire sweetheart," she jabbed, scrambling around the back of her computer for a unused USB port. "Or what urn is best suited for keeping your ashes all smokey-sweet for when your relatives go for a laugh."
"I'm going to have my ashes scattered in the wind," Neptune said wistfully.
Mercury threw her hands up in the air. "Why can't you just be normal?"
"Normal?" Neptune whispered quite seriously. "What is normal?"
"All right," Mercury huffed, "forget I asked, really, go back to Men in Lace or whatever it is you subscribe to. I'm going to go off and wheedle myself a new hub." She grabbed her brown jacket and stuck her phone into her jeans. "Don't touch Crater."
Neptune just looked at her.
"My computer," Mercury hissed exasperatedly, and left the door open on her way out.
---
He coughed as Mercury came into the tech shop, trying to put on an expression that somehow counterbalanced the dark circles under his eyes, which didn't work, unless you were into that kind of scary skeleton-look. Mercury smiled weakly at him.
"Hey, Venus," she said, and wrinkled her nose. "New kind of... deodorant?"
"Nah," he croaked. "Forgot to brush my teeth this morning. Sorry."
Mercury narrowly avoided gagging. It wasn't just that he'd forgotten to put on deodorant or brush his teeth. The guy reeked like a compost heap, honestly. No wonder he was always sick. All that bacteria, getting along swimmingly well in his orifices, making babies... she shuddered.
"Right. That's nice. Well, I need a new hub, and I need it cheap. You have any discounts on used?"
"Well, we have plenty of used. There any reason why you need a new one?"
"My internet offed itself," she explained. "The connection's especially terrible because we're next to admissions, and they steal all the bandwidth."
"Ah." He reached up behind him on a shelf housing several different PC models. Mercury steadfastly ignored the sweat stains under his pits. "I can help you there. Any particular kind?"
"Something modest? Well, no, I mean, it's doesn't quite matter so much to me. Nothing made of rainbows, though."
He snatched a lump off of the shelf. "Here you are."
"Thanks," she said. "Er..."
"Tell you what, even with the discount, I'll give it you for a day for free. If it works for you then you can pay me tomorrow."
"I actually have this gift card--"
He looked put out. "Oh."
Mercury grimaced. "--but that's really nice of you, really nice. I think I'll take you up on that, Venus, thanks a bunch."
Venus brightened, though it was a hard thing to pull off when one looked about as sickly as you can get without dying of Malaria or some such. He handed the package to her and smiled, though it came out more of a baring of the teeth since he was so skeletal. She tried to make a quick getaway. Venus was almost too awkward for her to handle, worse than Neptune, which was saying something.
"Feel better," she said uneasily, and left as quickly as her feet would permit her without looking too eager.
---
"Hullo, gorgeous," Earth smirked. "You look lovely as ever."
Sun dismissed him with a flyaway hand. "Don't even try it. It's never gotten you anywhere and I'm the one least likely to indulge you."
"Oh, but your radiance far surpasses that of any other woman. How could I not pursue you? It would be a crime."
"Don't smarm up to me, boy," Sun said. "Your charms may work on other girls, but I'm your teacher, and you need to learn to respect that."
"Terribly sorry, Professor Sun. But I can't learn respect if you don't teach me how. I've been a very bad student."
"Cut it out," Sun snapped.
Earth laughed. "Where's your sense of humor? Roasted in all that attitude, I imagine."
Sun sighed. Earth's grin widened as he leaned against her desk, flashing her a smile worthy of any suitable man, if he were ten years older. His eyes were especially enchanting. Green and blue all at once. He was, along with being too handsome for anyone's good, very intelligent. It was quite a problem.
She tried a new tactic. "What about that Moon girl? She seems nice. You'll have more luck with her."
"The albino one? Maybe," Earth debated, acquiring a pensive look she began to associate with internal ambition. "I could certainly get her. But she follows me everywhere. Like a dog, really, she's never out of my shadow. It's off-putting."
"Kind of like you," Sun replied shortly. "With me."
"Ooh, ouch. My poor heart."
"What heart?"
Earth sent her a smoldering look.
Good god. "Leave, please," she sighed.
"Am I distracting you?"
"Annoyingly, yes. Go."
"As you wish," Earth mock-bowed and showed himself out of her office. Sun rubbed her eyes and ran a hand through her hair. The things she dealt with at university. She remembered attending not so long ago, when she'd been young, but none of her students had been around then. She had no idea why she let Earth flirt so much with her, but it wasn't like she could deter him.
Slightly overwhelmed, Sun put in a call to her friend Alpha Centauri and settled down for a good long rant.
---
"You need to see someone about that face," Mars said carefully.
Jupiter heaved his huge body onto the couch and dug into the biscuits on the coffee table in front of them. "Sod off, Carrot-Top."
"No, really, big guy. I'm serious. It looks serious too. Real bad."
"Since when did you become the local dermatologist?"
"It doesn't take a doctor to figure out you have a problem," Mars said. "You've got it horribly. The, er, acne. Blemishes, I mean, to put it nicely."
Jupiter glared at him. "You think I don't know that?"
Mars shrugged. "I know the rash thing is a birthmark. But seriously, man. It's like a fireball shat on your face."
He barely managed to duck the swing, but managed to haul arse to the end of the couch in time. Jupiter looked livid. "I get enough of that already," he thundered. "Don't be a prat about it. Just because Earth's your cousin doesn't mean you can walk all over the rest of us."
"Sorry, sorry," Mars held up his hands in a gesture of placation.
"It's all right," Jupiter said, in way that illustrated that it was not, in fact, all right.
"You going to hit me if I sit next to you?"
"It's a possibility."
"All right," Mars cautioned. "I'm going to take a risk. I swear I'll never comment on it again. On my word."
Jupiter rolled his eyes. "Your word? There are truer things on American television."
Mars put on a very serious face. "I swear on the BBC."
Jupiter cracked a reluctant grin and patted the seat next to him, while he went for the remote. Mars settled down while Jupiter clicked on the telly, browsing through channels until he found a half-naked woman and staying put right there until she put her clothes back on. As far as either of them were concerned, this was a foolproof and rather excellent time-waster, as there were a lot of channels and enough naked women these days to fill a veritable sea of needy college students.
"You know what would be brilliant?" Mars asked, some time later, when they were both quite out of it and likely to drop off any moment.
"What?" Jupiter said sleepily.
"If I could actually score a girl like that."
"Highly bloody unlikely," Jupiter mumbled, nearly incoherently.
"Yeah, I know," Mars said. "But it's nice to pretend. Don't you sometimes?"
Mars' eyebrows drew together. "Jupe?"
But Jupiter was already asleep.
The great fat lump.
---
Pluto wiped his tears and sniffed quite pathetically. "Why?" He asked. "Why did you have to kick me out? I did nothing wrong. I did all my assignments. I know I didn't hang out with all of the other kids, I know was a bit cold to them, but we didn't really get along, and it's just not fair!"
Sun shrugged. "Nothing personal, darling. We just don't want you anymore."
"But why?"
"You know," Sun looked thoughtful, patting Pluto on the back, "I'm not quite sure. I'll think of something sooner or later, hmm?" She smiled and gave Pluto a little push out of her office. "Off you go!"
Pluto stared wet-eyed at Sun. "But I know I can do bet-"
She closed the door in his face.