be discreet

[msmage]

It's not much later, in Isabella's room, that she asks:

"So... is Alex really a dom?"

Comments

[eclipsi]

"To do the project, no, to come to any sort of consensus on it, probably."

[mrmage]

"...maybe you and the non-annoying person could do something yourselves?"

[eclipsi]

"Maybe, but the professor might check up on the cooperation aspect," she sighs.

[mrmage]

"Yeah, that sounds really annoying." Pause. "You could perhaps out-dom the other two."

[eclipsi]

"For a school project? Eugh, that would be weird. One of them isn't even a dom."

[mrmage]

Shrug. "How do you expect either of them to react if you and the other person without preferences both decide to side with one of the options and outnumber the other?"

[eclipsi]

"Dunno. Might make a fuss with the teacher about us being overbearing, might refuse to do any work, might grumble and go along with it."

[mrmage]

"Well... those three require very different approaches," he muses.

[eclipsi]

"Yep. Group fucking projects."

[mrmage]

"Hmm, I don't know, I'd find it interesting to try to juggle them and see if I couldn't make them agree and be happy with it."

[eclipsi]

"I suppose you could look at it like that but the existence of this fascinating challenge in the first place is frustrating."

[mrmage]

"Well, sure, it's not the kind of interesting challenge I'd create in the first place, I think."

[eclipsi]

"And it's not important in any grand scheme of things. So it's hard or me to work up enthusiasm for solving it. I suppose I'll have to think of something if we get to the point where we need to turn in a research plan and they're still fighting."

[mrmage]

"Yeah, I guess."

[eclipsi]

"How're your classes going?"

[mrmage]

"Alright! Pre-calc is fun, the US history teacher said she'd assign us a project to do in pairs next week but was all cryptic and said it'd be something 'fun' so I'm dreading it like the Plague."

[eclipsi]

"Pairs isn't as bad as groups. ...Sometimes fun means fun."

[mrmage]

"Even if it's fun, it's fun with history."

[eclipsi]

"Not a fan?"

[mrmage]

"History's a biased account that makes the future look much more predictable and inevitable than it really is. Everything looks so obvious when there's this linear narrative except people living then had a billion other things to worry about that aren't mentioned in textbooks because they never ended up becoming relevant."

[eclipsi]

"So you don't like history classes but you might like doing really serious history."

[mrmage]

"What do you mean?"

[eclipsi]

"You might like, I don't know, reading people's letters or old newspapers or things like that, primary source stuff."

[mrmage]

"Oh." Pause. "Yeah, actually, that could be fun. If a bit time-consuming, what with my wanting to be a healer. And doesn't post-cognition basically cover that more neatly anyway?"

[eclipsi]

"Only if you get a lot of range. You can start calling yourself a postcog if you can get five seconds; most people don't go past a year or two."