Camping In The Smokies solo w/ Clark

Clark didn’t want to be camping out here, AND definitely did not want to help set up. He was okay with a journey, but if he were forbidden from casting spells, what was the point? Surely no one in the mountains here would care if a little bibbity-boppity-boo was done..

But what Clark didn’t think about was that it was for a plethora of reasons, plus, the Bairds had been using magic a bit much lately so it would have been nice to.. touch grass perse, to get a mental break and to relax.

Clark stared at him, his expression violent as he made a guttural snarling noise. He was not going to oblige and do anything his stupid father wanted him to do. No, but if he wanted him to help, he might as well help.. move the rocks.

His expression changed to a smirk and Clark reached down to grab a rock, not one that was big, nor one that was too small. He grabbed one that was maybe an inch in size. He reared back his arm and the branches stopped rustling, the sound of woodpeckers pecking into the trees. The wind died, so he would totally have a fantastic shot of hitting his own father right?

Reducio

Accuracy Roll (Clark)
[d20]: 7 + 8 = 15
Dodge Roll (Octavius)
Pd20]: 15 + 5 = 20

Result: Missed.

Wrong. He had a shitty chance. The damned wind blew it off course. Yes, it was totally the wind that died. It had a vendetta against him, it had to. There was no other explanation to his horrible aim.

He grumbled, turned away and went back to the car. “Stupid dad. Dumb wind. Can’t get nothing I want.” His face soured as a mosquito came rushing up to him, and sweat flies hovering around his face. He began to slap the air, trying to get them out of the way. He threw open the door to the passenger side of the mustang and hopped in, slamming the door shut so loud the slamming scared off the squirrels and birds perched on the tree branches.

He looked in the rearview mirror and his siblings were happily helping. Why couldn’t he be happy? Why couldn’t he just want to help? Or, a better question, why was he the normal one in this stupid as hell family? Was he that attached to Joseph?

No. Neither truly enjoyed one’s company as Clark got older, but Clark began to feel nostalgic and craved the feeling again since he had passed, so is this why he’s so repulsed by this soon-to-happen-wedding?

Why was he even being a jerk? He turned around, looking away from the mirror and dug around under the seats that the boys were sitting in on the way to the campground. There was no food…

What was he to eat.. did his dear old dad finally screw up somewhere asides from raising kids? Probably, and maybe Clark had something to hold against him, that he planned to starve them. Octavius likely forgot about the food, that was probably what happened, he knew he watched his dad pack food, but that was while Ronnie was in the house.

He looked up in the mirror, turning back around and saw that the large tarp was being fastened to the trees surrounding the two tents.

The tent set up looked.. weird to him. But in general, the way the tents were set up was weird even if it weren’t the way Octavius had set it up. He had set it up so the tent openings were facing each other, setting the tents, long ways, vertical to the parking spot. But the one on the right side was slightly crooked to allow entrance between both tents. Clark opened the door to the passenger side and down came the heavy rainfall, the water relentless as it aimed to soak him with as few drops as possible, the droplets large in size from holding so much water.

He ran into the tent with Octavius in it, clearly angry, but as he stepped onto the horrid flooring, his water-soaked-self was beginning to flood the tent. He reared his left arm back and got himself ready to punch. “Dad.” He said, his tone not so sweet to hear.

Reducio

Accuracy (Clark)
[d20]: 4 + 8 = 12
Dodge (Octavius)
[d20]: 5 + 15 = 20

Result: Missed

Great. He missed. What a shitty puncher he was. GOD! Why did the universe hate him! He could punch his six year old twin brothers but couldn’t punch his stupid 40 something year old father that looked like he was in his 60s? He mumbled, his eyes instantly sunk to the ground and he looked ashamed but still angry.

Camp Section Set Up
_{I'm pretending its good art}

Reducio

Octavius stared at the rebelling child as he ran into his very own tent soaking wet and as the aftermath of his ever-so-dreadful attempt to hurt Octavius, he had to do something. He couldn’t do anything that would hopefully turn heads, nor could he make him do anything much too punishing.
The man took a few seconds to try and ponder exactly what to do, but tried to think as fast as his aging brain would allow him to. Did he bring paper and a quill? No. Well, yes, but not for this. He needed it.

He couldn’t ask for Clark to grab a switch, no. That was outdated, or rather, outdated to him. Yes, they were in the mountains where there were still people that follow that tradition of punishment, but Octavius was not that kind of person.

He sighed. One of the rules were that they could not destroy federal land, such as digging in the ground, or moving rocks as both disturbed animal habitats. Ugh.. taking away his smores privileges? Was that too harsh? No wait, would anyone know if it were a punishment if he made Clark run laps around the half-mile loop in their section of the campground? Maybe if Clark yelled and complained and did what he was known to do…

Great. What could he do? He grabbed Clark’s shoulders and stared at him, the two sets of eyes meeting one another. “You have tried to hurt me twice today. You’re going to have to wash our dishes for the entire week, if you do something stupid and reckless again, I will be forced to escalate this, and believe you me, I do not want to.”

Before Octavius would allow anything to be said, if words were going to be said, he quickly intervened with the words “I saw a sink and a faucet behind the bathrooms as I came up here, and the good thing is, you won’t have to walk as far to wash the dishes.”

Okay.. punishment issued.. he walked out of his tent, ignoring the pooling set of water, he’d deal with that later if the later-sunshine and heat didn’t cause the water to evaporate. He made his way to the car and dug through the trunk and car looking for food, specifically, food that he had packed before going on this trip.

The rain was not pouring as hard as it was several minutes ago, but it was still pouring enough to soak Octavius. He groaned, pulling his head out of the doorway to the passenger side and laid his arms across the roof, aligning it parallel and he laid his head down on the arms.

Was he really that stupid? How could he leave the food at home? Octavius sighed, hopping into the car to drive down to the Camp Store.

While doing so, the boys were left at the campsite. The drive wasn’t too far, it took at most 2 minutes as he had to follow the speed limit and find a parking spot in their miniscule, packed, parking lot. There were three rows, six parking spots each row. Between the second and third row, as they faced each other, was a strip of grass inside a concrete curb trim.

Cars kept coming, yes, slow, but continued coming. They seemed to be coming out of two roads not too far off from the Camp Store. One road was a one way, meaning you couldn’t drive into it, and only drive out of it, a line of cars streamed out regularly. The other one, was what the one way road was connected to, it was a two way road, one to go into the campground/camp store, the other to go to the picnic area, the scenic loop, North Carolina or back towards town, likely Townsend as the Y was one of the turns down that way.

Octavius made sure to watch his step, feeling like he was sticking out like a sore thumb as cars kept pulling out and he.. honestly.. felt a little nervous because what if they didn’t see him? How bad would an car-involved accident feel? Would it be worse than being hit with an iron ball several times (bludger)?

He slowly quickened his pace and made his way onto the side walk, seeing a bike rental shop with the boys bathroom and girls bathroom on the left side, an informational bulletin board with a glass covering, then the Camp Store on the right side. He looked at the two sets of doors and noted how one was seemingly used as the exit, despite not being marked as such, as people went in there but not as often as people would exit, and the other door on a different wall of the building enticed the entrance of people, but there was a line.

Octavius put his hands in his pocket to ensure that he got his wallet, as he got it to put the US Dollars into, as an attempt to blend in. Yes, okay so he had the paper money in his wallet, and man, was his wallet still thick and loaded. He might not need to go exchange his galleons for more dollar bills after all.

He looked at the line and mentally beat himself up for joining it, but why not join the line to see what the buzz was about? Maybe there was something worth this patience. After joining the line and waiting for two minutes, the rain finally let up and the sun began to beat down.
God, the humidity sucks. He felt himself sweating, the brows dripping large droplets onto his nose and it clumping up with one another as it slid off the nose and onto his shoes as he waited. He didn’t bring deodorant so maybe this is something he’d have to see.. if they sell it.
Finally, a few more minutes had passed and he was inside. He allowed his nose to deeply inhale the scent wafering around the place, and oh how good it smelled. Then again, most things cooked on a grill would appease Octavius. He around to see where it was coming from and it dawned on him that people were waiting in line for ice cream. This was the line to buy ice cream! Well, and food. It was to the concession counter, pretty much. The menu showed a Loop Sundae for 7.25, a Mayfield Swirl for 4.00, Mayfield Chocolate for 3.75, Mayfield Vanilla for 3.50, Roasted Nuts for 5.00, Turkey Burger for 11.25, Nathan’s Hotdog for 6.50 and finally soft drinks for 2.00 in one size, a medium. He didn’t really want to buy those, not yet anyways. Maybe later on.

Octavius looked besides one of the people in line as they advanced to make their order and saw “huckleberry” jelly, tea and taffy. But the smallest package (huckleberry jelly, small jar the size of a shot glass) of all of the huckleberry products were about 19.00 USD. He felt his mouth drop and was slightly shocked that ice cream could be cheaper than jelly. What was so significant about a berry that he wasn’t so sure he had heard of before? ‘Huckleberry’.. what was that?

Out of confusion he just moved on and walked out of the line, seeing that the store had other things to look at, like the magnetic rocks, geodes, crystal trees, even red boxers with a black bear on it! There were also obvious junk items like crisps, or as they call them here.. chips, sour candy drops, bubble-double gum rolls, and so on. Bottled drinks were approximately 5.00 USD and books on the history of the Appalachia mountains, a National Parks passport book, ghost/horror stories of the Tennessee-North Carolina Appalachia past, kids books that had weird titles that consisted of keywords related to animal poop.. were all sold from a range between 11.00 to 35.00.

In addition to the books, there were more science focused ones for identification to help identify rock types, animals, plants, even dinosaurs. He looked around, his eyes latched onto a section dedicated to something called “Junior Rangers” and there, there was a book with activities in it, a set of “badges” one could get, and an oath to follow the rules and be a good Junior Ranger. Unfortunately, it seemed it was for those who were young to the age of 12, well, he’d be able to get Tonto and Baldrick into it, but Clark was a different story, he had the height of Tonto and Baldrick, and the youthful look, but definitely not the age.

Oh well.. he’s going to buy the product. The Junior Ranger pen was 5.00 a piece and the crooked stick with graphite in it (there were no erasers, just a stick with a small hole drilled in with graphite inserted) was 2.00. The individual activity booklets were 8.00 each, the clothes totalled to about 25.00 (8.00 shorts, 8.00 shirt, 9.00 hat). In the end.. it was going to be expensive to get them all something together..

He hesitated, but proceeded to grab ones in the size of his three youngest sons on the trip with him, three crooked stick pencils, and the Junior Ranger book of activities. He looked to the next section over and saw a bunch of black bear stuffed toys in varying sizes. The smallest was 20.00. He stared at the price tag and instead let his expression of shock lead the way.. away from these expensive toys.

He walked around, now in the jewelry segment, and he smiled, thinking of how Simon liked to wear his earrings. The bad thing is, these earrings looked rather painful, so he wasn’t going to grab him any.

With all this walking around, he forgot why he even came to the Camp Store. Octavius only realized when he saw the jewelry, especially the bronze bear talon necklace with a leather cord. He walked back over close to the.. still long.. line and looked on the shelves to find graham crackers (7.99), twenty count pack of s’more sticks (3.25), (a big bag of) Lays chips (6.99), a loaf of wonder bread (3.99), hersheys chocolate bars (3.00 each, he grabbed two), jumbo marshmallows (5.99) then walked back over to the freezer section near the concession counter to obtain American Cheese slices (6.99), sandwich ham (6.99), packs of Nathan brand Hotdogs (7.99 each, he grabbed three (8 inside each)), turkey burger patties (9.50 each, he grabbed four (6 inside each pack)), beef burger patties (9.50 each, he grabbed two (6 inside each pack)), then walked back over to the shelves near the line and grabbed hotdog buns (6.99 for a 6 count pack, he grabbed four) and burger buns (6.50 for a 6 count pack, he grabbed four), then moved further down the shelves to find cans of chili (3.99, he grabbed two), a pan (15.99), plates (9.99 for a 6 count pack, he grabbed two), and plasticware (5.99 for 3 forks, knives and spoons. He grabbed three packs.)

As he walked up to the counter, he felt like he was going to drop everything he had just obtained and waddled, trying so hard not to drop things or to hit anything as he didn’t want to pay for things that were broken due to accidently knocking them over, and the line to buy regular stuff.. was in the fragile section, such as glass shotglasses.. cups.. ceramic décor.
The cashier rang up his items and as she put them into the bags, she read the cost and Octavius slowly, and reluctantly, moved towards his wallet. He wouldn’t have to get this.. if he remembered to bring the food.

He looked at the overall cost with the 10% tax that they apparently had.. he owed 363.04 DOLLARS? Oh god, this had better last for days. He pulled out three one-hundred dollar bills, one fifty dollar bill, one ten dollar bill, and four one dollar bills, telling the cashier to keep the change.

He took his bags and went out of the store, still shocked with how much everything was, and they didn’t seem that inexpensive at first, but in the long run, things add up quick. He ran fast across the road and through the parking lot until he got to his mustang. Hopefully no one had to slam on their brakes to a maniac running.

He hopped in and drove back to the campsite, still not believing that he paid that much for food. He should’ve had Clark pay as punishment, god damn. That was taxing. He ensured that no one was around, even did so much as to put up the clothes he just bought to block the view into the car, and he put the expendable refrigerated items onto the floorboard of the seat behind him, and cast glacius duo on it quietly, his voice barely above a whisper, to keep it cold, it needed to remain cold so it didn’t go bad, because shit! He didn’t buy a lot of things!
When he was done, he quickly hid his wand in his pocket before taking down the clothes and walking up to the tents, in where he could hear Baldrick and Simon talking, Simon talking about things that went over Baldrick’s head and Baldrick laughing as if he understood what was said. He didn’t.

He heard Ben and Tonto playing a game with one another in the tent, Ben celebrating the fact that he won the round, and Clark was sitting outside of the tents with a stick he picked up off the ground writing his name in the gravel near the table. He would show Clark later, mostly to surprise Tonto and Baldrick, and hopefully have Clark’s behavior not ruin it for Octavius and for the six year olds.

Baldrick opened the entry to the kids tent, the tent all of his kids were staying in, and walked out, seeing Octavius and he smiled. “You are back!” He exclaimed, happy to see him, but he obviously had a question, a confounded look on his face. “But where did you go?” He asked.

Octavius returned the smile, going to his knees to give Baldrick a hug. “I went to the store and got food because we did not have any. Now we can eat!” He said, but he noticed Baldrick’s expression changing to that of shame. “I want to tell truth dad. I saw salad in food from home and I pull food out of car so we do not eat salad. I am sorry..”

Oh, so.. he didn’t forget. Baldrick was the reason why he had to spend so much money.. on expendable food… sigh. But, Baldrick did confess. He couldn’t just punish him for that, it would not be fair. He put on his serious expression and moved his hands from the hug to rest onto his shoulder, still on the ground to be face-height with Baldrick. “I forgive you, but please, Baldrick, please do not ever do that again. Only take things out of the car when I tell you or ask you to. Please don’t be upset, I am happy you were honest, but I want you to please ask me if you’re going to take things out of the car, if you did not want a salad, I could have made you something, maybe even packed a few pumpkin pastees for you.”

Baldrick looked away, so Octavius stood up. He spoke in his normal voice, but tried to be a smidge louder. “Boys, please come here, get out of the tent.”

They came out, but Clark stayed, Octavius would deal with him later, just not now. He looked at the four boys. “Simon and Ben, I did not get you guys anything asides from our family meals, but I did get Tonto and Baldrick..” He whispered, “and Clark”, he resumed talking in his normal volume. “some stuff for a program they apparently have here called the Junior Rangers, I think you guys might enjoy it. Simon and Ben, you guys can join them if you wish, but apparently you guys cannot be Junior Rangers as the age caps at 12.”