Summer’s Rays

Sarah emerged from Grace’s bedroom, where she’d gone to put on her bikini, to find Grace sprawled upside-down across the couch. She gave her a puzzled glance. “Grace?”

Grace sighed melodramatically. “Sadness,” she intoned in a tone of voice normally reserved for announcements that there wouldn’t be any new episodes of Steven Universe for at least six months. 

“Problems?”asked Sarah, scratching the back of her head in amused puzzlement. Grace’s over-the-top affect reassured her it was nothing serious. 

Grace peered up at Sarah and her sad expression shifted to a smile. “Yummy,” she pronounced, her gaze traveling up and down the length of Sarah’s body. 

Sarah fought down a blush and smiled back. “That’s you,” she replied, likewise appreciating her girlfriend’s bikini-clad form. They were wearing matching white bikinis, and Tedd was supposed to be wearing one too. “But what is ’sadness’?”

“Tedd.”

Sarah wondered if she was only going to get single word responses from the normally loquacious Grace. 

“How so?”

Grace sighed heavily again and rolled off the couch with a little somersault and a twist, ending up sitting cross-legged at Sarah’s feet. She gazed up at Sarah with puppy-dog eyes. “Tedd says she thinks she got a message from the Will of Magic in a dream last night, and she doesn’t want to go to the beach until she’s figured it out.”

“Shethinks? She’s not sure?”

“Well, it’s either that, or it was just your normal dream about a talking wombat in a silk smoking jacket.” 

Sarah blinked at the mental image, but Magic had appeared in stranger forms. “So…no beach?” In truth she felt a touch relieved. The new bikinis Grace had talked her and Tedd into buying were both smaller and thinner than her pink bikini, and she’d had mixed feelings about wearing it out in public. 

Then she frowned. “Wait. A wombat? Does that look like a gray cat crossed with a koala bear?”

“Kinda, I guess. Why?”

“Um, I might have had a similar dream.”

Grace unfolded her legs under herself, rising to her feet.  “Seriously?”

“Yeah. And if Tedd got the same message I did…” Sarah shook her head, an exasperated smile on her face. 

“What was it?” Grace asked. 

She started giggling when Sarah told her. “Oh, she does overthink things sometimes.”

“Yeah. I thought Magic was working to be less cryptic?”

Grace shrugged. “Old habits die hard?” 

They trooped downstairs to Tedd’s rec room-laboratory. Sarah was disappointed to see that Tedd hadn’t yet changed into her matching bikini. 

“Oh,Teddy…” Grace caroled. 

“Hmmm?” Tedd didn’t look up from a notebook where she was jotting down some notes. 

“What did Magic tell you?” asked Sarah. 

“Umm. Well, I think I may have figured out what the second part means—” Tedd began. 

“No, what, exactly, did Magic say to you?” interrupted  Grace. 

“Eh?” Tedd looked up at her girlfriends and blinked a few times. ”Oh. It was a short verse:

    Visions in white

    Cause great delight.

    The sun’s golden rays

    Warm your whole day.”

She looked back down at her notes. “I think—”

“Tedd!” Sarah cut her off, as she rolled her eyes. “Look at us.”

Tedd glanced up briefly. “Hm? Oh, yes, you’re beautiful, loves.”

Sarah exchanged an incredulous look with Grace. 

“Might you even say, we’re visions in white?” suggested Grace blandly. 

Tedd froze, staring at her notes, then she sighed and put down her pencil. She rubbed her eyes for a moment. “Have a nice day,” she groaned. “Magic was telling me to have a nice day.”

Sarah and Grace burst into laughter, and after a moment, Tedd joined in, shaking her head ruefully. 

“Come on, sweetie,” Sarah said. “We want to see you in yourbikini.”

“Then we’ll go to the beach and give everyone whiplash,” grinned Grace. 

“And enjoy the sun’s rays the rest of the day,” smiled Tedd. 

–

The week is over, but one last fic from @chauffeurdad for the road! Thanks to everyone that turned EGS Flashfic week into a success!

Idea for this one came from this prompt. Definitely an AU, wherein Susan and Diane met earlier than in canon.

Diane’s date shrank away a little. “Oh, come on. It sounds like a better idea than puking our guts out all day, doesn’t it?”

“First off - if all it takes to get you to throw up for eight hours straight is riding one thrill ride… ew. Second, I’m not going to neckon Pirates of Lake Michigan.”

“Why not? It’s dark, there’s plenty of room between the boats…” He tried to sidle up to her again. Diane stepped back.

“There are security cameras over every square inch of the ride.”

“They won’t see-”

“Infrared cameras. Second, do you really get turned on around the smell of water that probably hasn’t been changed since this park opened?!”

“I-”

“Look, you want to ride that, feel free. I’m going on something else.”

“O-okay? Uh - where should we meet up?”

“School. Maybe. Later.” She stormed off, pulling her phone out of her bag. The Midwestern Kingdom was a weird park - it had started out as a blatant ripoff of Disneyland, a la Nara Dreamland, and had grown into its own thingin the seventies. The odd ‘WE CAN’T SAY DISNEY BUT THINK DISNEY’ elements were interspersed through thrill rides that were too odd to be picked up by King’s Island or Cedar Point. And while it was normally just open in the summer, it did open its doors for a ‘spring preview’ one week a year. 

Naturally, two thirds of her school was there, despite the lingering chill in the air. 

NoBottleBlonde: Did you make it out here?

If Lucy was there, she could get a ride home with her. Odds were slim, given what she’d said, but-

XenaWasRight: Nope.
XenaWasRight: Car’s still broken down. 
XenaWasRight: And I never knew fixing it would be this fun. 
NoBottleBlonde: Fun? Seriously? 
XenaWasRight: Hey, what can I say, the company makes the activity.
XenaWasRight: Gotta go. We’re lifting the engine out. 
NoBottleBlonde: What? What company?
NoBottleBlonde: Lucy?
NoBottleBlonde: I WANT DEETS LATER.

Well. Crap. Good that Lucy was having a date she was enjoyingfor once, even if ‘fixing her car’ wasn’t technically a date, but… that left her alone in the park. Unlesssss…

NoBottleBlonde: Hey, are you and your dork friends here?
TrillHitchhiker: I choose to take that term as a compliment. And yes. 
NoBottleBlonde: YES. Okay, my date turned out to be a real creep. Mind if I hang with you guys? 
TrillHitchhiker: Oh no. I am terribly offended. How dare you suggest such a thing. Gasp. I think I have a case of the vapors. 
NoBottleBlonde: :P 
TrillHitchhiker: We’re split up at the moment. Most of us are in one line or another, but we’re meeting in 30 minutes at the entrance to El Torqueno. 
NoBottleBlonde: I’m heading there now. Can’t believe that guy was too wimpy to even try riding it…
TrillHitchhiker: …the vast majority of our party is too. 
NoBottleBlonde: PFFT. I’m trying it. See you there soon. 

She closed down the phone and headed for the new ride. It was an intimidatingcoaster. A bright orange steel thing that wound in and out of ambiguously-industrial theming. Each pair of seats were also able to rotate around end over end. It was fast. It was intense. And - yes, if you had a weak stomach… but she was made of sterner stuff. She could manage it. 

Right? Right. 

The line wasn’t especially interesting. She did enjoy the fact that they were at least trying to build suspense, letting the line cut past several stretches of track, so you could hear the screams and roar of the ride and really soak in what was going to happen. She didn’t notice the sign until she was in sight of the boarding platform. 

Single riders will be paired. 

Oh. Great.  

She looked around rapidly, trying to make sure the creep wasn’t there. No. No, he hadn’t been clever enough to try to pull that. Good. So she had to ride with a stranger, but that wouldn’t matter much. It was just one ride, and then she’d be with her… estranged niece Cousin by blood friend and her friend’s friends. God. So much easier to ignore the blood relation. The last few minutes of wait were short, and then she was there, waiting on the platform alone as the operator herded her to a seat right at the back, and - then waved over another girl about her age. Shorter. More pear shaped, though she definitely made it work. Also blonde. She said something, though it was drowned out by the sound of the ride and the music over the PA. Diane just shrugged in return. The other girl grinned, rolled her eyes, and gestured to the seat. In they went, and the harnesses clicked into place… and that was it. A minute passed. Two. And then they were heading for the lift hill. The girl next to Diane let out a whoop. 

“AWESOME! I’ve been waiting for this for a YEAR!” 

“Seriously? Are you that much of a coaster junkie?” 

“Maybe? I dunno. I mean, I only ever go here…”Diane craned her head around. The other girl gave a hapless shrug,  barely visible in the harness, still grinning. Diane just laughed once. Eh, what the hell. She could drop the thin veneer of self control and just enjoythis for once. Her enthusiasm was infectious. They crested the lift hill, and for a moment they were all screaming, and then - DOWN. The speed was everything, plunging them through a canyon of rust and gray, before it twistedto the side, and then they were flippingbackwards, making it impossible to see where they were going - and the disorientation, the shock, the sheer adrenaline was so good,so pure, so cleansing, that Diane found herself screamingalong with everyone else, venting her nerves and her delight and the sheer sensory overload of it. 

Somewhere around the cobra roll, she found herself grabbing the other girl’s hand. She had been sort of flailing, and - wow, she had a HELL of a grip, and - she barely registered that for the rest of the ride. Not until they lurched to a stop in front of the station, and everyone started cheering. They were not quite upright, and the cars took a moment to spin them slowly into place before they advanced to the platform to unload with a loud hiss. 

The bars were lifted. They stumbled out, dizzy and laughing and flushed, and staggered towards the exit. 

“Oh. My. Fuzzy. GOD. That was amazing!” The shorter girl blurted. “That… that was better than I hoped for!” 

“I KNOW, RIGHT?” Diane was tryingnot to gush. “I swear, I - I nearly blacked out for a second. I - holy - frickI can’t even think straight right now.” She stumbled, and nearly fell, only to slump over on the shorter girl, who burst into giggles again - as someone cleared their throat nearby. 

“Well. I was going to tell you that we were waiting for Diane, but you found her. Ah - Diane, Sarah. Sarah, Diane.” Susan was standing at the bottom of the ramp, next to Justin, Elliot, and… well… the whole rest of Susan’s little crew. A curvy black girl (Grace, that - that washer name, right?) gave her a MASSIVE smile, grabbing the arm of another girl with a mop of purple hair. She was squeeingin an almost inaudible pitch.

“Yeah, yeah, we rode together. You… you don’t know what you’re missing. I swear, I’m still high off the vertigo.” Sarah nudged Diane upright, and - that was when both of them realized they were stillholding hands. And that they had been clutching each other so hard that they probably had bruisesfrom each other’s fingertips. 

Oh. 

Oh. 

That… probably shouldn’t have gotten a blush out of Diane, but-

“So which ride’s next? We gotta pick something a littletamer for these guys, but - we all up for the Steel Noodle?” Sarah didn’t let go. If anything, she gave her hand another squeeze before pulling her towards the next ride. 

She really had to send that creep a thank you letter. A severely passive aggressive thank you letter, but a thank you all the same.

(A/N: The roller coaster type in question is probably nonexistent, but is based on the same concept as a ‘4th Dimension’ roller coaster, albeit with more traditional coaster elements.)

Fic by Mod Zee. 

“Tentacles”

Day two of EGS Flashfic Week! A slight warning: This story is a little more suggestive than our usual fare, though it doesn’t go beyond the usual level of, say, an episode of Futurama, and is probably SFW unless you work in a convent. A ‘read more’ link has still been inserted. 

“Do… do I want to know?” After several long seconds, that was the only thing that could escape Sarah’s mouth. Grace cocked her head to the side - the squirrel girl was wearing a transformation that Sarah had never seen before, a somewhat disturbing fusion of mammalian and cephalopod traits. Mostly, she looked human-ish, though her skin was… different. Constantly shifting colors, subtly. Her eyes were WEIRD, and her arms were… not there. Replaced by a cluster of three tentacles apiece.

“What do you mean? This is awesome!”

“Yeah, but do I want to know why you and Tedd made this form? I mean, I can only imagine the shoehorning that he had to do to get the genetics to work.”

“Magic does a LOT to speed that up.” Grace winked, wrapping a pair of tentacles around Sarah’s shoulder. Sarah locked up at the touch, staring down at the tendrils, trying not to think about it. She was thinking about it. “I wanted to see what it would be like to have no bones for a while.”

“NO bones?!”

“None at all!” Grace grinned, and Sarah realized just why Grace looked wrong - her face was constantly shifting in SHAPE just a little, held in place only by - what? Musculature? Fluid sacs?

“That’s… that’s pretty freaky, I’m not going to lie. How different does it feel?”

“Honestly, except for the arms, you don’t think about it too much?” She shrugged. “And these are pretty cool. You’d be amazed at what you can do with them.”

“Yeah, I’d imagine.” Sarah’s blush ratcheted up a few notches, as Grace giggled.

“I mean like ‘scratching my own back’ or ‘tightening nuts without a wrench’, not THAT.”

“Riiiight. Like you and Tedd haven’t-”

“Oh we HAVE. I’m not denying anything there. But that doesn’t need to be the first place your mind goes.” She stretched upwards with all six  limbs. “Look at these things! They’re nature’s perfect all-purpose tools! Infinitely flexible, super-strong, and able to do SO much more than arms can, My tentacles are naughty because I’M naughty, not because of the mere fact that they are tentacles!”

“Fair. But I’m going to have to ask you to change back before we play Mario Kart.”

“Aww.”

Story by Mod Zee.