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Chapter Six: ClicheCamp I: If Verbs Could Kill
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It was Sunday morning, and Dana was cursing any and all deities as she trudged down the
front steps of the main OFUFF building. Needless to say, the first week of school had gone
less than ideally; fourteen separate stampede attempts had been stopped by the Moogles, and
all the participants had been thoroughly punished in appropriately painful ways. Dana
herself had managed to acquire six detentions, which she had variously spent picking fleas
out of the Moogles' fur, giving Bahamut-ZERO a full pedicure, washing down the walls of
Underground Torture Chamber 3b, putting extra soundproofing in the Mary Sue paddock (what the staff was doing with so many captured OCs, she really didn't want to know), re-plumbing the entire fourth floor, and bandaging up a rather disappointed Firefly99, who had attempted to flying-tackle Cloud and had gotten a faceful of his specially gelled hair.
Now, the entire school had been summoned to the empty valley three thousand feet below the
University building for some bizarre reason. It was five o'clock in the morning, the sun
had barely risen behind the Nibel mountains, and it was promising to be a dull, grey day.
What's more, the Moogles and Neo-Bahamuts were in an unusually cheerful mood; Dana had seen Cecel whistling Chopin's Funeral March in the hallway as the little Moogle happily polished
his claymore. And though she had only been in OFUFF a week, she had already learned one of
its fundamental rules for survival: when the the Moogles were happy, it was time to dive
for cover.
"What a pain," Lily commented. She and Maggie were following along behind Dana, yawning and stretching. They had only gone to bed about three hours before, due to a prolonged game of 'Sifer Says' with a new and particularly vicious mini that had sent all three to the
Infirmary with multiple status ailments. Then came their violent awakenings courtesy of
Vicks, Biggs, and Wedge, who seemed to think it was funny when a student was picked up by
her pajamas and tossed out a third-floor window. (Fortunately, Dana's fall had been broken
by her plush brother, who seemed to have taken the same route a few seconds earlier, but
Lily had crashlanded in the arms of ExDeath and Maggie had spent ten unpleasant minutes
being used as a Kleenex by Umaro, who had one hell of a head cold. Others weren't so lucky-
Akki was still trying to dig Lady Spork out of the ground.) Now they were making the cold
and unnecessarily rocky walk down the mountain slope to the valley, where it seemed that a
great number of white and tan canvas tents had been set up. Many students were already
milling around in front of said tents, looking confused and sporting numerous bruises from
other canons' various wake-up calls.
As they drew closer to the cluster of canvas and students, Dana began to notice something
strange about the ground. Here and there, tiny shining discs of silver were scattered over
the soil, gleaming despite the overcast day. "What the heck?" she muttered, leaning down to
examine one.
"OOOOOOOOOOH!" came Maggie's shriek from behind her. "They's DIMESIES! MONEY! MONEY!
MONEYMONEYMONEYMONEYMONEYMON- urk-" Her voice was abruptly cut off.
Surprised, Dana and Lily turned around, and beheld the shocked visage of a frozen Maggie
with one finger on a glittering silver dime. Large, blotchily rendered gold clocks were
hovering around her, their black hands stuck in place. Maggie could not move, or even
breathe. Her expression was somewhere between fright, dismay, and who-the-hell-dropped-an-ice-cube-down-my-underwear annoyance.
"Yeah, you'll want to avoid the dimes," Hellknight called as he and his roommate,
EvilSmileyFace, picked their way down the slope toward the three girls. "I overheard Miss
Drakonlily talking to Faris about whatever it is that's going on today- something to do
with cliches made real. Farris caught be before I could hear anymore."
"Of course," Lily groaned, rolling her eyes. "That's it. 'Stop on a dime.' She touched the
dime- ergo, a Stop spell. Honestly." She and Dana grabbed the frozen Maggie's arms and began to haul her down the mountainside after them, carefully avoiding the dimes. Hellknight and EvilSmileyFace followed them, Hellknight using a broken branch to sweep dimes out of the
way.
"Honestly," Dana muttered, after slipping for the fifty-seventh time, "This place is WAY too
literal. I mean, the Nibel mountains looked so . . . so . . . EASY in the game! This isn't
fair!" Dropping Maggie, she half-sat, half-fell down and covered her face with her hands.
"THIS ISN'T FAIR!" she wailed again, pounding the ground with both feet. "I wanna go home!
It's not nice to be stuck in this dumb place where my Sephy-kun was bewitched to ignore me
and Hojo's being mean and Fujin beat me up for trying to steal Seifer's trenchcoat and
there's a whole bunch of crazy Mogs and I had to get up at five in the morning just because
some stupid moron on the staff decided they wanted to be mean to us! IT'S NOT FAIR!"
Suddenly, a warm hand settled on her shoulder, and she heard the sound of someone settling
down on the ground. "Don't worry, dear," a kind voice said softly. "This is going to be
very easy. You won't get hurt, I promise."
Dana wiped her teary eyes with one hand and looked up. A blonde woman was kneeling in front of her, kindness and sympathy in her blue eyes. She was wearing what appeared to be a
purple, blue, black and yellow blitzball uniform, and there were three chocobo feathers
stuck in her ponytail. Her hands were covered in brown and black gauntlets, and one of them
was resting comfortingly on Dana's shoulder. She wore a staff ID tag which read "The Chocobo
Goddess, Special Director of Proofreading and Semantics." Unlike the rest of the staff,
though, her tag did not contain the admonition "Fear Me" or "Bow and Scrape, Feeble
Peasant."
"Here, now," Chocobo Goddess said, standing up and holding out one hand to help Dana up.
"Don't be so upset, dear- the staff is just a little unhappy that everyone's writing all
these awful stories. They're bound to lighten up soon."
Dana sniffled unhappily and clambered to her feet. "It's not fair," she repeated for the
fourth time. "Why'd they hafta get us up so early? They're always being nasty to us!"
"I know, I saw what those three bit characters were doing. Don't fret, I'll talk to them."
Chocobo Goddess said soothingly. "Come on, now, stop worrying so much- can you smile? There, doesn't that feel better?" Smiling herself, she led Dana back over to the confused-looking
Lily, who was awkwardly holding the still-frozen Maggie by one arm. "Let me help you," the
deity continued, and began to chant under her breath. A shower of green sparks descended on
Maggie, the clocks disappeared, and the confused fangirl dropped to the ground as she
promptly unfroze.
"Huh? Whatwasthatya?" she wondered, then without further ado began bouncing down the slope towards the tents, somehow avoiding the rest of the dimes without looking. Lily shot Dana
a helpless look and followed the hyper girl. Hellknight and EvilSmileyFace had already taken
off, leaving the girl alone with Chocobo Goddess.
The goddess checked her chocobo-shaped watch and glanced back at Dana, who was looking a bit more cheerful, though still suspiciously teary-eyed.
"It's about time for you to be getting down there, dear," Chocobo Goddess said, gently
taking Dana's arm and guiding her down the slope. "Don't panic, it's hardly difficult.
Just a little exercise to help you understand some things about writing, that's all. I'll
be right there the whole time, and I'll be glad to help you. Come on, now, cheer up . . . "
Dana nodded, her bruised ego reassured by the goddess's calm and kindly voice. She nodded
and began to scramble down the slope, leaving the protector of chocobos to watch from the
large rock where she now perched.
Only a completely self-absorbed, mindless, horrendously unaware lust-brained fangirl could
have missed the unpleasant grin that crossed the face of the Chocobo Goddess. Luckily for
evil, though, Dana was all of that and more.
***
"Everybody listen up!" the cursed female that Dana had painfully learned to address as
'Miss J' called. The students were gathered in the valley, hopping up and down and trying
to warm themselves against the chill morning air, while the staff looked quite content in
their trenchcoats and cloaks. Miss J was standing before the largest of the canvas tents,
holding the HP Shout and looking extraordinarily amused by something.
"LISTEN UP, DAMMIT!" she yelled, and the students shut up immediately. Thiranduil, who was curled at Miss J's feet, hissed approvingly and went back to gnawing on Obsidian Angel.
"Now that we're all quiet," Miss J continued in a [somewhat] calmer tone, "We'd like to
explain exactly why we've gotten you up before dawn. Normally, I wouldn't give a damn
whether you people were prepared for this kind of exercise or not, but it's more fun for
the staff to watch if you're wetting yourself before it even begins. Anticipatory terror,
and all that sort of thing. Miss Drakonlily, if you would . . . ?"
"With pleasure," Miss Drakonlily replied. "Alright, you lot, listen to me: at lunchtime on
Monday, our meal was rudely interrupted by an Over-Creative Writing spirit. Apparently,
some idiot student had decided to get poetic, because this one babbled even moreso than
usual. Gold, even gold chains, cannot "fall like the waters of Lethe." Gold is a metal.
Metals are solid. Solids cannot flow like water. Are we clear on this?"
There was some concerted muttering from the students.
"Edgarr, be a dear and fetch Bahamut-ZERO for me."
Everybody jumped.
"Well? Are we clear on that, then?"
Fervent nods all around.
"Cancel that, Edgarr." Miss Drakonlily steepled her fingers in the manner of Montgomery
Burns and grinned. "As I was saying: the OCW's appearance served some purpose after all.
Thanks to its habit of spouting inane and overused cliches, the staff has decided to sponsor
an emergency ClicheCamp for the students."
In the audience, Dana nudged Lily and flashed her a 'what the hell?' look. Lily shrugged
helplessly in reply.
"Every day for the next four days, each student will be required to complete a single
exercise that we will set for you. This will not take time from your study or class
periods."
"Always a bad sign," Hellknight muttered.
"These exercises are intended to educate you about the pitfalls of descriptive and-or
creative language, AKA similes, metaphors, cliches, and suchlike. Today's is the opening of
ClicheCamp, a little gem we call 'Satin is Not the Lord of the Underworld.' You will enter
through this door, two at a time-" she gestured to the closed flap of the large white tent
behind her "-and follow and observe the entire course unto its conclusion. Any students
attempting to escape before the end of the exercise will be given three hundred hours of
community service and made Kefka's personal slave for two weeks. Understand? Good.
"The purpose of this exercise is to pound one simple fact into your heads: when it comes to
long, flowery descriptive sentences, SPELL AND GRAMMAR CHECK ARE YOUR FRIENDS. We really shouldn't have to cover this at all, but unfortunately, staff research has uncovered some truly bizarre examples of student writing which . . . will not be discussed because poor Vincent has had enough trouble in his life and doesn't need to be reminded of the kind of stuff that people put him up to in these stories. All clear?"
Without waiting for them to answer, Miss Drakonlily continued. "There will be several teams
of two staff members each, watching students from a secure location; if anyone seems to be
in mortal peril, we'll be there to rescue them. Don't expect a romantic knight on a white
horse, though- the teams consist of myself and Rude, Reno and the Major, Lady Sanzennine and Elena, and Chocobo Goddess and Tseng." There were a few sighs from the Turk lusters. "Oh, and need I remind you that in this continuum the Turks still work for Shinra, and
consequentially are more interested in their paychecks than in you? Or that all four of
them went on a serious bender last night and their hangovers will not appreciate the
interference of needing to rescue students? Kindly consider that for a moment. And while
you're considering, find a partner for the exercise and don't waste any more of my time."
"Cheerful, isn't she?" Dana commented as she and Lily partnered up. Nearby, Maggie had
secured Alan Bates, who appeared to be weighing the pluses and minuses of running away
versus committing hari-kiri. "If / had to work with Rude, I'd quit."
"She doesn't seem too worried," Lily muttered suspiciously. "Doesn't it worry you, though?
They're almost never this happy, unless somebody's about to get mauled by a Moogle."
"Don't worry about it," Dana replied. "I met this really cool staff lady on the way down
. . . Chocobo Goddess, I think. She told me that they just like to scare people. It's not
gonna be that bad, really."
"I hope you're right." The other said as teachers began to arrange the pairs of students
into a line in front of the door to the tent. "They're probably just gonna yell at us about using the spellchecker. Sheesh, what could possibly happen?"
"Judging from the ominous Latin chanting that just started in the background, I'd say quite
a bit."
***
Dana and Lily were sixth in line; it took them about twenty minutes to get to the tentflap,
as the teacher guarding it (Seymour Guado) was taking his sweet time letting them through.
Finally, though, they reached it and were ushered through into . . . darkness.
"Well, this is impressive," Dana commented as the flap was lowered behind them,
extinguishing all light. "What's the point?"
"Damned if I know," Lily said. "Hmm . . . that's weird, though . . . something just crunched
on the ground . . . " there were scuffling sounds as she knelt down and scrabbled around.
"Um . . . Dana . . . ?"
"Yeah?"
"It's grass. Grass and dead leaves."
"So?"
"So we're in the Nibel Mountains. Grass doesn't grow in the mountains."
"Says you." Dana snapped. Silverblade Moonlight lived in a meadow on a mountaintop. If
there was grass in that story, then there was grass here. End of discussion.
"Says botany!"
"What?"
"Botany. The study of plants."
"Bo-ring. Who wants to study PLANTS, for crying out loud?"
"My mom!"
"Then your mom's dumb."
"HEY!"
Suddenly, a deep, rich, lyrical feminine voice began to speak out of the darkness, forcing
Dana and Lily to shut up. They knew that voice- Dana had heard it often enough, when she
was soundproofing the Mary Sue paddock, and had described it to Lily. The voice of the
Author.
"The glade was really quiet, green trees russelling, they're bark firm and dark lightx
stremeing down from th sky."
The blackness began to lift, but only slightly. A deep purple light was emanating from the
sky, turning Lily's white shirt a strange greenish-blue color and dyeing their polygons
peculiar shades. They were standing in a forest clearing, surrounded on all sides by trees
which appeared to be silently acting out scenes from "Gladiator." Tiny 'World of X-treme
Sports' logos were intermingled with the purplish light, giving the entire scene the look of
a television beer commercial gone deeply, seriously wrong.
" . . . whoa. Trippy."
"Totally."
Lily slowly moved across the badly defined glade, squinting at the trees, two of whom were
replicating Commodus' death at the hands of Maximus with a dead branch. She was about to
reach out and touch one of them, but the Author spoke again, and suddenly things got
extremely strange . . .
"The beutious maidens hair shed stars as she lay upon the rocs, drinking in the crystal
light of holy and pondiring on things to come."
Abruptly, the scene shifted out of focus as the universe tried to decide whether there was
one maiden or twenty- lying prone on the large, hawklike and extremely irritated birds which
had been created by the omission of a K- and seemingly drowning herself (themselves?) in the
Crystal Lite Strawberry which was now pouring down from the sky in torrents. What was more, the multiple females had large, malevolently burning basketball-sized blue dwarf stars
shooting out of their elegantly coifed hair with the force of a respectable cruise missile.
"IIIIIINCOMIIIIIING!" Lily yelled, falling to the ground as a star zoomed over her head,
nearly setting her blonde hair alight. Dana shrieked and dove behind one of the trees, only
to be set scrambling for cover again as another star scored a direct hit on her hiding
place.
"What the hell is going on here?" the shocked Dana cried, frantically swatting hot ashes
away from her. "I thought this was supposed to be some kind of class!"
"Search me!" Lily responded, rolling over and barely avoiding another star, which
crashlanded next to her and melted the rocky soil it hit into a pool of glowing magma. "I
think they're trying to kill us!"
"We've got to get out of here!" Yet another star zoomed over Dana's head and instantly
tanned her back and shoulders with the light and heat radiating from it. "Lily! How do you
end a scene?!"
"You mean you've never done it?!" WHOOSH. "Aaaah! My hair!"
"I don't know how!" Dana wailed. "Just get us out of here!"
Lily shoved her head in the dirt, extinguishing the flames that a passing star had lit in
her ponytail. Then she looked up and yelled "SUDDENLY, THE WORLD GOES DARK AND THE TWO GIRLS ARE OUT OF DANGER!"
Instantly responding to the commands of an Author, the scene was blanketed in darkness. The
glade and the badly-written maiden(s) vanished, the stars ceased hurling themselves around,
and the Crystal Lite stopped pouring from the sky. There was only silence now.
"I don't like this," Lily whispered after a moment. "I think we're in some kind of void or
something . . . if you see a huge guy in black armor, run."
"I can't see ANYTHING!" Dana whined. "And I'm cold!"
"It is kind of chilly here," her friend observed. "And I think I'm standing on something
hard . . . feels like rock."
On cue, the Author spoke again, and both girls groaned.
"She had said she woud not marry him until hel frose over but he was realy persisstent and
the ice began to apear."
The darkness abated again, and the fangirls looked around. They were in what appeared to be
a vast underground cavern, with bluish-green lights glowing on the walls. A silver-and-black
structure that Lily called a "Viking meadhall" was standing about a quarter of a mile away
across the rough terrain; a large pack of nasty-looking guard dogs was chained to its
doorposts, their color impossible to determine in the sickly light and deep shadows.
"This doesn't look like a Squaresoft town . . . " Dana said in a quavery voice, shivering
and wrapping her arms around herself. "Me not likees . . . "
A ragged cough interrupted her. Jumping, Dana and Lily whipped around-
"OH GOOODD! NOOOOOOOOOO!"
***
"I love the sound of fangirl-screams in the morning," Chocobo Goddess said cheerfully,
straightening the chocobo feathers in her hair. "Do you think they're sufficiently educated
yet?"
"Leave 'em a while," Miss J replied lazily, toying with the Necklace of Noncanon
Enhancement, her eyes drifting to the enchanted tent into which the last of the students had
been sent. "After all, this is only the first day, and the lesson'll take a while to sink
in."
Music- the intro to "Suteki Da Ne," specifically- began to creep into the background, but
nobody was surprised. Time for a song parody.
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Gaze upon the students, all wrestling with cliches
Laugh at their fics, avatars galore
Come on, fangirls, work- more to FF than hot lays
Muahahaha-! More pain, more!
Take care, fangirls! Look on the characters you love
Doing it like bunnies? No, no, no!
Look at the villains, towering up above
Do they melt with angst at every blow?
Isn't it great?
Watching as the Mary Sues are pulped into strudel
Isn't it cool?
Watching as the fanwriters are mauled by the Moogles
So now they cry
Whining that we're not fair
They wish the end was nigh
And we should care?
Canon isn't optional; over this best mull
"Thou shalt but borrow characters, and
Return them whole and recognizeable."
Not take and mutilate on demand.
Suckers, look upon all the fruits of your own works!
"Milky-white hands" and "flowing hair"
How should we punish every new godplaying 'Sue jerk?
Cooking alive in Kefka's lair?
Isn't it great?
Watching as the Mary Sues are pulped into strudel
Isn't it cool?
Watching as the fanwriters are mauled by the Moogles
So now they'll write
Under watch of ZERO
And if they dare to fight
To Chaos they go!
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"You realize, of course, that if anybody else had parodied a Final Fantasy song in front of
us, we'd have put them through a laundry wringer," the Major commented as the last strains
of music died away. "Doesn't that strike you as slightly hypocritical?"
"Not in a situation where the whole point is to bring cliches alive," Lady Sanzennine
responded. "What we have here, canons and noncanons, is poetic justice."