Feeling a little chorded

[Kallistos Rolleston]

His first option would have been to sit outside somewhere to play his guitar, but the cold, damp weather put a well, dampener on those plans, so rather than hiding in his room, or making a problem for anyone else, he headed to the auditorium, at lead he'd have good acoustics there, and the option to play the drums, should he feel the urge.

He sat on a chair on the stage and drummed his fingers on top of his guitar as he thought about what he wanted to play, with a smile he began to strum the first chord for Leaving on a jet plane, grinning as he played, and started singing the song, not caring if anyone walked through the door. Heck, if Kall were a shy person, he'd never have become a cheerleader!

[Katherine Lorelia]

Kitty was a musical girl by nature, and as such, she spent probably more time than most people did in the music classrooms. Admittedly, a lot of people were probably scared off by the teacher, who even the blonde would admit was a little on the terrifying side, but these were sacrifices that had to be made- and besides, the Irish girl was secretly convinced that her German teacher was not as mean as she pretended to be. Although she was probably on her own there.

There were times, however, when there were more convenient places to enjoy herself, and this was one of them. The auditorium had a reasonable set of musical facilities, more than sufficient for Kitty's needs, and, more often than not, the place was empty. So she was a little surprised to find someone else in the room, but Kitty, never taken aback for long, merely took the opportunity to join in.

[Kallistos Rolleston]

Kall's lips curved in a smile as his song became a harmony, and he bowed his head toward Kitty as he finished the song. "Hey, little Miss Sunshine." He said with a grin. "The last I checked, I'm not a Seirēn, so you weren't enticed in here, to your death, by my singing." Or at least, it had never happened before, and as far as he knew, there were no shipwrecks in the auditorium.

Without even thinking about it, he started on another song; Soul Asylum's Runaway Train, a slightly melancholy song, but very easy to play while not having to concentrate on the chords needed. "What brings you to the cavern?"

[Katherine Lorelia]

The blonde giggled. "I'm not so sure about that..." she teased, walking a little further in and seating herself comfortably on the floor at the taller boy's feet. "How do I know that this charming exterior isn't just a way of enticing helpless young maidens to their doom?" She couldn't exactly imagine what kind of doom might await her in the auditorium, she had to admit- except for maybe a bad singer, of which the Academy had more than a couple (not that the singers themselves always realised it).

"I had nothing better to do," she answered honestly, lying full length on the floor now and folding her arms across her chest. "So I decided I could tolerate you better than I could boredom." She grinned, poking her tongue out at him.

[Kallistos Rolleston]

Kall studied her for a moment, now seeing her as the protagonist in a story; a brave and fearless young explorer, disguised as a man so that she could sail the seven seas in search of habitable islands after the landforms around them had exploded as the robots took over the earth and women were no longer allowed to do anything other than be at home, looking after hearth and family. Him as a merman? He couldn't quite envision that one, even if he had dressed up as one for his first Halloween event here.

He arched an eyebrow as he looked down at where she was lying. "And you used your cheer-dar to work out that I was in here?" He asked with a grin. "Did you put another tracking chip in my shoe?" Not that she'd ever done that, but it sounded good at the time.

[Katherine Lorelia]

The blonde nodded solemnly. "Cheer-dar; exactly." She looked up at the boy, giving him an angelic smile. Such a thing would be quite useful actually, or at least so she thought; after all, you never knew when you might feel the need for an impromptu rehearsal session, and if you could just walk around the school and sense where your fellow cheerleaders were then it would be so much easier to organise one! Unfortunately, if such a sense did exist then Kitty had not been blessed with it, and so she was restricted to practising at the normal times. Perhaps it was for the best that she would never have an opportunity to occupy Kall's position.

"No." She rolled her eyes melodramatically. "Honestly, Kall, I know I'm blonde, but I'm still not dumb enough to try the same thing twice when it didn't work the first time."

[Kallistos Rolleston]

Kall laughed and shook his head. If anyone did have an internal radar that could pick out the direction of any one person, it would have to be Kitty! "The Force, strong in this one be." He said as he pressed his lips together and nodded.

He laughed at her antics and shook his had again. "All joking aside, how are you feeling now that we're half way through out cheer comps?" He was always nervous right before they went onto the mat, but as soon as they started, he was completely in the zone... which was probably a good thing, with what he was responsible for out there. "And are you psyched for the last three?" He could have thrown a high-V in with that question, but he was holding his guitar.

[Katherine Lorelia]

Kitty nodded solemnly. "Stick with me, young Padawan; I'll teach you the ropes," she assured him with a wink. Of course, she felt that there was very little that she could teach Kall in any case; he'd been cheering for a heck of a lot longer than she had, and she didn't doubt that he'd continue to be a lot better than she was. Such was life.

"Good!" she answered honestly, flashing a bright smile up at the taller boy. "Feeling pretty happy about it. I think we've got a good chance; don't you?" Of course, the blonde hadn't had her captain's experience in cheering competitions- they weren't nearly so common back in Ireland- but she felt that the work that they'd put into it should justify a good result.

[Kallistos Rolleston]

Kall laughed and shook his head. "I couldn't even being to imagine what kind of shenanigans I'd find myself in if I stuck with you for too long." He teased.

He nodded, liking her optimism, and agreeing with it too. "I think we could be in there." He said with a grin. "With a little more push from everyone, I think we could be better than we have been and really show people what we're made of." And he knew that these competitions were going to be his last chance to make sure that the scholarship he'd been offered was a sure thing.

Long conversations with his mom had helped keep his head where it needed to be during competitions, and then lectures from his other mom stopped him from falling behind in classes. Thinking about his mom's, he began to play the tune for stuck in the middle with you, as he often felt like he was trapped in the middle of his parents: Enya, his scholarly mother who always encouraged him to do his best, and Saibh, the energetic one, who at times acted more like and annoying big sister, who pushed him to be as active as possible, and encouraged his passion to cheer.

[Katherine Lorelia]

Kitty gasped, pressing both hands to her inconsiderable chest in a motion of utter outrage. "Anyone would think that I was a complete troublemaker!" she exclaimed, although her position was somewhat negated by the broad grin on her face. "When have I ever got you into trouble, Kall? Give me one example!" She certainly couldn't call any to him herself, but then she had a somewhat unreliable memory, and Kall was probably too sensible to allow himself to be unduly affected by her more erratic suggestions.

The blonde nodded rapidly, long hair working its way slowly down off her face to pool around the back of her head as it met the floor. "We can totally do it," she declared airily, waving a hand in the air as if to dismiss all competition already. "I have faith in you, but if it goes wrong, it's all your fault anyway." She gave him a sunny smile. "So I really have nothing to lose!"

[Kallistos Rolleston]

Kall laughed and shook his head. "Ah, but that's because I have the sense to know when I'm being led astray." He said with a wink. "No chance of leading me, if I refuse to follow." There, of course, was no harm in encouraging her to do what she wanted.

He laughed, though her words were very true. "I don't plan on anything going wrong, we need to make the school, academy, whatever, look good. Show them that we can do more things than ride horses." He stopped playing as he pursed his lips together in thought. "Would be funny if we turned up to one of the competitions, all in our cheer uniforms, on horseback. If nothing else, but for the look on the faces of everyone." It was highly unlikely they'd actually be able to pull it off, as they would then need somewhere to leave the horses and travel, but the thought was funny.

[Katherine Lorelia]

The blonde sniffed in mock outrage. "Fine, if that's the way you want to look at it..." She went to fold her arms, then quickly abandoned the idea as she realised that her position on the ground made it a little difficult to accomplish, especially since she would appear to be lying on top of one of her hands, though she couldn't say that she'd noticed that before. Bizarre. "And to think of all this time that I've had my trust in you, Kall..." Kitty sighed. But then, that was just it. Cheerleading was all about trust. She trusted people not to drop her. They, presumably, trusted her not to fall on them. Thus was balance maintained and the world continued to spin.

"If you were planning on things going wrong then that wouldn't actually be things going wrong; that would be things going to plan." The Irish girl grinned. Well, that was the kind of thing that a positive mindset did for you. "But we should totally do that! I could pull off the uniform with the boots, no problem."

[Kallistos Rolleston]

Kall laughed at her affronted look. "You sure you're not a redhead in disguise?" He asked with another laugh. His lips quirked in a grin. "I could pretend to drop you next time, if it would help?" Not that he ever would, as that's normally when everything went wrong.

He shook his head quickly. "Believe me. I'm picturing everything going right." Though he always had a backup plan in case they were hit with a curve-ball and needed to do something quick. After all, they were all out there for the same thing, and it wouldn't be the first time that another team changes their routine at the last minute because they found out the music of another team and reworked their routine with the same track.

He pursed his lips at the mention of boots, eyebrows dipping in thought; it probably wouldn't be too hard to get hold of some white cowboy boots, he knew that the squad for the Colts wore them. "We could all pull the uniform off with boots, soft white cowboy boots." The wouldn't be able to wear them for actual competition though, as it would take them weeks to break the boots in, and he wouldn't chance crippling his squad because he wanted new footwear.

[Katherine Lorelia]

Kitty's jaw dropped and, for once in her life, she was left utterly speechless. A redhead? Her? The thought had never even crossed her mind. Well... maybe once or twice. The saying might well be that blondes had more fun, and Kitty certainly had no cause for complaint because she was most definitely enjoying her life so far, but it had to be said that she suspected that it might be more accurate to assign that statement to the redheads of the world. "You drop me, Rolleston, and your life won't be worth living," she threatened, although the sparkle of humour in her eyes would seem to suggest that perhaps she was not being entirely honest.

"Glad to hear it." Kitty, being an eternal optimist, always pictured things going well, chiefly because she was more or less incapable of doing otherwise. Admittedly, it didn't always work, but in the main, she was not disappointed, and so she had never really contemplated any other way of doing things.

The Irish girl smirked. "You just want to roll in there like Clint Eastwood, don't you?" she teased, patting his foot vaguely.

[Kallistos Rolleston]

Kall couldn't help but laugh at Kitty's reaction to his question. "Your temper is fiery enough for a redhead." He added in between laughs. His laughter vanished as he arched his eyebrows. "So, if I ever do drop you, I'll make sure to start running before you get your breath back." He teased. Joking about it here was fun, but it wasn't something you joked about during practice.

Hi moms had always taught him to visualise what he was going to do - and it didn't matter the sport - to have a perfect, flawless result, and then to work out every little thing that could go wrong along the way and to have a backup plan in place for all of those. On the day though, the picture in his head was a flawless performance - with Plan B as an option.

With a grin he began to strum the William Tell Overture. "Never really been an Eastwood fan." He admitted. "This may shock you, but I'm not an old westerns kind of person. I more prefer the jousting tournaments and things like that."