I don't know on Cascade Hall

Selina Skies

September 11, 2020 5:47 AM

Head Student Vote by Selina Skies

The term had gone somewhere. Selina was not entirely sure where or what sort of time magic had messed with it. In some ways, it had crawled by, some minutes taking hours as she waited to be busy enough again not to think. But now… now it was nearly done, and so much felt up in the air, and she wasn’t sure she’d done enough to make everything better. She had to admit that she was looking forward to getting a break though.

Before that happened, there was the steady routine of the end of term to work through, starting with gathering all the fifth and sixth years in the hall after breakfast and handing out their ballot papers. It was a small year group, and there weren’t as many choices as usual. Still, it would be interesting to see which way it went.

“Good morning,” she addressed the group, “As you probably know, you are here to vote for next year’s head students. Please consider the candidates carefully, and think about who you feel would do a good job.” It seemed like the office of head student was being taken increasingly seriously, and last year’s trend for putting up campaign posters had been repeated this year.

With a wave of her wand, she dismissed the voting slips (charm-proof and tamper-proof though she hoped that wasn’t really necessary). There was a large wooden box at the front of the room which they could deposit their slips in when they were done, before heading out to class.

OOC - the form can be found here.. Voting is in character. You do not have to reply to this post to vote but are welcome to do so.

Subthreads:

Vote Sylvia! by Sylvia Mordue

No good options (tag Evelyn) by Ness McLeod with Evelyn Stones

I don't know by Heinrich Hexenmeister

13 Selina Skies Head Student Vote 26 1 5

Sylvia Mordue

September 11, 2020 8:32 PM

Vote Sylvia! by Sylvia Mordue

Sylvia entered the Cascade Hall feeling anxious. She had tried her hardest, and she wasn’t really used to any kind of situation where that in itself wasn’t going to be good enough to get her what she wanted, nor where being exactly who she was wasn’t necessarily going to please all the right people. Nate had also tried on her behalf, which was incredibly sweet of him, and she hoped between them they had done enough.

She had made campaign posters, both to remind all the people she’d interacted with over the past weeks of her good points, and because she thought that the act itself showed a dedication to the position which might be enough to convince anyone who still didn’t see any difference between her and Caitlin.

She had consulted with Nate about what was going on his posters so that they wouldn’t be too matchy-matchy, even though they weren’t in competition with each other. It would just look like one of them hadn’t really tried or was copying the other and, unfair as it was, people were most likely to think it was her, even though Nate’s response to the idea of campaign posters at all had been lackluster. She made sure that he had one though, mostly leaning on his Teppish virtues of kindness and helpfulness.

Her own poster informed the voting public that she was Organized, dedicated to the pursuit of excellence, and charitable. After all, when competing with another Crotalus, pure respectability wasn’t going to cut it. She had to hope the middle line and the time she’d spent in the potions lab was persuasive enough to the Aladrens. She that their little chat or her connection with Nate, was enough to persuade Evelyn that she was the lesser of two evils. And that none of it alienated her voters - although she would be very surprised if her girls didn’t fall in line, and vote for both her and Nate.

She cast her ballot, and tried to smile, although she had a feeling it was going to be a very long summer.

13 Sylvia Mordue Vote Sylvia! 1413 0 5

Ness McLeod

September 11, 2020 8:42 PM

No good options (tag Evelyn) by Ness McLeod

Ness surveyed the voting slip, feeling slightly dismayed with the state of democracy. The Aladren had been looking forward to getting to participate in an election because being politically active was important. But what the heck kind of choice was this? Heinrich’s name was, of course, already ticked, but the head girl candidates were just Stepford Pureblood 1 and Stepford Pureblood 2. Ness wouldn’t trust either of them as far as it was possible to throw them. Maybe less. Ness had five years’ Chasing experience at this point and could throw pretty darn hard. It was a far cry from last year’s group, who had got to vote in an openly gay head boy. That was the kind of democracy Ness wanted to be part of.

“Is it an affront to feminism to refuse to vote on the head girl part? Or is it more of one to vote for either of them?” Ness muttered to Evelyn, “They’re both as bad as each other.” The Aladren was pretty sure that spoiling your ballot was a valid act of political protest. You voted. You counted. But you did not endorse either candidate. That was honestly looking like the best option right now...

13 Ness McLeod No good options (tag Evelyn) 1419 0 5

Evelyn Stones

September 12, 2020 8:44 AM

You can say that again. by Evelyn Stones

Evelyn almost felt bad, because Nathaniel was on the ballot and if he hadn't been running head-to-head with Heinrich, she would have been happy to vote for him. As it was, there was no real competition at all. She checked the box by Heinrich's name, content with the knowledge that he probably did want this. She'd been listening for any sign that he explicitly did not and hadn't gotten any, so she was happy to do her part in promoting the head boy-ish-ness of her partner. The girls' side of the ballot was more bleak. Should she vote for the girl who would apparently hex her? Or the girl who had told her that the other girl would hex her whilst being an absolute weirdo about Nathaniel?

She checked the box by Caitlin's name, content with the knowledge that at least she was voting for not-Sylvia (she thought this was in Nathaniel's best interest, although he would undoubtedly want Sylvia to win even if he did not) and that she might even be going with whatever knowledge the staff had, considering Sylvia was not prefect.

When Ness asked about which was the more feminist response, Evelyn flushed a bit, feeling guilty. "I picked Caitlin," she whispered, showing Ness the ballot. "I didn't even think about not voting. I think it's probably a good show not to vote, but also may mean that we get stuck with Sylvia, since Merlin knows she'll vote for herself, plus she's got Nathaniel's vote." She wrinkled her nose. "It's not gonna be good no matter what," she agreed.

22 Evelyn Stones You can say that again. 1422 0 5

Heinrich Hexenmeister

September 12, 2020 6:47 PM

I don't know by Heinrich Hexenmeister

Heinrich had voted the previous year and half of his ballot had won. Gary had fallen to a Teppenpaw with posters. This year, again, the Aladren Prefect without Posters was up against the Teppenpaw Prefect with posters for Head Boy. Heinrich was not especially knowledgeable about who was friends with who, being one to mostly keep to himself unless doing so risked feeding the bad wolf, but he thought Dorian might be somewhat more popular than Nathaniel, and Heinrich was slightly less . . . Gary than Gary, so he couldn't write off his chances yet.

Truthfully, Heinrich was not entirely sure he wanted it. He didn't not want it, they way he hadn't wanted Prefect, mostly because he thought most people knew who he was by now and nobody had yet come up to him to demand a confirmation that yes he was the son of those Hexenmeisters. Still a little tendril of nerves still sat in his stomach thinking of next feast and being called up in front of everyone again. What if one of the new first years would be the one to recognize and out him as an assassin's firstborn?

So there had been no posters with his name on it. He didn't like seeing his last name written and displayed out where people could just stare at it and think about it.

On the other hand . . . he hadn't told anyone not to vote for him.

He was Aladren enough to think it would look good on his college applications next year, and if those schools recognized his name, he'd need every bit of help he could get to convince them he was not like his parents. The prefect badge might have been convincing on its own if he'd had any competition for it, but he hadn't. He'd been selected from a pool of one. This was his chance to prove he'd been given responsibility because he could handle it, because he was qualified, and not just by default.

That kind of validation would be reassuring. Also, he kind of enjoyed being a prefect, helping people, and thought he'd do a good job as Head Boy as well.

So he drew a check mark in the space next to his own name on this year's ballot, and looked down at the choices for Head Girl. This one was harder.

He had no strong opinions about either Caitlin or Sylvia. Caitlin was his fellow prefect and always seemed polite if a bit detached. This was, in his opinion, a good thing. He liked patrolling quietly without a lot of pointless conversation. They had a good working relationship, he thought. Sylvia had come to the potions lab this year, and seemed keen to improve her academics when they were already good, which he marked as a point in her favor, but she was almost a bit too friendly for his taste. He didn't think she'd been flirting with him exactly, but there was just something that had left him feeling vaguely uncomfortable without having any logical reason to base the feeling on. Possibly, it was just that he was bad at making friends when he didn't have any trauma or fictional adventure to bond over. He was just much more comfortable with Caitlin's co-existence than Sylvia's attentiveness.

Besides which, he felt reasonably sure Sylvia was not going to vote for Heinrich when her cousin was the one running against him, so he didn't feel too badly returning that favor.

He marked down a check beside Caitlin's name and turned in his ballot.

1 Heinrich Hexenmeister I don't know 1414 0 5

Ness McLeod

September 12, 2020 10:26 PM

No good options by Ness McLeod

"Caitlin will probably vote for herself," Ness shrugged. People did that. Out of the many, many flaws that Ness could list for both candidates, the fact that they would vote for themselves really didn't feature. Though Evelyn's point was more mathematical than personality, as she was counting who Sylvia had in her corner. Ness glanced around, unsure which way the rest of the Pureblood loyalties lay. There were way more important things to fill your brain with. Except, the Aladren now knew one person on Caitlin's side...

"You cancel out Nathaniel," Ness shrugged. Which was probably why it was a bad idea to go around and try to work out which way everyone was voting, because then Ness would be able to decipher how much it really mattered. Ness did not want the responsibility of picking the new head girl when she didn't want either of them.

"I mean, we could ignore Nathaniel, and I could cancel you out," Ness mused. That way they would have both enacted democracy without actually contributing to the outcome. And maybe whoever's candidate lost had to buy the other one a milkshake. Though, that was possibly even more of an affront to the people who had died for them to be able to vote - not at Sonora, specifically, which had probably just followed along with universal sufferage at some point, but in general. Plus, maybe Evelyn didn't want to be cancelled out. She seemed to have reached her own conclusion very quickly, and was talking about not wanting to get stuck with Sylvia.

"Is getting stuck with Caitlin any better?" Ness asked.

"You could also unvote," Ness pointed out, "I'm not saying you should," the Aladren added hastily because influencing other voters was A Bad Thing (though school didn't seem to be following quite so many rules on this as real elections, seeing as they were able to converse whilst deciding) but Evelyn had said she wished she'd thought of not voting. "If you mark them both, or turn that side of the paper into some epic doodle, that's the same as not ticking either of them - they can't count it if they can't tell what it's meant to be."

13 Ness McLeod No good options 1419 0 5

Evelyn Stones

September 13, 2020 12:58 PM

It's the twilight zone of head girls. by Evelyn Stones

CW - Severe internal antagonism of other characters.

Evelyn nodded. Pureblood society was literally the most annoying thing ever to Evelyn. She thought she'd probably be actually enraged by it if it didn't all seem so ridiculous. That was likely because she hadn't had to see a lot of serious discrimination so far, except what she had experienced or what she'd seen directed at her mother. That was different somehow. Pureblood society at Sonora meant picking your cousin's cousin's cousin because you had the same last name on a family tree, and thinking someone was better than everyone else just because their family was halfway to inbred. Perhaps that was harsh, but Evelyn was feeling harsh about it. Pureblood society was the crap that made Nathaniel talk like he had to save the world, and made Sylvia think she had the right to act all high and mighty, and kept headmasters like Brockert in place when he clearly didn't even like children. It was the crap that made Professor Wright feel small right alongside her and it was ridiculous. So maybe she was actually enraged.

"I'm not opposed to us canceling each other out," she said with a dry smile. She wrinkled her nose though, as it still wasn't a great option. "Caitlin is less . . . aggro," Evelyn decided. "Honestly, I just sort of feel bad if I'm not picking Nathaniel, who would probably be a good Head Boy if not for that absolute cutie," she pointed at Heinrich's name with a smirk in his direction. "And if Nathaniel doesn't get it, his cousin sure as heck shouldn't. But that's not great logic either."

She nodded, considering Ness' not-suggestion to unvote. "I'm torn," she admitted. "I don't really want either of them, but if I had to pick - and I don't quite have to but almost - I'd rather have Caitlin I think." She had filled Ness in on the odd interaction with Sylvia in the MARS room (a loaded, biased, one sided version except where Ness pushed for something more neutral) and there was no question which one Evelyn found at least mildly tolerable. "Can we just pick two head boys?" she sighed.

The thought triggered a question she'd had and she looked at her friend. "What will you run as?" she asked, aware that Ness was in the girls' dorms and generally viewed as female by most folks on campus. It would be fun to see 'Ness McLeod' on the head boy list just for that reason.

22 Evelyn Stones It's the twilight zone of head girls. 1422 0 5

Ness McLeod

September 18, 2020 6:38 AM

They're creepy and identical alright by Ness McLeod

Less aggro? Ness weighed that up. Whatever it meant, it certainly wasn’t enough to make the Aladren want to actively endorse Caitlin. Especially as Evelyn had. The only choice was whether to balance that out with a vote for Sylvia, or to stick with not voting for either of them.

What Evelyn said about Sylvia didn’t make Ness feel any more comfortable about voting for her, although it just seemed tangentially weird, rather than directly related to how suitable she was for head girl - and didn’t paint Caitlin very flatteringly either. Ness had never had a real conversation with either of them. Neither of them had, in the five years that Ness had been there, bothered to utter anything remotely friendly. And now they expected endorsement? A lack of direct hostility wasn’t enough to make Ness feel like either of these people was a good representative. Sonora was bright, and diverse, and welcoming. They weren’t.

Ness wasn’t sure that two head boys would be better in this situation. Heinrich was basically the only person on the form Ness wanted to vote for. Sure, Evelyn hung out a bit with Nathaniel (mostly when they were prefecting, right?) but Ness couldn’t see the appeal. So, he was able to engage in occasional conversation with the common people. Big wow. It didn’t mean he really regarded them as equals - it just meant he was two faced.

“I find it hard to believe Nathaniel doesn’t believe some of the same things his cousin and Caitlin do,” Ness stated, with arched eyebrows. A vote for any of them was an endorsement of what they believed. And what they believed was, at best, that people like Ness and Evelyn might be alright to make polite conversation with but would be beneath them to consider marrying. That there were fundamentally different levels of human, and that Ness and Evelyn’s was lower than their own.

“Maybe we should tear down the system,” Ness replied to Evelyn’s remark. That covered both wanting to vote for Nathaniel (though seriously, why?) and what Ness would run as next year.

13 Ness McLeod They're creepy and identical alright 1419 0 5