But fulfilling.

By the end, the two of you are both totally sick of walking around the school. Rhys Meddle is nice, but he is not very good at organisation, so it got very tiring very quickly just having the names written down and not the dorm room numbers. Plus, going in the order he put them in, you had to be zigzagging all over the school, so he didn't even group them properly. But at least it's all over now, and you can relax. Not that you were carrying anything, you were just walking and chatting the Cameron. But you feel like you were carrying stuff too. So it counts.

"Alright." Cameron says, coming out from the last deliveree's room and dusting his hands. "That just leaves my stuff."

He hoists up the box again, mostly empty now, and the earlier excitement comes back to his face again.

"So, what are you gonna do?" You ask, feeling your own excitement build as well. "Can I help at all?"

"I'm not sure, and definitely!" Cameron says. The two of you start walking back to your dorm room together, at a much brisker pace, chatting energetically. "I just asked for a bunch of parts and components, and I'm gonna make up ideas as we go."

"I will also make up ideas, then!"

You fiddle with your keys to unlock your dorm room door, and then hold it open for him. He dumps the mostly-empty box on the floor, and then moves over to his metal suitcase to get his bladed shields out. You lock up the door again, and hurry over to get a look inside the box.

Wow, he wasn't kidding about there being tons of stuff in here! The box only looked empty because of how full it was before, there's actually still plenty -- leather straps, rolls of fabric, copper wiring, insulation tape, magnets, small metal sheets, some light diodes, batteries, switches, speakers, a stanley knife, screws, lots of tools, and tons of stuff you don't even recognise.

Cameron comes back to the box and drops his shields next to it with a clunk, then sits down cross-legged against the wall, and shuffles to get himself comfy. You join him, sitting crouched on the other side of the box with your hands on your knees.

"So!" You start. "What should we do?"

"Well, right now, the straps sort of hurt my wrists if I do them too tight, but I have to do them tight or it'll be shifting around when I punch things." He explains, pulling components out of the box and setting them out on the floor. "I also don't have much I can do against things that have armour except shield-bashing, which is way less strong than punching. And you can't put your hips into it."

He finishes, then puts his hands onto his knees as well and looks up at you.

"S-so.... let's get to brainstorming."

The two of you spend the next little while together, hanging out and coming up with ideas for Cameron's weapon upgrades. You even get out one of your unused notebooks to jot down everything you come up with, and give it a rating out of 10 to decide which solutions are the best. And you do some helpful little diagram drawings, as well! Most of them are diagrams of birds, because you're in a bird mood. You can sorta tell that they're supposed to be birds.

"So!" You announce, with authority. "Here's what we've got: wrap soft fabric around the straps, so that it digs into you a bit less when you're not throwing punches. Try to find a way to make the blades retractable, so that you can punch with the thick blunt edge of your shields when you need to. Oh, or rotatable! I just- hang on."

You scribble down your new idea.

"Yeah, rotatable would work -- you could make the blade part spin ninety degrees to the outside, and then it's out of the way for punching. That's good."

"That's good." Cameron confirms. You set down your pencil and lift the book to read from again.

"Soft fabric! Retractable or rotatable blades! Find out how the stanley knives work where you can break off the end of the blade when it gets blunt so that the new tip is sharp again! And paint the shields lime green!" You set the book down in your lap triumphantly.

"Lime green?"

"Yeah. Don't you think that sounds cool?"

"Maybe."

You lift your head and look towards the window. Geez, it's starting to get sort of dark out... you've been working on this stuff for a while.

"Alright, thanks for the help, Debbie! That was a lot of good ideas. So 'mgonna.... 'mgonna get to it, now." Cameron says, following your gaze to the window. "Hey, is that....?"

You think you see it too. You both quickly get up, and hurry over to the window to get a better look. It's hard to tell from this far, but you're pretty sure.... oh, wow, it is! Across the Courtyard, on the opposite wall of the school windows, you can see Delilah and Jace up on the rooftop, setting up some picnic blankets and what look like picnic boxes.

"Are they having an evening rooftop picnic?!" You ask, ashamed that you didn't think of the idea first. Fooey!

{if StargazeCam == True}"We should've thought to get Lexi to open the roof for us too, when we went stargazing." Cameron says. {endif}"Must be pretty cold though, right?"

"That just means they get to snuggle for warmth!" You lament. "It's a fun friendship bonding moment and I didn't come up with it!"

Cameron turns to you, and blinks.

"O-oh. Sorry to hear that." He says.

This is just the worst. Was it Delilah's idea, or Jace's? You bet it was Delilah's, the way she was speaking earlier it sounded like it might've been for sure. You wouldn't be mad if it was Jace's idea, but if Delilah got another one over on you after not being locked out of her room earlier, then you just couldn't stand it. Where did they get the picnic food from, anyway?! The Food Court???

"Hey, Debbie." Cameron says, breaking you out of your mad-mode temporarily.

"Yeah?" You turn to him. He hesitates for a moment, and looks at the floor.

"....I bet Delilah didn't help Jace out with his crossbow." He says, simply.

He doesn't say anything else, or look up again, but he doesn't need to. You immediately you feel your tense anger melting away, and being replaced by a nice fuzzy warmth deep in your chest.

Yeah... he's right! You had your own friendship bonding moment just now! Not only that, but it will have much more permanent effects than just eating food. Cameron's going to be using those shields for the next three years at least, probably into his Warrior career as well. That totally beats out having some food for a couple of minutes!

Bright smile returned to your face, you drop forward and take Cameron into a big strong hug.

"Thanks, Cam!" You say, fully cheered up. "You're the best! I'm really glad we got given the same dorm room!"

Cameron's face reddens, and he still doesn't say anything, but he leans into your hug a bit and puts one of his arms around your back too, rubbing in small medicinal circles that snuff out the last lingering embers of upset. Haha, in your face Delilah. The Debbie Squad rules. And you're pretty sure that Jace is in the Debbie Squad too, anyway.

"Well," Cameron says, leaning back and out of the hug again. "I'm gonna start trying to.... you know, make some of those ideas real."

He looks over to his shields, their blades unscrewed from the main body and lying on top of each other nearby. You've got some more stuff you wanna get done before it gets too dark, as well, so you'll leave him to it from here! You spring up to your feet, reenergised, and ready to hit the world.