1-1 // Settling

Somewhere on the outskirts of Hidden Springs, four college dropouts, a husky, and a cat all moved into a one bedroom cabin.
They had bonded over their mutual hatred of one particular professor, and only that, for they had absolutely nothing else in common.
What could possibly go wrong?

"Hey, Skylar, don't you think money is going to be a bit of an issue here? We only have 216 simoleons. Maybe you should get a jo-"
Skylar proceeded to cut Masaru off.

"Ehhh, don't worry about it. We'll figure something out."
Meanwhile, Ciera made weird faces at the floor. Or Viola's backside. Or Diesel, who was clipping painfully through Viola's leg. I'm not sure which.

Regardless, Viola disagreed with Skylar's 'eh, whatever' attitude about money. Being more responsible than the entire rest of the household combined, she decided to search for a job.
Since the military base was just right around the corner from their cabin, she impulsively enlisted in the army.

Some might argue that this is a rather foolish decision to make on a whim, but that didn't matter. She could quit at any time, and there were no risks involved whatsoever. There's never any wars in SimNation, after all. You'd think that would make the army completely redundant, but nobody else seems to agree.

Back at home, a magical time portal suddenly appeared on the front lawn as Masaru and Diesel played. Neither of them paid any mind to it whatsoever. Magical time portals are an everyday occurrence, not worth a second glance. Or a first glance, for that matter.

It was in the way, so Skylar put in a box and left in some cabinet somewhere in case someone needed it later.

Prior to moving to Hidden Springs, Ciera borrowed a huge old book about potion making from a roommate. She had never done magic or alchemy before in her entire life, but it sounded cool, so she spent all of her savings on a fancy alchemy station. There was no room in the cabin, so she left it outside. It'd be fine, she decided. The book was rainproof.
And so, Ciera spent most of her day studying alchemy. She, too, did not bat an eye at the magical time portal.

Masaru and Viola took turns grooming Diesel over and over again, as the jealous Rusty looked on. Skylar cooked dinner, and didn't set the house on fire. None of the neighbors came around bearing fruitcake.
Their first day at home came and went in peace.

Ciera missed dinner because she was that focused on her alchemy book, but everyone else enjoyed homemade mac and cheese at the table.

The next morning, Private O'Mally was up bright and early for work, Masaru went to the town square to practice on his guitar, and Ciera decided to try her hand at brewing potions on the lawn in her pajamas.

Meanwhile, the unemployed Skylar sat around reading a newspaper and doing nothing of any value whatsoever.

It was as he did this that a thought hit him. Viola was working. Masaru was practicing. Ciera was doing... whatever it was she did outside in her pajamas with the big cauldron. But Skylar was sitting around reading a newspaper.
Everyone was working, and he felt left out.

So Skylar went straight to the diner and asked for an interview.

"Do you have any qualifications?" The interviewer asked.
"Last night, I made mac and cheese and the stove didn't catch fire." Skylar responded.
"Great! You start tomorrow!"

He celebrated his new job by doing some kind of robot dance outside the diner.

As it turned out, the army was stressful. Viola's drill sergeant was yelling at her all day, and it took all of her self control not to yell right back. So when Ciera asked about her day, she went on a tangent.

Ciera was completely unfazed. She simply pulled out a box from a pocket she didn't actually have and handed it to Viola.
"Here, try this."

And then Ciera wandered off, without bothering to explain. When Viola opened the box, she found it contained a bizarre glowing vial.
Common sense told her that drinking it would be a stupid idea. It was clearly something Ciera cooked up in her old filthy cauldron outside, containing whatever garbage the delusional old fool who wrote her book told her to put in it. It would probably make her sick.

Viola drank it anyway.

 And what do you know, all of Viola's stress melted away.
Wow. She'd have to thank Ciera later.
She was in such a good mood, she cooked dinner that night - as the actual chef was too busy playing with Rusty to do his job.

Well. She tried, anyway.

Never fear, Masaru to the rescue! As Skylar continued to neglect his job as designated cook, Masaru served dinner to the household. Unlike Viola's attempt, it came out edible enough.

The next morning went mostly the same as the previous, with the slight change of Skylar heading off to his first day of work. In the afternoon, Ciera made a trip to town to go visit the consignment store, looking to purchase ingredients for a new recipe and to sell some elixirs she made.

 The clerk seemed rather unimpressed.
"I'm sorry, ma'am, but this isn't a magic shop. I can't help you with your flask of bees, and we can't buy your mandrake juice."
"This is an Invigorating Elixir, and it contains wolfsbane, not mandrake!" said the mildly offended Ciera Garner.
"Uh-huh. Well, if you really want to sell it, there's a store on the other side of town that specializes in all this magic elixir mumbo-jumbo. Try there."

And so she did.

After taking her elixirs, the first thing Guillermo - the clerk - did was drop pickup lines. Ciera took well to them.

They flirted for a while, before Ciera had to go home. She left with a promise to be back.

Skylar and Viola would later find their paychecks missing. Ciera couldn't get her hands on beeswax anywhere, so she spent their money on a beehive, and a fence as she planned to grow the rest of her ingredients later and needed to 'keep out those pesky zombies'.

Perhaps a joint bank account wasn't such a good idea.
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Misc screenshots that didn't fit anywhere else -
Skylar stole Masaru's guitar immediately
I don't know why I took this screenshot, but hey. Rusty.
Skylar and Ciera love making silly faces.
These are adults.
Just like any real cat, Rusty prefers Diesel's large dog bed over her own cat-sized one
And just like any real dog, Diesel would rather sleep on the hard wooden floor than the vacated dog bed
Every evening, they like to do what I refer to as the "sink dance", where they all shuffle and walk in circles around the table all trying to get to the sink at once
Masaru brushed Diesel like seven times the first day
Rusty met an alien
That looks painful
Masaru actually got an audience, once
There was some random singing guy around town. Ciera tried to talk to him, but he was really into his song and wouldn't stop
Skylar's work uniform