I think I started to enjoy it more when I reframed its purpose in my mind.

We do church camp every single summer. I've been a participant since I was born, and a volunteer since I was twelve. We always do the same activities -- travelling to Vancouver Island, camping together, doing workshops for the kids and the adults, trying to evangelize -- so it's always exceedingly boring. I always try to find a God-given purpose for these things, and I guess God decided that the purpose of this year's camp was for me to hone skills that would be necessary for future contracts. It's a miracle I survived my first one considering how shit I am at anything survival or combat-related, but I need to take advantage of any avenues I have to make sure things are less 'miracle' and more a result of training.

So I involved myself in more physical and practical group activities! I played lots of hide-and-seek and grounders with the kids, lots of team-building with the teens, and I made it a point to win the scavenger hunt. A few of the preteens showed me their brainrot and taught me new functions in their phones. I got better at socializing with the people my age and making the kids do my bidding. I shocked the elders with my sudden enthusiasm and willingness to serve, so I just said God had compelled me to improve upon these skills so I would be better fit for His missions, and for once, I made my dad proud of me.

Outside of church camp, I read up more on guns and how to use them. I had no way to practice them because they're literally illegal regardless of whether I'd even be allowed to handle them by my dad, but I figured that at least I would know the theory behind them. I thought I was a decent driver, but after being in Theia's passenger seat and seeing the way she manoeuvred the car during the mission made me realize I am an amateur at best. Something about being acknowledged by the contract people and having my goals affirmed spoke to me, because I finally sat down one lonely 2am to try the makeup I'd accumulated over the past few months...

At the end of the contract, they gave me a gift, and for a while I was unsure of how to use it. Nothing really came to my mind at first, but at one point during the church camp I overheard some of the kids who were clearly forced to be there mumbling about fanfiction. I keep that shit to myself, but of course I listened in to their exasperated recounts of crazy things they'd read or heard of... and all I could think was damn, these amateurs. Literal amateurs. I've read and know so much more than they ever could, things they could never dream o--

Wait. That gives me an idea.