⇨ INTERLUDE: A Continuation

[ringleaders]

Who: The Ringmaster, all Supervisors, and any rule-breaker onlookers.
When: Twilight on D40
Where: The woods surrounding the grounds.
What: The Ringmaster found something threatening and has decided to share it with her supervisors.
Warnings: Wannabe satanism.

CATCH A FALLING STAR↴ The Ringmaster waits for all of the Supervisors to arrive before continuing onward. She doesn't say much about what they are doing as they wait for everyone to arrive, simply explaining that she has found something concerning that she needs to show them. Once everyone is together, she will lead the pack into the woods - with or without any snoops who may be trying to follow after, against her wishes. The forest is far more accommodating to her than it is to anyone else who tries to navigate it. Instead of getting wound in circles by its path, and running into dead ends, it's as if the trees have moved themselves to intentionally create an easy path for her to follow. It's stretching into the twilight hours as they travel, and various phosphorescent flowers and pods have begun glowing among the leaves with the shift to night, faintly illuminating the way. The sun is low in the sky when they arrive at the spot, still present but swiftly fading as its light cuts through the trees in beams. They reach an area that is not so much a clearing as it is a small space, tucked away between trunks and branches. In the center of that space lies a large, black mark, cut into the earth like a ritual sigil. The dirt and rock is blackened along its lines, and all plant-life within a few feet of its presence has died out completely. As the dark approaches, the black of the lines will seem to paradoxically glow, as if the void within it somehow creates a light of its own. The Ringmaster kicks a few last leaves off of the mark - it seems that she's been clearing away mess from this spot already today, and indicates the digit with a snarl of disgust. "I told you I was cursed!" she insists, putting her hands on her hips.

Comments

[cuckooed]

Koel blinks at the Ringmaster, then very quietly steps aside, wings fluttering. Hey, any port in a storm. The worst that can happen is that it doesn't work, right?

[periphrasing]

She's on the verge of saying something kind of snarky and just backing out of the conversation when the Ringmaster addresses her directly. Oh. Someone's actually? Listening to her? WHAT A CHANGE OF PACE. She's literally shocked.

Peridot blinks rapidly at their illustrious leader, taken aback. "Wha-- right now??" She looks around at the rest of the group, like, is she serious? "I. Um. I mean, I didn't exactly bring any tools out here with me--"

KINDA PUTTING HER ON THE SPOT HERE, RM.

[lordofthering]

The Ringmaster turns to look at Peridot with moderate edge of impatience, crossing her arms and tapping her foot. She waves a hand, dismissing her.

"Well, hurry up and go get them, then! Sans." She gestures at the skeleton pointedly. "Take her back quickly so that she can collect her explosives, and bring them here post-haste. We haven't got time to waste."

[osteothropy]

Sans is very displeased with being singled out to help, and casts Peridot a sideways glance of annoyed commiseration, before sighing loudly and waving goodbye to everyone in the area.

"Welp, gunna get some snacks and a lawn chair while I'm at it. If Peridot is going to blow up a ritual circle and kill everyone here, we may as well enjoy the show while we're at it."

[pipers_son]

"Bring a case of soda! The creamy ones!" Joker yells helpfully from where he's balanced himself on a sturdy enough tree branch. "Got thirsty walkin' all the way here!"

Listen. If he's going to do it anyway...

[periphrasing]

The gem shoots Sans a dirty look. As if she'd be so careless.

"Alright. Fine, she sighs. "I'll be back soon."

[zebrarhyme_everytime]

"Perhaps we need a shield," Zecora finally said, from her almost-invisibility in the nearby shadows. Healing had taken a great deal out of her after the attack, leaving her form even more oddly tenuous, or tenebrous, than normal.
"One that will not yield."

[osteothropy]

Sans clicks his teeth, giving Joker a finger gun.

"You got it, pal."

And then him and Peridot will disappear.

[lordofthering]

The Ringmaster relaxes a little, that plan on its way, but then perks up again to give Zecora a confused look.

"A shield for the explosives, or for the curse mark? Because I can tell you, simply shielding this... disease will have little effect."

[dorkypantsuit]

Psi isn't usually one to question the Ringmaster's orders, but this time he can't help being a bit confused.

"Yeah, but is blowing it up really a good idea?"

She'd already said Koel was right about thinking this wouldn't work.

[cuckooed]

"Madam, if this doesn't work." Koel looked up at the Ringmaster. "What will out contingency be? Is there a library or archive you know of that might have information about this symbol?"

Surely there's a library world somewhere, right?

[lordofthering]

"It will be fine," she insists to Psi, waving a hand. "If it doesn't work, then we'll try something else.

The looks to Koel.

"And no, but that won't be necessary, at any rate. Leaving this mark here has given me a perfect opportunity to find the source - as much as this mark is chaining my realm to their power, that chain can be followed back to the source. And then... I will show them what a terrible mistake they've made."

[cuckooed]

"...I see."

Koel understands what that means. She can almost smell the blood and venom dripping from the Ringmaster's words, from the intent. Whatever happens, it will not be clean.

"Then, we will need to be prepared for that, I assume?"

[zebrarhyme_everytime]

"Warding the blast?
I could do that, fast."

Zecora lifted her head slightly, looking from the mark up to the Ringmaster. Her words held no censure, only caution.

"But haste
Might waste
The opportunity
That we now see."

[dorkypantsuit]

"Wait wait wait. So, what you're saying is that instead of just 'breaking the chain,' you're going to follow it back towards danger?" He holds his hands out in front of him, looking to the other supervisors present (the ones that haven't flown into the trees). He knows someone here besides him has to have a problem with this. This is most definitely not what Signless would do.

[lordofthering]

"No, right now I'm planning on blowing the chain out of the ground!" the Ringmaster asserts, a bit haughtily at that. "However, if this doesn't work, I have my own ways of sending a message back to the spellcaster... no need to go there ourselves."

It's called magic, Psi, look it up.

[dorkypantsuit]

Okay, so he really doesn't know anything about magic, but he does no quite a bit about hideous revenge cycles. He knows the ringmaster isn't a human, but when she acts like a troll it still surprises him.

"As long as this is here we are in danger, right? So wouldn't pissing off the people that put it there seem like a really bad idea?"

[lordofthering]

She looks at Psi, frowning as if she's taken offense. It's not really about the concept that starting a fight might be a bad idea, but that she wouldn't be able to come out on top.

"What do you take me for?" she asks, her words sharp but not yet angry. "A prey animal? A rabbit forced to flee from the jaws of a fox? Hardly! I am more powerful than this specter could ever dream of!"

[dorkypantsuit]

"I know that! And so do you." Psi says back just as sharply, for a moment forgetting his place. There wasn't anything to prove here, and he needed her to see that. He doubted the vampires took them so lightly as destroyed as they were after that battle.

"Doesn't ignoring them say as much about their inabilities as destroying them?" He'd tell her to be the better person here, but he already knows that argument is doomed to failure, instead he appeals to her ego.

"If you respond you're acknowledging that they are a threat. Ignore them as you would a bug under your foot."

[pipers_son]

"Now, let's all just relax a bit, shall we?" Joker calls up from above, a tinge of reluctance running through his otherwise lax tone. The last thing they need to do is start bickering, especially over something so serious.

Still. Everyone has a point here.

"Ma'm," he starts, trying to get the Ringmaster's attention, "while yer a terror ta behold, make no mistake, I do think Zecora and Psi have somethin'. Ya could destroy whoever put this here easy, I know, but that sorta thing has a bad habit of... escalatin'. And some of our workers, now, they ain't as fierce as yerself."

He raises his hand and spreads his fingers out. "Of course, yer right that we need ta make sure that they don't get the stupid idea of doin' this again ta us in the future after we get rid of this thing, but are there any.... other routes for how ta go about that?"

[zebrarhyme_everytime]

"Destroying it may give alarm
To those who'd cause us harm," Zecora mused, seemingly to herself but quite pointedly out loud so that all could here.
"What if we left it here
And made it seem we were near?
Our foes would still look
In the place we'd forsook.
That would buy us precious time
To see the second line of this rhyme."

[motivenotfound]

Mari's silence is kinda calculated.

It's not like she knows much about this kind of magicspecifically, but magic and science usually mimic each other so closely they're basically the same thing. Metaphysical science is still science. Magic is still energy and shit. So you'd think she'd be running her mouth already.

But so far she's been oddly willing to keep her mouth shut and take it in.

... she's not really the best at home security. And she's been the cause of its collapse once.

So with that in mind, her track record isn't good. It makes her pretty reluctant to speak. But Joker's protest raises too many red flags.

"That's our job, Joker." Her eyes--all of them--narrow. Most of them only remain that way for a second, though; only the ones on her face remain so. "The enemy already made the first move. You don't quit a chess game after moving--or losing--one pawn."

She crosses two mismatched arms. The other massive one rests on her hip. The last touches her glasses, pushing them up a bit.

"Blowing it up, not blowing it up, that part doesn't matter right now!" Although she's always behind any plan that involves exploding a problem. But that's not the point! "The game's already started, right? Pawn to E4. The really stupid thing would be to sit here with our thumbs up our asses until the timer runs out."

[dorkypantsuit]

Psi scoffs, his temper starting to show in the sparks of red and blue that flicker to life and die in an instant around his horns. He turns to Mari, his own eyes narrowed.

"This isn't a game. It's real life and real lives that could be at stake if the wrong decision is made." He steps forward, moving closer to her in a subconscious move of aggression. "It wouldn't be the first time innocent people paid for your mistake either."

[lordofthering]

The Ringmaster has actually been sort of caught offguard by the volume of different opinions coming after her. Is ignoring this threat truly the best way to show her superiority? She isn't sure, but she can follow the logic of the idea. So she's actually contemplating Psi's advice when other people start chiming it, which inevitably results in Mari speaking up (with an opinion similar to her own) and then Psi snapping back accordingly.

"Oh my," she says under her breath, leaning back a bit and watching the two of them. Maybe she'll just see how these two sort it out and use that information to inform her own opinion.

[motivenotfound]

Wow. Okay. Excuse you!?

It's not because he's throwing her mistakes in her face. Which, hello, she does that just fine by herself if she's feeling in the mood. It's because he's missing the point. Her free hand--the one she'd adjusted her glasses with--actually makes a fist as she plants it on her hip.

"It's not literally a game! Grow up!" Psii should hopefully know better than to think Mari actually feels bad about people dying. If that were what got her down about that whole debacle... well, honestly, there isn't really a closer to that. She'd obviously be a much better person, and she probably wouldn't have been Night Rider, so who cares.

"If it's that bad, innocent people are gonna die anyway. That's just how it is. Everything has consequences! If you don't like it... honestly! Think about how pointless it'd be to die from something because someone felt bad about all the solutions!"

I mean, look at Second Impact. The world's population was halved, but if they hadn't initiated it artificially, then humanity would have just ceased to exist entirely. And the rebirth of human life wouldn't have been possible at all.