HELL OF A HANGOVER PT. 1

[ringleaders]

Who: The people who escaped!
When: Very early Day 66 to Day 67
Where: The Carnival
What: The Ringmaster brings everyone she can back to the carnival after getting kicked out the Celebration, a bit worse for wear. Those that have resolved their threads at the Masquerade can start trickling over here as they sort things out.
Warnings: Angst, mostly likely, as well as potentially graphic injuries.

RETURNING HOME↴ About 45 minutes after the conflict with the vampires begins, the Ringmaster will finally show her face at the Masquerade - and immediately be mortified by what she sees. Though initially mostly confused by the fact that there's been problems over the week, and characteristically obtuse about what's going on, as soon as she realizes the severity of the threat she will launch into action. If the Host managed to miss the combat already going on, they won't be able to miss the Ringmaster tearing up the joint and looking for her people. She's quick to scoop up those that have managed to gather in the dining hall - but unfortunately her arrival seems to be the vampire's cue to retreat. Her attempt to challenge the Host about this will result in the being finally losing their patience and banishing all the vampires and all of the carnival workers from the premises, forcing them back to the portals they arrived from and launching their remaining belongings out with them. The Ringmaster will be pretty fucking pissed off when they return (once again) and will tell everyone to take the time they need to recover, but to stick together and stay safe for the time being. She has a plan to chase down the carnival members that have been stolen, but it will take time. ► BEER PONG: Apparently the Ringmaster spent the entire week playing a nonstop game of beer pong, against several dozen of the Host's bodies. She hadn't quite won yet when the Masquerade began, so she was late. Whether or not she was caught up in the same spell as everyone else is up to interpretation, but the answer "definitely probably." She won, for the record. ► MISSING: Upon doing headcounts, it will turn out that all the supervisors are missing, as well as several regular workers - a few of which will have been spotted as freshly turned vampires during the fighting. Whether that was the point of the attack or not is unclear, but it's pretty clear that the Ringmaster is a little bit devastated about it - particularly about the supervisors. However, she will refuse to talk to anyone long enough to get into too many details. ► THE PLAN: The Ringmaster will announce that she intends to get everyone back - it's just a matter of figuring out their way back to the dimension they've been stolen off to. She guarantees that she will find it, but that it may take some time. In the end, the workers will have a total of two days to recover and plan - during the evening of Day 67, she will be leading a rescue mission to get them all back. You don't have to come, but lives do depend on its success.

Comments

[lordofthering]

She tolerates his presence - for now. Though, that patience is close to slipping the moment he reaches out to grab her. She snakes her wrist away before he can get a grip on it, stopping to look at him with a glare that is unusually venomous compared to her regular demeanor. Apparently that isn't appreciated.

But hey, mission accomplished, you got her to slow down.

"I talked to you plenty. I told you that I'll find a way to get to them, and then we'll be bringing them back."

[whattaprick]

"You and what army?" Lambert shoots back, just as pissy. He's not used to being the one talking people down from anything, and no doubt the other witchers would laugh to see him trying now, but ... it's practically an act of self-preservation, and he has a bargain he wants kept.

"You're talking about getting to them, but they got to us once already. They could find us again, and then what happens?" He waves his arms, palms turned up, wincing as it pulls at the still-bleeding gouges on his forearms. "Barely anyone here can fight. We don't even have any proper silver! We're not gonna win if we go for them head-on."

But boy, does he wish it was that simple. He pauses, exhales, and tries again, pinching at the bridge of his nose. "It's a trap. You know it is, right? They want you."

[lordofthering]

"Well, obviously!" she retorts. "Otherwise they would have just slaughtered the lot of them instead of giving anyone hope that they might be retrieved. This demon is obviously obsessed with me and is hoping to gain my attention by going after the servants of mine that I value most!"

She huffs. Yes, she knows that! It's extremely obvious, thank you, Lambert.

"I'll give you your silver, if you intent to fight. But no mere demon lord could hope to match my prowess! They have made a grievous mistake, this night."

[whattaprick]

The Ringmaster's already proven herself easily distracted from mortal concerns, so he had to be sure. Lambert's agitation will subside a little when she mentions giving him silver -- even if it's not his sword, anything would be better than the clumsy, slapdash experience of using his medallion as an improvised weapon.

"Well apparently the demon lord's got help," he'll point out, frowning. "One of the vampires mentioned a beautiful woman, white hair. That ring any bells for you?"

[lordofthering]

She pauses long enough that she just might be uncertain about that one. She blinks once. Twice.

"White hair?"

Her initial assumption is that they are dealing with some kind of Hot Topic vampire goth, based on her experience with a lot of the entities that rock white hair. But... hm.

"...Helping how? Some other tryhard demon from the hell dimensions? As if it's make a difference..."

But there is something about her response there that is just slightly wary, and ever so slightly unsure.

[whattaprick]

Now there's an interesting reaction. Lambert shakes his head.

"The vampire didn't know much more than that." Even accounting for how he'd dragged the information out of her, she hadn't lied about that part, at least. "Just said that she had a reason to be pissed off at the carnival too ... and whoever she was, she's how they found out where we were going next." A beat. "If this is important, it'd be nice to know."

He signed on for worldhopping and performing, damn it, not this ... whatever this is.

[lordofthering]

Oh, ashes.

The Ringmaster frowns, the moment lingering briefly before she pulls whatever her true reaction was inside of her, carrying on as if what he's just said is no big deal.

"It's too soon to say," she says, glancing away with a flip of her hair. "There are a lot of beautiful pale women in the multiverse, and a lot of women I've personally made angry. It's kind of my thing."

[whattaprick]

What did he just say about letting them know if it's something important? He gives her a look that says he's not convinced at all, but he won't push further on the point.

"Just don't make beautiful women coming after your carnival your thing too," he'll murmur, then shake his head. Any other day, he'd poke at that more, but he's tired, shaky, and could really use something to eat.

"Whatever we're doing -- holding down the fort, or hitting them back -- we're going to need to to prepare." He pauses. "You've dealt with him before, but the rest of us are just mortal."

[lordofthering]

"Oh, whatever," she'll respond to his murmured comment, batting a hand. "That hasn't happened for at least a thousand years!"

She crosses her arms.

"And I never dealt with this Lucifer wannabe myself. All we did was take out their generals... I didn't even know they had a demon overlord until we were being attacked."

[whattaprick]

"What do we actually know about them, then?" Lambert can't help ask, incredulously. "'Cause it doesn't sound like it's a lot." Besides how to kill them, anyway...

[lordofthering]

The Ringmaster pauses to contemplate that. She knows a decent amount any demons in general, but this one in particular...

"They are a medium to high level demonic entity, and yet another fool in the line of beings calling themselves something related to 'Satan', because truly, that never gets old." She huffs contemptuously. "And I guess they overwhelm mortal planets by creating thousands of vampires for whatever reason demons do the things they do..."

[whattaprick]

An apparently unoriginal thinker who likes taking over worlds ... just fan-fucking-tastic.

"So it doesn't sound like something we can take head-on," he says, slowly. "What happens to all those vampires if we take out their leader?"

[lordofthering]

She has to think about that one. There are a lot of factors it depends on.

"I'm not sure," she admits, after a moment. "I suppose it depends on the source of the demonic influence within the vampires themselves, and if it can sustain itself independently? Perhaps no more new vampires could be created. Or... perhaps all of current vampires would..."

Hmm. That's not good.

"...die, I suppose?"

[whattaprick]

There's a moment when Lambert has to resist grinding his dagger into his eye, because that would be less painful.

"All right," he finally says, after a pause. "So let's try and rule out the last one before we do anything crazy."

Although, while they're here anyway...

"I got blood from one of them. Think that'll help us figure anything out?" Look, you always loot monster bodies when you're done with them.

[lordofthering]

Her worry about it seems a bit more abstract than hers, but hey, it's not like she likes it either! She's interested enough in his sample, anyway.

"Vampire blood?" She puts out her hand. "Let me see."

[whattaprick]

Lambert fumbles with one of the potion bottles at his belt, then hands it over. It's a flat-ish glass flask filled with what's obviously blood of some
kind, sloshing around.

"Would've gotten more if I thought it was going to be useful."

[lordofthering]

The Ringmaster takes the flask and looks it over. A moment later, she pops it open and drinks it.

[whattaprick]

"What the fuck!" Lambert blurts automatically, watching as she swallows it down with his hands half raised like he wants to smack it out of her hands. But nope, too late! He is genuinely amazed the Ringmaster has managed to live as long as she has with that sense of self-preservation, blissfully ignorant of the irony inherent in that thought.

"You know that's poisoned, right?" Not that it'll probably make a dent in the Ringmaster, but, it needed to be said.

[lordofthering]

She looks at him frankly.

"Now, why would you poison vampire blood?" she asks, after smacking her lips a few times, like she's tasting something unusual.

[whattaprick]

"Poisoned the vampire to slow it down, killed it, then got the blood," Lambert says by way of explanation, still looking like he expects her to explode. "Standard witcher procedure."

[lordofthering]

"Ah, I see," she says. "Clever."

She smells the neck of the flask, gently at first, and then much more deeply, like a hound picking up the trail of a scent. Then, she burps a small amount of flame, patting her chest like someone who just ate something a little spicy.

"Hm," she says, capping the flask and handing it back. "Inconclusive."

It's still got about a third of the blood left. You're welcome.

[whattaprick]

"Now you're just fucking with me," Lambert says, plainly, but he'll take the bottle back gingerly, stowing it back on his belt. He'll have to do some experimenting of his own, then, but it will involve significantly less ingestion, thank you.

[lordofthering]

She crosses her arms, clearly offended.

"I am not!" she says, and then, without a trace of irony: "You can learn a lot about a person by eating them."

[whattaprick]

"How much of a person do you need?" Lambert asks, with apparently genuine fascinated disgust. "Because if I'd known that, I would've brought back a whole arm."

He doubts that technique would work for literally anyone else, but hey. You never know when it might be relevant.

[lordofthering]

"Usually just their soul," she says, and then appears to start hacking up a fur ball - only for it to turn out to be a small orb of faded blackness, caught in the palm of her hand like an evil ping pong ball. She wipes her mouth, and then straightens up, giving it a closer look.

"It's not much, but there is still part of the demonic spirit lingering in the blood..." she says. "I'm not completely sure what that means, but I would expect we'd at least have a little time to save those that have been affected."