[Open]

[hippocarnival]

Who: Yuya & everyone
When: Day 146-152
Where: Around the Carnival & Summerlands
What: Recovery, new changes, and continued antics while the carnival has a nice, long break.
Warnings: None, probably?

[Handstands]
[Yuya's in significantly better health than when they first arrived. He can still feel the residual pain and his stamina is rebuilding, but he's much more lively than before. He also realizes he needs to rebuild his strength, so even if he can't perform yet he's at least practicing so that he'll be ready to bounce back into action as soon as he's cleared.

He's taking his exercise outside the tents so the rest of the performers have plenty of room, and instead can be found tending to his errands around the carnival... on his hands. Just walking on his hands, knees bent for better balance as he navigates from the trailers to the cookhouse for lunch.] Excuse me! Coming through!


[Shadow]
[His shadow has been acting up since he returned. At first he was sure it was just a trick of his mind, but the long it goes on, the more chances he has to see that it is, in fact, just moving on its own sometimes. Okay, that's weird, but he just tries to ignore it. Only it doesn't end there, and by the second week it's taken on a different shape entirely. That's not uncommon, he's been assured, but when he finds it morphed into someone a little broader, taller (older), with hair that spikes up... it's unsettling.

He knows who it looks like. He's standing, shoulders tense as he glares at his own shadow. In the middle of the walkway.]


[Summerlands]
[Yuya's come to accept the Summer people. They're certainly not at domineering, volatile, or frightening as the rest of the Summer Court, and plenty of veterans--not the mention the Ringmaster seem to trust them wholly. So he's navigated deeper into the city, to one of the miracle gardens hidden behind pillars and wisteria.

It's a very small, circular garden, flush and green with scattered flowers. The greatest concentration of them, currently, is around Yuya--who's sitting down with dried fruit to snack on, looking serene.

It's easy to tell what's going on, because as soon as anyone steps in with a positive feeling flowers will start to sprout near them. The better they feel the bigger, brighter, more beautiful the flowers become. They smell wonderful, and something about that scent will bring good memories more easily to the front of their mind--no doubt generating more good feelings and more flowers. It's cyclical.]


[Wildcard]
[???]

Comments

[hippocarnival]

So there's a Winter Maiden and Queen too... who are the Crones? [That just sounds less pleasant of a title, but then again the Queen isn't a pleasant person. Arcadia isn't very pleasant, actually, and this all sounds very militant. He doesn't like that.

That does means she's probably very powerful, though. And they just straight up attacked her--they're lucky she didn't straight up slaughter them all!

Which, he remembers, he explicitly avoided telling Strange about. This is only going to be more worrying, but--] Uh--did you hear yet that a bunch of us attacked her? The Rose Queen. Including the Ringmaster.

[kingsroads]

I did. Both Lambert and Rita filled me in on what happened. [ His Portland self was far more judgmental of that action than Strange currently is. Obviously with what they know now attacking the Rose Queen wasn't ideal, but it's no use judging people on half-formed actions based on muddled memories. ]

That's obviously something to worry about, but perhaps not as much as you'd think. I don't think the Rose Queen is the Summer Queen. They said she was involved in colonization efforts and holding onto territory. Why would the fae send one of their most powerful members, one of the major members of court royalty to do something so base?

As for the Crones, I don't know much about them. Understandably, most of what I've heard was about the Summer Maiden, though there was a little bit about the Winter Maiden as well.

[hippocarnival]

So there's more than one Queen? [But he has a point. Royalty probably doesn't take to the frontlines, just like the Professor didn't come out of his base to handle the invasion.

Yuya threads his fingers through his hair with a frustrated pull, scrunching his brow. This is too much politics to keep track of.] Why is the Summer Court trying to invade other worlds? Is the Winter Court doing the same?

[Ah, that's right.] What'd you hear about the Winter Maiden?

[kingsroads]

[ Whereas Strange who's spent a lot of time dealing with kings, lords, peers, men of parliament, and so on and so forth, is doing a pretty damn good job keeping up with all the politics. He doesn't like it, of course, but that doesn't change the fact that he's better equipped to deal with these sorts of things than a lot of the carnival. ]

I'm still a little hazy on the specifics, but the Summer Court is trying to invade other worlds in order to colonize them. The term I heard used was 'repurpose.' Probably changing them to become more fae-accessible for the glory of Arcadia or some nonsense like that. I can only assume the Winter Court's doing the same as well.

[ Though about the Winter Maiden... ] Apparently Frost carried a bit of a torch for the Winter Maiden which made things awkward between the Winter Maiden and the Summer Maiden for some reason. If that were the case, I think we can at least assume the two Maidens are on relatively good terms...and since the Summer Maiden is also on good terms with the Ringmaster, who's not particularly a fan of Frost, that means the Ringmaster might be on good terms with the Winter Maiden as well.

[ this is high school levels of bullshit and even Strange is seriously considering making a flow-chart for all this nonsense. ]

[hippocarnival]

They really are like Academia. [A flow chart would probably help. He has no idea what Strange's archaic terms for romance are, however, so that just gets a confused look.] What does that mean, 'carried a torch'?

[He's visualizing this very literally. But what a torch have to do with the relations between the two maidens.]

[kingsroads]

[ There's a pause, where Strange comes up with a few synonyms. ]

Infatuated with, lovesick...to have a crush on? [ That's a term he remembers from Portland, hopefully it would help here. ] It's usually one-sided, though.

[hippocarnival]

Oh. [Yeah, he knows exactly what it's like for someone to come on way too strongly. He also has an idea why that probably makes things awkward for the Maidens...] So the Summer and Winter Courts don't get along with each other, but the Maidens do. And the Ringmaster gets along with the Summer Maiden, who doesn't care about all the invading that the Summer Court wants to do. The Rose Queen is probably not the Summer Queen, but she's still important in the Court? And the Ringmaster is a wild fae, so she's not really part of any of this... except for the people she makes friends and enemies with.

[Is he following this right.]

[kingsroads]

And the Summer Fae here in the Summerlands aren't part of Arcadia, which I believe is something like the main fae realm. [ that's the thing that Strange is fuzziest on. People mention Arcadia, but he's yet to piece out the ins and outs of what it actually is. ]

I think we've got it! [ he hopes they've got it. There's just so many points to this and even though Strange wrote down as much gossip as he could remember, it's entirely possible he wrote something down wrong. ]

[hippocarnival]

But it still feels like we barely know anything! [There's so many holes in their story. Yuya wouldn't be thinking so much about that, except faulty information was exactly what they ran against Academia with. It was necessary, of course, but there was a lot of key information they missed.] Was that all the Summer Fae knew, or should we keep asking?

[kingsroads]

I'm sure they know more. The problem is, I've no idea what questions to ask in order to find the answers we need.

[ Because really, they're not going to get anywhere if Strange asks 'hello there, terribly sorry but would you mind telling me as many details as possible about your species, hierarchy, and court organization?' ]

It can't hurt to keep asking about anything and everything, though.

[hippocarnival]

[Yuya nods. It's a strategy that works for him, anyway.] I'll ask around and see what I can find, too. You're going to tell the rest of the carnival, right?

[He has every faith that Strange intends to, but obviously it's all a touchy subject for most of the carnival right now. So many of them were deeply scarred by the Courts.]

[kingsroads]

Of course, [ Strange says, without hesitation. ] We've started to pick up new faces. I worry that if I don't tell them, nobody will.

[ Because Yuya's right: it's definitely a touchy subject for most of the carnival right now and he doubts anyone would want to actually talk about it to the new arrivals. ]

[hippocarnival]

Oh--that's right! [He hasn't run into many of them, but it was impossible to miss Reira. It would figure she isn't the only one.] If we're getting more help that means we're probably going to start our big acts again, right?

[Maybe a last hurrah to the Summer Fae, or just their next location.] Did you get clearance to start performing already?

[kingsroads]

I did. [ And Strange just seems so happy about the idea of performing again. ]

I've already started planning how best to incorporate this into my act, [ said with a vague gesture at his still-smokey feet. ] Though of course, I'll be happy to take suggestions.

[hippocarnival]

Lucky... [Yuya says it wistfully, but knowing everyone else is already getting back into the game just makes him more determined to recover so he can join them on the stage.

He looks down at Strange's smoke-feet, putting his hands on his hips as he considers that.] Do only your feet turn into smoke?

[kingsroads]

You know, I've no idea. There's only one way to find out, of course.

[ So why not find out here and now! Strange stares at his feet for a moment, as they turn solid. He then looks at his right hand, concentrating on it with a frown...and poof, that hand turns to smoke.

Strange is friggen pumped and looks over at Yuya with a grin. ]

Apparently not!

[hippocarnival]

[There goes his hand! Strange is so excited abut this that Yuya just grins wide in response.]

Maybe that can be your disappearing act! [One he figures out the matter of losing his clothes, that is.]

[kingsroads]

It could be! At the moment I'm entering via a mirror and leaving via water, but perhaps I could enter via water and leave as smoke. I'm certain I could ask someone to just knock over a bucket of water during the transition between acts--and then I could clean it up myself and use that water in my act!

[ It's obvious that Strange is just going to yammer on about magic and the intricacies of crafting his performance if not stopped. ]