lostcarnival | ⇨ HEARTSTONE MANOR

Entry tags:

⇨ HEARTSTONE MANOR

Who: Everyone!
When: Day 170 - Day ???
Where: Heartstone Manor
What: The carnival arrives at the Heartstone Manor. Do your best to play along, and try not to get too far ahead of the schedule with threading if you can avoid it, in case something that would affect your character happens early on.
Warnings: Individually marked! Could be a lot of things.

BEAUTIES AND THE BEAST↴

When the carnival arrives at the Manor, everyone will be taken into the Throne Room to greet the Prince for the first time. He will be lounging on his throne, and will take a look at the guests that the Ringmaster has brought before eventually dismissing everyone so that he can talk to her alone. After that, they will be given a brief tour of the Manor by some of the servants, and then brought to their rooms to start picking out clothes for tomorrow. On the first night they will be permitted to wear regular clothes, but starting the next morning the dress code will be enforced.

There will be a number of servants helping guests with clothing, and making alterations to suit the non-humanoid features they may have. The tailors work with fabric by hand, but their stitching is impossibly quick and accurate, with changes being made to complex clothing at unbelievable speed. Some guests may note while working with them that one of the seamstresses has wooden mannequin-esque hands instead of human ones, and another has two sets of arms. The arms are one of the most obviously inhuman traits that they'll see while first touring the building.

Come the morning of Day 171, the daily routine will begin.

⇨ THE DAILY SCHEDULE ⇦

► FIVE MEALS A DAY: Between breakfast, lunch, tea, supper, and evening drinks, the meals you are required to attend are frequent and long. Each meal (except drinks and tea) will have multiple rounds, and use all of the fancy cutlery. It will be difficult to keep up for those that are untrained. The food will vary greatly, but will generally to be palatable to those that are into whatever kind of food it might be. Some of them are odd delicacies that are very much an acquired taste, however. People who cannot eat will be given a pass once the Ringmaster explains it, but will be looked down on for it.

► DAILY ACTIVITIES: There are scheduled activities for every morning and afternoon,
and everyone is required to attend. Descriptions of each activity are provided on the "Event Descriptions" tab of the spreadsheet linked up above. There is only one hour of free time scheduled per day, after supper, and beyond that the servants will almost constantly have you on the go. The Prince and Ringmaster will not be present for most of the activities, but they will be there for every meal. If you character refuses to follow the schedule or makes a huge mess out of proceedings, make sure to report it here.

► AFTER CURFEW: At 11PM, everyone is expected to return to their quarters and spend the rest of the night there. Wandering after curfew is unacceptable by the Prince's rules, and if you do it there will be the chance of discover. Based on your character's stealth abilities, there will be dice rolling to determine if they are discovered or not, and by whom. Make sure you report any after curfew activity to the mod post here. This can also take place as an investigation if they are actually looking for something instead of just farting around.

► ROOM AND BOARD: The servants will remain upbeat for most of the time the guests are here, unless something is done to provoke them. They will be present at every activity, and there will be a variety of different individuals. One frequently spotted character will be the butler, a man with dark hair and small, sharp horns. He seems to be the main organizer of things.

► ODDITIES: Even beyond the obvious, there is something off about the Manor. Doors, windows, and other household objects will sometimes move seemingly without cause, and other times there will be banging sounds in the walls, or mysterious voices heard at a distance. It feels like you're being haunted. If you have a moment to wander the corridors, then you'll sometimes see open doors abruptly slam shut the moment you lay eyes on them, and wall sconces turn off or on. It's weird, man.

► THE HUNT: The Hunt activity will have its own event post, and some sign ups for those that will participate meaningfully. There will be some dice rolling to determine who hunts the most impressive game, and rewards handed out accordingly. Before that post goes up, however, you can do some investigations for the start of the event, if your character is interested in looking into the specifics of the contest and overall context.

MAKE SURE THAT ALL DECORUM VIOLATIONS ARE REPORTED HERE.

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.... Ginko is right about what not to say. As it is, Foster regards him in silence for a moment, his eyes lidded. Of course, it's not his place to speculate on what Ginko is really thinking; it's not his place to disapprove of others, he should accept whatever it is they say or think about him and--

He sits on the bed.

"Just say it," he says coolly.

Ginko sighs, and takes a deep breath. "I hope you're taking care of those wounds, and making sure they heal properly. And as troubling as this is, I'm somewhat impressed that you went so far to obey the rules."

There you go, Foster, feel free to get annoyed now.

"Who cares if they heal!" Foster replies, sharply, in a tone grandiose. "Or if they bleed, or if they fester and rot!"

He accentuates this with sweeping gestures of his claws, but then stops.

"It's not your body. It's not your pain, or happiness. I make my choices for me. That's the problem." The end of his tail jerks up and drops back onto the bedspread a few times before lying slack.

He knew he wouldn't like what Ginko had to say, but he also needed to hear him say it. Better to get it over with. Now it's over with.

He begins picking at the corner of a gauze pad with one claw, digging under the tape to peel the fibres out of the crusted blood.

Yeah. Yeah, there he goes. This is exactly why Ginko had kept quiet. He sighs and sits down on his bed. "Foster, I can't make my opinions match up with yours. That's why I didn't say anything; you can do what you want, I know it's not my call."

He knows he can be nosy, sure, but he's not...

...

Certain people.

"Please don't lie to me." He sounds... displeased? Disgusted. Bitter.

An eerie, too-long smile grows quickly over his face--a perverse reflex he can't help and would never want to. "It's revolting and scary, isn't it? You would change it.... you don't understand it, so you think it was the wrong choice."

He finally hooks the ends of them under the bandage and rips it off completely--taking with it a layer of crusted blood and ichor, which begins to bead back up through the poorly-clotted wound.

"I didn't lie. Unless that's what you're calling keeping unwanted opinions to myself." He pushes his fingers through his hair, careful not to dislodge his eyepatch. ...Though he supposes that'll have to come off at some point, huh.

He winces and averts his gaze. Thanks, Foster, he super did not need to see that. "Foster, I already said, it doesn't matter what I think because you won't listen to me one way or another. What you do isn't up to me. If you want me to tell you straight-out when I don't like what you're doing, I can, but if I'm going to do that you've got to stop... reacting like this whenever I do."

Foster is silent for several long moments, during which he studies the gauze pad he's peeled off, turning it over in his claws to scrutinise the soil, both crusted and wet, then drops it to instead press the tip of his claw (alarmingly) directly into the centre of his opened wound.

His face creases in pain as the swift agony of that touch radiates through his nerves and into his skin, his ribs and even turning his stomach--but he also relaxes after a second, the brief moment of affliction and its aftereffects obviously granting him an overall reprieve from... well, whatever it is, that's not externally visible.

"I want you to stop lying to me," he says, finally, putting the bloodied(?) tip of that claw in his mouth, sucking the gore off without looking at Ginko at all. "You don't like it because you don't understand it--so you think it's frightening, that I'm wrong."

Now he looks at Ginko, not sideways but turning to regard him directly in a... very unusual way for him.

"You think you know what is right, or... or good," He says it with such distaste, "And that means that what I do is wrong. That what you want for me to do, to think, to be is correct."

Edited 2017-10-22 18:58 (UTC)

...Okay, you know what, he's just... not going to look at Foster at all until this conversation is over.

"The fact that I don't understand isn't really the issue." There's plenty that Ginko doesn't understand, and most if it he doesn't particularly mind. He still doesn't look at Foster, but a frown pulls at the corner of his mouth.

"It's not really about right or wrong, either. If I think something you're doing is morally or ethically wrong, believe me, I will say so. But this is just a matter of my personal comfort. I'm not comfortable with this, sure, but..." Well, if Foster really wants him to be honest here. "That's because I'm worried. And I know you don't want to hear that."

You're right. He doesn't.

Foster looks away himself, his deep, crawling feeling of wrongness devouring any potential he has to be angry about that idea. "Personal comfort," he echoes, like he's trying not laugh. Or vomit. Or raise his voice.

"Hahahaha....!" He manages to avoid two of those. His tail flicks sideways, slapping back down onto the bedspread noisily. He actually snorts before laughing even more.

Ginko sighs and turns away to undo the buttons on his shirt. "Told you you wouldn't like it," he mutters. "What do you want me to do about it? I can't actually force myself to change how I feel."

He's only partly being snide here, actually; if there's a way they can avoid going through this same circular discussion in the future, he'd like to hear it.

Foster frowns, staring down into the blood-soaked bandage on his side.

"If you can't, then I will." It's... really that simple. It's his responsibility to fix the problems created by his existence. His responsibility to fix the way people think about him, when they're wrong--their feelings, their illusions, are his responsibility, and he knows the world will abide nothing but that he make his amendments.

"What do I have to do?" He's not asking about just dealing with it. If Ginko can't change how he feels, which sounds like horse shit to Foster anyway, then Foster will change how Ginko feels himself. "What would change your mind?"

Normally, he wouldn't even ask--Ginko is just privileged (ha) enough to know what's coming.

He figures it probably goes without saying that he would rather Foster didn't do that at all, and that Foster won't take it well if he does say that.

So, instead, he asks a question.

"Why are you so determined to do that?"

Foster looks at him. It's a look that suggests Ginko's question is akin to, say, 'why do wheels work?' or 'what does the colour green look like?'

Something so obvious and yet so indescribable--like the need to bleed. He doesn't control the rotation of the planet or the movement of the stars. But he knows they're there, and he is subject to them. What is he supposed to say?

"It's what I need to do," Foster says at last, somewhat impatient and unable to really wrap his head around the question. Then, just in case it wasn't clear, he adds, "That's a bad question."

"Why do you need to do it?" Ginko finally sits down on his bed, still watching Foster.

"It's not bad to ask for an answer to something I don't understand. If you think I'm stupid for it, that's fine; just explain it to me like I'm stupid."

'Why do you need to so it?'

It's the kind of question that's designed to send him over the edge, the precipice of impossibility that Ginko is backing him up onto, and he already feels the pressure inside him expand, the violent waves rise over the top of the cliff--but there's no climax to it, no actual overflow. Not... yet?

Foster stares at Ginko. It's a long stare, like Ginko has suggested he just... explain the sun.

"Hang... hang on," he says, visibly flummoxed by this request, and he turns his face away, holding it strangely in his paws while he tries to process this, his tail jerking across the bed--weird paroxysms of motion to match the harsh spasms of thought.

...This is, admittedly, a better reaction than Ginko had started to expect for a bit there. No ranting, no wild gestures, none of that.

Which, actually, is a little worrying in its own way, seeing as how this is Foster.

But Ginko nods, slowly, and hooks one ankle idly around the other. "...Take your time."

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⇨ HEARTSTONE MANOR

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